Homer | Classical Wisdom Weekly - Part 3

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Tag Archives: Homer

Women in the Odyssey: Goddesses, wives, lovers, and threats

By Ed Whelan, Contributing Writer, Classical Wisdom Traditionally, ancient Greece is seen as a patriarchal society where women were marginalized and oppressed. Yet, despite this, some women were able to be independent and play an important role in the Hellenic world. In the Odyssey of Homer, women play a significant role in the 20-year travels

Hades and Persephone

By Sean Kelly, Managing Editor, Classical Wisdom The myth of Persephone and Hades, that tale of shifting seasons, strangely remains evergreen. Through the centuries, the story of the god of the underworld abducting the goddess Demeter’s daughter, resulting in Demeter’s winter-inducing depression, has endured as one of the most popular and continuously retold stories from

The Top 8 Greatest Inventions of the Mycenaeans

By Ed Whelan, Contributing Writer, Classical Wisdom This month’s Classical Wisdom Litterae Issue is dedicated to the Mycenaeans! Get a subscription and learn more about these fascinating Bronze Age people HERE. Who were they? The Mycenaeans are often regarded as the first Greeks. They were the descendants of the first Neolithic farmers who settled in

Homer’s Real Story: The Truth Behind the ‘Iliad’

Written by John Martin, Contributing Writer, Classical Wisdom For the nearly three millennia since the Iliad’s creation, its grand story remains undiscovered. Homer’s masterpiece was a brilliant exercise in telling a new kind of story while letting his listening audience think that they were hearing another (more familiar, more easily accessible) one.  The blind poet,

The Cunning Homer: A New Look At The ‘Odyssey’

Written by Alberto Majrani, Contributing Writer, Classical Wisdom Who really killed the suitors in Homer’s Odyssey? A careful reading of the epic poem reveals a myriad of clues left by Homer with a surprising conclusion: Ulysses was not…really Ulysses. He was the expert Achaean archer Philoctetes in disguise!  With this key, the Homeric poem suddenly

Master of Stories: Odysseus in the Kingdom of the Dead

Written by Justin D. Lyons, Contributing Writer, Classical Wisdom Just as the adventures described in Books 9-12 of the Odyssey are often the most-remembered episodes due to their fantastic character, so Odysseus’ account of the underworld is one of his most striking. But did it “really” happen? Are we meant to believe that, within the