Changing Artistic Depictions of the Sirens · 3:41pm Dec 29th, 2016
I have just submitted a short fun end-of-year story: Star Swirl the Bearded and The Sirens of Capri. This is adapted from something I did for a writeoff, and is my take on Star Swirl and the Dazzlings.
There is a small temporal anomaly in the story of the Sirens. They were banished from Equestria by Star Swirl the Bearded, and then go on to confront Twilight Sparkle, Sunset Shimmer and friends in the battle of the bands. We know that Twilight’s time was over a thousand years after that of Star Swirl. Of course this can be easily explained in any number of ways. The way I dealt with it is to assume that Adagio, Aria and Sonata are just very long-lived, and have been kicking around, sulking, and failing to take over the world for a long time. No wonder they were getting a little frustrated by the time of Rainbow Rocks.
Which means they could have entered the world of Equestria Girls during the period of Classical Greece. I see no reason why Hellenic civilization did not develop in that world in broadly the same way as our own, so we can equate the Sirens of Equestria with those of ancient legend. The Sirens of Greek mythology were dangerous creatures with beautiful voices, who lured sailors to shipwreck their vessels with their enchanting song. To quote the ancient authorities:
You will come to the Sirens first of all; they bewitch any mortal who approaches them. If a man in ignorance draws too close and catches their music, his wife and children will never welcome him home again; the high clear tones of the Sirens will bewitch him … you must stop the ears of all your crew with sweet wax that you have kneaded, so that none of the rest may hear the song.
Homer, OdysseyWhen a sailor hears the Siren’s perfidious song, and bewitched by the melody, he is dragged to a self-chosen fate too soon; no longer he cleaves the waves, no longer he whitens the blue water with his oars unwetted now, but falling into the net of melodious Fate, he forgets to steer, quite happy, caring not for the seven starry Pleiades and the Bear’s circling course: so the monster, shaken by the breath of that deceitful tune, welcomed with delight the wound of the pipes which was his escort to death.
Nonnus, Dionysiaca
They are most commonly associated with the Italian island of Capri, just off the coast of Naples. In ancient times this was a Greek colony. Today it is a tourist resort and playground of the glitterati. Descriptions of what these creatures looked like vary a lot from source to source. Ancient artwork shows them as giant birds with human heads. While their voices are always enchanting, they are sometimes depicted as monsters, sitting in a field of bones, who would eat the flesh of captured sailors.
Yet the artistic depictions from the Romantic era are rather different. In the nineteenth century artists preferred to draw them in human form as beautiful naked women reclining on the shoreline.
So it is appropriate enough that in the 21st century we should draw them in a different way again.
I was particularly fascinated by the depiction of Starswirl the Bearded and the way he managed to trick the sirens into a free-form dance contest as part of his plan to banish them to a mirror dimension created by the original G1 pony-creation mirror.
(I suppose I should read the story before commenting on it, right?)
Hmm... I like to think they lured sailors to their death and then enjoyed the rising tension and anger back in town. Like, two of them stay in town while the third is out at sea doing the dull part of the job.
4360281 That is about 90% accurate to the comic depiction of the Sirens, in fact. Other than in the comics the sirens are time-warped by the mirror directly into modern times.
4360537 Time-warped? It's just a jump to the left...
4360588 Oh no, we're not doing that again!
Plausible, given that Sonata can't even manage to make decent fruit punch.
The comics did show a sort of story of Starswirl and the Sirens.
This does make a certain degree of sense. There are alternatives. One was mentioned above.
Another is "Narnia Time". While at least 2 years have passed since Equestria Girls in the MLP universe (there have been 2 Hearths Warmings since then), less than 1 has passed in the Equestria Girls universe. Of course, it's possible that Everfree takes place before the Hearth's Warming episode in Season 6, but it would still be over a year in Equestria. In Narnia, time always moves faster than on Earth, but the rate varies. If we were to apply that logic here, it may have been 1000 years in Equestria, but only say 10 on Earth. The Sirens haven't aged much, but their magic could keep them young. It would be odd if they had never had anything happen to their amulets in 1000 years. At some point a rock would have fallen on one of them or something. 'course, we don't know how variable that is.
This would then draw the problem of what varies the rate. In Narnia, it's implied to be Aslan's doing, but we don't have such a visible agency here.
Yet another possibility is that the mirror was incomplete when created, and they were in effect 'stuck' in a timeless limbo until it was 'finished' and connected to the other end. We don't know when that was, but it's possible that it wasn't actually done until sometime in the last 10 years. Unlikely, but I'm just raveling a thread.
4360691
"It's not my fault! Aria's the one who handles the punching here."
"Sonata... just shut up."
4364737
No throat is safe.