Product Description

This major addition to Blackwell’s Companions to the Ancient World series covers all aspects of religion in the ancient Greek world from the archaic, through the classical and into the Hellenistic period.

• Written by a panel of international experts
• Focuses on religious life as it was experienced by Greek men and women at different times and in different places
• Features major sections on local religious systems, sacred spaces and ritual, and the divine

Product Details

• Amazon Sales Rank: #1199398 in Books
• Published on: 2007-04-03
• Original language: German
• Number of items: 1
• Binding: Hardcover
• 520 pages

Review
"A splendid book at a not unreasonable price." (Reference Reviews, Issue 4 2008)

"Modestly aiming to offer a mere impression of such a vast field, and eschewing any specific intellectual agenda, Daniel Ogden has done an excellent job both in defining major topics for discussion and in commissioning a varied list of contributors, senior and junior, European and North American, classicists, archaeologists, and historians of religion…Ogden has done in excellent job." (Greece and Rome, Vol 55 No. 2 2008)

"…the Companion to Greek Religion is overall an excellent package of the best and most interesting research in Greek religion." (Scholia Reviews ns 17 2008)

"Blackwell ‘Companions’ have well–established reference potential defined by the breadth of scholarly perspectives presented. This volume offers…well–documented narrations, along with cross–referencing between them." (Choice)

"Covers all aspects of religion in the ancient Greek world…Each of the volume’s essays is written by an international expert…." (WordTrade.com)

"Blackwell maintains the high standard of its Companion series with these twenty seven essays … All in all, (there is) much excellent material here." (Journal of Classics Teaching)

From the Back Cover
A Companion to Greek Religion covers all aspects of religion in the ancient Greek world from the archaic, through the classical, and into the hellenistic period. Each of the volume’s 27 essays is written by an international expert and provides a survey of a particular area that reflects contemporary scholarship. All the contributions place an emphasis on religious life as it was experienced by Greek men and women at different times and in different places. Myth is considered alongside religion throughout.

The Companion opens with a review of the Near Eastern background to Greek religion. There follow major sections on the divine powers, communication with the divine, sacred space and time, local religious systems, social organisation and the family in religion, and mystery cults and magic. Further chapters consider the interaction between religion and art, literature, and philosophy. A closing chapter looks at the treatment of Greek religious themes in the cinema.

About the Author
Daniel Ogden is Professor of Ancient History at the University of Exeter. He is author of Magic, Witchcraft and Ghosts in the Greek and Roman Worlds (2002), Greek and Roman Necromancy (2001), and Greek Bastardy (1996), and editor of The Hellenistic World: New Perspectives (2002).