Prophets and Profits: Ancient Divination and Its Reception

ISBN-13: 9780367594619 / Angielski / Miękka / 2020 / 254 str.

Richard Evans

Opis

Whether humans sought knowledge by applying to an oracle or whether they used soothsayers who interpreted specific signs there was a fundamental desire to know the will of the gods. This volume examines the ways in which divination linked mortals with the gods, and places the practice within the ancient socio-political and religious environment.

Spis treści

Chapter 1: Introduction

Daniel Ogden

Chapter 2: Was Didyma (Branchidae) a False Prophet?

Richard Evans

Chapter 3: ‘Who Wrote Greek Curse Tablets?’

Olivier Dufault

Chapter 4: A Story of Blood, Guts and Guesswork: Synthetic Reasoning in Classical Greek Divination

Ralph Anderson

Chapter 5: Value-Added Divination at Dodona

Philip Bosman

Chapter 6: Divination and Profit in the Roman World

Federico Santangelo

Chapter 7: Profiting from Prophecy: Q. Marcius Rex and the Construction of the Aqua Marcia

Alex Nice

Chapter 8: Valerius Maximus and the Language of Stars

Jeffrey Murray

Chapter 9: "Arrows Fletched from Our Own Wings": Discovering a ‘Delphi of the Mind’ in the Writings of the Early Church Fathers

Daniel Crosby

Chapter 10: Egyptian Necromancy in Heliodorus Aethiopica (6.12-15) and The Witch of Endor Narrative (1 Sam 28)

John Hilton

Chapter 11: Sosipatra: Prophetess, Philosopher and Theurgist: Reflections on Divination and Epistemology in Late Antiquity

Crystal Addey

Chapter 12: One Oracle too Many? Corippus and Procopius on Female Prophecy in North Africa

Martine de Marre

Chapter 13: Deconstructing Divination: Superstition, Anticlericalism, and Cicero’s De Divinatione in Enlightenment England

Katherine East

Chapter 14: Prophecy and Paul Kruger: Robert Grendon’s Appropriation of Greco-Roman Prophets and Prophetic Devices in his South African Epic, Paul Kruger’s Dream

Szerdi Nagy

Chapter 15: Cassandra Prophesies Back: Marion Zimmer Bradley’s Firebrand

Elke Steinmeyer

O autorze

Richard Evans has taught at the Universities of South Africa and Cardiff. His research has focused on the political and military history of Greece and Rome, and the ancient topography of Sicily and Magna Graecia. He is currently an Honorary Research Fellow in the Department of Biblical and Ancient Studies at the University of South Africa.