ELEUSINIA
ELEUSINIA (
Ἐλευσίνια). This
title was chiefly applied to a festival held by the Athenians in autumn, in
honour of Demeter, Persephone, and Iacchus, consisting of sacrifices,
processions, and certain mystical ceremonies. It was one of the most
important festivals of Greece, dated from the earliest times, and continued
to maintain its high position long after living Greece was no more, and
everything else in that country had either perished or become mean and
contemptible (cf. Aristides,
Or. Eleusinia, vol. i p. 259,
ed. Jebb).
1. The Origin of the Eleusinia.
The mythical origin is contained in the Homeric hymn to Demeter, which
tells how Persephone, while gathering flowers, was, with the connivance
of Zeus, carried off by the god of the lower world, Hades or Polydegmon
(the great receiver); and how her mother Demeter, daughter of Rhea,
searching distractedly for her child, is advised by Hecate to consult
Helios, who sees all things and how Helios in pity tells her that Zeus
has granted to Hades to carry off her daughter to be his wife. Forthwith
Demeter changes herself into an old woman; and as she wanders forth
disconsolate through the world, she comes to Eleusis, and sits down on
the cheerless stone by a well. Anon the daughters of Celeus, the king of
Eleusis, come to the well to draw water. They bring her to their home,
where Metanira, wife of Celeus, gives her the latest born child,
Demophoon, to nurse. But Demeter is still bowed down with grief: she
sits dignified but silent in her room, till the jests and raillery of
Iambe, the servant-maid, at last make her smile. She consents to take
food and drink, but will have no wine, only a mixture (
κυκεών) of water with barley-meal and mint.
Days go on, and the child Demophoon thrives beyond what mortal child was
wont, for a goddess was his nurse: she used to anoint him daily with
ambrosia, and place him in the fire by night. But a little more time and
the child would have been immortal, when one night Metanira saw the
nurse
[p. 1.716]place him in the fire and cried aloud
with terror. Then did the anger of Demeter burn forth. Of a sudden the
aged nurse transformed herself into the goddess, told who she was, what
she had intended to do, and how that the little faith of the mother had
robbed the child of immortality, and finally bade the people of Eleusis
be told to erect a temple for her on the hill above the fountain, when
she herself would prescribe the services they must perform in order to
gain her favour. They did so, and Demeter dwelt there, shunning all
association with the other gods who had been parties to the carrying off
of her daughter. For a year Demeter dwelt there--an awful and desperate
year. Nothing grew. The human race would have perished, had not Zeus
agreed that Persephone should return. Right joyfully did Persephone obey
the summons of Hermes: but Hades persuaded her to eat a pomegranate seed
before she left, and that prevented her staying away from him for a
whole year. So Persephone returns, and great is the joy of mother and
daughter, in which the faithful Hecate sympathises. Rhea is then sent
down by Zeus to her daughter, and effects the reconciliation. The corn
comes up in abundance in the Rarian plain, and Demeter returns to
Olympus to dwell with the gods: but before she goes she prescribes to
Celeus, and to his sons Triptolemus, Diocles, and Eumolpus, the
solemnities and divine services that were in future time to be paid her:
and so the famous Eleusinian mysteries were a direct appointment of the
great goddess Demeter herself.
This was the story of the origin of the mysteries: but how the mysteries
came to be mysteries of the Athenians depends on another story, which
concerns the union of Eleusis with Athens. Erechtheus warred with the
Eleusinians (
Paus. 1.38,
3; Lobeck,
Aglaoph. 206 ff.), who are helped
by one Eumolpus, a Thracian, son of Poseidon (Apoll. 3.14, 4), and
founder of the mysteries (Lucian,
Demon,
34). The difficulties connected with the exact birthplace and
genealogical position of Eumolpus (see Lobeck,
op.
cit. 212; Roscher,
Lexikon der Mythol. s.v.
Eumolpus)--even Pausanias (
1.38,
7) is
perplexed with Eleusinian genealogies--we may pass over, remembering
that he is, according to this legend, a foreigner (Plut.
de Exsilio, p. 607, 10). The many beautiful
stories which are connected with Erechtheus and his family we may also
forget for the present, and proceed at once to the result, which was,
that Eleusis was conquered, and to the Athenians fell the political
headship, but to the family of Eumolpus and the daughters of the
Eleusinian king Celeus was assigned the high-priesthood (
ἱεροφαντία) of the Eleusinian worship. The
other family which held a priesthood in the mysteries, the Kerykes, were
said to have been descended from Keryx, the son of Eumolpus; though the
family itself considered its ancestors to have been Hermes and Aglauros,
daughter of Erechtheus, and so genuine Athenians (
Paus. 1.38,
3).
So ran the legends of Eleusis, “grouping together, in the same
scene and story, the goddess and the heroic fathers of the town;
legends which did not take their start from realities of the past,
but from realities of the present, combined with retrospective
feeling and fancy, which filled up the blank of the aforetime in a
manner at once plausible and impressive” (Grote, 1.42). But
yet something perhaps of the realities of the past may be learned from
them. We can clearly see that it is in connexion with the lower world
that the goddesses are honoured. They are Chthonian divinities (Preller,
Griech. Myth. 1.643), who presided over the
production of the fruits of the earth ; and it is reasonable to suppose
that this most primitive kind of worship was a relic of the Pelasgian
past, which continued on into historical times, in the form of mystical
and secret worship (cf. Hermann,
Gottesd. Alterth.
§ 32; K. O. Müller in Ersch and Grüber, s. v.
Eleusinia,). The religions of previous
inhabitants sometimes continued in this form: e. g. the Thesmophoria in
the Peloponnesus, after its conquest by the Dorians (
Hdt. 2.171). The worship, too, was confined to
certain families, which we shall see took an important part in the
ceremonies during historical times, when the festival had become a state
one. Curtius (
Hist. of Greece, 1.304) indeed holds the
view that the worship of the Great Goddesses was brought into Attica and
domesticated there by a number of illustrious Messenian families who had
fled from the Dorian invaders,---a view Schömann
(
Griech. Alt. 2.381) approves of, but suggests a more
remote origin by pointing out that the Homeric hymn (
v. 123) seems to hint at Crete being the original home of the
mysteries; and that a worship of Demeter, similar to that of Eleusis
except that it was not secret, was held at Cnosus is stated by Diodorus
(
5.77). Phrygian and Lydian influences
may be seen in the appearance of Rhea and Hecate in the hymn, but the
influence of Thrace and Crete (where Bacchus was a great god)--unless we
are to suppose, with K. O. Müller, that Demophoon of the hymn
is to be taken as a representative of Iacchus--had not yet been felt,
though it appears in the second legend. That influence came with the
elaborate Orphic theology and mythology [ORPMICA], about the 7th and 6th centuries B.C. One of their tales
related (Lobeck,
op. cit. 547 ff.) that Zagreus
was son of Zeus and his own daughter Persephone, a noble child, destined
to be Zeus's successor. Hera, in jealousy, urged the Titans to destroy
him. They cut him up and boiled him in a caldron, all except his heart,
which Athena picked up and carried to Zeus, who, after striking down the
Titans, gave the heart to Semele, and Zagreus was born again from her
under the name of Dionysus, or Iacchus, as he is called in the
Eleusinian worship. This tale is a good specimen of the Orphic
mythology; according to which the clear and definite Hellenic gods
disappear into vague kinds of half-allegorical or symbolical forms, the
divinities blend into one another according to stories which are of a
coarse and extravagant as well as tragical and terror-striking nature,
but which, from the very first, were in all probability intended for the
initiates, and meant to be taken as symbolical representations of
cosmogony, rather than as actual dogmatic facts (cf. Euseb.
Praepar. Evang. 3.1). Along with the Orphic theology
came also the Orphic life (Plat.
Leg. 6.782), and the
need it inculcated of religious purifications and various kinds of
asceticism,
e.q. abstinence from animal food
(
Hdt. 2.81;
Eur.
Hipp. 967;
Cretes, fragm. 20). Lenormant
(
Contemporary Review, 37.859) thinks that
[p. 1.717]Orphism, though introduced in a measure at
this time, did not get any permanent hold on the Eleusinian worship till
380 B.C., when the family of the Lycomidae,
who were specially devoted to Orphic rites, obtained the office of
daduchus (see below, § 5), his reason being that there is no
allusion to Zagreus in Aristophanes or the other Attic writers, while he
appears quite established by the time of Callimachus. And then, again,
there was the influence of Egypt, which became fully open to the Greeks
about 660 B.C. This influence was most marked. Dionysus and Demeter
became identified with Osiris and Isis (
Hdt.
2.42,
59,
144); and with this adoption of the Egyptian divinities came the
peculiarities of the Egyptian priesthood, with their minute and
scrupulous ceremonies, separate mode of life, elaboration of
“sacred tales” (
ἱεροὶ
λόγοι), and the secrecy and silence they required. This
secrecy is a cardinal feature of the Eastern religions and the Eastern
hierarchies; and it was doubtless owing to Eastern influences,
superadded to the national privacy of separate family cults, that this
secret and mystic character came to be attached so especially to the
worship of Demeter at Eleusis, the more so as we find many striking
Oriental characteristics in other mystic worships in Greece, such as
that of the Cabeiri in Samothrace. [
CABEIRIA] This influx of new and peculiar
religious rites is a marked feature in the history of Greek thought in
the 6th century B.C., producing as it did not
only oracles such as those of Bakis and the Sibyls, purificatory and
tranquillising rites such as those of Epimenides, but also the great
Pythagorean philosophy and the mystic brotherhood who held it.
It is just at this point that we are to fix the adoption of the
Eleusinian mysteries by the Athenians, consequent on the incorporation
of Eleusis into the Athenian state. Grote (3.71) has proved that this
incorporation took place much later than is generally supposed, as it
occurred only a short time before Solon (cf.
Hdt.
1.30, about Tellus the Athenian), and the list of
Athenian-Eleusinian priests does not reach higher (A. Mommsen,
Heortologie der Athener, 63). The fact is, this
introduction of the Eleusinian worship, with its foreign teaching
concerning the death and re-birth of Iacchus, was brought about by
Epimenides, who was called in from Crete to assuage the religious
terrors of the Athenians after the murder of Cylon, and the feeling of
guilt which took hold of the state in consequence of that crime of the
Alcmaeonidae. That was a time which in an eminent degree called for the
introduction of new forms of religious service; and to this earnest and
holy priest the Athenians were indebted for the development of the
gracious worship of Apollo (Curtius,
Hist.
1.323), and for the introduction of the Eleusinian worship of Demeter
and Iacchus, with the religious hope and consolation they brought to the
afflicted; and in gratitude a statue of Epimenides was set up before the
temple of the goddess in Agrae (Mommsen,
op.
cit. 52 ff., 62 ff.).
2. Eleusinia elsewhere than in Attica.
Not to mention the wide-spread worship of Demeter, Persephone, and
Dionysus throughout Asia Minor, evinced by such ceremonies as were held
at the Carian Nysa (
Strabo xiv.
p.649), the Pherrephattia at Cyzicus (
Plut. Luc. 10; Appian,
Bell. Mithr. 75), and
the Dionysiac symbols which so constantly occur on Asiatic coins; nor
the Eleusis on Lake Mareotis in Egypt, where there were initiations
which were
ἀρχὴ τοῦ Κανωβισμοῦ
(
Strabo xvii. p.800), accompanied
indeed with much debauchery; nor the worship of these goddesses in
Sicily, both at Gela, where Telines used their sacred symbols with such
effect as to restore his political faction and to get himself
established as their high-priest (
Hdt.
7.153; Grote, 5.62), and elsewhere (
Diod.
5.77)--we find special evidence that the Eleusinian Demeter
was worshipped in Boeotia, at Plataea where she had a temple (
Hdt. 9.62,
65,
101), at Celeae near Phlius (
Paus. 2.14,
1), and
in many places in Arcadia, Pheneus (ib. 8.15, 1), Thelpusa (25, 2, 3),
Basilis (29, 5), Megalopolis (31, 7). The mysteries at Pheneus are
interesting not only for the writings on the stone (
πέτρωμα) read each year to the mystae, but
also from its clearly being a worship of the dead, as may be seen from
the ceremony of the priest striking the ground with rods and calling on
those that are beneath the earth (
τοὺς
ὑποχθονίους, Paus.
l.c.). For
further, see Mr. Andrew Lang (
Nineteenth Century, April
1887, p. 565). In Messenia there were ancient solemn mysteries to these
goddesses and to the Great Gods--i. e. the Cabeiri--at Andania in
Messenia, which were put down by the Spartans after the Second Messenian
War, but restored to their old splendour by Epaminondas (
Paus. 4.1,
5;
2,
6 ;--Curtius,
Hist. 4.433). At this place was found a
most important inscription of 91 B.C. relating to the mysteries (see
Sauppe,
Die Mysterieninschrift von Andania). But even
this worship was inferior in solemnity and importance to the Attic
Eleusinia (
Paus. 4.33,
5), which may be considered to have consisted of two parts, viz.
the Lesser Mysteries at Agrae and the Greater Mysteries at Eleusis.
3. The Mysteries at Agrae (τὰ ἐν
Ἄγραις).
These were held in the spring at Agrae, a place on the Ilissus, S.E. of
the Acropolis. There is no doubt they were held in Anthesterion, when
there were the first signs of returning vegetation just after field-work
began (
C. I. G. 103, 50.20). The exact date cannot be
fixed, but Mommsen's suggestion is most probable (
op.
cit. 374), that the chief day was the 20th, the same day of the
month as the Greater Mysteries were held on in Boedromion--to which the
Lesser Mysteries had many points of similarity, even in matters
connected with the calendar, e. g. the same length of the mystery truce
(
C. I. G. 71). Mommsen supposes that the 19th was a
day of preparation, and the 20th and 21st the special mystery days.
These Lesser Mysteries were considered as a prelude to the Greater
(Schol.
Aristoph. Pl. 845,
ἔστι τὰ μικρὰ ὥσπερ προκάθαρσις καὶ
προάγνευσις τῶν μεγάλων), being on a much smaller
scale, but initiation in the Lesser was generally required before the
candidate could present himself for initiation into the Greater (Plat.
Gorg. 497 C;
Plut. Dem.
26). At Eleusis there were temples to Artemis Propylaea, to
Triptolemus and to Poseidon, as well as to Demeter; similarly at Agrae
there was a temple to Demeter, and altars to Artemis and Poseidon, and a
statue of Triptolemus (Mommsen, p. 377). The mysteries at Agrae
[p. 1.718]consisted probably to a large extent of
purifications, for which the water of the Ilissus was much used (
Polyaen. 5.17). They were held more
especially in honour of Persephone, called Pherrephatta here, than of
Demeter (Schol. on
Aristoph. Pl. 845,
yet cf. Bekk.
Anecd. 326). It appears that the carrying
off of Persephone was the most important representation in these
mysteries. Again we hear that at Agrae the fate of Dionysus was
pourtrayed (
μίμημα τῶν περὶ τὸν
Διόνυσον, Steph. Byz. s. v.
Ἄγραι). The death of Dionysus-Zagreus took place on the
13th of Anthesterion, the day on which the festival of the Chytrae was
held [
DIONYSIA]: so
perhaps on the ninth day after, the 21st (for funeral rites on the ninth
day after death, the
ἔνατα, see
Aeschin.
Ctesiph. § 225), the funeral ceremony
may have been held and his violent death related in a drama (Mommsen, p.
378). A great many, especially strangers, were initiated into these
mysteries who did not proceed to initiation into the regular Eleusinia:
the legend, too, said it was for the purpose of initiating Heracles, who
was a stranger and according to the primitive regulations could not be
initiated into the Eleusinia, that these Lesser Mysteries were
established (Schol. on
Aristoph. Pl.
845,
1013). A representation
of the initiation of Heracles on a vase found at Panticapaeum is given
in Baumeister's
Denkmäler, p. 475. For the
appearance of Aphrodite, cf. Themist.
Or. xx. p. 288,
Dind. There is a very similar one on a Pourtalès vase in the
British Museum, which Baumeister also alludes to (cf. Wieseler,
2.112).
4. The Course of the Festival at Eleusis.
Two days are fixed by definite evidence; viz. the 16th Boedromion for the
Ἅλαδε μύσται (
Polyaen. 3.11,
11;
de Glor. Ath. 349
fin.), and the 20th for the Iacchus day (
Plut. Cam. 19,
Phoc. 28).
The fixing of other days depends on conjecture, but can be determined
with a considerable degree of certainty. A month before the middle of
Boedromion, i. e. the middle of Metagitnion, the
σπονδοφόροι (see below) used to announce the mystery
truce to the neighbouring states (
C. I. G. 71; Aeschin.
Fals. Leg. § 133), so as to give the
strangers time to make all arrangements necessary for a visit to Athens.
During the latter portion of this month the votary who intended to be
initiated used to betake himself to some private man who had gone
through all the grades of initiation, was examined by him as to his
freedom from sin, received instruction as to what purifications and
offerings were necessary to gain the favour of the goddesses, and submit
the actual offerings for his inspection and approval. This instructor
was the
μυσταγωγός (see below). He
notified to the hierophant. the fitness of the applicant and introduced
him, this proceeding being apparently called
σύστασις. A not uncommon form of purification was the
Διὸς κώδιον (Suidas, s. v.),
which the daduchus used to cover the sinner's feet with (see Lenormant,
Contemp. Rev. 38.137). Sincere devotees appear to
have fasted for nine days (cf. [Hom.]
Hymn. Dem. 47),
from the 13th to the 21st, i. e. ate nothing during the day, taking
whatever food they did take between sunset and sunrise, like the
Mahomedans during Ramadan (cf.
Ov. Fast.
4.535; Preller in Pauly, 3.99); and votaries generally appear to
have abstained from domestic birds, fish, pomegranates, apples, and
beans (Porphyr.
Abst. 4.16). Ramsay (
Encycl.
Britannica, s. v.
Mysteries) notices the
effect of the long fasts as tending to enfeeble the body, already weak
enough after the heat of summer, and as a consequence the predisposition
of the votaries to religious enthusiasm; but perhaps he exaggerates too
much these fasts. On the 15th of Boedromion the formal assemblage
(
ἀγυρμός
Hesych. sub voce) took place of those
citizens and strangers who intended to take part in the
mysteries--though this assemblage does not appear to have been
absolutely essential, at least in late times (
C. I. G.
523). At the beginning of the 16th, in the evening (the day is reckoned
from sunset to sunset), Chabrias's distribution of wine to the people in
honour of his victory at Naxos used to take place (
Plut. Phoc. 6); and the next morning began
the first formal act of the festival, viz. the
πρόρρησις or
Ἅλαδε
μύσται. These are to be identified in point of time, else
Philostratus (
Vit. Apoll. 4.18) in an important passage
would omit the striking ceremony of
Ἅλαδε
μύσται. The passage is this:
τὰ
δὲ Ἐπιδαύρια μετὰ πρόρρησίν τε καὶ ἱερεῖα δεῦρο μυεῖν
Ἀθηναίοις πάτριον ἐπὶ θυσία δευτέρᾳ ( “as a
secondary sacrifice” ),
τουτὶ δ᾽
ἐνόμισαν Ἀθκληπιοῦ ἕνεκα, ὅτι δὴ ἐμύησαν αὐτὸν
ἥκοντα, Ἐπιδαυρόθεν ὀψὲ μυστηρίων. A proclamation
was made by the Archon Basileus (Poll. 8.90) and by the Hierophant and
Daduchus in the Stoa Poecile (Schol.
Aristoph. Frogs 369), for the departure of all strangers and
all murderers: and then the order for purification given, “Ye
mystae to the sea.” The “sea” was sometimes the
Piraeus (
Plut. Phoc. 28), though
probably only in time of Attica being occupied by enemies ; but
generally the
Π̔ειτοί, two salt
streams on the Sacred Road, one dedicated to Demeter, the other to Cora,
which contained fish that the priests alone were allowed to eat (
Paus. 1.38,
1;
Hesych. sub voce cf.
Etym.
M. s. v.:
ἱερὰ ὁδός: ἡ εἰς
Ἐλευσῖνα ἄγουσα ἥν ἀπίασιν οἱ μύσται ἅλαδε).
The next day, the 17th, sacrifices (
ἱερεῖα) were offered for the safety of the state
(Rangabé,
Inscr. 795) by the Archon Basileus
and the
ἐπιμεληταὶ (see § 6)
in the Eleusinium at Athens ([Lys.]
in Andoc. §
4; Mommsen, p. 249); and at all these sacrifices the
θεωροὶ of foreign states seem to have taken
part (Eur.
Suppl. 173). The night of the 18th may have
been spent by the very devout in sleeping (Mommsen, p. 253) in the
temple of Aesculapius, S.W. of the Acropolis, or in the laccheum (Boeckh
on
C. I. G. 481), also called the temple of Demeter. It
was just where the road from Piraeus entered Athens (
Paus. 1.2,
4). The early morning
of that day till about 9 A.M. was devoted to
ordinary business, as we find decrees issued bearing that date (Mommsen,
pp. 95, 225, 226). After this hour the Epidauria was celebrated in the
temple of Demeter or Iacchus and in the temple of Aesculapius. It was,
as we have seen, a supplementary sacrifice for those who came late, and
legend said it was instituted for the sake of Aesculapius, who himself
came late for the mysteries. Doubtless, however, the thought really lay
in this, that Aesculapius was supposed by his wondrous skill to have
raised again Iacchus from the dead, and the festival probably was
incorporated in the Eleusinia when the worship of Epidaurus got
connected with that of Athens (
Hdt. 5.82).
Meanwhile there were
[p. 1.719]being brought from
Eleusis certain religious objects,--playthings, it was said, of the
child Iacchus,--bone (
ἀστράγαλος), top
(
στρόβιλος), ball (
σφαῖρα), apples (
μῆλα), tambourine (
ρόμβος),
looking-glass (
ἔσοπτρον), woolly
fleece (
πὄκος), fan (
λίκνον), and such like, as we learn from
Clement of Alexandria (
Protrept. p. 15, ed. Potter; cf.
Lobeck,
Aglaoph. 701, 702). Phalli were perhaps also
carried among these mystical objects (Lyd.
de
Mensibus, 4.38, p. 82); but we must remember that the
statue of Iacchus, as we shall see, which was carried in procession to
Eleusis on the 19th, was not kept at Eleusis during the year, but at
Athens, having been brought back some day shortly after the conclusion
of the mysteries; for there was no Iaccheum at Eleusis (Mommsen, p.
253). The Athenian Ephebi met this convoy at the temple of Echo
(evidence from inscriptions in Mommsen, p. 252), which was probably the
same as the
ἱερὰ συκῆ, where the
story ran that Phytalus met the wandering Demeter (Brunck,
Anal. iii. p. 187, No. 183;
Ath.
74d : Philostr.
Vit. Soph. 2.20
fin.), and the bridge over the Cephissus, and was so
called from the cymbals (
ἠχεῖα) used
in the Eleusinian ceremony (Schol. Theocr. 2.36), and conveyed them to
Athens by nightfall. This is Mommsen's view as to the date: but
Lenormant (
Contemp. Rev. xxxviii. p. 138) thinks this
convoy took place on the 16th; for the convocation of the Ephebi is on
the 14th, according to the inscription given by Mommsen (p. 227), and it
is highly probable that it should have been thus arranged so that
additional splendour might be given to the procession by the mystae who
went to the
Ῥειτοὶ joining it on
their return home. In the early morning of the 19th, there were
occasionally decrees passed (Mommsen, p. 225). In the forenoon (
Plut. Alc. 34; cf.
Hdt.
8.65) the Iacchus procession started from the Eleusinium and
proceeded to the Iaccheum, where they got the statue of Iacchus; perhaps
then definitely organised the procession in the building assigned for
that purpose (
Paus. 1.2,
4); and then passing through the Ceramicus (Schol.
Aristoph. Frogs 399) left Athens by
the Sacred Gate (
Plut. Sull. 14),
priests and people crowned with myrtle and ivy, the rich ladies till the
time of the orator Lycurgus (Plut.
Vit. X. Orat. 842-4)
riding in carriages (Schol.
Aristoph. Pl.
1014). The statue of Iacchus was probably that cf a fair
child crowned with myrtle and holding a torch, hence called
φωσφόρος ἀστὴηρ in Aristophanes (
Aristoph. Frogs 342). There were many
ceremonies to be performed as the procession passed along the Sacred Way
to Eleusis--ceremonies which had to be given up during the Peloponnesian
War, while Attica was invaded by the Peloponnesians (
Plut. Alc. 34). One section of the
procession repaired to the Cephissus and took baths therein, another to
the bath by Anemocritus's statue near the tomb of Scirus the soothsayer,
who came from Dodona to Eleusis to assist the Eleusinians in the war
against Erechtheus and was slain. The Phytalidae sacrificed to Phytalus
in Laciadae, where lay a temple to the Mourning (
Ἀχέα) Demeter, and to Cora, with whose worship that of
Athena and Poseidon was joined (
Paus. 1.37,
2). Here according to Preller
(
Diss. de via sacra, p. 125, ed. Köhler) lay
the
sacra gentilitia of the Gephyraei (cf.
Hdt. 5.61) at the sacred fig-tree (cf.
Lenormant,
Voie Sacrée
Éleusinienne, pp. 245, 254 ff.). At the palace of
Crocon, the Croconidae perhaps bound small bands of saffron thread round
the right wrist and right foot of each mystes (cf. Phot. s. v.
κροκοῦν), which was considered as a
protection from the evil eye. The other priestly families had probably
particular ceremonies to perform at particular places. For a further
account of the Sacred Way, see Fr. Lenormant,
op.
cit. Occasionally during the procession the majority of those
who took part in it indulged in flouts and gibes at one another, a
proceeding called
γεφυρισμός, the
origin of which title is unknown, but is generally associated with the
bridge over the Cephissus (Strabo, 9.400). It was similar to the
τὰ ἐξ ἁμαξῶν of the Dionysia, or
the
στήνια of the Thesmophoria. We must
remember, however, that Lenormant (
Voie
Sacrée, p. 282;
Contemp. Rev. 38.141)
supposes this
γεφυρισμὸς to have
occurred during the procession, as it
returned
to Athens after the ceremonial at Eleusis was finished. Chants in
honour of Iacchus (e. g.
Aristoph. Frogs
325 ff.) were sung constantly during the procession, which
swelled louder as when, near midnight, Iacchus arrived at Eleusis amid
the blaze of torches (
Soph. Oed.
Col. 1045). That the procession did not arrive till
late at night is plain from the splendid chorus in the
Ion (1076 ff.), which sings of the torches of
the 20th and of the moon and stars dancing in heaven at the sight. The
journey from Athens to Eleusis is really only four hours long; but the
various ceremonies performed during the course of the procession
extended it to three or four times its normal length. On the next
morning certain sacrifices were performed (Rangabé, 813, 4),
consisting probably in part of swine, to Demeter (Schol. to
Aristoph. Peace 374). An inscription
in Mommsen, p. 257, orders sacrifices to be made by the
ἱεροποιοὶ to Hermes Enagonius, the Graces,
Artemis, and certain heroes, Telesidromus and Triptolemus. We do not
know what these sacrifices were at Eleusis: at Andania they were (Inscr.
50.70), besides others, a sheep to Proserpina and a sow to Demeter. (For
the offering of swine to the Earth Goddess, which offering was of a
magical import, and how it was believed that to mix the flesh of swine
with the seed-corn added to its fertility, see the Scholion on Lucian,
Dial. Meretr. ii., quoted by Mr. Andrew Lang,
“Demeter and the Pig,” in the
Nineteenth
Century, April 1887, p. 562, and his references to analogous
practices among the Khonds and Pawnees.) In later times the Ephebi made
supplementary sacrifices of oxen. The bulls were brought unbound to the
altar, and the Ephebi struggled with them to hold them as they were
being sacrificed: compare the rites to Demeter Chthonia at Hermione
(
Paus. 2.35,
5); hence perhaps the origin of the bull-fights alluded to by
Artemidorus (
Oneirocr. 1.8) as occurring at the
Eleusinia.
The 22nd and 23rd were the
μυστηριώτιδες
ἡμέραι (Rang. 813, 9), and the ceremonies celebrated thereon
were
παννυχίδες. During the evening of
the 22nd was probably what was called
λαμπρ́δων
ἡμέρα (cf. Fulg. 1.10), which consisted in a symbolical
search after Cora with torches (Lactant.
Inst. 1.21: cf.
Stat. Silv. 4.8,
50;
Juv.
15.149), performed principally by and for the less highly
initiated,
[p. 1.720]who conducted the search crowned
with myrtle, wearing a fawn-skin, and holding a wand, the mystagogues of
the several initiates taking part in the search--the whole proceeding
being perhaps an interlude in the story of Demeter and Cora, which
appears to have been represented in the temple on this night. After this
came with much ceremonial the partaking of the
κυκεών a mixture of mint, barley-meal, and water. This
was a cardinal feature in the ceremony, being, if we may so say, a
participation in the Eleusinian sacrament. It was in remembrance of
Demeter being refreshed after her long wandering and fruitless search.
There-after followed what was called the
παράδοσις τῶν ἱερῶν (Suidas, s. v.): certain relics
and amulets were given to the votary to touch or kiss or even taste
(Maury,
Rel. des Grecs, ii. p. 335), the votary
repeating, as the priest tendered him the objects with a regular
question ( “quae rogati in sacrorum acceptionibus
respondeant,” Arnob.
Adv. Gentes, 5.26), this
formula (
σύνθημα), as given by Clement
of Alexandria (
Protrept. p. 18):
ἐνήστευσα, ἔπιον τὸν κυκεῶνα, ἔλαβον ἐκ κίστης
ἐγγευσάμενος, ἀπεθέμην ἐις κάλαθον καὶ ἐκ καλάθου εἰς
κίστην. It appears that some kind of memento of this
ceremony was given by the priest to the votaries, which a sincere
believer used to keep in a linen cloth (Apul.
Apol. p.
140). The actual
ἱερὰ themselves were
kept in a chest (
τελέτης ἐγκύμονα μνστίδα
κίστην, Nonnus,
Dionys. 9.127) bound with
purple ribands, and consisted among others of sesame cakes of particular
shapes, pomegranates, salt, ferules, ivy, poppy-seeds, quinces,
&c. (Clem. Alex.
Protrept. p. 19): the
uninitiated were not allowed to see these “even from the
housetop” (Callim.
Hymn to Ceres, 4): cf. Grote,
5.63, and Lenormant on the
Cista Mystica in
D. and S. Not very different appear to have been the ceremonies of the
23rd. There were many wand-bearers but few bacchants, as the
superintendents of the mysteries used to say (Plat.
Phaed. 69 C), and it was for these latter, the more
highly initiated mystae of at least a year's standing, generally called
ἐπόπται, that the ceremonies of
the 23rd were held, and they were the highest and greatest (see below,
§ 7). Here, too, was probably a
παράδοσις τῶν ἱερῶν, the sacramental words used in
receiving which being
ἐκ τυμπάνου ἔφαγον, ἐκ
κυμβάλου ἔπιον, ἐκερνοφόρησα, ὑπὸ τὸν παστ̀ον
ὑπέδυον. All this undoubtedly points to the Phrygian worship
of Sabazius (cf. Jul. Firm. Maternus,
De error. profan.
relig. 18, ed. Halm), which was introduced by the Orphics into
the Eleusinian mysteries. On the afternoon of the 23rd was held that
portion of the feast which was called
πλημοχόαι (Ath. x. p. 496) or
πλημοχόη (Poll. 10.74), a sacrifice to the dead. The
πλημοχόη was a broad-bottomed
earthen jar, and two such were used in the ceremony, one filled with
wine and the other with water, the contents of the one thrown to the
east and of the other to the west, while mystic words (
ὕε κύε) were spoken. This sacrifice formed
a fitting conclusion to the mysteries in the special sense, the
μυστηριώτιδες ἡμέραι: for that is the way
we are to understand Athenaeus (
l.c.), not that
it was the end of the whole festival. It was like the
ζημία of the Thesmophoria: and it ended with
a
χαίρετε to the dead, which conclusion
was called
προχαιρητήρια (Harpocr. 161,
9; cf. Mommsen, p. 230). It must be noticed, however, that Lenormant
(
Contemp. Rev. 38.149) supposes the
πλημοχόη to have taken place just outside
the Dipylon gate of Athens, on the return of the procession from
Eleusis; and that this is proved from the mystic words
ὕε κύε ὑπερκύε found engraved on the
kerbstone of a well near that spot. The next morning, 24th, occurred
perhaps the
βαλλητύς (
Ath. 406;
Hesych. sub
voce), also called
τύπται
(
Hesych. sub voce), a sort of sham
fight, enjoined, it seems, in the Homeric hymn (
v. 267 ff.). There was a similar contest, called
λιθοβολία, at the festival of Damia and
Auxesia at Troezen (cf.
Paus. 2.32,
2). Lenormant in D. and S., s. v.
Balletys, sees a connexion with the herb
balis, symbol of resurrection and immortality
(
Etym. M. s. v.;
Plin.
Nat. 25.14). On this same morning and afternoon were the
ἀγῶνες σταδιακοί, alluded to in
Rangabé, 813. They were called Eleusinia or Demetria, and the
prize was some barley grown on the Rarian plain (Schol. on
Pind. O. 9.150,
166). Euripides was crowned at these Eleusinian games (
Gel. 15.20,
3).
There is no reason to suppose that these games were not annual (see
Hermann,
Gottesd. Alterth. § 55, 39); for the
Eleusinian
πεντετηρὶς referred to by
Pollux, 8.107, is a different and second-rate festival, as may be seen
from its being mentioned last in the list (Mommsen,p. 243). In early
times these games probably lasted two days; but in later times on the
25th the theatrical representations of the
Διονύσου τεχνῖται were held, and we have some
inscriptions referring to the sacrifices offered by this guild (ib.
266-7). As time went on, the 26th and 27th appear to have been devoted
to such theatrical exhibitions (Rangabé, 813, 6), held
perhaps for the purpose of keeping the visitors in the country.
According to a decree in Mommsen, p. 232, dated 28th, the people were
assembled at Eleusis and had not yet returned to Athens: but in the time
of Andocides (
de Myst. § 111) the 26th was the
day after the mysteries (Mommsen, p. 231); and that there were some
business days in Boedromion free after the mysteries is proved by
Demosthenes (
Ol. 3.5). The people do not appear to have
returned to Athens in a regular procession, though Lenormant, as we have
seen, thinks they did, and that the
γεφυρισμὸς and the
πλημοχόη
were incidents in that return journey. The mysterytruce lasted till the
middle of Pyanepsion (
C. I. G. 71).
5. The Priests and Priestesses.
The most important priest was the
Hierophant (
Ἱεροφάντης). In lists of the
Eleusinian priests he is put first (Dio Chrys. xxxi. p. 386, ed.
Dind. ;
C. I. G. 184, 190). He was nominated for life
(
Paus. 2.14,
1) from the Eleusinian family of the Eumolpidae, and was
generally an elderly man and bound to a life of strict chastity.
There was only one hierophant at a time, and his name was never
mentioned (Lucian,
Lexiph. 10), though in late
inscriptions we find the Roman gentile name but not the praenomen or
the cognomen given (
C. I. G. 187). His principal duty
was, clothed in an Oriental style with a long robe (
στολή) and a turban (
στρόφιον), as his name indicates, to
show and explain the sacred symbols and figures--perhaps in a kind
of chant or recitative, as he was required to have a good voice (cf.
[p. 1.721]Plut. Alc.
22; Epictet. 3.21.16;
C. I. G. 401).
The
Daduchus (
δᾳδοῦχος) or torchbearer was inferior to the
Hierophant, and of the same rank with the Keryx (
C. I.
G. 185, compared with 188). Originally he was descended from
the Eleusinian Triptolemus (
Xen. Hell.
6.3,
6); but about 380 B.C.
this family died out, and the Lycomidae, the family to which
Themistocles belonged, which celebrated a local worship of Demeter
at Phlyae full of Orphic doctrines and ceremonies, succeeded to the
daduchia (see Boeckh on
C. I. G. i. p. 441 f.). We
have seen above, p. 717
a, how
important Lenormant thinks the introduction of this family into the
Eleusinian priesthood was, in that it brought with it into the
Eleusinian ceremonies in a large measure the Orphic rites it was
accustomed to practise. It is uncertain whether the name of the
daduchus was sacred (Lucian,
l.c.) or not
(
C. I. G. 403, 423). His head-dress was Oriental,
as we may infer from a Persian soldier mistaking a daduchus for a
king (
Plut. Arist. 5). His main duty
was to hold the torch at the sacrifices, as his name indicates; but
he shared with the hierophant several functions, reciting portions
of the ritual (
Paus. 9.31,
6, compared with Philostr.
Vit.
Soph. 2.20), taking part in certain purifications (Suid.
s. v.
Διὸς κῴδιον), in the
πρόρρησις (Schol.
Aristoph. Frogs 369), and even in
the exhibition of the mysteries (Suid. s. v.
δᾳδουχεῖ). For these two priests, the Hierophant
and the Daduchus, who had to be men of tried sanctity (
νόμος τὸν μέλλοντα δᾳδουχεῖν
δοκιμάζεσθαι, quoted by Mayor on
Juv. 15.140), there was a regular consecration on their
entering office. It was the
τέλος τῆς
ἐποπτείας, and was called
ἀνάδεσις καὶ στεμμάτων ἐπίθεσις, because the
sign of it consisted in placing on the head of the new priest the
diadem of purple and the wreath of myrtle which they wore
permanently (Lenormant,
Contemp. Rev. 38.414).
c. The
Keryx
or Hierokeryx
(κῆρυξ, ἱεροκῆρυξ).
The
Keryx or
Hierokeryx (
κῆρυξ, ἱεροκῆρυξ). According to
Eleusinian tradition, the Kerykes traced their origin back to Keryx,
a younger son of Eumolpus; but they themselves considered their
ancestors to be Hermes and one of the daughters of Cecrops, Aglauros
according to Pausanias (
1.38,
3), Pandrosos according to Pollux (8.103).
Mommsen (p. 234) supposes they were an Athenian family which ousted
or absorbed an Eleusinian family, perhaps the Eudanemi (
Hesych. sub voce). His duties were
chiefly to proclaim silence at the sacrifices (Poll. 4.91).
d. The
Epibomios
(ὁ ἐπὶ
βωμῷ).
In early times he was certainly a priest (
τὸν
ἐπὶ τῷ βωμῷ ἱερέα,
C. I. G. 71 a, 39); he is generally mentioned in
connexion with the other three priests, but not always (e. g.
Plut. Alc. 22; Epictet. 3.21, 13;
C. I. G. 188, 190, 191). No family laid especial
claim to this priesthood. His name, as well as that of the Keryx,
was probably not sacred. The four Eleusinian priests were among
those who were maintained in the prytaneum--were
ἀείσιτοι, as they were called
(
C. I. G. 183 ff.).
e. The Hierophantis (ἱερόφαντις).
There was originally only one at a time; she belonged to Demeter
(
C. I. G. 434, 2), and her name was sacred: but a
new one was added when Hadrian's wife Sabina was deified as the
younger Demeter (ib. 435, 1073). Perhaps at this time or afterwards
the priestesses came to be multiplied; see the Schol. on
Soph. Oed. Col. 683,
καὶ τὸν ἱεροφάντην δὲ καὶ ρὰς
ἱεροφαντδας καὶ τὸν δᾳδοῦχον καὶ τὰς ἄλλας ἱερείας
μυρρίνης ἔχειν στέφανον. They lived a life of
perfect chastity during their tenure of office, though they might
have been married previously (Mommsen, p. 237). It is uncertain to
what family the original hierophantis of Demeter belonged; that of
the younger belonged to a branch of the Lycomidae (ib.). The duties
of the hierophantis corresponded to those of the hierophant. Pollux
(1.14) appears to call these priestesses
προφάντιδες, and perhaps they were also called
μέλισσαι (
Hesych. sub voce).
f.
Female torch-bearer,
δᾳδουχήσασα (
C. I. G.
1535; cf. Lucian,
Cataplus, 22).
g. Priestess (ἱέρεια).
She was not hieronymous, but eponymous (cf.
C. I. G.
386,
ἐπὶ ἱερείας Φλαοΰιας
Αοδαμίας). These priestesses belonged to the family of
the Phillidae (Suid. and Phot. s. v.). Her duties corresponded in
all probability with those of the Epibomios. (
h.) The
Spondophori (
σπονδοφόροι) were sent out to the adjoining country
a month before the ceremony to announce the truce for the mysteries
(Aeschin.
Fals. Leg. § 133). They belonged
to the families of the Eudanemi and Kerykes (
Hesych. sub voce
Εὐδάνεμος). Mommsen (p. 244)
thinks that a Eudanemos went from Eleusis and a Keryx from Athens at
the same time.
i. Minor offices:
- (1.) (φαιδρύντης τοῖν
θεοῖν (Inscr. ap. Mommsen, p. 227), perhaps
belonging to the Eleusinium of the city.
- (2.) ὑδρανός, whom
Hesych. describes as ἁγνίστης τῶν
Ἐλευσινίων. He probably superintended the
ἅλαδε μύσται.
- (3.) ἰακχαγωγὸς and
κουροτρόφος, female
nurses attending on the child Iacchus (Poll. 1.35; C.
I. G. 481, 9).
- (4.) Perhaps the same may be said of the δαειρῖτις; but it is very
uncertain. We know that Proserpina was originally called
Daeira in the Eleusinian worship.
- (5.) ἱεραύλης (ib. 184,
100.18) was probably the head of the ὑμνῳδοὶ and ὑμνητρίδες (Poll. 1.35), a sort of choir.
- (6.) Who the παναγεῖς and
the πυρφόροι were beyond
what can be inferred from their names cannot be determined.
Lenormant (p. 867) says the παναγεῖς were intermediate between the ministers
and the initiates.
Though not strictly a priest, yet as exercising an important
function in the mysteries, (
j) the
mystagogi (
μυσταγωγοὶ) may be mentioned here. They had to be men
who had passed through all the grades of initiation. They were
probably under the cognisance of the state, in a manner licensed
(Sauppe,
Mysterieninschrift, p. 37). Prior to
presenting himself for initiation, each votary had to place himself
under the guidance of one of these mystagogues, and got instruction
from him as to the various purifications and ceremonies he was to
perform. It was only by the unconscientiousness of mystagogues that
unworthy applicants ever got admission to the mysteries. After due
examination, if the mystagogue was satisfied, he presented the
applicant or returned his name to the Archon Basileus or his
assistants. This was called
σύστασις (Lenormant,
Cont. Rev. xxxviii.
p. 135). If a mystagogue could not say what purificatory sacrifices
were required for a special candidate, recourse was had to (
k) an
Exegetes (
ἐξηγήτης), who appears to have been
elected by the people from the Eumolpidae or Kerykes
[p. 1.722](cf.
C. I. G. 392) and
whose business it was to decide such difficult cases and generally
to give
responsa on Eleusinian
ecclesiastical law. There were many books of the mysteries (cf.
Lenormant,
Cont. Rev. 37.871) which were intended to
have been strictly kept from the uninitiated and which appear to
have contained not only what ritual was to be performed in various
cases--such perhaps was the Eumnolpidarum
πάτρια which Cicero asks Atticus (1.9, 2) for--but
also perhaps the allegorical and symbolical interpretations of some
of the myths: cf. Galen, 8.181, ed. Kuhn; Lobeck,
Aglaoph. 194.
The priests of the mysteries, especially the Eumolpidae, appear to
have had a special ecclesiastical court (
ἱερὰ γερουσία,
C. I. G. 392, 399) for trying offences of impiety (a
very vague and elastic term) in connexion with the festival, which
court they conducted according to unwritten laws of immemorial
antiquity (Lys.
in Andoc. § 10). To
prosecute before this court was called
δικάζεσθθι πρὸς Εὐμολπίδας. Their punishments,
according to Caillemer (D. and S., s. v.
Asebeia),
were strictly religious, exclusion from the mysteries, deprivation
of title of initiate, and such like. The curse and excommunication
were most solemn; priests and priestesses, turning to the west,
uttered the words of imprecation and shook their garments ([Lys.]
in Andoc. § 51). It may be that this
court was the only tribunal for cases of what we may call
heterodoxy, impiety consisting in the performance of rites contrary
to the traditional one and to that held by the priests; while other
kinds of procedure, superadded to the religious investigation and
condemnation, were adopted in accordance with ordinary criminal law
(such as
ἀπαγωγή, ἀσεβείαι γραφή,
ἔνδειξις, προβολή, εἰσαγγελία: see Wayte's note
on Dem.
Androt. p. 601.27) in cases of impiety, which
consisted in disorder and vulgar profanity. These charges were
brought before the Senate of Five Hundred sitting in the Eleusinium
of the city on the day after the mysteries (Andoc.
de
Myst. § 111). The penalty was death (
Thuc. 6.61
fin.) or banishment (Andoc. §
15), with confiscation of goods (
C. I. A. 1.277), for
profanation of the mysteries. The accuser, if he did not get the
fifth part of the votes, suffered a kind of
ἀτιμία (Andoc. § 33), i. e. was deprived
of the right to enter the temples and fined the usual 1000 drachmas
(Caillemer,
l.c.). Many shrank from
themselves bringing the accusation, and used to inform the Archon
Basileus of the profanation they had observed, and if he thought it
serious he made the accusation officially. This information laid
before the archon was called
φράζειν πρὸς
τὸν βασιλέα (Dem.
Androt. l.c.).
A vase representation from a hydria of Cumae of the Eleusinian
goddesses and their priests is given by Baumeister,
Denkmäler, p. 474, with full
explanations. The pictures are instructive as regards the dress of
the priests.
6. The Civil Functionaries connected with the Festival.
The chief civil superintendence of the festival was entrusted to the
Archon Basileus, who was assisted by four
ἐπιμεληταί, elected by the people, two from the people
generally and one each from the families of the Eumolpidae and Kerykes
(Aristot. ap. Harpocr. p. 118). The Archon generally appears to have
appointed an assistant (
πάρεδρος), who
was probably as a rule his relation--at least for the Dionysia in one
case the Archon appointed his father-in-law ([Dem.]
c.
Neaer. p. 1372.81). The duties of the Archon and his assistant
were to sacrifice and pray for the prosperity of the people, both at
Athens and Eleusis, and to have general police supervision over the
whole solemnity (Lys.
c. Andoc. § 4). The
ἐπιμεληταὶ had also such duties as
looking after the sacrifices, testing the offerings of the votaries,
classifying and marshalling the different grades of initiates, managing
certain monies, &c., if we may infer from the similar duties
attaching to the officials of this name at Andania. As to the finances
of the festival generally, according to
C. I. G. 71 a,
29,
ἱεροποιοὶ had the administration
of them. Midias was elected one of these. They were three in number
(Dem.
Mid. p. 522.115), though
Etym. M.
(s. v.) says they were ten.
7. The Initiates.
Originally only Athenians were admitted: legend said that Hercules and
the Dioscuri (
Plut. Thes. 33) had to be
adopted prior to initiation; but later (cf.
Hdt.
8.65) all Greek-speaking people who were not murderers were
admissible to be initiated (Isocr.
Panegyr. §
42). Barbarians were excluded: so Anacharsis had to be naturalised
(Lucian,
Scyth. 8); but it was not at all necessary to be
an Athenian citizen, as the Emperor Julian (
Or. 7.238)
implies. This Lobeck (
Aglaoph. 17-20) proves elaborately.
Women (Aristid.
Eleus. vol. i. p. 257, Jebb), and even
perhaps slaves (Theophilus,
Fr. i., vol. ii. p. 473,
Kock), were admissible. Children were admitted to the first grade only;
but among the children brought to Eleusis one was picked out for special
initiation, and “to appease the divinity by a more exact
performance” of the ceremonies required (Porphyr.
Abst. 4.5). That boy or girl (for boys, see
C.
I. G. 393, 400; for girls, 443-445, 448) was said
μυηθῆναι ἀφ̓ ἑστίας, and was called
ὁ (or
ἡ)
ἀφ̓ ἑστίας. He or she
had to be an Athenian of high birth (Bekk.
Anecd. 204),
perhaps of the special family of the Lycomidae, Eumolpidae, or the like;
and was probably initiated standing on the steps of the altar, while the
rest stood afar off. (Cf. Themist. xiii. p. 165,
ἀλλ̓ ἐχρῆν ὡς ἔοικε τὸν μυσταγωγόν μοι γενέσθαι τῆς
ἐρωτικῆς τελετῆς οὐ πορρωθεν τῶν παιδικῶν οὐδὲ ὄθνειον
ἀλλ̓ ἐγγύθεν καὶ ἀφ̓ ἑστίας.) The parents of the
child had to make extensive offerings and pay a large fee. For more
concerning initiation
ἀφ̓ ἑοτίας, see
Boeckh on
C. I. G. 393. Originally admission was free for
all initiates; but by virtue of a law passed by the orator Aristogiton,
each initiate had to pay a fee to the public treasury (Lenormant,
Contemp. Rev. xxxviii. p. 123).
The ordinary proceeding was for the initiate to receive his first
introduction as a child and afterwards the higher grades as a
man--
παῖς μύστης καὶ ἐπόπτης
ἀνήρ, as Himerius says (
Or. 22.1; cf.
C. I. G. i. p. 445). This falls in admirably with
what Tertullian says (
contra Valentin. 1): “Idcirco
et aditum prius cruciant, diutius initiant antequam consignant, cum
epoptas
ante quinquennium
instituunt,” --a statement not contradicted by the fact that the
shortest possible interval between the two
grades of initiation is stated at one year (Plut.
Demetr.
[p. 1.723]26; cf. Schol. on
Aristoph. Frogs 745). The whole cycle
of the mysteries was a
trieteris, and could
be gone through in two years: even the Homeric hymn extends the whole
legend beyond a year, and when the Orphic theology blended
Iacchus-Zagreus into the story, the regular course of two years came to
be adopted. There is a high probability, as we shall see ( §
8), that the first-year votaries at Eleusis were shown a drama
representing the usual story of Demeter and Cora, while the second-year
votaries were shown the whole legend of Zagreus: and as to the whole
course of the actual mysteries, there is a possibility that the
following arrangement was that adopted, though it must be remembered
that it is little more than conjecture, and given for what it is worth.
- (1.) First Spring at Agrae--the votaries mourn for Cora
ravished by Hades.
- (2.) First Autumn at Eleusis--mourning with Demeter for the
loss of her daughter, and exhibition of the ordinary legend.
- (3.) Second Spring at Agrae--the murder of Zagreus and his
heart being given to Cora (who here seems to take the place of
Semele), and conception of Iacchus.
- (4.) Second Autumn at Eleusis--rebirth of Iacchus, who is
carried in procession to Demeter at Eleusis, and there the
votaries sympathise in the joy of the earth-goddess, who once
more has about her her child and grandchild.
That there were different grades of initiates hardly needs proof: the
μύσται were those who had received
any degree of initiation, the
ἐπόπται
or
ἔφοροι the second-year votaries.
Suidas (s. v.
ἐπόπται) says so
explicitly--cf. Harpocr. s. v.
ἐπωπτευκότων, and
Plut. Demetr.
26; not to mention such passages as Plut.
de Iside et
Osiride, 100.78, where the different grades of proficiency
in philosophy are compared to those of the initiates into the mysteries.
There were mystic ceremonies for both these classes of initiates, one on
each of the two days, 22nd and 23rd. While anyone introduced by a
mystagogue could get admission to the ceremonies of the first year, the
μύησις, the
ἐπόπτεια or
ἐποψία
could only be seen by those who got a ticket from the
δᾳδοῦχος. A ticket of that kind has been
discovered marked
ΔΑΔ and
ΕΡΟΨ, with the symbols of an ear of corn
and a poppy (see Lenormant, 38.145). What those ceremonies were is the
most important and interesting point in our subject; but the seal of
silence which was laid on the votaries has not been broken. This secrecy
was most strenuously enjoined and most rigorously enforced, as we have
seen. The prosecution of Alcibiades for holding a travesty of the
mysteries in his own house, and Andocides's speech on the subject, are
well known. Aeschylus is said to have divulged the mysteries in styling
Artemis a daughter of Demeter (
Hdt. 2.156;
Paus. 8.37,
6), and :in other matters (Arist.
Nic. Eth. 3.1,
17 ; and Lobeck's discussion,
Aglaoph. pp. 77 ff.), and
to have only barely escaped death. Diagoras of Melos (
Diod. 13.6 ; [Lys.]
in Andoc.
§ 17) was banished from Athens and a price set on his head for
having divulged the mysteries. It was the prevailing belief of antiquity
that he who was guilty of divulging the mysteries was thought sure to
bring down divine vengeance on himself and those associated with him
(
Hor. Carm. 3.2.26). We are
accordingly left to conjectures more or less probable as to what the
chief mystic ceremonies were.
8. The Mystic Ceremonies in the Temple.
They were performed in the temple of the two goddesses at Eleusis, a
building reckoned one of the greatest masterpieces of the Periclean age.
Ictinus superintended the whole. Coroebus built the lower story, with
four rows of columns which divided the interior space. On his death
Metagenes took up the work and added an upper story, and Xenocles built
a cupola roof with an opening (
ὄπαιον）
in the middle for the light (
Plut. Per.
13; Vitruv. vii. Pref. § § 16, 17). The
dimensions of the whole building were 223 feet by 179, the measurement
of the cella being 175 feet by 179. The temple had no pillars in the
facade till the architect Philon, in the time of Demetrius of Phalerum,
built a pronaos with twelve pillars (Vitruv.
l.c.). The temple stood inside a large enclosure, which was
approached by a propylaea, there being yet another propylaea leading to
the temple. Inside this enclosure Lenormant has fixed the position of
the
ἀγέλαστος πέτρα, where Demeter
was said to have rested in her wanderings, as the rock where the great
statue of Demeter Achea, now at Cambridge, stood, i. e. on the axis of
the first propylaea close to a well, which he also identifies as
Callichorum. (See his elaborate description,
Contemp.
Rev. 38.125 ff.; and Baumeister's
Denkmäler, art.
Eleusis, with the
plan he gives. For fuller details, compare the
Ρρακτικὰ τῆς Ἀρχαιολογικῆς ἑταιρίας for 1883, and
M. Blavette in
Bulletin de Correspondance
helleńique, viii. (1884), pp. 254 ff.) The temple of
Ictinus, though built on the site of an older and smaller one, must be
distinguished from the most ancient temple which stood more to the
north, occupying a platform which overlooked the well Callichorum and
the
ἀγέλαστος πέτρα, exactly on the
spot where the Homeric hymn (5.273) orders it to be built. The great
temple of Ictinus was called by the ancients
μυστικὸς σηκός (Strabo, 9.395), and the inner portion
τελεστήριον or
ἀνάκτορον or
μέγαρον (cf. Lobeck,
Aglaoph. 59).
The ceremony was doubtless dramatic. “Deo and Cora,” says
Clement of Alexandria (
Protrept. p. 12), “have
become a mystic drama. Eleusis illustrates by the light of the
torches of the daduchus the carrying off of Cora, the wandering
journeys and grief of Deo” (cf. Minuc. Felix,
Octav. 100.21), a view to which the terms
ἱεροφάντης and
ἐπόπτης also lead us, and which is consistent with the
whole tenor of the ancient Greek religion, which was materialist and
naturalist in its doctrines, and used for its inculcation visible
symbols, but did not rise through the hearts and the consciences of its
votaries to a conception of the Divinity whom eye hath not seen nor ear
heard. “Above these two conditions,” says Preller
(
Gr. Myth. 1.653), “Nature as object and the
sensible as its formal expression, the religions of the ancients
have never arisen.” The ceremony, then, was dramatic. Aelius
Aristides (
Eleus. 1.256) asks, “Where else do the
recitals of the narratives chant forth greater marvels, or does the
ceremonial (
τὰ δρώμενα) involve a
greater affrightment (
ἔκπληξιν),
or does the spectacle match more fully what the ear hears?”
The
[p. 1.724]drama consisted of
δρώμενα and
λεγόμενα,
the former being much the more important, for the ancient religious
worship addressed itself, as Grote points out (5.63), more to the eye
than to the ear. There were hymns and chants (
Paus.
9.27,
2: the name Eumolpus
pointing to such,
C. I. G. 401, and the hierophant, as we
saw, was required to have a good voice), speeches and exhortations
(
ῥήσεις, παραγγέλματα), recitals
of myths (
μύθων φῆμαι. Aristid.
l.c.), wailings for the loss of Persephone
(Proclus on Plat.
Politic. p. 384). There were kinds of
dancing or rhythmical movements by those performing the ceremony
(Lucian,
de Salt. 15), clashing of cymbals (Schol. on
Theocr. 2.36; Vell. 1.4, 1), sudden changes from light to darkness
(
σκότους τε καὶ φωτὸς ἐναλλὰξ
γενομένων, Dio Chrys. 12.387), “toilsome wanderings and
dangerous passages through the gloom, but the end is not yet, and
then before the end all kinds of terror, shivering and quaking,
sweating and amazement, when suddenly a wondrous light flashes forth
to the worshipper, and pure regions and meadows receive him: there
are chants, voices, and dances, solemn words and holy images; and
amongst these the votary now perfected is freed at last and is
released, he wanders to and fro with a crown on his head, joining in
the worship and in the company of pure and holy men; and he sees the
uninitiated and unpurified crowd of the living in the thick mire and
mist, trampling one another down, and huddled together, abiding ever
in evils through fear of death and disbelief in the good things
yonder” (Themist. in Stob.
Serm. 120.26). For
somewhat similar descriptions of the mingled terror and comfort in the
spectacle, see Dio Chrys. 12.202; Plut.
Frag. de Anim.
6.2, p. 270;
de Facie lunae, 100.28;
de Prefect. Virt. p. 81; Proclus on
Plut. Alc. p. 142. Lucian
(
Catapl. 22) represents a man having entered Hades
and got into the dark asking his companion if what was represented at
Eleusis was not like this. Claudian's description (
de Rapt.
Proserp. init.) is sufficiently terrible; and amidst that
rhetoric Lenormant (
Contemp. Rev. 38.421) fancies he can
infer that the votaries, waiting anxiously outside the building, saw the
glimmer of the lighted interior through the
ὄπαιον ( “et claram dispergere culmina
lucem,” 5.8); then was heard the noise of the preparations for
the play, the doors were thrown open, and the daduchus appeared with
torches in his hands, and the statue of Demeter was seen in gorgeous
vestments and brilliantly lit up. It is more probable that the whole
performance took place inside the temple. But that figures of the gods
were introduced is certain--
εὐδαίμονα
φάσματα, as Plato (
Phaedr. p. 250 C) calls
them, which flitted noiselessly (
ἀψοφητί, Themist.
Or. 16.224, ed. Dind.)
across the stage; but the images were incomplete, not simple but
over-charged with strange attributes, they were ever in motion and
represented in a dim and murky light--they were neither
ὁλόκληρα, ἁπλᾶ, ἀτρεμῆ, nor
ἐν αὐγῇ καθαρᾷ, like the Platonic
Ideas--as we may infer with Lenormant (p. 417) from Plato (
l.c.). Galen, too (see Lobeck, p. 64), says the
representations were
αμυδρά. At
Andania, too (
Inscr. 50.24), provision is made for
ὅσα δεῖ διασκευάζεσθαι εἰς θεῶν
διάθεσιν. To be more precise, the mystic drama of Demeter
and Cora was unfolded to the mystae, the first-year initiates; but the
epoptae were shown a representation of what Clement calls “the
mysteries of the dragon,” which is the story of Zeus uniting
himself with Persephone (called Brimo: cf:
Philosophumena, viii. p. 115, ed. Miller) in the form of
a serpent, and the whole tale of Iacchus-Zagreus was probably told
(Clem. Alex.
Protrept. pp. 13-15; Tatian,
Or. ad
Graecos, 13 (9 ed. Migne); and Lenormant, p. 426). There was
shown to the epoptae a representation, symbolical probably of creation,
in which we hear (Euseb.
Praep. Evang. 3.12) that the
hierophant used to assume the part of the Creator, the daduchus that of
the sun, the altar-priest that of the moon, and the hierokeryx that of
Hermes. Again, “the last, the most solemn, and the most wonderful
act of the
ἐποψία” was
shown, the ear of corn cut in perfect stillness: the blade of corn
symbolised, we are told, the great and perfect ray of light issuing from
the Inexpressible One (
ὁ παρὰ τοῦ
ἀχαρακτηρίστου φωστὴρ τέλειος μέγας,
Philosophumena, p. 115), whatever that means, or rather
perhaps it was the symbol of life, the cutting down being death.
Lenormant (p. 428) points to the Barone vase, which on one side has Zeus
striking down the Titans, signifying death, and on the other side the
ear of corn springing up and offerings being brought to it, which
signifies life. In describing these vase-paintings he points out that it
was allowable to represent the scenes from the mystic ceremonies, for
they had no meaning without the explanatory words, which were only known
to the initiated. The general form under which the initiations are
represented on the vases is that of a marriage of the votary with
Eudaimonia in the other world--in one of which the votary, a youth cut
off by death in his prime, is represented as deserting
Ὑγίεια, Health, and passing to the arms of
Εὐδαιμονία, Bliss (Lenormant, pp.
431-433).
This picture may lead us to what is to be said in conclusion on the moral
and religious: import of the mysteries. If we choose to regard them in a
cold unimpassioned un-religious way, we can say that they were a
somewhat melodramatic performance, splendid no doubt, full of what
Lobeck (p. 107) calls fireworks (
pyrotechnia),
but a mere theatrical display. That there were connexions between the
mysteries and the theatre (the hierophants are said to have borrowed
costume from the dramas of Aeschylus,
Athen. 1.22, if the reverse is not rather the case) need not
surprise us; and that modern archaeologists profess to find in the
temple of Eleusis evidences of machinery by which the spectacle was
worked (Preller in Pauly, 3.89; Lenormant, p. 415) is only natural; for
there undoubtedly was a spectacle, a religious spectacle. But that man
is not to be envied who thinks to evince his superior wisdom by laughing
at and depreciating the ceremonies, as Lobeck does throughout his
learned work, or talking of them as “the great and illustrious
humbug of ancient history,” as De Quincey does (
On
Secret Societies, 6.255). Anything moral or religious may be
made ridiculous if one chooses to regard it from the lower plane of the
intellect alone, and does not take into account the subjective condition
of the moral worker
[p. 1.725]or the religious
worshipper. The universal voice of the great names of pagan antiquity,
from the Homeric hymn down to the writers of the late Roman Empire,
attest to the wonderfully soothing effect the mysteries had on the
religious emotions, and what glad hopes they inspired of good fortune in
the world to come ([Hom.]
Hymn. Dem. 483 ff.; Pind.
Fragm. 137, Bergk; Soph.
Fragm. 719,
Dind.; Isocr.
Panegyr. § 28;
Cic. Leg. 2.1. 4, 36;
Crinagoras in Jacobs'
Anthol. ii. p. 332, No. 42;
Paus. 5.10,
1,
10.31,
11); and “as a consequence of this clearer light, this
higher faith, the votaries became better men and better
citizens” (Mahaffy,
Rambles and Studies in Greece,
p. 184). “Neque solum,” says Cicero
l.c.,
“cum laetitia vivendi rationem accepimus, sed etiam cum spe
meliore moriendi.” For the object aimed at was rather, as
Aristotle pointed out (ap. Synesius,
Orat.
p. 48), not that the initiate should be taught anything, that would
appeal merely to his intellect (cf. Plut.
de Defect.
Orac. 23
fin.), but should be moved
and have his higher impulses stirred (
οὐ μαθεῖν
τι δεῖν ἀλλὰ παθεῖν καὶ διατεθῆναι). “The
light of the sun is bright for the initiated alone,” sing the
chorus of mystae in the
Ranae (454). Not
but that there were many scenes and symbols of a somewhat coarse nature,
φαλλαγωγίαι, ἑεροὶ γάμοι, such
as those represented by the hierophant and hierophantis, which
pourtrayed perhaps the unions of Zeus and Demeter, Zeus and Persephone,
and which entered into the higher worship (cf.
ὑπὸ ρὸν παστὸν ὑπέδυον), hut which are probably
grossly exaggerated by the Christian writers (cf. Hermann,
Gottesd. Alterth. § 55, 28; Lobeck, 196 ff.;
Lenormant, p. 427), who did not take into consideration their symbolical
meaning (cf. Lenormant,
Voie Sacrée, p. 89).
The truths, however, which these and other symbolical performances
contained was known only to the Hierophant, and explained by him to
those whom he thought fit to hear them; cf. Theodoretus
(
Therap. p. 49, Gaisf.):
τὸν
ἑεροφαντικὸν λόγον οὐχ ἅπαντες ἴσασιν: ἀλλ̓ ὁ μὲν πολὺς
ὅμιλος τὰ δρώμενα θεωρεὶ, οἱ δέ γε προσαγορευόμενοι ἱερεῖς
τὸν τῶν ὀργίων ἐπιτελοῦσι θεσμόν, ὁ δὲ ἱεροφάντης μόνος
οἶδε τῶν γιγνομένων τὸν λόγον καὶ οἷ ἄν δοκίμασῃ
υηνύει. Even the
ἐπόπται only knew part of the mystic secrets,
γνῶναί τι τῶν ἀπορρήτων (Sopatros,
Distinct. Quaest. p. 121, quoted by Lenormant, p.
414). The multitude of worshippers took it all on faith, but, as Mr.
Mahaffy (
op. cit. p. 184) finely remarks,
“even the coarsest features were hallowed and ennobled by the
spirit of the celebrants, whose reverence blinded their eyes while
it lifted up their hearts.”
The Eleusinian mysteries lasted for more than five centuries after Greece
became a Roman province. As late as the time of the Emperor Julian they
still enjoyed a considerable portion of their primeval sanctity (Gibbon,
iii. p. 132, ed. Smith), and were held in the highest esteem by the
Neo-Platonic philosophers. The edict of Valentinian and Valens against
secret worships did not extend to the Eleusinia, the praefect of Achaea,
Pretextatus, having represented that the life of the Greeks would be
barren and comfort-less without the mysteries (ib. iii. p. 249). The
hierophant who initiated Maximus and Eunapius in the 4th century was the
last Eumolpid. Subsequently Mithraic worship got blended with the
Eleusinian; but the mysteries did not finally perish till the
destruction of Eleusis by Alaric in his invasion of Greece, A.D. 396
(Gibbon,
l.c. with Dr. Smith's note; Lenormant,
Contemp. Rev. 37.862).
For further discussion on the mysteries, see
MYSTERIA The principal books to consult on the
Eleusinia are: St. Croix,
Récherches sur les
Mystères; Creuzer,
Symbolik, 4.33
ff.; Lobeck,
Aglaophamus, especially pp. 3-228; K. O.
Müller,
Kleine Schriften, 2.242-311 (a reprint
of his article
Eleusinia in Ersch and
Grüber); Petersen in Ersch and Grüber, 28.219 ff.,
especially 252-269, in the second volume of the article
Griechenland; Guigniaut,
Mémoires
sur les Mystères de Ceres et de Proserpine in the
Mèmoires de l'Acadèmie des
Inscr. xxi.; Preller in Pauly, art.
Eleusinia, and
Griechische Mythologie,
1.643-653; Hermann,
Gottesdienstliche
Alterthümer, § § 35, 55; Maury,
Religions de la Grèce, ii. pp. 297-381;
Schömann,
Griechische Alterthümer,
2.380-402; August Mommsen,
Hecrtologie der Athener,
62-75, 222-269; Baumeister,
Denkmäler, s. vv.
Eleusinia and
Eleusis;
Lenormant,
Monographie de la Voie Sacrée
Éleusinienne, 1864, and
The Eleusinian
Mysteries in the
Contemporary Review, xxxvii.
and xxxviii. May, July, and September 1880; Ramsay in the
Encyclopaedia Britannica, s. v.
Mysteries.
[
L.C.P]
