Odysseus's Return From the Trojan War Dated 160
srothroc writes "Scientists have used astronomical data from the Odyssey to attempt to pinpoint the time of Odysseus's return from his eponymous journey after the Trojan War. From the article: 'The scientists then searched for potential dates that satisfied all these astronomical references close to the fall of Troy, which has over the centuries been estimated to have occurred between roughly 1250 to 1115 B.C. From these 135 years, they found just one date that satisfied all the references — April 16, 1178 B.C., the same date as the proposed eclipse.""
about Atlantis - Thera/Santorini eruption (Score:3, Interesting)
It was a couple of times larger than Krakatoa/1883 (albeit smaller than Tambora/1815)
Re:Are they going to look for Atlantis next? (Score:5, Interesting)
It's possible, but it can't be the default position. Present-day oral traditions observed (and recorded) "in the wild" show that retellings of stories change drastically from generation to generation, not just from century to century. It's possible for isolated historical references to survive that kind of dilution, to be sure, and there are plenty of cases in Homer (though almost all in the Iliad); but they tend to get overwhelmed by the changes introduced by storytellers desire to (a) innovate, (b) keep their audiences in suspense, (c) cater to a specific audience (if you're a bard in an Athenian court, you're not going to tell stories that reflect badly on Theseus), and (d) several other factors which slip my mind right now but which you can read about in e.g. the anthropologist Walter Ong's book Orality and Literacy (not very up-to-date, but a popular one).
The upshot of that is that you don't scour literary texts with an agenda. As with any scientific enterprise, you keep your eyes open for out-of-the-ordinary correlations and then investigate. Solar eclipses in conjunction with a new moon are possibly enough to make it worth investigating this one, as I've admitted in a post above.
(I'd better interrupt to state for the record that it is known for certain that memorising Homer could only have become part of aristocratic Athenian education around 500 BCE at the earliest.)
Not really. The Atlantis story is one told by a late-Classical-Period author (Plato), with explicit claims that it is derived from a millennia-old tradition preserved by Egyptian texts. If anything, the Atlantis story has more extrinsic plausibility than this one!
In view of the conjunction with a new moon I'll retract some of my earlier scorn, but I'll still side with Eratosthenes when it comes to euhemerising myths. Which is really what these folks are doing: they're modern-day euhemerists [wikipedia.org].
Re:phew.. (Score:5, Interesting)
I'm not aware of any group which denies Jesus was a real person. They may not all agree on "who" he was or the meaning of his teachings, but they agree he existed.
Here are a few resources for this
http://www.carm.org/bible/extrabiblical_accounts.htm [carm.org]
>>What other "myths" could be somewhat verified in this manner?
Like the day Jesus was crucified?
"... because with Kepler's equations we can determine exactly when historical eclipses occurred. Perhaps it will not surprise you to learn that only one Passover lunar eclipse was visible from Jerusalem while Pilate was in office (30). It occurred on April 3, 33 AD, the Day of the Cross...."
http://www.bethlehemstar.net/day/day.htm [bethlehemstar.net]
The earth quakes which occurred during Jesus's Crucifixion?
http://www.bethlehemstar.net/day/day.htm [bethlehemstar.net]
"The sun will be turned to darkness and the moon to blood..." The gospels do recount that the sun was darkened on the day of the crucifixion from noon until 3 in the afternoon (29). Ancient non-Biblical sources confirm this. Phlegon Trallianus records in his history, Olympiades (41):
"In the fourth year of the 202nd Olympiad [AD 32-33], a failure of the Sun took place greater than any previously known, and night came on at the sixth hour of the day [noon], so that stars actually appeared in the sky; and a great earthquake took place in Bithynia and overthrew the greater part of Niceaea," obviously not a simple astronomical event. (42)
Or the Star of Bethlehem? A conjunction of Jupiter and the star Regulas in 2 BC which fulfills all 9 Biblical requirements of the star of Bethlehem?
http://www.bethlehemstar.net/dance/dance.htm [bethlehemstar.net]
QUOTE
1. It signified birth.
2. It signified kingship.
3. It had a connection with the Jewish nation.
4. It rose in the east, like other stars.
5. It appeared at a precise time.
6. Herod didn't know when it appeared.
7. It endured over time.
8. It was ahead of the Magi as they went south from Jerusalem to Bethlehem.
9. It stopped over Bethlehem. (Retrograde motion)
One point in contention is when Herod died. This theory depends on Herod dying in 1 BC, but most historians believe he died 4 BC. There is evidence for this theory but it isn't widely accepted. See the link for more details.
http://www.bethlehemstar.net/stage/stage.htm [bethlehemstar.net]
Re:Are they going to look for Atlantis next? (Score:5, Interesting)
There was still a lot of scepticism around until relatively recently, yes -- heck, there's still a lot even now (among historians; not so much scepticism among archaeologists). Plenty of people accepted Schliemann's discovery as the finding of Troy, mind you. But it's worth remembering that Schliemann thought Troy II was "Homeric" Troy -- it's now known that that archaeological layer is about 2000 years too early. That doesn't diminish the importance of the find, but it does show that Schliemann himself was a bit over-eager with his own agenda. The question of burden of proof can be a tricky one sometimes, though.
Question of the century -- literally. Actually it turns out that narrative poems are particularly prone to certain types of changes, because -- at least in pre-classical Greece -- they're not recited by rote. There's overwhelming evidence that early Greek epics were re-told using an enormous set of conventions (formulaic language, typical scenes, typical plot elements); so stories were driven partly by how the story is known to go, partly by the individual storyteller's creative imagination, and partly by these conventions. Basically, what we now refer to as "poetry" was for an early Greek poet "the special kind of language that you use for telling certain stories and which happens to come out in good meter almost automatically". This was one of the big discoveries of the 20th century about Homer, though a lot of people are still bewildered at the implications.
One implication, though, is that there are at least two forces at work that are actively pressuring changes in each re-telling of a story. One is the poet's creative imagination. Another is the very conventions of the poetic language. Suppose Odysseus meets a young woman on his way to someone's house; well, it so happens that that's an element in one kind of conventional story episode. That puts a tiny amount of temptation in the storyteller's way to put in the next conventional element, which happens to be encountering a dog or dogs at the entrance of the house. The pressure may be minuscule, but if you've got centuries of iterations ...
If you're interested in finding out more I recommend Albert Lord's book The Singer of Tales. A good fictional spin on the subject is a novel by the Albanian writer Ismail Kadare called The File on H. They're both good reads.
(Before I sign off I'd better correct something I put in my earlier post -- memorising Homer could have been part of Athenian education as early as 550 BCE.)
Re:phew.. (Score:5, Interesting)
Actually, IIRC, there are Hittite records of a town called "steep Wilusa", which was supposed to be in western Anatolia, sounding strangely similar to "steep Ilios" from Homer's Iliad. On top of that, one recorded ruler of Wilusa had a name suprisingly similar to "Priam", and another one called "Alaksandu", which "by coincidence" nicely matches "Alexander", another name of Paris.
Strange coincidences, huh? I should probably read more of what professor Calvert Watkins has to say on this. But even now it seems that there might be some factual truth in Homer's work, even though the historical core will never lessen the "legend" part of the tale. And of course, we will probably never know whether Achilles really looked like Brad Pitt.
Re:phew.. (Score:3, Interesting)
The bible actually states that his birth wasn't December 25th. It was durring the feast of tabernacles which makes if around September 22-29th. That date is actually a date that early Christians took in his name because Christianity was outlawed at the time and they could hide the celebrations in with other festivities of the time. About 300 or so years later, some pope made it the official date because of a number of things namely the traditional hiding of his birth. Some people claim that because Luke says that Elizabeth was 6 month pregnant when Gabriel visited Mary, it would have been during Chanukkah which took place in December meaning that the conception created Jesus's soul which is also tied to reasoning behind the Christian beliefs against abortion.
Anyways, This is already explained. The Christian religion doesn't celebrate Jesus the man but yahawe emanuel (god with us) or Jesus Christ, god incarnated.
It is actually an interesting read. Although it does require a read of the bible and the ability to carry over information that you actually understand from one book to another.
Re:phew.. (Score:3, Interesting)
Most of the assumptions about there being three wisemen are due to the carol We Three Kings.