12. Ancient Greek Legends Feature Bondage
The ancient Greek story of Andromeda’s rescue by Perseus is believed to be one of the first to depict bondage. In the legend, the Greek queen Cassiopeia of Joppa, after whom a constellation is named, bragged so widely about her daughter’s incredible beauty that she offended sea nymphs who reported her braggadocio to Poseidon himself.
Cassiopeia similarly angered Poseidon, so he sent a sea monster to destroy Joppa. An oracle, ancient Greek religious fortune tellers, told the King of Joppa, Cepheus, that the only way to stop the sea monster was to sacrifice his daughter to it. She was presented as a sacrifice chained tightly to a rock, one of the first depictions of bondage in a legend. The legendary hero Perseus found Andromeda fastened and fell in love with her. He killed the sea monster and saved her life.
Many artistic interpretations of the scene including Andromeda’s hands bound above her head, in a posture that would be familiar to any visitors to the Folsom Street Fair. Rembrandt, Eugène Delacroix, Paul Gustav Doré, and countless others painted Andromeda with cuffs holding her hands above her head, attached to a cliff or stone face by the ocean.