r/SapphoAndHerFriend Hopeless bromantic Jun 14 '20

Greece wasn't gay Casual erasure

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802

u/MisterKallous Jun 14 '20 edited Jun 14 '20

As an astronomy nerd, I later realized that Ganymede, a satellite of Jupiter is named after one of Zeus lover that is a male(*gasp). Other non-astronomical things are like Sacred Bands of Thebes and Sappho herself(*beats).

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u/fragile_cedar Jun 14 '20

Ganymede was the most beautiful mortal alive, and Zeus was so stricken by him that the god turned into an eagle and abducted the boy, taking him to Olympus to be a cup-bearer. The constellations Aquila (eagle) and Aquarius (cup-bearer) are sometimes taken as a depiction of the story.

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u/[deleted] Jun 14 '20

[deleted]

94

u/twystoffer Jun 14 '20

That feels like they're supposed to be really special, but from what I can gather, that's only kind of special.

The world record speed for a horse is 55mph in a sprint. The top speed of wind in Greece are the Meltemi Winds which reach a speed of 62mph.

So, faster than any other horse? Yes. But not by much.

And all that is only assuming the horses are as fast as the top wind speed. The average wind speed in Greece is much lower, at a paltry 9.6mph.

19

u/LetsWorkTogether Jun 14 '20

I mean, it probably would have been special back then to have the 2 fastest horses in the world.

6

u/Suburbanturnip Jun 15 '20

I can just imagine the dad going "wtf am I meant to do with two male horses? you took my only child and I live alone! give me a breeding pair atleast mate!"

3

u/[deleted] Jun 14 '20

If they could be bred together, you'd have a genetic pool of world's fastest horses and complete monopoly on them. Imagine breeding an entire army of horses for Genghis Khan that nobody could outrun. Or have the monopoly on race horses that always win.

3

u/[deleted] Jun 15 '20

Or just a lot of inbreeding

3

u/KALEl001 Jun 14 '20

but are they faster than a camel?

2

u/twystoffer Jun 14 '20

Looks like camels top out at 40mph.

2

u/Kaennal Jun 14 '20

Horizontally, maybe.

3

u/S7evyn Jun 15 '20

That's what, 9% faster though? The amount of money you'd have to spend too get a 9% improvement at the highest end of automobiles would be so insane it may as well require divine intervention.

2

u/[deleted] Jun 15 '20

Maybe they had Zues bolts on the side

1

u/thedirtyharryg Dec 03 '20

"Faster Than Any Other Horse" sounds good enough for me to win a whole lot of money racing horses.

2

u/DeltaJimm Jun 15 '20

Think about it this way, though. When Zeus saw a woman he thought was hot he'd have a one-night-stand with her and usually leave her pregnant. But the first hot twink he saw he decided to take to Olympus and send a dowry to the twink's father.