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alatismeni-theitsa · 9 minutes
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Can a naiad be evil? Also can they live in ponds instead of the traditional lakes, rivers, springs, or fountains?
Helloo five centuries later! 😂 Thank you for your patience, really! 🩵
"Naiad" is a general category for the nymphs/spirits of "sweet water" bodies. There are sub-categories depending on where one finds them, but you can just call them Naiads if you want to generalise. They can be found in springs (Πηγαίες), fountains (faucet type, where you drink from) (Κρηναίες / Κρηνίδες), rivers (Ποταμίδες), lakes Λιμνάδες ή Λιμνακίδες, marshes (Ελειονόμοι).
From this paper of Eirini A. Voikli:
The Naiads were considered very important fertility deities, endowed with divinatory and healing properties. They were honoured in all the conferences of the Immortals on Olympus. They were included, along with the Satyrs in the honorary escort of Dionysus during the god's festivals and they did not remain uninvolved in none of the festivals of the gods that favored fertility.
From their love affairs they birthed heroes, great artists, poets and sages. Their importance can be summed up in the inestimable value for humans that drinking water has, because it sustains humans and fertilises the earth through springs and rivers.
Naiads could be dangerous: Hylas of the Argo’s crew was taken forever by naiads who were fascinated by his beauty. The naiads can also exhibit jealous tendencies. A naiad (possibly Echenais or Nomia) was in love with shepherd Daphnis and prophesied that he would be blinded if he loved another woman. However, he was seduced, with the aid of wine, by the daughter of a king, and, in revenge, this nymph blinded him - according to Greek writers. Apart from that I don't think we have many stories of naiads acting with malice.
Only in Ovid's version there's another violent case, that of the nymph Salmacis forcibly kissing Hermaphroditus and fusing with him when he tried to escape (by the will of the Gods). In Greek versions she wasn't like this, however.
I wouldn't say the naiads were/are "evil", but more like expressions of nature with elevated power, closer to the gods, and occasionally selfish desires. While a naiad can shortly intervene in a human's life for her own gain, I feel it would be a stretch to have her want to destroy a whole kingdom, for example.
If you're writing a story about a naiad I advise against mixing Greek with Roman versions cause modern readers get confused about the actual beliefs of ancient Greeks, who had distinct religious stories.
🔵 If anyone knows more violent stories about naiads from ancient Greek writers let me know if anything here is inaccurate! I tried my best to gather info here.
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alatismeni-theitsa · 43 minutes
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Dear Theitsa, you have the patience of a saint! Reading all the dumbass ideas you have to explain to western supremacists lol I wish foreigners would stop being racially obsessed with ancient greeks and let us be. They should go appreciate their own culture and stop being so butthurt and obsessed over ours.
One day they'll stop treating our culture like an aesthetic prop and see us as humans with a (healthy) right to their own history and culture. Until then...we have lots of explaining to do 😂
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alatismeni-theitsa · 53 minutes
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Exactly! As I said, even average-looking Greeks going to different Greek villages get weird looks because they are the xenoi/strangers. But it's not in a hostile way, just in a gossip-y way, or because of the genuine thought of "what are you doing in the middle of nowhere??" 😂 I totally understand if a person who's been made very aware of their different appearance throughout their life feels somewhat threatened by this act, that's why I tried my best to explain it's not malicious. (If you can't change society yet it's good at least to let people know) By all means, remove yourself from the situation if you get creepy vibes, but usually even if people are looking at you because of your difference, it's because of curiosity and they mean no harm.
According to the comments by Greeks this well-traveled Latino man managed to describe the climate in Greece very accurately. I've posted and will post from time to time videos from foreigners describing their experience in Greece because part of people knowing the country is this experience. Generally, I'm happy that people with darker skintones have a generally pleasant experience when coming to live in Greece from abroad, and I hope we can only become better. (It would be great if we, as a nation, could treat native Black people the same but I digress cause class also plays a role here)
I also focused on this video to note once more how important it is to recognize that each country has its own history and social cues. The "mavros" (black) falls in this category. (OP recognizes this, liking the comments from a Greek below). While people can use "mavros" in a racist way, sometimes it's just an identifier like "tall", "skinny" etc. "Mavros" also doesn't mean "Black person" always. It's used to describe someone tan, since the verb for "tan" here is "I blacken" (μαυρίζω), and it can refer to tan people, or people darker than the average local. I don't condone the negative or racist use of "mavros" (obviously), however it's important to remember that intent matters more than language especially if the native speaker of another country is ignorant of how this word is used in your country.
Also if you are a new person in a village people will look at you weirdly no matter your skin tone just because it's jarring/interesting to see someone new there, but also if you look different from most people you will get some curious looks (most often than not, in a well-intended way and not hostile)
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Finally , it's important for one to know the local flavour of xenophobia, not to defend it (god guard us) but to navigate it better in the unfortunate case one encounters it. It will only harm you to assume the dynamics between ethnicities in another country work like they do in your country. For example, Greeks have beef with certain ethnicities since the Ottoman empire, but can have more recent beef with other people from different countries. Immigrants from different ethnicities who flock together abroad because of similar cultures can be political "mortal enemies" in their "fatherland" because of heavy history. That's just a generalisation but to be fair I warned you we were gonna briefly explore the xenophobic mind, which has nothing but generalisations.
As usual, guys add your experiences and opinions below. The character of this post is informative and I think we should all try to keep it this way.
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alatismeni-theitsa · 6 hours
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Hi @olive-garden-hoe and thanks for the vote of trust 😁 Nice addition !
I think it depends on the era as well!* Many of my Greek classmates with curly hair (girls in most cases) were straightening them almost every day! Even girls with straight hair were straighten them in the morning to achieve the very straight hair fashionable look. But now due to tiktok videos and Facebook groups which discuss Curly Girl methods many Greek girls maintain their curls and care for them. (Or learn they had curls in the first place because the way they treated their hair after washing them didn't allow them to appear - happened to an immediate family member 😅)
*I agree that keeping curly hair straight indeed helps with the maintenance because curly hair can need so much care!!
Maybe a bit of a dumb question, but were there people with straight hair in ancient Greece? Like, I know modern Greeks do, but every ancient representation of Greece I see tends to have curly or wavy hair. I don't think I've ever come across a statue, description, pottery, etc that depicts someone with straight hair, but I may be missing sources.
Ah lol 😂 Hello anon! Straight hair is veeery dominant in Greece and the surrounding areas. No different thing is said for our ancient ancestors. No phenomenon of a huge ancient population of naturally curled-haired people was observed in the area.
I imagine the ancient depictions needed some movement and that's why waves were carved, or maybe waves/curls was a hair beauty standard for art (like small breasts and similar faces etc). Maybe the real life beauty standard also demanded wavy hair, so people used hot iron, or rags on wet hair to achieve this result. These are very ancient techniques.
It can't be that the whole Greek population two thousand years ago had curled hair and, on top of that, the exact same type of wavy hair. Not to mention, the Greeks with naturally curly hair I've seen have often puffier hair than the ones depicted often in antiquity and it's a type of hair that isn't new by any means. So I wouldn't say that ancient Greek art depicted the average natural Greek hair of the time.
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As a greek person, I'm tired of seeing americans commenting on how greek gods/people should look like (especially when it comes to skin tones being "too dark/too pale" depending on where on the political spectrum said american falls on). If you are not greek, you shouldn't have a say on the matter. Stop getting offended for things us, actual greek people, think are fine, just because you want to find something to complain about/push some agenda, AND STOP TRYING TO TALK OVER US.
(Y/A: this post is about depictions of greek people in art. I don't give a shit about PJO or whatever fantasy book made by an american author is popular these days)
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alatismeni-theitsa · 2 days
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This is no AI or photoshop… Arnold Schwarzenegger watching and then dancing with Greek Evzones, back in 1991.
BONUS POINT: Giorgos “Giorgakis” Papandreou, dancing there with Arnold in the second pic
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alatismeni-theitsa · 3 days
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I said I would probably not post today however I am urgently popping up for this awesome fellow
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Happy Greek Independence Day 💙🤍🇬🇷🤍💙
Photo source
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alatismeni-theitsa · 6 days
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According to the comments by Greeks this well-traveled Latino man managed to describe the climate in Greece very accurately. I've posted and will post from time to time videos from foreigners describing their experience in Greece because part of people knowing the country is this experience. Generally, I'm happy that people with darker skintones have a generally pleasant experience when coming to live in Greece from abroad, and I hope we can only become better. (It would be great if we, as a nation, could treat native Black people the same but I digress cause class also plays a role here)
I also focused on this video to note once more how important it is to recognize that each country has its own history and social cues. The "mavros" (black) falls in this category. (OP recognizes this, liking the comments from a Greek below). While people can use "mavros" in a racist way, sometimes it's just an identifier like "tall", "skinny" etc. "Mavros" also doesn't mean "Black person" always. It's used to describe someone tan, since the verb for "tan" here is "I blacken" (μαυρίζω), and it can refer to tan people, or people darker than the average local. I don't condone the negative or racist use of "mavros" (obviously), however it's important to remember that intent matters more than language especially if the native speaker of another country is ignorant of how this word is used in your country.
Also if you are a new person in a village people will look at you weirdly no matter your skin tone just because it's jarring/interesting to see someone new there, but also if you look different from most people you will get some curious looks (most often than not, in a well-intended way and not hostile)
Tumblr media Tumblr media
Finally , it's important for one to know the local flavour of xenophobia, not to defend it (god guard us) but to navigate it better in the unfortunate case one encounters it. It will only harm you to assume the dynamics between ethnicities in another country work like they do in your country. For example, Greeks have beef with certain ethnicities since the Ottoman empire, but can have more recent beef with other people from different countries. Immigrants from different ethnicities who flock together abroad because of similar cultures can be political "mortal enemies" in their "fatherland" because of heavy history. That's just a generalisation but to be fair I warned you we were gonna briefly explore the xenophobic mind, which has nothing but generalisations.
As usual, guys add your experiences and opinions below. The character of this post is informative and I think we should all try to keep it this way.
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alatismeni-theitsa · 6 days
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eastern europeans love tumblr because it's literally a website for complaining. and we fucking love complaining like nothing else
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alatismeni-theitsa · 7 days
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ΕΕΕΕΕΫ ΒΑΑΑΑΑΑΫ! Zeus, the respected Father of Gods and humans, a mob boss 😭😭😭 Goldblum might be amazing in the role but don't these people think. Like, ok, I get it that it's a show but why is it a whole trend to never respect the father of Greek gods and Greeks? (According to our mythology the human race and Greeks specifically come from the gods)
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Headline written specifically to make a very specific subset of annoying person cream their jeans
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alatismeni-theitsa · 8 days
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Congrats on passing gay marriage in Greece! 🙌🙌🙌🎉🎉🎉
Do you have any queer Greeks you can recommend to learn more about? Historical figures, artists, musicians, activists-esp. those ivolved in the fight for this new law.
Hello and thank youuuu!!! You can check my tag #lgbt+ in greece , and also these two articles (first, second). Google Translate will do a good job but it's also perfectly fine to message me to ask if certain paragraphs don't make sense. They are in Greek but I couldn't find better ones in English. Yorgos Kapoutzidis (he's gay) and Katherine Reilly (she's trans) are also very visible at the moment.
Sorry if I missed anyone, please add your Greek icons below!
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alatismeni-theitsa · 8 days
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Sorry I'm late i was making out with the sky you understand.
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alatismeni-theitsa · 9 days
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I don't know if immigrants from other cultures behave like this but I wouldn't be surprised. I learned that when me or my family as greek americans go to greek owned stores and restaurants and talk greek in america, we often get discounted or free stuff with what we ordered. I went to a store earlier with my dad and we got some free chocolate that was by the counter. And another time, my sister tried to order something in greek and apparently butchered the pronunciation of a word but they still give her a free snack for the effort, lol.
I don't know if others do it but I think it's something people from many nations would do 😄 However, Greeks can go over the top with hospitality so it's fair to ask this question!
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alatismeni-theitsa · 9 days
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Personal opinion but I find it ironic how many complain about wanting Greek myth retellings with complex characters, yet completely ignore that our mythology is already complex.
Like authors would claim they will retell a popular myth to give voice to a female character, as if the women in the myths didn't have already. It's just not in a way it's used in popular media.
The women in the OG myths aren't afraid to speak their mind and be true to what they believe, they are scared but also brave, they can be soft and shy, but also angry and bitter. Mothers, daughters, slaves, goddesses, all give equal time to shine and those stories still hold after thousands of years because they fell human.
What modern retellings offer? A same strategy for profit. All powerful, all perfect, no flaws, all righteous that ends up hollow and bland as a character and easily forgettable. 🤷🏻‍♀️
Agreed! And I don't think it's just for profit. How the Anglosphere engages with Greek myth hasn't stopped being colonialist and imperialist in nature, especially since those countries still have sway over Greece and our politics (the US is our Big Brother as I often mention). Without adequate reaserch, so many of them feel comfortable to assume they know better than these savage ancient/modern Greeks and they are so much smarter, and only they can portray these characters in a way that matters (aka through their country's modern lens).
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alatismeni-theitsa · 10 days
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Happy Clean Monday !!!
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Kyra Sarakosti and Clean Monday
In the Christian Orthodox tradition, Lent it starts today, with Clean Monday, or Shrove Monday. While both Lenten traditions last 40 days, in the Eastern tradition Sundays are not counted, so the total time of Lent is 50 days.
To keep track of the weeks, children make a Kyra Sarakosti or Lady Lent calendar or cookie, with 7 feet or 7 shoes. Kyra Sarakosti does not have a mouth, since she is fasting. Her arms are crossed. Each Saturday, another foot is cut off, until the last Saturday, when the last foot is hidden in some other food and the person who gets it is considered lucky.
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alatismeni-theitsa · 12 days
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Karnavali in Kerkyra, Hellas 🃏🎭 (Part 2)
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alatismeni-theitsa · 12 days
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Karnavali in Kerkyra, Hellas 🃏🎭
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