Abstract

It is generally believed that Greece is the cradle of western civilization. As an important part of human culture, ancient Greek culture with thousands of year’s history has impact on the development of global culture, especially on western culture. Its influence on the western culture includes human’s religion, philosophy, natural science, custom, literature and art. As a shinning jewel of the ancient Greek culture, Greek mythology has its essence which is anthropomorphism—attribution of human characteristics or behavior to a god, animal, or an object. Hence, in order to get insight into the western culture, this four-chapter thesis analyzes the anthropomorphism in Greek mythology and reveals the reasons with the help of predecessor’s information.     
In the first chapter, the author introduces the background and purpose of the research. Chapter two is the analysis of anthropomorphism in Greek mythology which consists of three parts. Part one compares the form, flesh, skin and dressing between gods and human, then comes to the conclusion that gods and human beings are alike in appearance. The second part discusses the similarity in respect of personalities with examples that show the characters of gods. The third part mainly focuses on the social life of gods and draws a conclusion that Olympus is a copy of human society. Chapter three is divided into two parts to find out the causes. The first part is a brief discussion on the social conditions of ancient Greece. Part two probes into the western humanism at that age. The final chapter summarizes all contents of the thesis, and addresses its limitations and suggestions for further study.

Keywords: Greek mythology; anthropomorphism; reasons

摘要

众所周知，希腊是西方文明的摇篮。有着数千年历史的古希腊文化更是人类文化的重要组成部分，对全世界，尤其是西方文化的发展都有着极大的影响。它对西方文化的影响攘括了宗教信仰，哲学，风俗，文学和艺术等各个方面。而希腊神话则是古希腊文化中一颗璀璨的宝石。希腊神话的精髓在于它的神人同形同性特征，即神与人外形一致，性格一致。 因此，为了能更深入了解西方文化， 本文在参考前人资料的基础上，对希腊神话的拟人特征做出了分析，并探讨了该现象的成因。
本文由四个章节组成，第一章介绍了研究的背景和目的。第二章由三部分组成，对希腊神人同形同性特征做出了详细分析。第一部分分别对比了神和人在外形、肉体、皮肤、和服饰的相似点，从而得出神人同形的结论。第二部分结合具体事例，探讨了神人同性的特征。第三部分主要分析了神和人社会生活的相似处，证明神的世界其实是人类社会的翻版。第三章分为两部分，探究了神人同形同性的成因。第一部分是对古希腊社会形态的简要介绍，第二部分研究了当时西方社会的人本思想。本文最后一章总结全文，并对进一步的研究提出意见。

关键词：希腊神话；神人同形同性；起因