Abstract:Ancient Greek mythology includes two parts: the story of God and the legend of heroes. The two epic poems Iliad and Odyssey were written by the blind poet Homer. They contain most of the ancient Greek mythology. We all know that “language is the carrier of culture, and vocabulary is the basic unit of language, it is the most direct tool for carrying culture.” (Luo Xiaoli, 2005:15) As a result, ancient Greek mythology plays an irreplaceable role in learning English vocabulary and understanding Western culture. With the rapid development of society, English has become an indispensable skill in cross-cultural communication. This paper mainly explores English words and expressions from Homer's epic poems. For English learners, we are not only learning English language knowledge, but more importantly, we also learn the background knowledge of English language and culture. Only in this way can we achieve the goal of effective barrier-free cross cultural Communication. In addition, more understanding of Greek mythology can not only increase the interest of learning, but also help us learn English happily, which can play an invaluable role in English teaching.

Key words: Greek mythology; Homer’s epic poems; English expressions; English words

Contents

Abstract

中文摘要

Introduction-1

A.-English Words Derived From Iliad-4

B.-English Words Derived From Odyssey-4

II. The Influence of Homer's Epic Poems on English Idioms-6

A.-English Idioms Derived From Iliad-6

B.-English Idioms Derived From Odyssey-7

III. The Epic Simile of Homer's Epic Poems-9

A.-The Definition of the Epic Simile-9

B.-The Epic Simile in Homer's Epic Poems-9

Conclusion-11

Bibliography-13

Acknowledgements-14