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Acharnian Gate
Acharnae or Acharnai (; grc, Ἀχαρναί) was a ''deme'' of ancient Athens. It was part of the phyle Oineis. Acharnae, according to Thucydides, was the largest deme in Attica. In the fourth century BCE, 22 of the 500 members of the boule (ancient Greece), Athenian council came from Acharnae, more than from any other deme. Name The place-name of Acharnae is most likely pre-Greek in origin, similar to other place-names throughout Attica. During antiquity it was believed that the name originated from the word () or (), meaning seabass, due to the shape of the plain that Acharnae was in looking like a fish. Another view was that the name originated from Acharnas, one of the mythical heroes from Attica and the supposed founder of the city. Location Acharnae was located in the west-northwest part of the Attic plain, 60 stadion (unit), stadia north of Athens, south of Mount Parnes. The site of Acharnae is located at and southwest of Menidi (renamed to modern Acharnes). It w ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Deme
In Ancient Greece, a deme or ( grc, δῆμος, plural: demoi, δημοι) was a suburb or a subdivision of Athens and other city-states. Demes as simple subdivisions of land in the countryside seem to have existed in the 6th century BC and earlier, but did not acquire particular significance until the reforms of Cleisthenes in 508 BC. In those reforms, enrollment in the citizen-lists of a deme became the requirement for citizenship; prior to that time, citizenship had been based on membership in a phratry, or family group. At this same time, demes were established in the main city of Athens itself, where they had not previously existed; in all, at the end of Cleisthenes' reforms, Athens was divided into 139 demes, to which one can be added Berenikidai (established in 224/223 BC), Apollonieis (201/200 BC), and Antinoeis (added in 126/127). The establishment of demes as the fundamental units of the state weakened the ''gene'', or aristocratic family groups, that had dominated t ... [...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] |
