{"id":4775,"date":"2026-04-21T09:29:43","date_gmt":"2026-04-21T09:29:43","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/iwell-guard.com\/keres\/"},"modified":"2026-06-05T14:29:05","modified_gmt":"2026-06-05T14:29:05","slug":"keres","status":"publish","type":"page","link":"https:\/\/iwell-guard.com\/en\/keres\/","title":{"rendered":"Keres"},"content":{"rendered":"\t\t<div data-elementor-type=\"wp-page\" data-elementor-id=\"4775\" class=\"elementor elementor-4775 elementor-841\" data-elementor-post-type=\"page\">\n\t\t\t\t<div class=\"elementor-element elementor-element-10fdade e-flex e-con-boxed e-con e-parent\" data-id=\"10fdade\" data-element_type=\"container\" data-e-type=\"container\" data-settings=\"{&quot;background_background&quot;:&quot;classic&quot;}\">\n\t\t\t\t\t<div class=\"e-con-inner\">\n\t\t<div class=\"elementor-element elementor-element-herohlft0 e-flex e-con-boxed e-con e-child\" data-id=\"herohlft0\" data-element_type=\"container\" data-e-type=\"container\">\n\t\t\t\t\t<div class=\"e-con-inner\">\n\t\t<div class=\"elementor-element elementor-element-c3ceb64 e-con-full e-flex e-con e-child\" data-id=\"c3ceb64\" data-element_type=\"container\" data-e-type=\"container\">\n\t\t\t\t<div class=\"elementor-element elementor-element-96ae5e1 elementor-widget elementor-widget-heading\" data-id=\"96ae5e1\" data-element_type=\"widget\" data-e-type=\"widget\" data-widget_type=\"heading.default\">\n\t\t\t\t\t<h1 class=\"elementor-heading-title elementor-size-default\">Keres, Spirit of the Greek Tradition<\/h1>\t\t\t\t<\/div>\n\t\t\t\t<div class=\"elementor-element elementor-element-e45238a elementor-widget elementor-widget-text-editor\" data-id=\"e45238a\" data-element_type=\"widget\" data-e-type=\"widget\" data-widget_type=\"text-editor.default\">\n\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t<p>Keres is a <span class=\"iwg-fachbegriff\" data-tooltip=\"An incorporeal being to which an effect in the world is attributed.\" tabindex=\"0\">spirit<\/span> of the Greek <span class=\"iwg-fachbegriff\" data-tooltip=\"The passing on of knowledge and narratives across generations.\" tabindex=\"0\">tradition<\/span>.<\/p><p><strong><span class=\"iwg-fachbegriff\" data-tooltip=\"A spiritual being to which harmful or ambivalent effect is attributed.\" tabindex=\"0\">Demons<\/span> of the battlefield, death-bringers of Greek <span class=\"iwg-fachbegriff\" data-tooltip=\"The entirety of the transmitted divine narratives of a culture.\" tabindex=\"0\">mythology<\/span>.<\/strong><\/p><h2 id=\"dif-keres\">Keres on Hesiod&#8217;s battlefield<\/h2><p>The Keres are <strong>battlefield demons<\/strong> of Greek <span class=\"iwg-fachbegriff\" data-tooltip=\"The entirety of the transmitted divine narratives of a culture.\" tabindex=\"0\">mythology<\/span> who, according to Hesiod (Shield of Heracles 248-257; Theogony 211), descend together with Thanatos and Hypnos from the family of Nyx.<\/p><p>They are <strong>black, with long claws and fangs, in blood-soaked garments<\/strong>, hovering over battlefields and tearing the souls out of dying warriors. Unlike the Erinyes, they do not pursue moral or judicial offences, but embody the <strong>statistical violence of war<\/strong>.<\/p><p>In the <em>Shield of Heracles<\/em> they fight over corpses like carrion birds. In the <strong>Pandora narrative<\/strong>, Keres escape from the jar opened by Pandora as <span class=\"iwg-fachbegriff\" data-tooltip=\"A bodiless being to which agency in the world is attributed.\" tabindex=\"0\">spirits<\/span> of disease and ill alongside toils, cares and sicknesses.<\/p><p>Pausanias reports <span class=\"iwg-fachbegriff\" data-tooltip=\"A structure that serves the veneration of one or more deities.\" tabindex=\"0\">temple<\/span> images that show Keres as ribbed, starving figures of the night. Related figures: the Moirai (spinners of fate), Eris (strife), Achlys (the mist of death).<\/p>\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t<\/div>\n\t\t\t\t<\/div>\n\t\t<div class=\"elementor-element elementor-element-klsbdg01 e-con-full e-flex e-con e-parent\" data-id=\"klsbdg01\" data-element_type=\"container\" data-e-type=\"container\">\n\t\t\t\t<div class=\"elementor-element elementor-element-klshtm01 elementor-widget elementor-widget-html\" data-id=\"klshtm01\" data-element_type=\"widget\" data-e-type=\"widget\" data-widget_type=\"html.default\">\n\t\t\t\t\t<div class=\"iwg-pill-row\"><span class=\"iwg-klasse-badge\" tabindex=\"0\" data-tooltip=\"Spirit: incorporeal or semi-corporeal entity, the deceased, nature beings, household spirits or threshold guardians. Acts in everyday life, often bound to places or families.\">Spirit<\/span><a href=\"https:\/\/iwell-guard.com\/en\/greece\/\" class=\"iwg-kultur-badge\" tabindex=\"0\" data-tooltip=\"Religion and mythology of ancient Greece from the Mycenaean period to late antiquity.\">Greece<\/a><a href=\"https:\/\/iwell-guard.com\/en\/spirits-of-the-dead\/\" class=\"iwg-tradition-badge\" tabindex=\"0\" data-tooltip=\"The deceased whose spirits continue to act in the world of the living, household spirits, ancestors, restless dead.\">Spirit of the dead<\/a><\/div>\t\t\t\t<\/div>\n\t\t\t\t<\/div>\n\t\t<div class=\"elementor-element elementor-element-3f74855 e-con-full e-flex e-con e-child\" data-id=\"3f74855\" data-element_type=\"container\" data-e-type=\"container\">\n\t\t\t\t<div class=\"elementor-element elementor-element-1c30362 elementor-toc--minimized-on-tablet elementor-widget elementor-widget-table-of-contents\" data-id=\"1c30362\" data-element_type=\"widget\" data-e-type=\"widget\" data-settings=\"{&quot;exclude_headings_by_selector&quot;:[],&quot;no_headings_message&quot;:&quot;Es wurden keine \\u00dcberschriften auf dieser Seite gefunden.&quot;,&quot;headings_by_tags&quot;:[&quot;h2&quot;,&quot;h3&quot;],&quot;marker_view&quot;:&quot;bullets&quot;,&quot;icon&quot;:{&quot;value&quot;:&quot;fas fa-circle&quot;,&quot;library&quot;:&quot;fa-solid&quot;,&quot;rendered_tag&quot;:&quot;&lt;svg class=\\&quot;e-font-icon-svg e-fas-circle\\&quot; viewBox=\\&quot;0 0 512 512\\&quot; xmlns=\\&quot;http:\\\/\\\/www.w3.org\\\/2000\\\/svg\\&quot;&gt;&lt;path d=\\&quot;M256 8C119 8 8 119 8 256s111 248 248 248 248-111 248-248S393 8 256 8z\\&quot;&gt;&lt;\\\/path&gt;&lt;\\\/svg&gt;&quot;},&quot;minimize_box&quot;:&quot;yes&quot;,&quot;minimized_on&quot;:&quot;tablet&quot;,&quot;hierarchical_view&quot;:&quot;yes&quot;,&quot;min_height&quot;:{&quot;unit&quot;:&quot;px&quot;,&quot;size&quot;:&quot;&quot;,&quot;sizes&quot;:[]},&quot;min_height_tablet&quot;:{&quot;unit&quot;:&quot;px&quot;,&quot;size&quot;:&quot;&quot;,&quot;sizes&quot;:[]},&quot;min_height_mobile&quot;:{&quot;unit&quot;:&quot;px&quot;,&quot;size&quot;:&quot;&quot;,&quot;sizes&quot;:[]}}\" data-widget_type=\"table-of-contents.default\">\n\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t<div class=\"elementor-toc__header\">\n\t\t\t\t\t\t<h2 class=\"elementor-toc__header-title\">\n\t\t\t\tTable of contents\t\t\t<\/h2>\n\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t<div class=\"elementor-toc__toggle-button elementor-toc__toggle-button--expand\" role=\"button\" tabindex=\"0\" aria-controls=\"elementor-toc__1c30362\" aria-expanded=\"true\" aria-label=\"Open table of contents\"><svg aria-hidden=\"true\" class=\"e-font-icon-svg e-fas-chevron-down\" viewBox=\"0 0 448 512\" xmlns=\"http:\/\/www.w3.org\/2000\/svg\"><path d=\"M207.029 381.476L12.686 187.132c-9.373-9.373-9.373-24.569 0-33.941l22.667-22.667c9.357-9.357 24.522-9.375 33.901-.04L224 284.505l154.745-154.021c9.379-9.335 24.544-9.317 33.901.04l22.667 22.667c9.373 9.373 9.373 24.569 0 33.941L240.971 381.476c-9.373 9.372-24.569 9.372-33.942 0z\"><\/path><\/svg><\/div>\n\t\t\t\t<div class=\"elementor-toc__toggle-button elementor-toc__toggle-button--collapse\" role=\"button\" tabindex=\"0\" aria-controls=\"elementor-toc__1c30362\" aria-expanded=\"true\" aria-label=\"Close table of contents\"><svg aria-hidden=\"true\" class=\"e-font-icon-svg e-fas-chevron-up\" viewBox=\"0 0 448 512\" xmlns=\"http:\/\/www.w3.org\/2000\/svg\"><path d=\"M240.971 130.524l194.343 194.343c9.373 9.373 9.373 24.569 0 33.941l-22.667 22.667c-9.357 9.357-24.522 9.375-33.901.04L224 227.495 69.255 381.516c-9.379 9.335-24.544 9.317-33.901-.04l-22.667-22.667c-9.373-9.373-9.373-24.569 0-33.941L207.03 130.525c9.372-9.373 24.568-9.373 33.941-.001z\"><\/path><\/svg><\/div>\n\t\t\t\t\t<\/div>\n\t\t\t\t<div id=\"elementor-toc__1c30362\" class=\"elementor-toc__body\">\n\t\t\t<div class=\"elementor-toc__spinner-container\">\n\t\t\t\t<svg class=\"elementor-toc__spinner eicon-animation-spin e-font-icon-svg e-eicon-loading\" aria-hidden=\"true\" viewBox=\"0 0 1000 1000\" xmlns=\"http:\/\/www.w3.org\/2000\/svg\"><path d=\"M500 975V858C696 858 858 696 858 500S696 142 500 142 142 304 142 500H25C25 237 238 25 500 25S975 237 975 500 763 975 500 975Z\"><\/path><\/svg>\t\t\t<\/div>\n\t\t<\/div>\n\t\t\t\t\t\t<\/div>\n\t\t\t\t<\/div>\n\t\t\t\t\t<\/div>\n\t\t\t\t<\/div>\n\t\t<div class=\"elementor-element elementor-element-herorght0 e-con-full e-flex e-con e-child\" data-id=\"herorght0\" data-element_type=\"container\" data-e-type=\"container\">\n\t\t\t\t<div class=\"elementor-element elementor-element-heroimg00 iwg-hero-image elementor-widget elementor-widget-image\" data-id=\"heroimg00\" data-element_type=\"widget\" data-e-type=\"widget\" data-widget_type=\"image.default\">\n\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t<img fetchpriority=\"high\" decoding=\"async\" width=\"683\" height=\"1024\" src=\"https:\/\/iwell-guard.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/04\/geister_griechenland_keres-683x1024.webp\" class=\"attachment-large size-large wp-image-4776\" alt=\"Keres - spirits from the Greek tradition, historical illustration\" srcset=\"https:\/\/iwell-guard.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/04\/geister_griechenland_keres-683x1024.webp 683w, https:\/\/iwell-guard.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/04\/geister_griechenland_keres-200x300.webp 200w, https:\/\/iwell-guard.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/04\/geister_griechenland_keres-768x1152.webp 768w, https:\/\/iwell-guard.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/04\/geister_griechenland_keres.webp 1024w\" sizes=\"(max-width: 683px) 100vw, 683px\" \/>\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t<\/div>\n\t\t\t\t<\/div>\n\t\t\t\t\t<\/div>\n\t\t\t\t<\/div>\n\t\t<div class=\"elementor-element elementor-element-32917199 e-flex e-con-boxed e-con e-parent\" data-id=\"32917199\" data-element_type=\"container\" data-e-type=\"container\">\n\t\t\t\t\t<div class=\"e-con-inner\">\n\t\t<div class=\"elementor-element elementor-element-26e916cb e-flex e-con-boxed e-con e-child\" data-id=\"26e916cb\" data-element_type=\"container\" data-e-type=\"container\">\n\t\t\t\t\t<div class=\"e-con-inner\">\n\t\t<div class=\"elementor-element elementor-element-253a40d4 e-flex e-con-boxed e-con e-child\" data-id=\"253a40d4\" data-element_type=\"container\" data-e-type=\"container\">\n\t\t\t\t\t<div class=\"e-con-inner\">\n\t\t\t\t<div class=\"elementor-element elementor-element-1200c304 elementor-widget elementor-widget-heading\" data-id=\"1200c304\" data-element_type=\"widget\" data-e-type=\"widget\" data-widget_type=\"heading.default\">\n\t\t\t\t\t<div class=\"elementor-heading-title elementor-size-default\">Keres<\/div>\t\t\t\t<\/div>\n\t\t\t\t<div class=\"elementor-element elementor-element-11758e7f elementor-widget elementor-widget-text-editor\" data-id=\"11758e7f\" data-element_type=\"widget\" data-e-type=\"widget\" data-widget_type=\"text-editor.default\">\n\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t<p>The Keres are the death demons of the Greek tradition. They usually appear in a throng, show themselves above battlefields and collect the souls of the dying.<\/p><p>Homer already describes them in the Iliad, and Hesiod fixes their <span class=\"iwg-fachbegriff\" data-tooltip=\"The study of pictorial content and its meaning.\" tabindex=\"0\">iconography<\/span>. Unlike individually named figures, the Keres are largely anonymous, a class rather than a single being.<\/p><p>Typically they appear where death occurs suddenly and violently: in war, during plagues, in tragic accidents. They personify violent death itself, and their number and form change accordingly. In the reception of <span class=\"iwg-fachbegriff\" data-tooltip=\"Transitional epoch between antiquity and the Middle Ages, roughly the 3rd to 7th century.\" tabindex=\"0\">late antiquity<\/span> they grow closer to the Erinyes; some authors use the terms interchangeably.<\/p><div><p><strong>Keres in Homeric <span class=\"iwg-fachbegriff\" data-tooltip=\"The conception of the structure and order of the world within a culture.\" tabindex=\"0\">cosmology<\/span><\/strong><\/p><p>In Homer&#8217;s <em>Iliad<\/em> 18.535 the Keres are described as demonic entities that hover above the battlefields and rob mortals of their lives.<\/p><p>They are not deities with a <span class=\"iwg-fachbegriff\" data-tooltip=\"The entirety of religious acts of worship for a deity or sacred figure.\" tabindex=\"0\">cult<\/span> of their own, but instrumental forces, personified tendencies toward death and ruin. Homer names them collectively, never in the singular: they act as a swarm, and their presence means immediate mortal danger.<\/p><p>Hesiod&#8217;s <em>Works and Days<\/em> and <em>Theogony<\/em> classify them as daughters of Night, kin to Ker (the function of death in the singular). In this early epic they still lack a fixed form, more abstraction than apparition. Their function is cosmically necessary: they embody the boundary between life and death.<\/p><\/div>\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t<\/div>\n\t\t\t\t\t<\/div>\n\t\t\t\t<\/div>\n\t\t<div class=\"elementor-element elementor-element-159dcf9a e-flex e-con-boxed e-con e-child\" data-id=\"159dcf9a\" data-element_type=\"container\" data-e-type=\"container\">\n\t\t\t\t\t<div class=\"e-con-inner\">\n\t\t\t\t<div class=\"elementor-element elementor-element-48cee66f elementor-widget elementor-widget-heading\" data-id=\"48cee66f\" data-element_type=\"widget\" data-e-type=\"widget\" data-widget_type=\"heading.default\">\n\t\t\t\t\t<h2 class=\"elementor-heading-title elementor-size-default\">Short profile: Keres<\/h2>\t\t\t\t<\/div>\n\t\t\t\t<div class=\"elementor-element elementor-element-3f50d82c elementor-widget elementor-widget-text-editor\" data-id=\"3f50d82c\" data-element_type=\"widget\" data-e-type=\"widget\" data-widget_type=\"text-editor.default\">\n\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t<p><strong>Type:<\/strong> death demons, gatherers of souls<br>Origin: Nyx (Night), Hesiod; or from the primordial age of creation<br>Texts: Homer, Hesiod, vase painting<br>Period: Archaic period to <span class=\"iwg-fachbegriff\" data-tooltip=\"Transitional epoch between antiquity and the Middle Ages, roughly the 3rd to 7th century.\" tabindex=\"0\">late antiquity<\/span><br>Distribution: the Greek cultural sphere<br>Defence: burial rites; no specific <span class=\"iwg-fachbegriff\" data-tooltip=\"Warding off evil: of signs and objects intended to keep harmful influences away.\" tabindex=\"0\">apotropaic<\/span> <span class=\"iwg-fachbegriff\" data-tooltip=\"Practices that seek to intervene in the course of events through special actions or formulas.\" tabindex=\"0\">magic<\/span>, since the Keres appear where death is already present<\/p>\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t<\/div>\n\t\t\t\t\t<\/div>\n\t\t\t\t<\/div>\n\t\t\t\t\t<\/div>\n\t\t\t\t<\/div>\n\t\t\t\t\t<\/div>\n\t\t\t\t<\/div>\n\t\t<div class=\"elementor-element elementor-element-18613602 e-flex e-con-boxed e-con e-parent\" data-id=\"18613602\" data-element_type=\"container\" data-e-type=\"container\">\n\t\t\t\t\t<div class=\"e-con-inner\">\n\t\t\t\t<div class=\"elementor-element elementor-element-262b8a9f elementor-widget elementor-widget-heading\" data-id=\"262b8a9f\" data-element_type=\"widget\" data-e-type=\"widget\" data-widget_type=\"heading.default\">\n\t\t\t\t\t<h2 class=\"elementor-heading-title elementor-size-default\">Context<\/h2>\t\t\t\t<\/div>\n\t\t<div class=\"elementor-element elementor-element-46dcb7d e-con-full e-flex e-con e-child\" data-id=\"46dcb7d\" data-element_type=\"container\" data-e-type=\"container\">\n\t\t<div class=\"elementor-element elementor-element-61d3ab3 e-flex e-con-boxed e-con e-child\" data-id=\"61d3ab3\" data-element_type=\"container\" data-e-type=\"container\">\n\t\t\t\t\t<div class=\"e-con-inner\">\n\t\t\t\t<div class=\"elementor-element elementor-element-117c166 elementor-widget elementor-widget-heading\" data-id=\"117c166\" data-element_type=\"widget\" data-e-type=\"widget\" data-widget_type=\"heading.default\">\n\t\t\t\t\t<div class=\"elementor-heading-title elementor-size-default\">Period of the texts<\/div>\t\t\t\t<\/div>\n\t\t\t\t<div class=\"elementor-element elementor-element-73997a0 elementor-widget elementor-widget-text-editor\" data-id=\"73997a0\" data-element_type=\"widget\" data-e-type=\"widget\" data-widget_type=\"text-editor.default\">\n\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t<p>First mentioned in Homer (Iliad). Hesiod (Theogony, Shield of Heracles) develops their <span class=\"iwg-fachbegriff\" data-tooltip=\"The study of pictorial content and its meaning.\" tabindex=\"0\">iconography<\/span>. The tragedians use them as vivid metaphors for death. In the late <span class=\"iwg-fachbegriff\" data-tooltip=\"The era of Greek and Roman culture, roughly 800 BCE to 600 CE.\" tabindex=\"0\">Classical<\/span> and Hellenistic periods they grow closer to the Erinyes in literature.<\/p>\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t<\/div>\n\t\t\t\t\t<\/div>\n\t\t\t\t<\/div>\n\t\t<div class=\"elementor-element elementor-element-d47b156 e-flex e-con-boxed e-con e-child\" data-id=\"d47b156\" data-element_type=\"container\" data-e-type=\"container\">\n\t\t\t\t\t<div class=\"e-con-inner\">\n\t\t\t\t<div class=\"elementor-element elementor-element-ff38c2b elementor-widget elementor-widget-heading\" data-id=\"ff38c2b\" data-element_type=\"widget\" data-e-type=\"widget\" data-widget_type=\"heading.default\">\n\t\t\t\t\t<div class=\"elementor-heading-title elementor-size-default\">Area of distribution<\/div>\t\t\t\t<\/div>\n\t\t\t\t<div class=\"elementor-element elementor-element-4e49fcc elementor-widget elementor-widget-text-editor\" data-id=\"4e49fcc\" data-element_type=\"widget\" data-e-type=\"widget\" data-widget_type=\"text-editor.default\">\n\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t<p>The Greek heartland. No independent history of migration; the <span class=\"iwg-fachbegriff\" data-tooltip=\"A recurring element of content in art or narrative.\" tabindex=\"0\">motif<\/span> remains bound to the Homeric and Hesiodic <span class=\"iwg-fachbegriff\" data-tooltip=\"The passing on of knowledge and narratives across generations.\" tabindex=\"0\">tradition<\/span>, yet continues to work as a motif into Roman and Byzantine literature.<\/p>\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t<\/div>\n\t\t\t\t\t<\/div>\n\t\t\t\t<\/div>\n\t\t\t\t<\/div>\n\t\t<div class=\"elementor-element elementor-element-db03c39 e-con-full e-flex e-con e-child\" data-id=\"db03c39\" data-element_type=\"container\" data-e-type=\"container\">\n\t\t<div class=\"elementor-element elementor-element-229a87b e-flex e-con-boxed e-con e-child\" data-id=\"229a87b\" data-element_type=\"container\" data-e-type=\"container\">\n\t\t\t\t\t<div class=\"e-con-inner\">\n\t\t\t\t<div class=\"elementor-element elementor-element-1f471fc elementor-widget elementor-widget-heading\" data-id=\"1f471fc\" data-element_type=\"widget\" data-e-type=\"widget\" data-widget_type=\"heading.default\">\n\t\t\t\t\t<div class=\"elementor-heading-title elementor-size-default\">Source situation<\/div>\t\t\t\t<\/div>\n\t\t\t\t<div class=\"elementor-element elementor-element-36b1201 elementor-widget elementor-widget-text-editor\" data-id=\"36b1201\" data-element_type=\"widget\" data-e-type=\"widget\" data-widget_type=\"text-editor.default\">\n\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t<p>Epic and tragic literature; descriptions on Hesiod&#8217;s &#8220;Shield of Heracles&#8221;; iconographically in vase painting. Unlike Lamia or Empusa, a folk-<span class=\"iwg-fachbegriff\" data-tooltip=\"Practices that seek to intervene in the course of events through special actions or formulas.\" tabindex=\"0\">magical<\/span> culture of <span class=\"iwg-fachbegriff\" data-tooltip=\"A worn object to which a protective, misfortune-averting effect is attributed.\" tabindex=\"0\">amulets<\/span> against them is lacking.<\/p>\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t<\/div>\n\t\t\t\t\t<\/div>\n\t\t\t\t<\/div>\n\t\t\t\t<\/div>\n\t\t\t\t\t<\/div>\n\t\t\t\t<\/div>\n\t\t<div class=\"elementor-element elementor-element-3ae0637c e-flex e-con-boxed e-con e-parent\" data-id=\"3ae0637c\" data-element_type=\"container\" data-e-type=\"container\">\n\t\t\t\t\t<div class=\"e-con-inner\">\n\t\t\t\t<div class=\"elementor-element elementor-element-31d07739 elementor-widget elementor-widget-heading\" data-id=\"31d07739\" data-element_type=\"widget\" data-e-type=\"widget\" data-widget_type=\"heading.default\">\n\t\t\t\t\t<h2 class=\"elementor-heading-title elementor-size-default\">Name and variants<\/h2>\t\t\t\t<\/div>\n\t\t<div class=\"elementor-element elementor-element-b7642947 e-con-full e-flex e-con e-child\" data-id=\"b7642947\" data-element_type=\"container\" data-e-type=\"container\">\n\t\t\t\t<div class=\"elementor-element elementor-element-a086266 elementor-widget elementor-widget-text-editor\" data-id=\"a086266\" data-element_type=\"widget\" data-e-type=\"widget\" data-widget_type=\"text-editor.default\">\n\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t<p><strong>Greek:<\/strong> <em>\u039a\u03ae\u03c1<\/em> (Ker, singular), <em>\u039a\u1fc6\u03c1\u03b5\u03c2<\/em> (Keres, plural).<br>Etymology: connected with terms for &#8220;ruin&#8221; and &#8220;blow of fate&#8221;.<\/p><p>In <span class=\"iwg-fachbegriff\" data-tooltip=\"The epoch of Greek and Roman culture, roughly 800 BC to AD 600.\" tabindex=\"0\">antiquity<\/span> the number fluctuates. In Hesiod they are countless and malleable; the tragedians also use &#8220;Ker&#8221; metaphorically for death itself. There is no single individual with a name and a biography; the Keres remain an anonymous class.<\/p>\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t<\/div>\n\t\t\t\t<\/div>\n\t\t\t\t\t<\/div>\n\t\t\t\t<\/div>\n\t\t<div class=\"elementor-element elementor-element-709a44a8 e-flex e-con-boxed e-con e-parent\" data-id=\"709a44a8\" data-element_type=\"container\" data-e-type=\"container\">\n\t\t\t\t\t<div class=\"e-con-inner\">\n\t\t\t\t<div class=\"elementor-element elementor-element-2f585873 elementor-widget elementor-widget-heading\" data-id=\"2f585873\" data-element_type=\"widget\" data-e-type=\"widget\" data-widget_type=\"heading.default\">\n\t\t\t\t\t<h2 class=\"elementor-heading-title elementor-size-default\">Description<\/h2>\t\t\t\t<\/div>\n\t\t<div class=\"elementor-element elementor-element-70621c12 e-con-full e-flex e-con e-child\" data-id=\"70621c12\" data-element_type=\"container\" data-e-type=\"container\">\n\t\t\t\t<div class=\"elementor-element elementor-element-4296eb49 elementor-widget elementor-widget-text-editor\" data-id=\"4296eb49\" data-element_type=\"widget\" data-e-type=\"widget\" data-widget_type=\"text-editor.default\">\n\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t<p><strong>Appearance<\/strong><\/p><p>Winged women in dark garments, with long fangs and bloodstained claws. Hesiod describes their teeth as white and their eyes as glittering. They appear in a throng, often circling over battlefields.<\/p><p><strong>Behaviour<\/strong><\/p><p>They collect the souls of the dying, drink their blood and quarrel over corpses. Unlike Thanatos, who brings a peaceful death, the Keres are figures of violent, bloody, chaotic dying.<\/p><p><strong>Sphere of activity<\/strong><\/p><p>Battlefields, places of pestilence, catastrophes. They act where people die in great numbers and by violence. In times of peace they are largely absent.<\/p><p><strong>Mythological origin<\/strong><\/p><p>In Hesiod they are daughters of Nyx, sisters of the Moirai and of Thanatos. Some traditions make them offspring of Chaos. In either case they belong to the archaic, nocturnal layer of creation.<\/p><div><p><strong>Keres and concepts of corruption in Plato and Hellenistic <span class=\"iwg-fachbegriff\" data-tooltip=\"The scholarly doctrine of God and of the faith of a religion.\" tabindex=\"0\">theology<\/span><\/strong><\/p><p>Plato does not use the Keres directly in his dialogues, yet the concept of <span class=\"iwg-fachbegriff\" data-tooltip=\"Belonging to the earth or the underworld; in ancient religion the gods and spirits of the depths (Hades, the Erinyes, Demeter chthonia).\" tabindex=\"0\">chthonic<\/span> spirits of corruption shapes his hierarchy of demons. In the <em>Republic<\/em>, lower spirits are classified as executors of cosmic order, similar to the Keres.<\/p><p>Hellenistic <span class=\"iwg-fachbegriff\" data-tooltip=\"The scholarly doctrine of God and of the faith of a religion.\" tabindex=\"0\">theology<\/span>, especially in the Orphic and Neoplatonic tradition, distinguished between high deities and lower demonic powers, among which the Keres ranked as demons of death.<\/p><p>They were no longer understood as mere Homeric attributes of battle, but as a genuine ontological class: beings that mediated between gods and humans, with specialised functions in the metabolism of life and death. From this perspective the Keres became examples of the demiurgic division of the world: each force had its cosmological niche.<\/p><\/div>\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t<\/div>\n\t\t\t\t<\/div>\n\t\t\t\t\t<\/div>\n\t\t\t\t<\/div>\n\t\t<div class=\"elementor-element elementor-element-44e71476 e-flex e-con-boxed e-con e-parent\" data-id=\"44e71476\" data-element_type=\"container\" data-e-type=\"container\">\n\t\t\t\t\t<div class=\"e-con-inner\">\n\t\t\t\t<div class=\"elementor-element elementor-element-3c1fc3f0 elementor-widget elementor-widget-heading\" data-id=\"3c1fc3f0\" data-element_type=\"widget\" data-e-type=\"widget\" data-widget_type=\"heading.default\">\n\t\t\t\t\t<h2 class=\"elementor-heading-title elementor-size-default\">Profile: Keres<\/h2>\t\t\t\t<\/div>\n\t\t<div class=\"elementor-element elementor-element-84f33b8e e-con-full e-flex e-con e-child\" data-id=\"84f33b8e\" data-element_type=\"container\" data-e-type=\"container\">\n\t\t\t\t<div class=\"elementor-element elementor-element-hqkdc67p elementor-widget elementor-widget-text-editor\" data-id=\"hqkdc67p\" data-element_type=\"widget\" data-e-type=\"widget\" data-widget_type=\"text-editor.default\">\n\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t<p>The most important aspects of the Keres at a glance. You will find the detailed treatment of name, description, defence and parallels in chapters 2, 3, 5 and 6.<\/p>\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t<\/div>\n\t\t\t\t<\/div>\n\t\t<div class=\"elementor-element elementor-element-pemmx7c5 e-con-full e-flex e-con e-child\" data-id=\"pemmx7c5\" data-element_type=\"container\" data-e-type=\"container\">\n\t\t<div class=\"elementor-element elementor-element-pemmx7c1 e-con-full e-flex e-con e-child\" data-id=\"pemmx7c1\" data-element_type=\"container\" data-e-type=\"container\">\n\t\t<div class=\"elementor-element elementor-element-qh9oavvu iwg-steckbrief-card e-flex e-con-boxed e-con e-child\" data-id=\"qh9oavvu\" data-element_type=\"container\" data-e-type=\"container\">\n\t\t\t\t\t<div class=\"e-con-inner\">\n\t\t\t\t<div class=\"elementor-element elementor-element-awzx8k2k elementor-widget elementor-widget-heading\" data-id=\"awzx8k2k\" data-element_type=\"widget\" data-e-type=\"widget\" data-widget_type=\"heading.default\">\n\t\t\t\t\t<div class=\"elementor-heading-title elementor-size-default\">Origin of the Keres<\/div>\t\t\t\t<\/div>\n\t\t\t\t<div class=\"elementor-element elementor-element-x6rowhv0 elementor-widget elementor-widget-text-editor\" data-id=\"x6rowhv0\" data-element_type=\"widget\" data-e-type=\"widget\" data-widget_type=\"text-editor.default\">\n\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t<p>Daughters of Nyx, the Night. Sisters of the Moirai and of Thanatos, belonging to the nocturnal, archaic layer of creation.<\/p>\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t<\/div>\n\t\t\t\t\t<\/div>\n\t\t\t\t<\/div>\n\t\t<div class=\"elementor-element elementor-element-8e3o4kxs iwg-steckbrief-card e-flex e-con-boxed e-con e-child\" data-id=\"8e3o4kxs\" data-element_type=\"container\" data-e-type=\"container\">\n\t\t\t\t\t<div class=\"e-con-inner\">\n\t\t\t\t<div class=\"elementor-element elementor-element-08rkdgov elementor-widget elementor-widget-heading\" data-id=\"08rkdgov\" data-element_type=\"widget\" data-e-type=\"widget\" data-widget_type=\"heading.default\">\n\t\t\t\t\t<div class=\"elementor-heading-title elementor-size-default\">Whom the Keres concern<\/div>\t\t\t\t<\/div>\n\t\t\t\t<div class=\"elementor-element elementor-element-uwjelx8s elementor-widget elementor-widget-text-editor\" data-id=\"uwjelx8s\" data-element_type=\"widget\" data-e-type=\"widget\" data-widget_type=\"text-editor.default\">\n\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t<p>Soldiers, those stricken by plague, <span class=\"iwg-fachbegriff\" data-tooltip=\"An offering to a deity to express thanks, a request or veneration.\" tabindex=\"0\">victims<\/span> of accident and catastrophe. They appear where death is violent and sudden.<\/p>\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t<\/div>\n\t\t\t\t\t<\/div>\n\t\t\t\t<\/div>\n\t\t<div class=\"elementor-element elementor-element-jm2n74ec iwg-steckbrief-card e-flex e-con-boxed e-con e-child\" data-id=\"jm2n74ec\" data-element_type=\"container\" data-e-type=\"container\">\n\t\t\t\t\t<div class=\"e-con-inner\">\n\t\t\t\t<div class=\"elementor-element elementor-element-8vufse4c elementor-widget elementor-widget-heading\" data-id=\"8vufse4c\" data-element_type=\"widget\" data-e-type=\"widget\" data-widget_type=\"heading.default\">\n\t\t\t\t\t<div class=\"elementor-heading-title elementor-size-default\">Appearance of the Keres<\/div>\t\t\t\t<\/div>\n\t\t\t\t<div class=\"elementor-element elementor-element-mwb9u015 elementor-widget elementor-widget-text-editor\" data-id=\"mwb9u015\" data-element_type=\"widget\" data-e-type=\"widget\" data-widget_type=\"text-editor.default\">\n\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t<p>Winged women, dark garments, long fangs, bloody claws. In a throng, often circling over battlefields.<\/p>\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t<\/div>\n\t\t\t\t\t<\/div>\n\t\t\t\t<\/div>\n\t\t\t\t<\/div>\n\t\t<div class=\"elementor-element elementor-element-pemmx7c2 e-con-full e-flex e-con e-child\" data-id=\"pemmx7c2\" data-element_type=\"container\" data-e-type=\"container\">\n\t\t<div class=\"elementor-element elementor-element-37ss2yr6 iwg-steckbrief-card e-flex e-con-boxed e-con e-child\" data-id=\"37ss2yr6\" data-element_type=\"container\" data-e-type=\"container\">\n\t\t\t\t\t<div class=\"e-con-inner\">\n\t\t\t\t<div class=\"elementor-element elementor-element-3v0wp3wx elementor-widget elementor-widget-heading\" data-id=\"3v0wp3wx\" data-element_type=\"widget\" data-e-type=\"widget\" data-widget_type=\"heading.default\">\n\t\t\t\t\t<div class=\"elementor-heading-title elementor-size-default\">Effect of the Keres<\/div>\t\t\t\t<\/div>\n\t\t\t\t<div class=\"elementor-element elementor-element-w3247g2m elementor-widget elementor-widget-text-editor\" data-id=\"w3247g2m\" data-element_type=\"widget\" data-e-type=\"widget\" data-widget_type=\"text-editor.default\">\n\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t<p>They collect souls, drink blood and tear at corpses. They do not bring new death, but consume the death that has already occurred.<\/p>\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t<\/div>\n\t\t\t\t\t<\/div>\n\t\t\t\t<\/div>\n\t\t<div class=\"elementor-element elementor-element-0qpjal9w iwg-steckbrief-card e-flex e-con-boxed e-con e-child\" data-id=\"0qpjal9w\" data-element_type=\"container\" data-e-type=\"container\">\n\t\t\t\t\t<div class=\"e-con-inner\">\n\t\t\t\t<div class=\"elementor-element elementor-element-6ndoih0o elementor-widget elementor-widget-heading\" data-id=\"6ndoih0o\" data-element_type=\"widget\" data-e-type=\"widget\" data-widget_type=\"heading.default\">\n\t\t\t\t\t<div class=\"elementor-heading-title elementor-size-default\">Defence against the Keres<\/div>\t\t\t\t<\/div>\n\t\t\t\t<div class=\"elementor-element elementor-element-6684tyh9 elementor-widget elementor-widget-text-editor\" data-id=\"6684tyh9\" data-element_type=\"widget\" data-e-type=\"widget\" data-widget_type=\"text-editor.default\">\n\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t<p>No specific apotropaic magic; the Keres are part of death itself. Protection lies only in avoiding the battlefield, the place of pestilence, the violent situation.<\/p>\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t<\/div>\n\t\t\t\t\t<\/div>\n\t\t\t\t<\/div>\n\t\t<div class=\"elementor-element elementor-element-3lfi7x32 iwg-steckbrief-card e-flex e-con-boxed e-con e-child\" data-id=\"3lfi7x32\" data-element_type=\"container\" data-e-type=\"container\">\n\t\t\t\t\t<div class=\"e-con-inner\">\n\t\t\t\t<div class=\"elementor-element elementor-element-0kg99ga1 elementor-widget elementor-widget-heading\" data-id=\"0kg99ga1\" data-element_type=\"widget\" data-e-type=\"widget\" data-widget_type=\"heading.default\">\n\t\t\t\t\t<div class=\"elementor-heading-title elementor-size-default\">Parallels to the Keres<\/div>\t\t\t\t<\/div>\n\t\t\t\t<div class=\"elementor-element elementor-element-n0fum6kp elementor-widget elementor-widget-text-editor\" data-id=\"n0fum6kp\" data-element_type=\"widget\" data-e-type=\"widget\" data-widget_type=\"text-editor.default\">\n\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t<p>Erinyes (a fluid transition), Valkyries (Germanic), Gall\u00fb (Mesopotamian), Tzitzimime (Aztec), motifs of the Grim Reaper.<\/p>\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t<\/div>\n\t\t\t\t\t<\/div>\n\t\t\t\t<\/div>\n\t\t\t\t<\/div>\n\t\t\t\t<\/div>\n\t\t\t\t\t<\/div>\n\t\t\t\t<\/div>\n\t\t<div class=\"elementor-element elementor-element-7533bc7a e-flex e-con-boxed e-con e-parent\" data-id=\"7533bc7a\" data-element_type=\"container\" data-e-type=\"container\">\n\t\t\t\t\t<div class=\"e-con-inner\">\n\t\t\t\t<div class=\"elementor-element elementor-element-2447d18d elementor-widget elementor-widget-heading\" data-id=\"2447d18d\" data-element_type=\"widget\" data-e-type=\"widget\" data-widget_type=\"heading.default\">\n\t\t\t\t\t<h2 class=\"elementor-heading-title elementor-size-default\">Demonology in everyday life<\/h2>\t\t\t\t<\/div>\n\t\t<div class=\"elementor-element elementor-element-d5d0260c e-con-full e-flex e-con e-child\" data-id=\"d5d0260c\" data-element_type=\"container\" data-e-type=\"container\">\n\t\t\t\t<div class=\"elementor-element elementor-element-341be2ac elementor-widget elementor-widget-text-editor\" data-id=\"341be2ac\" data-element_type=\"widget\" data-e-type=\"widget\" data-widget_type=\"text-editor.default\">\n\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t<p><strong>Rituals of defence<\/strong><\/p><p>Individual Keres are not addressed or warded off; they belong to death, which is not negotiable. What matters <span class=\"iwg-fachbegriff\" data-tooltip=\"Belonging to a fixed religious sequence of actions.\" tabindex=\"0\">ritually<\/span> is correct burial and the lament for the dead, which regulate what the Keres do not: the dignity of the farewell.<\/p><p><strong>Invocations<\/strong><\/p><p>No specific invocations against Keres. In magical papyri and <span class=\"iwg-fachbegriff\" data-tooltip=\"A verbal formula intended to inflict misfortune on a person or thing.\" tabindex=\"0\">curse<\/span> tablets, &#8220;Keres&#8221; can occur as a term for the misfortune of a curse formula, but not as individual addressees.<\/p><p><strong>Amulets and protective symbols<\/strong><\/p><p>General defence against death through <span class=\"iwg-fachbegriff\" data-tooltip=\"Plural of apotropaion: objects and signs intended to ward off misfortune.\" tabindex=\"0\">apotropaia<\/span> (the Gorgoneion, the phallus, the <span class=\"iwg-fachbegriff\" data-tooltip=\"The widespread notion that an envious glance from another person can cause harm.\" tabindex=\"0\">evil eye<\/span>). Specific Keres amulets are absent. Protection lies rather in avoiding the situations in which Keres appear.<\/p>\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t<\/div>\n\t\t\t\t<\/div>\n\t\t\t\t\t<\/div>\n\t\t\t\t<\/div>\n\t\t<div class=\"elementor-element elementor-element-5a584676 e-flex e-con-boxed e-con e-parent\" data-id=\"5a584676\" data-element_type=\"container\" data-e-type=\"container\">\n\t\t\t\t\t<div class=\"e-con-inner\">\n\t\t\t\t<div class=\"elementor-element elementor-element-6d0757bf elementor-widget elementor-widget-heading\" data-id=\"6d0757bf\" data-element_type=\"widget\" data-e-type=\"widget\" data-widget_type=\"heading.default\">\n\t\t\t\t\t<h2 class=\"elementor-heading-title elementor-size-default\">Keres, parallels in other cultures<\/h2>\t\t\t\t<\/div>\n\t\t<div class=\"elementor-element elementor-element-60563f68 e-con-full e-flex e-con e-child\" data-id=\"60563f68\" data-element_type=\"container\" data-e-type=\"container\">\n\t\t\t\t<div class=\"elementor-element elementor-element-5a93fdd6 elementor-widget elementor-widget-text-editor\" data-id=\"5a93fdd6\" data-element_type=\"widget\" data-e-type=\"widget\" data-widget_type=\"text-editor.default\">\n\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t<p><strong>Rome:<\/strong> the Dirae or Furiae take over the avenging aspect, while the Keres as pure figures of death are less present in the Roman <span class=\"iwg-fachbegriff\" data-tooltip=\"The entirety of the gods of a religion or culture.\" tabindex=\"0\">pantheon<\/span>. Instead, Mors (Death) takes over the function as a single figure.<\/p><p><strong>Germanic tradition:<\/strong> the Valkyries collect the fallen from the battlefield. Structurally close, within a different <span class=\"iwg-fachbegriff\" data-tooltip=\"The academic study of God and the doctrines of a religion.\" tabindex=\"0\">theological<\/span> framework.<\/p><p><strong>Mesopotamia and beyond:<\/strong> the Gall\u00fb, executors of the underworld, are functionally related, even if within an entirely different mythical framework. In numerous cultures one finds messengers of death who appear in a throng and collect souls.<\/p><div><p><strong>Keres in <span class=\"iwg-fachbegriff\" data-tooltip=\"Practices that seek to intervene in the course of things through special acts or formulas.\" tabindex=\"0\">magical<\/span> papyri and magical practice<\/strong><\/p><p>In the Hellenistic magical papyri (PGM) the Keres are rarely <span class=\"iwg-fachbegriff\" data-tooltip=\"The petitioning or invoking address to a deity or power.\" tabindex=\"0\">invoked<\/span> directly, yet the concept of demons of death and corruption runs through magical <span class=\"iwg-fachbegriff\" data-tooltip=\"A verbal formula intended to inflict harm on a person or thing.\" tabindex=\"0\">curse<\/span> texts. Papyri containing <span class=\"iwg-fachbegriff\" data-tooltip=\"Verbal formula by which harm is to be inflicted on a person or thing.\" tabindex=\"0\">curses<\/span> of tearing apart, drying out or paralysis often invoke anonymous chthonic powers whose function corresponds to that of the Keres: separation, destruction, the theft of vitality.<\/p><p>The papyri show that magicians of <span class=\"iwg-fachbegriff\" data-tooltip=\"Transitional epoch between antiquity and the Middle Ages, roughly the 3rd to 7th century.\" tabindex=\"0\">late antiquity<\/span> possessed a differentiated theory of lower powers; not all were evil, but all were specialised. The Keres belonged to the class of necessary forces that needed no morality, because their commission derived from the cosmic architecture.<\/p><p>A magician who wished to make someone ill or weak invoked such powers not as enemies but as technical tools, whose use presupposed ethical justification.<\/p><\/div>\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t<\/div>\n\t\t\t\t<\/div>\n\t\t\t\t\t<\/div>\n\t\t\t\t<\/div>\n\t\t<div class=\"elementor-element elementor-element-cp8602301 e-flex e-con-boxed e-con e-parent\" data-id=\"cp8602301\" data-element_type=\"container\" data-e-type=\"container\">\n\t\t\t\t\t<div class=\"e-con-inner\">\n\t\t\t\t<div class=\"elementor-element elementor-element-cp7b7edad elementor-widget elementor-widget-heading\" data-id=\"cp7b7edad\" data-element_type=\"widget\" data-e-type=\"widget\" data-widget_type=\"heading.default\">\n\t\t\t\t\t<h2 class=\"elementor-heading-title elementor-size-default\">The Keres in Homer: death on the battlefield<\/h2>\t\t\t\t<\/div>\n\t\t<div class=\"elementor-element elementor-element-cpbfea484 e-con-full e-flex e-con e-child\" data-id=\"cpbfea484\" data-element_type=\"container\" data-e-type=\"container\">\n\t\t\t\t<div class=\"elementor-element elementor-element-cp74cc2f1 elementor-widget elementor-widget-text-editor\" data-id=\"cp74cc2f1\" data-element_type=\"widget\" data-e-type=\"widget\" data-widget_type=\"text-editor.default\">\n\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t<p>The oldest and densest evidence for the Keres comes from the Homeric epics, above all from the <em>Iliad<\/em>. There the Keres are not abstract personifications, but closely bound up with the experience of violent death in war.<\/p><p>The Greek word <em>k\u0113r<\/em> first denotes the lot of death allotted to a person, the ruin that reaches him. In the plural the Keres then appear as ghostly figures who bring about or embody this death.<\/p><p>A famous passage is the weighing of the lots of death: in the nineteenth book of the <em>Iliad<\/em>, Zeus places the Keres of Achilles and of Hector in his scales, and the heavier lot sinks toward the underworld, by which Hector&#8217;s death is decided.<\/p><p>Here the Ker is almost synonymous with the personal fate of the hero. Elsewhere, in the eighteenth book, a gruesome Ker appears in the turmoil of battle on the shield of Achilles, in a bloodstained garment, dragging the fallen and the wounded out of the fight by their feet.<\/p><p>From these passages a twofold image emerges. On the one hand the Ker is the individual destiny of death, fixed already at birth; Achilles speaks of the two Keres between which he can choose, a short and glorious life or a long and inglorious one.<\/p><p>On the other hand the Keres are acting, bloodthirsty beings that roam the battlefield. Scholarship has long debated whether two different conceptions are present here or whether these are aspects of a single one.<\/p><p>Much suggests that the Greeks could experience death both as an allotted measure and as an attacking power, without seeing a contradiction in this.<\/p>\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t<\/div>\n\t\t\t\t<\/div>\n\t\t\t\t\t<\/div>\n\t\t\t\t<\/div>\n\t\t<div class=\"elementor-element elementor-element-cpbd673b2 e-flex e-con-boxed e-con e-parent\" data-id=\"cpbd673b2\" data-element_type=\"container\" data-e-type=\"container\">\n\t\t\t\t\t<div class=\"e-con-inner\">\n\t\t\t\t<div class=\"elementor-element elementor-element-cp0a14da8 elementor-widget elementor-widget-heading\" data-id=\"cp0a14da8\" data-element_type=\"widget\" data-e-type=\"widget\" data-widget_type=\"heading.default\">\n\t\t\t\t\t<h2 class=\"elementor-heading-title elementor-size-default\">Keres, Moirai and Thanatos: distinguishing related powers of death<\/h2>\t\t\t\t<\/div>\n\t\t<div class=\"elementor-element elementor-element-cp890fc3c e-con-full e-flex e-con e-child\" data-id=\"cp890fc3c\" data-element_type=\"container\" data-e-type=\"container\">\n\t\t\t\t<div class=\"elementor-element elementor-element-cp209632e elementor-widget elementor-widget-text-editor\" data-id=\"cp209632e\" data-element_type=\"widget\" data-e-type=\"widget\" data-widget_type=\"text-editor.default\">\n\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t<p>In Greek thought the Keres stand beside several other powers concerned with death and fate, and their exact distinction was not always clear even to <span class=\"iwg-fachbegriff\" data-tooltip=\"Epoch of Greek and Roman culture, roughly 800 BC to 600 AD.\" tabindex=\"0\">ancient<\/span> authors. Most important is the distinction from the <a href=\"\/en\/the-moirai-goddesses-of-fate-and-keepers-of-the-thread-of-life\/\">Moirai<\/a>, the three spinners of fate.<\/p><p>While the Moirai, in Hesiod and in the later tradition, allot, measure and cut off the span of life, and thus embody the ordering side of fate, the Keres stand more for the concrete, often violent and calamitous event of death.<\/p><p>In the <em>Theogony<\/em>, Hesiod brings both into the proximity of Nyx, the Night, who bears them without a father; in his enumeration the Keres, the Moirai, Thanatos, Hypnos and further gloomy figures appear as siblings.<\/p><p>This genealogy assigns the Keres to the nocturnal, uncanny side of the cosmos. They differ from Thanatos, the calm personification of death itself, by their active, predatory character. Thanatos collects, the Keres tear.<\/p><p>In the <em>Aspis<\/em>, the shield poem transmitted under Hesiod&#8217;s name, there is a particularly drastic depiction: there the Keres are described as dark and baring white teeth, quarrelling over the fallen, sinking their claws into their bodies and drinking the dark blood.<\/p><p>This vampire-like portrayal is among the most detailed of <span class=\"iwg-fachbegriff\" data-tooltip=\"The epoch of Greek and Roman culture, roughly 800 BC to AD 600.\" tabindex=\"0\">antiquity<\/span>. Scholarship has pointed out that the Keres thereby come closest to what was imagined as blood-drinking battlefield demons, and that precisely in this they set themselves apart from the more nobly conceived Moirai.<\/p>\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t<\/div>\n\t\t\t\t<\/div>\n\t\t\t\t\t<\/div>\n\t\t\t\t<\/div>\n\t\t<div class=\"elementor-element elementor-element-cpe357717 e-flex e-con-boxed e-con e-parent\" data-id=\"cpe357717\" data-element_type=\"container\" data-e-type=\"container\">\n\t\t\t\t\t<div class=\"e-con-inner\">\n\t\t\t\t<div class=\"elementor-element elementor-element-cp2d7b0d1 elementor-widget elementor-widget-heading\" data-id=\"cp2d7b0d1\" data-element_type=\"widget\" data-e-type=\"widget\" data-widget_type=\"heading.default\">\n\t\t\t\t\t<h2 class=\"elementor-heading-title elementor-size-default\">The Athenian festival of the Anthesteria and the expulsion of the Keres<\/h2>\t\t\t\t<\/div>\n\t\t<div class=\"elementor-element elementor-element-cp7d73762 e-con-full e-flex e-con e-child\" data-id=\"cp7d73762\" data-element_type=\"container\" data-e-type=\"container\">\n\t\t\t\t<div class=\"elementor-element elementor-element-cpba9eef3 elementor-widget elementor-widget-text-editor\" data-id=\"cpba9eef3\" data-element_type=\"widget\" data-e-type=\"widget\" data-widget_type=\"text-editor.default\">\n\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t<p>Beyond epic poetry, the Keres are connected with the Athenian festival calendar, namely with the <em>Anthesteria<\/em>, a spring festival in honour of Dionysus in the month Anthesterion. The three-day festival had a markedly ambivalent character.<\/p><p>It celebrated the new wine, yet at the same time was regarded as a time in which the dead and uncanny spirits walked about the city. The last day, the <em>Chytroi<\/em>, was <span class=\"iwg-fachbegriff\" data-tooltip=\"Handed over to the sacred through a religious act and thereby set apart from the everyday.\" tabindex=\"0\">dedicated<\/span> to the deceased and to chthonic powers.<\/p><p>From the ancient <span class=\"iwg-fachbegriff\" data-tooltip=\"The passing on of knowledge and narratives across generations.\" tabindex=\"0\">tradition<\/span>, above all from later lexicographers and scholia, the phrase is known: &#8220;Out, you Keres, the Anthesteria are over&#8221;. It was apparently spoken at the end of the festival in order to drive the spirits admitted or tolerated during the festive period back out of the houses and the city.<\/p><p>Some sources read &#8220;Kares&#8221;, that is, Carians, instead of &#8220;Keres&#8221;, which has led to differing interpretations. Scholarship in the history of <span class=\"iwg-fachbegriff\" data-tooltip=\"The academic discipline that studies religions comparatively and without confessional commitment.\" tabindex=\"0\">religion<\/span>, for example in the classic works of Erwin Rohde and Jane Harrison, has discussed the passage intensively.<\/p><p>If the reading &#8220;Keres&#8221; is correct, an important finding emerges: the Keres were not merely literary figures of epic, but part of lived ritual practice. During the Anthesteria the doorposts were smeared with pitch and certain <span class=\"iwg-fachbegriff\" data-tooltip=\"The totality of the customs handed down within a community.\" tabindex=\"0\">customs<\/span> were observed that framed the uncanny festive period.<\/p><p>The Keres appear here as an open class of spirits of the dead and powers of misfortune, tolerated for a limited time and then <span class=\"iwg-fachbegriff\" data-tooltip=\"Belonging to a fixed religious sequence of acts.\" tabindex=\"0\">ritually<\/span> expelled.<\/p><p>The Keres thereby belong to the broad Greek circle of ideas about spirits that enter the human world at threshold times of the year and must be banished again through a fixed <span class=\"iwg-fachbegriff\" data-tooltip=\"An ordered sequence of symbolic acts with religious or cultural meaning.\" tabindex=\"0\">ritual<\/span>.<\/p>\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t<\/div>\n\t\t\t\t<\/div>\n\t\t\t\t\t<\/div>\n\t\t\t\t<\/div>\n\t\t<div class=\"elementor-element elementor-element-cpa2f747d e-flex e-con-boxed e-con e-parent\" data-id=\"cpa2f747d\" data-element_type=\"container\" data-e-type=\"container\">\n\t\t\t\t\t<div class=\"e-con-inner\">\n\t\t\t\t<div class=\"elementor-element elementor-element-cpe0b90e8 elementor-widget elementor-widget-heading\" data-id=\"cpe0b90e8\" data-element_type=\"widget\" data-e-type=\"widget\" data-widget_type=\"heading.default\">\n\t\t\t\t\t<h2 class=\"elementor-heading-title elementor-size-default\">Broadening of the term: Keres as demons of disease and misfortune<\/h2>\t\t\t\t<\/div>\n\t\t<div class=\"elementor-element elementor-element-cp33e1509 e-con-full e-flex e-con e-child\" data-id=\"cp33e1509\" data-element_type=\"container\" data-e-type=\"container\">\n\t\t\t\t<div class=\"elementor-element elementor-element-cp11c849e elementor-widget elementor-widget-text-editor\" data-id=\"cp11c849e\" data-element_type=\"widget\" data-e-type=\"widget\" data-widget_type=\"text-editor.default\">\n\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t<p>In post-Homeric literature the concept of the Ker broadens beyond death on the battlefield. In Hesiod and in later texts, <em>k\u0113r<\/em> can denote any form of ruin: disease, old age, hunger, madness, every ill that befalls a person. The Keres thereby become a collective category for everything that shortens, damages and ends life.<\/p><p>This extension of meaning shows itself particularly clearly in the Pandora narrative. From the opened vessel that Pandora brings with her in Hesiod, the ills pour out over humanity; in ancient interpretation these plagues were frequently equated with the Keres or brought into their vicinity.<\/p><p>In pictorial art, too, winged figures associated with disease and death appear that are connected with the Keres, even if the iconographic attribution often remains uncertain, because Keres, <a href=\"https:\/\/iwell-guard.com\/en\/erinyes\/\">Erinyes<\/a>, Harpies and Sirens overlap in their depiction.<\/p><p>This conceptual openness is central to understanding the Keres. They were never a clearly delimited <span class=\"iwg-fachbegriff\" data-tooltip=\"The entirety of the gods of a religion or culture.\" tabindex=\"0\">pantheon<\/span> with fixed names and functions, as the twelve Olympian gods were.<\/p><p>Scholarship describes the Keres rather as a category of ideas: the personified multitude of kinds of death and ills of life. It was precisely this indeterminacy that made them useful to Greek poets and thinkers.<\/p><p>Wherever it was a matter of grasping misfortune as an acting power, without granting it the full rank of a named <span class=\"iwg-fachbegriff\" data-tooltip=\"A being venerated as divine within a religion.\" tabindex=\"0\">deity<\/span>, one could speak of a Ker or of the Keres.<\/p><p>They thus stand at the boundary between personification, the concept of fate and demonology, and it is precisely at this boundary that their interest for the history of religion lies.<\/p>\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t<\/div>\n\t\t\t\t<\/div>\n\t\t\t\t\t<\/div>\n\t\t\t\t<\/div>\n\t\t<div class=\"elementor-element elementor-element-cpaa4ebda e-flex e-con-boxed e-con e-parent\" data-id=\"cpaa4ebda\" data-element_type=\"container\" data-e-type=\"container\">\n\t\t\t\t\t<div class=\"e-con-inner\">\n\t\t\t\t<div class=\"elementor-element elementor-element-cpf7b01df elementor-widget elementor-widget-heading\" data-id=\"cpf7b01df\" data-element_type=\"widget\" data-e-type=\"widget\" data-widget_type=\"heading.default\">\n\t\t\t\t\t<h2 class=\"elementor-heading-title elementor-size-default\">Afterlife of the Keres in the tradition of late antiquity and modern Greece<\/h2>\t\t\t\t<\/div>\n\t\t<div class=\"elementor-element elementor-element-cp70a8cae e-con-full e-flex e-con e-child\" data-id=\"cp70a8cae\" data-element_type=\"container\" data-e-type=\"container\">\n\t\t\t\t<div class=\"elementor-element elementor-element-cp316af1f elementor-widget elementor-widget-text-editor\" data-id=\"cp316af1f\" data-element_type=\"widget\" data-e-type=\"widget\" data-widget_type=\"text-editor.default\">\n\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t<p>The question of whether and how the Keres lived on after the end of ancient religion has been much discussed in <span class=\"iwg-fachbegriff\" data-tooltip=\"The transmitted popular culture with customs, narratives, and songs.\" tabindex=\"0\">folklore<\/span> research. A frequently cited line connects the ancient Keres with the modern Greek <em>Charos<\/em> or <em>Charontas<\/em> and with further figures of death in Greek folk tradition.<\/p><p>Indeed, the name of the ancient ferryman Charon has, in modern Greek <span class=\"iwg-fachbegriff\" data-tooltip=\"Religious ideas and customs that are widespread in everyday life.\" tabindex=\"0\">folk belief<\/span>, turned into an active, often mounted figure of death who comes for people.<\/p><p>Researchers of the 19th and early 20th centuries, among them Bernhard Schmidt in his work on the folk life of the modern Greeks, have attempted to see in such figures a continued effect of the ancient demons of death. Today&#8217;s scholarship is more cautious here.<\/p><p>It emphasises that no unbroken line between the ancient Keres and modern Greek conceptions of death can be demonstrated, and that Christian, Byzantine and folk-cultural layers lie in between. A direct identity of the ancient Ker and the modern Greek Charos cannot be proven.<\/p><p>What can be said responsibly, by contrast, is this: over the centuries Greek culture has retained an inclination to conceive of death as an acting, often threatening figure rather than merely as a condition.<\/p><p>The Ker stands at the beginning of this long line. In modern reception, in lexica of <span class=\"iwg-fachbegriff\" data-tooltip=\"The entirety of the transmitted divine narratives of a culture.\" tabindex=\"0\">mythology<\/span>, in fantasy literature and in computer games, the Keres have reappeared, mostly as winged spirits of death or as generic battlefield demons.<\/p><p>These depictions take up above all the drastic portrayal of the <em>Aspis<\/em> and largely leave out the more difficult aspects, the concept of fate and the ritual embedding. For the <span class=\"iwg-fachbegriff\" data-tooltip=\"The discipline that studies religions comparatively and without confessional commitment.\" tabindex=\"0\">study of religion<\/span> it remains essential to distinguish the popular simplification from the many-layered ancient <span class=\"iwg-fachbegriff\" data-tooltip=\"The passing on of knowledge and narratives across generations.\" tabindex=\"0\">tradition<\/span>.<\/p>\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t<\/div>\n\t\t\t\t<\/div>\n\t\t\t\t\t<\/div>\n\t\t\t\t<\/div>\n\t\t<div class=\"elementor-element elementor-element-36dd7469 e-flex e-con-boxed e-con e-parent\" data-id=\"36dd7469\" data-element_type=\"container\" data-e-type=\"container\">\n\t\t\t\t\t<div class=\"e-con-inner\">\n\t\t\t\t<div class=\"elementor-element elementor-element-13760ab4 elementor-widget elementor-widget-heading\" data-id=\"13760ab4\" data-element_type=\"widget\" data-e-type=\"widget\" data-widget_type=\"heading.default\">\n\t\t\t\t\t<div class=\"elementor-heading-title elementor-size-default\">Further links<\/div>\t\t\t\t<\/div>\n\t\t<div class=\"elementor-element elementor-element-28c87796 e-con-full e-flex e-con e-child\" data-id=\"28c87796\" data-element_type=\"container\" data-e-type=\"container\">\n\t\t\t\t<div class=\"elementor-element elementor-element-5d6538df elementor-widget elementor-widget-text-editor\" data-id=\"5d6538df\" data-element_type=\"widget\" data-e-type=\"widget\" data-widget_type=\"text-editor.default\">\n\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t<p>Recommended internal links:<\/p><ul><li><a href=\"https:\/\/iwell-guard.com\/en\/greece\/\">Greece<\/a><\/li><li><a href=\"https:\/\/iwell-guard.com\/en\/erinyes\/\">Erinyes<\/a> (a close transition)<\/li><li><a href=\"https:\/\/iwell-guard.com\/en\/gallu\/\">Gallu<\/a> (Mesopotamian parallel)<\/li><li><a href=\"https:\/\/iwell-guard.com\/en\/thanatos\/\">Thanatos<\/a> and the Moirai (mythological context)<\/li><li>Battlefield <span class=\"iwg-fachbegriff\" data-tooltip=\"The entirety of the transmitted divine narratives of a culture.\" tabindex=\"0\">mythology<\/span> and the cult of the dead<\/li><\/ul>\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t<\/div>\n\t\t\t\t<\/div>\n\t\t\t\t\t<\/div>\n\t\t\t\t<\/div>\n\t\t<div class=\"elementor-element elementor-element-grl4kl40 e-flex e-con-boxed e-con e-parent\" data-id=\"grl4kl40\" data-element_type=\"container\" data-e-type=\"container\">\n\t\t\t\t\t<div class=\"e-con-inner\">\n\t\t\t\t<div class=\"elementor-element elementor-element-bzsbfrmh elementor-widget elementor-widget-heading\" data-id=\"bzsbfrmh\" data-element_type=\"widget\" data-e-type=\"widget\" data-widget_type=\"heading.default\">\n\t\t\t\t\t<h2 class=\"elementor-heading-title elementor-size-default\">Sources and literature<\/h2>\t\t\t\t<\/div>\n\t\t<div class=\"elementor-element elementor-element-2c13224a e-con-full e-flex e-con e-child\" data-id=\"2c13224a\" data-element_type=\"container\" data-e-type=\"container\">\n\t\t\t\t<div class=\"elementor-element elementor-element-0eymh9ub elementor-widget elementor-widget-text-editor\" data-id=\"0eymh9ub\" data-element_type=\"widget\" data-e-type=\"widget\" data-widget_type=\"text-editor.default\">\n\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t<footer class=\"iwg-literatur\"><p>A selection of central works on the Keres and on Greek conceptions of death:<\/p><ul><li><span data-nosnippet>Vermeule, Emily: <em>Aspects of Death in Early Greek Art and Poetry<\/em>. Berkeley 1979.<\/span><\/li><li><span data-nosnippet>Burkert, Walter: <em>Greek Religion of the Archaic and Classical Period<\/em>. Stuttgart 1977.<\/span><\/li><li>Wachsmuth, Dietrich: &#8220;Keres&#8221;, in: <em>Der kleine Pauly<\/em>, vol. 3.<\/li><li><span data-nosnippet>Sourvinou-Inwood, Christiane: <em>&#39;Reading&#39; Greek Death<\/em>. Oxford 1995.<\/span><\/li><\/ul><div data-nosnippet=\"true\" class=\"iwg-litliste\"><p><strong>Standard literature (Greece):<\/strong><\/p><ul><li><span data-nosnippet><strong>Bremmer, Jan N.<\/strong>: <em>Greek Religion. Cambridge University Press, Cambridge 1999.<\/em><\/span><\/li><li><span data-nosnippet><strong>Bonnefoy, Yves<\/strong>: <em>Greek and Egyptian Mythologies. University of Chicago Press, Chicago 1992.<\/em><\/span><\/li><\/ul><\/div><\/footer>\n<p class=\"iwg-bib-more\"><span data-nosnippet>Further standard works in the <a href=\"\/en\/literature\/\">literature index<\/a>.<\/span><\/p>\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t<\/div>\n\t\t\t\t<\/div>\n\t\t\t\t\t<\/div>\n\t\t\t\t<\/div>\n\t\t<div class=\"elementor-element elementor-element-iwgca-keres-sec e-flex e-con-boxed e-con e-parent\" data-id=\"iwgca-keres-sec\" data-element_type=\"container\" data-e-type=\"container\" id=\"iwg-ca-keres\">\n\t\t\t\t\t<div class=\"e-con-inner\">\n\t\t\t\t<div class=\"elementor-element elementor-element-iwgca-keres-te iwg-ca-textwrap elementor-widget elementor-widget-text-editor\" data-id=\"iwgca-keres-te\" data-element_type=\"widget\" data-e-type=\"widget\" data-widget_type=\"text-editor.default\">\n\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t<div data-nosnippet=\"true\"><p class=\"iwg-ca-bridge\">The protective practice described here is a religious-studies classification of historical traditions. iWell Guard ties in with this cultural-historical line of wearable protective objects and represents a contemporary form of it. <a href=\"https:\/\/iwell-guard.com\/en\/about-iwell-guard-the-protective-pendant-in-detail\/?utm_source=iwell-guard.com&#038;utm_medium=text-link&#038;utm_campaign=schadwesen-tradition\">More about the iWell Guard \u2192<\/a><\/p><\/div>\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t<\/div>\n\t\t\t\t\t<\/div>\n\t\t\t\t<\/div>\n\t\t\t\t<\/div>\n\t\t","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>Keres, Spirit of the Greek Tradition Keres is a spirit of the Greek tradition. Demons of the battlefield, death-bringers of Greek mythology. Keres on Hesiod&#8217;s battlefield The Keres are battlefield demons of Greek mythology who, according to Hesiod (Shield of Heracles 248-257; Theogony 211), descend together with Thanatos and Hypnos from the family of Nyx. [&hellip;]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":3,"featured_media":4776,"parent":0,"menu_order":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","template":"elementor_header_footer","meta":{"_yoast_wpseo_focuskw":"Keres battlefield demons","_yoast_wpseo_title":"Keres: Spirit of the Greek Tradition","_yoast_wpseo_metadesc":"Keres, demons of the battlefield and death-bringers of Greek mythology. Hesiod and Homer, their place beside Thanatos and the motif of the kerostasia.","_yoast_wpseo_meta-robots-noindex":"","_yoast_wpseo_canonical":"","_angie_page":false,"gefaehrdungsstufe":"","wesen_kultur":"","wesen_klasse":"","footnotes":""},"categories":[79,88,93],"class_list":["post-4775","page","type-page","status-publish","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-cultures","category-greece","category-spirits"],"yoast_head":"<!-- This site is optimized with the Yoast SEO Premium plugin v27.7 (Yoast SEO v27.7) - https:\/\/yoast.com\/product\/yoast-seo-premium-wordpress\/ -->\n<title>Keres: Spirit of the Greek Tradition<\/title>\n<meta name=\"description\" content=\"Keres, demons of the battlefield and death-bringers of Greek mythology. 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