#nysus-temple | Explore Tumblr Posts and Blogs

gemsofgreece · 2 years

Note

Hi there, hope you're doing well ! I've been lurking around your blog for a while, but felt kind of shy to ask anything. In any case, and dunno if this has been asked to you already, but it is the first time I hear this term. Is this actually true?

I saw this comment on a video regarding the Byzantine Empire. People started a debate wether it's actually "just the Roman Empire" or the Byzantine Empire. I've been told Greeks call themselves ’Ελληνες, but it's the very first time in my life I hear the term Ρωμιοί.

Hello! It is totally true, albeit oversimplified in this comment and not at all easy to explain. I have answered a similar ask before but I have read a little more since then and I would like to give a new more informed and thus EVEN longer answer. Brace yourself.

So, there are actually four widespread names by which Greeks are known to this day: Hellenes, Greeks, Romans and Ionians.

The name Romans or Ρωμαίοι / Ρωμιοί (Roméi / Romjí) in Greek and Rum in Turkish is a remnant of the Roman / Byzantine heritage. So as you might know, the “original” Romans conquered the Greek territories and colonies around 200-40 BCE. For the most part, it is safe to say the Greeks were privileged in the Roman Empire. So much so, that Romans maintained Greek as the lingua franca and promoted Greek culture in at least the whole eastern part of the Roman Empire, while the initiation to the Greek language and culture was also a “must” in the elite of the Western part. Under these circumstances, the Greeks naturally embraced their new status as Roman citizens.

In history, such a thing as a Byzantine empire does not actually exist. In the end of the 4th century the Roman Empire split into western and eastern, theoretically in order to be better reigned. The Latins / original Romans were in the western part. The Greeks were in the eastern part which retained the Greek heritage the original Romans had more than allowed them to preserve. The western part was however dissolved for good within a century or so. That left the “non-Latin Roman” Eastern Roman Empire to be the remaining Roman Empire for the next 900 years!

For the first couple centuries of its solitary existence, the Eastern Roman Empire (known back then just as Roman Empire as there wasn’t a western one anymore) was in more or less good relations with the Latin states in the west (and also incorporated them for a little while). Progressively more and more problems arose with a most critical one being that the practice of Christianity was becoming more and more different. The bigger the gap, the more the Eastern Roman citizens immersed themselves back into the Greek and a more oriental heritage, originating from the other people of the empire (Armenians, Syrians, Egyptians, Illyrians, the new-coming Slavs etc). After the sixth century AD, Greek was adopted as the official language of the empire and there was clear desire to cut all associations and dependency by Rome’s Pope. The citizens of the Eastern Empire kept calling themselves Romans, which now outraged Western Europeans who considered them heretics and imposters and fabricated a very lurid and unflattering image of them, driven by the Pope’s fury.

Western Europeans usually refused to call the Eastern Roman Empire as such and called it Greek empire instead, due to its most populous ethnic people and its dominant (yet not exclusive) culture. The name “Greek” took a negative meaning in the hostile west at the time. It was true however that the Eastern Roman Empire had ceased having crucial similarities with the original Roman Empire, save for the legislation and maybe a love for horse races 😜

This is what leads to the modern discourse of what the Eastern Roman Empire should be considered. The Byzantine Empire is a term historians came up with to underscore all those differences which according to them made the Eastern Roman Empire a different entity from the initial Roman Empire. The citizens of the actual empire though did consider it Roman as the empire had not ever dissolved properly. Furthermore, as the leading element in the eastern part of the Ancient Roman Empire was already largely Greek, the citizens of the Byzantine Empire weren’t that aware of any sudden radical pro-Greek changes that would make them perceive the empire as a new entity. It is thus almost certain that at that point Roman did not mean “resident of Rome” or “Latin speaker of the Italian peninsula” in the east at all. The Byzantines thought they were the ones who were keeping the Roman Empire alive and as such they were the rightful heirs to its power, glory and title.

All eastern Roman ethnicities were largely aware of their descent, their background outside the Roman citizenship. Maybe the Greeks a little more due to the empire’s raging “Grecophilia”. We know that the Byzantine Greeks studied extensively the classics and the Ancient Greek philosophers and acknowledged them as their ancestors, and not the ancient Romans. This becomes more evident as the Eastern Roman Empire started losing lands to invaders. The last lands standing save for Constantinople were roughly the regions corresponding to modern day Greece. At this point and in general gradually after the 10th century, more and more eastern Romans, especially the wealthier and more educated, start identifying by the ancient term “Hellene”. The name Hellene was avoided considerably before the 10th century as it had acquired the meaning of “idolatrous”. The name “Greek” was used probably prior to the “Hellene” but might have been more avoided once “Hellene” took over as the West had given it the meaning of “debaucherous and corrupted”. Maybe this is the reason Greeks might have embraced the term Roman for longer than the other East Roman ethnicities but it’s also certainly because the Greeks were also the last standing Roman citizens. About 1000 years after the actual Romans!!! Crazy huh?

Then as you know the Ottoman Turks arrived. The Ottomans were trying for about two centuries to conquer the fast weakening and dismantling (thanks to the Crusaders) Roman Empire. But when they did, they knew they conquered the Romans. In a way, the Ottoman Turks got to know the Greeks as Romans and not the Latin Romans of Rome.

Just to complicate things a little more, the Ottomans categorised people based on religion and not ethnicity. So they created the Rum Millet, meaning the “Roman nation”, which was consisting of the Christian Orthodox believers. The Ottoman Sultans relied on the Greeks of Constantinople to govern the Rum Millet and all the ethnicities it consisted of, and as a result the term Roman / Rum remained strongly associated to the ethnic Greeks and the Greek speaking Orthodox people. As a result, Greeks kept calling themselves Romans in the Ottoman era. By that time though, the Greek word for Roman had been influenced by the Turkish word Rum and it had changed from Ρωμαίος (Romaeos) to Ρωμιός (Romiós).

During the Greek revolution and the independence, 300-400 years later, all sources we have point at the fact that wealthy, educated, poor and illiterate Greeks alike used the names Hellenes, Greeks and Romans interchangeably to identify themselves. The ways these names were preserved might have been different though:

Romios/Roman: preserved through the Turkish name for the Greeks and the Greek Orthodox

Hellene: preserved through the Orthodox Church (Greeks are mentioned as Hellenes in the New Testament), by the educated Greeks and by all Greeks who focused on the significance of Greek culture and history as the foundation of the ethnic identity

Greek: either the steadily more colloquial choice and / or popularised once more after several Greeks interacted with Western Europeans, eventually reclaimed by the Greeks without its medieval negative connotations (here I must add that the actual ancient word Γραικός - Graecus had no negative meaning whatsoever)

Nowadays, the name Roman is still used by the Greeks of Turkey and some other Greek minorities in the east. In Greece, it’s falling out of use at exponential rate since the early 20th century, especially as we realise there are less confusing terms to describe us more accurately. But it’s not considered problematic or anything. Nowadays we are “okay” with the term Greek, but we are not enthusiastic about it. Some dislike it as they can’t get over the negative connotations it had for a while. Our historically preferred way to call ourselves is Hellenes, it is the name that reflects our perception of our heritage, language and history. It is also the way we perceive our ethnicity for most of the stages of our existence, even when we called our nationality / citizenship “Roman”.

BONUS 1: And what about the Ionians? Ionians has its roots in the Ancient Greek tribe “Ionians” who first inhabited Anatolia (modern day west Turkey) in the early second millennium BCE. As a result most nations in the Near East call Greeks a variation of Ionians, because this is the easternmost indigenous Greek presence. Turks do too, an ethnic Greek is called Yunan which means Ionian and Greece is called Yunanistan. Yevan is our name in Hebrew and so on. This is a term we embrace but we generally associate more with the ancestral tribe and don’t use it for ourselves regularly.

BONUS 2: Western Europeans were adamant to separate the Byzantine Empire from the Roman Empire as long as all negative stereotypes and beliefs about it were surviving (until very recently). Nowadays that history buffs have spread that research starts showing that the Byzantine Empire has been the longest lasting and a very fascinating part of medieval European history, all of a sudden Western Europeans like to scream at your face the Byzantine Empire never existed and it’s “purely the Roman Empire through and through”. You can draw some interesting conclusions from that…

I like the use of the term Byzantine, not because it’s historically accurate of course, but because the good old western appropriation has started doing its wonders once again.

Hope this is shortened automatically as I don’t see the read below option available anymore, pro-scrollers may you have the best of luck 🤞

#Greece #history #medieval history #Middle Ages #Byzantine empire #Byzantine history #eastern roman empire #Greeks #Greek people #the names of the Greeks #Greek history #ask #nysus-temple #long post #tw long text #tw long post #greek facts

95 notes · View notes

quill-is-brainstorming · 1 year

Text

A gift for @nysus-temple and her awesome obsession.

Honestly, I don't even know if I'd call this a gift, more so a vision that came to me in a dream and that I decided to make reality. It was my vocation to make this.

#odysseus #sisyphus #the odyssey #ancient greek mythology #laertes #nysus-temple

19 notes · View notes

0lympian-c0uncil · 2 years

Text

Dionysus: Why would I make them so uncomfortable?

Apollo: It probably has to do with your reputation.

Dionysus: I have reputation?

Apollo: They feel your methods, your theories, are...

Dionysus: ... Spooky?

Apollo: ...

Dionysus,*smiling*: ... Do you think I'm spooky?

#@nysus-temple #Remembered how much you love Dionysus #dionysus #apollo #greek gods #greek mythology #incorrect greek gods #incorrect greek mythology #incorrect greek god quotes #incorrect greek quotes

221 notes · View notes

totally-italy · 27 days

Note

Greek Mythology!!

Firstly, thank you so much for sending me this ask! I really appreciate it and it genuinely made my day! Apologies for not answering immediately but I had to go to dinner and also watched a bit of Just Add Magic, for maybe the third time now, with my brother. Also, as a last note, I originally started planning the answer on here but then got carried away, hence the slightly more informal than usual essay. Lastly, I'm kind of wondering if I should gather up the courage to tag (@/nysus-temple) a blog of a Classics student (I think), who knows a lot about Greek Mythology and has posted about it before, so maybe let me know if I should....

Personally, I find that Greek Mythology is absolutely fascinating due to its multi-faceted nature in elucidating multudinous aspects of society around modern-day Greece; in origin, being a polytheistic religion, it consisted of hundreds or thousands of different gods, who were said to control various aspects of the natural world around them, ranging from the sea, the sky and fate, to smaller things such as the seasons and the existence of particular flowers. Ergo, one of the essential aspects of Greek Mythology is that it provided explanations of the world around them, giving answers to the essential human questions, such as why we exist and how the world as we know was created. And, due to the lack of the scientific theories and explanations that are available today, many people living in Greek city states and beyond believed in stories rooted in the lives and actions of gods who lived rather close by, on Mount Olympus.

On the other hand, though this mythology was significant in explaining the origins of human existence, like most religions, its more significant asset was that it provided gods for them to believe in, giving the Hellenes deities to both thank and blame for their fortunes and tragedies alike, whilst simultaneously bringing a dim hope of a certain degree of control; if one had angered an Olympian, they could pray and offer sacrifices to attempt to appease the gods, allowing them a potential solution to their misfortune. However, considering as the Greek gods were notorious for being self-centred and petty, this particular element of hope is not the most convincing or important aspect of the religion. Instead, like many modern religions that still span the globe, Greek Mythology was significant because it provides an explanation of what happens to people after death, in this case suggesting that a person's actions would dictate where in the Underworld they would end up: the Elysium Fields, if they had lived good and meaningful lives, the Fields of Asphodel, if their existence had been one of neither significantly good nor evil actions, or the Fields of Punishment and Tartarus, for the souls who committed sins or crossed the gods. On a psychological level, this is crucial because it gave people the reassurance that they could avoid the Fields of Punishment or Tartarus by trying to live in a just manner, whilst also offering an explanation of what happens after death and consoling people against the dread of simply ceasing to exist (which is particularly common within Western religions, rather than those which embrace both reincarnation and Samsara).

Moreover, most myths within Greek Mythology elucidate some of the morals that people should live by, whilst delineating blood crimes (the murder or injury of one's own relative) and a lack of Xenia (which is the virtue of hospitality, holding both the host and the guests to certain social standards and levels of respect) as being two of the worst sins that one could ever commit. Within this, the concept of fatal flaws is highly significant, considering as many heroes met tragic fates as a consequence of some of their personality traits, often in the form of hubris. However, the first and foremost concept that must be grasped when thinking about Greek Mythology is that the depiction of the gods, despite varying between individuals, often is akin to that of temperamental children with an unjust degree of power, rather than the Judeo-Christian notion of God as an omnipotent and omnibenevolent being. Essentially, the gods are an exploration of what humans would be like if they were completely immortal and did not have to face the consequences of their actions; considering as the gods would generally be revered above most mortals, they usually wouldn't have to face the repercussions of their negligence during their life and, being immortal, would not be punished in the Underworld after death.

For this reason, Greek Mythology contains many tales of gods like Zeus and Poseidon, who were revered for the power and authority that they held, but who nonetheless were unfaithful husbands and bad fathers who notoriously committed sexual assault on multiple occasions, yet were seldom held accountable for their actions. In contrast, other deities such as Hera, Aphrodite and Athena are depicted as jealous and arrogant deities, who have been hurt by others to the point of often also becoming cruel or unsympathetic perpetrators of horrendous and violent actions. In fact, Greek Mythology as a whole does not distinguish between deities by painting them in different lights based on how many sins they each committed or how many people they hurt; whilst such actions are not condoned, the entire infrastructure of Greek Mythology is such that a god resembles what they represent or stand for, sharing similar aspects within their own personality. For example, as the King of the Gods and the god of the sky, Zeus at times serves as a decisive ruler who works hard to ensure that quarrels on Olympus are resolved, whilst not subtracting his plethora of negative traits as one of the most egocentric and arrogant gods of Olympus.

Similarly, whilst Hera is depicted as jealous and vengeful to a fault, the psychology behind her pain over being constantly cheated upon strikes a nerve with those willing to empathise with her married life. Whilst she is the goddess of childbirth, marriage and family, her own life as an Olympian serves as a representation of mistaken marriage and its consequences on a person's mental health, whilst still exposing some of her deficiencies, particularly as the mother of Hephaestus.

Elaborating further, though certain deities are depicted in a warmer and less violent light, such as Hestia, who made of vow of peace after the end of the Titanomachy, it is clearly within her nature to provide comfort and care for those around her, considering as she is the goddess of the home and the hearth. For this reason, Greek Mythology, whilst providing some vague guidelines for sins that should be avoided, was neither intended to imply that mortals should act like the gods nor that all the Olympians are inherently evil; though gods such as Zeus and Poseidon are both rapists who would be imprisoned within our modern society, I honestly don't believe that the Greeks would have condoned their actions by simply arguing that gods should have their liberties or that, being an example of what people would be like if they were immortal, that they simply 'couldn't help themselves' since they were so unused to not having to face the consequences of their actions. In fact, when instead casting an eye to Roman Mythology, where poets like Ovid wrote about the gods in such a way as to heavily emphasise their negative traits and their deficits, it is clear that the gods were never intended to be seen as perfect deities, yet rather as omnipresent forces and authority figures who had to be revered in order to survive.

Overall, though at the heart of Greek Mythology, there is a general tendency to comply and not disagree with the gods, in order to not be cursed by them, I think it is really important to consider the multudinous facades within this rich culture of oral tradition; whilst providing a hypothetical explanation for how the world and people came to be, Greek Mythology is a religion which provides moral stories of the gods and how to avoid ending up in Tartarus, yet it has also been a source of entertainment for people of all epochs, bringing together generation after generation, all revelling in the magic of the storyteller, recounting the trials of various heroes as they struggled in their lives and faced their own quests. In conclusion, though it clearly also served as an explanation for the natural world and was a polytheistic religious tradition, I think Greek Mythology should also be considered for what it represents: an amalgamation of human experiences, from the pits of despair, to love and strength, whilst retaining a certain wariness of what they would become without the constraints of their own religion and of death.

#I hope that all made sense #Sorry I didn't fully re-read over it as a whole but it is nearly 1 am and I should probably sleep #That was really fun though #Thank you so much for that ask!#I will respond to the rest of the asks in my inbox after I have slept #Goodnight to all of y'all!#Sorry for the really long explanation #l'italiana parla

24 notes · View notes

dootznbootz · 3 months

Note

What’s your opinion on the whole ‘Odysseus is ACTUALLY the son of Sisyphus’ like where does that myth come from? I don’t think it’s that well known and I don’t think many people ascribe Odysseus with Sisyphus but it does make me wonder how such statement came to be

Sorry this took so long😭I really loved this ask and wanted to really have the time and energy to answer it!

So for the sources for it, nysus-temple has a great post on it. (another for good measure) I recommend asking them too!

From what I know for the myth, Autolycus has beef with so many people because he was a lil shit. Sisyphus decides to either seduce or rape Anticlea as revenge. Laertes marries her. (Laertes was an Argonaut, so I'd like to think that Jason being his friend AND Anticlea's half-sibling played a bit of a part)

I also think that it was possibly slander against Odysseus with how he's "a man of many turns". Sisyphus didn't honor xenia and was just an overall ass to many people but he was smart. A lot of people don't see him as a good man. Odysseus is very similar in many ways so I believe that this was meant to insult Odysseus as many people did not like him.

My Opinions PERSONALLY will be down below. (aka DO NOT take anything I say down below as fact. I'm just silly :P )

I plan to write it to be unknown.

For what I'm planning for Laertes and Anticlea's love story, has a lot to do with the whole "argonaut and friend of Jason". After what happened to Anticlea, Autolycus wasn't sure what to do and Laertes wanted to marry her. (I'm weird and think the idea of Odysseus and his mother going through the same thing would be interesting to pick apart :') ) Laertes secretly always admired her. Autolycus heard of this quiet country bumpkin and was like "Yeah. You seem good." Odysseus is born 9 months later. And it's unknown who's the father but it doesn't matter to Laertes.

Odysseus in mine takes after Anticlea physically in practically every way. (My post on his appearance in my fics) Ctimene also takes after Anticlea quite a bit but she has Laertes' eye color and her being more "stout" like he is.

Odysseus is around 13 when he first hears rumors about Laertes not being his dad and that Sisyphus is. That's a lot on him. It really bothers him when people try to say that he's actually Sisyphus' son. Just because he's smart and a lil shit doesn't mean that he's his son. He just takes after his mom's side of the family. And it means so so much to Odysseus that his dad loves him regardless.

#sighs #I started writing something for this one too but I realized half-way through that the reason it wasn't working is because it was #out of character for my sillies in the first place🙃#I'm sorry about that ;~; I didn't mean for it to take forever. I just really love this ask as I have a lot of on it but also don't wanna #give too much away without writing so yee #Mad rambles #shot by odysseus #odysseus #laertes #anticlea #I love the lil family.#tw rape mention #ask #winters0689 #my headcanons

21 notes · View notes

superkooku · 2 months

Note

Is there an opinion about greek myth someone might have that would make you not follow them? I am not necessarily talking about a super serious opinion, it could simply be a disagreement of opinion... It doesn't have to be a case of blocking, simply not following is okay...

Hi, anon 👋 !

So, there are quite a lot of popular opinions I heavily disagree with and make me want to avoid interacting with a post :

Zeus being an evil douche

Hades and Persephone being the only good couple

Odysseus being a cheater (I'm just ranting about it separately 🤣)

Medea/Clytemnestra did nothing wrong, and Jason/Agamemnon is 100% a douche

Anything surrounding Ovid Medusa (though it's a potentially interesting subject for ROMAN mythology discussions)

For FOLLOWING, however, I don't really have a clear pattern so much as a preference: I already prefer following accounts actually talking about the source material rather than Percy Jackson for example.

People that appreciate the Greek culture (reminder : I'm not Greek) and don't take the myths out of their context.

So, normally, we're pretty much on the same page.

(I dunno if it counts, but I kinda avoid Lore Olympus fan accounts. Nothing against anyone who likes something I don't, ofc, it's just awkward.)

Side note : for my FANDOMS, that's a whole other story. Some of these opinions make me cringe every time I see them. The more central to X media it is, the least I want to interact with the poster.

I hope I could answer your question.

Some other blogs whose answers could be very interesting : @margaretkart @dootznbootz @nysus-temple @katerinaaqu

#greek mythology #greek myth discussion #my blog #ask #not a reblog

16 notes · View notes

that-guy-in-the-chiton · 1 year

Text

Made a comic based on the incorrect quotes of the lovely @nysus-temple!

#anti lo #anti lore olympus #mythology #greek mythology #greek mythology art #helios #circe #Circe art #Helios art #Comic #webcomi #incorrect quotes #myart #my artwork #Helios is a bit of a himbo #Himbo

62 notes · View notes

pelideswhore · 1 year

Text

NOSTALGIA | CHAPTER 20

TAGLIST: @koruga @min3tta @athamad @sworebytheriverstyx @wolfythewitch @dauntless-and-assiduous @maraudersforlife5922 @instarss @ahouli-lia @eggbreadboi @starlightqueen34 @quill-is-brainstorming @scoopac @ellisthen @margaretkart @nysus-temple

NOTE: You can choose whether to read the fic under the cut or on ao3. I hope that after the archive being down for so long you will leave a comment or reblog, it really makes my day! As for the fic, we finally have a reunion now :’) i have read SO many research papers just for this scene, i will take no criticism on the matter. i am more of an expert than homer.

THE REUNION

Odysseus stepped into the courtyard, now clean from blood, sweat, and seawater. The slavegirls were gone. The air was filled with smoke from the large bonfire and wedding music, just as he had ordered. Though he could see the blood, to any outsider behind the locked gates, it would sound like Penelope had chosen a husband. No one would know of their deaths for now.

The tables had been emptied, cleaned, and set up straight again and Odysseus returned to his seat, watching Telemachus help the swineherd and some other slaves clear the ground of blood. He took a single braid in his hand and toyed with it, closing his eyes. Eurycleia had braided his hair the way he had always braided it before the war; loose, hanging off his scalp, and adorned with cuffs. He was at home now, after all.

When he opened his eyes, Penelope was standing at the entrance to the palace with Eurycleia by her side. He jumped up at the sight of her, but she just stood in the doorway. Instead of the black chiton, she wore a violet one that exposed her arms, the cloth falling to her sides instead of being pinned at her wrist and elbow. She held the dress up, as though she had been running.

The world faded away around him. He approached her like in a trance, without any control of his limbs. All he could feel was the wobble in his knees and the hammering of his heart. All he could see was his Penelope, unsmiling, unmoving, in the door to his palace.

“Why are you treating him like a stranger?” Telemachus asked. Even his voice was faded.

Odysseus shook his hand at him—not even he knew what the gesture was supposed to mean. “It’s alright,” he whispered, more to himself than anyone else, “it’s alright. She knows me. She’ll know me.”

Eurycleia left—Odysseus did not know where to nor did he care—and he was alone with his wife in the courtyard.

“Penelope,” he said, louder now. His voice cracked. “Do you not recognize me?” She just stared at him, unaffected. Her eyes pierced through him, like arrows delving right into his soul. Her eyes remained empty while his filled with tears. “Look— look at this.” He quickly pulled his short tunic up and her eyes trailed down to the scar. “Remember this? It’s me.”

She said nothing, but her chest began to rise and fall faster. She recognized him. Surely she recognized him. And even so, she faced him with a heart of stone. Then, she smiled. Without dimples. Odysseus frowned. “Excuse me, Odysseus,” she said, “for being so cold-hearted. I wouldn’t want to accept a stranger as my husband.”

“I know.” He blinked and a tear fell to his cheek. “I know.”

Penelope did not make a move to kiss him, to hug him, to touch him, so Odysseus stepped forward himself and grabbed her arms and squeezed them once before his knees gave in and he fell, digging his face into her lap. He grabbed fistfuls of her chiton, clutching on like he was clutching onto life, and soaked the dress with tears, the saltiness trickling into his mouth. Was she disappointed that he was back? Did she really want to remarry one of the suitors? Had it been more than a decoy?

She put her hands on his head, stroking the braids. “Eurycleia, set up a bed for my husband outside our chamber.”

Odysseus looked up at her and huffed an ironic laugh. The crying had stopped as suddenly as it had started. “You’re going to make me sleep outside?”

Penelope wiped his tears away. “You can’t blame me for being faithful to my husband,” she said. “You’ve been gone for twenty years—I don’t know you anymore.” Her eyes trailed over the new scars on his arm, on his wrist, on his shoulder. Anywhere skin was exposed, there was a scar.

He just stared at her and she continued with her order to Eurycleia. “Our bed,” she added. “Pull out our bed and let him sleep there. Surely he misses his bed.”

“What?”

She looked down again. “Is something wrong?” She smiled. Again, no dimples—something was wrong. Of course something is wrong. She’s forgotten the bed. Or worse—

“Have you let a strange man dig out our tree?”

She fell onto her knees in front of him so they were level and cupped his face. Dimples. “What tree?”

“Our marriage bed,” Odysseus explained, his voice choked. “The bed I carved into a tree with my own hands. Has a strange man dug out the roots of our olive tree?”

Her eyes filled with tears and she threw her arms around Odysseus, kissing the scar on his collarbone. He did not even remember where he had gotten it from. “You know me better than that, Odysseus.”

He remained frozen, hands hovering hesitantly behind her back. “What were you on about?” he whispered into her ear.

“I had to know that it was you. Only you could get so angry about moving a bed.” She put her hand on his cheek, eyes flitting to his lips, and whispered, “I’m sorry. Forgive me, but I had to do this.”

Penelope closed the gap between them, pulling him into a long kiss. He returned it, wrapping his arms around her and holding her tightly, hugging her like a wave hugs the shore. His heartbeat slowly adjusted to hers. Their mouths parted, foreheads and noses remaining together. “So, are you going to take me to bed or what?”

Odysseus smiled against her lips, scooped her up, making her squeal, and carried her up to their room. As they ascended, joy filled him from the inside like he was landing on Ithaca for the first time again. He was not shipwrecked anymore—he was here, with his wife. His Penelope. His home.

26 notes · View notes