Pontikos Lie Number Nine: “Arthur Kemp misdates and mislabels a pot depicting Hercules, calling him a "clear Semitic type"!”
THE LIE:
Pontikos writes: " 6204: Small vase for perfumed oils in the shape of Herakles' head from a particular production of Attic workshops at the end of the 6C BC. National Archaeological Museum, Athens . . . Thus, according to the self-proclaimed historian of the white race, Herakles, the progenitor of the "Nordic" Dorians [according to Kemp, that is] is "clearly Semitic"."
THE TRUTH:
Two points here: first, note how Pontikos claims that Hercules, who was a mythological character, and who never actually existed, can have a "real" physical appearance. This sort of argument suits him well here, but when he discusses the obviously Nordic mosaics at Pella, he dismisses them as ". . . the mosaic depicts a mythological scene and hardly represents living Macedonians".
Pontikos should make up his mind: either these figures represent real people, or they do not. Pontikos dismisses Nordic racial types in Grecian art as "not representing" living people, but is quite happy to say exactly the opposite when confronted with the jug above.
Of course, the truth is that both the Pella mosaic and the jug above represent living types, as art is ALWAYS a reflection of the people around the artists at that time, as they form the basis upon which artists make their work - in fact, artists even call people upon whom they base their work, "models" because they serve as models for the artwork.
This simple principle is explained in Chapter One of March of the Titans:
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"RACE APPEARS IN ART FORMS Art forms (artistic illustrations, be they conventional pictures or illustrations on pottery; or even statues) also provide significant indicators of the racial make-up of contemporary inhabitants. The ancient civilizations in particular - of all racial groupings - reflected themselves in their art forms (often because their own racial types were the only human models from which they had to work). In this way for example, early Chinese art depicted principally Chinese people, Inca and Aztec art depicted only Inca or Aztec people, and so on. In virtually all societies, original art forms portraying people closely followed contemporary physical appearances. This principle is well illustrated in the four art forms portrayed below.
Tracking race in history: race depicted in art forms. Early civilizations very often depicted images of their own racial types in their works of art, based on the reality that their own types were the most common (or only) human models they had to work with. A comparison of (from left to right) Olmec art, 400 BC; African art, circa 1400 AD; Japanese art, 1,000 AD; and Greek art, 340 BC; reflects this principle well. The study of art forms is a reliable indicator of the racial type of the communities in which the art works were created. |
COMPARING THE FACES
Whether the pot in question is supposed to be a representation of the mythical Hercules is beside the point. The fact is, it does not represent either the original Greek racial type, and was obviously modeled from an individual not of sole Grecian descent.
For example, this extended picture of the two pots above, along with a third pot - as on display in the National Museum in Athens - reveals the contrasts very clearly: The third pot is obviously more representative of European racial types:
Compare the pot on the left hand side above- the Semitic looking pot, in particular the bottom lip, to these pictures of three modern day obvious Semitic types: from left to right, the actors Eugene Levy, Jeff Goldblum and Gene Wilder; the latter, even though he has a large infusion of Nordic ancestry, still displays clear Semitic appearance.
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THE LIE PART II
Pontikos writes: "Interestingly, Hercules is described by Dicaearchus as dark [melanan], mixed-eyed [hupocharopon] and hook-nosed [grupon]. Much like his vase representation, that is, but not quite "Nordic" enough for the progenitor of the supposedly "Nordic" Dorians."
THE TRUTH PART II:
Whoops! Pontikos should polish up his knowledge of Ancient Greek. He says that Hercules' eyes are said to be "hupocharopon". Charopon means blue-eyed, not "mixed-eyed", as Pontikos claims!
According to Henry G. Liddell and Robert Scott, in their "Greek-English Lexicon", the word "charopos" means "bluish-grey-eyed". Link here, to the Lexicon article explaining the translation:
In fact, Hercules was described as Nordic in Euripides' play "Heracles" (lines 360 and 990), which states that both Hercules and one of his sons, was blond-haired:
HERCULES: "First he cleared the grove of Zeus of a lion, and put its skin upon his back, hiding his yellow hair in its fearful tawny gaping jaws."
A SON OF HERCULES: "But that other, with savage Gorgon-scowl, as the child now stood in range of his baleful archery, smote him on the head, as a smith strikes his molten iron, bringing down his club upon the fair-haired boy, and crushed the bones."
By putting the jug forward as a representation of Hercules, Pontikos is trying to create the impression that this was the only way in which the mythological Hercules was represented in Grecian art. Of course he was represented in a host of different ways, amongst them the following:
Below left: Hercules on a Greek coin: (www.calgarycoin.com/reference/ myth/myherc01.jpg); and Hercules in a famous statue.
Finally, Pontikos accuses Arthur Kemp of "misdating the pot", saying that it is 6th Century instead of 5th Century.
Someone had better then tell Professor Manolis Andronicos, Professor of Archeology at the University of Thessalonike, who dated the pots in the official guide to the National Museum in Athens!
Below is the title page and the caption of the page in question from the Official Guide to the National Museum in Athens:
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