Greek to Me: Icarus
Icarus never got near the sun. The air gets colder as you climb, and the Greeks had a version with no wings at all.
Icarus never got near the sun.
Air cools about three and a half degrees for every thousand feet you climb, beeswax holds until about a hundred and forty, and the Sun is ninety-three million miles away, so the boy would have frozen long before anything melted. Around 300 BC the Greek writer Palaephatus told it without wings: Daedalus slipped out of a prison window, took his son in a small boat, caught a strong south wind ("it seemed as if they were flying"), and the boat capsized. The island where the story puts Icarus ashore is still Ikaria, famous today for its ninety-year-olds.
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Greek to Me
Every episode, and a little about the girls, is on the series page.
See all the episodes
The Hesperides were not always Atlas's daughters.52 seconds
Artemis’s Boot Crew57 seconds
The Trojan Horse Isn’t in the Iliad54 seconds
Cerberus Didn't Always Have Three Heads56 seconds
Medusa Was the Victim1 minute, 10 seconds
King Midas Never Turned His Daughter to Gold1 minute, 8 seconds
Seven Years with Calypso1 minute, 10 seconds
The Sirens1 minute, 8 seconds
Atlas1 minute, 11 seconds
Pandora1 minute, 3 seconds
Icarus, in His Own Words1 minute, 10 seconds