Re: Did the Trojan war really happen the way Homer said it did?

From: Franz Gnaedinger (frgn_at_bluemail.ch)
Date: 12/07/04 

Date: 7 Dec 2004 09:40:06 -0800

Testing Google beta groups - I fear the new interface makes a mess
of everything, not only of my number patterns and the layout of
the ASCII messages but also of the quotes. Here I unquote my list
of symbols in Homer's Odyssey, wishing to know how such a list
looks like in proportional fonts. As a quote, my lists in beta are
a mess. I saw that sci.math is still ASCII. Why don't they keep ASCII
for all the scientific groups? And sorry if these message should
appear a couple of times: the posting service of beta doesn't yet
work properly, several people had the same problem I encountered,
we had to send our messages several times until it was posted, and
then they appeared as many times online as we had to try.

Franz Gnaedinger www.seshat.ch

Part 2 of my list of symbols in Homer's Odyssey (part 1 below)

* asterisks mark insights gained in this thread

Hermaes, messenger of the gods, can move anywhere in no time,
nobles each human work, can make everybody fall asleep and wake
them up again, also the god of the thieves -- alter ego of Homer,
who considers himself a messenger of the gods; who, in his poems,
can move from any place to any other place in no time; who can
fool us or open our eyes as he likes; who makes a swineherd one
of the most likable figures in the Odyssey; and who, as a bard,
uses or "steals" verses from other bards

Argos, dog of Odysseus -- evoking the watchful Argivian Alliance
that was symbolized by a circle of dots around a central dot
(Evans 12 on the Phaistos Disk, tattoos on the staring plaster
head from Mycenae)

Argeiphontes, epithet of Hermaes -- actual or virtual member
of the Argivian Alliance, looking out for enemies

* Beautiful Helen of the white arms, her long glittering robes --
tin, tin ingots, shiploads of the glittering tin ore cassiterite

* Xanthos Menelaos -- copper, the color xanthos (yellow red brown)
covering the hues of copper and copper ores

* Lovely Hermione, daughter of Helen and Menelaos, resembling
golden Aphrodite -- golden bronze, alloy of copper and tin

* A slave woman, mistress of Menelaos -- zinc, as occurring in
"enslaved" form in the mineral aucichalcite from Andros in the
Troas, a natural alloy of copper and zinc

* Late come strong Megapenthes, son of the slave woman and of
Menelaos -- brass, alloy of copper and zinc

* Paris-Alexander -- Alaksandu, son of an Achaean mother, king
of Wilusa (W)Ilios Ilion, who joined Hattusas and became a vassal
of Muwattalli II in around 1280 BC

* Judgement of Paris -- Alaksandu might have chosen the wife
of Zeus, Hera, who brought up Achilles: he could have become an
ally of the Greeks, thus honoring his Achaean mother and winning
the protection of powerful Thessaly, home of Achilles. Or he could
have chosen Athene, who, as personification of history, stood on
the side of the rising Greek civilization. But he chose Aphrodite
who promised him Helen. Aphrodite came from the copper island
Cyprus; Helen symbolized tin; and the love for which Aphrodite
stays means in the context of metals an alloy, here the one of
copper and tin yielding golden bronze. Alaksandu joined Hattusas.
The Achaeans, we may infer, had no longer free access to the Black
Sea, where they retrieved and purchased the rare and precious tin.
>>From now on they had to pay high duties, in metals, presumably tin,
for passing the Dardanelles, and this was the begin of a series
of incidents, which eventually led to the Trojan war.

Part 1 of my list of symbols in Homer's Odyssey

* asterisks mark insights gained in this thread

Homer, actually Homaeros -- pen name of the main bard of the
Odyssey, Melegistes of Smyrna, a pun: Hermos Hermaes homoios
homaereo Homaeros. The town of Smyrna was built on the ancient
mouth of the river Hermos. Hermaes was Homer's alter ego. Homoios
= equal, similar, refers to the similarity of the epics Iliad and
Odyssey. Homaereo = I unite speaks for Homer's wish of uniting
Greece and keeping together the Greek mainland, the many islands
and the Ionian colonies.

* Circe, Kirkae -- evoking the Goddess of Old Europe, whose name
might have been Kirike (www.seshat.ch/home/vinca.htm)

Penelope -- a pun on the Peloponnese

Calypso -- Anatolia in around 1200 BC

* Ino -- writing and poetry, perhaps honoring a historical person

Athene -- personifying history, once on the side of Asia Minor,
now on the side of the rising Greek civilization

* Arkeisios -- mythological founder of the Greek dwellings in the
Argolis, builder of the Circular Building on the hill of Tiryns

Lord Laertes, a gardener, son of Arkeisios -- eponymous Tiryns,
hero of the Phaistos Disk, introduced the edible olive elaia in
the Argolis

Odysseus, son of Laertes -- Greek military power and seafaring
skills in around 1200 BC

Telemachus, son of Odysseus -- Greece in the time of the Messenian
wars

Odysseus's journeys -- dreams that bring Odysseus back to Troy,
over and over again

Strange places Odysseus comes to -- Troy in disguise, and blended
with other places and periods of time

Polyphem -- Troy; his one eye the citadel

Pleasant Scherie -- according to Eberhard Zangger an early Troy

Animals such as horses and oxen, sheep and goats -- ships

Trojan horse -- a ship with a bow sprit in the shape of a stallion

The oxen of Helios Hyperion -- a Crimean fleet of freight ships
loaded with precious metals

Winds -- actual winds, or sea forces of the enemy, or forces of
the memory and conscience

(end of part 1; part 2 above)

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