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From the Anatolian Bird of Prey Goddess through the Ancient Greek Sirens to the Sea Virgins in Croatian Oral Legends

Suzana Marjanić ; Institut za etnologiju i folkloristiku, Zagreb

Sažetak

Writing about the Sirens, the half-women – half-birds in Greek legends, Marija Gimbutas stresses that, like Harpies, they stem from the Anatolian Vulture Goddess, or some other Bird of Prey Goddess. So in the Hellenist Era as well as later in the Middle Ages – with modifications of Sirens into Women-Fish in Mediaeval times – the Sirens were shown as women with bird’s feets and wings and figured as a symbol of obsession, nightmares and daydreams (Gimbutas 1991:189-190). In this article, we examine the figuration of Sirens in Croatian oral legends, in which they are usually named as sea maidens, or sea women and also as morska diklica or morska cura, variations in local dialects of sea maiden (mermaid) and, as well as the Siren form, there is also the form serena and dona serena (cf. Bošković-Stulli 1975). In that process, Croatian oral legends largely emphasise two characteristics of that mythic inhabitant of the sea as a sort of mythic cyborg – if we use the Donna J. Haraway’s definition of mythic cyborgs – that is, apart from their lower body with fish-like characteristics, the particularity of their singing is also emphasised. So what has remained of Greek iconography in Croatian legends is that very acoustic image of Siren-song, while there is a complete absence of the Ancient Greek conception that these were Women-Birds. Namely, while Sirens are shown according to the legends of Antiquity as hybrids, with the bodies of birds and the heads of women and/or more precisely with the lower part of the body being bird-like while the torso, head and hands were maiden-like (Rose 2001:335), in Croatian legends they are half-women – halffish. So the Medieaval catalogue of monsters, Liber monstrorum – probably dating from the 7th or 8th century – showed the mentioned transformation from a Woman-Bird into a Woman-Fish, although those two iconographies were simultaneously represented during the Middle Ages, admittedly with a certain dominance by the Woman-Fish.

Ključne riječi

siren; mermaid; merman; Croatian oral legends; the Mediterranean Monk Seal; green cultural studies

Hrčak ID:

107514

URI

https://hrcak.srce.hr/107514

Datum izdavanja:

15.9.2012.

Podaci na drugim jezicima: hrvatski

Posjeta: 5.418 *