Ulyssean - I find it risible that Scripps-Howard says Ulysses was the hero of Homer’s Odyssey. I wonder why the Romans changed his name from the Greek Oddysseus to Latin Ulysses.

umbelliferous
Definition:
\Um`bel*lif"er*ous\, a. [Umbel + -ferous: cf. F.
ombillif[`e]re.] (Bot.)
(a) Producing umbels.
(b) Of or pertaining to a natural order ({Umbellifer[ae]}) of
plants, of which the parsley, carrot, parsnip, and fennel
are well-known examples.

umber 1
n.
5Fr (terre d‘)ombre < It (terra d‘)ombra, lit., (earth of) shade, prob. < L umbra, a shade, shadow (but based on ? UMBRIA)6
1 a kind of earth containing oxides of manganese and iron, used as a pigment: raw umber is yellowish-brown; burnt, or calcined, umber is reddish-brown
2 a yellowish-brown or reddish-brown color
adj.
of the color of raw umber or burnt umber
vt.
to color with or as with umber

umber 2
n.
5ME < OFr umbre (Fr ombre) < L umbra: see prec.6
1 [Now Dial.] shade; shadow
2 a common European grayling (Thymallus thymallus)


umbrous - one dictionary says “shady” dozens of sites selling hamster appear to call it “creamy”

umland - apparently a German word, equivalent to “environs”

umpaty, unadulterated, unanimously, unappreciative, unchangeable,

uncinus - biology, a small hooklike process

uncomplimentary, unconscionable, uncrystallized,

unctuous
adj.
5ME < ML unctuosus, greasy < L unctum, ointment < ungere, to anoint: see UNGUENT6
1 a) of, like, or characteristic of an ointment or unguent; oily or greasy b) made up of or containing fat or oil
2 like oil, soap, or grease to the touch: said of certain minerals
3 soft and rich: said of soil
4 plastic; moldable
5 characterized by a smug, smooth pretense of spiritual feeling, fervor, or earnestness, as in seeking to persuade; too suave or oily in speech or manner
unc#tu[os4i[ty 739s4! tc8 or unc4tu[ous[ness
n.
unc4tu[ous[ly
adv.

uncurl, underestimate, underlineation, underscore, understand,understudy, underterred, undulating, unearth, unembroidered, unencombered, unenviable, unequivocal, uneventful, unfasten, unfavorable, unfilial, unfinished, unforeseeable, ungenteel, unguerdoned

I wonder why the Romans changed his name from the Greek Oddysseus to Latin Ulysses.

I've wondered the same thing. There seems to be more going on here than simple language differences. Herakles > Hercules I can see, particularly as it sheds light on the nuclear > nucular issue. Perhaps one of our resident linguists can weigh in.

The Latin form is more usually Ulixes. According to the Lewis and Short entry on Perseus, it doesn't come directly from the Greek, but via Etruscan Uluxe, or Siculan (the Siculi lived in Sicily and gave their name to the island) Oulixes.

http://makeashorterlink.com/?A5A412775

Bingley

It sounds as though the legend of Troy must have been widely circulated before Homer's opus got into print.

Here's a page about some early Roman and Greek history
with the mythological influences acknowledged that have been woven into the history. Not a
whole lot that's new there, but worth a look.

http://www.aug.edu/langlitcom/humanitiesHBK/handbook_htm/roman_history.htm

Joyce would have chosen Ulysses rather than Odysseus for his book that used the Odyssey as its scaffolding
because of Latin and the very strong influence
of the Catholic Church upon his early formation.

history. Not a whole lot that's new there

That's reassuring.

In reply to:

---

It sounds as though the legend of Troy must have been widely circulated before Homer's opus got into print.

---

Well, in 2300-odd years, I would certainly hope so.

Bingley

2300-odd years

Izzat 4600 altogether? ;)

Dear Bingley:manuscripts were printed by hand. I wonder when the earliest manuscripts of the Odyssey were made.
I found some archaeology sites indicating that the Etruscans
arrived in Italy fairly close to time accepted for Trojan war. I still think the Trojan war story is a bunch of baloney. There is evidence of a series of cities there having been destroyed and rebuilt. It was in a location to profit as a safe harbor and supply point for trading ships. And capable of accumulating wealth enough to invite attacks, and prompt rebuilding, until its channel and harbor
got silted in.And maybe terrain uplifted as well. It is now a couple miles from the water.

Re:I still think the Trojan war story is a bunch of baloney.

What? you don't believe that my mythical mother was raped, and that i and my mythical siblings, (some born, some hatched) didn't exist? or the that i am not the name sake of a the worlds most beautiful creature, a demi god?

there are elements of truth, and elements of fiction (think of the search for weapons of mass distructions, and the whole african uranium scandle) in all wars.

some just play better than others.

There was a Troy in Turkey--and there probably was a war, but about in 1200 BC. Homer would have created the Iliad and the Odyssey sometime around 800 BC according to Bernard Knox's notes I'm pouring over these days.

In the introduction to Fagles' 1996 translation, Bernard Knox notes that none of the characters in the Odyssey write--none!--except one. There will be one who writes--and I haven't found that character yet in the first nine books. That's because during Homer's time hardly anyone wrote. Knox notes that the Phoenicians brought some kind of non-alphabetic 'writing' to the Greeks--and I think Faldage has commented on that alphabet along with others here at some time in some thread--but very few people actually wrote, although the Greeks turned the Phoenician symbols into a working alphabet, one sound exactly for each letter.

There's a terrific argument in Knox's introduction in which the following is proposed:

"It is not surprising that many recent scholars in the field have come to the conclusion that writing did indeed play a role in the creation of these extraordinary poems, that the phenomena characteristic of oral epic demonstrated by Parry and Lord are balanced by qualities peculiar to literary composition. They envisage a highly creative oral poet, master of the repertoire of inherited material and technique, who used the new instrument of writing to build, probably over the course of a lifetime, an epic poem on a scale beyond the imagination of his predecessors" (20).

Homer
The Odyssey
Translated by Robert Fagles
Introduction and Notes by Bernard Knox
1996
Penguin Classics

...and this translation won numerous awards in 1996, by the way.

The entire presentation of the various theories about the impossibility of the writing of the epics v. the possibility is pages long in Knox's introduction--and entirely fascinating.

Me: 2300-odd years

Mav: Izzat 4600 altogether? ;)


c. 800 BC as WW points out for Homer, and c. 1500 AD (as a wild guess) for the first printed edition would make 2300 years, would it not?



Bingley

ha! that's tellin' 'im, Bingley.

no, it's just getting even ;)

Get the to a bookery, wwh!

I don't know whether you've ever read Gods, Graves, and Scholars, but I picked up a copy at a library sale--and today read a terrific chapter about the re-discovery of Troy by Schliemann, though he identified the incorrect layer--went down too deep. The whole story--which reads like an adventure book--is on pp. 29-43. I'd quote it fully, but won't. Ha! It's a wonder-filled chapter that I'm sure you'll enjoy reading--and it may even be on the internet. Here the publication info. you'll--or anybody else will--need:

Gods, Graves, and Scholars
The Story of Archaeology
C. W. Ceram
Translated from the German by E. B. Garside
New York
Alfred A. Knopf
1952

Dear WW: I have read quite a lot about Troy, but don't have any of the magazines or books now, and couldn't read them if I did.