Subject: (urth) lions of Ares

From: maa32 <maa32 at dana.ucc.nau.edu>
Date: Fri, 09 May 2003 05:01:08 +0000

OK - if you say that the lion was the symbol of Ares, can we explain the 
memory house of Latro that he constructs in 28 of SoA: "What are these 
statues?"  "Lions with the faces of men."  At first, latro thinks that all the 
statues are lions.  then, he is corrected: the second statue is the sphinx, 
who says, "I am your mother, and your mother's mother."  Well, the Sphinx is 
the daughter of Hera.  Ares is the son of Hera.  If Latro is the daughter of 
the Sphinx, and the Sphinx is somehow contiguous with Hera, then Latro's 
mother is Hera.  Jeez.  Ares mother is Hera.

However, I am willing to accept that the man with the lance Latro runs into on 
the way to his seige on Thamyris was Ares, VERY incognito, on the basis of 
this lion stuff.  Remember that the black man's name is Seven Lions, and the 
man with a lance was kind of blackish.

Also, the advice of Hercules to Latro is easily followed by him: Latro has all 
the tools, he just doesn't know it because he has been stripped of his memory.
 Hercules tells him to lose, otherwise he would triumph easily. Most mortals, 
no matter how much knowledge they have, can't utilize fighting advice without 
the body to pull it off.  It's not Tyson's corner man that wins the fight - 
it's Tyson.  give the same advice to, let's say, me, and I wouldn't be able to 
knock out a heavyweight champion.  Latro lacks the memory of the warrior, but 
he knows all the right things to do with the simplest promptings, which 
indicates that his experience is great indeed.

Thamyris says that Pleistorus (Ares) has been missing for a long time.  Long 
enough to inhabit a mortal body and grow up, as the real God would later do in 
Christ?  Why aren't Latro's symbols wolves instead of lions, since his name is 
Lucius?  Why does Thamyris say Ares is missing?  Why does the rain start when 
Kotys challenges Latro, thus betraying his god Ares?

Unfortunately, lions are roaring all the time in the text.  When Latro fights 
Pasicrates on the shore, lions are showing up all over the place.  Remember 
that Ares sister is surrounded by lions when she commissions him to go get the 
horses of the sun, but Ares is nowhere around there, unless he's latro.

I don't think that one lion can clearly identify the black rider when latro is 
suffused with lion companions.  However, I maintain that there is a close 
relationship between Latro and Ares, and that Nike certainly follows him 
without appearing to him.

Here is the question: what clear evidence in the text is given that Polos is a 
centaur? he gallops and trots everywhere, and when he disappears a red haired 
roan appears.  He knows a lot about horses.

Latro embodies arete, and at the beginning of Part three of SofA, Hegistratus 
and Cimmon and company swear to protect Latro before he goes off to the 
Spartan ceremony of manumission, for no apparent reason.  It seems as if they 
are talking about how necessary Arete is for the survival of their cities, and 
their icon of arete has become Latro.  Why?  The name of Ares is in the word 
Arete.

Very good points - the man with the lance and the lion probably was Ares.

Marc Aramini

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From: mournings glory <mourningsglory at hotmail.com>
Date: Fri, 09 May 2003 08:27:13 +0000

>mother is Hera.  Jeez.  Ares mother is Hera.

I'm confused here. I always thought that the Sphinx was the daughter of 
Echidna, along with siblings Hydra, Cerberus, and the Nemean lion--all 
monsters coincidentally enough encountered by Heracles. Thus my own theory 
about Latro--that, as a Roman, he's a direct descendant of Heracles and that 
many of his adventures are meant to recapitulate those of the great Semideid 
himself. This, of course, requires you to accept the notion that Latinus was 
the son of Heracles by King Faunus' widow or daughter (or a Hyperborean 
maiden in still another tradition), and that Latinus' daughter, Lavinia, 
marries Aeneas when he arrives after Troy is sacked. We are also given to 
understand that Latro hails from Latium--which has been named after Latinus. 
And look how many of the creatures Latro encounters are similar to those 
encountered by "the Glory of Hera": Drakaina--part Echidna, part hydra; 
various lions; a griffin (a Stymphalian bird prototype?); a stag; centaurs; 
Amazons; fabulous horses; a wild boar; a bull (or is that Severian?); plus 
there's also his indenturement to Kalleos, which recalls that of Heracles to 
Omphale, and his descent into the underworld. Heracles was also supposed to 
marry Iole; if little Io had her way Latro would be married to her. And is 
my memory failing (it's been a while since I read the two books), but isn't 
Antaeus or someone like him encountered somewhere?

Furthermore, Heracles is the son of a god and and a mortal who is 
transmogrified at death so perhaps Wolfe is attempting to paint him as 
another man+god avatar. (Indeed, will Latro be mistaken for/identified as 
Quetzacoatl if his adventures take him to pre-Columbian America?)

Perhaps further correspondences will yet take place in the future Soldier 
books (and I'm sure there are some in the first two that I've forgotten or 
overlooked), but I for one am really looking forward to the resumption of 
this series.

msg (a small dose)

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From: James Jordan <jbjordan4 at cox.net>
Date: Fri, 09 May 2003 14:50:05 +0000

series, if he ever gets to go there, maybe it is worth pointing out that 
the royal house of David are the Lions of Judah. You are wondering if Latro 
is like Severian, who is both Apollo and a post-Christ Christlike 
Christian. Maybe Latro is both Ares and a pre-Christ Davidlike 
pre-Christian. (There has to be a better way to say that, but you get the 
point, I'm sure.)
         You wrote:

   Remember that the black man's name is Seven Lions, and the
>man with a lance was kind of blackish.

         The Emperor of Ethiopia is also the Lion of Judah.

>Why aren't Latro's symbols wolves instead of lions, since his name is
>Lucius?

         Maybe that what the wolf is in Roman territory, the lion is in the 
parts farther east? Coordinate imagery? Or that Latro is Roman wolf in his 
mere humanity, and Ares/David(?) in his divinely-empowered humanity? When 
Lucius is empowered by Virtue (arete) he is Latro? Lucius : Latro :: Jesus 
: Christ :: any Roman : Ares?

>without appearing to him.

         Is the black rider the "divine archetype" of the black man?

Just some grist for your mill. It's been a long time since I read these, so 
perhaps none of this is helpful!

Nutria

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From: John Barach <jbarach at telus.net>
Date: Tue, 27 May 2003 16:55:38 +0000

Marc writes:

> Here is the question: what clear evidence in the text
> is given that Polos is a centaur? he gallops and trots
> everywhere, and when he disappears a red haired

The goat-man calls him "Kain-Tauros," and the "him" refers to what Latro saw
(which he reports at the end of the chapter), namely, the bay colt he had
just ridden, "trotting through the trees, Polos to the waist" (ch. 33, p.
269 old edition).  Furthermore, Polos himself tells Latro that he rode him
to steal the horses of the sun and to kill the boar (ch. 38, p. 308).

John Barach

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