One of the most iconic scenes in world mythologies is that of the dragon combat, where a hero overcomes a great monster in order to secure both immortal fame and the earthly rewards of the rule of a kingdom. Perseus used the freshly severed head of Medusa to petrify the great sea monster Cetus and […]
For heroines in Greek mythology, things don’t often end well. The case is similar for their counterparts in Roman mythology, which the Romans patriotically took as the historical foundations of their people, city, and their free republic. Several important stages in the evolution of the Roman state were catalyzed by various women’s sexual violation: Romulus’ […]
Day 1 of 7 Days of Roman Founders. By the end of the Roman Republic and dawn of Augustus’ Empire, various accounts of national origins were approaching uniformity: the twin descendants of the Trojan hero and refugee Aeneas, Romulus and Remus, founded the city of Rome in (give or take a year) 753 BCE. While […]
The Canadian heavy metal band Gatekeeper‘s release of their first LP East of Sun via Cruz del Sur last year catapulted the band into the spotlight as the new wave of traditional heavy metal gains ever more steam. But as today’s festivities turn our minds back to Canada’s unification into a single Dominion in 1867, […]
Among the many perils braved by Jason and his crew of Argonauts as they sailed toward the enchanted East was what we can rightly call the archetypal heavy-weight boxing match. Apollonius of Rhodes relates the episode most famously as the opening scene of Book 2 of his Hellenistic epic “Argonautica.” Shortly before encountering the Harpies […]
The Roman statesman, orator, and philosopher Cicero includes in his Tusculan Disputations an anecdote borrowed from earlier Greek historians about Dionysius II, tyrant of the Sicilian city of Syracuse (r. 367-344 BCE). Earlier in Greek history, the term tyrant simply denoted an autocratic ruler who took power unconstitutionally, but by the fourth century the political […]
The American heavy metal band The Lord Weird Slough Feg have recently released their latest album New Organon. Masterminded as always by guitarist, vocalist, and philosophy professor Mike Scalzi, “New Organon” is largely a series of meditations on various philosophical figures, texts, and ideas from throughout history. This includes tracks on Greek philosophers such as […]
The Italian heavy metal band Vultures Vengeance recently dropped their debut LP The Knightlore. Be sure to check it out, but today we look back a year at a song from their 2018 EP Lyrids: Warning from the Reign of the Untold. While the gods and generals of myth and history dominate metal’s classical reception, […]
Among the myriad femmes fatales of Greek mythology, the Sirens of Homer’s Odyssey are among the most popular as the subject of heavy metal lyrics. This comes as little surprise given that their method of deadly temptation is through the allure of music. Some sources say the Sirens were daughters of one of the Muses […]
The myth of Orpheus and Eurydice is duly famous both as a classic ‘katabasis’ (heroic descent into the underworld) and as a cautionary tale whose moral is that there cannot be love without trust. Son of Calliope, one of the 9 Muses, Orpheus was naturally a master poet and musician, and also a fitting husband […]
Heavy Metal Classicist 