Talk:Greek mythology

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Featured

This mediocre article is Featured simply because its subject is interesting and important. The treatment here is not really up to par yet. Wetman 20:37, 30 Jun 2004 (UTC)

Sex talk

(Warning: amateur hypothesis to follow!) Some would query, "Why so many stories about sex?". It would seem that (in reality) many Greek sailors were on journeys that lasted for (literally) years... so were all horny so-and-so's.

In ancient days, strong men were fertile, and fertile men were strong and potent. Naturally, as the gods were greater than men, they were much more potent. The chief god (Zeus) in particular was always after a girl. Since Zeus was all-powerful, every time he had sex with a woman, she became pregnant. As he didn't confine himself to goddesses, this resulted in many half-human, half-god people (demigods??). -- firepink

~Well. Zeus wasn't always after a girl - there's the handsome youth Ganymede as well, you know. Just thought I'd throw that in ;) *Which of them got pregnant?

Actually they are called semigods.

"Demigod" (or semigod) isn't a genuine Greek category. Heroes might fill the gap. Wetman 05:31, 26 Jun 2004 (UTC)

Sex is the creative force of the universe. The world was created by the act of sex (see cosmogony -not necessarily the greek one). What more natural for a series of stories that were created to explain the beginning of everything to talk about sex!

Local deities

In early Greece, there were many smaller cultures, each with their own "head god." As two cultures encountered one another, their beliefs clashed, and whichever culture was dominant had their head god absorb the other head god, along with all his myths. This was often accompanied with a new myth about this defeat, usually in the form of some sort of sexual conquest. Hence all the stories about rape and pursual attributed to Zeus, who is essentially the aggregation of dozens or hundreds of the head gods of these smaller cultures.

This is only one POV theory. I'm sceptical of all such POV theories. We certainly don't find such things in Mesopotamia (where Marduk essentially took over from Enlil and Anu) or from Egypt where Amon essentially absorbed Re. The theory might be true in the matter of Horus and Set.

But simple explanatory theories are so often the bane of true scholarship. But unfortunately they are attractive to readers who like to be among the in-crowd who delights in supposedly knowng what something really means. So misapplied solar theories are replaced by misapplied vegetation god theories are replaced by alleories of invididuation while ideas that the tales in some way indicate historical conflicts between cults and so many other theories get mixed into the brew. New Age books have their own irreconicable explanations. jallan 23:01, 30 Jun 2004 (UTC)

Ritual

I believe there is too much emphasis on stories of myth rather than the actual religious practice. The myths were never a "bible" so to speak of Greek religion. Mythographers even had contradicting versions. The ancient Greeks were also critical of Homer and Hesiod for portraying the Gods in such an unpious manner. A book you might wish to read is Did the Greeks Believe Their Myths? by Paul Veyne.

Roman "equivalents"

To: anybody who updates Greek or Roman mythology articles

Please keep Greek and Roman names separate and clear. For the time being, there is some overlap (such as Bacchus/Dionysus sharing an article) but, in general, separate articles do or should exist for both the Greek and Roman gods. Please do not edit the Ceres (Roman) article and include references to Poseidon, Zeus and Hermes (all Greek)--instead, use Neptune, Jupiter or Jove, and Mercury.

The initial entries invariably included a Roman "equivalent" and also a genealogy, neither of which were always relevant. Wetman 05:31, 26 Jun 2004 (UTC)

Men and women were much greater in those days, of course, though the Greeks did not see any wide gulf between their history and their religion

What exactly does this mean? -- Wapcaplet 11:22 2 Jul 2003 (UTC)

Criteria for Greek Mythology Articles

This comment is not so much about this article (which is so short that I'm confused as to its status as a featured article), but about how Greek mythology articles should be written, in general.

I think that there's a significant problem with many of Wikipedia's articles on this subject, as there seems to be a tendency to weed out contradictory versions and give one "real" story of how these things work. This is tempting, of course, but seems to me to be wrong. It is also wrong, I think, to just say "He was this, or possibly this, or maybe that." What we should be doing is being very clear about the sourcing. If Apollodorus says one thing, Hesiod another, and Homer still something different, and then Euripides gives a completely different recasting of the same story, we should be clear on the differing sources, and how they differently report the same basic stories. For instance, the Orestes article, which I was just looking at, basically tells the story as Aeschylus tells it, up through the Oresteia trilogy, and then switches over to Euripides's Iphigenia in Tauris, and then brings in some details about the end of his life from Apollodorus and maybe Pausanias. In the part about his murder of his mother and Aegisthus, only Aeschylus's version is described, in spite of the existence of two plays by Sophocles and Euripides on the subject (I added a brief mention of them, but I think all the different versions of the story should be told there). Then, there is absolutely no mention of the content of Euripides's play Orestes, which gives a completely different version of the resolution of the story from Aeschylus's Eumenides. And this kind of problem pervades the Greek mythology articles. At any rate, I thought I'd see if anyone else had any thoughts on this. john k 01:37, 13 Jun 2004 (UTC)

Amen! Bullfinch and his ilk are much to blame IMHO - the popularized versions just present one version, and don't mention scholars' suspicions that an episode was added for literary purposes, or that an oddball bit has deep anthropological significance. OCD has good examples to follow; for Helen, its key point is that she is likely a "faded goddess", but it also recounts the various versions and attributes them. Stan 06:14, 13 Jun 2004 (UTC)

I think John has 2 good points: 1) why was this article featured at this point? I am very surprised myself. 2) citing the different versions of myths and sources... Well, Wikipedia is a work in progress. If the articles about myths are not as detailed as John would like to, then it is simply because they are not YET that detailed. Anyone having a good knowledge of the matter is more than welcome to modify the articles and shed light on the "making of the myths". olivier 07:03, Jun 25, 2004 (UTC)

The Meridian Handbook of Classical Mythology does a good job, I think of explaining the different versions. Graves also did so in his book on the myths, although there was also a lot of irritating theorizing. At any rate, the problem isn't so much that the articles aren't that detailed. The problem is that the articles are structured in such a way as to be highly misleading. The featuring is really weird, though. This simply isn't featured article material at the moment. Can anyone more patient than me point us to the Featured article candidate discussion of this article? john k 08:54, 25 Jun 2004 (UTC)

Perhaps, some articles get to be "featured" because when we see them on the front page our ears turn pink and we get to work. Like the recent feature of Academia, eh! If featuring Greek mythology sparked John Kenny, Olivier and Stan Shebs' discussion, then it's a good firecracker! I added wikilinks to mythographers ("Interpreters") who define the post-Bulfinch tradition, taken as a group. Who's still omitted in that list? Wetman 05:31, 26 Jun 2004 (UTC)

The Opening

I changed the below paragraph because I could not parse it, I could not find the verb, and it didn't tell me what greek mythology is. I see it's been reverted, so I'll leave it for now, but surely it needs a full-stop in there, at least?

"The body of myth represented in Greek mythology combined with ritual practices to make clear to Hellenes the place of mankind within the natural world, the "rightness" or impiety of actions, and explained and justified events of archaic Greek history, to constitute the religion of Hellenic civilization, from the late second millenium BCE to the 5th century CE, when Christians closed the oracle sites and desecrated the temples."

From this, Greek mythology is ... what exactly? -Wikibob | Talk 19:03, 2004 Jun 28 (UTC)

I saw this comment, and read the introduction: it was so baroque and so horribly written that I have reverted to a version from yesterday. →Raul654 19:09, Jun 28, 2004 (UTC)

I have rewritten it so that even someone who confuses myth and ritual and religion can understand. Please improve it rather than revert it. Does everyone understand the actual meaning of "desecrate"? (This may be the secret problem here, eh.) Wetman 20:37, 30 Jun 2004 (UTC)

...I'm very sorry, I don't understand the current opening. Why not just... something more simple...? Vincit 20:50, 30 Jun 2004 (UTC)

How is it now? Shorter sentences. Plain obvious statements of what everyone already knows about Greek mythology. (Now will we be hearing that it overstates the obvious?) Any concepts that are unfamiliar to the average reader, that need to be further explained? Do our critics still find it horribly written? Wetman

It's still terrible. It doesn't actually introduce the topic. The old one was much, much better. →Raul654 23:52, Jun 30, 2004 (UTC)

I added a note about impiety. I think this overstated things the other way. I was thinking of how Euripides and most of those following appear to be embarrassed by many of the tales, particularly those about Zeus overthowing his father. Euripides somewhere as one of his characters (Heracles?) claiming he doesn't at all believe that tale. In other cases Euripides seems to be inviting pointed criticism at the behavior of his gods. Plato refers to not speaking about the battles of the gods, advice which seems mostly to have been subsequently followed to our loss. All that kind of thing was found embarrassing.

Mostly the Hellenistic intellectual looked to philosophy to provide answers, and often attempted to understand mythology allegorically or euhemeristically. Diodorus Siculus so proudly parades one bogus euhemeristic or rational explanation of mythology after another as superior interpretations. The article as it stands doesn't manage to bring in this standpoint against the old "Lies of the Poets". And I find it somewhat a shock when in Cicero's The Nature of the Gods (3.43), Carnaedes starts trying to distinguish real gods from purely mythological gods, apparently expecting that his audience will quite agree that Orcus (=Hades) and Hecate and various others are mostly not considered real deities. In some ways Ovid's attitude was very much like Bulfinch's or like a Ginsberg in his Legends of the Jews.

Essentially Greek mythology as we have it seems to have been largely petrified in fixed forms (with numerous internal discrepencies) about the beginning of the Hellenistic period and became increasingly looked on a literary rather than religious, paid attention to in the way that many modern non-fundamentalist Christians rather condescendingly look at the stories surrounding Jesus' birth. Apollo might in religion be increasingly identified with Helios or even Dionysus but the mythology doesn't reflect any later religious development. Isis may be increasingly worshipped in the Hellenistic world but she can't get a foothold into the old stories. The mythology was increasingly disassociated from actual religious practise and religious belief. Yet there remained the kind of enthusiasm that leads English-speaking tourists to tour Hamlet's castle or to visit Sherlock Holmes' Baker Street or the supposed Camelot at Cabury Castle. Pausanias is full of such things.

I leave these thoughts for others to use, to oppose, and perhaps to incorporate in the article. But the article should make clear that this reduction of powerful myths to literary ornament was also part of the Hellenistic experience. jallan 00:51, 1 Jul 2004 (UTC)

Just a suggestion, but maybe we should begin the article with a little stating-the-obvious-paragraph, just for more comfortable reading. Because when I first came on the page, i just could'nt read it. Maybe its just me whining, but I think the layout of this article should be more ... inviting. Vincit 08:46, 1 Jul 2004 (UTC)

User:jallan should give this article even a sketchy section on the Hellenistic skeptical approach and literary tradition. And User:Raul654 should give us one on the Christian view, something along the line of "silly old stories told by the heathens," with the Robert Graves quote for an epigraph, if that is the "topic" he mentions, which he fails to find introduced. I will set up the subsections. Wetman 01:12, 1 Jul 2004 (UTC)

Most of what I've done is minor intended fix up. (But the road to hell is paved ...)

I did smudge away the strange short discussion which seemed to list Hades as an "Olympian" god and say that it was with difficulty that Demeter and Dionysus were made "Olympian" gods. That seemed inaccurate and POV ... in that the Olympian gods were simply the most important deities generally worshipped and accordingly there was no more difficulty in including Demeter or Dionysus than "hateful Ares" or the vague personified hearth known as "Hestia" or that wild, plague god Apollo who even in the final mythology twice rebels against Zeus and is twice punished for it. Hades was never included among the "Olympians". I also removed the POV indication of an earlier period in which only local deities were worshipped. Such an evolutionary hypothesis should appear along side other hypotheses, probably in another article on various reconstructions of pre-Geek religion. I confess it seems to me an unlikely hypothesis. Is there any known religious system which worshipped only local deities?

A possible beginning sentence:

Greek mythology refers to stories of Greek gods and goddesses and ancient heroes and heroines, originally created and spread by oral tradition but (except arguably for the earliest surviving works) preserved in versions that are later literary reworkings.

Use something similar for every mythology? jallan 18:40, 1 Jul 2004 (UTC)

I like that opening sentence. That one is really clear. Vincit 21:14, 1 Jul 2004 (UTC)

"Golden hind'

The Xena-inspired nonsense formerly here can be better understood by reading the entries Golden Hind and Deer (mythology). Any issues? Please don't thoughtlessly revert again. Wetman 20:37, 30 Jun 2004 (UTC)

Logos and Ergon

I just did a big revision. I tried to cut down the repetition (e.g. the great many "contradictions in the sources" disclaimers, or "decline from Hellenistic era onwards" sentences) and make more distinctions between the kind and quality of sources. I also revised the Hellenistic Rationalism section. See how you like it. Please revert if it sucks beyond your wildest imaginings, or revise if it's just barely tolerable. Bacchiad 05:14, 16 Jul 2004 (UTC)