What Symbols And Animals Represent Latona Goddess And Why

Latona, female parent of Apollo and Diana and mistress of Jupiter, was forced to flee attributable to the jealousy of her rival Juno. 1 day, after arriving in nowadays-day Turkey, she approached a pool in a marsh to potable the water. Local peasants prevented her and in her fury she laid a expletive on them which changed them into frogs. Information technology was this episode, recounted by Ovid in the Book VI of his Metamorphoses, which inspired the Latona fountain.

The rivalry betwixt Latona and Juno

Latona, known as Leto in Greek mythology, was the daughter of the Titan couple Coeus and Phoebe. She became the mistress of Jupiter and conceived two children by him, Diana and Apollo.

When she discovered this pregnancy, Juno, Jupiter'south married woman, was filled with fury. She decreed exile from the universe for her rival, forbidding whatsoever land from accepting her to give birth there. Condemned to perpetual flying, Latona began an endless wandering across the Earth, before managing to detect a temporary refuge on the island of Delos where she gave nascence to Apollo and Diana.

Her two twins had inappreciably seen the light of solar day when Latona had to abscond once over again to escape from the fury of Juno. Her wanderings took her to the edge of Lycia, and it was hither that the episode occurred which is illustrated in the garden of Versailles.

The sun setting on Latona

The sun setting on Latona © EPV / Thomas Garnier

The encounter between Latona and the peasants of Lycia

During her wanderings, Latona one day reached Lycia, a region in Asia Minor located in present-twenty-four hours southern Turkey. Exhausted and parched, she decided to halt and saw down in a valley a swimming effectually which peasants were decorated gathering rushes and algae. Attracted by its clear h2o, she went to drink from it. Only the peasants objected and forbade her from drinking from the pond. Surprised, Latona tried to gratify so by saying:

"Why do you lot forbid me this water? Water belongs to everyone. Good and wise nature made for all of us the air, the light and the waters. I but want to use what is every person's right but here I accept to beg you lot for it as if it was a favour. I do not intend to wash my exhausted trunk but merely to quench my thirst. My oral fissure is dry and I can hardly talk. This water will be like nectar for me; permit me beverage it and I will owe you my life. Oh! Permit yourselves be moved by these two children at my breast who attain out their feeble arms to y'all."

Unmoved past these supplications, the peasants persisted in their refusal. They ordered Latona to leave the place and, to make certain she could not drink, they rushed into the pond where they trampled on the bed with their anxiety and churned up the water with their arms, then that the pond water was shortly filthy with mud.

A peasant gazing at Latona and her children

A peasant gazing at Latona and her children © EPV / Thomas Garnier

The acrimony of Latona and the metamorphosis

Enraged, Latona forgot her thirst, raised her hands to the sky and cried out: "May you live forever in the slime of your pond!" Her curse took effect immediately and the metamorphosis began.

As if driven mad, all the peasants dived into the pool, emerged and dived in again, swimming to the bottom and back up to the surface, showing their heads in a higher place the water before disappearing nether it again. They continued to shout abuse at Latona and even under the water their insults could still exist heard. But already their voices had changed, their throats swelled and their mouths widened, their heads shrunk into their shoulders, their backs turned dark-green and their bellies grew round and white. After becoming frogs, the peasants of Lycia were to alive forever like this in the slime of their pond, fulfilling the expletive of Latona.

The metamorphosis of the peasants

The representation of this episode in the garden of Versailles

This episode of the encounter between Latona and the peasants of Lycia is depicted in the Latona fountain in the eye of the garden of Versailles.

At the peak is the white marble sculpture grouping. The two children, Apollo and Diana, agree out their arms to beg the peasants. Latona already has her eyes raised to the heaven and her open mouth suggests the curse she is uttering against the peasants. The brilliance of the marble group offers a striking contrast with the gilt lead figures installed on the lower tiers.

Half-human and one-half-frog, six peasants are undergoing their metamorphosis. Some have kept their human advent almost intact. Others have well-nigh completed their transformation: their mouths are wide and circular, and their hands accept been transformed into flippers. The water that they spout evokes the insults they shouted at Latona and which led to their metamorphosis.

A stormy sky over the Latona fountain