Girls and Women in Classical Greek Religion
by Matthew Dillon
Routledge | July 2003 | ISBN-10: 0415319161 | 447 Pages | PDF | 13.5 mb
https://www.amazon.com/Girls-Women-Classical-Greek-Religion/dp/0415319161
It has often been thought that participation in fertility rituals was women's most important religious activity in classical Greece. Matthew Dillon's wide-ranging study makes it clear that women engaged in numerous other rites and cults, and that their role in Greek religion was actually more important than that of men. Women invoked the gods' help in becoming pregnant, venerated the god of wine, worshipped new and exotic deities, used magic for both erotic and pain-relieving purposes, and far more besides.
Clear and comprehensive, this volume challenges many stereotypes of Greek women and offers unexpected insights into their experience of religion. With more than fifty illustrations, and translated extracts from contemporary texts, this is an essential resource for the study of women and religion in classical Greece.
About the Author
Matthew Dillon is a Senior Lecturer at the University of New England, Armidale, Australia. His interest areas include Greek history and society, especially religion. He is the author of Pilgrims and Pilgrimage in Ancient Greece (Routledge, 1997), co-author with Lynda Garland of Ancient Greece, Social and Historical Times from Archaic Times to the Death of Socrates (Routledge 1994, second edition, 2000), and editor of Religion in the Ancient World, New Themes and Approaches (Hakkert, 1996).
CONTENTS
List of illustrations vii
Preface x
Introduction 1
PART I - Public religious roles for girls and women 7
1 Women as dedicators 9
2 The public religious roles of girls and adolescent women in Athens 37
3 Women priests 73
PART II - Segregated and ecstatic religious rites 107
4 Women-only festivals 109
5 Women at the margins of Greek religion 139
6 Prostitutes, foreign women and the gods 183
PART III - Sacrificial and domestic rituals 209
7 From adolescent girl to woman, wife and mother 211
8 Women, sacrifice and impurity 236
9 Women and the corpse: mourning rituals 268
Epilogue 293
Notes 301
Glossary 369
Abbreviations 372
Bibliography 380
Index 403
