Wikipedia:Reference desk/Archives/Language/2019 March 25

= March 25 =

"The only surviving Hellenistic epic,"
According to Argonautica, this work is the "only surviving Hellenistic epic." Aren't the Odyssey and Iliad also surviving Hellenistic epic? --Doroletho (talk) 01:13, 25 March 2019 (UTC)
 * No, the Iliad and Odyssey are earlier. The Hellenistic era began with the death of Alexander in the 4th century; the older epics date from the 7th or 8th, or even earlier. -- Elphion (talk) 02:57, 25 March 2019 (UTC)
 * To give more details, "Ancient Greece" is subdivided (at least according to the info box) into Greek Dark Ages (c. 1100 – c. 800 BC), Archaic Greece (c. 800 - c. 500 BC), Classical Greece (c. 500 - 323 BC), Hellenistic Greece (323 - ???) and Roman Greece (??? onwards).  (I haven't given a date for the last boundary, because the linked articles give multiple dates, depending I think on whether you define it as the start or the completion of the Roman conquest of Greece). Note also that the events of the Illiad and other Greek myths date to the Greek Bronze Age (Mycenaean era and earlier ), which according to this scheme is apparently too old to count as merely "Ancient" Greece. Iapetus (talk) 10:05, 25 March 2019 (UTC)
 * Of course, the boundaries are at once arbitrary and still real; at some point in the past, Greece isn't Greece anymore; after all, it doesn't make sense to speak of "Roman France" or "BCE England" because, though there were people living in what is today France and England for many thousands of years, there was no meaningful France or England until much later; even so, defining a "start line" for some place still involves some debate and there are going to be differences; does France start in around 500, when Clovis I united all of the Franks under one ruler? Does it start in 843, when the Treaty of Verdun established West Francia?  In 987, when Hugh Capet becomes King of the Franks and establishes the first unbroken line of French kings?  In 1180, when Philip II of France first uses "Kingdom of France" instead of "Kingdom of the Franks"?  It's not that there isn't a line, it's that there isn't one line to draw, there are several, and there are defensible positions for each one of them.  It's the same with Greece; at what point does the people living that region become the Greeks, and at what point is their culture Greek, and at what point is there a Greek nation in a meaningful sense?  Were the Minoans Greek?  Where the Mycenaeans Greek?  What is Greek anyways?  There's going to be different ways to think about these things, and as a result, different ways to define your boundary conditions.  However, this is a digression, the Hellenistic period is well defined, and it's the period after Alexander the Great.  -- Jayron 32 14:34, 25 March 2019 (UTC)
 * Erm... Roman France  ;-)  Alansplodge (talk) 21:11, 25 March 2019 (UTC)
 * You can find any idiot to write anything. The world is a big place.  However, no historian speaks of Roman France.  They may speak of Roman Gaul, which has coincidentally similar borders.  Also, click the blue link for Roman France.  You'll notice a nifty magic trick.  -- Jayron 32 12:50, 26 March 2019 (UTC)
 * Yes, it was a joke, hence the small text and smiley face. Alansplodge (talk) 10:48, 28 March 2019 (UTC)