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Odysseus's Return From the Trojan War Dated
srothroc writes "Scientists have used astronomical data from the Odyssey to attempt to pinpoint the time of Odysseus's return from his eponymous journey after the Trojan War. From the article: 'The scientists then searched for potential dates that satisfied all these astronomical references close to the fall of Troy, which has over the centuries been estimated to have occurred between roughly 1250 to 1115 B.C. From these 135 years, they found just one date that satisfied all the references — April 16, 1178 B.C., the same date as the proposed eclipse.""
I'm not aware of any group which denies Jesus was a real person. They may not all agree on "who" he was or the meaning of his teachings, but they agree he existed.
Here are a few resources for this
http://www.carm.org/bible/extrabiblical_accounts.htm
>>What other "myths" could be somewhat verified in this manner?
Like the day Jesus was crucified?
"... because with Kepler's equations we can determine exactly when historical eclipses occurred. Perhaps it will not surprise you to learn that only one Passover lunar eclipse was visible from Jerusalem while Pilate was in office (30). It occurred on April 3, 33 AD, the Day of the Cross...."
http://www.bethlehemstar.net/day/day.htm
The earth quakes which occurred during Jesus's Crucifixion?
http://www.bethlehemstar.net/day/day.htm
"The sun will be turned to darkness and the moon to blood..." The gospels do recount that the sun was darkened on the day of the crucifixion from noon until 3 in the afternoon (29). Ancient non-Biblical sources confirm this. Phlegon Trallianus records in his history, Olympiades (41):
"In the fourth year of the 202nd Olympiad [AD 32-33], a failure of the Sun took place greater than any previously known, and night came on at the sixth hour of the day [noon], so that stars actually appeared in the sky; and a great earthquake took place in Bithynia and overthrew the greater part of Niceaea," obviously not a simple astronomical event. (42)
Or the Star of Bethlehem? A conjunction of Jupiter and the star Regulas in 2 BC which fulfills all 9 Biblical requirements of the star of Bethlehem?
http://www.bethlehemstar.net/dance/dance.htm
QUOTE
1. It signified birth.
2. It signified kingship.
3. It had a connection with the Jewish nation.
4. It rose in the east, like other stars.
5. It appeared at a precise time.
6. Herod didn't know when it appeared.
7. It endured over time.
8. It was ahead of the Magi as they went south from Jerusalem to Bethlehem.
9. It stopped over Bethlehem. (Retrograde motion)
One point in contention is when Herod died. This theory depends on Herod dying in 1 BC, but most historians believe he died 4 BC. There is evidence for this theory but it isn't widely accepted. See the link for more details.
http://www.bethlehemstar.net/stage/stage.htm
There was still a lot of scepticism around until relatively recently, yes -- heck, there's still a lot even now (among historians; not so much scepticism among archaeologists). Plenty of people accepted Schliemann's discovery as the finding of Troy, mind you. But it's worth remembering that Schliemann thought Troy II was "Homeric" Troy -- it's now known that that archaeological layer is about 2000 years too early. That doesn't diminish the importance of the find, but it does show that Schliemann himself was a bit over-eager with his own agenda. The question of burden of proof can be a tricky one sometimes, though.
I don't doubt that you know much more about this than me, but isn't it different with poetry? Poems can't be easily changed in the retelling except by a poet, without damaging the meter.Question of the century -- literally. Actually it turns out that narrative poems are particularly prone to certain types of changes, because -- at least in pre-classical Greece -- they're not recited by rote. There's overwhelming evidence that early Greek epics were re-told using an enormous set of conventions (formulaic language, typical scenes, typical plot elements); so stories were driven partly by how the story is known to go, partly by the individual storyteller's creative imagination, and partly by these conventions. Basically, what we now refer to as "poetry" was for an early Greek poet "the special kind of language that you use for telling certain stories and which happens to come out in good meter almost automatically". This was one of the big discoveries of the 20th century about Homer, though a lot of people are still bewildered at the implications.
One implication, though, is that there are at least two forces at work that are actively pressuring changes in each re-telling of a story. One is the poet's creative imagination. Another is the very conventions of the poetic language. Suppose Odysseus meets a young woman on his way to someone's house; well, it so happens that that's an element in one kind of conventional story episode. That puts a tiny amount of temptation in the storyteller's way to put in the next conventional element, which happens to be encountering a dog or dogs at the entrance of the house. The pressure may be minuscule, but if you've got centuries of iterations ...
If you're interested in finding out more I recommend Albert Lord's book The Singer of Tales. A good fictional spin on the subject is a novel by the Albanian writer Ismail Kadare called The File on H. They're both good reads.
(Before I sign off I'd better correct something I put in my earlier post -- memorising Homer could have been part of Athenian education as early as 550 BCE.)
Actually, IIRC, there are Hittite records of a town called "steep Wilusa", which was supposed to be in western Anatolia, sounding strangely similar to "steep Ilios" from Homer's Iliad. On top of that, one recorded ruler of Wilusa had a name suprisingly similar to "Priam", and another one called "Alaksandu", which "by coincidence" nicely matches "Alexander", another name of Paris.
Strange coincidences, huh? I should probably read more of what professor Calvert Watkins has to say on this. But even now it seems that there might be some factual truth in Homer's work, even though the historical core will never lessen the "legend" part of the tale. And of course, we will probably never know whether Achilles really looked like Brad Pitt.
Ezekiel 23:20