Before Zeus ruled, there were Titans. Prometheus belongs to that earlier generation, a survivor of the war that placed Zeus on the throne. When the Olympians overthrow Cronos and the Titans in the Titanomachy, Prometheus does something unusual: he aids Zeus (Hesiod, Theogony 617–720). At first glance the decision appears pragmatic. The new regime isContinue reading “Prometheus”
Category Archives: myth
Troy
Troy is not the beginning of the heroic age. It is the point where the heroic age destroys itself. The Greeks understood this. Their myths do not describe a long golden era stretching indefinitely backward into legend. The heroic age is startlingly brief. From the first monster-slayers to the sack of Troy spans only aContinue reading “Troy”
Narcissus
The daffodils have begun to flower. Narcissus emerges from the ground. The Greeks named the flower for a boy who could not look away. The myth remembers something about spring that the botanical name preserves without explaining: that the eye, given something sufficiently beautiful, stops. The will follows the gaze. The season announces itself throughContinue reading “Narcissus”
Protective Arts 