Wandering in Ancient Greek CultureFrom the Archaic period to the Greco-Roman age, the figure of the wanderer held great significance in ancient Greece. In the first comprehensive study devoted to this theme, Wandering in Ancient Greek Culture unearths the many meanings attached to this practice over the centuries. Employing a broad range of literary and philosophical texts, Silvia Montiglio demonstrates how wandering has been conceptualized from Homer's Odysseus—the hero "who wandered much"—in the eighth century BCE to pagan sages of the early Roman Empire such as Saint John the Baptist in the first century AD. Attitudes toward wandering have evolved in accordance with cultural perspectives, causing some characterizations to persist while others have faded. For instance, the status of wanderers in Greek societies varied from outcasts and madmen to sages, who were recognized as mystical, even divine. Examining the act of wandering through many lenses, Wandering in Ancient Greek Culture shows how the transformation of the wanderer coincided with new perceptions of the world and of travel and invites us to consider its definition and import today. |
Contents
1 Wandering in Space and Time | 6 |
2 Pains and Privations of Wandering | 24 |
3 Wandering and the Human Condition | 42 |
The Wandering of the Gods | 62 |
5 Itinerant Sages in Archaic and Classical Greece | 90 |
Herodotus and Ionian Theōria | 118 |
From Parmenides to Plato | 146 |
The Cynics | 180 |
Cosmic Citizens and Godlike Travelers | 204 |
10 Wandering in the Greek Novel | 220 |
What Greek Wanderers Did Not Do | 262 |
Bibliography | 268 |
Index | 284 |
Common terms and phrases
Aethiopica Anacharsis Apollo Apollonius Apollonius's Arrian Epictetus Athenian Athens audience Calasiris Callirhoe Charicleia Chariton’s Circe citizen contrast Cynic wanderer Delos dering Dio Chrysostom Dio’s Diogenes Laertius Dionysus Dionysus's divine driven earth Egypt Empedocles Epictetus Eros Eumaeus Euripides exile foreign Fusillo gods Greece Greek Heliodorus’s Hera Heracles Hermes hero Herodotus Herodotus’s Hesiod highlights homeless wandering Homeric Hymn human ideal Iliad interpretation Io’s island Ithaca itinerant journey knowledge Konstan land leave Leucippe and Clitophon lover mad wandering means Menelaus mind mortal movement myth narrate narrative Nonetheless novel Odysseus Odysseus’s Oedipus Oedipus the King Oedipus’s one’s oracle Orations Parmenides passage Phaeacians philosopher Philostratus Plato poet Prometheus Bound road sage says similarly Socrates Solon Sophists Sophocles soul Stoic story stranger suffering suggests tell Theagenes theo¯ria theōria tion tragedy truth voyage walking whereas wisdom world traveler Xenophon Zeus Zeus’s