Leda And The Swan Essay

Helen of Sparta’s portrayals in many different accounts of mythology and history are extremely dissimilar. Helen was said to be the daughter of Zeus and Leda (Queen of Sparta), and was the wife of Menelaus, king of Sparta. Helen was abducted by Paris of Troy and when Menelaus came to retrieve Helen, the Trojan war began. In “The Odyssey”, Helen is shown as living happily with Menelaus after he brought her back from Sparta. She is portrayed as an intelligent person who sees things for what they truly are, but is mostly reserved to wifely duties. In “Trojan Women” by Euripides, Helen is shown as a person who was used by the gods as a reward for Paris with nothing else in mind. However, she fights vehemently for her own innocence in the

In Greek mythology, sirens were sea nymphs who used their sweet song to lure mariners to their death. The nature of the sirens and their origin story prove that most women, in Greek culture, were a depiction of someone who will seduce men and lead them to their doom. Women were the givers of life in an age when the processes of conception, fertility and childbirth were still deeply mysterious and little understood. With this, men wanted women to have a limited role in Greek culture because men feared the power that women have. Even though there were powerful female figures, like Athena and Aphrodite, the majority of women is represented as what men fear and made sure women had a limited role in Greek mythology and society. In Greek culture women were perceived as beautiful creatures who will seduce men, but have nefarious intentions, and the myths of women in Greek culture proving that men always feared the power that women could have.

In Greco-Roman Culture, humans imagine the deities of mythology to be and act certain ways, due to the needs they must fill. People invented certain deities for reasons that align with what they needed from them. To examine how a deity has a certain purpose, one must first examine what they are like. Athena and Ares are examples of deities invented for very specific purposes. One must first look at Athena and Ares’ similarities and differences in relation to their characteristics, their sexuality and physical appearances, as well as their different powers and how they are worshipped, to discover why they were created.

Gender inequality has been a controversial topic for numerous religions and cultures throughout history. Women were commonly regarded as the subservient gender, an idea that was no different in Ancient Greece. Throughout Greek mythology, women were considered inferior and troublesome symbols, while men were known for courage, leadership, and strength. While there is no argument of the flagrant sexism that is illustrated in Greek mythology, it can also be claimed that women were given a situated position of freedom, necessity, and power as well. Many popular Greek plays and myths contain several complexes and well described female characters. These goddesses themselves, partook the role of victim, heroine, and villain as it illustrated the diversity of characters in which women were portrayed and seen in both Ancient Greek society and mythology, allowing us to question “Were the women of Ancient Greek mythology equally represented as free and superior?” The creation of the Greek mythological universe, the creation of multi-gendered goddesses or deities, and the free and superior personalities accredited to women in Ancient Greek mythology to answer the question that women were fairly represented as powerful in Ancient Greek mythology.

The relationship between gods and mortals in mythology has long been a complicated topic. The gods can be generous and supportive, and also devastating and destructive to any group of humans. Mortals must respect the powers above them that cannot be controlled. The gods rule over destiny, nature, and justice, and need to be recognized and worshipped for the powerful beings as they are. Regardless of one's actions, intentions, and thoughts, the gods in Greek myth have ultimate power and the final decision of justice over nature, mortals, and even each other.

Zeus can be compared to Superman in the sense that he is powerful, he protects the weak, and punishes the wicked. He is a human-like god in a sense he commits adultery, and is often to his wife Hera. The real life ideals represented by Zeus’s role, is one of a just and powerful character that gets justice against those that are bad and by protecting the good and weak. For Zeus being the god over all the Olympian gods it is quite easy to be powerful and just. In real life instance the justice system is the one to execute injustice through the law, the police and court system. This enables the victims that a sense of justice has been served.

Homer’s epic, The Iliad, highlights the influence and jurisdiction that beauty provides. The prizes and glory a man accumulates from war measure his power, while beauty measures a woman’s power. Since conquering a woman is the ultimate prize to a man, her beauty represents ultimate power. Though the beauty of mortal women has the power to turn men against each other, mortal women have no influence over this power and are instead objectified by men. Immortal women, however, have authority over their beauty and are able to control men with their power. Helen, on the other hand, though mortal, has the beauty of a goddess. Yet, Helen is bound by her fate to Paris, making her power obsolete. By presenting Helen’s hopeless power and supplying the reader with insight on her suffering through her thoughts, Helen is portrayed as a tragic hero.

Leda was a beautiful maid who attracted Zeus; the mighty God transformed himself into the form of a swan with his divine powers and raped Leda. The outcome of this was the birth of Helen of Troy. The four stanzas reflect upon the actual scene of the rape, where Zeus (as a swan) attacks Leda.

In spite of this, most of the women he had slept with had been raped, including his own wife. Hera had been purposely avoiding her brother, wanting nothing to do with him. He was well aware of this, and while pursuing her had come up with a plan. Zeus transformed himself into a "sad and bedraggled looking cuckoo bird, soaked from a strong downpour"(Pontikis). Hera, pitying the bird, held him up to her heart for warmth and desired to heal him. In this moment, Zeus transformed back into his regular form and raped Hera, who could do nothing in the spontaneity. After this incident, they married out of guilt for the rape and conceived multiple children (Pontikis). Among other victims was the kidnapped Prince Ganymede, whom was taken by Zeus in the form of an eagle. Upon being ddelivered to Mount Olympus, he raped the young boy, and made him his cup-bearer (Leadbetter). As an apology, he did not return the prince to his family, but sent a couple of

Zeus’ affinity for being the main character of a myth is no different in the epic myth about his fight against Cronus and the Titans or the “Titanomachy.” In this larger-than-life battle Zeus has to overthrow his father Cronus and take his predestined place as king of the gods. In this myth however, Zeus has to grow and overcome many challenges that stand in his way to greatness. Zeus has to ask for help from his mother in order to be able to free his sibling from his father Cronus who had swallowed them whole. After Zeus frees his siblings he has to face the mighty Titans, so he asks the Cyclops and the Hecatonchires to aid him in this battle that lasts

     Aphrodite is another Olympian Deity who helps show the role of women in Greco-Roman society. Aphrodite was the goddess of sexual desire. I think this showed that women in this period used men’s desire to get things they wanted. In one myth Aphrodite got Zeus to change himself into a swan. Now, who’s supposed to be the most powerful god? This is very similar to the role of women in today’s society. Women usually use men’s desires to get them to do what they want them to. The big difference is that in today’s society many women give into the men and share in desire with them before they are married while in the Greco-Roman society very few women had premarital relations. Women who were not virgins were usually never married and sold into slaves by their fathers (Powell 34).

Hera is, probably, the brightest example of how Greco-Roman mythology reflects the power relations between women and men: Greek and Roman myths depict Hera as a woman of the utmost anger, evil, revenge, and jealousy. Aeschylus’s Prometheus Bound shows Hera as a woman full of negative emotions and the desire to destroy everything and everyone on her way to personal happiness. Aeschylus mentions the story of Hera, Zeus and Io. Zeus falls in love with Io but fearing Hera’s revenge, he turns Io into a cow and asks her to come to the meadow to make love with him: “but get thee gone to meadow deep / By Lerna’s marsh, where are thy father’s flocks And cattle-folds, that on the eye of Zeus / May fall the balm that shall assuage desire” (Aeschylus). In his poem, Aeschylus mentions Hera a few times, and every time her name is overfilled with negative connotations, turning Hera into a monster: “And Hera’s curse even as a runner stripped / Pursues thee ever on thine endless round” (Aeschylus). However, these

The Greek gods and goddess carry many attributes, most human. They are very much like humans in the way that they have weaknesses and strengths. Even though the gods display their characteristics much more drastically than humans do, the similarities are obvious. In Rosenberg and Baker’s book, the Greek gods have many human characteristics such as vengeance, jealously, and love.

The role of women in ancient Greek life was insignificant compared to that of Greek men. A woman's job was to take care of the children and to cook and clean unless she had servants or slaves that would do it for her. Yet, in Greek mythology, women were often written as major characters. Well-known Greek plays contain many well-written, complex, female characters. Female individuals in Greek mythology were often seen as very powerful and fierce and were depicted by “her wits, her beauty, or her bad deeds.”

Additionally, it is even more fascinating that not only do Greek Gods act like human; they also behave like humans: they could love, marry, produce children, and so on. However, there were problems, because although they were gods, they also were given weaknesses of humans, such as jealously, enviousness, spite, et cetera, which created immense problems by the fact that they were Gods with extreme power. Therefore, whenever they act upon hatred, much of their acts were very cruel and inhumane. Moreover, because there was such a large society of Gods, much of the Gods lives were shrouded in chaos and revenge. For instance, as described in the book Myth and Meaning, Hera was attributed towards the peacock for her ego-centric nature towards herself. She, like a peacock, tried to prove to Zeus, her husband, that she was the fairest woman in the land. Zeus, however, preferred to steal away and fantasize with other women. Then Hera, out of jealousy, who could not punish the most powerful God, instead inflicted it against Zeus’ lovers. All in all, Greek Gods and Goddesses look and act like humans would.