Friday, June 01, 2007

The Answers

I think I have given everyone sufficient time to read my trivia questions from the previous post and respond. It's been nearly a week. I guess it was trivia. I mean, not everybody knows trivia. I spent countless hours reading books about pirates (bad ones) and sailing ships as a kid, so perhaps my brain cataloged too much trivia pertaining to such. I did get one response and those look right to me. Here are the answers:

1. Matt's answer:
"Calypso is featured in The Odyssey, and delayed Odysseus on the island of Oyigia with her feminine wiles." That would be a yes. I would add that she was a nymph.
2. Matt's answer: "Tethys, a titaness, original sea goddess." Yes. If you want to go to more contemporary (as if) Greek mythology then you could say there was no sea goddess. Poseidon, the sea god, was male.
3. Davy Jones is actually derived from a word and meant the devil. He never was a real person. Not sure what the word was or if anyone knows that.
4. Davy Jones' locker is a euphemism for death at sea. (That was a real easy one, people.)
5. The captain of the Flying Dutchman was Captain Vanderdecken, a Dutch captain who may or may not have ever actually lived.
6. The legend goes that Vanderdecken attempted to sail the Flying Dutchman around the Horn (the bottom of South America) too late in the year. The storms were already terrible. But he kept trying to sail around it and fought the storms for more than a month. His ship ran out of food and fresh water and he still would not turn back. Then he cursed God in his anger at the weather. An angel came and cursed Vanderdecken, his ship and his crew. They would have to sail the high seas for eternity as a ghost ship.
7. If any sailor saw the Flying Dutchman (a ghost ship) he saw a harbinger of doom or bad luck. The Flying Dutchman was usually "sighted" in bad weather and sometimes down around the Horn.
8. Matt's answer: " Charon, as featured in the Aeneid."
9. Pirates kill people and steal stuff.
10. It's good because they wear fluffy shirts and wield cutlasses. Actually, this is one area where I have not been able to suspend my disbelief while watching the Pirates movies. I just keep thinking to myself, "But they're fighting for their right and freedom to kill people and steal things, why should I care about them?" Ah well, it's just a movie. And a fun movie at that.

2 comments:

Just Me said...

That was fun. Sorry I missed it!

Esther said...

Thanks! That's okay. From the look of things you've been pretty busy. ;oP