#iliad posting

[andromedaexists]

every so often I go to this website and just see what line from Homer the universe wants me to see that day and today I got this:

ἄμφω γὰρ πέπρωται ὁμοίην γαῖαν ἐρεῦσαι

(For it is fated that we both stain the same earth red, The Iliad, book 18 line 329)

and I just... I went to see what the context for that line was because it already almost made me cry just reading it and of fucking course it's Achilles talking to Patroclus

#andi talks #Iliad posting #achilles #the iliad #homeromanteion #i need to read the iliad again #i have the attic greek edition i very easily could #maybe that's what i'll do after reading the sun and the star #at least i can start it

[baejax-the-great]

Hi, I saw on one of your ao3 comments that you think Homers' Achilles is on the spectrum. This is a really interesting idea to me, but I don't know that much about autism - could you elaborate on why you think that? (Also, I think all of your fics are amazing ☺️)

Autism as a word and diagnosis did not exist in ancient Greece, and I have no idea if there would have been a similar concept about it (doubt it) or if more likely people with certain autistic traits would have been considered to have a certain type of personality. So for me to say that Homer deliberately wrote Achilles as "autistic" is a little tongue in cheek.

That said, reading the Iliad I did have a moment of "Ohhhh, dude's autistic I get it." Some people might look at my reasoning and say, "well, that could be a whole other thing with these other reasons," and that's fair. This is just how it came across to me and why.

Sense of justice/fairness. This is one of the more obscure autistic traits (that often gets misunderstood and shit upon by people), but it's how the book begins, so I'll start here. Autistic people are more likely to learn and follow rules to a T. This gets rolled into the trait of "rigid thinking" and has been related to autistic people's preference for solid routines. To think about where you lie with this trait, one example is the "walk" signal at a crosswalk. Some people jaywalk when the road is very clear and no one is around. Some people jaywalk when the road ISN'T clear because they don't give a fuck. And some people will wait for that light to turn white no matter what because that's what you are supposed to do and there are rules (although culture/country of origin will also affect how much relevance traffic lights have in your life).

This is a rule, but it has little do to with justice. So to figure out where you stand in terms of justice sensitivity, another metric is how angry you feel when you watch someone cut in line and not get punished for it. Some of us will sigh and move on with our life because dicks are everywhere, whatever, and some people will have a harder time letting go because this person broke a rule in an obviously unfair way, and they should be punished for that.

This trait does not mean that autistic people have a better sense of what justice is or what rules/laws are "just." That is all very subjective. But this trait does result in a stronger negative reaction to seeing those rules/laws violated.

Such as rage.

Achilles fits the bill here in both in terms of rigid thinking and his sense of justice. His reputation in the Greek tradition is as someone who was very educated. In fact, he is the most educated with regards to law and religion than the rest of the Achaeans thanks to his time with Chiron. More than that, he actually cared about what he was taught and was considered kind of a stick-in-the-mud in terms of believing that the armies should follow the rules and customs of their people at all times and that violating their own laws was bad, even if you really, really wanted to bang a hot chick.

When Agamemnon decides to take Briseis, he is breaking a Rule. The common interpretation of what happens here is that he has violated Achilles' pride and honor in doing so, and Achilles loses his shit. That's valid. To me it read a little differently. I mean, for one, Achilles is 100% correct in the first book. Agamemnon pissed off the gods in a way he shouldn't have bringing plague on everyone, and how does he solve this? By agreeing to do the thing Achilles told him to do to solve it and then immediately violating their customs to steal from Achilles, bringing down a plague of "Achilles is not going to help you anymore."

Achilles cries to his mom that he wants the gods to fuck over the Greeks to prove Achilles right, which is deeply immature, but also really makes sense to me. Like, Agamemnon did this shitty, illegal, rules-breaking thing, and he needs to feel the consequences of that action. Achilles isn't a god who can bring down a plague, but his mommy is, so get fucked, Agamemnon. It's Zeus time.

During the time Achilles is out of the fighting, he is routinely called hard-hearted, stubborn, and other words to indicate he will not be swayed, which again speaks to his rigidity of understanding how things should be done.

The Way Achilles Talks About His Emotions. Achilles very clearly states what he is feeling throughout the book, and he often restates it. We get it, bro. You're mad. And then sad. Really, really sad. While this is almost definitely for the audience to understand his feelings and just how deep they run, Homer also could have just told us outright what he was thinking without having Achilles say it out loud repeatedly. It also felt to me that Achilles talks about his feelings far more often and bluntly than other characters do, but again this could be because the story revolves around his 'rage.'

Regardless, even if it was purely for audience benefit, this is a behavior I have noticed with my adult ND friends, which is basically after a childhood feeling confused by what other people around them are doing or why they are reacting to things in a certain way, they have a strategy of very bluntly expressing themselves and where they are at in this situation. It can be far easier than trying to follow the subtleties of NT culture and just get whatever issue it is out in the open. Saying to someone "I am angry at you" can come off as overly aggressive and blunt depending on context, but it cuts to the heart of the matter. We can compare this with Odysseus, who does not express any very deep emotions at all in the Iliad (other than the fact that Thersites should shut the fuck up, anyway), presumably because that's nobody else's business.

The Embassy. Achilles' point to Odysseus that this entire war was started over a man stealing a woman is so correct and so ignored. He looks at this situation and says: Paris stole Helen, and Agamemnon rallied all the Achaeans to come make war with Troy. Agamemnon steals Briseis, and I'm meant to... keep fighting for him? In what way does this make sense?

Everyone around him sees it from a completely different perspective, basically that Achilles got angry over a girl. To Achilles this is not what it is about at all. And I'm with him on this. If stealing a woman is a sin egregious enough for thousands of Greeks to spend 10 years attempting to sack a city, then it is the same amount of egregious for Agamemnon to take Briseis and he's lucky Achilles didn't kill him immediately and sack Argos. He's getting off easy, which Achilles tells him.

Reading Odysseus lay out his argument followed by Achilles cutting him down with that bit of logic was like, yeah, I'm with Achilles, I don't even think he's being stubborn I just think he's right.

In the embassy chapter, Achilles also has his famous line about despising men who say one thing but mean another. Being very truthful and having difficulty noticing lies is another common trait of autism, and it would make sense for Achilles to find the dishonesty of his colleagues deeply annoying.

Old British scholars called him a sociopath. This might seem like a weird one, but I'm adding it into evidence. When I read the Iliad, I see Achilles as a very emotional person. Given that half the book is about his grief over Patroclus, I find calling him incapable of caring about others incredibly bizarre. But in addition to determining that these scholars who wrote these batshit essays have never once in their life had a friend, much less a friend that they loved, this kind of fits with how a certain type of old-fashioned scholar understands autism. I've actually been at neuroscience talks with crusty old assholes who talk about how autistics and orphans are incapable of empathy, and then use evidence that really just says to me they express empathy in a different way. (Yes, orphans. For real. A real talk I went to in like 2015. Did you know that orphans don't have feelings and don't care about the feelings of others. /s) Add to the old British tradition of their feral private school kids (which I believe they call public school? idk those assholes in blazers, you know the ones) literally caning each other for being smaller, weaker, or just different, and this to me is solid evidence that Achilles is neurodivergent and unwittingly awoke the bloodlust in these old (dead) bastards.

Speech Patterns. Not being able to read Ancient Greek, I can't actually say much about this one, but multiple scholars have commented that the way Achilles speaks in the Iliad is different to all the others. He has a unique way of speaking. Again, this is not necessarily an autistic trait, but it is common for autistic people to have different speech patterns than NT people, so it's more just a "hmmm, maybe" than actual evidence.

I feel like I'm forgetting other little things, but I'd have to fully reread the Iliad with this in mind to jog my memory, and maybe one day I will. TLDR; Achilles has a very rigid way of thinking and an uncommon way of expressing his emotions.

And as always, autism is a spectrum. Anything I've written about here isn't necessarily true of any autistic person out in the world.

#iliad posting #tagamemnon #man do I want this in the tags? I feel like... #listen I am not autistic I just believe in their beliefs #aka I'm related to autistic people and have ADHD and we got that overlapping vibe you know #anger outbursts are also a known trait of autism #there's also more subtle stuff #achilles gets really upset that despite being the best warrior he's not being appreciated #and sure that could just be pride or an obnoxious personality or whatever #but I've also seen this in my ND friends where maybe they are the best at tennis #but someone else is made team captain #because that person is more likable #and the ND friend is like but I'm better and I deserve that honor #and it really frustrates them #like Agamemnon sucks and everyone at that meeting knows it #but nobody sided with Achilles because conflict at this point is just like... can we not #okay rambling incoherently in the tags now I guess #achilles #old crusty scholar: as we see by the embassy chapter achilles is evil and awful #ND me: okay but he was 100% correct tho so I don't see the issue #people might be dying but he won that argument and that is the important part

[lesbianaglaya]

gods literally have to cannibalize they have to. do you get it like they have toooooooo. Okay

#what im saying is hera should’ve been allowed to eat priam and all of priam’s sons. #gabby.txt #iliad posting

[pygmy--tyrant]

do you think that menoitius giving away patroclus to serve the royal court of phthia was like the y/n getting sold to one direction trope to the ancient greeks

#iliad posting #greek mythology #sapphire's random thoughts

[adriles]

when we’re done with our overwhelming grief we’ll eat i guess

#book 22 #im verh drunk #hi #greatest hits #not really sure why this one resonated. are u all ok #is everyone just at the shiva #yall need to stop saying you arent gonna eat then in the tags #i love that a lot of you are getting beautiful things out of this #but some of yall need to know i wrote this while incredibly drunk #this isnt meant to be all that deep this is just shitty iliad posting #more comments like this is just judaism. surprise surprise im jewish #but again this isnt about sitting shiva #this is me drunk talking about the last 3 books of the iliad #idk what to tell u man

[wolfythewitch]

Diomedes

#art #digital art #tagamemnon #the iliad #well. this is post odyssey dio but #diomedes #epic cycle #illustration #greek mythology

[peggy-sue-reads-a-book]

Go off, Muse, of unhinged Achilles,

who cost the Greeks like so many Ls,

and yeeted countless souls of dank heroes

into Hades' big dark,

making their bodies into snack for doggos

and all kinds of birbs.*

Begin with the how Agamemnon--

CEO of men--

deadass canceled the main character.

*edit

#greek mythology #achilles #the iliad #gen z memes #gen z post #tagamemnon

[glossc1]

born from an egg 🥚

#helen of troy #helen of sparta #tagamemnon #greek mythology #classics #the iliad #classical mythology #minoan #first post yippee

[nobuuses]

#it’s about time i actually post about tsoa #tsoa #the song of achilles #achilles #patroclus #patrochilles #ancient greek #greek gods #troy #song of achilles #ancient greek memes #incorrect greek mythology #incorrect greek gods #zen #ancient greek gods #ancient greek mythology #the odyssey #persephades #the iliad #homer #odysseus #lore olympus #userpelion

[brother-emperors]

DO NOT BE AFRAID

this is combining Ovid's Heroides and the Excidium Troie because I can't stop thinking of Hermes telling him not to be afraid. what the fuck!! Ares is wearing the crown that Paris gave him.

I have. thoughts. about Paris. he's almost got this Troilos parallel in my mind, that the event that defines him in detail exists in a lost narrative that we don't have (the Cypria), but everyone else knew. the event that defines Troilos is his death (murdered, butchered by Achilles, the violence of which haunts everything after. Achilles, child killer, you can't escape that!), and the event that defines Paris is the Judgement. what's a lost text but a kind of grave!!

idk I don't think that Paris before the Judgement would recognize himself after bc when you become god touched, it rearranges your guts. you become transformed in the worst way possible! how could you recognize yourself! but I also think that all the Parises after the Judgement would recognize each other because that event is so locked into the trauma of war and the scar it leaves on the land, it's like a scar on the narrative too. it exists like this forever, over and over again, so you exist like that forever too. Troy collects grief and despairs.

Troy as trauma: Reflections on intergenerational transmission and the locus of trauma, Andromache Karanika

and Paris is like. a miserable little god/corpse-puppet or something, like a match for the gods to throw onto gasoline.

The Excidium Troie + Ovid's Heroides:

Excidium Troie, trans. Muhammad Syarif Fadhlurrahman

Ovid, Heroides 16 (trans. Harold Isbell)

a collection of things regarding Paris that made me go 😬 but under a cut bc this is getting. very long.

The Divine Twins in Early Greek Poetry, Corolla Torontonensis

Iliad 24 and the Judgement of Paris, C.J. Mackie

Elegy and Epic and the Recognition of Paris: Ovid "Heroides" 16, Elizabeth Forbis Mazurek

Ennian Influence in "Heroides" 16 and 17, Howard Jacobson

Paris/Alexandros in the "Iliad", I. J. F. de Jong

#long post #paris of troy #komiks tag #it's all greek to me #like. DISTANTLY. its #the iliad #drawing tag #listen i know it's fun to dunk on paris. but im a chronic killjoy. i know its cringe. mea culpa etc #i would love. I WOULD LOVE. to draw a comic and not have the commentary notes be longer than the comic itself #unfortunately i like to read and i cannot stop talking about things that i read. so this will not be changing. #ngl i keep hearing the last line 'my brother says you are a just judge' as 'and brutus says he is an honorable man' and that's smth for sur #god i wish this was shorter but then i remember it could've been longer bc i started drawing this while watching #some excellent korean horror but then i looked at myself in the mirror and said 'no. get your shit together.' #but that show is what sparked this. the themes. god i love shows. a round of applause for tv shows. #in a different world theres a version of me that didn't exercise self restraint and there's 30 screen caps from a horror show here too

[generouskittentidalwave]

I will never understand how Odysseus has all the braincells while also having none of them at the same exact time. He is an amazing war general and is insanely smart but has the attention span of a rat fuelled by the need to cause chaos simply because he is bored. He can't listen to one thing while getting distracted by the thing he was specifically told not to touch.

#this man will forever be an enigma #odysseus #the odyssey #homer's odyssey #the iliad #homer's iliad #ancient greek mythology #greek mythology #ancient greek #greek myth #greek mythology memes #greek myth memes #greek heroes #greek stuff #greek posts #greek blog #epic the musical #epic: the musical #epic the troy saga #epic: the troy saga #epic the cyclops saga #epic: the cyclops saga #epic the ocean saga #epic saga

[thoodleoo]

10 year war plan!!

1194-1186 BCE -fuck it -we ball

1185 BCE -fully develop brain

1184 BCE -if still insane, start devastating conflict with commander of the army -if normal, earn kleos for my actions in battle

#tagamemnon #the iliad (sort of) #'-fully develop brain' is maybe one of my favorite lines in a post ever #using the eratosthenes estimate for the war btw #queueusque tandem abutere catilina patientia nostra

[dnasplicers]

thinking abt patroclus and hektors bodies in the iliad and the aeneid. patroclus appearing to achilles as achilles loved him instead of as he died and hektor appearing to aeneas as mutilated even when we know apollo stopped his body from rotting. thinking abt the effect of the living on the dead

#ik this post has probably been made before but AUGH!!!!!!!! FUCK BRO!!!!!!!!!!!!! #tagamemnon #ilod #txt #hektor of troy #aeneas #patrochilles #patroclus #achilles #the aeneid #the iliad #greatest hits

[corviiids]

it's iliad with one L and odyssey with one D btw. this is difficult to remember because multiple Ls were taken in the iliad and there's definitely more than one D present in the odyssey so i do understand the confusion

#look i remembered to crosspost from twitter for once #instead of just i trip over while holding a bucket of posts and they fall where they fall #rookposting #iliad #odyssey #tagamemnon #this doesnt matter btw. like it matters to me. in my head #but if you spell it wrong everyone still knows what you're talking about. so like whatever #but also every time i see illiad im like (sighs)

[wolfythewitch]

diomedes doodle

#art #sketch #greek mythology #diomedes #this is post iliad but ah well #the iliad #tagamemnon #epic cycle

[baejax-the-great]

The tragedy of Achilles isn't that he got mad and was punished for it through the death of his friend.

The tragedy of Achilles is that it took him ten years and a very stupid argument to realize that dying in a pointless war against people who never wronged him was a complete waste of his life and that he valued living over glory, but at that point it was too late to disentangle himself from the cycle of violence that would claim his best friend/lover and inevitably himself.

#iliad posting again #Jo wrote up a much more comprehensive and intelligent response tot he idea of Achilles' story being a straightforward one about hubris #but I am always thinking about how the hubris interpretation irks me #the minute he decided to live the gods gave him a reason to die #tagamemnon #achilles #the iliad #greek myth