Homer's analogies in the Iliad

[Anonymous No.19773419]

I'm reading book 11 and I noticed that many of the fighting analogies Homer used so far are related to pastoral life.
What struck me was that he doesn't hurry back to the main narrative - some of the analogies are 10-15 lines long, and as a result these entirely fleshed out fresh scenes get injected into the story and keep the energy level of the poem from flagging.
The effect is immediate and undeniable, I leave the killing fields for a few moments and find myself in the thick woods of a Grecian mountain, the dust gone and the screams, and I'm surrounded by greenery and wool, at least until the inevitable lion pounces on the flock and either breaks their necks in his jaws or gets chased away by the herdsmen and their dogs.
But I'm curious - why choose pastoral imagery as a counterpoint to the war? By pastoral I mean the word literally. I'm sure there are many other aspects of life in a village or a small town back then which didn't revolve around herds and their keeping, for example I've noticed very few analogies and images related to plants, harvesting or the crafts, and images of the everyday life inside a hut or cottage, or even an 'estate', are nonexistent.
Does anyone know why this is? I'm sure the first composers after the war could have drawn on a wider palette of experiences to illustrate the action for their audiences, and Homer is definitely a skilled enough poet to have sprinkled in some when consolidating the works into the Iliad.
What gives?

[Anonymous No.19773496]

bump

[Anonymous No.19773691]

I take it noone knows?

[Anonymous No.19773763]

My best guess is that something like herding animals has more parallels to war than something like pottery or tending a garden with care. There aren't many every-day activities that would convey the idea of war.

[Anonymous No.19773869]

>>19773419
Because those wouldn't be good analogies?

[Anonymous No.19773916]

>>19773763
I agree with your logic, that's what I thought too. But then I thought some more and remembered some books that describe war and the analogies they use, and I've seen a lot more harvesting, smithing, wine-making, sailing and building than I have herding, Homer is the first one I come across to use it so extensively. My natural instinct is to think of something physically violent like smithing or felling trees or reaping, but I'm not saying Homer should've used primarily those, it just surprises me that it's so heavily skewed towards herding.
One of the best images I've read so far, and it really stuck with me, is that of a person's head falling limp on his shoulder as a garden poppy in full bloom droops its head weighed down by seeds and rain.

[Anonymous No.19773922]

Perhaps Homer came from a pastoral people who didn't live in villages or towns.

[Anonymous No.19773928]

>>19773419
Beautiful effort thread, thank you anon. I will give you my two cents as an amateurish reader of the Iliad - I was reading book 22, and I had a similar impression when it came to animal similarities, because it gave the whole fight with Hector a dream-like feeling, as if the two where chasing each other as incarnations of different animals. It was very beautiful. There I think it fits with the theme of Achilles strength being so overwhelming that Hector is basically his prey, and, as such, it conveys the feeling of doom and of the inevitability of Hector's death.
In 11, it may be that the comparison with pastoral life is due to the desire of presenting life as both war and peace, and maybe show how the two things are inseparable, in that they can be compared to each other constantly? If you are thinking of any specific passages, I'd look over them with you gladly and give you my thoughts, if you are interested. Otherwise, I think you can find a lot of secondary literature on homer's comparisons - I think there's an article by Buxton in the Cambridge Companion's to Homer on his similes, which could be a starting point if you are interested in this topic in general.
In any case, you are asking the right questions, and being an attentive reader will make your experience of the book much more rewarding.

[Anonymous No.19774039]

>>19773419
Three thoughts occur to me: it’s a continuation of the importance of pastoral life in the Indo-European tradition; images of dying mammals directly correlate to images of dying (human) mammals; and the practice of animal husbandry is intimately involved with interpersonal violence (since animals are easy to steal and shepherds are often nomadic), moreso than farming.

[Anonymous No.19774285]

>>19773928
Thanks a lot! It really does motivate one to be told he's doing well.
I agree with the interpretation that it helps present the idea that life is both the prosperous time and the disasterous. I don't have any specific passages in mind, more the whole pattern of using them so often especially when talking about war since Homer demonstrates his ability to use other analogies to great effect (like the poppy one I mentioned earlier) or when he likens the two armies to storm clouds gathering above the sea as seen by a shepherd in the distant mountains.
I am definitely going to check out the article you mentioned and I have some other questioned lined up for /lit/, but those are for when I'm done with the Iliad.
> being an attentive reader will make your experience of the book much more rewarding
That's my goal for 2022. I'm going through the whole 'start with the greeks' meme chart with the idea of asking specific questions and learning things from what I read, not just reading it "to have read it" as I used to.
>>19774039
funny as it sounds, the first thing that ocurred to you hadn't to me

[Anonymous No.19774681]

>>19773419
One thought was Homer was a bit of a naturalist, maybe even a bit of an outsider , and so spent most of his time in nature and rural lands? Also possibly to not speak of so many man made things and customs gives the text a sense of timelessness? Gods and man and nature and eternity? For example if someone was trying to produce such a story today with those aims, they may not make reference to McDonalds and Honda

[Anonymous No.19774814]

>>19773419
Just from my immediate thoughts and after reading this post >>19774039
one of the reasons I love hockey and particularly hockey fights so much is that it’s not really about fighting for the sake of it, or at least that’s not the supposed basis for most fights, but it’s about protection. Some guy has fucked with the goalie, or someone took a cheap shot at your star, so you have to send your goon out to make sure he can’t get away with it without repercussion and keep your boys safe, and this is all now somewhat built into the game.

In a similar way pastoral life is about the protection of your heard from potential predators, and as well the Greek phalanx style of war is the same way. You’re fighting side by side with your comrades as well as being supported from the back, but each person working in a single unit to protect the others.

[Anonymous No.19774878]

>>19774681
I like the direction you're going in and I agree that it does create a sense of timelessness, but at the same time he describes customs and wargear and ships in great detail which grounds the text back in its reality. I don't think someone aiming to write a timeless text today would necessarily omit brands and particulars, just look at the russian classics (or something like Shakepeare) which are firmly rooted in their world including all the little details, yet their stories cross the barrier of time easily.
>>19774814
mutual protection and comradeship is huuge in the Iliad, yeah, this makes a lot of sense as the 'claw-mad lions' the heroes are usually portrayed as shatter the herd and herdsman's peace and might be a more available emotion for those who've never fought in a war.

[Anonymous No.19775218]

>>19774878
Maybe also a common aim of some poets of history is to remind their fellow citizen of the beauties, powers, sublimities of nature, which in a time and place can so often be ignored. Think of the popularity of landscape paintings in the industrializing 17 18 1900s

[Anonymous No.19776185]

>>19773419
Et in arcadia ego

[Anonymous No.19776209]

>>19773419
They were indo-europeans, they loved cattle, horses and husbandry

Semi-nomadic roots

[Anonymous No.19776228]

Should have read the Junger threads.

[Anonymous No.19776342]

Consider the intimate and curious acquaintance one makes with various kinds of weeds,—it will bear some iteration in the account, for there was no little iteration in the labor,— disturbing their delicate organizations so ruthlessly, and making such invidious distinctions with his hoe, levelling whole ranks of one species, and sedulously cultivating another. That’s Roman wormwood,—that’s pigweed,— that’s sorrel,—that’s piper-grass, have at him, chop him up, turn his roots upward to the sun, don’t let him have a fibre in the shade, if you do he’ll turn himself t’other side up and be as green as a leek in two days. A long war, not with cranes, but with weeds, those Trojans who had sun and rain and dews on their side. Daily the beans saw me come to their rescue armed with a hoe, and thin the ranks of their enemies, filling up the trenches with weedy dead. Many a lusty crest-waving Hector,49 that towered a whole foot above his crowding comrades, fell before my weapon and rolled in the dust.

[Anonymous No.19776775]

>>19773419
Well spotted, you are onto something cental here.

Peaceful everyday life and warfare are juxtaposed all the time in the Iliad. Other examples involve the imagery on Achilles' shield or the choice that was given to Achilles, the choice between everlasting fame and obscure, peaceful longevity. It's very deliberate and it's a way to explore the central theme: the value of glory.

The role of the Gods in contrast with the mortals serves to explore the same theme BTW. They are immortal (duh) and therefore they don't need to be immortalized in song. Glory is therefore something unique to human condition.

As for why it's pastoral life specifically, I think it's partly wrong (vide Achilles' shield, which has images of farming IIRC), partly due Greece being an arid mountainous region not very suitable for crops, but perfectly good for grazing animals, >>19776209, >>19774039 and >>19773763. We should also consider the bard's audience, who mostly were rich landowners and / or lived in large towns, so they would respond more to this kind of imagery rather than the one that isn't used.

[Anonymous No.19776835]

>>19773419
I seem to recall just as many about the sea or about birds. There's a few about chopping trees down.

[Anonymous No.19776887]

As others in this thread of said the info-European roots are probably a major cause. Read about the cosmology of the indo Europeans to know their ideas about cattle, pastoralism. This was expressed through the Greeks with the Arcadian ideal

[Anonymous No.19777139]

Virgil does a similar thing with this stuff but I doubt he was as intimately familiar with farm life, Ie he cuts away to cathartic analogies pertaining to the natural world in the midst of a bloody conflict juxtaposing it etc etc

[Anonymous No.19777895]

>>19776209
>>19776775
>>19776887
thanks, I definitely have to look into the indo-european tradition

[Anonymous No.19777900]

>>19773419
It's not so much pastoral as it is related to hunting. It's always hunters/farmers fending off lion attacks, hunting boars, deer, etc., in other words the most common aristocratic pastime, which makes complete sense when you consider the author/readers of the Iliad.

[Anonymous No.19777904]

>>19773922
this. The an analogy only works if the listeners can grasp the other half of the analogy.

[Anonymous No.19777921]

>>19777895
The series continually treats the subject of pastoral/agrarian separations in religious symbolism, maybe it will help. Idk. Been a very long time since I read it.

[Anonymous No.19777930]

>>19777921
that's unironically going in my folder for ritual study, it's exactly what I've been looking for

[Anonymous No.19777937]

>>19776228
This

>One of the great recurring images in Storm of Steel is that of the man who becomes lost to his trigger-finger; standing like a hunter, still and alone in a dark field. Each shot a test, everything rests upon it, and he is willing to carry each shot to the grave with him. One even finds himself firing past all limits of the machine, forgetting its limitations.
>The men before him appear like rabbits scurrying for the bushes. And it is here that war becomes an endless chase, One forgets that combat is a confrontation, and so will die where he stands, not knowing that he has been lit up like a star in a field. Or perhaps he simply no longer cares, a welcome finality.

>In the oldest myths this is also where the warriors appear lower than the huntress, Atalanta. They even appear foolish, incapable, as if something had been lost to them. All of the first heroes were hunters, and in the Iliad the greatest warriors are hunters and farmers - a service to which they all hope to return, and that the war itself is dedicated to. Thus, war is itself a decline, or its possibility - of the laws of the forest, the simple heroism of pre-historic times. The King is forced to return to Artemis what is hers. Even at the cost of every hero. Blood is one of the sacrifices of dominion, and even legendary heroes are but leaves fallen to the forest floor. Homer's image of the great pines and oaks is only extended because of the reach of the war - it is the end of historical time. All connection to the primitive, Golden Age heroes,and their way of life is lost.

>One sees also the height of Rome and its fall in this. The imperial cult where there is no longer a distinction between man, god, and titan. The streets are lined with their images, but this is also an end to natural dedications.
>As Goethe says of the sculptures of goddesses: they must not be seen giving birth. The hero is the same, he cannot be seen in birth, or death. But there is a danger in this that the image of the mother - for the Romans, the wolf - also becomes lost.

[Anonymous No.19778789]

>>19777937
Storm of Steel is on the reading list, just haven't gotten to it, but I like this passage where's it from?

[Anonymous No.19778967]

>>19773419
Homer was probably one of the first Greek writers, if not the first, in the Illiad he does not only attempt to save the traditions and myths of Classical Greece (like Euclid to save greek mathematics, or Hesiod to save greek history) but also to make plain literature, and every classic in literature is both ahead of time and inside of it; that is, every work reflects onto the reality of the author. Homer's poems help us to understand the Greek mythology but also their reality, the pastoral landscapes show the neolitical/Bronze Age lifestyle, also giving place to the portraits of poverty (dog laying over manure, the princess washing her clothes in the river, the kings as peasants, etc.), and thus Ulysses sees as an important detail to come back to Itaca with wealth.

[Anonymous No.19779212]

>>19774285
>That's my goal for 2022. I'm going through the whole 'start with the greeks' meme chart with the idea of asking specific questions and learning things from what I read, not just reading it "to have read it" as I used to.
I did this too starting in Dec 2021. That chart skip over a lot of stuff, i will warn you, i dont think it touches Euripedes or Aristophanes at all.
>>19776342
Guess I'll need to read Walden.
>>19777921
Also neat. I would really like to learn more about the nomadic and pastoral roots of indo-european tradition

But for OP I thought like you did. I thought it was very much to draw the comparisons between war and peacetime, to remind you of the life these men would possibly be living if they weren't kings killing each other. The "little battles" of the common man. Book 18 hammers this home really hard.

[Anonymous No.19779238]

>>19779212
I too started in dec 2021 and I know that the chart skips a lot of stuff, I've taken care to research and get some additional books. When I'm done with it I'll make a better meme chart that includes Aeschylus, Euripedes and I'll see who else

[Anonymous No.19780105]

>>19773419
Genuinely a /lit/ thread, for once. I will contribute later, as soon as I get home to review chapter 11 from the Iliad.

[Anonymous No.19780123]

>>19773763
High attention to detail in housekeeping is very applicable to war.

[Anonymous No.19780282]

>>19779238
We are in a similar place I feel. Please make more threads i would love to chat with you.
I've read Homer (though the hymns are radically different), Hesiod, Aeschylus (but only Orestria), Sophocles (but only Theban plays), going through Euripedes. Sappho and Pindar are good reading re: further poets.

[Anonymous No.19780429]

>>19780282
I've said it in another thread but I love Anne Carson and I'll be getting her translation of Sappho's fragments.
And I'm definitely going to be making more threads, I'll just space them out so we have a steady stream of discussion about the Greek classics as I go through them.
Thanks, anon, it's inspiring when people contribute and are genuinely interested and it makes me wanna read even more so we can talk about the works here. I'm thinking I should also restart the All Poetry Threads, we had a few pretty good ones on Eliot and modernism, but I had to go away for a while and when I came back people had stopped posting about poetry.
Let's keep /lit/ engaged, frens
t. dragonbro

[Anonymous No.19780474]

>>19780429
Oh you're the guy who's brother wrote THAT dragon fic? Nice.
I liked Lombardo's translations of sappho fragments. Had an interesting intro about reading fragments of poems vs. an entire poem and some neat stuff on transmission. The fact so many of the fragments only survive from literary criticism citations is mindblowing to me

[Anonymous No.19780560]

>>19780474
kek no, I wish
I'm the guy who posted the Wittgenstein's dragon thing
I have to check out the intro to the translation you speak of. I fell in love with the bits I could make out in the trailer for Carson's Sappho. Carson used the missing lines of the poems to enhance the reader's experience and it looks visually fantastic.

[Anonymous No.19781889]

Bumping good thread

[Anonymous No.19781893]

>>19773419
I'm sure someone above has said it but you need to read some history of the Greeks around when Homer was thought to have lived.

[Anonymous No.19782189]

>>19773419
>What gives?
Hellens are:
Animist Pastoral Nomads from the Steppe, always have been, their insights, values, life drives, myths all stem from the Millenia Memory of them being Steppe Warriors and Hunters and Animal breeders....wink wink.

There u go.

[Anonymous No.19782203]

>>19773419
>>19782189
U think it's a coincidence the Wolf Symbology
of Rome and Sparta?

All Aristocratic Values stem from that past,
because at the base that is what European culture is.

[Anonymous No.19782215]

>>19782203
>Europeans are literal Fremen of Nature and Animals.

[Anonymous No.19782228]

>>19776228
archive?

[Anonymous No.19782297]

>>19777895
>The Problem of Tyranny and Philosophy in the Thought of Plato and Nietzsche
>Costin Vlad Alamariu

[Anonymous No.19782641]

>>19773419
This is a great question, OP.

Something maybe worth noticing is that the similes abound when the Gods are themselves more involved in the action, and the similes are almost absent when the Gods are finally told not to interfere by Zeus. One way to perhaps understand this is by looking to the plot: the motivation all of a sudden transforms when Menelaus and Parus fight, and that transformation seems to be captured in how Menelaus characterizes how their duel will work, i.e., Menelaus is rejecting his previous grounds for his claim to Helen (that she legally belongs to him by marriage), and replacing them with the need to prove that he's worthy. After this, everyone begins fighting not just to win Helen back, but now for both honor and glory.

The connection to the similes in this light might be that death for honor and glory is beautified by the presence of the Gods active in the war. The deaths on both sides are no longer just for legal right and protection of the city, and those deaths are accordingly immortalized in poetic images.

[Anonymous No.19782750]

>>19782641
Does Homer seem to imply any value judgement on the merits of going to war over the beauty of a woman? Any comment or critique?

Is it all meta-ly about man's blind obsession and addiction to woman, to beautiful woman?

Does he appear to sigh that this is the case, or provoke the rightness of these decisions?

Did he intend the audience to ponder these things?

Man is weak for beauty, therefore their gods are, and if their gods are, all is just?

The gods are drives, how characteristics of man would behave if he were immortal?

Go from bar to bar in a city on a Friday night and you will find a fight over a beautiful girl. You will find fights over did honor and disrespect, we could only imagine if those men were leaders of armies

[Anonymous No.19783404]

>>19782750
Anyone?

[Anonymous No.19783808]

Cool thread guys, keep responding guys

[Anonymous No.19783863]

>>19782750
In general, there's very little evidence to hang onto if you want to get inside Homer's head and all of that can be challenged. Remember that he wasn't using his own words, he complied the epics from a long oral tradition of rhapsodic poetry. There's still an argument whether he was even one person and this argument will never be resolved unless we learn something new.

[Anonymous No.19783881]

>>19783863
Ok, well inset 'the text' in exchange for 'homer' in what I wrote

[Anonymous No.19783973]

>>19782750
Good morning, I'll write an effortpost about this when I make some crepes for breakfast, hold on

[Anonymous No.19783978]

>>19773419

[Anonymous No.19783997]

>>19783881
>Does Homer seem to imply any value judgement on the merits of going to war over the beauty of a woman? Any comment or critique?
Ok, now an answer that's generally given here is that it's not so much about Helen, as it is about violating xenia -- the sacred law of hospitality. Paris went to Agamemnon as a guest and stole from him something precious, violating his authority and legacy. There's a religious angle here too, as Zeus is the protector of guests who seek shelter, there's a cultural angle here, as the Hellens were big on travelling and giving and using xenia and finally there's a self-interest angle here: travelling bards would definitely do well to keep emphasize the importance of this tradition, their life literally depended on it. So your whole line of inquiry is misguided and the ancients wouldn't think in these terms at all.

[Anonymous No.19784010]

>>19783997
And of course it was Menelaus not Agamemnon.

[Anonymous No.19784142]

>>19782750
>Does Homer seem to imply any value judgement on the merits of going to war over the beauty of a woman? Any comment or critique?
No, Homer makes no comments on whether the Mycenaeans were right or wrong in going to war. However, saying that they went to war for a woman is incorrect.
One part was that Paris violated the laws of hospitality which were very important in the Mycenaean culture and basically what >>19783997 said. It was understood that when you were wronged in certain ways, the gods charged you to punish those who had trampled their sacred laws, and that if you didn't you would either be seen as weak or coward by the people, or the gods would be displeased with you and heap further troubles on you.
Another important thing which is spoken of in the Iliad is that Paris carried off Sparta's treasure along with Helen, so if Menelaus didn't try to take Helen and the treasure back, he would be perceived as a king who couldn't protect his wife, his honor and hdis kingdom's riches, so his subjects wouldn't want to follow him and spread his name (therefore his glory).
The third part is purely practical, and it is corroborated by archaeological evidence of the Late Bronze Age - the Mycanaean civilization heavily relied on raiding to gather wealth. They did trade, but sailing and raiding towns or villages for cattle, gold, silver, women, bronze, wine and other goods were central in their culture. Waging war on Troy presented an opportunity for the kings who followed Agamemnon to amass wealth beyond what they would get from sacking the single city. The armies plundered everything within reasonable distance - Achilles himself mentions that he has sacked 23 (an exaggeration) towns and taken their loot to Agamemnon for distribution. If the kings hadn't been collecting a steady stream of riches over the years, they would never have held out just for Menelaus' honor or his promises of the treasure of Troy (which was substantially less at the end of the war as Priam had needed to grease his diplomacy with many gifts to keep the Trojan allies fighting).
>Is it all meta-ly about man's blind obsession and addiction to woman, to beautiful woman?
No, the central theme of the Iliad is glory.
>Does he appear to sigh that this is the case, or provoke the rightness of these decisions?
No, there's no discernible stance of the author in the text.
>Did he intend the audience to ponder these things?
It is not known what he intended, but the structure of the Iliad and the fact that Homer takes no clear moral position is indicative of the fact that the audience was meant to think about what they were hearing.
>Man is weak for beauty, therefore their gods are, and if their gods are, all is just?
That is simply incorrect.
>The gods are drives, how characteristics of man would behave if he were immortal?
No, the gods are not that but the reply is getting too long.

[Anonymous No.19784173]

>>19782641
thanks, this is something worth thinking about and exploring as I keep reading. I'm on book 14 now and I'm noticing that either my brain has finally picked up on how to read verse like this, or there Homer's changed something in his storytelling here becuase the fighting and character interactions in book 13 were the clearest and most interesting so far.
I'll definitely be reading another translation of the Iliad (most likely Pope's, I know, I know) just to compare and clarify some things, but that's going to be some time in the future. For now I'll focus on ploughing through the Greeks and learning as much as I can. What I've learned is surprisingly relevant to our contemporary lives and is very helpful to me as a poet.

[Anonymous No.19784177]

>>19782641
Thanks, this is something worth thinking about and exploring as I keep reading. I'm on book 14 now and I'm noticing that either my brain has finally picked up on how to read this kind of verse, or Homer's changed something in his storytelling here becuase the fighting and character interactions in book 13 were the clearest and most interesting so far.
I'll definitely be reading another translation of the Iliad (most likely Pope's, I know, I know) just to compare and clarify some things, but that's going to be some time in the future. For now I'll focus on ploughing through the Greeks and learning as much as I can. What I've learned is surprisingly relevant to our contemporary lives and is very helpful to me as a poet.

[Anonymous No.19784223]

>>19782750
You need to know that the parts where gods are directly involved in the action are not meant to be believed. I'm gonna summarize Walter Bröcker's Theologie der Ilias here.

If you wanna write a story, you basically have three sources from whence your material might arise:

1 experience (whether personal or not)
2 transcendent fantasy (because it surpasses experience, its unexperienceable)
3 transcendental fantasy (also unexperienceable, but it doesnt try to pass itself off as truth, it signifies itself as a mere invention of poetry and is thus not meant to be believed)

Homers gods are a product of transcendental fantasy. They are depicted as humans, but with almost unrestricted power and no existential threat. They are just as rude and quarrelsome as their minions, constantly fighting amongst each other, going back and forth. But all of this doesnt really matter to them. There is no real tragedy in heaven, only on earth. Nothing needs to be taken serious for them. While men fight and die down in the dust, the gods sit together and laugh. Even when the gods themselves fight (as in book 21), its only a source of amusement for Zeus. These homeric "godtales" (direct translation of Götterhistorien, couldnt find a better word) are 100% art and not religion. Examples are: the conspiracy of Thetis, Achilles' new arms (18), his fight with the river Xanthos (21), the fight of the gods (21), hectors death (22) or the judgment of paris (24).

Transcendent fantasy is not really important right now, but examples would be the prehistoric myths of Zeus (only mentioned in passing) and the historic myths of Heracles.

Now anytime we see a hero speak (outside of godtales), we have the expression of experience. You might have noticed that the gods are characterized different depending on whether the poet is speaking of them or a hero is doing it. Obviously they dont have sufficient knowledge to know which god is helping them, so they are mostly just referring to "a god" or "the deity", but they also dont differentiate between the gods and fate, which certainly happens multiple times in the godtales. You might call this understanding of the gods that is articulated in the statements of heros "Achaean religion".

[Anonymous No.19784340]

>>19773928
I like this answer.

>it may be that the comparison with pastoral life is due to the desire of presenting life as both war and peace, and maybe show how the two things are inseparable.

Indeed, this point is illustrated in the extensive description dedicated to Achilles's shield. The shield is a mandala that unites the opposites of peace/war and urban/pastoral living.

[Anonymous No.19784604]

Based high effort thread, have a bump.

[Anonymous No.19785928]

>>19784223
Cool thanks, I gotta read the illiaf again

[Anonymous No.19785956]

>>19784223
>>19784142
Ok well the judgement is on Paris for being a dishonorable jerk? For not being able to contain his desires? And causing the conflict that followed?

And you said the gods aren't real to them, they can't see them,band don't really interact, but I thought they do? The judgement of Paris fir instance, and Helen even being claimed to be born of a god, what's up with that then?

[Anonymous No.19785973]

>>19782750
>>19783404
Read Karl Kerenyi you pleb.

[Anonymous No.19785986]

>>19784223
>Homers gods are a product of transcendental fantasy
Lmao

look at this brainlet.

[Anonymous No.19786006]

>>19785956
the author does not judge Paris, the other characters do, as in the narration at no point calls out Paris for being wrong and retarded and a little bitch
>And you said the gods aren't real to them, they can't see them,band don't really interact, but I thought they do?
Are you talking about the characters in their own world? The anon above was analyzing it from a literary point of view, not according to the internal logic of the story

[Anonymous No.19786144]

>>19777937
Great post.

[Anonymous No.19786208]

>>19785956
The judgement of paris is one of the "godtales", so it doesnt fall under this category.

[Anonymous No.19787725]

Anything else?

[Anonymous No.19788839]

>>19773419
Damn, I want to read the Illiad now. Who made the translation you read?

[Anonymous No.19789395]

>>19788839
Fagles, I think it's the most accessible for a first time read, though I did compare some passages to Pope. The Knox introduction to Fagles was massively useful for me.

[Anonymous No.19789517]

>>19773419
Fascinating

[Anonymous No.19789865]

>>19773419
stop making low effort threads

[Anonymous No.19789885]

>>19789865
thanks for the bump
now fuck off

[Anonymous No.19789896]

>>19789885
stop making low effort posts.

[Anonymous No.19789924]

>>19773419
I'm wondering if many fighting forces at the time were composed of farmers? They had the tools that could be smelted into weapons and the strength from working in fields to fight? Therefore it's more a target audience type of thing, with the writing specficially tailored to man who thought that one day this could be them fighting beside the gods?

[Anonymous No.19789981]

>>19789924
It's iffy to classify them as farmers. Greece is mountainous and doesn't have a lot of arable land so cattle was a very important resource, it was the primary 'treasure' people sought to obtain from their enemies. That meant that the people taking care of the cattle weren't the lowest class and you can see that in the stories - those with royal blood are often found tending to their herds in peacetime. So the farmers as we understand them were not exactly the farmers of the Late Bronze Age.
>They had the tools that could be smelted into weapons and the strength from working in fields to fight?
The smiths started smelting tools into weapons toward the end of the Bronze Age when the deposits of tin were running low and they had to repurpose metal into tools of war.

[Anonymous No.19790758]

>>19789981
Noice

[Anonymous No.19791926]

>>19789924
>>19789924
It's in the Iliad. And Hesiod had entire mythology on farming.

[Anonymous No.19793266]

>>19773419
The short answer is that Greece at that time was pastoral, not agricultural. There's not much farmland. If you think there is no imagery relating to plants you're not reading carefully enough. Read the passage about the death of Simoeisios again.

[Anonymous No.19794058]

>>19782750
Hm, I'm not sure. Or at least there isn't something explicit enough to determine all of that from. Hector and Helen both criticize Paris for being a coward and putting Troy in danger on account of his action, but it might be that if war simply on account of a woman isn't the highest reason to go to war (everyone in the Greek contingent seems to resent being there for this, and Menelaus himself feels guilty for so many having died for him), nonetheless the war itself gives the Greek and Trojan heroes an opportunity to display their virtue and prowess and obtain honor and glory by being immortalized in poetry. Without the war over the woman, Achilles can't become what he is.

[Anonymous No.19794553]

You fight like a dairy farmer.

[Anonymous No.19794562]

>>19773419
So the pastoral are for men of action and war who steal women and sheep.

The agricultural are for weak grain eating men who are literally and liberally buttfucked by the men of the pastures, their grains eaten by sheep and goats, their women stolen, their men made into women.

Goat and sheep are the winning move bro. Until those grain eaters outbreed you.

Better enslave them all.

[Anonymous No.19795716]

>>19794553
kek

[Anonymous No.19796356]

Cool thread guys

[Anonymous No.19797458]

>>19796356
Agreed

[Anonymous No.19797544]

>>19794562
Why did the Neolithic Revolution have to happen bros?