1 - Localism and the Study of Ancient Greek Religion: The Example of the Divine Persona

Summary

This chapter explores how the local dimension of ancient Greek religion has featured in Classical scholarship. Kindt argues that the problem of location is intrinsic to the structure of ancient Greek religion, which, in the absence of traditional locations of authority, had multiple centres and peripheries. The way in which the Greeks conceived of the personalities of the gods and goddesses is a case in point: the idea of a unified existence as implied in the concept of the divine persona is challenged by the multiplicity of ways in which one and the same deity manifested itself in the human world. Three different ways in which Classical scholars have conceived of the categories of the local in relation to the Greek divine persona come into the picture here: as a realisation of the general, as the place at which variation occurs, and as two dynamic forces that variously intersect in different locations at which ancient Greek religion manifests itself.