OCR Classical Civilisation The World of the Hero (Homer) overview quiz quiz

One, either the Iliad or the Odyssey

Both the Iliad and the Odyssey in full, alongside the whole of the Aeneid as well

Neither of the Homeric epics; only Virgil's Aeneid is studied for this component

Three epics in total, namely the Iliad, the Odyssey and the Aeneid, all read in full

Nostos (homecoming), the theme that drives the Odyssey rather than the Iliad

Menis (the wrath of Achilles)

Kleos (glory), the immortal fame that a hero wins through his great deeds

Xenia (hospitality), the sacred guest-host bond central to the Odyssey

He is badly wounded by Hector in single combat and must retire from the fighting to recover

The gods order him to leave Troy and abandon the Greek expedition against the city altogether

Agamemnon dishonours him by seizing his prize Briseis

He has already won enough glory at Troy and chooses to withdraw and return home to Phthia

The embassy of Book 9

The supplication of Priam

The judgement of Paris

The death of Patroclus

Time is the public honour a hero receives now; kleos is the immortal glory that survives him

Time is the lasting glory won in song, while kleos is merely a battle prize handed out in the moment

They mean essentially the same thing, and the two Greek words can be used interchangeably

Time is something only the gods can possess, whereas kleos belongs to mortal heroes alone

Zeus refuses to fight in the battle, leaving the outcome to be decided by the other gods

Zeus weighs the fates of Hector and Achilles, and Hector's sinks

Zeus disguises himself as a mortal and enters the fighting on the walls of Troy himself

Zeus kills Hector himself with a thunderbolt rather than letting Achilles strike him down

War and peace, the alternation between the battlefield and life at home in the city

Love and death, the great rival forces that drive the action of the poem from book to book

Nostos (homecoming) and xenia (hospitality)

Fate and free will, the tension between destiny and the choices that mortals make for themselves

They both insult the gods directly to their faces and are struck down for their impiety

They both attack Telemachus and try to kill the young son of Odysseus before he can act

They both refuse to fight at Troy and are punished by the Greeks for deserting the army

They both grossly violate xenia (hospitality)

Athene

Hera

Aphrodite

Artemis

By the scar on his thigh, which the old nurse Eurycleia had earlier recognised as she washed him

By the secret of their immovable marriage bed

By his skill with the great bow, which only the true Odysseus could string and shoot through the axes

Through a sign sent by Athene, who confirms his identity to Penelope with an omen from the gods

When two rival gods compete to help the same hero on the battlefield at the same time

When a single hero has two separate reasons to keep on fighting in the war against Troy

When an event has both a divine cause and a human cause

When fate and the gods disagree about an outcome, and the will of Zeus must finally decide it

Rhyme and regular stanzas, the formal patterns that organise the verse from line to line

First-person narration throughout, with the poet telling the whole story in his own voice

Prose dialogue set between passages of verse, in the manner of much later epic poetry

Formulae, repeated epithets, type-scenes and extended similes