this post was submitted on 27 Jul 2026
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The Achilles thing made me chuckle. And then it made me weep a bit because general education seems to be dead. I learnt about the Trojan war and attached mythology at school, doesn't that happen anymore or is it an attention issue?
Maybe it's just anything Greek. I remember reading a comment chain right here on Lemmy like 6 months ago, something about a thing/machine/software named Prometheus. One commenter wondered why they'd name themselves after an Alien movie.
Ouch. Prometheus himself would probably have turned around and returned the fire where it came from if he knew about that.
"I still get punished for helping those idiots thousands of years ago? Boy, that was so not worth it."
Right!? The Alien from 'Kablam!' who taught Bob deserves better than that.
Yeah, after suffering so much.
Deep cut lol
That's not how forethought works!!
I don't think I ever covered any Greek myths in school in the UK. Like many others I did have an interest in them so I did read the Iliad and Odyssey in my school years (though I don't remember which translations)
At the end of the day there is simply far too much history to give everyone an overview of all of the big things. There are interesting aspects of the relationship between myth, history, historiography, and archaeology that I expect Troy could be a great subject for, but I don't think there's anything so unique about it that it has to be a topic
Here in the U.S., we cover the Greek stuff A LOT. Like it is hammered into your head. The reason for this is, of course, the U.S. sees itself as the heir to Athenian Democracy and Roman Republicanism, so we have to really emphasize that in our conditionin.... Uhhh education.
No, the reason is that the storytelling methods which we still use to this day originated in Greek drama and comedy. It’s foundational for a complete understanding of literature, theater, poetry, and indeed most all art forms. Any education without at least a significant time spent on the classics is utterly worthless.
Thank you for the sane take.
I read a lot of Greek mythology on my own and through elective classes but I think the only core course material I had on it was pretty brief. Shakespeare was pretty much every year starting in middle school but not much Greek.
Ya, like most things in the us, it's not ubiquitous. But my experience was similar to yours. We covered it, but it wasn't beaten into us like it was on some "we're the heir to the Athenian dynasty" tip.
Studying Greek classics being used as an "America bad" is the biggest stretch, jfc. Not everything is a conspiracy. Take it down a notch.
I don't remember learning about the Greek myths in Canada's (Ontario) public school either. I heard about them for the first time when I studied it in a university history class. We did ancient Greece, Rome, and Egypt as a young kid but I don't believe the myths were mentioned.
Here in german speaking central europe i learnt (i wont stop using it just to piss @atomicbocks@sh.itjust.works off lol) about the wars among the greek citystates, with references to Homer, and later on when learning Latin (which i sucked at, but that's not so important right now) we read excerpts and learnt (hahaha roflcopter) about the mythology a lot more. There also were references to the Greek mythology in our literature classes.
Interestingly, my education regarding norse mythology was sorely lacking after school. We touched a few subjects, but without personal initiative i wouldn't know shit about it outside of Odin, Loki, Thor and the Midgard Snake.
Oh great, those nords are now copying Skyrim and changing letters around to try and hide it!
It's fine, you're allowed to learn things outside of school. Something many people apparently have completely forgotten.
I took a whole Greek Lit class in high school.. but that was like 20+ years ago.
fuck I'm getting old
at least you are not growing old alone, i going with ya all the way ;-)
We did too but that was a few decades ago.