Hesiod

• ca. 700 B.C.
• Theogony
• Works and Days

"The most authoritative Greek account of the origin of the universe through the succeeding generations of gods...." - Powell : But in what sense "authoritative"?

What sort of "myth" is this? What is Hesiod trying to accomplish?

• Authority: Helikon, 9 Muses, staff
  
• Principles of generation (not random!)
  
• like breeds like (Erinyes (Furies) from blood, children of Strife)
• breeds opposites (children of Night, Barren Sea=Pontus from Earth=Gaea)
• symmetries (doublets)
• Uranus/Gaea :: Cronus/Rhea
• Eros :: Aphrodite
  
• Groupings of figures to explore the qualities of a divine force
  
• 9 Muses (willingness to make up names; cf. Nereids)
• 3 Graces
• 2 Strifes
• 50 Nereids (willingness to make up names)
  
• Selective -- not the only version, not simply a catalogue of what is well-known & accepted
• Homer: Oceanus & Tethys were the prime generators
• Cyclopes in the Odyssey
• Birth of Aphrodite from Zeus and Dione (why does Hesiod choose a diff. version?)
  
• Mythmaker- myth as infinite variation, as a way of thought
  
• Power of words: etymologizing (Aphrodite: philommedes vs. philomeides)
• Pandora
• Strife
  
• Overall systematic character & organization of the work
  
• 1st to 4th generation : Zeus & consorts : gods & mortals (cf. Near Eastern models)
• Abstractions : Titans : major Olympians, first generation : children of Olympians, minor Olympians
• Asexual : sexual : asexual (swallowing of Metis and Birth of Athena stops the cycle begun by sexual division)
• 5 ages of man (cf. Near Eastern models)

So what is Hesiod trying to accomplish?

Two quotes:

Herodotus (5th century B.C.): "It was Homer and Hesiod who created for the Greeks a genealogy of the gods, gave the gods their epithets, distributed their honors and competences, and stamped them with their forms."

Pausanias, Description of Greece 8.8.3 (2nd century A.D.)"When I began to write my history I was inclined to count these legends as foolishness, but on getting as far as Arcadia I grew to hold a more thoughtful view of them, which is this. In the days of old those Greeks who were considered wise spoke their sayings not straight out but in riddles, and so the legends about Cronus I conjectured to be one sort of Greek wisdom. In matters of divinity, therefore, I shall adopt the received tradition."

Tales of Prometheus

The making of Pandora, 1

The making of Pandora, 2

The irony of the tale of Pandora, women, and bees in Hesiod's Theogony

Pandora and the jar: mythic sense (or is it conflation?)

Jars and women: mythic sensibility

The Punishment of Prometheus, 1

The Punishment of Prometheus, 2

Prometheus, Zeus, and the sacrifice: mythic sense (or is it conflation?)

Reflections on the story of Prometheus and the story of the New Testament

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[Plato's Protagoras: Protagoras as mythmaker

Plato, a philosopher of the 4th century B.C.

Protagoras, a thinker of the 5th century B.C., and contemporary of Plato's teacher, Socrates ("Protagorean Theorem")]

[not included in the class due to time constraints: perhaps later in the course]