Felice Vinci

from Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

Felice Vinci (* 1946 in Rome ) is an Italian nuclear engineer and amateur historian. Since the early 1990s he has been dealing with the question of the localization of historical places from Greek mythology .

In his main work "Omero nel Baltico" (" Homer on the Baltic Sea "), published in 1995, he presented his theses on how many contradictions in the Mediterranean positioning of Greek myths could be resolved.

Omero nel Baltico

The main thesis of the work "Omero nel Baltico" says that the plot of the Iliad and the Odyssey took place in Northern Europe . Vinci is based on texts of Plutarch made, after which the island Ogygia , where Calypso the Odysseus had held before moving to Ithaca could return, lies in the North Atlantic, "five sailing days of Britain" removed.

Vinci justifies this thesis with the fact that a post-glacial climatic optimum, which caused an unusually warm climate for several thousand years and did not become apparent until around 2000 BC. Chr. Weakened, the cause is that a large number of ethnic groups migrated south and took their myths and stories with them. At their later settlements, the emigrated groups tried to preserve their lost homeland at least by naming the new areas, which, according to Vinci, led to today's difficulties with localizing the places mentioned in the Iliad and the Odyssey.

Arguments for the thesis

The topography described by Homer fits well with the northern localities found, where they seem doubtful in the Mediterranean region. For example:

  • Ithaka would be the small island of Lyø in the southwest of the Danish archipelago,
  • the Peloponnese as "fertile plain" (corresponds to the Danish Zealand according to Vinci ),
  • the long island " Dulichion ", which is said to be near Ithaka and whose exact location is disputed, corresponds to the Danish Langeland , according to Vinci ,
  • a reversal of the river flow as described by Homer (Od. V, 451-453) is not known in the Mediterranean, but can still be observed in Scandinavia at high tide,
  • the wide "Hellespontische See", on which Troy is supposed to be located, is the strait of the Dardanelles in the Mediterranean (for position according to Vinci see next block).

Vinci finds places and regions that, historically and partly still today, come from Homer's stories in their names for peoples, places and cities. For example:

Climatic conditions from the stories fit much better in northern latitudes. For example:

  • “The night was bad after the north wind fell / and frosty; then the snow began to fall like icy frost / and ice solidifies on our signs ”(Od. XIV, 475-477)
  • In the Iliad there is also fighting at night. Due to the polar days, the light conditions are much more suitable than the sparse moonlight in southern latitudes.

Archaeological finds from Bronze Age settlements (see also Nordic Bronze Age ) underline that people had already settled in these northern regions.

Arguments against the thesis

Just as Vinci's main arguments are better correspondence with geographical descriptions, Vinci's critics say that the description of Ithaca and other islands as steep and mountainous does not match the Danish islands.

In particular, Homer describes Ithaka with a clearly visible mountain, with a very well protected natural harbor near which the nymph's cave is, and the entire island area as so steep that no horses are used on the island. In addition, there is a rocky strait between Ithaca and the island of Same with the small rocky islet Asteris in the middle. The modern Greek Ithaca corresponds exactly to this description, whereas Ærø is a small flat island without a well-protected bay and without caves. Between Ithaca and Kefalonia (which is often equated with the Homeric seed) there is a strait with a rocky islet, on the other hand there is no strait between Ærø and Lyø (the ancient Same after Vinci) and the Danish South Pacific cannot be called rocky there.

Works

  • Felice Vinci: Homericus nuncius: il mondo di Omero nel Baltico . M. Solfanelli, Chieti 1993, ISBN 88-7497-532-5 .
  • Felice Vinci: Omero nel Baltico: saggio sulla geografia omerica . Fratelli Palombi, Roma 1995, ISBN 88-7621-474-7 . (5th revised and expanded edition 2009, ISBN 9788860601537 )
English translation by Felice Vinci and Amalia Di Francesco: The Baltic Origins of Homer's Epic Tales: The Iliad, the Odyssey, and the Migration of Myth . Inner Traditions, Rochester 2005, ISBN 1594770522 .
Swedish translation by Lennart Kankaanranta: Scandinavian origin för Homeros dicter: utspelade sig Iliadens och Odysséens äventyr i Östersjön och Nordatlanten? Lumio, Hedenäset 2009, ISBN 978-91-85889-21-1 .
German translation: Homer on the Baltic Sea: Iliad and Odyssey came from Northern Europe . Verlag Traugott Bautz, Nordhausen 2012, ISBN 978-3-88309-760-2 .

Secondary literature

Web links

personal data
SURNAME Vinci, Felice
BRIEF DESCRIPTION Italian engineer and amateur historian
DATE OF BIRTH 1946
PLACE OF BIRTH Rome