Dream Interpretation in a Prosperous Age? Artemidorus, the Greek Interpreter of Dreams

Bibliographic Data

ID23584151
AuthorsChristine Waide (corresponding author)
Year1999
Pages121-142
Publication date1999-07-08
Open AccessNo
TypeCHAPTER
VenueDream cultures (SOURCE_BOOK)
PublisherOxford University PressNew York, NY (PUBLISHER)
DOI10.1093/oso/9780195123364.003.0007
OpenAlexW4388387156
ISBN9780195123364
LanguageEN
Citations received8

In contrast to modem society and culture, in Greco-Roman antiquity dreaming and dream interpretation played a central role in a wide range of contexts. In the Asclepian cult practice of incubation, the dream was considered a sphere of communication shared by the god and the dreamer. The topic of the discourse was almost exclusively disease. While sleeping in the temple, ill people were spontaneously restored to health by the god in their dreams, or received sometimes clear, sometimes encoded instructions for furthering the healing process. The dream was perceived in this particular function but was not the object of systematic research, although cases of healing that the priests recorded in praise of the god, always comprising the dream experience, might have allowed for this, too.

Aesthetics · Art · Cult · Dream · Interpretation (philosophy) · Interpreter · Linguistics · Literature · Object (grammar) · Praise · Psychoanalysis · Psychotherapist · Theology · Ancient Mediterranean Archaeology and History · Classical Antiquity Studies · Historical, Religious, and Philosophical Studies · Philosophy · Psychology

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