Ancient Mythology Exam 2 November 5, 2012PandoraPandora: first woman, she was formed of clay by Hephaestus, as ordered by Zeus as a punishment to mankind for Prometheus’ theft of fire, and each god helped with her creation giving her gifts (her name means ‘all-gifted’).• Some of her gifts included weaving (Athena, craftiness), charm and beauty (Aphrodite, sexual desire), deceit (Hermes, trickster/messenger).• In the Theogony, her gifts were materialistic, she received clothes from Athena and a golden crown from HephaistosWorks and Days: a didactic poem by Hesiod around 700 BC, it expands upon Pandora’s creation myth; it is a farmer’s almanac (tells you when to plant crops and gives agricultural advice) and has folk wisdom; explains why life is so hard• Hesiod’s Theogony also includes Pandora; the Theogony is the myth about the birth of the gods and the creation of the universe.Didactic: gives moral advice, it teaches you somethingMisogynistic: hateful toward womenHephaistos/Hephaestus: blacksmith and creator (like Athena) god who forms Pandora out of clay and water. In the Theogony, Hephaistos gives Pandora a golden crown.Epimetheus:”afterthought” who is one of the brothers of Prometheus (“forethought) and son of Iapetus; he was warned by Prometheus, but he still accepted a gift from Zeus.Pyxis: a clay lidded box used for holding makeup.Pithos: a large highly decorated clay storage jar; they are compared with Pandora herself because both are made of clay, life-size (about five feet tall), the decorative work is equivalent to her gifts from the gods.Hope: abstract concept and god, if the jar was not opened by Pandora then hope would bring evil and/or absent from life.Kalon kakon: “beautiful evil,” Hesiod terms women this.Myth of the Races: explains why life is so hard and Hesiod juxtaposes the explanations; ages of man there is the golden, silver, bronze, heroic, and iron age and we as people get progressively worse; idea from the near east and was transposed into Greek mythology.Race of Heroes: one of the ages of man that includes Heracles, Perseus, Achilles, and Odysseus (who are real people, alluding to it being history not myth); this is the only age where man does not digress.PrometheusTitans: there are 12 titans and they are the children of Gaia and Ouranos, they become a younger race of gods that rule during the Golden Age.Iapetos: a titan and the parent with Clymene of Atlas, Prometheus, Epitheus, and Menoetius; he was the titan of mortal life.Gaia: earth, and mother of the titans.Ouranos: heaven, and father of the titans.Atlas: he was punished by Zeus along with his brothers; his punishment was to become a sky supported that held up the celestial sphere.Menoitios: his punishment was being hit with a flash of lightning and banished to Tartarus (the underworld).Mecone: Place of Prometheus’ sacrifice trick. The men and gods divide up the ox to decide who gets what. Prometheus wraps bones in fat (apparently good) and wraps the meat in the ox stomach (apparently bad) so Zues ends up getting the bones.Sicyon: another word for Mecone. Prometheus’ sacrifice trick with the ox happens here.Fennel stalk: Prometheus used a stalk of fennel plant to steal fire from the gods to give it to men.Ancient Mythology Exam 2 November 5, 2012Aeschylus: an ancient Greek tragedian who wrote Prometheus Bound.Prometheus Bound: by Aeschylus, portrays Prometheus as a culture hero who helps man by stealing fire from Zeus.Culture hero: mythological hero specific to a group who changes the world through invention or discovery, for example Prometheus to the humans for bringing them fire.Enki/Ea: trickster god who helped with the creation of humans in Enuma Elish and Atrahais.Metis: “wisdom,” a Titan, first great spouse of Zeus.Typhoios/Typhon: a Titan, the last son of Gaia, the father of all monsters.Metallurgy: Prometheus’ gift of fire helped to develop civilization including the use of “tools”Prometheus Unbound: by Aeschylus, fragmented, Prometheus is released from punishment and reconciles with Zeus.Kratos: “power” god.Bia: “force” god.Okeanids: arrive for a chorus of play.Okeanos: Zeus sympathizers.Io: arrives in the form of a cow, because Io was transformed by Zeus to hide from Hera, she is then persecuted by Zeus for being gadfly when with Argos and Hermes.Background Reading 7 (Prometheus Bound)Athens: Greek polis, city-state, plays a major role in politics, military, and cultural zenith.Agonistic: “competitive,” common in ancient Greek culture and exemplified in tragic competitions.Tragedy: a drama based on human suffering, they were performed at yearly religious festivals in honor of Dionysus, the Greek god of wine, emotion, and psychic release, and drama; an Athenian invention.Satyr play: a comic play involving satyrs, unrestrained and lusty humanoid creatures with horse tails and ears, they were always mythological and rarely historical.Trilogy: three stories all connected, they typically would all be performed on the same day before an audience in the theater, for example Prometheus Bound.Sophocles: an Athenian tragedian from c. 496-406, he is credited with introducing the third actor, and the three actors along with the chorus, which became the norm thereafter.Raven and CoyoteNative American: they tell oral stories that are collected by ethnographers; they are primarily about Coyote and Raven, trickster gods.Raven: son of Kit-ka’ositiyi-qa and culture hero in myths by the Tlingit (Klinkit) people• Shape-shifter, because he is a trickster, so his body is malleable and disguises himself as animals to have a difference in portrayal.• He is the creator god that forms the world.o He creates animals: come to the river on the other side people were wearing animal skins and he asks them to help him cross the river but they do not help, so Raven opens a box on sun and the people are transformed into animals. Raven eats the animals. o “King Salmon”: great food source for Klingit, Raven will eat them to show how good they are, jade adz (a rock shaping tool) mocks salmon, Raven finds one made of Jade which happens to have a face on it so he finds salmon and really wants to eat it. “After a while [Raven] came… come ashore here” he pretends the jade adz face is calling the salmon bad names so he kills the salmon with a wild celery stalk- that is how we knowAncient Mythology Exam 2 November 5, 2012that the Tlinkit people can eat salmon
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