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I'd hesitate to cut out so much from this article w/o putting it up for some kind of discussion. But I think that four paragraphs from the turn of the century Britannica:
--- all of this stuff is more Aryan race mythology from the turn of the century. My understanding is that just about all anthropologists and archaeologists no longer believe in a race of superhuman, patriarchal conquerors who destroyed a peaceful, goddess worshipping civilization, and replaced its female god with a male god; whether you want to root for the winners or the losers, it just didn't happen. This was romantic turn of the century mythmaking, and it's not surprising that this stuff was in a turn of the century encyclopedia, but it no longer is believed, at least by scholars.
The bit about Orestes symbolizing the replacement of private vengeance by rule of law might be worth saving, but a new bridge text might be needed that doesn't talk about Aryan sky gods and non-Aryan earth goddesses. -- IHCOYC 18:53 28 Jul 2003 (UTC)
This article is confusing and contradictory. Someone please clean it up! Mat334 20:22, 22 Oct 2004 (UTC)
Just wanted to say this is a great article. In particular, this paragraph:
answers a question I've been wondering about for some time and had never found an answer to. Specifically, in her respected book "Mythology", Edith Hamilton writes that Athena's vote in the trial was triggered by both mercy and respect for Orestes' penance. When I went back and read Aeschylus and Euripides, their texts gave much more superficial reasons for Athena's vote (principally, because Orestes was male and Athena felt it was the natural order to vote for him). I could never reconcile this with Hamilton's interpretation, but the above article paragraph explains it quite well, suggesting that Hamilton was taking the broader context of the myth into account when describing it. Enlightening for me, anyway.
Hope this [1] makes sense. The first sentence could probably use some work and the last section is a bit dodgy, but I think its looking better. John 00:54, 1 January 2006 (UTC)
I made some minor edits, but I didn't want to do very much because, not being familiar with the story, I wasn't sure how to resolve certain ambiguities. Also this is my first day on wikipedia and I don't want to look like an idiot :-) In "other literature", where it says "whose merciful justice", I assume we are talking about the gods, but then when we see "whose crime is" it seems like gramatically it should refer to the gods but actually does not. Anyone who knows care to rewrite that sentence? -- Nick Urban 09:51, 19 February 2006 (UTC)
This is a very good article and it gives some insight to what happened, but it was very jumpy. You skipped over a lot of important things that happened in the story. And some of the things that you said happened a little differntly but it could also be the trasnlation text that you read it from. Though overall it was not too bad. I didn't want to make any changes to it beacause I did not write the article but I would go back a brush up on some of the things that you have wriiten. —Preceding
unsigned comment added by
98.194.229.129 (
talk)
00:40, 25 February 2008 (UTC)
Orestes isn't derived from oreibates. They are both derived from oros "mountain." Orestes simply means "of or from the mountains." A mountaineer (in the sense of "mountain-climber") is something else altogether. Ifnkovhg ( talk) 05:35, 23 March 2008 (UTC)
In the Odyssey Homer doesn't say that Clytemnestra killed Agamemnon because he had sacrificed their daughter to the gods. Homer says that Agamemnon was killed by his cousin Aegisthus who had seduced Clytemnestra while he was off fighting. I think whoever wrote this is confusing Homer's version of the story with that of other myths. Foscolo ( talk) 03:17, 1 November 2008 (UTC)
Someone needs to go through this article and remove all of the remaining Murrayite nonsense. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 99.103.151.61 ( talk) 00:10, 14 July 2010 (UTC)
If i remeber correctly, Iphegneia (or however you want to spell it) was killed by Agamemnon in sacrifice for favorable winds to sail his fleet to Troy. How is she able to save Orestes if she was killed. If i missed something please let me know, but Agamemnon kills her before leaving for Troy. He is murdered after returning. Orestes kills his wife and lover in revenge and gets tortured by fureis. Then he is sent to get a statue. Right? So Iphegenia is dead and still is a priestess? Thoth19 ( talk) 20:36, 10 October 2010 (UTC)Thoth19
1. When did patriarchy replaced matriarchy in Ancient Greece?
2. "He was said to have died of a snakebite in Arcadia."
Orestes or Alete? It's not clear.
3. "There is extant a Latin epic poem, consisting of about 1000 hexameters"
I think this sentence should start with "There is an extant Latin epic poem". I'm not 100% sure.
4. "According to some sources, Orestes fathered Penthilus by his half-sister, Erigone."
What is the source for this claim?
ICE77 ( talk) 06:41, 5 June 2011 (UTC)
This article was the subject of a Wiki Education Foundation-supported course assignment, between 16 April 2024 and 11 June 2024. Further details are available
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— Assignment last updated by Lemurred ( talk) 20:38, 4 June 2024 (UTC)