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Homer's Perseus: The Ancient Greek Hero

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The hero, Perseus, was a compelling story to the ancient Greeks. His legend heavily influenced later ideas of heroic characters. In many ways, he was the ideal hero for the Greeks to look upon. sharing many of the same traits and mental patterns as the people, he became a way for people the people of Greece to glorify their own lives. Following Gilgamesh, and followed by the famous Heracles and Jason, the story of Perseus built a template for later stories. Perseus was seen as a hero to ancient Greeks because of how he followed the path of a hero, showed the traits of a hero, and created a hero’s legacy.

The story of Perseus follows the same order as many parallel stories of heroic greatness, but with different names, goals and locations. His experience was universal given that he was not only made a hero by ancestry, but by his actions. A recurring topic in Greek mythology was people sending their opponents on impossible journeys that they are not expected to complete, but instead die from. Odysseus was sent into the Underworld on his journey, Jason was sent far east to steal the Golden Fleece from a cyclops in …show more content…
This is is because of the legacy of perseus. Much like Superman, Perseus was the beginning of a long line of heroes. also like superman and his descendants, Perseus was a very lucky hero. Heracles was crippled by his insane violence and Achilles by his desire for glory, but Perseus was a very non-tragic character. His relationships with the gods were up to par and the most tragic thing about his life was his lack of parents. However, his successors retained the basic shape of all Greek heroes. Heracles and Achilles followed journeys with almost identical outlines. Greek Mythographers traced the line of monsters which were born due to the death of Medusa, most of which were killed by later heroes, which shows that each hero that killed a descendant of Medusa was imitating

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