In my recent participation in the video portrait ‘The Magpie Index’, which was very well conceived and put together by Richard Grayson, I said something to the effect that Jason’s journey to capture ‘The Golden Fleece’ had come down to us from the other side of eight thousand years ago. This is probably untrue because the story has too many elements of the Bronze Age about it.
What I meant to say, but in the heat of the moment, only alluded to, is that ‘elements of Homeric stories probably date back to a time well before the Bronze Age’. (which probably began C. 5300 years ago). Gold itself was in use 6 thousand years ago, but it’s conceivable that some of the Homeric stories predate that.
I noticed this when I saw the video through for the first time at The Baltic in Newcastle, so I thought that I’d make a correction before someone else made comment. ;-)
