079 The Quest for the Golden Fleece- The assembling of the crew and the construction of the Argo

Welcome back to Moments in Greek Mythology, I'm doing a multipart series on the story of Jason and the Argonauts who went searching for the fabled Golden Fleece. (Most of the story comes from the famous poet Apollonius of Rhodes in his epic the "Argonautica") Here's what you've missed so far.

First post was a prologue of the origin of the Golden Fleece and why it ended up in Colchis. Then on last week's blog I talked about the story of how the power hungry Pelias took over his brother's throne and the prophecy of the young man with the one sandal. Today's blog looks at the assembling of the famous Argonauts and the construction of the boat that gave them their name, The Argo.

It's like the Avengers of Greek Mythology

Now we begin the process of Jason preparing for this epic and highly dangerous journey to retrieve the fabled Golden Fleece. Pelias didn't give a time table for this journey because the king thought that this quest would undoubtedly lead to the death of Jason and assure that Pelias would remain as king. This didn't bother Jason though; he knew it was his destiny to become king of Iolcos and that he had the Queen of Heaven helping him. 

First thing's first though, Jason had to assemble a crew willing to go to god knows where to find a Ram's skin. (Albeit this was a legendary fleece made out of gold, but still it would take some balls to brave the many dangers that exist in this world) Luckily for our dear friend Jason, he lived in a time where the god's had raped many young girls to give birth to many more demigods who became famous heroes. They would soon be flocking to Jason to offer their services in this grand adventure.

The exact amount of how many Argonauts there were varies because of the simple fact that each city wanted their city associated with this myth. The Wikipedia page for the Argonauts gives me 83 entries, but remember this is from combining several other accounts into one list. However, I will just name a few that were among the crew.

The Winged Boreads (Sons of the North Wind Boreas) Calais and Zetes Philoctetes, a companion of Heracles and famously gifted archer (He was the guy if you remember from blogs from long ago, the guy who the Achaeans left on Lemnos because he was snake bitten)Peleus, who you should all know is the husband of Thetis and father of Achilles (Seen here wrestling Thetis in order to get her to marry him)Telamon father of the famous Ajax's in the Trojan War and helped Heracles sack Troy when Laomedon didn't pay up.

Our musician friend Orpheus (Seen here playing his beautiful music to the rabbits)

The Divine Twins Castor and Pollux who were the brothers of Helen of Troy (And also the constellation Gemini) 

Euphemus son of Poseidon who could walk on water and would be the Helmsman for the voyage

And of course our dear old friend Heracles. Who I did save for last, so I didn't lie.

And now for the Sir/Miss Not Appearing in this story:

The famous huntress Atlanta (Why did she not join? Well it was either that Jason forbade her since she would be the only woman in an all testosterone filled boat, which would undoubtedly cause strife among these macho men [OH YEAH!] or she refused the offer to join.)

This is only a model of the ship right?

Now that he had his crew assembled, Jason needed a ship worthy enough for such a journey. Thus he called upon the renowned shipwright Argus and he began making blueprints for the vessel. Not only would Jason have the best ship builder in the known world building this boat, but he would have the construction of this ship monitored by Grey-eyed Athena herself!

Yeah nail that sucker in there! 

The ship, naturally named the Argo after its builder, was said to be the first ship able to make long voyages into the open seas. It also had a special property, located on her prow, a special piece of timber from the sacred forest of Dodona. (A site dedicated to a Mother Goddess that was probably Rhea or Gaea) Not only could this piece of wood (Or branch as the illustration above shows) could talk; (!) it could give prophecies to the crew.  

With the ship named and finished, the crew ready, and the winds blowing favorably, Jason offered a prayer to Poseidon and all the other god's for a safe and easy journey. (Boy was he in for a rude surprise) Now dubbed the Argonauts, they set sail from Iolcos and for the great unknown that lied before them. 

Next week, a couple of stories from the early days of the voyage, so if you have any questions about this blog please don't hesitate in asking me via the comments section. (I look for comments almost twice a day, I have that much of a life :P)

Also tweet me on Twitter https://twitter.com/#!/AchillesF6 or add me to Google + https://plus.google.com/108400934039763512765/posts?hl=en. Anyway thanks once again for reading and I can't wait to do part 3 (Or was it 4?) Now to end the blog with some appropriate music: 

Please be sure to request music in the comments section, if I like it I might use it for the blog