Magic Armor Can’t Save the Tragic Heroes: Duty & Doom for Karna, Ferdiad & Achilles

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The climactic moment in Homer's Iliad when a dying Achilles' head bursts into flame

Magic Armor Can’t Save the Tragic Heroes: Duty & Doom for Karna, Ferdiad & Achilles

It is no longer a secret that there are historical connections between the myths from everywhere in the world, indicating that every culture had strong influences on each other and their legends. A minor example of this can be seen in something as simple as a body armor - Ancient India’s Karna's kawach (“armor”) has been compared with that of Ancient Greek’s Achilles’ Styx-coated body and with Ancient Irish warrior Ferdiad’s horny skin that could not be pierced.

Back in the eight and the ninth centuries BCE, Greece and India had established universities where a variety of subjects were taught and learned, including literature and rhetoric. Greece and India are also homes to the two greatest surviving epics - the Iliad and the Mahabharata. Another epic, Táin Bó Cúailnge (commonly known as “The Cattle Raid of Cooley”), a legendary tale from early Irish literature, followed some centuries after as it may have been put to writing in the eighth century CE. However, it had a considerable oral history before any of it was committed to writing.

Cú Chulainn is the central character of the Ulster (Ulaid) cycle in the in medieval Irish mythology and literature.

Cú Chulainn is the central character of the Ulster (Ulaid) cycle in the in medieval Irish mythology and literature. (Public Domain)


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