The Roman poet Catullus broke up with his girlfriend. Instead of moving on, he wrote dozens of incredibly bitter, hyper-specific poems mocking her new flings and published them for all of Rome to read.

The original breakup track.

#AncientTea #Classics #Relatable #CUBoulder #Poetry #Swifties

When King Philip of Macedon was invading Greece, he sent a threat to Sparta: "If I bring my army into your land, I will destroy your farms and level your city."

The Spartans sent a reply containing just one word: "If."

Absolute cold classic.

#AncientTea #History #Classics #CUBoulder #Sparta

Think graffiti is a modern invention? Pompeii’s walls are covered in thousands of petty messages.

"Secundus likes to cause trouble."
"Chilon, I hope you itch!"

Human pettiness is eternal.

#AncientTea #History #Pompeii #Archsky #classics #CUBoulder

In Homer's Odyssey, getting directions was wild. Menelaus had to cover himself in smelly seal skins, hide in a seal herd, and wrestle the shape-shifting sea god Proteus while he turned into a lion, snake, and tree.
Travel logistics were brutal.
#AncientTea #Odyssey #Classics #Mythology #CUBoulder

While staying incognito at a banquet in Phaeacia, Odysseus listened to a local bard sing a dramatic song about... Odysseus.
He sat there weeping into his cloak, forced to hear a stranger sing a ballad about his trauma.
Main character syndrome, but literal.
#AncientTea #Odyssey #classics #CUBoulder

When the Trojan War broke out, Odysseus didn't want to go. He pretended to be insane by hooking a donkey and an ox to a plow and sowing salt in his fields.
Palamedes exposed him by putting Odysseus’s baby son in front of the plow. Busted. #AncientTea #History #Classics #TheOdysseyMovie #CUBoulder

Odysseus was gone 20 years, disguised as a beggar on his return. The only one to recognize him instantly? His dog, Argos.
Argos wagged his tail, dropped his ears, and died happy on the spot.

Proof dogs are too good for us.

#AncientTea #Odyssey #classics #CUBoulder #dogsofbluesky #homer #mythology

Pythagoras didn't just do math; he ran a cult. His strangest rule? A ban on fava beans because he believed they contained the souls of the dead. Legend says he died refusing to cross a bean field to escape attackers. Death by geometry and legumes. #AncientTea #math #maths #cuboulder #classics

Crassus was the richest man in Rome, entirely obsessed with money. When he lost a battle to the Parthians, legend says they executed him by pouring molten gold down his throat to mock his greed.
Talk about a brutal corporate performance review. #AncientTea #classics #cuboulder #ancienthistory

Romans used to write "curse tablets" on lead sheets and bury them. One actual tablet found in the UK curses a thief who stole a citizen's cloaks, praying that the thief loses their mind and eyes until they return them.
Over a jacket. #AncientTea #Classics #History #CUBoulder #Archaeology #petty

Alcibiades was a brilliant Athenian general, but a total menace. He once defaced half the statues in Athens the night before a military expedition, switched sides to help Sparta when Athens got mad, and then switched back.
Real-life chaotic neutral. #AncientTea #Classics #History #DND #TTRPG

Ancient Tea ☕
Plato once defined a human as a "featherless biped."
Diogenes the Cynic thought this was ridiculous. He plucked a chicken, brought it into Plato's academy, and shouted, "Behold! I've brought you a man!"
Academic pettiness goes back 2,400 years. #AncientTea #classics #langsky