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Ancient Greek religion

Religious practices in ancient Greece encompassed a collection of beliefs, rituals, and mythology, in the form of both popular public religion and cult practices. The application of the modern concept of "religion" to ancient cultures has been questioned as anachronistic. The ancient Greeks did not have a word for 'religion' in the modern sense. Likewise, no Greek writer known to us classifies either the gods or the cult practices into separate 'religions'. Instead, for example, Herodotus speaks of the Hellenes as having "common shrines of the gods and sacrifices, and the same kinds of customs."

Most ancient Greeks recognized the twelve major Olympian gods and goddesses—Zeus, Hera, Poseidon, Demeter, Athena, Ares, Aphrodite, Apollo, Artemis, Hephaestus, Hermes, and either Hestia or Dionysus—although philosophies such as Stoicism and some forms of Platonism used language that seems to assume a single transcendent deity. The worship of these deities, and several others, was found across the Greek world, though they often have different epithets that distinguished aspects of the deity, and often reflect the absorption of other local deities into the pan-Hellenic scheme.

The religious practices of the Greeks extended beyond mainland Greece, to the islands and coasts of Ionia in Asia Minor, to Magna Graecia (Sicily and southern Italy), and to scattered Greek colonies in the Western Mediterranean, such as Massalia (Marseille). Early Italian religions such as the Etruscan religion were influenced by Greek religion and subsequently influenced much of the ancient Roman religion.

Beliefs
"There was no centralization of authority over Greek religious practices and beliefs; change was regulated only at the civic level. Thus, the phenomenon we are studying is not in fact an organized "religion". Instead we might think of the beliefs and practices of Greeks in relation to the gods as a group of closely related "religious dialects" that resembled each other far more than they did those of non-Greeks."

Theology
Ancient Greek theology was polytheistic, based on the assumption that there were many gods and goddesses, as well as a range of lesser supernatural beings of various types. There was a hierarchy of deities, with Zeus, the king of the gods, having a level of control over all the others, although he was not almighty. Some deities had dominion over certain aspects of nature. For instance, Zeus was the sky-god, sending thunder and lightning, Poseidon ruled over the sea and earthquakes, Hades projected his remarkable power throughout the realms of death and the Underworld, and Helios controlled the sun. Other deities ruled over abstract concepts; for instance Aphrodite controlled love. All significant deities were visualized as "human" in form, although often able to transform themselves into animals or natural phenomena.

While being immortal, the gods were certainly not all-good or even all-powerful. They had to obey fate, known to Greek mythology as the Moirai, which overrode any of their divine powers or wills. For instance, in mythology, it was Odysseus' fate to return home to Ithaca after the Trojan War, and the gods could only lengthen his journey and make it harder for him, not stop him.

The gods acted like humans and had human vices. They interacted with humans, sometimes even spawning children- called demigods- with them. At times certain gods would be opposed to others, and they would try to outdo each other. In the Iliad, Aphrodite, Ares and Apollo support the Trojan side in the Trojan War, while Hera, Athena and Poseidon support the Greeks (see theomachy).

Some gods were specifically associated with a certain city. Athena was associated with Athens, Apollo with Delphi and Delos, Zeus with Olympia and Aphrodite with Corinth. But other gods were also worshipped in these cities. Other deities were associated with nations outside of Greece; Poseidon was associated with Ethiopia and Troy, and Ares with Thrace.

Identity of names was not a guarantee of a similar cultus; the Greeks themselves were well aware that the Artemis worshipped at Sparta, the virgin huntress, was a very different deity from the Artemis who was a many-breasted fertility goddess at Ephesus. Though worship of the major deities spread from one locality to another, and though most larger cities had temples to several major gods, the identification of different gods with different places remained strong to the end.

Ancient sources for Greek religion tell a good deal about cult but very little about creed, in no small measure because the Greeks in general considered what one believed to be much less importance than what one did.

Afterlife
The Greeks believed in an underworld inhabited by the spirits of the dead. One of the most widespread areas of this underworld was ruled by Hades, a brother of Zeus, and was also known as Hades (originally called 'the place of Hades'). Other well-known realms are Tartarus, a place of torment for the damned, and Elysium, a place of pleasures for the virtuous. In the early Mycenaean religion all the dead went to Hades, but the rise of mystery cults in the Archaic age led to the development of places such as Tartarus and Elysium.

A few Greeks, like Achilles, Alcmene, Amphiaraus, Ganymede, Ino, Melicertes, Menelaus, Peleus, and a great number of those who fought in the Trojan and Theban wars, were considered to have been physically immortalized and brought to live forever in either Elysium, the Islands of the Blessed, heaven, the ocean, or beneath the ground. Such beliefs are found in the most ancient Greek sources, such as Homer and Hesiod. This belief remained strong even into the Christian era. For most people at the moment of death there was, however, no hope of anything but continued existence as a disembodied soul.

Some Greeks, such as the philosophers Pythagoras and Plato, also embraced the idea of reincarnation, though this was only accepted by a few. Epicurus taught that the soul was simply atoms which were dissolved at death, so one ceased to exist on dying.

Mythology

Greek religion had an extensive mythology. It consisted largely of stories of the gods and how they interacted with humans. Myths often revolved around heroes and their actions, such as Heracles and his twelve labors, Odysseus and his voyage home, Jason and the quest for the Golden Fleece and Theseus and the Minotaur.

Many species existed in Greek mythology. Chief among these were the gods and humans, though the Titans (who predated the Olympian gods) also frequently appeared in Greek myths. Lesser species included the half-man-half-horse centaurs, the nature-based nymphs (tree nymphs were dryads, sea nymphs were Nereids) and the half-man, half-goat satyrs. Some creatures in Greek mythology were monstrous, such as the one-eyed giant Cyclopes, the sea beast Scylla, whirlpool Charybdis, Gorgons, and the half-man, half-bull Minotaur.

There was no set Greek cosmogony, or creation myth. Different religious groups believed that the world had been created in different ways. One Greek creation myth was told in Hesiod's Theogony. It stated that at first there was only a primordial deity called Chaos, after which came various other primordial gods, such as Gaia, Tartarus and Eros, who then gave birth to more gods, the Titans, who then gave birth to the first Olympians.

The mythology largely survived and was expanded to form the later Roman mythology. The Greeks and Romans were literate societies, and much mythology, although initially shared orally, was written down in the forms of epic poetry (such as the Iliad, the Odyssey and the Argonautica) and plays (such as Euripides' The Bacchae and Aristophanes' The Frogs). The mythology became popular in Christian post-Renaissance Europe, where it was often used as a basis for the works of artists like Botticelli, Michelangelo and Rubens.

Morality
One of the most important moral concepts to the Greeks was aversion to hubris. Hubris constituted many things, from rape to desecration of a corpse, and was a crime in Athens. Although pride and vanity were not considered sins themselves, the Greeks emphasized moderation. Pride only became hubris when it went to extremes, like any other vice. The same was thought of eating and drinking. Anything done to excess was not considered proper. Ancient Greeks placed, for example, importance on athletics and intellect equally. In fact many of their competitions included both. Pride was not evil until it became all-consuming or hurtful to others.

Sacred texts
The Greeks had no religious texts they regarded as "revealed" scriptures of sacred origin, but very old texts including Homer's Iliad and Odyssey, and the Homeric hymns (regarded as later productions today), Hesiod's Theogony and Works and Days, and Pindar's Odes were regarded as authoritative and perhaps inspired; they usually begin with an invocation to the Muses for inspiration. Plato even wanted to exclude the myths from his ideal state described in the Republic because of their low moral tone.

While some traditions, such as Mystery cults, upheld certain texts as canonic within their praxis, such texts were respected but not necessarily accepted as canonic outside their circle. In this field, of particular importance are certain texts referring to Orphic cults: multiple copies, ranging from between 450 BCE and 250 CE, have been found in various parts of the Greek world. Even the words of the oracles never became a sacred text. Other texts were specially composed for religious events, and some have survived within the lyric tradition; although they had a cult function, they were bound to performance and never developed into a common, standard prayer form comparable to the Christian Pater Noster. An exception to this rule were the already named Orphic and Mystery rituals, which, in this, set themselves aside from the rest of the Greek religious system. Finally, some texts called ieri logi (ιεροί λόγοι) (sacred texts) by the ancient sources, originated from outside the Greek world, or were supposedly adopted in remote times, representing yet more different traditions within the Greek belief system.

Ceremonies
The lack of a unified priestly class meant that a unified, canonic form of the religious texts or practices never existed; just as there was no unified, common sacred text for the Greek belief system, there was no standardization of practices. Instead, religious practices were organized on local levels, with priests normally being magistrates for the city or village, or gaining authority from one of the many sanctuaries. Pausanias notes that the priest of the temple of Athena Alea at Tegea was a boy, who held office only until reaching the age of puberty. Some priestly functions, like the care for a particular local festival, could be given by tradition to a certain family. To a large extent, in the absence of "scriptural" sacred texts, religious practices derived their authority from tradition, and "every omission or deviation arouses deep anxiety and calls forth sanctions".

Greek ceremonies and rituals were mainly performed at altars, which were never inside temples, but often just outside, or standing by themselves somewhere. These were typically devoted to one or a few gods, and supported a statue of the particular deity. Votive deposits were left at the altar, such as food, drinks, as well as precious objects. Sometimes animal sacrifices were performed here, with most of the flesh taken for eating and the offal burnt as an offering to the gods. Libations, often of wine, would be offered to the gods as well, not only at shrines, but also in everyday life, such as during a symposium.

One rite of passage was the amphidromia, celebrated on the fifth or seventh day after the birth of a child. Childbirth was extremely significant to Athenians, especially if the baby was a boy. One ceremony was pharmakos, a ritual involving expelling a symbolic scapegoat such as a slave or an animal, from a city or village in a time of hardship. It was hoped that by casting out the ritual scapegoat, the hardship would go with it.

Sacrifice
Worship in Greece typically consisted of sacrificing domestic animals at the altar with hymn and prayer. The altar was outside any temple building, and might not be associated with a temple at all. The animal, which should be perfect of its kind, was decorated with garlands and the like, and led in procession to the altar; a girl with a basket on her head containing the concealed knife led the way. After various rituals, the animal was slaughtered over the altar. As it fell, all the women present "[cried] out in high, shrill tones". Its blood was collected and poured over the altar. It was butchered on the spot and various internal organs, bones and other inedible parts burnt as the deity's portion of the offering, while the meat was removed to be prepared for the participants to eat; the leading figures tasted it on the spot. The temple usually kept the skin to sell to tanners. That humans got more use from the sacrifice than the deity did not escape the Greeks, and was often the subject of humor in Greek comedy.

The animals used were, in order of preference, bulls or oxen, cows, sheep (the most common sacrifice), goats, pigs (with piglets being the cheapest mammal), and poultry (but rarely other birds or fish). Horses and asses are seen on some vases in the Geometric style (900–750 BCE), but are very rarely mentioned in literature; they were relatively late introductions to Greece, and it has been suggested that Greek preferences in this matter were established earlier. The Greeks liked to believe that the animal was glad to be sacrificed, and interpreted various behaviors as showing this. Divination by examining parts of the sacrificed animal was much less important than in Roman or Etruscan religion, or Near Eastern religions, but was practiced, especially of the liver, and as part of the cult of Apollo. Generally, the Greeks put more faith in observing the behavior of birds.

For a smaller and simpler offering, a grain of incense could be thrown on the sacred fire, and outside the cities farmers made simple sacrificial gifts of plant produce as the "first fruits" were harvested. The libation, a ritual pouring of fluid, was part of everyday life, and libations with a prayer were often made at home whenever wine was drunk, with just a part of the cup's contents, the rest being drunk. More formal ones might be made onto altars at temples, and other fluids such as olive oil and honey might be used. Although the grand form of sacrifice called the hecatomb (meaning 100 bulls) might in practice only involve a dozen or so, at large festivals the number of cattle sacrificed could run into the hundreds, and the numbers feasting on them well into the thousands.

The evidence of the existence of such practices is clear in some ancient Greek literature, especially Homer's epics. Throughout the poems, the use of the ritual is apparent at banquets where meat is served, in times of danger or before some important endeavor to gain the gods' favor. For example, in the Odyssey Eumaeus sacrifices a pig with prayer for his unrecognizable master Odysseus. But in the Iliad, which partly reflects very early Greek civilization, not every banquet of the princes begins with a sacrifice.

These sacrificial practices share much with recorded forms of sacrificial rituals known from later. Furthermore, throughout the poem, special banquets are held whenever gods indicated their presence by some sign or success in war. Before setting out for Troy, this type of animal sacrifice is offered. Odysseus offers Zeus a sacrificial ram in vain. The occasions of sacrifice in Homer's epic poems may shed some light onto the view of gods as members of society, rather than external entities, indicating social ties. Sacrificial rituals played a major role in forming the relationship between humans and the divine.

It has been suggested that the Chthonic deities, distinguished from Olympic deities by typically being offered the holocaust mode of sacrifice, where the offering is wholly burnt, may be remnants of the native Pre-Hellenic religion, and that many of the Olympian deities may come from the Proto-Greeks who overran the southern part of the Balkan Peninsula in the late third millennium BCE.

Festivals
Various religious festivals were held in ancient Greece. Many were specific only to a particular deity or city-state. For example, the festival of Lykaia was celebrated in Arcadia in Greece, which was dedicated to the pastoral god Pan. Like the other Panhellenic Games, the ancient Olympic Games were a religious festival, held at the sanctuary of Zeus at Olympia. Other festivals centered on Greek theatre, of which the Dionysia in Athens was the most important. More typical festivals featured a procession, large sacrifices and a feast to eat the offerings, and many included entertainments and customs such as visiting friends, wearing fancy dress and unusual behavior in the streets, sometimes risky for bystanders in various ways. Altogether the year in Athens included some 140 days that were religious festivals of some sort, though they varied greatly in importance.

Sanctuaries and temples

The main Greek temple building sat within a larger precinct or temenos, usually surrounded by a peribolos fence or wall; the whole is usually called a "sanctuary". The Acropolis of Athens is the most famous example, though this was apparently walled as a citadel before a temple was ever built there. The tenemos might include many subsidiary buildings, sacred groves or springs, animals dedicated to the deity, and sometimes people who had taken sanctuary from the law, which some temples offered, for example to runaway slaves.

The earliest Greek sanctuaries probably lacked temple buildings, though our knowledge of these is limited, and the subject is controversial. A typical early sanctuary seems to have consisted of a tenemos, often around a sacred grove, cave, rock (baetyl) or spring, and perhaps defined only by marker stones at intervals, with an altar for offerings. Many rural sanctuaries probably stayed in this style, but the more popular were gradually able to afford a building to house a cult image, especially in cities. This process was certainly under way by the 9th century, and probably started earlier.

The temple interiors did not serve as meeting places, since the sacrifices and rituals dedicated to the respective deity took place outside them, at altars within the wider precinct of the sanctuary, which might be large. As the centuries passed both the inside of popular temples and the area surrounding them accumulated statues and small shrines or other buildings as gifts, and military trophies, paintings and items in precious metals, effectively turning them into a type of museum.

Some sanctuaries offered oracles, people who were believed to receive divine inspiration in answering questions put by pilgrims. The most famous of these by far was the female priestess called the Pythia at the Temple of Apollo at Delphi, and that of Zeus at Dodona, but there were many others. Some dealt only with medical, agricultural or other specialized matters, and not all represented gods, like that of the hero Trophonius at Livadeia.

Cult images

The temple was the house of the deity it was dedicated to, who in some sense resided in the cult image in the cella or main room inside, normally facing the only door. The cult image normally took the form of a statue of the deity, typically roughly life-size, but in some cases many times life-size. In early days these were in wood, marble or terracotta, or in the specially prestigious form of a chryselephantine statue using ivory plaques for the visible parts of the body and gold for the clothes, around a wooden framework. The most famous Greek cult images were of this type, including the Statue of Zeus at Olympia, and Phidias's Athena Parthenos in the Parthenon in Athens, both colossal statues, now completely lost. Fragments of two chryselephantine statues from Delphi have been excavated. Bronze cult images were less frequent, at least until Hellenistic times. Early images seem often to have been dressed in real clothes, and at all periods images might wear real jewelry donated by devotees.

The acrolith was another composite form, this time a cost-saving one with a wooden body. A xoanon was a primitive and symbolic wooden image, perhaps comparable to the Hindu lingam; many of these were retained and revered for their antiquity, even when a new statue was the main cult image. Xoana had the advantage that they were easy to carry in processions at festivals. The Trojan Palladium, famous from the myths of the Epic Cycle and supposedly ending up in Rome, was one of these. The sacred boulder or baetyl is another very primitive type, found around the Mediterranean and Ancient Near East.

Many of the Greek statues well known from Roman marble copies were originally temple cult images, which in some cases, such as the Apollo Barberini, can be credibly identified. A very few actual originals survive, for example, the bronze Piraeus Athena (2.35 m high, including a helmet). The image stood on a base, from the 5th century often carved with reliefs.

It used to be thought that access to the cella of a Greek temple was limited to the priests, and it was entered only rarely by other visitors, except perhaps during important festivals or other special occasions. In recent decades this picture has changed, and scholars now stress the variety of local access rules. Pausanias was a gentlemanly traveller of the 2nd-century CE who declares that the special intention of his travels around Greece was to see cult images, and usually managed to do so.

It was typically necessary to make a sacrifice or gift, and some temples restricted access either to certain days of the year, or by class, race, gender (with either men or women forbidden), or even more tightly. Garlic-eaters were forbidden in one temple, in another women unless they were virgins; restrictions typically arose from local ideas of ritual purity or a perceived whim of the deity. In some places visitors were asked to show they spoke Greek; elsewhere Dorians were not allowed entry. Some temples could only be viewed from the threshold. Some temples are said never to be opened at all. But generally Greeks, including slaves, had a reasonable expectation of being allowed into the cella. Once inside the cella it was possible to pray to or before the cult image, and sometimes to touch it; Cicero saw a bronze image of Heracles with its foot largely worn away by the touch of devotees. Famous cult images such as the Statue of Zeus at Olympia functioned as significant visitor attractions.

Role of women
In addition to the role that women performed in sacrifices, the only public roles that Greek women could perform were priestesses; either hiereiai, meaning "sacred women", or amphipolis, a term for lesser attendants. As priestesses, they gained social recognition and access to more luxuries than other Greek women who worked or stayed in the home. They were mostly from local elite families; some roles required virgins, who typically only served for a year or so before marriage, while other roles went to married women. Women who voluntarily chose to become priestesses received an increase in social and legal status to the public, and after death, they received a public burial site. Greek priestesses had to be healthy and of a sound mind, the reasoning being that the ones serving the gods had to be as high-quality as their offerings. This was also true of male Greek priests.

It is contested whether there were gendered divisions when it came to serving a particular god or goddess, who was devoted to what god, gods and/or goddesses could have both priests and priestesses to serve them. Gender specifics did come into play when it came to who would perform certain acts of sacrifice or worship. Per the significance of the male or female role to a particular god or goddess, a priest would lead the priestess or the reverse. In some Greek cults priestesses served both gods and goddesses; Pythia, or female Oracle of Apollo at Delphi, and that at Didyma were priestesses, but both were overseen by male priests. The festival of Dionosyus was practiced by both and the god was served by women and female priestesses known as the Gerarai or the venerable ones.

There were segregated religious festivals in Ancient Greece; the Thesmophoria, Plerosia, Kalamaia, Adonia, and Skira were festivals that were only for women. The Thesmophoria festival and many others represented agricultural fertility, which was considered to be closely connected to women. It gave women a religious identity and purpose in Greek religion, in which the role of women in worshipping goddesses Demeter and her daughter Persephone reinforced traditional lifestyles. The festivals relating to agricultural fertility were valued by the polis because this is what they traditionally worked for; women-centered festivals that involved private matters were less important. In Athens the festivals honoring Demeter were included in the calendar and promoted by Athens. They constructed temples and shrines like the Thesmophorion, where women could perform their rites and worship.

Mystery religions
Those who were not satisfied by the public cult of the gods could turn to various mystery religions that operated as cults into which members had to be initiated in order to learn their secrets.

Here, they could find religious consolations that traditional religion could not provide: a chance at mystical awakening, a systematic religious doctrine, a map to the afterlife, a communal worship, and a band of spiritual fellowship.

Some of these mysteries, like the mysteries of Eleusis and Samothrace, were ancient and local. Others were spread from place to place, like the mysteries of Dionysus. During the Hellenistic period and the Roman Empire, exotic mystery religions became widespread, not only in Greece, but all across the empire. Some of these were new creations, such as Mithras, while others had been practiced for hundreds of years before, like the Egyptian mysteries of Osiris.

Origins
Mainstream Greek religion appears to have developed out of Proto-Indo-European religion and although very little is known about the earliest periods there are suggestive hints that some local elements go back even further than the Bronze Age or Helladic period to the farmers of Neolithic Greece. There was also clearly cultural evolution from the Late Helladic Mycenaean religion of the Mycenaean civilization. Both the literary settings of some important myths and many important sanctuaries relate to locations that were important Helladic centers that had become otherwise unimportant by Greek times.

The Mycenaeans perhaps treated Poseidon, to them a god of earthquakes as well as the sea, as their chief deity, and forms of his name along with several other Olympians are recognizable in records in Linear B, while Apollo and Aphrodite are absent. Only about half of the Mycenaean pantheon seems to survive the Greek Dark Ages. The archaeological evidence for continuity in religion is far clearer for Crete and Cyprus than the Greek mainland.

Greek religious concepts may also have absorbed the beliefs and practices of earlier, nearby cultures, such as Minoan religion, and other influences came from the Near East, especially via Cyprus and Phoenicia. Herodotus, writing in the 5th century BCE, traced many Greek religious practices to Egypt. Robert G. Boling argues that Greek and Ugaritic/Canaanite mythology share many parallel relationships and that historical trends in Canaanite religion can help date works such as Homer's Iliad and Odyssey.

The Great Goddess hypothesis, that a Stone Age religion dominated by a female Great Goddess was displaced by a male-dominated Indo-European hierarchy, has been proposed for Greece as for Minoan Crete and other regions, but has not been in favor with specialists for some decades, though the question remains too poorly evidenced for a clear conclusion; at the least the evidence from Minoan art shows more goddesses than gods. The Twelve Olympians, with Zeus as sky father, certainly have a strong Indo-European flavor; by the time of the epic works of Homer all are well-established, except for Dionysus, but several of the Homeric Hymns, probably composed slightly later, are dedicated to him.

Archaic and classical periods
Archaic and Classical Greece saw the development of flourishing cities and of stone-built temples to the gods, which were rather consistent in design across the Greek world. Religion was closely tied to civic life, and priests were mostly drawn from the local elite. Religious works led the development of Greek sculpture, though apparently not the now-vanished Greek painting. While much religious practice was, as well as personal, aimed at developing solidarity within the polis, a number of important sanctuaries developed a "Panhellenic" status, drawing visitors from all over the Greek world. These served as an essential component in the growth and self-consciousness of Greek nationalism. The mainstream religion of the Greeks did not go unchallenged within Greece. As Greek philosophy developed its ideas about ethics, the Olympians were found wanting. Several notable philosophers criticized belief in the gods. The earliest of these was Xenophanes, who chastised the gods' human vices and their anthropomorphic depiction. Plato wrote that there was one supreme god, whom he called the "Form of the Good", which he believed was the emanation of perfection in the universe. Plato's disciple Aristotle also disagreed that polytheistic deities existed, because he could not find enough empirical evidence for it. He believed in a Prime Mover, which had set creation going but was not connected to or interested in the universe.

Hellenistic period

In the Hellenistic period between the death of Alexander the Great in 323 BCE and the Roman conquest of Greece (146 BCE), Greek religion developed in various ways, including expanding over at least some of Alexander's conquests. The new dynasties of diadochi, kings and tyrants often spent lavishly on temples, often following Alexander in trying to insinuate themselves into religious cult; this was much easier for the Ptolemaic dynasty of Egypt, where the traditional ancient Egyptian religion had long had deified monarchs. The enormous raised Pergamon Altar (now in Berlin) and the Altar of Hieron in Sicily are examples of unprecedentedly large constructions of the period.

New cults of imported deities such as Isis from Egypt, Atargatis from Syria, and Cybele from Anatolia became increasingly important, as well as several philosophical movements such as Platonism, stoicism, and Epicureanism; both tended to detract from the traditional religion, although many Greeks were able to hold beliefs from more than one of these groups. Serapis was essentially a Hellenistic creation, if not devised then spread in Egypt for political reasons by Ptolemy I Soter as a hybrid of Greek and local styles of deity. Various philosophical movements, including the Orphics and Pythagoreans, began to question the ethics of animal sacrifice, and whether the gods really appreciated it; from the surviving texts Empedocles and Theophrastus (both vegetarians) were notable critics. Hellenistic astrology developed late in the period, as another distraction from the traditional practices. Although traditional myths, festivals and beliefs all continued, these trends probably reduced the grip on the imagination of the traditional pantheon, especially among the educated, but also in the general population.

Roman Empire
When the Roman Republic conquered Greece in 146 BCE, it took much of Greek religion (along with many other aspects of Greek culture such as literary and architectural styles) and incorporated it into its own. The Greek gods were equated with the ancient Roman deities; Zeus with Jupiter, Hera with Juno, Poseidon with Neptune, Aphrodite with Venus, Ares with Mars, Artemis with Diana, Athena with Minerva, Hermes with Mercury, Hephaestus with Vulcan, Hestia with Vesta, Demeter with Ceres, Hades with Pluto, Tyche with Fortuna, and Pan with Faunus. Some of the gods, such as Apollo and Bacchus, had earlier been adopted by the Romans. There were also many deities that existed in the Roman religion before its interaction with Greece that were not associated with a Greek deity, including Janus and Quirinus.

The Romans generally did not spend much on new temples in Greece other than those for their Imperial cult, which were placed in all important cities. Exceptions include Antoninus Pius (r. 138–161 CE), whose commissions include the Baalbec Temple of Bacchus, arguably the most impressive survival from the imperial period (though the Temple of Jupiter-Baal next to it was larger). It could be said the Greek world was by this time well furnished with sanctuaries. Roman governors and emperors often pilfered famous statues from sanctuaries, sometimes leaving contemporary reproductions in their place. Verres, governor of Sicily from 73 to 70 BCE, was an early example who, unusually, was prosecuted after his departure.

After the huge Roman conquests beyond Greece, new cults from Egypt and Asia became popular in Greece as well as the western empire.

Suppression and decline
The initial decline of Greco-Roman polytheism was due in part to its syncretic nature, assimilating beliefs and practices from a variety of foreign religious traditions as the Roman Empire expanded. Greco-Roman philosophical schools incorporated elements of Judaism and Early Christianity, and mystery religions like Christianity and Mithraism also became increasingly popular. Constantine I became the first Roman Emperor to convert to Christianity, and the Edict of Milan in 313 CE enacted official tolerance for Christianity within the Empire. Still, in Greece and elsewhere, there is evidence that pagan and Christian communities remained essentially segregated from each other, with little mutual cultural influence. Urban pagans continued to use the civic centers and temple complexes, while Christians set up their own, new places of worship in suburban areas. Contrary to some older scholarship, newly converted Christians did not simply continue worshiping in converted temples; rather, new Christian communities formed as older pagan communities declined and were eventually suppressed and disbanded.

The Roman Emperor Julian, a nephew of Constantine, initiated an effort to end the ascension of Christianity within the empire and reorganize a syncretic version of Greco-Roman polytheism that he termed "Hellenism". Later known as "The Apostate", Julian had been raised Christian but embraced his ancestors' paganism in early adulthood. Taking notice of how Christianity ultimately flourished under suppression, Julian pursued a policy of marginalization but not destruction towards the Church; tolerating and at times lending state support to other prominent faiths (particularly Judaism) when he believed doing so would be likely to weaken Christianity. Julian's Christian training influenced his decision to create a single organized version of the various old pagan traditions, with a centralized priesthood and a coherent body of doctrine, ritual, and liturgy based on Neoplatonism. On the other hand, Julian forbade Christian educators from utilizing many of the great works of philosophy and literature associated with Greco-Roman paganism. He believed Christianity had benefited significantly from not only access to but influence over classical education.

Julian's successors Jovian, Valentinian I, and Valens continued Julian's policy of religious toleration within the Empire, garnering them both praise from pagan writers. Official persecution of paganism in the Eastern Empire began under Theodosius I in 381 CE. Theodosius strictly enforced anti-pagan laws, had priesthoods disbanded, temples destroyed, and actively participated in Christian actions against pagan holy sites. He enacted laws that prohibited worship of pagan gods not only in public, but also within private homes. The last Olympic Games were held in 393 CE, and Theodosius likely suppressed any further attempts to hold the games. Western Empire Emperor Gratian, under the influence of his adviser Ambrose, ended the widespread, unofficial tolerance that had existed in the Western Roman Empire since the reign of Julian. In 382 CE, Gratian appropriated the income and property of the remaining orders of pagan priests, disbanded the Vestal Virgins, removed altars, and confiscated temples.

Despite official suppression by the Roman government, worship of the Greco-Roman gods persisted in some rural and remote regions into the early Middle Ages. A claimed temple to Apollo, with a community of worshipers and associated sacred grove, survived at Monte Cassino until 529 CE, when it was forcefully converted to a Christian chapel by Saint Benedict of Nursia, who destroyed the altar and cut down the grove. Other pagan communities, namely the Maniots, persisted in the Mani Peninsula of Greece until at least the 9th century.

Modern revivals

Greek religion and philosophy have experienced a number of revivals, firstly in the arts, humanities and spirituality of Renaissance Neoplatonism, which many believed had effects in the real world. During the period (14th–17th centuries) when ancient Greek literature and philosophy gained widespread appreciation in Europe, this new popularity did not extend to ancient Greek religion, especially the original theist forms, and most new examinations of Greek philosophy were written in a solidly Christian context.

Early revivalists, with varying degrees of commitment, were the Englishmen John Fransham (1730–1810), interested in Neoplatonism, and Thomas Taylor (1758–1835), who produced the first English translations of many Neoplatonic philosophical and religious texts.

More recently, a revival has begun with contemporary Hellenism, as it is often called. In Greece, the term is Hellenic National Religion (Ελληνική Εθνική Θρησκεία). Modern Hellenism reflects Neoplatonic and Platonic speculation (represented in Porphyry, Libanius, Proclus, and Julian), as well as classical cult practice. But it has far fewer followers than Greek Orthodox Christianity. According to estimates reported by the U.S. State Department in 2006, there were perhaps as many as 2,000 followers of the ancient Greek religion out of a total Greek population of 11 million, but Hellenism's leaders place that figure at 100,000.

title: Ancient Greek religion


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Far Beyond Driven

Far Beyond Driven is the seventh studio album by American heavy metal band Pantera, released on March 22, 1994, by Elektra Records and East West Records. Pantera's fastest-selling album, it peaked at number 1 on the Billboard 200 and was certified Platinum by the RIAA. The album was also certified Platinum by the Canadian Recording Industry Association. Far Beyond Driven is the first album by Pantera where the band's guitarist Darrell Abbott is credited as "Dimebag Darrell", having changed his nickname from "Diamond Darrell" soon after Vulgar Display of Power was released. The Japanese and the Driven Downunder Tour '94 Souvenir Collection editions contain a bonus thirteenth track, "The Badge", a Poison Idea cover. This cover was also featured on The Crow soundtrack.

Artwork
The original album cover shows a drill going into someone's anus, but the record label rejected it, worrying it would harm sales and would be rejected by stores like Walmart and Target. The band then changed it to a drill put in the frontal lobe of a human skull.

Background, music and lyrics
At the time of its release, Pantera's vocalist Phil Anselmo was injured with ruptured discs in his back and was suffering from chronic pain from degenerative disc disease. Anselmo began drinking heavily, abusing painkillers and muscle relaxants, and using heroin to alleviate the pain.

In an interview at Loyola University in March 2009, Anselmo said:

"'Well, I think it was about the time when the record [Far Beyond Driven] came in at #1. I was pretty terrified. I was happy as hell; don't get me wrong, man — I was like, 'Oh, my God, yes!' At that point, I had just gotten back from the doctor — from having my second MRI done — and I realized I had two blown-out disks. Now, in order for me to be this Superman that the media had built me up to be, I had to quell that pain. So I started off with regular painkillers and muscle relaxers. Eventually, you climb up the painkiller ladder, because painkillers lie to you; they will magnify that injury. And that's all that's on your mind — the injury and painkillers.'"

The song "I'm Broken" is about back pain that Phil Anselmo felt. Anselmo said "This is right when I started feeling the pain in my lower back, and it felt scary," says Anselmo. "I think this is one of the first times in my life, man, that I had this thing called 'vulnerability' kick in, and that was a very uncomfortable feeling." Anselmo adds, "I think that was really my first glimpse into kind of screaming to the world, 'Fucking... I am broken! Somebody fucking help me here!'"

Speaking about the song "5 Minutes Alone", drummer Vinnie Paul said:

"'The story behind this song is we were opening for Megadeth, and there was a guy that was flipping us off the whole show and so we stopped the show. And I was like, 'Listen, in case you haven't noticed there's 18,000 people who really dig what we're doing. You're the only one doing that stupid shit without even having to egg the crowd on.' Ten guys just jumped the guy and beat the shit out of him. His dad called the manager after all the lawsuits and this and that, and basically said, 'Give me five minutes with that Phil Anselmo guy. I want to whup his ass.''"

Anselmo spoke about what the song "5 Minutes Alone" is about saying:

"'There are always gold-diggers out there. The way I remember it was there was this kid that swore that I jumped off the stage and beat him up. Well, that was bullshit. That did not happen at all. When the father asked for five minutes alone with me, our manager responded aptly and perfectly: 'No, you don't.' [Laughs] 'I really doubt that,' and basically hung up on the guy. But once that story was conveyed to me, it actually made me angry because it wasn't fucking true. I basically plucked out those words from my agitator's mouth and yeah, man, 'five minutes alone,' fucking bring it.'"

In the liner notes of the album, all the songs' lyrics are printed apart from the cover of "Planet Caravan". The liner note reads:

"'This is a Black Sabbath song off of the Paranoid album. So don't freak out on us. We did the song because we wanted to. It has nothing to do with the integrity of our direction. It's a tripped out song. We think you'll dig it. If you don't, don't fucking listen to it. Thanks. On behalf of the rest of Pantera, Phil Anselmo '94.'"

The band tuned lower on the album than on previous efforts, with many songs going as low as C# standard. Several lyrical topics appear on Far Beyond Driven. The track "Good Friends and a Bottle of Pills" seems to be a reference to the song "Good Friends and a Bottle of Wine" on the Ted Nugent album Weekend Warriors. Phil Anselmo spoke about the track "Good Friends and a Bottle of Pills" saying:

"'The lyrical content was me probably giving a nod to my fascination at the time with Nick Cave's Birthday Party. Nick Cave was a genius. I will say the lyrics [on 'Good Friends'] tell a true story. I made a lot of mistakes as a youngster, and to reveal to this particular person who it was about, why it was about, what happened that particular night, would not be a very kosher. I can't do it. To this day, I won't do it. It would just be in bad taste. At this point, I don't think that person would want five minutes alone with me, unless we have a sip of white wine.'"

Pantera's bassist Rex Brown spoke about "Good Friends and a Bottle of Pills" saying:

"'It was just kind of fucking around – Vinnie had a drumbeat, Dime was just fucking around with that pedal, and I had the five-string bass. It was just this little groove that we had. We listened to it and at first, we went, 'What the fuck is that?' Then when Phil put the vocals on it, it just blew everybody's fucking minds. I don't know what the fuck he was thinking with the lyrics.'"

Phil Anselmo talked about the song "Strength Beyond Strength" saying "I was a rambunctious child," begins Anselmo. "None of it is regrettable, lyrically. You can look back at your lyrics and snicker. I'll always do, whether I'm embarrassed over it, or whether I'm embarrassed over it, or whether I'm embarrassed over it. You can tell growing spurts and pains and where you were in life, so I don't know. Strength fucking Beyond Strength is the old puffin' the chest up, 'look at us now,' we're as cute as [we're] fucking extreme."

Anselmo explained the meaning behind the song "Becoming" saying "The most popular heavy metal bands in the world at that time were, in my estimate and definitely all of our estimates, playing the game," Anselmo says. "They had reached this pinnacle; now they were kind of tapering off and writing more commercial stuff, whereas we realized our strong point, once again, was sticking to heavy metal and making it as heavy as our style would allow. Therefore, with 'Becoming,' it is what it says. We were becoming. Honestly, we had arrived."

Anselmo talks about the meaning behind the song "Shedding Skin" saying, "'Shedding Skin' was about me being in my 20s and any girlfriend, lady-friend of mine trying to tie me down at that age, at that particular time," begins Anselmo. "Basically, 'lay off, right now.' A relationship with me? A serious relationship with me at that age? Forget it, fuck off. Really, it's impossible."

Anselmo talked about the song "Slaughtered" saying "I've always had a distorted view of organized religion and I was never more confused than when I was in my 20s and whatnot," Anselmo says about 'Slaughtered.' "And still I like to use a fusion, if you will, of religions and fuck with them, so to speak. And then tear them down and piss all over them or build them up only to tip over."

Anselmo spoke about the song "Use My Third Arm" saying "A song like 'Use My Third Arm'... sometimes I just go off on just, tangents," Anselmo explains. "It's almost like a formulated temper tantrum over aimless things. Try and find the dead target on that song and I'll shake your hand, because I really don't know. It might take a psychologist or something. It's a temper tantrum, really, put to music."

Anselmo spoke about the song "Hard Lines, Sunken Cheeks" saying "I think it was a foreshadowing of the fear that I felt of not being the same. ... I know for a fact, I guess, that I dabbled in pain pills and stuff like that because I was miserable, and that's always a friggin' dead end, dead road, a terrible path to take. But at the time, I didn't have any other answers."

The song "25 Years", one of Pantera's most personal songs, is about Phil Anselmo's father. Anselmo said, "'25 Years' was written about my father. At the time [I] had a gigantic falling-out with him and I resented the fuck out of him and wrote a beautiful song about it." Anselmo continues, "It was a time capsule of how far he and I had not come, and I think a lot of fans could relate with the dysfunctional family vibe. I think I put in some pretty clever wording here and there, and it might be that wording that they had been searching for themselves for quite a while when it comes to anger."

Release and reception
At midnight on March 22, 1994, Pantera launched the release of Far Beyond Driven with an extensive record store campaign. They traveled to 12 cities in almost five days with MTV documenting their progress. Band members signed autographs, met fans, and promoted the album. The band released "I'm Broken" as the album's first single, which reached #19 on the UK Singles Chart, making it the band's highest-charting single worldwide. The LP also contained the first cover song on one of their major-label releases—Black Sabbath's "Planet Caravan" which served as the album's closing track and reached #21 on Billboard's Mainstream Rock Tracks and #26 on the UK Singles Chart. By March, the LP had sold over 185,000 copies and had reached #1 on the U.S. Billboard 200 album charts and Australian charts upon release. It remained on the Billboard 200 for 29 weeks.

The album received positive reviews. Rolling Stone gave the album four out of five stars. Rolling Stone would eventually rank Far Beyond Driven #39 on their list "The 100 Greatest Metal Albums of All Time". Spin wrote in April 1994 that the "quartet has successfully transformed itself into a cross between the older, faster Metallica and today's Rollins Band", adding that "at times, Phil Anselmo is every bit as charismatic as Henry Rollins." AllMusic reviewer Eduardo Rivadavia had a more negative take on the album, stating "Far Beyond Driven may have been Pantera's fastest selling album upon release, but it's hardly their best. In fact, although it shot straight to the number one spot on the Billboard sales chart in its first week (arguably the most extreme album ever to do so), this incredible feat doesn't so much reflect its own qualities as those of its predecessor, 1992's Vulgar Display of Power."

In November 2011, Far Beyond Driven was ranked number six on Guitar World magazine's top ten list of guitar albums of 1994. The album was also ranked at number twenty in Guitar World's "Superunknown: 50 Iconic Albums That Defined 1994" list.

Reissue
On March 24, 2014, a two-disc deluxe edition of Far Beyond Driven was released to celebrate its 20th anniversary. Disc one is a remastered version of the original album. Disc two is a live album featuring Pantera's set at the 1994 Monsters of Rock Festival.

Tour
Pantera toured South America, and were accepted into another "Monsters of Rock" billing. At that festival on June 4, 1994, the Abbott brothers got into a scuffle with journalists from the music magazine Kerrang! over unflattering cartoon depictions of drummer Vinnie Paul. Then in late June, Anselmo was charged with assault for hitting a security guard after he prevented fans from getting on stage, Anselmo was released on $5,000 bail the next day. The trial was delayed three times. In May 1995, he apologized in court and pleaded guilty to attempted assault and was sentenced to 100 hours of community service. Pantera continued their tour of the United Kingdom and eventually the United States in mid to late 1994, where the band was opened for by fellow heavy metal bands Sepultura and Prong. The tour of Far Beyond Driven also took Pantera to Australia and New Zealand for the first time in November–December 1994. The tour ended in March of 1995 with another run through the United States, this time with Type O Negative opening.

Personnel
Pantera
 * Phil Anselmo – vocals
 * Dimebag Darrell – guitars
 * Rex Brown – bass
 * Vinnie Paul – drums

Production
 * Terry Date – production, engineering, mixing
 * Pantera – co-production, arranging
 * Ted Jensen – mastering

license: Creative Commons - Attribution Share-Alike - https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/4.0/

title: Far Beyond Driven


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Shenlong

Shenlong, (, literally "god dragon" or "divine dragon", Japanese: 神竜 Shinryū) is the spirit dragon from Chinese mythology who is the dragon god of the tempest and also a master of rain. He is of equal significance to other creatures such as Tianlong, the celestial dragon, Zhulong, the dragon of eruption, Qinglong, the azure dragon, and Yinglong, the responsive dragon.

The spiritual dragon is azure-scaled and governs the storms, clouds, and rain, on which all agricultural life depends. Chinese, Japanese, Korean, and Vietnamese people would take great care to avoid offending him, for if he grew angry or felt neglected, the result was bad weather, drought, flood or thunderstorms.

Despite this, Shenlong appears to signify a special rank in the splendid robes and regalia of Chinese emperors. He was also five-clawed, which was iconic of the imperial dragon. Chinese empires have admired shenlong for centuries through festivals.

title: Shenlong


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Albert Gallatin

Abraham Alfonse Albert Gallatin (January 29, 1761 – August 12, 1849) was a Genevan–American politician, diplomat, ethnologist and linguist. Often described as "America's Swiss Founding Father", he was a leading figure in the early years of the United States, helping shape the new republic's financial system and foreign policy. Gallatin was a prominent member of the Democratic-Republican Party, represented Pennsylvania in both chambers of Congress, and held several influential roles across four presidencies, most notably as the longest serving U.S. Secretary of the Treasury. He is also known for his contributions to academia, namely as the founder of New York University and cofounder of the American Ethnological Society.

Gallatin was born in Geneva in present-day Switzerland and spoke French as a first language. Inspired by the ideals of the American Revolution, he immigrated to the United States in the 1780s, settling in western Pennsylvania. He served as a delegate to the 1789 Pennsylvania Constitutional Convention and won election to the Pennsylvania General Assembly. Gallatin was elected to the United States Senate in 1793, emerging as a leading Anti-Federalist and opponent of Alexander Hamilton's economic policies. However, he was soon removed from office on a party-line vote due to not meeting requisite citizenship requirements; returning to Pennsylvania, Gallatin helped calm many angry farmers during the Whiskey Rebellion.

Gallatin won election to the House of Representatives in 1795, where he helped establish the House Ways and Means Committee. He became the chief spokesman on financial matters for the Democratic-Republican Party and led opposition to the Federalist economic program. Gallatin helped Thomas Jefferson prevail in the contentious presidential election of 1800, and his reputation as a prudent financial manager led to his appointment as Treasury Secretary. Under Jefferson, Gallatin reduced government spending, instituted checks and balances for government expenditures, and financed the Louisiana Purchase. He retained his position through James Madison's administration until February 1814, maintaining much of Hamilton's financial system while presiding over a reduction in the national debt. Gallatin served on the American commission that agreed to the Treaty of Ghent, which ended the War of 1812. In the aftermath of the war, he helped found the Second Bank of the United States.

Declining another term at the Treasury, Gallatin served as Ambassador to France from 1816 to 1823, struggling with scant success to improve relations during the Bourbon Restoration. In the election of 1824, Gallatin was nominated for Vice President by the Democratic-Republican Congressional caucus, but never wanted the position and ultimately withdrew due to a lack of popular support. In 1826 and 1827, he served as the ambassador to Britain and negotiated several agreements, such as a ten-year extension of the joint occupation of Oregon Country. He thereafter retired from politics and dedicated the rest of his life to various civic, humanitarian, and academic causes. He became the first president of the New York branch of the National Bank from 1831 to 1839, and in 1842 joined John Russell Bartlett to establish the American Ethnological Society; his studies of Indigenous languages of North America have earned him the moniker "father of American ethnology." Gallatin remained active in public life as an outspoken opponent of slavery and fiscal irresponsibility and an advocate for free trade and individual liberty.

Early life

Gallatin was born on January 29, 1761, in Geneva, and was until 1785 a citizen of the Republic of Geneva. His parents were the wealthy Jean Gallatin and his wife Sophie Albertine Rollaz. Gallatin's family had great influence in the Republic of Geneva, and many family members held distinguished positions in the magistracy and the army. Jean Gallatin, a prosperous merchant, died in 1765, followed by Sophie in April 1770. Now orphaned, Gallatin was taken into the care of Mademoiselle Pictet, a family friend and distant relative of Gallatin's father. In January 1773, Gallatin was sent to study at the elite Academy of Geneva. While attending the academy, Gallatin read deeply the philosophy of Jean-Jacques Rousseau and Voltaire, along with the French Physiocrats; he became dissatisfied with the traditionalism of Geneva. A student of the Enlightenment, he believed in the nobility of human nature and that when freed from social restrictions, it would display admirable qualities and greater results in both the physical and the moral world. The democratic spirit of the United States attracted him and he decided to emigrate.

In April 1780, Gallatin secretly left Geneva with his classmate Henri Serre. Carrying letters of recommendation from eminent Americans (including Benjamin Franklin) that the Gallatin family procured, the young men left France in May, sailing on an American ship, "the Kattie". They reached Cape Ann on July 14 and arrived in Boston the next day, traveling the intervening thirty miles by horseback. Bored with monotonous Bostonian life, Gallatin and Serre set sail with a Swiss female companion to the settlement of Machias, located on the northeastern tip of the Maine frontier. At Machias, Gallatin operated a bartering venture, in which he dealt with a variety of goods and supplies. He enjoyed the simple life and the natural environment surrounding him. Gallatin and Serre returned to Boston in October 1781 after abandoning their bartering venture in Machias. Friends of Pictet, who had learned that Gallatin had traveled to the United States, convinced Harvard College to employ Gallatin as a French tutor.

Gallatin disliked living in New England, instead preferring to become a farmer in the Trans-Appalachian West, which at that point was the frontier of American settlement. He became the interpreter and business partner of a French land speculator, Jean Savary, and traveled throughout various parts of the United States in order to purchase undeveloped Western lands. In 1785, he became an American citizen after he swore allegiance to the state of Virginia, fulfilling the requirements of citizenship as established under Article IV of the Articles of Confederation. Gallatin inherited a significant sum of money the following year, and he used that money to purchase a 400-acre plot of land in Fayette County, Pennsylvania. He built a stone house named Friendship Hill on the new property. Gallatin co-founded a company designed to attract Swiss settlers to the United States, but the company proved unable to attract many settlers.

Marriage and family
In 1789, Gallatin married Sophie Allègre, the daughter of a Richmond boardinghouse owner, but Allègre died just five months into the marriage. He was in mourning for a number of years and seriously considered returning to Geneva. However, on November 1, 1793, he married Hannah Nicholson, daughter of the well-connected Commodore James Nicholson. They had two sons and four daughters: Catherine, Sophia Albertine, Hannah Maria, Frances, James, and Albert Rolaz Gallatin. Catherine died of whooping cough and the measles before she was eight months old, Sophia and Hannah also died as infants. Gallatin's marriage proved to be politically and economically advantageous, as the Nicholsons enjoyed connections in New York, Georgia, and Maryland. With most of his business ventures unsuccessful, Gallatin sold much of his land, excluding Friendship Hill, to Robert Morris; he and his wife would instead live in Philadelphia and other coastal cities for most of the rest of their lives.

Pennsylvania legislature and United States Senate
In 1788, Gallatin was elected as a delegate to a state convention to discuss possible revisions to the United States Constitution. In the next two years, he served as a delegate to a state constitutional convention and won election to the Pennsylvania House of Representatives. As a public official, he aligned with Anti-Federalists and spent much of his time in the state and national capital of Philadelphia. His service on the Ways and Means Committee earned him a strong reputation as an expert in finance and taxation.

Gallatin won election to the United States Senate in early 1793, and he took his seat in December of that year. He quickly emerged as a prominent opponent of Alexander Hamilton's economic program but was declared ineligible for a seat in the Senate in February 1794 because he had not been a citizen for the required nine years prior to election. The dispute itself had important ramifications. At the time, the Senate held closed sessions. However, with the American Revolution only a decade ended, the senators were leery of anything which might hint that they intended to establish an aristocracy, so they opened up their chamber for the first time for the debate over whether to unseat Gallatin. Soon after, open sessions became standard procedure for the Senate. Gallatin was one of two senators to vote against the Eleventh Amendment to the United States Constitution.

Whiskey Rebellion
Gallatin had strongly opposed the 1791 establishment of an excise tax on whiskey, as whiskey trade and production constituted an important part of the Western economy. In 1794, after Gallatin had been removed from the Senate and returned to Friendship Hill, the Whiskey Rebellion broke out among disgruntled farmers opposed to the federal collection of the whiskey tax. Gallatin did not join in the rebellion, but criticized the military response of the President George Washington's administration as an overreaction. Gallatin helped persuade many of the angered farmers to end the rebellion, urging them to accept that "if any one part of the Union are suffered to oppose by force the determination of the whole, there is an end to government itself and of course to the Union." The rebellion collapsed as the army moved near.

House of Representatives
In the aftermath of the Whiskey Rebellion, Gallatin won election to the United States House of Representatives, taking his seat in March 1795. Upon his return to Congress, Gallatin became the leading financial expert of the Democratic-Republican Party. In 1796, Gallatin published A Sketch on the Finances of the United States, which discussed the operations of the Treasury Department and strongly attacked the Federalist Party's financial program. Some historians and biographers believe that Gallatin founded the House Ways and Means Committee in order to check Hamilton's influence over financial issues, but historian Patrick Furlong argues that Hamilton's Federalist allies were actually responsible for founding the committee. After James Madison declined to seek re-election in 1796, Gallatin emerged as the Democratic-Republican leader in the House of Representatives. During the Quasi-War with France, Gallatin criticized military expenditures and opposed passage of the Alien and Sedition Acts. In the contingent election that decided the outcome of the 1800 presidential election, Gallatin helped Thomas Jefferson secure victory over his ostensible running mate, Aaron Burr.

Jefferson administration

Gallatin's mastery of public finance made him the obvious choice as Jefferson's Secretary of the Treasury; as Jefferson put it, Gallatin was "the only man in the United States who understands, through all the labyrinths Hamilton involved it, the precise state of the Treasury." Gallatin received a recess appointment in May 1801 and was confirmed by the Senate in January 1802. Along with Secretary of State Madison and Jefferson himself, Gallatin became one of the three key officials in the Jefferson administration. As Jefferson and Madison spent the majority of the summer months at their respective estates, Gallatin was frequently left to preside over the operations of the federal government. He also acted as a moderating force on Jefferson's speeches and policies, in one case convincing Jefferson to refrain from calling for the abolition of the General Welfare Clause.

In 1799, Gallatin made a speech advocating against normalizing relations with self-liberated slaves in the French colony of Saint-Domingue, arguing that if "they were left to govern themselves, they might become more troublesome to us, in our commerce to the West Indies, than the Algerines ever were in the Mediterranean; they might also become dangerous neighbors to the Southern States, and an asylum for renegades from those parts." In the speech, Gallatin also expressed opposition to miscegenation. Hofstra University professor Alan Singer argued based on this speech that Gallatin "was certainly not an abolitionist" and that "his claims to oppose slavery can also be read as racist attacks on the humanity of Africans, which was not uncommon among Whites during the antebellum era.

With Gallatin taking charge of fiscal policy, the new administration sought to lower taxation (though not import duties), spending, and the national debt; debt reduction in particular had long been a key goal of the party and Gallatin himself. When Gallatin took office in 1801, the national debt stood at $83 million. By 1812, the U.S. national debt had fallen to $45.2 million. One historian said of Gallatin:

"His own fears of personal dependency and his small-shopkeeper's sense of integrity, both reinforced by a strain of radical republican thought that originated in England a century earlier, convinced him that public debts were a nursery of multiple public evils—corruption, legislative impotence, executive tyranny, social inequality, financial speculation, and personal indolence. Not only was it necessary to extinguish the existing debt as rapidly as possible, he argued, but Congress would have to ensure against the accumulation of future debts by more diligently supervising government expenditures."

Shortly after taking office, Gallatin worked with House Ways and Means Committee Chairman John Randolph to reduce federal spending and reduce or abolish all internal taxes, including the tax on whiskey. He presided over dramatic reductions in military spending, particularly for the United States Navy. Despite his opposition to debt, Gallatin strongly supported and arranged the financing for the Louisiana Purchase, in which the U.S. bought French Louisiana. Both Jefferson and Gallatin regarded control of the port of New Orleans, which was ceded in the purchase, as the key to the development of the Western United States. Jefferson had doubts about the constitutionality of the purchase, but Gallatin helped convince the president that a constitutional amendment authorizing the purchase was impractical and unnecessary. Gallatin also championed and helped plan the Lewis and Clark Expedition to explore lands west of the Mississippi River.

Before and after the Louisiana Purchase, Gallatin presided over a major expansion of public land sales. With the goal of selling land directly to settlers rather than to land speculators, Gallatin increased the number of federal land offices from four to eighteen. In 1812, Congress established the United States General Land Office as part of the Department of the Treasury, charging the new office with overseeing public lands. To help develop western lands, Gallatin advocated for internal improvements such as roads and canals, especially those that would connect to territories west of the Appalachian Mountains. In 1805, despite his earlier constitutional reservations, Jefferson announced his support for federally financed infrastructure projects. Three years later, Gallatin put forward his Report on Roads and Canals, in which he advocated for a $20 million federal infrastructure program. Among his proposals were canals through Cape Cod, the Delmarva Peninsula, and the Great Dismal Swamp, a road stretching from Maine to Georgia, a series of canals connecting the Hudson River with the Great Lakes, and various other canals to connect seaports like Charleston with interior regions. Resistance from many congressional Democratic-Republicans regarding cost, as well as hostilities with Britain, prevented the passage of a major infrastructure bill, but Gallatin did win funding for the construction of the National Road. The National Road linked the town of Cumberland, on the Potomac River, with the town of Wheeling, which sat on the Ohio River. Many of Gallatin's other proposals were eventually carried out years later by state and local governments, as well as private citizens.

Throughout much of Jefferson's presidency, France and Britain engaged in the Napoleonic Wars. During Jefferson's second term, both the British and French stepped up efforts to prevent American trade with their respective enemy. Particularly offensive to many Americans was the British practice of impressment, in which the British forced captured American sailors to crew British ships. Jefferson sent James Monroe to Britain to negotiate a renewal and revision of the 1795 Jay Treaty, but Jefferson rejected the treaty that Monroe reached with the British. After the 1807 Chesapeake–Leopard affair, Jefferson proposed, over Gallatin's strong objections, what would become the Embargo Act of 1807. That act forbade all American ships from engaging in almost all foreign trade, and it remained in place until its repeal in the final days of Jefferson's presidency. Despite Gallatin's objection to the embargo, he was tasked with enforcing it against smugglers, who were able to evade the embargo in various ways. The embargo proved ineffective at accomplishing its intended purpose of punishing Britain and France, and it contributed to growing dissent in New England against the Jefferson administration. Overcoming Jefferson's declining popularity and the resentment at the embargo, Secretary of State Madison won the 1808 presidential election.

Madison administration
After taking office, Madison sought to appoint Gallatin as Secretary of State, which was generally seen as the most prestigious cabinet position. Opposition from the Senate convinced Madison to retain Gallatin as Secretary of the Treasury, and Robert Smith instead received the appointment as Secretary of State. Gallatin was deeply displeased by the appointment of Smith, and he was frequently criticized by Smith's brother, Senator Samuel Smith, as well as journalist William Duane of the influential Philadelphia Aurora. He considered resigning from government service, but Madison convinced him to stay on as a key cabinet official and adviser.

In 1810, Gallatin published Report on the Subject of Manufactures, in which he unsuccessfully urged Congress to create a $20 million federal loan program to support fledgling manufacturers. He was also unable to convince Congress to renew the charter of the First Bank of the United States (commonly known as the national bank). Although the national bank had been established as part of Hamilton's economic program, and Jefferson believed that it was "one of the most deadly hostility existing against the principles and form of our Constitution," Gallatin saw the national bank as a key part of the country's financial system. In a letter to Jefferson, Gallatin argued that the bank was indispensable because it served as a place of deposit for government funds, a source of credit, and a regulator of currency. In January 1811, the national bank was effectively abolished after the House and the Senate both defeated bills to recharter the national bank in extremely narrow votes. In response, Gallatin sent a letter to Madison, asking for permission to resign and criticizing the president for various actions, including his failure to take a strong stance on the national bank. Shortly afterwards, Madison replaced Secretary of State Smith with James Monroe, and Gallatin withdrew his resignation request.

Following the repeal of the Embargo Act of 1807, Gallatin was charged with enforcing the Non-Intercourse Act of 1809, which lifted parts of the trade embargo but still prevented American ships from engaging in trade with the British and French empires. In 1811, Congress replaced the Non-Intercourse Act of 1809 with a law known as Macon's Bill Number 2, which authorized the president to restore trade with either France or Britain if either promised to respect American neutrality. As with previous embargo policies pursued by the federal government under Jefferson and Madison, Macon's Bill Number 2 proved to be ineffective at halting the attacks on American shipping. In June 1812, Madison signed a declaration of war against Britain, beginning the War of 1812.

Madison ordered an invasion of Canada by relying on mostly state militias, but British forces defeated the invasion. The U.S. experienced some successes at sea, but was unable to break the British blockade. With the abolition of the national bank, the drop in import duties due to the war, and the inability or unwillingness of state banks to furnish credit, Gallatin struggled to fund the war. Reluctantly, he drafted and won passage of several new tax laws, as well as an increase in tariff rates. He also sold U.S. securities to investors, and an infusion of cash from wealthy investors Stephen Girard, John Jacob Astor, and David Parish proved critical to the financing of the war. During the War of 1812, the national debt grew dramatically, going from $45 million in early 1812 to $127 million in January 1816.

Diplomat

In 1813, President James Madison sent Gallatin to St. Petersburg, Russia to serve as a negotiator for a peace agreement to end the War of 1812. He was one of five American commissioners who would negotiate the treaty, serving alongside Henry Clay, James Bayard, Jonathan Russell, and John Quincy Adams. Efforts at starting negotiations in Russia quickly collapsed. While waiting abroad in the hope of future negotiations, Gallatin was replaced as Secretary of the Treasury by George W. Campbell, with the expectation that Gallatin would take up his old post upon his return to the United States. Negotiations with the British finally commenced in Ghent in mid-1814.

Negotiations at Ghent lasted for four months. The British could have chosen to shift resources to North America after the temporary defeat of Napoleon in April 1814, but, as Gallatin learned from Alexander Baring, many in Britain were tired of fighting. In December 1814, the two sides agreed to sign the Treaty of Ghent, which essentially represented a return to the status quo ante bellum. The treaty did not address the issue of impressment, but that issue became a moot point after the British and their allies defeated Napoleon for a final time at the June 1815 Battle of Waterloo. Gallatin's patience and skill in dealing with not only the British but also his fellow members of the American commission, including Clay and Adams, made the treaty "the special and peculiar triumph of Mr. Gallatin." John Quincy Adams, head of the American negotiating team, described Gallatin:"[H]e seldom yields to an ebullition of temper, and recovers from it immediately. He has a faculty, when discussion grows too warm, of turning off its edge by a joke, which I envy him more than all his other talents; and he has in his character one of the most extraordinary combinations of stubbornness and of flexibility that I ever met with in man. His greatest fault I think to be an ingenuity sometimes trenching upon ingenuousness." After the end of the war, Gallatin negotiated a commercial treaty providing for a resumption of trade between the United States and Britain. Though the war with Britain had at best been a stalemate, Gallatin was pleased that it resulted in the consolidation of U.S. control over western territories, as the British withdrew their support from dissident Native Americans who had sought to create an independent state in the Great Lakes region. He also noted that "the war has laid the foundation of permanent taxes and military establishments...under our former system we were becoming too selfish, too much attached exclusively to the acquisition of wealth...[and] too much confined in our political feelings to local and State objects."

When Gallatin returned from Europe in September 1815, he declined Madison's request to take up his old post as Secretary of the Treasury. He did, however, help convince Congress to charter the Second Bank of the United States as a replacement for the defunct First Bank of the United States. Gallatin considered going into business with his longtime friend, John Jacob Astor, but ultimately he accepted appointment as ambassador to France. He served in that position from 1816 to 1823. Though he did not approve of the prevailing ideology of the Bourbon Restoration, Gallatin and his family enjoyed living in Paris. While serving as ambassador to France, he helped negotiate the Rush–Bagot Treaty and the Treaty of 1818, two treaties with Britain that settled several issues left over from the War of 1812 and established joint Anglo-American control over Oregon Country.

Upon returning to the United States, Gallatin agreed to serve as William H. Crawford's running mate in the 1824 presidential election, but later withdrew from the race at Crawford's request. Crawford had originally hoped that Gallatin's presence on the ticket would help him win the support of Pennsylvania voters, but the emergence of General Andrew Jackson as a presidential contender caused Crawford to refocus his campaign on other states. Though Gallatin had never wanted the role, he was humiliated when he was forced to withdraw from the race. He was alarmed at the possibility Jackson might win, as he saw Jackson as "an honest man and the idol of the worshippers of military glory, but from incapacity, military habits, and habitual disregard of laws and constitutional provisions, altogether unfit for the office." Ultimately, John Quincy Adams won the 1824 presidential election in a contingent election held in the House of Representatives. Gallatin and his wife returned to Friendship Hill after the presidential election, living there until 1826. That year, Gallatin accepted appointment as ambassador to Britain. After negotiating an extension of the Anglo-American control of Oregon Country, Gallatin returned to the United States in November 1827.

Later life

Gallatin moved to New York City in 1828 and became president of the National Bank of New York the following year. He attempted to persuade President Jackson to recharter the Second Bank of the United States, but Jackson vetoed a recharter bill and the Second Bank lost its federal charter in 1836. In 1831, Gallatin helped found New York University, and in 1843 he was elected president of the New York Historical Society. In the mid-1840s, he opposed President James K. Polk's expansionist policies and wrote a widely-read pamphlet, Peace with Mexico, that called for an end to the Mexican–American War.

Gallatin was deeply interested in Native Americans, and he favored their assimilation into European-American culture as an alternative to forced relocation. He drew upon government contacts to research Native Americans, gathering information through Lewis Cass, explorer William Clark, and Thomas McKenney of the Bureau of Indian Affairs. Gallatin developed a personal relationship with Cherokee tribal leader John Ridge, who provided him with information on the vocabulary and the structure of the Cherokee language. Gallatin's research resulted in two published works: A Table of Indian Languages of the United States (1826) and Synopsis of the Indian Tribes of North America (1836). His research led him to conclude that the natives of North and South America were linguistically and culturally related and that their common ancestors had migrated from Asia in prehistoric times. Later research efforts included examination of the language of certain native societies in Mexico and Central America. In 1843, he co-founded the American Ethnological Society, serving as the society's first president. Due to his studies of the languages of the Native Americans, he has been called "the father of American ethnology."

The health of both Gallatin and his wife declined in the late 1840s, and Hannah died in May 1849. On Sunday, August 12, Gallatin died in Astoria, now in the Borough of Queens, New York at age 88. He is interred at Trinity Churchyard in New York City. Prior to his death, Gallatin had been the last surviving member of the Jefferson cabinet and the last surviving senator from the 18th century.

Legacy
Gallatin is commemorated in the naming of a number of counties, roads, and streets, as well as through his association with New York University. The Gallatin River, named by the Lewis and Clark expedition, is one of three rivers (along with the Jefferson River and the Madison River) that converge near Three Forks, Montana to form the Missouri River. The town of Three Forks is in Gallatin County, Montana, and Montana also hosts Gallatin National Forest and Gallatin Range. Gallatin, Tennessee, the seat of Sumner County and Gallatin County, Kentucky are also named for Gallatin. Gallatin's home of Friendship Hill is maintained by the National Park Service. A statue of Gallatin stands at the northern entrance of the Treasury Building; a statue of Hamilton stands at the building's southern entrance. The Albert Gallatin Area School District, located in southwestern Fayette County, Pennsylvania, and having contained within Gallatin's home, Friendship Hill, is also named after Gallatin. Businessman Albert Gallatin Edwards (who founded his eponymous brokerage firm in 1887 which folded into Wachovia in 2007) was named after Gallatin.

Gallatin's name is associated with NYU's Gallatin School of Individualized Study.

New York University's internal course enrollment website for matriculating students is named "NYU Albert", after Gallatin.

In 1791, Gallatin was elected to the American Philosophical Society.

Gallatin is featured on three U.S. stamps, including one issued in 1967 with the unusual denomination of 1¼¢.

Self-evaluation
Gallatin said "far too much credit has been given me for abilities at the expense of the purity of my motives."

title: Albert Gallatin


text:
Kerbdog (album)

Kerbdog (also sometimes known as 'Totally Switched' for the US release) is Kerbdog's eponymous debut album. The album was recorded in 1993 at Rockfield Studios in Wales and released on 28 March 1994 through Vertigo. Though the band had various indie influences, with bands like Sonic Youth, Fugazi and Big Black, the album ended up having a Metallica influenced proto-grunge sound. The band said that this was simply the result of getting professional equipment, and turning everything up as loud as they could. What also might account for this is the fact that grunge pioneer Jack Endino recorded the album. "If I remember right the whole thing took five weeks. No problems except that Cormac was still writing lyrics right up to the next-to-last day of mixing. Dummy Crusher was literally the last thing finished, we cut the vocal and then I mixed it next day. We had about run out of time at that point. [I] liked almost all of it. Thought the intro to EOG should have been half as long, but band disagreed; and in retrospect I would have turned up the vocals on EOG just a teeny bit, though no one ever complained. Didn't like Xenophobia much but that didn't make the album. Thought Clock should have been a single."

Jack Endino

The album was fairly well received in Britain, Ireland, and Europe, reaching number 97 in the UK Albums Chart. It also got a lot of radio play on US college radio, but the album didn't do as well as expected.

The album was originally released on LP, CD and cassette. It was re-released on CD in September 2012 on East World Records UK.

"Kerbdog" was finally re-released on green vinyl in November 2020 on Hassle Records. There was also a clear vinyl edition, limited to 300 hand-numbered copies.

Track listing
All songs written by Kerbdog.
 * 1) "End of Green" – 3:53
 * 2) "Dry Riser" – 3:59
 * 3) "Dead Anyway" – 3:58
 * 4) "Cleaver" – 3:24
 * 5) "Earthworks" – 4:11
 * 6) "Dummy Crusher" – 3:19
 * 7) "The Inseminator" – 3:28
 * 8) "Clock" – 4:10
 * 9) "Schism" – 3:55
 * 10) "Scram" – 3:17

"Xenophobia" and "Self-Inflicted" from the album sessions were later used as b-sides for the Dry Riser single.

Personnel

 * Cormac Battle - Guitar, Vocals
 * Darragh Butler - Drums
 * Billy Dalton - Guitar
 * Colin Fennelly - Bass
 * Jack Endino - Producer, Engineer, Mixing
 * Phil Ault - Assistant Producer, Assistant Engineer, Mixing Assistant
 * Simon Fowler - Photography
 * Freddie Sodima - Art Direction
 * Patrick Siemer - Design, Photography

UK Singles

 * Earthworks (demo version) (1993)
 * End Of Green (1993)
 * Dry Riser (1994) #60
 * Dummy Crusher (1994) #37

title: Kerbdog (album)


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Savage Love

Savage Love is a syndicated sex-advice column by Dan Savage. The column appears weekly in several dozen newspapers, mainly free newspapers in the US and Canada, but also newspapers in Europe and Asia. It started in 1991 with the first issue of the Seattle weekly newspaper The Stranger.

Since October 2006, Savage has also recorded the Savage Lovecast, a weekly podcast version of the column, featuring telephone advice sessions. Podcasts are released every Tuesday.

History
In 1991, Savage was living in Madison, Wisconsin, and working as a manager at a local video store that specialized in independent film titles. There, he befriended Tim Keck, co-founder of The Onion, who announced that he was moving to Seattle to help start an alternative weekly newspaper titled The Stranger. Savage "made the offhand comment that forever altered [his] life: 'Make sure your paper has an advice column – everybody claims to hate 'em, but everybody seems to read 'em'." He typed up a sample column, and to his surprise Keck offered him the job.

Until 1999, the format of the conversation began with an advice seeker saying, "Hey faggot", then asking their question. Savage's intent was reappropriation of the word into a positive description for gay guys. Using this word worked when the readers were LGBT, but as the column grew popular, Savage changed to a generic greeting to better match the expectations of the general public.

Since 2002, he has written the column at Eppie Lederer's desk, which he, a "lifelong fan" of her Ann Landers column, bought at auction after the noted advice columnist died.

Savage stated in a February 2006 interview in The Onion's A.V. Club (which publishes his column) that he began the column with the express purpose of providing mocking advice to heterosexuals, since most straight advice columnists were "clueless" when responding to letters from gay people.

Language
During the run of Savage Love, Savage has popularized several neologisms and initialisms. He has also debunked several sexual neologisms for sex acts, including the "donkey punch", the "Dirty Sanchez", the "pirate", and the "hot Karl", concluding "they're all fictions." He has objected to use of the term "pussy" as an insult, saying that vaginas were wonderful, "popping out babies", and proposed "scrotum" (pl. "scrota") as an insult.

Savage has also tried to reclaim many offensive words. For the first six years of the column, he had his readers address him with "Hey, faggot", as a comment on previous efforts to reclaim offensive words. He was criticized for this by some gay activists. After receiving criticism for use of the word "retarded"—considered by many to be an offensive slur against those with intellectual disabilities—Savage suggested "leotarded" as an alternative, because "leotard" rhymes with "retard".

Campsite rule
In any relationship, but particularly those with a large difference of age or experience between the partners, the older or more experienced partner has the responsibility to leave the younger or less experienced partner in at least as good a state (emotionally and physically) as before the relationship. The "campsite rule" includes things like leaving the younger or less experienced partner with no STDs, no unwanted pregnancies, and not overburdening them with emotional and sexual baggage.

Tea and sympathy rule
Shortly after a 2009 scandal in Portland, Oregon, involving openly gay mayor Sam Adams and Beau Breedlove, who had allegedly begun a sexual relationship with Adams almost immediately after turning 18, Savage created a companion rule to the "campsite rule", now known as the "tea and sympathy rule". The rule is a reference to a line in the play of the same name, in which a much older woman asks of a high-school-age boy, right before having sex with him: "Years from now, when you talk about this – and you will – be kind." Savage claimed in an article in The Portland Mercury that, while Adams followed the "campsite rule" – Breedlove did not claim that Adams had given him any diseases or caused him emotional trauma, and in fact still refers to Adams as a friend – Breedlove violated the "tea and sympathy" rule by making public statements that he knew could ruin Adams' career.

CPOS
"Cheating piece of shit", said of a cheater, but usually reserved for one who is chronic or abusive/passive-aggressive about it.

DTMFA and ITMFA
Savage often uses the expression "dump the mother-fucker already" (DTMFA), at the close of a response, recommending that the writer immediately end an abusive or worthless relationship.

A reader of Savage Love suggested the initialisation ITMFA, a take on DTMFA, meaning "Impeach the Motherfucker Already!" The initialisation was coined in reference to the presidency of George W. Bush in 2006, but was reintroduced in 2017 in reaction to the presidency of Donald Trump. Starting in 2018 Savage, through his website, sold clothing with ITMFA on it.

GGG
Savage coined "GGG", "good, giving, and game", and it means one should strive to be good in bed, giving "equal time and equal pleasure" to one's partner, and game "for anything – within reason". The term inspired the "How GGG Are You? Test" on dating site OkCupid, and the invention of a cocktail.

HTH
"How'd that happen?", a mock-incredulous reply to those who write in and say they had certain (often sexual) things "happen to" them, as if they had no part or say in the incident, when they clearly did.

Lifting luggage
Following the "rent boy" allegations regarding George Rekers, who has widely promoted aversion therapy, Dan Savage, along with others including Stephen Colbert, promoted the use of the idiom "to lift [some]one's luggage", meaning to supply sexual pleasure to, or derive it from, one's partner. This originated from Rekers who, when outed, insisted he had hired the escort only to assist him with lifting his luggage. Rekers also claimed he "spent a great deal of time sharing scientific information on the desirability of abandoning homosexual intercourse" and "shared the gospel of Jesus Christ with him in great detail".

Originally Savage suggested that "lifting my luggage" refer to listening to the speaker expound on the "desirability" of converting oneself from homosexual to heterosexual. Later, after several political humorists started employing "lifting your luggage" as an implicit or explicit reference to various sexual acts, Savage suggested that "whatever lifts your luggage" supplant "whatever floats your boat" in common parlance.

Monogamish
In a July 20, 2011 column, Savage coined the term "monogamish", applying it to his own relationship with his partner. The term describes couples who are "mostly" but not 100% monogamous; such couples have an understanding that allows for some amount of sexual activity outside the relationship. Savage believes that, of all the couples that people think are 100% monogamous, a lot of them are more "monogamish" than people realize. The term has since seen mainstream use.

Pegging
In 2001, Savage challenged readers of his column to coin a name for the sex act in which a woman uses a strap-on dildo to perform anal sex on her male partner. After multiple nominations and a reader vote, the verb "peg", popularized by the sex education movie Bend Over Boyfriend released in 1998, was chosen, with a 43% plurality over runners-up "bob" and "punt".

Saddlebacking
In 2009, after a controversy involving the Saddleback Church, the column defined "saddlebacking" as "the phenomenon of Christian teens engaging in unprotected anal sex in order to preserve their virginities". The term is a play on the word "barebacking", referring to sexual intercourse, especially anal sex between men, with no condom ("bare").

Santorum
Savage reacted strongly to statements made about homosexuality by former United States Senator Rick Santorum in an April 2003 interview with the Associated Press. Santorum included gay sex as a form of deviant sexual behavior, along with incest, polygamy, and bestiality, that he said threatens society and the family; he said that he believed consenting adults do not have a constitutional right to privacy with respect to sexual acts. Savage invited his readers to create a sex-related definition for "santorum" to "memorialize the Santorum scandal [...] by attaching his name to a sex act that would make his big, white teeth fall out of his big, empty head." The winning definition was "the frothy mixture of lube and fecal matter that is sometimes the byproduct of anal sex." Savage set up a website to spread the term, inviting bloggers and others to link to it, which caused it to rise to the top of a Google search for Santorum's name.

Tolyamorous
A tolyamorous person is someone in a monogamous relationship who knows that their partner occasionally has sex with somebody else, and is willing to put up with it and turn a blind eye. The word is similar to polyamory, and is a portmanteau of the Latin words "tolerare" (to tolerate, to bear) and "amor" (love).

Savage introduced this neologism on episode 900 of Savage Lovecast in January 2024.

title: Savage Love