(urth) Soldier Of The Mist: first reading (mit spoilers)

Son of Witz sonofwitz at butcherbaker.org
Wed Jan 27 16:55:20 PST 2010


>
>
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> --- On Tue, 1/26/10, Son of Witz <sonofwitz at butcherbaker.org> wrote:
>
> From: Son of Witz <sonofwitz at butcherbaker.org>
> Subject: Re: (urth) Soldier Of The Mist: first reading (mit spoilers)
> To: "The Urth Mailing List" <urth at lists.urth.net>
> Date: Tuesday, January 26, 2010, 5:35 PM
>
>
>>> Why Latro is so favored by the gods is not clear to me, nor is why he
>>> can
>>>touch the Gods and make them visible to others.  (I'm certainly not
>>> well
>>>versed in Greek Myth, so these are my best guesses)
>>
>> Well, he’s not merely *favored* by the Gods. He’s cursed by Demeter
>> because his part of the Persian army desecrated the grove near her
>> Temple. This IIRC was listed as a reason for the Persian’s defeat,
>> particularly by the Spartan 300 (where Latro was wounded).
>
> I vaguely remember something about a desecrated grove. Do you remember
> what scene or chapter that was.
> thanks. ~witz
>
>
>
> At the beginning of Chapter 1, Latro is told that he had been wounded
> "near the shrine of the Earth Mother, where the Great King's army fought
> the army of Thought and the Rope Makers."
> I don't remember if Wolfe says anything about the desecration of the
> grove, but Herodotus does.   The Persian navy sailed to the sanctuary of
> Demeter.  "There they beached their ships.  They cut down cultivated
> trees, surrounded the ships with a stockade of stone and wood, and fixed
> stakes in the ground around the stockade."    (The Histories, trans
> Robin Waterfield, Oxford World's Classics, p. 580.)
>
> Best wishes,Jack


Thanks Jack.
This makes me curious about Herodotus. I've never read The Histories. 
Crap, I have to admit having never even read Homer.  Better get cracking.
~witz
sent from my iPad in the future




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