The Satyrs & Fauns of Greek & Roman Mythology - (Greek Mythology Explained)

so it's only recently dawned on me that I have never made a video covering the Sator the Greek spirits of nature and fertility I have previously discussed the god Pan but never the satyr themselves so if you like creepy old goat men I guess this videos for you the ancient Greeks referred to the satyr as either satyros or Sailor knows which is quite similar to the Roman satyr I but no doubt the Roman name that most of you'll be familiar with is of course faun now where most people seem to get confused is that they believe the word faun is merely the Roman name for a satyr which isn't true satyrs and fauns do have some similarities but for the most part they are a different set of creatures in terms of both appearance and personality and there is this misconception that both forms and satyrs are half-man half-goat creatures but some of the earliest accounts of satyrs are closer to wild man than mythical creature they were often depicted as short balding wild men with a horse's tail and a constant erection hence the association to fertility forms on the other hand were always depicted as half-man half-goat and despite being feared by those who traveled in the wild they were actually said to help travelers who had become lost satyrs mostly just tried to have sex with nymphs and drink as much wine as they could thorns for the most part were jovial and mild tempered creatures but they were also quite naive and foolish whereas satyrs were far less helpful and far more ill-tempered the forms have pretty much mr. Tumnus before he became professor Eck's and satyrs are that weird uncle that no one really wants to be around but you have to say hi anyway because it's Christmas a time for family and togetherness that and your parents threatened to take away all of your presence if you didn't make conversation but they'll just take those presents away anyway because apparently you were a poorly behaved child who climbed Christmas trees and threw ashtrays at people but those are just lies and slander so the very obvious lesson of today's video is never listen to your parents they're stupid and you always know what's best if you want to climb a Christmas tree because you think Santa is at the very top then you climb your way to the North Pole if you want to throw ashtrays at your younger cousins because they told your mum you were climbing the Christmas tree then you throw as many as you can get your grubby little hands on and if you want to make a video about the Sator you should probably stick to the script and not go off on a random tangent about Christmas stories that no one really cares about in June but hey the only time I can record videos is at 3:00 a.m. so leave me alone now we mentioned earlier that the Roman thorn was not the same as the satyr but that's not to say that the faun wasn't influenced by the satyr and that's because there are many different types of satyr throughout Greek mythology not just the creepy uncle archetype the biggest influence of the faun was probably the pan airs which as you may have gathered from their name were the children of the god Pan who did have the torso of a man and the hooves of a goat closer resembling the half-man half-goat aesthetic that we've become accustomed to some even had the head of a goat and virtually no human qualities these panels were obviously closely linked to pan whereas the satyr we mentioned earlier were the followers of Dionysus in the epic poem dionyza Kharitonov the panas were monks the satyr that followed Dionysus in his expedition and war with India another type of satyr were the Solano's the children of Salinas and the mountain limps responsible for protecting Dionysus as a child and due to their father's association with wine and they were also considered spirits of winemaking no pun intended they also appeared similar to the original satyr old fat men with a boarding head and a horse's tail sometimes their bodies were even covered in white fluffy hair making it almost impossible to take them seriously the whole association to wine and women means they were often celebrated in line of Dionysus and during these festivals it wasn't too uncommon for people to dress up as satyrs and perform some kind of play so on to some of the more famous satyrs and what better place to start them with Salinas and el de satyr born from the earth with a father never mentioned we can look at a gaya as one of these satyrs main origins Salinas was considered the first god of wine a mantle that he would later passed down to Dionysus and that's because he was essentially he's foster father who along with the nymphs of Mount Nyssa would raise him from just the baby he then did what every good father does and taught Dionysus the value and importance of alcohol so I guess we know where he's party going attitude came from overall Salinas is depicted as a jolly old man who likes nothing more than having a good time with his favorite drinking partner and stepson he was also the catalyst behind the story of King Midas as him and Dionysus were separated during what I guess we can assume was a drunken night out he then woke up lost in the kingdom of King Midas who recognized him and offered the satyr his hospitality when the two were finally reunited though Isis granted the king he's golden touch and we all know how that story ends the most well-known Sater is undoubtably pan the god of shepherds hunters music and the wild amongst many other things not every poet seems to agree on his parentage but more often than not you'll see him considered as the son of Hermes and Penelope but this can also range from Zeus to any number of nymphs found in Arcadia just like Salinas pan was also thought to be an elder satyr but despite this he doesn't have many children we would recognize by name instead he's just credited as the father of his kind the name pan is thought of as one of the origins for the word panic and that's because pan was said to have a scream that when heard Maties enemies panic and run in fear this is something he used when the Giants invaded Olympus and even when he accompanied Dionysus in India it's also a pretty fair assumption that this may have been where the Roman idea forms being feared came from pan as we've just mentioned is no stranger to conflict in one of the stories of Zeus and - when - defeated Zeus he took from him his tendons and sinews leaving him wounded and incapable of fighting back when all of the other gods and goddesses had fled in fear it then felt a pan and Hermes to retrieve these tendons and so they did Zeus would then go on to defeat - and crush the Titan rebellion once and for all we can't really mention pan and not discuss his association to music and the creation of the pan flute in this story he fell in love with a nymph named sy rinks and he planned to tell her how he felt when she returned home but when she did and pan approached her she didn't know pan merely wanted to pay her compliment and so she ran away as fast as she could she ran to her sisters who then transformed her into a reed found in the water so pan wouldn't recognize her and this worked as the wind blew into the reeds pan notice that they made a pleasant melody not knowing which one of the reeds was his beloved nymph pan took a handful and placed them together and when he blew into them he created the first pan flute dedicated to the love that he had lost it was fairly common for the satyr to be shown chasing nymphs and pan himself does this quite often funnily enough it's not even the first time a nymph transformed herself into a random object to get away a nymph named pities transformed herself into a Pinetree when she was pursued often throughout Greek mythology there are certain individuals or creatures who dislike each other with the satyr it's hard to say because they spend most of their time listening to music and drinking wine I guess you could argue that they weren't particularly fond of the Giants but almost everyone hated or had some kind of issue of the Giants so that isn't really saying a whole lot the giant with 100 eyes Argos Penna POTUS had a brief altercation where he killed several satyr but in this story he was helping the people of Arcadia because the satyr was stealing their cattle when Zeus went to war with the Giants the satyr war among the many who offered their assistance riding into battle on their donkeys and no I didn't just make that up they actually rode donkeys all the time maybe they were that drunk that they thought they were horses or maybe they were just that short they couldn't ride horses regardless the image of a short drunk man riding a donkey makes me think of a dwarf and in some aspects the personality of the satyr and dwarves are quite similar but where dwarves prefer to live underground in their forges making awesome weaponry and treasures the satyr prefer to run around the forest in their weird drunken orgies overall satyr was seen as woodland spirits associated with fertility but the term itself is fairly broad because they can differ so drastically not only in terms of appearance but also temperament for example you have the dwarf like winemaking satyr you have the half-man half-goat children of pan and you even have satyr who are described as nothing more than pan flute players so essentially the musical satyr we have this bunch of somewhat rowdy creatures that most of the time just wanna sing dance and drink which pretty much just describes the human race nowadays they've become somewhat of a staple in modern fantasy but when it comes to stories aimed at a younger audience more often than not you'll see them as forms because their personalities are more in line with something for a younger audience now of course that isn't always the case the four nin Pan's Labyrinth is far from a jovial looking creature granted that movie isn't exactly made for children we also can't forget the 1997 Hercules movie by Disney and they just completely ignore the faun approach as we see a satyr named Phil and he does demonstrate very satyr like behavior with a desire for both wine and women but there was this weird mix between a satyr and the hero Philoctetes hence the name Phil but I don't really know where Disney was going with this one but that doesn't matter because Phil is voiced by Danny DeVito who is not only the greatest actor of his generation but of this entire universe so if you've ever wondered what a satyr or a faun sounds like the answer is obviously the trash man and the trash man I come out I think fresh all over all over the ring if you do have any thoughts or questions on the satyr then feel free to leave those in the comments below as always I've been your host mythology in fiction explained

Channel: Mythology & Fiction Explained

Views: 309,755

Keywords: Satyr, fuan, greek mythology, mythology and ficton explained, satyr greek mythology, hercules, mr tumnus, greek mythology stories, silenus, pan, zeus

Id: 2TjnbxpFkp8

Length: 12min 3sec (723 seconds)

Published: Tue Jun 04 2019