The German scholar Hermann Usener (1834–1905) made an important contribution to nineteenth-century scholarship in the fields of philology and comparative religion. In order to recreate a picture of the religions of the Greco-Roman world he drew on elements from the fields of ethnology, phenomenology and hermeneutics. This four-volume collection of essays and reviews was published posthumously in 1912–1914. Volume 3 (1914) reveals Usener's extensive knowledge of the Greco-Roman world. It contains essays on Greek literary history and on the development of philology as an independent discipline. Usener pinpoints the time when Plato wrote Phaedrus, discusses the development of Attic theatre and contributes to the history of astronomical symbols. The volume also includes several reviews.
