Can y'all recommend me some books or other sources on the Greek underworld?

by das_pope

Hi y'all,

So I'm doing a research paper on the Ancient Greek view of death, centered around passages from Homer's Odyssey. I've got a few great sources already (I'll list them below), but I was hoping y'all could point out some other good places to look--My university's library catalog is horrendous and has revealed very few helpful sources. I'm hoping to stick closer to the time period of Homeric thought, but so far I haven't found many sources centering around his time, so my research bleeds up to Plato and Sophocles.

Anything y'all think might be useful would help, thanks!

So far, the sources I have include:

Homer's The Odyssey, translated by Robert Fagles

Sophocles' Antigone, Translated by Robert Fagles

The Greek Myths by Robin Waterfield

Hades: the History, Origins, and Evolution of the Greek God by Jesse Harasta

Plato's The Republic, translated by Allan Bloom

rosemary85

Ditch the Hades book, it looks pretty junky. And with this topic, primary sources are not the right place to start. Try these:

  • Clarke, M. 1999. Flesh and Spirit in the Songs of Homer. Oxford.
  • Garland, R. 1985. The Greek Way of Death. Cornell.
  • Morris, I. 1992. Death-ritual and Social Structure in Classical Antiquity. Cambridge.
  • Sourvinou-Inwood, C. 1995. "Reading" Greek Death to the End of the Classical Period. Oxford.
  • Vermeule, E. 1979. Aspects of Death in Early Greek Art and Poetry. Berkeley.
  • Vernant, J.-P. 1981. "Death with two faces." Tr. Janet Lloyd. In S. C. Humphries and H. King (eds.) Mortality and Immortality: The Anthropology and Archaeology of Death, London, 285-291; = S. Schein (ed.) 1996, Reading the Odyssey: Selected Interpretive Essays, Princeton, 55-61.

Avoid anything older than Emily Vermeule's book.

Edit. Given your description, and for the sake of completeness in research, you might also need

  • Griffin, J. 1980. Homer on Life and Death. Oxford.

but don't rely on it.

Edit 2. Another addition:

  • Sourvinou-Inwood, C. 1981. "To die and enter the house of Hades: Homer, before and after." In J. Whaley (ed.) Mirrors of Mortality: Studies in the Social History of Death, London, 15-39.

And a final note: do not under any circumstances take Odyssey 11.488-91 as a statement of typical Greek views on death.

Edit 3. Yet more additions: articles, this time, and a couple of pieces on mystery cults.

  • Bernabé, A. 2009. "Imago inferorum Orphica." In G. Casadio, P. A. Johnston (eds.) Mystic Cults in Magna Graecia, Texas, 95-130.
  • Cole, S. G. 2003. "Landscapes of Dionysos and Elysian fields." In M. B. Cosmopoulos (ed.) Greek Mysteries: the Archaeology and Ritual of Ancient Greek Secret Cults, Routledge, 193-217.
  • Gainsford, P. 2008. "Achilles' views on death: succession and the Odyssey." Classical Bulletin 84: 7-26.
  • Hardie, A. 2005. "Sappho, the Muses, and life after death." Zeitschrift für Papyrologie und Epigraphik 154: 13-32.
  • Segal, C. 1992. "Euripides' Alcestis: female death and male tears." Classical Antiquity 11: 142-58.

That'll probably be enough to keep you going.