another messy sideblog

In general, our understanding of Daunian men's hairstyles is cloudy due to the schematic nature of Daunian art, where women are often depicted with a long braid whereas men aren't represented with any hair. Here's some examples from Iron Age Daunian stelae.

As you can see, earlier Daunian art doesn't give us much information. Here are some much later IV/III century Daunian tomb frescos from when the area was more Hellenized and Daunian art got more figurative:

As you can see, the Daunians depicted in frescos roughly contemporary with Lycophron's writing correspond pretty accurately to the image painted by the scholion. The Daunian men of this time seem to have worn their hair in a "mullet", like the other native peoples of Apulia, collectively dubbed "Iapygians" by the Greeks. Here are some examples of Apulian natives in Greek red-figure pottery:

Note the distinctly Italic clothing as well as the bronze belts, which you can also see in the stelae above and which they share with other pre-Roman Italic peoples outside of Apulia (you can read up on that here). The last image is a particularly good example to show the contrast between the Greek and the native "style". Below is a fresco from the famous "Tomba delle Danzatrici", from Ruvo di Puglia.

Now, back to Hector lol. If you like the guy you have no doubt seen this Apulian vase painting:

As much as I love it, I'm afraid it might not be Hector after all :(. This scene not only depicts the two warriors with the signature native clothing as seen in earlier examples, it also represents a particularly popular scene in Greek art for a native Italic market: the return/departure of the warrior, often accompanied by libations, as seen in the first two examples above and in the following couple of pictures.

Interestingly, though I have seen the Jatta Museum (where the vase in question is stored) suggest the identification of the scene with that of the Iliad before, it also suggests that the father of the child is actually the man on the left (who gets cut out of the pic most of the time lol), pointing out the similarities in his and the kid's clothes. It also identifies the helmet in "Hector"'s hand as a Chalcidian helmet, clearly extraneous to the otherwise characteristically Italic elements of the scene, and thus interpreted as war loot from the Greek settlers in the region.

Now, this doesn't mean this can't be Hector, Andromache and Astyanax, but it definitely doesn't seem to be the most likely case. BUT! In a weird roundabout way we learned how Lycophron might've pictured Hector's hairstyle, even if that isn't him on the vase! Funny how that works huh, one of the most famous would-be depictions of Hector might not be him but it just so happens it depicts the hairstyle a source mentions the Daunians having taking after him because the vase was produced near Daunia!

Hen Wilson:

Constantly overlooked by the fandom in favor of men, and when people do focus on her it's all about how she helps the m/m ship du jour get together, or supports them, or guides a man in his sexuality discovery. People outside the fandom are constantly being bombarded with the noncanon ship between two white (passing) men, and never even hear about the Black lesbian main character. The OG animals facts girlie but everyone gives that trait to her (white) male coworker.

BADASS Black lesbian firefighter who joined the crew at a time when it was rife with racism and misogyny. Had to fight three times as hard to earn her place and boy did she! Multifaceted, makes devastating mistakes, lashes out, is sososo compassionate, funny, and the smartest character on the show! And her wife is so hot

Hen is a main character who has been in a lesbian relationship since the very first episode(!!!), and yet it's only when the white male lead comes out as bi that fandom celebrates how wonderfully queer the show is and put his face on all the fandom Pride events and artwork! I guess it's not queer rep until it's a white man doing it…

Hen is brave, kind, has a huge heart, makes mistakes, loves, laughs… She's such a wonderful and vibrant character and she doesn't deserve to be overlooked by both the writers and the fandom!

Fandom turns her into a cheerleader for their fave m/m ship, usually Buddie but sometimes Bucktmmy (the latter being especially crazy considering her history with Tommy). Fans also hated on her for what she said about feeling like no one supported her after Bobby died because Buck made her fill out a grief checklist one time, even though that speech (while maybe not super supported by the previous episodes) had very clear subtext about her being the only black woman at her workplace.

Hen is a friend to all animals and is extremely messy in her personal life, two great qualities for any character.

fandom refuses to give her the same rich inner live her male coworkers have, because she's just allowed to be the mothering, wise, funny black woman. it's not that fans hate her, they proclaim to love her, but everytime she gets a storyline they complain. everytime she behaves like a human being, with flaws, on the show they complain. anyone's guess whether that's misogyny, racism or misogy-noir

Henrietta fucking Wilson, smartest person you'll ever know (except for her rocket scientist wife) is a firefighter/paramedic, she is badass, she's a mom, she's a lesbian, she's a great friend and she has this incredibly dry wit sometimes. she has flaws, she's stubborn, she tries so hard not to burden anyone that it's burdening, she makes decisions and takes the fall for them. she!!!

This is a complicated answer but here's my thesis. Hen (main character) is sometimes (sometimes!) not served that well by the canon, and I think it's because they are (since s1) afraid to let a black lesbian character be too messy. But this is about fandom, not canon. And she does have some really juicy storylines. And what I have noticed is that fans love to hate the show and they like to say Because Hen Has No Story as one of the reasons. And then when Hen has a juicy story, many of these some fans will insist it's Bad Actually and will come up with some of the most convoluted nonsensical reasons the storyline is objectively bad, when they are in fact clearly just upset their fave didn't get more attention that ep, but they can't say that because that would be racist and they are Not Racist, you see. So some really fun and interesting stories gets crickets at best and torn up and discarded at worst and sucks.

She marches to the beat of her own drum. She's compassionate and kind and brilliant. She's Judging You. She is SUCH a good friend. She is constantly celebrating people and making sure they feel appreciated. She had a really cool villain foil in s5 and nobody ever talks about how good it was. She loves animals. She's had to carve out her place wherever she goes. She has excellent intuition and she's daring and kind of egotistical about her ability to save lives with risky ad hoc medical hail marys. It's hard to sum her up, she's been here 9 seasons. In some ways the family dynamics of the team started with her.

I am a big gay dyke and I've had multiple (three) people recommend me 911 (before I started watching) on the basis that there is queer rep and the queer rep in question that three (THREE!) people went out of their way to mention to me (lesbian) was BUCK. NO ONE TOLD ME ABOUT THE LESBIAN!! WHO WAS IN IT AND MARRIED FROM THE BEGINNING!

Sansa Stark:

Perpetually a victim of the plot, denied agency, hated for being whiny, PLUS the whole deal where they changed the plot of the book so they could show her being raped in the show…

Sansa is an incredible character for the exact reasons I hated her ass when I was 14. She's often passive, conforms to expectations, and lashes out at her younger sister for being the opposite. Her arc finds her struggling to navigate a dangerous, violent world that hates women using only the tools she was taught as a girl would keep her safe and make her successful (her passivity, her virginity, her femininity, etc.).

Bashed as the worst and most useless character of the whole series for not immediately killing all the Lannisters ig despite literally watching her father’s head get cut off at thirteen years old. Also catches flak for thinking mean things about the fandom’s chosen son Jon Snow and her sister Arya Stark, but like. This is a middle schooler.

The WHOLE POINT of her character is to illustrate how the game of thrones corrupts innocence, ERGO the character HAS to start from an innocent place. Obviously she’s naive at the start of the series, why would any child raised in a loving household far away from court politics develop any political acumen? But despite this, she does learn quickly, and her character development is among the most exciting in the show (and I’m sure it will eventually be in the series as well)

I could write a dissertation on this one but if you say Sansa is worse that Joffrey you’re a misogynist. In my opinion people hate her because her abuse arc is painfully grounded in reality.

The very first man to use her as a pawn was her father and yet the fandom blames her for this. Sansa’s arc was supposed to be a mirror of her sister’s to show that if they comply (Sansa) if they rebel (Arya) no girls win in a patriarchal society but so many people would rather hate a fictional little girl because she didn’t girl boss her way out of oppression.

According to Sophie Turner (the actress who played Sansa), people hated Sansa so much that they would actually go up to Turner in real life and go "i don't like you" (and Turner would have been in like... her teens/early twenties at this point)

I really need fans to not need her to marry a creepy old pervert to prove that she isn’t vain and put her in her place. She’s twelve. Also these creepy men like her because she’s pretty. It’s also not her job to fix their defective personalities.

George R.R. Martin wrote a really complex world with layers of story and metaphors. He has something to say about climate change and nuclear weapons, these metaphors are obvious. Then he challenges us to look at government, power structures, patriarchal systems, concepts of honor vs what’s actually right, gender roles, and how to meaningfully change all of these things. Then to have people take away nothing other than the book is about a feud between to little girls, Sansa is the villain, and the story will be about defeating her. Sansa and Arya love each other. One conforms, one rebels, neither can win in a patriarchal society. Their arc is why this society is bad for all girls but so many fans willfully miss it because of their own misogyny.

Everyone loved the idea of a free and independent North under Robb or even Jon but they seem really agitated that Sansa was the one who saw it through. They are angry at her when she’s meek and even angrier when she exercises her agency to give her homeland something they seem pretty unified in wanting.

Ned was the very first man to use Sansa. He used her as a cover while investigating the Lannister’s without any sort of regard for how dangerous that is. Yet fans blame Sansa, an eleven year old girl for killing Ned. Girl argued like a lawyer on his behalf, the milk of the poppy defense was great and Ned was ready to through it away because honor. What’s sad is I don’t think that Sansa herself is able to process how much her male family members fail her because it’s too much to handle. People also expect Sansa a kid to stand up to Joffrey at the Trident when Ned a grown adult won’t stand up to Robert. The saddest thing is that I believe if Joffrey wasn’t a bastard Ned would have married Sansa to him. He would have felt bad about it but he would have upheld the system. Fans would naturally see this as Sansa’s character flaw and proof that Ned is good because he feels bad.

I'm going to preface it by saying I genuinely have no ill will towards, nor trying to argue nor shame nor start drama with the person who submitted it. I just have to say, gently and respectfully, that the part in the Sansa propaganda that talks about her being passive feels wrong (and maybe even be a result of unintentionally swallowing some of the character slander we are otherwise successfully fighting against!) for reasons the original submitter might consider below. Sansa Stark is not actually passive. I know it can seem that way because she dissociates a lot (for very understandable trauma related reasons) and cannot directly bring out a massive narrative change on her own because she is both effectively a prisoner as well as completely isolated, but she is actually a fairly active character, it's just that she is active in a more femininely acceptable way in the society of her world. She takes initiative in front of an entire court she doesn't understand the customs of to speak up in defense of her father, thinking on her feet and coming up with an extremely reasonable defense for him that some real world lawyers in modern day use in court (and that would have worked if the authority figure was ANY character in the entire narrative other than who it was at the time). She keeps choosing kindness. She tries to persuade her abusive captor to be kinder and gentler to his younger brother who wanted to honour him on his birthday and was unsuccessful at doing so, she shows courtesy and understanding to a cousin who is from the same family of her abusers (Lancel after the blackwater), she modifies her behavior to appear as acceptable to the people who hurt her and use any insubordination as an excuse to hurt her further, so she uses the facade of a completely nonthreatening helpless unremarkable individual to the point of falsely appearing stupid to actively conspire about her own escape in the godswood (a site of religious significance to her that almost nobody around her cares enough about to frequent and check up on). She operates within the socially acceptable role of a lady which she has been taught her entire short sheltered life, in order to make herself seem less threatening to avoid being targetted by the horrible people around her. She analyzes her situation and acts accordingly by choice. Sure, it can seem passive because that is how women need to appear in a world where the majority of power is held by Men, too many of whom desperately want to keep women powerless and subservient, but she actively tries to make the choice to be good and kind to the young, the innocent, and those who deserve compassion and mercy. She wakes up every day in a world that shows her endless cruelty, she analyzes the risks her behavior might incur, and she keeps choosing kindness despite it all and in the face of it all. And it's not an easy decision. Many people, even in our world, get slighted once and choose to burn every bridge they can find for the rest of eternity to get even. Sansa Stark is not actually passive. She just disguises herself as passive to survive. And people who think that is what she is are proof that her effort is paying off.