belief, ancient religious
Charles Stewart and John North
Currently ‘belief’ has at least three different meanings in the context of religion: (1) an inner psychological state of pious commitment; (2) the acceptance of received ideas; and (3) the doctrines ...
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colours, sacred
Herbert Jennings Rose and Simon Hornblower
Three colours are especially important for sacral purposes in antiquity; they are white, black, and red, the last being understood in the widest possible sense, to include purple, crimson, even ...
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eunuchs, religious
Richard Gordon
In the Classical period, religious eunuchs are a feature of several Anatolian cults of female deities, extending across to Scythia (Hdt. 4. 67: not shamans) and to the southern foothills of the ...
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music in worship
Herbert Jennings Rose
Both in Greece and Italy *music, vocal and instrumental, formed an important part of worship at all periods. To begin with *Homer, the embassy sent to Chryse in Iliad 1. 472–4 spend the whole day ...
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Narcissus (1), figure of Greek mythology
Herbert Jennings Rose and Antony Spawforth
Narcissus (1), in mythology, a beautiful youth, son of *Cephissus (the *Boeotian river) and Liriope, a *nymph. He loved no one till he saw his own reflection in water and fell in love with that; ...
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