The Descent of the Goddess: Ritual and Difference in Sappho’s Prayer to Aphrodite

Acknowledgments

I would first like to express my gratitude to my first teachers of Greek, Leonard Muellner and Mark Davies, without whom, perhaps, none of this would have happened. I am grateful to many people for advice and encouragement throughout the research and writing of this thesis. My thanks go first to Professor Nagy, who always knew the right thing to say; then to Professor Barbara Freeman, Professor Greg Crane, and Ted Allen, each of whom (wittingly or un-) nudged me in important directions at important junctures. I thank for their unselfish support the folks at Perseus, my room-mates Charles and Bobby, and especially my family. Finally, I offer my hopelessly insufficient thanks to Liz. I cannot imagine my life without her as a best friend and a σύμμαχος.