Moderator: Aldus Marius
hubris was obviously the boasting of oneself as greater than the gods. This was the greatest offense one could perpetrate. Another would be hospitality. We know that hospitality was highly regarded, Zeus would kill if he was refused, and Latin words like hospes show us that the myth wasn't just a myth. These myths were a lifestyle, traditions giving them a link with their culture, each other, and their past. It carries on to us today.
It is true that most of the stories lost their original meaning and become fantastic tales of adventure etc... But look at Socrates, he quotes the Odyssey and Iliad many times. These were regarded as scripture. Their society, and likewise ours, depends on some sort of mythological tradition to stand on. What society is there that totally shuns legends? We all have our heroes, we all have our great wars, our enemies, our friends.
What would the world be like without myths? (or Cpt. James Hook?)
What are myths ? Theories abound. They have been seen as echoes of cosmological and meteorological events; as attempts to explain some of the odder things that go on in the world - a sort of primitive science; as stories invented to validate existing customs or institutions; as evocative tales of a creative past; as justification for primitive rituals. Psychologists and structural anthropologists have all had a say.
Professor Kirk examines such universal theories in this Pelican. They are all, he admits, illuminating, but none is adequate by itself, because these 'traditional tales' are of such variety that no single theory can embrace them all. His general analysis of the nature of Greek myth is followed by a splendid account of Greek myths...
In the final chapter of this unusually rigorous study Professor Kirk speculates on the manner in which an age dominated by myth gave way to an age dominated by philosophy.
Quintus Aurelius Orcus wrote:Salve Draco
In nova fert animus mutatas dicere formas
corpora; di, coeptis (nam vos mutastis et illas)
adspirate meis primaque ab origine mundi
ad mea perpetuum deducite tempora carmen!
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