Category:Goliath (subject)

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According to Jewish (Christian and Islamic) traditions, Goliath was a giant warrior defeated in battle by young David.

Overview

In Depth

• Goliath (sources) -- survey of ancient sources

Goliath in Literature & the Arts

• See Goliath--fiction (art, cinema)

In Christian iconography, the victorious David is often portrayed "with the head of Goliath."

More rare are the representations and the accounts the actual fight between David and Goliath in the arts (Michelangelo, Titian, Caravaggio), as well as in literature and cinema.

== Goliath the Hero

In the 1960s, after the success of the movie Hercules (1958), Goliath also took a life of his own in a series of movies, which were completely detached from the biblical account and were given different historical and geographical settings. Names like Goliath, Hercules, Maciste, Samson became interchangeable to label similar muscular superheroes fighting in an exotic, ancient setting:

• Golia contro i giganti / Goliath Against the Giants (1960)

• Golia e la schiava ribelle / Goliath and the Rebel Slave (aka The Tyrant of Lydia vs. The Son of Hercules) (1963)

• Golia e il cavaliere mascherato / Goliath and the Masked Rider (aks Hercules and the Masked Rider) (1964)

• Golia alla conquista di Bagdad / Goliath at the Conquest of Baghdad (aka Goliath at the Conquest of Damascus) (1964)

The American market also found convenient to turn into Goliath-movies four Italian movies that originally had other protagonists:

• Il terrore dei barbari / Goliath and the Barbarians (1959)

• La vendetta di Ercole / Goliath and the Dragon (1960)

• Maciste e i vampiri / Goliath and the Vampires (1961)

• Maciste e i peccati di Babilonia / Goliath and the Sins of Babylon (1963)

Goliath became synonymous for power and strength. In 1967 an animated series by Hanna Barbera (Young Samson & Goliath) featured two superheroes with magic powers--a young boy named Samson and his dog Goliath.

External links

• Wikipedia