Introduction to project

My first meeting with the classical world
Colosseum, Rome - September 2011

Through writing this blog, which is a completely new form assessment for me, I have come to realise that the issues I am facing now are the same as the issues I faced when I first started this course, in 2010. Studying classics on a deeper level than I had previously done posed greater challenges than I had faced in school. I needed to think in different ways and the work was much more reflective and inquisitive than what I had previously done. Having written a number of essays through my three years at university, I feel that I have found my ‘scholarly’ or ‘academic’ voice, at least in that form of assessment. However, writing a blog poses a different challenge where I must find the balance between a scholarly and ‘informal’ tone.

Studying Ancient Greek Religion poses issues that are often faced when studying religions and other cultures. First we must face the issue that there is a major cultural difference that cannot be reconciled. There is a need to separate ‘us’ and ‘them’ and find neutral ground to study from. I have recently become more aware that I wear what could be called Christian-secular lenses when I study. I was raised in a secular society but I was still taught religious values and had my confirmation at 15 years old. I know now that I need to be more self-aware when studying other cultures and religions and remember that they held different values in their beliefs and in the practice of those beliefs. Bruit Zaidman and SchmittPantel states that ‘the function of religion cannot be the same in a society such as ours, in which communal life is very largely secularized, and in one where religion was thoroughly intertwined with all areas of public and social interaction.’ As scholars we must therefore take a step back and try to see Ancient Greek Religion not through our own eyes, but through the eyes of the Greeks. I will discuss this further in later blog posts. It does not make it easier either that the Greeks had no word for religion. The closest we come is Thriskeia, which the website Perseus roughly translates to religious worship, ritual and cult. However it could also be argued that our term religion is still not properly defined and that everyone has their own personal opinion as to what the term ‘religion’ stands for. (For more see Harrison,V. S.)

Through this project I will try to mainly use the goddess Artemis to focus on the questions posed in our lectures and ideas this course has led me to want to discuss further. Throughout my years at University I have found that my interest in Greek mythology has narrowed down to an even bigger interest in Greek goddesses, particularity those I have felt have either been misrepresented in scholarship or goddesses that have not received much attention. I first became interested in Artemis when I was working on an essay on Hera, at the time I was focusing on rituals and festivals and came over a link about the anger of Artemis. I was fascinated by how strict the rules for Artemis’s followers were, especially the role the young attendants played and the significance of them being parthenoi - marriageable virgins who have attained physical and sexual maternity.  Once I started doing more research on Artemis I also found myself being very interested in the dual aspect of her and how she represented a positive occurrence in Greek life such as infant survival but she also represented the curse of death in childbirth and stillborn infants. I hope that this blog will let me research this further and give me much more information on Artemis and the study of Ancient Greek Religion.

Bibliography:

-        Bruit Zaidman, L. and Schmitt Pantel, P., (1992) Religion in the Ancient Greek City. Translated by Paul Cartledge. Cambridge University Press: Cambridge. p .3

-        Harrison, V.S. (2006) ‘The pragmatics of defining religionin a multicultural world’. International Journal for - Philosophy of Religion Vol. 59, No. 3 pp. 133-152.

-         Perseus. (2013) Greek Word Study Tool. Available at:

               http://www.perseus.tufts.edu/hopper/morph?l=qrhskeia&la=greek Accessed on: 25/03-13

-        Theoi. Artemis. Available at: http://www.theoi.com/Olympios/Artemis.html Accessed on: 25/03-13

-       Theoi. Summary Artemis. Available at: http://www.theoi.com/Summary/Artemis.html

     Accessed on: 25/03-13

Identifying Artemis

One of the more difficult subjects I have faced when studying Ancient Mythology is identifying deities in physical evidence, vases, statues, mosaic, etc. In this post I will look at various images, also a Disney television episode, and discuss how the deity can be identified. Artemis is one of the goddesses that is quite easy to recognise because she has multiple items she is affiliated with. Clemente Marconi states that ‘she is often shown driving a chariot, sometimes harnessed to stags, and she is usually readily identifiable by her quiver or bow’. The chariot is drawn by deer that represents her connection with the forest whilst the quiver and bow are obvious hunter’s weapons. However she is not always represented by weapons, sometimes she can also be seen holding a lyre instead of the bow, representing her being the patron of maiden dancing and maiden song. Other attributes that can help identify her are hunting spears, maiden knee length skirts, animal pelts, hunting boots, wild beasts and torches. Now let us look at some depictions of Artemis, the images are hyperlinked so if you click on them it will take you to the original source.

In this vase from the late classical period, around 400-390 BC Artemis can be identified by the maiden knee-length skirt, her bow and arrow and most notably an animal skin cap. This vase depicts the War of the Giants also known as the Gigantomakhia. In such a detailed vase as this, where many other deities are present also fighting, it could have been difficult to identify Artemis. However, she is the only deity in a maiden knee length skirt and her bow and arrow together with the animal skin cap makes her easy to separate out from the other deities. (Louvre, Paris: S1677)

The image to the right is a drawing of a vase depicting Artemis and Apollo. The vase is from the early classical period around 450 BC and depicts Artemis holding an oinochoe jug and a lyre. I chose this vase painting to show that Artemis is not always the one depicted holding the bow, therefore it is important to remember that she is also associated with the lyre which, as I said before, represent her patronage over maiden dancing and song. It could be argued that in this particular instance Artemis was holding the lyre of Apollo and therefore it is a representation of him instead, however I think that in this instance it does not necessarily matter as the lyre represents them both and therefore helps identify the two of them. (Museum of Fine Arts, Boston, MA: 00.347)

In one episode (YouTubevideo) of Disney’s Hercules: TheAnimated Series, Artemis recruits Hercules to protect the boars in her forest from hunters. She is easily identified by her golden bow and arrow and her association with animals. Disney have used Artemis and her affiliation with boars to represent the fight against animal cruelty and teach younger generations about conservation and the effect humans can have on the environment around them. Even in modern times Artemis is used as a warning to treat nature and animals with respect. Throughout the episode we can also see that the animals love her, shown by them clinging to her and cuddling her, adding some humour to a fairly sombre episode, the creators of the series have probably here drawn on the fact that Artemis was the patron of wild animals and birds.

I have tried to show in this posting that Artemis is a fairly easy character to identify, she has a large amount of attributes that makes it easy to recognise her, even in larger groups of deities. For the future I hope to remember to apply some of these methods when trying to identify other deities, it has certainly been a good training exercise!

Bibliography:

- Marconi, C. (2004) GreekVases, Images, and Controversies: Proceedings of the Conference Sponsored bythe Center for the Ancient Mediterranean at Columbia University, 23-24 March 2002. Boston, MA: BRILL p. 75

- Theoi. The Gigantomakhia, War of the Giants. Available at:

               http://www.theoi.com/Gallery/L20.1.html Accessed on: 25/03-13

Images:

1.      http://www.theoi.com/Gallery/K6.5.html

2.      http://www.theoi.com/Gallery/T14.2.html

3.      http://disney.wikia.com/wiki/Artemis

YouTube Video:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=eBwAEyG3I-k

Polytheism - stepping away from our own lenses

The concept of polytheism can be difficult to grasp for someone who grew up in a European country and had what can be called a Christian-secular upbringing. This was one of the issues I faced myself when having to study something so complex and foreign as Hinduism, Buddhism and indeed Greek Mythology. It is easy to fall into the trap of trying to categorise and put everything in neat little boxes with ribbons on top to finish it off and store away, organised nicely. However this concept does not work when faced with the complexities of Greek Mythology, which we quickly saw in our lecture, when we tried to pair up and organise some of the major Greek deities, our white-board very quickly became messy and full of scribbles as you can see in the photo.

There has been a much bigger focus in later years that scholars need to take a couple of steps back, leave their own views behind and look with fresh eyes on the material. This is especially evident when we try to sort the gods as seen in the photo from our lecture. Previously there has been a focus in academia to study deities on a one by one basis and separate them as much as possible, or there had been an attempt to separate into the pairs of two,  greatly inspired by Jean Pierre Vernants work on the Hestia-Hermesrelationship. However I would like to argue that this approach no longer works. It is clear, and probably has been for some time (but scholars are stubborn creatures) that it is rarely possible to research Greek deities without addressing the tangled relationships they share with each other. It might be time to take a different approach in studying these ancient deities, a fresh pair of eyes has never hurt anyone, it might lead to some exciting new breakthroughs!

Another issue that makes it incredibly difficult to study Greek deities with ‘modern’ eyes is the use of epithets. RobertParker states that

‘a god with three sanctuaries in a given city would normally bear a different epitaph in each. The cult epitaph system was thus a central element in thus emphasis on the particular sanctuary, the cult as practised in a particular place, so characteristic of Greek religion.’

The epithets can therefore be seen as a way of separating various places of worship, but it is also important to remember that it was not just places of worship that gave various epithets, the actions and attributes of a deity could also lead to separation.  Artemis Lochia was a watcher of childbirth whilst Artemis Agrotera was ‘The Huntress’. I must admit that this has been one of the most confusing aspects for me to study. It has taken me much effort to set aside my conceptions and I still struggle with the concept that Artemis Lochia and Artemis Agrotera are both the same goddess but could also be found to be worshipped as separate deities. At first I considered that the Greeks were worshipping just a part of what made up the whole of the goddess Artemis, but that is not quite right either. They are both the same but at the same time different, I think partly why it was so difficult for me was because I kept associating epithets with the Christian concept of the Holy Trinity, another example of how I was not able to step away from previously learned concepts to study Greek mythology.

Bibliography:

- Parker, R. (2011) OnGreek Religion (Cornell Studies in Classical Philology). Cornell, NY: Cornell University Press p. 67

- Vernant, J.-P. (1983) Myth andThought Among the Greeks. London: Routledge and Kegan Paul

Anthropomorphism, modern depictions and how modern women can relate to Artemis

When we had our lecture on anthropomorphism I was inspired to look at how Artemis was viewed in a modern setting. A recently aired episode of Supernatural, named 'Remember the Titans', offered the perfect opportunity to look at this, but first I want to briefly discuss some other revelations I have had about Artemis and how I have studied her so far and also why she is so relatable to modern women.

Artemis is a good example of how women, when studying mythology, can relate to the deity they are researching and give her traits and challenges which we ourselves face. In the case of Artemis, I must admit to falling into this trap myself, she is one of the deities that I feel I can associate the most with. I hold the opinion that Artemis is a strong woman who makes her own choices and won’t let herself be controlled by men. Some would even go as far as to use the modern colloquial phrase she is ‘a strong independent womanwho don’t need no man!’ In this instance it is clear even to me, that I only interpret some of what Artemis was to the Greeks and mould her in my own image. It is a trap I am getting better at catching myself falling into, I hope it will make me more aware in other work I do as well.

In some ways Artemis is the perfect feminist mascot. She is a hunter, a role primarily associated with men, she is a virgin, maintaining her youth and wildness and she wields a powerful weapon in her bow, she therefore has the capability of protecting herself. This might be why she is captivating to a modern audience. Recently she was depicted in a TV episode of the show Supernatural where she was on a mission from her father, hunting down the Titan Prometheus because he had escaped from the punishment Zeus inflicted on him. In the episode she is recognisable by her weapon of choice, the bow and arrow. However there was one issue I had with the character, she failed her mission because she was in love with Prometheus! I was outraged! The creators of the show had completely disregarded what I would consider to be one of the key characteristics of Artemis, her virginity and her disregard for men. Her reasons for not falling for the powers of Aphrodite is made clear in the fifth Homeric Hymn:

‘Nor does laughter-loving Aphrodite ever tame in love loud-crying Artemis of the golden bow. For bow and arrows are her joy and slaying wild beasts in the mountains, and lyres and choruses and piercing cries and shady groves and the city of righteous men.’

It is here made clear that Artemis is one of the three goddesses than can resist the powers of Aphrodite. Artemis does so by choosing hunting, music and the forest over associations with men. It can be argued that Artemis valued so much over love and therefore did not have the time or the urge to fall for what so many other deities and mortals did.

On a side note, Ivana Petrovic has some interesting thought as to what ‘the city of righteous men’ might mean ‘One could perhaps conclude that it is one particular city whose upright men were dear to Artemis. Judging on the basis of her role in the Iliad, perhaps it is Troy.’ 

Through looking at how the Supernatural episode depicted Artemis, it seems I am not the only one who takes some aspects of Greek deities and leave other aspects behind to mould an image. When you compare the two images I have used in this blog post it is easy to see that the physical appearance of Artemis is very similar in the modern depiction and on the vase. But there are some aspects of her that has not been translated well into the episode; this can be a good example of how scholars need to take in all aspects of a deity to get an apt depiction.

Bibliography:

- Petrovic, I. () “TransformingArtemis: From the Goddess of the Outdoors to City Goddess,” in The Gods of Ancient Greece: Identities and Transformations (Edinburgh Leventis Studies), ed. Bremmer, J. N. Edinburgh University Press: Edinburgh

- Richardson, N. (2010) Three Homeric Hymns – To Apollo,Hermes, and Aphrodite. Cambridge University Press: Cambridge

- Shelmerdine, S. C., (1995) The Homeric Hymns, Newburyport, NY: Focus Publishing. 

Images:

1.      http://www.theoi.com/Gallery/K6.1.html

2.      http://supernatural.wikia.com/wiki/Artemis

Olympian vs. Chthonian - are all Olympians also Chthonian?

When we first started the lecture on chthonian deities I was very intrigued, because I had not encountered the term before (I had at least not noticed it enough to investigate further). However I quickly became confused, because what does chthonian actually mean? The Perseus Greek word study tool translates Chthon as earth whilst RobertParker briefly states that one view is that chthonians are ‘gods of the earth’. But even I can quickly see that that term is far too simplified and that many deities considered Olympian also fall under that category. Amongst others Hestia and Artemis can easily be connected to the earth, the hearth, which represents Hestia, ties her to the most important place in the house and indeed in the heart of the polis through the civic hearth. The forest and the city ties Artemis to the earth in much similar ways, it is of importance to mortals and one does not get much closer to the earth than the forest, as the modern depictions, on the left, of Artemis show she is ‘in touch with’ nature.

Even if one argues that ‘gods of the earth’ means that the deity is an anthropomorphic form of something on earth or something that touches the earth, this would still include Hestia and Artemis, and as we discussed in the lecture Zeus’s lightning bolt touches the ground as this image by National Geographic from Kavala, Greece shows! And if any deity is ‘Olympian’ it must be Zeus! In modern colloquial terms he is known as the ‘god of the sky’. However, Zeus can also be found with the epithet Chthonios. Therefore I would like to propose that all Olympian gods also are chthonian, but it is a ‘one-way street’ and there are deities that are purely chthonian.

The use of epithets seems to confirm that Olympian deities are also chthonian. However I would suggest that the epithet does not necessarily need to be Chthonios for the deity to be chthonian, other epithets that hint at any connection with the earth could be justification enough. Artemis is a great example of this, she had multiple epithets that tied her to the earth, and amongst them were Artemis Dictynnaea, Daphnaea, Cedreatis and Caryae/Caryatis which all ties her to specific trees. Others include Artemis Limnaea/Limnatis (Of the Lake), Artemis Eurynome (Of the Broad Pastures) and Artemis Helea (Of the Marshes/Of the Wetlands). However with so many epithets that tie her to the earth, how exactly can Artemis be an Olympian?

First and foremost I must again turn to Parker to offer a translation for a term, he states that one view briefly says that Olympians are ‘gods of the bright sky’, which I think this screen cap from Disney’s Hercules encapsulates nicely. The Online Etymology Dictionary translates Olympian as ‘ofor belonging to Olympus’ and classifies Olympus as ‘highmountain in Thessaly [or] name […] given to several mountains, each seeminglythe highest in the district’. Both translation therefore ties Olympians to the sky, but that does not explain how the deities are tied to it. One explanation can be that those belonging to the ‘house of Zeus’ are Olympian, for they are tied to the sky-god. However depending on whether you view ‘the house of Zeus’ as those in his family or those in his chosen household, you might end up including some deities that are  purely chthonian.

This raises an interesting question about Hades, if it is familial ties that connected certain deities to Olympus is it then possible that Hades could have ended up an Olympian if his ties to his brother had been stronger? And if it is Zeus that chooses who belongs on Olympus by whom he considers to have a place in his household, does this mean his ties to Hades were not favourable?

I would suggest a third option, that it is the development of tradition and mythology that dictated who belonged at Olympus, some deities had sky-ties on their own, such as Hermes who had ties to astronomy and astrology, whilst others were tied through Zeus. My opinion is that it was a combination of tradition, familial ties and myth that tied certain deities to Olympus and made them Olympian as well as chthonian. As to my previously asked question as to where this leaves Artemis, I would say that she is an Olympian because of her heritage from her father.

Bibliography:

- Online Etymology Dictionary. Available at: http://www.etymonline.com/index.php

Accessed on: 25/03-13

- Parker, R. (1991) “GreekReligion,” In The Oxford History of Greece and the Hellenistic World, ed. Boardman, J. Oxford University Press: Oxford

- Parker, R. (2011) OnGreekReligion (Cornell Studies in Classical Philology). Cornell, NY: Cornell University Press p. 80

- Perseus. (2013) Greek Word Study Tool. Available at:

               http://www.perseus.tufts.edu/hopper/morph?l=xqon&la=greek Accessed on: 25/03-13

- Scullion, S. (1994) ‘Olympianand Chthonian’. Classical Antiquity. Vol. 13, No. 1 pp. 75-119.

- Theoi. Artemis Titles. Available at: http://www.theoi.com/Cult/ArtemisTitles.html

Accessed on: 25/03-13

- Theoi. Hermes. Available at: http://www.theoi.com/Olympios/Hermes.html Accessed on: 25/03-13

- Theoi. Summary Hestia. Available at: http://www.theoi.com/Summary/Hestia.html

Accessed on: 25/03-13

- Zeus. Available at: http://www.greekmythology.com/Olympians/Zeus/zeus.html

Accessed on: 25/03-13

Images:

1.      http://www.styx.estranky.sk/fotoalbum/olypsky-bohovia/artemis.html

2.      http://environment.nationalgeographic.co.uk/environment/photos/lightning-cloud-ground/#/cloud-ground-lightning04_20840_600x450.jpg

3.      http://25.media.tumblr.com/tumblr_lz25ado7xF1r1ogfco4_500.jpg

Final Thoughts

When it came to finalising the blog and putting all the pieces I have worked on together I was in some ways disappointed that the project was over. Although I had been looking forward to designing the blog and spending time on the finishing touches, that process was surprisingly quick. I chose a fairly simple design as I wanted the focus to be on the content not the looks, I did however manage a small goodbye nod to Artemis by choosing a clearing in a forest as my background image and a green theme.

Looking back on the postings I have done it is obvious that an overall topic has been how Greek mythology is received and studied today, with perhaps an extra personal focus on how I study. The blog has been a great resource for self-reflecting on how I approach topics and I have learned a lot about my process and traps I should avoid falling into.  At the same time I feel that I have discovered a trend in modern scholarship. I feel like there are new methods of studying emerging which leads to new theories, it is an exciting time for academia!

In my blog post about polytheism I reflected on the fact that scholars have a tendency to want to put everything in separate boxes and tie it with a nice bow on top. I did not get to reflect on this in my last post but I think the issues faced with Olympian vs. chthonian deities is a clear sign of this! I think partly why this has been such a hot topic for so long is because scholars have not been able to set aside their categorising needs. As I said previously new methods are emerging that is leading to some exiting material, hopefully this will affect the Olympian/chthonian debate as well. Because of the extensive use of the internet that has been necessary for this blog I have come over some silly things that reflect how it is for outsiders to look at the sometimes confusing and sometimes even incestuous relationship that exits between the deities. This photo, taken from the Disney movie Hercules, with added text for comical effect, shows well how confusing Greek Mythology can seem to ‘outsiders’.

So to end this blog on a lighter note: In the end this project has been great for self-reflection, and I feel I have learnt much about how I can improve my studies of Greek Mythology. It has also taught me much about Artemis as a deity, whom I was impressed with before this project, but now also hold in high esteem.

Images:

1.      http://www.istockphoto.com/stock-photo-6072320-forest-path.php?refnum=Nikada

2.      http://kudanthaiyur.blogspot.co.uk/2010_10_01_archive.html

3.      http://accusativeofexclamation.tumblr.com/post/29723405772/achangingaltar-billyraysiren-greek-mythology