Monday, June 7, 2010

Myths and Legends: Diogenes Casting away his Cup

Diogenes Casting away his Cup. To find out more about the Cynic philosopher Diogenes, see this Wikipedia article: link; for information about the image: image source.

This image illustrates a famous story about Diogenes the Cynic philosopher who lived a life of abject material poverty. He thought he had rid himself of all his unnecessary possessions when he happened to see a boy drinking water from a river, using his hands as a cup. When he saw this, Diogenes threw away his own cup; the boy taught him that he did not even need to keep his cup. You can read a Latin version of the fable at the Mille Fabulae et Una blog.

You can also find more myths and legends for the week of June 3-9 here. For more information and links to the actual javascript code, see the Myths & Legends Widget Reference Page.