Mystic Cults in Magna Graecia

Published by University of Texas Press 2009

Mystic Cults in Magna Graecia

Edited by: Giovanni Casadio and Patricia A. Johnston

https://doi.org/10.7560/719026

Overview
Contents

About this book

In Vergil's Aeneid, the poet implies that those who have been initiated into mystery cults enjoy a blessed situation both in life and after death. This collection of essays brings new insight to the study of mystic cults in the ancient world, particularly those that flourished in Magna Graecia (essentially the area of present-day Southern Italy and Sicily).

Implementing a variety of methodologies, the contributors to Mystic Cults in Magna Graecia examine an array of features associated with such "mystery religions" that were concerned with individual salvation through initiation and hidden knowledge rather than civic cults directed toward Olympian deities usually associated with Greek religion. Contributors present contemporary theories of ancient religion, field reports from recent archaeological work, and other frameworks for exploring mystic cults in general and individual deities specifically, with observations about cultural interactions throughout. Topics include Dionysos and Orpheus, the Goddess Cults, Isis in Italy, and Roman Mithras, explored by an international array of scholars including Giulia Sfameni Gasparro ("Aspects of the Cult of Demeter in Magna Graecia") and Alberto Bernabé ("Imago Inferorum Orphica"). The resulting volume illuminates this often misunderstood range of religious phenomena.

Author / Editor information

Giovanni Casadio is Professor of the History of Religions at the University of Salerno in Italy. He is the associate editor of the Encyclopedia of Religion and has written more than one hundred articles on various topics of religious history and historiography.

Patricia A. Johnston is Professor of Greek and Latin Philology and Literature at Brandeis University in Waltham, Massachusetts. A past president of the Vergilian Society and founder and director of the Vergilian Society's annual Symposia Cumana, she has published extensively on Greek and Latin literature and culture, specializing in Vergil.

Information about other contributors

Reviews

This book represents the most current state of knowledge about cults in Magna Graecia and will set standards for subsequent discussions of the topic.

— Larry J. Alderink

This thematic structure is excellent. . . . As the first comprehensive collection of essays examining the range of cults of Magna Graecia, this book represents important reading.

— Journal of the Platonic Tradition

Topics

Frontmatter Publicly Available Download PDF	i
Contents Publicly Available Download PDF	v
Illustrations Publicly Available Download PDF	vii
Abbreviations Publicly Available Download PDF	xi
Chapter 1 Introduction Giovanni Casadio and Patricia A. Johnston Requires Authentication Unlicensed Licensed Download PDF	1
Part I Dionysus and Orpheus
Chapter 2 Dionysus in Campania: Cumae Giovanni Casadio Requires Authentication Unlicensed Licensed Download PDF	33
Chapter 3 The Meaning of βάκχος and βακχεύειν in Orphism Ana Jiménez San Cristóbal Requires Authentication Unlicensed Licensed Download PDF	46
Chapter 4 New Contributions of Dionysiac Iconography to the History of Religions in Greece and Italy Cornelia Isler-Kerényi Requires Authentication Unlicensed Licensed Download PDF	61
Chapter 5 Who Are You? Mythic Narrative and Identity in the “Orphic” Gold Tablets Radcliffe G. Edmonds Requires Authentication Unlicensed Licensed Download PDF	73
Chapter 6 Imago Inferorum Orphica Alberto Bernabé Requires Authentication Unlicensed Licensed Download PDF	95
Chapter 7 Putting Your Mouth Where Your Money Is: Eumolpus’ Will, Pasta e Fagioli, and the Fate of the Soul in South Italian Thought from Pythagoras to Ennius R. Drew Griffith Requires Authentication Unlicensed Licensed Download PDF	131
Part II Demeter and Isis
Chapter 8 Aspects of the Cult of Demeter in Magna Graecia: The “Case” of San Nicola di Albanella Giulia Sfameni Gasparro Requires Authentication Unlicensed Licensed Download PDF	139
Chapter 9 Landscape Synchesis: A Demeter Temple in Latium Kathryn M. Lucchese Requires Authentication Unlicensed Licensed Download PDF	161
Chapter 10 The Eleusinian Mysteries and Vergil’s “Appearance-of-a-Terrifying-Female- Apparition-in-the-Underworld” Motif in Aeneid 6 Raymond J. Clark Requires Authentication Unlicensed Licensed Download PDF	190
Chapter 11 Women and Nymphs at the Grotta Caruso Bonnie MacLachlan Requires Authentication Unlicensed Licensed Download PDF	204
Chapter 12 “Great Royal Spouse Who Protects Her Brother Osiris”: Isis in the Isaeum at Pompeii Frederick Brenk Requires Authentication Unlicensed Licensed Download PDF	217
Chapter 13 Aegyptiaca from Cumae: New Evidence for Isis Cult in Campania: Site and Materials Paolo Caputo Requires Authentication Unlicensed Licensed Download PDF	235
Chapter 14 The Mystery Cults and Vergil’s Georgics Patricia A. Johnston Requires Authentication Unlicensed Licensed Download PDF	251
Part III Mithras
Chapter 15 The Amor and Psyche Relief in the Mithraeum of Capua Vetere: An Exceptional Case of Graeco-Roman Syncretism or an Ordinary Instance of Human Cognition? Luther H. Martin Requires Authentication Unlicensed Licensed Download PDF	277
Chapter 16 The Mithraic Body: The Example of the Capua Mithraeum Richard Gordon Requires Authentication Unlicensed Licensed Download PDF	290
Chapter 17 Why the Shoulder?: A Study of the Placement of the Wound in the Mithraic Tauroctony Glenn Palmer Requires Authentication Unlicensed Licensed Download PDF	314
Bibliography Requires Authentication Unlicensed Licensed Download PDF	325
General Index Requires Authentication Unlicensed Licensed Download PDF	359
Index Locorum Requires Authentication Unlicensed Licensed Download PDF	367
Index of Authors Requires Authentication Unlicensed Licensed Download PDF	371

Language: English
Publisher: University of Texas Press
Audience: Professional and scholarly;
Pages
- Main content: 390

eBook

Published: December 3, 2009
ISBN: 9780292799271