Published online by Cambridge University Press: 11 June 2012
According to this account, the original name of the festival was Ἀθηναῖα, but this name had already been replaced by Παναθήναια in what we can regard only as having been still mythical times. Since Harpocration does not attempt to explain the nature or the purpose of the reforms which he ascribes to Erichthonius, the questions who really founded the Panathenaea and why do not arise on his account. All that need be said here is that the name Παναθήναια may mean one of two things: (a) a festival celebrated by ‘all-Athenians’ (cf. Πανιώνια) or (b) a festival in honour of Panathena (cf. Πάνδια). The most important point in Harpocration's statement, however, is the care with which he distinguishes between the two types of Panathenaic festival, that καθ' ἕκαστον ἐνιαυτόν and that διὰ πενταετηρίδος, ‘which they also called μεγάλα.’ The accuracy of his information on this point is demonstrated by official inscriptions, which speak of Παναθήναια τὰ μεγάλα (first in the Erythrae decree of 453–2—ATL ii. D10.3) and of Παναθήναια τὰ κατ' ἐνιαυτόν (IG ii–iii2. 334.31); the epithet μικρά describing the annual festival is found only in literature (Lysias 21.2, 4, referring to the celebrations of 409 and 403; Menander fr. 428 Körte). Even in official documents Παναθήναια can be used alone; but this usage is not so ambiguous as it appears, since, with the possible exception of IG i2. 302.58 (= Tod 75.61) of 415, which will have to be discussed later in this paper, I have not found a single case in which Παναθήναια alone necessarily, or even probably, refers to anything but the great Panathenaea.
2 This second possibility must be admitted, in view of H. Mühlestein's suggestion that Πάνζευς may have been a Pylian, divinity in Mycenaean, times (Minos iv, 1956, 78–89)Google Scholar; this interpretation is perhaps supported by the existence of Panathenaic festivals outside Athens, e.g. at Marathon, (Pind. Pyth. viii. 79Google Scholar and schol. ad loc.—Boeckh's scepticism is hardly justified).
3 The earliest occurrence of μεγάλα as an epithet of Παναθήναια is the private dedication by the Callias son of Didymias (No. 164 Raubitschek), which was presumably made soon after Callias's Olympic victory in 472 (Ol. 77—Paus. v.9.3.).
4 Though I cannot prove it, I am inclined to think that the Panathenaic amphora in the Cabinet des Mêdailles, No. 243 (No. 8 in the appendix to this paper), may show a part of this contest. IG ii–iii2. 2314.101 mentions a contest in which I take to be late officialese for
5 On Panathenaic amphorae in general, see Beazley, J. D., The Development of Attic Black-Figure (1951)Google Scholar, ch. viii.; AJA xlvii (1943), 441 ff. The smaler Panathenaics mentioned above should not be confused with the miniatures discussed by Beazley, in BSA xli (1940–1945 [publ. 1946]), 10–21.Google Scholar
6 Beazley's, suggestion (Development 88)Google Scholar that the Burgon amphora may be earlier than 566, since it shows a horse-race, is a legitimate inference from Eusebius's silence; but if it is right ‘566’ loses any value which it has hitherto had as an absolute date to which the stylistic chronology of early sixth-century black-figure vase-painting can be related.
7 Jacoby, F., ‘The First Athenian Prose-Writer’ (Mnemos. 3 Ser. xiii (1947), 13–64Google Scholar (= Abh. zurgriech. Geschichtsschreibung, ed. H. Bloch, 1956, 100–43); he deals with F2 at pp. 30 (114) and 34 n. 51 (118). In the second passage the date of Hippocleides is given as 556–5; this was presumably a printer's error in the 1947 edition, but if so it is unfortunate that it has been perpetuated in the 1956 reprint.
8 τιθέναι is one of the regular words for ‘to hold (a festival)’, cf. such titles as but in what we may call the chronographical style it may be used in the sense ‘institute’. So too with ἄγειν, agere, ποιεῖν, in the passages already quoted from Harpocration, Jerome and the scholiast on Aristides.
9 Mr. Lewis has suggested to me that someone might seek to combine Plut. Sol. 1. 7 with Schol. Plat. Phaedr. 227 a in an attempt to show that Peisistratus instituted the Panathenaic torch-race; but the torch-race was not a part of the agon gymnicus, and the probability is that it was held annually, as an introduction to the παννυχίς (cf. Plat. Rep. i. 328a).
10 Even this is doubtful: the author of the Hipparchus (224b) says that Peisistratus was and Plut. Sol. 10. 3 shows that this must mean ‘of the deme Philaidae’, not ‘of the Philaid clan’ (Nilsson, M. P., Cults, Myths, Oracles, and Politics in Ancient Greece, 1951, 63)Google Scholar; Miltiades' branch of the Philaid clan belonged to the deme Laciadae (Plut. Cim. 4, Alcib. 22).
11 Raubitschek 310 comments: ‘For it would be equally possible to restore καί which would be more satisfactory from the metrical view-point.’ The shorter word would, it seems, upset the distribution of letters on the stone, and hence other parts of Raubitschek's restorations; but since Raubitschek does not seem to regard this as a serious objection, it might perhaps be better to write rather than καί and to fill the gap between and with suitably divided between lines 3 and 4.
12 Professor Hampe has suggested to me the possibility that all three inscriptions were carved and set up at the same time, after the third festival of the series. I am inclined to think that the more summary form of No. 328 is to be understood as showing that it dealt with a less important occasion than the other two. If so, it would strengthen the case for the festival in question being the Panathenaea; Nos. 326 and 327 would refer to the ‘great’ Panathenaea, and No. 328 to the ‘little’ festival.
13 For reasons to be explained below, I believe that the true interpretation of these words is: ‘None of these [i.e. the four celebrations with which the hieropoioi are concerned] occurs in the same year’; if so, must be an intrusion of a very common type, and we should perhaps read Most editors, however, take to mean ‘in the same place’.
14 I follow Deubner, , Attische Feste (1932), 212Google Scholar n. 6, in assuming that this penteteris was the great Panathenaea; the onus of proof seems to me to rest on those who wish to argue that it was not.
15 Consider the figures in IG ii–iii2. 334; the inscription deals explicitly with the arrangements for the annual Panathenaea, and speaks of ‘the forty minae’ when discussing the provision of beasts for the sacrifice; 500 dr. are allowed besides for the pannychis.
16 In 13.14 Plutarch applies the verb to Pheidias, whom he has already described in 13.6 as Pericles' ‘general overseer’
17 Pace Wilhelm Schmid, (Gesch. d. gr. Lit., ii, 1934 169 n. 7)Google Scholar, there is no necessary connexion between this anecdote and Suidas's preceding statement that Pratinas competed against Choerilus and Aeschylus in Ol.70 (500–496). It should be noted that Hesychius does not say to which theatre he refers; he might be speaking of the ‘Periclean’ (or even of the Lycurgean) one.
18 Edmonds, J. M., The Fragments of Attic Comedy, i (1957), 45Google Scholar n. f, argues once again for 442; he shows that Wilamowitz and Geissler relied too much on the mention of Euathlus (fr. 78: cf. Gomme, , Thuc., i, p. 374 n. 1)Google Scholar; but he fails of appreciate the weakness of the argument from ostracism; quite apart from the fact that some people were ostracised without our knowing when or why (e.g. Callias son of Didymias—[Andoc] in Alcib. 32; cf. n. 3 above), an ostracism could easily be held in any year without anyone being actually ostracised.
19 For what I regard as the true interpretation of τότε, see below, p. 41.
20 An up-to-date study of Plutarch's sources for the life of Pericles is much needed. Ziegler, (RE, s.v. Plutarchos 2, 914)Google Scholar assumes that Plutarch's quotations from comedy are at second hand; PorfessorGomme, (Commentary on Thucydides, i, 1945, 77 ff.)Google Scholar suggests that Plutarch got his quotations from his own reading. In 13.7–12 the only statements of fact which Plutarch cannot have derived from his own observation are those about the design of the Odeion; and his assertion about Pericles' φιλοτιμίμία may be his own interpretation of the facts. There was a commentary by Callistratus on Cratinus's Thracian Women (Ath. xi. 495a; Edmonds, op. cit., 20); it may be that Cratinus's reference to the slow progress of the middle wall (fr. 300) also belongs to this play.
21 B.M. B188 (No. 9) shows two stages in a similar contest: A, the contest proper; B, either a preliminary address or the adjudication. Greifenhagen, A., Arch. Anz. 1935, 444Google Scholar, describes B.M. B141 (No. 4) as ‘Rhapsode u. Flötenspieler’; it would be very convenient if he were right, but I do not know of any evidence that rhapsodes ever employed an aulos accompaniment.
22 Rhapsodic competitions are known only to the literary tradition; the rhapsode on the vase by the Cleophrades painter, so superbly illustrated by Wade-Gery, The Poet of the Iliad, fig. 3, is not shown as a competitor and his recitation does not come from the Iliad or Odyssey (it may not even be in hexameters, unless he is licentiously lengthening the first syllable of Τίρυνθι). The argument for the primacy of the rhapsodes seems to depend mainly on the order of words in Plato, , Laws, Vi, 764dGoogle Scholar: If there is anything in this, one should surely complete Plato's list by inserting after
23 The evidence for this date is to be published in by Mr. Woodward (information from Mr. D. M. Lewis).
24 But not as one of economy, except of ‘critical’ materials; Professor Hampe has demonstrated to me, in a calculation which I hope he will publish, that the cash value of the oil bestowed on the victors in the athletic and equestrian contests was at least comparable with that of the gold and silver awarded to the musicians.
25 It is possible that those who believe, with Seltman, (Greek Coins 2, 1955, 61)Google Scholar, that there is some connexion between the first Attic coins bearing Athena's head and the Panathenaea, may be right, in spite of the doubts of Schwabacher, W. (Gnomon, xxix, 1957, 101–reviewing Seltman)Google Scholar; it is conceivable that one of the purposes of the new issue was to provide an appropriate medium for the payment of cash prizes to the musical victors. But this cannot be used to prove the date at which this coinage was first issued; only when the date of the coinage has been settled by proper numismatic arguments can we think of using it to settle any problems about the history of the Panathenaea.
26 For a summary of the questions at issue, see Leisegang, H., RE s.v. Platon, 2367Google Scholar; the possibilities range from the young Plato (so Friedländer, P., Platon, ii, 1930, 117–27Google Scholar) to someone writing about 320 (Wilamowitz).
27 Until the publication of ABV such an inquiry was all but impossible; even now, it could only be carried out satisfactorily by a person who was qualified to distinguish the truly Homeric from the cyclic, and who had a fully equipped archaeological and philological reference library at his command.
28 That there was some disinclination for aulos music among Athenians in the second half of the fifth century is suggested by the legend of Marsyas and Athena which becomes current then (cf. Jesse in Roscher, s.v. Marsyas); but it does not seem to have been known to Pindar when he composed the twelfth Pythian, and there is no evidence that any such disinclination was felt by the organisers of the Panathenaea, either in the sixth century or from the middle of the fifth onwards. It is possible that there is some connexion between the disuse of the Odeion and the disgrace of Themistocles; but why that should affect the musical contests (if it did), we cannot tell.