July 9th, 2021

Cyclops Tattoos

The one-eyed creature has been a constant presence in culture since the ancient Greeks

What exactly is it about looking at a cyclops that is so creepy?

The obvious explanation is that staring into the eye—the single eye—of a creature that looks so much like we do with that one obvious exception is unsettling. It’s simply disconcerting that in the spot where there should be two eyes staring back at you there is just one enormous peeper. The ancient Greeks really knew what they were doing when they came up with these baddies.

Cyclopes (that’s the plural for cyclops) can be divided into three main groups throughout mythology: Hesiodic, Homeric and wall-builders. Hesiod depicted cyclopes as three brothers who helped Zeus create his favorite weapon, the lightning bolt. Homer depicted cyclopes as a group of uncivilized shepherds who cause Odysseus some strife in “The Odyssey.” And then there are the wall-builders. It was said that the “Cyclopean Walls” consisting of massive boulders of Argos, Mycenae and Tiryns were built by cyclopes as they were clearly too large to have been built by man.

In today’s pop culture cyclopes are presented a little differently, particularly in that there are multiple beloved characters who just happen to be cyclopes. Leela from “Futurama” and Plankton from “SpongeBob SquarePants” are far from terrifying, even if Plankton wishes he was. Then there’s Cyclops from the X-Men. Scott Summers sucks. He is one of the worst X-Men. Period. But, he does look pretty cool as a tattoo, so I guess we had to include him.

It doesn’t matter if you look at these tattoos with both of your eyes, or just one of them, you’re going to enjoy this collection of cyclops tattoos.

 

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