From goya@racine.vjf.cnrs.fr Sun Jul 29 01:50:03 2001 Received: from mxu4.u.washington.edu (mxu4.u.washington.edu [140.142.33.8]) by lists.u.washington.edu (8.11.2+UW01.01/8.11.2+UW01.04) with ESMTP id f6T8nx0103982 for ; Sun, 29 Jul 2001 01:49:59 -0700 Received: from mail.noos.fr (descartes.noos.net [212.198.2.74]) by mxu4.u.washington.edu (8.11.2+UW01.01/8.11.2+UW01.04) with ESMTP id f6T8nws17012 for ; Sun, 29 Jul 2001 01:49:59 -0700 Received: (qmail 35511297 invoked by uid 0); 29 Jul 2001 08:49:57 -0000 Received: from unknown (HELO ?195.132.104.224?) ([195.132.104.224]) (envelope-sender ) by 212.198.2.74 (qmail-ldap-1.03) with SMTP for ; 29 Jul 2001 08:49:57 -0000 Mime-Version: 1.0 Message-Id: In-Reply-To: <26f5cd2702cf.2702cf26f5cd@homemail.nyu.edu> References: <26f5cd2702cf.2702cf26f5cd@homemail.nyu.edu> Date: Sun, 29 Jul 2001 10:51:28 +0000 To: classics@u.washington.edu From: Michael Chase Subject: Re: The Golden Fleece, etc. Content-Type: text/plain; charset="iso-8859-1" ; format="flowed" Content-Transfer-Encoding: quoted-printable >vendredi 27 juillet 2001, 19h33 > > Et si le mythe de la Toison d'Or n'en =C8tait pas un? >--par Lisa Orkin-- > > Reminds me of a friend, an expert on Strabo, who used to work for the Soviet Academy of Sciences in Moscow. Part of her job was to answer phone calls from the mayors of various Black Sea towns, who would phone in with questions like "Isn't it true that Jason and Medea spent the night in our town on August 15, 786 B.C.?" You see, if they received a positive reply, they could get federal funding to set up a commemorative celebration...My friend usually told callers that all that was just a myth, a response which, for obvious reasons, did not please them very much... Someone should do a historical survey of "Euherism throughout the ages", which would show how little this approach to mythology has changed from the Hellenistic age until today... Best, Mike. -- Michael Chase (goya@vjf.cnrs.fr) C.N.R.S./Annee Philologique Paris .