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<p>Monsters that act “automatically,” without thought or conscious awareness, constitute a category whose primary exemplar in American culture is the zombie. However, automaticity can be found in other realizations of the monstrous, including in ancient Greece and contemporary India. This paper compares the two. In Greece, the beings known as Eryines hunt and attack people who are guilty of crimes against members of their own kin group. One of the best examples is Orestes, whom the Erinyes pursue relentlessly because he killed his own mother, Clytemnestra. On the southeastern coast of India, among members of the Jalari fishing caste, there is a spirit called Sati Polalmma, who, like the Erinyes, attacks those who have broken oaths made to kin, especially oaths that concern sexual fidelity. The Erinyes and Sati Polamma are chthonic beings, associated with the earth, and are said to predate the patriarchal order of male deities. The paper explores automatic action as a characteristic of one category of the monstrous.</p>
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Monsters that act “automatically,” without thought or conscious awareness, constitute a category whose primary exemplar in American culture is the zombie. However, automaticity can be found in other realizations of the monstrous, including in ancient Greece and contemporary India. This paper compares the two. In Greece, the beings known as Eryines hunt and attack people who are guilty of crimes against members of their own kin group. One of the best examples is Orestes, whom the Erinyes pursue relentlessly because he killed his own mother, Clytemnestra. On the southeastern coast of India, among members of the Jalari fishing caste, there is a spirit called Sati Polalmma, who, like the Erinyes, attacks those who have broken oaths made to kin, especially oaths that concern sexual fidelity. The Erinyes and Sati Polamma are chthonic beings, associated with the earth, and are said to predate the patriarchal order of male deities. The paper explores automatic action as a characteristic of one category of the monstrous.

Automated Monsters of Vengeance: Comparing Goddesses in Ancient Greece and Hindu India

Ethnologia Actualis

This work is licensed under the Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-NoDerivatives 4.0 International License.

Monsters that act “automatically,” without thought or conscious awareness, constitute a category whose primary exemplar in American culture is the zombie....

Automated Monsters of Vengeance: Comparing Goddesses in Ancient Greece and Hindu India

Published Online: Nov 20, 2021

Page range: 25 - 36

DOI: https://doi.org/10.2478/eas-2021-0019

Keywords
automaticity, chthonic monsters, Greece, South India

© 2021 Charles W. Nuckolls, published by Sciendo

This work is licensed under the Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-NoDerivatives 4.0 International License.

Automated Monsters of Vengeance: Comparing Goddesses in Ancient Greece and Hindu India

Published Online: Nov 20, 2021

Page range: 25 - 36

DOI: https://doi.org/10.2478/eas-2021-0019

Keywordsautomaticity, chthonic monsters, Greece, South India

© 2021 Charles W. Nuckolls, published by Sciendo

This work is licensed under the Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-NoDerivatives 4.0 International License.

Keywords
automaticity, chthonic monsters, Greece, South India