Norse mythology

So when King Richard spurred his horse and galloped toward the broken line, calling out to his soldiers to turn back to the battle and fight. He was barely halfway across the field when the unsecured horse's shoe flew off. The horse stumbled and fell, and King Richard was thrown to the ground in front of the enemy. King Richard looked around him and saw that his soldiers were turning and running and the enemy's troops were closing in to him. His army had fallen to pieces, his troops were busy…

The Sarcophagus Panel Depicting the Abduction of Persephone was created by an anonymous Ionian sculptor around 190/200 CE. The Sarcophagus Panel Depicting the Abduction of Persephone is a high relief sculpture that shows Hades (god of the underworld) abducting Demeter’s (the harvest goddess) very young daughter Persephone so that he can marry the young girl. This relief sculpture was inspired by the Homeric Hymn to Demeter, which tells the story of Hades kidnapping Persephone. This work of art…

The Peloponnesian War was a 30-yearlong battle between the Grecian cities of Athens and Sparta. Thucydides, an exiled general of the Peloponnesian War, wrote “The History of the Peloponnesian War”. In his writings, he describes three specific events that contributed to the downfall of democracy in Athens. Throughout the war, Athenian democracy shifts from an ideal that works for the people and the progression of society, to a military approach dedicated to maintaining their war by any means…

A simile is the figure of speech used to compare two things using the words like or as, and so on. In the Iliad, Homer uses a lot of similes either to explain the character, or to explain the situation explicitly. The above simile is from book 16, titled Patroclus Fights and Dies. Patroclus knows a large number of the Achaeans are struggling to survive on the ship: some of them hit by arrows and others run through with spears. Achilles, a great warrior, could save them if he goes in war but he…

Languages in Julius Caesar, is unique because many of the dialogues spoken by the high-class citizens are not written in a typical Shakespearean rhymed iambic pentameter; they are mostly written in unrhymed iambic pentameter. For example, in the long conversation between Brutus and Caesar about Calpurina’s dream, notice the rhyme pattern, “This dream is all amissed interpreted;/It was a vision fair and fortunate:/Your statue spouting blood in many pipes./In which so many smiling Romans bathed,”…

Gods and goddesses played a primary part in the Ancient Greek society and culture. Aphrodite, the goddess of love, beauty, and eternal youth, was an essential goddess to Mount Olympus. Since she was the most attractive goddess on Mt. Olympus, which should not be shocking since she is the goddess of love, many gods and mortals were attracted to her (“Aphrodite, the Greek Goddess of Beauty, Love and Eternal Youth”). Along with beauty, Aphrodite possessed a magical girdle that attracted people to…

Odysseus’s Leadership Essay According to the epic The Odyssey by Homer, losing his entire crew on his journey back to Ithaca does not preclude Odysseus from being considered a good leader due to the circumstances in which he was helpless to prevent the loss of his crew and his aptitude for wisdom. To begin with, Odysseus is a good leader despite the fact that he lost his entire crew because he was rendered completely powerless such a catastrophe. Examples of this include the crew’s stay on…

“Poseidon is the god of the sea and rivers, creator of storms and floods, and the bringer of earthquakes and destruction”(theoi). Poseidon was given the sea to rule by his siblings. He is known as either Poseidon or Neptune and is the god of the sea. “Poseidon is commonly depicted in art as bearded with his trident, fashioned by the cyclopes and with which he would create earthquakes” (cartwright). Poseidon is a god with a lot of children and a violent family background, a lot of conflicts, and…

War tends to incite very specific images: madness, mēnis, and mercilessness. All these concepts create an atmosphere of carnage; however, when reading the histories of great ancient battles like those of the Trojan and Peloponnesian Wars, it is clear that even during comparatively less “civilized” times, war was not an unstoppable force; across both cultures, it proved to be limited, most notably by the notions of honor and humility. In Homer’s Iliad, the tone of the story is characterized by…

In Greek mythology there are many gods and goddesses who make up some people’s beliefs. One of those gods is Hephaestus, the god of fire. He is very important in Greek mythology because he was the son of Hera and Zeus, and would basically be the source for when god’s needed reliable weapons. The god of fire was a sibling to Apollo, Artemis, Hermes, Athena, Ares, and Persephone (greekgoddesses.net). His children were Euklela, Eupheme, Euthenia, Philophrosyne, Thaleia, Palikoi, Erikthonios, and…