HUMA 1105 Lecture Notes - Lecture 3: Theogony, Oceanid, Boeotia
19 Nov 2014
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Many gods mentioned had no known cults (like atlas) Long lists of deities, such as the oceanid and neried nymphs, seem to have been his own creation. Anthropomorphism: the attribution of human characteristics to or behavior to gods, objects, animals, etc. Personification: the attribution of a personal nature, to something nonhuman; something nonhuman being portrayed as embodying certain qualities, characteristics, etc. Anthropomorphism & personification came easily to greeks, especially their poets, when speaking/writing about gods. Example: gaia means earth -> in theogony, gaia is the goddess of the earth -> anthropomorphism: the theogony can read more as cosmology, than poetry or history; however the. Greeks at the time would have expected an epic story, hence why hesiod may have personified the gods: hesiod"s theogony seems to have a two-fold concern: 1. to provide a history or origin of the gods, and how zeus came to hold ultimate power.
