Health, Ritual, and Community in Ancient Greece

At the heart of this book is a deceptively simple question: What does "health" mean? The answer, historian Calloway B. Scott shows, is culturally contingent, and in ancient Greece the concept went well beyond the proper functioning of an individual's body. Rather, "health" (Greek hygieia) furnished a key discursive and ritual tool for civic cohesion, religious praxis, and even cultural identity. The all-important polis, central to ancient Greek social and political life, fundamentally depended on this conception of good health as a communal and religious phenomenon, and its ritualization informed relationships not just between individuals but also between communities of humans and between the human and divine realms.

Scott investigates an impressive array of sources, from technical medical treatises to poetry to material remains and sanctuary sites, to explore the "body politic" of the ancient Greek world—and to query exactly what keeping that body healthy meant. Health, political identity, social relationships, and religious praxis were all deeply entwined; thus rites, rituals, and healing spaces were public, bringing people together in cohesive, coherent, and, ideally, healthy communities.