“Crossing Over – the reluctant wayfarers”, Leo Plaw, 70 x 50cm, oil on canvas
Mercury (Hermes) is the god of communication, trade and transport. With the later he as a psychopomp, guided the souls of the dead to banks of the Styx (Acheron) where Charon the ferry man would then collect them and take them to the land of the dead, the Underworld. Naturally many of the dead would rather return to the land of the living and thus plead with him to guide them back. He is unmoved.