LLT 121 Myths of Fertility Powell Chh. 9-10
Ch. 9. The Great Goddess and her lost beloved
Demeter and Persephone (Kore)
Hymn to Demeter : be able to summarize the basic story.
Hades abducts the maiden
with Zeus's consent (and lure of narcissus)
Hecate and Helius hear
Demeter in disguise at Eleusis, as 'Doso'
welcomed by Celeus, Metaneira, and daughters
as nursemaid for Demophon
comforted by Iambe and kykeon
Demeter bathes Demophon in fire
spell broken by Metaneira
Cult at Eleusis founded in penance
Zeus persuades Hades to release Persephone two seasons for one
doomed to return by the pomegranate
Note: Rosetti's Proserpina, p. 232
Interpretations: Agricultural allegory?
Woman's predicament Near Eastern parallels
Ritual and Cult: Mysteries at Eleusis
mystes = initiate and Telesterion
Eumolpids and Kerykes
'Greater Mysteries,' late September
hiera to Athens [convocation and baptism]
fifth-day procession to Eleusis
Eastern parallels: Inanna and Dumuzi
vs. Ereshkegal (=Sumerian Persephone)
cycle of death and rebirth
Isis and Osiris
vs. Seth/Typhon
triumph of Horus
Cybele and Attis
Nana pregnant from the pomegranate
gives birth to Attis
Attis castrated and resurrected
Aphrodite and Adonis
Pygmalion and Galatea
son Paphos >> Cinyras >> Myrrha
Adonis born from Myrrha
dies on the boarhunt, resurrected in flower
Ch. 10. Dionysus
Son of Semele, daughter of Cadmus, given firey birth at Thebes
infant Dionysus sheltered by Ino (=Leucothea)
reared by nymphs of Nysa
links with Cybele
the entourage:
Maenads (=Bacchae) and Satyrs
Sileni, and encounter with Midas
Ariadne, bride of Dionysus
opposition to the new cult: victims and martyrs
Lycurgus in Thrace
daughters of Minyas
daughters of Proetus
[Icarius at Athens]
tales of power:
captured by pirates
triumphant return to Thebes
vs. cousin Pentheus:
Euripides' Bacchae
from the excerpt in Powell, be able to give a brief plot summary
identifying chief characters:
Pentheus Cadmus Agave
Dionysus brings Semele from the dead (=Thyone)
Interpretation: Bronze-age god, recast by oriental cult
Cult of Dionysus
vine and thyrsus
ekstasis and enthousiasmos
sparagmos and omophagia
Tragedy and Dionysia
origins in dithyramb, mystery, or funeral rite?
first actor introduced by Thespis
dramatic festival at Athens,
instituted under tyranny, flourished under democracy
Ch. 11 Journey among the Dead MythNotes
Hades, "the Unseen" = Roman Dis (Dives) = Pluto (Grk. Ploutos);
aka Orcus (boundary, confinement)
Soul as attenuated image
psyche = anima ghosts resentful of loss yearning to return (?)
Hermes psychompompos Anthesteria (Greek Halloween in Spring)
Epicurus: death of the soul
Tales of katabasis (the journey below) and return
Odysseus seeking Teiresias of Thebes
blood sacrifice for the dead to speak
(up come "new brides and unmarried boys, soldiers slain by the spear,
still in armor": each as death caught them)
Elpenor (whom they had left unburied)
Odysseus' own mother (Anticlea)
Teiresias tells of things to come
Agamemnon ('trust no woman')
Achilles ('better a hireling to the poorest man alive'...)
the vision (old material?)
Minos, judge among the dead
the great sinners:
Tityus Tantalus Sisyphus
'phantom' of Heracles
fields of Elysium, where Rhadamanthys rules (as told by Proteus)
Orpheus and Eurydice
Orphism, esp. death and rebirth of Dionysus
Plato's 'Myth of Er' (Republic 10)
Souls before (re)birth choose their lost
and drink of Lethe
Vergil's tale of Aeneas' Descent, in seach of father Anchises
Aeneas guided by Sibyl of Cumae
be able to draw a rough map of Vergil's underworld, placing the following:
Charon and Acheron
Cerberus
Phlegethon, Tisiphone, and prison of the damned (aka Tartarus)
Ixion, plus Tantalus, Sisyphus et al.
Elysium, vision of Roman heroes to come, and exit by Gates of Ivory