A man is tied to the mast of his ship, begging the crew to cut him loose. Every man has wax in their ears, and no one hears his pleas, not because they are unreasonable, but because they were never meant to.
This is the sort of scene that sticks in the memory, and it comes from a story that has been told roughly three thousand years, the Odyssey. This happens because the story captures something about the universe that people want to hear, and to understand what that is, it helps to look at what came before. This is a story about an empty void, a god who eats his children, a ten year war over a woman, and a sea god who has had three thousand years to hold a grudge. This is the whole chain of events, in order, before you see any of the later adaptations.
Greek Myth Was Never Bedtime Stories
It helps to look at what these stories were before they became bedtime stories. These were the religious, scientific, historical, and moral teachings of the ancient greeks. They told about why the harvests failed and why the harvests came. They told about why one family had three children, and the one next door had none. This was the framework for understanding the world, and it was built into the stories.
There was no single official version of these stories, either. They were passed from mouth to mouth for hundreds of years before being written down, and there are many different versions. Two names are often brought up when discussing these stories, however. Hesiod, writing around the seventh century BC, wrote the Theogony, or the creation story of the Greek gods. Homer, a slightly mysterious figure, is responsible for the Iliad and the Odyssey. There is some debate as to whether he actually existed, or if he was a collective pseudonym for a group of writers, but either way, the second poem is the one that we are most interested in.
Before Gods, There Was Only Void
Before the gods, there was only the empty void. Not chaos, but an empty space with nothing in it. From this void, there came into existence the first two gods, Gaia the Earth, and Uranus the sky, who joined together to make the universe as we know it.
Gaia and Uranus created the first children, the twelve titans, as well as some other children who were less desirable, so Uranus pushed them back into the Earth, where they remained until Gaia convinced her son Cronus to cut off his father's testicles with a sickle made of stone. Cronus obeyed his mother, and he became the new king of the gods.
The Tyrant Who Swallowed His Own Children
Cronus was not much better than his father, however, and in his rule he repeated the same tyranny. Cronus and his sister Rhea began to have children, the gods who would later become the Olympians, but when Cronus learned of this, he swallowed each of them whole when they were born. Rhea, his sister and wife, eventually brought him a stone wrapped in cloth, which he swallowed thinking it to be his child, and when the sixth child came to birth, she was not stopped. The child was given to Gaia to raise in secret, and the child's name was Zeus.
Zeus grew to be an adult, and then tricked his father into spitting out the children he had swallowed, who all came out of his stomach as fully grown adults. The six of them then began their war against Cronus and the old gods, and it was a long and difficult fight.
This war, the Titanomachy, was fought for ten years, until Zeus travelled to the deepest parts of the world and released the children Uranus had pushed into the Earth, who eagerly joined the fight. With their help, the Olympians were able to win the war, and the old gods were cast down to the lowest parts of the world. The new gods then split the world up between themselves, with Zeus taking the sky, Poseidon taking the sea, and Hades taking the underworld.
The ten-year war between Cronus's Titans and Zeus's Olympians, the Titanomachy, ended with Zeus and his siblings ruling the sky, sea, and underworld.
Keep in mind that it was Poseidon who got the sea, because that is where the next part of the story begins.
Gods With Very Human Issues
Zeus ruled as king and enforcer of law, and while he did this poorly, he was still much better than his father or grandfather had been. He spent much of his time being unfaithful to his wife Hera, who was also his sister, which caused plenty of issues for everyone, but at least the other gods were allowed to have their own lives. Poseidon was the god of the sea, and he had a short temper and a long memory for insults.
Athena, the goddess of wisdom and strategy, was born fully grown and armored from her father's head, and she valued brains over brawn, and she would be the one to help Odysseus the most throughout his travels. Aphrodite was the goddess of love and sexuality, and she was cruel and fickle. Hermes was the messenger of the gods, and he was clever and fast, and he often helped mortals when it suited him. What makes these gods interesting is that they are much like humans, and they often make the same mistakes that humans do. They hold grudges, help their friends, and are often surprisingly petty. They do not think of themselves as gods, and they do not act like gods, and the only reason they are gods is because they have the power to enforce their will on others.
Kleos, Hubris, and Xenia
There are three concepts that are deeply important to the Greek understanding of the world, and which shape the actions of nearly all mortals in these stories. Kleos is glory, and it is the reason why many warriors fight, because there is nothing waiting for them when they die, and the only way to live on in the memories of others is to earn yourself kleos.
Hubris and Nemesis are related, but not exactly the same. Hubris is the feeling of being better than anyone else, and Nemesis is the force that brings punishment upon those who feel this way. In other words, if you feel that you are better than the gods, Nemesis will make sure that you suffer for it.
Xenia is the most important concept of all, however, and it is the idea that is most important to the Odyssey. It is the code that makes the world function, and it is the reason why no one would think of stealing from another without first offering them food and shelter, and why the gods themselves are so often angry when mortals do not follow this code. It is the reason why Zeus watches over the world, and why he will punish anyone who does not hold to this code. This code will be the reason why so many people are punished in this story, and it will be the thread that ties together all of the events that happen after.
One Golden Apple and One Bad Decision
The Trojan War, which will eventually consume Odysseus and be the catalyst for his journey, begins with a simple act of spite.
Eris, the goddess of discord, was not invited to the wedding, and in revenge, she left behind a golden apple, inscribed with the words 'for the fairest'. Hera, Aphrodite, and Athena all wanted the apple, but none of them were willing to admit it, and the argument that ensued could have been enough to destroy Olympus.
The argument was brought before Paris, a Trojan prince who was pasturing his flocks when the goddesses arrived, and each of them promised him something different if he chose their side. Hera promised him political power, Athena promised him military might, but Aphrodite promised him the love of the most beautiful woman in the world, and Paris chose Aphrodite.
The Guest Who Stole His Host's Wife
No one seemed to think about the problem with this decision, because no one seemed to think that Helen of Sparta was anything other than a prize. Aphrodite did not seem to think that this was an issue either, because Paris was welcomed as a guest into the palace, and he returned to Sparta with Helen as his prize. This was a clear violation of Xenia, the ancient code of hospitality, and it is the reason why the Trojan War began.
Menelaus, Helen's husband, called upon all of the kings who had sworn to protect him to come to his aid, and they did, with the exception of Odysseus, who was trying very hard not to go.
The King Who Pretended to be Mad
Odysseus, king of the small and rocky island of Ithaca, did not want to go to Troy. He had heard from the seers that if he went, it would take twenty years for him to return, but he could not refuse outright, because he was bound by an old oath to do so, so he pretended to be mad. He plowed his fields with animals of different species and sowed salt into the furrows, so that no harvest might come up to greet him when he returned, but he was caught and forced to go anyway.
The war dragged on for ten years, and it was not won through strength, but through the one thing that Odysseus had in abundance, his mind. He thought of the one weapon that the Greeks did not yet have, the one that would allow them to finally take the city, and he created it himself. He built a great horse, large enough to hold the Greeks inside, and then gave it as a gift to the city, so that it might be taken inside and the city walls be opened to his fellow soldiers. It worked, and Troy fell after a decade of bloodshed.
Homer's description of Odysseus is one of a man who has many turns, and it is this cleverness, this ability to think rather than to act, that wins him the war and that will win him his way back home as well.
Odysseus's wooden horse, the trick that finally ended a ten-year siege and brought down the city of Troy.
The Cyclops and the Man Who Was Not Nobody
Troy was destroyed, and most of the kings who had fought there returned to their homes, but Odysseus did not return, and it was because of one man, the Cyclops known as Polyphemus.
Odysseus and his men find themselves trapped in the cave of Polyphemus, who begins to eat them, one by one, until Odysseus manages to trick the giant into leaving them alive by telling him that his name is Nobody. He drugs the giant and blinds him while he sleeps, and then manages to escape with his men, hiding beneath the bellies of the giant's sheep as they leave the cave. When Polyphemus cries out that Nobody has stolen his sight, no one comes to his aid, because, as he said, nobody has stolen his sight.
When the men are safely away from the cave, Odysseus calls out to Polyphemus, telling him that his real name is Odysseus of Ithaca, but he is too late, because the giant has already realized what has happened. Polyphemus calls upon his father Poseidon to curse Odysseus, and now the sea god has a personal reason to make sure that the man never returns home.
Winds, a Sorceress, and a Crew of Troublemakers
From there, Odysseus's travels continue to be plagued by trouble. Aeolus, the god of winds, gives him a bag containing all of the winds, so that the sea can no longer stop him, but the crew opens the bag while Odysseus sleeps, and they are blown back to where they started. On another island, the sorceress Circe turns half of the men into pigs, but Odysseus, with the help of Hermes, manages to convince her to turn them back. Before he leaves, she tells him that he must make a journey to the world's edge to speak with the dead, and that is what he does next.
The Dead and What They Said
At the edge of the world, he speaks with the dead and receives prophecy from Tiresias, who tells him what he must know to get home. He learns that his mother died of grief while waiting for him to return from Troy, and he learns it in the land of the dead, because he did not know that she had died at all. He speaks with Achilles, the greatest warrior to have ever lived, who tells him that he would have rather been an ordinary man, living an unremarkable life, than to have died young and left behind his fame. He speaks with Agamemnon, the king who led the Greek army to Troy, whose ghost warns him that no one should trust their home to return, because he himself had been betrayed and murdered when he arrived there.
It is this warning that leads to the most famous part of the story, the part about the Sirens.
The Sirens and the Man Tied to the Mast
The Sirens were creatures whose songs were so beautiful that sailors would crash their ships into the rocks to hear them, but Odysseus and his men survive this encounter because Odysseus has thought ahead. He has told his men to plug their ears with wax, and has tied himself to the mast of the ship so that he might hear the song and yet not be able to act on it. He is safe from the Sirens' music because his men have protected him, and he is able to tell the story afterwards because he lived to see the end.
A man tied to the mast of a ship, begging his crew to cut him loose while something beautiful tries to kill him. This is the sort of scene that has stayed in the memory for three thousand years, and it is only one part of a much longer story.
Odysseus has his own crew bind him to the mast so he can hear the Sirens' song without being able to steer his ship onto the rocks.
The Last of the Men
Odysseus's men are the last to die, because they are the last to have been promised something greater. They break their oath to Odysseus and slaughter the cattle of Helios, the sun god, while he sleeps, and Zeus strikes them all down with a bolt of lightning as they sail away. Every man dies in the storm, and Odysseus is left alone, but he survives, washed up on an island where the goddess Calypso keeps him for seven years, telling him that she will give him immortality if he agrees to stay with her.
Odysseus refuses, because he would rather live as a mortal, and he is allowed to go, because the gods have decided that he has suffered enough. He sails the last stretch of his journey alone, with no men to die with him.
A Palace Full of Men Who Had Forgiven Him
Ithaca was waiting for him when he arrived, but it was not the Ithaca that he had left. Over the course of twenty years, more than a hundred men had taken up residence in his palace, deciding that he must be dead, and living off of his wealth while demanding that Penelope choose a new husband to inherit his land.
Athena helps him, as she often does, by turning him into an old man, so that he might see what has happened before he reveals himself. He sees the good xenia, the hospitality that the servants have given to an old beggar, and the bad xenia, the hospitality that has been given to his palace's unwelcome guests.
Penelope's Loom
Penelope had not been idle while she waited for Odysseus to return either, and she had used the same cleverness that had helped her husband survive so many ordeals. She had told the suitors that she would choose a new husband when she finished weaving a shroud for her father's funeral, but every night, she unraveled the work she had done, until it was finally discovered.
The Bow and the Twelve Axes
When the time came for the suitors to leave, she set one final task before them, one that only Odysseus would be able to complete. The bow that he had once used to hunt with, and the twelve axes that had once been his prizes, would determine whether or not any of them would inherit his palace. Not one of the suitors was able to string the bow, but the beggar was able to do so, and he killed them all with ease.
The Bed That Could Not Be Moved
Even after that, Penelope does not recognize him, because twenty years had passed since he had last seen her, and deception had been the theme of his life. She tells him that she will leave their marriage bed and move it to another room, but he stops her, telling her that it would be impossible, for it was made around a living tree, and it could not be moved. Only then does she believe that he is truly her husband, and only then does she allow him to take back his palace.
Odysseus proves his identity by describing the marriage bed he carved from a living olive tree, the one detail only the real Odysseus could know.
Why the Odyssey Was Written
Agamemnon's ghost had warned him that no one should trust their home to return them, and Penelope is the living proof of this warning. Two kings, two long and terrible wars, and two women who waited for their men to return, but only one of them was rewarded for her patience. It was not because she was more clever or more deserving, but because she was every bit as clever as the man she had waited for, and she had made him prove himself before she allowed him to take back his home.
