DISSOLUTION AND NEW YEAR,S FESTIVAL
Greek myths and a large share of major Greek cults have become characteristicallydetached from the fisherman's everyday Pragma- tism and needs, playing out their socio-psychologicalfunction in a purely symbolic fashion. However, such culturally refined develop- ry. ANTHESTERIA ments are alwaysin danger of growing anemic' hlr We have seenthat the samestructure of sacrificialritual presents itself at different levels. The most detailed picture of the New Year's festival of the polis, with its dissolution in the unspeakablesacrifice and its restorationof order in the festivefeast and agon,was provided by Athens and Argos, but we were able to detecthints of it at Sikyon and Thebesas well; in the non-Greekrealm, there was the parallel of the Lemnian fire festival, where an artisan guild supplantedthe cus- L. Testimoniqand tomary Greekmilitary organization.The samestructures were given a new emphasis in the expanding cults of Dionysus, in the Agrionia Dissemination type on the one hand, where the period of exceptionbecame the set- ting for ecstasyand the sacrificialsparagmos outdoors, and in the type of the Dionysian advent on the other, where the god enteredthe The importance of the Anthesteria, celebratedin the spring in city from the sea.Fishing rituals and legendscame into play here too, honor of Dionysus, is immediately shown by the fact that it lent its especiallyin non-Greek areas.The sacrificeof the maiden and the name to a month, and not only at Athens; the name of the month plunge into the seaare answeredby the arrival of food from the sea. Anthesterionis attestedfor the entire Ionian region, for Eretriaon Eu- It is impossible to trace just how the rituals of hunters, fishermen, boea,for the island Tenos,from Miletus to Prieneon the coastof Asia nomadic animal-breeders,and city dwellers Brew apart, influenced Minor, Ephesus,Teos, from Erythrai to Smyrna,and in the Ionic colo- eachother, and overlapped.We may thereforewonder all the more at niesof Thasos,Kyzikos, and Massalia.'This agreementwas noted al- the structural unity that rendered that reciprocalexchange possible. readyby Thucydides,who drew the conclusion,still irrefutable, that The basic structure of sacrifice,with its preparations,bloody central this festival and the name of this month must antedateIonian colo- act, and restitution, grows into a great arc of myth embracing the nization of Asia Minor.' That makes the Anthesteria one of the ear- maiden's tragedy, regicide/parricideor infanticide, and the younger liestattested of all Greek festivals.And inasmuchas the festival deals generation'saccession to power. Nourishment, order, and civilized with Dionysus and wine, one may conclude that the wine-god D- life are born of their antithesis:the encounterwith death. Only homo onysusmust already have been long familiar by rooo n.c. The Linear necanscan becomehomo sapiens. B texts from Pvlos that refer to Dionvsus'befoie 12ooB.c. make this
f See Samuef (1972)Index s.a.) for the festival at Teos, see SIGs 38.11; SEG4.598; rnasos,LSS69;Smyrna,Philostr.V.Soph.t.z5.r(lI4z.z4ed.Teubn.);lasos,Bull.epigr. r97l nr. 7o;Massalia, Just. 43.4.6(lV3.n.rz below). For Syracuse,see Timaios, FGrHist 566F r58;Diog. Laert.4.8; Antigonos in Ath. 437e.Cf. FarnellY (r9o9)zt4-24, i77-2o; r\usson, Studiade Dionysiis Atticis (Lund,, rgo), tr5-38; idem (19o6)267-7r. For the rinthesteria and the Aiora see Eranos14 (1916),r8r-zoo = OpusculaI ,l95:r), 745-61:,; GSSS), S8z-8+, 5g4-g8; Foucart Qgo4) ro7-63; Harrison egzz) 3z-74; egz) 275-94; r-tubner ,1969\ jglz) 93-rz1; van Hoorn (r95r); Pickard-Cambridge r-25. with the ScholiaPOry YIp. o4 #853;Deubner (t932) rzz-23. 'PY-rnuc.2.1j.4 Ya roz; Xb 4t9; Gdrard-Rousseau(1968) 74-76;L. R. palmer, TheInterpretation of Mycewaan GreekTexts (rg$), z5o-58. Of no less importance is the excavation of the rernPle at Agia Irini on Keos:since r5oo B.c. it was continuouslyused as a cult site,and
272 I 243 TESTIMONIA AND DISSEMINATION ANTHESTERIA
that the god's no9ulat and often the only part of the festival that is mentioned. It conclusion easier to accept, even if it is conceivable Creeks precededby the day of "opening the casks,"the Pithoigia,on the be a secondaryaccretion tfe. wine festival' The Lr^is name may !o day of Anthesterion, and it was followed by the day of the ut*uy,connectedthenameAnthesteriawith,,blossoming,,,inparticu- "i""enttr to deviate i,notr," the Chytroi, on the thirteenthday of the month.?One must the blossom of the vine,oand there is no reason lar with that, accordingto the old religiouschronology, sundown sig- interpretationof the-name' ,Icall from^^- this simple of a day and that evening and night were reckonedas provides us with enough material to nufedttt" end O^." uguir,, only ,tthens and the Choesmeet festival.Here, in addi- ,f," of the following day. Thus, the Pithoigia form a comirehensi,J",aetaitea'picture.of.the "u" on the eve- by Attic poets' we the eveningof the eleventh,the Choesand the Chytroi tion to accountsby local historians and allusions on the Choes of the twelfth. Already in antiquity, this hazy distinction occa- the evidenceof a clearly delineatedtype of pottery nine have causedconfusion' can be no doubt that it was used on the main day of sionallY fit.f,"t-'fnere "iasks," "pitchers," "pots"-the earthy,popular characterof this festival, whose very name was Choes, the day of the."pitchers'" the may be seenin thesedesignations. Indeed, this festival was a pitchersare also relatedto the festivalevents' festival it p"ir,ti.,gs on these of the polis' when comparedwith, " in the fifth and fourth centuries auantittnigligeable for the finances Mosi of the-evidenceisioncentrated oc- later times as sav,the Panathenaia,the Mysteries,or the GreaterDionysia' It 8.c., but there are isolateddocuments in Hellenisticand curred largely on the level of folk custom, in contrastto the more re- well, so we know that this festival spannedover 1/oooyears' fell on the cent Dionysia, which were establishedin the sixth century by the Thucydides tells us that the *iin day.of the.festival the most tvrants and the polis. Moreover, the sanctuary of Dionysus in the twelfth day of Anthesterion.'This was the day of the Choes' trarshes,' which Thucydides consideredto be one of the oldest in Athens, was apparentlyuntouched by the monumentalbuilding pro- that of Dionysus:see J. L' caskey,Hesperia 1 sinceArchaic times the cult wascertainly at Atheni. It has not been identified with certaintyand had ap- (tg6g) 289. gram j964), 126-15; Simon in the time of Pausanias-perhaps it alstros,FGrHistSl4FrJ=HarPokr.'Av$eonlpttilz;cf.Macr.Sat.t.tz.4;Et.M' larently already disappeared Stovvcros"Avrltos IC *ur r"plu."d by the pii.rute cult site of the Iobakchoi.It probably lan- rog.rz; An. Bekk.| 4o1'32;translited "Floralia" by Just' 41'4'6; FGtHist F tz' and cf Eu- that was enjoined llllll2 and Paus' r.3r.4. L. Eiavtltls Phanodemos' 325 guisheddue toan especiallysacred commandment {J56 6' 218;.'Av.BLorlp unth"si-s the father of lhe'6ver of wine, Maron, Od. 9-:.97;Hes' ipon it: it could be opened only on a single day in the year, the day 'z\' Unconnectedwith Dionvsus ihera tC Xll 1329( "BekranJer," Wilamowitz lr91zl77 are'Hpa'g,rit"tc.-,'Hpoctiuten,duf'eo96potatArgos(Nilsson119o61357),dvBetrgopot An t37),'Avleorpl8es in Rhodes(LSS 96' and cf Hsch avfleanlpLa}es' TPhilochoros, in Sicliylnol. +dva-rgioooorlat FGrHist 84 (cf. Jacoby ad loc.); Cal1m. fr. r78; Apollod., FGrHist 244 "f,r1eroat (LSS18) The derivationfrom (A' W 3z8F S,ek*.iri...d), Paiania F rj3; rzr.zo Hude; cf. Nilsson (rg5il Aristoph. Ach roT6 rind rous must be rejectedalready because S.hol. Thuc. p. SS+. Verrall,iHS zo Lgrr|, t5-17; Harrison lgzzl +Z-+g) Xoas (Schol. ad loc., Suda 6zu) to claim that the Choes the suffixfor festivalnames Tzlp xai Xritpous led Didymos 1 of the apocope,which is preciselynot Aiticlonic ']no'o as itre1"o" (1968)2o7-20)' and Chytroi were on the same day. go"s back toMycenaeantimes' parilpn G6rard-Rousseau 8In the account of sales of sacrificial hides, 1G llllll2 1496,the Lesser Dionysia brings in sstudied and comprehensivelyby van Hoorn (r95r); see by Deubner (t912) 48-47, Dr., the Anthesteria nothing' "Choes"' AlA5o(t946)' 722-)9; 3rr Dr., the Greater Dionysia 8o8 J. R. Green, B/CS8 (196r), 4lz7' Cl' S' P' Karouzou' 'Called ,'946)' E' Simon' "Ein rti (ro0) iv ltipvats Arcvicrou Thuc. 2.r5.4; Isaios 8.35; "Demosth'" 59'76;Phi- H. R. Immerwahr, "Choesi.i Cnyt.oi," TAPA 77 245-tu; (tg6) Sv lochoros (?), FGrHist zz9; Callim. fr.3o5; Strabo 8p 161; Schol. Aristoph' Ran' Anthesterien-Skyphosdes Polygnotos ," AK 6 i9$),6-zz;Metzger 55-76;E 3zBF 'Attische.Feste- z16 (iv xai oixos rai vetirsro0 rleoi'); Steph. Byz. lripvat' Not mentioned by Pausa- Gnomon For a skepticalview seeA Rumpf' dr mon, 4z(t97o),Zto-ii' nias, who at the theater of Dionysus as the oldest shrine of Diony- r6t (t96tl, zo8-r4' Many' though by no meansall' depic- describes the shrine AttischeVasen," Bonn. lbi. sus: roi ALpvatou; confirmedby a Choes 1.2o.1.Philostr. V Ap. l.t4 also mentions an riTaApa roi Jtovioov tions on Choes pitchersrefer to tie Anthesteria.This is often XOITI cf. van Hoorn, RA z5 j9z), 1o4-zo. The fact that there were no marshes at this sanc- ug"*i,tlhu painting itself:one chouseven has a grafhto pitcherbeing depicted -ft tuary Yl W Dorpfeld exca- of the Anthesteriaon other sortsof vases is discussed by Strabo I p 16l and Schol. Thuc. POry #8y. 1r9Sz[3o7.,. 1791. ureare depictiois fnlectr Anthesteriain southern vated a small shrine between the Areopagus and the Pnyx, which was later the cult site well. Typicalchoes pitchersindicate that there was alsoan as rr of the lobakchoi (lG IIi III': r368 : sIG3 1109: Ls lt has been hypothetically identi- (l95tl McPhee,AKzz(tg7g)'38f Cf n'rabove;IV'5'n 5r) Italy:seeu"r,Hoo.., 5o-52;I' tied with the Limnaion: see AM zo (1895), r6t-76;46 (tgzr) 8r-96; Judeich (t91r) zgt- below. 96; Pickard-Cambridge (1968) zr-25. G. T. W Hooker, /HS 8o (rq6o), 7't2-'77, pleaded 62.t5.4; interpolationby Torstrik' trd"' and;acoby ri1 6a6exat71isdeleted as an for the area u.o,r.,d ih" llissos; Gu6pin (1968) 283 seeks to locate the Limnaion in the appearsalready in POxy^853and thus (FGrHisttII b Suppl., Notes PP. r6-6t), but Ilissos temple (V.3.n.2 below). There may be a picture of the temple on the Chous: text ii defended by A' W Gomme' A Hts- representsan anoent traditioi; the received Mtinchen r+e+; uutr Hoorn (r95r) #699pl.6t. "Demosth'" to)icalCommentary on Thucydidesll (1956),52-53' 59'76'
245 2a4
I Ilii, PITHOIGIA AND CHOES ANTHESTERIA
Dionysusin the or, more precisely, the great clay iars (niflot), which were sealed of the Choes. Another riddle is posed by the name day, the wine had fermented. The rule that the wine must then lie in historical times, marshesand swamps could scarcelybe after lvlarshr; for several months until spring is certainly strange and ar- foundinAthens.lfitcorrespondssopoorlytoAthenianconditions, untouched is no but it was observedeven outside of Greece,among the Ro- have come from a more ancient, alien tradition' There $ficial, ii r.,rrt Drinking the wine is not left to the whim of the individual; the such thing as an autochthonousorigin for religion' rnans.s gernmunitycomes together and celebratesthe god. The beginning seemsbound up with danger:it was possiblethat this drinking could "4sharrfl." Even today, the growersof wine follow set customs,start- ing- the harvesttogether, pressing their wine together. Here, tasting the new wine is a collectivecelebration within the The report of the Atthidographer Phanodemos can only z. Pithoigiaand Choes sanctuary. 'At referto the Pithoigia: the temple of Dionysus in the marshes,the Athenians mix the new wine which they bring from their casks for the god, and then drink it themselves.Hence Dionysus was called The Anthesteria has lcng attractedattention for three reasons. all three- the god of the marsh, becausethe new wine was mixed with water The first is as a children'sfestial.' On the day of the Choes' and drunk on that occasionfor the first time. . . . Delighted then with fo".-y"ar-old children were given presents' The depictions on tablos' and the mixture, the people celebratedDionysus in song, dancing and ".,J,tr" ti,,t" bho", pitchers of the cfiildten, their offertory for the his- calling upon him with the names Flowery, Dithyrambos, the Frenzied toys are a unique record of Athenian private life' Second' u ll of the One, the Roarer." i;i-" of religion, the Anthesteriawas fascinatingas a festival from the It is unthinkable that wine would be mixed and poured out to the dead: it wasiaid that ghosts or spirits of the dead emerged I be chased wine-godat a closedtemple. For this reasonalone, Phanodemos must underworld on theseiays and entered the city' only to mar- be referring to the Anthesteria.However, the temple iu Adpuarswas ut the end of the festival'' Third, referencesto a "sacred "queen" of open only on the Choes, on the twelfth day of the month.?The fact "*uyiiug"" at this festival have provoked great curiosity: the Dionysus tn that the eleventhday was alreadycalled "the opening of the casks"is Itfiu.,r, wife of the archon basileus,was presentedto both came into play' due to the sacralchronology. In the evening, the day of the Pithoigia marriage.3Thus, animism and fertility -magic as well Passesover into the Choes, so that the caskswould have been opened olr"rrhldor"ing that which, judging by the namesof the days iust beforenightfall, and the temple would have openedat sundown. of the Athenians, was fundamentallythe central as by the statements Plutarch attests that, in his native Boeotia, the new wine would be ' opening the casksand drinking the new wine' These simple in interpreting the "*r"riactions were h"eregiven a set, ritualizel form, and sThe understand this ritual' Vinalia on the twenty-third of April are degustandisuinis instituta:Pliny NH r8.287, Anthesteria, our main goal must be to and cf. Varro r.r.6.:16;Festus 65 M.; Ov. Fast.4.863-9o<;; Wissowa (r9rz) rr5.8. 'At ,n" p""opf" start with the new wine on the eleventh 6FG/Hrst Athens, F tz = Ath. calling the day pithoigia." so Plu- 125 465a: r.pdsre iepe 9t1 277 zt6 ANTHESTERIA PITHOIGIA AND CHOES opened in honor of the Agathos Daimon "after the evening wind.,,' ,l^" when pl"gl all the doors o{ the city shone,sticky and Throughout the day, people flocked together from vineyards all over so thatI::1,:::l a door-co rld black, be opened only with care, it was a most Attica: freeholderswho seldomentered the city, slavesand laborerss1 expressionof a sfiking diesater. All temples were shut on this day ro the landowners who lived in the city-a colorful crowd of strangers normal life was so that largely pararyzed:since there corrlJ-be ,,o 1.1 and friends with greatzlrlor loadedon clatteringcarts drawn by don_ sworn in the temple, oaths no important businesscould occur, no ,rl keys:they gatheredat the placein front of the temple, waiting for it to be settledon. marriage There could be no "normal,,sacrifice at any of open at sunset, and to pour the first libation to the god from the altars' Nevertheless, the jhe tempreswere not barricaded,j"rt ,rr.- newly opened casks.After holding out for months, despitelongings with ropes. round€d Each individual had to construct the symbolic and anxious curiosity,they finally broke the resinatedseals. The ten_ in boundary his mind:.on this day accessto the gods was inte-lrupted. sion of testing the results of a year'swork dissolvedinto pleasure- temple which onlythat was otherwiseshut waJno* open-the tem- reasonenough to praisethe god of wine. ple of Dionysus iz Aipvats. The fact that the wine-tasting grew into a drinking competition observance In of the diesater, far from the gods, peoplegathered on the following day of the pitchers, and that everyonegot his own behind.dogrgfleshly coveredwith pitch to eat togeihei jug-slaves u.,i, above and laborers, too, indeed, even children-seems to be all, to drink.'s rhe family, incruding ail relatives-itnorgh such a simple form of collectivemerriment as to require no explana- women-assembled frouuury without at the house of the head oFth'e family. tion.e In Aristophanes' Acharnians,the good fortune of the peace- officials gathered at the office of the archons, the Thesmotheteion making anti-hero, Dikaiopolis, culminatesin a drinking bout at the nearthe Areopagus.'u "king," rhe basileus,would preside. The peo- Choes. Here too, Dikaiopolis wins and gets a wineskin as a prize, ple probably came.together at the usual mealtime, in the late after_ enough to fill dozens of Choes pitchers. Thus, the guzzling is self- noon. what followed, however, was the clear antithesisof the usual perpetuating-no wonder scholarshave been satisfied to state that festivalmeal' Each participant had his own tabre,''and whereaswine the Choeswas an undeniably merry festival.'0Yet the backgroundfor and water were norma,y served in a great mixing bowl out of which this day'smerriment seemsstrange and even uncanny. the wine-pourers would fiil the cups"ail around,"eachparticipant at There is unambiguoustestimony that the day of the Choeswas a ,h:.9h.o".r.-_us given a pitcher that would be f,ir'foreue;-rh" 61""r, "day of pollution" (p,npa iptpo).r, People would start the day by which held about two and a half ritersof mixed wine.,8This is the pre- chewing-contrary to all natural predilection-on leavesof a particu- pap"vos, lar hawthorn variety, which were otherwiseused to ward off L4osKor.r.9o; Ov. Fnst.6.rz9-6g on spitroa/ba; Rohde (rg9g) I zlz.,]; Harrison (r9z:) ghosts.l?Doors would be painted with pitch-a normal way 39-40. to water- '3Phot' frlpruos' ' ' xai rrirrTl iypiovr zrB 219 I iir PITHOIGIA AND CHOES ANTHESTERIA food, one incurs guilt which must requisite for the notorious drinking competition: crowned with ir,y Sy-uinonsall. eating be distributed equally And only_thosewho receive their share wr'eaths,"the people would wait for the trumpet slsna-l'iblown frorx can belong, bound by the act they have committed. ';,1 the Thesmotheteionat the king's order to initiate the drinking. Then together- For preciselythis reason,the meaning of the all those assembledwould drink "in silence,"" without a word or q Choestouches the of children When a child was no longer a baby, flr,.,, song-indeed, apparently,without prayer-filling and refilling their hves at the age of it would be presented to the family clan, lliltl . titt the Chous was empty. glt oj all the odd customs on this tyee, the phratry ur,a it '',Jlll in the Choes festival for the first ",rpi"d'ay of pollution," the silencewhile drinking probably seemedthe participated time that same year.r, iqrtth, Choes, adolescence,and marriage,,zaare the most peiuliar to the loquaciousAthenians. To them, wine and song basic stagesin development of a young Athenian. The child went iogether, and drinking to one another with song and speech the was given a wreath his own table, and his own pitcher, was a highly refined socialgame. on the day of the choes-,people sat of blossomt of a size appropriate age. Sharing in the wine signified the togetheiunder one roof but as if enclosedby invisible walls: seParate to his first step toward shlring the life of the society,in adult life. A little Choes tailes, separatejugs, and ali surrounded by a-general.silenceknown in pitcher was placed the grave of any child who died before it was otherwise only at sacrificewhen the herald callsout his eigrlp'eire. in three, so that if could least reach the goal symbolically in the The languageof the ritual is clear:the so-calleddrinking competi- at next life which it had failed to reach in this one.2eThis was analogous tion bears th" Jtu*p of a sacrifice.The peculiaritiesof the Choes- to the placement of the Loutrophoros, the water jug for the bridal bath, drinking are the noim at the bloody sacrifice:not just the silence,22 on the tomb of one who had died beforemarriage.s Most of the Choes but theindividual tables'3and the distribution in portions as equalas pitchersthat have survived come from such grave offerings, a custom possible;r,above all, the atmosphereof pollution and guilt. From this which appears to havebeen especially fashionable for a time in perspective,the drinking competitionreveals its original function: ev- the second hlfu of the fifth century. starts together so that no one can say another_startedfirst.'?s This interpretation of the Choes ritual as an "ryotruLilewise, when the day begins,the act of chewing the leavesto avert initiation, a bond madeby-symbolically incurring guilt, is confirmed evil, rather than carrying them or hanging them up, is a cathartic by the etiological tgld by the Athenians to explain the customs. ihough preparationfor the ruitud meal, handed down from hunting rituals''u flths *ruryirrg in detail, they agree in speaking of a murder and blood glritt tt t"it its mark upon the drinking of wine. And they forged"a link "iwith rrAlkiphr. IV.4.n.zbelow 4.r8,tr; frequentlydepicted on the Choespitchers-cf. TPhilostr. 20Aristoph. IV.5.n.15below. Ach. roor; cf. Her. tz.z(rlr87.zred. Teubn. fi7r)'A*"ilut]trr,voiraiies iv 1rr]ui'Auheot4- ,1pfut. to Phanodemos, pti'tvtota?avoivrat Q. cona.6r1b, 641a;Eur. Iph. Taur.g5r. The prize, according r6ry dv06av rpir<|tdrd yevedstret. For membership in ttre phratry Ach' rooz, rzz5 has a wineskrn-a in_the"third or fourth year" FGrHist3z5F tr, was a cake (zr)\axo05);Aristoph' seeProcl. /n Tim. I88.rg Diehl; Deubner^eg1z),i0,44. competition:besides the Chous, Dikaiopolisimme- yewiloerl,s, comic of the drinking Itau"ov' yo,bu, EgrlBeias:see IG lIlIIIl 468.4o; cf. the relief, Koumanou- "*agg".ation of unmixedwine (ruz9); he thereupon receivesa whole doxos Deubner(1932) diately dririks a bowl 1!t llq-l pl. 16.r with the epigramflrxtas Xotxi,tv,6 6i iaipav EgBa- competition-depicted on a oc tois I For lriike with a Chous-i.e., victory in the drinking Xoi,s(#r57 Kaibel = /G Illlll'? r3r39).On the wreath of blossomsand oftertory : ARV'?87t'.95;E' Simon, Gnonron4z (r97o)'7rt" t:u.uuiHoorn (r95r) pheidip- Chous seeWiirzburg 4917 11,-" passim.The oft-depictedlittle cart was given to 2zEigqpeiv: seeG. Mensching, DasHelig! the Diasia (Aristoph. Nub. seeStengel (tgzo) ttt; among the Romans lt::: * 864),but an Athenian terracotta has a silenus puil- *t.t, F Eckstein,and Schweigen (t 926\,tor - toz A. Legner,Antike Kleinkunst im Liebieghaus(Frankfurt, ry69i, pl. pera 4r.The insqliption'Axpitrrot 23Movogayotinthe cult of Poseidonat Aegina, xao' airois i9' i11t'ipas6xxai6exa 6 narilp on a Chous in Baltim;re, Cjy USA 3o6.3,shows xof4pezos Aesch' presentfor a child. For teachersreceiving presents otuzrils 1.,rtCour,.tPlut. Q. Gr. 3ord-e Gf. etn. 588e);riz6paxcis 'e€_hubulidesH'lt Y":. i on the day of the choes (cf fr. r (ClF II on Keos, Ag.,5g5 at the feastof Thyestes-the text, howevet'is fragmentaryand corrupt qurried: 43r). one could only drink wine once one had seeArist. ft. 6tt.zg. E. Franekelad loc.). Re- 'Irro8alr4s' 2oA,tovuoog Plut De E Harpokr', Hsch' H:^Tt:uro",AlA5o(1946),rz6,t3o;A.Rumpf, Bonn.lbb.:16r(:196r),27i_74;var. iooiaittls 389a, 'ruorn (r95r) see #rt9, for instance,comes from the tomb of a child; #n5; fig.l5 por_ ,5For,,dividing up the guilt" in sacrificialritual seeMeuli (t946)zz8; at executions' ;goJd-.,u.r",, (r9zz)' zz8;at a stoneChous, Deubner pt. r5. rhe K. v. Amira, "GermanischeTodesstrafen," Abh. Mi)nchen 3t'3 zz6' Plot illlj^i.,eJ:-y":'-,:.1:l!{ !!: eyz) TI.Q.HNHXPH>TH is shown holding a Cirtes pitctrer on heigrave_stele: of murder, Hdt. 5.92y4' ;::-w :TMH fruits" (lndi- 26Forlaxatives and the like, see GB VIII 81;before the "festivalof the first r4rnosth. 44.18,1o; Eust. rz93.g;Cook III (rg4o) 37o_go. ans)see GB VIII n,75-76. PITHOIGIA AND ANTHESTERIA CHOES Orestheus,planted the first vine, the offspring heroic epic by introducing orestes: after killing his mother, Clytaern- whosegrandfather, of It has rightly been suspectedthat the Attic myth of nestra, Oresiescame to Athens pursued by the Erinyes, in searchof o'bitch.35 the the confusedOrestheus and Orestes.*Beyond the similar- expiation. Demophon, the Athenian king, did not dare turn sup- it o"r festival q11i- however,they are linked by the theme of bloodshed.In ptilnt away, but ire had to avoid polluting himself and his fellow ,r' in nu^"t, Hence of the myth that points toward Aetolia, the Athenians are lens through contactwith one who was himself polluted. the tlie uerrior, given just Orestes'companions, but the murderers' descendants,shar- curious ,oiirtior,t Orestesmight enter the house' but was his not Both guilt for his act' own table and jug of wine, and no one said a word to him' in- ine itt" " was a parallel myth from Ikaria, the modern Dionyso, an cluded und e^iuled at once, Orestescelebrated the first Choes fes- There famous for its vineyards and the customs of its vine- iival together with the Athenians.3'All behavedas though they had Attic village Dionysushimself cameto the houseof Ikarios,bringing him been stiined with murder, and on this day all Athenians are Ores- qrowers. and instructing him in cultivation, harvesting,and pressing teioi.3,As artificial as the inclusion of Orestesin the Athenian custorl ihe vine wine. Ikarios happily loadedthe casksfull of the god'snew may be, the ritual,s inner tension is appropriately expressedin the of the gift cart and brought it to his fellow villagers.But the "opening .o.rfli.t of duties and the shrewd solution found by the king: a com- ontohis of turned into a disaster:when the revellers,unfamiliar munal meal in which community is simultaneously abolished;the the casks" with grew drunk and sank to the ground, Ikarios was suspected murderer,stabu, paradoxicallyextended to all Athenians. The mur- wine, of poisonedthem. The angry crowd thereuponkilled their bene- derer may not enter the tempies-on the day of the-Choes,the tem- having ft9*. hearth and factorwith clubs, and his blood mixed with the wine. His daughter, ples are llosed; the murderer must be kept 1ryuy led by her dog Maira, searcheddesperately for her lost father iable-at the Choes, people eat at separatetables; it is forbidden to Erigone, till she found his body in a well; she subsequentlyhanged herself." speakwith the murderer-the Athenians emPty their pitchers in si- Thus,in the land of wine, in Attica, the myth of the wine overflows lence. The day of the Choes is a "day of pollution-,"..1'r't'apanfepa- with gruesomedetails: this wine is a very specialjuice and anything aboveall, the murderer is the one who is "polluted," p'capos'" but harmless. The new wine is imbibed as though it carriedblood guilt. This is the What we found expressed in the ritual is confirmed in the myths expressedeven more forcefully in another etiologicalmyth about of violence and murder Choesfestival, in which the wine is brought to Athens by Aetolians' surrounding the first wine: drinking the new be es- wine fulfills the function of a sacrificial meal, consecrated as some- They were killed, and the oracleordered the Choes festival to least thing bizarre, a disastrous inversion of the norm, on this day tablishedin atonement.vAetolia was a centerof viticulture, or at when of myths about wine: the ruler there was Oineus, the wine-man' $Hekataios, FGrHistI F 15;Apollod. r.64. 3F. = Ath' is the one rvho G. Welcker, 3rEur.Iplr. Taur. 947-6o-Phanodemos, FGrHist 1z5F rt 4l7c-d Nachtragzu der Schriftiiber die AeschylischeTrilogie e}z6), :186,ztt; S. z11I Wide, mentions'dlil'*t'",#';:;;" O"rnopiion; cf. Plut' Q. cona' 643a,6t1b' Apollod ' FGrHist j.?:t IakonischeKulte (i8y1, 8z-Bj. F rr, III b suppl 37The E4. speaksof Pandion; cf facobv on 325 laterauthors (esp. Hyg. : ,,Eratosth.', tZ';, e5 Par', Astr.2.4 Catast.pp.77-gr Robert;Nonnus tril at etier* seealso Hellanikos, FGrHist 3z1aF zz Marm. 47'34-264 p. rg4. For Orestes, lt dependfor the essentialson EratosthenedErigone (fr. zz-26 Powell;R. Mer- with the Anthesteriu,"" uiro S.hol. Lyk' 474' kelbach, FGrHist49 A 25.For the connection Misciltaneadi Studi Alessandriniin memoriadi A. Rostagni[1961], 469-526). Di- to the sixth centuryand that onysus' is assumedthat the Orestes-aitionfor the Choesgoes back visit is depictedon black figure vases(Brit. Mus. B t+S : ABV 245.6o;B r jJ = lll b Suppl ' Notes ^,Dv Aeschylus, Eum. 448-52,474-75,implicitly rejlcts it: see Jacoby 243'45\without namesbeing inscribed;the host could thus alsobe calledAmphi- t 223 lr ANTHESTERIA Tlfr' PITHOIGIA AND CHOES the normal order is inverted. The associationof wine and blood, the.drinker r'il es- qtently, of the wine would be drinking the god pecially around the Mediterraneanwhere red wine predominates, himself, i, ,1d ttre.myths about the death of the inventor of 1,,I wine came to be natural and is attestedoutside of Greece,in the Semiticrealm.s J11, of the sufferings,death, and 'fil descriptions, transformationof the god is clearly not just a metaphor: the drinking of wine becamesacred regard, the ri rrirnsetj'.J11his ClassicarGreeks had virtuaily ir,*.*o,rr,t- l-ti. when a whole complex ritual of bloody sacrifice was transferred inhibitions:ever,since '' to able Homer, gods had beenimmJrtal bv iefini_ lil{l the laborsand pleasuresof the wine-grower.'eFor it is certainthat '' the tion. Hg_w,_then,could a god die o.-be.orr,"the victim oif.Ji.,'iuurir_ 'lli sacrificial rites, rooted in the life of the hunter, are far older than tic meal? Such myths become themselves,,unspeakabr",,,-'6,.O'prlros. these,even though the history of the origin and disseminationof in- u-single But there ryar god of whom this story was told: Dionysus. toxicating beveragesin the Neolithic and in the early civilizations is Titans lured the child The Dionysus away from his tni.i", i.rl r,i^ still unclear.Various kinds of beer, the fermented drink made fro6 wecan gather from allusio"r,,,*,ir *yit, up_ barley,probably existedbefore wine; and we must considerthat other il*_,Tl:::ij. ,lg.y" in p_?r:ntty.nandecl the Orphic mysteries, was known in the kinds of narcoticsmay have servedsimilar functions in the religious century even if it fifth was officialry ignoied. To be sure, it describes ritual.{ Here, the male society discovered a new overpowering area preparation not the ._f-.:h" *1","*:i:g.urdless of larer of experiencein which the burdens of reality were swept awayby the interpretations- but, rather, a broody initi ation sacrifice *-irr,"ioiling"if"g.riri"g flood of something utterly different. And just as groups had always and roasting. The rite of the Anthesieria impries u ,o-u-hlt differ_ found their identity and inner solidaritythrough a sacrificialritual, so ent, though largely analo€ous, myth of the god torn apart, *horu this new pleasurewas actedout as a secret,unspeakable sacrifice. By blood is represented in the sacramentardrinling of thi ,i.,".* simultaneously liberating and binding, the god of wine offered a new or course/this hypoth"rl:,i1-y,l.may always have JxistJ i" and stable form of community. sionsanddisguises, whereas the story once again made""if distinctions "ff"_ Among the Indo-Aryans, the sacredintoxicating drink is called betweenthe god and the victim. Nevertheless, philostratus claimed Soma,a god who descendedfrom heaven, was mashed, trampled, and squeezed-a sacrificialvictim, but still a god, regardlessof his sThe oldest certain source known for the myth of Dionysus, death is form-and leads the pious back to heaven.a'TheGreeks tended to iivuiit,g r ri-*'";g.,"0 catim. frl equate Dionysus and the wine already in Classicaltimes.' Conse- {ffijli;lJi,:lT1l":l;lwilamowitz(re3z) 378-8o and,*':"1-ol,'l:'lG, arter him, L. i ov classique u""tt"o.r,"'drini,{',,)itirl^i'fi:;";1, ugsi, +6-6. that this myth was invented in the thereare earry Hellenistic age. But $"Blood earrieratusions to it: (r) rr of the vine" in Ugaritic:Baal II iv 37, ANETr33; Gen. 49:tr;Sir.5o.r5. "Blood !i1a 13).7.roLu(tu Ta^.,Loi r6v'eos;cf. p. Tan- nery,Reu. Phitot. zt h*oo\, r.z9; of the earth," Androkydes,Pliny N.ft. 14.58. Fi. ;. Ror", iinn'lZ Gg+r, identi(rcatron with osiris, and Fierodotus' Uz. e)The sAbove emphatic sil"nce conJ".ning the ta'tl all, pressingthe grapesturns into the bloody sacrificialact of tearing aPart, wereby no olosiris-which meanssecret in Egypt, , er, ,3r,, ,ig,'uJ alreadyamong the Egyptians:see S. Schott,"Das blutninstige Keltergerdt,"Zeitscht. ! .f. G. Murray in Harrison 11927) 3lz-+t.G)Plat. Lec.ror,rTrr&r*t1 gt".rr'uni'i.Jir,,gopiltrtrns iigypt. Spracheu. Altertumskunde74 Q918''1,88-93;D. Wortmann, ZPE z (1968),zz7-to; (4)Isocr' rr (Bus tuxrts rtlvyv