Lamia (play)
Lamia (; grc-gre, Λάμια), in ancient Greek mythology, was a child-eating monster and, in later tradition, was regarded as a type of night-haunting spirit ( ''daemon''). In the earliest stories, Lamia was a beautiful queen of Ancient Libya who had an affair with Zeus. Upon learning this, Zeus's wife Hera robbed Lamia of her children, the offspring of her affair with Zeus, either by kidnapping or by killing them. The loss of her children drove Lamia insane, and in vengeance and despair, Lamia snatched up any children she could find and devoured them. Because of her cruel acts, her physical appearance changed to become ugly and monstrous. Zeus gave Lamia the power of prophecy and the ability to take out and reinsert her eyes, possibly because she was cursed by Hera with insomnia or because she could no longer close her eyes, so that she was forced to always obsess over her lost children. The ''lamiai'' ( grc-gre, λαμίαι) also became a type of phantom, synonymous with t ... [...More Info...]       [...Related Items...]     OR:     [Wikipedia]   [Google]   [Baidu]   |
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The Knight And The Mermaid
''The'' () is a grammatical article in English, denoting persons or things that are already or about to be mentioned, under discussion, implied or otherwise presumed familiar to listeners, readers, or speakers. It is the definite article in English. ''The'' is the most frequently used word in the English language; studies and analyses of texts have found it to account for seven percent of all printed English-language words. It is derived from gendered articles in Old English which combined in Middle English and now has a single form used with nouns of any gender. The word can be used with both singular and plural nouns, and with a noun that starts with any letter. This is different from many other languages, which have different forms of the definite article for different genders or numbers. Pronunciation In most dialects, "the" is pronounced as (with the voiced dental fricative followed by a schwa) when followed by a consonant sound, and as (homophone of the archaic pr ... [...More Info...]       [...Related Items...]     OR:     [Wikipedia]   [Google]   [Baidu]   |
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Aristophanes
Aristophanes (; grc, Ἀριστοφάνης, ; c. 446 – c. 386 BC), son of Philippus, of the deme In Ancient Greece, a deme or ( grc, δῆμος, plural: demoi, δημοι) was a suburb or a subdivision of Athens and other city-states. Demes as simple subdivisions of land in the countryside seem to have existed in the 6th century BC and ear ... Kydathenaion ( la, Cydathenaeum), was a comedy, comic playwright or comedy-writer of Classical Athens, ancient Athens and a poet of Ancient Greek comedy, Old Attic Comedy. Eleven of his forty plays survive virtually complete. These provide the most valuable examples of a genre of comic drama known as Ancient Greek comedy, Old Comedy and are used to define it, along with fragments from dozens of lost plays by Aristophanes and his contemporaries. Also known as "The Father of Comedy" and "the Prince of Ancient Comedy", Aristophanes has been said to recreate the life of ancient Athens more convincingly than any other author. His pow ... [...More Info...]       [...Related Items...]     OR:     [Wikipedia]   [Google]   [Baidu]   |
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Shapeshifting
In mythology, folklore and speculative fiction, shape-shifting is the ability to physically transform oneself through an inherently superhuman ability, divine intervention, demonic manipulation, Magic (paranormal), sorcery, Incantation, spells or having inherited the ability. The idea of shape-shifting is in the oldest forms of totemism and shamanism, as well as the oldest existent literature and Epic poetry, epic poems such as the ''Epic of Gilgamesh'' and the ''Iliad''. The concept remains a common literary device in modern fantasy, children's literature and popular culture. Folklore and mythology Popular shape-shifting creatures in folklore are werewolf, werewolves and vampires (mostly of European, Canadians, Canadian, and Native Americans in the United States, Native American/early American origin), Ichchadhari naag and naagin (shape-shifting cobra), ichchadhari naag and ichchadhari naagin (shape-shifting cobras) of India, the huli jing of East Asia (including the ... [...More Info...]       [...Related Items...]     OR:     [Wikipedia]   [Google]   [Baidu]   |
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Pontus (region)
Pontus or Pontos (; el, Πόντος, translit=Póntos, "Sea") is a region on the southern coast of the Black Sea, located in the modern-day eastern Black Sea Region of Turkey. The name was applied to the coastal region and its mountainous hinterland (rising to the Pontic Alps in the east) by the Greeks who colonized the area in the Archaic period and derived from the Greek name of the Black Sea: ''(')'', "Hospitable Sea", or simply ''Pontos'' () as early as the Aeschylean ''Persians'' (472 BC) and Herodotus' ''Histories'' (circa 440 BC). Having originally no specific name, the region east of the river Halys was spoken of as the country ''()'', lit. "on the uxinosPontos", and hence it acquired the name of Pontus, which is first found in Xenophon's ''Anabasis (Xenophon), Anabasis'' (). The extent of the region varied through the ages but generally extended from the borders of Colchis (modern western Georgia (country), Georgia) until well into Paphlagonia in the west, with ... [...More Info...]       [...Related Items...]     OR:     [Wikipedia]   [Google]   [Baidu]   |
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Nicomachean Ethics
The ''Nicomachean Ethics'' (; ; grc, Ἠθικὰ Νικομάχεια, ) is Aristotle's best-known work on ethics, the science of the good for human life, which is the goal or end at which all our actions aim. (I§2) The aim of the inquiry is political science and the master art of politics. (I§1) It consists of ten books or scrolls, understood to be based on notes from his lectures at the Lyceum. The title is often assumed to refer to his son Nicomachus, to whom the work was dedicated or who may have edited it (although his young age makes this less likely). Alternatively, the work may have been dedicated to his father, who was also called Nicomachus. The work plays a pre-eminent role in explaining Aristotelian ethics. The theme of the work is a Socratic question previously explored in the works of Plato, Aristotle's friend and teacher, about how men should best live. In his ''Metaphysics'', Aristotle describes how Socrates, the friend and teacher of Plato, had turned philos ... [...More Info...]       [...Related Items...]     OR:     [Wikipedia]   [Google]   [Baidu]   |
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Aristotle
Aristotle (; grc-gre, Ἀριστοτέλης ''Aristotélēs'', ; 384–322 BC) was a Greek philosopher and polymath during the Classical period in Ancient Greece. Taught by Plato, he was the founder of the Peripatetic school of philosophy within the Lyceum and the wider Aristotelian tradition. His writings cover many subjects including physics, biology, zoology, metaphysics, logic, ethics, aesthetics, poetry, theatre, music, rhetoric, psychology, linguistics, economics, politics, meteorology, geology, and government. Aristotle provided a complex synthesis of the various philosophies existing prior to him. It was above all from his teachings that the West inherited its intellectual lexicon, as well as problems and methods of inquiry. As a result, his philosophy has exerted a unique influence on almost every form of knowledge in the West and it continues to be a subject of contemporary philosophical discussion. Little is known about his life. Aristotle was born in th ... [...More Info...]       [...Related Items...]     OR:     [Wikipedia]   [Google]   [Baidu]   |
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Heraclitus Paradoxographus
Heraclitus Paradoxographus ( el, Ἡράκλειτος) is the author of the lesser-known of two works known as ''Peri Apiston'' (''On Unbelievable Tales''). Palaephatus was the author of a better-known work of paradoxography with the same title, mentioned more often in antiquity. Heraclitus' ''Peri Apiston'' treats Greek mythology in the rationalizing manner that appealed to Christian apologists, in pithy language and thought. The text survives in a single 13th-century manuscript in the Vatican Library; it has minor imperfections, and it may well be a late Byzantine epitome of a longer work. Nothing is known of the author, although he appears to belong to the late 1st or 2nd century AD. He is unlikely to be any of the other men of the name of Heraclitus known from antiquity. The 12th-century Byzantine scholar and commentator on Homer, Eustathius of Thessalonica, is the only scholar who mentions him, as "the Heraclitus who proposes to render unbelievable tales believable".Noted by J ... [...More Info...]       [...Related Items...]     OR:     [Wikipedia]   [Google]   [Baidu]   |
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Bibliotheca Historica
''Bibliotheca historica'' ( grc, Βιβλιοθήκη Ἱστορική, ) is a work of universal history by Diodorus Siculus. It consisted of forty books, which were divided into three sections. The first six books are geographical in theme, and describe the history and culture of Egypt (book I), of Mesopotamia, India, Scythia, and Arabia (II), of North Africa (III), and of Greece and Europe (IV–VI). In the next section (books VII–XVII), he recounts human history starting with the Trojan War, down to the death of Alexander the Great. The last section (books XVII to the end) concern the historical events from the successors of Alexander down to either 60 BC or the beginning of Caesar's Gallic War in 59 BC. (The end has been lost, so it is unclear whether Diodorus reached the beginning of the Gallic War, as he promised at the beginning of his work, or, as evidence suggests, old and tired from his labors he stopped short at 60 BC.) He selected the name "Bibliotheca" in acknow ... [...More Info...]       [...Related Items...]     OR:     [Wikipedia]   [Google]   [Baidu]   |
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Diodorus Siculus
Diodorus Siculus, or Diodorus of Sicily ( grc-gre, Διόδωρος ; 1st century BC), was an ancient Greek historian. He is known for writing the monumental universal history ''Bibliotheca historica'', in forty books, fifteen of which survive intact, between 60 and 30 BC. The history is arranged in three parts. The first covers mythic history up to the destruction of Troy, arranged geographically, describing regions around the world from Egypt, India and Arabia to Europe. The second covers the time from the Trojan War to the death of Alexander the Great. The third covers the period to about 60 BC. ''Bibliotheca'', meaning 'library', acknowledges that he was drawing on the work of many other authors. Life According to his own work, he was born in Agyrium in Sicily (now called Agira). With one exception, antiquity affords no further information about his life and doings beyond his written works. Only Jerome, in his ''Chronicon'' under the "year of Abraham 1968" (49 BC), w ... [...More Info...]       [...Related Items...]     OR:     [Wikipedia]   [Google]   [Baidu]   |
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Duris Of Samos
Duris of Samos (or Douris) ( grc-gre, Δοῦρις ὁ Σάμιος; BCafter 281BC) was a Greek historian and was at some period tyrant of Samos. Duris was the author of a narrative history of events in Greece and Macedonia from 371BC to 281BC, which has been lost. Other works included a life of Agathocles of Syracuse and a number of treatises on literary and artistic subjects. Personal and political life Duris claimed to be a descendant of Alcibiades. He had a son, Scaeus, who won the boys' boxing at the Olympian Games "while the Samians were in exile"; that is, before 324BC. From 352 to 324 Samos was occupied by Athenian cleruchs who had expelled the native Samians. Duris therefore may well have been born at some date close to 350BC, and, since his main historical work ended with the death of Lysimachus in 281 BC, must have died at an unknown date after that. Some modern sources assume that the Olympic victor Scaeus must have been the father, not the son, of the historian D ... [...More Info...]       [...Related Items...]     OR:     [Wikipedia]   [Google]   [Baidu]   |
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Myth
Myth is a folklore genre consisting of Narrative, narratives that play a fundamental role in a society, such as foundational tales or Origin myth, origin myths. Since "myth" is widely used to imply that a story is not Objectivity (philosophy), objectively true, the identification of a narrative as a myth can be highly controversial. Many adherents of religions view their own religions' stories as truth and so object to their characterization as myth, the way they see the stories of other religions. As such, some scholars label all religious narratives "myths" for practical reasons, such as to avoid depreciating any one tradition because cultures interpret each other differently relative to one another. Other scholars avoid using the term "myth" altogether and instead use different terms like "sacred history", "holy story", or simply "history" to avoid placing pejorative overtones on any sacred narrative. Myths are often endorsed by secular and religious authorities and are close ... [...More Info...]       [...Related Items...]     OR:     [Wikipedia]   [Google]   [Baidu]   |
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Encyclopedia Of Indo-European Culture
An encyclopedia (American English) or encyclopædia (British English) is a reference work or compendium providing summaries of knowledge either general or special to a particular field or discipline. Encyclopedias are divided into articles or entries that are arranged alphabetically by article name or by thematic categories, or else are hyperlinked and searchable. Encyclopedia entries are longer and more detailed than those in most dictionaries. Generally speaking, encyclopedia articles focus on ''factual information'' concerning the subject named in the article's title; this is unlike dictionary entries, which focus on linguistic information about words, such as their etymology, meaning, pronunciation, use, and grammatical forms.Béjoint, Henri (2000)''Modern Lexicography'', pp. 30–31. Oxford University Press. Encyclopedias have existed for around 2,000 years and have evolved considerably during that time as regards language (written in a major international or a vernacu ... [...More Info...]       [...Related Items...]     OR:     [Wikipedia]   [Google]   [Baidu]   |