The oracle of Trophonios at Lebadeia (Boiotia), among the best documented in Greece, was active from the archaic period to the third century AD. At this oracle, divine revelation was given in the form of a ‘visionary trance’, experienced as a psychic journey or leap of the soul into the world of truth. From the beginning, the cult and legend of Trophonios (and of similar heroes) turned upon the boundary between ‘the other world’ and the here-and-now, and were intimately linked with psychagogy, divination (including iatromancy), and the mysteries. The analysis of each of the oracle's components in the light of ancient mentalities has broadened our understanding of both Trophonios and of Greek divination in general.
Pierre Bonnechere, Ph.D. (1992) in History, Université Catholique de Louvain, is now Professor (Dept. of History and Centre for Classical Studies) at the Université de Montréal. He has published on Greek animal and human sacrifice, on Boiotian oracles, and on Greek gardens and sacred groves.
...P. Bonnechère offre une bonne réflexion sur les cultes oraculaires et, par comparaison, mystériques dans l'Antiquité.'
Revue des Études Anciennes, 2004.
All those interested in Greek Religion, as well as classical philologists and historians of Greek mentalities.