Deities and divine councils

Entity 131 Person 8 Site 6 Study 24 Ancient text 3

• Original photograph

  Traditionally attributed author

  Homer

  The name to which Greek tradition attributes the Iliad and Odyssey.

  Roman portrait bust representing Homer, second century CE; British Museum 1805,0703.85. An artistic likeness made long after the epics, rather than a contemporary portrait

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• Original photograph

  Literary figure

  Telemachus

  Odysseus’s son in the Odyssey, whose position at home is affected by his father’s absence and family crisis.

  Telemachus returning to Ithaca in a plaster relief by Antonio Canova, late eighteenth century; Museo Correr, Venice. A modern work revisiting the ancient story, rather than an artifact from Homer’s era

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• Original photograph

  Literary figure

  Aegisthus

  Human figure in Greek narrative whose fate Zeus recalls at the Odyssey’s opening.

  Death of Aegisthus on a Greek vase of about 320 BCE; Louvre K 320, Wind Group. The artwork depicts the revenge story, rather than the Odyssey’s first assembly itself

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• Original photograph

  Literary figure

  Achilles

  Important hero of the Iliad, whose anger and participation shape the poem’s warfare.

  Achilles fighting Memnon on a vase of about 330–320 BCE; National Museum of Antiquities, Leiden, AMM 1. The scene belongs to broader Trojan War traditions, rather than the Iliad itself

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• Original photograph

  Literary figure

  Odysseus

  Greek hero whose attempt to return home after the Trojan War is followed in the Odyssey.

  Odysseus disguised as a beggar before Penelope, on a terracotta plaque of about 450 BCE; Louvre CA 860. An ancient representation of epic characters, rather than portraits of historically established people

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• Illustration

  Person

  Zoroaster / Zarathustra

  Figure to whom tradition attributes the Gathas; lifetime and location are uncertain.

  Modern diagram of textual layers, not a Zoroaster portrait or Avesta manuscript. No single composition year for each layer; surviving-copy age is not an idea’s age

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• Original photograph

  Person

  Tutankhamun

  Eighteenth-dynasty king, formerly Tutankhaten, associated with renewed royal support for traditional cults.

  Tutankhamun’s head and remains of Amun’s hand on the crown, limestone, Dynasty 18, The Met 50.6. Fragment of a statue group, not a complete Amun statue; context for renewed royal relations with Amun. Uncropped display copy

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• Original photograph

  Person

  Akhenaten

  Egyptian eighteenth-dynasty king, formerly Amenhotep IV, who reorganized royal religion around Aten and founded Akhetaten.

  Akhenaten offering a duck, limestone relief with paint, Dynasty 18, The Met 1985.328.2. Aten rays and hands survive; the complete disk is not preserved here. The museum gives a probable Amarna origin. Original preserved; display copy uncropped

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