Can I ask you about the underworld in Greek mythology? Particularly burials and judging where people end up.
How does it work?
If someone doesnât get the burial properly are they stuck from entering the underworld for all eternity? Did people give their enemies or slaves proper burials?
Are there any specific things that separate who gets into Elysium vs Asphodel vs Tartarus? (Christianity and Islam I think have just paradise and hell for right and wrong) (Norse mythology has Valhalla but you need to die in battle to get there) Are there similar ârulesâ?
if you have any good places to read about it, Iâd be happy to check those out please
Absolutely.
Well of course as someone expects burials is the primary source we have on not only beliefs for death and afterlife but also on societies themselves. One thing is for sure that regardless of beliefs, a burial seems to be a must for either case.
Now ancient Greek and Roman beliefs are of course different than abrahamic religions that speak on paradise hell and in cases of catholic belief pugnatory. There are also various branches and cults that bring some different aspect to life after death (for example Orphic tradition of mysticistic rituals) but generally speaking the ancient Greeks had a very blunt thought about death; that it is dark and unpleasant. We see this belief already in Homer where all the dead regardless of their heroic life, skills or good works they end up to the same place, what we call Asphodel fields. Essentially Homer gives us a very grim aspect of death; how everyone regardless of what they did in life will probably end up at the same place and even Achilles mentioned how he'd rather be the last slave at a poor house than reign among the dead.
Which is probably why Greeks had such a great obsession one could say with life, present as well as honor and glory through remembrance. Basically what you do now reflects on the eternity you will have in the memories of others and how your own children will inherit fame from you to go on. What you do on this life echoes forever to people that stay behind. Both Tartarus and Elysium seem to be reserved for the absolute worst and the absolute best. Both of these seem to be smaller persentages. Most of the time you expect to see monsters and titans in Tartarus where Zeus exiled them after taking over the authority of heavens while in Elysium we speak almost of deified heroes or heroes that earned respect through hero cults. The location of Elysium seems to have other names too such as "Isle of Leukas". It depends really on cults and different opinions in regards to human spirit but by n large 99% of the time you expect all to go to the underworld and like renounced heroes or figures associated with gods or have some godly feature end up to Elysium. Seems highly unlikely for common mortals to end up in Elysium.
Now what happens to souls that do not receive burial? Well once again various thoughts exist in regards to how that works. Now for a great deal of time spirit seems to linger around the dead body for several days (3 usually I believe, which is still used to these day in Greece when funerary rites are performed three days after the burial), after that the soul departs for Hades. The funerary rites seem to be granting the soul a safe passage to the other end especially with the obolus to pay Charon in later times when coin economy became more a thing. Now what happens if someone doesn't get properly prepared for the underworld? Well on popular belief, I believe known already in Virgil's Aeneid, the dead that did not get the passage to the river, they have to remain there at the edge of Styx and wait 100 years till they can finally cross over, wander about aimlessly at the crowded end (Part of it I used for my own story "The Death of Odysseus", specifically on the second chapter where Odysseus observes other shades around him and notices some are with shrouds and some are without etc You can see it both here and in my ao3) The possibility for a vengeaful or sorrowful spirit linger or speak to people can exist for instance Clytemnestra appears in Aeschulus later as a source for sending the Furies against her son or we see ghosts appearing in literature and then go down to Hades again, even if they do have a grave for instance in Argonautica by Apollonius Rhodius)
Generally speaking a person that didn't receive a burial or funerary rites seems to remain at the edge of Styx for an elongated period of time.
Burials are also of course happening. We do know that even in Homer there are stops of fights so that the dead will be granted burial. We do see the aspect of each side burying their own, usually at nights (hence also battles stopping at nights for resting as well as burying the dead) but we can assume that some sort of hasty burial would be expected at a battlefield even amongst adversaries (I partially got inspired by it for my Ismarus story particularly the third chapter) Of course in huge battles we can expect sometimes a mass grave to be made (historically we have this at rare occasions to signify the importance of a battle as a sacred space, for instance the tomb of Marathon.
Usually we can tell if a mass grave is indeed to signify a battle and not some sickness for instance (which we see already in Homer how funerary pyres were burning massively to bury the numerous dead by the plague) because we also tend to see the males of fighting age that bear trauma to their bodies and on occasions bear the arms that they had at battle. Burial customs of both burials and burns exist at the same time sometimes. Now slaves are hard to tell but I think it is save to assume they did get burials but as one expects, common graves and pits were being used. We even get some special findings such as the mass grave at Pydna in Macedonia that we see the burial ground of several bodies men and women mostly of mature age but less elders. They do have signs of stress and malnutrition to their bodies and signs of physical labor. A handful of them were even tied with chains or iron neck bands.
(images from antiquity.ac)
This burial in Pydna seems to be linked to the mass import of slaves from the wars Alexander the Great conducted. We even hear on a story given to us by Arrian. According to that, when Alexander won the battle of Granikos he captured, among others, fellow Greeks mercenaries that had sided with the enemy. He caught those and sent them back to be used for hard labor as punishment. We can expect slaves to receive a burial but so far it seems that they are mostly in mass graves and if they have any sort of personal items as burial goods, they would be very modest if any at all. But yes of course we would expect burials to happen (perhaps it also depends on whether a slave was dear to a master or had a more privileged position to a household for instance if he was the teacher of caretaker of the child of the family) if anything, out of hygiene and practicality
Now the idea of cenotaph aka an empty but symbolic tomb, seems to also exist. Already Telemachus in the Odyssey mentions how he would build a sema for his father if he found out that he is dead even if he would have no body to bury. Historically we do see post-mortem dedications too even outside of the tomb context. This serves of course the remembrance purpose when for some reason the body was not retrieved or not offered a proper funeral.
We also seem to have later sources to speak on how mutilating one's body before or after death would have impact on the dead below which is also why apart from recognition, traitors and treacherous slaves were mutilated by having their noses or ears cut off at some cases.
I hope this answers your question to some degree but I would be happy to elaborate more if there is something specific you need me to look up for.
