''Homo Necans: The Anthropology of Ancient Greek Sacrificial Ritual and Myth'' () is a 1972 book on

ancient Greek religion Religious practices in ancient Greece encompassed a collection of beliefs, rituals, and Greek mythology, mythology, in the form of both popular public religion and Cult (religious practice), cult practices. The application of the modern concept ...

and

mythology Myth is a genre of folklore consisting primarily of narratives that play a fundamental role in a society. For scholars, this is very different from the vernacular usage of the term "myth" that refers to a belief that is not true. Instead, the ...

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 student ...

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

Summary

Burkert's core thesis is that when

paleolithic The Paleolithic or Palaeolithic ( years ago) ( ), also called the Old Stone Age (), is a period in human prehistory that is distinguished by the original development of stone tools, and which represents almost the entire period of human prehist ...

man became a

hunter Hunting is the human practice of seeking, pursuing, capturing, and killing wildlife or feral animals. The most common reasons for humans to hunt are to obtain the animal's body for meat and useful animal products ( fur/ hide, bone/tusks, ...

, in spite of the generally

omnivorous An omnivore () is an animal that regularly consumes significant quantities of both plant and animal matter. Obtaining energy and nutrients from plant and animal matter, omnivores digest carbohydrates, protein, fat, and fiber, and metabolize ...

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 in which one organism, the predator, kills and eats another organism, its prey. It is one of a family of common List of feeding behaviours, feeding behaviours that includes parasitism and micropredation ...

instinct was made up for by turning patterns of intra-species

aggression Aggression is behavior aimed at opposing or attacking something or someone. Though often done with the intent to cause harm, some might channel it into creative and practical outlets. It may occur either reactively or without provocation. In h ...

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 a branch of zoology that studies the behavior, behaviour of non-human animals. It has its scientific roots in the work of Charles Darwin and of American and German ornithology, ornithologists of the late 19th and early 20th cen ...

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

animal sacrifice Animal sacrifice is the ritual killing and offering of animals, usually as part of a religious ritual or to appease or maintain favour with a deity. Animal sacrifices were common throughout Europe and the Ancient Near East until the spread of Chris ...

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 deity, gods, a human ruler, public or jurisdictional demands for justice by capital punishment, an authoritative/prie ...

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

ritual A ritual is a repeated, structured sequence of actions or behaviors that alters the internal or external state of an individual, group, or environment, regardless of conscious understanding, emotional context, or symbolic meaning. Traditionally ...

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. Religious beliefs can inform ordinary aspects of life including ea ...

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

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

' '' On Aggression'' (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 Greek mythology is the body of myths originally told by the Ancient Greece, ancient Greeks, and a genre of ancient Greek folklore, today absorbed alongside Roman mythology into the broader designation of classical mythology. These stories conc ...

. 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. With Karl Kerenyi and Walter Burkert, Harrison is one of the founders of modern studies in Ancient Greek religion and mythology. She ...

's ''Themis'', to a German audience, and employed a form of

structuralism Structuralism is an intellectual current and methodological approach, primarily in the social sciences, that interprets elements of human culture by way of their relationship to a broader system. It works to uncover the structural patterns t ...

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-American historian, literary critic, and philosopher of social science whose work belongs to the tradition of philosophical anthropology. Girard was the a ...

'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 Peter Joachim Gay ( né Fröhlich ; June 20, 1923 – May 12, 2015) was a German-American historian, educator, and author. He was a Sterling Professor of History at Yale University and former director of the New York Public Library's Center for ...

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 Martin Litchfield West, (23 September 1937 – 13 July 2015) was a British philologist and classical scholar. In recognition of his contribution to scholarship, he was appointed to the Order of Merit in 2014. West wrote on ancient Greek music, ...

, 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