Persephone's quest : entheogens and the origins of religion / / R. Gordon Wasson ... [et al.]

• Record Nr.: UNINA9910974852703321
• Pubbl/distr/stampa: New Haven, : Yale University Press, c1986
• ISBN: 9780300138146; 0300138148
• Descrizione fisica: 1 online resource (256 pages) : illustrations
• Altri autori (Persone): WassonR. Gordon <1898-1986.> (Robert Gordon)
• Disciplina: 200
• Soggetti: Religion; Religions
• Lingua di pubblicazione: Inglese
• Formato: Materiale a stampa
• Livello bibliografico: Monografia
• Note generali: Description based upon print version of record.
• Nota di bibliografia: Includes bibliographies.
• Nota di contenuto: Front matter -- TABLE OF CONTENTS -- LIST OF ILLUSTRATIONS -- Prelude -- CHAPTER 1. Persephone's Quest -- CHAPTER 2. Lightningbolt and Mushrooms -- CHAPTER 3. The Mahavlra Vessel and the Plant Putika -- CHAPTER 4. The Last Meal of the Buddha -- CHAPTER 5. Carved 'Disembodied Eyes' of Teotihuacan -- CHAPTER 6. Mushrooms and Philosophers -- CHAPTER 7. The Wild and the Cultivated: Wine in Euripides' Bacchae -- CHAPTER 8. The Offerings from the Hyperboreans -- Notes on the Essays in this Book
• Sommario/riassunto: This fascinating book discusses the role played by psychoactive mushrooms in the religious rituals of ancient Greece, Eurasia, and Mesoamerica. R. Gordon Wasson, an internationally known ethnomycologist who was one of the first to investigate how these mushrooms were venerated and employed by different native peoples, here joins with three other scholars to discuss the evidence for his discoveries about these fungi, which he has called entheogens, or "god generated within."