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Similar to GREEK MYTHOLOGY great heroes before the trojan war (20)
GREEK MYTHOLOGY great heroes before the trojan war
- 1. The Great Heroes Before the Trojan War: Perseus theseus hercules atalanta Prof. Ronuel L. del Rosario
- 2. PERSEUS
- 3. PERSEUS King Acrisius of Argos has a stunningly beautiful daughter (Danae) but wants a son, so he prays to the gods. Apollo tells him not only that Acrisius will never have a son, but also that the son of his daughter will kill him.
- 4. PERSEUS The only way to fully prevent this prophecy would be to kill his daughter, Danae, but Acrisius fears what the gods would do to him. Instead, he imprisons Danae in a bronze house without a roof and guards her carefully.
- 6. PERSEUS Arcisius does not expect, however, that Zeus will come to her and impregnate her. Perseus is born, and after Acrisius discovers the baby, he puts Perseus and Danae in a box and sets it out in the ocean.
- 7. PERSEUS Luckily (or thanks to Zeus), the box washes up on a small island, where a kind fisherman named Dictys takes Danae and Perseus in.
- 8. PERSEUS They live happily until Dictys's brother, King Polydectes, falls in love with Danae and decides to get rid of her son.
- 9. Perseus Polydectes convinces Perseus to kill the Medusa, a horrifying beast with snakes for hair. But this feat seems impossible because whoever looks at the snakes will turn instantly to stone.
- 10. PERSEUS Hermes gives Perseus guidance and a sword stronger than the Medusa's scales. He tells Perseus that to fight the Medusa Perseus will need special equipment from the Nymphs of the North.
- 11. PERSEUS Their location is a mystery, and Perseus must ask the Gray Women, three sisters who live in a gray land and are gray themselves. They share only one eye among the three, and they alternate using it.
- 12. PERSEUS Before Perseus sets out to find them, Athena gives him her shield and tells him that he must look at the Medusa through the shield, like a mirror, in order to avoid turning to stone.
- 13. PERSEUS Perseus finds the Gray Women and steals the eyeball, holding it hostage in exchange for the location of the Nymphs of the North. Hermes helps Perseus travel there, where he finds a land of happy people, always banqueting and celebrating.
- 14. PERSEUS They give him his three gifts: winged sandals, a magic wallet that changes to the size of whatever its contents, and, most important of all, a magic cap that will turn whoever wears it invisible.
- 15. PERSEUS With Hermes and Athena at his side, Perseus finds and kills Medusa. He puts the head in his wallet and flies, invisible, back toward his mother. On the way, he passes a beautiful woman chained to a rock, Andromeda, and falls in love with her instantly.
- 17. PERSEUS She was chained there because her foolish mother had thought herself more beautiful than any goddess, so as punishment the gods told her to chain her daughter to a rock, where she would be eaten by a serpent. Perseus kills the serpent and takes Andromeda home.
- 19. PERSEUS When he returns to the island, he discovers that Danae and Dictys have gone into hiding because Danae will not marry Polydectes. The evil king, meanwhile, is hosting a banquet with all his supporters.
- 20. PERSEUS Perseus barges in and holds up the head of Medusa. Unable to look away in time, all the men turn to stone. Perseus finds his mother, makes Dictys king, and marries Andromeda.
- 21. PERSEUS Optimistic, Perseus and Danae return to Argos to find her father, King Acrisius. They hope that his heart has warmed since he put them in a box out to sea, but when they reach Argos they realize that he fled the land.
- 22. PERSEUS One day, Perseus competes in a discus- throwing contest. His disc veers far to the side and lands on a spectator in the crowd, killing him instantly. This is Acrisius, in fulfillment of Apollo's prophecy.
- 24. THESEUS
- 25. THESEUS Theseus is the great Athenian hero. His father Aegeus is king of Athens, but Theseus grows up in southern Greece with his mother. When he is old enough, Theseus travels to the city to meet his father and overcomes many obstacles along the way. By the time he reaches Athens, he is known as a hero.
- 26. THESEUS Aegeus as the king of Athens declares Theseus heir to the throne and sends him on an important journey. Aegeus recounts the tragedy of Minos, the powerful ruler of Crete, who lost his only son Androgeus while the boy was in Athens.
- 27. THESEUS Aegeus had sent Androgeus on an expedition to kill a dangerous bull, but it killed Androgeus, and in revenge, King Minos vowed to destroy Athens unless every year seven maidens and seven men were sent to Crete.
- 28. These sacrificial youth would be fed to the Minotaur, a monster, half-bull and half-human, who lived inside a labyrinth.
- 29. THESEUS Theseus comes forward to be offered as one of the victims. He promises his father that he will kill the Minotaur, and upon his successful return, his ship will carry a white sail.
- 30. THESEUS When the fourteen men and women arrive in Crete, they are paraded through the town. Minos's daughter Ariadne sees and instantly falls in love with Theseus. She confers with Daedalus the architect to devise a plan for her beloved to stay safe.
- 31. THESEUS Then she meets with Theseus, who promises to marry her if he escapes from the labyrinth. Theseus follows Ariadne's plan, walking through the maze as he lets run a ball of string so he can retrace his steps. Theseus finds the Minotaur sleeping and kills it with his bare hands. Theseus, Ariadne, and the other Athenian youth all escape to the ship going back to Athens.
- 34. THESEUS On the way back, Ariadne dies. Theseus forgets to raise the white sail. His father, seeing the black sail, assumes his son has died and jumps into the sea. The sea has been called the Aegean ever since.
- 35. THESEUS Theseus rules in a people-friendly fashion, and Athens becomes the happiest city in the world. In later years, however, sadness ensues after he marries Ariadne's sister Phaedra. Theseus already had a child with Ariadne, Hippolytus. When Theseus and Phaedra visit him, Phaedra falls madly in love with Hippolytus, her stepson.
- 37. THESEUS He refuses her advances, but she writes a letter falsely alleging that he violated her, and then she kills herself. Theseus finds the letter and banishes his innocent son.
- 39. THESEUS Artemis appears to Theseus and reveals the truth, but it is too late because the boy has already been killed at sea.
- 41. HERCULES
- 42. Hercules Hercules is considered the greatest Greek hero of all. Unlike Theseus, who was both very strong and thoughtful, Hercules simply is strong. In fact, he is the strongest man who has ever existed, and therefore he considers himself something of a god. Indeed, he is half-god, a son of Zeus. Supremely confident, Hercules showed his brute force from a very early age, when he wrestled a snake that had slithered into his baby cradle.
- 44. Hercules The saddest incident of his life occurs after he has married Princess Megara and had three children with her. Hera, Zeus's jealous wife, cannot forgive her husband for having had Hercules as an illicit son, so she sends Hercules into insanity.
- 45. Hercules One night Hercules goes mad and unwittingly kills his three boys. When he realizes what he has done, he almost kills himself, but Theseus persuades him to go on living; that is the heroic option.
- 46. Hercules To cleanse himself, Hercules visits the Oracle at Delphi. The Oracle tells him to go to Eurystheus, who sends him on almost impossible challenges. Hercules completes all of his twelve labors: 1. killing the lion of Nemea, 2. killing a creature with nine heads called the Hydra (see video) 3. capturing a stag with horns of gold, 4. killing a boar, 5. cleaning the thousands of Aegean stables in one day
- 47. Hercules 6. exiling the Stymphalian birds, 7. going to Crete and retrieving the beautiful savage bull that Poseidon gave Minos, 8. retrieving the man-eating mares, 9. bringing back the girdle of Hippolyta, 10. returning the back of the cattle of Geryon (a monster with three bodies), 11. bringing back the Golden Apples of Hesperides— 12. and, finally, bringing Cerberus, the three- headed dog, up from Hades.
- 48. Hercules
- 50. ATALANTA
- 51. Atalanta When Atalanta's father sees that his child is a girl, not a boy, he leaves the poor infant on a mountaintop to die. Luckily for her, a she-bear discovers her and raises her to become a fast, daring young woman. She builds a reputation for being the best huntress in the land and becomes famous for killing a ruthless boar.
- 52. Atalanta Of all her adventures, the story of the golden apple is most famous. Atalanta decrees that she will marry whichever suitor can outrun her in a race. Knowing that she is faster than everyone, Atalanta smugly beats them all to the finish line.
- 53. Atalanta But one man, named Hippomenes, gets three exquisite golden apples. Along the race, the suitor drops one apple at a time. Atalanta cannot resist stopping to pick them up, and to her surprise, the suitor wins the race. She makes good on the vow and becomes his wife.