THE ODYSSEY

Orphic Hymn 18 to Pluton (trans. Taylor) (Greek hymns C3rd B.C. to 2nd A.D.) :

"O mighty Daimon [Haides], whose decision dread, the future fate determines of the dead, with Demeter's girl [Persephone]."

A2, watercolor, ink

Second post of my gods headcanons with some second generation gods!

Again, some of these may conflict with established Canon, don't at me.

Whenever I search for artwork of Eros and Psyche, this illustration always pops up. Interestingly, though, it doesn’t actually depict Eros and Psyche; the piece is titled "Romantic Encounter" and features the two main characters from a Russian Gothic romantic poem, in which a demon falls in love with a girl, and when they kiss, she dies. The irony of the illustration lies precisely in the fact that this "romantic encounter" is what causes the girl’s death, leaving the demon to continue his life of solitude and sorrow. For anyone who wants to know, the name of the poem is 'Demon' by Mikhail Lermontov.

In neither mythology or bronze age Greece there was a empire. Mycenea was basically a first among equals, respected and followed in times of turmoil but could not enforce anything as if it was a imperial capital.

There is two things that made Agamemnon the "leader'. First is that he ruled Mycenea. Mycenea is among the oldest cities (altrough it is constantly confused with Argos) of the Peloponnese, and since the earlier kings like Phoroneus and Argos they had sway over Corinth and Sicyon as well. Later, king Abas extended the city influence up to Iolcus and Phthia. Abas was the father of king Acrisius, father of Danae, mother of Perseus with Zeus. After Acrisius' accident, Perseus ruled as a Anax from Mycenea with Andromeda by his side.

Perseus' son Electryon became the king and entered into a war against the Teleboans. His nephew Amphytrion defeated the Teleboans and conquered the islands, awarding them to Cephalus, who becomes the father of Arcesius the builder of Ithaca. These islands were now ""under"" Mycenea as well. Amphytrion killed his uncle the king by accident (or not) so he fleed to Thebes with his wife Alcmena, daughter of Electryon. Because Electryon's sons died in the aforementioned battle, Sthenelus, the other son of Perseus, became king and the father of the next king, Eurystheus, while Alcmena exiled in Thebes became the mother of Heracles with Zeus.

While Heracles served Eurystheus, he conquered a bunch of cities. Heracles conquered Elis from king Augeas, and Augeas' son Agastenes became king but now as a ally of Mycenea. Heracles then conquered Pylus from Neleus son of Poseidon, who had refused to purify Heracles from murdering Iphitus, and Heracles even defeated Hades and Poseidon in the city as well. He put Nestor, Neleus' son, in the throne, now as a ally of Mycenea. Finally, he conquered Sparta from the usurper Hippocon, and gave the city to the true king Tyndareus, the father of Castor, Pollux, Clytemnestra and Helen (but Zeus was the true father of some of these). So Tyndareus had a debt to Mycenea now.

After Heracles became a god, Eurystheus wanted to kill Heracles dozens of sons as they were rivals of his family. But the Heraclidae took refuge in Athens, so there was a battle and Eurystheus and his sons were slain. Before or later than this (the timeline is contradictory if we combine different authors together) Castor and Pollux conquered Athens in the name of Sparta to rescue their sister Helen, and they put Menestheus in the throne of Athens as a ally.

After the end of the House of Perseus, Eurystheus maternal uncles Atreus and Thyestes became the kings of Mycenea, and they were the sons of king Pelops, son of Tantalus (that one). The brothers story I will not explain here, but Agamemnon and Menelaus, sons of Atreus, had to flee to Sparta where, with support of Tyndareus, they re-conquered Mycenea from their uncle Thyestes. Agamemnon became king and married Clytemnestra, Tyndareus' daughter, in a political marriage. Menelaus married Helen, the other "daughter" of Tyndareus, and after Helen fleed with Paris, and Castor and Pollux died in the same moment in a battle elsewhere, Menelaus became king of Sparta because he was married to Helen.

As you can see, Mycenea and its ally Sparta through the mythology subdued several cities. But these cities were not forced to follow Mycenea or pay tribute, is just that problematic kings were removed in favor of their less dangerous family members that would now go to war allied with Mycenea instead of against Mycenea and Sparta. Agamemnon simply inherited most of that after defeating his uncle.

The second thing that gave power to Agamemnon was his scepter. He inherited the scepter from his defeated uncle Thyestes, who took it from Atreus, who had received it from his father Pelops. Pelops had received it from Hermes who received it from Zeus, and it was forged by Hephaestus. So this scepter gave Agamemnon divine authority. So when Paris brought Helen with him, the greek kings had to honor their Oath to Helen as well as the fact they wanted to sack Troy, and since Agamemnon had the most amount of allies and the divine Scepter, they elected him as their overall ruler until the war was over. But he could be replaced as well: In certain versions of the Iphigenia myth, Agamemnon refused to kill his daughter, so the other kings threatened to kill him and replace him with Palamedes, as Palamedes was intelligent, cold and calculating, so the perfect ruler for them. But Agamemnon does go with the sacrifice and is not replaced.

I have seen many people insist that Agamemnon had the ambition to conquer Troy and he kinda forced everyone. When it can be argued that is the opposite. The kings elected him, and in the Iphigenia episode, they were forcing Agamemnon to take a decision. Agamemnon was not automatically the ruler, but the most powerful king and the one with divine aproval from Zeus, so the kings choose him to fulfill their ambition: the Oath they had to fullfil to Helen and their desire to conquer Troy and everything it had. Everyone was power hungry, not just Agamemnon, instead of blaming only him, he was instead a manifestation of the Achaean greed (this is why most of them suffered later, not just Agamemnon). He was also less cold-hearted than the likes of Palamedes, and his main reason to go to war was to defend the name of his brother that was under shame, so these are noble reasons. As for his flaws, well, after Aphrodite rescued Paris from the battlefield nullyfing any possibility of peace, Agamemnon said to his brother to not show any mercy to any Trojan as they were not trustworthy, so only from that point onwards he became excessively cruel. His biggest flaw was certainly everything sorrounding his wife, as he hated her and only married for political reasons, and this is what lead to his downfall in her hand and he didn't enjoy any peace after Troy, but died imediatly.

And how would I learn about it? Like, what was the magic they supposedly practiced in Greek society like?

🗡️🧶

I am making a mini essay about the concept of xenia in the Odyssey and as I’m writing and finding sources, I struggle to find one on Polyphemus’ case. Who do you think broke xenia, per Zeus’ law ?

Circe and Calypso’s cases have been much studied, also the suitors and how Zeus enforces punishment. Without even mentioning the Troyan Horse.

But considering the Cyclop’s episode, I can’t find a reliable source that depict the myth through this angle. Does anyone have sources or developed arguments ? Thanks in advance !

ART: Douglas Mora (instagram, see last slide)

Hello everyone! I hope a few of you remember me, it hasn’t been TOO long.

But if you don’t know, I have been posting about my Greek mythology comic for quite some time now. Mostly character designs and trying to engage with people on what they wanted to see.

If you don’t know: my story follows Heracles, a former god now turned back to mortal Private Investigator in the 1950’s after abandoning his post as a god. Heracles takes on a case following the kidnapping of a little girl at the hands of an ancient foe, forcing him to face his godlihood.

This is the first page to my comic book fully done! I hope you enjoy, let me know what you think :)

The version most people know today goes like this: Medusa was a beautiful priestess, Poseidon assaulted her in Athena's temple, and Athena punished her by turning her hair into snakes. But that story isn't in the oldest Greek source we have.

In Hesiod's Theogony (around 700 BCE, lines 270-283), the Gorgons Sthenno, Euryale and Medusa are daughters of Phorcys and Ceto who live beyond Oceanus. Medusa is the only mortal one of the three. She isn't described as a human woman who was changed. She is a Gorgon from birth. Hesiod also says Poseidon lay with her "in a soft meadow among spring flowers." There is no temple and no curse from Athena.

The full temple-and-curse version first appears in Ovid's Metamorphoses (Book 4), a Roman poem from around 8 CE, where Perseus tells it at a banquet. Later Greek writers had their own variants too. Apollodorus mentions that "some say" Athena wanted Medusa killed because Medusa claimed to rival her in beauty.

You can also see the change in art. Archaic Greek Gorgons on pottery and temple pediments are grotesque, with tusks, a lolling tongue and a wide grin. The "beautiful Medusa" type becomes common much later.

So I'm curious what people here think. Was Ovid inventing, or was he drawing on a Greek tradition that just didn't survive? And is there any pre-Roman source that hints at the temple story?

(Sisyphus is just one example, you can name more)

Eris, in my opinion, has got to be one of the most beautifully designed villains that I have ever seen. Eris’s design screams, “beautiful, but deadly and villainous” from the way her hair flows to the fact that she’s voiced by Michelle Pfeiffer who gives her such a gorgeous, silky, smooth tone, while still being villainous.

Can we talk more about her? She's SO underappreciated and there are barely any stories featuring her, or maybe there are, every myth that involves the sea there is! 🤭🤭

i found these and honestly i love them

For anyone who needs a refresher Salmoneus was a king who wanted his subjects to worship him like they would Zeus to the point of driving over a brass bridge with a chariot that had pots and pans trailing behind it while tossing torches to imitate a thunder cloud riding, lightning bolt chucking storm god.

Zeus himself wasn't impressed by his hubris and demonstrated the difference between playing god and being one with a well place thunderbolt.

The Aeneid says he's in Tartarus but never specifies if he has a punishment like Tantalus or his brother Sisyphus.

My idea would have him get his sinews cut out like what Typhon did to Zeus in their first battle only to have them regrow and the process repeats eternally so he would get his desire to be like Zeus in the most unpleasant way possible.

The only one other than her I have found who actually cites there sources is Jake Doubleyoo.

I has been thinking about it pretty often lately and excitement about getting to Elysium and growing intellectually or just relaxing in a meadow for a few years before I try again sounds amazing

But I said I shouldn't be that excited about it so how do I stop?

Death just sounds so peaceful and happy just talking about it now I'm smiling idk

The title is not meant to say that ALL monsters followed the same logic, so there is exceptions to what I going to say.

A lot of monsters were not outcasts in a lot of mythologies, not just greek. They believed that everything had its place and should not leave that place, and even monsters had a part to play. Another point is that today we make monsters or demons the enemies of the gods, but in pagan mythology/religion there were rarely sides, just hierarchy. The gods are at the top, with monsters/daimons/heroes in the middle, and everyone else at the bottom. So the conflict between monsters and heroes was a conflict of gods manipulating their favorites for the win, as simple as that.

For example, the serpentine Typhon as well as the Giants were sons of Gaia, and also were monstrous beings with the same intelligence as the gods, and their own existence didn't imply they would be "hated", they did what they did because they wanted power and were evil. We know this because Cecrops and Argos Panoptes were both sons of Gaia, the first one being half-serpent and the second a giant, and yet both were favored by the gods: Cecrops was a king faithful to Athena while Argos was one of Hera's heroes. So they were born exactly like Typhon and the Giants and even shared the same bodily characteristics, yet were champions of the gods. So intelligent monsters were not imediatly thrown away, they could serve the gods just like heroes served the gods, and the gods accepted them in the same way.

The Nemean Lion, Ladon, the Hydra and the Sphinx were all employed by Hera as the terryfing guardians of specific regions and cities. Cerberus was of course employed by Hades (and even Medusa ghost was employed by Persephone). The Harpies served Zeus, Python served Gaia, Orthrus serves Eurytion the herdsmen, son of Ares. Geryon the man with three bodies had a entire herd of red cattle and he lived a good life. And so on and so on.

So as you can see, monsters were not outcasts, their purpose if they had one was to guard places, and they were well respected, so much so that a lot of heroes were punished for killing or harming monsters, like Gilgamesh (in mesopotamian myths), Cadmus and Odysseus. Their purpose in mythology is to terrify the type of people who liked to trespass into sacred ground, and you want to employ terryfing monsters to guard your things if you are a god (this is why statues of Sphinxes and Gargoyles were built in temples or churches). Otherwise, their purpose is to constrast the heroes, because some gods were the parents of monsters or favored them, while others were the parents of heroes and/or favored them (in greece this is mostly Zeus and Athena). The monsters don't allow human civilization to flourish, while heroes are builders of cities and temples, so they represent two sides to a conflict, but the gods as a collective don't favor one side or the other, just individual gods does support one or the other. In the Odyssey Poseidon favors his brute son that eats human flesh, while Athena and Zeus favors Odysseus the hero.

As for Medusa, the most controversial monster, is the same thing. She lived in a island in Oceanus with her sisters, for the simple reason that that is the fate given to her by the gods. Not that the gods want to isolate her, but because like I said, everthing had a place, nature gods could not leave their place of birth because their part is to be there where they are needed, so river gods can't leave their margins, Helios the Sun can't leave the sky during the day, etc, and similary, Circe and Calypso were not exiled or banished either as modern media shows, they just had their own domain and lived there. Since the Gorgons live in a island and are children of Phorcys and Ceto, they are clearly some type of sea daimons, thus under the patronage of Poseidon thus explaining his encounter with Medusa (in the account provided only in Ovid, Medusa don't have snake hair or petryfing powers before Neptune, but elsewhere in mythlogy she was always monstrous, since birth, and had a encounter with Poseidon while she was already a monster).

And Athena in that myth supported the hero Perseus, while Poseidon sends the Cetus to Ethiopia; so both the hero and the monster had their divine patron and part to play, neither were outcasts. Athena helped Perseus in his mission while Poseidon send Cetus in a mission as well, the difference being the end-result of the mission of course, but both the hero and monster had one god on their side and were fighting for them.

Who do you guys think is in this statue alongside Nyx? I need to learn more about her children but I automatically think of Hypnos and Thanatos.

Hey everyone! I have been passively working on the Olympians over the past few months and finally decided to upload them again!! But this time, since I don’t want to make this just a repost, I added 7 new Gods!

This is a huge art dump, so let me go through one by one.

1. Zeus and Hera

2. Poseidon and Amphitrite

3. Hades and Persephone (Underworld vers.)

4. Persephone (Spring vers.) and Demeter

5. Artemis and Apollo

6. Athena and Ares

7. Aphrodite and Hephaestus

8. Hermes, Hestia, and Dionysus

9. All previous groups together

10. Nike, Cratus, Bia, and Zelus

11. Enyo, Phobos, and Deimos

Hope you all like these as usual, and as always comments, questions, and all that is appreciated! See y’all soon <3