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gemsofgreece · 23 days ago

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Hey! This is a linguistic ask, I think? I actually have another question as well, but since it has nothing to do with this topic, I'll send a separate ask. Anyway.

Could you tell me the meaning of βασιλεύοντες? When I looked it up, it appeared that this word is plural and that it would be translated more literally as "reigning ones". The pages showed me that it can be written as something like basileus. The specific phrase is "παρεγένοντο δὲ εἰς Σπάρτην ἐπὶ τὸν Ἑλένης γάμον οἱ βασιλεύοντε ς Ἑλλάδος. From what I understand, Ἑλλάδος is Hellas, i.e. Greece. So βασιλεύοντες Ἑλλάδος would be something like "those who reign over Greece". In the English translation, it's usually "Kings of Greece". However, if it's indeed basileis, from what I have researched this term is not literally "kings", since, for example, basileus/basileis was used for Byzantine emperors and for other authority figures other than kings in Ancient Greece, such as certain types of leaders. With that, my question is the following: does this word necessarily imply royalty or at least something equivalent to royalty in the society in question? Or, for example, can it be used to designate a noble? If it's exclusively royalty, it could apply to a prince (since in this context it's being applied to princes, including). Another intriguing thing is that one of the characters designated as such is actually illegitimate. In case the characters so named are needed for the interpretation, this is about Helen's suitors and in this source they are: Odysseus, Diomedes, Antilochus, Agapenor, Sthenelus, Amphimachus, Thalpius, Meges, Amphilochus, Menestheus, Schedius, Epistrophus, Polyxenus, Peneleos, Leitus, Ajax son of Oileus, Ascalaphus, Ialmenus, Elephenor, Eumelus, Polypoetes, Leonteus, Podalirius, Machaon, Philoctetes, Eurypylus, Protesilaus, Menelaus, Telamonian Ajax, Teucer, Patroclus. The source is Pseudo-Apollodorus' Library.

The other term that is present in The Iliad and is διογενὲς, which can be written as diogenes. The translation, from what I researched, would be something like "sprung from Zeus", "Zeus-descendent" and similar things. While researching if this meaning was literal or could have another possible connotation, I found the following suggestions:

The term describes characters who have Zeus in their bloodline in some way.

The term describes heroes in general in a complimentary way, regardless of their association with Zeus.

The term describes characters of royalty, as royalty comes from Zeus.

In the English translations, Caroline Alexander translated it as descended from Zeus, Zeus-descended, seed of Zeus and god-cherished (it's the same word in all cases), Martin Hammond translated it as Lord, Richmond Lattimores translated it as illustrious and Robert Fagles translated it as Prince. My doubt arose precisely because the translators seemed to have different interpretations and so did the academics (which is where I got the 3 theories suggested above from. It was from articles). Lattimore seemed to interpret it as a way of designating praise, Fagles seemed to interpret it as something that designates royalty, Hammond seemed to interpret it as something that involves status and Alexander simply went with the most literal idea, although in the case of god-cherished she may have interpreted it as designating someone divinely favored (in the sense of support). In The Iliad, this term is used in several characters, such as Achilles, Odysseus, Patroclus, Menelaus, Telamonian Ajax, Euaimon, etc. In The Odyssey, it's used with Odysseus.

I tried to research to see if perhaps some Greek scholar had given their own interpretation, but I couldn't find anything, probably because it hasn't been translated into other languages. So I'm curious if there was any Greek professional who suggested some possible meaning for this term? Is it to designate heroes? Is it a compliment? Is it literally someone who is descended from Zeus? Is the character royalty?

Many thanks in advance!

Hello! Welcome to Greek semantics haha

a) Βασιλεύοντες

Βασιλεύοντες is the plural masculine present participle of the verb "βασιλεύω" (basileúo) which means "I reign". Consequently, it means indeed "the men who reign over". Participles are extremely important in Greek and they replace common nouns very often. In this case, it could have been βασιλείς (basileís), kings, and it would not make any difference in the meaning of the text whatsoever. The choice could purely be aesthetical, personal, even instictual, without much thought put into it. Of course, the participle offers one additional information; time, those are the men who are currently reigning.

Who and what can a basileus (king) be in Greek history is pretty fluid. In general, it means the person who rules a particular state or region, no matter how small or vast. It is not always that or just that though. In Mycenaean Greek, the same word (in the form of something like quasireu) was to describe a nobleman of authority but quite probably not the king. This was the anax. The anax barely makes it to the early Archaic Homeric Greek. While various characters are basileis (most are the ones you are inquiring about) and by that time it really means kings, only Agamemnon is referred to as anax if I remember correctly, and Priam from the Trojans.

So, here's how that worked more or less. All of them were kings to their respective regions. Hellas and Argos (Central and South Greece, at the time) were always divided in smaller kingdoms where a chieftain, a warrior king ruled. These small kingdoms were technically the predecessors of the Greek city-states. Agamemnon was a basileus like everyone else. He could not really meddle at the inside matters of, say, Ithaca instead of Odysseus or Phthia instead of Achilles. However, when an issue greater than each's inside issues arose, when multiple basileis had to face a challenge together, when there was need for a common policy, then Agamemnon had the first say amongst them and he would take the final decision. He was the anax, the "king supreme" of Hellas and Argos. (Around that time both Hellas and Argos start being used interchangeably to define all of central and south Greece too and by the time of pseudo-Apollodorus Hellas was by far the most prevalent term to use.) The usage of anax soon faded after Homer. It interestingly made a comeback in Byzantine Christian context later. For example, the Virgin Mary is sometimes called "Ánassa", Queen (of Heavens). Derivative words from anax are present in modern Greek, i.e anáktoron, royal palace.

After the drop of anax, basileus was the only and general word for king. In Greek it resolutely does not matter how vast his land and how many people or ethnicities the basileus rules over as long as he is the supreme ruler in his region and answers to no one. This is why in actuality the obvious distinction between king and emperor that exists in western European languages are nowhere near as clear in Greek. In fact the Greek word for emperor αυτοκράτωρ (autokrátor) was a term coined in the Roman period to translate the Latin term imperator (commander, used for the Roman emperors). Αυτοκράτωρ means "the one who has all the power to himself". In other words, it was not a word that held a distinct meaning than that of the king. It was a coined term to emphasize on the power of the emperor, who in the eyes of the Greeks was... a king, but a strong one. This is why there are instances of the title ΒΑΣΙΛΕΥΣ ΑΥΤΟΚΡΑΤΩΡ (basileus autokrator). It techinically means "the king of all power". After the division of the Roman Empire and the fall of the western part, Greeks just kept calling the emperor βασιλέα (accusative case), as was their way. Especially once Greek became the official language in 610 BC, this was the official title for the emperor; Βασιλεύς Ρωμαίων. Modern Greek has probably been influenced by the western perception in this and treats βασιλιάς and αυτοκράτορας (the casual modern nominative cases) as different types of royalty and power like in the west, however this wasn't the case up until the Middle Ages.

Now, you are also right that sometimes the word addressed noble people without them being strictly royalty. It could be if the person had the utmost authority for a considerable area or if they were just royal, as in kin to an actual king or connected to them. It has always been even used as a compliment for commoners as well, "kingly". This belief has very old origins, certainly already in early archaic times. Someone kind and civil in their behaviour, someone with grace, bravery and other virtues, someone beautiful was thought to descend from royal genealogy or was praised as "fit for a king", "fit for a queen", even "fit for a prince or princess". This association never went extinct, it very much exists in modern Greek folklore. Furthermore, the names Basíleios (Basil, kingly), Basileía and Basiliké (queenly, royal) are some of the most common in Greece.

b) διογενές

Here it would be useful to have the full phrase you encountered this to know how literally or figuratively the word is used. And are you sure it's διογενές and not διογενής? Because the former is neuter. Both ε and η are transliterated as e in English.

If it's literal then yes, we are talking about a descendant of Zeus or something made by Zeus.

If it's figurative, then the explanation of this word will be consistent with the last paragraph above. Here I invite you to consider whether you have also stumbled onto the word δῖος (díos) that describes Homeric heroes several times, most of all Odysseus. And perhaps you know that Διογένης was a pretty common Ancient Greek name. Okay, keep this thought in mind for later.

Zeus' name ultimately derives from the PIE Sky Father god Dyeus. Its root can be better seen in the conjugation of Zeus' name (Greek proper nouns have declensions too). In Latin characters, it goes like Zeus Dios Dii Dia Zeu. Now, this di- root that has PIE origins meant "shine, brilliance, skylight". It is why the most important god is called as such because after all he is the God of the Heavens, THE God. (Other sky deities like Ouranós, unfortunately transliterated to Uranus, were later developments as Greeks were expanding their perception of their theogony).

So, δῖος means something like "divinely luminous", "god-like", "godly", "brilliant". It kind of means all those things. This is why Lattimore translated it as "illustrious", because it has the meaning of "great, renowned" and it is also through the same reasoning and a similar etymological concept, as it derives from a word that means shine, bright in Latin. Illustrious though misses a little on the divine connotations and the connection to Zeus in comparison. BTW no I did not forget this is about διογενές (diogenés) instead but the second part of the word is very easy to explain. In short, in this context it means birthed, produced, descended. So since δῖος and Zeus have the same etymology, you can say that it either means produced / descended from Zeus (literally or figuratively) or "made of (Zeus) divine brilliance". The most important thing here is that it does not matter much. Yep. The reason it does not matter is because if it's figurative then it absolutely designates praise. Godly. Divinely brilliant. God-luminous. A proper descendant of Zeus. Not that he certainly is. But he is magnificent enough that he could be. That's the point of these words. So whether Alexander's "seed of Zeus" is poetically accurate or not depends on the context of the full phrase, which I do not have.

Coming back to the beginning, a proof that it was often meant as praise and not always as a literal conviction that the character in question necessarily came from the (admittedly massive) genealogy of Zeus is how common the name Diogenes was in the real Ancient Greek world. All these common people did not actually claim ancestry from Zeus or that they were made of his divine skylight. It was a figurative form of praise, like names usually bear positive connotations.

Now, Hammond's and Fagles' Lord and Prince are way too liberal translations (another way to say they were wrong), however their reasonings are not all that far off. It's not that the terms δῖος and διογενής-ές designate royalty or status but they were definitely praises more frequently associated to nobility and royalty. This is because Ancient Greeks thought that their legendary heroes and kings and noblemen were superior to the mere humans that they were. After all many of them seemed to actually descend from gods according to the Greek myths. They were imagined as mortal humans but with some presumed distant divine intervention in their genealogy that made them more glorious human beings. This is a recurring positive association to nobility and royalty, which in turn evolved into this association of virtuous, gifted common people with a presumed relation to nobility and royalty that I described in the first answer. So, yes, it was commonly used as praise for royalty but no, it did not in itself mean royalty.

From a figurative perspective, Lattimore's "illustrious" is the closest interpretation however it misses on the divine aspect of it, which is the most important. It is unlikely you will find various interpretations from Greek professionals because the understanding of the word is pretty unanimous in Greece. Διογενής as an adjective is not in use in Greek anymore probably due to its direct association to Zeus, however there is the just as ancient synonym θεογενής [descended from god(s)] which also produces proper names such as Θεογένης or Θεαγένης, which mean the same thing except it comes from the most generic term for the god θεός and not specifically Zeus the Sky god (which are interestingly believed to come from different PIE roots despite sounding so similar). The connotations of it being overwhelmingly figurative and designating praise are clear to us because such adjectives associated to divinity ie θεϊκός, θείος meaning divine, god-like etc are very common in Greek and are used very liberally and expressively all the time.

The reason I focused way more on the figurative explanation is because the fact that we get four so different interpretations probably means the context of the phrase wasn't that of a character that we already know that was an offspring of Zeus. And because the literal meaning is so much easier lol

Okay for you and anyone who made it this far, congrats, you made it through a massive post with Greek semantics!

#greece #ancient greece #homer #ancient greek #etymology #greek #greek language #languages #linguistics #langblr #language stuff #greek culture #ask #babyrdie #tw long text #pseudo-apollodorus

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red-moon-at-night · 23 days ago

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Thinking about the idea of Helen's desire for kleos, and how she is limited in the ways in which she can achieve it as a woman, it is rather interesting to see how the most 'obvious' solution to it is avoided — through children.

The main consensus surrounding Helen's number of children is that she gives birth to one, a girl called Hermione. Some sources bring up several others, but the earliest and most consistent child mentioned (and birthed by Helen) is her:

He was bringing Alector's daughter from Sparta for his son, mighty Megapenthes, grown up, who'd been borne him by a slave. The gods no longer made a child appear for Helen after she gave birth to her first child, lovely Hermione, who had the form of golden Aphrodite. (Homer, Odyssey, OD.4.10 - ca. 700 BCE)

MENELAUS [Laurentian Scholiast on Sophocles' Electra, 539]: 'And she (Helen) bare to Menelaus, famous with the spear, Hermione and her youngest-born, Nicostratus, a scion of Ares.' (Hesiod, Fragments, CW.F70 - ca. 650 BCE )

Now Menelaus had by Helen a daughter Hermione and, according to some, a son Nicostratus; and by a female slave Pieris, an Aitolian, or, according to Acusilaus, by Tereis, he had a son Megapenthes; and by a nymph Cnossia, according to Eumelus, he had a son Xenodamus (Apollodorus, Library, 3.11.1 - ca. 100 CE)

When Orestes became king of the Lacedemonians, they themselves consented to accept him for they considered that the sons of the daughter of Tyndareus had a claim to the throne prior to that of Nicostratus and Megapenthes, who were sons of Menelaus by a slave woman. On the death of Orestes, there succeeded to the throne Tisamenus, the son of Orestes and of Hermione, the daughter of Menelaus (Pausanias, Description of Greece, 2.18.6 - ca. 174 CE)

It seems the later the sources get, the more children are added (look at that Apollodrus extract! Menelaus has been around!); but even then, Hermione is always mentioned, and often mentioned as the only legitimate child of Helen and Menelaus.*

*Yes the Scholiast on Euripides, Andr. 898 Cypria fragment does mention Pleisthenes the third born child, but... we're ignoring him (lol). As far as I'm aware he's only mentioned once and also no confirmation he's legitimate. Sorry Pleisthenes.

Now, let's talk about that a little. Helen giving birth to a daughter, and proceeding to not have any more children after that raises an important point — Helen does not produce an heir for her husband. Helen, as Menelaus' wife is expected to do that but she simply... doesn't. She has one child and that's it. Sometimes that one child isn't even intentional:

And she (Helen) bare neat-ankled Hermione in the palace, a child unlooked for. (Hesiod, Fragments, CW.F68 - ca. 650 BCE)

unlooked-for = unexpected; unforeseen.

However, as Ruby Blondell mentions in 'Helen of Troy: Beauty, Myth Devastation':

"In normal circumstances such failure to bear a son would jeopardize a Greek wife's position, since it denies her a woman's primary avenue to status within her husband's household. Since she did not relocate upon marriage, however, Helen needs no sons to establish her status at Sparta. Moreover, the absence of a son helps her maintain her independence. When a son grows up, he becomes another source of male authority over his mother." (pg. 32-33)

She has different circumstances from her peers; she doesn't need children to retain her status. In fact, if she were to bear a son it might be worse for her position.

This would explain her reluctance for children, if the lack of them was indeed a choice. Nonetheless, it's worth exploring the possibility that it is unintentional. There's certainly evidence for it being so, if we look at how Hermione fares in adulthood with her own fertility:

(to Andromache) but as for thee, slave and captive, thou wouldst fain oust me and secure this palace for thyself, and thanks to thy enchantment I am hated by my husband; thou it is that hast made my womb barren and cheated my hopes (Euripides, Andromache, 117 - ca. 425 BCE)

Helen is struggling to have children, and now Hermione is struggling to have children — like mother, like daughter. Is the infertility hereditary? Or perhaps there are some godly influences afoot:

TYNDAREUS Scholiast on Euripides' Orestes 249: Stesichorus says that while sacrificing to the gods Tyndareus forgot Aphrodite and that the goddess was angry and made his daughters twice and thrice wed and deserters of their husbands (Hesiod, Fragments, CW.F67 - ca. 650 BCE )

While this extract focuses only on Tyndareus' daughters and their infidelity, it wouldn't be a stretch to say that the curse of a god could extend to multiple generations of a family (e.g. the house of Atreus) and in other ways — in this case, not being able to get pregnant/have a successful pregnancy.

However, considering the infertility as an intervention by the gods, I don't think that this is necessarily a 'curse'. This feels more like fate. That, regardless of whether it is Helen's choice to have just Hermione or not, it is destined to happen. The subtext being 'just Hermione' and no more.

Blondell mentions that in Theocritus' poem The Epithamaly of Helen, the chorus pray that Helen bears Menelaus a child that resembles herself. If we take the quote from The Odyssey earlier, of Hermione 'who had the form of golden Aphrodite', we can assume that prayer is fulfilled. Blondell also says:

"There is something a little strange, however, about the chorus's prayer. ... since there is no doubt about a woman's identity as a mother, the crucial point, for a husband, is that his wife's offspring should resemble him. It seems strange too, at a wedding, to pray in effect for a daughter as opposed to a son and heir." (pg. 32)

Helen will have a child, and it will resemble her, but that's it. No sons, no heirs.

Enter stage left: Zeus' plan to reduce the population of demigods by having a beautiful daughter, who will instigate a long and bloody war.

How do you get such a daughter to instigate a war? By leaving her husband because she desires more than the cards she has been dealt.

If Helen does desire kleos, but is essentially barred from achieving it in the ways a woman traditionally does, then she must seek it elsewhere.

In choosing to leave with (effeminate, unconventional) Paris: If she doesn't wish to have children, maybe she thinks she can escape the 'inevitable' fate of all wives to bear a son and be known only as their mother — she will seek kleos elsewhere. If she does wish to have children, maybe she has tried to bear children, many, many times after Hermione and cannot, and in that shame of failing to meet the minimum standards of being a woman — she will seek kleos elsewhere.

Whatever her feelings are on the matter, fate remains the same: Helen will have a daughter that resembles her, and Helen will go to Troy with Paris. The facts still remain the same too: Helen cannot bear a son, and this separates her from womanhood. She cannot successfully be a woman by society's standards, and cannot make her legacy her children.

She must find kleos in other ways.

#helen of sparta #greek mythology #hermione of sparta #menelaus #analysis #im certain there are other sources that bring up children but I thought this would suffice to illustrate my point. Hermione is always there #Also: are there sources that mention children via Paris? yes there are - but that's *after* leaving to Troy.#So it doesn't really matter after that point speaking in terms of fate. She's already left her husband! War will break out.#Anyways I found this train of thought really interesting and wanted to write a post about it <3 Helen is so complex and sad </3 #she's the most beautiful woman in the world. but is she the most moral or ideal woman in the world by her society? not really.#she's so unconventional and that comes out in many different ways (like this)

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ukelele-boy · 2 months ago

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(this was posted Dec 2021 in the toa discord but I finally found it again cause my brain wouldn't stop looking for it) it's basically some timeline digging I did. I know other toa fans have done their own timelines so I wanna crosscheck. I only put 1-2 hours into this and it was a long time ago.

-------------

Ok I've dated the ademtus and apollo thing to before troy fell in 1200BCE, since ademtus' son, Eumelus, was in the trojan war (greek side). If we assume he is pretty young to fight in the war(20-40), then we can date the apollo ademtus thing to maybe 50-60 years before? But king laomedon, who was the king that apollo and Poseidon served, was the father of king priam who was an old man by the trojan war. So if king priam is like 60-70, we can assume that apollo served under laomedon around 80 years ago. Which makes sense because heracules was around for both laomedon and also to save adetmus' wife. But this means that apollo got turned mortal twice in the span of like 30 years and then 50 years later had to listen to zeus and let troy fall due to fate and lost his two sons.

It also means that the failed rebellion happened first, then apollo becomes a god, jives for like 15 years and then has that drama with ascelpusis mom, has a kid called ascelpius who dies at 14-15 to zeus, and then he gets turned mortal again.

If Hya is a prince of sparta (founded in 900BCE) and we could say he lived at it's peak (around 500 BCE), which means apollo met hya maybe 700 years after the trojan war.

And then around 900 years later Rome falls.

#mine #lester papadopoulos #trials of apollo #pjo apollo #Timeline #Meta

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false-guinevere · 11 months ago

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Does Jason even deserve the demonization? Ever since I found Eumelos' Korinthiaka and other versions, I can't help but think this is another Ovid/Medusa...

Honestly it can be hard to say, though I will say while there was clearly changes, I think it was more about just changes to the story over the centuries as well as completing claims from different regions. Different cities/regions would often portray myths and the gods different depending because they had different goals or values.

Kind of like the situation with Theseus, where the Athenians had motive to portray him in a more positive light so accounts there usually have him being forced to leave Ariadne while other version usually just have him abandon her by choice or forget about her. Or like how the Odyssey seems to have Clytemnestra’s big crime just be adultery while Aegisthus does the killing, but by the time of Oresteia, Clytemnestra is the sole killer of Agamemnon (and Aegisthus is a impotent loser) and that’s her big crime Orestes kills her for. Athenian plays especially tended to have a lot of Athenian propaganda and ideals. The Oresteia literally ends with the creation of the Athenian legal system.

And there is the popular theory Euripides might very well have been the one to popularize the verison where it’s Medea who kills her kids. And both Eumelus and Simonides have Jason and Medea as king and queen of Corinth. When it comes to myths where they can vary so significantly, I’m personally of the opinion to just kind of pick and choose what interests you more. Medea is one of my favorite plays so I really like the version of the story, but the other versions are also interesting and should be explored more.

#gawrkin #Medea #Jason

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deathlessathanasia · 6 days ago

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Alternative Theogonies 2: The Theogony of Eumelus' Titanomachy : r/GreekMythology

#fragments #Titanomachy (the epic poem)#cosmogony #theogony #titanomachia #titanomachy #eumelos #greek mythology

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apollosgiftofprophecy · 1 year ago

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Favorite Posts

Mainly this is so I can find these posts easily (for future reference) but also wanna make a place for all these great posts :3

this is definitely not complete and I don't think it ever will be haha

Mythology

Apollo is Best Dad by @whatasunchild

Artemis & Ipheginia in Aulis by @specialagentartemis

Mythology is Flexible by @tuurverheydepoetryandprose

Defend Apollo Hours by @whatasunchild

Apollo & Cassandra Fanfic by @odiko-ptino (i need more nuanced Apollo & Cassandra they give me LIFE)

The Hyacinthia by @sephospaganplace

@my-name-is-apollo

Apollo & Admetus I

Apollo & Admetus II (with extras!)

Marsyas

Apollo & Cassandra Analysis II

Apollo & Cassandra Analysis III

Apollo & the Succession Cycle

@amiti-art

Apollo & Rhoeo

Eumelus

Multiblogs

Apollo & Cassandra Analysis I by @poemsandmyths @theoiaesthetics and @wasspword

Apollo & Hera by @sukizula, @/my-name-is-apollo, @greek-suitehearts, @pjgreeksblog, & more!

The Eumenides Analysis by @clodiuspulcher and @crisisoninfintefandoms

ToA

Artemis & Apollo's Relationship in ToA by @worlds-oldest-teenager

TTT Apollo V Commodus Fight Analyzed by @newathens

Demigods POV on the gods V Apollo's by @the-primordial-archivist

Keyseeker's Abundance of Analysis by @flightfoot

Reread PJO/HoO/ToA by @hashtagloveloses

Apollo Headcanons by @ukelele-boy

Copollo Art That Inspired A Fanfic (And My Reaction To It) by @newobsessioneveryweek

Copollo Incorrect Quote by @moodyseal

The Apollo Iceberg by @lubble-underscore

ToA/AtLA Fusion by @colorsunlikeanythingseen

Rachel & Apollo by @hogoflight

@thesungod

"the fall of the sun; the final verse"

Apollo Slay Moments

@aeithalian

The Estelle Theory

Apollo's Fatal Flaw

Middle Child Hermes

@literallyjusttoa

Sunny's Timeline (part 1) (part 2)

Copollo ToApril 2023 Fanart

The Delphic Family (With Some of My Headcanons)

Caged God Art (that i wanna make a fanfic of) (that i DID make a fanfic of-)

Top 7 Exes From Ancient Greece

Apollo Headcanons

Zeus & Apollo

Greek & Roman Culture Differences

@fearlessinger

Apollo & Zeus BoO Analyzed

The Halcyon Green Elephant

ToA: What To Know Before Reading

What Apollo's Arc Is Really About

@tsarinatorment

Apollo Kids are Greek AND Roman

Apollo & Octavian

Michael Yew's Fatal Flaw (Ao3)

The Twins & the di Angelos (Ao3)

Michael Yew's Death (Ao3)

Kronos Wins AU (But Also Not)

MultiBlogs

Nico & Apollo by @tsarinatorment & @fearlessinger

Apollo is CHB's Patron by @tsarinatorment, with additions by @stereden (here) & @fearlessinger (here)

Commodus Redemption Arc: How It Could Happen some clowning between @moodyseal and myself :)

#masterpost #the trials of apollo #apollo #artemis #commodus #meg mccaffrey #zeus #hermes #trials of apollo #michael yew

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oreichalkos · 4 months ago

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THE HUGE ATLANTIS META THAT WAS A LONG TIME COMING

part 1 of god knows but i am a fool ( part 2 / part 3 )

oof bc idk if i can just post my metas whenever, i’m going to try to at least give a bit of a rundown of things about atlantis which honestly is probably me mashing a bunch of different myths together because i can’t keep things straight, but these will be around in portrayal.

from critias:

“and [poseidon] named them all ; the eldest, who was the first king, he named atlas, and after him the whole island and the ocean were called atlantic. to his twin brother, who was born after him, and obtained as his lot the extremity of the island towards the pillars of heracles, facing the country which is now called the region of gades in that part of the world, he gave the name which in the hellenic language is eumelus, in the language of the country which is named after him, gadeirus. of the second pair of twins he called one ampheres, and the other evaemon. to the elder of the third pair of twins he gave the name mneseus,and autochthon to the one who followed him. of the fourth pair of twins he called the elder elasippus, and the youngermestor. and of the fifth pair he gave to the elder the name ofazaes, and to the younger that of diaprepes. all these andtheir descendants for many generations were the inhabitants and rulers of divers islands in the open sea ; […] ”

recap. poseidon has a ton of kids with cleito, she gave him like 5 pairs of twins. in order from oldest to youngest, it seems that if i’m following this correctly: atlas, eumelus ( gadeirus ), ampheres, evaemon, mneseus, autochthon, elsasippus, mestor, azaes, diaprepes. if it wasn’t clear … which it probably wasn’t because wow is critias wordy, atlas is named the main king of atlantis.

there were many special laws affecting the several kings inscribed about the temples, but the most important was the following : they were not to take up arms against one another, and they were all to come to the rescue if any one in any of their cities attempted to overthrow the royal house; like their ancestors, they were to deliberate in common about war and other matters, GIVING THE SUPREMACY TO THE DESCENDANTS OF ATLAS. and the king was not to have the power of life and death over any of his kinsmen unless he had the assent of the majority of the ten.

so, atlas’ descendants are the main royal line and the king can’t play god with his people unless he consults the other kings. THE MAIN POINT OF THIS IS DARDANOS COMES FROM ATLAS’ LINE, he does in fact have many cousins. on this note, i’ll write about this whole family thing in a different post.

evidently, atlantis was also “an island greater in extent than libya and asia, and when afterwards sunk by an earthquake, became an impassable barrier of mud to voyagers sailing from hence to any part of the ocean” this is also from critias so uhhhh. ok well thats pretty big so uhhh idk what to say about that one but i mean sure it seems big enough in the show but i’ll do estimates later … the city was built in concentric circles tho so hey that’s at least kept in the show but my brain also always goes to minas tirith but in the ocean bc i have No Self Control™ …

HERE’S A KICKER THO

“now atlas had a numerous and honourable family, and they retained the kingdom, the eldest son handing it on to his eldest for many generations; and they had such an amount of wealth as was never before possessed by kings and potentates […] they were furnished with everything which they needed, both in the city and country. for because of the greatness of their empire many things were brought to them from foreign countries, and the island itself provided most of what was needed by them for the uses of life. in the first place, they dug out of the earth whatever was to be found there, solid as well as fusile.

they also dug out what is now only a name and was then something more than a name, ORICHALCUM. it was dug out of the earth in many parts of the island, and was more precious in those days than anything except gold.”

so atlantis had natural resources as well as imports and had this one (1) miracle substance called orichalcum which is in fact exactly what the oreichalkos in yugioh is based off of, but that’s probably pretty obvious now. i’m pretty sure that it is in the jp yugioh where he says ‘oreichalkos can become anything, cloth, wood, stone,’ he even mentions food ?? i think well uhh yeah this is what gives atlantis its huge advantages but it also is clearly a source of corruption. back in the day, gold was like the Most Important Thing™ which may not be the case now but imagine an island filled with a substance that is worth second only to gold, tell me the people living on that island wouldn’t get possessive and greedy about it.

“the entire circuit of the wall, which went round the outermost zone, they covered with a coating of brass, and the circuit of the next wall they coated with tin, and the third, which encompassed the citadel, flashed with the red light of orichalcum.”

i mean heck they COVERED THEIR CITY IN IT my god. also idk why but translating from what is seen on the cards in show… and whatnot oreichalkos is also a type of brass so thats redundant i guess it’s just … brass and magic brass idk, at this point just going through material from timaeus and critias is exhausting but anyway yes. i’ll continue this thing in part 2 which will also address more of this and how it actually ties in with my portrayal.

#⎛ worldbuilding ⎠

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