1. Although the word ‘Anastenaria’ is plural in Greek, I use it in the singular in English to refer to an entire ritual complex seen as an integrated whole.

2. The village of Ayia Eleni, which in 1976 had a population of approximately seven hundred, is composed of several distinct ethnic groups, the most important of which are the Kostilides and the indigenous Macedonians. Ayia Eleni is a fairly wealthy agricultural village which lies within the irrigation network of the Strymon River.

3. For a clear statement of the position of the Greek Ordiodox Church in regard to the Anastenaria see III (Athens, 1963), pp. 634-7.

4. The word konaki, which is derived from the Turkish konak meaning ‘mansion’ or ‘government house’, was used by Greeks living in areas under Turkish rule to refer to the building which housed the local administrative authorities.

5. The dance of the Anastenarides is a uniquely sacred version of the common ‘kerchief dance’ which in this context is danced individually. At the konaki and during the firewalk it is danced to a tune with a 2/4 rhythm known as ‘the tune of the dance’ while during the processions of the Anastenarides frorn one place to another it is danced to a tune with a 7/8 rhythm known as ‘the tune of the road’

6. The most useful accounts of the Anastenaria by Greek folklorists are the following: K. Romaios, XI (1944-5), 1-131; G. Megas, XIX (1961), 472-534; K. Kakouri, (Athens, 1963); and a series of articles by P. Papachristodoulou and others that appeared in between 1934 and 1961.

7. The word akrabas is derived from the Turkish akraba meaning ‘relatives’.

8. If a patient carries out the recommendations of the Anastenarides and yet fails to experience any improvement in his condition, he may invite the Anastenarides to his house again. They will either recommend a new course of action or tell him that he is not in fact ‘suffering from the saint’ and that he should consult a physician.

9. For the conceptual distinction which is usually made between trance (a psychobiological condition characterized by dissociation, loss of control, and hypersuggestibility) and possession (the cultural interpretation or explanation of such a state), see Wallace, A. F. C., ‘Cultural Determinants of Response to Hallucinatory Experience’, A.M.A. Archives of General Psychiatry, I (1959), 74-85 Google Scholar and Lewis, I. M., Ecstatic Religion: An Anthropological Study of Spirit Possession and Shamanism (Baltimore, 1971), pp. 37-65 CrossRefGoogle Scholar. Important studies of rituals involving trance and possession in various parts of the world include: Belo, J., Trance in Bali (New York, 1960)Google Scholar; Crapanzano, V., The Hamadsha: A Study in Moroccan Ethnopsychiatry (Berkeley, 1973)Google Scholar; Jeanmaire, H., Dionysos; histoire du culte de Bacchus (Paris, 1951)Google Scholar; Barre, W. La, They Shall Take Up Serpents: Psychology of the Southern Snake Handling Cult (New York, 1969)Google Scholar : and Metraux, A., Voodoo in Haiti (New York, 1959).Google Scholar

10. See the contributions in Case Studies in Spirit Possession, ed. V. Crapanzano and V. Garrison (New York, 1977). In the case of the Anastenaria, the following anxiety-provoking situations are often partially responsible for the psychogenic illnesses treated by the Anastenaria: the death of a parent or other close relative, the difficult relationship between stepchild and stepparent, and marriage, especially for a woman, who is separated from her family of origin and brought to live with her in-laws in the house of her husband.

11. Messing, S., ‘Group Therapy and Social Status in the Zar Cult of Ethiopia’, in Culture and Mental Health, ed. Opler, M. K. (New York, 1959), p. 326 Google Scholar; Kennedy, J. G., ‘Nubian Zar Ceremonies as Psychotherapy’, Human Organization, XXVI (1967), 101.Google Scholar

12. Crapanzano, The Hamadsha, p. 215.

13. W. and Mischel, F., ‘Psychological Aspects of Spirit Possession’, American Anthropologist, LX (1958), 256 Google Scholar; Frank, J., Persuasion and Healing (Baltimore, 1969), p. 63.Google ScholarPubMed

14. Mischel, op. cit., p. 254; Messing, op. cit., p. 320; and Koss, J., ‘Therapeutic Aspects of Puerto Rican Cult Practices’, Psychiatry, XXXVIII (1975), 160.CrossRefGoogle Scholar

15. Crapanzano, The Hamadsha, p. 219.

16. Wallace, A. F. C., Culture and Personality (New York, 1970), p. 236 Google Scholar; R. H. Prince, ‘Forward’, in Case Studies in Spirit Possession, ed. Crapanzano and Garrison, p. xiii.

17. S. and Freed, R., ‘Spirit Possession as Illness in a North Indian Village’, Ethnology, III (1964), 166.Google Scholar

18. Spirit Mediumship and Society in Africa, ed. J. Beattie and J. Middleton (London, 1969), p. xxviii.

19. Kennedy, ‘Nubian Zar Ceremonies as Psychotherapy’, p. 189.

20. Young, A., ‘Why Amhara Get Kureynya: Sickness and Possesssion in an Ethiopian Cult’, American Ethnologist, II (1975), 568.Google Scholar

21. Gill, M. and Brenman, M., Hypnosis and Related States: Psychoanalytic Studies in Regression (New York, 1966), p. 356.Google Scholar

22. Ibid., pp. 3 and 329.

23. Crapanzano, The Hamadsha, p. 5.

24. Lévi-Strauss, C., Structural Anthropology (New York, 1963), pp. 186-205.Google Scholar

25. Ibid., pp. 198-201.

26. Crapanzano, ‘Introduction’, in Case Studies in Spirit Possession, ed. Crapanzano and Garrison, p. 15.

27. Frequently the ritual fault itself involves the improper confinement or obstruction of an object sacred to St. Constantine. For example, an ayiasma may have been stopped up, or a piece of furniture may have been placed in front of an icon shelf. The correction of this ritual fault involves the release from confinement of the sacred object or the removal of that which is obstructing it. This process symbolizes the release of the supernatural power of St. Constantine and the cathartic release of becoming an Anastenaris which this power brings about.

28. R. and Blum, E., Health and Healing in Rural Greece (Stanford, 1965), p. 122.Google Scholar

29. The obvious similarity between the symptoms of people suffering from nevrika and those of people ‘suffering from the saint’ is recognized by the Kostilides. However, these two ‘illnesses’ are mutually exclusive according to the diagnostic categories of the Kostilides. If someone experiencing any of the above symptoms is cured after consulting a ‘neurologist-psychiatrist’, then it is clear that he was suffering from nevrika. If, however, he is cured after carrying out the recommendations of the Anastenarides, or if he actually becomes an Anastenaris, then it is clear that he was ‘suffering from the saint’. In fact, Kostilides say that a person who is ‘suffering from the saint’ is not ‘sick’ () and that he ‘has no illness’ since an ‘illness’, strictly speaking, is something that can be treated by a doctor.

30. The close association of images of confinement with feelings of anxiety and hence with the illnesses such feelings may cause is indicated by the fact that the word most frequently used by villagers to describe feelings of anxiety or worry is (from and which literally means ‘narrowness’ or ‘lack of space’.

31. Crapanzano, ‘Introduction’, in Case Studies in Spirit Possession, ed. Crapanzano and Garrison, p. 15.

32. For the texts of this and other songs sung during the ritual gatherings of the Anastenaria, see Megas, pp. 487-90.

33. The importance of drumming in rituals involving trance and possession is discussed in A. Neher, ‘A Physiological Explanation of Unusual Behaviour in Ceremonies Involving Drums’, Human Biology, XXXIV (1964), 151-60.

34. P. Kavakopoulos, XXI (1956), 283.

35. One elderly Anastenarissa, discussing dream symbolism, said that if one dreams that one is flying, it means that one is free of sin and anxiety.

36. In N. Kazantzakis, (Athens, 1954), pp. 102-3, Alexis Zorbas explicitly refers to dance as a way for a person (literally ‘to burst out’, and more generally ‘to clear one’s mind’). He says that he danced after the death of his young son, adding that if he had not danced at that moment he would have gone mad from grief.

37. Thus people who are not Anastenarides are referred to as ‘outside the dance’