Ulysses in the sun's car

Abstract

In this article, the Homeric epic will be the chosen source to demonstrate a set of knowledges previously established to the Ionian naturalists. In our reading hypothesis, the epic of Homer already presents an initial naturalistic position, starting with the fact that his works constitute, from the experience of death, a compliment to the life. And to demonstrate this set of antitheses between the two experiences, we will see that in the Homeric epic the presence of the story is meant to record the real exclusively seized by the human senses, even in the most subjective scenes involving infernal places and legendary beings. We will not assert such a characteristic to the point of turning Homer into an empirical one, but it is really a first alternative to the wonderful past evoked by the innumerable prophets.