Babylon in the Greek Imaginaire

Abstract

Babylon held a particularly special place in the Greek imaginaire as a cultural and literary cross-roads: it was space symbolic of the cultural hybridity and suppression of the imperial period, but also a space capable of captivating the historical, scientific, magical and fictional imagination. This study considers different lenses through which the Greeks viewed Babylon, covering a wide range of sources spanning from fifth century BCE up until the third/fourth century CE, which includes historiographies, biographies, magico-medical texts, comic dialogues, and the ancient novel. This thesis explores impressions of Babylon in Greek literature, how on one hand it was presented as a space of esoteric wisdom, and on the other, a dangerous and sensationalised space, and how these two strands of the imagination combined in the form of the ancient novel.