Ancient Greek Hero - Final Exam Review

It's All Greek to Me (Key Terms)

100

The word noos means this.

What is ‘mind, thinking, perception’?

200

The word memnēmai means this.

What is: “I have total recall”?

300

This word can be described as any of the following words: 

Aberration, Derangement, Veering off-course, Disaster

What is atē?

400

This word can mean ‘tomb of a hero’ OR ‘sign, signal’.

What is sēma?

500

This is the difference between tīmē and kleos.

Tīmē: Honor

• Honor paid to a superhuman force by way of cult. Can be physical (e.g. items given in rites), but not always. 

• Can be received by gods and cult heroes. 

• Discussed within the context of tragedy. 

Kleos: Glory/fame 

• Also: ‘a song about glory/fame’; ‘that which is heard’.

• Associated with epic (Iliad, Odyssey)

Homeric Questions(Iliad and Odyssey)

100

Name the two women/war-prizes that caused strife among the Achaeans at the beginning of the Iliad and the role of each.

Who are: Khrysēis and Brisēis

200

Name the two locations and kings that Telemachus visits on his ‘voyage of discovery’ at the beginning of the Odyssey.

Who are: Nestor in Pylos, Menelaos in Sparta?

300

This is the literary technique frequently used in epic poetry (especially oral poetry) in which certain scenes or stories can be told in great detail or very briefly summarized.

What is EXPANSION and COMPRESSION?

400

Name the two terms we discussed for ‘anger’ in the Iliad and the difference between the two.  

What are: 

Mēnis: ‘cosmic’ anger, timeless 

Kholos: mortal anger

500

Odysseus speaks with many psukhai (souls) when in the Underworld in Rhapsody 11; there are three familiar people, followed by what is known as the “Catalogue of Women/Heroines.” Name one of the first three psukhai he speaks to (e.g. not a member of the catalogue of women).

Who are: Elpenor, Teiresias, Antikleia?

Drama Queens (Tragedy)

100

According to the Oresteia, the Furies later became known by the following name.

What is/are the Eumenides.

200

This is how Oedipus dies in the tragedy Oedipus at Colonus.

What is, "That’s for Theseus to know and us to… never find out"?

300

This krater depicts a scene from one of the tragedies that we read. Name the tragedy title and the playwright. 

What is Hippolytus (Euripides)?

400

In Oedipus Tyrannos, who does Oedipus send to the Oracle of Delphi to determine the reason for the plague that has befallen Thebes?

Who is his uncle/brother(in-law) Creon?

500

Describe the two meanings of the term telos (i.e., the ‘normal’ meaning and the ‘special’ meaning), and how the term is relevant to the tragedy Hippolytus.

"Normal" Meaning: end (of the line, of life)

"Ritual Meaning": "coming full circle, rounding out, fulfillment, completion” OR “successfully passing through an ordeal” (initiation / transition from one phase of the human experience into another)

Hippolytus' mistake is that he thinks about 'telos' in the 'linear' fashion. 

Whose Line is it Anyway?(Quote Identification)

100

Identify the author of this text:

So for that reason, and to take a sacred voyage [theōria], Solon went to visit Amasis in Egypt and then to Croesus in Sardis. When he got there, Croesus entertained him in the palace, and on the third or fourth day Croesus told his servants [therapontes] to show Solon around his treasures. After Solon had seen and thought over how great and fortunate [olbios] they were, Croesus found the opportunity to say, “Athenian guest [xenos], we have heard much about your wisdom [sophiā] and your wandering [planē], how you in your love of wise things [philosopheîn] have traveled all over the world for the sake of a sacred journey [theōriā], so now I desire to ask you who is the most olbios of all men you have ever seen.” Croesus asked this question expecting the answer to be himself, but Solon, instead of flattering him, told it as it was and said, “O King, it is Tellos the Athenian.”

Who is Herodotus?

200

Name the author of this text: 

Hēsukhiā! You whose disposition is kindly to philoi, you Daughter of Dikē, you ultimate greatness of every polis, you who possess the supreme keys to councils of state and to wars! Receive on behalf of Aristomenes the tīmē of the victory at the Pythian Games. For you are the one who understands both how to give pleasure and how to make someone feel that pleasure—with an unerring sense of timing.

Who is Pindar (Pythian 8)?

300

Name the author of the text: 

And they [= the Golden Generation of humankind] are superhumans [daimones]. They exist because of the Will of Zeus. They are the good, the earthbound [epi-khthonioi], the guardians of mortal humans.  They guard acts of justice [dikē] and they guard against wretched acts of evil. Enveloped in mist, they roam everywhere throughout the earth. They are givers of prosperity. And they had this as a privilege [geras], a kingly one [basilēion]. Then a second Generation, a much worse one, a later one, the Silver, was made by the gods who abide in their Olympian homes. They were like the Golden one neither in their nature nor in their power of perception [noēma]. As a boy, each one was raised for a hundred years by dear mother; |each one was playing around, quite inept [nēpios], at home.

Who is Hesiod (Works and Days)?

400

To whom is the following speech directed? 

My lady, who among mortals throughout the limitless stretches of earth |would dare to quarrel [neikeîn] against you with words? For truly your glory [kleos] reaches the wide firmament of the sky itself —⁠like the glory of some faultless king [basileus], who, godlike as he is, and ruling over a population that is multitudinous and vigorous, upholds acts of good dikē [= eu-dikiai], while the dark earth produces wheat and barley, the trees are loaded with fruit, the ewes steadily bring forth lambs, and the sea abounds with fish, by reason of the good directions he gives, and his people are meritorious [aretân] under his rule.

Who is Penelope? (Odyssey 19)

500

Name the speaker of these lines, and the title of the tragedy in which they are spoken: 

Schooled in misery, I know many purification rituals, and I know when it is dikē to speak and similarly when to be silent; and in this case, I have been ordered to speak by a sophos teacher. For the blood slumbers and fades from my hand—thepollution [miasma] of matricide is washed away; while the blood was still fresh, it wasdriven away at the hearth of the god Phoebus by expiatory sacrifices of swine. It would be a long story to tell from the beginning, how many people I visited with no harm from the meeting. As time grows old, it purifies all things alike. So now with a pure mouth, in a manner that is euphēmos, I invoke Athena, lady of the land, to come to my aid. Without the spear, she will win me, my land, and the good faith of the Argive people, as faithful allies in dikē and for all time. Whether in the Libyan regions of the world or near the waters of Triton, her native stream, whether she is in action or at rest, aiding those who are philoi to her, or whether, like a bold marshal, she is surveying the Phlegraean plain, oh, let her come—she hears even from far away because she is a goddess—and may she be my deliverer from these troubles!

Who is Orestes, in Aeschylus’ Eumenides?

'Myth'ellaneous (Grab Bag/Etc.)

100

This is the Greek term for a 'victory ode'

What is an epinikion (plural: epinikia)?

200

Around the 5th century BCE, these people typically made up the Chorus in performances of tragedies.

Who are young men from the town ("junior citizens")/nonprofessional actors?

300

Socrates must defend himself against these charges in Plato’s Apology.

What is 1) corrupting the youth and 2) not recognizing the gods?

400

Describe the metaphor often used to discuss dikē.

What is a flourishing garden? (Odyssey 24.340-345)

500

Name one of the ‘key terms’ (not already mentioned in the ‘It’s All Greek to Me’ category) that has a ‘normal’ meaning and a ‘special’ meaning (i.e., the word means something different to a normal person v. a hero/initiate) AND describe both of the meanings

[Several possible answers]