Review of Bonnet, The names of the gods in ancient Mediterranean religions

BRYN MAYR CLASSICAL REVIEW: The names of the gods in ancient Mediterranean religions.

Corinne Bonnet, The names of the gods in ancient Mediterranean religions. Trans. R. Häussler. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2024. Pp. xxiv, 282 ISBN 9781009394826.

Review by
Dominic Dalglish, The Open University. dominic.dalglish@open.ac.uk

... Readers should appreciate that the volume’s particular focus on constructs of gods is just one means of studying forms of religious communication, the justification for which may be judged from the strength of its contributions. It is a fitting advertisement for the MAP database, and as such the contributors—and translator Ralph Häussler, who has done an excellent job of retaining the authors’ voices—should be proud of their achievement. If questions remain, it is perhaps because like a good workshop, you should leave with more of them than you arrived with.

The names include Phoenician Baal Oz (Lord of Power) in Cyprus, Mar ‘Olam (Lord of the World/Eternity) at Palmyra, Phoenician Melqart of Tyre, ancient Israel's YHWH, and many others, mostly from the Classical world.

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