ancient Greek culture Archives - Page 14 of 14

Did the Ancient Greeks Ever Climb Mount Olympos?

If you know anything at all about Greek mythology, you are probably aware that the ancient Greeks believed that the most important deities in their pantheon, known as the δωδεκάθεον (dōdekátheon), which means the “Twelve Gods” in Ancient Greek, lived atop Mount Olympos, which is a real mountain in the region of Thessalia in northern Greece.

This has led many people to wonder why the ancient Greeks never climbed Mount Olympos and saw that there were no gods up there. The assumption that they never did this has led many people to assume that the ancient Greeks as a whole must have been deeply superstitious and uninquisitive.

The surprising truth, though, is that the ancient Greeks did climb Mount Olympos and it doesn’t seem to have destroyed their religion. In fact, by late antiquity, regular trips up the mountain seem to have become incorporated into the religion itself.

What Is the Difference between a Siren and a Mermaid?

If you enjoy reading about mythology, you have most likely heard of mermaids and Sirens, but you may not be familiar with the difference between them. Most people today generally consider them the same thing. We usually tend to imagine both a mermaid and a Siren as a beautiful woman with the tail of a fish instead of legs. Sirens, however, originally come from Greek mythology and this is not at all how the ancient Greeks envisioned Sirens. On the contrary, the ancient Greeks did not envision Sirens (or, as they are called in Greek Seirenes) as having fish-like attributes at all.

No, Atlas Did Not Hold the Earth on His Shoulders

The image of the Titan Atlas holding the Earth on his shoulders is an iconic one that has inspired countless writers, thinkers, and artists. It is also a modern notion with no basis whatsoever in any ancient Greek texts. In actual ancient Greek mythology, Atlas does not, in fact, hold the Earth on his shoulders, but rather the sky. The misconception that the ancient Greeks imagined Atlas as holding the Earth on his shoulders arose as a result of the misinterpretation of classical representations of Atlas. In this article, I intend to set the record straight by examining how the ancient Greeks really envisioned Atlas and explaining how the misconception about him holding up the Earth arose.

Cats and Weasels

Everyone knows that, in ancient times, the Egyptians worshipped cats, but across the Mediterranean over in Europe, the situation was much different. During the Archaic Period (lasted c. 800 – c. 510 BC), housecats seem to have been almost completely absent from the Greek world; they do not appear in Greek art and not referenced in works of Greek literature from this time period.

During the Classical Period (lasted c. 510 – c. 323 BC), housecats seem to have been gradually introduced to Greece and southern Italy from Egypt and the Near East, but they seem to have been seen as strange, exotic pets—in the same way that keeping a parrot as a pet might be seen as unusual today.

Eventually, starting during the Hellenistic Period (lasted c. 323 – c. 31 BC) and continuing into the Roman Period, housecats as pets gradually became more and more common in the Greco-Roman world. Curiously, though, weasels seem to have been much more commonly kept as pets in ancient Greece than cats and the words for “cat” and “weasel” seem to often been conflated.