Unit 3-希腊罗马神话提纲

Unit 3 Five Ages of Man---Human Alienation from the Divine

Home Assignment:

Comment on human creation myths (Deucalion, Chinese , Indian, Hopi).

Prepare the questions 1-4, 6, and 9 on page 54.

Five Ages of Mankind

1.Golden Age黄金时代(c. 3000 B.C.-?)

Paradise; Cronus’s reign, Old Stone Age, Pre-agricultural times

A．men born spontaneously from the earth or fashioned from earth and water by Prometheus

B．ruled by Cronus (and Mother Earth), but without laws

C．life peaceful, care-free, labor-free, painless, but vegetarian (acorns and honey from the trees) D．everlasting youth until peaceful death in sleep

E．spirits as genii神怪/invisible protectors or helpers of later generations

(a life of plenty, freedom and primitiveness;ending with Pandora’s creation)

2.Silver Age白银时代(?-1900B.C.)

the Moon goddess’s reign, Middle and New Stone Age, Agricultural/ matriarchal period

A．the first race created by the Olympians

B．beginning of agriculture and primitive domestic life (bread)

C．the rule of Mothers and men the despised sex

D． a full 100 years’ childhood, but only a short time’s adult life

E．death from “reckless violence”

F．savage, ungrateful to creators

G．spirits as demons

( eradicated with the flood?)

3.Bronze Age青铜时代(1900-1250B.C.)

New Stone Age + Copper Age,agriculture and manufacture,a hunting and warring age, an age of men A．created by Zeus alone, reputedly from ash trees桉树，白蜡树

B．ate bread as well as flesh

C．bronze houses, bronze armors, and bronze tools or weapons

D．great warriors pursuing brutal, violent conflicts

E．spirits went down to Hell

(ending with Black Death or Deucalion flood)

4.Bronze Age or Age of Heroes青铜/英雄时代(1250-1100B.C.)

A．children out of gods’ or goddesses’union with mortals; semi-gods

B． a nobler race, “better and more just” than the preceding or succeeding generation

C．heroes who fought at Troy (Unit 9) or Thebes (p.386-393)

D．their spirits went to the Happy Isles/the Isles of the Blest/ Homeric Edenic Elysium极乐岛to live forever in peace and happiness

5.Iron Age黑铁时代(1100-600 B.C.)

loss of Paradise

A．all evils and corruptions, injustice and strives

B．toil for survival and suffer endless misery

C．spirits condemned

1. What picture of historical development do you get from the account of the Five Ages? Do you agree

with Hesiod? Why?

A Human life is in a process of decline (spiral/ circular/ linear downward) with each stage of devolution 退化

represented by a metal of inferior value to the one preceding it.

B As men degenerate both physically and spiritually, they alienate themselves from the gods; the farther away from the

gods/divinity, the nearer to the earthly/earth; also there is alienation between mind and heart/ instinct.

C The human sufferings are self-induced punishment by gods; Natural disasters are ways of punishing humans.

D Human civilization/knowledge/power leads to its separation from Divinity and Nature.

E The account is symbolic and apocalyptic 启示性的: According what has happened to the 5 earlier ages, what is to

happen is predicted. Human history is thus a painful lesson teaching mortals to obey the gods.

II. Gods’ Punishment of Humans

Deucalion Flood myth

the Biblical legend of Noah’s Ark p.282-3

●Lycaon or his fifty sons or Tantalus

●Historically several big floods in remote past

III. Prometheus

What role did Prometheus play in the primal history of mankind? What cultural value does the Promethean fire have in the history of human civilization?

How do you like the mythical account that Prometheus was unbound and restored to Olympus? And why?

●Family history

Titan Iapetus +Clymen e, daughter of Oceanos

--- Atlas holding the broad sky at the ends of the earth---Hesperides p.307-310

--- Menoetius sent by Zeus to Erebus

---Prometheus ( Forethought先觉者)--Deucalion

---Epimetheus(Afterthought后觉者) ---Pyrrha

●Creator of humans:

---dust/earth (with Uranus’s seeds)

---wet the earth with water (water of life)

---fashioned it into the image of Gods

---to put life into it, confined good and evil of animals into human body, making it half living being

(animal life)

---Athene gave it soul/psyche and breath of life

●Human benefactor:

---fire

---arts of healing, medicine

---mathematics

---astronomy

---navigation航海

---divination占卜

---architecture

---metallurgy冶金