‘Sing Muses, sing to me a story of Olympus and the deathless gods who govern earth, sea and sky’
It’s been a while since we posted a blog update, but that doesn’t mean we haven’t been busy! For the past two years, we’ve been writing Greek mythology short stories for the HistoryHit original series The Ancients as part of their Greek Gods and Goddesses Series hosted by Tristan Hughes.
Every episode in the series has begun with one of these scripts, and for long-time fans of Helicon’s work, you’ll notice they feature many of our favourite quirks of the oral-poetic tradition: epithets, type scenes, repeated motifs and accompanying music.
Each story is a combination of container and myth, opening with an invocation to the Muses to ‘sing of Olympus and the deathless gods who govern earth, sea and sky’. These containers are stories in their own right: shipwrecked Odysseus recounting Poseidon’s wrath; a cattle rancher seeking Hermes’s indulgence; a young boy begging for Hestia’s comfort. What follows is then a myth of the god or goddess themselves: the lineage of Zeus; Aphrodite winning the golden apple; Apollo and Artemis’s punishment of Niobe. Each script finally returns to the container scene, with the divine story some source of explanation, inspiration, even condemnation.
The series has covered the whole Olympian dynasty – thirteen gods and goddesses as well as a couple of bonus episodes on significant Greek heroes and kings like Achilles, Midas and Hercules; the monstrous Medusa; and the origins of the Sparta and Carthage.
The majority of the stories have also been told by long-time Helicon collaborator Nichola Woolley. She and the other voiceover artists have brought more life to these stories than we could ever have imagined, showing just how crucial oral recitation is to the tradition.
After the story, the series has featured in depth interviews between Tristan Hughes and a bevy of eminent academics, diving into the history, art, mythology and reception of each god and goddess.
Zeus definitely had favourites… Minerva Fighting Mars, Jacques-Louis David, 1771
Now like children, we shouldn’t have favourites, but if you’re looking for which episode to start with first (before you binge all of them, of course…), we’d recommend Apollo: God of the Sun, Hephaestus: God of Fire and Achilles. The latter, produced to coincide with Pride Month and focused especially on Achilles’s relationship with Patroclus, was awarded Silver in the 2023 Signal Awards and won the Listener’s Choice Award in the History Episodes category.
Every script and links to the relevant podcast recordings can be found here.
All that’s left to say is a huge thank you to the team at HistoryHit and to you for listening!