The goal of this article is to present the dissertation research which studies the Olympian Zeus’ temples built during the sixth and fifth centuries B.C. The intention is to understand how Olympia was responsible for the origin and dissemination of Olympian Zeus´cult through the Greek world. From the poleis survey that consecrated these temples to the deity and by the mapping of the cult in association to textual informations we will discuss the Olympios epiteth and the (...) name Olympieion, the spacial configuration of the Olympian Zeus sanctuaries and the relationship of the cult and the tyranny. (shrink)

Since 1900, several scholars have argued that the terms "Olympian" and "chthonian" are commonly misused or overused, and that in the realm of ritual in particular the difference between sacrifices with and those without participation in the offerings by the worshipers does not coincide with the difference between Olympian and chthonian divinities. Fritz Graf and Walter Burkert, applying a model from social anthropology, have lately maintained that participation and nonparticipation are "ritual symbols," that is, variables employed among others (...) to articulate phases within the ritual itself; they imply nothing about any recipient, and have to do only with "the inner logic of the ritual." The present paper undertakes a reassessment of the relationship between recipients of sacrifice and the various sacrificial modes from the point of view of the Olympian/chthonian distinction. It argues that Olympian and chthonian sacrificial modes are clearly distinguishable, and that the character of the divine recipient is a fundamental constitutive element of Greek ritual. The basic principles of the author's approach are worked out with reference to the test case of rituals attested at various places and dates for Zeus Polieus. It is suggested that there is a remarkable consistency of specific ritual motifs in all these cases; that very specific conceptual themes and areas of interest, centering on agriculture, are everywhere associated with this god; and that the rituals and the themes cohere with one another and constitute a specific application of the Olympian/chthonian distinction predicated on the special characteristics of this particular divinity, who has a foot in each realm. It is argued that the Olympian/chthonian distinction retains its basic significance if it is applied in a less mechanical way than it has traditionally been. It is a central organizing principle in Greek religion, but does not represent a sufficient basis for analyzing individual divinities or rituals: specific character traits and interests and the circumstances of particular rites are fundamental, and will affect its application in given cases. Nor are the two categories mutually exclusive: they constitute one essential system at work in shaping the phenomena of Greek religion, but there is a much larger area of intersection between the two sets than has generally been recognized. One specific element of Greek practice-sacrifices with participation, but where the participation is required to take place in the sanctuary-are studied in detail, and it is suggested that they belong to an area of ritual intersection between the Olympian and chthonian categories. Recipients of such sacrifices are wholly or partly chthonian in character ; the desire not to destroy meat has led in these cases to a variation on holocaust sacrifice in the direction of Olympian banqueting: participation, but in a tightly controlled ritual setting. A Hebrew parallel for this sort of ritual compromise is suggested. On the basis both of the study of this particular sacrificial mode and of the more fluid approach to the general distinction sketched earlier, a reconsideration of some canonical lists of rites regarded as exceptions to the Olympian/chthonian distinction is undertaken. Most of the exceptions can be satisfactorily reconciled with the distinction if it is conceived and applied in the manner suggested in the paper. (shrink)

The action of Euripides' Ion takes place in front of the temple of Apollo at Delphi. The chorus, maidservants of Kreusa who have come with her from Athens, enters at 184, admiring the temple and commenting on a series of mythological scenes which they see represented before them: Herakles slaying the Hydra with the help of Iolaos ; Bellerophon mounted on Pegasos slaying Chimaira ; a Gigantomachial which includes the figures of Athena brandishing her Gorgon shield against Enkelados , (...) class='Hi'>Zeus laying Mimas low with a thunderbolt , and Bakchos slaying another Giant with his thyrsos . The chorus's description recalls the temple of Apollo which stood in Delphi in Euripides' day. (shrink)

Discussion of the Cambridge Platonists, by Constantinos Patrides and others, is often vitiated by the mistaken contrasts drawn between those philosophers and late antique Platonists such as Plotinus. I draw attention especially to Patrides’s errors, and argue in particular that Plotinus and his immediate followers were as concerned about this world and our immediate duties to our neighbours as the Cambridge Platonists. Even the doctrine of deification is one shared by all Platonists, though it is also here that genuine differences (...) between pre-Christian and Christian exegesis can be found. All, it can be said, hope and expect to join ‘the dance of immortal love’, but Christian Platonists had a deeper sense of God’s ‘humility’ in His Word’s material and temporal manifestation. Not Olympian Zeus but the Crucified Christ was their preferred image of divine involvement, and their better guide to heaven. (shrink)

Dans cette étude, on présentera les divinités féminines honorées à Dion depuis les origines jusqu’à la conquête romaine et on enquêtera sur l’origine de leur culte. Le culte des Muses, seul attesté dans les textes anciens, était lié à celui de Zeus Olympien et encouragé par le roi macédonien Archelaos vers la fin du ve siècle avant notre ère en tant que moyen de propagande. Déméter était une divinité féminine importante, dont le culte a été mis au jour par (...) les témoignages archéologiques les plus anciens. Son sanctuaire accueillait également d’autres divinités féminines de la fertilité de moindre importance. Le culte de ces divinités, par opposition au culte des Muses, était fondé sur le désir du fidèle de communiquer avec les dieux avec lesquels une relation plus intime était supposée et qui pouvaient assurer leur existence et leur bien-être. De plus, le culte de la déesse égyptienne Isis, introduit à Dion au cours du iie siècle avant notre ère, a peu à peu éclipsé le culte de divinités plus anciennes, puisqu’Isis combinait plusieurs de leurs prérogatives. En conséquence, son sanctuaire est devenu le plus florissant durant la période romaine.In this contribution, the female deities worshipped at Dion since its establishment as a city through to the Roman conquest are presented and the origin of the cult of these deities is investigated. The worship of the Muses, the only worship attested in ancient texts, was related to the worship of Olympian Zeus and supported by the Macedonian King Archelaos around the end of the 5th century B.C. as a means of expediency and propaganda. Demeter was an important female deity, whose cult was brought to light by the oldest archaeological evidence. Her sanctuary also hosted other minor female deities of fertility. The cult of these deities, in contrast to the cult of the Muses, was based on the worshippers’ urge to communicate with those of the gods with whom a more intimate relationship was assumed and who could ensure their existence and welfare. Moreover, the worship of the Egyptian goddess Isis, introduced to Dion in the 2nd c. B.C., gradually overshadowed the worship of older deities, since Isis combined several of their qualities. As a consequence, her sanctuary became the most thriving shrine during the Roman period. (shrink)

Pindar's Eighth Olympian celebrates the victory of Alkimedon of Aigina in the boys' wrestling at Olympia in 460. This victory was the sixth won by a member of this family . The absence of detail about most of these victories suggests that the family had had little success in the great Panhellenic competitions and that the majority were won at minor festivals. However, one of the remaining five victories was certainly won in one of the four festivals which made (...) up the periodos. In lines 15–18, after preparatory generalizations about the diversity of paths to achievement, all with divine aid, Pindar describes the path of achievement, and the source of divine aid, which features in the victor's family: Tιμσθενες, μμε δ' κλρωσεν πτμος Zην γενεθλωι. ς σ μν Nεμαι πρπατον, 'Aλκιμδοντα δ πρ κρνου λ៹φωι θκεν 'Oλυμπινκαν. Timosthenes, in your case fate allotted you to Zeus as your family god, who made you pre-eminent at Nemea and Alkimedon Olympic victor by the Hill of Kronos. (shrink)

German classicist's monumental study of the origins of European thought in Greek literature and philosophy. Brilliant, widely influential. Includes "Homer's View of Man," "The Olympian Gods," "The Rise of the Individual in the Early Greek Lyric," "Pindar's Hymn to Zeus," "Myth and Reality in Greek Tragedy," and "Aristophanes and Aesthetic Criticism.".

This paper argues that Lycophron'sAlexandrafollows earlier texts in presenting challenges to Agamemnon's power as metaphorical re-enactments of primordial theogonic conflicts between Zeus and the forces of chaos. TheAlexandrafigures Agamemnon as Zeus and portrays Achilles, Clytemnestra and Cassandra as chthonic monsters opposed to the Olympian order. Employing intertexts with epic and tragedy, the poem highlights these figures’ symbolic antagonism with Agamemnon–Zeus and their connections to each other. It presents a radically resystematized vision of the cosmos that champions (...) the chthonic, the disordered and the feminine over the Olympian, the ordered and the masculine. Cassandra uses this backdrop to reinterpret her own story, inserting herself into the cosmogonic narrative as a resister of Olympian patriarchy who triumphs over masculine domination. (shrink)

Intertwined with the celebration of Athenian democratic institutions, we find in the "Oresteia" another chain of interactions, in which the elite families of Argos, Phokis, Athens, and even Mount Olympos employ the traditional aristocratic relationships of xenia and hetaireia to renegotiate their own status within-and at the pinnacle of-the civic order, and thereby guarantee the renewed prosperity of their respective communities. The capture of Troy is the result of a joint venture by the Atreidai and the Olympian "family" . (...) Although Agamemnon falls victim to his own mishandling of aristocratic privilege, his son is raised by doryxenoi in Phokis , a relationship which is mirrored by that with the Olympian "allies," Hermes and Apollo. Orestes' recovery of his father's position is thus shown to depend upon a network of "guest-friends" and "sworn-comrades," reinforced by the traditional language of oaths and reciprocal loyalty. In the Eumenides, the alliance between the Olympian and Argive royal families is re-invoked as the basis both for Athena's protection of Orestes, and finally for Zeus' concern for his daughter's Athenian dependents. In contrast to this successful "networking," and the resultant benefits that trickle down to the citizens of Argos and Athens, stand the seditious oaths and perverted "comradeship" of Aigisthos and Klytaimestra; likewise, the Erinyes are unable to draw on equivalent claims of pedigree or xenia to those enjoyed by Orestes and Apollo. Like all Greek tragedies, the "Oresteia" presents the action through constantly shifting viewpoints, those of aristocrats and commoners, leaders and led, while the propriety of this hierarchy itself is never questioned. And although the action moves from monarchical Argos to an incipiently democratic Athens, paradoxically we hear less and less about "ordinary," lower-class citizens as the trilogy progresses. Thus, at the same time that the trilogy reinforces the sense of collective survival and civic values , it also suggests that these can be maintained only through the proper interventions of their traditional leaders. Aeschylus' plays were composed during a time when the Athenian democracy was still developing, and elite leadership and patronage were still taken for granted. Attic tragedy and the City Dionysia may be seen as a site of negotiation between rival ideologies within the polis, wherein a kind of "solidarity without consensus" is achieved. Written and staged by the elite under license from the demos, the dramas play out dangerous stories of royal risk-taking, crime, glory, and suffering, in such a way as to reassure the citizen audience simultaneously of their own collective invulnerability, and of the unique value of their leading families. (shrink)

In Greek mythology the Muses –patron goddesses of fine arts, history, humanities, and sciences– are tellingly portrayed as the daughters of Zeus and Mnemosyne, the goddess Memory, who is of the race of Titans, older still than Zeus and other Olympian deities. The relationship between memory and such fields as epic poetry, history, music and dance is easily recognizable to moderns. But bards/poets like Homer and Hesiod, who began oral storytelling by “invoking the Muses” with their audience, (...) knew well that remembering, forgetting, and imagining are each to be esteemed as, in Hesiod’s words, “gifts of the goddesses.” The economy of memory is an important concern for moral psychology, philosophy of emotions, and philosophy of imagination. This chapter examines ways that amusements, both classically and today, can function to educate moral emotions in and though their multi-faceted engagements with the economy of memory. (shrink)

It is simply no longer acceptable to speak of the goddess Athena from the fifth generation of Olympian/Orphic Greece without reference to her mother Metis. Hesiod, among others, tells us Metis appears as a reincarnation of her first-generation self in the Olympian dynasty as wife of Zeus. She was originally the cosmic egg of all creation in the Orphic Theogony, as recounted by Apollodorus, and Taylor, from whose mucosity, the entire genealogy of the Olympian/Orphic heaven, is (...) spawned. However, from the moment Zeus murdered Metis as she was about to give birth to Athena their daughter, she has lapsed into the fissures of forgetfulness in philosophy, theology, mythology and early psychoanalysis. Indeed, in each field of inquiry, Athena is overwhelmingly deemed ‘unmothered’ and produced as Harrison tells us as a desperate ploy ‘from the brain of Zeus’ through his cunning intellect, for Athena to serve as his ‘mouthpiece’. This paper seeks to do more than simply restore Metis as mother to Athena. It explores the tragedy inherited by her violent removal, for mother/daughter relations, grievability and sustained disavowal of maternal divinity in dominant discourse. (shrink)

In the Philebus, Plato reinterprets the traditional Olympian pantheon in terms of a nationalistic account of the cosmos which grounds the alternative to hedonism which Socrates defends. From the metaphysics of the Philebus, we can grasp 'Zeus' as a formal characteristic of the cosmos, required by any teleological account, and internal to the intelligible order of the universe, rather than standing outside of it. The universe is at once rationally ordered and good in virtue of the relation of (...) reason to goodness itself. Notwithstanding the rationalistic bias of Plato's theology, the 'good' is prior to and responsible for the divine. (shrink)

In lieu of an abstract, here is a brief excerpt of the content:Philosophy and Literature 25.2 (2001) 373-376 [Access article in PDF] Book Review Why Literature Matters: Permanence and the Politics of Reputation Why Literature Matters: Permanence and the Politics of Reputation, by Glenn C. Arbery; 255 pp. Wilmington, Delaware: ISI Books, 2001, $24.95. Over the last decade or so, there has appeared an increasing number of books critical of the profession of literary studies. Such criticism has typically been directed (...) at literary theory and its preoccupation with the politics of race, class, and gender. To a limited extent, Glenn Arbery's Why Literature Matters: Permanence and the Politics of Reputation can be classified as belonging to such a "genre." Early in the book, for example, Arbery argues in favor of the "old-fashioned" idea, as he calls it, that literature is a "mode of knowledge" with the potential to open up transcendent modes of experience. Yet Why Literature Matters is so short on polemics and so long on incisive, sometimes brilliant readings of works ranging from the poetry and fiction of Seamus Heaney, Tom Wolfe, Toni Morrison, and Emily Dickinson to Shakespeare's Othello and Homer's Iliad, that such a characterization is insufficient at best and distorting at worst. Notwithstanding its title, this book is devoted less to advancing a polemic about "why literature matters" than to dramatizing, with performative power and grace, why most of us, politically oriented or not, are already quite sure that it does.Such performative power can be felt throughout Why Literature Matters, but [End Page 373] its presence is especially strong in the final, lengthy chapter on the Iliad, "The Sacrifice of Achilles." Bringing to bear his training as a classical scholar, Arbery contends that the Iliad is "about" a single event: the death or "sacrifice" of Achilles. Achilles, Arbery notes, was not just the greatest hero of the Iliad. He was also the greatest hero of the entire classical world: "Achilles has no rival in glory, either in the generation of heroes before him (not even Herakles), or in the ages after him. According to Plutarch, Julius Caesar wept because he had not accomplished as much as Alexander at the same age, but Alexander the Great envied Achilles."Why, then, does Arbery refer to Achilles' death as "sacrificial"? Drawing on a version of the Greek myth whose source is Pindar rather than the more commonly cited Hesiod, Arbery observes that Achilles' sacrificial death, which is not in fact narrated in the Iliad but is everywhere taken for granted, was necessitated by Zeus' successful plan to forestall a prophecy. That prophecy said that a son would be born to Zeus and the goddess Thetis, who would overthrow the Olympian god as Zeus had overthrown the Titans. Such a son, prophesized to be not the greatest of mortals but, much more, the greatest of gods, would have been--should have been, from Achilles's justly embittered standpoint--Achilles. But in fact Zeus foiled the prophecy by marrying Thetis off to a mere mortal, Peleus, thereby ensuring his own continued reign and Achilles' eventual death.It is the burden of Arbery's discussion to show not just that Achilles comes to accept and even "will" his own death, but that the meaning of such sacrificial death is embodied and given "presence" in the poetic form and language of the Iliad, including especially the descriptions of Patrocles and Hector, each of whom "inhabits the meaning of Achilles" by dying, successively, in Achilles' armor. Arbery goes so far as to compare Achilles' sacrifice with Christ's, asserting that reading the Iliad "in ignorance of the central importance of the marriage of Peleus and Thetis [is comparable] to reading [Dante's] Inferno (where references to holy things are scarce) in ignorance of the existence of Christ."Arbery makes clear, however, that it is the differences, rather than the similarities, that are most important in such a comparison. Those differences revolve around three issues. First, whereas Christ is a deity who sacrifices himself for humanity, Achilles is a mortal who sacrifices himself for the gods. Second, whereas humanity gains ultimate... (shrink)

In lieu of an abstract, here is a brief excerpt of the content:Kenneth R. Seeskin THE COMEDY OF THE GODS IN THE ILIAD "... no animai but man ever laughs." Aristotle, De Partibus Animalium, 673a8-9 No reader of the Iliad can fail to be struck by the great extent to which social relations among the gods resemble those which obtain among men. Zeus, the oldest and strongest of the Olympian deities, rules as an absolute monarchor patriarch. The "council" (...) meetings over which he presides are not unlike those which occur on earth. Like Agamemnon, he must assert his authority from time to time; and, like any mortal king, he must deal with problems relating to jealousy, adultery, dishonesty, and revenge. To the extent that the gods differ from mortal heroes, those differences are similar to the ones which separate mortal heroes and commoners. The gods occupy the highest place on the scale of excellence, beauty, and social status, mortals with divine ancestry occupy the next position, and so on down the line. Although the above picture is accurate in many respects, there is something about it which is bound to leave one cold, for, unlike his mortal heroes, Homer's gods often appear as clowns. One need only recall scenes like Hephaestus' bumbling attempt to wait on the other immortals (1.584 ff.), Hera's seduction of Zeus (14.157 ff.), or the famous theomachy (21.385 ff.) to see that, ironically, humans frequendy are more dignified than the gods they are trying to please. It was scenes like these which caused Longinus, in his essay On the Sublime, to remark that Homer appears to have made his men gods and his gods men (sec. 9). Now any long story is bound to contain comic relief. But for many authors (Shakespeare, for instance), comic relief is supplied by those whose social status is lower than that of the main characters, e.g., grave diggers, nightwatchmen, country bumpkins, or pettythieves. As Aristotle argued in the Poetics (sec. 2 and 5), comedy is an imitation of men worse than the average. In Book 2 of the Iliad, Homer does use Thersites 295 296Philosophy and Literature for comic effect; yet this scene is noteworthy for being the only one in the book which supports Aristotle's contention. In practically every other case, comedy is supplied by characters better than the average: it is supplied by the gods. Moreover, in the few cases where mortal aristocrats are involved in comic situations (e.g., the rambling speeches of Nestor), the teasing tends to be extremely mild. Farce and slapstick are reserved almost exclusively for the inhabitants of Olympus. Plato, for one, was outraged by passages where the gods look ridiculous and wanted them excised from the text. Not surprisingly, there is a tradition of modern scholars who feel a similar sense of outrage. Walter Leaf, for example, maintained that the theomachy is poorly written and thus not the work of Homer.1 Gilbert Murray argued that several of the scenes in question are in bad taste, exemplify the spirit of Milesian skepticism, and, again, are not the work of Homer.2 Wilamowitz constructed an elaborate theory which claimed that these passages are the work of a later rhapsode who probably was associated with Archilochus.3 Finally, George Calhoun, who exposed the flaws of those just mentioned, concluded that such passages show the influence not of a later period of skepticism but of an earlier, less refined period and were composed merely to please Homer's audience.4 Since it is not my purpose to enter the long debate over the authorship and unity of the text, let me state the guiding assumptions of this essay dogmatically. First, the passages in question are not interpolated and serve important artistic functions. Second, for whatever reason Homer decided to include them, their presence raises profound moral and religious questions. From the outset, it is clear that any anthropomorphic conception of the gods will have to fail in one important respect. The gods are immortal, humans are not. Thus even the lowliest human can do something which no god can—risk his life. For all of their quarrels, deceptive schemes, and forays into the thick of the fighting, the gods are... (shrink)

_Critical Pedagogy and Race_ argues that a rigorous engagement with race is a priority for educators concerned with equality in schools and in society. A landmark collection arguing that engaging with race at both conceptual and practical levels is a priority for educators. Builds a stronger engagement of race-based analysis in the field of critical pedagogy. Brings together a melange of theories on race, such as Afro-centric, Latino-based, and postcolonial perspectives. Includes historical studies, and social justice ideas on activism in (...) education. Questions popular concepts, such as white privilege, color-blind perspectives, and race-neutral pedagogies. (shrink)

The Right has a long history of questioning the importance of race analysis. Recently, the conceptual and political status of race has come under increased scrutiny from the Left. Bracketing the language of ‘race’ has meant that the discourse of skin groups remains at the level of abstraction and does not speak to real groups as such. As a descriptor, race essentializes identity as if skin color were a reliable way to perceive one's self and group as well as others, (...) and questions the viability of a social struggle based on race. In other words, race is not real and discourses that insist on its objective status are ensnared in reification. The response—equally from the Left—has been to reassert the centrality and changing dynamics of race in education and society. They argue that we need to develop more, rather than less, complex discourses on race. Orientations that attempt to discredit race analysis are therefore unable to dismantle the racial system because they refuse its significance as an autonomous system of interpellations. In other words, race is real. This essay appraises the debate within the Left about the status of race, their projections about the future of race, and the kind of struggle they promote in order to realize a society freed from the chains of racism. (shrink)

Hermeneutics, or the science of interpretation,is well accepted in the humanities. In thefield of education, hermeneutics has played arelatively marginal role in research. It isthe task of this essay to introduce thegeneral methods and findings of Paul Ricoeur'shermeneutics. Specifically, the essayinterprets the usefulness of Ricoeur'sphilosophy in the study of domination. Theproblem of domination has been a target ofanalysis for critical pedagogy since itsinception. However, the role of interpretationas a constitutive part of ideology critique isrelatively understudied and it is here thatRicoeur's (...) ideas are instructive. Last, theessay radicalizes Ricoeur's insights in orderto realize their potential to disruptasymmetrical relations of power in education. To this extent, the author contributes to thebuilding of a critical brand of hermeneutics,or the interpretation of domination. (shrink)

This article is intended to appraise the insights gained from Critical Race Theory (CRT) in Education. It is particularly interested in CRT's relationship with Marxist discourse, which falls under two questions. One, how does CRT understand Marxist concepts, such as capital, which show up in the way CRT appropriates them? The article argues that Marxist concepts, such as historical classes, class-for-itself, are useful for race analysis as it sets parameters around the conceptual use of historical races and a race-for-itself. Two, (...) how does CRT understand the role of capitalism, therefore shedding light on its position regarding the class problem? It is no doubt attentive to class power, but this is not the same as performing an immanent critique of capitalism. As a result, within CRT class achieves a color whereby class becomes a variant of race, better known as classism. Race becomes the theory with class vocabulary superimposed on it. Last, I suggest areas where CRT could combine with Marxism in order to forge a Critical Raceclass Theory of Education. (shrink)

_Critical Pedagogy and Race_ argues that a rigorous engagement with race is a priority for educators concerned with equality in schools and in society. A landmark collection arguing that engaging with race at both conceptual and practical levels is a priority for educators. Builds a stronger engagement of race-based analysis in the field of critical pedagogy. Brings together a melange of theories on race, such as Afro-centric, Latino-based, and postcolonial perspectives. Includes historical studies, and social justice ideas on activism in (...) education. Questions popular concepts, such as white privilege, color-blind perspectives, and race-neutral pedagogies. (shrink)

The phrase ‘the edge of race’ can be used both as a description and as a response to two key concerns. The first of these is that while race is increasingly on the periphery of education policy – with a growing disregard shown for racist inequities, as education systems become dominated by market-driven concerns – it is important that we map the shifting relations of race in neoliberal politics and policies. The second concern is that at this time, within and (...) outside the spaces of the academy, even to mention race equity is to risk condemnation, marginalization, and ridicule. The authors in this collection use ‘the edge of race’ as a provocation in order to examine the concepts, methodologies, policies, politics, processes, and practices associated with race and racism in education. The chapters offer empirical examples of the perpetuation and perniciousness of racism that point to the continued salience of research about race. Additionally, the chapters make contributions to conceptual and methodological understandings of race and racism. The contributors illustrate the contingency, productivity, and fragility of race as a concept, and point to how educational research continues to be a contested site in, and from which to study, race and education. This book was originally published as a special issue of _Discourse: Studies in the Cultural Politics of Education. _. (shrink)

Rene Descartes's motto challenges his would-be historians: "He lives well who hides well." He hid even in the Discourse on Method, where he professed to recount the story of his "entire life, " but said almost nothing about his childhood and youth. He mentioned neither family nor friends, and he boasted a total freedom from irrational passions. In the Discourse, which presented a new way of achieving certain truth through mathematical reason, Descartes stressed just one event, a day of thinking (...) at the beginning of winter, 1619. Tucked away in an unpublished notebook, however, Descartes also left the Olympica, which documented the wildly irrational dreams he had the night of November 10, 1619, and gave his own enthusiastic interpretations. Embarrassed scholars have tried to reason away this record and even the dreams themselves. Adapting clinical methods to historical research, John Cole offers the first systematic interpretation of the Olympian dreams. He argues that they expressed and masked Descartes's unresolved conflicts: his guilt at having rejected the law career for which he had been trained and which his lawyer father had wanted him to pursue, and his shame over early failures to satisfy the high expectations of his friend and mentor, Isaac Beeckman. Cole shows us how a critical historian can make sense of such irrational material and lets us see the creation of an egocentric and rationalist philosophy. (shrink)

Thundering Zeus. The Making of Hellenistic Bactria. Frank L. Holt., University of California Press, Berkeley and London 1999. xviii, 221 pp. ISBN 0-520-21140-5.

The papyrus fragments that belong almost certainly to Sophocles' Inacbos have been admirably discussed by Pfeiffer andCarden.1 But one remarkable feature that has never been explained adequatelyis the apparent reference to a black Zeus. P. Oxy. 2369 contains a fragmentarydescription of a stranger turning Io into a cow with a touch of his hand and thenleaving the palace.

Abstract:The dominant interpretation of Zeus' words at Iliad 20.21, which regards μέλουσί μοι ὀλλύμενοί περ as an expression of sympathy for dying warriors, poses a number of serious contextual and lexical problems. This article argues that Il. 20.21 is not an expression of compassion, but attention. Zeus is not concerned for dying warriors, but attentive to them, as indeed his deadly βουλή (Il. 20.20) requires him to be. The interpretation of Il. 20.21 has relevance to questions of great (...) significance for the interpretation of the Iliad, including Zeus' relationship to humans and the meaning of the Διὸς βουλή. (shrink)

Rivault’s book offers a comprehensive overview of the religious landscape of Caria as it relates to cults of Zeus, and is a reworked version of her doctoral thesis, examined at the University of Bordeaux in 2016. The book is structured around three chapters that each seek to speak to different elements of Zeus’ domain, with a short introduction and conclusion. The bulk of the text consists of what is effectively a catalogue of the different cult epicleses of (...) class='Hi'>Zeus that are found in Caria acros... (shrink)

Why do some people become WNBA champions or Olympic gold medalists and others do not? What is ‘special’ about those very few incredibly skilled athletes, and why do they, in particular, get to be special? In this paper, I attempt to make sense of the relationship that there is, in the case of sports champions, between so-called ‘talent’, i.e. natural predisposition for particular physical activities and high-pressure competition, and practice/training. I will articulate what I take to be the ‘mechanism’ that (...) allows certain people to rise to the Olympus of athletic excellence, and what being part of this elite club ‘feels like’. My proposal is based on the idea that so-called talent and practice interact in complex and unsystematic ways. I will also argue that becoming a top athlete involves undergoing a special kind of transformation, which makes such people qualitatively different from any ‘normal’ sport amateur, even when the difference might not be immediately visible to the ‘untrained’ eye. (shrink)

The metre of Olympian II is still a matter of some difficulty. It has commonly been recognized as differing from Pindar's other metres, but many opinions have been held of its character. An understanding of it is, however, not merely essential to any general theory of Pindar's metric but vital to the textual criticism of the poem. Without some coherent theory we cannot say where ‘Responsionsfreiheiten’ are allowed and some important cruces remain unsolved. In recent years three theories have (...) been put forward. In his Res Metrica pp. 153–5 W. R. Hardie put forward the view that it is an example of a μέτρον μονοεɩδές composed in Cretic verse. He holds that it is written in Cretics or their recognized metrical equivalent, Paeons. This kind of verse is known from the Delphic Paean to Apollo and the Paean of Limenius, and so far as the equivalence of Cretics and Paeons is concerned, there is no difficulty in it. But as Hardie himself admitted, his theory does not account for all the facts. It may be said to suffer from the following defects. n In Str. 1, 3, 5, 7 and Ep. 1, 4, 5 he has to assume the existence of an extra single syllable at the beginning of the line. Since all attempts to defend ‘Anacrusis’ are extremely doubtful, this can hardly be maintained here. 2. The clausula of the Strophe cannot be reduced to Cretics or Paeons. 3. He has to admit that in Ep. 2 and 3 there is ‘some Trochaic movement’ and presumably he would have to admit that in Str. 3 there is either an Iambic, or, as he would prefer, a Trochaic movement with Anacrusis in ἤτοɩ πɩσα μεν. There is certainly some truth in Hardie's theory, but since it does not consider all the facts or co-ordinate them into a whole, it is not really satisfactory. (shrink)

This note questions the transmitted word order at Pind. Ol. 2.100 and proposes a transposition to remove short open vowel at verse end.

Recent discussions of the Axial Age in Greece (R. Bellah, 2011; K. Raaflaub, 2005) detailed some of the distinctive features of Greek religious life that allowed for the eventual development of a more secular outlook. In contrast to the religion of the ancient Israelites with its strong emphasis on the providential nature of human history, Greek religion evolved as a traditional set of ritual practices and cults that allowed humankind to maintain the goodwill of the gods. However, divine favor was (...) no substitute for human effort as the Greeks did not regard the gods as the architects of their fate. Human beings were ultimately seen as responsible for their own individual fates with bad outcomes attributed to misfortune or personal character defects. Positive outcomes in everyday life were ultimately the result of individual or collective effort. This attitude is reflected in the text of Hesiod, who dates from the outset of the Axial era. Hesiod stated that the gods have created a world that provides everything we need for prosperity, but that they were also spiteful in that they required mankind to work hard to take advantage of it. This religious outlook led to the development of a Weberian worldly asceticism among individual Greeks which allowed for the economic rationalization that transformed Greece into a more competitive society in which social mobility was possible and poverty scorned. The growth in the size of the rural middle class made the political life of the polis more participatory, thus laying the basis for the competitive political and intellectual climate of Axial Age Greece. (shrink)

In his treatise On Isis and Osiris, Plutarch tries to explain the meaning of a statue or image of Zeus in Crete, which had no ears. An Egyptian or Egyptianizing image with separate ears, perhaps on a stele, incomprehensible to Greeks, but common in Egypt, might have given rise to Plutarch’s bafflement and fantasy interpretation.Dans son traité De Iside et Osiride, Plutarque essaie d’expliquer la signification d’une statue ou d’une image de Zeus en Crète, qui n’avait aucune oreille. (...) Une image égyptienne ou « égyptianisante » avec des oreilles séparées, peut-être sur une stèle, incompréhensible aux Grecs mais commune en Égypte, pourrait avoir provoqué la perplexité de Plutarque et son interprétation fantaisiste. (shrink)

L’examen de l’ensemble des données relatives au culte de Zeus Polieus à Athènes, tant dans l’asty que dans les dèmes (fin du vie s. – début du iiie s. ap. J.-C.), permet de mettre en évidence trois dimensions de ce dieu : son ancrage fondamentalement acropolitain ; sa position élevée, dont il tire de possibles compétences en matière agricole ; son rôle politique. Toutefois, ce dernier aspect ne doit pas être surévalué : à Athènes, le Polieus n’est ni un (...) dieu tutélaire ni un protecteur actif de la cité. Il semble plutôt garantir l’unité de la communauté politique et surtout la position tutélaire d’Athéna (Polias) ; c’est du moins ce que laisse entendre une glose d’Hésychios qui propose un récit étiologique des Bouphonies sensiblement différent de celui, bien connu, transmis par le De Abstinentia de Porphyre. The study of the evidence regarding the cult of Zeus Polieus in Athens, in the asty as well as in the demes (end of 6th c. – beginning of 3rd c. CE), allows us to emphasize three main dimensions of the god. These are: his fundamental rooting on the Acropolis, the highness of his location — which explains his probable agricultural skills — and his political role. The Polieus’ political capacity shall not be overestimated, though: in Athens, he is neither a tutelary god nor an active protector of the polis. He rather seems to guarantee the unity of the political community and, above all, the tutelary position of Athena (Polias). At least, this is what an aetiological tale for the Bouphonia, found in a gloss from Hesychios, seems to show. Indeed, this version of the myth differs noticeably from the more famous one from Pophyry’s De Abstinentia. (shrink)

Dans la société grecque antique, le tirage au sort était utilisé à des fins diverses, notamment pour la distribution (e.g. du butin), la sélection (e.g. des magistrats) et la procédure (e.g. l’établissement d’une alternance). Contrairement à l’inégalité des résultats attendue dans les jeux dits « de hasard » (par exemple, les jeux de dés), les Grecs anciens aspiraient souvent à l’égalité des résultats, par exemple, dans « l’héritage des parts par tirage au sort ». Les Grecs attendaient-ils des dieux qu’ils (...) déterminent les résultats du tirage au sort? Le tirage au sort était-il dès lors considéré comme une sorte de divination? L’examen des mythes de tirage au sort parmi les dieux grecs, tels qu’ils apparaissent notamment chez Homère et Hésiode, conduit à la conclusion inverse : lorsque, par exemple, Zeus, Hadès et Poséidon se partageaient leurs provinces ou « honneurs » (la mer, les enfers, le ciel), à la fois en tant que frères héritiers et en tant que vainqueurs se répartissant un butin, ils ne se tournaient certainement pas vers un autre dieu pour déterminer la réponse. Le tirage au sort dépend de la souveraineté du groupe qui décide de recourir à cette procédure ; il définit les contours-mêmes de ce qui constitue un groupe légitime, c’est-à-dire ceux qui ont accès au partage ; il souligne l’égalité des chances pour tous les participants et tente d’assurer l’égalité et l’équité des résultats. Dans l’ensemble, à l’exception des oracles explicitement associés au tirage au sort, chez les Grecs anciens, ce dernier était une affaire humaine. (shrink)

In pages 101–3 of his article Pope lists the numbers of occurrences of interrogative and enclitic in Aeschylus, Sophocles, and Euripides, and mentions occurrences in other authors. He shows that, although there is a dead heat between the numbers of instances of the two words in Aeschylus, nevertheless enclitic is very rarely indeed, and perhaps never, found in sentences which do not have a main verb. There are, however, occurrences of interrogative in sentences which lack a main verb and have (...) no predicate either. It must surely be rare to find statement sentences which do not contain at least subject and predicate at the best of times, let alone when happens to occur in the sentence. There are strong reasons, then, for rejecting the version of F and Triclinius, quite apart from the occurrence of in the sentence. One can defend by saying that either is understood from the preceding sentence, or else is vaguely understood: The favour of the gods comes to men perforce.’ But it is not very plausible. I am inclined to agree with Pope on this point, if not for quite the same reason. (shrink)

Zusammenfassung Die Anfragen an das Zeusorakel in Dodona sind eine einzigartige Quelle. Die Anfragen gelten den alltäglichen Anliegen von Menschen verschiedener Herkunft und geben den Blick frei auf die griechische Welt jenseits von Athen und Sparta. Die Veröffentlichung von 4.216 neuen Inschriften im Jahr 2013 hat unsere Datengrundlage vervielfacht und ermöglicht eine quantitative Auswertung der Anfragen. Dieser Aufsatz erschließt dieses Potenzial für die Wirtschaftsgeschichte. Er diskutiert methodische Schwierigkeiten bei der Interpretation der Anfragen und formuliert erste Thesen. Bereits im 5. Jahrhundert (...) v. Chr. war selbst die Wirtschaft einer eher abgelegenen Region wie Epirus von geldbasiertem Austausch und hoher Mobilität geprägt. Austausch und Mobilität erfolgten allerdings weitgehend innerhalb regionaler Grenzen und waren sozial eingebettet. (shrink)

In 1998, I suggested a new text for a notably corrupt passage in Pindar's Isthmian 5. This article is in effect a sequel to that earlier discussion. In the 1998 article, I proposed, inter alia, that the modern vulgate text of I. 5.58, ἐλπίδων ἔκνισ’ ὄπιν, is indefensible and the product of scribal corruption in antiquity, and that chief among the indefensible products of corruption there is the supposed secular use of ὄπις, as if used to mean something like ‘zeal’. (...) This is a sense for which there is no good evidence in classical Greek, where ὄπις always has a delimited religious denotation, meaning either ‘gods’ response’, ‘divine retribution’, or else ‘religious awe’ or ‘reverence’ towards the gods, through fear of that response or that retribution. If we discount I. 5.58 itself, all the pre-Hellenistic attestations can be straightforwardly listed under these headings: Il. 16.388 θεῶν ὄπιν οὐκ ἀλέγοντες, Od. 14.88 ὄπιδος κρατερὸν δέος, Hes. Theog. 221–2 θεαὶ... |... ἀπὸ τῷ δώωσι κακὴν ὄπιν, Pind. P. 8.71–2 θεῶν δ’ ὄπιν | ἄφθονον αἰτέω, sim. Od. 20.215, 21.28, Hes. Op. 187, 251, 706, along with, seemingly, a fragmentary fifth-century Thessalian verse inscription, CEG 1.120.1 Hansen; Hdt. 9.76.2 θεῶν ὄπιν ἔχοντας, 8.143.2. In addition, one other instance can be interpreted as either or, or in effect both: Od. 14.82 οὐκ ὄπιδα φρονέοντες... οὐδ’ ἐλεητύν. In all cases, though, ‘gods’ are specified, usually as a dependent genitive with ὄπις, or else separately but in the near context. Hellenistic and later occurrences of the word are few, and hints there of a secular reading can actually be taken to reflect misunderstandings based on, precisely, the early corruption in I. 5. (shrink)