Bacchylides begins his ode with the tale of Heracles fighting the Nemean lion, employing the battle to explain why pancration tournaments are now held during the Nemean games.
The façade of the gallery on the Rue Bouloi is decorated with two statues in niches representing Hermes with his winged helmet and a Caduceus hand, god of merchants, and Hercules dressed in the skin of Nemean lion.
According to one version of the myth, the Nemean lion took women as hostages to its lair in a cave near Nemea, luring warriors from nearby towns to save the damsel in distress.
The Lion King | The Lion, the Witch and the Wardrobe | Lion | The Chronicles of Narnia: The Lion, the Witch and the Wardrobe | The Wind and the Lion | lion | The Lion King (musical) | Lion Red Cup | Golden Lion | The Lion in Winter | Henry the Lion | Food Lion | Napier Lion | The Lion Sleeps Tonight | sea lion | Old Red Lion Theatre | Nemean lion | Gamelan Son of Lion | Cowardly Lion | White Lion | The Lion in Winter (1968 film) | The Adventure of the Lion's Mane | Paper Lion | Lion of Judah | Lion Group | Jerry and the Lion | In the Skin of a Lion | The Lion King 1½ | Son of a Lion | Sea Lion Caves |
Eurystheus and Hera were greatly angered to find that Heracles had managed to escape from the claws of the Nemean Lion and the fangs of the Lernaean Hydra, and so decided to spend more time thinking up a third task that would spell doom for the hero.
The external and interior decoration is typical of the French Renaissance style, with Classical orders (ionic, doric, Corinthian), scenes from the legend of Hercules, such as the Lernaean Hydra and the Nemean lion, as well as more personal motifs, such as the cannons, swords, the collar of the Order of Saint Michael.
Lions feature heavily in Ancient Greek mythology and writings, including the myth of the Nemean Lion, which was believed to be a supernatural lion that occupied the sacred town of Nemea in the Peloponnese.
Notable works include Saint Ambrose and Saint Gregory, Doctors of the Church by Filippo Lippi, Ferrari's The Lamentation of Christ, Deposition in the Sepulchre by Maarten van Heemskerck, After the Battle by Cornelis de Wael, Portrait of a Gentleman, Three-Quarters View by Nicolas Lagneau, Hercules and the Nemean Lion by Ignazio Collino, and Giuseppe Pietro Bagetti's Mountainous Landscape with Coastal Inlets.