The Tale of Pelops

For those who are scratching their heads and wondering aloud, "What in the world is a Pelops? And how exactly do you prepare it??" I offer a tale of mischief and woe that doesn't involve any actual food at all. (Can you tell that I'm trying to heighten the dramatic effect?)

Our story begins in the legends of ancient Greece - specifically, some time in the Iron Age. Around that time, Pelops was born to a king within Anatolia (modern-day Turkey) named Tantalus. Tantalus was a skilled chef and cultured epicurean. Those who tasted his cooking exclaimed that it could be a feast for the gods. Eventually, these gleeful cries of delight floated up, up to Mount Olympus, where the ever-curious and constantly meddling gods overheard them. Intrigued by the possibility of a meal more succulent than ambrosia, they ordered Tantalus to prepare for them his finest meal. Panicked by the very real possibility that he could disappoint them, he began scheming - and soon came up with an idea for a very special stew. He would slice up his son, Pelops, boil him with all the typical vegetable additives, and serve it as his Perfect Feast.

The gods, of course, caught on to his plot and restored Pelops to life, albeit sans his left shoulder, which was replaced with sculpted gold. (Poor Demeter, distraught over the loss of her daughter Persephone, had absentmindedly eaten it before she could be stopped.) The gods banished Tantalus to Hades, and even though he stands in a pool of water and grapes hang over his head, he is cursed with constant thirst and starvation. For when he bends down to take a drink, the water recedes; when he reaches to pick a grape, they coyly move just beyond his grasp. Pelops, meanwhile, moved to a district in Greece,* married a princess, had close to a dozen children and lived well until his death.

I suppose the original meaning of the parable was something about cannibalism, but I suggest that it also has a more relevant meaning for our current society. Perhaps we are all feasting on Pelops now - no, not our sons and daughters (ewwww), but instead our cheap, processed, efficiency obsessed, additive laden semi-food. Food for thought, I suppose. And a mythology lesson to boot! :)

*For those of us that are history geeks, you may note that this story never really took place in Greece at all; it occurred in some other kingdom, probably that of the Phrygians. It does occur where modern Greece is now, though.