Re: Gk. Lyssa

--- 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