TY - JOUR AU - Bzinkowski, Michał PY - 2015/09/13 Y2 - 2024/03/29 TI - The Case of the Angels: The Relevance of the Research by Classical Scholar John Cuthbert Lawson (1874-1919) on Modern Greek Culture JF - Classica Cracoviensia JA - cc VL - 18 IS - SE - Articles DO - 10.12797/CC.18.2015.18.04 UR - https://journals.akademicka.pl/cc/article/view/1743 SP - 83-110 AB - <p><strong>Case of the Angels: The Relevance of the Research by Classical Scholar John Cuthbert Lawson (1874-1919) on Modern Greek Culture</strong></p><p>In my paper I focus on the well-known John Cuthbert Lawson’s study about Modern Greek folklore (1910) and I venture to verify if it may be regarded as a reliable source of information about Greek folk beliefs. I base my argument on the eschatological remarks Lawson made concerning the personification of Death – Charos and his relationship to the Christian Angels. Confronting Lawson’s views and his source material with other similar demotic songs, mainly from the collections he had had access to, I try to show in what way the older collections of folk-songs might have distorted or falsified the eschatological images of Charos and the Angels, and what he overlooked while analyzing the sources. I also shed some light on possible influences of Byzantine orthodoxy on Modern Greek folk tradition to which Greek demotic songs belong.</p> ER -