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About The monitor. (Omaha, Neb.) 1915-1928 | View Entire Issue (April 21, 1917)
The African Origin of Grecian Civil ization Speech of George Wells Parker, De livered Before the Omaha Philo sophical Society, April 1, 1917. (Continued.) If I should conclude at this point my thesis would be complete and con clusive, but there are other subjects which demand some attention. 1 can not pass in silence the supposed tes timony to the presence of the fair type in Greece, and to its superiority over the darker population, furnished by the Homeric poems. This sup posed testimony has precipitated wordy wars as terrible, tho perhaps less sanguinary, as those which were engaged in by the gods and heroes themselves. The fault, however, lies with the translators rather than with the epics. From the work of these ir.ductrious authors we get the idea that golden hair and blue eyes were so common that there was little chance of any other sort of people lingering around. The truth of the matter is that these translators, like historians, have permitted their prejudices to warp their accuracy. There is not in the entire writings of Homer an ad jective or description applying to any of the principals that even suggests a single one of them having blue eyes and golden hair. Indeed, it is quite the reverse. Athena is glaukopis; glaukos means blue like the sea and the unclouded sky; the olive is glaukos also, and Athena is guardian of the olive. Glaukopis means that her eyes are brilliant and terrible. Apollo in Homer is chrysoros, that is to say, bearing a golden sword; while Xan thos, which has been mistranslated to mean fair, means reddish brown and brown. Artemis is chyse, golden, that is to say, brilliant, but never fair. Neptune is kyanochaites, that is to say bluish, blackish, like the dark and deep waves of the ocean. Eos, the dawn, is chrysothronos, rhodokatylos, krokopeplos, because the color of the dawn is golden, rosy and red. Neither Hera nor Kalypsos are fair from their descriptive adjectives. Achilles is xanthos which, as was said before, means reddish brown and brown. Aga memnon is also xanthos and remem ber, if you please, that he is in direct descent from Epaphos, the swarthy ancestor of the Pelasgic houses. So you see that even our translators are not to be trusted. Professor Sergi made an extensive investigation of the supposed testimony to the pres ence of the fair type in Greece and his conclusions are as follows: “In Homer none of the individuals are fair in the ethnographic sense of the word. I could bring forth a wealth of facts to show that what I have just stated regarding the anthropological charac ters of the Homeric gods and heroes may also be said, and with more rea son, of the types of Greek and Roman statuary which, tho in the case of the divinities they may be convention alized, do not in the slightest degree recall the features of a northern race.” Hence the blue-eyed and golden-haired gods and goddesses who grace the canvasses of our art galleries and the atre curtains are but pigmentary cre ations from the minds of artists who visualize the peculiarities of their own race just as the Jewish Madonna is depicted as a Spanish, Dutch, German, English, Italian, Russian, Scandina vian, and even as an African mother by the different nationalities in turn. Another idea which seems to be rap idly taking hold upon the scholastic mind is that the Illiad and Odyssey are in reality Minoan epics made over, ii you please, to fit the later Grecian epochs. While the Homer, we know professedly commemorates the deeds of Achaean heroes, everything about them is non-Hellenic. The whole pic ture of the civilization, including home Ine, dress, religious worship, and architecture, is Minoan and Mycenean. Warriors’ weapons are of bronze when the age to which we attribute Homer was an iron age. The combatants use huge body shields when, as a matter of fact, such shields had been obso lete long previous to 1200 B. C. The form of worship, hymns and invoca tions to deities, and the use of certain sacrificial forms were all adaptations from the Mycenean ritual. The ar rangement of the palaces and courts as narrated in the epics were counter parts of the Minoan and Mycenean palaces and had long since passed out of existence. Among the discoveries in Crete have been found pictorial scenes exactly as described in Homer, and the artistic representations upon the shield of Achilles and upon the shield of Hercules, as described by Hesiod, have been duplicated among the ruins of Crete. Upon intaglios recovered we find combatants strik ing at each other’s throats and you will recollect that Achilles does just this thing in his fight with Hector. I might continue these coincidences in definitely, but I believe that the point 1 desire to make is sufficiently clear to merit your attention. The great Grecian epics are epics of an African people and Helen, the cause of the Trojan war, must henceforth be con ceived as a beautiful brown skin girl. In the press and periodicals of our country we read that the classics are doomed and about to pass out of our lives, but the classics can never die. I sometimes dream of a magical time when the sun and moon will be larger than now and the sky more blue anl nearer to the world. The days will be longer than these days and when labor is over and there falls the great hush of light before moonrise, minds now dulled with harsh labor and com mercialism will listen to those who love them as they tell stories of ages past, stories that will make them tingle with pleasure and joy. Nor will these story tellers forget the classics. They will hear the surge of the ocean in Homer and march with his heroes to the plains of Troy; they v'ill winder with Ulysses and help him slay the suitors who betrayed the hos pitality of the faithful Penelope; they will escape from Priam’s burning city with Aeneas, weep over Dido’s love, and help him to found a nation beside the Tiber. And the translators who shall again bring into life the dead tongues will not let prejudice cloud their brains or truth make bitter their tongues. The heroes of Homer shall, like the Prince of Morocco, wear the livery of the burnished sun and be knit by binding ties to the blood of Afric’s clime from w'hence civiliza tion took its primal rise. (To be Continued) SOUTH OPPOSES NEGRO SOLDIERS (Continued From First Page) conducted in such a limited manner They are already four Colored reg iments in the army, and it seems that more may be recruited. The Negro has had hardly any show in the Navy however, being now confined to mess service. That the recruiting of Colored troops may present a different aspect from the Civil War, when only white officers were placed over them, is in dicated by the following observation made by Bradley Gilman in the Bos ton Globe. Negro Officers O. K. “The query at once arises: “If regi ments of Colored men were enlisted, would they demand or need Colored officers?” In the Civil War, Colored men fought well, but they had such officers as Shaw and Higginson. It was felt that only under white lead ership would they stand against white foes. But all this has changed. No needle on a dial more clearly marks unseen changes within than does the fact today that Negro regiments would not need white commanders, for the Negro race has acquired such con fidence in itself that Negro troops will follow such Negro leaders as Col. Charles Young, of the Regular Army, as confidently as they would follow any white officer. “This fact, which was indicated very clearly in the Spanish-American War and was clearly demonstrated on the Mexican border recently, is most significant as an evidence of the steady moral, and mental evolution of the race.” Quite a number are also consid ering what will be the future attitude about Colored cadets attending West Point and Annapolis, as well as en listing for higher grade service in the Navy. HELPERS CLUB SOCIAL The Helpers club, which has as its object the helping in a practical way the less fortunate, gave a very pleas ant and successful social Monday night at the residence of Mr. and Mrs. Joseph Lewis on North Twenty fifth street. There was a large at tendance. The evening was spent in music and various games, such as an old fashioned spoiling match, guess ing contests, carrying peanuts on a knife and pinning the tail on a rab bit. The prize winners were as fol lows: Spelling match, Mrs. John Al bert Williams; guessing contest, Miss Beatrice Black; peanut carrying, Henry W. Black; rabbit game, Mrs. Charles Solomon. Refreshments were served and a delightful evening was spent. THE NEW ROUND SHELLTEX EYEGLASSES i Strong, Stylish, Light and Comfortable i | Satisfaction guaranteed. PRICES REASONABLE i; Columbian Optical Co. 209-11 So. 16th Street. ' ___ i. A. Edholm E. W. 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