Back in my day
Back in my dayBack in My Day…
“Back in my day, people just didn’t do stuff like that.” In addition to hearing about how bread used to cost a nickel, that quote is what you hear it from the elders of most generations when talking about violence, especially on television in the present time; they say that the violence seen just did not seem to exist back then. However, when one thinks about it, violence that extreme has existed throughout the ages, whether it was as early as the Iliad and the Odyssey during the Greek era, the Aeneid in the Roman era, or even in Christian stories in the Bible.
The first example of historic extreme violence is back in the time of the Iliad and the Odyssey during the Greek era, which happened during the eighth or ninth centuries BCE. These two epics, which are considered by many scholars to be very fine works of art, are filled with gratuitous acts of violence and other such acts of immoral behavior. In the Iliad, especially in Book 5, where Homer tells of Diomedes’ aristea, a detailed account of how a man battles and injures both man and gods is given. In lines 72-75, for example, Homer gives us a terrifyingly graphic description of the battle scene:
“Now the son of Phyleus, the spear-famed, closing upon him
struck him with the sharp spear behind the head at the tendon,
and straight on through the teeth and under the tongue cut the bronze blade,
and he dropped in the dust gripping in his teeth the cold bronze.”
Examples of aggression and viciousness are also given in the Odyssey. In this, most say that Odysseus was justified in doing what he did, but it is still brutal fighting. The best example of viciousness is given when Odysseus finally returns home and has to defeat the suitors:
“Odysseus’ arrow hit him [Antinoos] under the chin and punched up to the
feathers through the throat. Backward and down he went, letting
the winecup fall from his shocked hand. Like pipes his nostrils
jetted crimson runnels, a river of mortal red, and one last kick
upset his table knocking the bread and meat to soak in dusty blood.”
These two examples might not be the same as a gang war or a drive-by in the middle of the streets in New York, but they are still brutal and gory nonetheless. The only difference between the two types is that the method that it is given to someone is different. In the past, a person would tell the story, and the audience would have to use their imagination to get the pictures and actions for themselves; in the present time, thanks to technology, people do not have to use their...
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