James Frazer - The Golden Bough - A Study in Magic and Religion (Third Edition, Vol. 07 of 12)

August Mommsen, Feste der Stadt Athen im Altertum (Leipsic, 1898), pp. 192 sqq.

Eustathius on Homer, Iliad , ix. 534, p. 772; Im. Bekker, Anecdota Graeca , i. 384 sq. , s. v. Ἁλῶα. Compare O. Rubensohn, Die Mysterienheiligtümer in Eleusis und Samothrake (Berlin, 1892), p. 116.

Eustathius on Homer, Iliad , ix. 534, p. 772; Im. Bekker, Anecdota Graeca , i. 384 sq. , s. v. Ἁλῶα.

Scholia in Lucianum , ed. H. Rabe (Leipsic, 1906), pp. 279 sq. (scholium on Dialog. Meretr. vii. 4).

Dittenberger, Sylloge Inscriptionum Graecarum , 2Nos. 192, 246, 587, 640; Ἐφημερὶς Ἀρχαιολογική, 1884, coll. 135 sq. The passages of inscriptions and of ancient authors which refer to the festival are collected by Dr. L. R. Farnell, The Cults of the Greek States , iii. (Oxford, 1907) pp. 315 sq. For a discussion of the evidence see August Mommsen, Feste der Stadt Athen im Altertum (Leipsic, 1898), pp. 359 sqq. ; Miss J. E. Harrison, Prolegomena to the Study of Greek Religion , Second Edition (Cambridge, 1908), pp. 145 sqq.

The threshing-floor of Triptolemus at Eleusis (Pausanias, i. 38. 6) is no doubt identical with the Sacred Threshing-floor mentioned in the great Eleusinian inscription of 329 b. c. (Dittenberger, Sylloge Inscriptionum Graecarum , 2No. 587, line 234). We read of a hierophant who, contrary to ancestral custom, sacrificed a victim on the hearth in the Hall at Eleusis during the Festival of the Threshing-floor, “it being unlawful to sacrifice victims on that day” (Demosthenes, Contra Neaeram , 116, pp. 1384 sq. ), but from such an unlawful act no inference can be drawn as to the place where the festival was held. That the festival probably had special reference to the threshing-floor of Triptolemus has already been pointed out by O. Rubensohn ( Die Mysterienheiligtümer in Eleusis und Samothrake , Berlin, 1892, p. 118).

See above, pp. 41 sq. , 43. Maximus Tyrius observes ( Dissertat. xxx. 5) that husbandmen were the first to celebrate sacred rites in honour of Demeter at the threshing-floor.

See above, p. , note 4.

Harpocration, s. v. Ἁλῶα (vol. i. p. 24, ed. G. Dindorf).

Dittenberger, Sylloge Inscriptionum Graecarum , 2No. 587, lines 124, 144, with the editor's notes; August Mommsen, Feste der Stadt Athen im Altertum , p. 360.

So I am informed by my friend Professor J. L. Myres, who speaks from personal observation.

This is recognised by Professor M. P. Nilsson. See his Studia de Dionysiis Atticis (Lund, 1900), pp. 95 sqq. , and his Griechische Feste , p. 329. To explain the lateness of the festival, Miss J. E. Harrison suggests that “the shift of date is due to Dionysos. The rival festivals of Dionysos were in mid-winter. He possessed himself of the festivals of Demeter, took over her threshing-floor and compelled the anomaly of a winter threshing festival” ( Prolegomena to the Study of Greek Religion , Second Edition, p. 147).

Scholiast on Lucian, Dial. Meretr. vii. 4 ( Scholia in Lucianum , ed. H. Rabe, Leipsic, 1906, pp. 279-281).

Clement of Alexandria, Protrept. ii. 15 and 20, pp. 13 and 17 ed. Potter; Arnobius, Adversus Nationes , v. 25-27, 35, 39.

See below, p. 116; vol. ii. pp. 17 sqq.

Dittenberger, Sylloge Inscriptionum Graecarum , 2No. 640; Ch. Michel, Recueil d'Inscriptions Grecques (Brussels, 1900), No. 135, p. 145. To be exact, while the inscription definitely mentions the sacrifices to Demeter and Persephone at the Green Festival, it does not record the deities to whom the sacrifice at the Festival of the Cornstalks (τὴν τῶν Καλαμαίων θυσίαν) was offered. But mentioned as it is in immediate connexion with the sacrifices to Demeter and Persephone at the Green Festival, we may fairly suppose that the sacrifice at the Festival of the Cornstalks was also offered to these goddesses.

See above, p. 42.

Anthologia Palatina , vi. 36. 1 sq.

Polemo, cited by Athenaeus, iii. 9, p. 416 b.

Nonnus, Dionys. xvii. 153. The Athenians sacrificed to her under this title (Eustathius, on Homer, Iliad , xviii. 553, p. 1162).

Theocritus, Idyl. vii. 155; Orphica , xl. 5.

Anthologia Palatina , vi. 98. 1.

Orphica , xl. 3.

Anthologia Palatina , vi. 104. 8.

Orphica , xl. 5.

Ibid.

Orphica , xl. 18.

This title she shared with Persephone at Tegea (Pausanias, viii. 53. 7), and under it she received annual sacrifices at Ephesus (Dittenberger, Sylloge Inscriptionum Graecarum , 2No. 655). It was applied to her also at Epidaurus (Ἐφημ. Ἀρχ., 1883, col. 153) and at Athens (Aristophanes, Frogs , 382), and appears to have been a common title of the goddess. See L. R. Farnell, The Cults of the Greek States , iii. 318 note 30.

Polemo, cited by Athenaeus, iii. 73, p. 109 a b, x. 9. p. 416 c.

E. Dodwell, A Classical and Topographical Tour through Greece (London, 1819), i. 583. E. D. Clarke found the image “on the side of the road, immediately before entering the village, and in the midst of a heap of dung, buried as high as the neck, a little beyond the farther extremity of the pavement of the temple. Yet even this degrading situation had not been assigned to it wholly independent of its antient history. The inhabitants of the small village which is now situated among the ruins of Eleusis still regarded this statue with a very high degree of superstitious veneration. They attributed to its presence the fertility of their land; and it was for this reason that they heaped around it the manure intended for their fields. They believed that the loss of it would be followed by no less a calamity than the failure of their annual harvests; and they pointed to the ears of bearded wheat, upon the sculptured ornaments upon the head of the figure, as a never-failing indication of the produce of the soil.” When the statue was about to be removed, a general murmur ran among the people, the women joining in the clamour. “They had been always,” they said, “famous for their corn; and the fertility of the land would cease when the statue was removed.” See E. D. Clarke, Travels in various Countries of Europe, Asia, and Africa , iii. (London, 1814) pp. 772-774, 787 sq. Compare J. C. Lawson, Modern Greek Folklore and Ancient Greek Religion (Cambridge, 1910), p. 80, who tells us that “the statue was regularly crowned with flowers in the avowed hope of obtaining good harvests.”