An interesting neolithic figure from Dimini - near Volos. This thing is somewhere between 4,000 and 5,000 years old!
Another neolithic figurine. Quite the pose, I think.
The unbelievably charming village of Makranitsa, on Mt. Pelion where the Centaurs are supposed to have lived. There are springs and fountains all over the place; you can see a good sized fountain on the right. The mountain must be full of water.
This is the view from Mikranitsa. That's a city called Volos below.
A piece of a grave stele with a nicely preserved painted scene of a girl at an altar. Volos has several examples of painted grave stones that have survived since ca. 3rd century BC.
Again, these are over 2200 years old.
An Orphic inscription on a sheet of gold foil from the same graveyard as the paintings above. The diagram below shows the text on the gold. This contains instructions for the deceased on how to get to the happy part of the afterlife.
I haven't studied the text closely (it's not easy to read), but I did recognize words like 'heavens' and 'earth' - as well as some words I'm pretty sure are mumbo-jumbo magic words.
3 comments:
Uh, I think we'd like a little more detail on that "happiness-in-the-afterlife" stuff! :)
Wouldn't we all. In a nutshell, during the Hellenistic Age (ca. 330-30 BC), people began looking for a more personalized form of religion than the normal state cults offered. So, they turned to 'mystery' cults. Only those who were initiated could know the secrets, and one of the them was always the secret words, signs, and rituals that would allow a departed soul to navigate the terrors and dangers of the next world and come to some place safe and happy.
Details of this happy place are (understandably) vague. Furthermore, these cults were very secretive and so we have very few sources for their rituals. The chorus of Aristophanes' play "The Frogs" is made up of Eleusinian Mysteries initiates who are happy in the underworld. They give as good of an idea as anything we have concerning mystery cult beliefs.
It's similar to Egyptian "Book of the Dead" and gnostic Christian beliefs which were often buried with the deceased as a crib sheet, I suppose.
I would guess this text has a prayer and a few magic words for the initiate to use on his/her way to the Elysian fields or wherever. I promise to give it more attention when I'm freezing my tail off this winter and not enjoying summertime in Greece.
The most popular mystery cult was the Elusinian mysteries, but the Orphics were important as well. The cult of Mithras - although not precisely the same type of cult - is a savior-religion, where a god/man comes to earth to save mankind from a deadly drought by spilling the blood of a great bull. Savior religions were popular during the centuries surrounding the life of Christ; many consider Christianity merely another Savior-religion.
I'm rambling here . . . you were probably just teasing anyway, but I find it a really interesting subject.
I was only half-teasing and I'm glad you said more -- this is fascinating stuff. And don't worry about the cold Pennsylvania winter -- you'll probably still have that tan to keep you warm!
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