Metope from the Temple of Zeus at Olympia: Heracles and Geryon, Main Fragment
Unknown · c. 460 BC
The largest of three fragments from the metope in which Heracles fights Geryon, the three-bodied giant whose cattle he had to steal as his tenth labour. What survives here is one of Geryon's bodies, wearing a short belted tunic that leaves a shoulder free and holding a round shield, locked in combat, together with a leg of Heracles pressing forward. Everything is carved in deep relief from Parian marble, the bright island stone chosen for the metopes of the temple of Zeus at Olympia, and the surfaces still show the crisp cutting of the severe style around 460.
Look at how the fragments have been assembled. The head of Geryon, displayed with this piece, is a separate fragment that has been mounted in a modern arrangement, and a plaster cast completes the top of Heracles's thigh from a third fragment. The metope came from the porches of the temple, where twelve panels told the labours of the hero, and was excavated in 1829 by the French Morea expedition. The Greek government presented the finds to France, and they entered the Louvre in 1830.
Did You Know? Geryon had three bodies, and this panel showed Heracles tackling them one by one, a rare subject in temple sculpture.
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