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IV. Ritual

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  19 March 2021

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When Herodotus describes the religion of non-Greek people, he mainly concentrates on their ritual. Consequently, it seems a reasonable conclusion that he, and presumably also his fellow Greeks, understood the significance of religion largely in ritual terms. Although recent scholarship has paid much attention to belief (Chapter I), there can be little doubt that ritual constitutes the heart of ancient Greek religion. Accordingly, Burkert began his analysis of classical Greek religion with a chapter called ‘Ritual and Sanctuary’. However, as the content of the term is not self-evident, I will start this chapter with some introductory observations on the use of the term and on the possibilities for studying ancient ritual (§1). Subsequently I will analyse important ritual acts, such as prayer, procession, and, in particular, sacrifice (§2). I conclude with a discussion of various larger ritual complexes (§3).

Type
Research Article
Information
New Surveys in the Classics , Volume 46: Greek Religion (Second Edition) , 2016 , pp. 44 - 63
Copyright
Copyright © The Classical Association 2021

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References

1 Thus, persuasively Gould 2001: 359–77.

2 Burkert 1985: 54–118, but more problem-oriented in Burkert 1979: 35–58. Bruit Zaidman and Schmitt Pantel 1992 also begin with ritual, but Rudhardt 1992 with the vocabulary of the sacred, Jost 1992 with the gods, and Parker 2011 with the absence of authoritative sacred texts.

3 As observed by Calame 1991: 196–203.

4 See the fascinating study of Stausberg et al. 2006.

5 For a good introduction to modern theories, see Stephenson 2019.

6 Vernant 1990: 169–79 and 1991: 244–57; Jameson 2014: 112–26.

7 Laxander 2000; Burkert 2001–11: vi.241–58; Parker 2011: 171–223.

8 Mikalson 1982.

9 See Stausberg et al. 2006.

10 For the historiography of the term, see Boudewijnse 1995; Bremmer 1998: 14–24; Bremmer 2019c (earliest history of the term).

11 See the interesting reflections of Henrichs 2019: 93–102 on insider interpretations.

12 Delavaud-Roux 1994; Henrichs 1996a, 1996b; Ceccarelli 1998. For a good introduction and historiography, see Naerebout 1997.

13 Calame 1997 (≈ Calame 2019); Albertocchi 2015.

14 Kotsidu 1991; Shapiro 1992; Rotstein 2012.

15 On prayer, see Versnel 1981b; Mikalson 1989; Aubriot-Sévin 1992; van der Horst 1994: 252–77 (silent prayer); Pulleyn 1997; Chapot and Laurot 2001. On hymns, see Lehmann 1997; Furley and Bremer 2001; Furley 2007.

16 For paeans, see S. Schröder 1999 (to be read with d'Alessio 2000); Rutherford 2001. For dithyrambs, see Zimmermann 1992.

17 Graf 1996b; Kavoulaki 1999; Kubatzki 2018.

18 For Plataea, see Yates 2019: 76–80. On Molpoi, see Herda 2006. For Thrasybulus, see Strauss 1985.

19 IG I3 34.42, 46.15–16, 71.57 (cow, phallus, and panoply); Adespota fr. 240 Kassel/Austin; Ael. VH 6.1 (equipment); Miller 1992: 103–5; Neils 1992 (beautifully produced); Cole 1993.

20 Xen. Ag. 8.7 (quotation); Calame 1997: 175.

21 Most recently, see Parker 2011: 124–70; Pirenne-Delforge and Prescendi 2011; Faraone and Naiden 2012; Ekroth and Wallensten 2013; Naiden 2013; Ekroth 2014; Bielawski 2017; Hitch and Rutherford 2017; Lippolis, Vannicelli, and Parisi 2018; Bremmer 2019e: 303–35; Ekroth 2019; Graf 2020.

22 For a summary of their views, see Naiden 2015. For the reception of the Paris school in the Anglophone world, see Ekroth 2020.

23 Tsoukala 2009; Bundrick 2014; Carbon 2017; Parker 2018a.

24 Van Straten 1995; Gebauer 2002; Hermary et al. 2004; T. Smith 2016; Klöckner 2017.

25 Klöckner 2006.

26 See Ekroth 2009, 2017.

27 See now, with extensive bibliography, Bremmer 2019e: 303–35, upon which I draw in this section.

28 On sacrifices at the beginning of battles, see Jouan 1990–91 (also when crossing rivers); Parker 2000b; Jameson 2014: 98–126. On sacrifices at the conclusion of oaths, see Faraone 1993.

29 Hägg and Alroth 2005; Parker 2011: 80–4, 283–6.

30 Bremmer 2019e: 349–415; Henrichs 2019: 37–68.

31 Jameson 2014: 215–20; Bremmer 2019e: 307–8.

32 For Hestia, see Eupolis F 301; Graf 1985: 363; Detienne 1989: 89–98. For Demeter, see, most recently, Forstenpointner 2001; Jameson 2014: 213–14; Amory 2016. For Dionysos, see Peirce 1993: 255f. In general, see Hermary et al. 2004: 68–95 (well documented).

33 Most recently, see Georgoudi 2018.

34 On birds, see Villing 2017 (with previous bibliography, also on cockerels). On fish, see Anth. Graeca 10.9, 14, 16; Robert and Robert 1950: 82; Mylona 2008.

35 Jameson 2014: 213–15.

36 Meuli 1975: ii.907–1021 (an article first published in 1946).

37 For the continuity between hunt and sacrifice, see Bremmer 2018b: 236–43.

38 Parker 2005: 187–91.

39 For Burkert's views, see Burkert 1983, 1996, and the articles collected in vol. 5 of Burkert 2001–11. The expression ‘comedy of innocence’ (Unschuldskomödie) was coined by Meuli (1975: ii.1005).

40 Peirce 1993.

41 Georgoudi 2008; Parker 2011: 129–30.

42 Karystos (IG XII 9.207), Chalkidike (SEG 38.671), Delos (IG XI 2.203 A; SEG 35.882), and Tenos (IG XII 5.842).

43 For the month name, see Egetmeyer 2010: i.312–15.

44 Aristoxenus fr. 29 Wehrli; Ael. VH 5.14; Varro, Rust. 2.5.3; Columella 6 praef. 7; Schol. Od. 12.353. See also Aratus 131–2; Ov. Met. 15.120–42, 470.

45 For his somewhat inconclusive analysis, see Parker 2011: 129–30. See also McInerney 2014; Lebreton 2015; Humphreys 2018: ii.641–3.

46 Detienne and Vernant 1979; Vernant 1991: 290–302 (291–2 for Vernant's opposition to Meuli and Burkert). The theses of Detienne and Vernant have received new, sometimes critical, attention in Georgoudi, Koch Piettre, and Schmidt 2005; Mehl and Brulé 2008; and Ekroth 2018c.

47 Ekroth 2018b.

48 Bonnechere 1999; Georgoudi 2005.

49 For Pythagoras and the Pythagoreans, see the exhaustive bibliography of Macris 2018.

50 Meuli 1975: ii.948: ‘dass das Olympische Opfer nichts anderes sei als ein rituelles Schlachten’; Burkert 1983: 35–48; Vernant 1981: 26: ‘Sacrifier, c'est fondamentalement tuer pour manger.’

51 Versnel 1993: 48–60 (extensive bibliographies); Graf 1993c; Padilla 1999. Contested by Dodd and Faraone 2003, but see Ma 2008 (with some modifications of the model, stressing its civic nature in historical Greece) and Dowden 2011.

52 For Sparta, see Ducat 2006. For Athens, see Vidal-Naquet 1983: 151–75 and 1992.

53 Ephoros FGrH 70 F 149 (= Strabo 10.4.16–20: all quotes); Koehl 1997; Seelentag 2015.

54 Marinatos 1993: 201–20; Bremmer and Horsfall 1987: 38–43, 53–6 (Bremmer on Indo-Europeans).

55 Anthropologists such as Geertz (1983: 56–8) have stressed that these views are two, necessary, sides of the same coin; see also Ginzburg 2013.

56 See Chaniotis 2005; Seelentag 2015: 93–128.

57 For this early stage, see also Seelentag 2015: 446–53.

58 For this important metaphor in Greek initiation, see Calame 1997: 215–16; this volume, Chapter VI, §1.

59 Seelentag 2015: 453–8.

60 For the Oschophoria, see Pilz 2011b; Humphreys 2018: ii.671–3. In general, see Bremmer 1999c.

61 For the Ekdysia, see Waldner 2009; Bremmer 2019e: 436–9. ‘To undress’: IC I.ix (Dreros).1.A.99–100; I.xix (Malla).1.17–18, etc. ‘Nude ones’: IC I.ix (Dreros).l.D.140–1 (azôstoi). ‘Very nude ones’: IC I.ix (Dreros).1 A.I 11–12 (panazôstoi). Periblemaia: IC I.xix (Malla).19.1.

62 Bremmer 1991; Davidson 2007: 304–15; Link 2009. On ‘kidnap’, see Bremmer and Horsfall 1987: 105–11 (Bremmer). The analysis in Seelentag 2015: 464–85 insufficiently takes into account all the available Cretan evidence and the comparable customs in other Greek cities.

63 Brelich 1969: 204f.

64 For Ares and Aphrodite, see Delivorrias 1984: 123–5; Bruneau 1984: 482–3; Graf 1985: 264 (magistrates); this volume, Chapter II, §3. For Ares, see Wathelet 1992. For Aphrodite, see Pirenne-Delforge 1994; Pironti 2007.

65 See also Polinskaya 2013: 201–2, 313f.

66 For an enlightening comparison of Greek and Hittite festivals, see Rutherford 2020: 226–45.

67 See Parker 1999; see also my reviews in Bremmer 1985 (Burkert) and 1990 (Graf).

68 Burkert 1983: 213–43; Hamilton 1992: 149–71; Noel 1999; Humphreys 2004: 223–75; Parker 2005: 290–316; Valdés Guía 2015; Heinemann 2016: 467–87.

69 Gaifman 2018.

70 On contests at home, see Parker 2005: 293–4; Heinemann 2016: 468.

71 See Heinemann 2016: 468–70 (size of the jugs, unmixed wine, separateness).

72 For the trumpet, see Graf 1985: 245; Krentz 1991; Neils 2014.

73 Graf 1985: 28 (wreaths, libations); Henrichs 2019: 69–83 (wine).

74 For holocausts, see Parker 2011: 144–50; Ekroth 2018b.

75 For the literary evidence, see Harder on Call. fr. 178.2. For the iconographical representation of this solitary drinking, see Heinemann 2016: 470–4.

76 Sad or glad events were often remembered on ominous or felicitous days: see Grafton and Swerdlow 1988; Chaniotis 1991.

77 Buxton 1984: 4; Val. Max. 9.8 (Anacreon). For Acharnians, see N. Fisher 1993. For misanthropes, see Plut. Vit. Ant. 70.

78 Contra Parker 2005: 297–301. Cf. Schmidt 2005: 2016–6; Heinemann 2006, 2016: 439.

79 Regarding Carians/Keres the matter is contested: compare Bremmer 1983: 113–18 and Parker 2005: 297.

80 Contra Versnel 1993: 116–17 (cf. Bremmer and Horsfall 1987: 86–7), although his observations on festivals of reversal (115–21) are of interest. On scenes of revolution, see Graf 1985: 245–6; on early modern times, see Le Roy Ladurie 1979.

81 For Thorikos, see CGRN 32; Henrichs 1990: 262–3.

82 Hamilton 1992: 55–6, but see Kapparis 1999: 324f.

83 Burkert 1983: 235 mistakenly suggests that Aristotle speaks of a sexual act: cf. Parker 2005: 303–5. On Dionysos, see Heinemann 2016: 449–52.

84 For Greek traditions of the flood, which eventually derive from the Near East, see Bremmer 2008: 101–16.

85 Parker 2005: 295f.

86 For choruses, see Hamilton 1992: 38–42.

87 On the phallus, see PCG Adesp. 154. In general on Dionysos and the phallus, see Csapo 1997.

88 Harder on Call. fr. 178.3 (literary evidence); Heinemann 2016: 435–42 (iconography).

89 Call. fr. 178; Possis FGrH 480 F 1; Philodemus, De pietate, 806–8, 865–9 (Epicurus: to be added to the sources in Hamilton 1992); Plut. Vit. Ant. 70.3; Diog. Laert. 4.8.

90 On la grande festa, see Versnel 1993: 127–8. On Synoikia, see Graf 1985: 167; Hornblower 1991–2009: i.265; Parker 2005: 480–1. On the Skira, see Parker 2005: 173–7.

91 Parker 2005: 76.

92 See Avagianou 1991; Garthwaite 2010.

93 Thuc. 2.14.4, but see Hornblower 1991–2009: i.266–7. On month names, see Trümpy 1997; Burkert 2001–11: vi.208–30.

94 On performance, see Hall and Harrop 2010; Oschema 2015. For cognitive science, see Meineck, Short, and Devereaux 2019.