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116-465: In Greek mythology , Thyestes (pronounced / θ aɪ ˈ ɛ s t iː z / , Greek : Θυέστης , [tʰyéstɛːs] ) was a king of Olympia . Thyestes and his brother, Atreus , were exiled by their father for having murdered their half-brother, Chrysippus , in their desire for the throne of Olympia. They took refuge in Mycenae , where they ascended the throne upon the absence of King Eurystheus , who

232-579: A pederastic light . Alexandrian poets at first, then more generally literary mythographers in the early Roman Empire, often re-adapted stories of Greek mythological characters in this fashion. The achievement of epic poetry was to create story-cycles and, as a result, to develop a new sense of mythological chronology. Thus, Greek mythology unfolds as a phase in the development of the world and of humans. While self-contradictions in these stories make an absolute timeline impossible, an approximate chronology may be discerned. The resulting mythological "history of

348-655: A Christian moralizing perspective. The discovery of the Mycenaean civilization by the German amateur archaeologist Heinrich Schliemann in the nineteenth century, and the discovery of the Minoan civilization in Crete by the British archaeologist Arthur Evans in the twentieth century, helped to explain many existing questions about Homer's epics and provided archaeological evidence for many of

464-564: A banquet by Clytemnestra and her lover Aegisthos. However, it was later discovered that the graves predated the Trojan War by at least 300 years. The play Agamemnon from Aeschylus's trilogy Oresteia depicts the king treading the scarlet cloth laid down for him, and walking offstage to his death. After the chorus's ode of foreboding, time is suspended in Cassandra's " mad scene ". She has been onstage, silent and ignored. Her madness that

580-603: A burning torch in the other, and ran towards the Trojan Horse, intent on destroying the Greeks herself, but the Trojans stopped her. The Greeks hiding inside the Horse were relieved, but alarmed by how clearly she had divined their plan. At the fall of Troy, Cassandra sought shelter in the temple of Athena . There she embraced the wooden statue of Athena in supplication for her protection, but

696-559: A chest behind in Troy, with a curse on whichever Greek opened it first. Inside the chest was an image of Dionysus , made by Hephaestus and presented to the Trojans by Zeus . It was given to the Greek leader Eurypylus as a part of his share of the victory spoils of Troy. When he opened the chest and saw the image of the god, he went mad. Once Troy had fallen, Cassandra was taken as a pallake (concubine) by King Agamemnon of Mycenae . While he

812-472: A collection of epic poems , starts with the events leading up to the war: Eris and the golden apple of Kallisti , the Judgement of Paris , the abduction of Helen , the sacrifice of Iphigenia at Aulis . To recover Helen, the Greeks launched a great expedition under the overall command of Menelaus 's brother, Agamemnon, king of Argos, or Mycenae , but the Trojans refused to return Helen. The Iliad , which

928-488: A combination of their name and epithets , that identify them by these distinctions from other manifestations of themselves (e.g., Apollo Musagetes is " Apollo , [as] leader of the Muses "). Alternatively, the epithet may identify a particular and localized aspect of the god, sometimes thought to be already ancient during the classical epoch of Greece. Most gods were associated with specific aspects of life. For example, Aphrodite

1044-462: A convenient framework into which to fit their own courtly and chivalric ideals. Twelfth-century authors, such as Benoît de Sainte-Maure ( Roman de Troie [Romance of Troy, 1154–60]) and Joseph of Exeter ( De Bello Troiano [On the Trojan War, 1183]) describe the war while rewriting the standard version they found in Dictys and Dares . They thus follow Horace 's advice and Virgil's example: they rewrite

1160-485: A flat disk afloat on the river of Oceanus and overlooked by a hemispherical sky with sun, moon, and stars. The Sun ( Helios ) traversed the heavens as a charioteer and sailed around the Earth in a golden bowl at night. Sun, earth, heaven, rivers, and winds could be addressed in prayers and called to witness oaths. Natural fissures were popularly regarded as entrances to the subterranean house of Hades and his predecessors, home of

1276-408: A further (in)sight into what is going on inside the palace in act 5 when she becomes a quasi-messenger and provides a meticulous account of Agamemnon's murder in the bath: 'I see and I am there and I enjoy it, no false vision deceives my eyes: let's watch' ( video et intersum et fruor, / imago visus dubia non fallit meos: / spectemus .) " Cassandra was given the gift of prophecy, but was also cursed by

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1392-552: A god "greater than he", Zeus swallowed her. She was already pregnant with Athena , however, and she burst forth from his head—fully-grown and dressed for war. The earliest Greek thought about poetry considered the theogonies to be the prototypical poetic genre—the prototypical mythos —and imputed almost magical powers to it. Orpheus , the archetypal poet, also was the archetypal singer of theogonies, which he uses to calm seas and storms in Apollonius' Argonautica , and to move

1508-513: A limited number of gods, who were the focus of large pan-Hellenic cults. It was, however, common for individual regions and villages to devote their own cults to minor gods. Many cities also honored the more well-known gods with unusual local rites and associated strange myths with them that were unknown elsewhere. During the heroic age, the cult of heroes (or demigods) supplemented that of the gods. "The origins of humanity [were] ascribed to various figures, including Zeus and Prometheus ." Bridging

1624-405: A musical contest with Apollo . Ian Morris considers Prometheus' adventures as "a place between the history of the gods and that of man." An anonymous papyrus fragment, dated to the third century, vividly portrays Dionysus ' punishment of the king of Thrace , Lycurgus , whose recognition of the new god came too late, resulting in horrific penalties that extended into the afterlife. The story of

1740-454: A number of local legends became attached. The story of Medea , in particular, caught the imagination of the tragic poets. In between the Argo and the Trojan War, there was a generation known chiefly for its horrific crimes. This includes the doings of Atreus and Thyestes at Argos. Behind the myth of the house of Atreus (one of the two principal heroic dynasties with the house of Labdacus ) lies

1856-521: A poem of Troy instead of telling something completely new. Cassandra Cassandra was a daughter of King Priam and Queen Hecuba of Troy . Her elder brother was Hector , the hero of the Greek- Trojan War . The older and most common versions of the myth state that she was admired by the god Apollo, who sought to win her love by means of the gift of seeing the future. According to Aeschylus , she promised him her favours, but after receiving

1972-467: A son, Penthilus . In the first century AD, Seneca the Younger wrote a tragedy called Thyestes . In 1560 Jasper Heywood , then a Fellow of All Souls College , Oxford , published a verse translation . Shakespeare 's tragedy Titus Andronicus derives some of its plot elements from the story of Thyestes. In 1681, John Crowne wrote Thyestes, A Tragedy , based closely on Seneca's Thyestes, but with

2088-499: A spirit to every aspect of nature. Eventually, these vague spirits assumed human forms and entered the local mythology as gods. When tribes from the north of the Balkan Peninsula invaded, they brought with them a new pantheon of gods, based on conquest, force, prowess in battle, and violent heroism. Other older gods of the agricultural world fused with those of the more powerful invaders or else faded into insignificance. After

2204-461: Is portrayed as a sacrificer, mentioned as a founder of altars, and imagined as a voracious eater himself; it is in this role that he appears in comedy. While his tragic end provided much material for tragedy— Heracles is regarded by Thalia Papadopoulou as "a play of great significance in examination of other Euripidean dramas." In art and literature, Heracles was represented as an enormously strong man of moderate height; his characteristic weapon

2320-608: Is set in the tenth year of the war, tells of the quarrel between Agamemnon and Achilles, who was the finest Greek warrior, and the consequent deaths in battle of Achilles' beloved comrade Patroclus and Priam 's eldest son, Hector . After Hector's death, the Trojans were joined by two exotic allies, Penthesilea , queen of the Amazons , and Memnon , king of the Ethiopians and son of the dawn-goddess, Eos . Achilles killed both of these, but Paris then managed to kill Achilles with an arrow in

2436-469: Is that "the Greek gods are persons, not abstractions, ideas or concepts." Regardless of their underlying forms, the Ancient Greek gods have many fantastic abilities; most significantly, the gods are not affected by disease and can be wounded only under highly unusual circumstances. The Greeks considered immortality as the distinctive characteristic of their gods; this immortality, as well as unfading youth,

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2552-414: Is the source of modern phrase "Thyestean feast", meaning one at which human flesh is served . When Thyestes was done with his feast, he released a loud belch, which represents satiety and pleasure and his loss of self-control. An oracle then advised Thyestes that, if he had a son with his own daughter Pelopia , that son would kill Atreus. Thyestes did so by raping Pelopia (his identity hidden from her) and

2668-698: Is unleashed now is not the physical torment of other characters in Greek tragedy , such as in Euripides ' Heracles or Sophocles ' Ajax . According to author Seth Schein, two further familiar descriptions of her madness are that of Heracles in The Women of Trachis or Io in Prometheus Bound . He specifies that her madness is not the type that uses language to descriptive physical agony or other physical symptoms. Instead, she speaks, disconnectedly and transcendent, in

2784-654: The Iliad and the Odyssey . Other poets completed the Epic Cycle , but these later and lesser poems now are lost almost entirely. Despite their traditional name, the Homeric Hymns have no direct connection with Homer. The oldest are choral hymns from the earlier part of the so-called Lyric age . Hesiod , a possible contemporary with Homer, offers in his Theogony ( Origin of the Gods )

2900-550: The Theogony and the Works and Days , contain accounts of the genesis of the world, the succession of divine rulers, the succession of human ages, the origin of human woes, and the origin of sacrificial practices. Myths are also preserved in the Homeric Hymns , in fragments of epic poems of the Epic Cycle , in lyric poems , in the works of the tragedians and comedians of the fifth century BC, in writings of scholars and poets of

3016-573: The Chimera and Medusa . Bellerophon's adventures are commonplace types, similar to the adventures of Heracles and Theseus. Sending a hero to his presumed death is also a recurrent theme of this early heroic tradition, used in the cases of Perseus and Bellerophon. The only surviving Hellenistic epic, the Argonautica of Apollonius of Rhodes (epic poet, scholar, and director of the Library of Alexandria ) tells

3132-520: The Chronography as "shortish, round-faced, white, mannish figure, good nose, good eyes, dark pupils, blondish, curly, good neck, bulky breasts, small feet, calm, noble, priestly, an accurate prophet foreseeing everything, practicing hard, virgin". Meanwhile, in the account of Dares the Phrygian , she was illustrated as ". . .of moderate stature, round-mouthed, and auburn-haired . Her eyes flashed. She knew

3248-469: The Derveni Papyrus now proves that at least in the fifth-century BC a theogonic-cosmogonic poem of Orpheus was in existence. The first philosophical cosmologists reacted against, or sometimes built upon, popular mythical conceptions that had existed in the Greek world for some time. Some of these popular conceptions can be gleaned from the poetry of Homer and Hesiod. In Homer, the Earth was viewed as

3364-528: The Hellenistic and Roman ages was primarily composed as a literary rather than cultic exercise. Nevertheless, it contains many important details that would otherwise be lost. This category includes the works of: Prose writers from the same periods who make reference to myths include Apuleius , Petronius , Lollianus , and Heliodorus . Two other important non-poetical sources are the Fabulae and Astronomica of

3480-549: The Hellenistic Age , and in texts from the time of the Roman Empire by writers such as Plutarch and Pausanias . Aside from this narrative deposit in ancient Greek literature , pictorial representations of gods, heroes, and mythic episodes featured prominently in ancient vase paintings and the decoration of votive gifts and many other artifacts. Geometric designs on pottery of the eighth century BC depict scenes from

3596-536: The Parthenon depicting the sack of Troy); this artistic preference for themes deriving from the Trojan Cycle indicates its importance to the Ancient Greek civilization. The same mythological cycle also inspired a series of posterior European literary writings. For instance, Trojan Medieval European writers, unacquainted with Homer at first hand, found in the Troy legend a rich source of heroic and romantic storytelling and

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3712-578: The Peloponnese peninsula from Mycenae to Leuctra . In Mycenae, German business man and pioneer archeologist Heinrich Schliemann discovered in Grave Circle A the graves of Cassandra and Agamemnon and telegraphed back to King George I of Greece : With great joy I announce to Your Majesty that I have discovered the tombs which the tradition proclaimed by Pausanias indicates to be the graves of Agamemnon, Cassandra, Eurymedon and their companions, all slain at

3828-679: The Peloponnesian kingdoms of Mycenae , Sparta and Argos , claiming, according to legend, a right to rule them through their ancestor. Their rise to dominance is frequently called the " Dorian invasion ". The Lydian and later the Macedonian kings, as rulers of the same rank, also became Heracleidae. Other members of this earliest generation of heroes such as Perseus, Deucalion , Theseus and Bellerophon , have many traits in common with Heracles. Like him, their exploits are solitary, fantastic and border on fairy tale , as they slay monsters such as

3944-577: The Roman culture because of the story of Aeneas , a Trojan hero whose journey from Troy led to the founding of the city that would one day become Rome, as recounted in Virgil's Aeneid (Book II of Virgil's Aeneid contains the best-known account of the sack of Troy). Finally there are two pseudo-chronicles written in Latin that passed under the names of Dictys Cretensis and Dares Phrygius . The Trojan War cycle ,

4060-459: The Trojan War , Aegisthus seduced Agamemnon's wife, Clytemnestra, and the couple plotted to kill her husband upon his return. They succeeded, killing Agamemnon and his new concubine, Cassandra . Clytemnestra and Aegisthus had three children: Aletes , Erigone , and Helen who died as an infant. Seven or eight years after the death of Agamemnon, Agamemnon's son Orestes returned to Mycenae and, with

4176-466: The Ancient Greek pantheon, poets composed the Homeric Hymns (a group of thirty-three songs). Gregory Nagy (1992) regards "the larger Homeric Hymns as simple preludes (compared with Theogony ), each of which invokes one god." The gods of Greek mythology are described as having essentially corporeal but ideal bodies. According to Walter Burkert , the defining characteristic of Greek anthropomorphism

4292-481: The Epic Cycle as well as the adventures of Heracles . In the succeeding Archaic , Classical , and Hellenistic periods, Homeric and various other mythological scenes appear, supplementing the existing literary evidence. Greek mythology has had an extensive influence on the culture, arts, and literature of Western civilization and remains part of Western heritage and language. Poets and artists from ancient times to

4408-597: The Greek leaders (including the wanderings of Odysseus and Aeneas (the Aeneid ), and the murder of Agamemnon) were told in two epics, the Returns (the lost Nostoi ) and Homer's Odyssey . The Trojan cycle also includes the adventures of the children of the Trojan generation (e.g., Orestes and Telemachus ). The Trojan War provided a variety of themes and became a main source of inspiration for Ancient Greek artists (e.g. metopes on

4524-468: The Greek world and noted the stories they heard, supplied numerous local myths and legends, often giving little-known alternative versions. Herodotus in particular, searched the various traditions he encountered and found the historical or mythological roots in the confrontation between Greece and the East. Herodotus attempted to reconcile origins and the blending of differing cultural concepts. The poetry of

4640-543: The Olympians, the Greeks worshipped various gods of the countryside, the satyr-god Pan , Nymphs (spirits of rivers), Naiads (who dwelled in springs), Dryads (who were spirits of the trees), Nereids (who inhabited the sea), river gods, Satyrs , and others. In addition, there were the dark powers of the underworld, such as the Erinyes (or Furies), said to pursue those guilty of crimes against blood-relatives. In order to honor

4756-686: The Roman writer styled as Pseudo- Hyginus , the Imagines of Philostratus the Elder and Philostratus the Younger , and the Descriptions of Callistratus . Finally, several Byzantine Greek writers provide important details of myth, much derived from earlier now lost Greek works. These preservers of myth include Arnobius , Hesychius , the author of the Suda , John Tzetzes , and Eustathius . They often treat mythology from

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4872-514: The Trojan cycle, as well as the adventures of Heracles. These visual representations of myths are important for two reasons. Firstly, many Greek myths are attested on vases earlier than in literary sources: of the twelve labors of Heracles, for example, only the Cerberus adventure occurs in a contemporary literary text. Secondly, visual sources sometimes represent myths or mythical scenes that are not attested in any extant literary source. In some cases,

4988-411: The Younger , in his play Agamemnon , has her prophesy why Agamemnon deserves his recorded death: Quid me vocatis sospitem solam e meis, umbrae meorum? te sequor, tota pater Troia sepulte; frater, auxilium Phrygum terrorque Danaum, non ego antiquum decus video aut calentes ratibus ambustis manus, sed lacera membra et saucios vinclo gravi illos lacertos. te sequor… (Ag. 741–747) Why do you call me,

5104-456: The age when gods lived alone and the age when divine interference in human affairs was limited was a transitional age in which gods and mortals moved together. These were the early days of the world when the groups mingled more freely than they did later. Most of these tales were later told by Ovid's Metamorphoses and they are often divided into two thematic groups: tales of love, and tales of punishment. Tales of love often involve incest, or

5220-476: The appropriation or invention of some important cultural artifact, as when Prometheus steals fire from the gods, when Tantalus steals nectar and ambrosia from Zeus' table and gives it to his subjects—revealing to them the secrets of the gods, when Prometheus or Lycaon invents sacrifice, when Demeter teaches agriculture and the Mysteries to Triptolemus , or when Marsyas invents the aulos and enters into

5336-605: The army of the dead." Another important difference between the hero cult and the cult of gods is that the hero becomes the centre of local group identity. The monumental events of Heracles are regarded as the dawn of the age of heroes. To the Heroic Age are also ascribed three great events: the Argonautic expedition, the Theban Cycle , and the Trojan War . Some scholars believe that behind Heracles' complicated mythology there

5452-450: The arrival of Dionysus to establish his cult in Thrace was also the subject of an Aeschylean trilogy. In another tragedy, Euripides' The Bacchae , the king of Thebes , Pentheus , is punished by Dionysus, because he disrespected the god and spied on his Maenads , the female worshippers of the god. In another story, based on an old folktale-motif, and echoing a similar theme, Demeter

5568-409: The beginnings of the universe in human language. The most widely accepted version at the time, although a philosophical account of the beginning of things, is reported by Hesiod , in his Theogony . He begins with Chaos , a yawning nothingness. Next comes Gaia (Earth), "the ever-sure foundation of all", and then Tartarus , "in the depth of the wide-pathed Earth", and Eros (Love), "fairest among

5684-452: The broader designation of classical mythology . These stories concern the ancient Greek religion 's view of the origin and nature of the world ; the lives and activities of deities , heroes , and mythological creatures ; and the origins and significance of the ancient Greeks' cult and ritual practices. Modern scholars study the myths to shed light on the religious and political institutions of ancient Greece, and to better understand

5800-502: The composition of the story of the Argonauts is earlier than Odyssey , which shows familiarity with the exploits of Jason (the wandering of Odysseus may have been partly founded on it). In ancient times, the expedition was regarded as a historical fact, an incident in the opening up of the Black Sea to Greek commerce and colonization. It was also extremely popular, forming a cycle to which

5916-447: The concept and ritual. The age in which the heroes lived is known as the Heroic age . The epic and genealogical poetry created cycles of stories clustered around particular heroes or events and established the family relationships between the heroes of different stories; they thus arranged the stories in sequence. According to Ken Dowden (1992), "there is even a saga effect: We can follow

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6032-457: The dead. Influences from other cultures always afforded new themes. According to Classical-era mythology, after the overthrow of the Titans, the new pantheon of gods and goddesses was confirmed. Among the principal Greek gods were the Olympians, residing on Mount Olympus under the eye of Zeus. (The limitation of their number to twelve seems to have been a comparatively modern idea.) Besides

6148-507: The deathless gods". Without male assistance, Gaia gave birth to Uranus (the Sky) who then fertilized her. From that union were born first the Titans —six males: Coeus , Crius , Cronus , Hyperion , Iapetus , and Oceanus ; and six females: Mnemosyne , Phoebe , Rhea , Theia , Themis , and Tethys . After Cronus was born, Gaia and Uranus decreed no more Titans were to be born. They were followed by

6264-610: The divine-focused Theogony and Homeric Hymns in both size and popularity. Under the influence of Homer the "hero cult" leads to a restructuring in spiritual life, expressed in the separation of the realm of the gods from the realm of the dead (heroes), of the Chthonic from the Olympian. In the Works and Days , Hesiod makes use of a scheme of Four Ages of Man (or Races): Golden, Silver, Bronze, and Iron. These races or ages are separate creations of

6380-468: The evolution of their culture, of which mythology, both overtly and in its unspoken assumptions, is an index of the changes. In Greek mythology's surviving literary forms, as found mostly at the end of the progressive changes, it is inherently political, as Gilbert Cuthbertson (1975) has argued. The earlier inhabitants of the Balkan Peninsula were an agricultural people who, using animism , assigned

6496-459: The existence of this corpus of data is an indication that many elements of Greek mythology have strong factual and historical roots. Mythical narration plays an important role in nearly every genre of Greek literature. Nevertheless, the only general mythographical handbook to survive from Greek antiquity was the Library of Pseudo-Apollodorus. This work attempts to reconcile the contradictory tales of

6612-405: The fates of some families in successive generations." After the rise of the hero cult, gods and heroes constitute the sacral sphere and are invoked together in oaths and prayers which are addressed to them. Burkert (2002) notes that "the roster of heroes, again in contrast to the gods, is never given fixed and final form. Great gods are no longer born, but new heroes can always be raised up from

6728-504: The first known representation of a myth in geometric art predates its first known representation in late archaic poetry, by several centuries. In the Archaic ( c.  750  – c.  500 BC ), Classical ( c.  480 –323 BC), and Hellenistic (323–146 BC) periods, Homeric and various other mythological scenes appear, supplementing the existing literary evidence. Greek mythology has changed over time to accommodate

6844-810: The fullest account of the earliest Greek myths, dealing with the creation of the world, the origin of the gods, Titans , and Giants , as well as elaborate genealogies, folktales, and aetiological myths. Hesiod's Works and Days , a didactic poem about farming life, also includes the myths of Prometheus , Pandora , and the Five Ages . The poet advises on the best way to succeed in a dangerous world, rendered yet more dangerous by its gods. Lyrical poets often took their subjects from myth, but their treatment became gradually less narrative and more allusive. Greek lyric poets, including Pindar , Bacchylides and Simonides , and bucolic poets such as Theocritus and Bion , relate individual mythological incidents. Additionally, myth

6960-485: The future." Cassandra was one of the many children born to the king and queen of Troy, Priam and Hecuba . She is the fraternal twin sister of Helenus , as well as the sister to Hector and Paris . One of the oldest and most common versions of her myth states that Cassandra was admired for her beauty and intelligence by the god Apollo, who sought to win her with the gift to see the future. According to Aeschylus , Cassandra promised Apollo favors, but, after receiving

7076-416: The gift, she went back on her word. As the enraged Apollo could not revoke a divine power, he added to it the curse that nobody would believe her prophecies. In other sources, such as Hyginus and Pseudo-Apollodorus , Cassandra broke no promise to Apollo, but rather the power of foresight was given to her as an enticement to enter into a romantic engagement, the curse being added only when it failed to produce

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7192-497: The gift, went back on her word and refused Apollo. Since the enraged Apollo could not revoke a divine power, he added a curse that nobody would believe Cassandra's prophecies. Cassandra appears in texts written by Homer , Virgil , Aeschylus and Euripides . Each author depicts her prophetic powers differently. In Homer's work, Cassandra is mentioned a total of four times "as a virgin daughter of Priam, as bewailing Hector's death, as chosen by Agamemnon as his slave mistress after

7308-685: The god Apollo so that her true prophecies would not be believed. Many versions of the myth relate that she incurred the god's wrath by refusing him sexual favours after promising herself to him in exchange for the power of prophecy. In Aeschylus' Agamemnon , she bemoans her relationship with Apollo: Apollo, Apollo! God of all ways, but only Death's to me, Once and again, O thou, Destroyer named, Thou hast destroyed me, thou, my love of old! And she acknowledges her fault: I consented [marriage] to Loxias [Apollo] but broke my word. ... Ever since that fault I could persuade no one of anything. Latin author Hyginus in Fabulae says: Cassandra, daughter of

7424-466: The gods, the Golden Age belonging to the reign of Cronos, the subsequent races to the creation of Zeus . The presence of evil was explained by the myth of Pandora , when all of the best of human capabilities, save hope, had been spilled out of her overturned jar. In Metamorphoses , Ovid follows Hesiod's concept of the four ages. "Myths of origin" or " creation myths " represent an attempt to explain

7540-551: The grip of her psychic possession by Apollo, witnessing past and future events. Schein says, "She evokes the same awe, horror and pity as do schizophrenics ". Cassandra is one of those "who often combine deep, true insight with utter helplessness, and who retreat into madness." Eduard Fraenkel remarked on the powerful contrasts between declaimed and sung dialogue in this scene. The frightened and respectful chorus are unable to comprehend her. She goes to her inevitable offstage murder by Clytemnestra with full knowledge of what

7656-490: The hands of both Athena and Poseidon : "Athena threw a thunderbolt at the ship of Ajax; and when the ship went to pieces he made his way safe to a rock, and declared that he was saved in spite of the intention of Athena. But Poseidon smote the rock with his trident and split it, and Ajax fell into the sea and perished; and his body, being washed up, was buried by Thetis in Myconos ". In some versions, Cassandra intentionally left

7772-530: The heel. Achilles' heel was the only part of his body which was not invulnerable to damage by human weaponry. Before they could take Troy, the Greeks had to steal from the citadel the wooden image of Pallas Athena (the Palladium ). Finally, with Athena's help, they built the Trojan Horse . Despite the warnings of Priam's daughter Cassandra , the Trojans were persuaded by Sinon , a Greek who feigned desertion, to take

7888-587: The help of his cousin Pylades and his sister Electra , killed both their mother, Clytemnestra, and Aegisthus. Tired of the bloodshed, the gods exonerated Orestes and declared this the end of the curse on the house of Atreus, as described in Aeschylus ' play The Eumenides . However, other stories say that when Aletes and Erigone came of age and became rulers at Mycenae, Orestes returned with an army then killed his half-brother and raped his half-sister, who gave birth to

8004-656: The highest social prestige through his appointment as official ancestor of the Dorian kings. This probably served as a legitimation for the Dorian migrations into the Peloponnese . Hyllus , the eponymous hero of one Dorian phyle , became the son of Heracles and one of the Heracleidae or Heraclids (the numerous descendants of Heracles, especially the descendants of Hyllus —other Heracleidae included Macaria , Lamos, Manto , Bianor , Tlepolemus , and Telephus ). These Heraclids conquered

8120-420: The horse inside the walls of Troy as an offering to Athena; the priest Laocoon, who tried to have the horse destroyed, was killed by sea-serpents. At night the Greek fleet returned, and the Greeks from the horse opened the gates of Troy. In the total sack that followed, Priam and his remaining sons were slaughtered; the Trojan women passed into slavery in various cities of Greece. The adventurous homeward voyages of

8236-473: The incongruous addition of a love story. Prosper Jolyot Crebillon (1674–1762) wrote a tragedy "Atree et Thyeste" (1707), which is prominent in two tales of ratiocination by Edgar Allan Poe . In 1796, Ugo Foscolo (1778–1827) wrote a tragedy called Tieste that was first presented in Venice one year later. Caryl Churchill , a British dramatist, also wrote a rendition of Thyestes. Churchill's specific translation

8352-451: The influence of Seneca is apparent. "The reminiscence of Atreus' speech in the Thyestes of Seneca, which might subtend Cleopatra's own passionate, distended rhetoric about Antony" (Edgecombe, 257). Greek mythology Greek mythology is the body of myths originally told by the ancient Greeks , and a genre of ancient Greek folklore , today absorbed alongside Roman mythology into

8468-468: The king and queen, in the temple of Apollo, exhausted from practising, is said to have fallen asleep; whom, when Apollo wished to embrace her, she did not afford the opportunity of her body. On account of which thing, when she prophesied true things, she was not believed. Louise Bogan , an American poet, writes that another way Cassandra, as well as her twin brother Helenus, had earned their prophetic powers: " she and her brother Helenus were left overnight in

8584-623: The lamb should be king. Thyestes produced the lamb and claimed the throne. Atreus retook the throne using advice he received from the gods. Zeus sent Hermes to him, advising him to get Thyestes to agree that should the sun rise in the west and set in the east, Atreus could have his throne back. Atreus did so, and Helios reversed his normal course, in anger over Thyestes' actions. Atreus then learned of Thyestes' and Aerope's adultery and plotted revenge. He killed Thyestes' sons and cooked them, save their hands and heads. He served Thyestes his own sons and then taunted him with their hands and heads. This

8700-473: The lone survivor of my family, My shades? I follow you, father buried with all of Troy; Brother, bulwark of Trojans, terrorizer of Greeks, I do not see your beauty of old or hands warmed by burnt ships, But your lacerated limbs and those famous shoulders savaged By heavy chains. I follow you... Later on in Seneca's work, this behavior is reflected in acts 4 and 5 as "Her mantic vision in act 4 will be supplemented by

8816-576: The middle of the Archaic period, myths about relationships between male gods and male heroes became more and more frequent, indicating the parallel development of pedagogic pederasty ( παιδικὸς ἔρως , eros paidikos ), thought to have been introduced around 630 BC. By the end of the fifth-century  BC, poets had assigned at least one eromenos , an adolescent boy who was their sexual companion, to every important god except Ares and many legendary figures. Previously existing myths, such as those of Achilles and Patroclus , also then were cast in

8932-589: The murder of Aegisthus and Clytemnestra by the latter's children Electra and Orestes . Cassandra predicted that her cousin Aeneas would escape during the fall of Troy and found a new nation in Rome. Coroebus and Othronus came to the aid of Troy during the Trojan War out of love for Cassandra and in exchange for her hand in marriage, but both were killed. According to one account, Priam offered Cassandra to Telephus 's son Eurypylus , in order to induce Eurypylus to fight on

9048-564: The myth of the voyage of Jason and the Argonauts to retrieve the Golden Fleece from the mythical land of Colchis . In the Argonautica , Jason is impelled on his quest by king Pelias , who receives a prophecy that a man with one sandal would be his nemesis . Jason loses a sandal in a river, arrives at the court of Pelias, and the epic is set in motion. Nearly every member of the next generation of heroes, as well as Heracles, went with Jason in

9164-475: The mythological details about gods and heroes. The evidence about myths and rituals at Mycenaean and Minoan sites is entirely monumental, as the Linear B script (an ancient form of Greek found in both Crete and mainland Greece) was used mainly to record inventories, although certain names of gods and heroes have been tentatively identified. Geometric designs on pottery of the eighth-century  BC depict scenes from

9280-475: The name from the Proto-Indo-European root * (s)kend- "raise". The Online Etymology Dictionary states "though the second element looks like a fem. form of Greek andros "of man, male human being." Watkins suggests PIE *(s)kand- "to shine" as source of second element. The name also has been connected to kekasmai "to surpass, excel. " Cassandra was described by the chronicler Malalas in his account of

9396-412: The nature of mythmaking itself. The Greek myths were initially propagated in an oral-poetic tradition most likely by Minoan and Mycenaean singers starting in the 18th century BC; eventually the myths of the heroes of the Trojan War and its aftermath became part of the oral tradition of Homer 's epic poems , the Iliad and the Odyssey . Two poems by Homer's near contemporary Hesiod ,

9512-413: The one prophecy that was believed was that of Paris being her abandoned brother. Before the fall of Troy took place, Cassandra foresaw that if Paris went to Sparta and brought Helen back as his wife, the arrival of Helen would spark the downfall and destruction of Troy during the Trojan War. Despite the prophecy and ignoring Cassandra's warning, Paris still went to Sparta and returned with Helen. While

9628-485: The one-eyed Cyclopes and the Hecatoncheires or Hundred-Handed Ones, who were both thrown into Tartarus by Uranus. This made Gaia furious. Cronus ("the wily, youngest and most terrible of Gaia 's children") was convinced by Gaia to castrate his father. He did this and became the ruler of the Titans with his sister-wife, Rhea, as his consort, and the other Titans became his court. A motif of father-against-son conflict

9744-479: The people of Troy rejoiced, Cassandra, angry with Helen's arrival, furiously snatched away Helen's golden veil and tore at her hair. In Virgil's epic poem, the Aeneid, Cassandra warned the Trojans about the Greeks hiding inside the Trojan Horse , Agamemnon 's death, her own demise at the hands of Aegisthus and Clytemnestra , her mother Hecuba's fate, Odysseus 's ten-year wanderings before returning to his home, and

9860-454: The poets and provides a grand summary of traditional Greek mythology and heroic legends. Apollodorus of Athens lived from c.  180 BC to c.  125 BC and wrote on many of these topics. His writings may have formed the basis for the collection; however, the "Library" discusses events that occurred long after his death, hence the name Pseudo-Apollodorus. Among the earliest literary sources are Homer 's two epic poems,

9976-528: The present have derived inspiration from Greek mythology and have discovered contemporary significance and relevance in the themes. Greek mythology is known today primarily from Greek literature and representations on visual media dating from the Geometric period from c.  900 BC to c.  800 BC onward. In fact, literary and archaeological sources integrate, sometimes mutually supportive and sometimes in conflict; however, in many cases,

10092-454: The problem of the devolution of power and of the mode of accession to sovereignty. The twins Atreus and Thyestes with their descendants played the leading role in the tragedy of the devolution of power in Mycenae. The Theban Cycle deals with events associated especially with Cadmus , the city's founder, and later with the doings of Laius and Oedipus at Thebes; a series of stories that lead to

10208-537: The result desired by the god. Later versions on the contrary describe her falling asleep in a temple, where snakes licked (or whispered into) her ears which enabled her to hear the future. Hjalmar Frisk ( Griechisches Etymologisches Wörterbuch , Heidelberg, 1960–1970) notes "unexplained etymology", citing "various hypotheses" found in Wilhelm Schulze, Edgar Howard Sturtevant , J. Davreux, and Albert Carnoy . R. S. P. Beekes cites García Ramón's derivation of

10324-406: The sack of Troy, and is killed by Clytemnestra over Agamemnon's corpse after Clytemnestra murders him on his return home. " In Virgil's work, Cassandra appears in book two of his epic poem titled Aeneid , with her powers of prophecy restored. In Book 2 of the Aeneid, unlike Homer, Virgil presents Cassandra as having fallen into a mantic state and her prophecies reflect it. Likewise Seneca

10440-476: The same temple and tried to seduce Cassandra, who rejects his advances, and curses her by making her prophecies not be believed. Her cursed gift from Apollo became an endless pain and frustration to her. She was seen as a liar and a madwoman by her family and by the Trojan people. Because of this, her father, Priam, had locked her away in a chamber and guarded her like the madwoman she was believed to be. Though Cassandra made many predictions that went unbelieved,

10556-417: The sea. With his dying gasp, Myrtilus cursed their line, which is where Thyestes and Atreus come in. Thyestes' brother and King of Mycenae, Atreus , vowed to sacrifice his best lamb to Artemis . Upon searching his flock, however, Atreus discovered a golden lamb which he gave to his wife, Aerope , to hide from the goddess. She gave it to her lover, Thyestes, who then convinced Atreus to agree that whoever had

10672-504: The seduction or rape of a mortal woman by a male god, resulting in heroic offspring. The stories generally suggest that relationships between gods and mortals are something to avoid; even consenting relationships rarely have happy endings. In a few cases, a female divinity mates with a mortal man, as in the Homeric Hymn to Aphrodite , where the goddess lies with Anchises to produce Aeneas . The second type (tales of punishment) involves

10788-575: The ship Argo to fetch the Golden Fleece. This generation also included Theseus , who went to Crete to slay the Minotaur ; Atalanta , the female heroine, and Meleager , who once had an epic cycle of his own to rival the Iliad and Odyssey . Pindar , Apollonius and the Bibliotheca endeavor to give full lists of the Argonauts. Although Apollonius wrote his poem in the 3rd century BC,

10904-517: The side of the Trojans. Cassandra was also the first to see the body of her brother Hector being brought back to the city. In The Fall of Troy , told by Quintus Smyrnaeus , Cassandra attempted to warn the Trojan people that Greek warriors were hiding in the Trojan Horse while they were celebrating their victory over the Greeks with feasting. Disbelieving Cassandra, the Trojans resorted to calling her names and hurling insults at her. Attempting to prove herself right, Cassandra took an axe in one hand and

11020-483: The society while the beliefs were held. After they ceased to become religious beliefs, few would have known the rites and rituals. Allusions often existed, however, to aspects that were quite public. Images existed on pottery and religious artwork that were interpreted and more likely, misinterpreted in many diverse myths and tales. A few fragments of these works survive in quotations by Neoplatonist philosophers and recently unearthed papyrus scraps. One of these scraps,

11136-484: The son of Pelops and Hippodamia , and father of Pelopia and Aegisthus . His three sons by a naiad , who were killed by Atreus , were named Aglaus, Orchomenus and Calaeus. Pelops and Hippodamia are parents to Thyestes. However, they were cursed by Myrtilus , a servant of King Oenomaus , the father of Hippodamia. Myrtilus was promised the right to Hippodamia's virginity and half of Pelops' kingdom, but Pelops denied both to him and killed him by throwing him into

11252-454: The son, Aegisthus , did kill Atreus. However, when Aegisthus was first born, he was abandoned by his mother, ashamed of the origin of her son. A shepherd found the infant Aegisthus and gave him to Atreus, who raised him as his own son. Only as he entered adulthood did Thyestes reveal the truth to Aegisthus, that he was both father and grandfather to the boy and that Atreus was his uncle. Aegisthus then killed Atreus. While Thyestes ruled Mycenae,

11368-508: The sons of Atreus, Agamemnon and Menelaus , were exiled to Sparta . There, King Tyndareus accepted them as the royalty that they were. Shortly after, he helped the brothers return to Mycenae to overthrow Thyestes, forcing him to live in Kythira , where he died. As a token of good will and allegiance, King Tyndareus offered his daughters to Agamemnon and Menelaus as wives, Clytemnestra and Helen respectively. When Agamemnon left Mycenae for

11484-601: The stone, which had been sitting in Cronus's stomach all this time. Zeus then challenged Cronus to war for the kingship of the gods. At last, with the help of the Cyclopes (whom Zeus freed from Tartarus), Zeus and his siblings were victorious, while Cronus and the Titans were hurled down to imprisonment in Tartarus . Zeus was plagued by the same concern, and after a prophecy that the offspring of his first wife, Metis , would give birth to

11600-406: The stony hearts of the underworld gods in his descent to Hades . When Hermes invents the lyre in the Homeric Hymn to Hermes , the first thing he does is sing about the birth of the gods. Hesiod's Theogony is not only the fullest surviving account of the gods but also the fullest surviving account of the archaic poet's function, with its long preliminary invocation to the Muses . Theogony also

11716-469: The tale known to us through tragedy (e.g. Sophocles' Oedipus Rex ) and later mythological accounts. Greek mythology culminates in the Trojan War, fought between Greece and Troy , and its aftermath. In Homer's works, such as the Iliad , the chief stories have already taken shape and substance, and individual themes were elaborated later, especially in Greek drama. The Trojan War also elicited great interest in

11832-490: The temple of the Thymbraean Apollo. No reason has been advanced for this night in the temple; perhaps it was a ritual routinely performed by everyone. When their parents looked in on them the next morning, the children were entwined with serpents, which flicked their tongues into the children's ears. This enabled Cassandra and Helenus to divine the future. " It would not be until Cassandra is much older that Apollo appears in

11948-564: The war of the Seven against Thebes and the eventual pillage of that city at the hands of the Epigoni . (It is not known whether the Seven figured in early epic.) As far as Oedipus is concerned, early epic accounts seem to have him continuing to rule at Thebes after the revelation that Iokaste was his mother, and subsequently marrying a second wife who becomes the mother of his children—markedly different from

12064-434: The world" may be divided into three or four broader periods: While the age of gods often has been of more interest to contemporary students of myth, the Greek authors of the archaic and classical eras had a clear preference for the age of heroes, establishing a chronology and record of human accomplishments after the questions of how the world came into being were explained. For example, the heroic Iliad and Odyssey dwarfed

12180-474: Was abducted and brutally raped by Ajax the Lesser . Cassandra clung so tightly to the statue of the goddess that Ajax knocked it from its stand as he dragged her away. The actions of Ajax were a sacrilege because Cassandra was a supplicant at the sanctuary, and under the protection of the goddess Athena and Ajax further defiled the temple by raping Cassandra. In Apollodorus chapter 6, section 6, Ajax's death comes at

12296-519: Was away at war, Agamemnon's wife, Clytemnestra , had taken Aegisthus as her lover. Cassandra and Agamemnon were later killed by either Clytemnestra or Aegisthus. Various sources state that Cassandra and Agamemnon had twin boys, Teledamus and Pelops, who were murdered by Aegisthus. The final resting place of Cassandra is either in Amyclae or Mycenae . Statues of Cassandra exist both in Amyclae and across

12412-593: Was central to classical Athenian drama . The tragic playwrights Aeschylus , Sophocles , and Euripides took most of their plots from myths of the age of heroes and the Trojan War. Many of the great tragic stories (e.g. Agamemnon and his children, Oedipus , Jason , Medea , etc.) took on their classic form in these tragedies. The comic playwright Aristophanes also used myths, in The Birds and The Frogs . Historians Herodotus and Diodorus Siculus , and geographers Pausanias and Strabo , who traveled throughout

12528-401: Was fighting the Heracleidae . Eurystheus had meant for their lordship to be temporary; it became permanent because of his death in conflict. The most popular representation of Thyestes is that of the play Thyestes by Seneca in 62 AD. This play is one of the originals for the revenge tragedy genre. Although inspired by Greek mythology and legend, Seneca's version is different. Thyestes was

12644-478: Was insured by the constant use of nectar and ambrosia , by which the divine blood was renewed in their veins. Each god descends from his or her own genealogy, pursues differing interests, has a certain area of expertise, and is governed by a unique personality; however, these descriptions arise from a multiplicity of archaic local variants, which do not always agree with one another. When these gods are called upon in poetry, prayer, or cult, they are referred to by

12760-728: Was performed at the Royal Court Theater Upstairs in London on June 7, 1994. In 2004, Jan van Vlijmen (1935–2004) completed his opera Thyeste . The libretto was a text in French by Hugo Claus , based on his 20th century play with the same title (in Dutch: Thyestes ). Thyestes appears in Ford Ainsworth 's one-act play, Persephone . Seneca's influence in literature is reflected through other works. In Arnold's Sonnet on Shakespeare,

12876-592: Was probably a real man, perhaps a chieftain-vassal of the kingdom of Argos . Some scholars suggest the story of Heracles is an allegory for the sun's yearly passage through the twelve constellations of the zodiac. Others point to earlier myths from other cultures, showing the story of Heracles as a local adaptation of hero myths already well established. Traditionally, Heracles was the son of Zeus and Alcmene , granddaughter of Perseus . His fantastic solitary exploits, with their many folk-tale themes, provided much material for popular legend. According to Burkert (2002), "He

12992-511: Was repeated when Cronus was confronted by his son, Zeus . Because Cronus had betrayed his father, he feared that his offspring would do the same, and so each time Rhea gave birth, he snatched up the child and ate it. Rhea hated this and tricked him by hiding Zeus and wrapping a stone in a baby's blanket, which Cronus ate. When Zeus was full-grown, he fed Cronus a drugged drink which caused him to vomit, throwing up Rhea's other children, including Poseidon , Hades , Hestia , Demeter , and Hera , and

13108-583: Was searching for her daughter, Persephone , having taken the form of an old woman called Doso, and received a hospitable welcome from Celeus , the King of Eleusis in Attica . As a gift to Celeus, because of his hospitality, Demeter planned to make his son Demophon a god, but she was unable to complete the ritual because his mother Metanira walked in and saw her son in the fire and screamed in fright, which angered Demeter, who lamented that foolish mortals do not understand

13224-571: Was the bow but frequently also the club. Vase paintings demonstrate the unparalleled popularity of Heracles, his fight with the lion being depicted many hundreds of times. Heracles also entered Etruscan and Roman mythology and cult, and the exclamation "mehercule" became as familiar to the Romans as "Herakleis" was to the Greeks. In Italy he was worshipped as a god of merchants and traders, although others also prayed to him for his characteristic gifts of good luck or rescue from danger. Heracles attained

13340-431: Was the goddess of love and beauty, Ares was the god of war, Hades the ruler of the underworld, and Athena the goddess of wisdom and courage. Some gods, such as Apollo and Dionysus , revealed complex personalities and mixtures of functions, while others, such as Hestia (literally "hearth") and Helios (literally "sun"), were little more than personifications. The most impressive temples tended to be dedicated to

13456-499: Was the subject of many lost poems, including those attributed to Orpheus, Musaeus , Epimenides , Abaris , and other legendary seers, which were used in private ritual purifications and mystery-rites . There are indications that Plato was familiar with some version of the Orphic theogony. A silence would have been expected about religious rites and beliefs, however, and that nature of the culture would not have been reported by members of

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