Numina · Book V
Book V
Greek Mythology
We know Greek myth well because the Greeks wrote it down early, argued about it in public, and put it on stage. Homer assumes it, Hesiod systematises it in the Theogony, the tragedians use it to think with, and by the Hellenistic period mythographers are collating variants the way a modern editor collates manuscripts.
Its gods are anthropomorphic to an extent that embarrassed later philosophers: they lie, they are jealous, they lose their tempers and take it out on cities. Xenophanes complained about this in the sixth century BCE and the complaint has never really stopped. The compensating idea is that the universe has a shape they do not control — the Moirai spin, and Zeus does not overrule them.
Watch for the local variants. “Greek mythology” as a single system is a convenience of textbooks; Argos, Athens and Thebes each told it differently, and often with an eye to who ought to be in charge.
Contents
- V.1Hesiod's successionto come
Chaos, Ouranos, Kronos, Zeus — power taken three times by force.
- V.2The Olympiansto come
Twelve gods who behave badly, and the philosophers who objected.
- V.3The heroesto come
Herakles, Theseus, Perseus: what a hero is for.
- V.4Troy and afterto come
The war, the returns, and the house of Atreus.
- V.5Moirato come
The thing Zeus does not overrule, and what that implies about him.
The chapters are laid out; nothing is written into them yet. They stand so that what is missing is obvious rather than invisible.