The Diomedeia: Diomedes, the Peoples of the Sea, and the Fall of the Hittite Empire

The Diomedeia is to Diomedes as the Odyssey is to Odysseus or the Iliad is to Ilios. It indicates "the tale [or song] of Diomedes". Diomedes is most famous as one of the major Achaian (Achaean or Greek) heroes in Homer's Iliad, but the trajectory of his mythic life goes well beyond Homer, from the Argolid to Ilios (Troy) to southern Italy. But I was most drawn to the fact that this tale indicates a major awakening of character over his lifetime, rare in mythology but a fine opportunity for a novel.


This is a historically-based novel with authentic, legendary, & fictional characters interacting across the extraordinary panorama of the Bronze Age Collapse in the Hittite Empire between the Aegean and eastern Mediterranean seas. Diomedes, previously a hero of the Trojan War, and the polyglot Peoples of the Sea raid inland into the Hittite Empire during its final months. It is both a study of ancient mythic consciousness and an exciting adventure of love, character, destruction, desperate survival, and the lived mystery of pagan rituals. It was a time of such chaos, royalty was overthrown, palaces and temples were burnt, and the power of the gods was thrown into doubt, yet the ancient Great Goddess, who had been suppressed, began to regain her former dominance.


Diomedes, though prominent in Homer's Iliad--a warrior the equal of Hektor or Achilleus, a thinker as cunning as Odysseus and as wise as Nestor, and the only man who dared wound gods--has seldom, if ever, been the chief protagonist in literature. He is given his due within. His wandering adventures and suffering after the destruction of Ilios (Troy) are traced as far north as Kolkhis (Colchis) in the Black Sea, through involvement with the last Hittite royal family in Anatolia, and as far south as Alasiya (Cyprus) in the Mediterranean. He ascends the heights of glory but also must descend into the dark Underworld in an attempt to save the one he loves.


1143909813
The Diomedeia: Diomedes, the Peoples of the Sea, and the Fall of the Hittite Empire

The Diomedeia is to Diomedes as the Odyssey is to Odysseus or the Iliad is to Ilios. It indicates "the tale [or song] of Diomedes". Diomedes is most famous as one of the major Achaian (Achaean or Greek) heroes in Homer's Iliad, but the trajectory of his mythic life goes well beyond Homer, from the Argolid to Ilios (Troy) to southern Italy. But I was most drawn to the fact that this tale indicates a major awakening of character over his lifetime, rare in mythology but a fine opportunity for a novel.


This is a historically-based novel with authentic, legendary, & fictional characters interacting across the extraordinary panorama of the Bronze Age Collapse in the Hittite Empire between the Aegean and eastern Mediterranean seas. Diomedes, previously a hero of the Trojan War, and the polyglot Peoples of the Sea raid inland into the Hittite Empire during its final months. It is both a study of ancient mythic consciousness and an exciting adventure of love, character, destruction, desperate survival, and the lived mystery of pagan rituals. It was a time of such chaos, royalty was overthrown, palaces and temples were burnt, and the power of the gods was thrown into doubt, yet the ancient Great Goddess, who had been suppressed, began to regain her former dominance.


Diomedes, though prominent in Homer's Iliad--a warrior the equal of Hektor or Achilleus, a thinker as cunning as Odysseus and as wise as Nestor, and the only man who dared wound gods--has seldom, if ever, been the chief protagonist in literature. He is given his due within. His wandering adventures and suffering after the destruction of Ilios (Troy) are traced as far north as Kolkhis (Colchis) in the Black Sea, through involvement with the last Hittite royal family in Anatolia, and as far south as Alasiya (Cyprus) in the Mediterranean. He ascends the heights of glory but also must descend into the dark Underworld in an attempt to save the one he loves.


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The Diomedeia: Diomedes, the Peoples of the Sea, and the Fall of the Hittite Empire

The Diomedeia: Diomedes, the Peoples of the Sea, and the Fall of the Hittite Empire

by Gregory Michael Nixon
The Diomedeia: Diomedes, the Peoples of the Sea, and the Fall of the Hittite Empire

The Diomedeia: Diomedes, the Peoples of the Sea, and the Fall of the Hittite Empire

by Gregory Michael Nixon

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Overview

The Diomedeia is to Diomedes as the Odyssey is to Odysseus or the Iliad is to Ilios. It indicates "the tale [or song] of Diomedes". Diomedes is most famous as one of the major Achaian (Achaean or Greek) heroes in Homer's Iliad, but the trajectory of his mythic life goes well beyond Homer, from the Argolid to Ilios (Troy) to southern Italy. But I was most drawn to the fact that this tale indicates a major awakening of character over his lifetime, rare in mythology but a fine opportunity for a novel.


This is a historically-based novel with authentic, legendary, & fictional characters interacting across the extraordinary panorama of the Bronze Age Collapse in the Hittite Empire between the Aegean and eastern Mediterranean seas. Diomedes, previously a hero of the Trojan War, and the polyglot Peoples of the Sea raid inland into the Hittite Empire during its final months. It is both a study of ancient mythic consciousness and an exciting adventure of love, character, destruction, desperate survival, and the lived mystery of pagan rituals. It was a time of such chaos, royalty was overthrown, palaces and temples were burnt, and the power of the gods was thrown into doubt, yet the ancient Great Goddess, who had been suppressed, began to regain her former dominance.


Diomedes, though prominent in Homer's Iliad--a warrior the equal of Hektor or Achilleus, a thinker as cunning as Odysseus and as wise as Nestor, and the only man who dared wound gods--has seldom, if ever, been the chief protagonist in literature. He is given his due within. His wandering adventures and suffering after the destruction of Ilios (Troy) are traced as far north as Kolkhis (Colchis) in the Black Sea, through involvement with the last Hittite royal family in Anatolia, and as far south as Alasiya (Cyprus) in the Mediterranean. He ascends the heights of glory but also must descend into the dark Underworld in an attempt to save the one he loves.



Product Details

ISBN-13: 9781778297717
Publisher: DokNyx Publications
Publication date: 08/01/2022
Sold by: Barnes & Noble
Format: eBook
Pages: 432
File size: 18 MB
Note: This product may take a few minutes to download.

About the Author

I have been writing all my life. Most of my adult life was spent as a university professor, so publishing until now has been all academic (but still successful). Once I retired, I returned to a novelistic venture I had been dreaming of since reading Homer's Iliad at 15 years old: bringing to life the further adventures of the hero, Diomedes. I lived in Greece for a year after my BA in Philosophy. During my later years, as an avocation, I studied the Bronze Age in Ancient Greece, as well as theories of myth and ritual. I live alone in the Canadian woods by a big lake and like it very much.

Table of Contents

CONTENTS


Maps

I. Routes of the Peoples of the Sea, vii

II. Hittite Empire ca. 1250 BCE, viii

III. Hattusa, Capital City of the Hittites, viii

Acknowledgements ix 

Note to the Reader, x

Epigraph, xii


Book I: The Fall of the Hittite Empire, 1

1. The Gathering of the Invaders, 1

2. Suppiluliuma II, 17

3. Peoples of the Sea Inland, 54

4.  --Interlude: Kolkhis, 76 

5. Five Cities Burn-Interlude: Fall of Ilios (Troy), 90

6. The Plunder of Arinna, 93 

7. The End of Hattusa, 102

8.  --Interlude: The Palladion, 115

9. Ishtar's Sacred City, 122

10. The Destruction of Nerik, 147


Book II: The Apotheosis of Suppiluliuma II, 170

1. Lawazantiya and the Sack of Ugarit, 170

2. The Great Queen Meets the High Priestess, 199

3. Congress of Diomedes and Lieia-Hepa, 219

4. --Prelude: The Triple Goddess, 238

5. Battle Before the Temple, 246

6. Sarpedon's Warriors Approach (Kabi Meets Henti), 264

7. Lilitu, High Priestess of Ishtar, 296

8. Descent into the Underworld, 318

9. Katabasis of Diomedes, 353


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