For millennia, people have universally engaged in ecstatic experience as an essential element in ritual practice, spiritual belief and cultural identification. This volume offers the first systematic investigation of its myriad roles and manifestations in the ancient Mediterranean and Near East.
The twenty-nine contributors represent a broad range of scholarly disciplines, seeking answers to fundamental questions regarding the patterns and commonalities of this vital aspect of the past. How was the experience construed and by what means was it achieved? Who was involved? Where and when were its rites carried out? How was it reflected in pictorial arts and written records? What was its relation to other components of the sociocultural compact? In proposing responses, the authors draw upon a wealth of original research in many fields, generating new perspectives and thought-provoking, often surprising, conclusions. With their abundant cross-cultural and cross-temporal references, the chapters mutually enrich each other and collectively deepen our understanding of ecstatic phenomena thousands of years ago. Another noteworthy feature of the book is its illustrative content, including commissioned reconstructions of ecstatic scenarios and pairings of works of Bronze Age and modern psychedelic art.
Scholars, students and other readers interested in antiquity, comparative religion and the social and cognitive sciences will find much to explore in the fascinating realm of ecstatic experience in the ancient world.
Author(s): Diana L. Stein, Sarah Kielt Costello, Karen Polinger Foster
Publisher: Routledge
Year: 2021
Language: English
Pages: 632
City: London
Cover
Half Title
Title Page
Copyright Page
Table of Contents
List of Illustrations
List of Contributors
Acknowledgments
Foreword
Introduction
PART ONE: Setting the Stage
1 Contextualizing the Study of Ecstatic Experience in Ancient Old World Societies
2 Not Only Ecstasy: Pouring New Concepts into Old Vessels
3 From Shamans to Sorcerers: Empirical Models for Defining Ritual Practices and Ecstatic Experience in Ancient, Medieval and Modern Societies
PART TWO: Psychoactive Substances Past and Present
4 Psychoactive Plants in the Ancient World: Observations of an Ethnobotanist
5 Ecstasy Meets Paleoethnobotany: Botanical Stimulants in Ancient Inner Asia
6 Caucasian Cocktails: The Early Use of Alcohol in “The Cradle of Wine”
7 Mind-altering Plants in Babylonian Medical Sources
8 Plant-based Potions and Ecstatic States in Hittite Rituals
9 Forbidden at Philae: Proscription of Aphrodisiac and Psychoactive Plants in Ptolemaic Egypt
10 The Ring-Kernoi and Psychotropic Substances
PART THREE: Ecstatic Experience and the Numinous
11 Beer, Beasts and Bodies: Shedding Boundaries in Bounded Spaces
12 Lament, Spectacle and Emotion in a Ritual for Ishtar
13 Writing for the Dead, Welcoming the Solar-Eye Goddess and Ecstatic Expression in Egyptian Religion
14 Altered States on Prepalatial Crete
15 Bodies in Ecstasy: Shamanic Elements in Minoan Religion
16 The Mycenaeans and Ecstatic Ritual Experience
17 Emotional Arousal, Sensory Deprivation and “Miraculous He aling” in the Cult of Asclepius
18 Ecstasy and Initiation in the Eleusinian Mysteries
19 Apolline and Dionysian Ecstasy at Delphi
20 Communing with the Spirits: Funeral Processions in Ancient Rome
PART FOUR: Expressions of the Ecstatic Mind
21 Ecstatic Experience and Possession Disorders in Ancient Mesopotamia
22 Ghosts In and Outside the Machine: A Phenomenology of Intelligence, Psychic Possession and Prophetic Ecstasy in Ancient Mesopotamia
23 Ecstatic Speech in Ancient Mesopotamia
24 Ecstatic Experience: The Proto-theme of a Near Eastern Glyptic Language Family
25 Understanding the Language of Trees: Ecstatic Experience and Interspecies Communication in Late Bronze Age Crete
26 Psychedelic Art and Ecstatic Visions in the Aegean
27 Sight as Ecstatic Experience in the Ancient Mediterranean
Index
