Historical basis and time of creation of Homeric poems. G. Schliemann and Troy.
Mythological basis and plot of Homeric poems.
The concept of an epic hero and images of warriors in the poem.
Moral problems of Homeric poems.
The originality of the epic worldview and style.
The Homeric question and the main theories of the origin of the poems.
Homer is traditionally considered the author of the two epic poems, The Iliad and The Odyssey. Pushkin: “You can only feel Homer.” The authorship of Homer has not been proven, just as his existence has not been proven. He became a legend already in antiquity. Almost all Polis argue about the right to consider themselves his homeland. Epic poetry arose in the 10th century BC, the poetry of Homer - at the turn of the 9th and 8th centuries. These are the first written creations with which European literature began. Most likely, this is not the beginning of a tradition - the author refers to predecessors and even includes excerpts from predecessor poems in the text. "Odyssey" - Demodocus, Thamir the Thracian. Then parodies of Homer’s poems appear - “Batrachomyomachy” - the fight between frogs and mice.
Antiquity is not characterized by the usual definition of “epic”. "Epic" - "speech, story." It appears as a form of everyday story about an event important for the history of a tribe or clan. Always poetic reproduction. The subject of the image is the history of the people based on mythological perception. The artistic ancient epics are based on majestic heroism. Heroes of epics represent entire nations (Achilles, Odysseus). A hero is always strong with the strength of his people, representing both the best and the worst in his people. The hero of Homer's poems lives in a special world where the concepts “everyone” and “everyone” mean the same thing.
Studying the language of Homer's poems, scientists came to the conclusion that Homer came from an Ionian aristocratic family. The language of the Iliad and Odyssey is an artificial subdialect that has never been spoken in life. Until the 19th century, the prevailing point of view was that the content of both poems was poetic fiction. In the 19th century, they started talking about the reality of events after Troy was discovered by the amateur Heinrich Schliemann (in the last quarter of the 19th century).
Heinrich Schliemann was born in 1822 in Germany into the family of a poor pastor. On his seventh birthday, he received a colorful encyclopedia of myths and after that he declared that he would find Troy. He doesn't get an education. The story of his youth is very stormy: he is hired as a cabin boy on a schooner, the schooner is shipwrecked, Schliemann ends up on a desert island. At the age of 19 he goes to Amsterdam and gets a job there as a petty clerk. Turns out. That he is very receptive to languages, so he soon goes to St. Petersburg and opens his own business - supplying bread to Europe. In 1864, he closed his business and used all the money to open Troy. He goes to places where she could be. The entire scientific world carried out excavations in Bunarbashi in Turkey. But Schliemann relied on Homeric texts, where it was said that the Trojans could go to the sea several times a day. Bunarbashi was too far from the sea. Schliemann found Cape Hisarlik and found out that the real reason for the Trojan War was economics - the Trojans charged too much for passage through the strait. Schliemann carried out the excavations in his own way - he did not excavate layer by layer, but excavated all the layers at once. At the very bottom (layer 3A) he found gold. But he was afraid that his unprofessional workers would plunder him, so he told them to go celebrate, while he and his wife carried the gold into the tent. Most of all, Schliemann wanted to return Greece to its former greatness, and, accordingly, this gold, which he considered the treasure of King Priam. But according to the laws, the treasure belonged to Turkey. Therefore, his wife - Greek Sophia - hid the gold in cabbage and transported it across the border.
Having proved to the whole world that Troy really existed, Schliemann actually destroyed it. Later, scientists proved that the required temporary layer was 7A; Schliemann destroyed this layer while extracting gold. Then Schliemann conducted excavations in Tiryns and dug up the homeland of Hercules. Then excavations in Mycenae, where he found a golden gate, three tombs, which he considered to be the burials of Agamemnon (the golden mask of Agamemnon), Cassandra and Clytemnestra. He was wrong again - these burials belonged to an earlier time. But he proved the existence of an ancient civilization, as he discovered clay tablets with writing. He also wanted to conduct excavations in Crete, but he did not have enough money to buy the hill. The death of Schliemann is absolutely absurd. He was driving home for Christmas, caught a cold, fell in the street, was taken to a poor shelter, where he froze to death. He was buried magnificently; the Greek king himself walked behind the coffin.
Similar clay tablets have been found in Crete. This proves that a very long time ago (12th century BC) there was writing in Crete and Mycenae. Scientists call it “linear pre-Greek pre-alphabetic syllabary,” and there are two varieties: a and b. A cannot be deciphered, B has been deciphered. The tablets were found in 1900 and deciphered after the Second World War. Franz Zittini deciphered 12 syllables. The breakthrough was made by Michael Ventris, an Englishman, who suggested that the basis should be taken not from the Cretan dialect, but from the Greek dialect. So he deciphered almost all the signs. The scientific world was faced with a problem: why did they write in Greek at the time of its heyday in Crete? Schliemann first tried to determine the exact date of the destruction of Troy - 1200 BC. He was only wrong by ten years. Modern scholars have established that it was destroyed between 1195 and 1185 BC.
Two categories of people are considered native speakers of the Homeric language: Aeds and Rhapsodes. Aeds are storytellers, creators of poems, semi-improvisers, they have a high position in society, so they had the right to change something in the poems. Homer mentioned Demodocus and Thamir the Thracian. The art of the Aeds is mysterious, since it is very difficult to remember so much text. The art of the Aeds is clan-based; each clan had its own secrets of memorization. Some families: Gomerids and Creophilides. Most often they were blind, “Homer” means blind. This is another reason why many believe that Homer did not exist. Rhapsodes are only performers; they could not change anything.
In relation to the epic, the concepts of plot and plot are very different. Plot is a natural direct temporal connection of events that constitutes the content of the action of a literary work. The plot of Homer's poems is the Trojan cycle of myths. It is associated with almost all mythology. The plot is local, but the time frame is short. Most of the motivations for the characters' actions are outside the scope of the work. The poem “Cypria” was written about the causes of the Trojan War.
Reasons for the war: Gaia turns to Zeus with a request to clear the earth of some people, since there are too many of them. Zeus is threatened by the fate of his grandfather and father - to be overthrown by his own son from the goddess. Prometheus names the goddess Thetis, so Zeus urgently marries her to the mortal hero Peleus. At the wedding, an apple of discord appears, and Zeus is advised to use Parisa Mom, a malicious adviser.
Troy is otherwise called the kingdom of Dardanus or Ilion. Dardanus is the founder, then Il appears and founds Ilion. Hence the name of Homer's poem. Troy - from Tros. Sometimes Pergamon, after the name of the palace. One of the kings of Troy is Laomedon. Under him, the walls of Troy were built, which cannot be destroyed. This wall was built by Poseidon and Apollo, people laughed at them, Laomedont promised a reward for the work. Aeacus treated the gods well, so he built the Sketian Gate - the only one that can be destroyed. But Laomedont did not pay, the gods became angry and cursed the city, so it is doomed to destruction, despite the fact that it is the favorite city of Zeus. Only Anchises and Aeneas, who are not related to the family of Laomedon, will survive the war.
Helen is the granddaughter of Nemesis, the goddess of retribution. At the age of 12, Theseus kidnapped her. Then everyone wanted to take her as a wife, Odysseus advised Elena’s father to let her choose for herself and take an oath from the suitors to help Elena’s family in case of trouble.
The Iliad covers a short period of time as events. Only 50 days of the last year of the war. This is Achilles' anger and its consequences. This is how the poem begins. The Iliad is a military-heroic epic, where the central place is occupied by the story of events. The main thing is the anger of Achilles. Aristotle wrote that Homer chose the plot brilliantly. Achilles is a special hero; he replaces an entire army. Homer's task is to describe all the heroes and life, but Achilles overshadows them. Therefore, Achilles must be removed. Everything is determined by one event: on the earthly plane, everything is determined by the consequences of the wrath of Achilles, on the heavenly plane - by the will of Zeus. But his will is not all-encompassing. Zeus cannot decide the fate of the Greeks and Trojans. He uses the golden scales of fate - the shares of the Achaeans and Trojans.
Composition: alternation of earthly and heavenly plot lines, which are mixed towards the end. Homer did not break his poem into songs. It was first broken by Alexandrian scientists in the third century BC - for convenience. Each chapter was named after a letter of the Greek alphabet.
What is the reason for Achilles' anger? For 10 years they ruined many surrounding policies. In one city they captured two captives - Chryseis (got to Agamemnon) and Briseis (got to Achilles). The Greeks begin to develop a consciousness of the value of their personality. Homer shows that tribal collectivity is becoming a thing of the past, a new morality begins to form, where the idea of the value of one’s own life comes to the fore.
The poem ends with Hector's funeral, although in essence the fate of Troy has already been decided. In terms of plot (mythological sequence of events), the Odyssey corresponds to the Iliad. But it tells not about military events, but about wanderings. Scientists call it: “an epic poem of wanderings.” In it, the narrative about a person replaces the narrative about events. The fate of Odysseus comes to the fore - the glorification of intelligence and willpower. The Odyssey corresponds to the mythology of late heroism. Dedicated to the last forty days of Odysseus’ return to his homeland. That the center is return is evidenced by the very beginning.
Composition: more complex than the Iliad. Events in the Iliad develop progressively and consistently. There are three storylines in the Odyssey: 1) the Olympian gods. But Odysseus has a goal and no one can stop him. Odysseus gets out of everything himself. 2) the return itself is a difficult adventure. 3) Ithaca: two motives: the actual events of the matchmaking and the theme of Telemachus’ search for his father. Some believe that Telemachy is a late insertion.
Basically, this is a description of Odysseus’s wanderings, and in retrospective terms. Events are determined by retrospection: the influence of events from the distant past. For the first time, a female image appears equal to the male one - Penelope, the wise one - the worthy wife of Odysseus. Example: She spins a burial cloth.
The poem is more complex not only in composition, but also from the point of view of the psychological motivation of actions.
"The Iliad" is Leo Tolstoy's favorite work. The meaning of Homer's poems lies in moral values, they present them to us. At this time, ideas about morality were being formed. Relationship with materials. Heroism and patriotism are not the main values that interest Homer. The main thing is the problem of the meaning of human life, the problem of the values of human life. The theme of human duty: to the homeland, to the tribe, to the ancestors, to the dead. Life on a universal scale is represented as an evergreen grove. But death is not a reason for grief - it cannot be avoided, but must be met with dignity. Ideas about human friendship are formed. Odysseus and Diomedes, Achilles and Patroclus. They are all balanced. Problems - what is cowardice? Bravery? Loyalty to home, people, spouse? Faithful wives: Penelope, Andromache.
As mentioned earlier, Homer’s heroes collected the generalized traits of the entire people they represented. The images of warriors were diverse. Homer did not yet have an idea of \u200b\u200bcharacter, but, nevertheless, he does not have two identical warriors. It was believed that a person is already born with certain qualities, and nothing can change during his life. This view undergoes a change only in the works of Theophrastus, a student of Aristotle. The amazing moral integrity of Homeric man. They have no reflection or duality - this is in the spirit of Homer's time. Fate is a share. Therefore, there is no doom. The actions of the heroes are not related to divine influence. But there is a law of double motivation of events. How are feelings born? The easiest way to explain this is by divine intervention. Homer's talent: the scene with Achilles and Priam.
Each warrior has the same set of qualities, but the images are unique. Each of the characters expresses one aspect of the national Greek spirit. There are types in the poem: elders, wives, etc. The central place is occupied by the image of Achilles. He is great, but mortal. Homer wanted to depict the poetic apotheosis of heroic Greece. Heroism is Achilles’ conscious choice. Epic Valor of Achilles: Brave, strong, fearless, war cry, fast running. In order for the heroes to be different, the number of different qualities is different - an individual characteristic. Achilles has impulsiveness and immensity. Homer's characteristics: he knows how to compose songs and sings them. The second most powerful warrior is Ajax the Great. He has too much ambition. Achilles is fleet-footed, Ajax is clumsy and slow. The third is Diomedes. The main thing is complete selflessness, which is why Diomedes is granted victory over the gods. Epithets: Achilles and Odysseus have more than 40. In battle, Diomedes does not forget about the economy. The leaders of the campaign are depicted in conflict with epic laws. The authors of the epic write objectively. But Homer has many epithets for his favorite heroes. The Atrides have few epithets. Diomedes reproaches Agamemnon: “Zeus did not give you valor.” A different attitude towards Nestor, Hector and Odysseus. Hector is one of Homer's favorite heroes; he is reasonable and peaceful. Hector and Odysseus do not rely on the gods, so Hector is inherent in fear, but this fear does not affect his actions, since Hector has epic valor, which includes epic shame. He feels responsible to the people he is protecting.
Celebration of wisdom. Elders: Priam and Nestor. Nestor survived three generations of people, thirty years each. New wisdom: the intelligence of Odysseus. This is not experience, but mental flexibility. Odysseus is also distinguished by: all the heroes strive for immortality - it is offered to him twice, but he exchanges it for his homeland.
Homer first gives us the experience of comparative characterization. Song 3 of the Iliad: Helen talks about the heroes. Menelaus and Odysseus are compared.
The image of Helen in the Iliad is demonic. In the Odyssey, she is a housewife. It is not her appearance that is being described. And the elders’ reaction to it. We know very little about her feelings. In "Odyssey" it is different - there is nothing mysterious.
Features of the epic worldview and style.
First, the volume of epic poems is always significant. The volume depends not on the desire of the author, but on the tasks set by the author, which in this case require a large volume. The second feature is versatility. Epic served many functions in ancient society. Entertainment comes last. Epic is a repository of wisdom, an educational function, examples of how to behave. An epic is a repository of information on history, preserving the people’s understanding of history. Scientific functions, since it was in epic poems that scientific information was transmitted: astronomy, geography, crafts, medicine, everyday life. Last but not least is the entertainment function. All this is called epic syncretism.
Homer's poems always tell about the distant past. The Greek was pessimistic about the future. These poems are intended to capture the golden age.
The monumentality of images in epic poems.
The images are elevated above ordinary people, they are almost monuments. They are all loftier, more beautiful, smarter than ordinary people - this is idealization. This is epic monumentality.
Epic materialism is associated with the task of describing everything in full. Homer fixes his attention on the most ordinary things: a stool, carnations. All things must have color. Some believe that back then the world was described in two colors - white and gold. But Wilkelman denied this; he was engaged in architecture. In fact, there are a lot of colors, but the statues are whitened by time. The statues were dressed, painted, decorated - everything was very bright. Even the Titanomachy on the Parthenon was painted. In Homer's poems, everything is colored: the clothes of goddesses, berries. The sea has more than 40 shades of color.
The objectivity of the tone of Homeric poems. The creators of the poems had to be extremely fair. Homer is biased only in epithets. For example, the description of Thersites. Thersites is absolutely devoid of epic valor.
Epic style: three laws.
1) The law of retardation is a deliberate stop of action. Retardation, firstly, helps to expand the scope of your image. Retardation is a digression, an inserted poem. Tells about the past or expounds the views of the Greeks. The poems were performed orally and during the retardation the author and performer tries to arouse additional attention to the situation: for example, a description of the rod of Agamemnon, a description of the shield of Achilles (this description shows how the Greeks imagined the universe). Marriage of Odysseus's grandfather. Odysseus always had one heir in his family. Odysseus is angry, experiencing the wrath of the gods.
2) The law of double motivation of events.
3) The law of chronological incompatibility of simultaneous events in time. The author of epic poems is naive; it seems to him that if he depicts two simultaneous events at the same time, it will be unnatural. A striking example: Priam and Helen are talking.
Epic poems abound in repetition. Up to a third of the text is repetition. Several reasons: due to the oral nature of the poems, repetitions are properties of oral folk art, folklore description includes constant formulas, most often these are natural phenomena, equipment of chariots, weapons of the Greeks, Trojans - stencil formulas. Decorating epithets firmly assigned to heroes, objects, gods (hair-eyed Hera, cloud-busting Zeus). The gods, as perfect creatures, deserve the epithet “golden”. Aphrodite is most associated with gold - the aesthetic sphere; for Hera it is sovereignty, power. Zeus turns out to be the darkest. All gods must be smart, omniscient. The Provider is only Zeus, although others too. Athena: intercessor, protector, irresistible, indestructible. Ares: insatiable for war, destroyer of men, stained with blood, breaker of walls. Often epithets are so fused that they contradict the situation: noble suitors in the house of Odysseus. Aegisthus, who kills Agamemnon, is blameless. These are all folklore formulas.
Epic comparisons. Striving for clarity of the image, the poet strives to translate each description into the language of comparison, which develops into an independent picture. All Homer’s comparisons are from the everyday sphere: battles for ships, the Greeks are pushing back the Trojans, the Greeks fought as neighbors for boundaries in neighboring areas. Achilles' rage is compared to threshing, when oxen trample grain.
Homer often uses description and narration through enumeration. He does not describe the picture in its entirety, but strings together episodes - the murder of Diomedes.
A combination of fiction with details of realistic reality. The line between reality and fantasy is blurred: a description of the Cyclops' cave. At first everything is very realistic, but then a terrible monster appears. An illusion of objectivity is created.
The poems are written in hexameter - dactyl hexameter. Moreover, the last foot is truncated. In the middle there is a caesura - a pause that divides the verse into two hemistiches and gives it regularity. All ancient versification is based on a strictly ordered alternation of long and short syllables, and the quantitative ratio of stressed and unstressed syllables is 2:1, but the stress is not forceful, but musical, based on raising and lowering the tone.
When we hear or read about ancient Greek heroes, we imagine strong, physically developed athletes striving for glory and challenging fate. But was Odysseus, one of the most famous characters in Homer’s poems “The Iliad” and “Odyssey”, like this? How did he glorify and immortalize his name? What feats did you accomplish?
Myths and poems of Homer
From century to century, ancient Greek myths told about the origin and structure of the world, the deeds of heroes and Olympian gods. The wonderful world of mythology fascinated and frightened, explained and prescribed; it reflected the value system of Ancient Greece and the connection of times. Hellenic myths had a huge influence on the formation of European and world culture, and the names of many heroes, gods and monsters became common nouns, symbols of some qualities and properties. For example, a chimera is a symbol of something non-existent that can give rise to dangerous illusions and misconceptions.
With the development of social, economic and other public relations, mythological consciousness began to collapse, and the poems of the legendary Homer “Iliad” and “Odyssey” served as a kind of bridge between folklore and literature.
The heroic epic of Homer is the peak of the development of Hellenic mythology, but at the same time its artistic interpretation. In addition, as archaeological excavations by Heinrich Schliemann have proven, Homer's poems to some extent reflect the reality of the 11th-9th centuries BC. and can serve as a historical source. Homer is the first ancient Greek poet was, according to legend, blind and lived in the 8th century BC. However, there is no reliable information confirming the fact of its existence yet. But there are wonderful epic poems that recreate the magnificent world of ancient Greek mythology and, at the same time, had a huge impact on the development of all European culture.
The cross-cutting character of both Homer's poems is Odysseus, king of Ithaca, participant in the Trojan War.
If in the Iliad he is one of the minor (albeit key) characters in the siege of Troy, then in the Odyssey he is the main character.
Biography of Odysseus
The name "Odysseus" in ancient Greek means "angry" or "wrathful". The Romans called him Ulysses. The name Odysseus now has a common meaning: an odyssey is a long, dangerous journey filled with adventures.
Odysseus is the son of Argonaut Laertes and Artemis's companion Anticlea. According to legend, Odysseus's grandfather was Zeus, supreme Olympian god.
Odysseus's wife - Penelope, her name became a symbol of marital fidelity. Long She waited twenty years for her husband to return from the military campaign, deceiving numerous suitors with inventive cunning.
A major role in the poem “Odyssey” is played by the son of the main character, Telemachus.
Turning to the Homeric epic, we can identify the fateful events in the life of the legendary hero:
- participation in matchmaking with Helen the Beautiful, where Odysseus meets his future wife Penelope;
- participation, albeit reluctantly, in the Trojan War;
- protection of the body of Achilles;
- creation of the Trojan horse;
- a ten-year journey by sea and numerous adventures in which Odysseus loses all his companions;
- returning to Ithaca in the guise of an old beggar;
- the brutal extermination of Penelope's numerous suitors;
- happy family reunion.
All these events create a unique portrait of Odysseus, a characteristic of his personality.
Hero's personality
The main feature of Odysseus’ personality is its universality and cosmic nature. The genius of Homer created the image of a comprehensively developed person. Odysseus appears not only as a brave hero and winner on the battlefield, he also performs feats among monsters and wizards.
He is cunning and reasonable, cruel, but devoted to his homeland, family and friends, inquisitive and crafty. Odysseus is an excellent speaker and wise adviser, a brave sailor and a skilled carpenter and trader. He refused eternal youth and love, offered by the nymph Calypso, who was in love with him, in order to return to his homeland, to his family.
Thanks to his cunning and resourcefulness, Odysseus overcame numerous dangers:
- on the island of the Cyclops he blinded the giant Polyphemus and thereby escaped death and saved his comrades;
- defeated the sorceress Circe;
- heard the sirens singing, but did not die;
- passed on a ship between Scylla and Charybdis;
- defeated Penelope's suitors.
In essence, Odysseus's voyage is a path into the unknown, comprehension and mastery of the unknown, a road to oneself and the acquisition of one's own personality.
The legendary hero appears in Homer's poems as representative of all humanity, discovering and learning the world. The image of Odysseus embodied all the richness of human nature, its weaknesses and vastness. It is no coincidence that many famous writers and poets turned to this image: Sophocles, Ovid, Dante, Shakespeare, Lope de Vega, P. Corneille, L. Feuchtwanger, D. Joyce, T. Pratchett and others.
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Heroic Homeric epic
Insomnia. Homer. Tight sails.
I read the list of ships halfway through:
This long brood, this crane train,
That once rose above Hellas.
Osip Mandelstam
Homer's heroic epic absorbed the most ancient myths and legends, and also reflected the life of Greece on the eve of the emergence of class society.
It is now considered established that around the 12th century BC, the Achaean tribes went to Troy in search of new lands and wealth. The Achaeans conquered Troy and returned to their homeland. The memory of the great last feat of the Achaean tribe lived among the people, and songs about the heroes of the Trojan War gradually began to take shape.
When Attica and Athens gained primacy in Greece, the Athenians also associated the exploits of the sons of Theseus with this war. Thus, it turned out that all the Greek tribes had a work in the Homeric epic that glorified their common great past, equally dear and eternal to all.
It is also interesting to note that the Homeric epic reflected an even more ancient culture, namely the culture of the island of Crete. In Homer one can find many elements of everyday life and social life that are reminiscent of this ancient culture. Cretan inscriptions mention the names of heroes known from Homer's epic, as well as the names of gods always considered purely Greek.
Homer's poems have a majestic, monumental character inherent in the heroic epic. However, in "Odyssey" there are many everyday, fairy-tale, and fantastic features. This is understandable, because the Iliad is dedicated to war, and the Odyssey to the vicissitudes of human life.
The plot of the Iliad is connected with the myth of the abduction of Helen, the wife of the Greek king Menelaus, ruler of Sparta, by the Trojan prince Paris. The Iliad begins from the moment when the plague began in the Greek camp in the tenth year of the siege. She was sent by the god Apollo, the patron saint of the Trojans, at the request of his priest, from whom the Greek leader Agamemnon took his daughter. The priest’s long speech is figurative and vivid. He asks for revenge.
Thus he cried; and silver-bowed Apollo listened!
He rushed quickly from the heights of Olympus, bursting with anger,
Carrying a bow over his shoulders and a quiver of arrows, covered from everywhere;
Loudly winged arrows, beating behind the shoulders, sounded
In the procession of the angry god: he walked, like the night.
To stop the plague, Agamemnon is forced to return his daughter to her father, but in return he takes the captive from Achilles. The angry Achilles, possessed by a feeling of bitter resentment, goes to his camp. Achilles refuses to participate in the siege of Troy.
Fierce battles begin, in which the Greeks are defeated by the Trojans. Then they send ambassadors to Achilles (IX canto), but to no avail; he refuses to take part in the battles. Finally, in Canto XVI, Patroclus, Achilles’ friend, enters the battle because he can no longer see his comrades die. In this battle, Patroclus dies at the hands of the Trojan hero Hector, the son of King Priam.
Only then Achilles, avenging his friend, enters the battle. He kills Hector, brutally mocking his corpse. However, old Priam, Hector’s father, appeared in Achilles’ tent at night and begs him to return his son’s body. Achilles, touched by the old man's grief and remembering his own father, whom he will never see, returns Hector's body and even establishes a truce to give the Trojans time to mourn their dead. The Iliad ends with the burial of the heroes of two warring camps - Patroclus and Hector.
The heroes of the poems are courageous and majestic. They know no fear of the enemy. Both the Greeks and the Trojans are depicted with great respect and love. It is no coincidence that the Greek Achilles and the Trojan Hector are examples of heroism. Achilles is a thunderstorm for the Trojans, a stern, unshakable warrior. He loves his homeland. But in his soul there also lives pity for the Trojan - the old man Priam, who lost his own son. He feels the bitterness of his own fate (he is destined to die in his prime). He takes revenge for insults, remembers evil, and sometimes cries like a child. But the main line of his character is heroism that knows no limits and devotion to the common cause. A remarkable example of the generosity of Achilles and the humanism of the ancient epic in general is the scene of the XXIV song of the Iliad, when Achilles gives the body of Hector to King Priam.
Swift-footed Achilles says:
“Elder, do not anger me! I myself understand that it must
To return your son to you: she brought me news from Zeus
My silver-footed mother, the sea nymph Thetis.
I feel that you too (you, Priam, cannot hide from me)
The strong hand of God led to the Myrmidon ships...
Together with Priam, Achilles laments the plight of man, and with him mourns the dead; he allows Priam to celebrate a funeral feast for Hector for twelve days and releases him to Troy with rich gifts.
Hector is a Trojan leader and the main defender of the city. He leaves his father, mother, wife and child, leaving for the last battle. The scene of Hector’s farewell to Andromache and his son is filled with tenderness and boundless love. The boy cries, frightened by his father's helmet. Hector takes the shining helmet off his head, and the child laughs and reaches for it. The mother is thoughtful and sad. She anticipates the death of Hector and the sad fate of his orphan son. Andromache watches the last duel from the city wall. Hector, deprived of the help of the gods, fights Achilles until his last breath. His life was given for his homeland.
The Odyssey depicts the events after the destruction of Troy. All the heroes returned home, except for Odysseus, king of the island of Ithaca. He wanders for ten years because of the hatred of the sea god Poseidon.
Muse, tell me about that experienced husband who
Wandering for a long time since the day when Saint Ilion was destroyed by him,
I visited many people of the city and saw their customs,
I grieved a lot in my heart on the seas, worrying about salvation
Your life and the return of your companions to their homeland...
The beginning of the Odyssey tells about the last events of the seven years of Odysseus's wanderings, when he lived on the island of the nymph Calypso. From there, at the behest of the gods, he goes to his homeland. Odysseus arrives in Ithaca in Canto XIII. Waiting for him at home is his wife Penelope, besieged by suitors, and his son Telemachus, who has become a young man. Odysseus stops with a swineherd, then, disguised as a beggar, makes his way into the palace and, finally, in alliance with his faithful servants, exterminates all contenders for Penelope’s hand, suppresses the uprising of the relatives of the murdered, and begins a happy life in the circle of his family. The image of Odysseus’s wife Penelope, a faithful, devoted and intelligent woman, is beautiful. For twenty years, Penelope raised her son and protected the house in the absence of her husband.
Homer describes Penelope’s joy when she was convinced that it was really Odysseus in front of her:
She was so happy, admiring her returned husband,
To tear his snow-white hands from his neck without having
Strength. The golden-troned Eos could have found them in tears...
The society represented by Homer is a patriarchal race that does not yet know class stratification. Kings work on an equal basis with shepherds and artisans, and slaves, if they exist, are captives taken in war and do not yet occupy a humiliated position in the family. Odysseus builds a raft for himself, Princess Nausicaa washes her clothes. Penelope weaves skillfully.
At the same time, property inequality appears, the leaders receive the best booty, the fate of the slaves depends on the will of the master. Penelope, for example, mercilessly threatens the old nanny, loyal to her masters; Odysseus betrays the guilty servants to cruel execution; The warrior Thersites, not without reason, reproaches the leaders for self-interest and ambition and accuses them of all the hardships of war. However, his words do not find sympathy among the warriors, since they are obsessed with one idea - to defeat the enemy. For this, they are ready to forget the insults from the leaders.
Odysseus is a brave warrior, but at the same time a man experienced in life’s adversities. Odysseus knows how to fight not only with weapons, but also with smart words. If necessary, he can deceive and use cunning. The main thing in him is love for his native land, for his wife and son, whom he has not seen for many years. For their sake, he even rejected the immortality that the nymph Calypso wanted to give him.
In the XIV song of the Odyssey it is said that “people are different, some love one thing, others another.” In Homer's poems, the gods are as diverse and interesting as people. Here is the faithful assistant of the Greeks, especially Odysseus, the wise Athena, here is the treacherous, gloomy Apollo, protector of the Trojans, and the wild, blood-covered god of war Ares.
What about the things around people? They are beautiful and "sacred". Every thing made by human hands is good and is a work of art. Hundreds of lines are devoted to the description of the shield of Achilles; even the latch on the door of Odysseus’s house is carefully described. A person is delighted with his skill, his art, his active work. He not only fights and destroys, but strives to create something necessary and at the same time beautiful.
The language of the poems is especially worth noting. They were written in hexameter (hexameter dactyl), which was pronounced somewhat into a sing-song manner. Constant epithets, extended comparisons and speeches of the heroes are also of great importance.
Constant epithets, for example, “cloud-catcher” Zeus, “white-armed” Hera, “silver-footed” Thetis, are mostly complex and somewhat cumbersome. Extensive comparisons (the battle, for example, is depicted as a raging fire, a storm in the forest, a fight of wild animals, a river flood that breaks all the dams) slow down the narrative, as do the speeches that the heroes often exchange during a fierce battle. The slow pace of the narrative and its majestic character are colored with unusual colors in the description of nature.
In the poems, every thing is visible, tangible and colorful. The sea, for example, is “gray” in the foam of the surf, “violet” under the blue sky, “purple” in the rays of the sunset. Even the earth in the Iliad “laughs” in the shine of shields and armor under the spring sun.
Thus, the Homeric epic embodies not only the harsh heroism of war, but also the joy of creativity, creative work and peaceful life, based on respect for man, on the awakening in him of the best, humane feelings.
That is why the Homeric epic is rightfully considered an encyclopedia of ancient life.
Bibliography
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Homer's heroic epic absorbed the most ancient myths and legends, and also reflected the life of Greece on the eve of the emergence of class society.
It is now considered established that around the 12th century BC, the Achaean tribes went to Troy in search of new lands and wealth. The Achaeans conquered Troy and returned to their homeland. The memory of the great last feat of the Achaean tribe lived among the people, and songs about the heroes of the Trojan War gradually began to take shape.
When Attica and Athens gained primacy in Greece, the Athenians also associated the exploits of the sons of Theseus with this war. Thus, it turned out that all the Greek tribes had a work in the Homeric epic that glorified their common great past, equally dear and eternal to all.
It is also interesting to note that the Homeric epic reflected an even more ancient culture, namely the culture of the island of Crete. In Homer one can find many elements of everyday life and social life that are reminiscent of this ancient culture. Cretan inscriptions mention the names of heroes known from Homer's epic, as well as the names of gods always considered purely Greek.
Homer's poems have a majestic, monumental character inherent in the heroic epic. However, in "Odyssey" there are many everyday, fairy-tale, and fantastic features. This is understandable, because the Iliad is dedicated to war, and the Odyssey to the vicissitudes of human life.
The plot of the Iliad is connected with the myth of the abduction of Helen, the wife of the Greek king Menelaus, ruler of Sparta, by the Trojan prince Paris. The Iliad begins from the moment when the plague began in the Greek camp in the tenth year of the siege. She was sent by the god Apollo, the patron saint of the Trojans, at the request of his priest, from whom the Greek leader Agamemnon took his daughter. The priest’s long speech is figurative and vivid. He asks for revenge. Thus he cried; and silver-bowed Apollo listened! He rushed quickly from the heights of Olympus, bursting with anger, carrying a bow on his shoulders and a quiver of arrows, closed from everywhere; Loudly winged arrows, beating behind the shoulders, sounded in the procession of the angry god: he walked, like the night.
To stop the plague, Agamemnon is forced to return his daughter to her father, but in return he takes the captive from Achilles. The angry Achilles, possessed by a feeling of bitter resentment, goes to his camp. Achilles refuses to participate in the siege of Troy.
Fierce battles begin, in which the Greeks are defeated by the Trojans. Then they send ambassadors to Achilles (IX canto), but to no avail; he refuses to take part in the battles. Finally, in Canto XVI, Patroclus, Achilles’ friend, enters the battle because he can no longer see his comrades die. In this battle, Patroclus dies at the hands of the Trojan hero Hector, the son of King Priam.
Only then Achilles, avenging his friend, enters the battle. He kills Hector, brutally mocking his corpse. However, old Priam, Hector’s father, appeared in Achilles’ tent at night and begs him to return his son’s body. Achilles, touched by the old man's grief and remembering his own father, whom he will never see, returns Hector's body and even establishes a truce to give the Trojans time to mourn their dead. The Iliad ends with the burial of the heroes of two warring camps - Patroclus and Hector.
The heroes of the poems are courageous and majestic. They know no fear of the enemy. Both the Greeks and the Trojans are depicted with great respect and love. It is no coincidence that the Greek Achilles and the Trojan Hector are examples of heroism. Achilles is a thunderstorm for the Trojans, a stern, unshakable warrior. He loves his homeland. But in his soul there also lives pity for the Trojan - the old man Priam, who lost his own son. He feels the bitterness of his own fate (he is destined to die in his prime). He takes revenge for insults, remembers evil, and sometimes cries like a child. But the main line of his character is heroism that knows no limits and devotion to the common cause. A remarkable example of the generosity of Achilles and the humanism of the ancient epic in general is the scene of the XXIV song of the Iliad, when Achilles gives the body of Hector to King Priam. ...says fleet-footed Achilles: “Old man, do not anger me! I myself understand that I must return my Son to you: my silver-footed Mother, the sea nymph Thetis, brought me news from Zeus. I feel that you too (from me, you, Priam , you can’t hide it) The strong hand of God led to the Myrmidon ships...
Together with Priam, Achilles laments the plight of man, and with him mourns the dead; he allows Priam to celebrate a funeral feast for Hector for twelve days and releases him to Troy with rich gifts.
Hector is a Trojan leader and the main defender of the city. He leaves his father, mother, wife and child, leaving for the last battle. The scene of Hector’s farewell to Andromache and his son is filled with tenderness and boundless love. The boy cries, frightened by his father's helmet. Hector takes the shining helmet off his head, and the child laughs and reaches for it. The mother is thoughtful and sad. She anticipates the death of Hector and the sad fate of his orphan son. Andromache watches the last duel from the city wall. Hector, deprived of the help of the gods, fights Achilles until his last breath. His life was given for his homeland.
The Odyssey depicts the events after the destruction of Troy. All the heroes returned home, except for Odysseus, king of the island of Ithaca. He wanders for ten years because of the hatred of the sea god Poseidon. Muse, tell me about that experienced man who, Wandering for a long time since the day Saint Ilion was destroyed by him, visited many people of the city and saw the customs, grieved a lot with his heart on the seas, caring about the salvation of his life and the return of his companions to their homeland...
The beginning of the Odyssey tells about the last events of the seven years of Odysseus's wanderings, when he lived on the island of the nymph Calypso. From there, at the behest of the gods, he goes to his homeland. Odysseus arrives in Ithaca in Canto XIII. Waiting for him at home is his wife Penelope, besieged by suitors, and his son Telemachus, who has become a young man. Odysseus stops with a swineherd, then, disguised as a beggar, makes his way into the palace and, finally, in alliance with his faithful servants, exterminates all contenders for Penelope’s hand, suppresses the uprising of the relatives of the murdered, and begins a happy life in the circle of his family. The image of Odysseus’s wife Penelope, a faithful, devoted and intelligent woman, is beautiful. For twenty years, Penelope raised her son and protected the house in the absence of her husband.
Homer describes Penelope’s joy when she was convinced that it was indeed Odysseus in front of her: So she rejoiced, admiring her returned husband, without the strength to tear his snow-white hands from his neck. The golden-troned Eos could have found them in tears...
The society represented by Homer is a patriarchal race that does not yet know class stratification. Kings work on an equal basis with shepherds and artisans, and slaves, if they exist, are captives taken in war and do not yet occupy a humiliated position in the family. Odysseus builds a raft for himself, Princess Nausicaa washes her clothes. Penelope weaves skillfully.
At the same time, property inequality appears, the leaders receive the best booty, the fate of the slaves depends on the will of the master. Penelope, for example, mercilessly threatens the old nanny, loyal to her masters; Odysseus betrays the guilty servants to cruel execution; The warrior Thersites, not without reason, reproaches the leaders for self-interest and ambition and accuses them of all the hardships of war. However, his words do not find sympathy among the warriors, since they are obsessed with one idea - to defeat the enemy. For this, they are ready to forget the insults from the leaders.
Odysseus is a brave warrior, but at the same time a man experienced in life’s adversities. Odysseus knows how to fight not only with weapons, but also with smart words. If necessary, he can deceive and use cunning. The main thing in him is love for his native land, for his wife and son, whom he has not seen for many years. For their sake, he even rejected the immortality that the nymph Calypso wanted to give him.
In the XIV song of the Odyssey it is said that “people are different, some love one thing, others another.” In Homer's poems, the gods are as diverse and interesting as people. Here is the faithful assistant of the Greeks, especially Odysseus, the wise Athena, here is the treacherous, gloomy Apollo, protector of the Trojans, and the wild, blood-covered god of war Ares.
What about the things around people? They are beautiful and "sacred". Every thing made by human hands is good and is a work of art. Hundreds of lines are devoted to the description of the shield of Achilles; even the latch on the door of Odysseus’s house is carefully described. A person is delighted with his skill, his art, his active work. He not only fights and destroys, but strives to create something necessary and at the same time beautiful.
The language of the poems is especially worth noting. They were written in hexameter (hexameter dactyl), which was pronounced somewhat into a sing-song manner. Constant epithets, extended comparisons and speeches of the heroes are also of great importance.
Constant epithets, for example, “cloud-catcher” Zeus, “white-armed” Hera, “silver-footed” Thetis, are mostly complex and somewhat cumbersome. Extensive comparisons (the battle, for example, is depicted as a raging fire, a storm in the forest, a fight of wild animals, a river flood that breaks all the dams) slow down the narrative, as do the speeches that the heroes often exchange during a fierce battle. The slow pace of the narrative and its majestic character are colored with unusual colors in the description of nature.
In the poems, every thing is visible, tangible and colorful. The sea, for example, is “gray” in the foam of the surf, “violet” under the blue sky, “purple” in the rays of the sunset. Even the earth in the Iliad “laughs” in the shine of shields and armor under the spring sun.
Thus, the Homeric epic embodies not only the harsh heroism of war, but also the joy of creativity, creative work and peaceful life, based on respect for man, on the awakening in him of the best, humane feelings.
That is why the Homeric epic is rightfully considered an encyclopedia of ancient life.
HOMERIAN EPIC
Wrath, goddess, sing to Achilles, son of Peleus, the Terrible One, who caused thousands of disasters to the Achaeans... From that day, when those who raised a dispute, the Shepherd of the peoples, Atrid, and the noble hero Achilles, were inflamed with enmity.
(Translation by N. Gnedich)
It all started with the fact that after one of the Achaean raids in the vicinity of Troy, Agamemnon got the daughter of the priest Chryses from the temple of Apollo as booty. Having arrived at the Greek camp with a huge ransom, Chris tearfully asked Agamemnon to return his daughter to him, but received an insulting refusal; then he turned to Apollo with a plea for revenge on the Greeks. Apollo, heeding the request of his priest, sent a pestilence to the Achaean army, which raged for nine days. On the tenth day, Achilles convened a public meeting to decide on the further presence of the army at Troy. The soothsayer Kalkhant, asked about the cause of divine anger, revealed to those gathered that Apollo was punishing the Achaeans for insulting Chryses and demanding the return of his captive daughter to the father. Agamemnon, naturally, could not object to the fulfillment of Apollo’s will, but demanded another booty in return for Chryseis: having encountered resistance from Achilles, Agamemnon, in irritation, threatened to take away his no less beautiful captive Briseis. A dispute flared up, and only the intervention of the goddess Athena prevented an armed fight between the leaders: Achilles did not defend his share of the booty - Briseis - with weapons in his hands, but in anger at Agamemnon, who insulted him, he refuses to take further part in the battles until the situation of the Achaeans becomes critical and they will not call him into battle, atoning for the insult inflicted on him with rich gifts (Book I).
The self-removal of Achilles from military operations frees up the battlefield for the display of valor by other Achaean leaders; however, neither the duel between Menelaus and Paris (Book III), nor the exploits of Diomedes and other Greek heroes (Books IV-VI), nor the single combat of Ajax with the Trojan leader Hector (Book VII), nor even the intervention of the gods are able to delay the menacingly approaching the offensive of the Trojans, who are helped by Zeus himself (Book VIII) at the request of the divine mother of Achilles Thetis. A small respite from the battle scenes is provided only by the famous meeting of Hector with Andromache; Having arrived from the battlefield in the city to order the performance of prayers and offerings to the goddess Athena, Hector lingers here for a short time, meeting his wife with a baby son in her arms, and this meeting of the spouses is destined to be the last in their lives (Book VI).
Meanwhile, the Achaean leaders, experiencing increasing difficulties, convince Agamemnon to send ambassadors to Achilles with a proposal for reconciliation; but even the richest expiatory gifts and the promise to return seven more skilled slaves to him along with Briseis are not able to soften Achilles, who is unyielding in anger (Book IX). True, in the newly flared up battles, the Achaeans manage to achieve some successes (Book XI), but then their position becomes more and more critical (Books XII-XIII), so that the supreme goddess Hera, who sympathizes with the Greeks, has to resort to an extreme means: she seduces Zeus, and while the Thunderer rests in her arms, Ajax manages to wound Hector and remove him from the battle (Book XIV). The Trojans, left without a leader, take flight, but the awakening of Zeus puts an end to all the machinations of the hostile Three Gods: Hector, miraculously healed by Apollo, approaches the Achaean ships and even manages to set fire to one of them (Book XV). Although the situation of the Greeks becomes almost hopeless, Achilles still persists in anger. He only agrees to let his closest friend Patroclus go into battle, to whom he gives instructions to drive the Trojans away from the ships, but not to try to capture Troy. Dressed in the armor of Achilles to intimidate his opponents, Patroclus successfully completes the first part of the assignment, and then, inspired by success, rushes to storm Troy and here finds his death at the hands of Hector, who is again helped by Apollo himself (Book XVI). A fierce battle takes place around the body of the dead man, and
The Achaeans manage to defend the corpse of Patroclus only with the greatest difficulties (Book XVII).
The death of a friend evokes in Achilles a thirst for revenge, before which his resentment against Agamemnon recedes into the background. True, to comply with the laws of honor, Agamemnon gives him all the previously promised gifts, but Achilles is already eager to fight (Book XIX). Since Hector managed to remove Achilles’ armor from Patroclus, the god Hephaestus, at the request of Thetis, makes new weapons of extraordinary beauty for Pelidus (Book XVIII). Obsessed with a thirst for revenge for Patroclus, Achilles piles up the corpses of the enemies he killed on the Trojan Plain, blocking the flow of the Scamander River (Xanthus) with them. In indignation, the river god tries to drown Achilles in his waves, but Hephaestus brings down an all-consuming fire on Xanth, from which the river waters begin to boil (books XX-XXI). Finally, the surviving Trojans take refuge behind the city walls; only Hector remains on the field, waiting for an inevitable meeting with Pelid, and dies by his hand. Furious in revenge, as before in anger, Achilles ties Hector's body to his chariot and drags him along the ground; Priam and Hecuba, Hector’s elderly parents, weep, seeing from the Trojan wall the desecration of his body, sadly mourning the murdered husband Andromache. And already in these moments, Priam conceives the idea of going himself with countless treasures to the camp of Achilles in order to ransom Hector’s body (Book XXII). This plan is not carried out immediately, for the epic singer must first describe in detail the burial of Patroclus and the funeral games in his honor (Book XXIII). Then, not without help from the gods, Priam freely reaches Achilles’ tent; Shocked by the sight of the unfortunate old man and the awareness of the disasters that befell him, at the same time remembering his elderly father, who was not destined to wait for his son’s return from Troy, Achilles gives Hector’s body to Priam. The poem ends with a description of the funeral lament over the murdered man and his funeral (Book XXIV).
Unlike the Iliad, which is a poem about one of the episodes of the Trojan War, the Odyssey tells of the wanderings that befell the cunning Odysseus after the destruction of Troy, and of his return to Ithaca. Moreover, the plot of the poem does not unfold in direct chronological sequence, but contains repeated retreats and returns to the starting point.
Gods
In Homer's epic, myth and historical reality, truth and fairy-tale fiction are closely intertwined. It is no coincidence that at first even the reality of the ancient existence of the city of Troy itself was questioned. But in the 70s of the last century, the German archaeologist-enthusiast Heinrich Schliemann discovered the ruins of the ancient city of Iliova (Troy) in the north of Asia Minor.
Based on ancient Greek myths, the Iliad and Odyssey are heavily populated with Olympian gods. Olympus and earth live in close unity. In Homer's poems, the world appears in mythological form as a single tribal community led by Zeus.
The ancient Greeks believed that the immortal celestial beings were fully endowed with the whole gamut of human feelings, that they interfered in the lives of heroes, and determined the destinies of those who live on earth.
In addition to their virtues, the gods also have all the human shortcomings that Homer mercilessly ridicules. They, just like people, quarrel, scold, and sometimes even fight. The gods are vindictive and vengeful. But they are also concerned about the fate of the heroes fighting under the walls of Ilion. After all, according to the ideas of the ancient Greeks, generations of heroes descend from Zeus, who is called by Homer “the father of men and gods,” or from his relatives. Some heroes are directly related to the gods. Like, for example, Achilles - the son of the sea goddess Thetis, the Lycian king Sarpedon, who is the son of Zeus and the goddess Europa, and others.
The epic always deals with events so significant for the destinies of entire peoples that, by the will of the ancient singers - the Aeds (Homer was also considered a blind singer), the gods necessarily intervene in these events. The events that caused the Trojan War are also clearly of a cosmic nature. The myth tells that the Earth, burdened with a huge human population, turned to Zeus with a request to reduce the human race. Zeus heeded the request of the Earth and started a war between the Greeks and Trojans. The reason for the war was the abduction of the wife of the Spartan king Menelaus, Helen, by the Trojan prince Paris. The angry Menelaus, together with his brother Agamemnon, gathers a Greek army and sails on ships to Ilion.
In the Iliad and Odyssey, as well as in the entire Trojan cycle, the gods take a direct part in events. The motivation for all the personal actions of the heroes comes from the outside. What, for example, was the reason for Achilles’ anger at the leader of the Greek army, Agamemnon? Wrath, which brought the Achaeans, as it is said in the poem: “suffering without counting” and “many strong souls of heroes” who sent them to Hades. The reason for the quarrel between the two heroes was the captive, daughter of the priest Chryses, Briseis, whom Agamemnon took from Achilles. By the will of Apollo, he was forced to give his captive Chryseis to her father Chryses. Thus, the culprit of the quarrel between Achilles and Agamemnon turned out to be the god Apollo, who sent an evil disease to the Achaean army and thereby forced Agamemnon to return the daughter, captured from him, to the priest of the temple of Apollo in Troy.
Also, other actions of heroes and life situations are motivated by the will of the gods. When, for example, during a duel, Menelaus grabbed Paris by the helmet and dragged him to the Achaean camp (Iliad, song 3), the goddess Aphrodite broke the helmet strap and freed Paris. But the belt could have broken on its own, without the intervention of Aphrodite, who patronized Paris.
The gods not only intervene in human life, they direct the thoughts and actions of people in the direction they need. As a result of the decision of the gods and the direct influence of Pallas Athena, who sympathizes with the Achaeans, the Trojan Pandarus shoots at the Greek camp, treacherously violating the recently concluded truce. When the Trojan Priam comes to Achilles’ tent to ask for the body of his son Hector, he goes to meet him. Here all the actions of Priam and Achilles are inspired by the gods.
However, the Homeric epic should not be understood to mean that man in himself means nothing, and that the true heroes are the gods. Homer hardly took mythology literally and represented man as just a pathetic plaything of the gods. Without a doubt, Homer puts human heroes in the first place in his poems, and his gods are only a generalization of human feelings and actions. And if we read about how the deity invested some action in this or that hero, then this should be understood in such a way that this action is the result of a person’s own decision. But this decision came to him so subconsciously that even the hero himself considers it divine predestination. And although the strict epic style implies that all thoughts, feelings and actions of a person are inspired by the gods, Homer, on this strict epic basis, gives infinitely diverse types of relationships between heroes and gods. Here there is the complete subordination of man to the divine will, and the harmonious unification of the divine and human will, and a rude attack by man on one or another Olympian god.
In Homer's poems there is almost not a single episode where the gods, who are, as it were, the main culprits of events in the lives of the heroes, do not act. The gods are at enmity with each other just like the Achaeans and the Trojans, divided into two camps. The Trojans are constantly patronized by Apollo, Ares, Aphrodite, the Achaeans - Pallas Athena, the wife of Zeus Hera, Thetis. This doesn't happen by accident. The fact is that the Trojan mythology of the ancient Greeks reflected the complex process of mutual assimilation of the cultures of the Balkan and Asia Minor Greeks that was taking place at that time. As a result of this assimilation, gods, so to speak, of Asian origin appeared in the pantheon of Olympian deities. These are Apollo, Artemis, Ares, Aphrodite, who constantly sympathize with the Trojans. When Zeus allows the gods to enter the war, they all immediately side with the defenders of Ilion. This is natural for the psychology of the ancients. After all, according to their concepts, the gods are also members of their tribal communities and are subject to the requirements of community ethics, which, first of all, obliges them to defend their homeland.
Homer laughs at the gods very often. He even depicts the famous battle of the gods not in a heroic, but rather in a humorous way. And indeed, is it really possible to take such a battle of the gods seriously, when Apollo and Poseidon shook land and sea so much that “Hades, the ruler of the underworld, was horrified under the earth?”
Comics reach the level of burlesque when the sublime is depicted as base. In burlesque style, Homer almost always describes scenes taking place on Olympus. His gods mostly feast and laugh. An example is the first song of the Iliad, where Hera’s marital jealousy is described. Zeus intends to beat his jealous wife, and the bandy-legged freak Hephaestus makes the feasting gods laugh by rushing around the house with a goblet of wine.
Satirical motifs are also strong in Homer’s poems. Thus, the Cyclopes in the poem “Odyssey” are depicted as a caricature and satire of people living without any laws. The images of some gods and heroes are also satirical. And although humorous and satirical tendencies are just a touch in the diverse palette of shades with which Homer describes the gods and heroes, this is precisely why he received criticism in his time. Already at that time, Homer was condemned by some contemporaries from the point of view of religion and morality. Many ancient Greeks were offended by what they thought was the frivolity with which Homer endowed his gods and heroes with almost all human weaknesses and vices.
Heroes
If Homer’s gods, as noted above, carry all the features of ordinary people and the poet sometimes reduces his description of the gods’ activities to sarcasm (as if justifying the well-known saying that from the great to the ridiculous is one step), then some heroes he equally bestows the characteristics of the gods. This is Achilles, born from the goddess Thetis, invulnerable to arrows and spears, whose armor is made by the god Hephaestus himself. Achilles himself is like a god. From one of his screams, the Trojan troops flee in horror. And what is the description of the spear of Achilles worth:
“That strong, huge ash tree was heavy; none of the Achaeans
Couldn't move; only Achilles shook it without difficulty..."
Of course, Homer's poems, created in the era of communal-tribal disintegration, show the heroes in their new quality. These are no longer heroes of a strict epic style. Traits of subjectivism, instability, and effeminacy creep into the characters of Homer's heroes. The psychology of some of them is very capricious. The same Achilles, undoubtedly the main character of the Iliad, throughout the entire poem knows only that he is capricious, harming his own compatriots over trifles, and when Hector kills his best friend Patroclus, he falls into a real rage. He puts his personal interests above patriotic duty. Although, according to the laws of the strict epic style, he had to fight not out of revenge, but out of duty to his homeland.
Achilles is probably one of the most complex figures in all ancient literature. His character reflected all the contradictions of that era of transition from the communal-tribal form of society to slavery. In Achilles, along with insane cruelty and thirst for revenge, tender feelings for Patroclus and for his mother, the goddess Thetis, coexist. Significant in this regard is the scene when Achilles cries with his head on his mother’s lap.
Unlike the cunning and treacherous Odysseus, Achilles is straightforward and brave. Even knowing about his bitter fate to die young, he still undertakes this dangerous trip to Ilion. Meanwhile, as has already been said, this is the hero of a later epic, when the ideals of harsh heroism were already a thing of the past, and the hero’s capricious personality, very selfish and nervous, was in line. Instead of the former primitive collectivism, an individual personality appeared on the stage. Namely, a person, and not just a hero, since according to the laws of the tribal community, every man must be a hero. Every man was expected to fight bravely for his community, and cowardice on the battlefield was considered the greatest disgrace.
But in view of the fact that Homer’s work is based on heroic mythology, the personality in his poems is still in a strong connection with his family and tribe, he represents a single whole with them. A different portrayal of personality would go beyond the boundaries of the epic and would show a picture of later classical slavery.
The son of the Trojan king Priam, Hector, strictly observes the rules of communal ethics. Unlike the hysterical Achilles, he is strict, fearless and principled. His main goal is to fight for his homeland, for his people, for his beloved wife Andromache. Like Achilles, he knows that he must die defending Troy, and yet he openly goes into battle. Hector is the epitome of an epic hero with almost no flaws.
Agamemnon, unlike Hector, is endowed with numerous vices. He is also a brave warrior, but at the same time weak-willed, greedy and, so to speak, a morally unstable subject. Sometimes a coward and a drunkard. Homer often tries to belittle him, to present him from an ironic perspective. Along with the Olympian gods, Homer also makes fun of the heroes. In general, the Iliad can be interpreted as a satire on the Achaean kings, especially Agamemnon and Achilles. Of course, the leader of the Achaeans, Agamemnon, is not as capricious and petty as Achilles, because of whose selfish resentment the Greeks suffered such great losses. He is in many ways more principled and honest, but still cannot be considered a classic epic hero. Agamemnon, in a way, matches the eternally feasting and laughing Olympian gods.
And finally, Odysseus, as Homer says, “is equal in intelligence to God.” His image cannot be understood in a simplified way, as the image of only a diplomat and practitioner, and even more so, a cunning and adventurer. The adventurousness of the image of Odysseus in the second Homeric poem would have had its rightful place if the hero had not had a selfless love for his native hearth, “the smoke of his native land” and for Penelope waiting for him in Ithaca.
The synthesis of myth, fairy tale and real life led to one goal - the creation of the image of a new hero, who absorbed the features necessary for an active person in the era of the exploration of new lands, the development of navigation, crafts, slavery and trade. It is no coincidence that Homer turns to a clearly adventurous plot. In Odysseus, he was attracted primarily by intelligence, enterprise, dexterity, patience and courage - everything that was required for a hero of modern times. Indeed, unlike the other Achaean kings, Odysseus also wields a carpenter’s ax when building a raft for himself, as well as a battle spear. People obey him not by order or the law of the tribal community, but by the conviction of the superiority of his mind and life experience.
Of course, Odysseus is practical and cunning. He gladly receives rich gifts from the Phaeacians and, on the advice of Pallas Athena, the hero’s patron, hides these treasures in a cave. Once in Ithaca, he falls with emotion at his native land, but at that moment his head is full of cunning plans for how to deal with insolent suitors.
But Odysseus is fundamentally a sufferer. No wonder Homer constantly calls him “long-suffering.” He is more of a sufferer than even a cunning man, although Odysseus’s cunning seems to be limitless. It is not for nothing that in the Iliad he often acts as a spy, disguised as he makes his way into Troy, besieged by the Achaeans. The main reason for Odysseus’s suffering is an insurmountable longing for his homeland, which he cannot achieve due to the will of circumstances. The gods take up arms against him: Poseidon, Aeolus, Helios and even Zeus. Terrible monsters and cruel storms threaten the hero with death, but nothing can restrain his craving for his native Ithaca, love for his father, wife, and son Telemachus. Odysseus did not even hesitate in his choice when, in exchange for his homeland, the nymph Calypso promised to grant him immortality and eternal youth. Odysseus chooses a path home to Ithaca full of hardships and dangers. And, of course, the role of a bloodthirsty killer who mercilessly deals with the suitors, filling the entire palace with their corpses, does not fit well with this tenderly loving husband and father. What can you do, Odysseus is a product of his cruel era, and the suitors would not have spared him either, if Odysseus had fallen into their hands.