Deep dives into world mythology and folklore, without the dumbing down
Elias Blackwood · May 27, 2026
Dante Alighieri wrote the Inferno in the early 1300s. His medieval vision of Hell shaped how the West imagines damnation. Before Dante, Hell was abstract theology. After him, it became vivid, specific, and unforgettable. Every circle has its own logic, its own torment, and its own moral lesson. Understanding these nine circles means understanding one … Read more
Elias Blackwood · May 23, 2026
The Cult of Dionysus: How a Synth-Pop Banger Channeled an Ancient Greek God “The Cult of Dionysus” by The Orion Experience is about rejecting the rigid, joyless norms of ordinary life in favor of a hedonistic, pleasure-and-freedom-centered existence — framed as joining a “cult” devoted to Dionysus, the Greek god of wine, theater, and ecstatic … Read more
Elias Blackwood · May 30, 2026
Most readers approach Dante Alighieri’s Inferno as a medieval compendium of torment—a lurid ledger of suffering inflicted on the damned. This reading fundamentally distorts the poem’s inner logic. The Inferno functions not as Dante’s endpoint but as his clinical assessment. Like any rigorous diagnosis, it brings pain before healing begins. The spiritual architecture of Dante’s … Read more
Elias Blackwood · May 20, 2026
I remember sitting in a graduate seminar on classical literature — this was about 1999 — when a professor said something that has stayed with me for the better part of three decades: “The Greeks did not write tragedies to…
Elias Blackwood · May 17, 2026
I still remember the first time a student in one of my comparative religion seminars confidently declared that Medusa was “just a monster.” It took everything I had not to groan audibly. After more than 25 years of studying ancient…
Elias Blackwood · May 13, 2026
I still remember the exact moment this question clicked for me. I was a second-year graduate student working through Snorri Sturluson’s Prose Edda in one hand and a battered copy of Hesiod’s Theogony in the other, and I kept stopping…
Elias Blackwood · May 10, 2026
About fifteen years into my research, I was working through Hesiod’s Works and Days in the original Greek when something stopped me cold. Hesiod wasn’t just telling farmers when to plant their crops — he was embedding an entire cosmological…
Elias Blackwood · May 7, 2026
I still remember the moment I realized how badly most people misunderstand Dionysus. I was sitting in a graduate seminar on Greek religion — this was back in the late 1990s — when a classmate confidently declared that Dionysus was…
Elias Blackwood · May 4, 2026
What Were Dionysus’ Worshippers Called? Maenads, Bacchants, and the Thiasus Few things get me more excited as a history buff than digging into the stranger, wilder corners of ancient religion — and nothing in the Greek world is stranger or wilder than the cult of Dionysus. If you’ve ever wondered exactly what Dionysus’ worshippers were … Read more
Elias Blackwood · May 2, 2026
Hi! I’m Jake, and everyone in my blocky village calls me Jake Cobblestone-Toes because I trip over every single loose cobblestone block in the Overworld! My messy brown hair sticks up like grass on a dirt block, and I wear a bright green hoodie with a smiling Creeper face on it. Additionally, I have one … Read more