Greek & Roman Mythology Midterm 1 2023

Zeus

Zeus

-Areas of Concern: The sky, kingship

- Attributes: Beard, Eagle, Thunderbolt

- Based on the same root as Roman Iu- in Iupiter (Jove) and - Sanskrit Dyaush pita (both "sky father"),

- Associated with Egyptian Amun and Persian Ahura-Mazda

Prometheus

- fire, eagle

- son of Iapetos

- father of Deucalion

- brother of Epimetheus

- technology, mankind

- steals fire from Zeus

- deceived zeus into taking intestines as a sacrifice and giving the meat of the animal to humans

Hera

- Zeus's Wife/Sister

- Goddess of marriage and family

- Attributes: Peacock, Crown

- Associated with Roman Juno and Carthiginian Tanit

Apollo

Son of Zeus & Leto, god of reason, music, medicine, & prophecy

Rational

Civilization

Order

Athena

-pre hellenic Mycenaean goddess

-daughter of Zeus and Metis

= sprung from Zeus' head after he consumed Metis

-patroness of heros, wisdom, crafts, warfare-Sanctuary: Athens

-wears aegis given to her by her father Zeus

-virgin goddess

Ares

-son of Zeus and Hera

-all war, but often violence that is not just or defensive

-Spouse: on going affair with Aphrodite ("love and war"

Poseidon

-native Greek God

-Son of Kronos and Rhea

-freshwater, sea, horses, earthquakes

-symbol is a trident

-Spouse: Amphitrite

Ishtar

- Love Sex Fertility and War

- staff with snakes, headdress

- "akkadian name" for summarian Innana

- immortal

Enki (Ea)

- God of Water

- also called ea made humans in atrahasis

- warns atrahis of Napishtim

Deucalion

- Son of Promethius

- connected to flood myth

- restarted human race after the bronze age

- zeus was mad at the pride of the people getting to close to gods

Pandora

wife of Epimetheus, the first mortal woman, created by the gods as a punishment for Prometheus after he steals fire from Zeus, she is a gift

Heracles

Lion skin, club, strength, spreading culture, associated with Phoenician Melqart

Theseus

Son of Aegeus or Poseidon, Husband to Phaedra

First king of Athens and all it's territory

Slayer of the Minotaur

Achilles

Son of Peleus and the sea Nymph Thetis

Invulnerable except for his heel

Chose "unwithering fame" and a short life over a long life in obscurity

Diomedes

- Hero participates in Trojan War

- becomes king of argos

- from the Iliad

- one of the best warriors of all of the achaeans

- killed the sons of Phainops and Eurydamas

Odysseus

- Son of Laertes, Husband ofPenelope, Father of Telemachus

- King of Ithaca

- Greek hero who took ten years to return after the end of the Trojan War

Gilgamesh

King of Uruk, a city-state in Sumer, he wanted to be immortal and went on a quest to find the key to immortality. Helped build a wall

Critical Thinking

Not having the answer before asking the question

Thesis

Statement based on facts that a reasonable person can disagree with

Observation

Statement about multiple facts that multiple people agree with

Humanism

Humans were the same in ancient times therefore understandable

Historicism

The ideas that human beings hadfundamentally different ideas ofhow the world worked in the past and their motives cannot always be understood

Idealism

The belief that categories exits "out there" independent of language and human beings. Sometimes these categories are referred to as "natural"

Textualism

- Story subject language

- limited change (variations allowed)

- Because categories and even mythic figures are constructed by language it is better to try to understand categories and mythic figures as subject to limited change over time rather than imperfect copies of an ideal hero or category.

Enkidu

- Formed from clay and saliva

- becomes friends with gilgamesh

- dies

Shamhat

- Sacred Prostitute

- brings Enkidu into contact with civilization

- femenine

Humbaba

Guardian of the cedar forest of Labininu, put there by the god Enlil, killed by Gilgamesh and Enkidu for being in the way

Utanapishtim

a legendary king of Shuruppak in southern Iraq, who survived the Flood by making a boat

Pyrrha

the daughter of Epimetheus and Pandora and wife of Deucalion of whom she had three sons, Hellen, Amphictyon, Orestheus; and three daughters Protogeneia, Pandora II and Thyia

Cyclops (Polyphemus)

- Son of Poseidon and Thoosa (Cyclops)

- man eating giant

- story of Odysseus and the sheep (got giant drunk blinded him and then escaped by tieing themselves to undersides of sheep)

Silk Route

a network of trade networks that connected regions from Europe across Asia, ideas and languages also traveled back and forth, including stringed instruments

Uruk

One of the first cities in Sumer, home of the temples of Innana and Anu, mythical home of Gilgamesh

Hissarlik

- Archaeological site of turkey, (claimed to be lost city of troy)

- modern name for ancient troy

Argos

- a city located in central Greece and it's known for the temple of Hera

- continually occupied from the Stone Age to today

Homer

- Believed to be the author of the Iliad, the Odyssey, and the Homeric Hymns

- Allegedly born in differentplaces such as Chios or Smyrna

- Most professionals now believe that Homer is a name for a tradition than a person

(Pseudo)-Apollodorus

author of library of greek mythology

George Smith

Born in London, 1840, discovered "The Epic of 'Iz-Du-bar'" while reading cuneiform tablets at the British Museum

Berossus

- Active early 3rd C BCE

- Author of The History ofBabylonia

- First (only?) author to use sources written in Akkadian for his history