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Greek mythology research
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Cassiopeia was the queen of Aethiopia (or Ethiopeia), the wife of King Cepheus and mother of Princess Andromeda. As legend has it, Cassiopeia was a very vain woman in regards to her daughter. Although there are different versions of the tale, it is regarded that Queen Cassiopeia insulted the daughters of Poseidon known as the Nereids, the sea nymphs of the Aegean Sea, by boasting that her daughter was most beautiful. The consequences of this bold statement were almost grave. The Nereids went to Poseidon to voice their distress over the matter and Poseidon reacted by sending a terrifying sea monster named Cetus to mandate the ultimate sacrifice: Andromeda herself. Her parents decided that the only way to save their kingdom was to oblige
and they chained their only daughter to a rock in the sea for Cetus to claim. Much to Cassiopeia and Cepheus relief, Zeus' son arrived just in time to vanquish the beast. Perseus' reward was Andromeda's hand in marriage. However, Cassiopeia was not going to be forgiven for her vanity and Poseidon decided to provide her humility for half of eternity by placing the throne in which she sat upon pointing towards the North Star Polaris, which the constellation revolves around, so that she is upside-down half of every night.
One of the myths was, Polyphemus was in love with a sea nymph named Galateia, a sicilian nereid who had cheated on him with a man named Acis. When Polyphemus discovered this he crushed Acis under a rock. Another myth was the story of Odysseus. This story was when Polyphemus had captured Odysseus one of victorious greek leaders and twelve of his crew members when they were sailing for home from the trojan war. They became captured when they arrived to an unknown island of cyclopes. Odysseus and his men came upon the cave of Polyphemus, and went inside in hopes to steal food while Polyphemus was away tending his flock. Curiosity got the best of Odysseus as he wanted to see what a cyclops looked like. Odysseus and his men hid in the cave waiting for Polyphemus to come back.
In the Odyssey Eurycleia is a slave who was bought by Odysseus’ father but was treated the same as his wife. She was so important is the lives of Odysseus that she is the one that nurses Odysseus and his son Telemachus as children. Despite the fact that she is a slave in Odysseus’ household but is treated as a member of the family so she holds no ill will. When Telemachus goes on his Journey to search for answers about his father it is Eurychleia who gives him his rations and helps him sneak away. When Odysseus returns to Ithica the first person to recognize him is Eurycleia. As she is bathing him she recognizes his scar from a childhood accident and “joy and torment gripped her heart at once, tears rushed to her eyes” (533-534). Eurycleia’s
However, Calypso’s “love” is more like sexual desire. Calypso holds Odysseus on her island for sever year, and “in the night, true, [Odysseus] would sleep with her in the arching cave - he had no choice - unwilling lover alongside lover all too willing…” (Odyssey 5, 170-172). Calypso is a selfish goddess who wants to dominate Odysseus without considering Odysseus’s feeling. The fact that Calypso sleeps with Odysseus every night demonstrates that she treats Odysseus more like as sex captive than a real lover. Even though she claims, “ I welcomed him warmly, cherished him, even vowed the make the man immortal, ageless, all his days” (Odyssey 5,150-151), the hospitality that she shows here is just a tool to help her possess Odyssey. By making Odyssey ageless and immortal, Calypso can hold Odyssey and satisfy her possessive obsessions forever. Calypso’s sexual desire can be further proved in her angry speech. She says, “ Hard-hearted you are, you gods! You unrivaled lords of jealousy-scandalized when goddesses sleep with mortals, openly, even when one has made the man her husband” (Odyssey 5,130-133). Calypso is angry because female gods and male gods are treated unequally about the affairs with mortals. She asks Odysseus to become her husband because she wants to achieve sexual equality. However, at the end, Calypso releases Odyssey since she is afraid of the punishment from Zeus (Odyssey 5, 153). The fact that Calypso easily submits to Zeus’s
The image of seductresses is a recurring motif in The Odyssey. These women are a temptation to Odysseus. They attempt to keep Odysseus from accomplishing his goal: his homecoming. Circe is a bewitching goddess. She entices Odysseus’ crew into her palace with her enchanting voice. However, after she feeds them, she promptly turns them into pigs. Circe also succeeds in enticing Odysseus; he stays with her one year as her lover. It is so long that his crew declares that it is “madness” (326). They say that it is “high time” that Odysseus thinks of his homeland (326). Later on, Odysseus and his crew encounter the sirens. Knowing the danger they pose, Odysseus has all his men’s ears stopped up with wax. However, Odysseus wishes to hear their song; so he asks his crew to tie him to the mast. The song of the sirens is so sweet and enticing. Their “ravishing voices” almost make Odysseus forget his desire to return home (349). His heart “throbbed” to listen longer; he signals for his men to let him go free. The grea...
Aeschylus’ Oresteia is the chronicles of a cursed family that includes a circle of betrayal, adultery, and murder, among other things. The Greek word oikos can be used to describe the Greek family structure. In Homer’s Odyssey, two polar opposites of oikoi are given. First, the son of Odysseus’ son Telemachus meets Nestor, who symbolizes a near-perfect oikos . The family is involved in a large sacrificial feast upon the arrival of Telemachus . He also utilizes xenia, the Greek word for manners or the ideal guest-host relationship, to perfection. The family is tight knit, and they are a prime example for any oikos found in literature. Another oikos that is explained in the Odyssey is the one found in the Oresteia. The importance of the oikos in the Oresteia can be seen in the opening seconds of the play. The physical oikos can be seen right away, as the lookout from the top of the house can be heard bellowing at the beginning of Agamemnon . The literal oikos on the stage only helps to convey the problems with the oikos both symbolically and physically. There are many problems evident with this oikos. Some problems with the oikos arise because of the sacrifice of Iphigenia by Agamemnon, but the majority of the problems with the oikos arise because of Agamemnon’s wife, Clytemnestra. A point can be made that a loyal and productive woman is necessary for the proper health and maintenance of the oikos. Clytemnestra fails this in many ways. The gender roles shown in the oikos are not common, and are reversed to a certain degree. Clytemnestra does not mourn her dead husband, and is not able to administer the funeral rites and she was the one who murdered him. The lack of funeral rites is uncommon and problematic. Clytemnestra also shows ...
She is always spoken of respectfully and is remembered for her heroic deeds. She is not degraded like many of the other women Odysseus sees in the underworld. Everyone worships her and speaks about her achievements with great admiration; she is truly admired, but because she is a goddess. Athena has control over men that most women in The Odyssey do not. Women 's lives depend on what men think of them, on the other hand, men 's lives depend on Athena 's opinion of them. Athena is "Zeus ' virgin daughter" and no one has used her in that way. She is too important to be used as being an enjoyment for men; they depend on her for their own welfare. Another woman that plays a big role in this epic is Calypso. Calypso a nymph, a child of Zeus, and lives on an island in the middle of the ocean. One day Odysseus is sent to her by the god of the sea, Poseidon, because Poseidon was mad at Odysseus for blinding his son, the Cyclops. It is on this island that another woman is used as a sexual toy and is not thought of for her own achievements, but rather for her beauty, and the fact that she is the daughter of Zeus. Men in The Odyssey only value women who they can use for physical needs and wealth, such as the women in the underworld that Odysseus encounters, and Penelope. Homer shows us how men in The Odyssey consider women less important than men. The readers rarely hear of women throughout the book. When they do, they are shown
Both Virgil and Milton portray femininity and women as a threat to the divine higher order of things by showing women as unable to appreciate the larger picture outside their own domestic or personal concerns. For example, in the Aeneid, it is Dido, the Queen of Carthage, who out of all the battles and conflicts faced by Aeneas, posed to the biggest threat to his divinely-assigned objective of founding a new Troy. Like Calypso detains Odysseus in Homer's epic, Dido detains Aeneas from his nostos to his "ancient mother" (II, 433) of Italy, but unlike Calypso, after Dido is abandoned by Aeneas she becomes distraught; she denounces Aeneas in violent rhetoric and curses his descendents before finally committing suicide. Therefore, Virgil demonstrates how women have a potent and dangerous resource of emotions, which can ambush even the most pious of men. Indeed, Dido's emotional penetrate the "duty-bound" (III, 545) Aeneas who "sighed his heart ou...
Throughout the epic, Aeneas suffered the loss of many people dear to him. The first person to pass away was his wife Creusa. During the ...
Aphrodite, goddess of love and beauty, later rose from the sea where Uranus's body had been thrown. Now Cronus became king of the universe. Cronos married his sister, Rhea, and they had six children. At the time of Cronos's marriage to Rhea, Gaea prophesied that one of his children would overthrow Cronos, as he had overthrown Uranus. To protect himself, Cronos swallowed each of his first five children -- Hestia, Demeter, Hera, Hades, and Poseidon -- immediatly after birth.
... she make an exception for Hippolytus. But by the end of the play she vows revenge against Aphrodite. “Cypris shall find the angry shafts she hurled against you for piety and innocence shall cost her dear. I’ll wait until she loves a mortal next time and with this hand-with these unerring arrows i’ll punish him.”
Orion, son of Poseidon and Euryale, one of our constellations, bears his name. Poseidon was the father of the hero Theseus, although the mortal Aegeus also claimed to be his father. Theseus didn't mind the thought of having two fathers; he was happy, enjoying the lineage of each when it suited him. He became the king of Athens by virtue of being Aegeus's son, but availed himself of Poseidon's parentage in facing a challenge handed him by King Minos of Crete. This monarch threw his signet ring into the depths of the sea and dared Theseus to retrieve it.
Since Poseidon, god of the earthquake, is still furious toward Odysseus for stabbing Polyphemus in the eye, the Phaeacians’s xenia went wrong. They hosted their guest properly, but went against the gods’ will and in a way showed no respect to the gods, especially Poseidon. After Poseidon knew Odysseus went back to Ithaca, he said, “I will lose all my honor now among the immortals, now there are mortal men who show me no respect – Phaeacians, too.” (13. 145-147) Thus, the Phaeacians were punished and killed for showing xenia to the wrong
While many other gods took pity upon Odysseus’ hardships and tried to aid him, Poseidon alone was unyielding, “forever fuming against him for the Cyclops whose giant eye he blinded…” (1. line #?), manipulating the seas in order to throw Odysseus off course. In addition to having power over the seas, he also fathers many monsters such as Polyphemus (the Cyclops), Triton (half-fish, half-human), and Pegasus (a flying horse). In a world where humans, gods, and monsters clash in conflict, Poseidon acts as a bridge between gods and monsters, being a god himself, but fathering monsters as well. This sets him apart from other gods, making him seem unpredictable, easily angered, and distant to others. As a result, the uncertainty that humans have towards Poseidon’s temper makes him the god whom the humans sacrifice the most feverously to. This is especially the case with King Nestor, one of Odysseus’ only war comrade that makes it safely back home to the land of Pylos. Suffering from the trauma of the war and journey home, King Nestor became extremely fearful of the gods, and namely Poseidon, “Many thighs of bulls we offered Poseidon there--thank god we’d crossed that endless reach of sea” (3. ???). He understands that without Poseidon’s will, he would not have made it home, and is thus cautious in dealing with sacrifices to avoid ever angering the god. This can also be seen with the Phaeacians; being that they are isolated from the rest of the world, they must rely on the ocean in order to interact with others, and to them, Poseidon gifted flying ships that could permit them to travel across the ocean. Without those ships, they would truly be isolated from society to become a kingdom with a name but no honor. However, when they agree to help Odysseus, Poseidon turns their indispensable ships into stone, and like King Nestor, they came to understand that they live and thrive under the will and
When he fled he took his father, and his son Ascanius with him (Ott 102). Aeneas’s wife became lost during the evacuation. When he fled he also took “penati, the family gods, the most important and only specifically Roman divinity” (Ott 102). To Aeneas, it was an important part of his “identity, origin, and past” (Ott 102) that he needed in order to make sure that his fate was fulfilled when he set out to find new people. Like Romulus and Remus, Aeneas traveled the lands looking to fulfill his fate. It is said the ghost of his wife, who became lost at the battle of Troy, told him to go West to where the Tiber River flowed (Anderson 1). Aeneas traveled to Thrace, Sicily, and Crete before a storm pushes him ashore in Northern Africa (Anderson 1). Once there he fell in love with and married Dido, the Queen of Carthage (Ott 102). Soon Aeneas is reminded by Mercury that his destiny was to reach Rome, causing him to leave Dido who killed herself out of longing (Anderson 1). “Aeneas’s character as portrayed by Virgil is not only that of a heroic warrior. In addition, he guides his life by obedience to divine command, to which he sacrifices his own natural inclination” (Anderson 1). Although Aeneas is not Greek, his is “immortalized as a valorous citizen, brave soldier, respectful son, loving father, and caring husband…” (Ott 103). The Greek God Poseidon
After Agamemnon’s death, Aegisthus is next in line to become king and Clytemnestra is his queen. Her desire for power is hidden by her claims of justification. She challenges anyone to take her power. “[H]e who conquers me in fair fight shall rule me” (45). She threatens the Chorus to a fight for power. She knows she has all the power now the king was dead and she is his queen. Clytemnestra is aware she killed him for his power, but her arrogance makes her put the deed on the curse of the House of Atreus and vengeance for