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Astyanassa
According to late Greek sources on classical mythology, Astyanassa ( grc, Ἀστυάνασσα) was Helen of Troy, Helen of Troy's maid. The 10th century scholar Patriarch Photios I of Constantinople, Photius, citing Ptolemy Chennus, mentions the story that Aphrodite lent her magical embroidered band (''kestos himas'') to Helen, to ensure that Paris (mythology), Paris would fall in love with her, and that Astyanassa stole it. The Byzantine dictionary ''Suda'' adds the legend that Astyanassa was the first erotic author (in a tradition that included two other women writers, Philaenis and Elephantis): she wrote a book about sexual positions.Suda, Suida, ''Suda Encyclopedia'' s.v. ''Astyanassa'' Notes [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Kestos Himas
The magical Girdle of Aphrodite or Venus (Ancient Greek, Greek: wikt:ἱμάς, ἱμάς, ''himás'': 'strap, thong'; wikt:κεστός, κεστός, ''kestós'': 'girdle, belt'; Latin: wikt:cingulum#Latin, ''cingulum'' wikt:Veneri, ''Veneri'', wikt:cestus#Latin, ''cestus'' wikt:Veneris, ''Veneris''), variously interpreted as girdle, Belt (clothing), belt, breast-band, and otherwise, is one of the erotic accessories of Aphrodite, the Greek goddess of love and beauty. According to Homer, the girdle was imbued with the power to inspire the passion of desire in mortals and immortals alike. Hera, in her role as the goddess of marriage, sometimes borrowed it from Aphrodite to mitigate lovers' quarrels, to instigate the bridal contests of suitors, and on at least one occasion to manipulate her husband Zeus.Atsma 2017, n.p. Sources Homer, ''Iliad'' 14.159–221 The earliest mention of the girdle is in Book 14 of the ''Iliad'', when its magical power is sought by Hera, who wants ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Helen Of Troy
Helen of Troy, Helen, Helena, (Ancient Greek: Ἑλένη ''Helénē'', ) also known as beautiful Helen, Helen of Argos, or Helen of Sparta, was a figure in Greek mythology said to have been the most beautiful woman in the world. She was believed to have been the daughter of Zeus and Leda, and was the sister of Clytemnestra, Castor and Pollux, Philonoe, Phoebe and Timandra. She was married to King Menelaus of Sparta "who became by her the father of Hermione, and, according to others, of Nicostratus also." The usual tradition is that after the goddess Aphrodite promised her to Paris in the Judgement of Paris, she was seduced by him and carried off to Troy. This resulted in the Trojan War when the Achaeans set out to reclaim her. Another ancient tradition, told by Stesichorus, tells of how "not she, but her wraith only, had passed to Troy, while she was borne by the Gods to the land of Egypt, and there remained until the day when her lord Menelaus, turning aside on the homewar ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Philaenis
Philaenis of Samos was supposedly the author of a famous ancient sex manual. According to a surviving fragment of a treatise which claims to have been written by her, she was from Samos, and her father was called Ocymenes. However, many modern scholars consider "Philaenis" a fictional character whose ''persona'' may have been adopted by a variety of erotic writers. Two satirical Greek epigrams from the ''Palatine Anthology'' by the poets Aeschrion of Samos and Dioscorides purport to defend Philaenis's reputation by insisting that she did not write the treatise attributed to her. Aeschrion instead insists that the treatise was written by the Athenian sophist Polycrates. The reputed writings of Philaenis were well known throughout classical antiquity and scholars believe that they may have influenced Ovid's ''Ars Amatoria''. In later times, Philaenis was remembered for her reputation of licentiousness. A fictional character named Philaenis appears in the ''Epigrams'' of the Roman po ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Troy
Troy ( el, Τροία and Latin: Troia, Hittite language, Hittite: 𒋫𒊒𒄿𒊭 ''Truwiša'') or Ilion ( el, Ίλιον and Latin: Ilium, Hittite language, Hittite: 𒃾𒇻𒊭 ''Wiluša'') was an ancient city located at Hisarlik in present-day Turkey, south-west of Çanakkale and about miles east of the Aegean Sea. It is known as the setting for the Greek mythology, Greek myth of the Trojan War. In Ancient Greek literature, Troy is portrayed as a powerful kingdom of the Greek Heroic Age, Heroic Age, a mythic era when monsters roamed the earth and gods interacted directly with humans. The city was said to have ruled the Troad until the Trojan War led to its complete destruction at the hands of the Greeks. The story of its destruction was one of the cornerstones of Greek mythology and literature, featuring prominently in the ''Iliad'' and the ''Odyssey'', and referenced in numerous other poems and plays. Its legacy played a large role in Greek society, with many prominent ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Maid
A maid, or housemaid or maidservant, is a female domestic worker. In the Victorian era domestic service was the second largest category of employment in England and Wales, after agricultural work. In developed Western nations, full-time maids are now only found in the wealthiest households. In other parts of the world, maids remain common in urban middle-class households. "Maid" in Middle English meant an unmarried woman, especially a young one, or specifically a virgin. These meanings lived on in English until recent times (and are still familiar from literature and folk music), alongside the sense of the word as a type of servant. Description In the contemporary Western world, comparatively few households can afford live-in domestic help, usually relying on cleaners, employed directly or through an agency (Maid service). Today a single maid may be the only domestic worker that upper-middle class households employ, as was historically the case. In less developed nations, v ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Patriarch Photios I Of Constantinople
Photios I ( el, Φώτιος, ''Phōtios''; c. 810/820 – 6 February 893), also spelled PhotiusFr. Justin Taylor, essay "Canon Law in the Age of the Fathers" (published in Jordan Hite, T.O.R., & Daniel J. Ward, O.S.B., "Readings, Cases, Materials in Canon Law: A Textbook for Ministerial Students, Revised Edition" ollegeville, MN: The Liturgical Press, 1990, p. 61 (), was the ecumenical patriarch of Constantinople from 858 to 867 and from 877 to 886. He is recognized in the Eastern Orthodox Church as Saint Photios the Great. Photios is widely regarded as the most powerful and influential church leader of Constantinople subsequent to John Chrysostom's archbishopric around the turn of the fifth century. He is also viewed as the most important intellectual of his time – "the leading light of the ninth-century renaissance". He was a central figure in both the conversion of the Slavs to Christianity and the Photian schism, and is considered " e great systematic compiler of the Eas ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Ptolemy Chennus
Ptolemy Chennus or Chennos ("quail") ( grc-koi, Πτολεμαῖος Χέννος ''Ptolemaios Chennos''), was an Alexandrine grammarian during the reigns of Trajan and Hadrian. According to the ''Suda'', he was the author of an historical drama named ''Sphinx'', of an epic, ''Anthomeros'', in 24 books (both lost) and a ''Strange History''. The last is probably identical with the ''New History'' in six books ascribed by Photius to Ptolemy Hephaestion, of which a summary outline has been preserved in Photius' ''Biblioteca'' (cod. 190), who observed sarcastically of its credulous author that he found it "a work really useful for those who undertake to attempt erudition in history," for "it abounds in extraordinary and badly imagined information." It was dedicated to the author's lady, Tertulla, and contained a medley of all sorts of legends and fables belonging to both the mythological and historical periods. An identification with Ptolemy-el-Garib has been suggested, but this is n ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Aphrodite
Aphrodite ( ; grc-gre, Ἀφροδίτη, Aphrodítē; , , ) is an ancient Greek goddess associated with love, lust, beauty, pleasure, passion, and procreation. She was syncretized with the Roman goddess . Aphrodite's major symbols include myrtles, roses, doves, sparrows, and swans. The cult of Aphrodite was largely derived from that of the Phoenician goddess Astarte, a cognate of the East Semitic goddess Ishtar, whose cult was based on the Sumerian cult of Inanna. Aphrodite's main cult centers were Cythera, Cyprus, Corinth, and Athens. Her main festival was the Aphrodisia, which was celebrated annually in midsummer. In Laconia, Aphrodite was worshipped as a warrior goddess. She was also the patron goddess of prostitutes, an association which led early scholars to propose the concept of "sacred prostitution" in Greco-Roman culture, an idea which is now generally seen as erroneous. In Hesiod's ''Theogony'', Aphrodite is born off the coast of Cythera from the foam (, ) ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Paris (mythology)
Paris ( grc, Πάρις), also known as Alexander (, ''Aléxandros''), the son of King Priam and Queen Hecuba of Troy, is a mythological nobleman that appears in a number of Greek legends. Of these appearances, probably the best known was the elopement with Helen, queen of Sparta, this being one of the immediate causes of the Trojan War. Later in the war, he fatally wounds Achilles in the heel with an arrow as foretold by Achilles's mother, Thetis. The name ''Paris'' is probably of Luwian origin, and comparable to '' Pari-zitis'', attested as a Hittite scribe's name. The name Paris is etymologically unrelated to the name of the French city of Paris, which derives its name from a Gaulish tribe called the Parisii. Description Paris was described by the chronicler Malalas in his account of the ''Chronography'' as " well-grown, sturdy, white, good nose, good eyes, black pupils, black hair, incipient beard, long-faced, heavy eyebrows, big mouth, charming, eloquent, agile, ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Bibliotheca (Photius)
The ''Bibliotheca'' ( el, Βιβλιοθήκη) or ''Myriobiblos'' (Μυριόβιβλος, "Ten Thousand Books") was a ninth-century work of Byzantine Patriarch of Constantinople Photius, dedicated to his brother and composed of 279 reviews of books which he had read. Overview ''Bibliotheca'' was not meant to be used as a reference work, but was widely used as such in the 9th century, and is one of the first Byzantine works that could be called an encyclopedia. Reynolds and Wilson call it "a fascinating production, in which Photius shows himself the inventor of the book-review," and say its "280 sections... vary in length from a single sentence to several pages". The works he notes are mainly Christian and pagan authors from the 5th century BC to his own time in the 9th century AD. Almost half the books mentioned no longer survive. These would have disappeared in the Sack of Constantinople by the Fourth Crusade in 1204, in the final Fall of Constantinople to the Ottomans in 145 ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Suda
The ''Suda'' or ''Souda'' (; grc-x-medieval, Σοῦδα, Soûda; la, Suidae Lexicon) is a large 10th-century Byzantine encyclopedia of the ancient Mediterranean world, formerly attributed to an author called Soudas (Σούδας) or Souidas (Σουίδας). It is an encyclopedic lexicon, written in Greek, with 30,000 entries, many drawing from ancient sources that have since been lost, and often derived from medieval Christian compilers. Title The derivation is probably from the Byzantine Greek word ''souda'', meaning "fortress" or "stronghold", with the alternate name, ''Suidas'', stemming from an error made by Eustathius, who mistook the title for the author's name. Paul Maas once ironized by suggesting that the title may be connected to the Latin verb ''suda'', the second-person singular imperative of ''sudāre'', meaning "to sweat", but Franz Dölger traced its origins back to Byzantine military lexicon (σοῦδα, "ditch, trench", then "fortress"). Silvio Giuse ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Elephantis
Elephantis ( grc, Ἐλεφαντίς) (fl. late 1st century BC) was a Greek poet and physician apparently renowned in the classical world as the author of a notorious sex manual. Due to the popularity of courtesans taking animal names in classical times, it is likely Elephantis is two or more persons of the same name. None of her works have survived, though they are referenced in other ancient texts. Works According to Suetonius in The Twelve Caesars, the Roman Emperor Tiberius took a complete set of her works with him when he retreated to his resort on Capri. One of the poems in the ''Priapeia'' refers to her books: :''Obscenas rigido deo tabellasdicans ex Elephantidos libellisdat donum Lalage rogatque, temptes,si pictas opus edat ad figuras.'' ("Lalage dedicates a votive offering to the God of the erect penis, bringing shameless pictures from the books of Elephantis, and begs him to try and imitate with her the variety of intercourse of the figures in the illustrations.")Tr ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
