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Entity

North American Society for the Study of Christian Apocryphal Literature

Research society maintaining a guide to Christian apocryphal texts and witnesses.

Entity

Ornias

A harmful spirit named in the Greek Testament of Solomon, whose capture begins the ring-and-Temple narrative.

Entity

The shamir in the Talmudic story

A remarkable stone-cutting creature in Gittin 68's Temple-building story, not an identified archaeological tool.

Entity

Ashmedai

The 'king of demons' in the Babylonian Talmud's Gittin 68 story about Solomon and the shamir.

Civilization

Ancient Greek world

Greek-speaking communities and cities around the Aegean and beyond, extending across the borders of modern Greece.

Attic krater attributed to the Hirschfeld Workshop, ca. 750–735 BCE, with a funerary scene. Evidence of early Greek art, rather than a divine assembly. The Met, 14.130.14

Entity

Phoenicians

Communities of Levantine coastal cities known for Mediterranean contact during the first millennium BCE.

Ahiram’s sarcophagus from Byblos, held by the National Museum of Beirut. Evidence for art and writing on the Levantine coast; the sarcophagus and inscription have debated dates that need not coincide

Entity

Odyssey

Greek epic attributed to Homer, following Odysseus’s return after the Trojan War.

Papyrus fragment of the Odyssey, about 285–250 BCE; Met 09.182.50. It preserves lines from Book 20, rather than the assembly scenes in Books 1 and 5

Entity

Iliad

Greek epic attributed to Homer, narrating a phase of the Trojan War.

Fragment of the Hawara papyrus preserving Iliad 2.757–775, about 150 CE. A witness to the epic’s transmission in the Roman period; its date is not the date of composition

Entity

Leto

Greek goddess and Apollo’s mother in the Iliad, appearing among the gods supporting the Trojans.

Leto, Apollo and Tityos on an Attic vase, about 450–440 BCE; Louvre G 375, attributed to Polygnotos. The image belongs to the story of the assault on Leto and Tityos’s punishment

Entity

Artemis

Goddess of hunting in Greek traditions and Apollo’s sister, named among the divine company in the Iliad.

Apollo and Artemis with a deer inside an Attic cup of about 470 BCE; Louvre Cp 1005 / G 151. Archaeological evidence for representations of the two deities

Entity

Ares

God of war in Greek traditions and a participating figure in the Iliad.

Roman statue of the “Borghese Ares” type, held by the Louvre, Ma 866. The type’s name and identification do not make it a contemporary image of Iliadic scenes

Entity

Tartarus

Deep abyss in Greek poetic imagination, named by Zeus as a place of punishment in the Iliad.

Modern explanatory diagram of Tartarus in Iliad 8.13–16: depth compared with the distance between sky and earth, with iron gates and a bronze threshold. A poetic comparison, rather than an archaeological map

Entity

Polyphemus

One-eyed giant in the Odyssey and Poseidon’s son within the narrative.

Odysseus offering a drink to Polyphemus in a Roman mosaic at Villa del Casale, Sicily. A later representation of the adventure narrated in Odyssey Book 9

Entity

Nymphs in Greek poetry

Divine figures associated with natural places in Greek poetry, such as springs and groves.

Hermes leading three nymphs, with the river god Acheloös, on a marble relief of about 320–300 BCE; Met 25.78.59. Evidence for nymphs in Greek art and votive practice

Entity

Oceanus

Water-related divine figure in Greek poetry, distinguished from the modern geographical use of “ocean.”

Head of a sea deity in a Roman mosaic from Fordington, usually identified as Oceanus; the heritage record also allows Neptune. Dorset Museum, England. Evidence from Roman art later than the Homeric epics

Entity

Muses

A group of Greek divine figures associated with song and poetry.

Muses in a musical scene on an Attic white-ground pyxis, about 460–450 BCE; Museum of Fine Arts, Boston, 98.887. This caption leaves the depicted man’s debated identity open

Entity

Apollo

God of music and prophecy in Greek traditions, also participating in the Iliad’s events.

Apollo and a Muse on an Attic white-ground cup; Museum of Fine Arts, Boston, 00.356. An ancient representation of the god, rather than a particular Iliadic assembly scene

Entity

Calypso

Divine figure in the Odyssey who keeps Odysseus on her island while he longs to return home.

Mercury ordering Calypso to release Odysseus, painted by Gerard de Lairesse about 1680; Rijksmuseum SK-A-212. A later European representation of the story, rather than an ancient Greek artifact

Entity

Themis

Greek goddess instructed in the Iliad to gather the gods for a meeting with Zeus.

Themis and Aegeus inside an Attic cup, about 440–430 BCE; Berlin Antikensammlung F 2538. A photograph of the ancient vessel, rather than a modern redrawing

Entity

Iris

Greek divine messenger who conveys Zeus’s command to Poseidon in the Iliad.

Winged Iris on a Greek vase, about 500–490 BCE; Louvre L 43. An ancient representation of the divine messenger named in the Iliad

Entity

Hades

Underworld god in Greek narratives, and brother of Zeus and Poseidon in the Iliad exchange.

Hades and Persephone inside an Attic cup, about 430 BCE; British Museum 1847,0909.6 / E 82. An ancient artistic representation of the underworld’s rulers

Entity

Thetis

Sea goddess in Greek poetry and mother of Achilles, one of the Iliad’s heroes.

Peleus and Thetis on an Attic vase, about 470–460 BCE; Louvre LL 32 / N 3348 / L 55.1. Greek artistic evidence for the figures, rather than an image of Thetis’s appeal to Zeus in the Iliad

Entity

Hephaestus

God of metalworking in Greek traditions; the Iliad portrays him as Hera’s son and mediator in her dispute with Zeus.

Hephaestus returning to Olympus on a donkey, on an ancient Greek cup in the British Museum, 1836,0224.48. The image depicts the return story, rather than the Iliad’s assembly scene

Entity

Hermes

Greek god acting as a messenger in the Odyssey passages examined here.

Hermes carrying a ram on an Attic vase, about 515–510 BCE; Louvre Cp 639 / F 159. An archaeological representation of one aspect of the god

Entity

Hera

Greek goddess and Zeus’s wife, appearing in council and family-disagreement scenes in the Iliad.

A woman tentatively identified in the museum catalogue as Hera, nursing Heracles; vase of about 365–350 BCE, British Museum 1846,0925.13. The female figure’s identification remains uncertain

Entity

Poseidon

Sea god in Greek traditions and an influential figure in the Iliad and Odyssey.

Poseidon with a trident and a fish inside an Attic cup, about 510 BCE; National Museum of Denmark 13407. An ancient representation of the deity

Concept

Ugaritic language

Ancient Semitic language preserved in Ugarit’s tablets on the Syrian coast, from the fourteenth–twelfth centuries BCE, written in a cuneiform alphabet.

Fragment bearing the sequence of Ugaritic alphabetic letters, about 1400–1200 BCE in the Louvre catalogue; AO 19992. A photograph of an actual witness from Ugarit

Concept

Sumerian language

Ancient language of southern Mesopotamia, clearly attested in third-millennium BCE texts and maintained in learning and ritual after its spoken use declined.

Tablet of a Sumerian lament with Akkadian translations of many lines, about the second–first centuries BCE; Met 86.11.286a. A late witness to the language’s continued scribal and ritual use

Entity

Hundred-Handers

Beings in Hesiod’s poem, shown in one scene leaving captivity and darkness for light.

Modern diagram of the release from captivity into light at Theogony669. It explains the scene when comparing emergence verbs, without reconstructing the Hundred-Handers’ appearance

Entity

Tashmishu

Divine figure named in Kumarbi’s pregnancy with the storm god and the river Aranzah.

Modern diagram highlighting Tashmishu among the figures in Kumarbi’s pregnancy account. It preserves the multiple names without supplying a complete biography or imagined portrait

Entity

Aranzah

River as a divine figure, named among those Kumarbi carries in the Hittite song.

Modern diagram of Kumarbi’s pregnancy list, highlighting Aranzah as a river divine figure. Branches group names in the scene; not a river map or the order of every birth event

Entity

Hurrians

Ancient Near Eastern groups and language, prominent in northern Mesopotamia, the Levant and Anatolia in the second millennium BCE.

Hurrian-language incantation tablet from Ras Shamra, about 1400–1200 BCE, Louvre AO 12016. Rama, 20 October 2007. Evidence of Hurrian at Ugarit, not the Kumarbi-song tablet

Entity

Alalu

First heavenly ruler in the surviving Kumarbi song; defeated by Anu, he flees to the dark earth.

Modern diagram of the surviving Alalu–Anu account: service, defeat and flight to the dark earth. Arrows do not establish genealogy; no ancient divine likeness is invented

Entity

Aphrodite

Greek goddess whose origin Hesiod relates to foam after the assault on Ouranos.

Aphrodite with a Turtle, an incomplete restored statue from Dura-Europos, about the second–third centuries CE, Louvre AO 20126. Shonagon, 5 January 2024; an object later than Hesiod’s poem

Entity

Athena

Greek goddess associated in Hesiod with Zeus, Metis and birth from the head.

Athena’s birth from Zeus’s head on an Attic vessel, about 570–560 BCE, Louvre CA 616. Bibi Saint-Pol, 1 June 2007. An ancient artistic witness; the museum records restorations to the vessel

Entity

Metis

Divine figure and Athena’s mother in Hesiod; Zeus swallows her while pregnant to forestall a possible successor.

Modern diagram of Metis’s role in Hesiod: pregnancy, a warning about succession, swallowing by Zeus and Athena’s birth from the head. Arrows order events; not an ancient image of the goddess

Entity

Rhea

Zeus’s mother in Hesiod, hiding the child and giving Kronos a stone instead.

Rhea presents the stone to Kronos; wood engraving published in the 1878 Leipzig edition of Der Olymp. Later printed reception of the scene, not an artifact photograph or a likeness from Hesiod’s time

Entity

Gaia

Earth as a divine figure, active in the gods’ origins and conflicts in Hesiod.

Gaia lifts the infant Erichthonios toward Athena; detail of an Attic vase, about 470–460 BCE, Munich 2413. Bibi Saint-Pol, 10 February 2007; another scene representing Gaia as Earth

Entity

Ouranos

Sky as a divine figure in Greek poetry; Kronos’s father in Hesiod.

The assault on Ouranos in a sixteenth-century work by Vasari and Gherardi, Palazzo Vecchio, Florence. Later artistic reception, not an ancient Greek witness or a contemporary image of Hesiod’s time

Entity

Kronos

Greek divine figure and Zeus’s father; Hesiod connects his reign with struggles between divine generations.

Rhea hands Kronos a wrapped stone on an Attic jar, about 460–450 BCE, attributed to the Nausicaä Painter. Metropolitan Museum of Art, 06.1021.144; museum photograph