Awesome Analysis As Always Girl!! ✨✨

Awesome analysis as always girl!! ✨✨

This is a very worthy subject to discuss let alone in such epic pieces. Once again it shows how both the Iliad and the Odyssey portray the Gods as symbolism not only of nature's forces, but also of the struggles and disasters humans must go through, in this case in the form of diseases brought forward in a form of punishment from certain actions.

It's also quite a tragic mix with war and post war situations since fighters are exposed to rough, many times unsanitary, and overcrowded environments which become a breeding ground for such desieses, and if they are already weakened by wounds and other problems, the possibilities for death grows.

Very good observation in the type of bacteria and plagues! In the mythological sense this is also quite the low and efficient blow from Apollo, to first strip them of their guard and transportation animals, and then strike the people themselves, it's scary how his attacks are described in the form of his arrows! And realistically this is indeed a good point to how such diseases affect humans and spread, becoming airborne from the animals to the people.

Those are a scary combination of symptoms as well especially as they progressively get worse, it must be pure suffering and agony to die like this! It must have felt like hell for the soldiers. Also interesting connection with Palamedes and how a good cardio system is valuable to survive the disease.

Again a very good observation, the losses from diseases should definitely be counted as losses of the war because even if they didn't die in the battle itself it was still a very direct result of it, especially since it hit the Greek side in this context. Also curious indeed that they were the most affected!

And for real I can imagine even the highest ranking and some kings were not spared at least some effects of the illnesses. Especially if they were less vigorous or weakened by some other factors. That analysis of Helen and Menelaus is awesome as well ✨ and it certainly explains how certain demographics were safer from it.

Oh gosh this is definitely a great reference and inspiration for our story and the narrative regarding the war and the rebels (and even the enemy soldiers) and surrounding people dealing with the illnesses in war camps and their very harsh conditions! Definitely the dark reality of how the fighters are not safe after the battles are over, and can still pretty much succumb to such horrible situations of plagues and diseases! Man now I feel like drawing something about this! 👀✨

The Iliad Plague

Honestly I am disappointed at how little we talk about the Iliad plague that was sent by Apollo in the first rhapsody of the Iliad to the Greeks after Chryses, Apollo's priest, begged for justice for the disrespect Agamemnon showed him plus the fact that his daughter was not returned to him.

"First he stroke the mules and the swift dogs but then he shot his shafts to the humans themselves and the funeral pyres were burning non-stop and crowded and for nine days the army was being assaulted by the God's arrows"

(Translation by me)

So we basically get that the plague spread to animals first and then swiftly passed to humans and it became deadly very quickly.

It seems like a classic case of an assault of the bacteria Yersina which is responsible for three major plagues; the bubonic, septisemic and pneumonic plagues. All three seem to be associated with transmission from animals to humans. In this case my random guess would be that this would be the case or a pneumonic plague. It transmits from the breathing of fumes and it is much easier transmittable from one person to another given that both other plagues require the mix of bodily fluids. Since the disease seems to strike animals commonly not associated with food like mules or dogs it seems more probable the disease was of a lung nature.

The main symptoms of a pneumonic plague are:

Fever

Headaches

Shortness of breath

Chest pain

Intense coughing

Hemoptysis (aka "coughing out blood")

It seems indeed highly probable that the plague was of such nature which would lead to a large number of soldiers suffer from headaches and fever which gradually got worse and added coughing chest pain and coughing out blood (the other plagues have also intense vomiting-boubonic- and blood infection -septisemic-). Various post-homeric and mainly early Roman sources speak on the contributing of Palamedes suggesting better diet and exercise countering the effects of the plague or preventing it. Although traditionally we know plagues can be effectively cured with the use of antibiotics it is probable that the mention of cardio exercise could be a wink that a good cardio system can defend itself against lung diseases.

Either way it surprises me that the losses of war when studied rarely mention the results of this plague since many people count only the deaths in battle and not this which is ironically the only set of deaths seemingly affecting only the Greek side. It is interesting given how many times cities being surrounded by armies are the first to suffer from diseases rather than the people outside (although both sides suffer eventually from diseases). Realistically speaking we do understand why we see so many mentions of diseases.

And again when it comes to the sequel Odyssey as well, very few people consider not only the losses Odysseus undoubtedly suffered in battle but also one should expect he lost a man or two from the plague as well (mind you I can easily imagine some kings also being affected by it at least at early stage especially the less vigorous such as Nestor because of age or Menelaus if we take my headcannon that he probably was a bit frail of health later as I mentioned to the post tagging @thehelplessmortals which could indeed back up more how careful Helen was with him since plagues do affect massively the health of lungs or heart permanently

More vigorous and fighting fit characters like Achilles or Diomedes or Odysseus and Agamemnon seemed less likely to have been stroke by the plague. Achilles is also the one who calls upon council of kings to find a solution.

☆☆☆☆☆☆☆☆☆☆☆

During my collaboration with @artsofmetamoor I always entertain the thought of disease to the various war camps. Disease would often be the most common way soldiers died instead of battles.

In our stories our characters suffer a lot of many things but this also makes me do a note to self to refer more on plagues or diseases