 |
The Greeks first developed
many of the things we take for granted today, such as geometry,
myrmidons, and bad hair days.
Medusa had the first Terribly Bad Hair Day when her locks turned to snakes. As occasionally happens even in our more enlightened age, her glance turned men to stone. Perseus cutting off her head probably came as a relief, though today we would simply treat the problem with a little conditioner and a blow dry. |
| The blind bard Homer and
his son Bart used to roam ancient Greece, reciting the
Iliad
and the
Odyssey, both of which Homer had memorized. These were long,
involved epic poems, the first great works of Western literature.
The Greeks would sit in their halls and listen spell-bound, saying
things like, "Har! Stuck 'im in the eye with a spear, did he?
Har-har! That's a good one! Gotta remember that, tell it to the
wife!" They also made fun of Homer because he was
bald.
That was because classical civilization didn't spring into being full-blown. It took a few hundred years for the rough edges to wear off. The Greeks could relate to things like skewering an opponent and then dragging his body behind the chariot around the city walls better than we can today; but we relate better to car chases and gun fights, so it probably works out even. |
 |
 |
Since the Greeks weren't
civilized yet, they used to hang around street corners, whistling at
the babes and saying things like, "Hey, baby!" and
"Hubba hubba!"
The poet Sappho, from the Isle of Lesbos, got tired of all that. She was short and dark-haired, and the prevailing standard of beauty among the fellows leaned more toward lanky blondes. She decided she liked women better than men because they had more class. So she started hanging around street corners and saying "Hubba hubba" herself. |
 |
Socrates was even balder than Homer, and he was homely to boot. He was a brilliant thinker. Athens at that time was a pure democracy. All the citizens would get together and someone would make a proposal and they would all vote on it. As it happened, somebody proposed that Socrates commit suicide by drinking hemlock. Somebody else seconded the motion and that was that. A few years later the same people were sitting around scratching their heads, trying to figure out why the Macedonians were in charge. |
|
Phryne was an Athenian
courtesan who was so good-looking -- and skilled at this and that --
that she had the boys lined up for blocks, all of them holding cash.
She made so much money she offered to rebuild the walls of Thebes
after Alexander the Great destroyed them.
The Greeks had a highly refined legal ethic. When Phryne was accused of being a traitor, her lawyer brought her into court, dramatically removed her gown and asked: "Can a babe with a body like this be a traitor?" The verdict was "not guilty." |
 |