Greek Necromancy
Overview
This note was generated from the Greek studies corpus.
Key Passages
Passage 1
d (katobasis), but some reference to the latter remains inevitable.13 Not only did one “descend*’ into some oracles of the dead, but, as we have seen, even when cvocating ghosts a necroman- cer could be imagined to be dissolving the boundaries between the lower world and the upper one in such a way that the distinction between the descent of the consulter and the ascent of the ghosts was effaced.14 When in myth Heracles famously descended to carry off Cerberus, he suppos- edly emerged at nekuomanteion sites and perhaps even enhanced their necromantic power for having dislodged the warden of ghosts. According to some other mythological accounts, Theseus and Pirithous made their descents at the Acheron nekuomanteion, as did Orpheus.15 Conscqucndy, the attempt to draw a hard and fast distinction between necromancy and katabasis leads to embarrassment: for such a principle, Collard actually u Hapfhcr 1921-24, 2: 546-49; Collard 1949:…
Passage 2
settle it after accidentally killing her, he was driven by it to his own death. His own ghost then in turn had to be called up by psychagdgoi or “evocators” to be setded (chapters 3 and 7). The tragedies of Aeschylus (ca. 525-455 B.C.) have an important role in the history of necromancy. His fragmentary Psuchajjqgoi affords us our first attestation of these necromantic professionals (again, projected into a mythical context). They may well have been around for a long time before. They seem to have been associated with oracles of the dead, but also to have acted independent of them, at least for the purpose of ghost- laying. From the fifth century B.C. also we begin to hear of other profes- sional necromancers, notably joftes, “sorcerers,” whose very name derives from the mourning wail, goos, and indicates that their wide powers actu- ally originated in the manipulation of the…
Passage 3
e thesis, “La necromancie dans 1’antiquite,” which takes as its cask the collation and reproduction of some of the more important literary sources for the sub- ject.3 At a more localized level, there are, admittedly, numerous commen- taries upon and discussions of individual necromancy episodes in the ma- 1 Swift 1726: book 3.7-8. 2 E.g., for ghosts, Kytzler 1989; Bernstein 1993; Sourvinou-Inwood 1995; Felton 1999; Johnston 1999; and for magic (and more on ghosts), Faraone and Obbink 1991; Bcinand 1991; Faraone 1992 and 1999; Gager 1992; Johnston 1994; Grafl997a; Clauss and John- ston 1997; Ribinowitz 1998; and Jordan et al. 1999. 1 Honorable mentions for general treatments go also to Hcadlam 1902; and Hopftier 1921-24, 2: 546-617, and 1935. xvi INTRODUCTION jor works of ancient literature. There have also been many treatments of the supposed archeological site of the Acheron oracle of the dead in Thcs- proria in northwest Greece…
Connections
Sources
- Greek_and_Roman_Necromancy_Daniel_Ogden_.pdf