More about Sappho

My friends from web analytics company, asked me to do some stuff, while I was telling you about Sappho. So, revenons a nos moutons...

Sappho's poetry centers around passion and love for various personages and genders. The word "lesbian" itself derives from the name of the island of her birth, Lesbos. Her name is also the origin of its less common synonym sapphic. The narrators of many of her poems speak of infatuations and love for various women.

In antiquity, Sappho was commonly regarded as the greatest, or one of the greatest, of lyric poets. An epigram in the Anthologia Palatina, ascribed to Plato says:

Some say the Muses are nine: how careless!
Look, there's Sappho too, from Lesbos, the tenth.

And I could not agree more.

I will tell you more interesting stuff later on.

Sappho rules!

Everybody heard about Sappho, at least in connection with the island of Lesbos. I bet, you know that much. I was asked to create several epitaphs from the point of web analytics, and I could not help myself but use some quotes from Sapphos's poetry.
Specialists and web analysts say, that Sappho's birth was sometime between 630 BC and 612 BC, and that she died around 570 BC. Unfortunately, the bulk of her poetry, which was well-known and greatly admired throughout antiquity, has been lost, but her immense reputation has endured through surviving fragments.

Guess, what? No contemporary historical sources exist for Sappho's life — only her poetry. Scholars have rejected a biographical reading of her poetry and have cast doubt on the reliability of the later biographical traditions from which all more detailed accounts derive. So what do we know about Sappho?

It seems that she was born into an aristocratic family, because her language is so sophisticated. References to dances, festivals, religious rites, military fleets, parading armies, generals, and ladies of the ancient courts are all reflected in her writings. She speaks of time spent in Lydia, one of the wealthiest and most powerful countries of that time. More specifically, Sappho speaks of her friends and happy times among the ladies of Sardis, capital of Lydia, once the home of Croesus and near the gold-rich lands of mythical King Midas.

I have to get back to you within an an hour to continue my story...

Late Antiquity and Outlawed Magic

In the late antiquity people were certainly extremely superstitious. In my local web analytics company I read a lot of books that were written by outstanding writers of that time. I am talking not only about the great minds like Pliny the Elder, Plutarch, Apuleius and the like. They define superstition as fear of the gods that leads to the need to resort to magical rites and taboos, the consultation of professional sorcerers and witches, charms and spells, and unintelligible language in prayers addressed to the gods. Highly educated people of that time took for granted other magical practices, such as hurting someone by the evil eye. They also believed in daemons that serve as agents or links between gods and human beings and are responsible for many supernatural events in human life that are commonly attributed to divine intervention. Some daemons are good, some are evil, but even the good ones, in moments of anger, can do harmful acts. There was this usual hostility and animosity towards magic.

Great mind of that time were also convinced of the powers of certain herbs or roots as revealed to humanity by the gods. They argued that the divine powers in their concern for the welfare of humanity wish for humanity to discover the secrets of nature. For example, in their wisdom the gods sought to bring humans gradually closer to their status; which certainly many magical traditions seek. Thus, by acquiring knowledge one can aspire to gain knowledge even from the gods. Yet, even the author of Natural History Pliny, the Elder thought negatively of magic. He wrote that the claims of the professional magicians were either exaggerated or simply false. And those sorcerers who had written down their spells and recipes despised and hated humanity. Arts of the magicians of Rome were linked with the emperor Nero, whom Pliny claims had studied magic with the best teachers and had access to the best books, but was unable to do anything extraordinary.

Overall, attitude towards magic was extremely hostile in Roman empire. Practicing magic was outlawed under Roman law. It was very easy for a philosopher to be accused of magical practices. A consensus was established quite early in Roman history for the banning of anything viewed as harmful acts of magic. The Laws of the Twelve Tablets for example expressly forbid anyone from enticing his neighbors’ crops into his fields by magic. Actual trials for alleged violation of these laws were held in Rome many times. It is also recorded that Chaldean astrologers were expelled from Rome in 139 BC - on the grounds that they were magicians. In 33 BC astrologers and magicians are explicitly mentioned as having been driven from Rome. Twenty years later, Augustus ordered all books on the magical arts to be burned. In 16 CE magicians and astrologers were expelled from Italy, and this was reinstated by edicts of emperors Vespasian in 69 CE and Domitian in 89 CE. The emperor Constantine I in the 4th century CE issued a ruling to cover all charges of magic. In it he distinguished between helpful charms, not punishable, and antagonistic spells. In these cases Roman authorities specifically decided what forms of magic were acceptable and which were not. Those that were not acceptable were termed “magic”; those that were acceptable were usually defined as traditions of the state or practices of the state’s religions.

From Magi to Horror Movies

I was always curious about the origin of the word magic. Through my research for local web analytics company I learned, that the prototypical "magicians" were a class of priests. These priests were known as the Magi of the ancient religion Zoroastrianism. The reputation of Magi in ancient Persia together with that of Ancient Egypt influenced to a great degree Hellenistic religion. The ancient Greek mystery religions had strongly magical components, and in Egypt, a large number of magical papyri, in Greek, Coptic, and Demotic, have been recovered. These sources contain early instances of much of the magical lore that later became part of Western cultural expectations about the practice of magic, especially ceremonial magic. For example, among all, they contain early instances of the use of "magic words" said to have the power to command spirits. They also first describe the use of "magic" wands and other ritual tools. In these documents we also encounter the use of a magic circle to defend the magician against the spirits he is invoking or evoking and the use of mysterious symbols or sigils thought useful to invoke or evoke spirits.

These ancient documents also in details tell about the use of spirit mediums. For example, many of the spells call for a child to be brought to the magic circle to act as a conduit for messages from the spirits. In the time of the Roman emperor Julian, marked by a reaction against the influence of Christianity, there was a temporary a revival of magical practices. And, of course, all those practices mentioned, above, happily moved into our horror movies and became a great part of sci-fi thrillers and even action movies.