The Mycenaean Origin of Greek Mythology
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THE MYCENAEAN ORIGIN OF GREEK MYTHOLOGY BY MARTIN P. NILSSON 1932 The Mycenaean Origin of Greek Mythology by Martin P. Nilsson. This edition was created and published by Global Grey ©GlobalGrey 2018 globalgreyebooks.com CONTENTS Chapter 1. How Old Is Greek Mythology? CHAPTER 2. MYCENAEAN CENTERS AND MYTHOLOGICAL CENTERS Introduction 1. Argolis 2. Laconia 3. The Dominion Of Pylos 4. The Rest Of The Peloponnese 5. The Ionian Islands 6. Southern Boeotia 7. Northern Boeotia And Thessaly 8. Attica 9. Conclusion Chapter 3. Heracles Chapter 4. Olympus 1 CHAPTER 1. HOW OLD IS GREEK MYTHOLOGY? The question: How old is Greek mythology? may at first sight seem idle, for Greek mythology is obviously of many different ages. For example, many genealogies and eponymous heroes created for political purposes are late, such inventions having been made through the whole historical age of Greece; yet most of them are earlier than the very late myths like the campaigns of Dionysus, or the great mass of the metamorphoses, especially the catasterisms, which were invented in the Hellenistic age. The great tragic poets reshaped the myths and left their imprint upon them, so that the forms in which the myths are commonly known nowadays often have been given them by tragedy. Similarly, before the tragic poets, the choric lyric poets reshaped them. The cyclical epics also are thought to have exercised a profound influence upon the remodeling of the myths. In Homer we find many well-known myths, often in forms differing, however, from those in which they are related later. Finally, it cannot be doubted that myths existed before Homer. Our question concerns, however, not the reshaping and remodeling of myths, which often consists only of an imitation of current patterns, but the real creation of myths, especially the creation of the great cycles of myths. From this standpoint, the Hellenistic and many earlier myths may be put to one side. The tragic poets hardly invent new myths but do reshape old ones, often in a very thorough fashion, and the same is to be said of the choric lyric poets. For the glory and fame of ancient poets depended not, like that of modern poets, on their invention of something quite new and original, but rather on their presentation of the old traditional material in new and original fashion. Consequently our question concerns the old stock of mythology after all secondary inventions have been discarded and is really not so idle as may appear at first glance. In fact various attempts have been made to give an answer, although the question has not been put so simply and straightforwardly as it is here, but has been enveloped in inquiries and 2 reasonings having other purposes. The point, however, which I wish to emphasize is the importance of the principles which underlie our research and determine our procedure. I pass over comparative mythology very lightly, because it began to lose favor in my youth, thirty years ago or more, and nowadays is very little reckoned with in scientific discussion. But I should like to draw attention to one point of some interest in this connection. Comparative mythology was so called because it compared Greek myths with those of other Aryan peoples and by this means tried to discover the original myths and religion of the Aryan people from whom the peoples of Europe and some peoples of Asia are descended, just as comparative philology discovered by similar means that the languages of these peoples were derived from the language once spoken by the old Aryans. The underlying supposition was clearly that the Greek myths were pre-Greek in the sense that the Greeks had taken them over from the Aryans and brought them with them when they immigrated into Greece. Comparative mythology overlooked, however, the very important distinction between divine and heroic mythology and thought erroneously that the heroic myths were derived from the same source as the myths concerning the gods. This source it found in the phenomena of nature. If the view of comparative mythology were right, these lectures would really be pointless, for then it must needs be admitted that Greek mythology existed not only in the pre-Homeric age but also before the Greeks immigrated into Greece. But since the seventies of the last century the whole problem has been extraordinarily deepened and complicated. We have learned to distinguish between religion and mythology and we have learned to know a new epoch of Greece which cannot be considered as wholly prehistoric in the usual sense of the word-- the Mycenaean age. Max Müller and his followers condemned Euhemerism, but this theory has come to the fore again in recent years. In my opinion the reaction is just but goes too far. Certain English scholars take mythology as reproducing actual historical facts, just as the logographers did when they brought the myths into a historical system. They do not, of course, overlook the fabulous elements of the myths but think that the mythical persons and such exploits 3 as are not of a fabulous character are good history, and they go so far as to accept without question the mythical genealogies and the mythical chronology. I am unable to do this. I know and appreciate the tenacity of folk memory, but I know also how popular tradition is preserved--and confused and remodeled. The remodeling affects especially the chronological relations of the personages, which are changed freely.1 In so far as epical tradition is concerned, the right analogy is not the traditions which have an historical aspect but the Nibelungenlied and the Beowulf and similar epical traditions which I shall characterize later. We know how badly historical connections fared in them, how history was confused and mixed up with fabulous elements. If good historical tradition is to be preserved, an undisturbed life both in regard to settling and to civilization is an absolute condition, but the downfall of the Mycenaean civilization was a most stormy and turbulent age, and its turmoils, which mixed up the Greek tribes and changed their places of settlement, mixed up and confused their traditions, too. The historical aspect of Greek mythology and especially the mythical chronology are products of the systematizing of the myths by the poets of cyclical epics and still more the product of rationalization and historification by the logographers.2 A very different standpoint is taken by German scholars, whose preoccupation is a historical treatment of the myths; in opposition to the theories of comparative mythology, this school is called the historical school. The answer given by this school is not so simple as that proposed by nature mythology. I must therefore try to clear up the underlying principles to the best of my ability, although the numerous works of the school often are contradictory in details and it is very difficult to do full justice in a short analysis of principles. The historical school acknowledges that elements of myths existed in an early period, before the development of epic poetry, but supposes that 1 See my article "Ueber die Glaubwürdigkeit der Volksüberlieferung bes. in Bezug auf die alte Geschichte" in the Italian periodical Scientia, 1930, pp. 319 et seq. 2 The lectures of one of my predecessors in the Sather professorship, Professor Myres, came into my hands through the kindness of the author after my lectures had already been written down. Professor Myres thinks that heroic genealogy makes up a fairly reliable chronological scheme. My different standpoint I hope to justify in the following pages. I have tried to take justly into account the circumstances of time, of popular tradition, and of the transmission of epic poetry. 4 these rather simple elements were brought into connection with one another and composed so as to form more complex myths through the agency of poetry. From this process a very deep-going reshaping and even creation of myths resulted. The poetry to which this creative expanding of mythology is ascribed is the epic poetry; viz., the Homeric and post-Homeric epics, the cyclical epics, and many lost epics of which we have only a scanty and fragmentary knowledge. Further, it is reasonably inferred that epics existed also before Homer and were used in composing the extant Homeric poems. The historical school assumes not only a remodeling and reshaping of myths but indeed a creation of cycles of myths--and that is what concerns us here-- for it is supposed that the mythical cycles came into being through the union of various simple mythical elements. If this process were ascribed to the Mycenaean age, I should have little to say against it; but as it is ascribed to the Homeric and the immediately preceding and following periods, I must disagree. I shall use a few examples to illustrate the methods of the historical school and the discrepancies to which they lead. Several years ago Professor Friedländer tried to trace the development of the Heracles cycle. 3 According to his theory, the fundamental fact is the belief of the Tirynthians in their helpful hero. From the Peloponnese, Heracles emigrated to the island of Rhodes and here new adventures were added to those which had been brought from the Peloponnese. Thus the cycle of the twelve adventures was developed and formed on Rhodes. The most comprehensive and significant example, however, is Professor Bethe's attempt to explain the origin and development of the Trojan cycle.4 He finds the old kernels of this cycle in the duels between heroes who, according to him, were originally localized on the mainland of Greece. These simple and unconnected myths were brought to Aeolia by the different tribes to which the heroes belonged when these tribes immigrated to northwest Asia Minor shortly before or in the seventh century B.C.