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Above Terracotta pinax (painted plaque) from the 5th century BC, attributed to the Gela Painter, showing a funerary scene. The deceased lies on a bed, surrounded by family, some tearing their hair in mourning.
The Greek dead and the Great Beyond
The ancient Greeks thought much about the dead – how their remains should be disposed of, how their spirits might be summoned, how malignant they could be if unavenged. Classicist David Stuttard brings us face to face with the Greek dead.
Near the western shores of Greece, just south of Corfu’s southern tip and the lovely mainland seaside town of Parga, the modern village of Ephyra sprawls on a low hill above well-watered farmland. Sheep’s bells clack hypnotically; crows caw from nearby trees; and far off to the east the jagged mountains of Thesprotia shimmer like a mirage in the morning haze. It is a place of such beguiling peace and beauty that even the most well-informed, imaginative visitor must struggle to envisage how it looked 3,000 years ago. For then, instead of fertile ploughland, marshes stretched towards the seashore; a shallow lake, reedy and loud with frogs, lapped against the cliffs that fall sheer from the
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