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This introductory chapter begins with a description of the current state of interpretative >aporia surrounding Euripedes' plays, Children of Herakles and Suppliant Women. It argues that the widespread interpretative dismay about the form of the texts seems to follow from erroneous assumptions about their content. It is also argued that in the political plays, the pairings of seemingly opposite feminine types — good/bad, fetishized/uncanny, constructive/destructive — constitute a coherent structural device with particular implications for political theorizing.

This chapter analyses the play, Children of Herakles. The play is a drama of displacement, underscoring the problematics of place — the priorities and codes that govern religious, political, and social space. It opens with a shocking violation of the religious space represented by the altar standing at the centre of the orkhestra; it traces the desperate flight of a hero's kin who, deprived by exile of their political status, are forced to wander from polis to polis; and its high point is the self-sacrifice of a young girl who, in order to perform her heroic deed, must cross the invisible but culturally well-guarded border between male and female spaces.

This chapter argues that Euripides' Children of Herakles and Suppliant Women should be studied together because both are remarkably similar products of a moment in the playwright's career and the history of Athens. That moment, in the early stages of a (Peloponnesian) War — a conflict with a foe who was ideologically and culturally different, if not in fact opposite — made those myths particularly suggestive as vehicles for re-examination of what it meant to be Athenian. It further argues that an understanding of these plays as living theatrical examples of the complex and elusive principle of negotiation can be key to viewing them as coherent and especially apt dramatic investigations of the nature of the democratic polis — which is to say, as truly ‘political’ plays.

This chapter discusses the myth contained in Pindar's Isthmian 6, in which Pindar tells the story of how Herakles, visiting Telamon to summon him for their expedition against Troy, prays to Zeus that his host will have a son who will be a great warrior, naming the child Ajax. The importance of the common exploits of Herakles and Telamon for Aegina is discussed, especially in light of the pedimental sculpture of the Temple of Aphaia, along with the increased prominence of Ajax in the Aeginetan tradition, which reveals revisionism of more ancient versions of the Ajax myth. Also of interest is the way in which the mythical narrative of the friendship between Herakles and the Aeginetan Aiakidai seems to mirror contemporary relations between Thebes and Aegina, as an aetiology for cultural and political ties, between Theban poet and Aeginetan patron, and between Thebes and Aegina more broadly.

This chapter offers an overview of the criteria by which Herakles has been categorised, both in antiquity and in modern scholarship, on the hero-to-god scale. Most recently the debate has focused particularly on cult practice, but other elements which need to be taken into account include the geographical extent of Herakles’ popularity, intimations of immortality in his heroic myth and, most crucially, the apotheosis story. It is this last which ultimately differentiates Herakles from all other ‘ambiguous’ hero-gods and articulates his exceptionally liminal status.

The Greeks were polytheists who believed in a multitude of gods. In the modern discussion of Greek religion the gods take second place to ritual, and the study of individual gods is privileged over attempts to define their general characteristics qua gods. While studies of the functions and personalities of gods like Apollo, Demeter, Dionysos or Herakles abound, no comprehensive treatment of the generic properties of the Greek gods exists. The question “What is Greek god?” is considered too ‘theological’ and therefore shunned. This chapter examines four divine qualities that are shared by all the Greek gods—their immortality, anthropomorphism, foreknowledge, and finally their power.

The paper treats the visualization of epiphany and theoxeny in ancient Greek art with particular reference to votive reliefs, such as those dedicated to Asklepios, Aphrodite, Herakles and the Dioskouroi. It discusses some images showing the direct encounter with the divine, most of them from the fifth and fourth century BC. It points out their significant characteristics and analyzes them, showing that different concepts of gods are reflected in different modes of epiphany.

This chapter applies spatial theory to the general themes of the poem. The Argo’s voyage involves a material, bodily experience of space, but it produces space by connecting the places on its itinerary as interrelated constituents of a spatial system. It defines that space also by tracing routes or “pathways” on the sea, and also because the Argonauts leave signs of their presence in places where they stop. These signs imply narratives of what they did, and these narratives explain landmarks or ritual and other cultural practices associated with the Argonauts and exemplary for later times. In these stories (called aitia by the Greeks), space and time fuse together, and space is a signifying system, as is the poem itself, which is self-reflexively identified with the voyage. The Argo is a mobile embodiment of Greek space, confronting the alterity of foreign places and peoples. Herakles’ random movement through space provides a contrast with the systematic production of it by Jason and the Argonauts.

This chapter discusses Greek and Phoenician (with Tyre’s central role) “colonial” networks. Colonization created the network-oriented, city-state culture of the ancient Mediterranean (contrasting with the ól, or “yoke” of the Near Eastern empires, in the words of Ezekiel). The chapter places special focus on the gods-heroes Herakles and Melqart, founders of dynasties and cities, as giving expression to notions of foundation, territorial appropriation, accommodating middle grounds, as well as irredentist claims. Analysis of sources (biblical and others) reveals those aspects that allowed for identifying the two. The grafting of Herakles onto specific sites of intended Greek colonization (especially western Sicily) sometimes followed preexisting networks established by Phoenicians. A polytheistic network allowed for translation and syncretism; it also transformed (even in Thasos, where Herakles was superimposed upon Melqart) the quintessential wandering and terrestrial Herakles into a city-associated and even maritime hero. Herakles provided irredentist “charters” for conquest (Dorieus) that could transform into a middle ground of common existence (Elymians, Phoenicians, Herakleia Minoa). His use by Greeks in the Mediterranean helped integrate the new colonies into Panhellenic networks of myth.

When the Lindians erected the stele with its inventories of votives and epiphanies by 99 BC, oral tradition about the antiquity and wealth of the sanctuary or city was not sufficient, as the Greek world was developing new ways of using written sources and discovering new texts to use in its study of the past. The Lindians had played a role in the adventures of Herakles, the Trojan War, the colonization to the coast of Asia Minor and to Magna Graecia, the Persian Wars, and the conquests of Alexander the Great. They bask in the reflected glory of their goddess, Athena Lindia, who is indisputably resident on their acropolis. The citation of sources reveals the Lindians grafting new ways of thinking onto traditional storytelling patterns. Pride in their past of military victories, colonising expeditions, and great heroes may have helped to compensate the Lindians for their place in the present.

The great importance of Alexander the Great's historical achievement for the development of Christianity has long been recognized. The notion of Alexander as a philosopher-king who strives for a Unity of Mankind has come under serious attack by scholarship since World War II. Yet the influence of Alexander on the world of myth and religion depended not solely on what he did, but also on what other people thought, told, and wrote about him. This book suggests a possible link connecting the life, career, and posthumous reputation of Alexander the Great with that of Jesus Christ. It treats Alexander both as a historical character and as a mythical one, but treats Jesus for his myth alone. It also examines the special relation between Alexander and his mythical ancestral hero Herakles and whether, and to what degree, the myth of Alexander could also influence the theology and mythology of the one who is to come. It concludes by arguing that Alexander was a flesh-and-blood character who broke the barrier between humanity and divinity, and is thus a unique forerunner of Christ.