1Henk Versnel’s contributions to the study of Graeco-Roman religions have earned for him the dedication of the 200^th volume of the series Religions in the Graeco-Roman World. The book under review is the result of a roundtable discussion held in 2016 to commemorate Versnel’s 80^th birthday. The main objective was to produce “a historiographic volume about the variegated interests of the honorand himself” (p. ix). Following an extensive introduction to Versnel’s life, influences and interests, the book is divided into five parts. The book ends with an epilogue in which Versnel responds to the papers.

2Part 1 is titled “Inconsistencies and Other Complexities” and consists of three chapters. The opening chapter by Jennifer Larson underscores Versnel’s endorsement of a psychological approach to the study of ancient religion, despite his lack of explicit engagement with the field of Cognitive Science of Religion (CSR). Larson demonstrates how CSR can aid in understanding divine justice, miracles, and ruler cults in ancient religion. In the second chapter of this section, Casper de Jonge analyses the ways in which ancient scholars sought to explain inconsistencies in Archaic literature. He illustrates that discussions of inconsistencies and strategies of addressing them were a prominent feature of ancient literary criticism, with arguments employed that are strikingly similar to those used in modern scholarship. Aristarchus, for example, already concluded that one should not expect Homer to be consistent in the logical terms of a scholar living in later times. Tim Whitmarsh’s chapter on divine metonymy closes this part. He addresses how the gods were perceived, focussing, for example, on Eros as both a divine entity and a substitute for the concept of love. The evident ambiguity in this double portrayal reflects, according to Whitmarsh, the Greeks’ best efforts to explain the gods’ involvement in the natural world. For Whitmarsh, divine metonymy displays the Greeks’ attempts to make the divine tangible in words, but also reflects “their uncertainty as to the true nature of the gods’ involvement in the phenomenal world” (p. 123).

3The second part consists of two essays on “Myth and Ritual” and is more historiographical than the preceding part. Robert Segal provides a diachronic overview of scholarship on myth-and-ritual theory, highlighting the evolution of debates and differences in views regarding the connection between myth and ritual. The chapter ends with Segal’s ideas regarding the future of myth-and-ritual theory. This chapter fulfils its role as an historiographical overview, providing the reader with a good understanding of the development of studies on myth and ritual since the late 19^th century. Next is Michael Konaris, who takes Versnel’s essay Transition and Reversal in Myth and Ritual as a starting point for his discussion. He uses four case-studies, also discussed by Versnel, to delve into the relationship between myth and ritual : Kronos and Kronia ; Saturnus and Saturnalia ; Bona Dea and Thesmophoria ; and Apollo and Mars. The overview of each case study is relatively brief but serves to highlight Versnel’s main ideas regarding myth and ritual, with the addition of some of Konaris’ own comments. The main takeaways are an endorsement of Versnel’s rejection of monolithic approaches to religion, and the conclusion that comparative studies between Greek and Roman myths and rituals can be beneficial.

4Part 3 is “Magic, Prayers for Justice, and Emotion”. It starts with a chapter by Christopher Faraone on prayers for justice and curses. The chapter explores the relationship between categories and outliers in the study of religion and magic. Faraone maintains that Versnel’s category of “prayers for justice” cannot be dismissed on the grounds that there are outliers in the source materials. In a similar manner, he also suggests that the existence of female practitioners of erotic curses cannot be used as evidence against the dominance of male practitioners. Most variations can be attributed to authors adapting their texts to fit specific audiences. Furthermore, he argues that the agonistic context of defixiones cannot be dismissed. Faraone concludes his chapter by providing suggestions for the future of scholarship on curses. This is primarily a summary of newly discovered curses and tools that could offer insights into local variations in cursing practices. The following chapter by David Frankfurter provides a good overview of ancient magic in relation to religion and ritual. The conclusion is that magic is not a universal “generalization for whatever seems weird [….]” (p. 194). Rather, it is a heuristic term that can highlight the importance of “material aspects of ritual, local applications of official ritual, and shifting evaluations of traditional religious figures or rites” (p. 194). The section concludes with Angelos Chaniotis’ chapter on emotional processes in ancient religion. Chaniotis builds upon the foundations laid by Versnel, although Versnel did not use the term ‘emotions’ specifically. Chaniotis takes a dedicatory inscription that mentions the epiphanic experiences of a group of soldiers who witnessed Herakles standing beside them in their battles central. He suggests that staged or group epiphanies served as models for individual epiphanic experiences. The chapter creates a coherent narrative of the emotional background of the dedication—the emotional language the dedicants chose to communicate. It also shows the role of “memories of narratives of miracles; memories of Herakles’ divine iconography; memories of rituals” (p. 217) in shaping this dedication to Herakles. The personal experience was subsequently transformed into a collective experience through making the dedication public, creating a model for other worshippers’ experiences and future epiphanies.

5Part 4, “Saving Death”, has only one chapter by Christina Eschner. She discusses the motif of Jesus’ sacrifice and its ‘pagan’ antecedents, as highlighted by Versnel in his article “Jezus Soter – Neos Alkestis?”. The chapter focusses on the Gospel of Paul in relation to a wider context of non-Christian ideas about how the death of one person can save others. The main arguments are summarised at the end. The idea of sacrificing oneself to save others was prevalent in the first century AD in both pagan and Jewish literature and is carefully adapted by Paul for specific situations. Furthermore, Eschner argues that the concept of a redemptive death transforms the death of Jesus on the cross, criticised by Jews and Gentiles, into a positive idea.

6The final section of the book focuses on Henotheism and includes a chapter by Nicole Belayche. The focus is on explaining henotheism as a consistent part of ancient polytheism. Belayche sees henotheism as part of a religious system of powers. In such a system, worshippers may attribute cosmic sovereignty to one god over others. Henotheism then serves as a structuring principle of a pluralistic divine world, and was already present in the pre-Hellenistic period. Versnel’s response to this chapter is much more extensive than his responses to others, taking up almost half of the epilogue (p. 315–349). He provides valuable insights into how their ideas on henotheism and religion more broadly differ, more so than I could do justice to here.

7Versnel’s focus on written sources has been pointed out by critics and is noted by the editors: “some of his research could have benefited from a wider range of source material […]” (p. 18). This is a relevant point, but could also be turned around: I am confident that Versnel’s insights into inconsistencies and his broader ideas about Greek religion are useful not only when it comes to textual sources but also important for the study of material culture of religion. The interplay between written sources and material culture subsequently creates a more holistic understanding of how religion and sacred spaces functioned. It is therefore unfortunate, though understandable, that no attempt to do so has found a place in this work celebrating Versnel’s impact on scholarship. Although Chaniotis, Belayche and Larson in particular include epigraphical sources in their discussions, most sources are literary—and all of them focus on the text. Frankfurter briefly addresses the material turn and its importance for our understanding of ancient religion and magic (p. 192– 193), but Versnel dismisses this without much explanation in his response (p. 315–316). A deeper engagement with the material aspect might have prompted Versnel to a more positive comment.

8The book fulfils its promise by covering Versnel’s various interests through contributions from a group of experts in their respective fields. The historiographical nature of the book means that the reader may not encounter many truly new insights, as most of the contributors explicitly build on their previous work. However, I believe that this book will provide a good starting point for many students and scholars of various aspects of ancient religions. More importantly, it celebrates the great diversity of Versnel’s scholarly contributions, and this is well deserved.