Pergamon: City of Science ... and Satan?

Biblical Archaeology Review ^ | August 2009 (-ish) | Sarah Yeomans

[Nikas777]

nephilim is a Hebrew construct - not related to Greek mythology. The scene depicts the war of the Olympian gods vs the early more beastly Titans. To me this struggle in mythology represented the Greeks giving up the earlier gods who were half human and half monster like found in earlier civilizations in Mesopotamia and Egypt and embracing anthropomorphic gods - gods that looked and acted like men.

[Nikas777]

Snakes, the symbol for Aesklepios, ornament a marble altar. In the ancient world, snakes symbolized healing and life-renewal. The caduceus was adopted as a symbol of the medical profession because of its similarity with the serpent entwined staff of Aesklepios. IIRC, there is more than one example in situ.

In spiral like the DNA helix.

If you are into fringe stuff like I am (for fun mostly) you would read lots of speculation regarding the connections.

[Nikas777]

The mythological scenes depicting the war of the Olympian gods vs the early more beastly Titans to me always represented the Greeks giving up or rejecting the earlier gods who were half human and half monster like found in earlier civilizations in Mesopotamia and Egypt and embracing anthropomorphic gods - gods that looked and acted like men.

[aruanan]

In spiral like the DNA helix.

Not really. The two strands in DNA lie head to tail. In the caduceus, they lie head to head, tail to tail. Also, the double spiral of the caduceus has strands that are 180 degrees apart.


The two strands of the DNA helix are not.


The best guess of the origin of the caduceus is the practice of using a stick to provide traction in extracting Guinea worms by winding them up onto the stick as they erupt.

[JoeProBono]

[Nikas777]

I am just saying if you read fringe books, like I do, for fun, the DNA helix/caduceus connection is a big deal. I think in UFO type books.

[colorado tanker]

LOL! I hate that Microsoft paper clip. Right up there with Jar-Jar Binks.

[Daffynition]

[Nikas777]

What is that?

[SunkenCiv]

Ew! I’d repressed the memory of Jar-Jar Binks for years, thanks a lot. ;’)

[SunkenCiv]

There were a number of traditions more or less coexisting, which was also the case in Egypt (the consolidated beliefs there were a terrific mishmash as a result), Mesopotamia (and neighboring territories such as Elam), and Europe (which indeed Greece was part of) due to the occasional ingress of big migrations coming out of central Asia down the steppe. The need to make disparate traditions whole (probably for political reasons, unions of towns under one rule, that kind of thing) led to unusual genealogical myths (Venus from the head of Zeus, Apollo from Zeus bangin’ a swan, for that matter, Kronos devouring his children, Ouranos getting castrated, etc). Apollo is actually not originally Greek at all (not even his name), and yet became in some ways the quintessential pagan Greek deity.