The Girliest Boss U Know

-Theseus to Adrastus in Euripides' Suppliants

From the same play as before:

Aethra: My son, shall I say something which will give you and our city some honour?

Theseus: Yes, please do. Women can offer much wise council.

Aethra: But, I’m a little hesitant to utter what it’s in my mind.

Theseus: That’s a shame, mother. Keeping wise words from your dear son!

Aethra: No, I won’t stay silent now so as to have this silence punish me some time in the future. Nor will I hold back something that needs to be said through fear that speech making is unbecoming to women.

And again, because this is my favorite ancient play, I will insist on showing one of my all-time favorite quotes from it. Theseus debates the value of equality/democracy over monarchy, and says that because a king takes and takes and gives nothing, then:

Why would anyone want to bother with wealth and livelihood for his boys if it will all end up in the ruler’s hands? Or his girls. Why bother raising sweet daughters in your house if they, too, will end up with the ruler, whenever he wants them, leaving you with tears of sorrow? I’d rather die than have my daughters dragged against their will into a wedding bed!

There is nothing more hateful to a state than a tyrant. There, first, there are no common laws because one person rules, holding the law in his control. This is not equality. When laws are written both the weak and the wealthy receive equal judgment. It is possible then for the weak to accuse the lucky whenever they are slandered and the smaller person overcomes the great if his cause is just. This is freedom.

Plutarch’s Life of Theseus gives us a good idea how he was viewed by the disenfranchised:

And now he lies buried in the heart of the city [of Athens], near the present gymnasium, and his tomb is a sanctuary and place of refuge for runaway slaves and all men of low estate who are afraid of men in power, since Theseus was a champion and helper of such people during his life, and graciously received the supplications of the poor and needy.

And that’s before we even get into how he acts in Sophocles or any of Euripides’ other plays <33 in Callimachus’ Hecale, it seemed that he had adopted his progressive opinions from her, after learning that a king had forced her entire family to fight in a war they wanted no part in, leaving her abandoned and alone after they died. He wanted to support and honor her as much as possible

-Theseus to Adrastus in Euripides' Suppliants

From the same play as before:

Aethra: My son, shall I say something which will give you and our city some honour?

Theseus: Yes, please do. Women can offer much wise council.

Aethra: But, I’m a little hesitant to utter what it’s in my mind.

Theseus: That’s a shame, mother. Keeping wise words from your dear son!

Aethra: No, I won’t stay silent now so as to have this silence punish me some time in the future. Nor will I hold back something that needs to be said through fear that speech making is unbecoming to women.

And again, because this is my favorite ancient play, I will insist on showing one of my all-time favorite quotes from it. Theseus debates the value of equality/democracy over monarchy, and says that because a king takes and takes and gives nothing, then:

Why would anyone want to bother with wealth and livelihood for his boys if it will all end up in the ruler’s hands? Or his girls. Why bother raising sweet daughters in your house if they, too, will end up with the ruler, whenever he wants them, leaving you with tears of sorrow? I’d rather die than have my daughters dragged against their will into a wedding bed!

sketchys based on Go for it! Octomura by @pirozhkiparty :)) where Nakamura is a Cecaelia (obsessed with your writing fr fr)

Guys pls go read this fic it cures depression. It actually adopted 63 orphan children and solved world hunger. This fanfic has been ordained by the holy church of BL

right before this clip, Hirose shows Nakamura the game they’re talking about. He’s trying to include Nakamura, to not ice him out or make him feel excluded. He invited him to study and then to lunch! He clearly wants Nakamura here and enjoys his company. But Nakamura doesn’t know about the things they’re talking about and so can’t contribute.

We’re in Nakamura’s head for 99% of the anime. We know that in this scene, he’s writing down notes about what Hirose likes (music, shows, video games) so he can check them out later. But Hirose doesn’t know that, and they just came from studying at the library. So to Hirose, it seems like Nakamura doesn’t actually want to be there; that he’s just being polite and is trying to continue studying with his notebook. And that’s why Hirose looks so sad and guilty in a shot that we the audience are privy to, but Nakamura doesn’t notice.

And we see how Hirose deals with that guilt and sadness—by not giving up! By paying attention! He thinks Nakamura is sitting in polite discomfort, trying to sneak in some studying, and he tries to make Nakamura more comfortable. He asks him about what music he likes, he notices when his drink is empty and offers to get him more. He even gets sulky when his other friends usurp his gallant offer by asking him to get more for them, too, because that offer was to Nakamura, thank you!

Then, when Nakamura helps him get the drinks, Hirose takes that opportunity to apologize for his perceived offense of “making” Nakamura tag along.

And we get a nice subtle parallel here to when Hirose almost did the exact thing he’s worried Nakamura is doing now—politely tagging along when Takeuchi tells him to join so as not to rock the boat or be a “spoilsport,” as Takeuchi calls him. Forcing himself to go. And now Hirose is concerned that he acted like Takeuchi and pressured Nakamura.

This is such interesting insight into Hirose, and really helps further establish—outside of Nakamura’s biased POV—that he’s a genuinely kind and considerate person (even if he does have a bit of a mischievous streak with that prank he pulled on Takeuchi) and that he’s genuinely interested in putting in effort in being friends (and maybe more) with Nakamura.

I really hope we get more insights like this outside of Nakamura’s POV because Nakamura, our precious adorable unreliable narrator, is wrapped up in his own anxieties and stuck in his own head, and assumes Hirose is perceiving him through the same Doom Gloom Awkward Weirdo lens he sees himself and his actions through. But Hirose doesn’t know his thoughts, his plans, his hopes, and Hirose has his own internal world that Nakamura can’t see into, either.

Live Paris reaction

(he fled while Hermes chased after him and Hera bade him to stop. She was usually the first to speak to him, and spoke to him the longest)

Luckily he mentions the sources he took this from so it helps me to know what I should read

Apollonius Rhodius

Diodorus Siculus

Theocruitus's Idylls

Lycophrom

None of these sources seems to imply that she slept with Butes with the objective of making Adonis jealous. Apollonius only mentions Aphrodite saving Butes out of pity. Diodorus was more interested in relating the costumes of Sicily and praising Eryx, he mentions Butes only at the start and there is no mentions of Adonis. Theocruitus talks about the festival of Adonia with no mention of Butes. Lycophrom just briefly mentions Eryx. I am very inclined to not believe this narrative... I am quite relieved, Butes x Aphrodite is too goated for her to sleep with him just to make Adonis jealous. But now that I know that this guy is not that reliable I want to comment on some other stuff he says that I think it is misleading

The only source that I know that even mentions Adonis adding his portion of the year to Aphrodite is Pseudo-Apollodorus and it never say that she used her girdle to bewitch him.

That detail was very unnecessary to add and it really paints Aphrodite into a negative light of manipulating her lover's free will

Scholiast on Theocritus’ 15th Idyll, like 100:

δέσποιν' ἃ Γολγώς: πόλις Κύπρου ὠνομα- σμένη ἀπὸ Γολγοῦ τοῦ ᾿Αδώνιδος καὶ ᾿Αφροδίτης. Ἰδάλιον δὲ πόλις Κύπρου. Ἔρυξ δὲ πόλις Σικελίας ἀπὸ Ἔρυκος τοῦ 10 Βούτου καὶ ᾿Αφροδίτης. τὸ δὲ χρυσῷ παίζουσ' ᾿Αφροδίτα τοιοῦτον ἴσως ἐστίν, ὅτι οἱ ἐρῶντες χρυσῷ πείθουσι τὸ ἐρώ- μενον.

Here is a rough translation:

Mistress of Golgoi: a city of Cyprus, named after Golgos, the son of Adonis and Aphrodite. Idalion too is a city of Cyprus. Eryx is a city of Sicily, named after Eryx, the son of Butes and Aphrodite. And the phrase ‘Aphrodite playing with gold’ is perhaps of this sort: that lovers persuade the beloved with gold.

Scholiast on 103a is also interesting for Adonis

μηνὶ δυωδεκάτω: τινὲς δι' εξαμήνου φασὶν ἀνέρχεσθαι τὸν "Αδωνιν.

In the twelfth month: some say that Adonis ascends after six months.

Tzetzes’ On Lycophron 831a:

“Schoeneidi;” Schoeneis, Arenta, and Xene are epithets of Aphrodite. Adonis is called “Gauas” by the Cypriots. According to some, Adonis was the son of Cinyras, the king of the Cypriots, and not Theiantos, from whom Aphrodite gave birth to Priapus, who was ugly and deep-voiced. For Hera, being pregnant, touched her with a bewitched hand and caused her to give birth to such a child. Adonis was called “destroyed by the Muses” because the Muses, angry at Aphrodite for causing them to fall in love and making many of them give birth, killed her beloved Adonis. They sang a delightful hunting song, and hearing it, he was excited and rushed to hunt, where he was killed by a boar. Others say he was killed by Ares in the war. The Muses, carried away by their anger at Aphrodite, because she had stirred many of them to love and persuaded them to mate with men and give birth, such as Calliope giving birth to Orpheus and Cymodoce from Oeagrus; Terpsichore giving birth to Rhesus from Strymon; Cleio giving birth to Linus from Magnes; they killed her beloved Adonis. For they sang a delightful hunting song and caused Adonis, Aphrodite's lover, who heard it, to be excited and rushed to hunt. Ares, the god, being Aphrodite's rival, either transformed himself into a boar or, seeing Adonis rushing at a boar, came against him and killed him. And Adonis's blood flowing down turned the anemone, which was previously white, red; for Adonis happened to fall near an anemone. Aphrodite, learning of the tragedy, ran around barefoot, lamenting pitifully, and she herself, pierced by the thorns of a rose, turned the rose red with the flowing blood.

Tzetzes’ On Lycophron 831b:

🍐🐄 Hera Pais, the cow eyed bride🪵🏛

 "I sing of golden-throned Hera whom Rhea bare. Queen of the immortals is she, surpassing all in beauty: she is the sister and the wife of loud-thundering Zeus, -- the glorious one whom all the blessed throughout high Olympus reverence and honour even as Zeus who delights in thunder." -Homeric Hymn to Hera

"The presence of a cuckoo seated on the sceptre [of Hera] they explain by the story that when Zeus was in love with Hera in her maidenhood he changed himself into this bird, and she caught it to be her pet [in order to seduce her]." - Pausanias, Description of Greece 2. 17. 4

I’m currently reading "The Transformation of Hera: A Study of Ritual, Hero, and the Goddess in the Iliad" by Joan V. O’Brien. She argues, sometimes speculatively, about the early cult origins of Hera, but I still find it very interesting.

The book suggests that Hera’s early rites in Samos might have portrayed her as arriving annually on a horse drawn chariot at a confluence of waters, where her bathing and binding to a cultic tree were believed to renew all life, presenting her as a goddess of the seasons.

There also seems to be an argument that she had a connection to the Potnia Theron, based on the large animals associated with her and the artifacts found at her temples, such as lions, griffins, and sphinxes. Her association with domestic animals like cows and horses could suggest that she was seen as a tamer of beasts, and her yoking of the bull may be parallel marriage and the "taming and yoking" of the bride.

I find this especially interesting because it aligns with my view of Hera as a goddess who makes things perfect.

In some traditions, it seems that she was worshipped in different life stages with epithets such as Hera Pais (the young maiden before marriage) Hera Teleia (the married woman)

Inktober 12: Young Hera racing.

“Hera’s cult at Olympia was administered by a college of sixteen women chosen from the most venerable and respected matrons of the district. These women organized the Heraia, or games held to honor Hera, concurrently with the quadrennial Olympic games. While women were generally excluded from the Olympic games both as competitors and spectators, the Heraia involved a footrace for girls of three different age categories. They ran in the same stadium as the men and boys, though the track was one-sixth shorter. The winners received a portion of the meat from the cow sacrificed to Hera and a crown of olive.”