Summary
Burkert's core thesis is that when paleolithic man became a hunter, in spite of the generally omnivorous orientation of the great apes, lack of a predator instinct was made up for by turning patterns of intra-species aggression against the prey: Homo necans means "man the killer". Thus, the animal hunted by ancient man automatically acquired aspects of an equal, as if it were of one of the hunter's relations. In a first attempt at applying ethology to religious history, [1] Burkert confronts the power and effect of tradition in uncovering traces of ancient hunting rituals so motivated in historical animal sacrifice and human sacrifice (by his thesis unified as deriving from the same fundamental principle) in specific historical Greek rituals with relevance to human religious behaviour in general. Burkert acknowledges that a decisive impulse for the thesis derived from Konrad Lorenz' On Aggression (1963).
The thesis is an extension of the hunting hypothesis, which states that hunting as a means of obtaining food was a dominant influence on human evolution and cultural development (as opposed to gathering vegetation or scavenging). The guilt incurred in the violence of the hunt was reflected in sacred crimes, which through rituals of cleansing and expiation served to unify communities. Burkert supports his thesis by integrating a multitude of examples that elaborate primitive ritual as it is reflected in Greek mythology. He examines various cult-complexes in detail, confronting "sacrificial ritual with its tension between encountering death and affirming life, its external form consisting of preparations, a frightening central moment, and restitution", [2] and affirming in detail the initial hypothesis.
Erechtheus in Greek mythology was a king of Athens, the founder of the polis and, in his role as god, attached to Poseidon, as "Poseidon Erechtheus". The name Erichthonius is carried by a son of Erechtheus, but Plutarch conflated the two names in the myth of the begetting of Erechtheus.
Aristaeus was the mythological culture hero credited with the discovery of many rural useful arts and handicrafts, including bee-keeping; he was the son of the huntress Cyrene and Apollo.
Sacrifice is the offering of material possessions or the lives of animals or humans to a deity as an act of propitiation or worship. Evidence of ritual animal sacrifice has been seen at least since ancient Hebrews and Greeks, and possibly existed before that. Evidence of ritual human sacrifice can also be found back to at least pre-Columbian civilizations of Mesoamerica as well as in European civilizations. Varieties of ritual non-human sacrifices are practiced by numerous religions today.
In the Eleusinian Mysteries, the bakchoi were the branches of initiates that carried out the procession along the Sacred Way, the twenty-one kilometer hike from Athens to Eleusis. The term is sometimes distinguished from mystai (initiate), specifically the Eleusinian initiate, only for the purpose of emphasis since the two words are considered synonymous. The bacchoi was considered a transformed state after performing initiations and this was described by Euripides in the case of his Cretans, who proclaimed they were made holy – mystai and bacchoi – after cleansing themselves through initiation.
In Greek mythology, Pelops was king of Pisa in the Peloponnesus region. He was the son of Tantalus and the father of Atreus.
Hippodamia was a Greek mythological figure. She was the queen of Pisa and the wife of Pelops, appearing with Pelops at a potential cult site in Ancient Olympia.
Animal sacrifice is the ritual killing and offering of animals, usually as part of a religious ritual or to appease or maintain favour with a deity. Animal sacrifices were common throughout Europe and the Ancient Near East until the spread of Christianity in Late Antiquity, and continue in some cultures or religions today. Human sacrifice, where it existed, was always much rarer.
A sacrificial tripod, whose name comes from the Greek meaning "three-footed", is a three-legged piece of religious furniture used in offerings and other ritual procedures. This ritual role derives from its use as a simple support for a cooking vessel placed over a fire. As a seat or stand, the tripod is the most stable furniture construction for uneven ground, hence its use is universal and ancient.
Religious practices in ancient Greece encompassed a collection of beliefs, rituals, and mythology, in the form of both popular public religion and cult practices. The application of the modern concept of "religion" to ancient cultures has been questioned as anachronistic. The ancient Greeks did not have a word for 'religion' in the modern sense. Likewise, no Greek writer known to us classifies either the gods or the cult practices into separate 'religions'. Instead, for example, Herodotus speaks of the Hellenes as having "common shrines of the gods and sacrifices, and the same kinds of customs."
Walter Burkert was a German scholar of Greek mythology and cult.
In Greek mythology, Antiope was the daughter of the Boeotian river god Asopus, according to Homer; in later sources she is called the daughter of the "nocturnal" king Nycteus of Thebes or, in the Cypria, of Lycurgus, but for Homer her site is purely Boeotian. She was the mother of Amphion and Zethus.
The killer ape theory or killer ape hypothesis is the theory that war and interpersonal aggression was the driving force behind human evolution. It was originated by Raymond Dart in the 1950s; it was developed further in African Genesis by Robert Ardrey in 1961.
In ancient Greece, the Buphonia denoted a sacrificial ceremony performed at Athens as part of the Dipolieia, a religious festival held on the 14th of the midsummer month Skirophorion—in June or July—at the Acropolis. In the Buphonia a working ox was sacrificed to Zeus Polieus, Zeus protector of the city, in accordance with a very ancient custom. A group of oxen was driven forward to the altar at the highest point of the Acropolis. On the altar a sacrifice of grain had been spread by members of the family of the Kentriadae, on whom this duty devolved hereditarily. When one of the oxen began to eat, thus selecting itself for sacrifice, one of the family of the Thaulonidae advanced with an axe, slayed the ox, then immediately threw aside the axe and fled the scene of his guilt-laden crime.
Myth and ritual are two central components of religious practice. Although myth and ritual are commonly united as parts of religion, the exact relationship between them has been a matter of controversy among scholars. One of the approaches to this problem is "the myth and ritual, or myth-ritualist, theory," held notably by the so-called Cambridge Ritualists, which holds that "myth does not stand by itself but is tied to ritual." This theory is still disputed; many scholars now believe that myth and ritual share common paradigms, but not that one developed from the other.
In Ancient Greece, the Lykaia was an archaic festival with a secret ritual on the slopes of Mount Lykaion, the tallest peak in Arcadia. The rituals and myths of this primitive rite of passage centered upon an ancient threat of cannibalism and the possibility of a werewolf transformation for the epheboi who were the participants. The festival occurred yearly, probably at the beginning of May.
Violence and the Sacred is a 1972 book about the sacred by the French critic René Girard, in which the author explores the ritual role of sacrifice. The book received both positive reviews, which praised Girard's theory of the sacred, and more mixed assessments. Some commentators have seen the book as a work that expresses or points toward a Christian religious perspective. However, the book has also been seen as "atheistic" or "hostile to religion". Violence and the Sacred became highly influential, in anthropology, literary criticism, and even Christology. It has been compared to the classicist Walter Burkert's Homo Necans (1972). Girard further developed its ideas in a subsequent book, Things Hidden Since the Foundation of the World (1978).
The festival calendar of Classical Athens involved the staging of many festivals each year. This includes festivals held in honor of Athena, Dionysus, Apollo, Artemis, Demeter, Persephone, Hermes, and Herakles. Other Athenian festivals were based around family, citizenship, sacrifice, and women. There were at least 120 festival days each year.
Hunting magic is a form of magic used in hunter-gatherer societies that involves rock art in rituals to encourage a successful hunt. First observed among modern hunter-gatherers, it has been offered as a hypothesis to explain the purpose of ancient rock art from a functionalist approach. Proponents have pointed to violent imagery found in some rock art alongside animals as support for the hypothesis.
In ancient Roman religion, the October Horse was an animal sacrifice to Mars carried out on October 15, coinciding with the end of the agricultural and military campaigning season. The rite took place during one of three horse-racing festivals held in honor of Mars, the others being the two Equirria on February 27 and March 14.
African Genesis: A Personal Investigation into the Animal Origins and Nature of Man, usually referred to as African Genesis, is a 1961 nonfiction work by the American writer Robert Ardrey. It posited the hypothesis that man evolved on the African continent from carnivorous, predatory ancestors who distinguished themselves from apes by the use of weapons. The work bears on questions of human origins, human nature, and human uniqueness. Although some of his ideas were refuted by later science, it was widely read and continues to inspire significant controversy.
