#hellenic chat

OKAY OKAY So no source actually lists Perseis as the wife of Helios. She is Specifically the Mother of his children-

Sources:

Homer, Odyssey 10. 139 ff (trans. Shewring) (Greek epic C8th B.C.) : "We came to the island of Aiaia (Aeaea); here Kirke (Circe) dwelt, a goddess with braided hair, with human speech and with strange powers; the magician Aeetes was her brother, and both were were the radiant sun-god's [Helios'] children; their mother was Perse, Okeanos' (Oceanus') daughter." Hesiod, Theogony 955 ff : "To Helios, the unwearied Sun, the glorious daughter of Okeanos (Oceanus), Perseis, bore Kirke (Circe) and the King Aeetes." Pseudo-Hyginus, Fabulae 156 : "Children of Sol (the Sun) [Helios]. Circe by Persis, daughter of Oceanus, and Pasiphae."

Now, this obviously happened a lot with Gods, and was not really considered an affair by the standards of the time. I've spoken some on this before so check my tag for more information.

Rhodes, however, IS called his wife.

Sources:

Pindar, Olympian Ode 7. 13 ff (trans. Conway) (Greek lyric C5th B.C.) : "Praise the sea maid, daughter of Aphrodite, bride of Helios (the Sun), this isle of Rhodes." Pseudo-Apollodorus, Bibliotheca 1. 28 (trans. Aldrich) (Greek mythographer C2nd A.D.) : "Poseidon married Amphitrite, and had as children Triton and Rhode, whom Helios (the Sun) made his wife."

(There are more sources discussing them, but these are the ones explicitly using the word wife).

While Perseis has the older sources mentioning her with Helios, Rhodes has the specificity of being his wife. So in this situation, Rhodes would be his wife and Perseis a mother of his children.

I mean yeah but the Hearth is where you go for aid and council, it's the center of the home, center of the city, it is where you go for aid and help and to be at peace.

Of course the hearth aids in strength, you do all your home activities around it. You find peace and food and rest and recovery at the hearth.

Hmm, not sure where to start here so I'll list various notes about the beliefs!

First! The ancients did actually know the Earth was a sphere, including the Greeks. This is important to Astronomy, and was learned with Astronomy. Empedocles and Anaxagoras learned via a lunar eclipse, as they watched the shadow of the earth cover the moon.

Of course there were other methods of determining this too, such as ships! When a ship comes over the horizon you see the top first, which points towards the Earth being a sphere. This is brought up by quite a few astronomy texts of the time!

But Lunar Eclipses were important for astronomy!

Here's a picture of how Aristarchus of Samos calculated the size of the Earth via a lunar eclipse! The bottom circle is the sun, then the Earth, and then the moon. This isn't the only way this was done, but it's a cool method!

Other things... hmm, I suppose Aristotle's theory of the four fundamental elements is notable. Fire, Water, Air, and Earth. Which was further separated into Hot and Cold and Wet and Dry. He believed all of space, and all of the Earth, was composed of these elements. Earth was the heaviest and fire the lightest, and the lighter the element the further it got from the center of the universe.

My personal favorite aspect of beliefs is the Wandering Stars vs Fixed Stars. Or what we know as Planets vs Stars. The Astra Planeta The Greeks noticed some stars moved around a lot more than others, and while they didn't know about planets they did know these stars were different. These moved around the celestial sphere of the universe and the heavens.

The heavens were argued to be made of a fifth element, unique to them, the quintessence.

There are "two rings" of this universe, the terrestrial range (with the moons orbit marking its boundary) and the outer/heavenly orbit which contained the rest. Things like comets and the wandering stars were in the terrestrial orbit while the constellations were in the heavenly orbit.

There's so much more I could say, but I'll just provide some sources to read up more and say that we still use a lot of the terms and theories today even if refined lol.

The time frame of Persephone's birth isn't something I can find a consistent source on, many mention her birth as a side note more than a detail. So I'm not sure. I can't find mention of Persephone, which probably means she was born after but there's no guarantee of it.

Would you happen know anything about the significance of women wearing veils in Ancient Greece or at least be able to point me in the right direction?

I read that Icarius, Penelope’s father wasn't willing to let her leave with Odysseus until after she covered herself with a veil that apparently symbolized she was under Odysseus’s protection, but what I can’t find out how Icarus figured that out.

(Also, I’ve been trying to figure out which translation of the Odyssey to buy for myself and I think I’ve decided on Emily Wilson’s after seeing a post of yours this last week, so thanks!)

We don't actually know for sure what the reasoning for it was, though there are multiple possible reasons.

A veil was after all a symbol of modesty, and even status to a certain extent. Especially in its original purpose (you could be lashed in the Assyrian times for wearing a veil if you were a slave). So it's possible that it was tied to that.

Veils and weddings have been tied together for a long time. The earliest time that we have reasoning for is the Roman's, in latest record I know. Which was a symbol of the husbands authority or something along those lines. The Greeks? We don't really know the reason behind it.

Also is it true that Artemis was one of the Patron Gods of Sparta along with Ares and did Artemis have any followers who were male or were women only aloud to follow her?

I did aaaages ago. I got Athena.

Sparta revered a number of Gods, including Athena funnily enough. But yes, Artemis was very popular with them.

Artemis had a huge number of male worshippers and followers. She hunted alongside several men. She even allowed men to spend time with her group, as long as they respected the boundaries. She was heavily worshipped for hunting, wilderness survival, and wild animals as a whole.

The times men got punished for being around her was when they lied about being men (sneaking in disguised as women while being men, usually because of a crush on a Huntress with Artemis), peeping on them bathing (multiple instances with Artemis punishing them), or pissing off Apollo with their behavior (some versions of Orion).

The first one concerns Pearl in the Nile. Will Nephthys is recognise Mr. D. as a (somewhat) cthonic deity?

The second one deals with the Greek myth in general, but do you kow, why are the Kindly Ones reffered to as such?

You'll have to wait and see for the Pearl in the Nile!

When the Kindly Ones were present in the big trial during Oresteia their name was changed in the end from the Erinyes to the Eumenides, which can be translated as "Kindly Ones" (amongst other things). They were basically transformed into beings of good.

Also, you don't wanna refer to forces which might hunt you down for doing bad by their name, no need to get on their double checking list lol.