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Anthesteria
The Anthesteria (; grc, Ἀνθεστήρια ) was one of the four Athenian festivals in honor of Dionysus. It was held each year from the 11th to the 13th of the month of Anthesterion, around the time of the January or February full moon. The three days of the feast were called Pithoigia, Choës, and Chytroi. It celebrated the beginning of spring, particularly the maturing of the wine stored at the previous vintage, whose ''pithoi'' were now ceremoniously opened. During the feast, social order was interrupted or inverted, the slaves being allowed to participate, uniting the household in ancient fashion. The Anthesteria also had aspects of a festival of the dead: either the Keres () or the Carians () were entertained, freely roaming the city until they were expelled after the festival. A Greek proverb, employed of those who pestered for continued favors, ran "Out of doors, Keres! It is no longer Anthesteria". Name The name is usually connected with (), the combining form ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Choes
The Anthesteria (; grc, Ἀνθεστήρια ) was one of the four Athenian festivals in honor of Dionysus. It was held each year from the 11th to the 13th of the month of Anthesterion, around the time of the January or February full moon. The three days of the feast were called Pithoigia, Choës, and Chytroi. It celebrated the beginning of spring, particularly the maturing of the wine stored at the previous vintage, whose ''pithoi'' were now ceremoniously opened. During the feast, social order was interrupted or inverted, the slaves being allowed to participate, uniting the household in ancient fashion. The Anthesteria also had aspects of a festival of the dead: either the Keres () or the Carians () were entertained, freely roaming the city until they were expelled after the festival. A Greek proverb, employed of those who pestered for continued favors, ran "Out of doors, Keres! It is no longer Anthesteria". Name The name is usually connected with (), the combining form of ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Dionysus
In ancient Greek religion and myth, Dionysus (; grc, Διόνυσος ) is the god of the grape-harvest, winemaking, orchards and fruit, vegetation, fertility, insanity, ritual madness, religious ecstasy, festivity, and theatre. The Romans called him Bacchus ( or ; grc, Βάκχος ) for a frenzy he is said to induce called ''bakkheia''. As Dionysus Eleutherios ("the liberator"), his wine, music, and ecstatic dance free his followers from self-conscious fear and care, and subvert the oppressive restraints of the powerful. His ''thyrsus'', a fennel-stem sceptre, sometimes wound with ivy and dripping with honey, is both a beneficent wand and a weapon used to destroy those who oppose his cult and the freedoms he represents. Those who partake of his mysteries are believed to become possessed and empowered by the god himself. His origins are uncertain, and his cults took many forms; some are described by ancient sources as Thracian, others as Greek. In Orphic religion, he wa ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Basilinna
The ''Basilinna'' ( grc-gre, Βασιλίννα) or ''Basilissa'' (), both titles meaning "queen", was a ceremonial position in the religion of ancient Athens, held by the wife of the ''archon basileus''. The role dated to the time when Athens was ruled by kings, and their wives acted as priestesses (Hiereiai). The duties of the basilinna are described in the pseudo-Demosthenic speech ''Against Neaira'', which is the main source of evidence about the position. The laws which set out the qualifications for a basilinna were inscribed on a stele which stood in the sanctuary of Dionysus at Limnai. She was expected to be of Athenian birth and not previously married, though Noel Robertson argues that these requirements may have been ignored as inconvenient. The most important duty of the basilinna appears to have been taking part in a sacred ritual marriage to the god Dionysus as part of the Anthesteria. This ceremony seems to have taken place at the Boukoleion, near the Prytaneion ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Athenian Festivals
The festival calendar of Classical Athens involved the staging of many festivals each year. This includes festivals held in honor of Athena, Dionysus, Apollo, Artemis, Demeter, Persephone, Hermes, and Herakles. Other Athenian festivals were based around family, citizenship, sacrifice and women. There were at least 120 festival days each year. Athena The Panathenaea ( grc, Παναθήναια, "all-Athenian festival") was the most important festival for Athens and one of the grandest in the entire ancient Greek world. Except for slaves, all inhabitants of the ''polis'' could take part in the festival. This holiday of great antiquity is believed to have been the observance of Athena's birthday and honoured the goddess as the city's patron divinity, Athena Polias ('Athena of the city'). A procession assembled before dawn at the Dipylon Gate in the northern sector of the city. The procession, led by the Kanephoros, made its way to the Areopagus and in front of the Temple of Athen ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Keres (mythology)
In Greek mythology, the Keres (; Ancient Greek: Κῆρες), singular Ker (; Κήρ), were female death-spirits. They were the goddesses who personified violent death and who were drawn to bloody deaths on battlefields. Although they were present during death and dying, they did not have the power to kill. All they could do was wait and then feast on the dead. The Keres were daughters of Nyx, and as such the sisters of beings such as Moirai, who controlled the fate of souls, and Thanatos, the god of peaceful death. Some later authorities, such as Cicero, called them by a Latin name, ''Tenebrae'' ("the Darknesses"), and named them daughters of Erebus and Nyx. Etymology The Greek word κήρ means "death" or "doom" and appears as a proper noun in the singular and plural as Κήρ and Κῆρες to refer to divinities. Homer uses ''Κῆρες'' in the phrase ''κήρες θανάτοιο'', "Keres of death". By extension the word may mean "plague, disease" and in prose "ble ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Anthesterion
The Attic calendar or Athenian calendar is the lunisolar calendar beginning in midsummer with the lunar month of Hekatombaion, in use in ancient Attica, the ancestral territory of the ancient Athens, Athenian polis. It is sometimes called the Greek calendar because of Athens's cultural importance, but it is only one of many Ancient Greek calendars, ancient Greek calendars. Although relatively abundant, the evidence for the Attic calendar is still patchy and often contested. As it was well known in Athens and of little use outside Attica, no contemporary source set out to describe the system as a whole. Further, even during the well-sourced 5th and 4th centuries BC, the calendar underwent changes, not all perfectly understood. As such, any account given of it must be a tentative reconstruction. Local focus The Attic calendar was an exclusively local phenomenon, used to regulate the internal affairs of the Athenians, with little relevance to the outside world. For example, just acr ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Jane Ellen Harrison
Jane Ellen Harrison (9 September 1850 – 15 April 1928) was a British classics, classical scholar and linguistics, linguist. Harrison is one of the founders, with Karl Kerenyi and Walter Burkert, of modern studies in Ancient Greek religion and Greek mythology, mythology. She applied 19th-century archaeology, archaeological discoveries to the interpretation of ancient Greek religion in ways that have become standard. She has also been credited with being the first woman to obtain a post in England as a ‘career academic’. Harrison argued for women's suffrage but thought she would never want to vote herself. Ellen Wordsworth Darwin, Ellen Wordsworth Crofts, later second wife of Sir Francis Darwin, was Jane Harrison's best friend from her student days at Newnham, and during the period from 1898 to her death in 1928. Life and career Harrison was born in Cottingham, East Riding of Yorkshire, Cottingham, Yorkshire on 9 September 1850 to Charles and Elizabeth Harrison. Her mo ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Eleusinian Mysteries
The Eleusinian Mysteries ( el, Ἐλευσίνια Μυστήρια, Eleusínia Mystḗria) were initiations held every year for the cult of Demeter and Persephone based at the Panhellenic Sanctuary of Elefsina in ancient Greece. They are the "most famous of the secret religious rites of ancient Greece". Their basis was an old agrarian cult, and there is some evidence that they were derived from the religious practices of the Mycenean period.Dietrich (1975) ''The origins of Greek Religion''. Bristol Phoenix Press pp. 166, 167Walter Burkert. (1985)''Greek Religion''. Harvard University Press. p. 285 The Mysteries represented the myth of the abduction of Persephone from her mother Demeter by the king of the underworld Hades, in a cycle with three phases: the ''descent'' (loss), the ''search'', and the ''ascent'', with the main theme being the ''ascent'' () of Persephone and the reunion with her mother. It was a major festival during the Hellenic era, and later spread to Rome. S ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Chytroi
Chytri (or Khytri, el, Χύτροι) was one of the ten city-kingdoms of Cyprus in antiquity. It was located in the centre of the island, in the territory of Chytraea, west of Mesaoria. Today the modern town of Kythrea (Kyrka) has preserved the ancient name. Ancient history After 1200 B.C. and after the Trojan war many Greek immigrants led by Chytros, son of Alexander and grandson of the Athenian Akamas, hero of the Attican tribe of the same name, settled in Cyprus. Kythrea is situated near the ancient kingdom of Chytroi which was founded by Chytros. There has been found here a necropolis. In the time of the Assyrian king Assurbanipal, Pilagura was King of Kitrusi, one of the ten kingdoms on the island. Numerous inscriptions have been found in the Cypriot dialect, some in ordinary Greek. Chytri was noted for the worship of Apollo, Artemis and Aphrodite Paphia. In Delphic Theorodochoi inscription, one inscription mention the Chytri. Later forms of the name are Cythraia, Cytherei ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Slaves In Ancient Greece
Slavery was an accepted practice in ancient Greece, as in other societies of the time. Some Ancient Greek writers (including, most notably, Aristotle) described slavery as natural and even necessary.Ernest Barker (1906) The Political thought of Plato and Aristotle "The slave is a necessary instrument, like other kinds of wealth, for the moral life." p.313 This paradigm was notably questioned in ; the produced the first recorded condemnation of slavery.J.M. Roberts. '' ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Glossary Of Ancient Roman Religion
The vocabulary of ancient Roman religion was highly specialized. Its study affords important information about the religion, traditions and beliefs of the ancient Romans. This legacy is conspicuous in European cultural history in its influence on later juridical and religious vocabulary in Europe, particularly of the Western Church. This glossary provides explanations of concepts as they were expressed in Latin pertaining to religious practices and beliefs, with links to articles on major topics such as priesthoods, forms of divination, and rituals. For theonyms, or the names and epithets of gods, see List of Roman deities. For public religious holidays, see Roman festivals. For temples see the List of Ancient Roman temples. Individual landmarks of religious topography in ancient Rome are not included in this list; see Roman temple. __NOTOC__ Glossary A abominari The verb ''abominari'' ("to avert an omen", from ''ab-'', "away, off," and ''ominari'', "to pronounce on an ome ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Photios I Of Constantinople
Photios I ( el, Φώτιος, ''Phōtios''; c. 810/820 – 6 February 893), also spelled PhotiusFr. Justin Taylor, essay "Canon Law in the Age of the Fathers" (published in Jordan Hite, T.O.R., & Daniel J. Ward, O.S.B., "Readings, Cases, Materials in Canon Law: A Textbook for Ministerial Students, Revised Edition" ollegeville, MN: The Liturgical Press, 1990, p. 61 (), was the ecumenical patriarch of Constantinople from 858 to 867 and from 877 to 886. He is recognized in the Eastern Orthodox Church as Saint Photios the Great. Photios is widely regarded as the most powerful and influential church leader of Constantinople subsequent to John Chrysostom's archbishopric around the turn of the fifth century. He is also viewed as the most important intellectual of his time – "the leading light of the ninth-century renaissance". He was a central figure in both the conversion of the Slavs to Christianity and the Photian schism, and is considered " e great systematic compiler of the Eas ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
