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Text and Context: Second Reader: Prof JUDITH. A. HENDRIKSMA 5540747 RMA Ancient, Medieval and Renaissance Studies Utrecht University 21-06-2019 Supervisor: Prof. Dr. J.H.Blok; Second Reader: Prof. Dr. I.J.F. de Jong Text and Context: The Narrative Audience of the Homeric Hymn to Demeter and the cult at Eleusis Cover Image: Close-up of the Ninnion Tablet, Nat. Arch. Museum Ath. 11036. ©Pim Möhring. Table of Contents Acknowledgements.....................................................................................................................................................................2 CHAPTER 1. INTRODUCTION: THE HOMERIC HYMN TO DEMETER AND ELEUSIS .....................................................................3 1.1 Introduction...........................................................................................................................................................................3 1.2 Homeric Hymns: genre, dating and context..........................................................................................................................6 CHAPTER 2. METHODOLOGICAL FRAMEWORK: NARRATOLOGY………………............................................................................15 CHAPTER 3. NARRATOLOGICAL ANALYSIS: ABDUCTION.........................................................................................................23 3.1: Abducting (1-46) ................................................................................................................................................................23 3.2: Searching (47-90) ...............................................................................................................................................................30 CHAPTER 4 NARRATOLOGICAL ANALYSIS: ELEUSIS .................................................................................................................38 4.1 Withdrawing (91-183) .........................................................................................................................................................38 4.2 Nursing (183-255) ...............................................................................................................................................................45 4.3 Atoning (256-304) ...............................................................................................................................................................59 CHAPTER 5. NARRATOLOGICAL ANALYSIS: WITHDRAWAL......................................................................................................67 5.1 Withholding (305-389) ........................................................................................................................................................67 5.2 Reuniting (390-469).............................................................................................................................................................79 5.3 Revealing (470-495) ............................................................................................................................................................90 CHAPTER 6. CONCLUSION: THE NARRATIVE AUDIENCE OF THE HOMERIC HYMN TO DEMETER...........................................98 WORKS CITED..........................................................................................................................................................................102 2 Acknowledgements I would very much like to joke that this thesis was mystically revealed to me in a dream, or was the result of a divine epiphany, but it is actually the result of long months of intense research, and an even longer fascination with the cult of Demeter at Eleusis and its earliest textual source, the Homeric Hymn to Demeter. I would like to take up some precious space to thank all of those who have encouraged, inspired, and shaped that fascination into what can be found in this thesis. First and foremost, I would like to thank professor J. H. Blok, for supervising my work in the last months before her retirement, and for her excellent classes in the two years before that. Secondly, I would like to thank professor I.J.F de Jong, who, although I am not one of her students, has indulged my interest in classical narratology and ancient texts since my bachelor’s thesis, and has initiated me into this topic more diligently than any second reader should have to. I would like to thank dr. Floris van den Eijnde, for drawing me back to ancient history with his passion and enthusiasm. My friends and fellow students, without whose support I would not have had the fun in studying or writing that I have had, in particular Manon van der Maas, Alma Kant, Iris van Nederpelt, Marlous Pelger, Pim Möhring, Renee van de Gein and Bram Benthem. Furthermore, my friends from comparative literature, in particular Kelly van der Meulen, who has endured long conversations about antiquity, and my friends from abroad, who have endured long conversations about literature, in particular Caelyn Duffee, Toryn Suddaby, Liz Halsey and Christian Thiessen. Finally, I would like to thank my family, my parents and sisters, who have supported me unconditionally throughout my studies. Lastly I thank my grandfather, who has been my biggest supporter ever since I started learning Greek and Latin so many years ago. 3 CHAPTER 1. INTRODUCTION: THE HOMERIC HYMN TO DEMETER AND ELEUSIS 1.1 Introduction. If any archaic text has been shared and appreciated by all ancient disciplines, it is the Homeric Hymn to Demeter. This text, the oldest text about the Eleusinian Mysteries (dating to the seventh or sixth century B.C.E), has been invaluable to religious historians and archaeologists for understanding the nature of the rites, while for philologists its narrative was significant for its connection to Homer and Hesiod.1 The hymn recounts the well-known myth of the rape of Persephone and Demeter's efforts to recover her, as well as an aetiology of Demeter's cult in Eleusis. Through these myths the hymn also touches upon important parts of Greek society and religion, such as the Greeks’ cosmology, the dynamics of the Olympian pantheon, mortality, death and the afterlife, and the Eleusinian cult. The text's content lends itself well to an interdisciplinary approach. Because this text is so valuable on such an interdisciplinary level within ancient studies, it has a long history of publications that have contributed to both its historical and literary interpretation, with mixed results. This has also shown how significant interdisciplinary analysis is for those sources from antiquity that are both literary sources as well as important historical sources for places, cults, and the origins of ideas or institutions. It has also shown how complicated approaching the hymn can be. The Homeric Hymn to Demeter is the earliest textual evidence of the Eleusinian mystery cult. Using it for historical research has proven to be difficult; while the origins of most cults are obscure, the hymn is exceptionally ambiguous and has no contemporary sources to be compared to. It is also no small complication that the text belongs to the hymnic genre, and is no historical account but a mythological story. Even within those narrative dimensions the ambiguity of the text is exceptional because of the cult’s secretive nature.2 The rituals of the Mysteries were kept secret, and anyone who was initiated into the Mysteries was strictly prohibited from speaking of them: its power lay in its hidden rites.3 A problem of this secrecy is that the rites are both talked about and specifically not talked about in most texts. At times, a glimpse of the religious procedures and the meaning of the cult is given, but they are never described in full because of that taboo. When the Mysteries do get talked about, the preliminary rituals and procession are described, and their impact is praised, but the nature of the holy secrets are never dispersed, or what meaning they hold. Most often sources emphasize the impression they leave, and their results (a wonderful afterlife for the initiated), but never what they are.4 On the other hand, the fame of the Eleusinian Mysteries from the fifth century B.C.E onwards 1 Foley 1994 : p. XIII 2 Clay 1989: p. 204-205 3 Mylonas 1961 : p. 224-225 4 Mylonas 1961: p. 228 4 poses a problem just as much. Because of their great renown, ancient authors tend to neglect crucial information as much as they actively conceal, because they assume their readers are familiar with the Mysteries. The Eleusinian Mysteries were widely known in the ancient world, their fame nearly on par with Panhellenic sanctuaries such as Olympia and Delphi, and they drew worshippers from all over the Greek world, even though they did not host any Panhellenic games. That everyone who could speak Greek and had never committed murder qualified for initiation, and was promised a blessed afterlife, ensured a wide attraction to the cult.5 Eleusis was a consistent cult center from the archaic period until late antiquity, even gaining special interest from Roman emperors, and was consistently a familiar concept in the ancient Mediterranean, despite the secrecy.6 The Homeric Hymn to Demeter, too, exhibits ambiguity because of this. Firstly, the text observes the secrecy by putting emphasis on the importance of the rites in explicit language yet presenting the actual rituals in ambiguity. Secondly, the hymn presumes certain things to be known and does not elaborate on them. the exact cultic practices the hymn reflects, and what exactly is ritualistic
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