Unchanged by any teller — how the centuries since have seen Helle.
The gallery
Phrixus and Helle Fleeing on the Golden Ram (fresco, MANN inv. 9478)
Unknown (Roman wall painter), 1st century AD
A Roman wall painting from Pompeii showing the siblings Phrixus and Helle carried over the sea by the winged, golden-fleeced ram Chrysomallus. Helle is shown slipping toward the waves as her brother clings to the animal — the moment just before she falls and drowns in the strait that would bear her name, the Hellespont. The fresco is now in the Museo Archeologico Nazionale di Napoli (inv. 9478). It is one of the canonical ancient images of the escape that opens the saga of the Golden Fleece, evidence of how popular the story of the two refugee children was in Campanian domestic decoration.
Phrixus and Helle (fresco from the Masseria di Cuomo, MANN inv. 8889)
Unknown (Roman wall painter), c. AD 45–79
A Fourth-Style Pompeian fresco from the Masseria di Cuomo (Insula Occidentalis VI, 17), now in the Museo Archeologico Nazionale di Napoli (inv. 8889). It depicts Helle and her brother Phrixus aboard the flying golden ram as they flee their murderous stepmother Ino. The composition isolates the fatal instant of the flight across the sea, the episode in which Helle loses her grip and plunges into the water, giving her name to the Hellespont (the Dardanelles). The painting is among the best-preserved Roman renderings of the myth and a key witness to its diffusion in Roman household art.
Apulian Volute Krater: Preparation for the Sacrifice of Phrixus and Helle (Darius Painter)
The Darius Painter, c. 340 BC
A monumental Apulian red-figure volute krater attributed to the Darius Painter, now in the Antikensammlung, Berlin (inv. 1984.41). The vase shows the preparation for the sacrifice of Phrixus and Helle by their father Athamas — the crisis from which the golden-fleeced ram swoops in to rescue the children, carrying Helle to her death over the sea. As one of the grandest South Italian vases of the later fourth century BC, it documents how the theatrical, suffering-laden version of the Helle and Phrixus story circulated in Greek vase painting well before its Roman afterlife.