Eating People Is Might: Power and the Representation of Anthropophagy in Antiquity
type: CreativeWork
description: For several decades, scholars have read cannibalism in ancient texts as an ethnographic and rhetorical strategy to marginalize, minimize, demonize, or otherwise denigrate ‘the Other.’ It is seen as a characteristic of the wild, the savage, the uncivilized, and the bestial, something one attributes only to other people. This project challenges that assertion. In situating the many varied references to eating people in ancient Greek, Near Eastern, and Roman literature within their historical and generic contexts, I provide an alternative reading of the purpose of these accusations and stories. I argue that consumption of another is a statement of power, and those who can consume freely or dictate the strictures of another’s diet hold the most immense power. This underlying quality forms the core of the various established topoi in antiquity, which are employed in different ways according to their function in a text, the genre of the text, and even the language and culture in which that text is written.
abstract: For several decades, scholars have read cannibalism in ancient texts as an ethnographic and rhetorical strategy to marginalize, minimize, demonize, or otherwise denigrate ‘the Other.’ It is seen as a characteristic of the wild, the savage, the uncivilized, and the bestial, something one attributes only to other people. This project challenges that assertion. In situating the many varied references to eating people in ancient Greek, Near Eastern, and Roman literature within their historical and generic contexts, I provide an alternative reading of the purpose of these accusations and stories. I argue that consumption of another is a statement of power, and those who can consume freely or dictate the strictures of another’s diet hold the most immense power. This underlying quality forms the core of the various established topoi in antiquity, which are employed in different ways according to their function in a text, the genre of the text, and even the language and culture in which that text is written.
author: Weimer, Christopher
keywords: Classical Literature and Philology, Near Eastern Languages and Societies, cannibalism, mythology, ancient greece, ancient near east
date published: 2022-09-01T07:00:00Z
date modified: 2026-07-24T01:58:49Z
provider: City University of New York - Graduate Center
publisher: Networked Digital Library of Theses and Dissertations
type: WebPage
source organization: The Graduate School and University Center of The City University of New York