Odysseus the wise ruler message. The legendary king of Ithaca, or who Odysseus is

Odysseus is the main character of Homer's poem "The Odyssey". He was the king of the island of Ithaca and a participant in the Trojan War, where he became famous. So what kind of hero was Odysseus?

Several centuries ancient greek myths They talk about what was happening in those days. Since there was some truth in these stories, it was easier for scientists to reconstruct historical events. Some of the most famous records that have survived to this day are the poems of the poet Homer.

Odysseus was very smart and cunning hero capable of emerging victorious from any situation. Odysseus' father was King Laertes, and Anticleia's mother was Artemis's faithful companion.

One day, Odysseus arrived in Sparta to compete for the hand and heart of Helen the Beautiful. There were many suitors there, but the father was afraid that by choosing one, he would anger the others. Then Odysseus suggested that Elena choose herself, and oblige the suitors with an oath that they would not have any complaints about her choice. The girl chose her betrothed. And Odysseus liked another girl more - Penelope. Her father promised that he would marry his daughter to the one who gets to the finish line of the race the fastest.

Odysseus won, but the girl’s father wanted to break his promise and began to persuade Penelope to stay at home. Then Odysseus again suggested that the girl make the choice herself. And she chose him, despite the fact that her father was against it. After the wedding, the couple went to the island of Ithaca.

Soon, Elena the Beautiful's suitors did not keep their promises and kidnapped her. The Trojan War began. The seer told Odysseus that if he decides to go to war, he will return only after 20 years, lonely and poor. He did not want to leave his young wife and son Telemachus. But King Agamemnon himself arrived to persuade Odysseus. And the hero had to agree.

When they arrived in Troy, a new prediction was received, which said that the first one to leave the ship on earth would die. No one dared to doom themselves to certain death, so Odysseus decided to go first, followed by the rest. But he used a trick and jumped from the ship onto his shield, and a completely different person stepped on the ground. The hero confidently walked towards victory and it was he who gave the idea to the people with the Trojan Horse to get beyond the city gates.

After the victory, Odysseus returned to Ithaca. He then recaptured his wife from her suitors, and later found himself in exile at the behest of Poseidon. Homer did not accurately describe how the story of Odysseus ended. Some sources claim that he died during his exile, while others say that Odysseus was turned into a horse and spent the rest of his days that way.

Option 2

The myths of Ancient Greece tell about gods and heroes, their campaigns, exploits and reigns. Everything there was ruled by the thunder god Zeus and his wife Hera. In the underwater kingdom, Poseidon was in charge, but Hades took over the underwater kingdom of the dead. Hell, to put it more clearly. Zeus, Poseidon and Hades are three brothers who equally rule over all of Greece. In general, there are many gods, as well as heroes. For example, Hercules and his 12 labors (in fact, he became famous not only for this), Perseus and the head of the Gorgon, Theseus and the battle with the Minotaur in the labyrinth. One of the representatives of the heroes is Odysseus.

Who is he and how did he start his journey?

Odysseus was the son of Laertes. He was the king of Ithaca and a very smart man. He was already middle-aged at the start of the Trojan War. He had a wife, Penelope, and a son, Telemachus. Odysseus had to take part in the war, but he did not want to leave his family, just as he did not want his family to lose him. Therefore, Odysseus tried to cheat, but it did not work out: Palameus took advantage of Odysseus’s son and recognized his deception, for which Odysseus hated Palameus and wanted to take revenge.

Later, Odysseus himself, by cunning, was able to find Achilles, whom his mother was trying to hide. And it was thanks to Odysseus that Troy was defeated, because it was he who suggested building a horse and getting into enemy territory.

Homecoming and his famous exploits.

Odysseus lost many of his friends along the way. His evil fate was not made easier by the fact that for 7 years the hero of the Trojan Battle had to languish on the island of Ogygia with a nymph named Calypso. Only after this was Odysseus able to begin his journey to Ithaca. By the way, how did it happen that Odysseus ended up with Calypso for 7 years? And this is Poseidon’s punishment for the fact that Odysseus blinded Polyphemus, the son of Poseidon. What exactly is Polyphemus? This is a Cyclops - a cannibal that Odysseus and his team were not lucky enough to get to. But thanks to his ingenuity, Odysseus managed not only to get his guys out, but also to wound the Cyclops in the eye, thereby blinding him.

But his most famous exploits are the battle against the Sirens and the sailing against Scylla and Charybdis. There is nothing special to say about the two monsters, but the sirens... Women are birds who sing songs to sailors, with which they attract them to their lair to kill and eat. But they did not deceive Odysseus. He ordered everyone to put wax plugs in their ears, and he himself was tied to the mast so that he would not succumb to temptation. If Odysseus asked to untie him, then his comrades tied his body even tighter.

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Odysseus is the most popular character ancient Greek mythology. He is the brave, cunning and wise king of Ithaca, famous for his exploits during the Trojan War and for his journey to his homeland, which lasted 10 years.

The most complete account of his life can be found in Homer's poems The Iliad and The Odyssey. In the first, it is among the main characters, and in the second he is the main character.

In the Latin version, the name of Odysseus sounded like Ulysses. His patron was the wise warrior goddess Athena.

Descendant of the Gods

The mother of the future hero was Anticlea - the daughter of the most clever robber Autolycus and the granddaughter of Khione and the messenger of the gods Hermes.

The official father of Odysseus was considered to be Laertes, a participant in the campaign of the Argonauts - the son of Arkisius (Acrisius) and the grandson of the supreme god Zeus.

However, there was also a version that real father Odyssey - Sisyphus (Sisyphus), who seduced Anticlea before her marriage.

Odysseus's homeland was the small island of the Ionian Sea - Ithaca, where in due time he took over the reins of power from the aged and decrepit Laertes. According to the ancient Greek writer Istra of Alexandria, Antricleia gave birth to a son in Alalkomenia in Boeotia.

Odysseus and Penelope

Initially, Odysseus, like many of his contemporaries, wanted to marry Helen the Beautiful. He was among her many suitors. But, as they say, it didn’t work out. And in Greek mythology, the wife of Odysseus is Penelope, the cousin of Helen the Beautiful, the daughter of the Spartan Icarius and the nymph Periboea.

Icarius did not immediately decide to give his daughter’s hand to the king of a small and not very rich kingdom. According to one version, his brother Tyndareus, to whom Odysseus performed a favor, persuaded him to take this step. According to another version, Odysseus’s matchmaking was accepted after his victory in a running competition.

But be that as it may, Odysseus returned to his homeland with his young wife. Soon Odysseus' son, Telemachus, was born.

Trojan War

However, Odysseus did not enjoy a happy family life for long. Mythology tells that after Helen the Beautiful fled from Sparta with the Trojan prince Paris, he had to go with the Spartans to Troy to restore justice.

Not wanting to leave his young wife and son, Odysseus tried to pretend to be insane. But Palamedes, one of those who came to call Odysseus to the walls of Troy, managed to expose his pretense, and he, willy-nilly, had to leave Ithaca.

Having equipped 12 ships, Odysseus, whose story is told in this article, sets off for Troy. On the way, he helped the Greeks find Achilles (Achilles), hidden by his mother Thetis, who was trying to protect her son from death, on the island. Skyros.

He volunteered to appease the angry Artemis by delivering the most beautiful of Agamemnon’s daughters, Iphigenia, to Aulis (the girl was to be sacrificed to the goddess).

According to the ancient Greek epic, the exploits of Odysseus were aimed at preventing the outbreak of the Trojan War. Together with the legal husband of the escaped Helen, Menelaus, he tried to settle the matter peacefully.

During the war, which was never avoided, Odysseus showed himself as brave warrior, an excellent and cunning strategist and tactician. It was he who captured the Trojan intelligence officer Dolon; detained the soothsayer Helen; made a sortie against King Res, who came to the aid of the Trojans; stole from the besieged city the statue of Pallas Athena, which was supposed to help the Greeks win; persuaded Philocret to give the bow of Hercules (according to another version, he simply stole this bow). The exploits of Odysseus are numerous. Some of them will be discussed below.

In addition, there is a version that the idea of ​​​​creating the legendary Trojan Horse also belonged to Odysseus.

Moreover, during the siege, taking advantage of the opportunity, Odysseus takes revenge on Palamedes, who exposed his cunning with madness.

After the death of Achilles, Odysseus receives his armor, which leads to Ajax's suicide. Subsequently, Odysseus gives this trophy to the son of Achilles, persuading him to join the war.

In the land of the Kikons

Throughout the 10 years that the siege of Troy lasted, the hero was haunted by the desire to quickly return to his native Ithaca and his family. Therefore, immediately after the end of the war, Odysseus prepared to return.

Mythology tells us that when ships loaded with rich booty sailed past the Thracian coast, where the Cicon tribes lived, Odysseus’s companions decided to take revenge on the local residents for fighting on the side of the Trojans. The first on the way of the Greeks was the city of Ismar, which they plundered and destroyed. Deciding to celebrate the victory, the “guests” organized a merry feast on the shore.

At the same time, it is argued that Odysseus not only did not participate in the robberies, but also tried to take his comrades away from the island, anticipating the beginning of a new, even bloodier massacre. However, he failed to force his friends and comrades to sail from unfriendly shores. As a result, when the inhabitants of the villages neighboring Ismar gathered to take revenge, the Greeks found themselves in the minority.

During the ensuing battle, which lasted only a day, the ranks of Odysse’s companions were greatly thinned, and the rest barely managed to get to their ships and set sail from the Thracian coast.

In lotophages

The ships with the surviving soldiers, caught by the wind, found themselves off unknown shores 9 days later. These were the lands of lotus eaters - a country where lotuses were grown in the fields instead of bread. Having tasted the tender and tasty plants, he fell into oblivion and no longer wanted to return home and wanted to stay on the island forever.

Several of Odysseus's comrades managed to try this delicacy, and they had to be taken to the ships by force.

Odysseus and the Cyclops Polyphemus

Sailing along the shores of the Sicilian Sea, Odysseus's companions saw rich fertile lands on which goats and sheep grazed in abundance. This was the patrimony of the one-eyed monsters - the Cyclops.

Deciding to get to know the local people and wealth better, Odysseus and 12 comrades landed on the shore, taking with them some food and wine captured from Thrace. In search of the owners of the area, they reached a huge cave, where they decided to wait.

The cave, as it turned out, belonged to Polyphemus, the son of Poseidon and the most powerful of the Cyclops. When he returned home in the evening, Odysseus and his companions were frozen with fear - Polyphemus was so terrible and huge.

Odysseus and the Cyclops could not find a common language. The king of Ithaca tried to speak to Polyphemus, but he, without listening, grabbed two people, tore them into pieces and ate them.

Odysseus and his friends could not get out of the cave - the entrance was blocked by a huge boulder, which even a hundred soldiers could not move.

In the morning, Polyphemus ate a couple more of Odysseus’s comrades, promising to leave Odysseus himself, who called himself “Nobody,” for last. In gratitude for the honor, Odysseus offered the Cyclops a taste of Thracian wine. The drink was to his taste, and Polyphemus drank the entire wineskin offered to him by the captive.

Having grown tired, the giant owner fell asleep. Taking advantage of this, Odysseus set fire to a huge olive stake and poked the burning brand directly into the only eye of the sleeping Cyclops. Roaring in pain and rage, Polyphemus jumped up and began rushing around the cave in order to catch the offenders and take revenge on them. However, no matter how hard he tried to discover Odysseus and his comrades, he failed.

Then the giant sat down at the exit of the cave and began to wait patiently, but then the true descendant of Hermes once again showed cunning: he tightly tied himself and his comrades under the belly of the sheep and rams, which the Cyclops daily let out to graze in the meadows, and together with the animals left without hindrance the home of its inhospitable owner.

But after Odysseus and his companions were on the ship and felt safe, the hero lost his caution and named himself. Hearing the name of his offender, Polyphemus turned to his father, the powerful and formidable Poseidon, with a request to punish Odysseus. And he heeded his son’s pleas, which is why Odysseus’s journey to his homeland was greatly delayed.

Odysseus on Aeolia

The next island to which the only surviving ship of Odysseus landed was the island of the wind god Aeolus. Here the host and guest became close friends, and Aeolus gave Odysseus a leather bag with winds, which were supposed to help the travelers return home sooner.

And here it is, the long-awaited Ithaca. Having seen their native shores from afar, Odysseus’s companions decided to open Aeolus’ bag, suggesting that rich treasures were hidden in it. At the same moment, the ship was picked up by the freed winds and again found themselves at Aeolia.

Aeolus refused to help Odysseus and his comrades. And they were again forced to set off on a long voyage, leaving themselves to the will of the waves and wind.

Odysseus and Kirk

After long wanderings, Odysseus (mythology confirms this) lands on the shores of the island. Eya, ruled by the daughter of the Sun, the sorceress Kirk (Circe). The owner of the island turns the hero's companions into pigs. He himself is saved from this fate by the miraculous root that Hermes gave him.

Odysseus forces the sorceress to return his comrades to human form, and together they spend a whole year on the island.

When Odysseus and his comrades were already getting ready to set off, Kirk said that the gods were telling him to go to the ends of the world, to the entrance to the dark kingdom of Hades. There he must summon the soul of the blind soothsayer from Thebes, Tiresias, and learn from him what to do next.

In the kingdom of Hades

Having reached the entrance to the underworld, Odysseus dug a hole with his sword and began to lure the souls of the dead. First he poured honey and milk into the pit, then wine and water mixed with flour. Finally, he sacrificed several black sheep.

Feeling the blood, souls flocked to Odysseus from all sides, however, standing guard, he did not allow anyone to approach the pit, remembering Kirk’s instructions that Tiresias should be the first to drink the sacrificial blood.

Having tasted the gifts of Odysseus and having regained the gift of speech, Tiresias predicted long and difficult journeys for the king of Ithaca, at the end of which he, however, must return to his homeland.

After communicating with the soothsayer, Odysseus (the mythology of Ancient Greece confirms this) was able to communicate with his own mother, Agamemnon, Hercules, Achilles, Patroclus. But when there were too many souls, the hero left his post and returned to the ship.

Odysseus and the Sirens

The next test for Odysseus and his comrades is a meeting with half-birds, half-women - sirens. These scary-looking creatures had such beautiful voices that anyone who heard them forgot about everything, put aside the oars and left the ship to the will of the waves. As a result, falling into the funnel, the ships crashed on the coastal reefs.

Knowing in advance what awaited them, Odysseus covered the ears of his companions with wax, and ordered himself to be tightly tied to the mast. The measures taken allowed the ship to pass through the dangerous place without hindrance.

Scylla and Charybdis

After the sirens, terrible monsters lay in wait for Odysseus on his way - Scylla and Charybdis. The first caught and devoured sailors, and the second formed a whirlpool several times a day, into which it drew ships. The travelers had to sail through a narrow strait between these two creatures.

When the hero's ship sailed to the rocks where the monsters lived, Charybdis was just absorbing water from the strait, drawing in everything that was in it along with the water. In order not to fall into the stomach of Charybdis, Odysseus took the ship further away, thereby approaching Scylla’s cave, from where several jaws instantly poked out and grabbed six travelers. The rest, meanwhile, managed to break through the strait and escape.

Sacred cows of Helios and the wrath of Zeus

Having avoided another danger, Odysseus and his comrades land on the island. Thrinacia, in the meadows of which sacred cows belonging to the Sun God Helios graze.

Remembering the instructions of Tiresias, Odysseus warns his companions not to dare touch these cows. However, exhausted and hungry, they do not heed the words of the son of Laertes. After waiting for Odysseus to fall asleep, his comrades killed several cows and ate their meat.

Such blasphemy angered Zeus, and as soon as Odysseus’s ship set sail from the shore, the thunder god smashed it to pieces by shooting lightning at it. As a result, all the companions of the king of Ithaca died. He himself miraculously survived, grabbing the mast.

Odysseus and Calypso

For several days Odysseus was carried along the waves until he washed up on the island. Ogygia, where the nymph Calypso lived. Having found a completely exhausted man, the nymph left him, bringing him back to life.

Here Odysseus had to stay for 7 whole years - Calypso did not want to let go of the hero. The nymph even offered him immortality on the condition that he would remain on her island forever. But Odysseus was eager to go home, and nothing could make him forget his beloved Penelope and Telemachus.

It is unknown how long this paradise captivity would have lasted if one day Hermes had not appeared on the island, conveying the will of Zeus to Calypso - the Thunderer ordered the release of Odysseus. Unable to resist supreme god, the nymph gave freedom to her rescued hero.

Having learned about the will of the gods, Odysseus immediately began to prepare for sailing - in a few days he managed to build a strong raft and set off.

Return to Ithaca

But the adventures of Odysseus are not over yet. On the way, he is again overtaken by the wrath of Poseidon, still trying to avenge his Cyclops son. As a result of a storm sent by Poseidon, Odysseus loses his raft and swims to the island of Scheria, where the Phaeacians live.

Once in the palace of the local ruler Alcinous, the hero tells him about himself and his wanderings. In response, the Phaeacians equipped a ship for him, loaded him with rich gifts and sent him to Ithaca.

And here, finally, is the island of Odyssey, the long-awaited homeland of Ithaca. Scientists who paid attention to the description of the luminaries located in the sky at that time (according to Homer) calculated that this historical return took place on April 16, 1178 BC. e.

However, the tests are not over yet. Upon arrival on the island, Odyssey faces many challenges. He learns of numerous suitors besieging his wife and occupying his own palace.

With the help of the gods, the rightful king of Ithaca enters the palace unrecognized, wins the competition arranged by Penelope, and then, together with his son, kills all the uninvited guest suitors. As a reward for many years of suffering, the gods return beauty and strength to both spouses. Odysseus and Penelope are reunited.

Further fate

There are several versions regarding the further fate of Odysseus. According to one, he reigned happily in his kingdom for a long time, and then died peacefully in Epirus, where he was revered as a heroic soothsayer.

According to another, after some time, Odysseus’s son Telegon, who was born by the sorceress Kirk, killed his own father. According to this version, the grown-up boy, having heard enough of his mother’s stories about his father, went in search of him. But, arriving in Ithaca, he was forced to enter into battle with his father without recognizing him. As a result of the battle, Telegonus mortally wounded Odysseus with the bristles of a sea urchin. Soon after this, Odysseus died. After his death, Telegon took his father's body to bury him on the island where Kirk ruled.

The story about Odysseus himself and his adventures is reflected in the culture and art of many peoples. Most often he was depicted as a large and strong man with a beard and an oval cap, which was worn by Greek sailors.

Over time, the hero’s name became a household name, and the word “odyssey” began to be used to describe a long journey, by analogy with the many-year journey of the legendary king of Ithaca.

Odyssey. Epic poem (VIII-VII centuries BC)

The Trojan War was started by the gods so that the time of heroes would end and the present, human, iron age. He who did not die at the walls of Troy must die at way back.

Most of the surviving Greek leaders sailed to their homeland, as they sailed to Troy, with a common fleet across the Aegean Sea. When they were halfway, the sea god Poseidon struck with a storm, the ships were scattered, people drowned in the waves and crashed against the rocks. Only the chosen ones were destined to be saved. But it wasn’t easy for them either. Perhaps only the wise old Nestor managed to calmly reach his kingdom in the city of Pylos.

The supreme king Agamemnon overcame the storm, but only to die even more terrible death- in his native Argos she killed him own wife and her avenging lover; The poet Aeschylus will later write a tragedy about this. Menelaus, with Helen returned to him, was carried by the winds far into Egypt, and it took him a very long time to get to his Sparta. But the longest and most difficult path of all was the path of the cunning king Odysseus, whom the sea carried around the world for ten years. Homer composed his second poem about his fate: “Muse, tell me about that experienced man who, / Wandering for a long time since the day when Saint Ilion was destroyed by him, / Visited many people, cities and saw customs, / Endured a lot of grief seas, caring about salvation...” “The Iliad” is a heroic poem, its action takes place on a battlefield and in a military camp. “Odyssey” is a fairy-tale and everyday poem, its action takes place, on the one hand, in magical lands giants and monsters, where Odysseus wandered, on the other hand, in his small kingdom on the island of Ithaca and its environs, where his wife Penelope and his son Telemachus were waiting for Odysseus. Just as in the Iliad only one episode is chosen for the narrative, “the wrath of Achilles,” so in the Odyssey only the very end of his wanderings, the last two stages, from the far western edge of the earth to his native Ithaca. Odysseus will tell about everything that happened before at the feast in the middle of the poem, and he will tell it very concisely: all these fabulous adventures in the poem account for fifty pages out of three hundred. In the Odyssey, the fairy tale sets off everyday life, and not vice versa, although readers, both ancient and modern, were more willing to reread and remember the fairy tale.

In the Trojan War, Odysseus did a lot for the Greeks - especially where it was not strength that was needed, but intelligence. It was he who guessed to bind Elena’s suitors with an oath to jointly help her chosen one against any offender, and without this the army would never have gathered for a campaign.

It was he who attracted young Achilles to the campaign, and without this victory would have been impossible.

It was he who, when at the beginning of the Iliad, the Greek army, after a general meeting, almost rushed back from Troy, managed to stop him. It was he who persuaded Achilles, when he quarreled with Agamemnon, to return to battle. When, after the death of Achilles, the best warrior of the Greek camp was supposed to receive the armor of the slain man, Odysseus received it, not Ajax. When Troy failed to be taken by siege, it was Odysseus who came up with the idea of ​​​​building a wooden horse, in which the bravest Greek leaders hid and thus penetrated into Troy - and he was among them. The goddess Athena, the patroness of the Greeks, loved Odysseus most of all and helped him at every step. But the god Poseidon hated him - we will soon find out why - and it was Poseidon who, with his storms, prevented him from reaching his homeland for ten years. Ten years at Troy, ten years in wanderings, and only in the twentieth year of his trials does the action of the Odyssey begin.

It begins, as in the Iliad, with “Zeus’ will.” The gods hold a council, and Athena intercedes with Zeus on behalf of Odysseus. He is captured by the nymph Calypso, who is in love with him, on an island in the very middle of the wide sea, and languishes, in vain wanting to “see even the smoke rising from the thousand shores in the distance.” And in his kingdom, on the island of Ithaca, everyone already considers him dead, and the surrounding nobles demand that Queen Penelope choose a new husband from among them, and a new king for the island.

There are more than a hundred of them, they live in Odysseus’s palace, riotously feast and drink, ruining Odysseus’s household, and have fun with Odysseus’s slaves. Penelope tried to deceive them: she said that she had made a vow to announce her decision no earlier than weaving a shroud for old Laertes, Odysseus’s father, who was about to die.

During the day she wove in full view of everyone, and at night she secretly unraveled what she had woven. But the maids betrayed her cunning, and it became more difficult for her to resist the insistence of the suitors.

With her is her son Telemachus, whom Odysseus left as an infant; but he is young and is not taken into account.

And so an unfamiliar wanderer comes to Telemachus, calls himself an old friend of Odysseus and gives him advice: “Fit out a ship, go around the surrounding lands, collect news about the missing Odysseus; if you hear that he is alive, you will tell the suitors to wait another year; if you hear that you are dead, you will say that you will hold a wake and persuade your mother to marry.” He advised and disappeared, for Athena herself appeared in his image.

This is what Telemachus did. The suitors resisted, but Telemachus managed to escape and board the ship unnoticed, for Athena helped him in this too.

Telemachus sails to the mainland - first to Pylos to the decrepit Nestor, then to Sparta to the newly returned Menelaus and Helen. The talkative Nestor tells how the heroes sailed from Troy and drowned in a storm, how Agamemnon later died in Argos and how his son Orestes took revenge on the murderer; but he knows nothing about the fate of Odysseus. The hospitable Menelaus tells how he, Menelaus, got lost in his wanderings, and on the Egyptian shore waylaid the prophetic old man of the sea, the seal shepherd Proteus, who knew how to transform himself into a lion, and into a boar, and into a leopard, and into a snake, and into water, and into tree; how he fought with Proteus, and defeated him, and learned from him the way back, and at the same time learned that Odysseus was alive and suffering in the middle of the wide sea on the island of the nymph Calypso. Delighted by this news, Telemachus is about to return to Ithaca, but then Homer interrupts his story about him and turns to the fate of Odysseus.

The intercession of Athena helped: Zeus sends the messenger of the gods Hermes to Calypso: the time has come, it’s time to let Odysseus go. The nymph grieves: “Did I save him from the sea for this reason, did I want to bestow him with immortality?” - but he doesn’t dare disobey. Odysseus doesn't have a ship - he needs to put together a raft. For four days he works with an ax and a drill; on the fifth, the raft is lowered. He sails for seventeen days, steering by the stars, and on the eighteenth a storm breaks out. It was Poseidon, seeing the hero eluding him, who swept up the abyss with four winds, the logs scattered like straw.

“Oh, why didn’t I die at Troy!” - Odysseus cried. Two goddesses helped Odysseus: a kind sea nymph threw him a magic blanket that saved him from drowning, and Athena, faithful to him, calmed three winds, leaving the fourth to carry him and swim to the nearest shore. He sailed for two days and two nights without closing his eyes, and on the third the waves throw him onto land. Naked, tired, helpless, he buries himself in a pile of leaves and falls asleep dead asleep.

It was the land of the blessed Phaeacians, ruled by the good king Alcinous in a high palace: copper walls, golden doors, embroidered fabrics on the benches, ripe fruits on the branches, eternal summer over the garden. The king had a young daughter, Nausicaa; At night Athena appeared to her and said: “You will soon be married, but your clothes have not been washed; gather the maids, take the chariot, go to the sea, wash the dresses.” We went out, washed, dried, and started playing ball; the ball flew into the sea, the girls screamed loudly, their scream woke up Odysseus. He rises from the bushes, scary, covered with sea-dried mud, and prays: “Whether you are a nymph or a mortal, help: let me cover my nakedness, show me the way to people, and may the gods send you good husband" He washes himself, anoints himself, dresses, and Nausicaä, admiring him, thinks: “Oh, if only the gods would give me such a husband.” He goes to the city, enters King Alcinous, tells him about his misfortune, but does not identify himself; touched by Alcinous, he promises that the Phaeacian ships will take him wherever he asks.

Odysseus sits at the Alcinous feast, and the wise singer Demodocus entertains the feasters with songs. “Sing about the Trojan War!” - Odysseus asks; and Demodocus sings about Odysseus’ wooden horse and the capture of Troy. Odysseus has tears in his eyes. “Why are you crying?” says Aya-kina. “That’s why the gods send death to heroes, so that their descendants will sing their glory. Is it true that someone close to you fell at Troy?” And then Odysseus reveals: “I am Odysseus, son of Laertes, king of Ithaca, small, rocky, but dear to the heart...” - and begins the story of his wanderings. There are nine adventures in this story.

The first adventure is with the lotophages. The storm carried Odysseus' ships from near Troy to the far south, where the lotus grows - a magical fruit, having tasted which a person forgets about everything and wants nothing in life except the lotus. The lotophages treated Odseus's companions to the lotus, and forgot about their native Ithaca and refused to sail further By their strength, the crying ones were taken to the ship and set off on their journey.

The second adventure is with the Cyclopes (Cyclopes). They were monstrous giants with one eye in the middle; They; they tended sheep and goats and knew no wine. Chief among them was Polyphemus, the son of the sea god Poseidon. Odysseus and a dozen comrades wandered into his empty cave. In the evening Polyphemus came, huge as a mountain, drove the herd into the cave, blocked the exit with a block, and asked: “Who are you?” - “Wanderers.” “Zeus is our guardian, we ask you to help us,” “I am not afraid of Zeus!” And the Cyclops grabbed two of them, smashed them against the wall, devoured them to the bones, and began to snore. In the morning he left with the herd, again blocking the entrance; and then Odysseus came up with a trick; He and his comrades took a Cyclops club, as large as a mast, sharpened it, burned it on fire, and hid it; and when the villain came and devoured two more comrades, he brought him wine to put him to sleep; The monster liked the wine.” “What is your name?” he asked. "Nobody!" - Odysseus replied, “For such a treat, I, Nobody, will eat you last!”

The intoxicated Cyclops began to snore. Then Odysseus and his companions took a club, approached, swung it and stabbed it into the giants’ only eye. The blinded ogre roared, other Cyclopes came running: “Who offended you, Polyphemus?” “Nobody!” - “Well,” if no one, then there’s nothing to make noise,” - and they went their separate ways. And in order to get out of the cave, Odysseus tied his comrades under the belly of the Cyclops rams so that the Cyclops wouldn’t grope them, and so they left with the herd cave in the morning.

But, already sailing, Odysseus could not stand it and shouted: “For insulting the guests, execution from me, Odyseus from Ithaca!” And the Cyclops furiously prayed to his father Poseidon: “Don’t let Odysseus sail to Ithaca - and if he is destined to do so, then let him not sail soon, alone, on someone else’s ship!” And God heard his prayer.

The third adventure is on the island of the wind god Eol. God sent them a fair wind, and tied the rest in a leather bag and gave it to Odysseus: “When you get there, let them go.” But when Ithaca was already visible, tired Odysseus fell asleep, and his companions untied the bag ahead of time; a hurricane arose and they were washed back to Aeolus. That means the gods are against you!” Eol said angrily and refused to help the disobedient man.

The fourth adventure is with the Laestrygonians, wild cannibal giants. They ran to the shore and brought down huge rocks on the Odysseus ships; out of twelve ships, eleven died; Odysseus and a few comrades escaped on the last one.

The fifth adventure is that of the sorceress Circe (Kirka), the Queen of the West, who turned all aliens into animals. She brought wine, honey, cheese and flour with a poisonous potion to the Odyssean envoys - and they turned into pigs, and she drove them into a stable. He escaped alone and in horror told Odysseus about it; he took the bow and went to help his comrades, not hoping for anything. But Hermes, the messenger of the gods, gave him a divine plant: a black root, a white flower - and the spell was powerless against Odysseus. Threatening with a sword, he forced the sorceress to return human form to his friends and demanded: “Bring us back to Ithaca!” “Ask the way from the prophetic Tiresias, the prophet of the prophets,” said the sorceress. “But he died!” - “Ask the dead!” And she told me how to do it.

The sixth adventure is the most terrible: the descent into the kingdom of the dead. The entrance to it is at the edge of the world, in the land of eternal night. The souls of the dead in it are disembodied, insensitive and thoughtless, but after drinking the sacrificial blood, they gain speech and reason. On the threshold of the kingdom of the dead, Odysseus slaughtered a black ram and a black sheep; souls of the dead They flocked to the smell of blood, but Odysseus drove them away with his sword until the prophetic Tiresias appeared before him. Having drunk the blood, he said: “Your troubles are for offending Poseidon; your salvation is if you do not also offend the Sun-Helios; if you offend, you will return to Ithaca, but alone, on someone else’s ship, and not soon. Penelope's suitors are ruining your house; but you will master them, and there will be a long reign and a peaceful old age.”

After this, Odysseus allowed other ghosts to participate in the sacrificial blood. The shadow of his mother told how she died of longing for her son; he wanted to hug her, but there was only empty air under his hands. Agamemnon told how he died from his wife: “Be careful, Odysseus, it is dangerous to rely on wives.”

Achilles said to him: “It is better for me to be a farm laborer on earth than a king among the dead.”

Only Ajax did not say anything, not forgiving that Odysseus, and not he, got the armor of Achilles. From afar Odysseus saw the hellish judge Minos, and the Eternally Executed proud Tantalus, the cunning Sisyphus, the insolent Tityus; but then horror seized him, and he hurried away, towards the white light.

The seventh adventure was the Sirens - predators who lure sailors to their death with seductive singing.

Odysseus outwitted them: he sealed the ears of his companions with wax, and ordered himself to be tied to the mast and not let go, no matter what. So they sailed past, unharmed, and Odysseus also heard singing, the sweetest of which could not be heard.

The eighth adventure was the strait between the monsters Scylla (Skylla) and Charybdis: Scylla - about six heads, each with three rows of teeth, and twelve paws; Charybdis is about one larynx, but one that swallows a whole ship in one gulp. Odysseus preferred Scylla to Charybdis - and he was right: she grabbed six of his comrades from the ship and devoured six of his comrades with six mouths, but the ship remained intact.

The ninth adventure was the island of the Sun-Helios, where his sacred herds grazed - seven herds of red bulls, seven herds of white rams. Odysseus, remembering the covenant of Tiresias, took a terrible oath from his comrades not to touch them, but contrary winds were blowing, the ship was standing still, the companions were hungry and, when Odysseus fell asleep, they slaughtered and ate the best bulls. It was scary: the flayed skins moved and the meat on the skewers mooed - the Sun-Helios, who sees everything, hears everything, knows everything, prayed to Zeus: “Punish the offenders, otherwise I will go down to the underworld and shine among the dead.” And when the winds died down and the ship sailed from the shore, Zeus raised a storm, struck with lightning, the ship crumbled, the companions drowned in a whirlpool, and Odysseus, alone on a piece of log, rushed across the sea for nine days until he was thrown ashore on the island of Calypso.

This is how Odysseus ends his story.

King Alcinous fulfilled his promise: Odysseus boarded the Phaeacian ship, fell into an enchanted sleep, and woke up on the foggy shore of Ithaca. Here he is met by his patroness Athena.

“The time has come for your cunning,” she says, “hide, beware of the suitors and wait for your son Telemachus!” She touches him, and he becomes unrecognizable: old, bald, poor, with a staff and bag. In this form, he goes deep into the island to ask for shelter from the good old swineherd Bvmey. He tells Bvmei that he was from Crete, fought at Troy, knew Odysseus, sailed to Egypt, fell into slavery, was among pirates and barely escaped. Eumaeus calls him to the hut, sits him at the hearth, treats him, grieves about the missing Odysseus, complains about the violent suitors, feels sorry for Queen Penelope and Prince Telemachus. The next day, Telemachus himself arrives, returning from his journey - of course, Athena herself also sent him here. In front of him, Athena returns Odysseus to his true appearance, powerful and proud. "Aren't you god?" - asks Telemachus.

“No, I am your father,” Odysseus replies, and they embrace, crying with happiness.

The end is near. Telemachus goes to the city, to the palace; Eumaeus and Odysseus wander behind him, again in the guise of a beggar. At the palace threshold, the first recognition takes place: the decrepit Odyssean dog, who for twenty years has not forgotten the voice of his owner, raises his ears, crawls with his last strength to him and dies at his feet. Odysseus enters the house, walks around the upper room, begs for alms from the suitors, and endures ridicule and beatings.

The suitors pit him against another beggar, younger and stronger; Odysseus, unexpectedly for everyone, knocks him over with one blow. The suitors laugh: “May Zeus give you what you want for this!” - and they don’t know that Odysseus wishes them quick death. Penelope calls the stranger to her: has he heard news about Odysseus? “I heard,” says Odysseus, “he is in a nearby region and will arrive soon.”

Penelope can't believe it, but she is grateful to the guest. She tells the old maid to wash the wanderer's dusty feet before going to bed, and invites him to be at the palace for tomorrow's feast. And here the second recognition takes place: the maid brings in a basin, touches the guest’s feet and feels the scar on his shin that Odysseus had after hunting a boar in his youth. Her hands trembled, her leg slipped out: “You are Odysseus!” Odysseus covers her mouth: “Yes, it’s me, but keep quiet - otherwise you’ll ruin the whole thing!” The last day is coming.

Penelope calls the suitors to the banquet room: “Here is the bow of my dead Odysseus; whoever pulls it and shoots an arrow through twelve rings on twelve axes in a row will become my husband!” One after another, one hundred and twenty suitors try on the bow - not a single one is able to even pull the string. They already want to postpone the competition until tomorrow - but then Odysseus stands up in his beggarly form: “Let me try too: after all, I was once strong!” The suitors are indignant, but Telemachus stands up for the guest: “I am the heir of this bow; I give it to whomever I want; and you, mother, go to your feminine affairs.” Odysseus takes the bow, bends it easily, rings the string, the arrow flies through twelve rings and pierces the wall. Zeus thunders over the house, Odysseus straightens up to his full heroic height, next to him is Telemachus with a sword and spear. “No, I haven’t forgotten how to shoot: now I’ll try another target!” And the second arrow strikes the most arrogant and violent of the suitors. “Oh, you thought Odysseus was dead? No, he is alive for truth and retribution! The suitors grab their swords, Odysseus strikes them with arrows, and when the arrows run out, with spears, which the faithful Eumaeus offers. The suitors rush around the chamber, the invisible Athena darkens their minds and deflects their blows from Odysseus, they fall one after another. A pile of dead bodies is piled up in the middle of the house, faithful male and female slaves crowd around and rejoice when they see their master.

Penelope did not hear anything: Athena sent a deep sleep to her in her chamber. The old maid runs to her with good news: Odysseus has returned, Odysseus has punished the suitors! She doesn’t believe: no, yesterday’s beggar is not at all like Odysseus as he was twenty years ago; and the suitors were probably punished by the angry gods. “Well,” says Odysseus, “if the queen has such an unkind heart, let them make my bed alone.” And here the third, main recognition takes place. “Okay,” Penelope says to the maid, “take the guest’s bed from the royal bedroom to his rest.” “What are you saying, woman? - Odysseus exclaims. “This bed cannot be moved from its place, instead of legs it has an olive tree stump, I myself once knocked it together on it and fitted it.” And in response, Penelope cries with joy and rushes to her husband: it was a secret sign, known only to them.

This is a victory, but this is not peace yet. The fallen suitors still have relatives, and they are ready to take revenge. They march toward Odysseus in an armed crowd; he comes out to meet them with Telemachus and several henchmen. The first blows are already thundering, the first blood is being shed, but Zeus’s will puts an end to the brewing discord. Lightning flashes, striking the ground between the fighters, thunder rumbles, Athena appears with a loud cry: “... Do not shed blood in vain and stop the evil enmity!” - and the frightened avengers retreat.

And then: “The light daughter of the Thunderer, the goddess Pallas Athena, sealed the alliance between the king and the people with a sacrifice and an oath.”

The Odyssey ends with these words.

Alcinous is a character in the Odyssey (songs 6-13), king of the Phaeacians, husband of Aretha and father of Nausicaä. After Odysseus arrives on the island of the Phaeacians, Scheriya A. cordially welcomes the stranger into his home, treating him to a feast, and promises a safe return to his homeland. He arranges games during which the Phaeacian youths challenge Odysseus to compete with them. Odysseus wins in throwing and volunteers to compete in any of the martial arts, but A. stops the dispute that has barely begun, offering to turn to singing and dancing, and then orders his nobles to give gifts to the wanderer, especially encouraging the young man Euryalus, who insulted Odysseus with a daring challenge. After the gifts are presented to Odysseus, the singing resumes, and Odysseus cannot hold back his tears to the song of the capture of Troy. A. asks him to finally reveal his name, and the hero identifies himself and tells about his previous wanderings. After the end of the story, A. orders his subjects to multiply the gifts to Odysseus and the next day sends him by ship to Ithaca.

On the way back, this ship is turned into a rock by Poseidon, angry that, contrary to his will, Odysseus nevertheless reached his homeland. At the sight of this miracle, A. prays to the gods to limit themselves to this and not to send other disasters to the land of the Phaeacians.

In the Odyssey, A. appears as a wise ruler and owner of the house, caring for peace in it and observing the divine laws of hospitality. This is precisely what dictates his concern for Odysseus: A. twice interrupts his singer Demodocus, seeing that the memories of the events he describes cause pain to the stranger. Likewise, he seeks to prevent the guest's perceived offense by giving him the opportunity to prove himself in competitions with the youths, but then stopping them, and subsequently forcing Euryalus to apologize for challenging Odysseus. The respect that the Phaeacians have for their king, among whom he is “first among equals,” is constantly emphasized.

Athena is a goddess, the daughter of Zeus, a character in the Odyssey and the Iliad. In the Iliad, A. invariably takes the side greek heroes besieging Troy. In the Odyssey, A. is the main active deity. At the beginning of the Odyssey, it is she who reminds Zeus of the misadventures of Odysseus and persuades her father to allow the hero to return to Ithaca. When Odysseus finally arrives at home and fights with the daring suitors, Athena helps him deal with them, after which she prevents a feud between Odysseus and the relatives of the suitors he killed. The goddess also patronizes the son of Odysseus, Telemachus, protecting him from suitors who are trying to kill the young man after he publicly condemned their unworthy behavior.:, Nausicaa is the princess of the Phaeacians, the daughter of Alcinous and Arete. In the image of N., beauty is emphasized first of all (Odysseus compares the slenderness of her figure to a young palm tree), modesty befitting an unmarried girl (Odysseus even prays to her, standing in the distance, for “if he touched her knees, he would anger a pure maiden”), but both rationality and determination, reinforced by Athena. She prudently tells Odysseus not to accompany her, fearing misunderstandings (for which she is subsequently reproached by Alcinous, but Odysseus passes this off as his own decision), and also advises turning not directly to the king, but to his wife, in order to gain her support first of all. At the same time, N.’s awakened heartfelt inclination towards a stranger is emphasized, whose beauty and power force her to consider Odysseus the favorite of the gods.

Odysseus (in the Roman tradition - Ulysses) is the king of Ithaca, the main character of Homer's poem "Odyssey" and one of minor characters"Iliad". O.'s courage is combined with cunning and prudence. O. himself considers cunning to be the main feature of his character: “I am Odysseus, son of Laertes, everywhere by the invention of many / Glorious Cunnings and raised to heaven by loud rumor.” The father of Anticlea, O.'s mother, Autolycus, “the great oathbreaker and thief,” was the son of Hermes, a god who was famous for his dexterity and ingenuity. Thus, cunning is O’s hereditary trait. However, not only natural ingenuity, but also rich life experience helps O. in his many years of wanderings. Thanks to his resourcefulness and ability to deceive his enemy, O. manages to cope with the terrible cannibal Cyclops Polyphemus, and then with the sorceress Circe, who, with the help of a miraculous potion, turns his companions into pigs. Homer constantly emphasizes that not only courage and physical strength, but wisdom often helps out his hero.

Among the numerous characters of the Odyssey and the Iliad, O. is the most striking figure. It is no coincidence that many writers and poets turned to this image in their work (Lope de Vega, Calderon, I. Pindemonte, Y. V. Knyazhnin, L. Feuchtwanger, J. Joyce, etc.). Compared to other heroes (Hector, Achilles, Agamemnon, Paris, etc.), whose characters are determined by any one characteristic feature, O. is a multifaceted figure. Courage, the lack of which he cannot be blamed for, coexists with reasonable practicality, the ability to turn the most unfavorable circumstances to his advantage. O. is alien to the stubborn arrogance of those warrior heroes whose heroism lies entirely in action and who despise prudence and caution, identifying them with cowardice. O.'s weapon is not only a sword, but also a word, and with its help he often wins brilliant victories. The amazing adventures that O. had a chance to experience serve Homer only as a kind of background in order to show how much his hero yearns for his native Ithaca. No force can tear out the memory of his homeland from O.’s soul, and this is the greatness of his image.

Penelope is a character in the Odyssey, daughter of Icarius and the nymph Periboea, wife of Odysseus and cousin of Helen. In world culture, the name P., who has been waiting for the return of her beloved husband for 20 years, has become the personification faithful wife. During Odysseus's absence, P. is besieged by numerous suitors, young men from the best families of Ithaca and nearby islands. But P., realizing that strength is on their side, acts with cunning: for three years she deceives the suitors, promising to make her choice after weaving a funeral shroud for her father-in-law Laertes, and at night she undoes what she managed to weave in a day. (This motif was often used by many writers and poets, for example O. Mandelstam.) Homer invariably gives his heroine the epithet “reasonable,” but P., a zealous and economical housewife, is ready to sacrifice everything she has, just not to become the wife of another. Therefore, she resigns herself to the fact that the suitors, in constant feasts, ruin her husband’s estate.

At the same time, the cunning P. offers the grooms something to bring! gifts to her and accepts them, evasively promising to someday become the wife of one of them. P.'s prudence and caution are also manifested in the fact that she does not immediately trust a person who is named after her husband, but subjects him to scrutiny. The image of P., as, indeed, most female images in Homer’s poems, is characterized by some passivity. Sh may be forced, but still submits to the circumstances that rule over him. However, in Homer, P.’s image goes beyond those ideas about female character that prevailed in his era. The external passivity of P.'s behavior in dealing with suitors, her resigned submission to her son, young Telemachus, at whose first word she obediently retires to her chambers - all this is overshadowed by her faith and devotion. The attractiveness of P.’s image is that behind her passive expectation of her missing husband hides a more active and heroic feeling.

Plan:

Introduction

• 1 Main stories
  • 1.1 Birth and early life
  • 1.2 Beginning of the Trojan War
  • 1.3 Trojan War
  • 1.4 The Wanderings of Odysseus
  • 1.5 Further stories
• 2 Character
• 3 Family relationships
• 4 Sources in ancient literature
• 5 Image in art
  • 5.1 Odysseus in literature
  • 5.2 Odysseus in fine art
  • 5.3 Odysseus in cinema
  • 5.4 Odysseus in music
Notes

Introduction

This page is dedicated to the ancient Greek mythological king Odysseus. To view other meanings of this name, see the article Odysseus (meanings).

Odysseus(Greek Όδυσσεύς , lat. Ulysses, Ulysses), in ancient Greek mythology, the king of Ithaca, the son of Laertes and Anticlea, the husband of Penelope and the father of Telemachus, who became famous as a participant in the Trojan War, an intelligent and resourceful speaker. One of the key characters of the Iliad, the main character of the poem Odyssey, which tells about the long years of wandering and the return of Odysseus to his homeland. Odysseus was distinguished not only by his courage, but also by his cunning, resourceful mind (hence his nickname “cunning”).

The name "Odysseus" probably comes from the Greek - "oδύσσομαι" ("to be angry", "to be angry") and thus means "He who is angry" or "He who hates".

The adventures of Odysseus and his return to his faithful wife Penelope were reflected in a number of works of literature (Homer, Sophocles, Euripides, etc.) and art (drawings on antique vases, frescoes in Pompeii, etc.).

The image of Odysseus reflects the era when the Achaeans began to travel by sea, ships went on long voyages and people lost contact with their families. Story, like a story The Odyssey also appears in Celtic literature.

Later, the name of Odysseus became a household word and the word “odyssey” began to mean any long journey (the book “The Odyssey of Captain Blood”, the film “A Space Odyssey”).

He was depicted as a bearded man wearing an oval Greek sailor's cap.

1. Main stories

1.1. Birth and early life

• He received his name, etymologized as “hated” (in Zhukovsky, “angry”) from his grandfather Autolycus. Some called him the son of Sisifus. According to Ister of Alexandria, Anticlea gave birth to him in Alalkomenia in Boeotia. According to Ptolemy Hephaestion, his original name was Utis(“nobody”) for big ears ( ota).
• The place where Odysseus hunted with the sons of Autolycus was shown in Delphi.
• Odysseus arrives in Sparta and participates in matchmaking with Helen the Beautiful. Meets Penelope. He suggests that Elena's father, Tyndareus, bind all the suitors with an oath to help Elena's future husband in order to avoid conflicts. Having won the race for Penelope's hand, he erected three temples to Athena Celevtia in Sparta. He dedicated a statue to Poseidon to Hippias in Pheneus (Arcadia), when he had horses. After marrying Penelope, he returned to Ithaca.

1.2. Beginning of the Trojan War

• After Helen's kidnapping by Paris, the suitors gather for Trojan War. It was predicted to him that if he went to Troy, he would return after 20 years beggars and without companions, and he pretended to be insane and harnessed a horse and a bull to a plow and began to sow salt, but Palamedes exposed him. Palamedes threatens to kill the newborn Telemachus, and Odysseus is forced to admit his deception. He goes to war and vows revenge on Palamedes. According to Homer (who does not mention Palamedes), Agamemnon visited Ithaca and persuaded Odysseus.
• In order to find Achilles, hidden by his mother among the women, and take him to war, Odysseus and Diomedes, disguised as merchants, arrive on the island of Skyros and, having laid out goods, imitate an attack by robbers. All the women run away in fear, only one (Achilles) grabs a weapon, and thus gives herself away.
• On Odysseus' shield there was an image of a dolphin.

1.3. Trojan War

• From Cephallonia (or from Ithaca) Odysseus brought 12 ships to Troy.
• On the way to Tenedos, he argued with Achilles. According to Homer, he argued with Achilles at the feast.
• When the ships sail to the Trojan shores, the attack almost fails, since it is predicted that the first to set foot on this land will die. Odysseus raises the people, jumping off the ship first, but not having time to throw a shield at his feet. Thus, the first to set foot (and die) is Protesilaus.
• He was ambassador to Troy.
• Odysseus takes revenge on Palamedes by framing him as a traitor.
• In the Iliad he killed 17 Trojans. According to Gigin, he killed 12 warriors in total.
• Odysseus and Ajax Telamonides protect the body of Achilles. Achilles' armor goes to Odysseus (who turned to Athena), and the insulted Ajax commits suicide.
• Having learned that the war cannot be won without the bow of Hercules, which remained with Philoctetes, abandoned on the island at the beginning of the war, Odysseus goes there and persuades the embittered Philoctetes to provide it (or steals Philoctetes’ bow on Lemnos).
• Together with his friend Diomedes, Odysseus persuades Achilles' son, Neoptolemus, to take part in the war (again at the request of the prophecy). Gives him his father's armor.
• Priam's son Helenus prophesies that for victory it is necessary to obtain a palladium from Troy - a statue of Athena. Odysseus steals it along with Diomedes.
• Odysseus invents the Trojan horse. Sat in a Trojan horse.

1.4. The Wanderings of Odysseus

Odysseus tied to the mast to avoid the sirens' song. Fragment of a red-figure vase.

J. W. Waterhouse. Odysseus and the Sirens

• Troy is taken, the ships are sailing.
• Odysseus's ships moor to the island of lotus eaters, who find oblivion in eating the lotus. He loses part of his team.
• Odysseus' ships dock at the island of the Cyclops and settle down for the night in a cave, which turns out to be the dwelling of the giant Polyphemus. He eats part of the team. Odysseus blinds him with a sharp stake and climbs out of the cave, clinging from below to the wool of sheep being searched by a blind Cyclops.
• Odysseus finds himself on the island of Aeolus, the king of the winds; he gives him a fur in which the winds are enclosed and orders him not to untie it until the shores of Ithaca appear. The team thinks that the king has given Odysseus treasures, and while he sleeps, they secretly untie the fur. The winds break out and in the blink of an eye carry the ship away from Ithaca, which has already appeared.
• On the island of the Laestrygonian cannibals, Odysseus loses many people eaten. He only has one ship left.
• Odysseus's ship lands on the island of the sorceress Circe. Her treats turn people into pigs and other animals. Odysseus enters into a love affair with her, she submits to him.
• Odysseus descends into the underworld to talk with the soothsayer Tiresias and find out what he needs to do to get home. Among other things, he receives a prediction from Tiresias: “Leave your wave-covered Ithaca, take an oar and wander until you meet people who do not know the sea and among them establish the veneration of the lord of the sea element.”
• Having lived with Circe for a year, Odysseus sets off further, past the island of the Sirens, who lure sailors to their deaths with their enchanting singing. He plugs the ears of his rowers with wax, he himself, full of curiosity, orders them to tie themselves to the mast and listens. This way they avoid the threat.
• Floats between Scylla and Charybdis, a terrible six-headed monster and a colossal whirlpool. Loses 6 people eaten.
• On the island of Helios, Odysseus's companions kill the bulls of the sun god. As punishment, Zeus sends a storm that destroys the ship, in which only Odysseus survives.
• Odysseus throws the nymph Calypso onto the island. He becomes her lover. There is not a single ship on the island, and Odysseus is forced to remain there for seven years. Finally the gods forgive him and send Hermes to order Calypso to release Odysseus; he builds a raft and sails away from her.
• He sails to the island of the Phaeacians and is found by Princess Nausicaä. Odysseus tells his story to the Phaeacians. They put him on a ship and take him to Ithaca. According to the version, returning from the island of the Phaeacians, due to the anger of Hermes, he was shipwrecked and ended up in Ithaca.
• In Ithaca, Athena gives Odysseus the appearance of an old beggar so that he remains unrecognized. Lives with the swineherd Eumaeus, reveals himself to his son Telemachus; goes to the palace to watch the grooms rampage. Odysseus is insulted. Nanny Eurycleia recognizes him by his scar. The faithful dog Argus recognizes him and dies.
• Penelope, on the advice of her son, agrees to marry the one of the suitors who will string Odysseus's bow and shoot an arrow through 12 rings. No one except an old beggar is capable of this. Together with Telemachus, Odysseus organizes a bloody massacre, killing several dozen people.
• The grooms' parents try to rebel, they are suppressed. Odysseus meets his father. The poem ends with the spectacle of Laertes, Odysseus and Telemachus triumphant.

1.5. Further stories

Beating up the suitors

• The parents of the dead suitors, prominent people, bring charges against Odysseus. The king of Epirus and the nearby islands, Neoptolemus, was chosen as the arbitrator. He delivers a verdict: Odysseus is expelled from his kingdom of Ithaca for 10 years. During these years, the heirs of the suitors had to pay for the damage they caused to Odysseus, paying the due amounts to Telemachus, who had now become the king of Ithaca.
• To appease his eternal enemy Poseidon, Odysseus sets off on foot, on the advice of the soothsayer Tiresias, through the mountains, carrying an oar on his shoulders (according to Tiresias, his wanderings were supposed to end in a land far from the sea, where no one had heard of navigation). In Thesprotia, local residents shouted when they saw an oar: “What kind of shovel are you carrying on your shiny shoulder, foreigner?” Odysseus made sacrifices to Poseidon and was forgiven. According to Pausanias, Odysseus's wanderings ended with the Epirotes.
• Odysseus married the queen of the Thesprotians, Callidice, and led an army against the brigs commanded by Ares. Apollo's intervention brings peace.
• According to some versions, Odysseus died peacefully in Aetolia or Epirus, where he was revered as a hero endowed with the gift of posthumous prophecy (or he died when a seagull dropped the sting of a sea dove on his head).
• According to Theopompus, he died in Etruria (or was only buried there). He was buried on Mount Perga near Cortona in Etruria.
• According to the Arcadians, Odysseus's wanderings ended in Arcadia. Built the temple of Athena Sotera and Poseidon on Mount Boreas in Arcadia.
• According to some, he founded the city of Askiburg in Germany.
• According to other legends, after the expiration of the period of exile, Odysseus leaves Callidice and their little son Polypoita rules the kingdom and returns to Ithaca.
• Ithaca is not ruled by Telemachus, but by Penelope on behalf of youngest son Polyporta. Telemachus was exiled from Ithaca to Cephallia out of fear for Odysseus, as the oracle predicted “Odysseus, your own son will kill you!”
• Death, according to the prediction of Tiresias, comes to Odysseus from across the sea: his son from Circe (Circe) Telegonus goes to look for him. Landing at Ithaca, he mistakes it for the island of Corcyra and begins to plunder it. Odysseus arms himself to repel the attack. Telegonus killed him on the shore with a spear that had a stingray spine instead of a tip.
• Killed by Telegonus, Odysseus was resurrected by Circe's drugs, but when Circe and Telemachus were killed, he died of grief; or Circe's maid turned him into a horse, and he remained one until he died of old age.
• After death, his soul chose life ordinary person, far from business.

2. Character

3. Family relationships

The old nanny Eurycleia recognizes Odysseus by the scar on his leg

• patroness divine
  • Athena
• parents
  • Laertes, son of Arcesius, grandson of Zeus. According to one version of the myth, Odysseus's real father is the cunning Sisyphus.
  • Anticlea, daughter of Autolycus, granddaughter of Hermes and Chione
• sister
  • Ktimena- lived with her husband on the island of Zama, neighboring Ithaca
• spouse
  • Penelope, cousin of Elena the Beautiful. Their children:
    • Telemachus. According to one version of the myth, Telemachus married Nausicaä. Their son:
      • Perseptolis
    • Poliport- born after Odysseus returned to Ithaca.
• beloved
  • enchantress Circe. Their children:
    • Telegon- according to one version of the myth, he will kill his unrecognized father Odysseus, then marry his widow Penelope, and marry his mother, Circe, to his half-brother Telemachus
    • Avson(Avzon) - the ancestor of the Avsons, ancient tribe Italy, the first king of Italy. (Or - the son of Calypso).
    • Latin- the founder of the Latins. (Either - the son of Odysseus and Calypso, or - the son of Telemachus).
  • nymph Calypso. Their children:
    • Nausifa
    • Navsina
    • Ankiy(Antius). (Or - the son of Aeneas).
    • Ardey. (Or - the son of Aeneas).
    • Rum. (Or - the son of Aeneas).
    • Avson(Avzon) - the ancestor of the Ausons, the most ancient tribe of Italy, the first king of Italy. (Or - the son of Circe).
    • Latin- the founder of the Latins. (Either - the son of Odysseus and Circe, or - the son of Telemachus).
  • Evippa, daughter of the king of Epirus. Their children:
    • Euryalus- according to one version of the myth, he will be killed by an unrecognized father
  • Callidice, queen of the Thesprotians. Their children:
    • Polypoit
  • Aetolian princess, daughter of King Foant. Their children:
    • Leontophon

4. Sources in ancient literature

• Homer. "Iliad"
• Homer. "Odyssey"
• "Telegony"
• Virgil. "Aeneid"
• Sophocles Plays "Ajax", "Philoctetes"
• Euripides. Plays “Hecuba”, “Cyclops”, “Res”.
• Apollodorus. "Library", III, 8
• Apollodorus. "Epitomes", III, 7; V, 6-22; VII, 1-40
• Ovid. "Metamorphoses", XIII, 1-398

5. Image in art

5.1. Odysseus in literature

• The protagonist of Aeschylus's tragedies "The Trial of Arms" (fr. 174-177 Radt), "Soul Callers (Psychagogues)" (fr. 273-275 Radt), "Penelope" (fr. 187 Radt), "The Bone Collectors" (fr. .179-180 Radt), satirical drama “The Pickaxe” (fr. 309-311 Radt);
  • tragedies by Sophocles “Odysseus the Madman” (fr. 462 Radt), “Iphigenia” (fr. 305-308 Radt), “Eantes”, “Philoctetes”, “The Laconian Women” (fr. 367-368 Radt, the abduction of Palladium), “Nausicaa” "(fr. 439-440 Radt), "Phaeacians" (fr. 675 Radt), "Washing" (fr. 451a Radt), "Odysseus struck by a thorn" (fr. 453-461 Radt), his satyr drama "Companions "(fr.562-568 Radt),
  • the tragedy of Euripides “Hekabe”, the satyr drama of Euripides “Cyclops”, the tragedy of Pseudo-Euripides “Res”,
  • tragedies unknown author“Odysseus - the False Messenger” and “The Ithacans”, tragedies of Chaeremon and Apollodorus of Tarsus “Odysseus”, comedy of Epicharmus “Shipwrecked Odysseus”,
  • the tragedy of Pacuvius “Washing”, the tragedy of Seneca “The Trojan Women”.
• Porfiry. Neoplatonic treatise “On the Cave of the Nymphs.”
• Dante. " The Divine Comedy", "Hell", canto XXVI. (1308-1321)
• Hans Sachs. "The Wanderings of Ulysses."
• Dolce L. “Ulysses.”
• Lope de Vega. "Circe".
• Calderon. "The Greatest Witchcraft, Love"
• Shakespeare. "Troilus and Cressida." (c. 1602)
• Corneille. "Circe".
• Fenelon, Francois. "The Adventures of Telemachus, Son of Odysseus" (Telemachides). (1699).
• Bodmer I. Ya. “Ulysses.”
• Pindemonte. "Ulysses."
• Alfred Tennyson. Poem "Ulysses".
• Knyazhnin. "Circe and Ulysses."
• F. Ponsard. "Ulysses."
• Lion Feuchtwanger. "Odysseus and the Pigs, or On the Inconvenience of Civilization"
• Wyspianski S. “The Return of Odysseus.”
• Hauptmann G. “Bow of Odysseus.”
• The image of Odysseus (Ulysses) is used by James Joyce in the novel Ulysses.
• Nicholas Kazantzakis. Poem "Odyssey" (1938).
• J. Giraudoux. "Elpenor."
• Henry Rider Haggard. "Wanderer" One of the heroes of the novel is Odysseus, the eternal Wanderer, whom fate brings to Egypt.
• Joseph Brodsky. The poem “Odysseus to Telemachus” from the perspective of Odysseus (1972).
• Eivind Jonson. "Surf and Shores."
• Terry Pratchett. The image of Windrissey (“Eric”) is a re-interpretation of the image of Odysseus in an ironic key.
• A. Valentinov. "Diomedes, son of Tydeus"
• E. Gevorkyan. "Dark Mountain"
• L. Malherbe. "Ithaca Forever"
• Henry Lyon Oldie. "Odysseus, son of Laertes" (2000).
• Dan Simmons. Fantasy novels "Ilion" and "Olympus"
• Jerzy Andrzejewski. "Nobody" (1981)
• Vladimir Berezin. "Way Signs" (2009)

5.2. Odysseus in fine art

V. Serov. Odysseus and Nausicaa

• He was depicted in the painting of Polygnotus at Delphi among the participants in the capture of Troy; the second part of the painting depicts his descent into Hades.
• Esquiline frescoes, 1st century. BC e. "The Travels of Odysseus."
• frescoes by F. Primaticcio.
• frescoes by N. del Abbate at Fontainebleau
• frescoes by A. Allori in Florence
• frescoes by P. Tibaldi in Bologna
• Frescoes by Guercino in Cento
• Jordaens, Jacob. "Odysseus in the Cave of Polyphemus", 1630s.
• Rubens. "Ulysses lands on the lands of the Phaeacians."
• Salvator Rosa. "Odysseus and Nausicaa."
• Claude Lorrain. “Ulysses on the Island of the Phaeacians”, “Ulysses returns Chryseis to his father”, 1648.
• Turner W. “Ulysses and Polyphemus.”
• Warterhouse J. “Ulysses and Circe”, “Ulysses and the Sirens”.
• Böcklin, Arnold. "Odysseus and Calypso", 1882.
• Serov, Valentin. "Odysseus and Nausicaa", 1910

5.3. Odysseus in cinema

• "Ulysses" film (1955). In ch. role: Kirk Douglas.
• "The Travels of Odysseus" TV series (1968/1969). In ch. role of Bekim Fehmyu.
• "Odyssey" - film by Andron Konchalovsky (1997). In ch. roles - Armand Assante, best known for his roles as gangsters.
• "Troy" is a 2004 film starring Brad Pitt. Odysseus - cameo character, played by Sean Bean.
• “Oh, where are you, brother?” - film by the Coen brothers (2000). The script is a reworking of The Odyssey (Oscar Award for Best Adaptation of a Literary Work), set during the Great American Depression. George Clooney plays Ulysses Everett McGill
• Odysseus: Journey into the Underworld - film by Terry Ingram (2008).

5.4. Odysseus in music

• Monteverdi. Opera "The Return of Ulysses" ( Il Ritorno d'Ulisse in Patria).
• C. Monteverdi. Opera "Delia and Ulysses". Together with F. Maneli. 1630. (music and libretto lost)
• J. F. Rebel. Opera "Ulysses". 1703.
• R. Kaiser. Opera "Ulysses". 1722
• K. Szymanowski. The Metopes cycle: three stages of the return of Odysseus (the island of the Sirens, the island of Calypso and the island of the Phaeacians). 1915.
• N. Skalkotas. Overture for orchestra "The Return of Odysseus". 1945
• N. A. Bentson. Opera "Ulysses".
• E. Englund. Ballet "Odyssey". 1959.
• A. Logothetis. Ballet "Odyssey". 1963
• T. Andoniu. Epilogue for soloist, reader and chamber ensemble. 1963.
• E.K. Golubev. Ballet "Odyssey". 1965.
• L. Dallapiccola. Opera "Ulysses". 1968.
• K.V. Molchanov. Musical "Odysseus, Penelope and others." 1970.
• A. Hovaness. Symphony No. 25 "Odysseus" ( Symphony No.25 ("Odysseus"), Op. 275). 1973.

I. Trotsky

The Odyssey is a Greek epic poem, along with the Iliad, attributed to Homer. Being completed later than the Iliad, "O." adjoins the earlier epic, but does not constitute a direct continuation of the Iliad. Theme of "Odyssey" - wanderings cunning Odysseus, king of Ithaca, returning from the Trojan campaign; in separate references there are episodes of the saga, the time of which coincided with the period between the action of the Iliad and the action of the Odyssey. Like the Iliad, O. is an epic of the era of the formation of the ancient socio-economic formation and expresses the ideology of the ancient Ionian military-landowning aristocracy, which degenerated into a trade and slave-owning plutocracy. This process of degeneration left a greater imprint on the Odyssey than on the Iliad, since by the time of the creation of O. he has already advanced further. Military-“feudal” ideology gave way to the glorification of cultural life, and “O.” The ethical deepening of Greek religion, which accompanied the class struggle of the 7th-6th centuries, had already touched upon. In accordance with this "O." creates a much less archaic cultural background for the age of heroes than the Iliad, reflecting quite closely the present: the time of the fall of royal power in Greek communities and the initial periods of the development of Ionian trade and navigation. Most researchers attribute the time of registration to “O.” to the 7th century BC and most likely - by the second half of this century. The “cunning” and “long-suffering” Odysseus is already a hero of a completely different type than the heroes of the “Iliad”; the field of poetic vision is expanded by increased interest in foreign lands, in the life of small people, in the psychology of women; attitude "O." not without even a touch of sentimentality.

While the Iliad is built on the legends of the heroic saga, in O. The material that predominates is everyday life and fairy tales, essentially unrelated to the heroic saga. The text of “O.”, like the text of the Iliad, came to us in the edition of Alexandrian philologists and was divided by them into 24 books.

Plot outline

Action "O." dated to the 10th year after the fall of Troy. Odysseus languishes on the island of Ogygia, forcibly held by the nymph Calypso; At this time, in Ithaca, numerous suitors are wooing his wife Penelope, feasting in his house and squandering his wealth. By decision of the council of gods, Athena, who patronizes Odysseus, goes to Ithaca and encourages the young Odysseus’ son Telemachus to go to Pylos and Sparta to ask about the fate of his father (Book I). With the help of Athena, Telemachus (who tried in vain to remove suitors from his house) secretly leaves Ithaca for Pylos (Book II). The elderly king of Pylos, Nestor, informs Telemachus of information about some Achaean leaders, but for further information he sends him to Sparta to Menelaus (Book III). Welcomed by Menelaus and Helen, Telemachus learns that Odysseus is being held captive by Calypso. Meanwhile, the suitors, frightened by the departure of Telemachus, set up an ambush to destroy him on his return journey (Book IV). Starts from Book V new line telling the story: the gods send Hermes to Calypso with the order to release Odysseus, who sets off on a raft on the sea. Having miraculously escaped from a storm raised by his hostile Poseidon, Odysseus swims to the shore of the island of Sharia, where happy people live - the Phaeacians, sailors with fabulously fast ships. The meeting of Odysseus on the shore with Nausicaa, the daughter of the king of the Phaeacians Alcinous, forms the content of book VI, rich in idyllic moments. Alcinous receives the wanderer in his luxurious palace (Book VII) and arranges a feast and games in his honor, where the blind singer Demodocus sings about the exploits of Odysseus (Book VIII), who finally reveals his name and tells about his adventures. Stories (“apologists”) of Odysseus: Odysseus visited the country of lotus eaters who eat lotuses, where everyone who tastes the lotus forgets about their homeland; the cannibal giant, the cyclops Polyphemus, devoured several of Odysseus’s comrades in his cave, but Odysseus drugged and blinded the cyclops and escaped with his other comrades from the cave under the wool of rams; for this, Polyphemus called upon Odysseus the wrath of his father Poseidon (Book IX). The god of the winds, Aeolus, favorably handed Odysseus a fur with the winds tied in it, but not far from his homeland, Odysseus’s companions untied the fur, and the storm again threw them into the sea. The cannibal Laestrygonians destroyed all of Odysseus's ships, except one, which landed on the island of the sorceress Kirke (Circe), who turned Odysseus's companions into pigs; Having overcome the spell with the help of Hermes, Odysseus was the husband of Kirke (Book X) for a year. He went down to the underworld to question the soothsayer Tiresias and talked with the shadows of his mother and dead friends (Book XI); sailed past the Sirens, who lure sailors with magical singing and destroy them; drove between the cliffs where the monsters Skilla and Charybdis live. On the island of the sun god Helios, Odysseus's companions killed the god's bulls, and Zeus sent a storm that destroyed Odysseus's ship with all his companions; Odysseus sailed to the island of Calypso (Book XII). The Phaeacians, having given Odysseus a gift, take him to his homeland, and the angry Poseidon turns their ship into a cliff for this. Turned by Athena into an old beggar, Odysseus goes to the faithful swineherd Eumaeus (Book XIII). Stay with Eumaeus (Book XIV) - an idyllic genre picture. Returning from Sparta, Telemachus safely avoids the ambush of the suitors (Book XV) and meets with Odysseus at Eumaeus, who reveals himself to his son. Odysseus returns to his home in the form of a beggar, being insulted by suitors and servants (Books XVII-XVIII), and makes preparations for revenge. Only the old nanny Eurycleia recognizes Odysseus by the scar on his leg (book. XIX). Evil omens hold back the suitors who intend to destroy the stranger (book XX). Penelope promises her hand to the one who, bending Odysseus's bow, shoots an arrow through 12 rings. The beggar stranger alone carries out Penelope's task (Book XXI), interrupts the suitors, revealing himself to them, and executes the servants who betrayed him (Book XXII). Penelope finally recognizes Odysseus, who tells her the alcove secret known only to the two of them (book XXIII). The poem ends with scenes of the arrival of the souls of the suitors in the underworld, the meeting of Odysseus with his father Laertes, and the conclusion of peace between Odysseus and the relatives of the murdered (Book XXIV).

Composition

"ABOUT." built on very archaic material. The hero Odysseus (among the Etruscans Uthsta, lat. Ulixes) is an ancient, apparently still “pre-Greek” figure with a name somewhat Hellenized by folk etymology. The plot of a husband returning unrecognized to his homeland after long wanderings and ending up at his wife’s wedding is one of the widespread folklore plots, as is the plot of “a son going in search of his father.” Almost all episodes of Odysseus's wanderings have numerous fairy-tale parallels. The very form of the story in the first person, used for the stories about the wanderings of Odysseus, is traditional in this genre (folklore of seafarers) and is known from Egyptian literature of the beginning of the 2nd millennium (the story of the “shipwrecked man”). Comparison of stories "O." with related fairy tales, he discovers that in the Greek epic the fairy-tale material has already undergone significant processing in a rationalistic direction and many fairy-tale moments are preserved only in a rudimentary form; the fairy tale already has a tendency to turn into an everyday short story, and many moments that at previous stages of the plot belonged to the supernatural world receive a realistic-descriptive interpretation. In the stories put into the mouth of Odysseus (“apologists”), geographical observations of Ionian sailors could also be deposited, but numerous attempts to geographically localize Odysseus’s wanderings did not lead to any unambiguous and satisfactory results. The archaic nature of both the plots and the figure of Odysseus does not yet testify to the original connection between the hero and the plots, and much in “O.” may be “borrowing” from tales about other heroes, for example. from the Argonauts cycle, the popularity of which is indicated in the “O.” itself. In any case, numerous traces of previous developments of the plot remained unsmoothed out in the text of the poem.

Narration technique in "O." in general it is close to the Iliad, but the younger epic is distinguished by greater art in combining diverse material. Individual episodes are less isolated in nature and form integral groups. The “song” theory, which explained the emergence of large poems by the mechanical “stitching together” of individual “songs,” was therefore rarely applied to “O.”; Kirchhoff’s hypothesis that “O.” is much more widespread among researchers. is a reworking of several “small epics” (“Telemachy”, “Wanderings”, “Return of Odysseus”, etc.). The disadvantage of this construction is that it tears into pieces the plot of the “return of the husband,” the integrity of which is evidenced by parallel stories in the folklore of other peoples, which have a more primitive form than “O.”; a theoretically very plausible hypothesis of one or more “proto-odysseys,” i.e., poems that contained the entire plot and formed the basis of the canonical “O.”, encounters great difficulties when trying to restore the course of action of any “proto-odyssey.” The “analytical” hypothesis is opposed to the “unitary” one, which considers the poem as complete work a single author who used diverse sources; the inconsistencies and unevenness observed in the “Unitarian” stylistic processing observed in the “Odyssey” are attributed to the “author” himself, who processed ancient material into different directions in order to create a broad canvas, and due to the difficulties of combining heterogeneous material in the early stages of the epic. The ideological unity of the “O.” testifies in favor of the unitary hypothesis. And creative nature processing of the plot, but the lack of objective criteria in the available material for identifying the individual style of the Greek epic poet within the class style of the epic makes it extremely difficult to resolve the issue. Some of the “Unitarians” also support the traditional idea of ​​a single author of the Iliad and Odyssey (Homer), considering the Odyssey only a later work of Homer.

In the later fate of Homer's poems "O." played a much smaller role than the Iliad, around which ch. arr. and literary disputes took place about epic poem(see The Iliad). Unknown in the Middle Ages and influencing European literature only through Virgil’s “Aeneid” (the motif of the descent into the underworld), “O.” aroused noticeable interest in the XV-XVI centuries. Hans Sachs dramatized it in his "Wanderings of Ulysses", and since the "miraculous" was an almost obligatory integral part into the European poem, the fairy-tale-fantastic side of “O.” It was repeatedly used by poets of this time (Boiardo, Ariosto, Spencer), until the ideology of the Catholic reaction gave preference here to the Christian miraculous element (merveilleux chrétien). But generally speaking, the morally descriptive (“ethical”, in ancient terminology, in contrast to the “pathetic” “Iliad”) character of “O.” brought it closer in the literary consciousness of modern times to the novel rather than to the epic. The comparative simplicity of Homeric morals (for example, Princess Nausicaa washing clothes), the genre-idyllic interest in the commoner (the “divine” swineherd Eumaeus), etc. - these “base” elements (bassesse) made “O.” even less acceptable than the Iliad for poetics French classicism. But the “naturalness” and “innocence” of the morals depicted in “O.” aroused the admiration of theorists of the emerging bourgeois literature of the 18th century (their predecessor was Fenelon as in theoretical works, and in the moralistic novel “The Adventures of Telemachus”), and the material “O.” was widely used along with the Iliad to build the theory of bourgeois epic (Goethe, Schiller, Humboldt).

Bibliography

I. Editions of the text: NauckA., HomericaCarmina, Berlin, 1874

Ludwich A., Odyssee, Lpz., 1888-1891

Monro D. and Allen T. W., Odyssee, Oxford, 1917

Van Loieuwen, 1917

Bérard V., L'Odyssée, t. I-II, P., 1924

Schwartz E., Odyssee, Munich, 1924

Wilamovitz-Möllendorff U., Die Heimkehr des Odysseus, Berlin, 1927