How Do Odysseus and Athena Plan to Make Things Right Again in Ithaca?

Mythological son of Odysseus

Telemachus departing from Nestor, painting by Henry Howard (1769–1847)

Telemachus ( tə-LEM-ə-kəs; Ancient Greek: Τηλέμαχος, romanized: Tēlemakhos , lit.'far-fighter'), in Greek mythology, is the son of Odysseus and Penelope, who is a central grapheme in Homer's Odyssey. When Telemachus reached manhood, he visited Pylos and Sparta in search of his wandering male parent. On his return to Ithaca, he establish that Odysseus had reached home before him.

The kickoff 4 books of the Odyssey focus on Telemachus'south journeys in search of news about his father, who has notwithstanding to return home from the Trojan War, and are traditionally given the championship the Telemachy.^[i]

Etymology [edit]

Telemachus's name in Greek means "far from battle", or perhaps "fighting from afar", as a bowman does.^[ii]

Odyssey [edit]

Slaughter of the suitors by Odysseus and Telemachus, Campanian red-effigy bell-krater, ca. 330 BC, Louvre (CA 7124)

In Homer's Odyssey, Telemachus, under the instructions of Athena (who accompanies him during the quest), spends the first four books trying to gain cognition of his father, Odysseus, who left for Troy when Telemachus was still an infant. At the starting time of Telemachus' journey, Odysseus had been absent-minded from his home at Ithaca for twenty years due to the Trojan State of war and the intervention of Poseidon. During his absence, Odysseus' house has been occupied by hordes of suitors seeking the manus of Penelope.^[three] Telemachus commencement visits Nestor and is well received by the quondam man who regales him with stories of his father'south glory. Telemachus then departs with Nestor's son Peisistratus,^[4] who accompanies him to the halls of Menelaus and his wife Helen. Whilst there, Telemachus is once again treated as an honored guest equally Menelaus and Helen tell complementary withal contradictory stories of his father'southward exploits at Troy.^[5]

Telemachus focuses on his father'southward return to Ithaca in Volume 15. He visits Eumaeus, the swineherd, who happens to exist hosting a bearded Odysseus. After Odysseus reveals himself to Telemachus due to Athena'due south communication, the ii men plan the downfall of the suitors. Telemachus then returns to the palace to keep an eye on the suitors and to await his begetter as the beggar.^[six]

When Penelope challenges the suitors to cord Odysseus' bow and shoot an arrow through the handle-holes of twelve axe heads, Telemachus is the first to attempt the task. He would have completed the task, nearly stringing the bow on his fourth attempt; even so, Odysseus subtly stops him earlier he tin can end his try. Following the suitors' failure at this task, Odysseus reveals himself and he and Telemachus bring swift and bloody death to the suitors.^[7]

Telegony [edit]

Statue depicting Telemachus

The Telegony was a short two-volume epic poem recounting the life and death of Odysseus after the events of the Odyssey. In this mythological postscript, Odysseus is accidentally killed past Telegonus, his unknown son by the goddess Circe. After Odysseus' decease, Telemachus returns to Aeaea with Telegonus and Penelope, and there marries Circe.

From the Dictionary of Greek and Roman Biography and Mythology:

Telemachus: The son of Odysseus and Penelope (Hom. Od. i. 216). He was still an infant at the fourth dimension when his father went to Troy, and in his absenteeism of virtually twenty years he grew up to manhood. After the gods in council had determined that Odysseus should return habitation from the isle of Ogygia, Athena, assuming the advent of Mentes, king of the Taphians, went to Ithaca, and advised Telemachus to eject the troublesome suitors of his female parent from his house, and to go to Pylos and Sparta, to assemble information concerning his father. Telemachus followed the advice, but the suitors refused to quit his house; and Athena, in the form of Mentes, accompanied Telemachus to Pylos. There they were hospitably received by Nestor, who likewise sent his ain son to conduct Telemachus to Sparta. Menelaus again kindly received him, and communicated to him the prophecy of Proteus apropos Odysseus (Hom. Od. i.–iv.).

From Sparta Telemachus returned home; and on his arrival there, he found his father, with the swineherd Eumaeus. But as Athena had metamorphosed him into a beggar, Telemachus did not recognise his father until the latter disclosed to him who he was. Father and son now agreed to punish the suitors; and when they were slain or dispersed, Telemachus accompanied his male parent to the aged Laertes. (Hom. Od. xv.–xxiv.; comp. Odysseus.)

In the mail service-Homeric traditions, nosotros read that Palamedes, when endeavouring to persuade Odysseus to join the Greeks against Troy, and the latter feigned idiocy, placed the babe Telemachus before the plough with which Odysseus was ploughing (Hygin. Fab. 95; Serv. ad Aen. ii. 81; Tzetz. advert Lycoph. 384; Aelian, V. H. xiii. 12.).

According to some accounts, Telemachus became the father of Perseptolis either past Polycaste, the girl of Nestor, or by Nausicaa, the daughter of Alcinous (Eustath. ad Hom. p. 1796; Dict. Cret. six. half dozen.). Others chronicle that he was induced by Athena to ally Circe, and became by her the father of Latinus (Hygin. Fab. 127; comp. Telegonus), or that he married Cassiphone, a daughter of Circe, simply in a quarrel with his mother-in-police he slew her, for which in his turn he was killed past Cassiphone (Tzetz. advert Lycoph. 808.). He is too said to have had a daughter called Roma, who married Aeneas (Serv. ad Aen. i. 273.).

One business relationship states that Odysseus, in event of a prophecy that his son was unsafe to him, sent him away from Ithaca. Servius (ad Aen. ten. 167) makes Telemachus the founder of the town of Clusium in Etruria.^[viii]

[edit]

In Contest of Homer and Hesiod, information technology is alleged that the Roman Emperor Hadrian asked the Delphic Oracle nigh Homer's birthplace and parentage. The Oracle replied that Homer came from Ithaca and that Telemachus was his father by Epicasta, daughter of Nestor.^{[9] [10]}

According to Aristotle and Dictys of Crete, Telemachus married Nausicaa, Rex Alcinous' daughter, and fathered a son named Perseptolis or Ptoliporthus.^[11]

Other appearances [edit]

Telemachus is the subject of François Fénelon'southward The Adventures of Telemachus, Son of Ulysses (1699), a scathing assault on the monarchy of France.

Telemachus was the subject of numerous operas throughout the eighteenth century, virtually based on Fénelon's version.^[12] Among the most famous of these operas were André Key Destouches's Télémaque (1714), Alessandro Scarlatti'south Telemaco (1718), Gluck'south Telemaco, ossia L'isola di Circe (1765), Giuseppe Gazzaniga's Gli errori di Telemaco (1776), Jean-François Le Sueur's Télémaque dans l'île de Calypso ou Le triomphe de la sagesse (1796), Simon Mayr's Telemaco nell'isola di Calipso (1797), and Fernando Sor'southward Telemaco nell'isola di Calipso (1797).

Telemachus is 1 of the chief characters in Ulysses, a 1705 play by Nicholas Rowe.

Telemachus is featured in the 1833 poem (published in 1842) "Ulysses" past Alfred, Lord Tennyson.

In the 1922 novel Ulysses past James Joyce, Stephen Dedalus is generally regarded as corresponding to Telemachus.

"Telemachus" is the championship of Volume Three of Thomas Wolfe's autobiographical novel Of Time and the River (1935).

Joseph Brodsky published the verse form "Odysseus to Telemachus" in 1972.

Telemachus is a frequent character in the poesy of Louise Glück.^[13]

Telemachus was the proper name of Carole King'southward cat and is pictured on the encompass of her album Tapestry.^[fourteen]

Telemachus appears every bit the son of Ulysses in the 1981 French-Japanese animated tv set serial Ulysses 31.

Telemachus is a major character in Madeline Miller'southward novel Circe. He somewhen marries and has children with Circe.

Telemachus is the championship of a poem past American poet Ocean Vuong.^[15]

"Telemachus Sneezed" is the name of a fictional novel in The Illuminatus! Trilogy. and is a parody of the championship of Ayn Rand's novel, Atlas Shrugged.

Telemachus is the pretend name father "Bandit Heeler" uses in the "Hospital" and "Tickle Crabs" episode of the blithe series "Bluey".

Notes [edit]

1. ^ The Odyssey. George Herbert Palmer, 1921, prose.
2. ^ Brann, p. 277.
3. ^ Homer, Odyssey Books I–Ii
4. ^ Homer Odyssey Volume 3
5. ^ Homer Odyssey Book 4
6. ^ Homer, Odyssey Books XV–XVI
7. ^ Homer, Odyssey Books XXI–XXII
8. ^ Schmitz, Leonhard (1870). "Telemachus". In Smith, William (ed.). Dictionary of Greek and Roman Biography and Mythology. Vol. Iii. p. 989.
9. ^ "Hesiod, The Homeric Hymns, and Homerica" (Contest of Homer and Hesiod)
10. ^ Parke, Herbert William (1967). Greek Oracles. pp. 136–137 citing the Certamen, 12.
11. ^ Allan, Arlene (2010). "The Authorization of Telemachus". Classical Antiquity. xix (ane): fourteen–30. doi:ten.1525/CA.2014.33.1.31.
12. ^ Monson, Dale E. (2001). "Telemachus". In Sadie, Stanley; Tyrrell, John (eds.). The New Grove Dictionary of Music and Musicians (2d ed.). London: Macmillan. ‎
13. ^ Meadowlands (1996), summary
14. ^ Brown, Helen (7 March 2016). "Carole Rex interview: 'I didn't have the courage to write songs initially'". The Telegraph.
15. ^ "Archived copy". Archived from the original on 2018-09-05. Retrieved 2018-09-05 . {{cite spider web}}: CS1 maint: archived re-create every bit title (link)

References [edit]

• Brann, Eva, Homeric Moments: Clues to Delight in Reading the Odyssey and the Iliad, Paul Dry Books, 2002. ISBN 9781589882805.
• Homer, The Odyssey with an English Translation by A.T. Murray, PH.D. in ii volumes. Cambridge, MA., Harvard Academy Press; London, William Heinemann, Ltd. 1919. Online version at the Perseus Digital Library.

External links [edit]

Wikimedia Commons has media related to Telemachus.

• Telemachus – Τηλέμαχος, Carlos Parada at the Greek Mythology Link

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Source: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Telemachus

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