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Books & Reading Schedule

Oedipus and the Sphinx

Below are the texts we recommend for a serious study of ancient Greek religion, together with a fifteen-week core reading schedule. The schedule lists the texts we expect a reader to become familiar with week by week; it is designed to be cumulative, so plan to visit and then revisit.

Required texts

  • Richard Buxton, The Complete World of Greek Mythology (Thames & Hudson) - CW
  • Robert Graves, Greek Myths, 2 vols. (Penguin) - GM
  • M. Hadas, Ten Plays by Euripides (Bantam)
  • Peter Levi (trans.), Pausanias: Guide to Greece, 2 vols. (Penguin)
  • P. MacKendrick, The Greek Stones Speak (Norton) - GS
  • Jon D. Mikalson, Ancient Greek Religion, 2nd ed. (Wiley-Blackwell) - AGR
  • M. P. Nilsson, Greek Folk Religion (Philadelphia)
  • John Pedley, Sanctuaries & the Sacred in the Ancient Greek World (Cambridge) - P
  • D. G. Rice & J. E. Stambaugh, Sources for the Study of Greek Religion (SBL, corrected ed.) - S
  • L. B. Zaidman & P. S. Pantel, Religion in the Ancient Greek City (Cambridge) - R

Recommended

  • Peter Levi, Atlas of the Greek World (Facts on File)
  • Georg Luck, Arcana Mundi (Johns Hopkins)
  • M. P. O. Morford & R. J. Lenardon, Classical Mythology (Oxford, latest ed.)
  • W. F. Otto, The Homeric Gods (Ayer)

Notes on editions

Translations by other hands are perfectly usable; just remember that page references in our notes follow the editions above. Graves’ Greek Myths exists as a two-volume set and as a single larger volume with identical contents - make sure you have the full text. The Atlas (recommended) is out of print but easy to find second-hand, and goes far beyond its title: it is an excellent illustrated introduction to Greek culture, society and material remains.

Reading schedule

Books are referred to by the abbreviations given above. For the Sources book (S), page references are to the corrected (2009) edition, with the original edition’s page numbers in square brackets.

  • Week 1: CW 130–145, 200–205; AGR xv–29
  • Week 2: P 1–28; S 1–19, 39–51 [1–25, 51–68]; AGR 32–51; CW 1–41, 42–53; Euripides Trojan Women
  • Week 3: R ch. 1–3; P 119–134; S 19–22 [25–30]; AGR 61–63, 102–118; CW 66–87, 94–101, 146–153; Nilsson ch. 1
  • Week 4: P 154–166; S 81–88 [107–115]; AGR 124–168; Nilsson ch. 2, 4
  • Week 5: CW 102–129; P 29–77; R ch. 4–6, 12
  • Week 6: P 78–118; R ch. 8–10; AGR 54–58, 68–78; Euripides Ion; S 105–110 [139–146]
  • Week 7: P 186–204; R ch. 14; S 96 [126–7]; AGR 59–61; Euripides Iphigeneia at Aulis
  • Week 8: [mid-point] Nilsson ch. 5, 6; S 89–92, 113–114 [117–121, 150–151]
  • Week 9: CW 54–65; S 62–65 [81–85]; R appendix 1, appendix 2
  • Week 10: R ch. 7; S 111–120 [147–159]; Euripides Hippolytus
  • Week 11: CW 170–199, 206–213; AGR 92–102; S 71–80 [93–106]
  • Week 12: P 135–153; AGR 78–92, 170–184; R ch. 11; Nilsson ch. 3, 7; S 52–61, 93–104, 127–145
  • Week 13: R ch. 13; S 146–190 [195–255]; AGR 58–59, 85–92; Euripides Bacchae
  • Week 14: P 205–240; S 23–37, 67–70, 121–125; AGR 186–226
  • Week 15: Review and revisiting - return to the texts that bear on your own interests and paper.

Alongside this core, do your own follow-up reading - looking up context, names and terms in Graves, MacKendrick and Pausanias, and in the online material gathered on this site. For brief prompts into each topic, see the Aphormai.

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