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Artemis Bear-Leader*

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  11 February 2009

Michael B. Walbank
Michael B. Walbank
Affiliation:
The Calgary Institute for the Humanities, The University of Calgary
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Extract

Editors of Lysistrate have regarded this passage as a kind of cursus honorum of a well-brought-up young Athenian lady: the chorine first served at the age of seven as a bearer of the sacred casket (arrephoros); then at the age of ten as miller of corn for Athena Archegetis (aletris); then followed service as a ‘bear’ (arktos) of Artemis at the Brauronia; finally, she returned to Athens as a basket-bearer (kanephoros), holding a string of figs, when a fair young girl. After this, presumably, she married.

There are several difficulties in this interpretation: notably, the intrusion into service apparently wholly devoted to Athena of a spell as one of Artemis' servants at Brauron; moreover, the evidence is that Artemis' ‘bears’ were pre-pubescent, not young girls on the verge of marriage, as the above interpretation seems to require them to be. Another weakness lies in the period of service as an arrephoros: this passage seems to be the only direct evidence that arrephoroi might be seven-year-old, rather than adolescent, girls.

A more extreme interpretation is that of A. Brelich, who regarded this passage as proof that there existed in fifth-century Athens a system of universal female initiation, based on four successive grades, arrephoria, aletria, arkteia and kanephoria. I do not propose to comment in detail upon Brelich's hypothesis, but critics of it might begin by questioning the age and number of the arrephoroi, and the function and location of the kanephoroi.

Type
Research Article
Information
The Classical Quarterly , Volume 31 , Issue 2 , December 1981 , pp. 276 - 281
Copyright
Copyright © The Classical Association 1981

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References

1 There is some question as to whether the arrephoroi discussed in the Etymologicum Magnum (ed. T. Gaisford, 1848) are male or female: 'Αρρηφορεῖν: Τ⋯ χρυσ⋯ν ⋯σθ⋯τα φορεῖν, κα⋯ χρυσ⋯α τ⋯σσαρες δ⋯ παῖδες ⋯χειροτονο⋯ντο κατ' εὐγ⋯νειαν ⋯ρρηφ⋯ροι ⋯π⋯ ⋯τ⋯ν ⋯πτ⋯ μ⋯χρις ἕ〈ν〉δεκα. Το⋯των δ⋯ δ⋯ο διεκρ⋯νοντο, οἳ δι⋯ τ⋯ς ὑφ⋯ς το⋯ ἱερο⋯ π⋯πλου ἤρχοντο κα⋯ τ⋯ν ἄλλων τ⋯ν περ⋯ αὐτ⋯ν. Λευκ⋯ν δ⋯ ⋯σθ⋯τα ⋯φ⋯ρουν κα⋯ χρυσ⋯α. The girls who participate in the Panathenaic procession on the Parthenon Friezes are all, with one exception, young girls close to adulthood: the exception is the bare-bottomed figure who receives the folded peplos from the Archon Basileus on the East Frieze. I share Martin Robertson's view that this ‘child’ is more likely a girl than a boy (Robertson, M. and Frantz, A., The Parthenon Frieze, London, 1975, p. 51Google Scholar). However, whatever its sex, this ‘child’ is only a head shorter than the Archon, and thus is pubescent, rather than pre-pubescent.

2 Brelich, A., Paides e parthenci (Rome, 1969), pp. 229–311Google Scholar. A less extreme interpretation is that of Parke, H. W., Festivals of the Athenians (London, 1977), pp. 139–43Google Scholar. See also Deubner, L., Attische Feste (Berlin, 1932), pp. 9–17Google Scholar (arrephoria) and 207 (Brauronia), and Ghali-Kahil, L., Antike Kunst 8 (1965), 20–33Google Scholar, and 20 (1977), 86–98 (‘Bears’).

3 See the review of Brelich by Sourvinou [-Inwood], C., JHS 91 (1971), 172–7, especially pp. 174 ffCrossRefGoogle Scholar.

4 Sourvinou-Inwood, C., CQ n.s. 21 (1971), 339–42CrossRefGoogle Scholar.

5 Stinton, T. C. W., CQ n.s. 26 (1976), 11–13CrossRefGoogle Scholar.

6 Mommsen, A., Heortologie (Leipzig, 1864), pp. 7 and 13Google Scholar; Deubner, (supra, n. 2), p. 14Google Scholar.

7 Moeris, p. 130 (ed. Koch), s.v. ⋯ρρηφ⋯ροι.

8 The entries under 'Αρρηφ⋯ροι, 'Αρρηφορία and 'Αρρηφορεῖν in the Etymologicum Magnum seem to conflate several quite different rituals: 'Αρρηφ⋯ροι κα⋯ ⋯ρρηφορ⋯α: 'Εορτ⋯ ⋯πιτελουμ⋯νη τῇ 'Αθηνᾷ, ⋯ν Σκιρροφρι⋯νι μην⋯. Λ⋯γεται δ⋯ κα⋯ το⋯ Ε, ⋯ρρηφορíα. Παρ⋯ τ⋯ ἄρρητα κα⋯ μυστήρια φ⋯ρειν. ῍Η ⋯⋯ν δι⋯ το⋯ Ε, παρ⋯ τ⋯ν ῎Ερσην τ⋯ν Κ⋯κροπς θυγατ⋯ρα, ⋯ρσηφορ⋯α. Τα⋯τῃ γ⋯ρ ἦγν τ⋯ν ⋯ορτήν. For 'Αρρηφορεῖν, see supra, n. 1.

9 1. 27. 3–4.

10 2. 1.

11 IG 2 ii. 3465, 3470, 3471, 3473, 3482, 3486, 3496, 3497, 3516, 3555, 3556, all Athena or Athena Polias; 3472, 3488, 3515, all Athena Polias and Pandrosos; 3461, 3466, 3634, unattributed, but probably all Athena. IG 2 ii. 3528 is also unattributed; here, alone, the girl is called an ⋯ρρηφ⋯ρος.

12 Supra, n. 7.

13 IG 2 ii. 5098 and 5099.

14 For Boiotia see, for example, SEG xviii. 343, line 17; however, Boiotian practices ought to be viewed as distinct from Attic. For Agrai, see Pausanias 1. 19, and Farnell, L. R., The Cults of the Greek States ii (London, 1895), p. 609Google Scholar. New evidence suggests that Farnell's hypothesis may be wrong: an unpublished inscription of the mid-fourth century b.c. (from the Athenian Agora: to be published in a forthcoming issue of Hesperia) mentions an Ileithyeion in Kollytos. The deme of Kollytos lay to the south of the Akropolis, very close to, or even including, the site of Agrai: it is worth mentioning that the inscription is concerned with property belonging to Artemis Agrotera, and that the Ileithyeion is the neighbour of this property, so that it might still be possible to argue that Eileithyia's sanctuary was within the temenos of Artemis Agrotera. However, it is questionable whether Artemis Agrotera and Artemis Brauronia should be used as evidence for each other's cult-practices. In any case, elsewhere in Attica Eileithyia seems to have had her own temple: see Pausanias 1. 18. 4–5. Travlos, J. (Pictorial Dictionary of Ancient Athens, London, 1971, p. 28)Google Scholar places it near the Agora of Caesar and Augustus, that is, to the north-east of the Akropolis.

15 Except, that is, for the male (or female) arrephoroi discussed supra, n. 1.

16 From this passage derives the discussion of aletrides in Eustathios, 1885. 9.

17 The restoration ['Αθεν⋯ι τêι] 'Αρχεγ⋯τ[ιδι---] in line 4 of IG 2 i. 38 (late fifth century b.c.) has never been questioned (see, most recently, Stinton's acceptance of it, op. cit., p. 12), but is by no means certain. IG 2 ii. 674, line 17 (ὅπως ἂν…θ⋯σωσɩν τ⋯ι 'Αθην⋯ι τεῖ 'Αρχη[γέτɩδɩτ]⋯ς φόλεως) seems to be the earliest undoubted reference and is dated in 277/6 b.c. The next reference is in the middle of the second century b.c. (IG 2 ii. 3474), and the Gate of Athena Archegetis, in the Agora of Caesar and Augustus, was dedicated in 11/10 or 10/9 b.c. (IG 2 ii. 3175).

18 Alcibiades 2. 5. The phrase is put into the mouth of Alkibiades.

19 SEG xiii. 26.

20 SEG xxii. 60.

21 IG 2 i. 190b, lines 7–8.

22 IG 2 ii. 1932, lines 13 and 14.

23 The title is restored in SEG xvi. 787, line 2, but this is a very late inscription from Palestine, hardly relevant to the issue here.

24 For the inscriptions from Lykosoura, see IG v. 2. 514–47.

25 It would be a comparatively simple emendation to change τ⋯ρχηγέτι to τ⋯ρκτηγέτι in line 642 (for a similar epithet applied to Artemis, Κυνηγ⋯τις, see Cornutus, ND 34; note that in line 1270 of this play, too, Artemis may be addressed as Hegetis: see note 38, infra). There is no known instance of this title, however. The scholiast evidently read τ⋯ρχηγ⋯τι in the text before him.

26 Ghali-Kahil (supra, n. 2) publishes several krateriskoi, found mostly at Brauron, but also at other Attic sites connected with Artemis; young girls are shown running or dancing, sometimes holding torches or wreaths, in a sanctuary identified as that of Artemis by the presence of a palm-tree. In the Brauron fragments, at least, these girls are sometimes shown naked, sometimes clothed in a short chiton. In her 1977 article she publishes two fragments of a krateriskos, of which one depicts a real bear (drawing, fig. 4, p. 91), and the other depicts young, naked girls running away (drawing, fig. 3, p. 91). A fragment of another such vase (drawing, fig. 7, p. 93) shows a priestess wearing a bear-mask. That these vases depict the ritual of the arkteia I have no doubt.

27 Schol. Aeschines, Ctes. 120 (p. 90, ed. Dindorf): ⋯ορτ⋯ παρ' 'Αθηναíοις ⋯ν ᾗ αἱ παρθ⋯νοι ἱερ⋯ τινα Δήμητρος ⋯ν κανοῖς ⋯β⋯σταζον ⋯π⋯ κεφαλήνς· ὅθεν κανηφ⋯ροι κ⋯κληνται.

28 Schol. Aristophanes, Ach. 242: κατ⋯ τ⋯ν τ⋯ν Διονυσ⋯ων ⋯ορτ⋯ν παρ⋯ τοῖς 'Αθηνα⋯οις αἱ εὐγενεῖς παρθ⋯νοι ⋯κανηφ⋯ρουν; see also IG 2 ii. 3489 (Dionysos); 3220 (Mother of the Gods, Asklepios and Aphrodite); and 4456 and 4480 (Asklepios).

29 IG 2 ii. 3483.

30 IG 2 ii. 3477.

31 For the archaeological history of the sanctuary, see Papadimitriou, J., Scientific American (06 1963), pp. 111–20Google Scholar: the death of the excavator has delayed publication of the site, and this 1963 article remains the most accessible, as well as most extensive, account in print. For the cult in light of the archaeological finds, see Kontis, I., ADelt 22 (1967), 156–207Google Scholar.

32 These votive stelai have not received formal publication, but photographs and slides of them have been on sale for some years at the National Archaeological Museum in Athens and, more recently, at Brauron. At least three stelai are involved, all of the first half of the fourth century, b.c., to judge from their sculptural style and the inscriptions. A photograph of one is published by Alavanou, A., Brauron and Halai Araphenides (Athens, 1972), p. 31Google Scholar. A similar ritual may be involved in the worship of Zeus Meilichios, to judge from a votive stele of the mid-fourth century b.c. (Athens, National Archaeological Museum, no. ΓΛ 1408); for a drawing of this see Nilsson, M., Geschichte der griechischen Religion, i3 (München, 1967), tafel 28. 1Google Scholar.

33 Hesychios, s.v. 'Ηγητηρ⋯α παλ⋯θη σ⋯κων ⋯ν γ⋯ρ τῇ ⋯ορτῇ [παρ⋯] πλυντηρ⋯ων, φ⋯ρουσι παλ⋯θην συγκειμ⋯νην ⋯ξ ỉσχ⋯δων.

34 Hesychios, s.v. Πλυντήρια.

35 Athenagoras, Leg. 1.

36 See infra.

37 See Rogers, B. B., The Lysistrata of Aristophanes (London, 1911), pp. 54–5Google Scholar, where the same suggestion is made. For Artemis Phosphoros, see IG 2 ii. 902 line 8, 977 line 8, and 4659 line 1.

38 Bisetus, followed by Bergler, Bothe and Blaydes; rejected by Van Leeuwen (1903).

39 Rogers, (supra, n. 36), p. 146Google Scholar.

40 Indeed, as the referee for this journal has pointed out to me, Artemis Brauronia seems to have had the same functions, as the women's goddess in Attica, that Persephone may have had in Lokroi. For full discussion of Persephone in Lokroi see Sourvinou-Inwood, C., JHS 98 (1978), 101–21CrossRefGoogle Scholar.