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To: fqued

Well respected for his resourcefulness and insight, but Greek warfare disdained victory through trickery.

You will notice that unlike many other pantheons, Greek mythology lacks a god of deceit. This is because the Greeks themselves despised the idea of dishonesty.


80 posted on 09/24/2005 4:04:36 PM PDT by Wombat101 (Islam: Turning everything it touches to Sh*t since 632 AD...)
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To: Wombat101
Actually, the Greek pantheon did include a trickster god, Hermes, who was worshipped as such (Hermes Dolios) at Pellene in Achaea.

The Spartans won the Peloponnesian War of 431-404 B.C. by a trick, at least according to Xenophon, the only surviving contemporary historian who covers that period: Lysander captured the Athenian fleet at Aegospotami in 405 B.C. by fooling the Athenians, and that led to the Athenian surrender some months later.

Earlier, in 413 B.C., the Syracusans tricked the Athenians when they were preparing to retreat from their encampment near Syracuse. That helped seal the fate of the Athenian forces, who were almost all killed or captured...but the Syracusans don't seem to have had any misgivings about fooling the Athenians (who had, after all, been trying to capture their city by siege).

If you look at how Homer portrays Odysseus in the Iliad and the Odyssey, he's definitely one of the good guys.

82 posted on 09/24/2005 5:01:47 PM PDT by Verginius Rufus
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