Myths as Propaganda of the Oppressors

I’ve decided to unleash my knowledge of Bronze Age into my blog (rather than save it for my friend Melissa’s ear.) I’m going to go through the Bronze cultures I’ve investigated, beginning with the Pre-Hellenistic Greeks centering on Crete (because you probably know them better), then expanded to the Luwians and the Hittites, the inhabitants of modern Turkey.

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Greek myths baffle us! One minute Zeus is eating his first wife whole to gain her intelligence, the next he’s gettin’ it on as a swan or bull or starting a war with an apple. But we can’t look at myths outside of their time and place and context.

As enlightened as the great Plato and Diogenes were, Athens was an incredibly oppressive place as a woman. As brutal as the aggressive Spartans were, their wives managed their estates, held land rights, could leave the house and exercised in short skirts. Some speculate that Helen gladly hopped the boat for Troy because she came from a Spartan culture and was married to an Athenian lord. Additionally, all that knowledge and wisdom we associate with Ancient Greece may not have existed if Pythagoras did not spend decades wandering the world collecting wisdom.

AND THAT was centuries after the bronze age collapsed. SO, who were these earlier people? The Mycenaeans attacked and destroyed ancient Crete. The Mycenaeans attacked Troy (Wilusa) or the Luwians (Turkey’s West Coast). Some evidence shows they may have teamed up and attacked other coastal cities all the way to Egypt, where they were called “the sea peoples”.

Which means, if anything, they were conquerors. And we all know what conquerors do, they rewrite history.

So, let’s look at some of these myths as propaganda of the oppressor.

But first.

Let’s go back to pre-Hellenistic times. The Bronze Age.

Nature can be horrific. It can cause you drought and plague and famine. It can give you a great harvest or destroy your entire village. Your very lives depend on the whims of nature, and you have no control over it.

So you need to way to communicate with it… Can I have a little rain here? Hey mountain spring, can you give me a little more water? Hey storm clouds, we’ve had enough rain. Any more and the river’s going to run right through my house.

So, to contend with that, every mountain, every island, every spring were transformed into a deity. In times of need, you could offer the deity more so that she’d help you out. In times of plenty, you could thank her for the harvest you relied upon each year to make it through the winter.

And you know what?

Perhaps that actually worked, as quantum physics seems to prove. Hey photon, can you be a wave? Yes! How about the next photon, can you act like a particle? Absolutely! “Oh hey gnarly wind that can blow the super fire into our valley, can you just be mellow for a week or two”, prayed one hundred thousand evacuated minds… (I digress.)

So every mountain, every spring, every river, island had a goddess associated with it, naturally. Men couldn’t create life. Women did, as did the mountain soil and the forest springs. At every harvest, each community paid tribute to their springs in a grand ceremony involving some wonderful story about how the spring came to be, or invited their people to live there, or how the spring saved their village at disastrous time, or the spring’s relationship with their storm god.

And then, the invaders come. Perhaps they were cousins of the distant past. Perhaps they were from the warmer lands or the colder lands or the lands of the sea. Either way, they came and took over.

And what is the easiest way for their gods to be superior to yours? We weave them into the myth. Our Storm God Zusi fornicated your spring and produced this king (who happens to be your current king’s ancestor)! Because, what’s a better show of power than making your goddess my god’s consort.

Or maybe they didn’t conquer you. Perhaps they brought you super useful innovative pottery or glass beads or tasty saffron to enliven your boring meals. (Aren’t they so cool! Dude look at their bronze swords!) Perhaps some of these sailors settled among you. So, to emulate or impress outsiders that are bigger and technologically more advanced than you, you weave them into your myths, you make room for their gods.

So this harvest or spring festival, when you’re people gather together as you have for decades to do the work together then celebrate, and you tell the story of your spring goddess and the history of your people to thank and appease your gods, you find freakin’ Zeus has replaced your Storm God who brings the rain! Maybe the story’s the same and the names just different. Maybe there’s a whole other story being played out before you, a show of power for the recent attack that you lost. Either way, WTF!

(Or perhaps centuries later, the Hellenized Greeks Poets just changed the names of your gods to tell a story their audience would understand, unifying stories of different city cultures across the span of the sea. That’s why they don’t make sense.)

So, whether Poseidon romantically entices your mountain priestess into the sea or outright rapes her depends on the relation of the city to the oppressor. If Zusi (Luwian Thunder God) rapped your mountain spring, it’s probably because the city’s people said “HELL NO!” to their invasion.

So, perhaps we should rethink those cuddly little Greek myths and seriously ask why did Zeus eat his first wife Metis (who he met on Crete)?