Venus is the roman goddess of Love, Zeus the greek god of thunder, Thor the norse god of lightning.
This is how these lovely creatures are introduced in school, in mythology dictionaries, and even in greek and latin textbooks.
I have been wondering for some time whether in greek or latin there would be any similar expression, t.i., deus + gen., or theós + gen.
I have still not seen it in any of my readings. I would like to ask if anyone has seen it anywhere, and when they first appeared.
Cheers!
God of this, god of that
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Re: God of this, god of that
Not exactly the same thing, butTertius Robertus wrote:I have been wondering for some time whether in greek or latin there would be any similar expression, t.i., deus + gen., or theós + gen.
A fitting god for such a world.2 Cor 4:4:...ὁ θεὸς τοῦ αἰῶνος τούτου ἐτύφλωσεν τὰ νοήματα τῶν ἀπίστων...
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Re: God of this, god of that
Ok. So such reified classifications tend to be external to how they themselves (Greeks, Romans etc) talked about their deities. We like to think of a limited number (12 or so) deities with carefully delineated spheres of influence and easily identifiable characteristics. But the truth is gods were essentially local and highly varied and their epithets often point to specific features.
So, "Zeus" may refer to the character we know from literature but in real terms one finds Zeus Ombrios/Hyetios as a god of rain, Keraunios/Astrapaios as a god of thunder. You'd get variations of Zeus limited to a specific area like Nemeios (from Nemea), or Diktaios (from Dikte) etc. You would also find specific cultic iterations such as Zeus Melikhios (kindly Zeus, from Attica, who was worshiped as a snake).
So, you find epithets rather than nom +gen combinations and the information they could convey would in fact be extremely varied.
So, "Zeus" may refer to the character we know from literature but in real terms one finds Zeus Ombrios/Hyetios as a god of rain, Keraunios/Astrapaios as a god of thunder. You'd get variations of Zeus limited to a specific area like Nemeios (from Nemea), or Diktaios (from Dikte) etc. You would also find specific cultic iterations such as Zeus Melikhios (kindly Zeus, from Attica, who was worshiped as a snake).
So, you find epithets rather than nom +gen combinations and the information they could convey would in fact be extremely varied.
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Latin Historical Prose
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Re: God of this, god of that
Indeed, thanks for the example.Not exactly the same thing, but
2 Cor 4:4:...ὁ θεὸς τοῦ αἰῶνος τούτου ἐτύφλωσεν τὰ νοήματα τῶν ἀπίστων...
A fitting god for such a world.
Quite messy they were.So such reified classifications tend to be external to how they themselves (Greeks, Romans etc) talked about their deities. We like to think of a limited number (12 or so) deities with carefully delineated spheres of influence and easily identifiable characteristics. But the truth is gods were essentially local and highly varied and their epithets often point to specific features.
Thanks for clearing that up. Now that you mention I do remember seeing a Zeus Soteros somewhere.So, you find epithets rather than nom +gen combinations and the information they could convey would in fact be extremely varied.