Comment on Medusa likely would have had tiny snakes growing from her upper lip and chin as she aged.
captainlezbian@lemmy.world 11 hours agoAlso within mythology different people completely change the story to fit their narratives. There are stories of Medusa where she’s just an ancient monster from before the Olympian age.
Also to add to your bit about the Amazons, it’s likely that they were just the mythologization of the people of the Eurasian steppes such as the Scythians. They had a lot less divisions in gender than the Greeks including female warriors and leaders. To the Greeks that’s the same as a society completely run by women who are “less of women” where men are subjugated (though be aware, I’m telling this story, and that right there was a parallel I threw in to compare the Greeks to modern anti feminists, just like how bits of mythology got tweaked as they entered new cultures and contexts). But yeah Tomyris of Scythia is said to have killed Cyrus the Great of Persia. And the Romans continued the Greek tradition of accusing any society where women could hold the same power as men of being a matriarchy totally comparable to their patriarchy, something we have no evidence of ever being a thing historically.
XeroxCool@lemmy.world 6 hours ago
I wasn’t aware of that equality=matriarchy perception. I haven’t dove into the actual human ancient Greeks much, so thanks for that added info for me to seek out at some point. I had some inkling after finding out about the mythological Amazons
captainlezbian@lemmy.world 1 hour ago
Yeah I have a friend who’s really into the bronze age, and I just think it’s fascinating how the stories we tell and the ways we reinterpret stories says so much about us. Fiction is a tool to share our values and ideas in a palatable and entertaining way, even if we don’t mean to do so.