Download The Odyssey

The Odyssey
An Introduction
Homer
Believed to be the author of both The
Iliad and The Odyssey (7th or 8th century
BC)
 First written literature (passed down
orally)
 Blind Greek poet

Homer Wrote….
Ancient Greek ____________ are
stories that explain the world and include
god/goddesses, as well as heroes
 An Epic Hero is a larger than life hero
from history who goes on a journey, and
demonstrates traits that are valued by
society

Gods and Goddesses
Prominently featured in the Greek epics
 Twelve main Olympian gods, live on
Mount Olympus
 Resembled humans in form, but were
immortal

Creation of the Gods
The Titans (Elder Gods) ruled before any
other god
 The first was Gaia, also called Mother
Earth
 Gaia is the mother of all the Titans
 Uranus is the father of all the Titans
 Gaia and Uranus had 12 children

The God’s Story, continued
One of the children was Chronus, the
youngest
 Uranus ATE his children
 But, Gaia hid Chronus….
 Chronus overthrew Uranus, married his
sister Rhea, and became the second ruler

More on Chronus and Rhea
Chronus and Rhea had four children…
 History repeats: Chronus ATE his children
 Rhea had a fifth child….ZEUS
 Zeus was also hidden from Chronus

So about that Zeus guy…
Zeus faced his father Chronus
 Made him throw up the other four
children
 Zeus banished Chronus
 Zeus married his sister Hera
 Zeus became the third ruler of the
universe, as well as the ____________
of the gods

Family Tree
Aphrodite

Goddess of Love and
Beauty
Apollo

God of the Sun and
Music
Ares

God of Savage War
Artemis

Goddess of the
Hunt
Athena
Goddess of
____________ and
warfare

Demeter

Goddess of Grain
and Fertility
Hephaestus

God of
Technology,
Industry, and
Manufacturing
Hera

Goddess of Marriage
Hermes

The Messenger God
Hestia

Goddess of
Domesticity and
Family
Poseidon

God/King of the
_________ and
Earthquakes
Zeus

God of the Sky and
Thunder; King of the
Gods
The Illiad
Written before The Odyssey
 Last five weeks of Trojan War
 Set in Troy
 Model for an epic of war

How The Illiad Went Down
The Trojan War started when Prince
__________ stole _________, the wife of
Menelaus
 Menelaus recruited ___________,
__________, and other heroes to fight Troy
in order to get Helen back.

The Trojan War
The Trojan War lasted ________ years. The
war ended after Odysseus came up with the
idea of the ____________ __________.
 The Greeks hid in the horse; when the Trojans
pulled the horse inside, the Greeks surprised
them by jumping out and ____________.
 The _____________ won the war.

Which brings us to…

Odysseus’s arrogance angered the gods
and they punished him by forcing him to
wander aimlessly. Odysseus’s journey
home is the story of
____________________.