Consecrated Ground

The Greeks had hundreds of gods and spirits that governed nearly every aspect of life. For centuries the people had been paying them homage and consecrating spaces and buildings in their honour. The mythologies that told the stories of the gods, such as Homer’s The Iliad, were particularly important to the Hellenistic cultures and were treated as sacred texts. Numerous festivals would be held all year round so that the gods would bless the land and people. With so many gods, cults were established to focus beliefs on one particular deity or another. Like other peoples, belief in an afterlife was a given, so that mortal life did have consequences. For the Greeks, they might suffer in Tartarus, abide in Hades or go to the noble, beautiful fields of Elysium, depending on their path through life. Indeed, if strict funeral rites were not observed the dead might be condemned to wander as lost souls.