The real and mythical natural world in ancient Greece: an environmental secondary sense?

Abstract

The presence and valuing of natural elements in literature and plastic representations (reliefs, vascular painting) is not abundant in ancient Greece, where human figure and anthropomorphization are the ground rule. Nevertheless, in spite of the relative shortage of natural motifs, these are very significant in the mythical Greek imagination, and not only as underlying or complementary motifs. Based on commentaries on textual sources and the analysis of a number of representations, especially vascular, this text highlights three aspects: the special interdependence between human beings and the environment; the mythical-symbolic value of natural, wild, or cultivated landscapes;elements of the environment, such as water, vegetation, especially trees, or relief, such as mountains.

keywords: myth; art; nature.