La disputa femenina per la sobirania del Partenó a La flauta de l’emperador de Kostís Palamàs

Abstract

This article analyses the dispute over the sovereignty of the Parthenon between its original owner, the goddess Athena, and her Christian successor, the Virgin Mary, as presented in the poem by the Greek «national poet» Kostis Palamas The Emperor’s Flute published in 1910. In this work, Palamas uses two episodes from Byzantine historiography on the life of Emperor Basil II the Bulgar-Slayer to construct a discourse that promotes the political vision of the Greek nationalist «Great Idea». However, he does not attribute to Constantinople and Christianity the usual predominant role in the ideology of his time but rather claims Athens as the capital of modern Hellenism and prophesies the future victory of the pagan goddesses Athena-Sophia and Aphrodite- Agape over the Virgin Mary. In his discourse on femininity, Palamas combines the Germanic tradition of praise of the Eternal Feminine with the symbolist characterization of woman as a flower of evil.