Herodotus as an historian of religions and polytheism: the Egyptian matrix

Vinciane Pirenne-Delforge (Collège de France, FNRS) will address the topic ‘Herodotus as an historian of religions and polytheism: the Egyptian matrix’.

This is the second in the second series of Graeco-Aegyptiaca lectures organised by The Palladion (https://www.palladion.hu/en/) and the UCL Department of Greek and Latin (https://www.ucl.ac.uk/classics/graeco-aegyptiaca)

Abstract

My lecture aims at addressing some well-known passages of Herodotus’s Book 2 about the origin of the gods and the place of the divine in his inquiry. The fact that these passages, crucial for the modern historian of religions, are embedded in the developments on Egypt is related to the Greek vision of the depth of Egyptian time, but the overall framework remains purely Greek and refers to what we call “Greek religion”.

This is a free online event, which will take place on Zoom: to reserve a place, please see our Eventbrite page: https://www.eventbrite.co.uk/e/herodotus-as-an-historian-of-religions-and-polytheism-the-egyptian-matrix-tickets-460657327467. If you are interested in signing up to our Graeco-Aegyptiaca email list, please write to [email protected].