THE MYTHOLOGY OF ANCIENT GREECE
Spring Semester, 2003
D. White
Course Number: 3200:289-080
Tues., 9 September 2003
STUDY GUIDE #2
Some of this might be on the first quiz; most will be saved for the second quiz. I’ll let you know closer to quiz time.
PRINCIPAL LITERARY SOUCES FOR GREEK AND ROMAN MYTH:
Homer: Iliad (“Story of Ilium (=Troy)”, Odyssey (“Story of Odysseus”) – these are epic (“spoken”, not sung)
Hesiod: Theogony (“Birth of the Gods”), Works and Days (which is a didactic, or “teaching” poem)
Homeric Hymns: poems attributed to Homer, each one consists of an invocation to a particular god and
often the retelling of a particular myth about that god or goddess.
Lyric Poetry:
Pindar (5th cent. B.C.): Victory Odes for victors in the various Games
Other lyric poets, 7th-5th centuries B.C. (lyric poetry is sung to the accompaniment of the lyre)
Tragedy:
Tragic Poets (there were many others, but these are the only ones of whom we have complete plays):
Aeschylus (525-456 B.C.)
Sophocles (496-406 B.C.)
Euripides (480-406 B.C.)
Alexandrian Scholar-Poets:
Callimachus (born ca. 310 B.C.): Aitia (“Causes”); Hymns (imitations/parodies of the Homeric Hymns)
Apollonius of Rhodes (ca. 295-215 B.C.): Argonautika (“Voyage of Argo”)
Roman poets:
Vergil (70-19 B.C.): Aeneid (“Story of Aeneas”); Georgics (“On Farming”)
Ovid (43 B.C.-A.D. 18):
Metamorphoses (“Transformations”), collects a great many Greek and Roman myths, served as
“handbook” for Greek myth for hundred of years in Western Europe;
Fasti (“The Calendar”), deals with Roman myths and rituals, only covers January-June because
Ovid was exiled to Tomi on the Black Sea before he could finish it.
There are also non-poetic, “nonfiction” and encyclopedic sources, such as:
Pausanias (2nd cent. A.D.), Description of Greece, a guidebook in which he related the myths and legends
connected to the places he visits and describes.
The Bibliotheca (“Library”), an encyclopedic summary of Greek myths, probably dating to the 1 st or 2nd cent. A.D.
and attributed (falsely) to Apollodorus, a scholar of the 2nd century B.C.
OLYMPIAN GODS -- GREEK AND ROMAN NAMES:
(Even if we don’t get to a particular god by the quiz date, know this list):
Greek name
Zeus
Hera
Poseidon
Demeter
Hestia
Hades
Apollo
Artemis
Ares
Aphrodite
Hermes
Hephaistos (or, Hephaestus)
Athena
Dionysus
Roman name
Jupiter
Juno
Neptune
Ceres
Vesta
Pluto; Dis
Apollo
Diana
Mars
Venus
Mercury
Vulcan
Minerva
Bacchus; Liber
THE NINE MUSES (in no particular order, and the area of art that each one inspired):
Melpomene – Tragedy
Clio – History
Calliope – Epic Poetry
Erato – Lyric Poetry
Thalia – Comedy
Urania – Astronomy
Polyhymnia – Sacred Song
Terpsichore -- Dance
Euterpe – Flute Playing
SEVEN WONDERS OF THE (ANCIENT) WORLD (the only one still in existence is the Pyramids):
Statue of Zeus (made of gold and ivory (“chryselephantine”) by the sculptor Pheidias) in the temple at Olympia
Pyramids of Egypt (as old at the time of the ancient Greeks as the ancients Greeks are to us!)
Lighthouse (Pharos) at Alexandria in Egypt. (Called “Pharos” or “Pharos Lighthouse”, after the island
where it was located. Note: not “Pharaoh’s lighthouse”!)
Hanging Gardens of Babylon (possibly mythical)
Mausoleum (tomb of King Mausolus) at Halicarnassus, in SW Asia Minor (Turkey)
Colossus of Rhodes (cf. Emma Lazarus’ poem The New Colossus at the Statue of Liberty)
Temple of Artemis at Ephesus (in western Asia Minor; the same Ephesus as the one mentioned in the New
Testament of the Bible, as in St. Paul’s letter to the Ephesians)
MISC. FROM EARLY CREATION MYTHS:
AGES OF MAN:
Hesiod, Works and Days
Golden
Silver
Bronze
Heroic
Iron
Ovid, Metamorphoses
Golden
Silver
Bronze
Iron
PROMETHEUS (“Forethought”):
Son of Iapetus and Klymene
Brother of Epimetheus (“Afterthought”) and Atlas
Principal stories:
Division of the Sacrifices (why humans get to eat the good parts)
Creation of humanity (cf. Mary Shelley – Frankenstein is “The Modern Prometheus”)
Theft of fire from the gods (fire = civilization; civilized people cook their food)
Punishment in Caucasus mountains – eagle/vulture pecking out liver
Friend of humanity, sometimes just called “The Titan”
PANDORA (“All-Gifts”):
Might mean “all-gifted” or “all-giver”
Different stories in Theogony and Works and Days
First woman
Made as punishment for humanity, because of Prometheus’ theft of fire
Story of her Jar (not “box”) – unleashes evils except Hope
FLOOD STORY:
Zeus punishes humanity for evils – story of Lycaon
Deucalion and Pyrrha survive
Husband and wife, also brother and sister – children of Prometheus
As I said, Quiz 1 might include some material from this handout, depending on how far we get. Quiz 2 might also
include some items from the first handout if I think they are important enough to go over again. Quiz 2 will also
include some material from the handout about all the gods, going only as far as we will have gotten in class by the
time of that quiz.