The Transformation of Hera: A Study of Ritual, Hero, and the Goddess in the Iliad

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Rowman & Littlefield, 1993 - Literary Criticism - 248 pages
Did the goddess Hera achieve fame because she slept in the arms of great Zeus? In this book, Joan V. O'Brien explodes this verdict. Starting from the etymological link between Hera's name and the Greek words for 'hero' and 'the season, ' O'Brien provides an archeological, historical, and literary reassessment of the goddess as a religious, cultural, and political construct
 

Contents

The Early History of the Samian Heraion
9
Samian Cult Statues and Cult Houses
17
Samos Mistress of Animals and Her Ritual
45
Heras lliadic Venom and Its Source
77
Hera Argeia Patron of the NonDorian Argolid
113
Panhellenic Transformations From Soaring Life to Scheming Wife from Life Tamer to Wife Tamer
167
Conclusion
203
Bibliography
209
The Delian and Olympian Heraia
227
Index
237
About the Author
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About the author (1993)

Joan V. O'Brien is Professor of Classics at Southern Illinois University, Carbondale. She is the author of In the Beginning: Creation Myths from Ancient Mesopotamia, Israel, and Greece (Scholars Press, 1982).

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