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.""

Comments

phew..

[agendi]

I can sleep at night now.

Re:phew..

[srothroc]

Well, I thought it was interesting, considering the whole "mythical" quality of the story. Don't forget that people doubted Troy was real, let alone the Trojan War, until relatively recently. With the additional verification of other (astronomical) elements of the epic as well as the phenomenon that marked his return, it lends more credence to the story as a whole as well as the existence of Odysseus himself.

What other "myths" could be somewhat verified in this manner?

As far as other myths go, don't forget that a lot of people claim that Jesus was an actual person, but in an era that had an extensive bureaucratic system and census, no record was ever made of him, and he was much, much more recent than Odysseus...

Re:phew..

[techno-vampire]

Well, I thought it was interesting, considering the whole "mythical" quality of the story.

If you want to be accurate, the Trojan War is a legend, not a myth. A legend starts as a true story handed down by word of mouth, and gradually gathers additional details, incidents and other accretions before finally being written down. Behind every legend is a core of truth if you can but find it. The Voyage of the Golden Fleece, as an example, probably started out as the story of a trading and raiding expedition to the Black Sea.

A myth is an invented story created to explain how things came to be, or illustrate a moral or religious point. Thus, the myth of Persephone having to spend six months out of every year in the Underworld was an attempt to explain the changing of the seasons.

Re:phew..

[4D6963]

As far as other myths go, don't forget that a lot of people claim that Jesus was an actual person, but in an era that had an extensive bureaucratic system and census, no record was ever made of him

Wait, you forgot about the record of the execution by hanging of a guy named vaguely like him about a decade after his presumed death for wizardry. Not to mention the extensive writings of his life all written at least a couple of generations after his presumed death! I mean with evidence like that who could reasonably doubt that Jesus ever existed, son of God or not? It makes me feel all warm and fuzzy inside to think that all (except a few heretics) of modern scholars and historians accept his historicity as a fact!

Re:phew..

[Moridineas]

If you want to be accurate, the Trojan War is a legend, not a myth. A legend starts as a true story handed down by word of mouth, and gradually gathers additional details, incidents and other accretions before finally being written down. Behind every legend is a core of truth if you can but find it. The Voyage of the Golden Fleece, as an example, probably started out as the story of a trading and raiding expedition to the Black Sea. Bunk. Behind every legend is a core of truth if you can but find it. -- is that supposed to be like "Quidquid latine dictum sit, altum sonatur" (that which is said in Latin sounds profound).

There is a reason the stories--myths and legends--of ancient greece are collectively called "Greek Mythology"--they are so intertwined as to be one. The distinction is largely meaningless.

I mean, by your standard, what do you do, go through each story and take a stab in the dark the story was based on something real or not? You hypothesis that Jason and the Argonauts is based on actual events while Persephone was just made up is a fine one--it's interesting, but it's a total guess, thousands of years after the fact at that!

What about myths about Heracles? Fighting with Gods, doing impossible things, yet possibly based on a real person, so is that a myth or a legend? You state that a myth is "an invented story created to explain how things came to be." Pillars of Hercules? The myth goes that massive land structures were put into place by Hercules. Is heracles a myth or legend? Or he is both?

No, there is not a "core" of truth behind every legend. Sure, some stories might be based upon actual events, some myths too. All--no.

A myth is an invented story created to explain how things came to be, or illustrate a moral or religious point. Thus, the myth of Persephone having to spend six months out of every year in the Underworld was an attempt to explain the changing of the seasons. Completely arbitrary ... If the people telling and hearing the stories believes in all of their realities, your point is irrelevant. Do you think during the high classical age that your average hellene sat around saying "Ah, well I'll pray to Heracles for xyz, realizing that the stories of his accomplishments are based upon real events, and I'm also fully aware that Zeus is just made up to explain thunder" (or whatever).

Re:phew..

[techno-vampire]

As far as the Argonauts go, I based my comments on the Afterword of Hercules, My Shipmate, by Robert Graves. He had come to the conclusion that there was a basis of fact behind the story, and wrote a fascinating book based on the idea that all the major events of the book could have happened, although not exactly in the form we know them now. (As an example, the harpies were really carrion birds, and the queen simply told her blind husband that they were supernatural creatures.) In the case of Hercules, or Herakles (I think it's spelled) to give it the Greek form, I gather that scholars now think that there were at least a dozen different men with that name who's adventures were combined. Not sure of the exact number, or of any of the details, but that's what I've heard. Just because it's called "Greek Mythology" doesn't mean that every single one of the stories is a myth; it's just a way to lump them together in one convenient group.

Re:phew..

[NoobixCube]

I don't know much about verifying myths, but I have to go feed my minotaur now. He gets grumpy when adventurers don't stumble into my labyrinth.

Re:phew..

[CNeb96]

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

Re:phew..

[K. S. Kyosuke]

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.

Re:phew..

[sumdumass]

The bible actually states that his birth wasn't December 25th. It was durring the feast of tabernacles which makes if around September 22-29th. That date is actually a date that early Christians took in his name because Christianity was outlawed at the time and they could hide the celebrations in with other festivities of the time. About 300 or so years later, some pope made it the official date because of a number of things namely the traditional hiding of his birth. Some people claim that because Luke says that Elizabeth was 6 month pregnant when Gabriel visited Mary, it would have been during Chanukkah which took place in December meaning that the conception created Jesus's soul which is also tied to reasoning behind the Christian beliefs against abortion.

Anyways, This is already explained. The Christian religion doesn't celebrate Jesus the man but yahawe emanuel (god with us) or Jesus Christ, god incarnated.

It is actually an interesting read. Although it does require a read of the bible and the ability to carry over information that you actually understand from one book to another.

Re:phew..

[Phroggy]

What's more interesting is the "facts" that can be disproved by proper analysis. For example, one event that millions take for granted and consider true, the birth of Jesus on a Dec 25th, is easily disproved since shepherds wouldn't have been out in their fields in December. Many other religious "facts", regardless of the religion, are similarly easy to dismiss, yet a sizeable portion of humanity still considers them to be true and base their belief system on them. Note that none of the millions of people who believe Jesus was born on December 25th are well versed in what the Bible actually says, since it most definitely does not say that. In fact, nothing in the Bible suggests that we should observe Christmas as any sort of holiday at all, on any date.

Millions of people also believe that three wise men appeared alongside the shepherds in Bethlehem on the night Jesus was born. On the contrary, the Bible doesn't say how many wise men there were (only that they brought three gifts), and they didn't arrive until almost two years later.

Of course you may not believe any of this actually happened, but just because the popular story is ridiculous doesn't mean the events actually recorded in the Bible are untrue.

Re:phew..

[liquiddark]

Is...is that a euphemism?

Re:phew..

[AdminGamer]

I love how popular it is to doubt Christianity among the geek community, as if it somehow further proves your superior intelligence over the rest of the world. Unfortunately, when you choose an argument such as this "he never existed," you're disregarding your beloved wikipedia which you'd normally jump to for a link instantly when it fit your needs.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Historicity_of_Jesus

It's a choice of faith whether you believe that he was anything more than a Jewish teacher.... But if you're willing to believe most of what we know of history from that period, many elements of which was gleaned from only a single source of archaeological evidence, denying his existence is a bit absurd.

Re:phew..

[Anonymous Coward]

Wait, you forgot about the record of the execution by hanging of a guy named vaguely like him about a decade after his presumed death for wizardry. Not to mention the extensive writings of his life all written at least a couple of generations after his presumed death! I mean with evidence like that who could reasonably doubt that Jesus ever existed, son of God or not? It makes me feel all warm and fuzzy inside to think that all (except a few heretics) of modern scholars and historians accept his historicity as a fact!

Actually there is extensive evidence in Roman writings of both his existence in life and death by crucifixion.
If you discount evidence for other historical figures in the same manner you are that of Jesus, then there is no credible evidence for the existence of Julius Ceasar or Nero, amongst a host of others.

Re:phew..

[lilomar]

the Bible doesn't say how many wise men there were (only that they brought three gifts), and they didn't arrive until almost two years later. Actually, the Bible lists three types of gifts, and it doesn't say that there weren't any others.
Most of the assumptions about there being three wisemen are due to the carol We Three Kings.

what I figured!

[themushroom]

That's how I've always felt (as an English minor)... that the stories of Homer were dated. :-D

Re:what I figured!

[value_added]

That's how I've always felt (as an English minor)... that the stories of Homer were dated.

As an English Major, it's worth pointing out that Homer's contributions to ... ah, fuckit. Just read the Derivative Works section in the Odyssey Wiki article. You'll find everything from Dante to James Joyce to Stargate and Sponge Bob there.

For the rest of the kids, the funny word ("eponymous") used in the submission means "giving one's name to", as in Romulus gave his name to Rome. Romulus, of course was ... ah fuck that too. It happened a long time ago, before Star Trek the original TV series, even.

Re:what I figured!

[jollyreaper]

For the rest of the kids, the funny word ("eponymous") used in the submission means "giving one's name to", as in Romulus gave his name to Rome. Romulus, of course was ... ah fuck that too. It happened a long time ago, before Star Trek the original TV series, even. Look, there's no need to Remus a new one over this.

Are they going to look for Atlantis next?

[Petrushka]

Here's another scientist's perspective on the historicity of the Odyssey:

You will find the scene of the wanderings of Odysseus when you find the cobbler who sewed up the bag of the winds.
-- Eratosthenes

Speaking as someone who works on ancient Greek literature for a living (no, there's not all that many of us), I look forward to this group's publication of their discoveries of exactly which island the Cyclops lived on, the chemical make-up of the drug in the lotus that kept the Lotus-Eaters somnolent, and details on the god Poseidon's dietary habits.

Myths do, occasionally, have a historical basis; rarely, and only ever in a very distorted fashion; but, very occasionally, it happens. For example, discoveries in Hittite textual archives over the last few decades now have a number of people seriously contemplating the possibility that some kind of "Trojan War" may, in some distorted sense, actually have actually happened. But for a story to have its roots in an event from which it is separated by several centuries in which there was no such thing as writing ... well, why not just announce that you've found Atlantis? That kind of announcement would have pretty much the same relationship between myth and historicity.

In addition, the "darkening of the sky" bit that they quote comes in the middle of an episode where a seer is having a vision of blood running down the walls. If you're going to look for historically verifiable events, why not look at events that the poem describes as actually happening? -- a hallucination isn't really a very convincing candidate.

Plutarch suggested the prophecy of Theoclymenus referred to a solar eclipse.

Plutarch also thought that Odysseus visited a goddess named Calypso who lived on an island in the Atlantic Ocean, in the middle of a sea enclosed by a horseshoe-shaped continent. It's just not easy to have much confidence in him when he's talking about subjects about which he clearly doesn't have a clue.

Re:Are they going to look for Atlantis next?

[ResidntGeek]

But for a story to have its roots in an event from which it is separated by several centuries in which there was no such thing as writing ... well, why not just announce that you've found Atlantis? That kind of announcement would have pretty much the same relationship between myth and historicity.

Oh, come on, that's not fair. The Mycenaean and Hellenic peoples were two ends of the same culture, and the Greek Dark Age was only, what, four or five centuries long? It's really not that implausible that the story could have been preserved that long (at the most, remember - no telling when in the dark age Homer composed), especially given that it was regularly memorized in its entirety by students in the Hellenic period. Atlantis is a random children's story that got lost, then blown out of proportion. Not the same thing.

Re:Are they going to look for Atlantis next?

[Petrushka]

That is true; I had seen another article earlier today, which didn't mention the bit about the fact that it was a new moon. So that part of the story is new to me, and it does mitigate my annoyance quite a bit.

I'm not very convinced, though. The other references they draw on are much more problematic: it has been known for a loooong time that the internal chronology of the Odyssey is a complete mess. For that reason I wouldn't put any stock in the bit about

Odysseus is told to watch the Pleiades and late-setting Bootes and keep the Great Bear to his left. Next, five days before the supposed eclipse, Odysseus arrives in Ithaca as the Star of Dawn -- that is, Venus -- rises ahead of the sun.

Still, the new moon thing is of interest. Not enough to convince me, but enough to get me to actually pay attention to their findings if I ever manage to find out where they're publishing them.

Re:Are they going to look for Atlantis next?

[Petrushka]

Oh, come on, that's not fair. The Mycenaean and Hellenic peoples were two ends of the same culture, and the Greek Dark Age was only, what, four or five centuries long? It's really not that implausible that the story could have been preserved that long (at the most, remember - no telling when in the dark age Homer composed),

It's possible, but it can't be the default position. Present-day oral traditions observed (and recorded) "in the wild" show that retellings of stories change drastically from generation to generation, not just from century to century. It's possible for isolated historical references to survive that kind of dilution, to be sure, and there are plenty of cases in Homer (though almost all in the Iliad); but they tend to get overwhelmed by the changes introduced by storytellers desire to (a) innovate, (b) keep their audiences in suspense, (c) cater to a specific audience (if you're a bard in an Athenian court, you're not going to tell stories that reflect badly on Theseus), and (d) several other factors which slip my mind right now but which you can read about in e.g. the anthropologist Walter Ong's book Orality and Literacy (not very up-to-date, but a popular one).

The upshot of that is that you don't scour literary texts with an agenda. As with any scientific enterprise, you keep your eyes open for out-of-the-ordinary correlations and then investigate. Solar eclipses in conjunction with a new moon are possibly enough to make it worth investigating this one, as I've admitted in a post above.

especially given that it was regularly memorized in its entirety by students in the Hellenic period.

(I'd better interrupt to state for the record that it is known for certain that memorising Homer could only have become part of aristocratic Athenian education around 500 BCE at the earliest.)

Atlantis is a random children's story that got lost, then blown out of proportion. Not the same thing.

Not really. The Atlantis story is one told by a late-Classical-Period author (Plato), with explicit claims that it is derived from a millennia-old tradition preserved by Egyptian texts. If anything, the Atlantis story has more extrinsic plausibility than this one!

In view of the conjunction with a new moon I'll retract some of my earlier scorn, but I'll still side with Eratosthenes when it comes to euhemerising myths. Which is really what these folks are doing: they're modern-day euhemerists.

Re:Are they going to look for Atlantis next?

[Petrushka]

It's not the default position, though. Schliemann was laughed at, and people didn't give the idea of a historical Trojan War serious credence until the independent evidence from the Hittite tablets. Only then did scholars start looking for serious correlating evidence from other Mycenaean sites.

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.)

Re:Are they going to look for Atlantis next?

[sfsp]

Petrushka opined,

"Solar eclipses in conjunction with a new moon are possibly enough to make it worth investigating this one..."

No, not really. Solar eclipses ALWAYS happen at the same time as the new moon. However, the fact that Mercury went retrograde 34 days before, as mentioned in the text of the poem; at the same season that Bootes is setting and the Pleiades are visible, as mentioned in the text of the poem; and that Venus is visible in the morning, as mentioned in the text of the poem; and that the sun is eclipsed, as mentioned in the text of the poem; and it ALL JUST HAPPENS to occur around the most probable estimate of the historical date of the events--THAT is what makes this worth investigating.

There is evidence of significant historical details being preserved in oral tradition. This might be one example.

Re:Are they going to look for Atlantis next?

[nicomachus]

sfsp said:

"There is evidence of significant historical details being preserved in oral tradition. This might be one example."

Maybe, but I'd like to see exactly what texts in the Odyssey the authors get their numbers of days from. For example, Homer most certainly does not say "Mercury was in retrograde motion 34 days before" or anything like it. The authors instead rely on a story about the god Hermes (= Roman Mercury, but of course identified by the Greeks with the planet Mercury) going from west to east and then back from east to west. We need to supply a lot of interpretation to see this as a reference to an episode of retrograde motion (i.e. relative east-to-west motion with respect to the background of fixed stars).

For the inner planets, and especially Mercury, you can't directly observe an entire east-to-west (or west-to-east) swing, since in the middle the planet's too close to the sun to be observed. What you actually see is (1) planet visible in the morning, before the sun, (2) planet appears closer to sun on successive mornings, (3) planet no longer visible for a succession of days, (4) planet visible in the evening, just before sunset, (5) planet moves farther from the sun on successive evenings, (6) planet moves back towards the sun on successive evenings, (7) planet no longer visible for a while, (8) planet visible in the morning just before the sun, (9) repeat. To get a reference to this out of a story about Hermes delivering a message to someone in the west and then coming back requires some genuine interpretive argument.

It may well be that the authors of the article (i.e. Magnasco and Baikouzis, the authors of the article discussed in the MSNBC article linked to this current thread) have supplied enough argument to make their case for this. However, I can't tell, because their article isn't available to me (it's in PNAS for June 23, and my institution's online subscription only shows the June 17 issue as available. I'll check it out when it goes online.

Incidentally, the MSNBC summary appears to have been written by someone with little familiarity with naked-eye astronomy. And as others have pointed out, there's absolutely nothing surprising about a solar eclipse happening at the time of the new moon, since that's the only time it could possibly happen (but the fact that the proposed eclipse is located at new moon in the Odyssey may be evidence that, at the very least, someone somewhere along the line of transmission had actually seen a solar eclipse and remembered that it happened at the time of a new moon--a natural thing to remember for ancient Mediterranean societies, which used the moon as a short-range calendar).

Damn

[MrCreosote]

I had March 25th in the sweep.

Re:What we really want to know is

[Petrushka]

Ummm, you know, Mount Olympos is a real mountain. It's right here ...

As for Circe, in Italian myth (by which I guess I mean Etruscan myth) she was thought to live on a cape on the west coast of Italy, about halfway between Rome and Naples, which is still called Monte Circeo. I think Circe may have left by now, though.

Re:What we really want to know is

[techno-vampire]

Have these same scientists found Aeaea or Mt. Olympus?

I don't know about Aeaea, but I do know that Mt. Olympus is a real mountain, and the highest one in Greece.

about Atlantis - Thera/Santorini eruption

[vlad_petric]

I thought that the Thera/Santorini epic eruption is a cataclysm that could well be associated with the fall of Atlantis (after all, it marked the beginning of the end for the Minoan civilization).

It was a couple of times larger than Krakatoa/1883 (albeit smaller than Tambora/1815)

Re:about Atlantis - Thera/Santorini eruption

[Petrushka]

The main issue with the Atlantis story is that (a) Plato invented it himself, and (b) he dates it to about 9400 BCE if I recall correctly -- which would be around about the same time that we first see Neolithic humans in Greece. (I'm sure there's a standard excuse Atlantis-hunters use to explain the latter point, though.)

In the year 5028...

[Anonymous Coward]

Resurrection of Dinosaurs Dated. Scientists have thoroughly examined the fashion styles of individuals in the documentary Jurassic Park, and have dated the first reincarnations of dinosaurs to approximately 1700 A.D.

To be entirely fair, though

[Moraelin]

As far as other myths go, don't forget that a lot of people claim that Jesus was an actual person, but in an era that had an extensive bureaucratic system and census, no record was ever made of him, and he was much, much more recent than Odysseus...

To be entirely fair, though:

1. Jesus seemed to have been a pretty common name back then. So basically it's like having a myth in the USA about a guy called John or in Russia about a guy called Ivan. There were plenty of Jesuses around and there are a few mentions of some unrelated ones in the chronicles. Whether one was actually the son of God or not, is a completely other issue.

2. A lot of records from that era don't exist any more, or are incomplete. Seriously, we're left scratching our heads even when it comes to such issues of state interest as what the strength of the roman legions were, at almost any given point, or what were their generals.

So assuming that you can just find out about some John Doe (for the Romans, Jesus was just another nutter executed for speaking against the emperor, not anyone special in any way,) and that you can take lack of a signal as confirmation that such a person existed, is kind of ignorant. Again, even from Rome itself we don't actually have the records of everyone they executed, and we _can't_ say that, for example, someone called Bigus Dickus never existed because we didn't find his records.

Plus that area had some bloody revolts, very soon thereafter, and some very brutal and devastating roman retaliation, followed by pretty much forced exodus at sword point. There are more than enough records that were lost in that chaos.

3. There seems to have been an interesting early sect, namely the Ebionites, which actually had a bunch of people who knew Jesus and supposedly _relatives_ of Jesus. They actually insisted that the leadership of the church should go to the relatives of Jesus, not to Peter, which wouldn't make sense if they didn't have such among them.

The interesting thing is that they seem to have had a very different view of Christianity and Jesus than what the apostles mangled it into, and even more so than what the Byzantines later decided it should be. What we inherited as Christianity is a long series of deviations, starting with Paul who basically insisted to throw away half the old Judaism (i.e., of the Old Testament) to make the new religion more palatable to non-jews and thus easier to proselitize. The Ebionites actually called Paul an apostate.

At any rate, these guys had a much more... down to earth view of it all, and viewed Jesus as just, you know, a human. A prophet and divinely inspired, to be sure. But not the divine "superuser" that later Christianity made him into. And while a lot of information about them is lost, from what the mainstream christians said about them, it seems that these guys thought Mary was _not_ a virgin at birth, Jesus _didn't_ come back from the dead, etc. The bugger just died on the cross, like everyone else, and stayed dead.

At any rate, I'd say that a sect based on a group of his friends and relatives makes no sense at all, if he didn't exist. Or let me qualify that better: if _a_ Jesus didn't exist.

Now don't get me wrong, I'm not saying you should be a christian or anything. Note that, going by the views of, you know, those who actually knew him and didn't have to embelish the story to proselitise, he was just a guy. Maybe divinely inspired, if you want to believe that, or maybe he just got a sunstroke there in the desert or ate some funny mushrooms and had visions of what didn't actually exist, if you want to take the skeptical view. Take your pick.

I'm only saying that _a_ guy called Jesus _might_ have actually have existed and started the whole madness. Of course, we don't know for sure, but it's not too ludicrious a hypothesis, even if the evidence is less than bullet-proof. On the other hand, exactly what he was, and if he's even vaguely like what your local pastor claims, that's another story.

Re:To be entirely fair, though

[Sunshinerat]

1. Jesus seemed to have been a pretty common name back then.

Jesus... Jesus? His name is Brian...

The way I heard it...

[SeePage87]

The way I heard it is that memories become legend, legend fades to myth, and even myth is long forgotten when the Age that gave it birth comes again.