Basic question about Polytheism

[brotus maximus]

i know this is a bit off topic in this topic but reading the first post about hercules reminded me there were a lot of gods and godesses related to each other or had a different name it sounds like but at the same time alot of them seemed similar am I right?? cause i just confused my self please help me???

[Ursus]

We know that there are many associations with gods of different cultures, but is there evidence of Greek assimiliation of gods as the Romans did?

 

 

Actually, yes. The origins of Hellenic religion are manifold. At least three strands are observed: 1) The Minoan-Myceanean proto-Hellenic religion 2) The Indo-European 3) Near Eastern/West Asian

 

For instance, Zeus is a god that has undeniable linguistic roots in the Indo-European religion. However, there is some kind of Zeus in the Minoan religion. Furthermore, his mythological and cultic persona seems to have much in common with Near Eastern/West Asian wheather deities and was probably influenced by them.

 

As another example, Aphrodite is a much re-worked version of the Punic Ishtar-Astarte

[brotus maximus]

so in some ways alot of gods/godesses are based or were influenced by other gods and godesses and such around them from different cultures(greek in paticular and rman gods-many are alike with different names as an example)

riddick

[Ursus]

The Mediterranean was a melting pot and a lot of different cultures were interacting. Cultures often adopted the gods of their neighbors, albeit with some cultural modifications (or cultural distortions, depending on your perspective).

[Pantagathus]

Even though there are pre-existing threads containing this same question, I've split this out of the Hercules thread into its own because it was indeed off topic there.

 

Now, on top of what Ursus said, one reason perhaps that the ancients found similarities between their Gods & their neighbor's religions is because most Polytheistic religions simply focused on aspects of the natural world that are important to the sustainment of human life on one side (agriculture & weather, Love & procreation, knowledge aquisition & transmition, commerce, etc..) and the reverence of death and conflict as unavoidable aspects of life on the other.