Document Type
Book Chapter
Publication Date
12-17-2020
Publication Title
Greek Epigraphy and Religion
Pages
11-26
Publisher Name
Brill
Publisher Location
Leiden, The Netherlands
Abstract
The Latin phrase leges sacrae and its various translations (sacred laws, lois
sacrées, heilige Gesetze) have been applied since at least the nineteenth cen-
tury to various collections of inscribed documents. It is a modern invention
born out of the German Wissenschaft ideology of systematic, scientific, com-
prehensive methods of inquiry. This rubric and the collecting of Greek inscrip-
tions under it have always been recognized as problematically subjective, and
in the last decade or so a flurry of scholarship has critiqued the corpora more
directly. Much of this analysis has focused on the leges half of leges sacrae:
whether “sacred law” corresponds to an ancient category, what legal aspects of
sacred laws distinguish them from other laws and decrees, and how their terms
might have been enforced. What has been less examined, however, is what de-
fines the subject matter that led to the classification of these documents as
sacrae. What is sacred about Greek sacred law?
Recommended Citation
Gawlinski, Laura. Greek Religion and Epigraphic Corpora: What's Sacrae about Leges Sacrae?. Greek Epigraphy and Religion, , : 11-26, 2020. Retrieved from Loyola eCommons, Classical Studies: Faculty Publications and Other Works, http://dx.doi.org/10.1163/9789004442542_004
Creative Commons License
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Copyright Statement
© Brill, 2020.
Comments
Author Posting © Brill, 2020. This is the author's version of the work. It is posted here by permission of the Brill for personal use, not for redistribution. The definitive version was published in Greek Epigraphy and Religion, Pages 11-26 December 2020. https://doi.org/10.1163/9789004442542_004