The Folds of Olympus : Mountains in Ancient Greek and Roman Culture

by: Konig, J.

The Folds of Olympus: Mountains in Ancient Greek and Roman Culture

Jason König

A cultural and literary history of mountains in classical antiquity

The mountainous character of the Mediterranean was a crucial factor in the history of the ancient Greek and Roman world. The Folds of Olympus is a cultural and literary history that explores the important role mountains played in Greek and Roman religious, military, and economic life, as well as in the identity of communities over a millennium—from Homer to the early Christian saints. Aimed at readers of ancient history and literature as well as those interested in mountains and the environment, the book offers a powerful account of the landscape at the heart of much Greek and Roman culture.

Jason König charts the importance of mountains in religion and pilgrimage, the aesthetic vision of mountains in art and literature, the place of mountains in conquest and warfare, and representations of mountain life. He shows how mountains were central to the way in which the inhabitants of the ancient Mediterranean understood the boundaries between the divine and the human, and the limits of human knowledge and control. He also argues that there is more continuity than normally assumed between ancient descriptions of mountains and modern accounts of the picturesque and the sublime.

Offering a unique perspective on the history of classical culture, The Folds of Olympus is also a resoundingly original contribution to the literature on mountains.

xxx, 444 pages : illustrations (black and white), maps (black and white) ; 24 cm

Contents:
Part I: Mountains and the divine. Summit altars
Mountains in archaic Greek poetry
Pausanias : mythical landscapes and divine presence
Egeria on Mount Sinai : mountain pilgrimage in early Chistian and late antique culture
Part II: Mountain vision. Mountain aesthetics
Scientific viewing and the volcanic sublime
Mountains in Greek and Roman art
Mountain landmarks in Latin literature
Mountains and bodies in Apuleius' Metamorphoses
Part III: Mountain conquest. Warfare and knowledge in mountain territories
Mountain narratives in Greek and Roman historiography
Strabo : civilising the mountains
Ammianus Marcellinus : mountain peoples and imperial boundaries
Part IV: Living in the mountains. Mountain and city
Dio Chrisostom and the mountains of Euboia
Mountain saints in late antique Christian literature
Epilogue

The Folds of Olympus : Mountains in Ancient Greek and Roman Culture

by: Konig, J.

• ISBN-13: 9780691201290 / 978-0-691-20129-0
• ISBN-03: 0691201293 / 0-691-20129-3
• Princeton University Press, New Jersey, 2022

Greek athletics

by: Konig, J.

• ISBN-13: 9780748634903
• ISBN-03: 0748634908
• Edinburgh University Press, Edinburgh, 2010