Classical culture, mythology, and religion
What the exam tests
You must know mythic narrative, divine functions, cult practice, and the relation between Greek and Roman religious systems. Questions often ask for identification, aetiology, or the civic meaning of a festival.
Core map
- Succession myth: Chaos, Gaia, Uranus, Cronus, Zeus; Titanomachy; Olympians.
- Greek–Roman pairings: Zeus/Jupiter, Hera/Juno, Poseidon/Neptune, Demeter/Ceres, Athena/Minerva, Apollo, Artemis/Diana, Aphrodite/Venus, Hephaestus/Vulcan, Ares/Mars, Hermes/Mercury, Dionysus/Bacchus-Liber, Hades/Pluto-Dis.
- Heroes: Heracles, Theseus, Perseus, Achilles, Odysseus, Aeneas. The Trojan cycle links Greek myth to Roman foundation legend.
- Cult: sacrifice, votives, purification, processions; Delphi's oracle; Eleusinian Mysteries; Athenian Dionysia and Panathenaea.
- Roman religion: state cult supervised by pontifices and augurs; Vestals; household Lares, Penates, Genius; festivals such as Lupercalia and Saturnalia; imperial cult.
- Myth has variants. Aetiology explains a rite, place, or institution; ritual charter explains why a cult matters.
Worked example
Demeter and Persephone.
- Hades abducts Persephone; Demeter's grief causes crop failure.
- A compromise allows Persephone to return for part of the year; the pomegranate seeds bind her to Hades.
- The story explains the seasons and founds the Eleusinian Mysteries. Reasoning: the myth is both aetiological and cultic; it does not merely entertain.
Traps
- Assuming one canonical version of a myth.
- Equating gods too mechanically: Roman Mars is not simply Greek Ares in every respect.
- Confusing Greek mystery cult with public civic festival.
- Treating imperial cult as ordinary atheism or as pure politics; it was a religious and political language.