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Myths, Baby! Podcast
Canada
Приєднався 26 сер 2017
This is the official UA-cam channel for the Let's Talk About Myths, Baby! podcast, written, hosted, and produced by Liv Albert. It is a work in progress as the back episodes of the podcast are being converted into video and uploaded. You can listen to the entire podcast by searching on your podcatcher of choice or visiting www.mythsbaby.com. Accurate captions are also being uploaded to the videos so that the podcast is accessible to those who need them.
The UA-cam account is run by Michaela Smith, the Hermes to Liv's Olympian gods.
The UA-cam account is run by Michaela Smith, the Hermes to Liv's Olympian gods.
It Began With an STI, Origins of Athenian Theatre & Euripides' Satyr Play, Cyclops
Liv looks at some of the more phallic origins of theatre (hint, it's very phallic) and retells the only surviving Satyr play, Euripides' Cyclops. Help keep LTAMB going by subscribing to Liv's Patreon for bonus content!
CW/TW: far too many Greek myths involve assault. Given it's fiction, and typically involves gods and/or monsters, I'm not as deferential as I would be were I referencing the real thing.
Sources: Euripides' Cyclops Companion by Carl A Shaw; Euripides' Cyclops from Six Classical Greek Comedies, translated by Kenneth McLeish and J. Michael Walton; Warwick entry on the Sanctuary of Dionysus.
Attributions and licensing information for music used in the podcast can be found here: mythsbaby.com/sources-attributions.
See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.
More episodes and transcriptions/subtitles are ongoing. For all the episodes of the podcast, search your favourite podcast app! This episode originally aired August 20, 2024.
CW/TW: far too many Greek myths involve assault. Given it's fiction, and typically involves gods and/or monsters, I'm not as deferential as I would be were I referencing the real thing.
Sources: Euripides' Cyclops Companion by Carl A Shaw; Euripides' Cyclops from Six Classical Greek Comedies, translated by Kenneth McLeish and J. Michael Walton; Warwick entry on the Sanctuary of Dionysus.
Attributions and licensing information for music used in the podcast can be found here: mythsbaby.com/sources-attributions.
See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.
More episodes and transcriptions/subtitles are ongoing. For all the episodes of the podcast, search your favourite podcast app! This episode originally aired August 20, 2024.
Переглядів: 82
Відео
Liv Reads Quintus Smyrnaeus: The Fall of Troy, Part 10
Переглядів 7914 годин тому
Liv reads Book 12 and part of Book 13 of the Fall of Troy, translated by AS Way. The Greeks get a little divine help in the form of a follow wooden horse. It does not go well for the Trojans (or Sinon, or Laocoon). Help keep LTAMB going by subscribing to Liv's Patreon for bonus content! This is not a standard narrative story episode, it's a reading of an ancient source, audiobook style. For reg...
Sometimes You Just Stumble Into Something. . . More As to Your Qs
Переглядів 6121 годину тому
Surprise! Liv answers even more listener questions because there were too many and they were too good. Remember you can submit your question for the next Q&A episode(s) anytime at mythsbaby.com/questions Help keep LTAMB going by subscribing to Liv's Patreon for bonus content! CW/TW: far too many Greek myths involve assault. Given it's fiction, and typically involves gods and/or monsters, I'm no...
The Best Answers Are Ridiculously Long Winded & Detailed in Historical Context. . . Answers (Q&A 2)
Переглядів 64День тому
Liv answers more listener questions, featuring myth, history, and lots of educated rambling! Help keep LTAMB going by subscribing to Liv's Patreon for bonus content! CW/TW: far too many Greek myths involve assault. Given it's fiction, and typically involves gods and/or monsters, I'm not as deferential as I would be were I referencing the real thing. Attributions and licensing information for mu...
Is It Sappho, Sappho, or Psappho? Answering Your Burning Questions (Q&A 1)
Переглядів 1,2 тис.14 днів тому
Liv answers listener questions, featuring myth, history, and a little bit about ancient Greek dialects! More questions will be answered on Friday's episode. Help keep LTAMB going by subscribing to Liv's Patreon for bonus content! CW/TW: far too many Greek myths involve assault. Given it's fiction, and typically involves gods and/or monsters, I'm not as deferential as I would be were I referenci...
Conversations: Real Men Compete Naked, the Ancient Olympics w/ Alexandra Sills
Переглядів 13314 днів тому
Liv speaks with Alexandra Sills (of Gladiator episodes fame) about the origins of the Olympic Games. Spoilers: the ancient Greeks were a wild bunch. Read more from Alexandra at Bad Ancient and Working Classicists. Help keep LTAMB going by subscribing to Liv's Patreon for bonus content! CW/TW: far too many Greek myths involve assault. Given it's fiction, and typically involves gods and/or monste...
Sing, Muse, of Gods and Wrestlers, Origins & Odes of the Ancient Olympics
Переглядів 9721 день тому
A look at the ancient and mythological history of Olympics, featuring some songs written for the ancient games' victors. CW/TW: far too many Greek myths involve assault. Given it's fiction, and typically involves gods and/or monsters, I'm not as deferential as I would be were I referencing the real thing. Sources: Pindar, the Odes, translated by Andrew M. Miller; readings from the Ernest Myers ...
Liv Reads Quintus Smyrnaeus: The Fall of Troy, Part 9
Переглядів 6321 день тому
Liv reads the rest of Book 10 and Book 11 of the Fall of Troy, translated by AS Way. Paris is injured and the only woman who can save him is the wife he abandoned for Helen. Things aren't looking good for the Trojans, but Aeneas is pretty cool. Help keep LTAMB going by subscribing to Liv's Patreon for bonus content! This is not a standard narrative story episode, it's a reading of an ancient so...
Remnants of a Matriarchy Hidden in the Crimes of Zeus (Part 2)
Переглядів 14228 днів тому
Liv finishes revisiting the third episode of the podcast, the many crimes of Zeus, this time breaking down what's hidden behind the wild stories of a predatory god. Help keep LTAMB going by subscribing to Liv's Patreon for bonus content! Submit to this year's summer/anniversary Q&A! CW/TW: far too many Greek myths involve assault. Given it's fiction, and typically involves gods and/or monsters,...
Conversations: Putting the Trans in Transformation, Iphis and Caeneus w/ Dr Joe Watson
Переглядів 75Місяць тому
Liv speaks with Dr Joe Watson about the trans characters of Ovid's Metamorphoses, Iphis and Caeneus, along with some necessary asides into Atalanta, Arachne, and Medusa. Follow Joe on Twitter. Help keep LTAMB going by subscribing to Liv's Patreon for bonus content! CW/TW: far too many Greek myths involve assault. Given it's fiction, and typically involves gods and/or monsters, I'm not as defere...
Beloved Boyfriends of Greek Myth's Most Famous Heroes
Переглядів 163Місяць тому
Stories of Achilles and Heracles and their beloved boyfriends. Featuring a clip from my conversation with Charlotte Gregory, episodes on Plato's Symposium, and the episode dedicated to Heracles' lovers. Find all episodes from past Pride Months in this Spotify playlist. Help keep LTAMB going by subscribing to Liv's Patreon for bonus content! CW/TW: far too many Greek myths involve assault. Given...
A Special Anniversary Episode, Seven Years of LTAMB
Переглядів 37Місяць тому
Some of Michaela's favourite moments from the last couple years of the podcast, because it's our seven year anniversary! CW/TW: this compilation features episodes on Seneca's Thyestes (major gore etc.) and one on Ovid's "Nice Guys" (major misogyny), and as always... far too many Greek myths involve assault. Given it's fiction, and typically involves gods and/or monsters, I'm not as deferential ...
Conversations: Beyond the Binary, the Divine Madness of Dionysus w/ Chiara Baldini
Переглядів 112Місяць тому
Liv speaks with raver and researcher Chiara Baldini who talks Dionysus, pre-patriarchal goddesses, and ecstatic worship. Read more from Chiara on Academia.edu and find her Advaya courses here. Help keep LTAMB going by subscribing to Liv's Patreon for bonus content! CW/TW: far too many Greek myths involve assault. Given it's fiction, and typically involves gods and/or monsters, I'm not as defere...
Gender Has Always Been Fluid, Just Ask Dionysus
Переглядів 500Місяць тому
Stories of Dionysus and gender identity in Greek myth. Featuring clips from my conversations with Emma Pauly and Yentl Love and episodes on Dionysus and Ampelus. Find all episodes from past Pride Months in this Spotify playlist. Help keep LTAMB going by subscribing to Liv's Patreon for bonus content! CW/TW: far too many Greek myths involve assault. Given it's fiction, and typically involves god...
Remnants of a Matriarchy Hidden in the Crimes of Zeus
Переглядів 377Місяць тому
Liv revisits the third episode of the podcast, the many crimes of Zeus, this time breaking down what's hidden behind the wild stories of a predatory god. Help keep LTAMB going by subscribing to Liv's Patreon for bonus content! Submit to this year's summer/anniversary Q&A! CW/TW: far too many Greek myths involve assault. Given it's fiction, and typically involves gods and/or monsters, I'm not as...
Conversations: The Love of a Good Woman, Translating Sappho w/ Brendon Zatirka
Переглядів 72Місяць тому
Conversations: The Love of a Good Woman, Translating Sappho w/ Brendon Zatirka
When the Pythia Speaks, You Listen (Euripides' Ion Part 4)
Переглядів 92Місяць тому
When the Pythia Speaks, You Listen (Euripides' Ion Part 4)
Liv Reads Quintus Smyrnaeus: The Fall of Troy (Part 8)
Переглядів 118Місяць тому
Liv Reads Quintus Smyrnaeus: The Fall of Troy (Part 8)
Liv Reads Quintus Smyrnaeus: The Fall of Troy (Part 6)
Переглядів 72Місяць тому
Liv Reads Quintus Smyrnaeus: The Fall of Troy (Part 6)
For Love or Possession, Defining Ancient Parenthood (Euripides' Ion Part 3)
Переглядів 100Місяць тому
For Love or Possession, Defining Ancient Parenthood (Euripides' Ion Part 3)
SPECIAL! Gender Rebels of Greek Mythology: Heracles x Omphale by Ancient History Fangirl
Переглядів 162Місяць тому
SPECIAL! Gender Rebels of Greek Mythology: Heracles x Omphale by Ancient History Fangirl
Conversations: A Man of Many Turns, Odysseus & the Odyssey w/ Joel Christensen
Переглядів 272Місяць тому
Conversations: A Man of Many Turns, Odysseus & the Odyssey w/ Joel Christensen
Keeping the Secrets of Apollo, Euripides' Ion (Part 2)
Переглядів 98Місяць тому
Keeping the Secrets of Apollo, Euripides' Ion (Part 2)
Liv Reads Quintus Smyrnaeus: The Fall of Troy Part 5
Переглядів 73Місяць тому
Liv Reads Quintus Smyrnaeus: The Fall of Troy Part 5
Liv Reads Quintus Smyrnaeus: The Fall of Troy (Part 7)
Переглядів 33Місяць тому
Liv Reads Quintus Smyrnaeus: The Fall of Troy (Part 7)
Beware the Blood of a Gorgon, Euripides' Ion (Part 1)
Переглядів 124Місяць тому
Beware the Blood of a Gorgon, Euripides' Ion (Part 1)
Liv Reads Quintus Smyrnaeus: The Fall of Troy (Part 4)
Переглядів 64Місяць тому
Liv Reads Quintus Smyrnaeus: The Fall of Troy (Part 4)
RE-AIR: It's Almost Like Being Trans Isn't New...Transgender Transformations in Ovid's Metamorphoses
Переглядів 202Місяць тому
RE-AIR: It's Almost Like Being Trans Isn't New...Transgender Transformations in Ovid's Metamorphoses
Conversations: Revisiting the Cultural Memory of the Bronze Age
Переглядів 3073 місяці тому
Conversations: Revisiting the Cultural Memory of the Bronze Age
(Mostly) Archaic Myths as Cultural Memory of the Bronze Age
Переглядів 1 тис.3 місяці тому
(Mostly) Archaic Myths as Cultural Memory of the Bronze Age
The random jk Rowling praise is very off putting 😭 but I’m hoping that she no longer supports or likes her
okay so witch woman slept with the goat.... XD(satyr)
lovely
i started listening to your podcast over a year ago and guess what? i'm going to university for the first time and you inspired me to do it! i'll be studying art history & archeology, we don't have classics studies here in france but i'm still really happy for what i'll be doing. so thank you for your work, it's really making an impact :)
I just want you to know I found you on Spotify a few mouths ago looking up "Greek Mythology" and this podcast has become very dear to me though I'm not completely sure why. It amazing to find someone who cares about these stories like I do and makes them so interesting and entertaining. That all. :)❤
Excellent episode thanks for the info!
The one woman who would have seen the ancient Greek Olympic games supposedly changed every year it was held, but would have been the then priestess (a unmarried girl?) of the the goddess Demeter Chamyne (which was derived either from the earth having opened (chainein) at that place to receive Hades, or from one Chamynus, to whom the building of a temple of Demeter at Elis was ascribed.) but the fact that she would have seen all these men with "dog leashes" (like, I can't, was that also some obscure reference also to like Cerberus?!) ... oh, I can imagine how funny she found it. Like absolutely joked about it with other women. I have never heard it described as Alexandra Sills does and I feel that's a shame. More people need to know! Probably the reason men didn't want women there was because, like today, they would have been afraid of being laughed at, especially if Elis was, as is implied by it having first a Temple of Hera there, a religious place for women later taken over by men/Zeus.
4.20 'Phoenicia being an ancient/mythological region in the Middle East. I am not totally sure how real it was' -Phoenicia was definitely real, and important! Roughly equating with modern Lebanon and (like Greece) split between city states and small kingdoms rather than under one ruler, the Phoenicians were from very early times active seafarers and traders throughout the Mediterranean and beyond (visiting Britain to trade for tin, one of the metals needed to make bronze.) They also established colonies in Sicily, southern Spain and Carthage in North Africa. Their language was quite closely related to that of their neighbours the Hebrews. Because the Phoenicians were active sailors, merchants and colonizers, the Greeks encountered them frequently and there was almost certainly significant cultural influence. The Greeks learned most of the letters of their alphabet from the Phoenicians, although the Greeks added the vowels, as has already been pointed out here. The Phoenicians were the main producers of the expensive purple dye that coloured the robes of the Roman Emperors and symbolised luxury in the Greco-Roman World and is the reason European monarchs still wear purple robes at their coronations today. (The Phoenician purple dye was very unusual in that instead of gradually fading with exposure to sunlight, as most clothes do, it actually became brighter over time.) Carthage, Ancient Rome's great rival, the city of Hannibal and of the (possibly mythical) Queen Dido, was a Phoenician (also called Punic) colony, which acquired a Republican constitution like the Romans and Athenians. The Phoenicians had a dark side, practicing human sacrifice, apparently sometimes even of their own children, and, at least in Carthage, sometimes crucifying unsuccessful military commanders. Although their system of writing has had immense influence (the alphabet in which I am writing this is basically the modernised version of the Roman version of the Etruscan version of the Greek version of Phoenician script) as far as we know they mainly used it for business records and simple inscriptions. Any imaginative literature or ideas of history, geography, science or ethics that they had seem to have remained a purely oral culture and hence has now been lost, except to the extent that its early influence on Ancient Greek, Roman and other cultures may still indirectly affect us now in ways we may not always realise.
Samuel Butler, whose circa 1900 translation this is (and hence out of copyright now, there might be legal problems using a more modern translation if the publishers' lawyers notice.) Butler's translation made the phrase 'wine dark sea' well known in the English speaking World. I understand that the original is literally 'wine faced sea'. As, if what someone told me is correct, although the phrase 'bit the dust', meaning fall dead on the ground, had occasionally been used in English before, it was Butler's translation of the Iliad that made it well known. Samuel Butler also wrote a satirical fantasy novel called Erewhon [an anagram of Nowhere] about an imaginary Civilization beyond a mountain range in New Zealand. Butler never married and there has been speculation as to whether he was what we might now call gay, which in those days was illegal. However, at the time Butler claimed he preferred to have an arrangement with a prostitute rather than to marry, on the principle: 'Why keep a cow, when I can buy my milk?'
18:00 The ghost they give sacrifice to is Zeus, Lugh, Thor, Jupiter, and you'll need to pool a couple of mythos before it all comes together. But what you get is the Dryas over 14,000 years ago was the fall of humanity... not from the solar - but from a celestial battle between Saturn, sending Lycaon (sometimes called Iapetus), and Jupiter. Later Iapetus' three sons try to get revenge for their father's murder, in the Celtic Myth of Cermait's sons. But in the Greek myth they eat their father's essence and move to Jupiter's court. Their names were Atlas, Prometheus, and Epimethus - these would become the ("Gae Assail") spear in Celtic mythos. While io (get it? I/O ) alone is the Prometheus or Light Bringer of the Younger Dryas and Later the Mjolnir.
"But first I need to give Phoebus a piece of my mind. What is wrong with him. Does he abandon young virgins after raping them? Is he apathetic to the deaths of children born from these affairs? Don’t do it! You have power, you should pursue virtue. 440 Whenever mortals do wrong the gods punish them. How can it be right that you who write the laws for mortals are guilty of transgressing them? If -I know this won’t happen, but for the sake of argument-if you and Poseidon and Zeus who rules 445 the sky had to pay the penalty to humans for rape you would empty your temples atoning for your wrongs. You do wrong seeking pleasure without forethought. It is not right any more to speak ill of men if we imitate what the gods consider “fine” 450 but for those who teach us these things it’s another story." -Ion from diotima-doctafemina.org/wp-content/uploads/2022/03/Euripides-Ion.pdf Ion must have been raised by Apollo's Pythia and I just kind of wish there was a version where the Pythia and Creusa /Kreousa just ran away together and Athena blessed their union. It makes me wonder too if Euripides ever met any of the Pythia (Pythagoras’ teacher was supposedly the Pythia Themistoclea /Aristoclea/ Theoclea ) !
I'm intrigued with how Marija Gimbutas is mentioned here with Chiara Baldini and in "Better Off With Bears, Artemis & Goddess Worship w/ Dr Carla Ionescu" too, on a peaceful Neolithic people that were goddess worshiping (or at least created multiple 'Venus figurines'), so presumed matriarchal; connected the ancient Minoan Crete goddesses of Artemis/Demeter/Rhea and tying Persephone/Dionysus into it by a dying/rising type god, later the cult of Bacchus/Liber/Fufluns runs into Roman censorship. I can't help thinking of the Olympic Games today (2024) where so many modern Christians saw a mockery of 'the Last Supper' in a display of what was meant to be homage to Dionysus in the opening ceremony.
Wish the Ellen Lauren /Anne Bogart SITI production of “The Bacchae” was available to watch online somewhere Dionysus as a meta producer/actor/stage manager with it makes me think that the Athenian(?) saying theater had "Nothing to do with Dionysus" (in Aristotle's Politics I think?) was more wish than truth.
Thanks, Liv & Michaela, for this episode and the podcasts generally. This 'greatest hits' one would have been even better with more context e.g. date of the original episode in case we want to go back and listen to the whole thing, who the people were Liv was talking to, some places to look for further information e.g. had they written books or did they have their own websites on the subjects they were discussing? The second item, I think it was, launched into the middle of a story without information as to what the story was or what had happened up to that point, which was confusing. Not far into it, Liv mentioned the 'Chorus', so I guessed this was the plot of an ancient Greek play, probably a tragedy. After a while she mentioned 'his brother Atreus', so I thought, 'Oh, it's THAT family!' Then she mentioned 'The Miller translation' [of what?]. I would have assumed this must be a Greek tragedy and that if we wanted to know more we would therefore have to identify a play translated by Aeschylus, Sophocles or Euripides, who I believe are the only Greek tragedians whose work survives, translated by someone called Miller. Then, towards the end there was a single reference, which some listeners could have missed, to 'Seneca' and one to 'the Wilson translation'. I happened already to know, which some listeners may not, that the Roman philosopher and tutor to the future Emperor Nero, Seneca, wrote several tragedies, I assume in Latin, that survive, and that Emily Wilson, best known for translating Homer, published a book of translations of several of them a few years ago. So my guess is that Liv was basing her talk on a Roman play about a subject from Greek Mythology, that has been translated by (Emily?) Wilson and also by someone else called Miller, although which translation she recommends if we want to read the whole play she did not say. Nor do we know from this how this story fits into the Myths more generally. Does it affect the stories of Agamemnon or Menelaos, the 'sons of Atreus', who will be the next generation of the same family? I originally listened to this episode on Apple podcasts, which did not give much additional information. To be fair, clicking on the description on this UA-cam version it does briefly mention Seneca and that the play is called Tydeus.
1st segment until 23min in is "Conversations: Wandering Through Wine Culture, Ancient Greek Drinking w/ Dr Nadhira Hill" / ua-cam.com/video/iw5ls36LUQc/v-deo.html ; 2nd is from one of the three episodes summarizing Seneca's Thyestes so, A Cursed Ghost and a Goddess of Vengeance Walk Into a Bar . . . Seneca's Thyestes (Part 1) ua-cam.com/video/8dFMeQKDhLI/v-deo.html / What the Goddess of Divine Retribution Wants . . . (Seneca's Thyestes Part 2) ua-cam.com/video/Qdorcjed1iY/v-deo.html / Children Make For A Very Impious Meal (Seneca's Thyestes Part 3) ua-cam.com/video/6X2eEknTOJY/v-deo.html
After 43 min it's "Conversations: The Face That Lit a Thousand* Screens, Helen of Troy in Hollywood w/ Ruby Blondell" ua-cam.com/video/k9S0JF_g6es/v-deo.html ; after 1hr it's Ovid's Ars Amatoria which she's done two episodes on, so most likely either, "But He's Such a Nice Guy! Ovid's Ars Amatoria in Mythological Practice" ua-cam.com/video/uxFzYNCzJXQ/v-deo.html or "Liv Reads Ovid: Valentine's Selections from the Ars Amatoria" ua-cam.com/video/NhXM0EC88DQ/v-deo.html 1hr 10 is "Conversations: The Things They Found in Tombs, Bronze Age Mycenae w/ Dr Kim Shelton" ua-cam.com/video/fzBlkIbRVmg/v-deo.html - hope this helps! (No, I'm not connected to the making of the Myths, Baby! show, just have a unusually good memory when it comes to myth)
❤❤
Hey, fellow Euripides lover here. I'm really interested in the Troy myth rn and Euripides' Helen and Orestes were great for that. He always does something interesting with familiar myths. But you read more than me. Do you have a reading suggestion for me? Love the Athena detail in this btw too <3 Great pod, thank you for doing what you do 🙏
I love how you guys converse! So entertaining thank you for this pod 🫶🏼🫶🏼🫶🏼
This video deserves far more than the 2 Likes and 77 views it has received at time of writing (July 2024) on UA-cam in the 2 years since it was posted. Fortunately, this and Liv Albert's 'Myths Baby' podcasts can also be listened to on other platforms, so I trust has a larger audience there. Between them Liv and Laura manage to raise several ideas I had not thought about before, or in a couple of cases that l had wondered about but had rarely found discussed by anyone else, and not at all by academic classicists. I don't know if anyone except me will ever read these Comments, but I am inspired to leave some thoughts of my own here so there is a record of them. I had already discovered the Greek Myths Comix videos but did not know the name of the lady whose voice I recognise from them, who I learn from this is called Laura Jenkinson Brown. I am delighted to find her here in conversation with Liv Albert of Let's Talk About Myths Baby, to whom (granmar) l also enjoy listening. 18.44 I had not thought before that part of what motivates Achilles in the Iliad could be resentment at having been used to fool Agamemnon's daughter Iphigenia to go to be a human sacrifice just before the War, in a story that is not mentioned in the Iliad but may already have been familiar to Homer and his audience. 32.30 ish onwards, I had not thought before about Laura J-B's point in relation to Odysseus's dalliance on the way home with Circe and Calypso could be because they are both goddesses and saying 'No' to a god or goddess, or otherwise offending them, in many other Myths leads to them using their divine powers, or their influence with other even more powerful gods, to bring a curse or death not just on the person who offends them but on their family too. If Odysseus had refused Circe or Calypso, he might have endangered himself and Penelope and Telemachus as well. 39.42 Calypso is described as protesting against the 'double standard' that male gods are allowed to have affairs with mortals, but goddesses are usually not. This is a common modern interpretation of that passage, but I am not sure if it is right or not. Calypso does say she resents the fact that the gods will not let her do what she wants (continue her affair with Odysseus) and that the same applies to other goddesses who want to have affairs with mortals. However, she never actually draws the parallel that no such rule applies to male divinities who want to have their fun with mortal women, nor that it is unfair to have different rules for males and females. Perhaps that is implied, or perhaps we are projecting our modern attitudes anachronistically. I really don't know. Apart from the fact that, then as now, male and female sex drives are somewhat different, in Ancient times, before modern contraception and DNA tests, the consequences of women enjoying sexual freedom were so different from the consequences for men, in terms of pregnancy and men bringing unwittingly bringing up another man's child as their own, that it probably seemed to make a kind of sense that different sexual standards should apply to males and females. I am not saying that was fair, just explaining why they might have seen things like that then.
that's what i've been saying, man
Fax have been spoken🫤🗣️🔥🔥💯💯
This and my Comment below concern two important questions that Laura raises in this discussion about Homer's Odysseus that I had been thinking about, but I don't know of any university academic commentators ever considering. I was not even quite sure if we were allowed to ask about them, as 'Adult content' in both cases. 37.42 Laura 'You don't hear about Odysseus having bed slaves at Troy, but you hear about all the other Greek leaders having them.' Liv 'Everyone else is' Laura 'You hear about Achilles, you hear about Patroclus, you hear about Agamemnon, and you can probably assume about a lot of the rest of them, because there are an awful lot of enslaved women being passed about. They say that they've divvied up all of the women from all of their exploits around the area...but you don't hear that Odysseus has one. So, maybe it is assumed that he does but you certainly don't hear about it. To be honest, you don't hear enough about the enslaved women full stop.' Regarding the last point, are you sure you want to know too much? Their personal stories, if you think about what they have likely gone through in the process of becoming a slave concubine to the side who have killed their husbands and fathers, must frequently be horrific. If you do want to think about such things, then Pat Barker's novel 'The Silence of the Girls', mostly imagined from Briseis's point of view, is eloquent, but unsuitable for very sensitive or easily upset readers. I think there is just enough evidence in the Iliad to say that, more likely than not, Odysseus does have a slave concubine/ bed slave, who is not mentioned because she has no role in the plot. Remember, we might not even have known Briseis existed had the two most important Greek leaders not quarreled over her, and this affected the course of the war. We only learn that Patroclus has a slave concubine called Iphis, and Achilles has a second one called Diomede, because of a single reference to the sleeping arrangements in Achilles/ Patroclus shared hut near the end of Book 9 of the Iliad. That Homer mentions their existence at all is probably only because the visit that has just been described of Odysseus and others, on behalf of Agamemnon, to Achilles' hut focuses attention on living arrangements there. From which we also learn e.g. that Patroclus does the cooking and Achilles sings and plays the lyre. Homer may mention the fact that Achilles and Patroclus each have a pretty or elegant captured girl to sleep beside them at night, either to convey the idea that Patroclus and Achilles are living well on the loot Achilles has won by his exploits as a warrior, and/or, if the rumours of a homosexual relationship between them were already circulating in Homer's time, to play down, or at least provide a cover that by emphasising Achilles and Patroclus's heterosexuality. (Whether, when the guests are gone, there is some partner swapping, or a menage à trois, or menage à quatre, arrangement involving Achilles, Patroclus and the girls, we don't know.) Had there not been an important meeting between leaders in Achilles' hut, we might well never have known that Patroclus had a concubine, or that Achilles had a second concubine as well as Briseis. The point for the purpose of this argument is that we only know about any of these 'bed slaves' because there is some context in the story as to why they are mentioned. If Odysseus has one, she would probably not be mentioned, since she does nothing relevant to Homer's plot. My reasons for thinking that, at least most likely, he does are: 1. Why wouldn't he, when almost everyone else seems to? Even if Odysseus loves Penelope, he goes to Troy as a youngish, vigorous man, and 10 years is a long time to expect him to go without sex. 2. In Book 1 of the Iliad, when Agamemnon is fuming at the prospect of being compelled to give up his 'prize' (geras in the Greek) the lovely slave Chryseis, whom he has already said he intends to sleep with, Agamemnon says in that if he has to lose Chryseis, he will compensate himself by taking Ajax's, Odysseus's or Achilles' prize. Prize/Geras can in their culture mean either a valuable object won as spoils of war, or a woman won as spoils of war. The prize Agamemnon is threatening to take from Odysseus could therefore in theory be either a woman, or an inanimate object like a bronze tripod or a cauldron. However, an attractive young woman sounds a more suitable replacement for Chryseis than a metal tripod. Certainly, the prize that Agamemnon actually does take from Achilles is not a metal object, but the beautiful girl Briseis. We don't know what prize Agamemnon was thinking of taking from Ajax, but there was an ancient tradition, although recorded later than Homer, that Ajax had a child by a captured slave concubine called Tecmessa. So Agamemnon could have been threatening to take her. Other relevant points: 1. In Book 23 of the Iliad, at Patroclus's Funeral Games, Odysseus and Ajax compete at wrestling for the prizes offered, one of which is a woman skilled in domestic crafts. The match is declared a draw, so we don't know if Odysseus wins this woman or not. If he does, we don't know if their relationship becomes more intimate than just discussing domestic crafts. 2. Menelaos is, as Laura says, at least mot mentioned in the Iliad as having a slave concubine during the Trojan War. However, Menelaos is evidently not opposed to the idea of having sex with slave women, as we are told in Book 4 of the Odyssey that, in addition to having a daughter by Helen, Menelaos also has an adult son called Megapenthes, whose mother was a slave. Megapenthes has an honoured place in Menelaos's household. Whether Helen minds, we are not told. So Menelaos would presumably not have thought it wrong to take a captured local woman as a bed slave during the Trojan War too. 3. In Euripides' 'Trojan Women', which Laura mentions, and also another of his plays, called 'Hecuba', the elderly Queen of Troy, Hecuba, becomes Odysseus's slave at the end of the Trojan War, but she does not survive the voyage back to Ithaca. However, Hecuba has by that stage given birth to 20 children, most of whom had grown to adulthood, so she is probably too old to be likely to be made a concubine.
Another comment with 'adult content' on a point Laura raises, I think rightly, that is ignored by most academic and other commentators on Homer. In Book 10 of the Odyssey, when Odysseus and his crew take a year's break from their journey on Circe's island, which must be at least partly a relief for them after enduring 10 years of war and all the things that have happened since: 42.20 Laura 'And I am sure his men were probably quite enjoying their time too, because one thing that's never mentioned is how many slave women, enslaved women, were on those ships too. And they're not just on the ship while these guys are chilling out in Circe's house. They are being used, very likely. They are probably quite happy to. The men, not the women.' Liv 'No! God! And I think Circe had a lot of, like, nymphs on her island, so they might have been having some consensual fun as well, I like to think, at least a little.' This refers to the fact that during the whole of Odysseus's narrative of the voyage, Books 9 to 12, almost the centre of the Odyssey, there is no mention at all of any women being on Odysseus's ships. Nor, if they were being held there as slaves, does the poem address the practical problems that would involve, such as what arrangements are made for guarding them when the ships stop off anywhere, or what happens about these additional mouths to feed when the crew are running out of food on Thrinacia in Book 12. Some people assume this means that there were no women on board. Others say that since Homer and Odysseus do not mention any, it is useless to speculate on matters on which we have no information. A few prefer not to have to consider such things lest some of the implications spoil their enjoyment of the Odyssey. Personally, I think Laura is right that Homer and his audience would have assumed that there were quite a lot of women on board the ships, whom Odysseus and his men have captured and enslaved from Troy and other towns they conquered, and whom they now keep as domestic servants, certainly, but also, at least equally certainly, for the younger and prettier of these women, for sex. Indeed, it would be more surprising and surely require explanation if this was not so. At the beginning of the previous Book, Book 9, Odysseus tells his Phaeacian hosts, that soon after setting sail for home after the Trojan War, he and his men opportunistically sack a coastal town of the Cicones, who were allies of the Trojans and thus enemies of the Greeks. There, the Greeks slay the Cicones men and 'took the wives and much loot to share out among ourselves.' That is the only mention of these women. We therefore reasonably have to ask what Homer and his audience would assume happens to them. Before that in Book 3 of the Odyssey, Nestor tells Telemachus about the Greek fleet, which includes Odysseus and his ships, setting sail for home after the War, after, Nestor says, loading their plunder and women on board. As the Greeks had left their own women at home when they went away to the War, these must be local ladies from Troy and the Trojan allied towns that the Greeks sacked during the war, whom the Greeks reduced to slavery. Whatever serious moral difficulties we, with our modern values, have with this, many passages from Homer and other ancient authors make clear that it was totally normal and accepted then that when warriors conquered a town; they killed all its men and enslaved its women, who became the absolute property of the victors. The Greeks looked forward to this as a reward if they won, the Trojans feared it if they lost. The Ithacans who went to the War with Odysseus surely expected their share of these women, as of the other spoils. Odysseus, as a leader who, for all his faults, does try to look after his men, would surely have made sure that they got them. And while female slaves were certainly valuable in part because, in a pre-industrial society where everything had to be done by someone's labour, they would be set to work weaving and at domestic tasks, one of, probably the, most important things they were wanted for, was to use their bodies for sex. And after 10 years away from their own wives and mistresses at the War, the manly Greek warriors would be near desperate for it. Thus, it is extremely likely that from the beginning of the voyage, there were many slave women on the ships, probably traumatised after having witnessed the massacre of their own menfolk, having to sleep with the Greek warriors who killed them. It is possible that, depending on where they were being held, some of these women may have escaped early in the voyage in the confusion as the Odysseus and his men are forced to flee for their lives and set sail at once, when a new army of Cicones arrives the day after the raid on the town. If any women did escape, the Cicones, as allies of the Trojans, would probably have taken them in and integrated them into their society, since the Trojan women no longer had homes and families of their own to go back to. However, probably not all of these women escaped As Laura says, Odysseus's crew seem content to delay going home to their families for a long time on Circe's island, only demanding to leave after a year has passed. That suggests that most of the crew have sexual partners on the island. As there are few other inhabitants, this must mean that the crew are happily bonking away with Trojan and Cicones women slaves. Given what must have been the utterly traumatic beginning to the relationship from the women's point of view, whether this has to mean they are all being 'forced' [there is another word for this beginning with 'r' that UA-cam don't like people using], or whether, if not treated too harshly, some of the women may begin to switch allegiance to the Greek warriors, or effectively trade sex for protection and better treatment, I don't know, and indeed we probably cannot fully know how a woman from Aegean Bronze Age culture would react in this situation. As Liv and Laura say in relation to another point in this video, we have to remember that this is war, and atrocities happen in wars even today. As to what ultimately becomes of these women, assuming, as I think logically we must, that they are there on the ships, they presumably all die, along with all the crews, except Odysseus himself, when the ships are lost. However, Homer thinks it unnecessary to pad out his story by mentioning the fate of slaves, unless they have some particular part in the plot. A tough World in those times. As to whether it is plausible that Homer could have chosen to leave out entirely something we might consider important, like the presence of, most likely, hundreds of enslaved women on Odysseus's ships, and the deaths of all of them, I would say yes, as there are other things that to us would seem important that Homer's narrative leaves out, whether to avoid making his epics even longer and more complicated, or because they seemed less important to him and his audience, or would have been so obvious to them as not to need stating, or that they preferred not to have to think about. These include: -Whether the Greek warriors were having children by the women they captured as concubines during the 10 years of the Trojan War, and what happened to those children -What happened to Briseis after the death of Achilles. Achilles' ghost is in both the Underworld scenes in the Odyssey, and asks for or is brought news from the land of the living about his father, his son and his own funeral, but he does not ask about, nor does anyone mention, Briseis. -The fate of children during the sack of cities. We are normally told about the men (killed) and women (made slaves), but rarely what happens to the children, except in a few individual cases like Astyanax, whose fate is hinted at. -Whether women on the losing side committed suicide during the sack of cities to avoid becoming slaves or sex slaves. I would expect that many would choose that way out, but there is no mention of it in Homer.
love this ! I recently started working with Aphrodite/Ishtar I love learning about their lore and the things their mythology encouraged
Any dudes that feel personally attacked, that's a you problem, I loved this episode!! New subscriber
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I am not quite convinced by a lot of what Joel says, but find it hard to explain why. If you want a view of Odysseus that includes some criticism, I prefer the episode that Liv recorded a couple of years ago about Heroes jointly with Laura Jenkinson Brown of Greek Myths Comix, about Achilles, Odysseus and Aeneas.
On Hector and Andromache's infant son Astyanax being thrown to his death from the city wall when the Greeks capture Troy, to make sure Astyanax cannot grow up to be a formidable warrior like his father, and seek violent revenge on the Greeks: 28.53 Liv: Odysseus 'threw a baby off a wall' Laura 'Yes, but he also saved another baby...the child of Antenor, a Trojan who gave him hospitality... he saves Antenor's child from the Trojan War...And yes, he also killed Hector's child, but I can kind of see why, not that I think there is ever a reason to kill children, but he's doing it to prevent further atrocity in the future because the pattern of revenge...so, horrible thing to have to even vaguely try to say is justified because it's not justified, but I can see why he thought he should do it.' Liv 'It's also war, I think we have to remember' Laura 'Yes, and war crimes happen in war. That definitely is a thing.' Both incidents of killing or sparing Trojan children during the Sack of Troy occur after the end of the Iliad. From internet search about this: -As so often, more than one version of the myth is found in surviving Ancient literature. Liv and Laura are accepting the version in which Odysseus kills little Astyanax. There is an alternative version in which it is not Odysseus but Achilles' son Pyrrhus, also called Neoptolemus. I had not heard about Antenor's son before but Antenor was one of King Priam's counsellors who had unsuccessfully tried to persuade Priam to try to resolve the conflict, and thus save Troy, by returning Helen to Menelaos. When Odysseus and Menelaos visited Troy before the beginning of the War to try to negotiate a settlement, they stayed with Antenor, who according to some versions prevented a plot by some of the Trojans to murder Menelaos and Odysseus while they were visiting, which would have been a serious breach of 'xenia' (hospitality). Antenor had many sons, most of whom died fighting the Greeks in the War. Very unusually, since the Greeks killed almost all the Trojan men at the end of the War, Antenor and his two surviving sons, one of whom was an adult, were allowed to live and Odysseus was important in protecting the two sons. I don't know the full circumstances of this.
50.00 Liv: Aeneas, although a minor character in the Iliad, 'does seem like he's ready to be this important character' - I had not thought about that before. On Virgil both imitating but trying to outdo Homer's Iliad and Odyssey e.g. both have their hero visit Hades, meeting the spirits of warriors who died in the Trojan War, one difference I notice is as follows. Homer has the ghosts of Greek warrior leaders like Achilles, Patroclus and Agamemnon meet each other and Odysseus when he visits Hades. However, Homer simply does not mention that the ghosts of Trojans they killed, or who killed them, like Hector and Paris, are presumably also down in Hades, or what those meetings would have been like. Virgil does address that in Book 6 of the Aeneid. Aeneas encounters the spirits there of Greek warriors who recognise him as an enemy. Some run away from him. Others try to shout war cries, but because they are now disembodied spirits they are unable to make any sound.
Very insightful!
Have you heard of Dr. Ammon Hillman?
Keep going
Hiii
I thought I will sleep to this. Am awake now.
this was awesome ❤
Great chat thanks . Really interesting insights. Have you read Kazantzakis : The Odyssey A Modern Sequel. ? He grafts a 1000 page poem onto Homer's Odyssey . It set me to reading Nikos Kazantzakis other fabulous books .
Another issue in AC odyssey is that it continues the myth of infanticidal exposure. It’s in one of the loading screen factoids. And I agree about Alexios. He sounds much more cartoonish compared to Kasandra
33:09 instead of “free” a better framing would be “anti-state”
One of the best episodes so far
Too true about Gaza, Liz! The Israeli people themselves see that!
I love your readings.
What an amazing conversation!
It was so fun!
Are you coming back? I only just found you and have been really enjoying your content.
So much better heard then read. Thank you. Now if I only knew greek.
All Hail Kybele, the Idian Mountain Mother of all the Gods, Humans, and Beasts.
Would you be able to add time stamps for each chapter? Thanks!
This was really interesting. I hope you can do some more like this.
Amazing reading! Thank you for this.
This is exactly what I have been looking for.. Thank you for this wonderful podcast. This topic needs to be discussed and it is something truly enlivening to the soul.
Have really liked these Bronze Age episodes. Thanks. Regarding the Linear B written tablets surviving from the time, mostly palace inventories and administrative records of use of stores, so sadly there are no histories, legends, poems or personal letters: -The syllabic script was somewhat clumsy in representing the sounds of Greek (was it derived from a script originally designed for a different language with a different structure?) which may be why it was not used to record poems that may already been circulating orally, containing early forms of myths. There were no symbols to represent free-standing consonants, only consonants followed by a vowel, so that there were separate symbols for ta, te, ti, to etc., sa, se, si etc. This meant that to write a name like 'Patroclos', where there are consonants together, and which ends in a consonant, a scribe would have to write something like: Pa-ta-ro-co-lo and leave the reader to puzzle out that this was meant to be pronounced 'Patroclus' Ditto something like Sa-pa-ra-ta for 'Sparta'. Hence, reading out a passage would have tended to be halting, tedious and difficult for long passages and to lose any poetic rhythms. This may be why they stuck to using Linear B for functional tasks like accounting for jars of olive oil, sheep and slaves received or sent by the palace. A point I understand is discussed by scholars that, unless I missed it, Liv perhaps did not have time to mention in any of these Bronze Age Episodes, that may even tie in with legends of the Trojan War, is the mention of women identified as being from various places in the Eastern Aegean working in or for the palace, apparently as slaves, in the Linear B tablets. Some are identified as being from islands or towns on the coast of Anatolia that in later historical times were inhabited by Greeks, but which may not have been then, and which according to the traditions about the Trojan War the Greeks raided and plundered. In at least one case, one of these women is described as 'To-ro-ja', which may be the nearest that Linear B could approximate to writing 'Trojan'. In another case, they are referred to by a word that implies 'War Captive'. These women are sometimes described as having children with them, but not as having husbands. This is compatible with the ruthless practice, very cruel by our values, but accepted then, in Homer, that when the Greeks captured an enemy town in war or raiding they normally killed all the men there, so there would be no further resistance or revenge, while the, more easily dominated, women were considered part of the loot and were enslaved. Are these women, apparently not free, from across the sea, recorded working for the Mycenaeans in the Linear B tablets, victims of whatever conflicts and raids gave rise to the traditions about the Trojan War? Did the Greeks kill their menfolk and enslave them? Were the children they have with them enslaved with them at the same time and/or sired out of them by their Greek masters, using them as slave concubines? Whoever these women and their children were, they are presumably among the ancestors of the present day Greeks, who are thus, in a sense, both Greek and Trojan in ancestry and genetics.
For your algorithm
@FlintDibble At about 44min in there's a mention of a Sue?Susan Sharrett (sp?) and how she has published a paper or book talking about a warrior grabbing two different spears/shields described in the Iliad from bronze age / iron age spear? What's her last name/ the title of the work? I also wonder if there's a way to pin down where the sacrifices as described in the Iliad mirror what region they have first found the burning of thigh bones it used?