Napoleon commissioned the statue group of Theseus killing a Centaur from Canova, but Franz I scooped the piece in 1823 and brought it to Vienna. He had the Theseum built in the Volksgarden for it. Eventually, it was moved to the Kunsthistorisches Museum. I’m there for scale - it’s not a big temple.
Diana Riding a Centaur - This is an automaton - a mechanical marvel created by Hans Jakob Bachmann of Augsburg from 1602-06. It is one of several automatons in the collection of the Kunsthistorisches Museum in Vienna. Click on the photo to see a video. Photo by Charles Reeza.
This is just a fragment of a huge bronze candelabra made for Saint-Remi Church. It measured more than 6 meters tall and 5 meters wide. Each of the four feet depicted one of the four evangelists surrounded by fantastic animals and decorated with pieces of rock crystal. The candelabra was smashed during the French Revolution, and this is the only piece that was saved.
Waterbaby from “Centaurworld”. Season 2 is coming on December 7th, ya’ll! Didn’t expect it to be released so soon, so YAY!!! Waterbaby is a real queen, so it was about time I did some fanart of her. Are you excited for the upcoming season as well?
To break my art block I used one of those randomized prompt websites with my brother once and got “favorite characters as centaurs.” So here you go I guess! Centaur Bashir and O’Brien. I like to think the other aliens haven’t changed at all
Antonio Canova (b. 1757, Possagno, d. 1822, Venezia)
Theseus’s best friend was Pirithous, prince of the Lapiths. Pirithous had heard stories of Theseus’s courage and strength in battle but wanted proof, so he rustled Theseus’s herd of cattle and drove it from Marathon, and Theseus set out in pursuit. Pirithous took up his arms and the pair met to do battle, but were so impressed with each other they took an oath of friendship and joined the hunt for the Calydonian Boar. In Iliad I, Nestor numbers Pirithous and Theseus “of heroic fame” among an earlier generation of heroes of his youth, “the strongest men that Earth has bred, the strongest men against the strongest enemies, a savage mountain-dwelling tribe whom they utterly destroyed." Later, Pirithous was preparing to marry Hippodamia. The centaurs were guests at the wedding feast, but got drunk and tried to abduct the women, including Hippodamia. The Lapiths won the ensuing battle.
In Ovid’s Metamorphoses Theseus fights against and kills Eurytus, the "fiercest of all the fierce centaurs” at the wedding of Pirithous and Hippodamia. Hovever Theseus fights several centaurs in his life, and Eurytius is not beaten with a club in Ovid’s tale. Thus Canova could have found inspiration in a different source.
Marble, height 340 cm Kunsthistorisches Museum, Vienna
In our d&d campaign we recently caught up to my gal’s team after well over a year of separation (via particular Events) and I am emotional about these taurs forever and always, especially considering the damage they’ve faced
long time lurker, first time… you know how it goes. i finally feel like submitting something, you can tag me as nettle/ ! i saw a centaur ask and may have tweaked it a lot for my own preferences… whoops. hope you guys have as much fun reading as i did writing! (dear mods, you guys are amazing. you da best ♥️)
(ModNote: Tagged as rape, noncon, & abuse due to possibly triggering content. Please read carefully.)
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Mallow chewed on his lip, frowning down at the swell of his new pudge. He had gotten a little excited at one of the fairy festivals his herd had attended, and couldn’t remember what had occurred.
Clearly, his body did. He was a centaur, a breed held in high standards by the fey courts. Naturally, fey were tricky. They were also known for being extremely horny and having an affinity for making babies with everything that moved. If any had learned he had the proper equipment to bear their children, well…
He ran a hand over the small dome, feeling the firm surface beneath. It hadn’t been very long since the festival, so he couldn’t be too far along, but… he didn’t like it. He knew any given number of his herd would raise it for him so parenthood wasn’t a worry of his, but he still dreaded the looming threat of his body changing without his permission.
He decided to ignore it for now. What could he do otherwise? He didn’t want to alert his friends just yet. Admitting he had been taken advantage of was more than he could bear at the moment.
As time passed, it became less easy to forget about. He retained his horse half’s muscle, but the half of him that appeared human was less forgiving of his hormones. Sometimes, he really DID forget, and would reach for a bottle before groaning and putting it back.
His friends joked with him one night after his nomadic herd had settled down after traveling miles. “Mallow, I think you’re putting on some weight. Have you been visiting the man settlements, or are the fairy rations finally catching up?”
“Probably just the rations,” He laughed lightly, despairing to himself that others had begun to notice. He covered himself in skins, embarrassed, and tried to sleep. Ignoring it had worked so far, he just needed to distance himself from the herd for a while.
Bloated weeks passed, and to his horror his lower half began to swell too. He twisted around as best he could despite the roundness of his upper belly, trying to get a good look at how distended he was becoming. He wrapped his arms around his belly, trying to squash the ball at his middle back inside, but he came to the quick realization that that was a terrible idea when his lunch came back up. As he poked at himself, he realized that both his upper and lower halves held the same baby. Half of it was cradled in his upper womb, and the larger half was kept safe in his lower. He had had no idea that mares carried foals this way, and felt horrified bile rise in his throat at the thought of having to push this unwanted monster out.
His friends had started suspecting something was up, and he would catch the herd whispering sometimes. The mares approached him sometimes, trying to offer their support, but backed off after he snapped at them. They knew hormones were a bitch, and decided to let him learn at his own risk.
His determination toward not acknowledging his condition was slowly broken down, and he began to wonder just how much more his body could take. He regretted wondering, however, when his bellies began to bulge out to either side. He was HUGE, and he still had longer to wait. His bellies slowly filled to the brim as his unwanted cargo happily invaded without a care for how he felt, and he decided to leave the herd until this nightmare was over. He wanted to be alone, despising the thought of anyone seeing him in this miserable state anymore. He packed, said his farewells despite many protests from the herd, and went out by his lonesome.
The first few days were delightful. Finally, he didn’t feel obligated to cover himself at all hours. Finally, he could stop pretending that he couldn’t feel sharp little hooves in his ribs. He was happy, in a twisted way.
Then came the first contraction. He spooked, thinking something had bitten him. After cautiously checking around himself, he felt it again. This time, he could see his bellies distort in on themselves. Contractions being doubly as painful in two different torsos was something he should have expected, but it still shook him up. He fell to his knees and curled over himself as tightly as he could, trying not to move but feeling the need to move all the same.
He felt his upper womb squeeze first, slowly squashing its contents into the lower womb to prepare for impending eviction. He gasped, unable to breathe from the pain, fat tears pricking at the corners of his eyes. It felt like someone was kicking him in the gut over and over, and as he screamed he felt his voice give out from the force. He bit down on the leather strap he had thought to bring along, hoarsely wailing as he scrabbled for something to grip, something to brace himself with. He finally grabbed his front hooves with his hands, and pressed his back hooves into a tree. His lower half contorted grossly every few minutes, and he groaned through the pressure as he choked back heavy tears. He continued to labor for hours, loudly cursing the fey that had ruined him this way while he cried. With each contraction, his belly squeezed down tightly enough to see a hard outline of the foal.
The evening came and went, and it felt like no progress had been made. He could no longer hold onto anything, all of his energy had given out. Just when he was about to sleep off as much pain as he could, he felt a warmth rush over him as his vision and mind went dark.
He regained consciousness in a dim cell. It was damp, and the stone walls were less than inviting. He felt woozy, sobering up quickly to the feeling of his womb inverting itself. He shrieked, and tried to reach down to ease the feeling. Tried, but failed because he was immobilized. His neck wore a large iron collar, shackled to the cell walls. Each limb was also chained tightly to the walls in every direction, forcing him to stand in the very center of the room with his saggy human belly and increasingly mobile horse belly on display. He was unable to move, muscles quivering with the effort of keeping himself upright while also shoveling out a massive centaur foal. Outside the cell, several fey sat and watched him struggle with the chains, wriggling in a feeble attempt to free himself. He cried out for help, begging them to let him down, he was exhausted and unable to stand for much longer. His face was stained with snot and tears, hair plastered to his face and pointy ears.
All of them acted like they couldn’t hear him, just observing his awful labor for hours until one finally stood and entered the cell. Mallow sobbed, thanking it over and over for releasing him, taking pity. The fey walked up to him, ignoring every word. Mallow felt something at his rear, and trusted that the fey was assisting him. He felt himself relax, and started bearing down as he felt the extreme pressure grinding down on his pelvis. His legs shook with the effort, and he felt his knees beginning to buckle with the strain. Finally, he felt the beginning of something coming out. He sobbed with relief, losing touch of his sanity for a moment as he grunted and screamed it out. He felt his hole spread slowly, and he hated himself for letting himself be in this situation. Chained in a fey dungeon while giving birth to a thing he had hated the entire time it was gestating inside him, what else could possibly be thrown his way?
He felt the head of it begin to appear, and hyperventilated between his body’s powerful contractions. The head crowned and popped out quickly, and Mallow felt like it had sapped all of his energy with it. As he stopped to rest for just a moment, the fey behind him put its hands around the baby’s head and pulled it the rest of the way out without warning. Mallow saw stars, blacking out from the sheer shock of having it ripped out from inside him. His empty belly contracted weakly, as if making sure that finally, it was really empty, before Mallow felt himself fade into unconsciousness.
He woke up again, finding himself alone back in the forest he had been camping in when he went into labor. He was exhausted, and slowly came to the realization that his nightmare was over. He would have jumped for joy if he felt like he could walk, but he didn’t, so he stayed right there on the ground. He patted himself down, making sure he hadn’t torn or been damaged elsewhere, letting his hands rest on his deflated bellies. He didn’t miss the baby, but he wondered why he had been chosen for whatever that was. Was it some weird fey tribute? He decided he didn’t care.
He prodded at himself some more, letting relief finally seep over him. He was so elated that he decided to ignore the firmness at his middle, and attributed it to being pulled out of shape after just birthing a massive baby. He decided that the feeling was something to think about later. Surely it wasn’t something that could come back to bite him… right?
Nothing approaches a field like me. Hard gallop, hard chest – hooves and mane and flicking tail. My love: I apprehend each flower, each winged body, saturated in a light that burnishes. I would make a burnishing of you, by which I mean a field in flower, by which i mean, a breaching – my hands making an arrow of themselves, rooting the loosened dirt. I would make for you the barest of sounds, wing against wing, there, at the point of articulation. Love, I pound the earth for you. I pound the earth.
So I broke a horse expert’s brain last weekend asking her what - anatomically speaking - would be the worst part of figuring out a functioning centaur. “Oh! Air intake would be a nightmare…like how…no, impossible… and the digestive system, OH GOD THE SPINE.”
Basically, it’s good a centaur’s in charge of disease control. He’s probably intimately familiar with ALL ailments.
