Episode 277: Ares
/Whatever you thought about Ares before now, we think we can change your mind a little bit. We’re talking about propaganda, roosters, and learning lessons from our mistakes.
Content Warning: This episode contains conversations about or mentions of war, violence, death, sexual assault, human sacrifice, blood, murder, arranged marriage, incest, propaganda, and gore.
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Transcript
AMANDA: Welcome to Spirits Podcast, boozy diamonds, mythology, legends and folklore. Every week, we pour a drink and learn about a new story from around the world. I'm Amanda.
JULIA: Aand I'm Julia
AMANDA: And this Episode 277: Ares! As part of our It's All Greek To Me Series.
JULIA: Yeah, Amanda, I knew this day would come someday and we, unfortunately, are going to have to cover maybe my least favorite member of the Olympic Pantheon, Ares. But the problem is like, just because he ranks low on my list of favorite Greek gods doesn't mean that this episode is going to be like a towner or not interesting. In fact, doing the research for this episode, I found out a lot of cool shit about Ares that I never knew. And I hope that both you and our listeners get some interesting insight on Ares and kind of where he falls in the pecking order on Olympus.
AMANDA: I was gonna say even if he is your least favorite, it feels like that could be sort of the most interesting episode because as we know, the more fuckboy-y the gods are, the more fun we have with it.
JULIA: That is true. That is true. So I guess, Amanda, like always, I want to start us off. Give me your first impressions on Ares.
AMANDA: Ram?! Is that something?
JULIA: That is the zodiac sign of the ram.
AMANDA: Okay.
JULIA: Yes, spelled differently.
AMANDA: Oh, that's true. Other than that, I got really nothing except to like war?!
JULIA: Okay. War. that's fair.
AMANDA: That's what I'm bringing to the table today.
JULIA: Great. I love that. I'm gonna throughout the episode, just like check-in with you be like, alright, how we feel about Ares? We good? How are we feeling.
AMANDA: I'll do my best to reserve judgment.
JULIA: Exactly, exactly. But I want to feel out your vibe as we kind of go through the story because unfortunately, Ares is a little bit maligned at times, especially by the Greeks. And I think you'll see why. And then we can kind of talk about whether that's fair or not.
AMANDA: Okay, I like it. I'm going in with an open and fair and balanced mind.
JULIA: There we go. That's all I ask for when we go into these episodes. Ares was the Greek god of war, as you pointed out, and was the son of Zeus and Hera, which is actually one of the few children that Zeus had with his actual wife, shockingly.
AMANDA: Wow.
JULIA: And, oddly enough, most of the gods were kind of ambivalent about Ares, he kind of shares at least some respect in like the domain with Athena because she is also a war goddess, but she is much more beloved by the Greeks compared to Ares. Most of this has to do with the fact that Athena is the goddess of kind of the craft and art of warfare, as opposed to Ares, who is more of the like, physical aspect of battle and also the personification of the brutality and blood lust that you see in war.
AMANDA: I mean, I get why there's a god for that, but it already sounds like he's not being set up to like, have a good or happy sort of time.
JULIA: Yeah, no, he's, he's not really and you know what? sometimes the gods kind of fall into these areas where they're not the happiest that this is their domain. They're not thrilled that this is it. See Hades, but yeah, Ares kind of got the short end of the stick there. Athena, kind of in comparison is the one who's like handing out wisdom typically reserved for like, strategists and generals and leadership in war, whereas Ares is out in the field giving soldiers the sort of savage and dangerous blood lust that they need in order to survive a battle.
AMANDA: Wow.
JULIA: So whereas Athena gifts wisdom to men, Ares often endows places and objects with his powers, and also his personality.
AMANDA: Okay.
JULIA: Because like a lot of the kind of defining traits of Ares is highlighted by his differences with Athena, which is why I'm driving this home so hard.
AMANDA: No, totally.
JULIA: So in terms of kind of where Ares came from, a lot of times we'll talk about like the pre-Greek traditions that they came out of. Ares, probably derived in the northeast of Greece. So like not like the centralized area of Greece that would eventually spread and become more metropolitan and stuff like that. So he was specifically either from Thrace, or Scythia. And the Greek Historian, Herodotus, believed that he was a unnamed god who was kind of the second tier of the city and divine hierarchy.
AMANDA: Fascinating.
JULIA: Yes. So when we're talking about kind of these earlier traditions before the canon of Greek mythology was codified, a lot of times either the names of these gods were lost over time, or they evolved into something else as these traditions met other city-states of Greece. So this version of Ares, the kind of second-tier Scythian Ares was offered killings or blood sacrifices of cattle and horses, and Herodotus claims as well, human sacrifice, specifically, the god was sacrificed one out of every 100 war captives
AMANDA: Geez.
JULIA: Yeah.
AMANDA: I mean, it makes sense. But geez.
JULIA: And I also kind of want to state but like in the minds of the Ancient Greeks, the Thracians, the area in which Ares was said to have come out of were considered like very warlike, not civilized, that kind of thing. So I think, again, a lot of the like, if you're taking Athens as the center of Greece, and they're very, like, oh, democracy and craft refinement.
AMANDA: Yeah.
JULIA: And we're literally named after Athena, they're going to look down on Ares, which again, is a lot of like, is Ares just getting kind of a bad rap? Or like, is he actually not as good? It really is all kind of like, who's telling these stories?
AMANDA: Yeah, it also feels a lot like people who are sort of in rooms deciding who goes to war and not on a battlefield, doing the war. Sort of outsourcing the unpleasantness of it all, or highlighting and sort of deifying and redefining the, like noble, you know, like, stand up for ourselves, like conquer, ship, whatever, or even just the material gains that result from that and saying, like, oh, but all- all the smelly parts and the- the sad parts, like, you know, let's, let's shut that off to the side.
JULIA: That's a great point, Amanda. And I think that is an interesting perspective for something that I want to talk about a little bit later on. So keep that in mind. Definitely.
AMANDA: I will. That's what I'm cooking on.
JULIA: Yes. So this version of the Scythian Ares when he had those kinds of human sacrifices of the war captives, the captives' blood was usually used to douse an iron sword, which was the specific symbol of the city and Ares.
AMANDA: Wow.
JULIA: Yeah. Spooky. Don't really love that. How are we feeling about Ares? Let's check-in.
AMANDA: I think I preempted your check-in a little bit. But that-that is how I am feeling so far. Like, particularly with the kind of context of the origin and kind of where pre-existing worship of a sort of proto-Ares might have existed. I am kind of picturing a lot of sort of men in pristine togas, you know, in the comforts of Athens, making decisions that impact poor people who have to go out and actually put their lives on the line.
JULIA: Right. Or in the like, gleaming white tents at the back of the lines in a battlefield.
AMANDA: Exactly, the one of the horse who sits back and gets to leave.
JULIA: Exactly, yeah, the one who gets to stand out and be like, Alright, everyone else charge, I'm gonna stay back here. Unlike the other Greek gods, which, you know, this is usually my favorite part, Amanda, Ares did not have a lot of epithets under which he was called or worshipped. In fact, his name comes from the Greek word, ara, which means bane, ruin, or curse.
AMANDA: Oh, no!
JULIA: Yeah, not great, poor guy. In fact, there was actually an epithet that was given to the names of other gods when they were worshipped as a warrior or involved in warfare. And that was Areios for example like Zeus would be Zeus Areios when he was going into battle, or Athena Areia, you know?
AMANDA: Sure.
JULIA: So like, he preempted kind of other gods' warfare abilities, or warfare aspects, which I think is interesting.
AMANDA: And it is kind of reminding me of like, the context friend, like the friend that you really want to go to a museum with, or kind of have bits of or like, see at a party, but you wouldn't necessarily hang out one on one 'cause they seem like a little bit much for you. And that makes me sympathetic toward Ares.
JULIA: I might turn you totally around on Ares here, I don't know.
AMANDA: You probably will. I'm going on the journey.
JULIA: Yeah. So in the Iliad, so basically, the Iliad, for those of you who don't know, is the story of the Trojan War, and then it's followed by the Odyssey, which is all about Odysseus' travel back after the Trojan War. But in the Iliad, Homer uses the word Ares as synonymous with the word for battle, which I think is cool from a linguistic standpoint.
AMANDA: Totally.
JULIA: However, despite not having epithets he is referred to in the Iliad by Homer again, you're gonna see this kind of like coloring of him as murderous blood-stained the incarnate curse of mortals and a coward, too who bellows with pain and runs away when he is wounded.
AMANDA: Oh!
JULIA: Yeah
AMANDA: Oh, okay.
JULIA: And we will, we'll get to that story a little bit later. But Amanda, unsurprisingly, our girl, Edith Hamilton, not a fan of Ares.
AMANDA: He doesn't strike me as one of the Pantheon she'd invite to dinner.
JULIA: Yeah, she's-she's not a fan whatsoever. And I feel like a lot of that is colored by, you know? The Iliad and how he's characterized there. But again, I'm not surprised in the slightest. Edith Hamilton in The Mythology mentions that he's not worshipped in any city, which I think has been disproven by scholars in the past. So sorry, Edith. It's been like a century since you published this, so you didn't know any better but scholars note that Ares did have less formal temples than the other Olympians. But there were still a few that have been found or were noted by ancient historians. So for example, the historian, Pausanias mentioned that in the 2nd Century AD, there was a temple to Ares at Olympia and in Athens, there was the Areopagus, or the mount of Ares, which was a place of worship that was said to be the location where Ares was tried and acquitted for his killing of Halirrhothius, who was the son of Poseidon and who had actually raped Ares' daughter, and so he killed him in revenge. One of the few justified killings of Ares. and one of the more interesting aspects of the worship of Ares is these chained statues that were found in a Temple of Enyalius in Sparta. So the temple featured basically a cult practice of binding images of Ares as a way of ritually binding the god under the orders of this oracle. So each year, there was a festival where the statue was ritualistically bound in iron chains, oftentimes by a priest that was supposed to represent Hermes, interestingly enough, because I don't think they really had beef in most of the mythologies. But Hermes, kind of doing the dirty work of the gods is a pretty common aspect. The reasoning given by the oracle was that this ritual binding was that it would make Ares, "...a peaceful deity for you once he has driven the enemy horde, far from your country, and he will give rise to prosperity much prayed for."
AMANDA: Hmm, that's so interesting, because it makes a lot of sense, I think that people would want to kind of look in the face of their actions. So it's not Ares driving away enemies, right? It's like people under the kind of bannership or spirit or possession of Ares in their minds. Like, this is the big sort of promise and contradiction of society, right? That like we can all kind of put away our baser urges and prioritize other people and be a bit more civilized than we would on our own. And we're kind of mutually held to account and so to have a day a year where you sort of look in the face of the same spirit within a metaphorical or not, that lets you murder others in the battlefields who have their own families and homelands, and then chain it up and put it away for another day, I can see having really powerful meaning for people.
JULIA: Yeah, absolutely. And I think that this aspect of Ares, which I'll give you a little teaser is called Ares Karpodotes or the giver of fruits. So this idea that you can only prosper once your borders are safe once the enemy has been driven out is a really interesting one, especially when you are considering that Ares typically is this god of the battlefield. And so what do you do with him when there is no longer a battlefield?
AMANDA: Yeah.
JULIA: It's almost like this idea. And I obviously like the imagery of it is kind of violent and terrible. But the idea that like bloodsoaked fields, bear sweeter fruit is very much what the vibe that I get here.
AMANDA: Yeah, I think that is definitely the vibe that they're going for.
JULIA: All right, cheking in, how are we feeling?
AMANDA: Feeling like, this is a really interesting need for people, right? Like you became a god in the first place. Because people really needed to put their finger on something about what it is that he represents and that it persisted and was incorporated into the Greek Pantheon. I am having a really interesting time kind of thinking about what part of the sort of civilizing and ruling process this serves.
JULIA: Yeah, so that's a really interesting transition into kind of how Ares is perceived in like the myths about the Olympic Pantheon and the kind of canon of Greek Mythology. So as Edith Hamilton points out, Ares doesn't feature in many myths, like he's not off doing shenanigans like most of the other gods, but when he does appear, it's often in a moment where he's being humiliated or shamed.
AMANDA: Oh.
JULIA: For example, we talked about this in the Aphrodite episode, but the story in which Aphrodite and Ares are caught in a trap by Aphrodite, his husband, Hephaestus while the two are sleeping together a little added bonus that I didn't say in the Aphrodite episode, but Ares had at the time tasked his young soldier and companion whose name was Alectryon with basically warning Ares if Helios, Sun god was going to come by and the problem was Alectryon fell asleep while he was on guard duty and Helios discovered Aphrodite and Ares together told Hephaestus, we know how that turns out. Ares furious that he got caught actually turned Alectryon into a rooster and that is why roosters' crow with the arrival of the sun every morning. And also the rooster is one of the animals that is usually sacrificed for Ares in his- his ritual and his worship.
AMANDA: Stunning.
JULIA: We also talked about in the Artemis episode we talked about those two giant brothers in the sons of Poseidon, which was Otos and Ephialtes, who were the ones who bound Ares in chains and imprisoned him in a bronze cage or in some stories. It's a bronze urn before those twins were eventually killed by Artemis and her cunning and trickery. One of the stories that we see Ares featured in most prominently is unsurprisingly the Trojan War one because the Iliad is so long and so codified and also because it's a war so, why wouldn't he be?
AMANDA: Of course.
JULIA: Ares actually originally back to the Greeks, but it was after Aphrodite's persuasion that he joined the side of the Trojans, which kind of put him in direct opposition of his sister Athena. However, even though Ares should be shining in the Trojan War as the god of War, as I mentioned before, he's often characterized as a coward, and especially by Homer. So there is a moment in the battle where Ares appears on the battlefield with the Trojans. And then the Greek general, Diomedes calls for a retreat because he spots him there among the Trojan troops. However, Athena appeals to Zeus and being like, it's kind of unfair that Ares is out there just fighting when you know, we're not out there fighting, we're just backing up these mortals. And so Zeus allows Athena to intervene and to drive Ares away from the battlefield, but she doesn't like join the Greeks herself instead, together with Hera, Athena inspires Diomedes to attack Ares with his spear, which is a thing that no sane mortal would ever do, like without the backing of two goddesses.
AMANDA: Oh, yeah.
JULIA: And so when he is struck, Athena makes sure that the attack hits, and it said that the cries of Ares shook the battlefield and Ares wounded, flees back to Mount Olympus and the Trojans are forced to fall back.
AMANDA: Wow.
JULIA: To give you a little context about how people feel about Ares. There's a great quote from The Iliad, following that scene directly, and it's from the perspective of Zeus and it's like Ares returning wounded from the war and complaining about the battlefield outside the walls of Troy and so here it is. So, "Then looking at him darkly Zeus who gathers the clouds spoke to him: (Ares) ‘Do not sit beside me and whine, you double-faced liar. To me, you are the most hateful of all gods who hold Olympos. Forever quarreling is dear to your heart, wars, and battles. … And yet I will not long endure to see you in pain, since you are my child, and it was to me that your mother bore you. But were you born of some other god and proved so ruinous long since you would have been dropped beneath the gods of the bright sky.”
AMANDA: Wow. If you weren't my own flesh and blood I would disown you is a strong statement.
JULIA: Yeah. So, as you can see, the Greeks Homer, the fellow Gods on Olympus, even Ares' own father Zeus, not particularly fond of Ares.
AMANDA: No.
JULIA: Not at all. But thankfully for Ares, at least not all of the stories about him were negative and we'll tell a couple more of those stories and learn about his like squad just as soon as we get back from our refill.
AMANDA: Okay, let's do it.
AMANDA: Julia, welcome to the refill. Do you want some of this delicious vegan cheese spread that was brought by our newest patrons, Amber, Megz, and Rikoelike?
JULIA: Yes, Amanda. You've really gotten me into the like non-dairy cheeses lately, and I really appreciate that.
AMANDA: Oh, I like that you're being open to it. I know it's like different it's not milk-based. But for those of us who can't digest the milk, it's nice to be able to enjoy and it goes very well with the amazing like, artisanal cracker platter gluten-free and not, by the way, brought but our supporting producer level patrons, Uhleeseeuh, Anne, Froody Chick, Hannah, Jack Marie, Jane, Jaybaybay, Jessica Kinser, Jessica Stewart, Kneazlekins, Little vomitspiders running around, Megan Moon, Phil Fresh, Captain Jonathan MAL-uh-kye Cosmos, Sarah, Scott, Taylor, and Zazi.
JULIA: Amanda, they each brought a box of different crackers and now we're just swimming in crackers.
AMANDA: Honestly, my dream, I have no notes I'm never going to leave.
JULIA: Well luckily, our legend level patrons bought a bunch of different like dips and [8:31] and stuff, Audra, Bex, Clara, Iron Havoc, Morgan, Mother of Vikings, Sarah, & Bea Me Up Scotty. Thank you guys this is great!
AMANDA: So good. And there's plenty of room to go around by the way. So if you would like to have your name read on the show. If you want to enjoy the six years of extras we have over on our Patreon go to patreon.com/spiritspodcast, your support for as little as $1 an episode helps us to make this our job and to pay our new researcher and to edit the show to spiff up our equipment maybe our music someday soon I don't know maybe we're working on it to make the listening experience a little more fun for you. So all of that patreon.com/spiritspodcast.
JULIA: Now, Amanda, we're heading back into the party, and did I hear you recommending something to someone when we were out there before?
AMANDA: Yes, I have been diving back into my pandemic comfort zone of Cuddleburg, that's right, Julia it's my Animal Crossing Island, Cuddleburg and I am finally enjoying the updates that Animal Crossing: New Horizons has published over the last year. I-I fell off Cuddleburg for a while I felt guilty I felt like my islanders when I visited we're all going to be like, oh hey, haven't been here for a while that's awkward and I'll be like, I know I'm sorry. But I have been enjoying things like cooking and the- the sort of like commune space that got opened up there's new kinds of things you can dig up new bugs to catch new fish to catch it is just such a dream. So, highly recommend Animal Crossing and if you haven't picked up in a while, try it.
JULIA: I bet your villagers were happy you were back.
AMANDA: Oh, thank you. They were after they had their first kind of sassy comment. They were happy to have me. And they threw me a birthday party! Oh, Julia was so good.
JULIA: Aww! So cool. Well, listeners if you love what we do here on Spirits and you love the other Multitude shows and you've caught up on all of them, which I-- bravo, very impressed. There is good news because there are other shows that you can listen to at Multitude, including our weekly friendly debate show, Head Heart Gut.
AMANDA: That's right. This is a let's call it low stakes, but high-intensity debate show where every single month three different Multitude hosts get on to debate definitively with our quantitative metrics, and ultimately, a final debate that's timed and judged by a guest judge the best of three things we're doing Neapolitan ice cream, right now we're trying something actually experimental in April that Multicrew members already know what it's going to be. So if you want to know you got to join to find out and it's another Multitude show that has been going on weekly since 2019. So there is a ton to catch up on or just dive right in and enjoy talking about it with other Multicrew members in the Multitude Discord so that is a way to support Multitude as an independent collective here in the big bad world of podcasting and help us do things like start new shows, which we may or may not be working on. So go to multicrew.club to learn all about the Multicrew to learn about Head Heart Gut and to get access to this weekly friendly debate show. Julia, we talk a lot about morning rituals, you really opened my eyes with the idea of a morning bath, which is just so badass, and I appreciate it so much. But have you thought a lot about evening rituals? Do you have something that you do to kind of wind down and transition into the sleep or the relaxing time?
JULIA: I usually read a book before bed but I really haven't given much thought into like what other like steps I can take to relax myself more at night.
AMANDA: I definitely am very sensitive to light. So I start kind of turning off certain lights in my house. As we get toward bedtime in my room, I have like two different sets of string lights, one that's brighter and one that's less bright. And so when I'm like laying down to read, I'll turn on them both, and then when I'm ready to almost start going to sleep I'll turn off the one to leave the other one. I have a whole process but your senses like all of them really matter. And so I think that it's a great idea to use something like Calm, which is the mental wellness app that gives you the tools you need to improve the way you feel to relax you can use their soundscapes, their guided meditations, curated music tracks and of course, those sleep stories shout out to the train gang all of us who listen to train stories fall, asleep love, you, see you appreciate you that is a wonderful way to start transitioning yourself to power off at night.
JULIA: Yeah and over 100 million people around the world use Calm to take care of their minds and calm is ready to help you stress less sleep more and live a happier life today and for listeners of the show, Calm is offering an exclusive offer a 40% off a Calm Premium subscription at calm.com/spirits go to c-a-l-m.com/spirits for 40% off an unlimited access to Calm's entire library that's calm.com/spirits. Amanda, is there a piece of clothing in your closet that just feels perfect like the one that you always put on because it looks good and it feels good and you have to break it in because like it's perfect from the moment that you put on?
AMANDA: Yes I have a pair of overalls that I then went ahead and bought in two more colors that I put them on and I feel kind of like a poky trainer kind of like a farmer and in both cases ready to just take on the day because I have so many pockets, Julia. How can my day go wrong with so many pockets?
JULIA: pockets are great and you know what else it feels like pockets for your boobs It is the Third Love 24 classic t-shirt bra it is so comfortable. Oh my gosh. It's great in both it's fit, its style, its function and it's design and it's been loved and worn by so many people and it doesn't like it doesn't like, pinch in or it doesn't dig it is so so incredibly comfortable. And it's got those straps that never slip. It's fantastic I'm literally wearing one right now.
AMANDA: True story I did my first in-person event in two years a few weeks ago and I wore a Third Love bra because I wanted to feel like I had the confidence and extra oomph and it was not distracting, right? Like it fit I forgot it was on and that I think is the highest compliment you can pay to a bra. Because normally you're like hey this sucks and I want to take it off but not with Third Love stuff.
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AMANDA: And finally, Julia, this podcast is sponsored by Better Help Online Therapy this month better help is asking us to remind you that you matter just as much as everybody else in your life does. And all the ways that you show up for your friends and family and loved ones and you would drop anything to go help somebody in need. You deserve to put that amount of care and urgency into the way you feel and the way you treat yourself as well.
JULIA: Yeah, absolutely. And Better Help is online therapy that offers video, phone, and even live chat sessions with your therapist. So you don't have to see anyone on camera if you don't want to. It's much more affordable than in-person therapy and you can be matched with your therapist in under 48 hours. Give it a try and see why over 2 million people have used Better Help Online Therapy.
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JULIA: So Amanda in my mind, Ares is very much a like cheap shots of whatever bottom shelf or well alcohol is on sale kind of guy. And whatever gets me fucked up the quickest so I can go fight someone in a parking lot kind of guy.
AMANDA: Yeah. Yeah. My dad hates me. So I'm going to do shots of Everclear. Yeah, yeah, for sure.
JULIA: For our listeners. I don't personally recommend that as a drink pairing for this episode.
AMANDA: No.
JULIA: So I came up with a cocktail choice that should be much more enjoyable. So I'm going to recommend you all the man of war cocktail, which is a very classy bourbon and citrusy drink with a little bit of sweetness and a bit of zing to it. It probably won't make you want to fight people in a parking lot. So that's a plus.
AMANDA: Yeah, no, that's- that's never a good a good outcome.
JULIA: Yeah. So this is bourbon, triple sec, a little bit of sweet vermouth, some lemon juice, though, you could probably like kind of hype it up with another type of citrus as well if you wanted to get fancy about it. And then for people who want a little bit more sweetness, you can do a little drizzle simple syrup to taste.
AMANDA: Love it.
JULIA: So with a kind of sweeter option, let's talk about a slightly less embarrassing story for Ares. So Ares played a pretty substantial role in the founding of the city of Thebes. Though it's not really the same kind of nice way that Athena is associated with Athens. As you might remember, Thebes was founded by the hero Cadmus, who was instructed by Athena to follow a sacred cow to a spring where she then told him to defeat the springs Water Dragon Guardian and then told him to bury the Dragon's Teeth in the ground. And from there, the teeth kind of sprang out of the ground as these fierce armed men who then Cadmus tricked into fighting among themselves until there was only five remaining and then he got those five remaining men to help him build the Citadel of Thebes. However, because there's always a however, the dragon that Cadmus killed was sacred to Ares and in some stories was like one of his children. And after Thebes was built, Ares came to the hero and was like, hey, that was fucked up, you're in trouble now. So what you're going to do to make it up to me is you're going to serve as my servant for eight years as penance for that death.
AMANDA: Always also a good lesson for your D&D campaigns that when you kill one bad thing, a bigger batch is probably going to be mad about it.
JULIA: Yes. It's very Beowulf to where it's like--
AMANDA: Yes.
JULIA: Yeah, you kill the Grendel, but not the Grendel's mother now she's pissed.
AMANDA: Oh, yeah.
JULIA: Cadmus actually does serve Ares and serves him well. And Ares is so pleased with Camus's service that he gives Cadmus his daughter the goddess Harmonia as his wife. Pretty nice. Not a bad deal.
AMANDA: Not bad.
JULIA: Somewhat bad, though. So the wedding of Cadmus and Harmonia is like one of those big Greek Mythology events for sure. Like-
AMANDA: Oh, everyone was there, Julia. Everyone was there.
JULIA: Everyone was there. And as we've talked about before, Ares and Hephaestus, not the best of friends, certainly. And Harmonia is the daughter of Ares and Aphrodite. Aphrodite being Hephaestus' wife.
AMANDA: Yep.
JULIA: So Harmonia received many gifts as one does when you're a beautiful goddess and also getting married. One of those gifts was from Hephaestus and it was called the Necklace of Harmonia. Hephaestus made it himself very nice, however, definitely cursed.
AMANDA: Oh, I was I'm so nervous. Like my whole body's clenching.
JULIA: 100% Cursed brought misfortune to whoever possessed it.
AMANDA: Fuck.
JULIA: Yeah. So Cadmus is family, therefore was constantly struck with misfortune. And as the like ruling family that meant like their royal children were constantly like either dying or terrible things were happening to them. His city was constantly like restless and like on the verge of either collapse or riots under his rule. And so Cadmus as soon as he was able to kind of like gave up his throne to one of his children and fucking left with his wife.
AMANDA: Geez. Bummer.
JULIA: And Cadmus kind of reflecting on his life was like all of this happened because I slayed that dragon, that dragon kind of fucked me all over the place. I'm not a fan. I wish I had never done that. And he said to Harmonia, he basically says that if the gods are so invested in the life of that serpent, I wished for that life for myself. And in that instance...
AMANDA: Uh-oh.
JULIA: You should never make wishes that the gods can hear.
AMANDA: NO! Julia, was he turned into a dragon?
JULIA: He turns into a dragon.
AMANDA: Fuck!
JULIA: And Harmonia sees him you know, growing scales, transforming and so she begs Ares, let me share the same fate as my husband. And so she is transformed as well.
AMANDA: Oh, no! We get a double Animorphs corner.
JULIA: Double Animorphs corner and now they're like these dragon human hybrids going on. And Ares is like, Well, my beautiful daughter is now a dragon lady.
AMANDA: Damn.
JULIA: That's not his fault, though. He tried his best. He wasn't trying to hurt anyone in this one.
AMANDA: That's true
JULIA: For Harmonia, though, but speaking of Harmonia, Ares had a lot of other children that we talked about in our Aphrodite episode, you'll probably remember, Deimos, who was terror, also Phobos who was fear. And not only were they Ares his children, but they attended to him on the battlefield as well. So he basically had a whole brigade of folks that if Ares was riding out into the battlefield, here's the folks that came along, there was Eris, who's the goddess of discord who he discussed in the Aphrodite episode famous for the golden apple that started the Trojan War. There was also Enyo, who was the goddess of bloodshed and violence. It was also said that the minor war god, Enyalios was either Ares's son by Enyo or another aspect and named for Ares himself, but in most cases, he was another attendant for Ares. There's also Kydoimos, who was said to be the personification of the confusion and uproar in the middle of battle, which I think is very evocative and very cool.
AMANDA: It is.
JULIA: If you've ever seen a war movie, and like, you know, the main character that you're following is all sudden looking around the battlefield and you can't tell friend from foe and there's ringing in your ears and everything slowed down and distorted. That's his vibe.
AMANDA: Totally.
JULIA: Finally, there was another daughter of Ares that rode alongside him whose name was Alala, who was the personification of the Greek war cry, which was said to be a mimicry of Ares' own war cry.
AMANDA: I was gonna say, with that name, it's got to be something that sounds like the name. And sure enough, it was.
JULIA: It was probably like a phonetic, like spelling of what it sounded like, which is kind of cool and neat, I think.
AMANDA: Me too.
JULIA: Yeah, let's do the quick check. And Amanda, how we think about Ares?
AMANDA: I am still kind of stuck on this idea of this as the history as you were saying earlier of the conquerors, right? Of the victors of this sort of empire. And I think it really serves the conquerors to view war and war-making as a sort of, like, quote, unquote, Primitive Act, or something that needs to be denigrated, or something that is even cowardly, like the association of battle and cowardice, I think, is really fascinating. Because I think it depends on them to give you a justification or give you permission to do this or make sure that the like structures of society make you feel super justified in doing it. And then you know, use your ritual and you and you put it away. So Ares as a figure feels like, almost the most like, two-dimensional of any of the gods that we've talked about so far. Like, what was his experience? What was it like, you know, why? Why are his kids, Discord and Fear, like that is kind of an enigma to me. And so maybe more than the others. I'm thinking about this as like, a tool of a state.
JULIA: Yes. That's very interesting. And we're gonna talk about that very soon. But it's also interesting because I feel like we give Ares like oh, you know, his children are Fear and Discord. Oh, you know, here's all of these like bloody and violent gods that are associated with him, but not the only ones, honestly. So for example, one of his other children was the goddess, Nike, who is the personification of victory, though in other stories she was the child of Pallas and Styx, but it's another goddess that is very much associated with him, but not one who is like extremely violent, similar to Harmonia. He was also said to be the father of the Amazons, which I think is really interesting and something I kind of forgot when thinking about the Amazons and while the Amazons were this warrior race, I think kind of DC and the comic universe of who the Amazons have kind of thrown me off in terms of like, oh, no, they were like a war society in Greek Mythology.
AMANDA: Right.
JULIA: But I do think of that kind of like perfect, beautiful Island of all ladies, x you know?
AMANDA: Oh, yeah. Hard to forget once you- once you see it.
JULIA: Exactly. But like it really is interesting that Ares was the father of the first Amazon queen, who he had with not the same Harmonia, not his daughter, but a different Harmonia who is a nymph. However, because this is Greek mythology, another famous Amazon queen, Hippolyta was said to be the daughter of the first Amazon queen and also Ares. So there's that usual Greek mythology incest that we have come to learn and expect.
AMANDA: Exactly. Not know and love but expect.
JULIA: Expect, certainly not going to say, love, because not a fan. So, Amanda, this is kind of where we get into the aspects that you've been talking about throughout. So in later representations of Ares, either by the Romans as Mars or during the Renaissance Era, Ares was much more highly respected. So part of this is because the Romans elevated Mars to be the father of Romulus, who's Rome's legendary founder. And as such, he began to take on this role of like guardian deity of the entire Roman state. In these representations, Ares was typically shown with either as or with a spear or helmet as his kind of representation. His animal was the dog. His bird was the vulture, also, as we talked about before the rooster and the Romans chose to portray him not as the cowardly and bloodthirsty war god of the Greeks, but rather this personification of valor and courage in battle, which I think kind of like gets away from the point and the separation between Ares as a war god and Athena as a war god. But that's also like just the Romans for you. And I think a lot of that has to do with the unification of the Roman state and the kind of like nationalism, of Roman warfare, as opposed to the Greeks, which were kind of like, yeah it was the Greek society as a whole, but there was a lot of like, inter-warfare between the city-states. Going back to the point that you've brilliantly made several times at this point, the idea that, like, we have to make this god more appealing to make our war seem more appealing does kind of seem like this propaganda almost, right?
AMANDA: It's a rebrand, right?
JULIA: Exactly. So like, you're telling the people like, oh, no, this war, god is your protector and your father of the city, like basically the grandfather of the Roman Empire. And so he embodies all of these like valor and courage that you as a Roman soldier must have in order to protect the Roman state.
AMANDA: Totally and venerate that and the people and the apparatus that uses all of these perhaps sometimes unpleasant requirements and skills for all of our mutual benefit.
JULIA: Yeah, it feels very much to me, the kind of like Uncle Sam Wants You poster?
AMANDA: Yeah
JULIA: You know what I mean? Where now Mars/Ares is Uncle Sam and you as a soldier we're not going to embody that kind of like oh yes, bloodshed in the battlefield is scary and violent and like chaos and discord. No, you are honoring Mars/Ares by being a soldier and like, embodying his valor and his bravery and his courage when you're on the battlefield.
AMANDA: Like all of us at Spirits. This makes me want to really dive into like historical comparisons and papers that people have written on this subject.
JULIA: Oh my god, I bet there's some really, really great ones out there. If you have written one, hey, let us know. I would love to hear about it and also read it. Now Amanda, kind of to wrap us up, I have a couple of hymns to Ares that I came across that I think also give us an idea of what the everyday person felt when worshiping Ares or thinking about Ares and I would love to do a little bit of poetry corner for him as well.
AMANDA: Poetry corner!
JULIA: We're gonna start with the Homeric Hymn to Ares.
JULIA:
Cool so this one goes, "Ares, exceeding in strength, chariot-rider, golden-helmed, doughty in heart, shield-bearer, Saviour of cities, harnessed in bronze, strong of arm, unwearying, mighty with the spear, O defence of Olympus, father of warlike Victory, ally of Themis, stern governor of the rebellious, leader of righteous men, sceptred King of manliness, who whirl your fiery sphere among the planets in their sevenfold courses through the aether wherein your blazing steeds ever bear you above the third firmament of heaven; hear me, helper of men, giver of dauntless youth! Shed down a kindly ray from above upon my life, and strength of war, that I may be able to drive away bitter cowardice from my head and crush down the deceitful impulses of my soul. Restrain also the keen fury of my heart which provokes me to tread the ways of blood-curdling strife. Rather, O blessed one, give you me boldness to abide within the harmless laws of peace, avoiding strife and hatred and the violent fiends of death."
AMANDA: Wow, that's really- says it all, doesn't it?
JULIA: Yeah. And I mean, again, when we talk about the way that he's portrayed in the stories, a lot of times the fact that you are calling for him to drive away cowardice from my head to crush down the deceitful impulses of my soul, that is so interesting because he's so often portrayed as being a coward of falling into these deceitful impulses. They're calling for him to help with getting rid of them, which I think is really interesting.
AMANDA: Yeah, I mean that that also goes to the relatability of gods, right?
JULIA: Yeah.
AMANDA: Like, we are supposed to look to this example and these stories and see not people that act perfectly or that are sort of above moral trials and tribulations, but who also get caught up in jealousy and emotion and rivalries and get tricked and trick each other. And so for Ares to be somebody who demonstrates cowardice, even though he's the one who's supposed to embody the opposite of cowardliness, that's pretty powerful. And I think it says to the average person, whether they're trying to summon up the courage to, you know, have a difficult conversation with somebody, or maybe the Greeks don't want them to, like oppose a conqueror. But you know, there are lots of situations where you would kind of call for that strength, and knowing that the person you're calling from also has their own foibles, I think makes it more persuasive and stronger, and not like we're sort of pretending everybody's perfect. And I'm just, you know, here a lowly worm.
JULIA: I love that. And I love the idea because we talk about on the show all the time that the reason we tell myths and legends is to teach society lessons and to have them come away with like how we're supposed to act in society. Maybe a lot of the stories that are told by Ares are methods in which we tell each other okay, don't act like this. Look at Ares, he has learned his lesson, look at the scolding that he got from Zeus, if you are to call upon Ares, know that you know that he has learned his lessons from the stories that you've heard from him and that he is the person to go to in order to learn more, you know?
AMANDA: Totally, and maybe especially for a guy that's kind of so powerful, and whose domain isn't just like growing stuff, which I say loving all of the gods that are farming, as we know. Maybe this guy in particular really need some examples of overreach or positive examples of restraint. Because venerating someone with sort of unchecked power might sort of give peasants ideas.
JULIA: I also love because we're talking about that the phrase stern governor of the rebellious
AMANDA: Yes.
JULIA: That is so evocative. I love that being like, yeah, you can rebel. Just know Ares is going to be the one in charge of you and he's not afraid of a little bloodshed.
AMANDA: Yeah, no, absolutely.
JULIA: So like weigh your options carefully and if you know rebellion is called for Ares will back you but at the same time if you're just like if you don't have justification, he won't. Alright, we have one more to kind of finish this out and this is an Orphic Hymn. So this one goes, "to Ares, The Fumigation from Frankincense. Magnanimous, unconquer'd, boistrous Mars, in darts rejoicing, and in bloody wars Fierce and untam'd, whose mighty pow'r can make the strongest walls from their foundations shake: Mortal destroying king, defil'd with gore, pleas'd with war's dreadful and tumultuous roar: Thee, human blood, and swords, and spears delight, and the dire ruin of mad savage fight. Stay, furious contests, and avenging strife, whose works with woe, embitter human life; To lovely Aphrodite [Kypris], and to Dionysus [Lyaios] yield, to Ceres [Deo] give the weapons of the field; Encourage peace, to gentle works inclin'd, and give abundance, with benignant mind."
AMANDA: Wow, there's really the meter of Shakespeare in there that really feels like the final speech and like Midsummer or Macbeth.
JULIA: Yeah, that is a translation from the human sacrifice in ancient Greece, which was published in 1991.
AMANDA: All right.
JULIA: Good job, guys. Good translation.
AMANDA: I love that they're saying like listen, Ares, we get it. So brave and strong and smart and hot. However, take a chill pill, put on the back burner yield to Aphrodite and Dionysus and you know, lay down your rifle pick up a rake be benevolent instead of all the other things that you were before.
JULIA: Yeah, we know that you call for bloodshed because that is in your nature. But we as humans would prefer not to fight, please and thank you. We don't like fighting.
AMANDA: Yeah, you love these things, and we don't so would you consider farming?
JULIA: I love the phrase defiled with gore that is so evocative and gross. And I love it. I really like this idea that like, one yes, the first hymn was kind of calling for like, hey, here's lessons that I could learn from Ares and then this one is like, hey, Ares, we get it. Can you chill for like a second? Please, my guy? I beg of you.
AMANDA: Yeah, they're really saying like, we know that you love it. But that is not what we love. And please, sir, would you consider growing some vegetables?
JULIA: Yes, or letting us grow some vegetables. It's cool, man if you want to do your worst stuff every now and again but the rest of us got to eat.
AMANDA: The furious contests and avenging strife like they really do in bitter my little human life so please to not like an appeal on behalf of society, whereas the previous poem felt more like an individual appeal of like, I need not the whole thing but I need to like borrow a little bit of inspiration from you.
JULIA: I think actually the last one kind of very much embodies that like Ares of the fruit, you know? The giver of fruit, Ares when he is chained and bound and they're like, alright, we're only gonna let you out if someone invades our land otherwise you got to stay and be chill, my guy.
AMANDA: Yeah. And I mean, like, in a lot of ways farming in sort of that like bucolic pastoral fantasy like, that is the opposite of war right? Or that's the homefront. To use you're sort of World War Two propaganda poster example from earlier which I think is excellent having rewatched Avengers: Endgame. That is kind of the- the society that we're all fighting for when states want to remind us and sort of put a very like, nationalistic and easily defensible excuse for war kind of on our minds. It makes a lot of sense even though I first kind of cocked my head that sort of farming and fruit would go hand in hand with war.
JULIA: Yeah, there you go. Hey, look, poems given us even more context, incredible.
AMANDA: Thanks!
JULIA: So, Amanda, I guess that's what I want to rap with on Ares. Final thoughts? Did we turn you around on Ares?
AMANDA: I think Ares is a very interesting tool and I think that if I heard his name or heard him invoked or heard a story I would sort of get really curious instead of being like oh god of war whatever that's to me now a signal of like, who is invoking him and why and I think that's a really great outcome. So good job, Julia.
JULIA: Thank you. I'm actually very glad without this episode came out because I went into it being like, oh, I don't want to do a whole thing on Ares. I don't like Ares. But both the research and getting to talk about it with you gave me a lot of insight into him being like you said a tool and not being as two-dimensional as the Greek stories in Greek myths and Greek canon kind of making out to be.
AMANDA: Oh my god, it's all Greek to me, babe.
JULIA: It's all Greek to me, babe. Here we go!
AMANDA:
Well, thank you, Julia. And everybody remember-
JULIA: Stay creepy.
AMANDA: Stay cool.
AMANDA: Spirits was created by Amanda McLoughlin Julia Schifini and Eric Schneider with music by Kevin MacLeod and visual design by Alison Wakeman.
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JULIA: Thanks for listening to Spirits. We'll see you next week.
AMANDA: Bye!
Transcriptionist: Krizia Marrie Casil