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So glad that when Athena disguises me she chooses to keep my perfect thighs. She really does have my best interests at heart

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YUH

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Arthur saying that he 'tells all his knights' that 'no man is worth your tears' makes it sound like knights frequently show up to training distraught that their boyfriends dumped them the night before and Arthur is getting tired of this getting in the way of their swordplay practice

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a quick psa to anyone recently getting into greek mythology and is a victim of tumblr and/or tiktok misconceptions:

-there is no shame in being introduced to mytholgy from something like percy jackson, epic the musical or anything like that, but keep in mind that actual myths are going to be VERY different from modern retellings

-the myth of medusa you probably know (her being a victim of poseidon and being cursed by athena) isn't 100% accurate to GREEK mythology (look up ovid)

-there is no version of persephone's abduction in which persephone willingly stays with hades, that's a tumblr invention (look up homeric hymn to demeter)

-as much as i would like it, no, cerberus' name does not mean "spot" (probably a misunderstanding from this wikipedia article)

-zeus isn't the only god who does terrible things to women, your fav male god probably has done the same

-on that note, your fav greek hero has probably done some heinous shit as well

-gods are more complicated than simply being "god of [insert thing]", many titles overlap between gods and some may even change depending on where they were worshipped

-also, apollo and artemis being the gods of the sun and the moon isn't 100% accurate, their main aspects as deities originally were music and the hunt

-titans and gods aren't two wholly different concepts, titan is just the word used to decribe the generation of gods before the olympians

-hector isn't the villain some people make him out to be

-hephaestus WAS married to aphrodite. they divorced. yes, divorce was a thing in ancient greece. hephaestus' wife is aglaia

-ancient greek society didn't have the same concepts of sexuality that we have now, it's incorrect to describe virgin goddesses like artemis and athena as lesbians, BUT it's also not wholly accurate to describe them as aromantic/asexual, it's more complex than that

-you can never fully understand certain myths if you don't understand the societal context in which they were told

-myths have lots and lots of retellings, there isn't one singular "canon", but we can try to distinguish between older and newer versions and bewteen greek and roman versions

-most of what you know about sparta is probably incorrect

-reading/waching retellings is not a substitute to reading the original myths, read the iliad! read the odyssey! i know they may seem intimidating, but they're much more entertaining than you may think

greek mythology is so complex and interesting, don't go into it with preconcieved notions! try to be open to learn!

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Eepy sketch I don't like how it looks agshsgss

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Odysseus @ Achilles

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Naming my son Far From Battle because I, unlike some people I will not name, have the foresight to not name him The Anger Causer

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OKAY. okay i think im on to something (just imagine calypso is there lol)

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I keep falling asleep and its ruining my life

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I told my wife to remarry another man and be happy if I don't survive. miscalculated. Will have to murder him upon the dawn of my return

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I suspect my wife may be lying to me and am duly aroused

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Athena keeps making me taller every time she disguises me. Is she trying to tell me something

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Hades 2 Odysseus I've grown quite fond of you

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penelope didn't have to turn the tree bed into a riddle. she could have asked odysseus to prove his identity, to tell her something only he would know — which she actually did a few books earlier, when she asked the beggar to describe odysseus, and odysseus told her about a purple cloak with a particular golden brooch that she fastened herself twenty years ago. when penelope tells telemachus they have signs by which they'll know each other, you sort of expect more of the same. and instead, she decides to trap him. like a bug in a cup.

and it's delightful to me, idk, how odysseus has been trapped and cornered in various way throughout the odyssey, but arguably never so that he has to tell the truth to get out. (with the phaeacians, maybe? the omniscient narrator corroborates some of what he tells them, but do we really know everything?) and in fact he is not trying to get free of penelope. he wants something from her, wants to convince her, wants to be welcomed home, but until this point he's lied to her, revealed himself to other people before her, and been distant with her (though also patient! he doesn't try to strongarm or rush her into accepting him; it's his idea to sleep elsewhere).

except penelope isn't looking for him to be distant and patient. penelope lies in a way that requires odysseus to stop playing along — not only to prove that he knows what odysseus knows, but that he's willing to tell the truth about himself.

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"odysseus is [depicted as being] justified in murdering the twelve women because they [are depicted as having] betrayed the household that provides for them" yeah i know, i just don't think it means we can't interrogate the odyssey further. that is an accurate description of what the text portrays and believes, but even so, it's loaded with assumptions. why does the text assume they slept with the suitors willingly when they are otherwise depicted without much interiority (melantho's feelings about eurymachus are ambiguous even compared to melanthius)? if they weren't willing, would it have been depicted differently, and how? if they were willing, what might have made those relationships look attractive or strategic or safe to them? why are they dependent on the household in the first place? why are some readers resistant to the extension of compassion toward them? does that have anything to do with the text's depiction of them? is that worth pushing back against?

i mean, obviously i think the answer to the last question is yes. you should try to understand the context of odysseus' actions, but you should also try to understand the actions of the slaves, even though (and especially because) the text cares about them less. you can interrogate how it portrays and what it believes about power. the odyssey is thousands of years old; it can take it

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a bunch of sketches i did of hermes bc I really like @gigizetz's design🥺sorry if I messed up the design in any way </3