The role of the preistess

Reclaiming the role of the old priestess: Ritual agency and the post -menopausal body in ancient Greece

Gentile, Kristen Marie. The Ohio State University, ProQuest Dissertations Publishing, 2009. 3375833.

These post-menopausal priestesses were exceptional within the Greek sacrificial system as they are the only known example of female cult agents who slaughtered the sacrificial animal. I address the issues of why these women could sacrifice and why they were involved in the Chthonia specifically. I argue that these post-menopausal women were accepted as slaughterers because they were no longer viewed as a threat to the male patrilineal system. In addition, the female focus of the Chthonia as a mystery cult in honor of Demeter prompted the choice of postmenopausal priestesses.In many of the recent studies of women in ancient Greece, the primary focus has been on the adolescent, the parthenos, and the mother and wife, the gynê. These two age groups have a considerable amount of ancient evidence that describes them, especially in relation to their ritual activities. 

the older woman is the graus

\p 4 Joan Breton Connelly draws attention to the similarity between the activities performed by women in the home and those done in the temple.11 Women weave, bake, and clean both as part of their household responsibilities and as their duties in the temple.

p 6 like priestess like goddess, changing roles for women reflected in different deities, identification

Specifically, she sees an intimate relationship between the priestess and goddess, one akin to impersonation

 p 57 The necessary characteristics and qualifications of a female to become a priestess varied according to local cult traditions. I consider two of these characteristics in this chapter—age and sexual status—because of their bearing on a woman‟s ability to attain ritual purity. The acquisition and maintenance of ritual purity was important for all individuals who were engaged in sacred practices. Ritual purity highlights the boundaries between sacred and profane times, spaces, and events

p 57 Pollution resulted from a variety of natural life events, including birth and death, with which women were intimately connected. Additionally, pollution was associated with sexual intercourse, and so short periods of chastity or complete sexual abstinence were at times demanded for the sake of ritual purity.
 

 p60 According to ancient gynecological conceptions, post-menopausal women were able to regain a sense of virginity, and with their “renewed virginity,” post-menopausal women achieved the same level of ritual purity as young women who were still physical virgins.

p 63 Ancient Greek cults more commonly assured ritual purity through physical virginity by restricting the length of service until a female entered puberty or married. Some cults did not make the requirement for physical virginity explicit. Virginity was simply assumed because of the young age of the females who served, as was the case with the arrhêphoroi in Athens, who were typically between seven and eleven years old.7 Other cults specifically required that a parthenos serve as the priestess until the time of her marriage. For example, both the priestesses of Poseidon at Kalaurea and Artemis at Aegeira in Achaea were described as parthenoi (Paus. 2.33.2; 7.26.5). Pausanias identifies each as a priesthood in which a parthenos served until she reached an age when it was appropriate for her to marry. The practice of limiting the required time for physical virginity reflects the social status and value of the parthenos.
 

p 66 While there is evidence of many priestly offices to which married women in their sexual prime were appointed, there is scarcely any mention of requirements for prolonged sexual abstinence. One of the most notable examples of such a priesthood is the priestess of Athena Polias in Athens.12 Evidence shows that she was involved in numerous festivals, including the Chalkeia, Plynteria, Kallynteria, Skira, and the Eleusinian Mysteries. There are no known regulations about any periods of chastity surrounding her religious duties; however, there are extant regulations against the consumption of Attic cheese and the sacrificing of ewe-lambs. Abstinence, however, is associated with the celebrations of the Thesmophoria. Both the women who attended the festival and the officials had requirements of chastity.13 Notably, the women who served as the antletriai at the Thesmophoria in Athens had to remain chaste for three days prior to the festival as well as during the festival itself.

p 76 As both medical and popular evidence show, virginity in antiquity was understood to be as much a social condition as a physiological one. These gynecological ideas have important religious implications, especially regarding ritual purity. Through renewed virginity, celibate post-menopausal women were equivalent to young physical virgins in terms of their level of ritual purity. With their renewed virginity, old women were excellent candidates for priesthoods, which required both an extended length of service and a high degree of ritual purity. This conception of renewed virginity is further supported in the mythology of the goddess Hera. Pausanias reports an Argive tradition in which Hera renews her virginity annually.
 

p 80 Diodorus It is said that in ancient times parthenoi delivered the oracles on account of their uncorrupted nature and their similarity to Artemis. Thus, it was fitting for these females to protect the secrets of prophesying. But at an earlier time, Echecrates the Thessalian visited the oracle and saw the prophesying parthenos. He desired her on account of her beauty, and so he stole her away and ravaged her. On account of this terrible incident, the Delphians determined that in the future a parthenos would no longer deliver oracles, but a woman, older than fifty years, would prophesy. And she would dress in the attire of a parthenos, as a remembrance of the earlier priestess.

regarding the oracle at Delphi

p 98 the evolutionary theory of sacrifice- communion with gods

the functionalist theory- Evans Pritchard

p 99 Walter Burkert‟s Homo Necans: The Anthropology of Ancient Greek Sacrificial Ritual and Myth and René Girard‟s Violence and the Sacred propose theories of sacrifice that radically altered the theoretical landscape that is communal murder, ( Freud) and guilt

p101 The “Paris School” rejects the comparison of Greek sacrificial ritual and hunting rites; it insists that Greek sacrifice must be studied in the context of the Greek religious system

p103 Once the sacrificial victim was chosen, both the animal and the human participants prepared themselves for the sacrifice. The animal was typically adorned with ribbons, garlands, or even gold.22 Not only were the animals beautified, but also the people involved often wore special attire, such as white clothing or wreaths. These initial physical preparations made them ready to perform the preliminary sacrificial rites. The sacrifice began with a procession, which marked off ordinary from sacred space and private from public space.23 Different members of society played distinct roles in the procession and eventually the sacrifice itself. Men led the sacrificial victim, while parthenoi acted as the carriers of sacrificial objects; for instance, as hydrophoroi and kanêphoroi, they carried the water for the sacrifice and the basket in which the sacrificial knife was hidden among the barley groats.24 Flute players and other musicians accompanied the procession, while a crowd of people, often of mixed genders and ages, followed.

there was prayer and Great care was taken so that the sacrificial blood fell only was it was supposed to go. “At this very emotional moment the pipes stayed silent,” and the female participants shouted the ololygê. 30 The ololygê as a ritual cry was not unique to sacrificial ritual; it was also associated with rituals surrounding
 

while women seem to be excuded from acrifice and even eating ghe meat 

the two documented instances of women wielding the sacrificial knife: the Ruvo amphora in the Naples museum and the evidence concerning the Chthonia in Hermione.38 Both are explained as exceptional instances of cult practice to Dionysius and Demeter, respectively.39

p 109 The ritual system of Hermione exemplifies the issues concerning the role of women in the Greek sacrificial system. The festival of the Chthonia in Hermione involved four post-menopausal women acting as priestesses, sacrificers, and slaughterers.

p 117 Four old women, who remain inside, are the ones who put an end to the cow. For whoever has the opportunity, cuts the throat of the cow with a sickle. Afterwards the doors are opened and those responsible for the task drive in the second cow, and then the third, and after that one the final fourth one. The old women put an end to all the cows in the same way, and there exists another marvel during the sacrifice: on whatever side the first cow falls, it is necessary for all of them to fall. The ritual activities of the priestesses took place inside of the temple, not at an altar in front of the temple. Because the sacrifice occurred inside the temple, it was secret and unobserved by the throng of processional participants, unlike a typical sacrifice that was observed. The physical act of slaughter also did not follow the normal process in which the blood must flow onto the altar. Gunnel Ekroth has suggested that only a small amount of blood was sprinkled on the altar during a typical animal sacrifice.71 The infrequent depictions of the actual moment of slaughter and the small size of the bloodstains shown on representations of altars support her arguments on the relative insignificance of the spilling of the blood. The Chthonia, on the contrary, seems to emphasize blood. Blood must have drenched the floor of the temple since four cows were being killed in a confined space.
 

p128 ; agnates are instead people who sacrifice together—who know they are agnates because they sacrifice together.”

p130 Male anxiety over paternity, and in effect their future heirs, fueled their fear of childbirth and, subsequently, childbearing women. Therefore, social and ritual paternity through sacrifice, rather than biological paternity, became a more secure method for male Greeks to establish their heirs. Patrilineality and the accompanying opposition between childbirth and sacrifice consequently developed together in the Greek social system.

p136

The most renowned mystery cult in antiquity, in terms of both Demeter and the entire Greek religious system, was at Eleusis in Attica. I

Paula Perlman has suggested that the Hermionians were actively trying “to establish the Chthonia as a local counterpart to the far more famous Mysteries at Eleusis.”127 These efforts can be seen in the appointment of the theorodokoi, in the local variations of mythology, and in the specifics of the festival. The interpretation of the Chthonia as a mystery cult provides the most likely explanation for the appointment of post-menopausal women as priestesses, but first it is necessary to explore the Chthonia as a mystery cult, akin to the Eleusinian Mysteries.

p 138 Scholars who favor this interpretation of the Chthonia as a mystery cult argue that the eight lists of nearly five hundred names are initiates to the mysteries of the Chthonia (IG IV 728, 730-735; SEG XI 382). These lists date to the fourth century to third century BCE and preserve both male and female initiates, just like the lists from the Eleusinian Mysteries.128 Alternatively, Pirenne-Delforge denies that these lists contain the names of initiates or that mysteries even existed in Hermione.129 She argues that the silence of Pausanias concerning any initiatory mysteries is proof of their non-existence. PirenneDelforge connects the secret rites at the periboloi to agrarian rituals like the Thesmophoria, which supports her overall interpretation of the festival as the result of a famine and celebration of harvest.

A mention of Demeter Chthonia in one of the so-called “Orphic” gold tablets also associates her with the tangled web of mystery cult figures and language.gold tablet dates to the late fourth or early third century BCE and was found near Pherai in Thessaly.1send me to the feasts of the initiates; I have the rites and the rituals of Demeter Chthonia and of the Mountain Mother.”132 The purpose of the gold tablet was to guide the initiate in the underworld towards a better afterlife. This gold tablet connects Demeter Chthonia to the intricate eschatological system that is associated with these tablets and various mystery cults. While it does not specifically prescribe a set of eschatological beliefs to the worship of Demeter Chthonia in Hermione, it does suggest that Demeter Chthonia is connected to this tradition.1

p 140 Plouton‟s role in the Hermionian religious system was much more pronounced. The Hermionians worshipped the god of the underworld in numerous forms to such an extent that they appeared to have a preoccupation with what is beneath the ground. The Hermionians, in fact, contended that they possessed a direct passage to the underworld and, therefore, had a special connection to the deities of the dead. They believed that their privileged connection freed them from the obligation of putting money in the mouths of the dead to pay for passage to the underworld (Str. 8.6.12). Their preoccupation with the underworld extended to their ritual system.

Pausanias identifies three sacred precincts associated with the underworld.

Behind the temple of Chthonia, there are places that the Hermionians call the one of Klymenos, the one of Plouton, and the third of these, the Acherusian Lake. All are surrounded by stone fences, and in the one of Klymenos there is a chasm in the earth. Herakles led the Hound of Hell [Cerberus] up through this chasm, according to the stories of the Hermionians 

p141 The Hermionians believed that the sibling pair, Klymenos and Chthonia, founded the temple, while the Argive tradition retains the mythic pattern in which punishment ensues after a god is denied hospitality. The Argive version centers on Chthonia, who disapproved of her father‟s failure to offer hospitality to Demeter. Consequently, Chthonia was saved from her father‟s punishment of being burned alive and was carried away to Hermione, where she set up a sanctuary to Demeter in praise and

p144 two additional priesthoods, which were filled by post-menopausal women: the Sixteen Women of Elis and the fourteen Gerarai of Athens. Both are examples of collective priesthoods, in that multiple individuals served at one time.the administrative and ritual duties of the college, namely the weaving of Hera‟s peplos, arrangement of choruses, and organization of the Heraia. These responsibilities are both explicitly and implicitly connected to the institution of marriage. It is the association of the Sixteen Women with marriage, in particular their interactions with the parthenoi who participated in the Heraia that necessitated their post-menopausal identity.

p149 The ritual roles of the Sixteen Women can be divided into three parts: they wove a peplos for Hera, arranged choruses, and organized the Heraia. The first of these roles, the weaving of the peplos, was performed every fourth year, probably in conjunction with the Heraia (Paus. 5.16.2; 6.24.10).

p164 In conclusion, the stereotype of the old woman as wise, demonstrated in the ancient figure of the nurse, the constructs of intergenerational cultural transmission, and the fairy godmother, explains the choice of post-menopausal women for the college of the Sixteen Women. Because of their ritual role in guiding and counseling the parthenoi, the Sixteen Women needed to be of advanced age so that they would have already experienced the life events of marriage and motherhood.
 

p 168The feminine forms of these adjectives, γεξαξά, γεξαηξά, and γεξαηά, were primarily associated with cultic functions. Whether in the case of the Gerarai of Athens or other priestesses, these adjectives became synonymous with cult titles. In fact, even in their usage in the Homeric scene described above, the women are performing ritual activities, although they are not specifically priestesses. In addition to the association of this cult title with these priestesses of Dionysus in Athens, other priesthoods had similar cult titles.

p 169 these women required the high level of ritual purity that could be attained by post-menopausal woman through renewed virginity. Their need for ritual purity is explicitly expressed in the ancient evidence. Moreover, because of their presumed role as assistants to the basilinna during the Anthesteria, specifically in regard to the hieros gamos, “the sacred marriage,” the Gerarai needed to possess the requisite knowledge and experience of marriage to guide her through this ritualized marital process.
 

p171 In the speech of ps.-Demosthenes, a sacred herald is called as a witness, and he repeats in court the oath, or more likely a part of it, that the Gerarai recited (D. 59.78). The oath emphasizes the physical purity of the priestesses; “I live purely and I am unpolluted and pure from others who are polluted and from intercourse with a husband,” ἁγηζηεύσ θαὶ εἰκὶ θαζαξὰ θαὶ ἁγλὴ ἀπό ηε ηῶλ ἄιισλ ηῶλ νὐ θαζαξεπόλησλ θαὶ ἀπ‟ ἀλδξὸο ζπλνπζίαο (D. 59.78). Much of the vocabulary in this oath is familiar from previous discussions of ritual purity, such as that concerning the Pythia, and points to the Gerarai as being a celibate post-menopausal women. In the oath of the Gerarai, two forms of ἁγλόο and θαζαξόο, one adjectival and one verbal, are used. The chiasmatic word order of this “purity” vocabulary further emphasizes the necessity for the ritual purity of the Gerarai and the importance of the oath in proclaiming so.

p175 It is clear from the sources that the Gerarai were priestesses of Dionysus

p 179 The events of the Anthesteria have been analyzed by a number of eminent scholars.86 While much debate exists concerning the details, there is consensus about the basics of the festival. The Anthesteria occurred on the eleventh, twelfth, and thirteenth days of the month of Anthesterion. Each day had its own name: Pithoigia, “Jaropening,” Choes, “Wine-jugs,” and Chytrai, “Pots,” chronologically. One of the main issues on which scholars have agreed when attempting to summarize or make generalizations about the Anthesteria, is the diverse nature of the ritual activities that were a part of the festival. Generally, the Anthesteria is seen as being concerned with two distinct themes, wine and the world of the dead.87 I do not provide a detailed account of the Anthesteria, as other scholars have already presented such descriptions, and, ultimately, most of the details are not pertinent to the involvement of the Gerarai. Instead, I focus on those aspects in which the Gerarai were assumed to participate, specifically the secret rituals at the sanctuary of Dionysus in the Marshes and the hieros games between the basilinna and Dionysus.
 

p 180scholars have made assumptions and attempted to reconstruct the events of this festival that took place inside the sanctuary from iconographic evidence, especially a group of vases known as the Lenaia vases. These vases depict women drawing wine, drinking, and dancing around a masked idol of Dionysus. They are distinctive in that the women do not seem to have a frenzied or bacchic character, but instead are elegant and subdued as would be expected of priestesses with the venerable quality inherent in the cult title the Gerarai. 88 While it is not impossible that these vases depict the ritual activities of the Gerarai, it would be unusual for rites acknowledged as secret to be displayed so vividly and publicly.

p181it seems more likely that actual sexual intercourse occurred, which necessitated a living representation of the god.92 Suggested mortals include the priest of Dionysus and the archon basileus himself. However, because of the emphasis on the uncorrupt and married nature of the basilinna, the archon basileus is most plausible, although he may have worn a mask during the act. Ultimately, the reenacted sacred marriage was the sexual union between legitimate husband and wife.

p182 4 The Old Priestess as “Othermother” and Guide The stereotype of the wise old woman and her ability to pass on important cultural traditions prompted the choice of post-menopausal women for the collective priesthoods of the Sixteen Women of Elis and the Gerarai of Athens. In each of these priesthoods, marriage played an integral role in their ritual responsibilities. For the Sixteen Women, their role, most notably in the Heraia, placed them in a position to counsel and guide the younger generation as they moved to the next stage of womanhood. Old women were seen as reservoirs of wisdom and cultural knowledge and, thusly, are in a privileged position to act as “othermother” to the parthenoi of Elis. The Gerarai served in many ways as a foil to the Sixteen Women because they had a similar role, albeit they fulfilled it symbolically. Because the bride in the hieros gamos during the Anthesteria was not a parthenos but a gynê, there was not the same need for counsel. However, the hieros gamos emphasized the connections to actual wedding ritual, and so the Gerarai as postmenopausal women still had wisdom and knowledge to share. The Sixteen Women of Elis and the Gerarai of Athens were both priesthoods that emphasized old women as wise and knowledgeable as the relevant social aspect of their post-menopausal identity.

p183 In turn, consider the matters of the gods. I think these things are the essential ones. We as women have the greatest part in them. For women prophesy the insight of Loxias at the oracles of Phoebus. Concerning the hallowed site of Dodona, beside the sacred oak tree, the female sex reveals the insights of Zeus to those from Greece who desire them. Regarding the rituals for the Fates and the Unnamed Goddesses [the Furies], they would not be considered holy under the control of men, but in the power of women, they all thrive. For this reason, women rightly have a share in the matters of the gods. As this often quoted fragment from Euripides‟ tragedy, Captive Melanippe, illustrates, the importance of women as priestesses in Greek religion was recognized in antiquity. T