Title: The Descent To The Underworld
1The Descent To The Underworld
- World Literature I
- Presentation by
- Ralph Monday
2"Man is the cruelest animal. At tragedies,
bullfights, and crucifixions he has so far felt
best on earth and when he invented hell for
himself, behold, that was his very heaven."
Friedrich Nietzsche
3From the land of the living to the realm of the
dead.
4A journey to the underworld is archetypal.
Charon driving The Damned in Michelangelo's Last
Judgment
5Cultural Conceptions of the Underworld
- Babylonian/Sumerian
- Hebrew
- Greek
- Roman
- Judeo-Christian
6The Setting Sun in the West, settling into the
Underworld.
Babylonian/Sumerian
7- Upon death the Sumerian would go to the land of
the dead, a dark, - Shadowy place completely dark.
- Here, Erishkigal, Queen of Darkness rules the
land from which no one returns. - Gilgamesh went to this land, but by a boon of the
gods, is allowed to return to the world of the
living.
8Hebrew
9- She'ol is the Hebrew abode of the dead the
underworld, grave or pit. - In the Hebrew Bible it is portrayed as a
comfortless place beneath the earth, - beyond gates, where both the bad and the good,
slave and king, pious and wicked - must go after death to sleep in silence and
oblivion in the dust.
10- Sheol/Gehenna is a physical location
characterized by fire and smoke. - A murky, shadowy place, the Hebrew underworld is
much like a burning - garbage dump.
- This was a place in Israel, the valley of Hinnom
where sacrifices were made and later corpses were
burned.
11Greek
- The Greeks believed that the underworld was one
of the areas assigned to the Major Olympians
after - The Olympian gods/goddesses overthrew the Titans,
an earlier group of gods.
12- In dividing the spoils of the battle, Hades/Dis
was given dominion over this region. Hades ruled
this realm - With Persephone, a maiden that he kidnapped.
Generally, in Greek epics the underworld is a
vague, undefined place. - Sometimes the underworld is divided into two
parts Erebuswhere the dead pass as soon as they
die--and
13- Tartarusa deeper location where the Titans are
kept. The Greek underworld is a shadowy place
where - shades of all sortsvillains and heroeslead a
miserable existence. - These shades are neither punished nor rewarded.
They simply live a miserable existence after
death.
14Hades, King of the Greek Underworld
15Hades abducting Persephone
16Roman
- In The Aeneid Virgil creates a more detailed
picture of the underworld than any found in
earlier writers. - Virgils underworld contains geographical
features, and the wicked are separated from the
brave and virtuous.
17- A journey to Virgils hell is dangerous. In order
to enter the kingdom of the dead, Aeneas must
secure a - golden bough and be guided and protected by the
Sibyl of Cumae. - Virgils underworld is the model that Dante bases
his Inferno upon.
18Hades and Persephone with the three headed dog
Cerebus.
19Aeneid, Map of the Underworld