This book speaks to all those with an interest in the question of the human in its relation to the non-human. More specifically, it illustrates how the ancient world mobilized concepts of ‘the animal’ and ‘animality’ to conceive of the human in a variety of ways. To this end, it offers ten essayistic interventions into ways of ‘thinking the human’ that reach from antiquity to the present in the ultimate aim to challenge our understanding of who we really are.

In the past, architectural change in Archaic Greece was often explained as a somehow natural, coherent evolution from “primitive” wooden structures to sophisticated stone temples. Following the ancient writer Vitruvius, modern authors have attempted to demonstrate that the architectural orders, in particular the Doric, can be traced back to functional necessities typical of wooden buildings. While this explanation of the Doric order has long been questioned, few attempts have been made to explore alternative explanations. The chapter lays out a methodology to analyze architectural change by asking how the experience of sacred spaces and landscapes changed and who were the social groups interested in promoting such change. The chapter highlights the kinetic and multisensorial dimension of the experience of space and architecture, as stressed also by authors from other fields. Further, a survey of recent contributions to the study of the Doric and Ionic orders suggests that they emerged suddenly in the early sixth century BC, rather than evolving slowly over centuries. The emergence of the Doric order went hand in hand with the emergence of architectural sculpture on pediments and friezes. By looking at a series of case studies the book aims to shed light on the relation between the various transformation processes.

The sanctuary of Apollo at Delphi offers an example of how an ancient cult site was transformed into a Panhellenic sanctuary as a result of political and military conflicts involving some of the leading city-states of the region. After the so-called First Sacred War in the 590s/80s BC, Delphi was launched as the center of the Greek world with its oracle and its Panhellenic games. The Doric style of the Apollo temple and other buildings on the site helped to communicate the ambitions and values of the amphictyony that was in charge of the administration of the sanctuary after the war. The standardization of architecture and sculpture was an important feature in the elite competition that took place in Panhellenic sanctuaries like Delphi, where cities from all over Greece set up costly treasuries and votive statues. Ionic monuments such as the sphinx of the Naxians alternated with Doric buildings. On the basis of recent scholarship, the Ionic order can be interpreted as a regional variation of the “Panhellenic” Doric order. As can be shown, the Ionic order corresponds with cultural values such as abundance, variety, multilingualism, and openness toward Near-Eastern and Egyptian influences that are also characteristic of Ionian poetry, philosophy, and culture.

This chapter alerts readers of the shortcomings of a mining approach to Pausanias’ Periegesis as a prime evidence for the study of local religion in ancient Greece. The question of where local specificities are discussed in the narrative is as critical as the actual information conveyed. The chapter speaks to the analytical challenge of interpreting a narrative that is, on the one hand, reflective of the non-linear and essentially decentralised nature of the local, yet on the other filters this nature through the linear rigours of writing. Starting from fleeting experiences of the local, highly subjective to the individual that makes them, Hawes turns to an exemplary discussion of Argos, Thebes, and Messenia that exposes the mechanics of a scripted localism, a literary approximation to place. The discussion of Pausanias’ localistic perspective extends to the narrative technique of cross references and to instances where such connections were deliberately denied: the case in point being Pausanias’ treatment of the notorious problem of the location of Homeric Pylos.

This chapter alerts readers of the shortcomings of a mining approach to Pausanias’ Periegesis as a prime evidence for the study of local religion in ancient Greece. The question of where local specificities are discussed in the narrative is as critical as the actual information conveyed. The chapter speaks to the analytical challenge of interpreting a narrative that is, on the one hand, reflective of the non-linear and essentially decentralised nature of the local, yet on the other filters this nature through the linear rigours of writing. Starting from fleeting experiences of the local, highly subjective to the individual that makes them, Hawes turns to an exemplary discussion of Argos, Thebes, and Messenia that exposes the mechanics of a scripted localism, a literary approximation to place. The discussion of Pausanias’ localistic perspective extends to the narrative technique of cross references and to instances where such connections were deliberately denied: the case in point being Pausanias’ treatment of the notorious problem of the location of Homeric Pylos.

“The Dioskouroi in Existential Crisis,” deals with Nemean 10 and its extended mythical narrative. That myth is an aitiology of the entry of Kastor and Polydeukes into immortality, framed as a choice made by Polydeukes between claiming immortality for himself or sharing both mortality and immortality with his brother. I argue that Pindar’s epinician aitiology intervenes in and revalues enduring ambiguities surrounding the relationship of the Dioskouroi to mortality and immortality by valorizing Polyedeukes’ perspective, which privileges the parameters of mortal experience. This case study emphasizes the resonances evoked by the structure of the ode itself between the disorientation of the Dioskouroi from mortal experience and from the surrounding contexts of the ode.

This chapter deals with local narrative traditions and the ritual acts associated with local sanctuaries (to the extent to which these can be fruitfully investigated) of Hera, whose cult titles Teleia and Basileia echo how she is portrayed in the archaic epic poetry. This is notably the case at Argos, Samos, and Perachora, where important sanctuaries of the goddess are located outside the city centre, but also in Olympia, ‘the Olympus on earth’, where the first monumental temple of the Panhellenic sanctuary of Zeus is associated with her. Her cults in Plataia, Delos, Lesbos, Corinth, Athens, and western Greece shows how her roles of spouse and sovereign overlap and to some extent come to be confused because of her complex relation to Zeus. This relation is crucial to understanding the expectations of Hera’s worshippers, although in a certain number of places the connection with Zeus is not made fully explicit.