In 1963, the Polish animation studio Se-Ma-For released a short stop-motion film that appeared, to the casual observer, simply to be retelling a famous ancient tale.

Król Midas – or “King Midas” – is a 10-minute silent animation about the king who, according to legend, acquired the ability to turn anything he touched into gold. Outwardly, the film, by Lucjan Dembiński (best known for his later work on The Moomins) seems little more than a charming children’s rendition of this ancient myth.

Maybe, though, there was more to it than meets the eye. According to a new study by a Cambridge academic, any adults watching in 1960s Communist Europe may, as the action unfolded, have noticed a subtle critique about the authoritarian states behind the Iron Curtain.

The argument is advanced in a chapter written by Dr Frances Foster, from Cambridge’s Faculty of Education, for the new book Animation and the Ancient World. Foster raises the possibility that Król Midas was sneaking a hidden protest past the Polish regime’s censors at a time when speaking out against the government could mean imprisonment, or worse.

Her argument hinges on the fact that Dembiński blended and altered existing versions of the Midas story. In other versions, Midas is often a comical, naïve figure who requests his “golden touch” and later regrets his decision. In Dembiński’s 1960s reboot, however, the touch is a curse resulting from his lust for wealth and power.

The pivotal moment occurs when Midas steals his own daughter’s crown – a symbol of her authority – and stashes it in his treasure vault. This causes him to acquire his magical, but devastating, ability.

“To audiences in 1960s Poland, living under a communist regime, the idea of a ruler becoming a danger to everyone around him through his all-consuming lust for power had a very particular political resonance,” Foster said. “If political commentary was Dembiński’s aim, he disguised it in a surprisingly detailed reconstruction of the ancient world.”

Excavations comparable to those of Tutankhamun's tomb

Foster, who studies how stories and ideas from the ancient past have been – and continue to be – read, used and understood, was drawn to Król Midas by that extraordinary attention to classical detail.

Six years earlier, in 1957, archaeologists had excavated the “Midas mound” on the site of the ancient city of Gordion in Anatolia, Turkey. This was thought to be the burial site of the real Midas, who ruled Phrygia in the 8^th century BCE.

Historians now believe it belonged to Midas’ father, but at the time the excavation was huge international news – on a par, in the eyes of one commentator, with that of the tomb of Tutankhamun. “It is pretty clear that when making this film, Dembiński had done his homework and was influenced by what they had found,” Foster said.

The archaeologists, to the disappointment of those invested in Midas’ mythical reputation, unearthed little gold. They did, however, find plentiful evidence that Phrygia was a major trading power, with connections to places like Egypt and Crete.

Unusually for a children’s film, this material evidence was incorporated into Król Midas. Foster shows that its design took inspiration from real-life Assyrian reliefs, Cretan statuettes and depictions of Mycenaean soldiers. It even features tiny models of pottery from Gordion.

More niche still was its use of what we would now recognise as ‘Easter eggs’ for ancient history buffs. In Midas’ palace, for example, the reflective floors resemble water and the curtains hanging above them bear the Egyptian hieroglyph, mw, meaning “water ripple”. The door to Midas’ treasure vault contains a carving of the Medusa, who famously turned her victims into stone – a nod to Midas’ own petrifying powers.