Talk:Ismarus (Thrace)

Odysseus's raid on Ismaros: Women

In adding a few factual details about the raid I considered mentioning the following, but concluded it might make the article too long and discursive for Wikipedia rather than factual, subject to anyone else's views.

-Odysseus (acting as narrator at this point) briefly mentions that the unfortunate women of Ismaros are enslaved and shared out among the victors, presumably to be concubines and servants, but never mentions them again. Odysseus does not say if he takes one of these women for himself, nor does he say if they are present on the ships as slaves for the rest of the voyage, or whether they escape or are rescued during the battle between Odysseus's men and the Cicones' army the next day. Presumably, to Homer and his original audience, the fate of enslaved women who play no other part in the plot of the Odyssey is unimportant and not worth holding up the action of the poem to consider.

-That Odysseus and his warriors slaughter the men of Ismaros and enslave their women can seem shockingly cruel by modern standards, but was apparently the norm in war then. This is what the Greeks/Achaeans have already done to the people of Troy and many other towns in the 10 year war that has just ended. Evil Tim Lawyer (talk) 22:12, 19 September 2024 (UTC)