Castor and Pollux - in Culture

In Culture

The twins are mentioned in the Bible as being the logo for a shipping company that carried Paul to Rome: Acts 28:11 (KJV)—"And after three months we departed in a ship of Alexandria, which had wintered in the isle, whose sign was Castor and Pollux."

Castor et Pollux was the title of a 1737 opera by Jean-Philippe Rameau (libretto by Bernard), modified in 1754. The latter version became quite popular. The Italian composer Francesco Bianchi wrote another version called Castore e Polluce, first performed in 1779, and there was yet another opera by the same title by Georg Joseph Vogler in 1787.

In 1842 Lord Macaulay wrote a series of poems about Ancient Rome (the Lays of Ancient Rome). The second poem is about the Battle of Lake Regillus and describes the intervention of Castor and Pollux. They are referred to as the "Great Twin Brethren" in the poem.

Castor and Pollux (elephants) were killed and eaten during the 1870 Prussian siege of Paris.

There are at least four sets of twin summits named after Castor and Pollux. In Yellowstone National Park in Wyoming, USA, the peaks are found close to the headwaters of the Lamar River in the Absaroka Range. Another pair is located in the Pennine Alps at the Swiss-Italian border. A third is in Glacier National Park of western Canada, within the Selkirk mountains. The fourth is in Mount Aspiring National Park of New Zealand, named by the explorer Charlie Douglas.

Castor and Pollux are characters that appear in a few of Robert A. Heinlein's books.

Castor Troy and Pollux Troy are villains (brothers) that appear in the 1997 film Face/Off.

Castor and Pollux are twin cameramen in the final book of Suzanne Collins' The Hunger Games trilogy. Like in the myth, Castor was killed and Pollux survived.

Also, in the Percy Jackson & the Olympians fantasy series of novels series, Dionysus' twin sons are named Castor and Pollux. In the fourth book of the series Castor is killed in the battle, thus following the story of one passing and the other living.

In Andrew Hussie's webcomic Homestuck, the character Sollux Captor, who is themed after the constellation of Gemini, is named after Castor and Pollux, presumably due to the fact that said constellation contains two stars by those names.

The band Cursive released an rock-opera album called "I Am Gemini" in 2012 about a set of twins called Cassius and Pollock.

In Persona 3 Pollux (Polydeuces) and Castor appear as the Personae of Akihiko Sanada and Shinjiro Aragaki respectively, who are good friends. Shinjiro is killed, following the myth.

Canadian Singer Kathryn Calder has an song entitled Castor and Pollux.