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A story of blood, guts and guesswork : synthetic reasoning in classical Greek divination

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Anderson_Blood_guts_guesswork_final.pdf (199.0Kb)
Date
05/09/2017
Author
Anderson, Ralph Thomas
Keywords
B Philosophy. Psychology. Religion
DE The Mediterranean Region. The Greco-Roman World
PA Classical philology
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Abstract
This paper explores the interpretative strategies at work in a range of examples of ancient Greek divination. Anthropological studies indicate that contemporary divination depends not on scientific notions of objective and replicable truth but on the performative efficacy of the decisions that it supports. Divinatory outcomes are negotiated through a complex interplay between diviner, client and the known and suspected features of their environment. Similar processes may be detected in a number of well-known episodes of divination in Herodotus and Xenophon. Greek divination can be seen as a deliberative process in which the human protagonists progressively synthesise salient features of their surroundings to disclose hidden threats and potential courses of action. Divination emerges as an improvisational process akin to story-telling, in which each element of the story acquires its full meaning only when brought into the appropriate relationship with the other elements, and in which the overall significance of the tale is not known until it reaches its conclusion.
Citation
Anderson , R T 2017 , A story of blood, guts and guesswork : synthetic reasoning in classical Greek divination . in R Evans (ed.) , Prophets and Profits : Ancient Divination and Its Reception . vol. Acta Classica Supplement 9 , Routledge , pp. 50-64 , 2015 Classics Colloquium , Pretoria , South Africa , 5/11/15 .
 
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Publication
Prophets and Profits
Status
Peer reviewed
Type
Book item
Rights
© 2018, Routledge. This work has been made available online in accordance with the publisher’s policies. This is the author created, accepted version manuscript following peer review and may differ slightly from the final published version. The final published version of this work is available at: https://www.routledge.com/9781138290150
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  • University of St Andrews Research
URL
https://www.routledge.com/9781138290150
URI
http://hdl.handle.net/10023/17211

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