Studies in Early Greek Theology

This volume gathers twenty-five essays by Jenny Strauss Clay on how the archaic Greeks conceptualized the divine and humanity's place in the post-Promethean world. Together with her monographs, these essays have over the past decades shaped our understanding of early Greek theology as it finds expression above all in archaic hexameter poetry. Part I is concerned with cosmogony, theogony, and cosmography. Its chapters ask how the mortal bard comes by the authority to narrate the early stages of the cosmos and to describe regions - such as Tartaros - that lie beyond ordinary human experience. Taken together, they trace a set of reflections that interrogate the traditional source of poetic authority, the Muses. A related epistemological question concerns how such knowledge, once acquired, can be communicated at all. Part II turns to the world of the gods. Particular attention is paid to the concept of religion in these texts and to the organization of the cosmos under Zeus, the role of justice, and the distribution of honors among the gods. Part III explores the relationship between gods and mortals in archaic poetry, taking up the epistemological divide between them, hero cult, and the so-called 'heroic code'. Taken as a whole, the volume presents a philosophical theology that engages crucial moments of archaic reflection on the cosmos, the divine, the place of mortals in the world, the authority of knowledge, and the correctness of language.

Introduction
Part I: Cosmogony, Theogony, Cosmography
Chapter 1
Commencing Cosmogony and the Rhetoric of Poetic Authority
First published in Fuhrer, T. and Erler, M. (eds.) 2015. Cosmologies et cosmogonies dans la littérature antique (Entretiens 61, Fondation Hardt, 2015), Vandœuvres/Geneva, 105-47.
Chapter 2
The Hittite Song of Emergence and Hesiod's Theogony
First published Philologus 158 (2014) 1-9.
Chapter 3
A Stroll through Hesiod's Tartarus
First published in Christopoulos, M. and Paizi-Apostolopoulou, M. (eds.) 2019. The Upper and the Under World in Homeric and Archaic Epic. Proceedings of the 13th International Symposium on the Odyssey. Ithaca, 393-412.
Chapter 4
Typhoeus or Cosmic Regression (Theogony 821-880)
An earlier version was published in Chesi, G. M. and Spiegel, F. (eds.) 2020. Classical Literature and Posthumanism. London, 133-40. A slightly modified version of this chapter appeared in Archiv für Religionswissenschaft 21-22 (2020) 313-26.
Part II: The World of the gods
Chapter 5
Homeric Religion
First published in Pache, C. (ed.), in association with Dué, C., Lupack, S., and Lamberton, R. 2020. The Cambridge Guide to Homer. Cambridge, 245-56.
Chapter 6
Theology and Religion in the Homeric Hymns
First published in Bouchon, R., Brillet-Dubois, P. and Le Meur-Weissman, N. (eds.) 2013. Hymnes de la Grèce antique. Approches littéraires et historiques. Actes du colloque international de Lyon, 19-21 juin 2008. Lyon, 315-22.
Chapter 7
Zeus's Politics in the Iliad, or: Zeus, the Godfather
Chapter 8
The Justice of Zeus in the Theogony?
First published in Clauss, J. J., Cuypers, M., and Kahane, A. (eds.) 2016. The Gods in Greek Hexameter Poetry. Stuttgart, 21-31.
Chapter 9
How to Deal with Difficult Goddesses: Nyx, Styx, and Hecate
First published in Tulli, M. (ed.) 2020. Graziano Arrighetti e la produzione letteraria dei Greci. Atti del convegno (Pisa, 9-10 gennaio 2018). Rome, 47-60.
Chapter 10
The Silence of the Pythia
First published in Athanassaki, L. Martin, R. P., and Miller, J. F. (eds.) 2009. Apolline Politics and Poetics: International Symposium. Athens, 5-15.
Chapter 11
Hide and Go Seek: Hermes in Homer
First published in Miller, J. F. and Strauss Clay, J. (eds.) 2019. Tracking Hermes, Pursuing Mercury. Oxford/New York, 67-78.
Chapter 12
Sappho's Hesperus and Hesiod's Dawn
First published in Philologus 124 (1980) 302-5.
Chapter 13
Fusing the Boundaries: Apollo and Dionysos at Delphi
First published in Mètis. Anthropologie des mondes grecs anciens 11 (1996) 83-100.
Part III: Gods, Heroes, and Men
Chapter 14
The Whip and Will of Zeus
First published in Literary Imagination 1 (1999) 40-60.
Chapter 15
Δέμαςand Αὐδή: The Nature of Divine Transformation in Homer
First published in Hermes 102 (1974) 129-36.
Chapter 16
Immortal and Ageless Forever
First published in Classical Journal 77 (1981-82) 112-17.
Chapter 17
Aeolia, or Under the Sign of the Circle
First published in Classical Journal 80 (1985) 289-93.
Chapter 18
The Πλαγκταί and Μῶλυ: Divine Naming and Knowing in Homer
First published in Hermes 100 (1972) 127-32.
Chapter 19
Doubletalk: Divine and Human Language from Homer to Parmenides
Chapter 20
The Triads of Olympian 2: God, Hero, Man, Past, Present, Future, and Geography
Chapter 21
The Beginning and End of the Catalogue of Women and its Relation to Hesiod
First published in Hunter, R. L. (ed.) 2005. The Hesiodic Catalogue of Women: Constructions and Reconstructions. Cambridge, 25-34.
Chapter 22
How to Be a Hero: The Case of Sarpedon
First published in Karamalengou, E. and Makrygianni, E. (eds.) 2009. Ἀντιφίλησις. Studies on Classical, Byzantine and Modern Greek Literature and Culture in Honour of John-Theophanes Papademetriou. Stuttgart, 30-8.
Chapter 23
Achilles Inaugurates His Cult
First published in Greece & Rome 72 (2025) 38-64
Chapter 24
Last Tango in Ogygia: Divine and Human in Odyssey 5
A version of this paper appeared in Classical Journal 121.1 (2025)
Chapter 25
The New Simonides and Homer's Hemitheoi
First published in Boedeker, D. and Sider, D. (eds.) 2001. The New Simonides: Contexts of Praise and Desire. Oxford/New York, 243-5.