Michael H. Jameson

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Michael Hamilton Jameson (born October 15, 1924 in London , † August 18, 2004 ) was an American classical philologist , epigraphist and archaeologist . His main contributions to Greek religion were in the realm of Greek sacrifice and the nature of the Greek religion. Several of his articles were groundbreaking. He was also known for his discovery of the decree of Themistocles .

Life

Michael H. Jameson grew up in Beijing , where his father, Raymond D. Jameson, was a professor of Western Literature at Beijing University . In 1942 he received his bachelor's degree in Greek from the University of Chicago at the age of 17. From 1943 to 1946 he worked as a Japanese translator for the United States Navy . In 1949 he received the Ph.D. for his work "The Offering at Meals: Its Place in Greek Sacrifice".

He acquired his epigraphic knowledge in 1949 during a stay at the American School of Classical Studies in Athens . The stay was made possible by a scholarship from the Fulbright program . After a short stay at the University of Minnesota , he received a grant from the Ford Foundation from 1953 to 1954 at the Institute for Social Anthropology at Oxford University . From 1954 to 1976 he was a professor at the University of Pennsylvania . In 1976 he moved to Stanford University , where he worked until his retirement in 1990.

His great discovery was the decree of Themistocles, which he discovered in a Greek café in 1960. The decree describes the preparations for the battle of Salamis in 470 BC. The discovery changed the way science looked at Thucydides and subsequently triggered a series of scientific contributions.

Michael H. Jameson's specialty was the Greek religion . In particular, he dedicated himself to the cult and the Greek sacrifice. He published new inscriptions from Halieis , Mases, Zarax, Epidauros , Epidauros Limera, Karpathos , Hydra , Kasos , Anthedon and Tiryns and wrote articles in Inscriptiones Atticae Euclidis Anno Anteriores . In 1962 he worked as an archaeologist in the sunken city of Halieis. In the Argolida he initiated ecological studies between 1979 and 1983, which were the first in the field of paleoecology in ancient Greece . This activity led to the publication of A Greek Countryside: The Southern Argolid from Prehistory to the Present Day , which he published in 1994 with Tjeerd Van Andel and CN Runnels by Stanford University Press .

Michael H. Jameson was able to accept several prizes and received research grants such as the Guggenheim grant in 1966/67. In 1968 he was elected to the American Academy of Arts and Sciences . At the end of his life he was Crossett Professor Emeritus for Humanities at Stanford University . He died of an illness in 2004.

Walter Burkert said of him: "His essays remain models - for epigraphers in how to think about Greek religion, and for historians of Greek religion in how to use the documents of epigraphy."

Publications (selection)

  • The Hero Echetlaeus . In: Transactions of the American Philological Association, Vol. 82, 1951, pp. 49-61.
  • The Women of Trachis . Translation. In: Sophocles II, Chicago 1957.
  • Mycenaean religion . In: Archeology, Volume 13, 1960.
  • A Decree of Themistocles from Troizen . Hesperia , Vol. 29, 1960, pp. 198-223.
  • Waiting for the Barbarian: New Light on the Persian Wars . In: Greece & Rome, Volume 8 (1), Cambridge 1961, pp. 5-18.
  • Mythology of Ancient Greece . In: Samuel Noah Kramer: Mythologies of the Ancient World. New York 1961.
  • Notes on the sacrificial calendar from Erchia . Bulletin de correspondance hellénique , Vol. 89, 1965, pp. 154-172.
  • The mysteries of Eleusis . Bulletin of the Philadelphia Association for Psychoanalysis, Volume 19, September 1969.
  • The Excavation of a Drowned Greek Temple . Scientific American , October 1972, pp. 74-91.
  • Sacrifice and animal husbandry in Classical Greece . In: CR Whittaker (Ed.): Pastoral Economies in Classical Antiquity. Cambridge Philological Society, Supplement 14, 1988, pp. 87-119.
  • Perseus, the Hero of Mykenai . In: R. Hägg and GC Nordquist (Ed.): Celebrations of Death and Divinity in the Bronze Age Argolid. 1990.
  • Sacrifice before Battle . In: VD Hanson (Ed.): Hoplites: The Classical Greek Battle Experience. 1991, pp. 197-227.
  • The asexuality of Dionysus . In: Thomas H. Carpenter and Christopher A. Faraone (eds.): Masks of Dionysus. Cornell University Press 1993.
  • The Ritual of the Athena Nike Parapet . In: Robin Osborne and Simon Hornblower (Eds.): Ritual, Finance, Politics. Athenian Democratic Accounts Presented to David Lewis. Oxford 1994, pp. 307-324.
  • Cults and Rites in Ancient Greece: Essays on Religion and Society . Cambridge 2014. ISBN 978-0-521-66129-4 . (Collection of essays with introductions by Paul Cartledge , Irene Polinskaya and Allaire B. Stallsmith ( Preface ); Paul Cartledge ( General Introduction ); Fritz Graf ( Gods and Heroes ); Christopher A. Faraone ( Rites ); Robert Parker ( Religion and Society ) and Jan N. Bremmer ( Michael Jameson and the Study of Greek Religion )).

literature

Web links

Individual evidence

  1. ↑ Martin Ostwald: Michael Hamilton Jameson, October 15, 1924 - August 18, 2004. In: Proceedings of the American Philosophical Society, Volume 151, No. 1, March 2007, p. 114.
  2. ↑ Martin Ostwald: Michael Hamilton Jameson, October 15, 1924 - August 18, 2004. In: Proceedings of the American Philosophical Society, Vol. 151, No. 1, March 2007, pp. 115 and 123; Michael H. Jameson: Cults and Rites in Ancient Greece: Essays on Religion and Society . Cambridge 2014, pp. Xxiv.
  3. ↑ Martin Ostwald: Michael Hamilton Jameson, October 15, 1924 - August 18, 2004. In: Proceedings of the American Philosophical Society, Volume 151, No. 1, March 2007, p. 118.
  4. ↑ Martin Ostwald: Michael Hamilton Jameson, October 15, 1924 - August 18, 2004. In: Proceedings of the American Philosophical Society, Volume 151, No. 1, March 2007, p. 117.
  5. ↑ Martin Ostwald: Michael Hamilton Jameson, October 15, 1924 - August 18, 2004. In: Proceedings of the American Philosophical Society, Volume 151, No. 1, March 2007, p. 119.
  6. ↑ Book of Members 1780 – present, Chapter J. (PDF; 354 ​​kB) In: American Academy of Arts and Sciences (amacad.org). Retrieved April 5, 2020 .
  7. ↑ Michael H. Jameson: Cults and Rites in Ancient Greece: Essays on Religion and Society . Cambridge 2014, pp. Xxvi.
personal data
SURNAME Jameson, Michael H.
ALTERNATIVE NAMES Jameson, Michael Hamilton (full name)
BRIEF DESCRIPTION American classical philologist, epigrapher, and archaeologist
DATE OF BIRTH October 15, 1924
PLACE OF BIRTH London
DATE OF DEATH August 18, 2004