Week 6 Reading Notes: Part B: Sinbad: Fifth Voyage

So for these Week 6 reading notes I chose to focus on a hero story and came across Sinbad. Here are the notes I pulled from the reading. I hope these will inspire me for a good solid story this week.

The Arabian Nights' Entertainments by Andrew Lang and illustrated by H. J. Ford (1898).


So Sinbad, as one can imagine is not used to a quiet life in this specific part of his story. In this part he sets sail to an unknown island and Sinbad and his crew found a "roc's egg

Creepy.

The merchants who were travelling forced the egg open killing the birds and setting them on fire.

Ope, the parent birds showed up and were not happy about this situation, the sky darkened.

Sinbad and the others ran back to the ship and tried to escape the parent birds. Giant rocks were being thrown at them and one finally hit the ship right in the middle and destroyed the boat flinging the crew overboard.

This overall was a very interesting story. I hope to be able to build off of it.

Arabian Nights (Google Images)

https://images.app.goo.gl/oZSFswbGkVuyAjoa6

Reading Notes Part A: Egypt: King of the Dead

Egypt: King of the Dead, Donald Mackenzie, http://mythfolklore.blogspot.com/2014/06/egypt-king-of-dead.html

Horus (Google Images)

https://images.app.goo.gl/uhaRfA1YkkB3Sj9C9

Hello,

These are why notes for Week 5, part A on King of the Dead. Again I am taking notes as I read in case I need to record any sudden questions that arise while reading and any research that I had to do because of the reading as a whole.

Because this is just a part of the Ancient Egypt unit I have to try and orient myself as to where I am at in terms of time and the events that happened before. It is a bit confusing.

So Set is ruling over Egypt in this moment in time when Horus is supposed to be the rightful king. Although Horus isn't king he still has followers that are essential to him.

Horus has a dream of his father Osiris, which is an interesting piece of information. Set is Horus' uncle. In this dream Horus was urged to overthrow Set and get rid of Set's followers.

However impossible it seemed at the time Horus was able to overthrow Set and run him and his followers out towards the "eastern frontier"

Horus lost an eye!

So one thing that I've noticed in many of these stories is that there is always some kind of higher power depending on the religion and what not of the area in which the story originated. In this case it consists of gods and goddesses that choose judgement and whatnot of those dead and alive. The thing with Egypt in general is that there are many different symbols and uses of things in the culture and definitely in the stories. I think I should be able to use that to my advantage when writing my story for this week. :)

Reading Notes: Ghosts of Erebus: Part B

Here are my reading notes for Ghosts of Erebus for Part B.

Homer's Odyssey: Ghosts of Erebus, http://mythfolklore.blogspot.com/2014/05/odyssey-ghosts-of-erebus.html

Ulysse (Google Images) 

https://images.app.goo.gl/v7qNiXYMY1QnMS3y7

So, this is a very intense part of the Odyssey, it seems. Filling their ships with sheep for sacrifice and sailing away to a different land.

I personally like this part because it's a ghost story, 'tis the season of spook! :)

The order and method that went into the actual luring of the ghosts is interesting to me. The dumping of libations and water and then sacrificing the sheep is strange. Some ghost stories just focus on the fact that the ghosts were actually summoned not the full process by which they were summoned.

Once the ghosts actually showed up was also interesting in this portion of the story as well. The ghosts were not just fallen warriors or aged individuals but they were girls who were young. I'm curious to know what happened to them.

I think the Odyssey overall is very interesting, I read it in high school and had to do a project on it. To be able to go back through portions of it is entertaining. If anything I think that this story shows a lot about the social and cultural aspects during the time of its origin. Food for thought, I suppose.

Reading Notes: Homer's Odyssey: Part A: The Land of the Cyclopse

For these reading notes I focused on The Land of the Cyclopse for Part A.

Homer, "Odyssey: The Land of the Cyclopse" http://mythfolklore.blogspot.com/2014/05/odyssey-land-of-cyclopes.html

Odyssey (Google Images) 

https://images.app.goo.gl/1dtqmsZ21bYygpvk7

So, I'm taking notes while I'm reading instead of just reading through and then going back to take notes and right at the start I notice that it is discussed that the Land of the Cyclops have no code of law. This is something that I find interesting from a societal point of view. If there is no code of law then socially anything goes within this society, right? To me that's a bit terrifying.

-Why is this land free of man but full of goats?

So the Cyclops seem to not have the skills to create vessels to explore and escape the island. Does this mean, perhaps, that they are not quite as intelligent as man then?

The Cyclops' Cave:

The men were able to hunt some of the copious amounts of goats and feast with their wine, gain strength before exploring.

The last sentence says that this giant was "born a monster". Does that mean that it has to constantly be categorized as a monster then for the rest of its life? Could this story simply be a tie to strangers that have different cultural and social customs from that of the original storyteller?