Talk:Delphic Sibyl

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Contents 1 Redirect 2 Errors and NPOV 3 Three suggested reference links 4 Pausanias 5 ugh! 6 Requested move from "Delphic Sibyl" to "Pythia" 6.1 Survey 6.2 Discussion 7 Reconsideration 8 Move request cancelled; material moved to Pythia

[edit] Redirect

Shouldn't "Oracle at Delphi" redirect to "Phythia" rather than the Delphic Sibyl? If someone is searching for "Oracle at Delphi," they are almost certainly looking for Pythia. Otherwise, we need a disambiguation page for Oracle at Delphi rather than a simple redirect to this page. ZG 13:36, 13 March 2007 (UTC)

[edit] Errors and NPOV

Maybe it's sensible that the article Sibyl does not mention this article, since:

• It tells us that the Pythia at Delphi was "Delphica."
• It tells us that Delphi was a "Greek colony".
• It tells us that "prophecies" were written on bay leaves.
• It tells us that the Delphic Sibyl was "among the most admired of the Sibyls because of her physical and ideal beauty."

Oi!--Wetman 04:28, 19 Mar 2005 (UTC)

I found the "among the most admired of the Sibyls because of her physical and ideal beauty!" It's from the Vatican Museum—always so dependable in reading Greek mythology—site on Michelangelo's Sibyls in the Sistine Chapel: Vatican Museums. You just can't get there from here! --Wetman 04:45, 19 Mar 2005 (UTC)

Some of the rest of this text is cut and pasted from [1] --Wetman 05:50, 19 Mar 2005 (UTC)

I've removed some of the really egregious stuff, including the copyvio. I have no idea if the rest is accurate, however—I'm quite suspicious of it. Frankly, I think that Delphi#Oracle is a much better rendition. Think we should just copy it over the current article? —Simetrical (talk) 21:29, 8 Apr 2005 (UTC)

This guy seems to think it's ^&(^ too.

http://www.isidore-of-seville.com/oracles/2.html Wikipedia Hall of Shame:

• Wikipedia: Delphic Oracle currently redirects to Sibyl. This is Wikipedia at its worst. The entry is a fantastic blend of 19c. scholarship and modern religious fantasy, disconnected from contemporary classical scholarship. The writers' efforts to gloss over Apollo's role at Delphi is not to be believed. This is everything that is wrong with Wikipedia: a handful of modern "pagans" can shanghai a page. Since pagans outnumber people with Classics degrees (particularly on Wikipedia), the pagans' view of truth wins.
• Wikipedia: Oracle. Better.
• Wikipedia: Dodona. Similar mother-goddess problems.[2]

Sancassania 17.10.2005 10.00 GMT

[edit] Three suggested reference links

(1) The discussion of this topic on today's Diane Rehm Show on National Public Radio. The audio archive should be posted at http://www.wamu.org/programs/dr/06/03/13.php#9773 at approximately 1:00 PM Eastern Standard Time. (2) The book by the interviewee on the above-referenced radio program, namely, The Oracle: The Lost Secrets and Hidden Messages of Ancient Delphi, by William J. Broad. (3) One or more of the research sources cited by Mr. Broad, e.g. DeBoer JZ, Hale JR, Chanton J. 2001, New Evidence for the Geological Origins of the Ancient Delphic Oracle (Greece),” from Geology; Spiller HA, Hale JR, DeBoer JZ. 2002, “The Delphi Oracle: A Multidisciplinary Defense of the Gaseous Vent Theory,” from Journal of Toxicology-Clinical Toxicology; and/or Hale JR, DeBoer J, Chanton J, and Spiller H. 2002, “New Evidence for the Geological Origin of the Delphic Oracle: Active Faults, Gaseous Emissions, and Architectural Anomalies in the Temple of Apollo,” from Conference abstract, 103rd Annual Meeting of the Archeological Institute of America.

Suburban 17:19, 13 March 2006 (UTC)

[edit] Pausanias

Pausanias, a Romanized Greek, visited a much diminished Delphi in the 2nd century AD. Listen to his garbled understanding from his Description of Greece(10.12.1):

"There is a rock rising up above the ground. On it, say the Delphians, there stood and chanted the oracles a woman, by name Herophile and surnamed Sibyl. The former Sibyl I find was as ancient as any; the Greeks say that she was a daughter of Zeus by Lamia, daughter of Poseidon, that she was the first woman to chant oracles, and that the name Sibyl was given her by the Libyans."

Anyone care to set this quote in context of the Delphic "Sibyl"? --Wetman 06:28, 14 March 2006 (UTC)

[edit] ugh!

Well, I just removed some of the more glaring errors from this article, but a lot remains to be done. I'm thinking that the article should be moved to Pythia; "Sibyl" isn't used of the Delphic oracle until the Roman period.

After that, the article should be re-written/expanded to:

1) give some impression of the oracle's role in Greek culture & history: it was consulted before colonial expeditions went out, before major changes in city law-codes, to ask whether a new cult should be founded, during major political crises (see Herodotus), by individuals like Socrates and Xenophon. (some of this material is in the main Delphi article, but more detail can be provided here)

2) cover the Delphic oracle in literature: it shows up briefly in Iliad, central in Aeschylus' Oresteia, Sophocles Oedipus, etc.

3) have a detailed section on the elaborate ritual of consulting the oracle, and the nature of the Pythia's prophecies: did she speak gibberish that was interpreted by the prophetai, or did she give prophecies herself? Was she in a frenzy, high on ethylene, or did she appear calm and rational? (Despite the recent articles in Nature and National Geographic, this is still a wide-open question.)

Perhaps this article should be moved to Pythia and there should be a main Delphic Oracle page. I'll wait for feedback before I move the page...

--Akhilleus (talk) 06:47, 31 March 2006 (UTC)

[edit] Requested move from "Delphic Sibyl" to "Pythia"

Requested move has been cancelled, see below

Delphic Sibyl → Pythia … Rationale: Pythia was the original title of the priestess of the Delphic Oracle … Please discuss/vote at Talk:Delphic Sibyl — --Akhilleus (talk) 05:01, 3 April 2006 (UTC)

[edit] Survey

Add *Support or *Oppose followed by an optional one-sentence explanation, then sign your opinion with ~~~~

• Support This is the wrong name. The Sibyl was at cumae, and her imitators claimed to be Italian. Septentrionalis 05:10, 3 April 2006 (UTC)
• Support Pythia is the proper name. But make the old article re-direct to the new one. And all the pointers to the old article, too, which are quite numerous ! --- (Bob) Wikiklrsc 19:36, 3 April 2006 (UTC)
  • Don't worry about this. The move will automatically generate a redirect from the old name to the new. The redirects from other names will have to be changed, but that's often done as part of the move; we don't have to worry about fixing the other links - if someone feels like doing the drudgery, more power to them. Septentrionalis 21:24, 3 April 2006 (UTC)
    • Great. Thanks for your kind comments. -- (Bob) Wikiklrsc 22:50, 3 April 2006 (UTC)

[edit] Discussion

Add any additional comments

It is of interest that William Smith's standard opus in 1870, and which strongly influenced The Oxford Classical Dictionary later, Dictionary of Greek and Roman Biography and Mythology, names a Delphian Sibyl [2].

Also, confer Smith's Dictionary of Greek and Roman Antiquities, the article on Pythia. [3]. And the article on Oraculum [4] --- (Bob) Wikiklrsc 07:21, 3 April 2006 (UTC)

Do you have a source more recent than 1870? I'm also not sure I want to follow Pausanias on Delphi, beeswax temples and all. Septentrionalis 16:54, 3 April 2006 (UTC)

Hi. Not at hand, unfortunately. I am in agreement with the basic idea of calling the priestess Pythia and the article accordingly. I was just trying to point out some known references. Smith, even though he's from 1870 is used a lot.

As long as the old article re-directs to the new Pythia article, I think all is well. I will look when I can for a more current reference. I guess someone has checked out the Oxford Classical Dictionary already. Yes, I know the bit about Pausanias.

A web search reveals that there are references to the Delphic Sibyl, albeit seemingly technically incorrectly. Like the Vatican Museum when describing the artwork of the The Delphic Sibyl by Michaelangelo and the detail from the Sistine Chapel Ceiling. [5]

Looking up "Pythia" on the Perseus project at Tufts University says it's another name for Delphi: [6]

The priestess clearly was called the Pythia. I do think that people still popularly refer to the Sibyl at Delphi or Delphic Sibyl, however techincally inaccurate that might be according to ancient Greek sources.

Again, it's all fine to change the article, as long as "Delphic Sibyl" re-directs to it.

Thanks. --- (Bob) Wikiklrsc 17:53, 3 April 2006 (UTC)

Bob, thanks for supporting the move to "Pythia." As you've noted, "Pythia" can be an old name for Delphi, and it can also refer to the Pythian Games. But the word usually refers to the priestess of Apollo. I'm not sure if "sibyl" is a very popular name for her now; certainly within classical scholarship she's consistently referred to as Pythia.

A note on sources:

If you look at the Oraculum article, you'll notice that Smith refers to a Pythia throughout, but doesn't seem to mention a sibyl.

The 3rd edition of the OCD uses "Pythia" consistently; s.v. "Delphic oracle".

Or heck, I dunno...how about primary sources? Wikipedia articles on classical topics are abysmal at citing primary sources, but on this topic, there are a great many: Herodotus refers to the Delphic oracle a lot, and uses the title Pythia or variations of it often, e.g., Histories 5.62.

Pausanias also refers to a Pythia (e.g., 10.14.5--the translation is "Pythian priestess" but the Greek is ἡ Πυθία).

Plutarch, who was a priest at Delphi, wrote several dialogues about the oracle; the dialogue known by the Latin title of De Pythiae oraculis refers many times to the Pythia; he also mentions a sibyl, but he seems to be talking about a woman named Sibylla, a female poet who wrote a collection of prophetic verses long before Plutarch's day (the 1st-2nd cent CE).

I am actually not sure whether any Greek source calls the Delphic oracle a Sibyl. Saying that there's a Delphic Sibyl is not quite the same as saying that the oracle is a sibyl. It seems to me that their identification happens after the oracle stops functioning, but I don't have sources for this. --Akhilleus (talk) 18:49, 3 April 2006 (UTC)

Thanks for your reply, Akhilleus. Currently, The Perseus Project at Tufts University, amongst other citations, points to Harry Thurston Peck, Harpers Dictionary of Classical Antiquities (1898), and this article entry on "Delphi" which clearly calls the priestess pythia, not surprisingly. [7] And to this entry for "Pythia": [8]

National Geographic magazine calls her the Pythia in an article, Delphic Oracle's Lips May Have Been Loosened by Gas Vapors, By John Roach for National Geographic News, August 14, 2001 [9]

I know scholarly articles refer to her as the pythia which is my comfort level, too.

Oddly enough, there seems to be a headword entry in the Suda Byzantine encyclopedia from the 10th century, on "Delphic Sibyl": [10]

A more popularly vernacular book, Priestesses by Norma Lorre Goodrich, 1989, is all about the Oracle at Delphi and priestesses, wherein she consistently refers to the priestess at Delphi as pythia.

And Python; a study of Delphic myth and its origins, a book by Joseph Eddy Fontenrose, 1959, refers to her as Pythia, of course.

Maybe the confusion is all because of Michaelangelo's Delphic Sibyl art !

Best. --- (Bob) Wikiklrsc 19:21, 3 April 2006 (UTC)

Yes, I just checked the OCD (Oxford Classical Dictionary) and it says the priestess was called the Pythia. No surprise. The 1970 edition has no entry for "Pythia", but as --Akhilleus (talk) wrote, under the entry, "Delphic Oracle", it clearly states that she is called the Pythia. In the 1949 edition of the OCD (and up to at least the 1961 printing), there is an entry for "Pythia", and it simply refers the reader to the entry on "Apollo", section 4, which refers the reader again to the "Delphic Oracle" entry wherein it is stated that, again, the priestess is called the Pythia. Such is the scholarly nomenclature known to me before. But the regular parlance might be another story. After all, it has been hypothesised that "language is a virus" ! (cf. William S. Burroughs, "Language is a virus from outer space.") [11] [12]. Nevertheless, the priestess is still properly known as the Pythia, although one can imagine and see how the name Delphic Sibyl came into some sort of popular usage. --- (Bob) Wikiklrsc 03:58, 4 April 2006 (UTC)

Also, just for completeness, here is the entry in the Liddell and Scott Lexicon of Greek (Henry George Liddell, Robert Scott, A Greek-English Lexicon) which clearly defines the Pythia as the priestess. [13] --- (Bob) Wikiklrsc 04:35, 4 April 2006 (UTC)

[edit] Reconsideration

Some research has led me to the conclusion that the Delphic Sibyl and the Pythia are entirely separate during the classical period. Even the Byzantine Suda treats them as separate concepts.

A comparison of Pausanias 10.5.5, on the foundation of the temple of Apollo and the Oracle, with Pausanias 10.12.1, on the Delphic Sibyl, shows that Pausanias thinks of the "Pythia" as a title that is passed from priestess to priestess, while the Delphic Sibyl is a mythical individual who left behind books of oracular poetry.

I'm not sure where the confusion between the two arose, but I notice that the major source of confusion on the web seems to be this very Wikipedia article.

So, I don't think this page needs to be moved after all; rather, the material on the Pythia should just be cut and pasted into the Pythia page, and the material that is on the Delphic Sibyl can remain here. Both pages need to make it clear that the Delphic Sibyl is not the Pythia. --Akhilleus (talk) 19:09, 4 April 2006 (UTC)

Fascinating catch. Great work. I wonder myself now about their being two separate entites, even though what you've researched is seemingly conclusive. So, from what you are saying and have researched, the Delphic Sibyl was a mythical figure according to Pausanias as opposed to the Pythia who was real and was the priestess. Hmm. This opens more doors than before ! I will have to look into it as well a little deeper. Thanks very much, Akhilleus ! --- (Bob) Wikiklrsc 22:41, 4 April 2006 (UTC)

I read very carefully both passages from Pausanias, and found myself asking more questions than having answers. It is not totally clear in certain aspects. Consider also, Prophecy and history in the crisis of the Roman Empire: a historical commentary on the Thirteenth Sibylline Oracle by David Stone Potter, Oxford [England] : Clarendon Press ; New York : Oxford University Press, 1990. (scholarly review of the book) This had been Potter's doctoral thesis. Consider what Potter says:

"In the late fifth century BC it does appear that 'Sibylla' was the name given to a single inspired prophetess. It would also appear that her words were circulated as books of prophecy and that her name was inserted in these books. This may also have been the case with books attributed to other early prophets such as Orpheus, Epimenides, Bacis, or Musaeus, and the inclusion of a name served to differentiate her utterances from those of the prophets and prophetesses at oracular shrines who spoke only as the mouthpiece of a god, and who did not include details of their lives in their responses. The circulation of such collections in Greece may be traced back to at least the sixth century, the time when the activity of chresmologists, ‘oracle-collectors’, is first attested. All that can be said is that ‘Sibylla’ appears to have been less interesting to people in mainland Greece than other prophets, such as Bacis or Epimenides, until the end of the fourth century. This may well be the case because the areas that seem to be connected with her activity in the earliest period, Erythrae and Marpessus in the Troad were in Asia Minor. Like other wandering prophets, she was not associated with a specific shrine and was thought to produce here oracles because she had some sort of special divine knowledge. The form of her prophecies may have been much like that of the surviving books: a series of conditional and final clauses say that ‘when certain conditions obtain, something will happen’. It does not seem to be the case that her books had any unity other than that they were supposed to contain the utterances of a single prophetess".

“It is impossible to know how this form of prophetic behavior developed. It has been argued that the Sibylline tradition developed because there was in fact a famous prophetess of that name who was a representative of an indigenous tradition in the Troad. This may be true (it is impossible to prove), but it does not explain the currency of the style of prophecy with which the Sibyl is associated. She was just one of a number of mythical and semi-mythical characters to whom such books were attributed. The format, a long collection of prophecies uttered by a single prophet, has obvious earlier parallels in Palestine, Mesopotamia, and the wisdom literature of Egypt. Therefore the most likely explanation for the spread of this form of presentation in archaic Greece is that it was borrowed from the east. What does not seem to be paralleled – though it must be emphasized that many of the surviving texts from Mesopotamia are broken in such a way that it is not possible to know who the prophet was – is the association of a woman with this sort of book. But this is not a serious problem. Both men and women had an important role as prophets in the Greek world, and even if the form was ‘borrowed’ from anther culture, it is entirely to be expected that it would be interpreted within the spectrum of Greek activity. Hence, both men and women could be imagined as producing such books."

“The number of Sibyls proliferated in the wake of Alexander’s conquest of the east. According to Varro, who composed a list of them for his work on the Antiquities of Human and Divine Matters, there were ten of them: The Babylonian, the Libyan, the Delphic, the Cimmerian, the Erythraean, the Samian, the Cumaean, the Hellespontine, the Phrygian, and the Tiburtine. The Libyan Sibyl may be a creation of Varro, or an earlier scholar, based on Euripides’ Busiris. The Babylonian Sibyl was reported by Nicanor, the author of a history of Alexander (and possibly a member of his staff), the Delphic Sibyl was discussed by Chryssippus in his work on divination, and the Cimmerian was the invention of Naevius. The Erythraean appeared in the work of Apollodorus of Erythrae, the Samian was uncovered by Eratosthenes, and the Hellespontine was discussed by Heracleides Ponticus. Heracleides is known from other sources to have mentioned the Phrygian Sibyl, and he may be the source for Var.’s knowledge of her as well. Varro does not give a source for information on the Cumaean Sibyl (who was too well known in Rome to require such annotation) but he does tell the story of her dealings with Tarquin; nor does he name his source for the Tiburtine Sibyl, presumably because she was also too well known. This list, which is representative rather than complete, may reflect the growth of the doxographic tradition in the Hellenistic world."

"A somewhat different picture of Sibylline texts is provided by Pausanias. The variation is the result of a difference in perspective: Varro seems to have derived his knowledge of Sibyls from the works of other learned men while Pausanias derived his from personal reading of the texts and visits to the homes of famous Sibyls. Pausanias sets forth most of his knowledge about Sibyls in a digression artfully placed at the point during his tour of Delphi where he saw the rock upon which the Sibyl was supposed to have sung her prophecies. He says that the Sibyl who sang there was named Herophile. She was younger than the ‘earlier Sibyl’ who had been the daughter of Zeus and of Lamia, the daughter of Poseidon, and who had been given the name ‘Sibylla’ by the Libyans. Despitethis, Herophile was still born before the Trojan War: she had foretold the birth of Helen at Sparta and the ruin that the daughter of Leda would bring to Europe and Asia. She was the same woman whom the Delians remembered as the author of a poem to Apollo. It also seemed to have been the case that she suffered from divine possession and insanity while she spoke: at times she would say that she was Artemis and the wedded wife of Apollo, at others she would say simply that she was her sister or daughter. In another place in her ‘oracles’ she said that she was the daughter of a mortal and a nymph on Ida."

"In his account of Herophile, Pausanias is clearly conflating a number of accounts he discovered in oracles which had been attributed to her because of the autobiographical accounts they contained. He reconciled them by assuming that she was possessed and therefore not to be held responsible for any inconsistency. The story Pausanias decided was true made her the daughter of a nymph and placed her birth at Marpessus in the Troad. He had even been to visit the place and seen her tomb in the Sminthian grove near Alexandria Troas. He seems to have been impressed not only by the tomb, but also by the fact that the inhabitants of Alexandria were able to tell him that she had been an attendant at the temple when she gave ‘that prophecy which we know to be true’ on the occasion of Hecuba’s dream. He goes on to say that she spent a great deal of her life on Samos, but that she also visited Delphi and Delos. He was so convinced by the people at Alexandria that he said that the people of Erythrae, who also claimed her as their citizen, were frauds."

“The next Sibyl whom he mentions is Demo, the Sibyl of Cumae. He also says that when he visited Cumae he had not been impressed. All that the people there could show him was a small stone urn in which her bones had been placed. They could not even quote any of her verses. He also knew of a later Sibyl named Sabbe, who was the daughter of Berosus and Erymanthe. He asserts that she lived with the ‘Jews around Palestine’ but that others called her Babylonian and still others called her Egyptian. He also knew of women who had given prophecies but were not called Sibyls."

“Pausanias’ account is of particular interest because it shows how a pious, somewhat traditional, thinking man would react to the information about Sibyls in the oracles that he had read and at the sites that he had visited. He also places these Sibyls very firmly in a local context and suggests something of the rivalry between cities that laid claim to a particularly famous Sibyl as a fellow citizen. In fact, two of the places he mentions were soon to improve the evidence for their Sibylline connections. By 161, when Lucius Verus arrived at Erythrae, he found a newly constructed shrine to the local Sibyl, a complete with a fountain and statues, one of them inscribed with a long poem giving the details of the Sibyl’s life. At Cumae, at about the same time, the Sibyl’s bones were moved to a large bronze phakos and the cave where she gave her prophecies was shown to tourists. This seems to have impressed the author of the Cohortatio ad Graecos, who visited the spot in the third century."

“The evidence of Pausanias is especially important because it places the Sibyls in their proper context within the Roman world. In Pausanias, as in the works of his contemporary Lucian, we can see that she was a respected prophetess. Lucian suggests through his parodies that Sibylline verses were quoted, as were those of Bacis, to lend an air of authority to contemporary events. It seems to have been important to people that the coming of Alexander of Abonuteichos had been predicted by a Sibyl and that the Sibyl would speak on the subject of Peregrinus’ self-immolation. Pausanias suggests that Sibyls were venerated for their powers and that they were cherished members of the civic community. They were people about whom civic dignitaries cared deeply and in honor of whom they spent money. Pausanias also places the composition of Sibylline verse in its proper milieu: among the educated classes of the Greek east, among the people who thought that she increased the dignity of their city and who would have the education to compose in verse. These verses are not always eloquent, but they do represent the sort of versification that an average educated man could produce."

“Varro does not discuss (there is no reason why he should) and Pausanias only briefly alludes to the appropriation of the Sibyl as a prophet by other peoples (most notably the Jews of Alexandria) in their efforts to claim intellectual respectability in a Greek context. This process may be compared to the similar appropriation of other wise men of the classical past. It is also the case that this proliferation might not have been a significant development if it were not for the existence of the libri Sibyllini at Rome. An effort to replace the collection after it was destroyed in 83 BC certainly caused great interest in the Greek east, and the well-advertised connection between Sibyls and the greatness of Rome may well have made her words more interesting than those of other prophets throughout the Mediterranean world. It may also help to explain why Jewish Sibylline verses which echoed Old Testament prophecy were popular among Christian apologists. In the works of these apologists the Sibyl was elevated to the position of the greatest prophetess of antiquity."

One can find the above quotes also in a student's website [14] on Sibyls. It's only literally quoting sources, like Potter, Pausanias, et al.

Potter has written a subsequent book which is of interest, also. Prophets and Emperors. Human and Divine Authority from Augustus to Theodosius by David S. Potter, Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press, 1994. (Scholarly review of the book)

It all leaves me a bit unclear for the moment. --- (Bob) Wikiklrsc 00:23, 5 April 2006 (UTC)

Bob, thanks for the quote. I don't think it's unclear at all; that quote certainly doesn't cast any doubt on our conclusion that the Sibyl and the Pythia are different things. It will come in handy in revising the Sibyl article and its many children, but it won't affect Pythia. --Akhilleus (talk) 03:27, 5 April 2006 (UTC)

Hi Akhilleus. Thanks for your reply. Well, I totally agree with you in principle and spirit. I just found myself, after writing the above, actually tracking down and reading Dr. Potter's book mentioned above, and several others, and the Greek text of Pausanias alongside Sir James Frazer's translation and ten volume line-by-line commentary. That was a lot of work for one night in the library. Anyway, here are some references:

• David S. Potter[15], Prophecy and history in the crisis of the Roman Empire: a historical commentary on the Thirteenth Sibylline Oracle, 1990. Cf. Chapter 3.
• Herbert William Parke, Sibyls and Sibylline Prophecy, 1988.
• Pausanias, Description of Greece, [ed. and translated by Sir James Frazer], 1913 edition. Cf. v.5

It gets very complicated but interesting. In Pausanias, the first Sibyl mentioned ("the former" [earlier]) was of great antiquity, and was thought to have been given the name "sibyl" by the Libyans. Frazer calls this text defective (p.288). The second Sibyl, referred to by Pausanias, and named "Herophile", seems to have been based ultimately in Samos, but visited other shrines, Delphi, etc. and sang there, but that at the same time, Delphi had its own sibyl. On p.103 of Potter, he writes, "In the late fifth century BC it does appear that 'Sibylla' was the name given to a single inspired prophetess". See this site for a resume [16] under "Sibyls in mythical times". See also [17]. Potter also says, on p.106, "Varro got his knowledge of sibyls from the words of other learned men, while Pausanias derived his from personal reading of the texts and visits to the homes of famous sibyls." It gets more interesting than that, but let's leave it there for now, and proceed with your suggestion. Bests. --- (Bob) Wikiklrsc 07:43, 5 April 2006 (UTC)

[edit] Move request cancelled; material moved to Pythia

After determining that the Pythia and Sibyl are different figures (see discussion above, especially the very helpful quote from Potter provided by Wikiklrsc), I moved the Pythia material from this article to the Pythia article, which had been a redirect page until that point. I hope I didn't step on anyone's toes, but I'm very confident that the Sibyl is not the Pythia, and I wanted to remove this confusion from Wikipedia ASAP.

--Akhilleus (talk) 06:42, 5 April 2006 (UTC)

Hi Akhilleus. Thanks for the move. I may be putting some more material in the articles, but it all looks very well. Well done ! See my new information above from a night's reading in the library. I finally got my hands on Potter's book, etc. Great to collaborate. WP at its best. Thanks. --- (Bob) Wikiklrsc 07:53, 5 April 2006 (UTC)

There's still a lot of confusion here because on the Delphi page and discussion page, "Delphic Sibyl" is treated as a fiction created later. The greatest confusion is that in the Heracles article, Heracles is described as being given instructions by the Delphic Sibyl, and there is a link to the The_Twelve_Labours, and in THAT article, Heracles is said to have been instructed by the Oracle, and there is no reference to the Sibyl. Confusion! 203.122.211.118 05:41, 1 May 2006 (UTC)

Thanks for the heads-up. --Akhilleus (talk) 06:24, 1 May 2006 (UTC)