προσπόλων Εὐμολπιδᾶν. The Eleusinia had four chief ministrants. 1. The “ἱεροφάντης”. This office was hereditary in the Eumolpid gens; Plut. De Exil. 17 “Εὔμολπος ἐμύησε καὶ μυεῖ τοὺς Ἕλληνας” (as the earliest hierophant, and the ancestor of his successors). 2. The “δᾳδοῦχος”: hereditary in the gens of Callias and Hipponicus, which traced itself from Triptolemus. 3. The “ἱεροκήρυξ”: hereditary in the gens of the “Κηρυκίδαι” (or “Κήρυκες”). 4. The altar-priest, “ἱερεὺς ὁ ἐπὶ βωμῷ”, or “ἐπιβώμιος”, who offered the sacrifice. It is not known whether this office was hereditary. As some relationship seems to have existed between the Eumolpidae and the two other gentes, προσπόλων here possibly includes (2) and (3), but is more naturally taken of the “ἱεροφάντης” only. A hydria found at Cumae, and belonging to a Campanian collection now at St Petersburg, exhibits an Eleusinian group of deities and priests, among whom the “ἱεροφάντης” is distinguished by a long white stole, partly embroidered with gold, a myrtle wreath, and the thyrsus. (It is reproduced by Baumeister, Denkmäler des kl. Alt.., p. 474, pl. 520.)
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Sophocles: The Plays and Fragments, with critical notes, commentary, and translation in English prose. Part II: The Oedipus Coloneus. Sir Richard C. Jebb. Cambridge. Cambridge University Press. 1899.
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