Unchanged by any teller — how the centuries since have seen Arcas.
The gallery
Arcas and Callisto
Sebastiano Ricci, c. 1725–1730
This shimmering late-Baroque canvas by the Venetian master Sebastiano Ricci (1659–1734) captures the climactic moment of the Arcas myth as told by Ovid (Metamorphoses 2.496–530). The young hunter Arcas, son of Zeus and Callisto, has come upon a she-bear in the Arcadian forest — in truth his own mother, transformed by Juno's jealous curse. Ricci freezes the instant of near-matricide: Arcas stands in a heroic pose with his javelin poised to strike, arrested by the beast's strangely human, pleading gaze. The bear's eyes are rendered with deliberate emphasis, the visual key that reveals an apparent hunting scene to be a tragedy of unwitting recognition. Above, Jupiter is shown intervening to avert the crime and bear both mother and son into the heavens as the constellations Ursa Major and Boötes (Arctophylax, the Bear-warden). Praised for its theatricality and luminous tonality, the work is among the rare paintings to depict Arcas himself rather than the more frequently illustrated seduction or discovery of Callisto.
Arcas Shoots at Callisto
Crispijn van de Passe (I), 1602–1607
From van de Passe's Ovid Metamorphoses series in the Rijksmuseum (RP-P-OB-15.903): Arcas draws on the bear that is his mother Callisto, while in the background Jupiter already lifts mother and son toward the stars. The engraving compresses Ovid's near-matricide and catasterism into a single Northern-Renaissance plate.
Arcas Aims His Arrow at Callisto
Workshop of Hendrick Goltzius, 1590
Haarlem workshop engraving after Goltzius (Rijksmuseum RP-P-1882-A-6371): Arcas, son of Jupiter and Callisto, levels his bow at a bear, unaware she is his mother transformed fifteen years before. At right, Jupiter places both among the constellations before the arrow can fly — Arcas as Boötes, Callisto as the Great Bear.
Callisto and Arcas Raised to the Stars
Attributed to Léon Davent (after Léonard Thiry), c. 1547–1550
Fontainebleau-school etching in the Rijksmuseum (RP-P-2010-94), attributed to Léon Davent after Léonard Thiry: Jupiter snatches Callisto from Arcas's arrow and sets mother and son among the stars. Arcas's destiny as the Bear-warden (Boötes) is the celestial sequel to the hunt that nearly made him a matricide.
In play
Arcas
Callisto's son, eponym of Arcadia, endures beside his mother in the sky — the Little Bear following the Great.
Boötes
Greek star-lore makes Arcas the Bear-warden (Arctophylax): the hunter placed among the stars to watch his mother as Ursa Major.
Ursa Minor
One strand of the catasterism lifts Arcas as the Little Bear — the son who nearly speared his mother, fixed forever beside the Great Bear.