week 1 Flashcards
rite
a traditional act
greeks vs romans
romans not as good at myth making but were more pragmatic than the greeks
myth
a traditional tale (applied) to provide an etiology of why something is the way it is
not made up on the spot
myth of Atlantis is not traditional (more of a story) cuz plato made it up.
like metamorphoses, stories that Ovid tells are not myths either cuz the are purely for entertainment
Myth can be applied to an issue as an example to something thats happening now (a paradigm)
you can adapt and change it
mythology
a set of myths
saga / legend
More with humans than with gods
religion
set of rites
tradition
handing down of customs by generations
sacrifice
the killing of an animal in honour of a god (to make it holy, of course)
guy who blames helen of troy for trojan war
remebers homer?
homer
ancient greek poet
Helen of troy the recantation poem( alteration of the myth but meaning stays basically the same)
- zeus was father of Helen
helen was a phantom (adalon)
Poet Pindar
friends with the syrocues King?? greek city inhabited by greeks (now Sicily)
this king was sick (no cure)
pindar writes poem
talks about centaur Cheiron (wise kind centaur lead a school of heroes)
one of his student asklepious invented medicine
(both dead in this poem, and pindar said if these guys were alive id have them find a cure for you)
its wrong to come back from the dead cuz ppl are supposed to be mortal to distinguish us from the gods
Niobe
had 6 daughters and 6 sons
(very proud of having many offsprings)
- bragged at Leto for having 2 kids until Leto’s kids killed all of hers.
then Niobe turned into a rock.
Persuasion (lliad?)
- Achilles gives back body of hector (he killed him in battle and Hector’s old father the king of troy, pays Achiles for his dead son’s body)
- Achilles took a bow after killing guy (hector killed Achilles’ best friend)
- Achilles is starving (cuz he wont eat till he gets revenge or something)
- tells kings that even both they are greiving even Niobe ate and so they must eat together.
Warning (Horace Odes)
Horace warns that hes better than any poet exept Pindar cuz he’s too good
“Whoever strives, lulus, to rival pindar, relies on wings fastened with wax by daedalean craft and is doomed to give his name to some crystal sea.”
(there’s lore here but I missed what was said)
Something about Daedaleaus making wings (his son cant use them tho because gods will get jelous is people can fly (flies and drowns, ecarion sea?)
Aetiology (explanation for something)
Phaethon guy asks mom “is the sun my father?”
“yea dude”
son tries to meet sun BUT sun guy has car? son gets keys but clearly cant drive.
Almost crashes into the earth and Zeus is like NAH BROTHER and thunderbolts him.
daughters of the sun given gift to cry and turned into trees as they grieve their brother
Flexibility of myth
- playwrights / narrative poets can adjust myth
- lots of plays based on myths
in a play : some guy sacrifies ram instead of his son in another version
- bull people?
- someone’s husband is running away
Pindar changes story of Pelops (he doesn’t like the morals in this story)
gets rid of when gods engage in canabalism and eat human flesh… cuz wtf
also removes: that guy threw mechanic off cliff to cover up his cheating in chariot race
ppl are cool with it cuz poets can do whatever they want
you can tell a less believable story thats more entertaining:
Achiles Heel
god mother knew that her son was gonna live a short glorius life,
she took him to hell styx (took newborn baby and dumped him (which makes him invulnerable) except she held him by the heel (so he doesn’t drown) which is the only part that remained vulnerable.
another more believable story is that greeks would put poison on tip of their arrows so that you would die no matter where it hit you, like in the heel.
STEW GUY myth
guy killed son and cut him up put him in stew to feed gods wanted to test them) gods ate some, realized it was a shoulder were like ew, punished man that made stew and put boy pack together, and gave him an ivory shoulder.
Pindar didn’t like that and changed it BUT he left in the part where Poseidon rapes the child later… and then gives him horses.
Myth and Truth
A truth that should not be forgotten - were gonna make it in a poem
A letheia (truth)
Lanthanesthai (must not be forgotten i think)
put it in a poem put it in a song type shit
they thought back then that the more the unbelivabel increadible stuff that gods do actually made more sense because if they did ordaniry things they wouldnt be GODS
words
added letter a to a word to reverse its meaning.
thiest vs atheist
monarchy vs anarchy
Ichor
what gods had instead of blood
Archy
means rule
- monarchy
- anarchy
rule of myth 3
gods only speak about gods in words they are not, because there arent enough words to describe how sublime they truly are.
