CLA160H1 Lecture Notes - Rex Nemorensis, Latinus, Turnus
Document Summary
The golden bough is very important for the entire school of ritual theory. Frazer interprets a whole lot of myth and many stories are interpreted as distorted reflections of rituals. Particular to the golden bough involving death and rebirth. Orestes fleeing to italy to the grove of artemis. Hippolytus dying and then brought back to life and flees to italy where he is established as king of the grove in the cult of diana. Frazer would say that these myth explore the primitive rebirth (ritual slaying of old king, then symbolically reborn in the new king) The idea that myth reflects or reenacts ritual is central to frazer"s thinking in golden bough. He does not present myth as subordinate, but after him it is thought that myth is developed after ritual in order to explain. For frazer ritual and myth can start out side by side: the cyclical birth of fertility in the natural world and then death and regeneration.
