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Tantalus

File:Underworld_Painter_-_RVAp_18-282_-_underworld_-_youth_and_man_in_naiskos_-_München_AS_SH_3297_-_09.jpg · Wikimedia Commons · See Wikimedia Commons

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thumb|300px|Tantalus on an Apulian red-figure volute krater, 330-320 BC, Staatliche Antikensammlungen.

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Tantalus is a figure from ancient Greek mythology, depicted here in a red-figure pottery vessel from around 330-320 BC. The image serves as a historical artifact showing how ancient Greeks visually represented their mythological stories on ceramic vessels.

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Image
De kwelling van Tantalus, RP-P-1906-2813.jpg
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Commons category
Tantalus
name in native language
Τάνταλος
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via Wikidata · CC0

~23 min read

Article

13 sections
Contents
  • Etymology
  • Historical background
  • Family
  • Mythology
  • Punishment in Hades
  • Feasting
  • The golden dog
  • In classical drama
  • Tantalus in art
  • See also
  • References
  • Bibliography
  • External links

thumb|300px|Tantalus on an Apulian red-figure volute krater, 330-320 BC, Staatliche Antikensammlungen.

Tantalus (), also called Atys, was a Greek mythological figure, most famous for his punishment in Tartarus: for either revealing many secrets of the gods, for stealing ambrosia from them, or for trying to trick them into eating his son, he was made to stand in a pool of water beneath a fruit tree with low branches, with the fruit ever eluding his grasp, and the water always receding before he could take a drink. This punishment, although the best-known today, was a more unusual detail in surviving early Greek sources, where variants including a stone suspended above his head are more commonly recorded.

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