Oral Stories Quick Write: Write down a story that you haven’t read but has been passed down orally through either your family, friends, or community

Add to Table of Contents: Greek Oral traditions and The Epic Notes

Greek Oral Traditions collection of stories passed down orally for hundreds of years before written performed by traveling singers/poets/bards throughout Greek islands and surrounding areas of Mediterranean Would have been evening’s entertainment for people in Greece at that time Stories would have been embellished and dramatically performed in same way we tell stories around campfire

Greek Oral Traditions Cont. Works from oral tradition share certain characteristics that made it easier for traveling poet/bard to remember them: Use of particular meter (likely dactylic hexameter in Homer’s ancient Greece) Repetitive, standard scenes (arming of warrior, battle of two champions) and phrases (epic similes and epithets) These helped poet/bard as he made it through long stories and provided sense of continuity to his listeners (same way chorus of song makes us feel a sense of closure or structure)

Homer Notes Greek poet Not much known about him for certain except his name Believed to be blind, perhaps because bard Demodocus (from Book 8) in Odyssey was also blind 7 different cities put forward claims to be his birthplace called Ionia in western coast of Asia Minor, settled by Greek colonists Composed Iliad and Odyssey sometime around 8th Century B.C.

The epic Long, narrative poem that tells about the adventures of a hero who reflects the ideals and values of a culture Often based on legends (some truth, some imagination) Portrays imaginary past (time better than one in which epic is created) Events in Iliad and Odyssey tell about things happening long before Homer’s time Iliad is older, Odyssey comes next; laid down certain patterns and set precedent for all literature that came after it Homer adds own individual embellishments to long cycle of stories he was writing down for first time

Epic Poetry Conventions Epic simile Homer develops a simile at great length and detail, going on for several lines Defined: an elaborate, more involved version of a regular simile Used for emphasis, such as to describe a character’s thoughts and feelings or magnitude of a battle between two armies

Epic Simile Example And Odysseus let the bright molten tears run down his cheeks, weeping [like] the way a wife mourns for her lord on the lost field where he has gone down fighting the day of wrath that came upon his children. At sight of the man panting and dying there, She slips down to enfold him, crying out; then feels the spears,prodding her back and shoulders, and goes bound into slavery and grief. Piteous weeping wears away her cheeks; but no more piteous that Odysseus' tears, cloaked as they were, now, from the company. In this excerpt, Odysseus is watching the performance of a bard and finds himself listening to the story of the fall of Troy and of his own part in it. What is his reaction? What two things are being compared? What does the comparison help to emphasize?

Epic poetry conventions cont. Epithet Brief, descriptive phrases that helped to characterize a particular person or thing Had right meter or number of syllables to fill out line Examples: Odysseus: “master mariner” or “old contender” Hero in Iliad: “swift-footed” Achilles Dawn: comes up “with fingertips of rose” Ocean: “winedark sea”

Many English words and word elements can be traced back to Greek. IT’S GREEK TO ME... Many English words and word elements can be traced back to Greek. Often you can guess the meaning of an unfamiliar word if you know the meaning of its parts; that is, the root and any prefixes and suffixes that are attached to it. HANDOUT DUE WEDNESDAY, 8/30. QUIZ TUESDAY, 9/5 A word root is a part of a word. It contains the core meaning of the word, but it cannot stand alone. A prefix is also a word part that cannot stand alone. It is placed at the beginning of a word to change its meaning. A suffix is a word part that is placed at the end of a word to change its meaning. English is a living language, and it is growing all the time. One way that new words come into the language is when words are borrowed from other languages. New words are also created when words or word elements, such as roots, prefixes, and suffixes, are combined in new ways.