Abstract
The appearance of the term daimōn as an alternative to theos and/or hērōs in a few Dodonian oracular lamellae has suggested that daimōn may assume a cultic dimension, at least in the intention of those seeking to determine the identity of a divine interlocutor. The unanswered question is therefore : why do epigraphic ritual prescriptions and dedications contain no use of the term daimōn, apart from in poetic texts inscribed on stone or in the very specific, and globally rather rare, case of theAgathos daimōn sometimes associated with theAgathē Tychē ?
The last lecture of the year tackled such a question. To do so, we had to make a clear distinction between the poetic plots analyzed so far, where reference is made to generic divine actions, and ritual acts that must address a specific interlocutor or interlocutors. In these cases, the use of a proper name is a necessary step. In a ritual context where adequate communication is sought, the superhuman interlocutor is a named divine entity. Ritual prescriptions and Pausanias' Periegesis were successively called upon in an attempt to identify the cultic equivalent(s) of the notion of daimōn analyzed this year.
