Signification of the Incubation Dream in Ancient Authors: Morphosemantics, Exegesis and Psychoanalysis Through Some Epigraphic and Litterary Documents in Ancient Grece

Abstract

In all antique civilizations, the incubation (in “in”, cumbo “sleep”) was one of religious practices allowing men to communicate with the divine or the supernatural. For the Egyptians, it’s like a real nightmare, exclusively reserved to women, during which the woman, in dream, is sexually deceived by a demonic god. In ancient Greece, the incubation is completely different, it’s another relationship between the human and the divine, it’s an active and voluntary operation allowing the dreamer to receive an answer or a solution to his problems through divinities. So in this article, the study concernes this dream through epigraphical and litterary documents: the birth conditions of this dream, its report with the psychic life, the stimuli which happen during the sleep, and the affect on the health of the dreamer, are studied in all their aspects.