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A Research on Characteristics and Cultural Backgrounds of Chinese and Greek Mythological War Deities

선정규 1

1고려대학교

Accredited

ABSTRACT

Mythology is a complex of cultures. Therefore it reflects the historicalexperience that people went through and the structured system ofcontemplation built over time. The figure of a war deity, the primary characterin the mythology associated war which might have terminated or sustained anation, represents the most primitive contemplation system of the race. Thepurpose of the current research is to understand the difference in how easternand western people have developed their thoughts, by investigating two wardeities in Chinese myth and Greek myth, Chiyou and Ares. The research alsolooks into the embedded culture in those two mythological characters. Such investigation leads to the conclusions as following. First significant difference is found from the appearance of two gods. Chiyouhas the look of hybrid, of human and animal, while Ares has the look ofcomplete human. The dissimilarity in the appearance results from the differentformation and concept of divine characters. Two characters have different backgrounds in becoming divine characters aswell. The beginning of Chiyou was a human who was deified later. Ares, on theother hand, originated from a god, and gained the human characters later. In terms of aesthetics, stories of two characters have different types ofbeauty. The story of Chiyou is typical tragedy, while Ares represents typicalhostility. Paradoxical figure of Chiyou is the consequence of worshiping tragic heroand deifying the winner, while the hostility of Ares results from individualismand worshiping military force.

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