Jenay Clark

Oxford Readings in Greek Religion

Chapter 3: Tribes, Festivals, and Processions

by W. R. Connor

I. Scholarly Attention

• Archaic Age between the 8th & 5th centuries reveals that society and economics were closely connected to politics of the period.

1. Scholars have pointed out that Greek rituals are usually associated with specific political movements or leaders and the development of cult and festivals (57-58).

2. Distance between leaders and followers, traditionally assumed.

3. Manipulation of myth and religion for propaganda purposes, usually assumed.

(But W. R. Connor plans to show that there was NOT great distancebetween leaders and followers, and that there was NOT cynical manipulation in ancient Greece)

4) Festivals and political disturbances converge

II. Pisistratus' Return

• A tall woman dressed as Athena escorted Pisistratus upon his arrival after his first exile.

a. Herodotus states Athenians believed that the goddess Athena had really appeared to escort him to Athens. He scoffed at the Athenians gullibility in being fooled that Athena had really appeared -- and riding a chariot of all things.

What can explain this scene?

b. Thought of as a ritual re-enactment of divine fertility (61)

• Pisistratid propaganda-- the association between Heracles and Pisistratus.

a. Pisistratus might have worn a lion skin like Heracles

• Pisistratus became a favorite mortal of a god

a. like mythological characters (i.e. Odysseus, Diomedes, Heracles)

• Processions

a. People praised and likened to gods

i. Verbal

ii. Acted out

b. Processed into the city on a chariot with Athena

i. The chariot ride represents him as a helper of Athena and true protector and ruler of Athens

ii. Pisistratus and Athena's roles were reversed when the both of them returned to Athens after being away from the city

• Athenians did not buy into the whole idea that humans were representing themselves as gods, rather they acted alongside the rulers and helped establish a new civic order, and a renewed affection amongst the people, leader, and protecting divinity. (67)
• The ceremony served as an expression of popular consent
• Divine dress-people sometimes dressed as divinities to draw psychic energy and believed that they had special powers.

a. Pisistratus did not do this however, he only represented himself as a human, but he did however, associate himself with Athena upon his return to the city.

III. Solon's Rule

• "Solon established, as is well known, a new basis for political privileges and prerogatives within his city, by substituting wealth for birth as the principal criterion (68).

a. Citizens were classified into four groups according to the number of units that they produced in agriculture each year

i. Highest class-500 units: Pentekosiomedimnoi

ii. Had the widest range of political priviledges

b. 300 or more units- Knights

i. Somewhat reduced privileges

c. Further down the line were the fourth class-Thetes

i. Very restricted prerogatives

• Wealth Classifications were largely determined by how much salt, honey, wool, milk, meat or flocks of animals you could produce in a year.
• Solon was not the first rules to use the classification system

a. Aristotle's Athenaion Politeia was the first written knowledge of this system

• Solon divided the people into four property classes according to wealth (69), not a new thing in Athens
• First-Fruit offerings were also largely based on wealth, the more you gave to sacrifice the more prominent your place in the procession was when presenting the offerings.
• Chariot drivers were deemed the wealthiest citizens and so forth.....

a. Chariot Drivers-Pentekosiomedimnoi

b. Horse riders-Hippeis

c. Marchers-Zeugitae

• Athenians use of first-fruit offerings and travel arrangements were self-imposing, the Athenians used this system to control each other. They used it to measure whether or not the fruit offerings of people were honestly represented at the festivals.
• Military processions displayed individual status, civic order, and affluence

IV. The leader uses tribal structures, processions, or festivals to state community values and state policy. The leader in many cases is seemingly closely associated with his people and "share" many of their experiences. The leader shares a close affection with his people that the sanctions that the leader imposed where viewed as a way to better the city-state and to strengthen the unity among the people.

"The merging of individual and community interest, the sense of shared goals and well-being, the ability of the effective leader to recognize and give expression to new civic attitudes are all central to political leadership in this period (75).

Return to Main Page: CLST 4003H. Spring, 2002.