The Odyssey - Manual of Secret Teachings?

voyageur said:
Cited as being 1700 years old. Note sure what to make of this:

For instance, The text referring to "The Odyssey" tells a legendary story of ancient drug use: Helen of Troy, for whom the Trojan War had been fought, gives her guests a drug (possibly opium) that "takes away grief and anger, and brings forgetfulness of every ill," the text reads. "Whoever should drink this down when it is mixed in the bowl would not let fall a tear down his cheek in the course of that day at least. Imitate." The word "imitate" appears to indicate the students should copy the passage in some way. Ancient records say that some people believed this passage had a magical quality to it that could calm young people.

Which reminded me again of this Pythagoras paragraph:

The favorite method of healing among the Pythagoreans was by the aid of poultices. These people also knew the magic properties of vast numbers of plants. Pythagoras highly esteemed the medicinal properties of the sea onion, and he is said to have written an entire volume on the subject. Such a work, however, is not known at the present time. Pythagoras discovered that music had great therapeutic power and he prepared special harmonies for various diseases. He apparently experimented also with color, attaining considerable success. One of his unique curative processes resulted from his discovery of the healing value of certain verses from the Odyssey and the Iliad of Homer. These he caused to be read to persons suffering from certain ailments…


Hexameter verse recitation is known to bring about synchronization of breathing and heart rate as described in this paper here
Oscillations of heart rate and respiration synchronize during poetry recitation.

Cardiorespiratory synchronization, especially during sleep, is known to correlate with vagal activity, replenishment of energy at the neuronal level, activity of neurotransmitters and signaling from the older parts of the brain like the brain stem and hypothalamus. Overall, it seems that cardiorespiratory synchronization has an effect on health and well-being. This is perhaps a component of the Pythagorean discovery of using verses from Iliad and Odyssey for healing people from certain ailments.
 
Read it in about the year 2000 as a Junior College Literature course requirement. To this day I parrot what the Man Servant said when Odysis returned home, "Oh my Swine herd!" On a deeper level there did seem to be so much about the story that was about archetypal things and mysterious things. My Professor was quiet enlightened about Homer's works and tried her best to open our eyes to the deeper meaning, a Universal meaning of some truth. We were required to also read the Iliad and other works of Greek authors and as I recall, Homer's writings were on the deepest levels.
 
In high school, 'The Odyssey' was required reading in one of my classes. In college, I took 2 Greek mythology courses where both the Iliad and the Odyssey were read and discussed. The instructors of these classes focused on the texts, the various gods, and the chronology of the story. They did not delve into deeper or applicable meanings in these books. Like others have stated on this thread, I think I will need to reread these books in light of the information shared here.
 
obyvatel said:
Hexameter verse recitation is known to bring about synchronization of breathing and heart rate as described in this paper here
Oscillations of heart rate and respiration synchronize during poetry recitation.

Cardiorespiratory synchronization, especially during sleep, is known to correlate with vagal activity, replenishment of energy at the neuronal level, activity of neurotransmitters and signaling from the older parts of the brain like the brain stem and hypothalamus. Overall, it seems that cardiorespiratory synchronization has an effect on health and well-being. This is perhaps a component of the Pythagorean discovery of using verses from Iliad and Odyssey for healing people from certain ailments.

I don't have an account for the full study, yet this is an excellent point of reference; exactly perhaps why EE/POTS seems to replicate these benefits, too, for many many people.
 
voyageur said:
obyvatel said:
Hexameter verse recitation is known to bring about synchronization of breathing and heart rate as described in this paper here
Oscillations of heart rate and respiration synchronize during poetry recitation.

Cardiorespiratory synchronization, especially during sleep, is known to correlate with vagal activity, replenishment of energy at the neuronal level, activity of neurotransmitters and signaling from the older parts of the brain like the brain stem and hypothalamus. Overall, it seems that cardiorespiratory synchronization has an effect on health and well-being. This is perhaps a component of the Pythagorean discovery of using verses from Iliad and Odyssey for healing people from certain ailments.

I don't have an account for the full study, yet this is an excellent point of reference; exactly perhaps why EE/POTS seems to replicate these benefits, too, for many many people.

Hi voyageur,
The full paper is available here.
http://ajpheart.physiology.org/content/287/2/H579.full
 
All things considered, it seems to me to be a useful practice to regularly memorize and recite poetry. Good for the brain, heart, etc. However:

Although the rules seem simple, it is hard to use classical hexameter in English, because English is a stress-timed language that condenses vowels and consonants between stressed syllables, while hexameter relies on the regular timing of the phonetic sounds. Languages having the latter properties (i.e., languages that are not stress-timed) are a few minor languages spoken in Africa, Ancient Greek, Latin and Hungarian.

While the above classical hexameter has never enjoyed much popularity in English, where the standard metre is iambic pentameter, English poems have frequently been written in iambic hexameter.
 
obyvatel said:
Hi voyageur,
The full paper is available here.
http://ajpheart.physiology.org/content/287/2/H579.full

Thank you - and an interesting "however" above, Laura.
 
It sounds interesting that the PIE root, i.e., h₂éḱmō [from *h₂eḱ-] stands for 'stone. Also, from which the English word 'hammer' is derived.

Proto-Indo-European
Etymology


Noun

*h₂éḱmō m

stone

Descendants

Balto-Slavic:
Latvian: akmens, asmens
Lithuanian: akmuo, ašmuo, ašmenys
Slavic: *kamy
Hellenic:
Ancient Greek: ἄκμων (ákmōn, “anvil, pestle, battering ram”)
Indo-Iranian:
Indo-Aryan:
Sanskrit: अश्मन् (aśman, “stone, hammer, thunderbolt”)
Iranian:
Kurdish: asman
Old Persian: (asmānam, “sky”)
Middle Persian: (āsmān, “sky, heaven”)
Persian: آسمان (âsemân, “sky, heaven”)

*h₂éḱmō stone Ancient Greek akmōn, Lithuanian akmuo, Latvian akmens, Sanskrit aśman, Avestan asman, Russian камень (kámen’), English hamer/hammer, Polish kamień, Old Norse hamarr, Hittite aku, Persian asman/, Gaulish acaunum, German hamar/Hammer


The Indo-Europeans had a god of thunder and lightning, probably represented as holding a hammer or similar weapon; this is how the Baltic thunder -god Perkunas and the Old Norse god Thor are depicted (the hammer Mjölnir, is cognate with words in Celtic and Balto-slavic for 'lightning' and regenerative associations; a lightning bolt can cleave stone and tree (oak)[...] cf Perkūnas (Lithuanian: Perkūnas, Latvian: Pērkons, Prussian: Perkūns, Finnish: Perkele, Yotvingian: Parkuns) was the common Baltic god of thunder, one of the most important deities in the Baltic pantheon. In both Lithuanian and Latvian mythology, he is documented as the god of thunder, rain, mountains, oak trees and the sky.
It is interesting to note in this connection that the PIE word for 'stone' secondarily refers to 'heaven' in Indo-Iranian and Germanic; while we are not enterily certain of the underlying association; it may rest on a conception of the heaven as a stony vault, from which fragments might fall in the form of meteorites; or it be connected with the stony missiles thought to be hurles by the god of thunder.

Mjölnir:
It is usually interpreted as meaning "That which smashes", derived from the verb mölva "To smash" (cognate with English meal, mill); comparable derivations from the same root meaning "hammer" are Slavic molot and Latin malleus (whence English mallet).

An alternative suggestion compares the name to Russian молния (molniya) and the Welsh word mellt, both words are taken as meaning "lightning". This second theory would make Mjölnir the weapon of the storm god identified with lightning, as in the lightning-bolt or vajra in other Indo-European mythologies.[1]

In the Old Norse texts, Mjölnir is identified as hamarr "a hammer", a word that in Old Norse could mean "hammer" as well as "stone, rock, cliff", ultimately derived from an Indo-European word for "stone, stone tool", h₂éḱmō; as such it is cognate with Sanskrit aśman, meaning "stone, rock, stone tool; hammer" as well as "thunderbolt".

Sources:
http://en.wiktionary.org/wiki/Appendix:List_of_Proto-Indo-European_nouns


http://en.wiktionary.org/wiki/Appendix:Proto-Indo-European/h%E2%82%82%C3%A9%E1%B8%B1m%C5%8D#Proto-Indo-European

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mj%C3%B6lnir

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Perk%C5%ABnas

Indo-European Language and Culture: An Introduction by Benjamin W. Fortson IV (http://www.amazon.com/gp/product/1405103167?ie=UTF8&tag=httpwwwgoodco-20&linkCode=as2&camp=1789&creative=9325&creativeASIN=1405103167&SubscriptionId=1MGPYB6YW3HWK55XCGG2)

FWIW :)
 
Another curious resemblance of biblical narration and Odyssey thread.

“Thence we sailed on, grieved at heart, glad to have escaped death, though we had lost our dear comrades;
[135] and we came to the isle of Aeaea, where dwelt fair-tressed Circe, a dread goddess of human speech, own sister to Aeetes of baneful mind; and both are sprung from Helius, who gives light to mortals, and from Perse, their mother, whom Oceanus begot.
[140] Here we put in to shore with our ship in silence, into a harbor where ships may lie, and some god guided us. Then we disembarked, and lay there for two days and two nights, eating our hearts for weariness and sorrow. But when fair-tressed Dawn brought to its birth the third day,
[145] then I took my spear and my sharp sword, and quickly went up from the ship to a place of wide prospect, in the hope that I might see the works of men, and hear their voice. So I climbed to a rugged height, a place of outlook, and there took my stand, and I saw smoke rising from the broad-wayed earth
[150] in the halls of Circe, through the thick brush and the wood. And I debated in mind and heart, whether I should go and make search, when I had seen the flaming smoke. And as I pondered, this seemed to me to be the better way, to go first to the swift ship and the shore of the sea,
[155] and give my comrades their meal, and send them forth to make search. But when, as I went, I was near to the curved ship, then some god took pity on me in my loneliness, and sent a great, high-horned stag into my very path. He was coming down to the river from his pasture in the wood
[160] to drink, for the might of the sun oppressed him; and as he came out I struck him on the spine in the middle of the back, and the bronze spear passed right through him, and down he fell in the dust with a moan, and his spirit flew from him. Then I planted my foot upon him,
[165] and drew the bronze spear forth from the wound, and left it there to lie on the ground. But for myself, I plucked twigs and osiers, and weaving a rope as it were a fathom in length, well twisted from end to end, I bound together the feet of the monstrous beast, and went my way to the black ship, bearing him across my back and
[170] leaning on my spear, since in no wise could I hold him on my shoulder with one hand, for he was a very mighty beast
. Down I flung him before the ship, and heartened my comrades with gentle words, coming up to each man in turn: “‘Friends, not yet shall we go down
[175] to the house of Hades, despite our sorrows, before the day of fate comes upon us. Nay, come, while there is yet food and drink in our swift ship, let us bethink us of food, that we pine not with hunger.’

And here's how Christ looks like in some icons:

_http://iconandlight.wordpress.com/icons_gallery/the_good_shepherd_greek_icon_orthodox/
_http://commons.m.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:Good_shepherd_icon.jpg
_http://afon-ru.com/o-Konstantin-Kobelev-V-1986-godu-v-Butyrkah-bylo-8000-arestantov-sejchas-okolo-1500-O-budnyah-tyuremnogo-sluzheniya-svyashennika

From Wikipedia:

The image of the Good Shepherd is the most common of the symbolic representations of Christ found in Early Christian art in the Catacombs of Rome, before Christian imagery could be made explicit. The form of the image showing a young man carrying a lamb round his neck was directly borrowed from the much older pagan kriophoros (see below) and in the case of portable statuettes like the most famous one now in the Pio Cristiano Museum, Vatican City (right), it is impossible to say wether the image was originally created with the intention of having a Christian significance. The image continued to be used in the centuries after Christianity was legalized in 313. Initially it was probably not understood as a portrait of Jesus, but a symbol like others used in Early Christian art, and in some cases may also have represented the Shepherd of Hermas, a popular Christian literary work of the 2nd century. However, by about the 5th century, the figure more often took on the appearance of the conventional depiction of Christ, as it had developed by this time, and was given a halo and rich robes, as on the apse mosaic in the church of Santi Cosma e Damiano in Rome, or at Ravenna (right). Images of the Good Shepherd often include a sheep on his shoulders, as in the Lukan version of the Parable of the Lost Sheep.
 
Regarding the two different ways Zeus is portrayed in the Odyssey and the Iliad, had me now thinking of how in the OT, the God Jehovah is portrayed differently from the God Yahweh.
 
The Iliad and The Odyssey ARE a record of astronomical phenomenon . . . possessing accurate calculations, spherical trigonometry and a high-level knowledge of astronomy. Pls read "Homer's Secret Iliad: The Epic of the Night Skies Decoded" (Sept 1999) and "Homer's Secret Odyssey" (Sept 2011) by Florence Wood and Kenneth Wood . . . It is an amazing piece of deductive reasoning . . .
 
Thirteen verses from the fourteenth Rhapsody (chapter) found engraved on clay tablet probably dating ca. 300 AD.

Oldest extract of Homer's Odyssey found

Homer Odyssey: Oldest extract discovered on clay tablet
10 July 2018

_102466943_8383dbb5-37bd-42d3-9e0b-6ce16da8938c.jpg


A clay tablet discovered during an archaeological dig may be the oldest written record of Homer's epic tale, the Odyssey, ever found in Greece, the country's culture ministry has said.

Found near the ruined Temple of Zeus in the ancient city of Olympia, the tablet has been dated to Roman times.

It is engraved with 13 verses from the poem recounting the adventures of the hero Odysseus after the fall of Troy.

The tale was probably composed by Homer in the late 8th Century BC.

It would have been handed down in an oral tradition for hundreds of years before the tablet was inscribed.

The exact date of the tablet still needed to be confirmed, but its discovery was "a great archaeological, epigraphic, literary and historical exhibit", the Greek culture ministry said in a statement.

Excavations to uncover the tablet took three years.

The Odyssey is widely considered to be a seminal work in Western literature.

The poem, spanning some 12,000 lines, tells the story of Odysseus, king of Ithaca, who spends 10 years trying to get home after participating in the fall of the kingdom of Troy.

The tablet, discovered by Greek and German researchers, contains 13 verses from the Odyssey's 14th Rhapsody, in which Odysseus addresses his lifelong friend Eumaeus.


NOTE: the probable date of ca. 300 AD (source Ministry of Culture in Greece) stems from this news item in Dutch:
Oudste exemplaar gedicht 'Odyssee' gevonden in Griekenland | NU - Het laatste nieuws het eerst op NU.nl
 
The Iliad and The Odyssey ARE a record of astronomical phenomenon . . . possessing accurate calculations, spherical trigonometry and a high-level knowledge of astronomy. Pls read "Homer's Secret Iliad: The Epic of the Night Skies Decoded" (Sept 1999) and "Homer's Secret Odyssey" (Sept 2011) by Florence Wood and Kenneth Wood . . . It is an amazing piece of deductive reasoning . . .

Interesting. I remember when I read Where Troy Once Stood that a lot of the events were encoded astrology signs signalling directions (eg, the Ram meant the location of Aeries at the Hellenic New Years). Was it similar to that? Could you share some examples you remember? :)
 
Interesting. I remember when I read Where Troy Once Stood that a lot of the events were encoded astrology signs signalling directions (eg, the Ram meant the location of Aeries at the Hellenic New Years). Was it similar to that? Could you share some examples you remember? :)

Sure thing . . . The Book is so awesome that I'll just name the principal characters and page references:-

========================================================================
'Agamemnon' the 'King of Men' became the star Regulus from the constellation of Leo (Page 83)

Smooth talking Nestor was associated with Capella in Auriga (Page 83)

Red-haired Menelaus represented Antares in Scorpius (Page 83)

Sirius in Canis Major, the brightest star of all, was associated to Achilles, the warrior without equal on the battlefield (Page 83)

The best is the battle between Paris and Menelaus described on Page 131:-

"In Paris, Homer is describing the magnificent constellation of Orion. . . It is clear from Homer's descriptionof PAris that he is facing left - or towards the East - confronting Menelaus, who, as the constellation of Scorpius, is just appearing over the horizon."
========================================================================

The Trojan Horse is, of course, the constellation of Pegasus :)
 

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Minoan civilization continued to prosper until it came to a sudden and mysterious end. A combination of archaeology and mythology provide clues to how this may have happened. The central event was a massive volcanic eruption that partially sank the island of Thera some eighty miles northeast of Crete and left a crater four times the size of that created by the eruption of Krakatoa in 1883, the largest recorded volcanic eruption in recorded history, This eruption had three devastating effects: a shock wave which levelled Crete's cities, a tidal wave which destroyed its navy, and massive fallout of volcanic ash which poisoned its crops. Together these weakened the Minoans enough to let another people, the Mycenaean Greeks eventually take over around 1450 B.C.E.

The following isn't news, but I just recently stumbled upon it and thought about sharing it here. Not sure if this specific connection was mentioned here before.

History of Geology: The (possible) Geological Origin of the Minotaur Myth
The (possible) Geological Origin of the Minotaur Myth
By David Bressan on Sunday, May 29, 2016
According to myth the Minotaur was a terrible creature, born from an unnatural union between queen Pasiphaë of Crete and a sacred bull, send by the Greek god Poseidon to the island. The monster, half man and half bull, with an appetite for human flesh, was so dangerous that it was imprisoned in a subterranean labyrinth, so complex nobody could escape from it. The poet Callimachus of Cyrene (320-303 BC) describes the angered roars of the Minotaur coming from this prison - and only human sacrifices could calm the beast.



Fig.1. Wall paintings dating to the 16th century BC from Tell el-Dab (Egypt) showing the bull-leaping ritual, Minoan artists exported their style and skills to other regions around the Mediterranean Sea.

The oldest descriptions of the Minotaur also note that the bull made tremble and shake the earth. It´s also curious to note the relationship between the Minotaur and Poseidon, Greek god of the sea. Poseidon could also generate earthquakes with his trident, as one name describes him as Enosigeo, the earth-shaker. Also the labyrinth is an old symbol of earth´s unknown interior, the womb of the goddess Gea. So the Minotaur myth shows some remarkable connections to earth or earthquakes.

For sure the Greek Minotaur myth was inspired by much older stories from the Minoan Civilization. The antique culture of Crete (3650-1400 BC) did worship the bull, as paintings discovered in the excavated ruins show a strange ritual involving young men leaping over the back of a bull. Bull cults are generally associated to fertility, but possibly on Crete it was also a response to the risk posed by earthquakes.

Weak earthquakes are common on Crete, as the island is located on the border of two important tectonic plates, the African Plate in the South and the Aegean Plate in the North. Stronger events happened in past times (~365 AD) as suggested by a 10m displacement observed along the coasts of the island.



Fig.2. Crete´s location above a subduction zones makes it vulnerable to earthquakes, map from PLATT et al. 2007.

So was the Minotaur – including his associations to earth – a personification of the mysterious, at the time unexplainable, forces of nature?

 
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