Uranus (mythology) - Cultural Context of Flint

Cultural Context of Flint

Greek deities
series
  • Titans and Olympians
  • Aquatic deities
  • Personified concepts
  • Other deities
Primordial deities
  • Chaos
  • Aether
  • Gaia
  • Uranus
  • Eros
  • Erebus
  • Nyx
  • Tartarus
Chthonic deities

Hades and Persephone,
Gaia, Demeter, Hecate,
Iacchus, Trophonius,
Triptolemus, Erinyes

The detail of the sickle's being flint rather than bronze or even iron was retained by Greek mythographers (though neglected by Roman ones). Knapped flints as cutting edges were set in wooden or bone sickles in the late Neolithic, before the onset of the Bronze Age. Such sickles may have survived latest in ritual contexts where metal was taboo, but the detail, which was retained by classical Greeks, suggests the antiquity of the mytheme.

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