The History of Greek Mythology and Women

The myths of ancient Greece have shaped Western civilisation for three millennia – from the epic poems of Homer to the stories of gods, heroes and legends that still captivate us today. But whose stories have we been told, and who were the real women behind them? What can the latest archaeology tell us about the women whose lives inspired Homer’s Helen of Troy, Circe, Calypso, Aphrodite and more – women whose true histories have been lost for millennia? And how does understanding their side of the story change the way we read the past, and think about the future? In this talk, award-winning classicist and historian Dr Emily Hauser delves into these questions and more, drawing on her book Mythica: The Bestselling Story of the Real Women of the Iliad and Odyssey. Weaving together the original texts, recent archaeological finds and the latest DNA studies, she will reveal who these women – queens, mothers, warriors, slaves – really were, how they lived, and how history has (or has not, until now) remembered them. Doors open at 7pm, talk starts at 7:30pm - come down early to grab a good seat! Speaker Bio: Dr Emily Hauser is an award-winning classicist and historian. She read Classics at Cambridge with Mary Beard, where she received a double first with distinction and won the prestigious Chancellor's Medal for Classical Proficiency.