#Institut Iliade

[greekmythcomix]

Excuse me I’m having a bit of a moment

When I started making my little comics it was for fun and for my classes and I had no life so I had all the time in the world to fall down endless rabbitholes of research and even do my own translations and make entire pages of panels in one night.

Now it’s ten years later and I have no time because I have a kid and a DIY project with a mortgage attached and a husband I actually want to spend time with and I ache everywhere and am so damn tired and I can barely find time or inclination in the week for a single panel because the research takes about a week and even then it’s not enough

And I wonder why I bother because now I’ve found you here, all you amazing artists who make absolutely beautiful mythology art and my diddy little explanatory comics for my classes with black and white stickmen look like what they are, a bit crap really, and who even sees them, and what does my work matter and why am I even bothering with my You Are Odysseus project when there are so many other worthy projects I could be doing and should be doing and who wants to hear from me anyway

So here’s me trying to make myself feel like I matter:

- 18 years of teaching Classical Civilisation, building my knowledge and reputation

- 11 and 15 years respectively teaching the Iliad and Odyssey

- 200+ schools and homeschoolers helped to take on or teach the Classical Covilisation GCSE in Classical Civilisation with lesson resources I made available

- 4 years of ClassicsTober prompts (JOY!)

- two awards from institutions I deeply respect

- so many comments on my YouTube videos that are variations on the same theme: ‘you made me understand’

✨- and I just noticed there are over 1 million pageviews on greekmythcomix.com✨

- and I do still actually enjoy making my silly little comics because creating and teaching make me feel ALIVE

Never stop creating what you love. What is the point in existing if we do?

[the---hermit]

21|12|2024

So I haven't posted an update in a while. I have been struggling quite a bit with staying focused and low energy, in addition to getting a cold, which means that I am way behind schedule with my studying. This morning I managed to finally finish reading and underlining the last book for my political institutions exam, but I still have a couple of chapters I need to turn into written notes, and honestly I don't know how to approach this, because I really wanted to take the whole next week to just rest, but also I want to only have to review things after my holiday break. So I really don't know how to deal with things, I might try to finish the notes on Monday and then take a week off. Surely on Monday I will do the tiniest bit of planning just so I know what to expect from my time after the holidays. Because if I do not have a clear picture I know I won't be able to fully relax. I will also have to send a couple of emails and check stuff to subscribe to my exams, but that will be problem for future me. Music has truly been my one saviour in the past few weeks, I don't know what I'd do without it. The way it changes my mood and helps me avoid going into overthinking spirals is pure magic.

Today's productivity:

read first thing in the morning

finished reading and underlining Governo by Paolo Colombo (This was a short but very dense non fiction book on the history and concept of government. It focused a lot on the language, which I didn't expect but found very interesting. As expected the part dealing with more contemporary periods were the ones I struggled with the most. It was definitely well made, but I absolutely despise political history so I kind of struggled at the end. But that is totally a personal thing, I have to admit this is the second book I read in this series focused on political concepts and they are both very well made and curated. The are very dense indeed, but they are clearly made so that anyone can get what they are talking about and the way they both approached the concepts they were analizing in an historical way was really cool since usually when talking about politics people focus on the last century only.)

continued writing notes for the book mentioned above

finished working on a test I have to turn in next week

duolingo

📖: Iliad by Homer, Governo by Paolo Colombo

[citrineandrosmarin]

🦉Athena Masterpost: Domains🦉

🐍 Masterpost Link 🐍

Last updated: Date of Publishing

Athena, Goddess of…

Metis

As a concept, metis could be translated and understood as meaning “practical wisdom”, “cunning”, “prudence”, “craftiness’ or “skill,” but it is often simply translated into “wisdom.” To many, this word conjures up the image of an old sage, a scholar surrounded by books and full of knowledge. But this was not how metis was conceptualized in ancient Greek culture.

Metis is “a complex but very coherent body of mental attributes and intellectual behaviour which combine flair, wisdom, forethought, subtlety of mind, deception, resourcefulness, vigilance, opportunism, various skills, and experience acquired over the years." It is an intelligence which is often associated with trickery and deception, adaptability, improvisation, shifting movement, shape-changing, quick thinking and seizing the opportunities at the right moment (kairos). Metis is more focused on getting practical results and success within an activity, not theoretical knowledge, and could be applied to many areas of life: "It may involve multiple skills useful in life, the mastery of the artisan in his craft, magic tricks, the use of philtres and herbs, the cunning strategems of war, frauds, deceits, resourcefulness of every kind."

Metis is also not limited to humans, but also applied to animals, such as foxes, fish and octopuses - animals with ‘cunning tricks’ (dolos) and deceptions that allow them to catch their prey or evade their predators. "The world of duplicity is also a world of vigilance: both the fishing frog squatting in the mud and the octopus plastered to its rock are on the alert; they keep a look out, are on the watch for the moment to act. Every animal with metis is a living eye which never closes or even blinks."

This was the kind of cunning we would associate today with the trickster archetype, not the book-loving sage. Athena was not the only deity to have metis (for example, Zeus is another major one) but this concept is a core part of who she is and influences her other associations and her connections with other deities.

Sources:

“Cunning Intelligence in Greek Culture and Society” - Marcel Detienne, Jean-Pierre Vernant

“Athena” - Susan Deacy

🐍Excerpts from “Cunning Intelligence in Greek Culture and Society”

Skill: Related to metis in that it’s very practical, with some intuitive sense but also dependent on experience and practice. This can be applied to many areas of life, though in Athena’s case it was often in relation to war, crafts, sailing and invention.

Crafts: Mainly associated with weaving, Athena was also worshiped in the festival of bronze smiths and artisans, Khalkeia. This aspect is very closely related to skill - as the word for both is ‘tekhne’ (τέχνη). This word is also one related to metis and associated words.

Invention: Athena is known as an inventor, with particular inventions being the bridle, plough and aulos. This aspect is also related to metis, craft and skill.

War: Although typically associated with the skills of war, and strategy, Athena was also associated with war in the same way that Ares was - she was ‘dreadful’ Athene “concerned with works of war, the sack of cities and the shouting and the battle.” (Homeric Hymn 11 to Athena)

🐍On the comparison of Athena and Ares

🐍Iliad - Athena dons the Aegis

Civilization, Politics & Justice: Athena in cult was often paired with Zeus, and these two presided over a number of civic institutions, for example the boule (a council that ran the daily affairs of the city) was watched over by Athena Boulaia and Zeus Boulaios. Athena was closely tied to the Athenian state and in myth was also heavily involved in the first criminal trial - that of Orestes.

Hero Mentorship: Athena was often involved in guiding, aiding and mentoring heroes such as Diomedes, Odysseus, Telemakhus, Herakles, Bellerophon and Perseus.

🐍Athena and Herakles Wedding Imagery

Education and Knowledge [SPG]: Athena’s modern associations with education and intelligence come from how she was adapted in post classical times as an allegorical symbol for church-approved virtues of wisdom and justice. The Renaissance furthered this connection, as she became a symbol of the arts, education, science, human excellence, and liberty.

Information Technology [UPG]: My personal UPG, based in part on Athena's associations with invention, civilization and knowledge, and in part on my own understanding of her character and my relationship and practice with her.

[allthedoorsareopennow]

ALRIGHT. LET’S INVESTIGATE THE UDAD PHOTOS. MUCH INFORMATION BELOW. SO MUCH

ok top left. brian is the oracle of delphi, of course in greek mythology the most prominent oracle

bottom left. for some reason the goddess artemis’ name seems to have been misspelled as artimes? I have no idea why. artemis is the olympian that features in actea and lyssa.

bottom right. seems to suggest marius’ lecture will take place in the aristotle institute - aristotle is a famous greek philosopher (among other things, grouped loosely as a polymath)

top right. as you likely know, these are military dog tags, usually intended to allow for the identification of corpses. an enomotarch is the commander of an enotomy, a division of 25-36 soldiers, bound together by oath. this seems to be a term originating in Sparta.

middle right. tipple seems to be a term for alcohol, consistent with the bottle top the term appears on. the toy soldier seems to have made its own liquor brand while in the city. (perhaps DB stands for dionysus bacchus, the greek and roman names respectively for the god of alcohol?)

right. a coin is shown, on one side reading ‘to speed the/journey down’. this likely is about the belief that the ferryman (charon) who takes the dead souls across the river acheron and into the underworld must be paid. virgil’s aeneid claims that if the deceased cannot afford to pay the ferryman, they must wander the shores of the styx (another underworld river, in some stories providing the same function as the acheron) for one hundred years before they are allowed to cross into the underworld. thus having this coin to give the ferryman would literally speed the journey down into the underworld in greek mythology. also depicted on this side is the logo of the acheron. on the other side of the coin is featured a headshot of ashes, with the text ‘a penny’ above (the smallest british unit of currency). I cannot discern the text below.

background. the blueprint for the aegis, which in homer’s iliad is a device carried by athena pr zeus, interpreted as either an animal skin or a shield, sometimes featuring the head of a gorgon, that symbolises protection.

the text on the left appears to read as follows:

‘…[ti]tanium…n for the…ens district…[lig]htning rod

‘spikes - they look badass

‘Durable Ti core

‘Moderator’

Ti is the chemical symbol for titanium. also depicted is a uranium fission reaction. a moderator is something else that is needed in a fission reactor core, so this must be a design for a fission reactor. ‘enriched to 90%’ refers to the uranium - uranium-235 is the most fissile isotope, so the more U-235 you have, the more fission you can achieve. for context, reactors often use uranium enriched to 3.5-4.5% - 90% is overkill by a long way for energy generation purposes. my guess is that this reactor core is designed to provide huge amounts of energy to operate sone kind of lightning device, likely intended for zeus (the god of lightning). it is signed by athena and raphaella la cognizi.

BRING FORTH THE NEXT IMAGE!

another acheron coin is shown. I'm not really sure what’s happening in most of this one.

ANOTHER!

more acheron coins and a half-visible toy soldier’s tipple bottle cap. the focus of this picture is a torn and blood-splattered coaster for Calypso’s, the bar from which the suits kidnapped ulysses.

NEXT!

now this is more like it

a zeus coin is depicted, showing five credits - presumably the official currency of the city

there is a gambling chip bearing the name hermes, perhaps referencing his role as a trickster god

the guitar pick is stamped with the name apollo, the greek god of music and song.

there is a fragment of a newspaper cover - we will get more shots of this later.

the emblem of poseidon is shown to be a trident, a weapon poseidon is often depicted as wielding, representing his status as god of the sea.

wow I wonder what name is on that card it’s mostly blocked I wonder if the next will have the name..

BEHOLD!

so that’s presumably an ID card for a security guard, whose name we can now see is Anippe ?aiad. Anippe in greek mythology is the egyptian daughter of the river god nilus, and is thus a naiad, so the name on the card is Anippe Naiad. I can find little information about her, other than that heracles killed her son.

we also get a look at ulysses here, the the text ‘//ALL POINTS FUGITIVE ALERT//‘ above their mugshot.

NEXT!

the text on the ulysses info that seems to be on some kind of old tablet reads

…1) COUNT THEFT:

…[CYCLO]PS - POSEIDON PROPERTY

…OR CAPTURE: DR-25000

…E BOUNTY

…S:

SPONSORED BY POSEIDON INDUSTRIES

CLICK TO LEARN MORE

this seems to be putting a bounty of ‘DR-25000’ (presumably a currency?) on ulysses’ head for the theft of the eye of the cyclops.

more newspaper.. shall we take a closer look?

across four different images, here is the newspaper:

TRANSCRIPT BEGINS

ALL THE NEWS ALL THE TIME

LARGEST HOME CIRCULATION

LARGEST ADVERTISING VOLUME

DELPHI 2374

The City Oracle Telephone Number

THE CITY ORACLE

IN THREE PARTS - 46 1…

PART 1 - GENERAL NEWS…

ORACLE OFFICE

292 West Hector Stree[t]

VOL. LVIII KRONOU MORNING, GAMELION 5, 12390 DAILY, 5 DRACH[MA]

OEDIPUS IN INCEST MARRIAGE SCANDAL

SHOCKING NEW REVELATIONS OVER IDENTITY OF HERO DOCTOR'S WIFE AND MOTHER

MAN WHO CURED THE SPHINX TRIES TO PLEAD IGNORANCE - WILL SEEK TO FIND REFUGE OFF WORLD

(columns on right):

INSIDE

NARCISSUS DENIES PLASTIC SURGERY CLAIMS

HERMES TO UNVEIL NEW HI-SPEED MAGLINES

FORTY DEAD IN SUB-LEVEL 54D EXPLOSIONS: WHO IS “GUNPOWDER TIM?”

TWENTY YEARS FROM ILIUM: WILL THE SCARS EVER HEAL?

Oedipus Rex, the doctor hailed as a hero after successfully curing the disease ravaging the sublevel slums, has been revealed to have been married to his own mother for the last eight years, in what is being hailed as the social scandal of the decade.

Mr. Rex previously claimed to have grown up in one of the City's most troubled orphanages. However, a source within the Acheron has claimed that Teiresias, one of the network's most trusted interfaces, revealed his true origins yesterday.

“I didn’t know,” Oedipus told The Oracle, “I’d always believed my parents to be dead. I had no way of knowing they were even alive, let alone…”

Oedipus’ wife and mother, Jocasta Rex, has been unavailable for comment. She was last seen boarding a transport line to Outer Thebes, an area known for the number of suicides it attracts.

It is known she had been married once before to Laius, Mayor of one of the Thebian districts at the centre of the Sphinx epidemic. It was repoterd that he disappeared shortly before the announcement of the cure, under circumstances described by City PD as ‘suspicious’.

CONTINUED PG.5

HERACLES ACQUITTED ON MISTRIAL TECHNICALITY

The City High Court finally came to a ruling today in the case of Heracles, the notorious figure at the centre of the murder trial which has gripped the City for the last four weeks.

Heracles, who worked for the House of Zeus as head security for fifty years before resigning under unknown circumstances last Theozenios, was found not guilty of the brutal slaying and dismemberment of his wife and two children.

According to sources familiar with the case, he was found lying unconscious in his home, surrounded by the bodies of his family, holding in his hand what was at first thought to be the murder weapon. However, forensic evidence regarding the blade was judged to have been inadmissible, and his insistence he was defending his family from an attacker swayed the jury.

Heracles has been unable to identify the assailant against which he was struggling. This is not the first time Heracles has been involved in accusations of violence. Rumours persist that he may have been the infamous “Thunderbolt of Zeus” while working with the company, despite no connection ever being proven between the Olympian patriarch and the unknown hitman.

CONTINUED PG.9

TRANSCRIPT ENDS

Delphi and the oracle are referenced several times.

A drachma is a greek unit of currency, hence why I have guessed that as the unit of price for the newspaper.

Teiresias, the one referenced as revealing Oedipus’ parentage, is a blind prophet of Apollo from Thebes, known for clairvoyance and being transformed into a woman for several years. he is referenced as being one of the first brains volunteered into the acheron in the fiction, and holds and manages all the knowledge of the acheron.

Theoxenia seems to be a descriptor for greek mythology stories in which characters show benevolence and hospitality to strangers who turn out to be disguised deities capable of reward. These stories encourage people to treat anyone they meet as potential disguised divinity.

ONWARD!

another oracle of delphi ad, the corner of the newspaper, and part of hades’ file on oedipus..

TRANSCRIPT BEGINS (pencil markings in orange)

Name: Oedipus Rex not given surname

Occupation: Doctor (Retired) Disgraced

Age: 52 No records- abandoned at birth. Estimate Height: 5’10” Weight: 132l[b]

Hair: Chestnut Eyes: N/A self-blind[ed]

District: Thebes

Abandoned by wealthy but paranoid parents at birth. Olympians secret[ly] pulled strings, used him as poster [child] for failing orphanage scheme. Notab[le] for successfully researching the cause/[…] for the Sphinx - exceptional intel[ligence] shown. Worthy candidate for "Trial [by] Wits". Currently seeking to leave T[he] City after publicised patricide and maternal relations; will likely pla[…] ball given ample funding. EXPLOIT

END TRANSCRIPT

the tab at the side reads WITS. as well as oedipus’ fingerprints, there is a dirty handprint in the top right of the document. the newspaper appears to be stained with rings of tea or coffee.

at first I thought the photo of oedipus featured in hades’ document was this one, but it doesn’t quite match. it’s a good photo anyway.

NEXT

gunpowder tim’s dog tags from earlier are visible at the base of the photo again. A different part of Oedipus’ file is shown, showing a handprint and the start of a date on the photo of Oedipus, beginning 08/12. a map is shown too, with crosses through two locations and a circle around another. from what I can see the streets seem to mostly have fairly generic names.

sadly I have now reached image limit. when I have made the next post, I will link it here.

update I realised some of the stuff guessing cut off words and such that I did is pointless because the full documents for a bunch of them are in the goddamn cd book thing. and I kind of can’t be bothered to finish cause it feels like half the stuff I did was pointless. if you would be interested say so and maybe I will do more. but otherwise. nah

[vicnormansstuff]

Jean-Marie Le Pen raconte Dominique Venner, « l’intellectuel samouraïque » | Institut Iliade

[mythological-art]

Paris

Artist: Johann Heinrich Wilhelm Tischbein (German, 1751–1829)

Date: 1785-1795

Medium: Oil on Canvas

Collection: Art Institute of Chicago

Paris, also known as Alexander, is a mythological figure in the story of the Trojan War. He appears in numerous Greek legends and works of Ancient Greek literature such as the Iliad. In myth, he is prince of Troy, son of King Priam and Queen Hecuba, and younger brother of Prince Hector. His elopement with Helen sparks the Trojan War, during which he fatally wounds Achilles.

[galleriaartethule]

Willy

Nos héroïnes

[classicsstudentsunion]

little-discussed classics major experience is either reading the entirety of the iliad/odyssey before you even dream of stepping foot in a post-secondary institution OR never reading the iliad/odyssey in one go but instead reading it in pieces according to whatever essays you have to write this semester until you graduate having fully read both of them. No in-between.

[chthonic-cassandra]

I just read a Wonder Woman comic that revolved around the concept of an honor-bound host-guest relationship, where one person pledged themselves to service to the other and that other was bound to protect them as long as they stayed. I assume the specific ritual was made up for the comic, but was there anything in that vein in Greek antiquity it may have been drawing from?

There absolutely is!

The institution of guest-friendship (ξενία/xenia) was a major part of Ancient Greek society as a structuring ethical principle, and it shows up all the time in classical literature. It's this idea of reciprocal obligation, respect, and care owed between a host and guest, even if they were originally strangers to one another. Guest-friendship falls under the domain of Zeus Xenios, who can punish those who violate it from either side, or bless who fulfill it.

The behavior of the suitors in the Odyssey is so egregious partly because it's a violation of xenia; by contrast the way Odysseus is treated by the Phaeacians, and the way he responds, is model host-guest behavior. We likewise see the power of xenia in book six of the Iliad, when Diomedes and Glaucus meet in battle, realize their fathers had a guest-friendship relationship, and so choose not to fight each other. And of course a lovely paradigmatic example of xenia is when Baucis and Philemon, alone of all the households disguised Zeus and Hermes visit in the Metamorphoses, invite the two strangers in to share what humble food they have and are blessed for it.

[aurumacadicus]

It’s time to pick our September book for book club! Tumblr will vote, and the book club will then vote among the top three in Discord. If you’d like to join the book club, send me a message and I’ll send you a link to the discord! Check out the books’ summaries under the cut!

Carry On by Rainbow Rowell

Simon Snow is the worst Chosen One who’s ever been chosen.

That’s what his roommate, Baz, says. And Baz might be evil and a vampire and a complete git, but he’s probably right.

Half the time, Simon can’t even make his wand work, and the other half, he starts something on fire. His mentor’s avoiding him, his girlfriend broke up with him, and there’s a magic-eating monster running around, wearing Simon’s face. Baz would be having a field day with all this, if he were here—it’s their last year at Watford School of Magicks, and Simon’s infuriating nemesis didn’t even bother to show up.

Assistant to the Villain by Hannah Nicole Maehrer

ASSISTANT WANTED: Notorious, high-ranking villain seeks loyal, levelheaded assistant for unspecified office duties, supporting staff for random mayhem and terror, and other Dark Things In General. Discretion a must. Excellent benefits.

With ailing family to support, Evie Sage’s employment status isn’t just important, it’s vital. So when a mishap with Rennedawn’s most infamous Villain results in a job offer—naturally, she says yes. No job is perfect, of course, but even less so when you develop a teen crush on your terrifying, temperamental, and undeniably hot boss. Don’t find evil so attractive, Evie.

But just when she’s getting used to severed heads suspended from the ceiling and the odd squish of an errant eyeball beneath her heel, Evie suspects this dungeon has a huge rat…and not just the literal kind. Because something rotten is growing in the kingdom of Rennedawn, and someone wants to take the Villain—and his entire nefarious empire—out.

Now Evie must not only resist drooling over her boss but also figure out exactly who is sabotaging his work…and ensure he makes them pay.

After all, a good job is hard to find.

Plain Bad Heroines: A Novel by Emily M. Danforth

Our story begins in 1902, at the Brookhants School for Girls. Flo and Clara, two impressionable students, are obsessed with each other and with a daring young writer named Mary MacLane, the author of a scandalous bestselling memoir. To show their devotion to Mary, the girls establish their own private club and call it the Plain Bad Heroine Society. They meet in secret in a nearby apple orchard, the setting of their wildest happiness and, ultimately, of their macabre deaths. This is where their bodies are later discovered with a copy of Mary’s book splayed beside them, the victims of a swarm of stinging, angry yellow jackets. Less than five years later, the Brookhants School for Girls closes its doors forever—but not before three more people mysteriously die on the property, each in a most troubling way.

Over a century later, the now abandoned and crumbling Brookhants is back in the news when wunderkind writer Merritt Emmons publishes a breakout book celebrating the queer, feminist history surrounding the “haunted and cursed” Gilded Age institution. Her bestselling book inspires a controversial horror film adaption starring celebrity actor and lesbian it girl Harper Harper playing the ill-fated heroine Flo, opposite B-list actress and former child star Audrey Wells as Clara. But as Brookhants opens its gates once again, and our three modern heroines arrive on set to begin filming, past and present become grimly entangled—or perhaps just grimly exploited—and soon it’s impossible to tell where the curse leaves off and Hollywood begins.

The Fifth Season by N. K. Jemisin

This is the way the world ends…for the last time.

It starts with the great red rift across the heart of the world’s sole continent, spewing ash that blots out the sun. It starts with death, with a murdered son and a missing daughter. It starts with betrayal, and long dormant wounds rising up to fester.

This is the Stillness, a land long familiar with catastrophe, where the power of the earth is wielded as a weapon. And where there is no mercy.

The Eye of the World by Robert Jordan

The Wheel of Time turns and Ages come and pass, leaving memories that become legend. Legend fades to myth, and even myth is long forgotten when the Age that gave it birth returns again. What was, what will be, and what is, may yet fall under the Shadow.

When a vicious band of half-men, half beasts invade the Two Rivers seeking their master’s enemy, Moiraine persuades Rand al’Thor and his friends to leave their home and enter a larger unimaginable world filled with dangers waiting in the shadows and in the light.

The Iliad by Homer

Sing, O Goddes, the anger of Achilles, son of Peleus, that brought countless ills upon the Achaeans…

So begins Homer’s The Iliad, the classic account of the final year of the Trojan War, a vicious, 10-year bloodbath between the Greeks and the Trojans following the abduction of Helen of Sparta. In this prose retelling of Homer’s poem, we follow the mighty Greek hero Achilles and his comrades as they battle against the Trojans, the gods, and even fate itself.

[irelandseyeonmythology]

DIAS Black Friday Sale

Once a year, the Dublin Institute for Advanced Studies (DIAS), offers a sale for Black Friday -- DIAS is one of the major publishers for Celtic Studies, many of the best studies of medieval Irish material have come through there.

Some books that I recommend, personally:

Fergus Kelly, A Guide to Early Irish Law (26.25 Euro, normally 35) (THE introduction to law in medieval Ireland)

"", Early Irish Farming (26.25 Euro, normally 35) (Everything you wanted to know about day to day life in medieval Ireland but were afraid to ask. Literally. Everything.)

Medieval Irish Prose

Fergus Kelly, Audacht Morainn (18.75 Euro, normally 25)

Are you planning on becoming a medieval Irish king? Do you want to know what you should do to involve the total destruction of the natural order? Then this is the text for you! Now with English translation!

In all seriousness, this text is used a LOT with regards to studies of ideal kingship in medieval Ireland.

Cecile O'Rahilly, The Táin from the Book of Leinster (26.25 Euro, usually 35)

I'll be real with you, lads: I hate Cú Chulainn. I hate him. I hate his smug, misogynistic face. His creepy multi-pupiled eyes. The shitty way he treats Emer. The way that his presence is like this black hole in the study of medieval Irish literature that means that the Ulster Cycle can get a prestigious yearly conference held in its honor while the other cycles are left with either crumbs or outright dismissal. I think the Táin is boring and episodic as a piece of lit and I've never found anything overly redeeming about it over any other piece of medieval Irish literature, especially since imo other pieces of literature do women (and homoeroticism) much better and get much less praise for it.

...that being said. It's important. It IS iconic, both as a piece of medieval Irish literature and, in general, to Irish literature. Its status as The Irish Iliad means that, if you want to study medieval Irish stuff...you have to read the Táin. And this is a version of the Táin that you might not have gotten, translated and edited by a master of Old Irish, with commentary.

"", Táin Bó Cúailnge: recension I (10 Euro, normally 35)

See above.

Early Irish History and Genealogy

T.F. O'Rahilly, Early Irish History and Genealogy (30 Euro, normally 40)

So. On the record, a lot of what he says here is absolutely not currently believed in the field. Just. No. BUT. There's a reason why I always recommend him anyway, and it's because if you're serious about doing a study of Irish Mythology, whatever we take that to mean...you will not be able to avoid this man. His ideas were very popular for decades and still often are to people who don't really focus on mythology. It's better to know where these ideas come from and to identify them than not, and O'Rahilly, in his defense, had an *excellent* knowledge of his sources. It's dense, it's difficult (rather like the author himself, from the accounts I've heard), but it's necessary if you really want to attack this.

Joan Radner, Fragmentary Annals of Ireland (22.50, normally 30)

There is so much weird shit in the Fragmentary Annals. So much.

Welsh

Patrick Sims Williams, Buchedd Beuno: The Middle Welsh Life of St Beuno (22.50 Euro, normally 30)

I know what you're thinking: "Why the FUCK are they recommending this book about a random Welsh saint? Answer: Because this is how I learned Middle Welsh. The introduction to Welsh at the front of the book + the VERY good index at the back is still one of the best ways to learn Middle Welsh. Also if anyone was watching the Green Knight film and going "Why is there a lady with her head chopped off?" this answers that question.

 R. L. Thomson, Pwyll Pendeuic Dyuet: the first of the Four Branches of the Mabinogi, edited from the White Book of Rhydderch, with variants from the Red Book of Hergest (15 Euro, normally 20)

Once you've gotten enough of a hang of Middle Welsh to know the basics, it's time to dive into the classics, and what better way to do it than with the Mabinogi, starting at the very beginning, with the First Branch? Personally, I dislike a lot of Thomson's orthographic decisions, but, hey, it's the First Branch, and that's Middle Welsh orthography for you.

Ian Hughes, Math uab Mathonwy (22.50 Euro, normally 30)

The Fourth Branch, my beloved. Incest, rape, bestiality (well...pseudo bestiality, really), creating a new life while not being willing to deal with the consequences of it...it truly has it all. Not for the faint of heart, but absolutely worth the read if you can stomach it because imo it handles its themes very well and it's incredibly haunting.

And a lot more -- go in, shop around, see what's available. Even with the older books, they're often things that we're still referencing in some way into the present.

[heavenslittlemachine]

my myth teacher keeps giving us these questions asking us who we think is right in situations where both parties are clearly in the wrong (most egregious example was from the iliad about achilles and agamemnon arguing over who should be able to keep a sex slave???) which makes me think this must be one of the ways educational institutions groom children into becoming voters

[the---hermit]

Behold: a low quality picture of my notes.

10|01|2025

In the past couple of days I started reviewing for my history of political and social institutions exam as well. Both tomorrow and Monday will be fully dedicate to my last review for my history of Sabaudian states exam, for which so far I am the only person who has signed up. That is going to be an experience™ if I end up being the only student there. It's kind of fucking up with my anxiety and stess levels, I won't lie. In fact I have been having terrible sleep and many nightmares, which isn't ideal. Hopefully in the next couple of days I can get some rest and grow a bit more confident. I cannot wait for exam season to be over. I also emailed a professor to let her know that despite what I had previosly told her I will not be taking her exam this season, instead I will take that in April. I had ment to email her for a few weeks now, but I also didn't want to sent her emails during the holiday break.

📖: Iliad by Homer

[littlesparklight]

Was the Myth of Ganymede invented to justify pederasty?

No matter what Plato tries to claim in the Laws 636c about how the Cretans definitely invented it exactly because of that reason... That's just not something we can know haha.

Like, trying to claim we know the reason any given myth at all was "invented" is kind of ridiculous in general!

When it comes to the Ganymede myth, our oldest surviving version is in the Iliad. Which, as any academic will tell you, doesn't have any overt sexual dimension. They usually like to assert that this means that in the Iliad's time of formation, Ganymede's abduction didn't have any sexual/pederastic dimension yet. (In the Iliad, it isn't even Zeus himself/alone to takes Ganymede, but "all the gods".)

Which might very well be true! In which case a sexual/pederastic dimension was added sometime maybe after somewhere 700 BC.

However, I'd also like to point out that the Iliad likes to angle quite a lot of its myths in various ways, and doesn't necessarily tell us everything (it especially likes to strip out as much of the fantastic as it can, even with still having the gods as characters and actors). So, I don't think that necessarily means we could categorically say there might not have been any sexual (and thus pederastic) angle to the Ganymede myth at this point.

The Homeric Hymn to Aphrodite (probably at least Archaic in date) jumps to having Zeus be the agent who takes Ganymede (but again, all the gods are delighting in his presence!). I've still read academics wanting to say there is yet no sexual dimension here. Perhaps there isn't. But I'm not sure I (personal, unprofessional opinion as it is lol) would agree, considering the context Ganymede and Zeus is being brought up, both in terms of the hymn itself dealing with a sexual relationship, and the company it keeps (Eos-Tithonos).

I think at best one might be able to say that if Ganymede's myth didn't have a sexual dimension between him and Zeus "from the start" (whenever that would be, whether or not formal pederasty as such or something similar was a thing yet), then the sexual dimension might have been added in response to (changing) social developments, that is, pederasty.

But, we don't know. We can't know. And either way I don't think it was in any way invented to justify such a thing. At most, it could be reflecting it.

(Especially since formal paiderasteia is something very specific and the myth of Ganymede probably/definitely is older than said formal institution, sexual dimensions or no, depending on how old one would consider the formal institution to be.)

[inspofromancientworld]

The Iliad and the Odyssey and their Ancient Origins

By JW1805 at en.wikipedia, Public Domain, https://commons.wikimedia.org/w/index.php?curid=2171360

Homer lived in about the 8th century BCE and was an Ancient Greek poet, widely regarded as one of the best poets in the world, Plato saying he 'taught Greece', Dante having Virgil say he is the 'Poet sovereign', Alexander Pope referring to him as the 'greatest of poets'. There were many other works attributed to Homer in antiquity, including the Contest of Homer and Hesiod, perhaps expanding the line from Hesiod's Works and Days in which he claimed to have won a poetry contest. Though, with various references in the poem, it was dated to the second century CE.

By Francesco Hayez - The Yorck Project (2002) 10.000 Meisterwerke der Malerei (DVD-ROM), distributed by DIRECTMEDIA Publishing GmbH. ISBN: 3936122202., Public Domain, https://commons.wikimedia.org/w/index.php?curid=152601

It is thought that the blind bard Demodocus from the Odyssey was meant to represent Homer, leading to the oft repeated description that Homer was blind. He was said to have been the son of the river god Meles and the nymph Critheis, that he wandered, and that he died after failing to solve a riddle. There were many biographies of Homer written in the ancient world, all of which were based on the traditions passed down about him rather than based on studying writings of those who might have known him.

By Lawrence Alma-Tadema - fAFfW9CzajZAaA at Google Cultural Institute maximum zoom level, Public Domain, https://commons.wikimedia.org/w/index.php?curid=21886584

Studying Homer's writing is one of the oldest forms of scholarship, going back to Ancient Greece and Rome. There are writings by Xenophanes of Colophon, a Greek theologian, who claimed that Homer's treatment of the gods made him 'immoral'. Theagenes of Rhegium countered that the poems are meant to be allegories, only symbolic and not meant to be taken as literal representations of the gods. There were also commentaries to help make Homer's Ancient Greek understandable to those who spoke classical Greek. His works were taken as to support the Stoics and containing hidden wisdom, and that the poems purpose was to educate. Eustathius of Thessalonica produced nearly 6,000 pages (in the 21st century printed version) of commentary on the Iliad and the Odyssey in the 12th century CE.

By Pinpin (talk · contribs) - Inspiré de la carte "ACHAEANS and TROJANS" du site de Carlos Parada, CC BY-SA 3.0, https://commons.wikimedia.org/w/index.php?curid=2830268

Dating the Trojan War and the composition of the Iliad and the Odyssey as well as their historical factually is complicated. The ancient Greeks give us a date of 1184 BCE as the date of the sack of Troy, though there are wide-spread doubts that Troy existed as Homer wrote about them. Homer's poems also contain combinations of Bronze Age elements (bronze weapons, large shields, and a boar's tusk helmet) along with Iron Age elements (cremation, smaller shields, and many aspects of the civilization). These may be artifacts of anachronism that crept in because of Poetic license or lack of primary sources, or they may be elements that show the epics are works of pure historical fiction. No locations have been found, to date, that match Homer's description of Troy. Additionally, with the translation of Linear B, we now know that Bronze age Greek civilization was more closely related to that of the ancient Near East.

By CherryX per Wikimedia Commons, CC BY-SA 3.0, https://commons.wikimedia.org/w/index.php?curid=21675688

Whether the Trojan War happened as described in the Iliad and the Odyssey was debated even in antiquity. Thucydides, a historian who lived about 460-400 BCE, was of the opinion that it was a historical event but was exaggerated by Homer, that there were not 1,186 ships sent to Troy. Later, opinion swung that the Trojans won the war and the epics were a way of the Greeks hiding that loss from the historical record, as written by Dio Chrysostom in about 100 CE. Gradually, it was generally believed that the Trojan War was fully fictional until 1870, when Heinrich Schliemann excavated Hisarlik, Çanakkale, which he believed to be the historical Troy, leading to the interpretation that the that there was a Greek campaign against Troy but that the poems aren't a faithful record of the events. Since the 1990s, efforts have been made to understand the conflict as it appeared in writing of the countries around the area, such as the Hittites.

By Unknown author - http://www.lgpn.ox.ac.uk/image_archive/mss/mss2.html, Public Domain, https://commons.wikimedia.org/w/index.php?curid=4297434

The Iliad and the Odyssey are both written in a 'literary language', or formal language, rather than the 'everyday language' that people commonly spoke. They were mostly written in Ionic Greek with an level of importance of the number of syllables per line, which was part of the reason for many of the epithets (such as 'rosy-fingered Dawn' and 'owl-eyed Athena') as well as the so-named 'Homeric formulae (for example: 'and then answered [him/her], Agamemnon, king of men' or 'when the early-born rose-fingered Dawn came to light') which influenced later Greek and Roman poetry. These 'oddities' are sometimes taken as evidence that the epics were orally transmitted before they were written down. Other 'fingerprints' of oral telling include 'ring composition' (introducing elements or ideas in one order then reversing them, which might be a mnemonic device), short sentences with limited use of conjunctions, and using 'type scenes' for things that happen often in the poem.

By User:Bibi Saint-Pol - Own work (Original text: Own work (using Wikisource for text)), Public Domain, https://commons.wikimedia.org/w/index.php?curid=1904767

The Iliad is 15,693 lines long, divided into 24 books (one for each letter of the Greek alphabet). It covers the ten-year long siege of Troy (Ilium) by the Mycenaean Greeks, though it focuses primarily on the final weeks of that campaign. It also details the machinations of the Olympian gods in provoking and prolonging the war.

By Michel Martin Drolling - Transferred from en.wikipedia to Commons by User:Twice25 using CommonsHelper., Public Domain, https://commons.wikimedia.org/w/index.php?curid=4297275

The first four books give the exposition for the story, beginning near the end of the war, then explaining what happened that caused the war, from the competition between the goddesses for the golden apple caused by the spiting of Eris. through to Hera convincing Zeus that only the destruction of Troy is acceptable and Athena nudging the Trojan archer Pandarus to shoot Menelaus, breaking the truce. The next three books focus on duels between the Greeks and Trojans. Books 8-15 talk about the Trojans winning against the Greeks and the machinations among the gods to allow this to happen. Books 16-18 focus on Patroclus' sacrifice and books 19-24 focus on Achilles' grief and rage at the death of his companion. Achilles' rage is the ring composition that encompasses the entire poem as it begins 'Wrath of Achilles' as the opening words of the epic.

By File:Odyssey_manuscript.jpg photoshoped by Odysses - File:Odyssey_manuscript.jpg, Public Domain, https://commons.wikimedia.org/w/index.php?curid=46651771

The Odyssey is 12,109 lines long, also divided into 24 books. It focuses on Odysseus' return home to Ithica and his reunion with his family, which can be contrasted with Agamemnon's return home to Clytemnestra, who kills Agamemnon with the help of her lover Aegistrus, or Achilles' inability to return home at all despite his fame. The second main theme is that of hospitality to strangers, as exemplified by the Phaeacian court and by Odysseus' shepherd who takes him in when he's disguised.

By VladoubidoOo - Own work, CC BY-SA 3.0, https://commons.wikimedia.org/w/index.php?curid=30558926

The Odyssey begins with Odysseus being unable to return home to Ithica because he angered Poseidon, so he's staying with Calypso, or a captive of Calypso. There is also a focus on Odysseus' family, Penelope and Telemachus, and the suitors camping in the palace, campaigning for Penelope's hand in another type of siege, with Telemachus setting out for Sparta to find information on his father. The first four books set up the story with the gods pushing the humans into place to begin the journey. Books 5-8 deal with Odysseus leaving Calypso's island of Ogygia and and he managed to make it to Scherie despite Poseidon's wrath at him because of the help of goddesses. In books 9-12, Odysseus recounts his adventures to the Phaeacians including episodes with the lotus fruit that cause amnesia, the island of the Cylcopes, the winds given by Aeolus and the resulting storm, the Sirens, and the hunting of the sacred cattle, which is how Odysseus ended up on Calypso's island. In books 13-20, Odysseus is able to get home with the Phaeacians' help, though they drop him off while he's asleep and at a hidden cove so Athena needs to let him know where he is. She has him hide the treasure the Phaeacians left for him and disguise himself as an old man so he can reconnoiter things around his home. Telemachus returned home from Sparta, avoiding an ambush set up by the suitors as he does so. He meets up with his father and they plan how to defeat the suitors. In books 21-24, they carry out the plan, beginning with challenging the suitors to an archery contest for Penelope's hand through to the massacre of the suitors and the execution of the maids who were unfaithful to the household through having sex with the suitors.

You can read the Iliad here. You can listen to the Iliad here. You can listen to OSP's summary here.

You can read the Odyssey here. You can listen to the Odyssey here. You can listen to OSP's summary here.

[camisoledadparis]

THIS DAY IN GAY HISTORY

based on: The White Crane Institute's 'Gay Wisdom', Gay Birthdays, Gay For Today, Famous GLBT, glbt-Gay Encylopedia, Today in Gay History, Wikipedia, and more … October 30

Peisistratus rides into Athens with Athene

605 BC – On this date the Athenian benevolent tyrant Peisistratus was born (d.527 BC). Peisistratos was the son of a philosopher and teacher called Hippocrates, and was named for the Peisistratos in the Odyssey. He lowered taxes and increased Athens' economy.

According to Plutarch he was the eromenos (Greek for "young lover") of the Athenian lawgiver Solon. He assisted Solon in his endeavors, and fought bravely in the battle of Salamis.

When Solon left Athens, Peisistratos became leader of the party of the Highlands (poor, rural people) in 565 BC. Peisistratos used a clever scheme, calling for bodyguards after he pretended to be attacked. Those bodyguards were composed of the people of the Highlands who had entered Athens. In 561 BC he seized the Acropolis with this group of bodyguards, becoming ruler. His rule did not last - he was driven out by Lycurgis, Megacles and others from the party of the Coast within the year. He returned 10 years later (in legend, with Athene at his side), regained power and reigned for 23 years until his death in 527 BC.

During his reign, many temples were built and he encouraged poets and artists by welcoming them into his court. According to a story first mentioned by the Latin author Cicero, Peisistratus ordered the writing down of the Iliad and Odyssey of Homer, which had previously been transmitted orally.

1882 – Johannes Holzmann (d.1914) was a German anarchist writer and activist who generally went by the pseudonym Senna Hoy.

Holzmann, born in Tuchel, Prussia (now Tuchola, Poland), hailed from a bourgeois Jewish family. Moving to Berlin, he became a teacher of religion at first. Like many intellectuals around the turn of the century, he felt oppressed by the restrictive morals then reigning German society. He quit teaching in 1902 and founded the League for Human Rights (Bund für Menschenrecht, in German) in 1903.

In 1904, he published a booklet entitled "Das dritte Geschlecht" ("The Third Gender"). In it, he attacked homophobia, laying most of the blame on religion. Above all, the text was intended to be educational and covered evolution, biology and issues then facing homosexuals.

From 1904 to 1905, Holzmann edited the journal Der Kampf: Zeitschrift für gesunden Menschenverstand (The Struggle: Journal for Common Sense). Though it was not published by any particular organization, the journal was anarchist in outlook. In addition to fictional stories, Der Kampf published articles on various topics, including many about homosexuality. Among its writers were Else Lasker-Schüler, Peter Hille, and Erich Mühsam and, at its best, it had a circulation of up to 10,000.

During this time, Holzmann wrote an article entitled "Die Homosexualität als Kulturbewegung" ("Homosexuality as a Cultural Movement"). He argued that the right to privacy entailed that "no one has the right to intrude in the private matters of another, to meddle in another's personal views and orientations, and that ultimately it is no one's business what two freely consenting adults do in their homes." He attacked Paragraph 175 of the German criminal code which criminalized homosexual acts.

To him, the struggle against the prohibition of homosexual acts was part of a larger struggle for emancipation. He disagreed with the mainstream socialist movement, namely the Social Democratic Party of Germany (SPD), that viewed the repeal of Paragraph 175 as a minor issue. He also opposed the SPD's tactic of forcefully outing gays, such as the steel magnate Friedrich Alfred Krupp, in order to bring about the repeal of Paragraph 175. He called this tactic an "indecent weapon", saying that anyone who practices it "is willing to remove ground under his own feet by practicing the very injustice that he opposes". He also disagreed with many other German gay rights activists such as Adolf Brand who did not see their struggle as part of a wider movement.

He views caused him to be monitored by the police. Annoyed by this, he wrote a letter to the chief of the Berlin police, threatening to punch the next person he caught spying on him in the face. For this, he was sentenced to four months in prison, but he decided to flee rather than serve the sentence.

Once in Zurich, he worked for a newspaper called Der Weckruf (The Wake-up Call). He was arrested once more and deported. He sneaked back into Switzerland. He tried to stay in hiding by faking his own death. He wrote an obituary for himself claiming that he had been killed in the course of a prisoners' escape. After this was exposed, he was disgraced, even within the anarchist scene. Therefore, he decided to leave Zurich. After spending a couple of months in Paris, he decided to move to Russia.

He opted for Russia, having reported on the 1905 Russian Revolution in Der Kampf, because he thought Europe's future depended on the outcome of revolutionary developments in that country. He joined an anarchist federation in Poland, then part of the Russian Empire. He assisted that organization for several weeks, robbing rich merchants to fund the group's activities. In June 1907, he was caught and sentenced to fifteen years of hard labor. Having struggled for his release for years, his supporters finally managed to convince the Russian authorities to let him go. However, the German authorities refused to let him back into the country, so he was forced to remain incarcerated in Russia. Meanwhile, Holzmann's health deteriorated. He suffered from malnutrition and typhus and died on April 28, 1914.

1930 – The Oscar-winning Spanish-born Cuban cinematographer Néstor Almendros, was born on this date (d.1992). Born in Barcelona, Spain, Almendros moved to Cuba at age 18 to join his exiled anti-Franco father. In Havana, he founded a cinema club and wrote film reviews. Then he went on to study in Rome at the Centro Sperimentale di Cinematografia. He directed six shorts in Cuba and two in New York. After the 1959 Cuban Revolution, he returned and made several documentaries for the Castro regime. But after two of his shorts (Gente En La Playa and La Tumba Francesa) were banned, he moved to Paris. There he became the favorite of Éric Rohmer and François Truffaut. In 1978, he started his Hollywood career, and won the Academy Award for Best Cinematography for the film Days of Heaven. Four years later he was nominated again by the Academy for his work on Sophie's Choice.

In his later years, Almendros co-directed two documentaries about the human rights situation in Cuba: Mauvaise Conduite (about the persecution of Gay people) and Nobody Listened (about the arrest, imprisonment, and torture of former comrades of Fidel Castro). He shot several prestigious advertisements for Giorgio Armani and Calvin Klein.

In 1992, Néstor Almendros died of AIDS in New York at age 61. Human Rights Watch International has named an award after him, given every year at the HRWI film festival.

1931 – Hubert Kennedy is an American author and mathematician.

Kennedy was born in Florida and studied mathematics at several universities. From 1961 he was professor of mathematics, with research interest in the history of mathematics, at Providence College (Rhode Island), He spent three sabbatical years doing research in Italy and Germany.

Kennedy came out as gay on the cover of the magazine The Cowl, and, along with Eric Gordon, was part of the first Gay Pride parade in Providence, Rhode Island, which was held on June 26, 1976.

In 1986 Kennedy moved to San Francisco, where he continued his historical research on the beginnings of the gay movement in Germany. Since 2003 he has been in a home for assisted living in Concord, California.He has over 200 publications in several languages, from an analysis of the mathematical manuscripts of Karl Marx and a revelation of Marx's homophobia, to theoretical genetics and a proof of the impossibility of an organism that requires more than two sexes in order to reproduce. In addition, Dr. Kennedy has written biographies of the Italian mathematician Giuseppe Peano and the German homosexual emancipationist/theorist Karl Heinrich Ulrichs, and has edited the collected writings of Ulrichs. His translations of the boy-love novels of the German anarchist writer John Henry Mackay and his investigations of the writings of Mackay have helped establish Mackay's place in the gay canon.

Hysén speaks at Stockholm Pride

1959 – Glenn Hysén, born in Gothenburg, Sweden, is a football manager and former player who played for leading Dutch, Italian and English clubs and won 68 caps for Sweden. He is also a reality television star, coach, and football commentator.

Hysén is the father of Tobias Hysén of IFK Göteborg, Alexander Hysén of GIF Sundsvall, and Anton Hysén of Utsiktens BK.

At Frankfurt Airport in 2001, Hysén attacked a man who had groped him while in the public restroom. In 2007, Hysén spoke at Stockholm Pride, the largest gay pride festival in the Nordic region. Many people from the gay community were surprised due to the earlier incident. At the Stockholm Pride, he delivered a speech denouncing sports homophobia and laid to rest his 2001 airport incident.

He stated that,

"I know that many LGBT people have been the victims of assaults and hate crimes. I can therefore understand if some people have been upset by the airport incident, so I want to be clear: I think that it is completely unacceptable that anybody should be subjected to assaults, insults or hate crimes due to their sexual orientation or gender identity ...The incident had been blown out of proportion in the media...In order to finally flush the Frankfurt Airport punch down the toilet: it is not the case that I beat up a gay person. I categorically deny that ...I'm not proud that I took a swing at him, but I am proud that I have integrity and that I reacted."

In the same speech he asked "How easy would it be for a sixteen-year-old boy who plays football to come out as gay to his team mates?" In March 2011, his youngest son, Anton Hysén, a professional footballer himself, came out of the closet to the media.

1991 – Danell Leyva is a Cuban-American former gymnast who competed for the United States. He is the 2012 Olympic individual all-around bronze medalist and 2016 Olympic parallel bars and horizontal bar silver medalist. He is also the 2011 US national all-around gold medalist and the 2011 world champion on the parallel bars.

In gymnastics, Leyva was a specialist on parallel bars and horizontal bar, having his own signature move (jam-dislocate-hop to undergrips) on the latter.

In 2013, Leyva signed a multi-year sponsorship agreement with Adidas Gymnastics. Fellow US Olympic Team members Jake Dalton, McKayla Maroney and Jordyn Wieber were also sponsored by Adidas.

After ending his career in gymnastics, Leyva began to pursue an acting and media career. Soon after the 2016 Olympics, he moved from Miami to Los Angeles to pursue this career and enrolled in acting classes. By mid-2017, Leyva had already filmed two television advertisements, appeared on a Nickelodeon show, and worked as a choreography consultant on Brooklyn Nine-Nine. He had also purchased a production company, which he named "Parallel Entertainment".

Leyva competed on American Ninja Warrior in 2019.

On October 11, 2020, for National Coming Out Day, Leyva revealed via Twitter that he identifies as bisexual and pansexual.

1992 – New Ways Ministry, a Mt. Rainier, Maryland group led by three Roman Catholic bishops, announced it would release a statement of disagreement with the Vatican's call for Gays and Lesbians to be barred from becoming adoptive or foster parents, teachers, coaches, or military personnel. 1,500 lay persons signed the statement.