Once upon a time, the Olympians took over the control of mankind in order to rule the world as their gods and goddesses. People obeyed them without any questions and followed them like a herd of cattle returning home at sunset. Life went on, and the gods ruled everything the way they desired. There were rules for the mortals to follow that didn’t apply to the immortals. The immortals were immune to any consequences from broken rules and misconduct. The gods persecuted many mortals and nymphs and fathered children half god and half human. These children did not earn any reverence in Olympus as children of gods because of their inadequate human blood, but they were not accepted in the society of mortals as they were seen as the spies of the gods. One day, exhausted from not being adherent of neither the Olympians nor the mortals, Alleseus, son of Zeus and mortal mother Javina starts his journey to Olmypus along with his other half-mortal friends to seek answers from his father, Zeus. Their arrival angered Hera and she commanded for their demise at once. To survive Hera’s wrath, Alleseus called upon his father Zeus for help. Zeus did not want mortal blood to befoul Olympus and refused to help Alleseus. Betrayal from his own father gave him the answer he has always been looking for. Anger and disgust for his father built up in him. He vowed to his best friend Arehemseus, son of Ares that no matter what comes upon them, they will always find their way to each other and bring about the destruction of Olympus. Zeus, upon hearing this, gets scared of being overthrown by one of his children, remembering the curse of Kronos where Zeus will be overthrown by one of his children just like he dethroned Kronos. Thus, he plans to kill Alleseus and his friends by creating a thunderstorm. A friendly sea nymph, travels across the ocean to warn Alleseus and his friends about the storm and advises them to build a ship. Devastated by the news, the group of friends start building their ship. On the last day of their construction, they hear the siren; a storm is on its way. They start to sail without any destination. Their primary goal was to survive from Zeus’s vexation. Then, Zeus sends a thunderstorm; one unlike what mankind had ever seen, to separate Alleseus and his friends and curses them all to never be able to communicate with each other again. Despite all their effort, the ship breaks and one by one slowly everyone is lost in the vast ocean. Alleseus holds onto Arehemseus tight, one promise to be kept until his last breath. Then a massive wave sweeps them away and Alleseus wakes up on a stranded island. Alleseus started looking for help with no sense of direction. He waits for the night to come but the sun has no intention to set. Alleseus realizes that he is in the equator of the Earth from the long days and very short nights. The scorching sun burns his skin, making him look like a terra-cotta vessel. He tries to wash off the colour, but it seems like it is engraved on his skin, never changing back to the colour it was before. Arehemeus, on the other hand, wakes up on a white, cold ground. His body, colder and whiter than ever. He looks around, no man to be seen but cows with dense, furry coats. He sharpens a rock, and kills one of the furry cows. If it weren’t for his father Ares’ traits, he would be dead from the cold or the starvation, whichever would take him first. He notices his hands; almost as white as the ground. Regardless of his efforts, his skin remained as pale as the ground below his feet.
Analysis:
During the times when the Greek myths took place, there were very significant differences between the motrals and the immortals. The gods and goddess used their superiority to rule and to oppress people into doing what they wanted them to do. By following these myths, many events and truths of the recent world can be explained through mythology. The difference between people, their various races, the genders, and their social classes can be explained through the creation of my myth. The influence of the Greek gods into dividing up the entire human race into different individual races surfaces throughout my myth.
In my myth, I introduced a few new characters. I named the son of Zeus, Alleseus after the word Aloysius which means “famous warrior” in old German. As Zeus is perceived to be the strongest god, the name that means warrior best describes Alleseus’s personality. On the other hand, Arnhem is a city in the Netherlands which is one of the sites of World War II battles. The name Arehemeus is derived from the name of the city as it has a connotation with war, which Ares is the god of. Javina, the mortal mother’s name means joyful as her relevance to the Greek myth is superfluous, but joyful in Alleseus’s life. Alleseus and Arehemeus’s friendship builds over the bond of the identity of their fathers. In the Percy Jackson series, Ares constantly tries to cause trouble for Percy. Percy is named after Perseus who is the son of Zeus and when thinking in my myth, Perseus and Alleseus would be siblings and for that reason Ares’s son should have hatred for Alleseus by birth. However, Alleseus and Arehemeus being friends shows the difference between Arehemeus’s character in contrast to his father’s. He didn’t treat the other half-mortals like his father did because he knew the struggle of being one himself.
The Greek Poet Hesiod mentions the differences in people in his poem Work and Days when he describes men working from different ages (Homer, Work and Days 23). He mentions the differences between these men, in how they lived, and were treated in different eras. This is the beginning of the differences being created between humans. People were treated according to their rank in the society, with improved lifestyles with the elevation of the social hierarchy. In my myth, it is very clear from the beginning that there are social triumphs to be met for both mortals and immortals (Homer, Work and Days 23). However, the mortals are always to be obedient to the gods because of their supernatural powers and immortality. In my myth, other than focusing on the different races being created, there is a big focus on the social hierarchy between the mortals and the gods. In my myth, the half-mortals are not accepted in Olympus as they are not gods and have mortal blood in them. However, they are different from the mortals as well. In the Percy Jackson series, Percy and his fellow half-gods all suffered from ADHD which differentiated them from the others and they were bullied for this (Riordan, Percy Jackson). I used this to show how they were different from the mortals which did not allow them to be a part of the mortal world either.
In Hesiod’s Work and Days there is also mention of how one can be punished if they are disobedient to the gods. When Prometheus rebels against Zeus by giving humanity fire, Zeus promises to punish both Prometheus and humanity (Homer, Work and Days 23). He sends Pandora to punish Prometheus and when Pandora opens the box, ignoring all the warnings, evil is unleashed, punishing all of humanity with it (Homer, Work and Days 23). In my myth, Zeus carries out something similar when Alleseus and his friends try to rebel against Zeus. Zeus sends a thunderstorm that not only damages the ship that Alleseus and his friends made, but with a thunderstorm also gives the people a natural disaster that the humans may not recover from. The gods’ wrath continues to showcase the drastic effects not only on an individual but to humanity with different aspects of racial differences. In my myth, the thunderstorm separates Alleseus from his friends and they are cursed by Zeus that they will never be able to communicate with each other again. When Alleseus is stranded on the island, away from all his friends, he tries to communicate with the islanders living there. However, the islanders do not speak his language and so he has to slowly adapt to their language to survive on the island. While adopting their language, Alleseus forgets his own language and how he used to speak to his friends. This incorporates with Zeus’ curse because even if Alleseus meets his friend Arehemeus or anyone else from the group that planned to go to Olympus they all would have forgotten the language that they originally spoke as they would all be speaking a different language, since they had to adapt to the different areas that the thunderstorm sent them. This will actuate Zeus’ curse, creating the differences of languages and in essence, racial differences. In my myth, I used the environmental science behind the differences of colour to show how different half-mortals were landed on different parts of the world, and the heat from the sun had different levels of intensity in each territory. The heat from the sun in the equator is the highest and that is why people in those regions were darker in skin colour as they were exposed to the sun for longer and the UV rays had the most intensity. On the other hand, Arehemeus landed at a place where there was only snow, which caused him to get pale and have no colour in his skin. In Homer’s work on Iliad, the glory of the Trojan war is delightfully exhibited at the cost of colonizing one's kingdom and discriminating against different races, creating racial difference. Taking over one’s land was glorified and was portrayed to be a hero’s act (Homer, Iliad 21.470). Commotions and oppression against the minorities created racial differences in different parts of the world and the discrimination among races were also encouraged (Homer, Iliad 21.470). Throughout the Homeric Hymns and the Theogony, different stories about the lives of the gods and goddess were talked about. In my myth, many of these stories were used as well as taken ideas from to compile different aspects of the myth and to portray it in a scenario with many greek myths. Throughout the Homeric Hymns, there were continuous displays of the strength of Zeus and Hera and many other gods (Homer, Homeric Hymns 12). The Homeric Hymns showed the anger of Hera and how she has the power to destroy whatever she wants (Homer, Homeric Hymns 12). In the Theogony, Zeus’s strength and angre is seen and how one can be punished if they disobey Zeus is also very clear (Hesiod, Theogony). In the myth of Heracles and his labours, Hera is angered by Heracles and tries to destroy Heracles by driving him crazy and causing him to kill his own family (Seneca, Hercules Furens). To repent for his deeds, he is ordered to do the twelve humanly impossible tasks which he successfully finishes (Seneca,Hercules Furens) . In my myth, Alleseus is faced with a similar fate as Heracles and is faced with the wrath that Hera brings upon him due to her jealousy. To survive from both the strong gods and goddess of Olympus, Alleseus tries to use his wit to come up with a solution and build a ship. However, he cannot escape the god's punishment and his curse and gets separated from his friends. Their separation causes them to go to different parts of the world where no one understands them. This leads them to adapt to the people’s lifestyle and language, forgetting their own, creating a racial difference and starting different races across the world.
In conclusion, the myth that I have created with many similarities to original Greek myths shows how the racial difference started. Alleseus and his friends were separated to different parts of the world where they adapted to the environment, the language, and the culture, starting different races across the world.
Bibliography:
Hesiod, Work and Days.
Homer, Iliad.
Seneca, Hercules Furens 406.
Aeschylus, Eumenides.
Strabo, Geography.
Rick Riordan, Percy Jackson and the Lightning Thief.