“Noms de dieux!” Gods at the borders

Abstract

Gods honored in ancient religions cannot be classified into static lists or canonical genealogies, as took place for centuries from the Church Fathers until at least our modern dictionaries, nor can they be studied only through the compilation of etymologies. Actually, they should not be regarded as monolithic entities but, rather, as “systems of notions” (Gernet and Boulanger 1932) or “divine powers” (puissances divines as stated by Vernant 1965). Their names and characters, in particular, are potentially as diverse as cult places and ritual occasions, and a plurality of relational networks can be observed among cults, texts, and images. The process of naming the gods is more complex than univocal correspondences between a name or an epithet to one and the same particular god. On the contrary, it is increasingly acknowledged that naming strategies are at the heart of the dynamic construction of the divine and, therefore, of its relational network. More specifically, the use of epithets (so-called epicleses in cultic context) as well as any other way of multiplying specific aspects of the gods, testifies to the plurality of the divine and gives us a clue to understanding the complex unity and plurality of each superhuman power to whom Greeks and West Semitic peoples prayed. Since October 2017, at the University of Toulouse – Jean Jaurès, a group of five post-doctoral researchers and one research engineer,1 led by Corinne Bonnet, have been working on ancient Greek and West Semitic religions, focusing on this innovative perspective: the shift from gods, considered as clear-cut entities, with a name, an attribute, a genealogy, and located in a fixed framework (the “pantheon”), to the analysis of flexible, pragmatic, and informed naming strategies adopted by worshippers in specific times and places. The framework within which this venture is taking place is the five-year ERC Advanced Grant, entitled “Mapping Ancient Polytheisms – Cult Epithets as an Interface between Religious Systems and Human Agency” (MAP).2 Therefore, the MAP project takes divine naming strategies seriously. By this expression we mean that a god may be called by a variety of possibilities, encompassing, certainly, “proper names” (theonyms) but also composed of numerous and dif-