JOHN CHAPMAN (active 1792-1823)
Rocks of Cyclops (914 cm -30 feet)
Italy ( Sicily)
In Rocks of Cyclops, Engraving, 1798.
The formation
The Rocks of Cyclops (914 cm -30 ft)) in Aci Trezza , in Italy (Sicily) is a fascinating place rich in legends and myths. Spectacular basaltic The Rocks of the Cyclops, is considered one of the most important place where discover antiques myths and descirbe on the most famous poem The Odyssey attributed to Homer . According to legend this was the land where lived a Cyclop, the son of the sea god Poseidon called Polyphemus, one of the popular characters from Homer’s poem, Odyssey.
It is possible to reach the rocks by boat from the port of the village and the location offers lots of things to do such as snorkelling, underwater fishing and diving.
Polyphemus the Cyclop also killed a young shepherd named Aci. After his death, the nymph Galatea, who was in love with the shepherd, asked to the Gods to transform the body of his partner into a river which began to flow into the bay where today you can find the Rocks of Cyclops. Thanks to this legend many of the villages located near the coastline (Aci Castello, Aci Trezza, Acireale, etc) acquired the named of Aci to honour this ancient and romantic legend.
The artist
John Chapman is considered one of the most gifted stipple engravers of the late eighteenth century, relatively little is known of the life of John Chapman. He is thought to have been mostly self-taught. During his career, Chapman engraved exceptional allegorical subjects after the designs of J. Smith and Raphael Corbould. He worked closely with Thomas Macklin on his Shakespeare series; almost half of the engravings bear his name.
___________________________________
2020 - Wandering Vertexes...
by Francis Rousseau