The conflict between
Matriarchy and Patriarchy
in the Greek Dark Age
Matriarchy and Patriarchy
in the Greek Dark Age
War of the Gods is a monograph expounding the interpretation of the history of the Greek Dark and Archaic Ages (c.1200 – 479 BCE) that was first presented in Primitive Materialism. It presents a self-contained argument for the thesis that Greek mythology was laid down during the epoch when the Greeks lost the power of both writing and figurative representation, these being a consequence of the terrible war that took place between matriarchy and patriarchy, a war in which men and women (as Amazons or otherwise) also fought, as testified by the myths and the remnants of the oral tradition.
The work explains the Bronze Age Collapse (c.1200) – a catastrophe of monstrous proportions that struck the civilised Near East and reduced its population by 90%, a catastrophe hitherto not accounted for. The war was resolved by the victory of patriarchy, which established a religion of Zeus Almighty, of the Father. But the resultant religion of Greece was an admixture of the new Olympian religion of the Father, and a chthonic religion of the Mother, albeit with reformed rites. Since ritual male adult and child sacrifice was practiced in the context of the fertility religion of the Goddess, the reformation took the form of a rejection of such practices, with transmuted rites, and stimulated the further evolution of Western consciousness from primitive materialism into Ionian consciousness.
There are corrections to “errors” of previous attempts to account for Greek mythology and the history of the Dark Age. Among these errors was that of the Greeks themselves, who backwardly projected their mythology onto a time preceding the Bronze Age collapse, interpreting it as thereby belonging to the Minoan-Mycenaean culture, or earlier. The ancient Greek thesis of a Dorian invasion of the Peloponnese is also exposed to have no explanatory content, and thereby to be false. Greek legends were constructed late in the archaic period in the wake of the revolution in religion, when they were consolidated by means of genealogies.
There is a summative analysis of the culture and religion of the Minoan-Mycenaean culture – correction to the view of the “survival” of Minoan-Mycenaean religion in later Greek times – Olympian religion is wholly a construction of the Dark and Archaic Ages – what survived was transmuted rites from the fertility religion of the Goddess and her consort, Dionysus.
The work supports by additional analysis the view that Homer can be dated to c.677 at the time of the fall of Egyptian Thebes. This late date for Homer brings the cultural effusion of the word and image (iconography) into harmony.
The contemporary bias against acknowledging that during the Dark Ages the Greeks did practice human sacrifice in the context of the fertility religion of the Goddess is refuted in the chapter Human Sacrifice and its Denial.
The work challenges the contemporary bias in favour of writing the history of the Dark Ages by reference to archaeology alone. The oral tradition preserved in Greek mythology is interpreted by a methodology advocating the mythologem as a narrative symbol linking two or more images as primary. Oral tradition is understood by analogy with the material assemblage of an archaeological find, and by analogy with the comparative method of linguistics.
The work is intended for electronic distribution, in which format it is free. It has 48 illustrations with commentaries that illuminate the thesis. It may also be purchased in paperback format.
The work explains the Bronze Age Collapse (c.1200) – a catastrophe of monstrous proportions that struck the civilised Near East and reduced its population by 90%, a catastrophe hitherto not accounted for. The war was resolved by the victory of patriarchy, which established a religion of Zeus Almighty, of the Father. But the resultant religion of Greece was an admixture of the new Olympian religion of the Father, and a chthonic religion of the Mother, albeit with reformed rites. Since ritual male adult and child sacrifice was practiced in the context of the fertility religion of the Goddess, the reformation took the form of a rejection of such practices, with transmuted rites, and stimulated the further evolution of Western consciousness from primitive materialism into Ionian consciousness.
There are corrections to “errors” of previous attempts to account for Greek mythology and the history of the Dark Age. Among these errors was that of the Greeks themselves, who backwardly projected their mythology onto a time preceding the Bronze Age collapse, interpreting it as thereby belonging to the Minoan-Mycenaean culture, or earlier. The ancient Greek thesis of a Dorian invasion of the Peloponnese is also exposed to have no explanatory content, and thereby to be false. Greek legends were constructed late in the archaic period in the wake of the revolution in religion, when they were consolidated by means of genealogies.
There is a summative analysis of the culture and religion of the Minoan-Mycenaean culture – correction to the view of the “survival” of Minoan-Mycenaean religion in later Greek times – Olympian religion is wholly a construction of the Dark and Archaic Ages – what survived was transmuted rites from the fertility religion of the Goddess and her consort, Dionysus.
The work supports by additional analysis the view that Homer can be dated to c.677 at the time of the fall of Egyptian Thebes. This late date for Homer brings the cultural effusion of the word and image (iconography) into harmony.
The contemporary bias against acknowledging that during the Dark Ages the Greeks did practice human sacrifice in the context of the fertility religion of the Goddess is refuted in the chapter Human Sacrifice and its Denial.
The work challenges the contemporary bias in favour of writing the history of the Dark Ages by reference to archaeology alone. The oral tradition preserved in Greek mythology is interpreted by a methodology advocating the mythologem as a narrative symbol linking two or more images as primary. Oral tradition is understood by analogy with the material assemblage of an archaeological find, and by analogy with the comparative method of linguistics.
The work is intended for electronic distribution, in which format it is free. It has 48 illustrations with commentaries that illuminate the thesis. It may also be purchased in paperback format.
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Contents
God or Goddess? Darkness Visible The Catastrophe The Minoan-Mycenaean Culture Human Sacrifice and its Denial Methodology of Reading Myth The History of Greek Religion in the Dark Age The Reformation of Greek Religion Patriarchy Full Steam Ahead Conclusion |
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Published by Black's Academy Limited
Image shows The Greek Myth of Creation