Within the depth-psychology and comparative-mythology corpus assembled under the Seba library, ‘Race’ operates along two largely non-overlapping axes. The first and most extensively documented is the cosmogonic-mythological axis, where ‘race’ denotes the successive generations or kinds of humanity catalogued in Hesiod’s Works and Days — the races of gold, silver, bronze, heroes, and iron — and where Jean-Pierre Vernant’s structuralist analysis stands as the dominant interpretive voice. Vernant reads these races not as stages in linear decline but as paired functional oppositions organized around the polarities of dike and hubris, with each race defined relationally rather than in isolation. Kerényi corroborates this reading by attending to the cosmological architecture that places the divine race alongside the mortal one. The second axis — modern sociopolitical — is represented only fragmentarily, primarily through the text misattributed to Hannah but clearly drawn from scholarly commentary on Voegelin and Arendt, which identifies four analytical levels in the race concept (empirical, political, explanatory, philosophical) and traces how nineteenth-century biologism narrowed what had been a complex body-mind-spirit category. Athletic ‘races’ — chariot contests, foot races, wrestling bouts at Patroclus’s funeral games — appear extensively in Homer and constitute a third, largely literal usage. The tension between myth, sociology, and competitive performance gives the concordance entry its unusual breadth.
the succession of the races in time reflects a permanent, hierarchical order in the universe… cosmic time is unfolded alternately, first in one direction
Vernant’s foundational argument that Hesiod’s racial sequence is not linear decline but a cyclical, hierarchically structured cosmological scheme.
, Myth and Thought Among the Greeks, 1983thesis
the race of silver, which is inferior to the race that preceded it, exists and is defined only in relation to that race… Pious rule is opposed by impious rule
Vernant demonstrates that each race is constituted relationally — defined by functional opposition (dike versus hubris) rather than by intrinsic qualities alone.
, Myth and Thought Among the Greeks, 1983thesis
The lesson of the myth of the races is, in fact, formulated by Hesiod with all possible precision… Listen to dike; do not allow hubris to grow.
The myth of the races is shown to have an explicit ethical purpose: to instruct both the farmer Perses and the ruling kings in the proper relationship between justice and overreach.
, Myth and Thought Among the Greeks, 1983thesis
the violence glorified in warlike man cannot cross the threshold of the afterlife: in Hades, the race of bronze fades away like a wisp of smoke, into the anonymity of death.
Vernant argues that the afterlife fate of each race confirms the functional logic of the myth: military hubris earns anonymity, whereas royal dike earns daemonic elevation.
, Myth and Thought Among the Greeks, 1983thesis
in the heroic age, gods and goddesses still came to mix with mortals and to engender, at the meeting point between the two races, demigods (hemitheoi)
The race of heroes is distinguished as the corrective counterpart to bronze, restoring proximity between mortal and divine that had been severed by martial hubris.
, Myth and Thought Among the Greeks, 1983thesis
The men of gold, the royal ones, who are the incarnation of the justice of the ruler, obtain in the afterlife an honor described as ‘royal.’
Vernant correlates posthumous honor with functional identity: the gold race rules justly and therefore receives royal daemonic status after death.
, Myth and Thought Among the Greeks, 1983thesis
the race of silver is the only one of the… paired with the race of gold, whose dike it turns into hubris
Silver is not merely inferior to gold but is its structural inversion, converting the royal function’s dike into hubris — making opposition constitutive of each race’s identity.
, Myth and Thought Among the Greeks, 1983supporting
The races of gold and silver are promoted, in the strict sense of the term: from being perishable beings they become daemons… the race of gold becomes epichthonian daemons, the men of silver become hupochthonian daemons
The asymmetric afterlife promotion of the first two races — one above ground, one below — structurally mirrors their opposed expressions of the same royal function.
, Myth and Thought Among the Greeks, 1983supporting
by the end of the age of iron nothing will remain except geras: men will be born old, with their temples already white.
The race of iron’s terminal condition — birth into old age — marks the complete inversion of the golden race’s peaceful fullness and signals the cyclical end that must precede renewal.
, Myth and Thought Among the Greeks, 1983supporting
once Zeus has annihilated the race of iron in its turn, that is to say, once what has been shown to be a complete cycle is over, it will be possible for a new race of men to be born
Vernant argues for a cyclical rather than eschatological reading of the myth: the destruction of iron is not absolute termination but the precondition for cosmic renewal.
, Myth and Thought Among the Greeks, 1983supporting
the race of bronze was born also play a role in other accounts of early mortals… ash trees or the nymphs of the ash trees from whom the race of bronze was born
The mythological genealogy connecting the race of bronze to the Meliai ash-nymphs situates this race within an indigenous warrior-origin complex found across Greek traditions.
, Myth and Thought Among the Greeks, 1983supporting
they all die in battle, in the prime of life… the men appear from the start as grown, at the height of physical prowess, never having concerned themselves with anything other than the works of Ares.
The race of bronze is characterized by its exclusive identification with a single life-stage — the warrior prime — linking it structurally to military brotherhoods and myths of autochthonous origin.
, Myth and Thought Among the Greeks, 1983supporting
the fate after death of the men of silver who are promoted to the rank of the Blessed of the Infernal Regions indicates their superiority over the men of bronze, whose fate in the afterlife is to be among the anonymous dead in Hades.
Even within the declining sequence, the afterlife hierarchy corroborates functional rather than merely metallic ranking, undercutting a simple linear-decline reading.
, Myth and Thought Among the Greeks, 1983supporting
to explain the sequence of races, it introduces not just a simple linear pattern but progression that follows alternate phases and that suggests… a coupling of the races into pairs that share the same function
Vernant defends his paired-functional interpretation against the objection of over-complexity, insisting that the text itself demands recognition of inter-racial pairing.
, Myth and Thought Among the Greeks, 1983supporting
the race of heroes, whose presence is indispensable for the classification of divine beings, distorts the structure of the account; from the point of view of the sequence of races, it appears to be an episode tacked on afterward
Vernant acknowledges the structural problem the heroic race poses for any schema derived from metallic decline, and frames his own solution as integrating rather than excising this anomaly.
, Myth and Thought Among the Greeks, 1983supporting
the heroes of the cult are associated with a distant, ancient past; they belong to another age and represent a humanity different from that of the mortals who pay homage to them. They are ‘the divine race o’
The heroic race, when viewed through cult rather than epic, constitutes a separate ontological order — a superhuman past — rather than simply a chronological predecessor to the present.
, Myth and Thought Among the Greeks, 1983supporting
The second race created by the Olympians, the race of silver, was much inferior. It resembled the golden race neither in body nor in soul.
Kerényi’s retelling of Hesiod foregrounds embodied and psychic difference between races, situating the myth within the broader narrative of divine creation and human destiny.
, The Gods of the Greeks, 1951supporting
Mankind, considered as a great family, is the counterpart of the race of gods — that is to say, the family of the Olympian gods… The race of gods was composed of immortals, the human race of mortals.
Kerényi establishes the fundamental cosmological pairing: the human race is defined as the mortal counterpart to the immortal divine race, making mortality itself the constitutive feature of humanity.
, The Gods of the Greeks, 1951supporting
there are at least four analytical levels to Voegelin’s analysis. First there is ‘the empirical fact of race or ethnic differences’… Second is ‘the political idea of race as a mobilizing principle’
Voegelin’s four-level taxonomy — empirical, political, explanatory, philosophical — is presented as the most analytically rigorous framework available for thinking about race beyond biological reductionism.
, Encounters with the Soul: Active Imagination as Developed by C. G. Jung, 1981supporting
Arendt very much shared the idea that the cultures of sub-Saharan Africa were culturally underdeveloped. But she did break decisively with the idea that the state should be linked to
The passage locates Arendt at the intersection of residual cultural hierarchy and a principled refusal of ethnic nationalism, marking a partial but genuine break with racialist state theory.
, Encounters with the Soul: Active Imagination as Developed by C. G. Jung, 1981supporting
The functional trichotomy, if it can be objectively correlated with the text… does not clarify its internal aim; whereas the tripartite theology allows us to grasp the meaning that the poet confers on the ancient account of the ages of the world
Vernant situates his own interpretive project against Dumézil’s functional trichotomy, arguing that theological structure rather than sociological function illuminates the myth’s authorial intention.
, Myth and Thought Among the Greeks, 1983supporting
the poet remains convinced that the way the kings perform their judicial function has direct repercussions on the world of the laborer, either favoring or impeding the abundance of the fruits of the earth.
The myth of the races is connected to the poem’s practical ethics: the justice of the ruling class has material consequences for agricultural productivity and social order.
, Myth and Thought Among the Greeks, 1983supporting
the olive-crowned victor in the men’s race at Olympia represented Zeus… the olive-crowned victor in the girls’ race, which was held every fourth year in honour of Hera represented in like manner the god’s wife
Harrison documents the ritual dimension of competitive racing at Olympia, arguing that victors in sex-segregated races embodied the divine couple Zeus and Hera in an ancient octennial festival.
, Themis: A Study of the Social Origins of Greek Religion, 1912aside
It may be the tomb of somebody who died here long ago, or else the post that ancient people used for races. Now swift-footed Lord Achilles has specified that this will mark the turn.
The chariot-race turning post at Patroclus’s funeral games is associated with an ancient tomb, linking competitive racing to hero cult and the commemoration of the dead.
, The Iliad, 2023aside
In the foot-race, for all his speed, I outran Iphiklos, and with the spear I out-threw Polydoros and Phyleus.
Nestor’s nostalgic catalogue of his youthful athletic victories — foot-race, boxing, wrestling, chariot — frames competitive racing as a marker of heroic excellence that old age forecloses.
, The Iliad of Homer, 2011aside
so far they ran even, but then the mares of Atreides gave way and fell back, for he of his own will slackened his driving for fear that in the road the single-foot horses might crash
The chariot-race episode dramatizes the tension between competitive aggression and tactical prudence, with Menelaus choosing caution over the risk of destruction.
, The Iliad of Homer, 2011aside
Hesiod seems situated between the Homeric world and the world of the polis… he truly seems to be a precursor, given his terminology and his classification of divine beings into gods, daemons, the dead, and heroes.
Vernant situates Hesiod’s theological taxonomy — which underpins the myth of the races — as a transitional schema between Homeric cosmology and the structured religious categories of the classical polis.
, Myth and Thought Among the Greeks, 1983aside