Greek tradition
Dead relative in Greek dream interpretation
The oldest dream of the dead in European literature is not interpreted at all. It is simply attended to.
What this page is
What follows describes what the Greek material says about particular images, where it says it, and what the method around it required. It is not a claim that a dream about any of these things means anything, and Artemidorus's own framework holds that most dreams mean nothing at all.
In the twenty-third book of the Iliad, Achilles falls asleep grieving and the shade of Patroclus comes and stands over him, the same in size and voice and eyes, wearing the same clothes. It asks why it has been forgotten, tells him it cannot pass into the house of the dead until its body is burned, and asks for burial. Achilles reaches for it and it is gone.
Ancient commentators noticed the novelty of the scene, that the poet had found a way to give words to someone already dead. What is striking to a modern reader is what nobody in the passage does with it. Nothing is decoded. The dream makes a request and the request is carried out.
That is the Greek pattern for the dead in dreams: they arrive looking exactly as they did, they ask for something owed, and the obligation falls on the living. Interpretation is not required, because the dream is not treated as a message in code.
Worth knowing
Bereavement dreams are near-universal and well documented across cultures with no shared tradition. The detail Homer notices, that the figure appears unchanged and that reaching for it ends it, is reported by grieving people who have never read him.
What is actually recorded about dreaming of dead relative
Dreams of the dead are extremely common in bereavement, are frequently reported as comforting rather than distressing, and are taken seriously by grief researchers as part of how mourning proceeds. What they are not is evidence of contact.
The dead relative entrySources and reviewed references
2 references. What these labels mean
- 1.The Iliad and the Odyssey, the dream passagesHistorical dream record
Homer
Cited for: The oldest dream material in Greek literature: the ghost of Patroclus appearing to Achilles in Iliad 23, and Penelope's gates of horn and ivory in Odyssey 19, which is the earliest surviving statement that some dreams are true and some are not.
- 2.Dreams and Experience in Classical AntiquityAcademic book
William V. Harris (2009) · Harvard University Press
Cited for: How dreams were recorded, classified and used in Greek and Roman practice, including temple incubation and the interpretive traditions around it.