Essay On Atlantis

1500 Words3 Pages

Atlantis as a Victim of its Hubris

Nathan Sikora
History 100
11/17/2017

In modern times, discussion around the myth of Atlantis generally consists of debate regarding whether or not Atlantis was a real civilization. One side attempts to paint the myth of Atlantis as a historical fact based on corroborating reports from within Egypt during the reported time of its existence while the other side simply tries to show that the myth of Atlantis is a cautionary tale of hubris to prove a point made in the Timaeus and Critias by Plato. While we still do not know if either side is completely correct, it is assumed that the myth of Atlantis was used by Plato in order to show what happens to a perfect society when their own hubris came to be …show more content…

The word hubris is generally described as a arrogance to the point of a flaw. This arrogance tends to offend the gods within Greek mythology as they are the ones who provide for these people and civilizations to reach such great heights. Often times, the gods will choose to bring someone back down a level by taking away what made them so great or by simply offing them altogether which is seen within the myth of Atlantis . In the Greek myth of Narcissus, a man named Narcissus looked into his reflection in water only to become enamored with his beauty and falls in love with himself. Because he was so filled with hubris, he felt no need to take care of biological functions as humans need to do in order to survive, ultimately leading to him dying because of his fascination with himself. Narcissus’ name is where our words relating to narcissistic came from within the English …show more content…

In the myth of Atlantis we see that Poseidon was given dominion of the land that would make up Atlantis and eventually takes a mortal as a wife whose name was Cleito . Poseidon made a home for her and then began to cut up the island into rings with a sort of moat in between them to protect Cleito. Poseidon then sired 10 sons with Cleito and they became the rulers of Atlantis . In order to set the civilization in the right direction and be able to step away from its management, Poseidon created a set of rules . It is seen in the myth that Poseidon took great care in the creation of Atlantis and especially great love for Cleito. To so readily subside into vanity and perhaps greed as the Atlanteans do, would be extremely displeasing to the gods as they are depicted within Greek

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