wine-dark sea
Epic purple waters
Wine-dark sea is a poetic phrase for the ocean, borrowed from Homer's epics where it describes the Aegean and Mediterranean.
The color evokes deep purple-blue waters at certain times of day.
The phrase signals literary or elevated register: We sailed out onto the wine-dark sea.
It has become shorthand for Homeric style and ancient Greek atmosphere.
- HomericOf grand, ancient verse
- epic poetryExtended narrative in verse
- AegeanEastern Mediterranean sea
- odysseyExtended adventurous journey
- HomerAncient Greek epic composer
the Iliad · epic · voyage · purple · Mediterranean · ancient · rosy-fingered · ancient Greece · dawn · Odysseus · rosy-fingered dawn · Greek · mythic · waves · stormy · vessel · galley · Troy
- OdysseyOdysseus, Penelope, Telemachus, Ithaca, Homer
- HomerHomer, Iliad, Odyssey, Odysseus, Achilles
- Homeric epicsIliad, Odyssey, Homer, Achilles, Odysseus
- Odyssey locationsIthaca, Troy, underworld, Charybdis, great hall
- Homeric Greekepithet, formula, hexameter, epithets, formulas
- epic poetryIliad, Odyssey, Aeneid, Paradise Lost, Beowulf
wine-dark seaH2O
Water's molecular notation
marine environment · saline solution · blue water · the ocean · seawater
wine-dark seacrystal-clear waters
Perfectly transparent aquatic environment
wine, dark, wines, wined, winery, wineries, darken, darkened, darkening