ἩΜΙΘΕΟΣ en question : l'homme, le héros et le demi-dieu

Abstract

The notion of 'demi-god' is both a modem category, useful for defining certain characters of Greek mythology, and a term with inherited meanings from classical semantics, which means that its definition is just as complex as that of the term hero to which it is linked. In the archaic tradition, the term 'demi-god' is used to designate a set, a group of individuals collectively understood as having two lines of descent, one human, the other divine. This group is defined by a certain number of common characteristics, which place them on the borderlines between mortality and immortality. These characteristics disappear when the characters which make up this group are no longer considered collectively but individually, as was already the practice of the mythographers of the Hellenistic and Roman periods. The mortality / immortality antinomy, which is nonetheless the basis of their definition, no longer functions in analyses of individual destiny, and it becomes impossible, on this basis, to provide a single and general characterisation of the demi-god.