To Receive Information from the Dead
To Receive Information from the Dead

Summary/Abstract: The paper makes a comparative analysis of the retrieval of information from the dead through the magical rite described in the Odyssey and in the adventurous love novel An Ethiopian story (Aethiopica – Ethiopian Story or Theagenes and Chariclea) by Heliodorus. In Odyssey (Hom. Od. 10. 504–541 Fuchs), the sorceress Circe teaches Odysseus how to go to the entrance of the kingdom of Hades and Persephone, and what ritual actions to perform in order to learn from the Teiresias how to return home. In Aethiopica (The Ethiopian Story or Theagenes and Chariclea), Heliodorus (6. 13–14) recounts the ritual acts performed by the sorceress to summon his dead son back from the world of the Beyond in order to ask him if his brother is alive and well. The similarities and differences in the two rites are discussed. The comparison between two written sources with almost a thousand years of difference between them allows one to observe an inherited magical practice, and the change of attitude towards it in the value system.The paper makes a comparative analysis of the retrieval of information from the dead through the magical rite described in the Odyssey and in the adventurous love novel An Ethiopian story (Aethiopica – Ethiopian Story or Theagenes and Chariclea) by Heliodorus. In Odyssey (Hom. Od. 10. 504–541 Fuchs), the sorceress Circe teaches Odysseus how to go to the entrance of the kingdom of Hades and Persephone, and what ritual actions to perform in order to learn from the Teiresias how to return home. In Aethiopica (The Ethiopian Story or Theagenes and Chariclea), Heliodorus (6. 13–14) recounts the ritual acts performed by the sorceress to summon his dead son back from the world of the Beyond in order to ask him if his brother is alive and well. The similarities and differences in the two rites are discussed. The comparison between two written sources with almost a thousand years of difference between them allows one to observe an inherited magical practice, and the change of attitude towards it in the value system.

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