What is fair game for the midterm and final?
If you read attentively, take notes in class, and generally are
truly interested in the material and try to fit it all together,
preparing for the midterm should be a pleasant and rewarding
experience that calls on you to gather and master details about the
many facets of these epics we have discussed.
You should be able to identify the following characters: by
'identify' is meant that you should list things like the important
facts about their family, where they are from, where they occur in
the epics, and what they do in what we have read. You do not have to
include all of those details, but more is better. Knowing enough to
thoroughly convince someone that you have attentively read the
assigned material and studied the material presented in class
carefully will suffice. You may include details from outside of the
epics, but they are extra, not really what is being asked for here.
How to gather the information: use whatever reference works help,
for example Wilson's appendix or wikipedia or sparknotes, etc.
Hopefully, you have filled your book with underlinings and questions
and observations in the margin, so it is a landscape you can
recognize, review, and easily situate yourself in, like a trail you
have just hiked.
NOTE: The spelling here may not match Wilson, but it should be
close: it may or may not match Wikipedia either. I want a
correct spelling on the exam, but there are several.
If you simply cannot find something listed here, email me.
FORMAT of EXAM:
- short answer ID's about the lists of characters and phenomena
below): enough details to clearly show knowledge: how much is
enough? That cannot be specified, but more is better
- chronology: there will be a table and you will have to fill in
the cells (see below)
- map: put labels on a map (details below)
- simple plot questions, like the ones on the in-class quizzes,
and simple questions like those on the after class quizzes
- snippets of text for you to identify/explain: like the short
answer ID's--enough details to clearly show knowledge, and more
is better
- Short answers from you: there are three questions at the end
of this document that you will be asked on the exam. The more
detailed and thoughtful your answers are, the better.
THE FOLLOWING CONTAINS INDICATIONS OF EVERYTHING THAT CAN BE
ON THE EXAM
Characters
Major characters are bold-faced
- Achilles
- Aeneas
- Agamemnon
- Aigisthus
- Aiolos
- Ajax (Oïleus)
- Ajax (Telamonian)
- Alexander/Paris
- Alkinoös
- Amphinomos
- Andromache
- Antilochus
- Antinoös
- Aphrodite
- Apollo
- Ares
- Argos
- Astyanax (Skamandros)
- Athena/Athene
- Bryseis
- Calchas/Kalchas
- Cassandra
- Charybdis
- Chryseis
- Circe
- Demodokos
- Diomedes
- Elpenor
- Eos
- Eumaios
- Eurykleia
- Eurymachos
- Glaucus
- Hektor
- Helen
- Helios
- Hephaistos
- Hera
- Hermes
- Idomeneus
- Iris
- Kalypso
- Klytaimnestra
- Laertes
- Laistrygonians
- Lotus-Eaters
- Machaon
- Melantho
- Memnon
- Menelaus
- Mentor
- Nausikaa
- Nestor
- Odysseus
- Pandarus
- Patroklos
- Penelope
- Penthesilea
- Philoctetes
- Phoenix
- Polyphemos
- Poseidon
- Priam
- Proteus
- Sarpedon
- Scamander
- Skylla
- Talthybios
- Teiresias
- Telemachus
- Teucer
- Thetis
- Zeus
Other Items/phenomena you need to be able to identify:
these include important items from the notes on the website
- Aristeia
- Doloneia
- Teichoscopia
- Catalog of Ships
- The Epic Cycle
- Dactylic Hexameter
- Allegory and the overall meaning of Iliad and Odyssey
- Xenia/Guest friendship
- Supplication
- Epithets
- athletic games (funeral games for Patroclus and games at
Phaeacia)
- The 'Heroic Code' of ethics
- Gods v. Humans: what are the key differences and similarities?
- Telemacheia
- Reasons why the Telemacheia works at the start of Odyssey
- Lang's thesis: War Story and Wrath Story
- Elements in the epics that seem 'out of place'
- things like the catalogue of ships, the teichoscopia, or the
telemacheia: why they might seem out of place and why they
might actually fit very well in spite of that
- the problem of "Homer": what\who is "Homer"
- Milman Parry (and Albert Lord)
- orality
- Shield of Achilles
- Red Figure vs. Black Figure pottery
- Type scenes
SO what would a good answer look like?
- Teiresias: Teiresias, also spelled Tiresias, from Thebes (in
Thessaly) is a blind seer whom we encounter in Odyssey
when Odysseus goes to the land of the dead. He is a shade, but
he alone of the dead retains good understanding. Circe tells
Odysseus not to let any other shades drink from the blood until
Teiresias does. Then, when Odysseus gets there, even before
tasting the blood, Teiresias recognizes Odysseus. After drinking
the blood he prophesies to Odysseus how he can get home and that
he will kill all the suitors.
- Notice the facts there: 1. where he is from, 2. a trait,
blindness, 3. a profession, seer, 4. where in the epics, 5.
what he does in the epics.
- Other facts may apply to other figures.
- You will not need all these facts to pass, and you
would get full credit with less than is here, but that answer
would definitely get full credit.
- Dactylic Hexameter: the metrical pattern of long and short
syllables. it is the same for every line, and each line is made
up of 6 (hence hex-) units called dactyls (long-short-short) and
spondees (long-long). Most lines have long-short-short-long-long
at the end (the 'shave and a haircut). This is the rhythm of the
songs. It surely helped the bards to remember the vast poems and
their components.
- Notice: 1) the term is defined, 2) it's importance for the
poems is indicated.
The timeline on the website: this will be 'easy points'
for those who remember it, and will be sad for those who do not:
- They are found in "First Day of Class" notes under the
heading: Some Chronology to this course: a Timeline
- Be ready to fill in the blanks on a timeline like that
- Know the dates
- Know the names of the periods
- Know why the various periods are significant for this course
- i.e. what material we discuss here fits where on that
timeline
Maps:
- See Wilson P.
94-5 "the world of the Odyssey" map
- Be ready to label all the place names that are in the same
font as "Thrace" and "Phrygia", also be ready to label all the
place names in what is now the areas of modern Greece, the
Aegean Sea, and Asia Minor.
- Wilson P.
96-97 "The aegean and asia minor"
- be ready to label the following:
- crete, cyprus, Rhodes, Sparta, Argos, Athens, Euboea,
Tenedos, Lesbos, Delos, Mt Olympus, Troy, Lemnos, Lycia,
Hittites
- P. 98-99
"Mainland Greece"
- be ready to label: Cephallenia, Ithaca, Dulichium (Leucas),
Chalcis, Boeotia, Euboea, Athens, Attica, Peloponnese,
Thessaly, Macedonia, Thrace
- P. 100-101
The Peloponnese
- be ready to label: Lacedaemon, Cythera, Argo, Argos,
Mycenae, Attica, Euboea, Cephallenia, Ithaca, Dulichium
(Leucas), Achaea, Arcadia, Attica, Athens, Salamis, Delphi
Also, simple plot questions, such as the ones on the quizzes, are
fair game.
There will be snippets of text like the following: your task
will be to identify them and explain their significance: this is a
very important part of the test.
- The hunters came to a wooded valley, and on ahead of them
- ran the dogs, casting about for the tracks, and behind them
- the sons of Autolykos, and with them ___(name omitted)__
- went close behind the hounds, shaking his spear
far-shadowing.
- Now there, inside that thick of the bush, was the lair of a
great boar
- ...with fire from his eyes glaring
- the boar stood up to face them close. There first of all was
noble __(name omitted)__
- who swept in, holding high in his heavy hand the long spear
- and furious to stab, but too quick for him the boar drove
- over the knee, and with his tusk gashed much of the flesh
- tearing sidewise, and did not reach the bone of the man.
- The dear sons of Autolykos were busy to tend to him,
- and understandingly they bound up the wound....
- Then Autolykos and the sons of Autolykos,
- healing him well and giving him shining presents, send him
- speedily back rejoicing to his own beloved country.
- A good answer would be: Story of how Odysseus got his
scar from the boar: told as part of when Eurykleia recognized
him (by the scar, when she was washing him), which is a
"recognition scene" and occurs at ________ (describe the point
in the Odyssey/sequence of events this fits into)______."
Do not forget that we also read Plato's Ion, the
beginning of Thucydides' Peloponnesian War and Herodotus'
Persian War: there may be a snippet from one of those.
The following short answer (a paragraph) questions may
be on the test: your answer should be specifically focused,
thoughtful, doable, and show your own personal interests:
- On your next reading of these epics, what details would you
keep track of and why?
- Next time Prof. Bailly teaches this course, what one topic
that has not been covered would you research and present if you
were invited to come back and be a guest lecturer for one day?
- What are some significant moral problems with the ethical
systems you see operating in these epics?