Argonautica in the context of "Jason"

The Amazons (Ancient Greek: Ἀμαζόνες Amazónes, singular Ἀμαζών Amazōn; in Latin Amāzon, -ŏnis) were a people in Greek mythology, portrayed in a number of ancient epic poems and legends, such as the Labours of Heracles, the Argonautica and the Iliad. They were female warriors and hunters, known for their physical agility, strength, archery, riding skills, and the arts of combat. Their society was closed to men and they raised only their daughters, returning their sons to their fathers with whom they would only socialize briefly in order to reproduce.

Courageous and fiercely independent, the Amazons, commanded by their queen, regularly undertook extensive military expeditions into the far corners of the world, from Scythia to Thrace, Asia Minor, and the Aegean Islands, reaching as far as Arabia and Egypt. Besides military raids, the Amazons are also associated with the foundation of temples and the establishment of numerous ancient cities like Ephesos, Cyme, Smyrna, Sinope, Myrina, Magnesia, Pygela, etc.

The Library of Alexandria in Alexandria, Egypt, was one of the largest and most significant libraries of the ancient world. The library was part of a larger research institution called the Mouseion, which was dedicated to the Muses, the nine goddesses of the arts. The idea of a universal library in Alexandria may have been proposed by Demetrius of Phalerum, an exiled Athenian statesman living in Alexandria, to Ptolemy I Soter, who may have established plans for the library, but the library itself was probably not built until the reign of his son Ptolemy II Philadelphus. The library quickly acquired many papyrus scrolls, owing largely to the Ptolemaic kings' aggressive and well-funded policies for procuring texts. It is unknown precisely how many scrolls were housed at any given time, but estimates range from 40,000 to 400,000 at its height.

Alexandria came to be regarded as the capital of knowledge and learning, in part because of the Great Library. Many important and influential scholars worked at the Library during the third and second centuries BC, including: Zenodotus of Ephesus, who worked towards standardizing the works of Homer; Callimachus, who wrote the Pinakes, sometimes considered the world's first library catalog; Apollonius of Rhodes, who composed the epic poem the Argonautica; Eratosthenes of Cyrene, who calculated the circumference of the earth within a few hundred kilometers of accuracy; Hero of Alexandria, who invented the first recorded steam engine; Aristophanes of Byzantium, who invented the system of Greek diacritics and was the first to divide poetic texts into lines; and Aristarchus of Samothrace, who produced the definitive texts of the Homeric poems as well as extensive commentaries on them. During the reign of Ptolemy III Euergetes, a daughter library was established in the Serapeum, a temple to the Greco-Egyptian god Serapis.

The Parian Chronicle or Parian Marble (Latin: Marmor Parium, abbr. Mar. Par.) is a Greek chronology, covering the years from 1582 BC to 299 BC, inscribed on a stele. Found on the island of Paros in two sections, and sold in Smyrna in the early 17th century to an agent for Thomas Howard, Earl of Arundel, this inscription was deciphered by John Selden and published among the Arundel Marbles, Marmora Arundelliana (London 1628–9) nos. 1–14, 59–119. The first of the sections published by Selden has subsequently disappeared. A further third fragment of this inscription, comprising the base of the stele and containing the end of the text, was found on Paros in 1897. It has entries from 336/35 to 299/98 BC.

The two known upper fragments, brought to London in 1627 and presented to Oxford University in 1667, include entries for the years 1582/81–355/54 BC. The surviving upper chronicle fragment currently resides in the Ashmolean Museum at Oxford. It combines dates for events which modern readers would consider mythic, such as the Flood of Deucalion (equivalent to 1529/28 BC) with dates we would categorize as historic. For the Greeks, the events of their distant past, such as the Trojan War (dated from 1217 to 1208 BC in the Parian inscription) and the Voyage of the Argonauts were historic: their myths were understood as legends to the Greeks. In fact the Parian inscriptions spend more detail on the Heroic Age than on certifiably historic events closer to the date the stele was inscribed and erected, apparently during 264/263 BC. "The Parian Marble uses chronological specificity as a guarantee of truth," Peter Green observed in the introduction to his annotated translation of the Argonautica of Apollonios Rhodios: "the mythic past was rooted in historical time, its legends treated as fact, its heroic protagonists seen as links between the 'age of origins' and the mortal, everyday world that succeeded it."

In Greek mythology, Medea (/mɪˈdiːə/; Ancient Greek: Μήδεια, romanized: Mḗdeia; lit. 'planner, schemer') is the daughter of King Aeëtes of Colchis. Medea is known in most stories as a sorceress, an accomplished pharmakís, a worker in pharmakeía (medicinal magic), and is often depicted as a high-priestess of the goddess Hecate. She is a mythical granddaughter of the sun god Helios and a niece of Circe, an enchantress goddess. Her mother may have been Idyia.

She first appears in Hesiod's Theogony around 700 BC, but is best known from Euripides's 5th-century BC tragedy Medea and Apollonius of Rhodes's 3rd-century BC epic Argonautica. In the myth of the Argonauts, she aids Jason in his search for the Golden Fleece. Medea later marries him, but eventually kills their children and his other bride according to some versions of her story.

Apollonius of Rhodes (Ancient Greek: Ἀπολλώνιος Ῥόδιος Apollṓnios Rhódios; Latin: Apollonius Rhodius; fl. first half of 3rd century BC) was an ancient Greek author, best known for the Argonautica, an epic poem about Jason and the Argonauts and their quest for the Golden Fleece. The poem is one of the few extant examples of the epic genre and it was both innovative and influential, providing Ptolemaic Egypt with a "cultural mnemonic" or national "archive of images", and offering the Latin poets Virgil and Gaius Valerius Flaccus a model for their own epics. His other poems, which survive only in small fragments, concerned the beginnings or foundations of cities, such as Alexandria and Cnidus places of interest to the Ptolemies, whom he served as a scholar and librarian at the Library of Alexandria. A literary dispute with Callimachus, another Alexandrian librarian/poet, is a topic much discussed by modern scholars since it is thought to give some insight into their poetry, although there is very little evidence that there ever was such a dispute between the two men. In fact, almost nothing at all is known about Apollonius and even his connection with Rhodes is a matter for speculation. Once considered a mere imitator of Homer, and therefore a failure as a poet, his reputation has been enhanced by recent studies, with an emphasis on the special characteristics of Hellenistic poets as scholarly heirs of a long literary tradition writing at a unique time in history.

In Greek mythology, Erato (/ˈɛrətoʊ/; Ancient Greek: Ἐρατώ) is one of the Muses, associated with erotic lyric poetry. The name would mean "desired" or "lovely", if derived from the same root as Eros, as Apollonius of Rhodes playfully suggested in the invocation to Erato that begins Book III of his Argonautica.

Jason and the Argonauts (working title: Jason and the Golden Fleece) is a 1963 epic fantasy adventure film loosely based on the 3rd century BC Greek epic poem The Argonautica by Apollonius Rhodius. Distributed by Columbia Pictures, it was produced by Charles H. Schneer, directed by Don Chaffey, and stars Todd Armstrong, Nancy Kovack, Gary Raymond, and Laurence Naismith.

Shot in Eastman Color, the film was made in collaboration with stop-motion animation visual effects artist Ray Harryhausen and is known for its various legendary creatures, notably the iconic fight scene featuring seven skeleton warriors. Although it was a box office disappointment during its initial release, the film was critically acclaimed and later considered a classic.

Gaius Valerius Flaccus (/ˈflækəs/; died c. AD 90) was a 1st-century Roman poet who flourished during the "Silver Age" under the Flavian dynasty, and wrote a Latin Argonautica that owes a great deal to Apollonius of Rhodes' more famous epic.