From this perspective, the decisions of Zeus in both cases reflected his views on what is right for humanity, which he was attempting to instill in people by punishing them (Jones 3). Moreover, the consequences of the actions of mortals always implied physical suffering as a method to teach them a lesson. In both stories, “the battle of wits” between people and gods had the central place and, therefore, it was the reason why the conflicts occurred (Mueller 1). The mortality of the main characters of the myths is opposed to the power of gods, and it defines the latter’s advantageous position in matters of justice. Thus, the suffering of the king was more severe than the destiny of Prometheus. He had to “thrust the rock uphill toward the brink” over and over again as it kept coming back to him (Homer 684). According to Homer, Sisyphus was doomed to wrestle with “his monstrous boulder with both arms working” (Homer 682). In this way, the significance of his role in life positively correlated with the gravity of his punishment. The king was known for cheating death several times, and his torture, in contrast to Prometheus, was eternal (Homer 681). This character was the king of Corinth, and the similarity between the two men was added by the fact that he was also punished by Zeus (Homer 640).
The second figure from Greek mythology is Sisyphus, and his crime was similar to the one of Prometheus. Consequently, he was freed by Heracles and forgiven by the gods. According to Hesiod, Zeus chained the man to a cliff and set an eagle upon him, which “fed on his immortal liver, which grew the same amount in the course of the day” (525-526). He was punished by Zeus for his failed attempt to trick the gods and steal forbidden fire in order to give it to people (Hesiod 524). The latter was a wicked person who once saw Zeus with a smoking bolt and designed a plan which led to gruesome consequences for Prometheus (Hesiod 517). He was one of the four sons of an Oceanid nymph, Clymene, and the Titan Iapetos, who went to the gods guided by his brother Menoitios (Hesiod 509-510). The first character under consideration is Prometheus from “Theogony,” written by Hesiod. Notably, the originator of the wave, also dropped some superb new jokes of their own.Learn More Hesiod’s “Theogony” and Prometheus Some jokes flew extremely close to the sun. (For reference, in a deal with Hades, Orpheus played his lyre to pull his love Eurydice from the underworld on the condition he didn't look back at her - folks, he did the damn thing).įor the past 24 hours, the stream of nerdy classical jokes has been as neverending as having one of your internal organs pulverised daily by a bird of prey. The account dropped this great Orpheus and Eurydice joke in July 2020, which seems to be at the core of the recent wave of quote retweets. 'Assassin's Creed Odyssey' review: a stunning, mythic adventure of Olympic proportions The trend seems to have stemmed from an account called Classical Studies Memes for Hellenistic Teens, which has been posting memes related to Classical Studies (Ancient Greece, Rome, Egypt etc.) for three years. This classic tale and the rest of the legendary gang all get their moment in - or way too close to - the sun in this wonderfully nerdy online trend, including the likes of Prometheus (titan who created humans, then stole fire and gave it to said humans, punished for eternity by a Zeus-y eagle who pecks out his liver daily, fun!), Odysseus (king of Ithaca, hero of Homer's The Odyssey, takes ages to get home). In case you slept through the class or Stephen Fry's audiobook of Mythos (how could you!?), Sisyphus was a king of Corinth whose cunning deception of Death led to an eternal daily punishment of rolling a great stone up a hill in the afterlife, only to have it roll down again every time. Making puns about Sisyphus is an everlasting task, set to be rolled out again and again for eternity.įolks on Twitter have been turning to Greek mythology and epic tales of late for some truly Olympic puns, mainly about the ill-fated Sisyphus, but also featuring every other goddess, god, titan, hero, and doomed human you could think of from the legends and stories of ancient Greece.