Attic red-figure stamnos by the "Siren Painter," found at Vulci (Etruria), dated in the mid-5th c. BCE

The Sirens' song, by contrast to Circe, is the intellectual pleasures, a far graver danger to Odysseus and to us all, if we are to believe Aristotle, than the sensual pleasures represented by Circe. Aristotle, in the very first sentence of his Metaphysics, says "all human beings by nature yearn for knowledge." Circe must forewarn Odysseus to have himself tied to the mast to avoid the irresistible temptation of infinite knowledge that makes one forego all one's other moral and social commitments.

The poet Dante places Odysseus (Ulysses) in Hell for this failure of moral and social commitment. Click HERE to see why.

Odysseus' encounter with the Sirens is a favorite theme of ancient painters and lives a long and vigorous afterlife in the history of Western art. Several examples follow.

 ß BACK             CONTENTS & INDICES             NEXTà