Odysseus did not want to go to war. When the oath he had devised to bind the other kings was called due and the kings of Greece gathered for Troy, he attempted to escape it. He yoked an ox and a donkey to the same plow and drove them in erratic lines across the field,Continue reading “Odysseus”
Tag Archives: Virgil
The Dioscuri
The myth begins with Zeus in disguise. He comes to Leda, queen of Sparta, in the form of a swan. Later poets make it salacious. The earlier versions make it necessity. Their union yields eggs. From them Castor and Polydeuces emerge, and in many traditions Helen and Clytemnestra as well. Only the brothers are calledContinue reading “The Dioscuri”
Diomedes and Aeneas
In Calydon, Oeneus made his offerings to the gods, and in the counting of names he forgot Artemis (Ov. Met. 8). The first fruits rise in smoke to Zeus, Hera, the household powers, the immortals who tolerate men so long as men remember them. It is the old economy of reciprocity, the one James FrazerContinue reading “Diomedes and Aeneas”
Protective Arts 