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Der Fuß des Dionysos – eine „griechische Frage“

  • Renate Schlesier
Published/Copyright: June 25, 2012
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Abstract

The article focuses on a cultic hymn to Dionysos, transmitted in no. 36 of Plutarch’s Greek Questions. I read this unique testimony, as others have done, mainly against the background of Pausanias’ Description of Greece, books 5 und 6. But my results differ from former treatments and are especially the following: 1) Plutarch’s assertion that “the women of Elis” sing the hymn to Dionysos is to be understood literally; as in Pausanias, the women of Elis are not identical with the Elean college of the Sixteen Women. 2) The topographical reference in the hymn (“temple by the sea”) has to be taken seriously; the conjecture “temple of the Eleans” is not justified. 3) The women of Elis invoke Dionysos to make his epiphany as hero among them “with ox-foot”, and not “with bull-foot”; the invocation “noble bull”, at the end of the hymn, points to a cultic restitution of the god and has sexual implications.

Keywords: Stier; Ochse; Heros; Meer; sexuell
Published Online: 2012-06-25
Published in Print: 2012-06

© by Akademie Verlag, Berlin, Germany

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