The Trojan War Flashcards
Who is Laomedon’s son?
Priam
What was Hecuba’s dream about?
she would give birth to a fire-brand which would ignite the city
Who is Priam’s wife?
Hecuba
What did Priam do after Hecuba had the dream about their baby?
send the new born baby boy to exposed to die on Mount Ida
What does Paris mean?
wander-off of men
Who raised Paris?
suckled by a she bear and raised by the servant in charge of killing him
Who was Paris visited by and what did they demand? What did they bribe him with?
Hera, Athene, & Aphrodite. They demanded that he make judgement about their relative beauty. Power by Hera, Victory in war by Athene, & the hand of Helen the world’s most loveliest woman by Aphrodite.
Who is the father and mother of Helen?
Zeus & Leda
Who is Helen married to already before Paris?
Menelaos, King of Sparta
What is the Greek laws about a man and woman commit adultery?
The man to be blind and the woman barred from participation in public sacrifice
What was the basic moral rule that Paris broke?
He had been a guest in Menelaos’ house and repaid this hospitality with gross betrayal
Who was Helen’s moral father?
Tynadareos
After Paris and Helen eloped what did Menelaos do?
turned to his more powerful brother Agamemnon, king of Mycenae and many Greek warriors who took an oath and went out to Troy
What was Achilles prophecy?
he has been told prophetically that he is fated never to return from Troy
Who was Achilles’ comrade and close friend?
Patroclus [Patroklos]
What was Odysseus prophecy?
had been told prophetically that the war will keep him from home for 20 years.
The 20 = (i) 10 years of fighting and (ii) another 10 to get home.
Who were the major heroes on the Greek side?
- Ajax [Aias], son of Telamon. Huge in size and strength. Utterly dependable.
- Diomedes, son of Tydeus. King of Argos
- Nestor is the most elderly of the Greek warriors, imagined as being in his
60s. Kind of Pylos - Philoctetes [Philoktetes]
Who were the Trojan heroes?
1) Hector [Hektor], son of Priam and Hecuba
2) Aeneas [Aineias], son of Anchises and the goddess Aphrodite
3) The Trojan women: Cassandra, Polyxena, Andromache
4) Helen at Troy pg 205
Who were some of the God’s among the Trojan War?
- Apollo and Aphrodite support the Trojans
- Hera, Athena, and Poseidon support the Greeks
- Zeus, Ares, and Hermes tend to be neutral
[The gods watch the war from heaven, or from atop Mt. Ida near Troy, sometimes they descend (not Zeus) to join in the human fighting.]
By the war’s end, page 138, Apollo has turned against the Trojans—perhaps
because by now they are fated to lose
Agamemnon is portrayed as what kind of leader? why ?
a terrible leader: arrogant, selfish,
divisive.
In his foolish hubris, Agamemnon (i) disrespects a priest of Apollo and
then (ii) acts high-handedly toward his own top-champion warrior (in confiscating
Achilles’ concubine for himself.
The Greek hero Ajax (son of Telamon) heroically saves the Greeks ships from being what?
saves the beached Greeks ships from being burned up by the advancing Trojans
Which son of Zeus’ dies because its his fate to die in the Trojan war?
Sarpedon
What Patroclus do with Achilles permission? What happens to him next?
To aid the Greeks,
Patroclus with Achilles’ permission enters the battle in Achilles’
armour and kills the Trojan hero Sarpedon. Patroclus routs the Trojans and in pursuit climbs halfway up Troy’s wall, but then the Trojan champion Hector slays Patroclus outside the walls.
Achilles re-enters the fight, equipped in wondrous new armour supplied by which God?
Hepheatus
Who kills Priam and how does it die?
Priam is killed by Achilles’ son, Neoptolemus, at an altar of Zeus
Who is Astyanax? & What happens to him?
Hector’s toddler son, Astyanax, is deliberately thrown to his death from the wall.
Who is Polyxena and how does she die?
She is the youngest daughter of Priam and Neoptolemos (Achilles’ son) drives his sword into her throat. Her death being demanded by the ghost of Achilles.
Who is Cassandra violated by and where?
Ajax at the alter of Athena
With the capture of Troy, how do the God’s feel?
The gods in disgust now turn against the Greeks. Many Greeks on their journeys home will encounter the
gods’ anger, beginning the end of the Age of Heroes.
From now on, the gods withdraw from humankind: They will no longer socialize with or sleep with human beings. There’ll be no more impregnation of human women by Zeus
what does “nostalgia” mean?
“aching to go home”.
what does the Greek work ‘nostoi’?
going home
Who, how and when is Agamemnon killed?
on his return back to Mycenae, he is murdered in his bath with a ax or sword or dagger by his wife (Cytrmnestra) and her lover (Aeistus)
What does Orestes (Agamemnon’s son) do once he finds out his mother killed his father?
avenge his death and kills his own mother, later to haunted by the furies (their job is to punish violence against blood-relatives)
