Hirpi Sorani and Modern Fire-Walkers: Rejoicing through Pain in Extreme Rituals

Yulia Ustinova

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Chapter 3 Hirpi Sorani and Modern Fire-Walkers: Rejoicing through Pain in Extreme Rituals

于SENSORIVM: The Senses in Roman Polytheism

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Yulia Ustinova

Yulia Ustinova
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类型:: 章节

Page Range:: 71–89

DOI:: https://doi.org/10.1163/9789004459748_005

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Abstract

Hirpi Sorani, “the wolves of Soranus,” were priests, belonging to several Faliscan families and worshipping Apollo Soranus and other local gods. Once a year, during a popular community festival celebrated on Mount Soracte, these priests carried offerings, walking barefoot on blazing embers and feeling no pain. In antiquity, some regarded their abilities as god-given, while others attributed the immunity of Hirpi Sorani to pain to application of an ointment. Fire-walking occurred also in other parts of the Mediterranean world.

Fire-walking is well-known in the modern world. Contemporary anthropological research, employing interviews with the fire-walkers, as well as quantitative criteria of assessing their physical and mental state, sheds light on the experiences of ancient fire-walkers. Fire-walking involves alteration of consciousness, associated with the release of endogenous substances, which renders high-ordeal participants immune to pain, and results in the state of euphoria and blessedness. The research on the state of low-ordeal witnesses of fire-walking demonstrates that they were also passionately involved. Thus, perceived suffering and alteration of consciousness of several people endows the entire community with a transformative experience which can be construed in terms of redemption and purification.

These observations elucidate the cognitive and social roles of fire-walking in the ancient Mediterranean: these rituals bestowed the high-ordeal participants with feelings of euphoria and extreme salience of their experience, which compelled them to participate in the ritual time and again, while the empathy of the low-ordeal participants brought about feelings of elation and purification.

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SENSORIVM: The Senses in Roman Polytheism

丛编： Religions in the Graeco-Roman World, 卷： 195

ISBN:: 9789004459748

出版社:: Brill

印刷出版日期:: 20 May 2021

Subjects
- Classical Studies
- Religious Studies
  - History of Religion
  - Religion in Antiquity

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African Studies	Education	Media Studies
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Biblical Studies	Jewish Studies	Slavic and Eurasian Studies
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Book History and Cartography	Life Sciences	Theology and World Christianity
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Chapter 3 Hirpi Sorani and Modern Fire-Walkers: Rejoicing through Pain in Extreme Rituals

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