Troy Historical Accuracy Essay Example for Free

Troy Historical Accuracy Essay The epic poem the â€Å"Iliad† is arguably one of mans most well known novel or book behind the Bible and the Odyssey (sequel to Iliad). The Iliad, and Odyssey for this matter where ancient texts written by Homer. The Iliad is a story set approximately 1194-1184 BC about the Trojan War and the ten year siege of Troy. This battle has many famous mythical figures such as Achilles the leader of the Myrmidons, Helen the princess that ran off with Paris which sparked the battle. Helen was the wife of King Menelaus ruler of the Spartans. Paris is a prince of Troy and brother to Hector the air to the throne. The movie adaptation is focused less on the adventures the Spartans had while sailing to Troy and more on the short stint of pre battle and end battle. The movie suggests the battle of Troy was over the course of a few weeks when per the Iliad it latest ten years. Now this battle has never been proven for accuracy and may have never happened. However the movie has a very direct sense of what and how the war was. It shows the layout of the city of Troy, the characters mentality and fondness or lack there of, of the characters. The way battles started seems quite accurate. Before a battle the opposing armies would taunt each other. After this the major warriors, or best of the army would duel each other. Depending on the outcome of this the battle would ensue. This is shown a few times in the movie. Once between Paris and Menelaus, which started the war. Paris surrendered and went to his brothers ankles. Hector protected Paris from being slaughtered. It shows the ships, blood, and garb the persons would wear in this time frame. Or does it? The dates this war happened of approximately 1194-1185 (10 years) is during the bronze age. This plays a key role in the historical accuracy of it. The weapons, shields, and clothing for battle is all wrong. These items shown are closer to the dark ages. The uniforms or garb of the ancient Greeks and Trojans where slightly less than what is shown in the movie. The movie depicted a very if not identical uniform for every soldier. In reality only the middle and upper class soldiers would have these. Even at that, the uniforms were not identical like in the movie. They where typically handed down from generation to generation due to cost. The armor and shields where made of Bronze breastplates in a muscled style, a helmet that covered most of their head and shin protection made of bronze. This is the uniform of the very well off soldiers. The common man would have even less. They would use a linen reinforced with bronze plating or animal skin, this was called â€Å"Linothorax armor† which was priced much lower then the fully bronze uniforms for the wealthy. The Greeks also found range weapons to be cowardly and would avoid use of them. In the movie both the Trojans and Spartans (Greeks, who thinks range weapons are cowardly) had many bows and used them often. The weapons other than long range used by both armies where typically Doru, which were long spears. These Doru like in the movie were 7-9 feet in length and where the primary weapon. In the movie the swords were primary, which in reality these where secondary weapons. These swords, or Xiphos where for use after the Doru were snapped or lost in combat. The xiphos were 2 feet for the Trojans and a bit shorter for the Spartans. The Spartans blades were typically 1-1. 5 feet long. This was more advantageous for the Spartans when the lines got much closer. The movie depicts both blades to be equal size on either side of the war. The ships where also dated much later in time. The ships of the bronze age would not have the very large and ornate front (Stem, Bow, or Head) and the stern would be higher. In the movie it seems to be the opposite. Most of the ships had much larger and obvious heads than sterns. The bow and stern would also be more angled and arched up. The movie depicts the ships bow to be flat on many ships. The movie Troy is a great story about the war between Troy and the Spartans. It depicts Achilles as a great warrior and in a strange way kind man. It has the beauty of Helen and the Anger of Menelaus. Much of this movie has been done historically correct however there are major flaws in its accuracy. I highly suggest one to watch this movie as it is quite enjoyable and the epic it is based on should be read as that is quite great itself.

Wuthering Heights: Sympathy With The Villain Essay -- essays research

Heathcliff, the main character in Wuthering Heights by Emily Bronte, has no heart. He is evil to the core - so savage that his lone purpose is to ruin others. Yet at the very moment at which the reader would be expected to feel the most antipathy towards the brute -after he has destroyed his wife, after he has degraded the life of a potentially great man, and after he has watched the death of his son occur with no care nor concern, the reader finds himself feeling strangely sympathetic towards this character. The answer to this oddity lies in the presentation of the character himself, which causes us to be more pitying of him than we otherwise might. Bronte’s describes the young boy, Heathcliff, as†dark, almost as if he came from the devil,† immediately spurring the reader to view the character as evil and immoral. His actions from thence forward largely tend to enhance this notion. From the very get go he hates Hindley, and although the feeling is mutual, Heathcliff certainly does his just portion of cruel deeds. In one incident Mr Earnshaw has given both Hindley and Heathcliff a colt. When Heathcliff’s colt goes lame, he threatens to blackmail Hindley if he does not trade with him. At a young age, he begins to plot revenge against Hindley. â€Å"I’m trying to settle how I shall pay Hindley back,† he says, â€Å"I don’t care how long I wait, if I can only do it at last. I hope he will not die before I do!† And in his adult years, we find him teaching Hindley’s son Hareton to swear desiring that the boy become just as foul as he. As the novel continues, Heathcliff devel ops another aversion. This time, to the man that married his lover, Edgar Linton. In one particular scene Edgar, Catherine, and Heathcliff are all involved in a passionate dispute. â€Å"I wish you the joy of a milk-blooded coward,† he says, â€Å"....I compliment you on your taste. And that is the slavering, shivering thing you preferred me too. I would not strike him with my fist, but I’d kick him with my foot and experience considerable satisfaction.† After the completion of this speech, Heathcliff proceeds to just as he had discussed. Later, to gain power of Edgar, Heathcliff elopes with Edgar’s sister, Isabella. Their marriage proves to be far from delightful, for Heathcliff has no love for Isabella. â€Å"Is Mr Heathcliff a man?† Isabella writes, â€Å"If so, is he mad? And if not, is he a devil?† Heathcliff’s com... ...ovel draws to a close, Heathcliff realizes the futility of his life, as it has been spent on that one task. â€Å"I get levers and mattocks to demolish the two houses (referring to Edgar’s and Hindley’s) and train myself to be capable of working like Hercules, and when everything is ready and in my power, I find the will to life a slate off either roof has vanished!...I could do it; and none would hinder me. But where is the use?...I have lost the faculty of enjoying their destruction, and I am too idle to destroy for nothing.† Upon realizing this, Heathcliff wills himself to die. Thus, despite Heathcliff’s immoral behavior and throughly evil actions, the book closes leaving the reader with a pitying disposition on the character’s behalf. After never being taught to love, being abused, losing ones love, and living for one thing only to later discover it’s futilty, one might ponder that Heathcliff couldn’t help but be how was. The circumstances were almost beyond his control. The passionate, violent environment of Wuthering Heights shaped him into the fiend that he was. And to read of that hellish existence is enough to impart a sympathetic sigh from even the most critical of readers.

Plato and the Allegory of the Cave Essay

The son of a wealthy and noble family, Plato (427-347 B.C.) was preparing for a career in politics when the trial and eventual execution of Socrates (399 B.C.) changed the course of his life. He abandoned his political career and turned to philosophy, opening a school on the outskirts of Athens dedicated to the Socratic search for wisdom. Plato’s school, then known as the Academy, was the first university in western history and operated from 387 B.C. until A.D. 529, when it was closed by Justinian. Unlike his mentor Socrates, Plato was both a writer and a teacher. His writings are in the form of dialogues, with Socrates as the principal speaker. In the Allegory of the Cave, Plato described symbolically the predicament in which mankind finds itself and proposes a way of salvation. The Allegory presents, in brief form, most of Plato’s major philosophical assumptions: his belief that the world revealed by our senses is not the real world but only a poor copy of it, and that the real world can only be apprehended intellectually; his idea that knowledge cannot be transferred from teacher to student, but rather that education consists in directing student’s minds toward what is real and important and allowing them to apprehend it for themselves; his faith that the universe ultimately is good; his conviction that enlightened individuals have an obligation to the rest of society, and that a good society must be one in which the truly wise (the Philosopher-King) are the ru lers. The Allegory of the Cave can be found in Book VII of Plato’s best-known work, The Republic, a lengthy dialogue on the nature of justice. Often regarded as a utopian blueprint, The Republic is dedicated toward a discussion of the education required of a Philosopher-King. The following selection is taken from the Benjamin Jowett translation (Vintage, 1991), pp. 253-261. As you read the Allegory, try to make a mental picture of the cave Plato describes. Better yet, why not draw a picture of it and refer to it as you read the selection. In many ways, understanding Plato’s Allegory of the Cave will make your foray into the world of philosophical thought much less burdensome. * * * * * * [Socrates] And now, I said, let me show in a figure how far our nature is enlightened or unenlightened: –Behold! human beings living in a underground cave, which has a mouth open towards the light and reaching all along the cave; here they have been from their childhood, and have their legs and necks chained so that they cannot move, and can only see before them, being prevented by the chains from turning round their heads. Above and behind them a fire is blazing at a distance, and between the fire and the prisoners there is a raised way; and you will see, if you look, a low wall built along the way, like the screen which marionette players have in front of them, over which they show the puppets. [Glaucon] I see. [Socrates] And do you see, I said, men passing along the wall carrying all sorts of vessels, and statues and figures of animals made of wood and stone and various materials, which appear over the wall? Some of them are talking, others silent. [Glaucon] You have shown me a strange image, and they are strange prisoners. [Socrates] Like ourselves, I replied; and they see only their own shadows, or the shadows of one another, which the fire throws on the opposite wall of the cave? [Glaucon] True, he said; how could they see anything but the shadows if they were never allowed to move their heads? [Socrates] And of the objects which are being carried in like manner they would only see the shadows? [Glaucon] Yes, he said. [Socrates] And if they were able to converse with one another, would they not suppose that they were naming what was actually before them? [Glaucon] Very true. [Socrates] And suppose further that the prison had an echo which came from the other side, would they not be sure to fancy when one of the passers-by spoke that the voice which they heard came from the passing shadow? [Glaucon] No question, he replied. [Socrates] To them, I said, the truth would be literally nothing but the shadows of the images. [Glaucon] That is certain. [Socrates] And now look again, and see what will naturally follow if the prisoners are released and disabused of their error. At first, when any of them is liberated and compelled suddenly to stand up and turn his neck round and walk and look towards the light, he will suffer sharp pains; the glare will distress him, and he will be unable to see the realities of which in his former state he had seen the shadows; and then conceive some one saying to him, that what he saw before was an illusion, but that now, when he is approaching nearer to being and his eye is turned towards more real existence, he has a clearer vision, -what will be his reply? And you may further imagine that his instructor is pointing to the objects as they pass and requiring him to name them, -will he not be perplexed? Will he not fancy that the shadows which he formerly saw are truer than the objects which are now shown to him? [Glaucon] Far truer. [Socrates] And if he is compelled to look straight at the light, will he not have a pain in his eyes which will make him turn away to take and take in the objects of vision which he can see, and which he will conceive to be in reality clearer than the things which are now being shown to him? [Glaucon] True, he now. [Socrates] And suppose once more, that he is reluctantly dragged up a steep and rugged ascent, and held fast until he ‘s forced into the presence of the sun himself, is he not likely to be pained and irritated? When he approaches the light his eyes will be dazzled, and he will not be able to see anything at all of what are now called realities. [Glaucon] Not all in a moment, he said. [Socrates] He will require to grow accustomed to the sight of the upper world. And first he will see the shadows best, next the reflections of men and other objects in the water, and then the objects themselves; then he will gaze upon the light of the moon and the stars and the spangled heaven; and he will see the sky and the stars by night better than the sun or the light of the sun by day? [Glaucon] Certainly. [Socrates] Last of he will be able to see the sun, and not mere reflections of him in the water, but he will see him in his own proper place, and not in another; and he will contemplate him as he is. [Glaucon] Certainly. [Socrates] He will then proceed to argue that this is he who gives the season and the years, and is the guardian of all that is in the visible world, and in a certain way the cause of all things which he and his fellows have been accustomed to behold? [Glaucon] Clearly, he said, he would first see the sun and then reason about him. [Socrates] And when he remembered his old habitation, and the wisdom of the cave and his fellow-prisoners, do you not suppose that he would felicitate himself on the change, and pity them? [Glaucon] Certainly, he would. [Socrates] And if they were in the habit of conferring honors among themselves on those who were quickest to observe the passing shadows and to remark which of them went before, and which followed after, and which were together; and who were therefore best able to draw conclusions as to the future, do you think that he would care for such honors and glories, or envy the possessors of them? Would he not say with Homer, Better to be the poor servant of a poor master, and to endure anything, rather than think as they do and live after their manner? [Glaucon] Yes, he said, I think that he would rather suffer anything than entertain these false notions and live in this miserable manner. [Socrates] Imagine once more, I said, such an one coming suddenly out of the sun to be replaced in his old situation; would he not be certain to have his eyes full of darkness? [Glaucon] To be sure, he said. [Socrates] And if there were a contest, and he had to compete in measuring the shadows with the prisoners who had never moved out of the cave, while his sight was still weak, and before his eyes had become steady (and the time which would be needed to acquire this new habit of sight might be very considerable) would he not be ridiculous? Men would say of him that up he went and down he came without his eyes; and that it was better not even to think of ascending; and if any one tried to loose another and lead him up to the light, let them only catch the offender, and they would put him to death. [Glaucon] No question, he said. [Socrates] This entire allegory, I said, you may now append, dear Glaucon, to the previous argument; the prison-house is the world of sight, the light of the fire is the sun, and you will not misapprehend me if you interpret the journey upwards to be the ascent of the soul into the intellectual world according to my poor belief, which, at your desire, I have expressed whether rightly or wrongly God knows. But, whether true or false, my opinion is that in the world of knowledge the idea of good appears last of all, and is seen only with an effort; and, when seen, is also inferred to be the universal author of all things beautiful and right, parent of light and of the lord of light in this visible world, and the immediate source of reason and truth in the intellectual; and that this is the power upon which he who would act rationally, either in public or private life must have his eye fixed. [Glaucon] I agree, he said, as far as I am able to understand you. [Socrates] Moreover, I said, you must not wonder that those who attain to this beatific vision are unwilling to descend to human affairs; for their souls are ever hastening into the upper world where they desire to dwell; which desire of theirs is very natural, if our allegory may be trusted. [Glaucon] Yes, very natural. [Socrates] And is there anything surprising in one who passes from divine contemplations to the evil state of man, misbehaving himself in a ridiculous manner; if, while his eyes are blinking and before he has become accustomed to the surrounding darkness, he is compelled to fight in courts of law, or in other places, about the images or the shadows of images of justice, and is endeavoring to meet the conceptions of those who have never yet seen absolute justice? [Glaucon] Anything but surprising, he replied. [Socrates] Any one who has common sense will remember that the bewilderments of the eyes are of two kinds, and arise from two causes, either from coming out of the light or from going into the light, which is true of the mind’s eye, quite as much as of the bodily eye; and he who remembers this when he sees any one whose vision is perplexed and weak, will not be too ready to laugh; he will first ask whether that soul of man has come out of the brighter light, and is unable to see because unaccustomed to the dark, or having turned from darkness to the day is dazzled by excess of light. And he will count the one happy in his condition and state of being, and he will pity the other; or, if he have a mind to laugh at the soul which comes from below into the light, there will be more reason in this than in the laugh which greets him who returns from above out of the light into the cave. [Glaucon] That, he said, is a very just distinction. [Socrates] But then, if I am right, certain professors of education must be wrong when they say that they can put a knowledge into the soul which was not there before, like sight into blind eyes. [Glaucon] They undoubtedly say this, he replied. [Socrates] Whereas, our argument shows that the power and capacity of learning exists in the soul already; and that just as the eye was unable to turn from darkness to light without the whole body, so too the instrument of knowledge can only by the movement of the whole soul be turned from the world of becoming into that of being, and learn by degrees to endure the sight of being, and of the brightest and best of being, or in other words, of the good. [Glaucon] Very true. [Socrates] And must there not be some art which will effect conversion in the easiest and quickest manner; not implanting the faculty of sight, for that exists already, but has been turned in the wrong direction, and is looking away from the truth? [Glaucon] Yes, he said, such an art may be presumed. [Socrates] And whereas the other so-called virtues of the soul seem to be akin to bodily qualities, for even when they are not originally innate they can be implanted later by habit and exercise, the of wisdom more than anything else contains a divine element which always remains, and by this conversion is rendered useful and profitable; or, on the other hand, hurtful and useless. Did you never observe the narrow intelligence flashing from the keen eye of a clever rogue –how eager he is, how clearly his paltry soul sees the way to his end; he is the reverse of blind, but his keen eyesight is forced into the service of evil, and he is mischievous in proportion to his cleverness. [Glaucon] Very true, he said. [Socrates] But what if there had been a circumcision of such natures in the days of their youth; and they had been severed from those sensual pleasures, such as eating and drinking, which, like leaden weights, were attached to them at their birth, and which drag them down and turn the vision of their souls upon the things that are below –if, I say, they had been released from these impediments and turned in the opposite direction, the very same faculty in them would have seen the truth as keenly as they see what their eyes are turned to now. [Glaucon] Very likely. [Socrates] Yes, I said; and there is another thing which is likely. or rather a necessary inference from what has preceded, that neither the uneducated and uninformed of the truth, nor yet those who never make an end of their education, will be able ministers of State; not the former, because they have no single aim of duty which is the rule of all their actions, private as well as public; nor the latter, because they will not act at all except upon compulsion, fancying that they are already dwelling apart in the islands of the blest. [Glaucon] Very true, he replied. [Socrates] Then, I said, the business of us who are the founders of the State will be to compel the best minds to attain that knowledge which we have already shown to be the greatest of all-they must continue to ascend until they arrive at the good; but when they have ascended and seen enough we must not allow them to do as they do now. [Glaucon] What do you mean? [Socrates] I mean that they remain in the upper world: but this must not be allowed; they must be made to descend again among the prisoners in the cave, and partake of their labors and honors, whether they are worth having or not. [Glaucon] But is not this unjust? he said; ought we to give them a worse life, when they might have a better? [Socrates] You have again forgotten, my friend, I said, the intention of the legislator, who did not aim at making any one class in the State happy above the rest; the happiness was to be in the whole State, and he held the citizens together by persuasion and necessity, making them benefactors of the State, and therefore benefactors of one another; to this end he created them, not to please themselves, but to be his instruments in binding up the State. [Glaucon] True, he said, I had forgotten. [Socrates] Observe, Glaucon, that there will be no injustice in compelling our philosophers to have a care and providence of others; we shall explain to them that in other States, men of their class are not obliged to share in the toils of politics: and this is reasonable, for they grow up at their own sweet will, and the government would rather not have them. Being self-taught, they cannot be expected to show any gratitude for a culture which they have never received. But we have brought you into the world to be rulers of the hive, kings of yourselves and of the other citizens, and have educated you far better and more perfectly than they have been educated, and you are better able to share in the double duty. Wherefore each of you, when his turn comes, must go down to the general underground abode, and get the habit of seeing in the dark. When you have acquired the habit, you will see ten thousand times better than the inhabitants of the cave, and you will know what the several images are, and what they represent, because you have seen the beautiful and just and good in their truth. And thus our State which is also yours will be a reality, and not a dream only, and will be administered in a spirit unlike that of other States, in which men fight with one another about shadows only and are distracted in the struggle for power, which in their eyes is a great good. Whereas the truth is that the State in which the rulers are most reluctant to govern is always the best and most quietly governed, and the State in which they are most eager, the worst. [Glaucon] Quite true, he replied. [Socrates] And will our pupils, when they hear this, refuse to take their turn at the toils of State, when they are allowed to spend the greater part of their time with one another in the heavenly light? [Glaucon] Impossible, he answered; for they are just men, and the commands which we impose upon them are just; there can be no doubt that every one of them will take office as a stern necessity, and not after the fashion of our present rulers of State. [Socrates] Yes, my friend, I said; and there lies the point. You must contrive for your future rulers another and a better life than that of a ruler, and then you may have a well-ordered State; for only in the State which offers this, will they rule who are truly rich, not in silver and gold, but in virtue and wisdom, which are the true blessings of life. Whereas if they go to the administration of public affairs, poor and hungering after the’ own private advantage, thinking that hence they are to snatch the chief good, order there can never be; for they will be fighting about office, and the civil and domestic broils which thus arise will be the ruin of the rulers themselves and of the whole State. [Glaucon] Most true, he replied. [Socrates] And the only life which looks down upon the life of political ambition is that of true philosophy. Do you know of any other? [Glaucon] Indeed, I do not, he said. [Socrates] And those who govern ought not to be lovers of the task? For, if they are, there will be rival lovers, and they will fight. [Glaucon] No question. [Socrates] Who then are those whom we shall compel to be guardians? Surely they will be the men who are wisest about affairs of State, and by whom the State is best administered, and who at the same time have other honors and another and a better life than that of politics? [Glaucon] They are the men, and I will choose them, he replied. [Socrates] And now shall we consider in what way such guardians will be produced, and how they are to be brought from darkness to light, — as some are said to have ascended from the world below to the gods? [Glaucon] By all means, he replied. [Socrates] The process, I said, is not the turning over of an oyster-shell, but the turning round of a soul passing from a day which is little better than night to the true day of being, that is, the ascent from below, which we affirm to be true philosophy? [Glaucon] Quite so.

The Violence Is An Acceptable Act - 1799 Words

Society is any group of people usually sharing a common goal. Within a society, most people have morals they follow. Murderers within societies go against one of the biggest morals of all, which is taking away a person’s life. Numerous killers have psychological problems that make them believe violence is an acceptable act. Although killing is a huge problem in this world, many killers do not even realize how they are affecting people’s lives. The reality is, no matter what kind of disorder the murderer may have, killing is still affecting society. Within the huge varieties of murders there are, there are many different kinds of killers. I have found that one of the groups you can put killers into is premeditated and predatory†¦show more content†¦These different types of killers are all deadly, just in different ways. I think if all psychologists in this field came together to work as one, they could put an end to this killing, and it would affect society in a positive way by having less crimes happen. Psychotics and Psychopaths are just two of the mental disorders that have to do with the psychological side of why people kill. Psychotics have a â€Å"Complete loss of one’s sense of reality† (Brogaard, Berit). Some symptoms of psychosis are hallucinations, beliefs that are not logical, being paranoid, and strange behavior. These characteristics go directly with the definition because they all describe how psychotics are not in tune with the reality of situations. Think of how you would feel if you were so mentally ill that you heard voices in your head and hallucinate in the middle of doing something. I know I would feel completely lost (Brogaard, Berit; Bloodthirsty - Inside the Mind of a Serial Killer). Although psychotics and psychopaths are both mental disorders, they think in very different ways. Psychopaths are definitely in tune with the world around them because like I mentioned earlier, they plan out their crimes. Psychopaths feel no guilt for what they do, h ave impossible goals in mind, think they are better than others, and they have a difficult time following rules (Brogaard, Berit;