1991 Fiscal Year Final Research Report Summary
Religious Meaning and Artistic Form of Greek and Roman Myth
| Project/Area Number |
02301070
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| Research Category |
Grant-in-Aid for Co-operative Research (A)
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| Allocation Type | Single-year Grants |
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| Research Field |
文学一般(含文学論・比較文学・西洋古典)
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| Research Institution | Kyoto Univeristy |
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Principal Investigator |
OKA Michi Kyoto University, Faculty of Letters Professor, 文学部, 教授 (40025052)
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| Co-Investigator(Kenkyū-buntansha) |
OGAWA Masahiro Nagoya Un., Fac. of Letters, Assoc. Prof., 文学部, 助教授 (40127064)
NAKATSUKASA Tetsuo Kyoto Un., Fac. of Letters, Associate Prof., 文学部, 助教授 (50093282)
HASHIMOTO Takao Kobe Univ., Fac. of Culture, Professor, 教養部, 教授 (20027791)
FUJINAWA Kenzo Kyoto Univ., Faculty of Letters, Prof., 文学部, 教授 (50025053)
MATSUMOTO Nisuke Osaka Gakuin University, Professor, 国際学部, 教授 (30066097)
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| Project Period (FY) |
1990 – 1991
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| Keywords | Greek Myth / Roman Myth / Homer / Hesiod / Pindar / Aeschylus / Sophocles / Euripides |
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| Research Abstract |
Although myths relating the deeds of heroes and gods naturally reflect the religious attitudes of peoples who tell them, those that evolve to refined literary forms tend to lose their fresh religious meanings. However, the dynamic development of the Greek and Roman myths incorporated in Greek and Latin literature can be explained only by the fact that the poets endeavored not merely to retain and deepen their religious meanings but also to find the most artistic manner of expressing.
Homer's myths attain a high degree of artistic refinement. Hesiod, on the other hand, tried to express simple religious feelings in a rationalistic way, and, in the tragedies of Aeschylus and Sophocles in particular, literary forms were perfected while myths were made to yield their deeper religious meanings. However, this harmonious blending of religion and literature, which is also to be found in the poems of Pindar as well as in the works of Herodotus and Plato, was soon lost with the conscious and non-traditional exploitation of myths practiced by Euripides.
In Hellenism, the artistic forms were brought to perfection while religious meanings were wholly lost : myths became mere vessels to contain the literary messages of the poets. Even though the Romans inherited the Hellenistic literary treatment of traditional myths from the Greeks, their myths never lost their deep religious feeling or their relationship with native rituals and festivals, probably because the Romans identified the myths with events in their own history.
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