What's the dealio with the two Aiases? I read somewhere that there was originally one, then he turned into two "local" heroes in separate traditions, then those two were both merged into the "main" tradition again, but now as two separate characters instead of the original one. They do suspiciously stick together a lot.
Are there any other theories about them?
Also look at that Achilles culturally appropriating the blacks with his dreadlocks....tsk tsk
>>8239599
It's a bit of a misunderstanding, really. Homer had quite the...affinity, let's say, to honey-sweetened Chios wine in his later years. He wrote Aias as the son of one Telamon (he loved making up these ridiculous names). He then forgot about that, and also about making Aias this big, brawny bear kinda guy, and when he wrote the next scene he had Aias as a twink-like, weasly fellow, the son of Oileus ("the oily", further reference to his sneakiness and androgyny). He had greenlighted the proofs for the first two books and, by the time he realised his mistake and broke open his wine jugs in the donkeys' trough, it was all out in the latest issue of The Smyrnean, which serialized his stuff. He then resolved to make up for it by coming up with hundreds more ridiculous made-up names. It wasn't enough. After being thoroughly thrashed by the critics he gouged his eyes out in shame and begged to be exiled. Unable to write, he went on to inspire and develop a new style of "oral" poetry, a clear break from the rigidity of written text that had been the only medium of literature until then.
