Re: Gk. Lyssa

From: tgpedersen@...
Message: 9832
Date: 2001-09-28

--- In cybalist@..., Miryam y César Libran Moreno <libran@...>
wrote:
>
> Dear all,
> I hope I might be allowed to avail myself of the collective wisdom
of
> the list to try to find a solution to my puzzlement. I have been
trying
> to compile all possible classical references about the goddess
Lyssa,
> the personification of madness or even rabies. The word lyssa and
its
> derivatives (lussaw,lusswn, lusswdhs, lusshthr) are common enough in
> Homer (ex. gr. Il. 9.239. 305, 21.542) with the meaning "raging
> madness", but we don´t find a mention of a goddess called Lyssa
until
> two lost plays by Aeschylus, Toxotides (attested in a vase painting
> illustrating a scene from this tragedy) and Xantriae fr. 169 R.,
both
> dated between 499/8-456 a.C. Later we find her in the cast of
characters
> in Euripides´ Heracles and possibly in a number of later tragedies
> (Pollux 4.142 says the mask of Lyssa was one of the abnormal masks
in
> tragedy, which might imply the stage appearance of the goddess might
> have been some sort of fixture in post-classical plays). I have
always
> thought that Lyssa as a personification of Rabies or Madness was an
> invention of Aeschylus´ and as such she had no impact at all in the
> Greek cult or pantheon; I am no indoeuropeanist, but given her name
> (*luk-yH2) and her obvious connections with wolves and rabid dogs,
I was
> wondering whether she might, after all, be a part of the
indoeuropean
> pantheon, some sort of pre-existing wolf spirit or demon, discarded
by
> the more rational Homer (and the ionian tradition) and taken up
again by
> Aeschylus as some sort of "theatrical prop" to signify stage
madness,
> like he did (in part) with the Erinyes and the Alastores? Do we
have an
> analogous figure in the rest of the indoeuropean pantheon, some
sort of
> wolf-spirit which drives men and dogs mad or rabid, or are there any
> linguistic traces that such a figure could have existed?
> My most expressive thanks in advance.
> Best, Miryam

The Lejre Chronicle has a story of an evil, mad king Snjó who died of
being bitten by a horde of lice. Assuming the writer was, as Saxo,
trying to make sense of traditional song/stories, something like
Lyssa/madness might be behind. But I must admit getting an -s- out of
*luk-yH2 in Germanic would be difficult.

Torsten