Beyond Mysteries: the Local World of Ancient Eleusis

Hans Beck, Sebastian Scharff (Herausgeber)

Buch | Hardcover

494 Seiten

2025
Brill (Verlag)
978-90-04-71961-3 (ISBN)

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Starting from the observation that the history of Eleusis was not confined to the Mysteries alone, the contributions to this volume explore the multiple manifestations of Eleusis’ local universe in a connected world.

Situated at the crossroads between Athens, Boiotia, Megara, and Salamis, Eleusis was exposed to the changing fortunes in a connected world. From the Athenian perspective, Eleusis marked the fringes of their territory. From everybody else’s point of view, it was a destination or a gateway: to Athens, the Saronic region and the Aegean, Central Greece, or the Peloponnese. In the midst of these itineraries, the Eleusinians had their own ideas about the world writ-large. This volume delves into the local horizon of the site, its agents and stakeholders, the stories that moved them, and the places where interactions took place.

Hans Beck is Professor and Chair of Greek History at the University of Münster. He has published widely on local constellations in Central Greece and the Peloponnese, including Localism and the Ancient Greek City-State (Chicago, 2020). He is the recipient of the Anneliese Maier Research Prize and an Elected Fellow of the Royal Society of Canada. Sebastian Scharff holds a postdoctoral research fellowship in the Department of Humanities at the University of Trento. He has published extensively on Greek religion, interstate relations and ancient athletics, including Eid und Außenpolitik (Steiner, 2016) and Hellenistic Athletes (CUP, 2024).

Preface

List of Figures and Tables

Contributors

1 Beyond Mysteries: Introduction to the Local Horizon of Ancient Eleusis

Hans Beck and Sebastian Scharff

Part 1: Settings and Surroundings

2 Eleusis in Its Economic and Environmental Setting

Anton Bonnier

3 Along the Mystery Highway: Eleusis and Thebes in the Archaic Age

Hans Beck

4 Between Argos and Athens: Eleusis as a Contested Space

Jeremy McInerney

Part 2: Saronic Dimensions

5 Late Bronze and Early Iron Age Eleusis in a Saronic Context: Political Geography and Ritual Practice

Sarah C. Murray

6 Eleusis in the Gulf of Distorting Mirrors: Demeter’s Look-Alikes and Her Saronic Reflections

Irene Polinskaya

7 Between Locality and Diffusion: Εleusis in the Homeric Hymn to Demeter and the First-Fruits Decree

Christy Constantakopoulou

Part 3: Sites and Cults

8 Healing across the Gulf: Eleusis and the Asklepios Cult

Roy van Wijk

9 Between Προσβατήριος and Πατρός: Poseidon at and around Eleusis

Shannon M. Dunn

10 The Eleusinian Deities in Ionia

Julietta Steinhauer

11 Votive Reliefs from Eleusis in a Local, Regional, and Transregional Perspective

Anja Klöckner

Part 4: Civic Life

12 Listmaking, Accountability, and Gender in Eleusinian Myth and History

Athena Kirk

13 Eleusis as a Place of Competition: the Eleusinian Games

Sebastian Scharff

14 The Public Enactments of the Deme Eleusis: between Mysteries and Military

Stephen Lambert

Part 5: Stories and Myths

15 Centrality Reconsidered: Eleusis, Athens, and Mythotopography

Angela Ganter

16 Eleusis and Athens at War: Myth, Conflict, and Identity

Oliver Grote

17 Eleusis, Theseus and the Burial of the ‘Seven against Thebes’

Christoph Michels

18 The Profanation of the Mysteries in the Attic Orators: between Rhetorical Use and Historical Evidence

Priscilla Gontijo Leite

Part 6: Afterlives

19 Sacred Diplomacy: Eleusis as a Mediator between the Athenian Polis and the Roman Empire

Margarita Sardak

20 Plutarch’s Eleusis

Chandra Giroux

21 Eleusis at the Intersection of Antiquity and Modernity: the mystēria, Altered Consciousness, and the Neuroscience of Transformational Experience

Michelle Zerba

Erscheinungsdatum	14.05.2025
Reihe/Serie	Religions in the Graeco-Roman World ; 199
Verlagsort	Leiden
Sprache	englisch
Maße	155 x 235 mm
Gewicht	946 g
Themenwelt	Geschichte ► Allgemeine Geschichte ► Vor- und Frühgeschichte
	Geschichte ► Allgemeine Geschichte ► Altertum / Antike
	Geisteswissenschaften ► Geschichte ► Regional- / Ländergeschichte
	Geisteswissenschaften ► Religion / Theologie ► Weitere Religionen
ISBN-10	90-04-71961-X / 900471961X
ISBN-13	978-90-04-71961-3 / 9789004719613
Zustand	Neuware