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Homer's epic poems, the Odyssey and the Iliad, played a
role in the development of Greek civilization that is equivalent to the
role that the Torah, the canonical version of the Pentateuch or
first five books of the Bible, had played in Palestine. The Christians
reinterpreted and translated the Jewish Bible as the Old Testament of
their own Bible, covered in "The Invention of Writing and the Earliest
Literatures" (see pages 52–103 in volume A).
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Contemporary with the death of Plato (ca. 347 B.C.), the Indian epic
Mahabharata covered in "India's Heroic Age," was begun (see
pages 953–1001 in volume A).
- The shield that the god Hephaestus makes for Achilles
in the Iliad featuring scenes of peace and war
can perhaps be usefully compared to Aeneas's shield
chronicling Rome's history. It is described in detail
in Virgil's Aeneid, covered in "The Roman
Empire" (see pages 1125–1129
in volume A).
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