''Homo Necans: the Anthropology of Ancient Greek Sacrificial Ritual and Myth'' (german: Homo Necans: Interpretationen Altgriechischer Opferriten und Mythen) is a 1972 book on ancient Greek religion and

mythology Myth is a folklore genre consisting of narratives that play a fundamental role in a society, such as foundational tales or origin myths. Since "myth" is widely used to imply that a story is not objectively true, the identification of a narra ...

by the classicist

Walter Burkert Walter Burkert (; 2 February 1931 – 11 March 2015) was a German scholar of Greek mythology and cult. A professor of classics at the University of Zurich, Switzerland, he taught in the UK and the US. He has influenced generations of studen ...

. It won the Weaver Award for Scholarly Literature, awarded by the Ingersoll Foundation, in 1992.

Summary

Burkert's core thesis is that when paleolithic man became a hunter, in spite of the generally

omnivorous An omnivore () is an animal that has the ability to eat and survive on both plant and animal matter. Obtaining energy and nutrients from plant and animal matter, omnivores digest carbohydrates, protein, fat, and fiber, and metabolize the nut ...

orientation of the

great apes The Hominidae (), whose members are known as the great apes or hominids (), are a taxonomic family of primates that includes eight extant species in four genera: '' Pongo'' (the Bornean, Sumatran and Tapanuli orangutan); ''Gorilla'' (the ...

, lack of a

predator Predation is a biological interaction where one organism, the predator, kills and eats another organism, its prey. It is one of a family of common feeding behaviours that includes parasitism and micropredation (which usually do not kill th ...

instinct was made up for by turning patterns of intra-species aggression against the prey: ''Homo necans'' means "man the killer". Thus, the animal hunted by ancient man automatically acquired aspects of an equal, as if it were of one of the hunter's relations. In a first attempt at applying

ethology Ethology is the scientific study of animal behaviour, usually with a focus on behaviour under natural conditions, and viewing behaviour as an evolutionarily adaptive trait. Behaviourism as a term also describes the scientific and objecti ...

to religious history, Burkert confronts the power and effect of tradition in uncovering traces of ancient hunting rituals so motivated in historical animal sacrifice and

human sacrifice Human sacrifice is the act of killing one or more humans as part of a ritual, which is usually intended to please or appease gods, a human ruler, an authoritative/priestly figure or spirits of dead ancestors or as a retainer sacrifice, wherein ...

(by his thesis unified as deriving from the same fundamental principle) in specific historical Greek

ritual A ritual is a sequence of activities involving gestures, words, actions, or objects, performed according to a set sequence. Rituals may be prescribed by the traditions of a community, including a religious community. Rituals are characterized ...

s with relevance to human

religious behaviour Religious behaviours are behaviours motivated by religious beliefs. Religious actions are also called 'ritual' and religious avoidances are called taboos or ritual prohibitions. Actions The two best known religious actions are prayer and sa ...

in general. Burkert acknowledges that a decisive impulse for the thesis derived from

Konrad Lorenz Konrad Zacharias Lorenz (; 7 November 1903 – 27 February 1989) was an Austrian zoologist, ethologist, and ornithologist. He shared the 1973 Nobel Prize in Physiology or Medicine with Nikolaas Tinbergen and Karl von Frisch. He is often regarde ...

' ''

On Aggression ''On Aggression'' (german: Das sogenannte Böse. Zur Naturgeschichte der Aggression, "So-called Evil: on the natural history of aggression") is a 1963 book by the ethologist Konrad Lorenz; it was translated into English in 1966. As he writes in th ...

'' (1963). The thesis is an extension of the hunting hypothesis, which states that hunting as a means of obtaining food was a dominant influence on human evolution and cultural development (as opposed to gathering vegetation or scavenging). The guilt incurred in the violence of the hunt was reflected in sacred crimes, which through rituals of cleansing and expiation served to unify communities. Burkert supports his thesis by integrating a multitude of examples that elaborate primitive ritual as it is reflected in

Greek mythology A major branch of classical mythology, Greek mythology is the body of myths originally told by the ancient Greeks, and a genre of Ancient Greek folklore. These stories concern the origin and nature of the world, the lives and activities ...

. He examines various cult-complexes in detail, confronting "sacrificial ritual with its tension between encountering death and affirming life, its external form consisting of preparations, a frightening central moment, and restitution", and affirming in detail the initial hypothesis.

Reception

''Homo Necans'' was conceived in the 1960s; it controversially introduced functionalism, along the lines of

Jane Ellen Harrison Jane Ellen Harrison (9 September 1850 – 15 April 1928) was a British classical scholar and linguist. Harrison is one of the founders, with Karl Kerenyi and Walter Burkert, of modern studies in Ancient Greek religion and mythology. She ...

's ''Themis'', to a German audience, and employed a form of structuralism in interpreting complexes of ritual and festival, to apply some findings of

for the first time to mythology.

René Girard René Noël Théophile Girard (; ; 25 December 1923 – 4 November 2015) was a French polymath, historian, literary critic, and philosopher of social science whose work belongs to the tradition of philosophical anthropology. Girard was the aut ...

's '' Violence and the Sacred'' appeared the same year. The book that was controversial at its first appearance was less revolutionary when it finally appeared in English, Burkert noted, in an introduction to the English translation (1983). The historian Peter Gay praised ''Homo Necans'' as a suggestive discussion of the impulse to revenge. Robert Parker, in reviewing ''Homo Necans'' for ''

The Times Literary Supplement ''The Times Literary Supplement'' (''TLS'') is a weekly literary review published in London by News UK, a subsidiary of News Corp. History The ''TLS'' first appeared in 1902 as a supplement to ''The Times'' but became a separate publication ...

'', observed of Burkert that "boldness of theory and consummate learning are united in him as in few others". M.L. West, in ''

Journal of Hellenic Studies ''The Journal of Hellenic Studies'' is an annual peer-reviewed academic journal covering research in Hellenic studies. It also publishes reviews of recent books of importance to Hellenic studies. It was established in 1880 and is published by Camb ...

'', remarked that the book was "an exceptional intellectual experience".

Notes

Bibliography

* * *(1997) ''Homo Necans: Interpretationen Altgriechischer Opferriten Und Mythen: 2., Um Ein Nachwort Erweiterte Auflage'' (Religionsgeschichtliche Versuche Und Vorarbeiten, Vol 32) (2nd edition, with a 1996 postscript) de Gruyter, {{ISBN, 3-11-015098-0. 1972 non-fiction books Books by Walter Burkert German non-fiction books References on Greek mythology

Summary

Reception

See also

Notes

Bibliography