The Sack of Troy, by the Kleophrades Painter on Greek water jar 490 BCE

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The Sack of Troy, by the Kleophrades Painter
(on Greek water jar 490 BCE)
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The Rape of Cassadra by Ajax the Lesser (Roman
Relief Sculpture)
3

• Solomon J. Solomon. The Rape of
• Cassandra (1886).

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• Aigisthos and Klytemnestra kill Agamemnon
• Orestes kills Aegisthos (and his mother)

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Pierre Narcisse Guérin (1817) Aegisthos
encourages Klytemnestra
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Klytemnestra kills Cassandra
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• John Collier. Victorious Clytemnestra
• (ca. 1800)

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• Electra. Frederick Leighton (1869).

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What sort of journey does the Odyssey represent?

• Troy (Ten-year Transition) Ithaka
• The reality of War The realm of FANTASY The
  reality of Home
• where one relearns the norms
• of civilized behavior

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A Journey from the Civilized to the Uncivilized,
and back again

• Kikonians A world very similar to that of the
  Homeric warriors
• Lotus-eaters Danger of forgetting (about Home
  and Homecoming)
• Cyclopes Monsters who live in a golden age and
  flout xenia // Ps suitors
• Aiolos incestuous household not a good model
  of oikos
• Laistrygones Mortals who are really monsters //
  Ps suitors Greeks without Greek values
• Circe Illusion of domesticity, of being home
  not a real Penelope
• UNDERWORLD/ DEATH THE ultimate uncivilized place
• Emergence from the underworld is a version of a
  REBIRTH
• Circe The first step towards reintegration is
  to recognize illusions for what they are
• Sirens // lotus-eaters but more precise danger
  of forgetting beautiful song
• Look like women but are really monsters (cf.
  Laistrygones)
• Scylla Charybdis man-eating she-dog
  Whirlpool
• Cattle of Helios The crews greatest violation
  thus far will cost them all their life (except
  O.)
• Kalypso She who hides
• Phaiakia Utopian land, most resembling Ithaka
  but isolated and ultimately undesirable

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Odysseus and his crew blind the Cyclops
Polyphemos (early Greek black vase painting, ca
670 BCE)
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• Same scene as
• previously
• (slightly later)

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Odysseus and his crew escape, or the triumph of
metis over brute strength (black figure cup)
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Circe. Dossi Dossi (1531)
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Circe, who turns men into pigs, is pursued in
turn by Odysseus(red figre vae painting)
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Odysseus and his crew escape. Jordaens (mid
1600s)
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Circe. Wright Barker (1890s)
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The Sirens (Greek vase painting)
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The Sirens (Roman relief sculpture)
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The Sirens. Herbert Draper (1909)
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The Cattle of Helios. Pellegrino Tibaldi (late
1500s).
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Calypso. Arnold Böcklin (mid 1800s)
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• Calypso.
• Bryson Burroughs
• (1928)