Homer's Mythology

Homer’s Mythology: Tracing a Tradition Homer’s Mythology: Tracing a Tradition has been designed to help students to: • identify Homer and the time and place in which he wrote; • recognize the major events and characters of the Iliad and the Odyssey to ancient Greek mythology and legend; • identify the major themes of the Iliad and the Odyssey to ancient Greek mythology and appreciate their universality; and • understand the origin and importance of the epic as a literary form. • Introduction and Summary The Iliad and the Odyssey mark the beginning of Western Literature; they are its earliest surviving works. These long epic poems were composed and recited orally in the days before the Greeks used an alphabet, but at some time about 500 B.C. both works were written down. The Iliad and the Odyssey were both recognized in antiquity as great works of art and still retain this place in Western Literature. For centuries, study of these two epics formed the basis of all Greek education. HOMER’S MYTHOLOGY: Tracing a Tradition is a three-part video which introduces students to the Iliad and the Odyssey and to the social and historical context in which these works were written. Because both poems are long and complex, and are concerned with life and events far removed from today’s world, students need background information and preparation before beginning to read them. Part 1: Homer’s World provides historical context for both poems by explaining their oral composition, the role of poets in ancient Greek society, and the importance of Homer’s works. The little that is known about the poet the Greeks called Homer is summarized and the mythology—the gods and goddesses of Mount Olympus—and the legendary material on which the poems are based are introduced. Part 2: The Iliad begins by defining the qualities that make an epic and explains Homer’s use of epithets. The major characters and conflicts in the Iliad are introduced, and the legendary cause of the Trojan War and the story of the Wooden Horse—not parts of the poem itself—are also discussed. Quotations from the text of the Iliad highlight some of the main episodes. Part 2 ends with a discussion of the themes in the Iliad. The treatment of the Odyssey in Part 3: The Odyssey is similar to that of the Iliad in Part 2. The structure of the poem is analyzed, significant events are discussed, and major characters introduced. The universality of the poem’s themes and its influence on later art and literature are also discussed. • Background Information • The Early Civilizations of Greece The first known civilization in Greece flourished on the island of Crete from about 2500 to 1400 B.C. Called Minoan, after the legendary King Monos of Crete, its center was the elaborate palace of Cnossus. From archaeological findings, it is known that the Minoans were an advanced and wealthy society and that they traded with the East and with Egypt. Their religion was a form of nature worship centered in a Mother Goddess. Minoan civilization ended abruptly in 1400 B.C. when invaders from mainland Greece, who were known as the Achaeans, sailed to Crete, occupied Gnossus, and destroyed it. It is the Achaeans—also called the Danaans—who are the main characters in Homer’s poems. They fought in the Trojan War and their era, also known as the age of the Mycenaean civilization, was the Heroic Age of Greece. The Achaeans themselves had come from northern Europe to Greece where they conquered a native people whom they called Pelasgi. The Achaeans embarked on expeditions of conquest—first to Crete, where they assimilated much of what they found in the Minoan culture. In the time the Achaeans developed a wealthy and warlike civilization, intent on conquest and expansion. They expanded eastward toward Asia Minor and Cyprus until they ran into the powerful kingdom of Troy, which controlled the Black Sea. The Trojan War, for centuries considered only a legend, doubtless did take place. Although its legendary cause was the rescue of Helen, its real cause was probably the Mycenaean desire for expansion and trade. The ten-year-long Trojan War apparently weakened the Achaeans and some fifty years after the war ended, they were overrun by a new wave of invaders from the north—the Dorians. These invaders conquered all of Greece, and Mycenaean empire collapsed. The Heroic Age was over. Even before the Dorians conquered Greece, many Achaeans had founded communities on the western islands and on the shores of Asia Minor. With the Dorian conquest, many more fled to these colonies. Little is known about life in ancient Greece from about 1200 to 800 B.C., a period called the Dark Ages of Greece. Civilization was apparently less elegant, less prosperous, and life more difficult than it had been during the height of the wealthy Mycenaean Empire. Poets told and retold idealized stories of the “good old day”—days when men were great heroes. Homer, sometimes said to have been born at Smyrna and to have lived in Chios, wove these stories into two great epics, the Iliad and the Odyssey. • The Homeric Question In Part 1 the narrative touches lightly on the question of whether or not there really was a single poet named Homer who wrote the Iliad and the Odyssey. Controversy over this “Homeric Question” has raged since a German scholar named F.A. Wolf raised it in 1795. During the nineteenth century and the early part of the twentieth century the Homeric question aroused impassioned debate. Those critics and scholars who maintained that there was one author for both poems have been called “Unitarians,” while those who thought there were two different authors, or whole host of authors, or that the poems evolved over many centuries have been called “Analysts.” The ancient Greeks believed there was a single Homer, author of both poems, although they were aware that some additions had been made to the original texts. Most critics agree that the Catalogue of Ships in Book 2 of the Iliad, for example, was basically an ancient document somehow inserted into the poem. Many critics believe that the Odyssey originally ended in Book 23 with the reuniting of Penelope and Odysseus and that all of the rest of Book 23 and Book 24 are later editions. Details of the Homeric question are probably too scholarly for most high school classrooms, and today most critics no longer are interested in whether one man or two or many wrote the poems. The Homeric question, they feel, will never be answered, and energy is better spent in studying the poems themselves. • Using the Program HOMER’S MYTHOLOGY: Tracing a Tradition is a flexible program that may be used in a variety of ways to suit individual class needs. You may want to show all three parts of the video on succeeding days. (A single part takes approximately 15 minutes). Or you may choose to show individual parts as they relate to your curriculum. The varied perspectives from which the Iliad and the Odyssey are viewed make the program appropriate for a wide range of classes in literature, history, or the humanities. It would be particularly useful in a course on the epic, in a close study of either the Iliad or the Odyssey (traditionally part of the ninth-grade literature curriculum), or in courses on the hero, Greek mythology (or any other mythology), poetry of action, or world literature. In classes in which you are using the program to introduce epic poetry, students can read portions of the Iliad and the Odyssey and compare them with works from other cultures, noting the similarities and differences. Such a sampling might include the Elder Edda (Scandinavian), Gilgamesh (Babylonian), the Mahabharata and Ramayana (Hindu), and Beowulf (Anglo-Saxon), The Aeneid by Virgil (Roman), Paradise Lost by John Milton, and the Divine Comedy by Dante. • Presenting the Program Before showing the program to your class, preview them as you would any classroom material. This will enable you to decide how best to use them and what preparation students may need. Ask your school or public librarian for the best available map of modern Greece. Familiarize students with the location of Greece and with its island geography. Point out the surrounding seas: the Mediterranean, the Aegean, the Adriatic, and the Black Sea. Locate the islands of Crete and Ithaca and the city of Athens. Compare the map of modern Greece with an historical map of ancient Greece. The best source is the Atlas of the Classical World by A.A. M. Van der Heyden and H.H. Scullard, published by Thomas Nelson Inc., 1959. If this atlas is not available, ask your librarian for help in locating another map of ancient Greece. You will want to show a map of the periods from about 1400 to 1200 B.C. (the Mycenaean civilization) and from about 900 to 700 B.C. (Homer’s time). Such maps are sometimes titled the “Prehistory of Greece.” Have students note especially the strategic location of Troy, which controlled the entrance to the Black Sea. Before showing the video, it is a good idea to introduce vocabulary words which may be unfamiliar to the students. You may want to e write the words on the board, providing brief definitions or synonyms. On the following pages, you will find difficult words in the context in which they occur. • Discussion Questions and Activities for Students Part 1 1. Name and identify the important gods and goddesses of ancient Greek mythology. How were these different from the earlier Greek gods and goddesses? 2.

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