One main question comes to mind when reading mythical stories that make
reference to centaurs; how did the ancient Greeks relate to these rambunctious
creatures? Most of the stories told about centaurs do not put them in the most
flattering light; they more often than not get drunk and start fights. We will
get to the relationship between the Greeks and the centaurs later, but first
let us look at the origins of the centaur.
Most accounts trace the lineage of the centaurs to Ixion. Ixion was
pretty messed fella. For you see he screwed up his first marriage by
substituting a marriage gift to his father-in-law with a trap of hot coals.
His next mistake turned out to be his last because it involved the gods, and
nothing good happens to mortals when the gods are involved. To make a long
story short, Zeus caught Ixion seducing Hera (actually a cloud made to
look like the goddess) and sent him to Hades, as one of the great
sinners, to turn of a wheel of fire for eternity. The cloud gave birth to the
first centaur, Centaurus. In this light, centaurs and thier actions can be
seen as opposing marriage customs. Not only do they forsake legal marriages,
but also traditional relationships such as the guest-host relationship. This
can be seen as they "crash the party" at which Pholus is entertaining Heracles.
The centaur is a combination of human and horse, and seems that the more
equine the centaur the more hostile. They are the combination of man and
animal; civilization and the wilderness. When they become intoxicated, which
is in almost every story, they become more animal and bad things happen. This
observation makes me think that centaur myth may have appeared as an opposition
to Dionystic rituals. These centaur stories seem to be pointing out the bad
things that can happen when man becomes wilder through drink.
Psychoanalytically, these stories might be seen as the incarnation of repressed
desires. Just looking at the etymology of their name, we
can see that the centaur was a sexually aggressive creaure. Maybe this was a
way for the Greeks to express their instinctual frustrations in an open way.
No matter which way one looks at them, the centaurs are in opposition to
traditional values and codes of conduct. They oppose legal marriage bonds, and the
sacred guest-host relationship.