Death and Burial in the Greek Word

THESAURUS CULTUS ET RITUUM ANTIQUORUM (ThesCRA) VIII PRIVATE SPACE AND PUBLIC SPACE POLARITIES IN RELIGIOUS LIFE RELIGIOUS INTERRELATIONS BETWEEN THE CLASSICAL WORLD AND NEIGHBOURING CIVILIZATIONS and Addendum to vol. VI DEATH AND BURIAL Supplementum ANIMALS AND PLANTS

The J. Paul Getty Museum, Los Angeles

© 2012 Fondation pour le Lexicon Iconographicum Mythologiae Classicae (LIMC) At LIMC, Basel: Antoine Hermary, Editor in Chief Bertrand Jaeger, Editorial Coordinator Getty Publications 1200 Getty Center Drive Suite 500 Los Angeles, California 90049 – 1682 www.gettypublications.org Typography by Martino Mardersteig, printing and binding by Stamperia Valdonega Group, Verona Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data Thesaurus cultus et rituum antiquorum. p. cm. English, French, German, and Italian. Includes bibliographical references. ISBN 978-0-89236-787-0 (8-volume set--hardcover) ISBN 978-1-60606-102-2 (volume 8--hardcover) 1.∑Greece--Religion--Encyclopedias.∂2.∑Rites and ceremonies--Greece--Encyclopedias. 3.∑Ritual--Greece--Encyclopedias.∂4.∑Rome--Religion--Encyclopedias. 5.∑Rites and ceremonies--Rome--Encyclopedias.∂6.∑Ritual--Rome--Encyclopedias. I.∑Lexicon Iconographicum Mythologiae Classicae (Organization) BL727.T44 2004 292'.003--dc22 2004013084

Addendum to vol. VI

1.e. D E AT H A N D BU R I A L Death and Burial in the Greek World

IV. Greek funerary rituals in their archaeological context contents 1. Introduction . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 2. Prothesis, ekphora, lamentation . . . . . 3. The burial . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 4. Cremation versus inhumation: evidence from the Early Iron Age . . 5. Warrior burials . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 5.1. Geometric burials . . . . . . . . . . 5.2. The «Hero» of Lef kandi . . . . . 5.3. Archaic and Classical burials . . . 6. After the burial . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 7. The cult of the dead in Early Greece 8. Burial practices in Archaic Athens . . 9. Archaic funerary rituals: the «Opferrinnen» ceremony . . . . . 10. Burials of the Classical period . . . . . 11. Classical family periboloi . . . . . . . . . 12. Communal burials of the Classical period . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 12.1. State burials . . . . . . . . . . . . . 12.2. Mass burials . . . . . . . . . . . . . 13. Marking the tombs . . . . . . . . . . . . 13.1. Semata of the Early Iron Age . . 13.2. The Archaic grave markers . . . 13.3. Classical grave stelai . . . . . . . . 13.4. Clay plaques, pinakes and vessels . 14. Macedonian tombs . . . . . . . . . . . . 15. Child burials . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .

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general bibliography : Ahlberg, G., Prothesis and Ekphora in Greek Geometric Art (1971); Alcock, S. E., «Tomb Cult and the Post Classical Polis», AJA 95 (1991) 447–467; Antonaccio, C., «Contesting the Past: Hero Cult, Tomb Cult, and Epic in Early Greece», AJA 98 (1994) 389–410 (= Antonaccio 1); ead., An Archaeology of Ancestors. Tomb Cult and Hero Cult in Early Greece (1995) (= Antonaccio 2); Arrington, N. T., «Topographic Semantics. The Location of the Athenian Public Cemetery and Its Significance for the Nascent Democracy», Hesperia 79 (2010) 499–539; Blandin, B., Les pratiques funéraires d’époque géométrique à Érétrie: espace des vivants, demeures des morts, Eretria XVII (2007); Boardman, J., «Painted Funerary Plaques and Some Remarks on Prothesis», BSA 50 (1955) 51–66 (= Boardman 1); id., «Sex Diπerentiation in Grave Vases», in d’Agostino, B. (ed.), La parola, l’immagine, la tomba. AION 10 (1988) 171–179 (= Boardman 2); Bohen,

B., «Aspects of Athenian Grave Cult in the Age of Homer», in Langdon, S. (ed.), New Light on a Dark Age. Exploring the Culture of Geometric Greece (1997) 44–55; Cavanagh, W. G., Attic Burial Customs ca. 2000–700 B.C. (Ph. D. Bedford College, London 1977); Clairmont, Chr., Patrios Nomos. Public Burials in Athens during the Fifth and Fourth Centuries B.C. (1983); Closterman, W. E., The SelfPresentation of the Family: The Function of the Classical Attic Peribolos Tombs (Ph. D. Johns Hopkins Univ., Baltimore 1999) (= Closterman 1); ead, «Family Members and Citizens: Athenian Identity and the Peribolos Tomb Setting», in Patterson, C. B. (ed.), Antigone’s Answer. Essays on Death and Burial, Family and State in Classical Athens, Helios suppl. 33 (2006) 49–78 (= Closterman 2); Coldstream, J. N., Geometric Greece, 900–700 B.C. (20032) (= Coldstream 1); id., «Hero-Cults in the Age of Homer», JHS 96 (1976) 8–17 (= Coldstream 2); Crielaard, J.-P., «Cult and Death in Early 7th Century Euboea», in Marchegay, S., et al. (eds.), Nécropoles et Pouvoir. Idéologies, pratiques et interprétation (1998) 43–58; Deoudi, M., Heroenkulte in homerischer Zeit (1999); Dicky, K., Corinthian Burial Customs ca. 1000 to 550 B.C. (Ph. D. Bryn Mawr 1992); Garland, R., The Greek Way of Death (1985) (= Garland 1); id., «The Well-ordered Corpse: An Investigation into the Motives behind Greek Funerary Legislation», BICS 36 (1989) 1–15 (= Garland 2); Gnoli, G./Vernant, J. P. (eds.), La mort, les morts dans les sociétés anciennes (1982); Guimier-Sorbets, A.-M./Morizot, Y. (eds.), L’enfant et la mort dans l’Antiquité I. Nouvelles recherches dans les nécropoles grecques. Le signalement des tombes d’enfants (2010); Houby-Nielsen, S., «Interactions between Chieftains and Citizens? 7th Century B.C. Burial Customs in Athens», ActaHyp 4 (1992) 343–374 (= Houby-Nielsen 1); ead., «Burial Language in Archaic and Classical Kerameikos», Proceedings of the Danish Institute at Athens 1 (1995) 129–191 (= Houby-Nielsen 2); ead., «The Archaeology of Ideology in the Kerameikos: New Interpretations of the ‘Opferrinnen’», in Hägg, Polis 41–54 (= Houby-Nielsen 3); ead., «Child Burials in Ancient Athens», in Sofaer Derevenski, J. (ed.), Children and Material Culture (2000) 151–166 (= Houby-Nielsen 4); ead., «Women and the Formation of the Athenian City-State», Metis 11 (1996) 233–260 (= Houby-Nielsen 5); ead., «Grave Gifts, Women and Conventional Values in Hellenistic Athens», in Bilde, P., et al. (eds.), Conventional Values of the Hellenistic Greeks (1997) 220–262 (= Houby-Nielsen 6); Huguenot, C., La Tombe aux Erotes et la Tombe d’Amarynthos, Eretria XIX (2008); Hughes, D. D., «Sacrifice and the Cult of the Dead in Ancient Argos», in Hägg, R./Alroth, B. (eds.), Greek Sacrificial Ritual, Olympian and Chthonian (2005) 75–83; Humphreys, S. C., «Family Tombs and Tomb Cult in Ancient Athens: Tradition and Traditionalism?», JHS 100 (1980) 96–126; Johnston, S. I., Restless Dead. Encounters between the Living and the Dead in Ancient Greece (1999); Kistler, E., Die «Opferrinne-Zeremonie». Bankettideologie am Grab, Orientalisierung und Formierung einer Adelsgesellschaft in Athen (1998); Kottaridi, A., «TÔ ¤ıÈÌÔ ÙË˜ Î·‡ÛË˜ Î·È ÔÈ

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addendum vi 1.e. death and burial, gr./mort et inhumation, gr. Larsson Lovén, L./Strömberg, A. (eds.), Gender, Cult and Culture in the Ancient World from Mycenae to Byzantium (2003) 28–37; Vermeule, E., Aspects of Death in Early Greek Art and Poetry (1979); Whitley, J., «Early States and Hero Cults: A Re-Appraisal», JHS 108 (1988) 173–182 (= Whitley 1); id., Style and Society in Dark Age Greece. The Changing Face of a Pre-literate Society 1100–700 B.C. (1991) (= Whitley 2); id., «The Monuments that Stood before Marathon: Tomb Cult and Hero Cult in Archaic Attica», AJA 98 (1994) 213–230 (= Whitley 3); id., «Gender and Hierarchy in Early Athens», Metis 11 (1996) 209–232 (= Whitley 4).

M·ÎÂ‰fiÓÂ˜. ™Î¤„ÂÈ˜ ÌÂ ·ÊÔÚÌ‹ Ù· Â˘Ú‹Ì·Ù· ÙË˜ ÓÂÎÚfiÔÏË˜ ÙˆÓ AÈÁÒÓ», in Stampolidis 2, 359–371 (= Kottaridi 1); ead., «Macedonian Burial Customs and the Funeral of Alexander the Great», in Pandermalis, D./Drougou, S./Kalogerakou, N. (eds.), Alexander the Great: from Macedonia to the Oikoumene, Congress Veroia 1998 (1999) 113–120 (= Kottaridi 2); Kübler, K., Kerameikos V 1. Die Nekropole des 10. bis 8. Jahrhunderts (1954) (= Kübler 1); id., Kerameikos VI 1. Die Nekropole des späten 8. bis frühen 6. Jahrhunderts (1959) (= Kübler 2); id., Kerameikos VI 2. Die Nekropole des späten 8. bis frühen 6. Jahrhunderts (1970) (= Kübler 3); id., Kerameikos VII 1. Die Nekropole der Mitte des 6. bis Ende des 5. Jahrhunderts (1976) (= Kübler 4); Kurtz, D./Boardman, J., Greek Burial Customs (1971); Lemos, I. S., The Protogeometric Aegean. The Archaeology of the Late Eleventh and Tenth Centuries B.C. (2002); Loraux, N., The Invention of Athens. The Funeral Oration in the Classical City (2006); Morris, I., Burial and Ancient Society (1987) (= Morris 1); id., «Attitudes toward Death in Archaic Greece», ClAnt 8 (1989) 296–320 (= Morris 2); id., Death-Ritual and Social Structure in Classical Antiquity (1992) (= Morris 3); id., «Law, Culture and Funerary Art in Athens, 600–300 B.C.», Hephaistos 11/12 (1992–93) 35–50 (= Morris 4); id., «Burning the Dead in Archaic Athens: Animals, Men and Heroes», in Verbanck-Piérard, A./Viviers, D. (eds.), Culture et Cité. L’avènement d’Athènes à l’époque archaïque (1995) 45–74 (= Morris 5); id., «Archaeology and Archaic Greek History», in Fisher, N./Van Wees, H. (eds.), Archaic Greece. New Approaches and New Evidence (1998) 1–91 (= Morris 6); Oakley, J. H., Picturing Death in Classical Athens. The Evidence of the White Lekythoi (2004); d’Onofrio, A. M., «Korai e kouroi funerari attici», AION 4 (1982) 135–170 (= d’Onofrio 1); ead., «Aspetti e problemi del monumento funerario attico archaico», AION 10 (1988) 83–96 (= d’Onofrio 2); ead., «Le trasformazioni del costume funerario ateniese nell necropolis pre-soloniana del Kerameikos», AION 15 (1993) 143–171 (= d’Onofrio 3); Patterson, C. B., «The Place and Practice of Burial in Sophocles’ Athens», in ead. (ed.), Antigone’s Answer. Essays on Death and Burial, Family and State in Classical Athens, Helios suppl. 33 (2006) 9–48; Pomeroy, S. B., Families in Classical and Hellenistic Greece. Representations and Realities (1997); Sabetai, V., «Marker Vase or Burnt Oπering? The Clay Loutrophoros in Context», in Tsingarida, A. (ed.), Shapes and Uses of Greek Vases (7th–4th Centuries B.C.) (2010) 291–306; Shapiro, H. A., «The Iconography of Mourning in Athenian Art», AJA 95 (1991) 629–656; Snodgrass, A. M., «Les origines du culte des héros dans la Grèce antique», in Gnoli/Vernant 89–105 (= Snodgrass 1); id., «The Archaeology of the Hero», AION 10 (1988) 19–26 (= Snodgrass 2); Sourvinou-Inwood, C., «A Trauma in Flux: Death in the 8th Century and After», in Hägg, R. (ed.), The Greek Renaissance of the Eighth Century B.C. (1983) 33–49 (= Sourvinou-Inwood 1); ead., ‘Reading’ Greek Death, to the End of the Classical Period (1995) (= Sourvinou-Inwood 2); Stampolidis, N. Chr., «Homer and the Cremation Burials of Eleutherna», in Crielaard, J. P. (ed.), Homeric Questions. Essays in Philology, Ancient History and Archaeology (1995) 289–308 (= Stampolidis 1); id. (ed.), K·‡ÛÂÈ˜ ÛÙËÓ EÔ¯‹ ÙÔ˘ X·ÏÎÔ‡ Î·È ÙËÓ ¶ÚÒÈÌË EÔ¯‹ ÙÔ˘ ™È‰‹ÚÔ˘ (2001) (= Stampolidis 2); Stears, K., «The Times They Are Changing: Developments in Fifth-Century Funerary Sculpture», in Oliver, G. J. (ed.), The Epigraphy of Death. Studies in the History and Society of Greece and Rome (2000) 25–58; Strömberg, A., «Private in Life – Public in Death. The Presence of Women on Attic Classical Funerary Monuments», in

Following death, the body was prepared by the women of the family for the prothesis, the lying in state of the deceased3. In Homer the prothesis of the dead heroes extends from two to seventeen days, depending apparently on the social status of the

1. See ThesCRA VI 1 e Death and Burial, gr. I. 2. van Gennep, A., The Rites of Passage (transl. 1960); Kavoulaki, A., «Crossing Communal Space: The Classical Ekphora, ‘Public’ and ‘Private’», in Dasen, V./Piérart, M.

(eds.), \I‰›0 Î·› ‰ËÌÔÛ›0. Les cadres ‘privés’ et ‘publics’ de la religion grecque antique (2005) 130–131. 3. Kurtz/Boardman 143–144; Garland 1, 23–31; Johnston 39–43.

1.

Introduction

Burial rites have always been considered an important part of our understanding of ancient Greek beliefs about death and the afterlife. The necessity of honoring the dead by means of proper rites is frequently mentioned in ancient literature1. The earliest descriptions of a hero’s funeral, namely those of Patroklos, Hektor and Achilles, show that this ritual was already well-established by the time of Homer. The deceased’s journey to the next world was eπected by elaborate ritual conducted by the relatives of the deceased, primarily the women. The Greek funeral had a ritual structure, which in most of its parts seems to have been maintained throughout Antiquity. In general, this structure relates to the schema of rites de passage defined by van Gennep and concentrates on the care of the deceased; the laying-out of the body (prothesis) for mourning, the processional transportation of the body to the place of its deposition (ekphora), and lastly the deposition of its cremated or inhumed remains2. The term «burial rituals» describes the rites perfomed on behalf of the dead at the time of the funeral and also on certain days after the interment, thus giving to the living the opportunity to honour the dead through the socially accepted channels. Periodic oπerings were also made after the burial, as it is shown in the ancient texts and the iconography. Through the material record it is possible to identify the visible expression of those rituals and reconstruct, up to a certain point, a «burial» behaviour.

2. Prothesis, ekphora, lamentation

addendum vi 1.e. tod und bestattung, gr./morte e inumazione, gr.

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deceased. Although there is no evidence as to the length of the prothesis during earlier periods, this was probably defined in each case by the family. This part of the ritual oπered the possibility to perform the traditional lament and initiate the proper rites honouring the deceased and at the same time to define and re-establish their own and their group’s social identity and status. However, the traditional length of the prothesis was later restricted by Solon’s law to a single day. It is uncertain where the prothesis took place, whether inside the house or in the courtyard. The choice may have depended on several factors, as to the time of the year or the weather conditions, although an interior space is frequently indicated on vase representations. The body was washed, anointed with oil and perfume, wrapped in a shroud and then laid out on the funeral kline which served as the funeral bier. A lesser covering was also provided over the body. According to the pictorial representations of the prothesis and ekphora, lamentation was deployed around the funeral kline; mourning women tore their hair in lamentation and probably sang ritualized laments, both ÁfiÔ˜ and ıÚÉÓÔ˜, men paid their final respects and oπerings were presented to the deceased. There is a constant separation of the roles of men and women at the prothesis, depicted on vase representations and matching the literary evidence, accentuating the role of women in caring for the body4. Children were only occasionally allowed to participate5. A number of details as to the placement and care of the body can be seen in the iconography of vases since the geometric period. Mattresses and pillows were used for the placement of the deceased on the bier, the jaws were held by chin straps to prevent gaping, branches and vases containing oil were placed close to the bier in order to prevent bad odors and probably to keep insects away from the corpse. A late addition seems to have been the placing of an obol in the mouth of the deceased as a payment to Charon for ferrying the souls of the dead across the river Styx into the Underworld6. This custom can be found in the literary sources from the late 5th cent. B.C. and approximately from the same period in the graves. The so-called «Charon’s pieces», usually made out of bronze, were not al-

ways inserted in the mouth of the deceased; they could be also found in the hand or loose in the grave. In the cases however that coins were found in numbers inside the graves, a function as grave gifts along with the rest of the oπerings has been suggested. After the performing of the traditional lament during the prothesis, the ekphora took place, when the body was carried out to the place of burial. Family members and other mourners accompanied the dead to the grave, although funerary legislation of the late Archaic and Classical periods sometimes restricted the number of the participants. In Athens, Solon passed laws which regulated the excess of the funeral, as to the number of the participants, the number of garments worn, the duration of prothesis, the amount of food and drink that was consumed during the burial, the time and order of the procession to the grave7. Solon’s legislation is often juxtaposed with the excess of the ekphora and the lamentation during earlier periods. In the depictions of funerals on the Athenian geometric marker vases, whether those were meant to evoke the heroic age described in the epics or as contemporary representations, attention is drawn to prothesis, ekphora and the lament (fig. 1)8. A large number of persons is shown to participate in the diπerent stages of the funerary ritual, while the actual interment is never depicted. Processions of chariots and warriors and indications of funeral games add a heroic symbolism to those representations and create a strong link to the descriptions of funerals of noble leaders and warriors in Homer and Hesiod9. Funerals recur with some variation in the long series of Archaic grave plaques, on black and red-figure loutrophoroi of the 6th and 5th cent., down to the white lekythoi of the later 5th cent. B.C. Shortly after 500 B.C. diπerent moments in the funeral ritual are shown, such as the placing of the body in a co√n and the interment in the ground, which however never became popular10. Archaic and Classical prothesis and ekphora scenes render the diπerent roles of men and women during the ritual. On a clay pinax in the Louvre (ThesCRA VI pl. 49, 1) family members are designated by inscriptions. Generally women stand closer to the head, touching or embracing the de-

4. Shapiro 634–639; Houby-Nielsen 5, 236–243. For images of prothesis and ekphora see ThesCRA VI 1 e Death and Burial, Gr. III.2.1.1. 5. For the depiction of children in the funerals of the geometric period, cf. Ahlberg 99–100. 108 fig. 25. Krater, New York, MMA 14.130.14: ThesCRA VI 1 b Childhood and Adolescence, Gr. pl. 48, 1. For later examples, cf. Oakley 76. 6. Garland 1, 23; Grinder Hansen, K., «Charon’s Fee in Ancient Greece? Some Remarks on a well-known Death Rite», ActaHyp 3 (1991) 207–218; Stevens, S. T., «Charon’s Obol and other Coins in Ancient Funerary Practice», Phoenix 45 (1991) 215–229.

7. Garland 1, 31–34; Garland 2, 1–15; Sourvinou-Inwood 1, 43–48; Shapiro 630–631. 641–644. 8. Ahlberg 46–68; Huber, I., Die Ikonographie der Trauer in der griechischen Kunst (2001) 61–86. For a recent discussion of the Geometric prothesis scenes upon a new amphora from Marathon (= fig.1), cf. Vlachou, V., «A Group of Geometric Vases from Marathon: Attic Style and Local Originality», in Mazarakis Ainian, A. (ed.), The Dark Ages Revisited. Acts of an International Symposium in Memory of William D. E. Coulson (2011) 759–779. 9. Morris 1, 46–52; Morris 2; Sourvinou-Inwood 1. 10. Kurtz/Boardman pls. 36–38; Shapiro 634 n. 30–31; Oakley 145–173. 218–219.

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Fig. 1

ceased, while men stand at the feet or at a distance and are rarely shown charged with the placement of the co√n inside the grave, a moment rarely shown. The practice of dressing and furnishing the deceased, the choice and placement of the oπerings inside the grave have also been associated with the women of the family11. Depictions of prothesis on the red-figure loutrophoroi of the 5th cent. include a smaller group of people; black can be seen for the garments of the mourners, while red is depicted on white lekythoi12.

3. The burial The final stage of the ritual was marked by the interment of the deceased and the final removal from the company of the living13. After the arrival at the grave, the body was either inhumed or cremated. A wooden, clay or stone co√n could be used for the interment, while for cremation a cinerary urn was used to collect the cremated remains, which in turn was interred. Plain stone sarcophagi were in use since the Geometric period, according to the evidence from Corinth. Stone

11. Houby-Nielsen 5, 237–242; Shapiro 634–639. 12. Shapiro 647; Boardman 2, 175. 177–179. For redfigure loutrophoroi, cf. Van den Driessche, B., «Prothésis et cortège de porteurs de lébès sur des fragments de loutrophores attiques à figures rouges du Musée de Louvain-la-Neuve», RALouvain 18 (1985) 34–47. For whiteground lekythoi, cf. Oakley 76–87. 13. Garland 1, 34–37. 14. Kurtz/Boardman 181–182.

sarcophagi of the early 6th to the 5th cent. B.C. were used in the chamber tombs on Aigina14. Clay sarcophagi decorated and unpainted were found in numbers from the 7th cent. in Chios and later in Eastern and Northern Greece. The decorated sarcophagi of East Greece, painted or with relief decoration are mainly of the 6th and early 5th cent. The commonest class of the painted sarcophagi is the so-called Clazomenian, which have been found mainly in East Greece15. Wooden co√ns are only rarely preserved inside the graves16. An impressively preserved wooden larnax from Piraeus regrettably unpublished, is exhibited in the local Archaeological Museum. Libations for purification or as an oπering to the dead were common and residues of liquids are frequently traced in cemeteries, while the ritual oπering of wine and oil is mentioned in a late 5th cent. inscription from Keos17. Burnt sacrifices were also common according to archaeological and literary evidence. Burnt deposits containing pottery and animal bones are usually found above or inside the grave, indicating that part of the funeral ceremonies would take place while the tomb was still open.

15. Cook, R. M., Clazomenian Sarcophagi (1981). For some richly furnished burials in Clazomenian sarcophagi from Abdera, cf. Morris 6, 48. 16. Protonotatiou-Deilaki, E., «KÙÈÛÙfi˜ ˘Ú·ÌÔÂÈ‰‹˜ Ù¿ÊÔ˜ ÂÎ ÙÔ˘ ÓÂÎÚÔÙ·ÊÂ›Ô˘ ÙË˜ KÚ·ÓÓÒÓÔ˜», £ÂÛÛ·ÏÈÎ¿ 3 (1960) 29–46; Kurtz/Boardman fig. 63; Hitzl, I., Die griechischen Sarkophage der archaischen und klassischen Zeit (1991) 196 no. 33 pl. 16. 17. LSCG no. 97; Kurtz/Boardman 200; Andronikos, M., Totenkult. ArchHom III W (1968).


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Oπerings of food and drink, garlands, jewelry, weapons and mainly pottery were presented to the deceased18 and were deposited with the cinerary urn or around the inhumed body inside the grave. Unburnt vases which were packed inside the grave have been seen as food and drink containers for the journey of the deceased to the underworld19. Oπerings are usually seen as symbols of the social position and status of the deceased as well as of the aspirations of the family who use the occasion as a focus for display20. Some of the oπerings were probably the personal possessions of the deceased, such as weapons and tools for men, dress ornaments and household accessories for women, toys and miniature objects for children.

4. Cremation versus inhumation: evidence from the Early Iron Age Diπerent regions of Greece had their own distinctive mortuary practices. Inhumation and cremation were practised usually alternating for a brief time. Age, sex and wealth diπerences were given strong expression in burial, even in the same communities such as Athens21. Single burials were the norm in Attica marking a break with the multiple burials practice of the Bronze Age. From Protogeometric times until the 8th cent. cremation displaced inhumation for adults. The cremation of the deceased took place outside the grave. The ashes were collected and placed in urns, usually neck-handled amphorae for men and belly-handled amphorae for women (fig. 2)22. The urns were then placed in a hole dug at the bottom of a rectangular shaft together with some oπerings. The remains of the pyre were thrown into the shaft which was then filled with earth. This type is known as the «trench-and-hole» cremation23. In a few cases the cremated remains were thrown directly into the shaft together with the debris of the pyre and the oπerings. Remains of broken pots and animal bones found in the fill of the pits indicate that perhaps a funeral feast had taken place. From around the middle of the 9th cent. B.C. the grave was occasionally divided by a barrier into two compartments, one deeper for placing the cremation urn and a shallow one for the unburnt oπerings24.

18. Garland 1, 113–115; Burkert, GrRel (Engl.) 192–193; Papadopoulos, J. K., The Early Iron Age Cemetery at Torone 1 (2005) 385–387. For a Geometric prothesis scene, where gifts are presented to the deceased, cf. Ahlberg 211–212 fig. 39. 19. Coldstream 1, 33. 20. Dickinson, O., The Aegean from Bronze Age to Iron Age. Continuity and Change between the Twelfth and Eighth Centuries B.C. (2006) 177–178; Strömberg, A., Male or Female? A Methodological Study of Grave Gifts as Sex-Indicator in Iron Age Burials from Athens (1993) 44–46. 53–54; Coldstream 1, 78–80; Whitley 4, 221–231; Sabetai 303.

Fig. 2

By the second quarter of the 8th cent. inhumation burials multiply and by the middle of the century become the prevailing rite in Athens, although in the rest of Attica there still is considerable diversity25. For an adult inhumation the body was laid in the grave on its back, in a supine extended position (pl. 39, 1: Athens, Kerameikos), while in some cases traces of rectangular wooden co√ns were found inside the graves. Pottery oπerings were placed around and over the deceased. A funeral feast around the grave is indicated by the burnt remains that were swept inside the shaft. At the end of the ceremony the grave was filled with earth and covered by stone slabs. In the cemeteries of Lef kandi, both inhumation and cremation were practised, but in most of the tombs no traces of full inhumation or cremation were found. Fragments of human remains were placed inside the tombs along with grave goods, indicating the possibility of more complicated funerary rites26. Cremations took place inside the grave. The funeral pyres were built over the rec-

21. Cavanagh; Whitley 2, 102; Morris 1. On the role of cremation in the social evolution of Athens, cf. Morris 5, 45–74. 22. Boardman 2, 171–173; Whitley 2, 110–111; Strömberg (n. 20) 66. 79–80. 23. Morris 1, 18–20 fig. 7. For a discussion of the Protogeometric burials from Athens, cf. Lemos 152–157. 24. Coldstream 1, 56. 81. 25. Morris 5, 64–65. 26. Lef kandi I, 209–216; Lemos 161–168.

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tangular shafts, with dimensions close to the human body. Most of the grave oπerings were found burnt inside the graves they were thrown to the pyre during the funeral, rather than deposited after the burial. In the Argolid, inhumation remained the prevailing rite ever since the Mycenaean period. Large stone cists, shafts and large pithoi were used for the inhumations of adults27. A local peculiarity is the re-use of earlier graves for later burials and the presence of multiple burials as well. Inhumations of adults into large pithoi are also found at Sparta dating from the Geometric period. At Corinth the use of stone sarcophagi for the interment is attested since the Geometric period. In Crete, tholos and chamber tombs continue to be in use, and in some cases there is evidence for use by individual families28. Both inhumation and cremation were practised, though cremation for adults became fully established in the mid 9th cent. B.C. Urns, usually kraters and a variety of pithoi, were used either as a cinerary container or a co√n that was placed in the chamber or the dromos of the tomb. Re-use of Minoan larnakes has also been identified. At Vergina, early burials are found inside and beneath mounds of earth (tumuli), each one containing within its defining circle of stones between five and fifteen inhumations, both male and female. Grave goods of jewelry, weapons and pottery suggest the social status of the deceased29. At Halos, a unique cemetery of tumuli which contained varying numbers of cremation pyres covered by stone cairns began to be used towards the end of the Protogeometric period continuing to Archaic times (pl. 39, 2). Males and females were cremated in situ; the cremation pyres were covered by stone cairns which were then placed underneath earth tumuli. Iron weapons such as swords, spears, and daggers, as well as iron and bronze jewelry, bowls and phialae were found along with ceramic vessels inside the burials. No oπerings were associated with the child burials. Stone structures served as oπering tables for ritual use and in several cases the pyres were marked by standing slabs.

Burials described as «warrior burials» were accompanied by at least one sword and spearhead among other oπensive weapons, and rarely armour. However not each grave furnished with weapons can be identified as a warrior grave, although graves rich in weaponry were proven to belong to young males32. Bronze cauldrons could contain the ashes of the dead warriors, with a lead, bronze or stone cover, in a particularly «heroic manner»33. Inhumation is also attested as a burial practice for male warriors. In the cremation burials, the sword had been deliberately curved with fire and placed around the neck or the belly of the amphora that contained their cremated remains (fig. 3). It seems that such a personal possession of a warrior should not be reused. Knives, spearheads and other iron equipment were also burnt in the fire and then inserted inside the grave beside the urn. Hemispher-

27. Courbin, P., Tombes géométriques d’Argos I (1974); Folley, A., The Argolid 800–600 B.C. An Archaeological Survey (1988) 34–46. 28. Coldstream 1, 383; Cavanagh, W., in Knossos North Cemetery II (1996) 652–675; Sjögren, L., Fragments of Archaic Crete. Archaeological Studies on Time and Space, Boreas 31 (2008) 152–156. 29. Cremation is extremely rare, cf. Andronikos, M., BÂÚÁ›Ó· I: TÔ ÓÂÎÚÔÙ·ÊÂ›Ô ÙˆÓ Ù‡Ì‚ˆÓ (1969) esp. 164; Snodgrass, A. M., The Dark Age of Greece (20002) 160–163 figs. 60–62. 30. Wace, A. J. B/Thompson, M. S., «Excavations at Halos», BSA 18 (1911–12) 1–29, Malakasioti, Z., «T·ÊÈÎÔ› Ù‡Ì‚ÔÈ ÛÙËÓ ÂÚÈÔ¯‹ BÔ˘ÏÔÎ·Ï‡‚·-¶Ï·Ù¿ÓÔ˘ AÏÌ˘ÚÔ‡: H ÂÚ›ÙˆÛË ÙÔ˘ ·ÁÚÔ‡ ¢. ¢ÂÛÔÙÔÔ‡ÏÔ˘», in AÚ¯·ÈÔÊıÈˆÙÈÎ¿ 2 (1997) 189–196; Georganas, I., «Constructing Identities in Early Iron Age Thessaly: The Case

of the Halos Tumuli», OJA 21 (2002) 289–298; id., «Dying in Early Iron Age Thessaly», in AÚ¯·ÈÔÏÔÁÈÎfi ¤ÚÁÔ £ÂÛÛ·Ï›·˜ Î·È ™ÙÂÚÂ¿˜ EÏÏ¿‰·˜ 2, 1 (2006) 195–205. 31. Zaphiropoulou, Ph., «The Tumulus Necropolis at Tsikalario on Naxos», AnnStorAnt n.s. 15–16 (2008–09) 49–55; Snodgrass (n. 29) 156–157; Coldstream 92. 427. 32. Snodgrass, A. M., Early Greek Armour and Weapons (1964) 136–139; Lemos, I. S., «Homeric Reflections in Early Iron Age Elite Burials», in Alram-Stern E./Nightingale, G. (eds.), Keimelion (2007) 275–283; Whitley 4, 215–217; id., «Objects with Attitude: Biographical Facts and Fallacies in the Study of Late Bronze Age and Early Iron Age Warrior Graves», Cambridge Archaeological Journal 12 (2002) 217–232. 33. The earliest examples were found at the cemeteries of Kriezi St. (ArchDelt 22 B [1967] 93) and Dipylon (AM 18 [1983] 104–106); Coldstream 1, 120.

The centre of the tumuli was occupied by a small «tholos» of a rather peculiar type, while child burials in pithoi, pits and cists were placed round the periphery of the tumuli. Traces of funerary meals indicate that ritual libations and animal sacrifices probably took place during and shortly after the burial30. Further to the South, cremation burials underneath stone tumuli were investigated at Tsikalario on Naxos31. The tumuli covered one or more cremations, usually on flat ground or in cists covered by stone slabs. Child enchytrismoi were presumably placed outside the tumuli, although no skeletal remains have been recovered from the interior of the vases. A kind of «road web» facilited, according to Ph. Zaphiropoulou, the way of the visitors in order to find their own burial construction, while a large «menhir» served as a marker of the necropolis. Ritual ceremonies at Tsikalario have been associated with the veneration of ancestors.

5. Warrior burials 5.1. Geometric burials

addendum vi 1.e. tod und bestattung, gr./morte e inumazione, gr. ical bronze bowls were used to cover the urn34. The practice of the «killed» sword is testified in Athens since the Protogeometric period, but also in Euboea and the Cyclades35. In Knossos, cremation in urns accompanied by weapons was a frequent occurrence from the 11th cent. B.C.36. In the Argolid, three inhumation burials of the late 8th cent. B.C. have been characterized as warrior burials, among them the cuirass tomb T. 45 furnished with bronze armour, iron axes, obeloi and firedogs37. About the same period, in a grave excavated within the recently investigated necropolis at Kifissia, a sword of the Naue II type accompanied a male inhumation, probably as an indication of the social status of the deceased rather than evidence for a warrior38. A link between heroic status and the rite of cremation and the placement of the ashes in metal urns of the 8th cent. has been proposed. The manner in which the warriors were buried is strikingly reminiscent of the descriptions of the burials of such heroes as Patroklos and Hector in the Iliad and thus an interpretation of them as heroes has been suggested39. The use of a bronze cauldron as an ash urn is well documented in Crete and spread through Euboea to the West40. It seems that this was the socially accepted rite in order to commemorate the life and deeds of a distinguished dead person that not infrequently went far beyond the domestic and private sector of the community and got a public character. Nevertheless, as O. Dickinson notes: «cremation may have high-status associations at the sites where it was adopted, but it does not seem to have been absolutely required for high status burials»41.

369

Fig. 3

One of the earliest examples of a warrior burial in a «heroic manner» is the adult male cremation that was found beneath the large building at Toumba Lef kandi dated to the early 10th cent. (fig. 4)42. The cremated remains were wrapped in a cloth and placed in a bronze amphora of Cypri-

ot origin, almost a century old. A set of iron weapons, a sword, a razor and a spearhead, were deposited in the shaft next to the amphora. Near the male cremation, a woman was interred with her arms folded, hands and feet crossed. A wooden co√n was used for the female inhumation that was accompanied by a quantity of jewelry including a golden heirloom pendant. An iron knife with an ivory pommel had been placed beside her head. The shaft with the human burials was lined with mudbricks and plastered with clay, while a wooden floor and cover were also identified. The sacrificial burial of four horses was found in a diπer-

34. Coldstream 1, 30–35. From MG II onwards drinking vessels such as skyphoi replaced the bronze bowls as stoppers. 35. Lemos 156 (Athens). 166 (Lef kandi); Coldstream, J. N., «Foreigners at Lef kandi», in Mazarakis Ainian (n. 8) 135–139, esp. 138–139; Popham, M. R./Lemos, I. S., «A Euboean Warrior Trader», OJA 14 (1995) 151–157; Kourou, N., «Tenos-Xobourgo. From a Refuge Place to an Extensive Fortified Settlement», in Stamatopoulou, M./Yeroulanou, M. (eds.), Excavating Classical Culture (2002) 261. 36. Whitley 2, 187. 37. Courbin, P., BCH 81 (1957) 322–386; id., Tombes géométriques d’Argos I (1974) 40–41; Deilaki, E., ArchDelt 26 (1971) 81–82; ead., ArchDelt 28 B (1973) 99; Whitley 2, 189–191. 38. Schilardi, D., «AÚ¯·ÈÔÏÔÁÈÎ¤˜ \EÚÂ˘ÓÂ˜ ÛÙ· BfiÚÂÈ· ¶ÚÔ¿ÛÙÈ· ÙË˜ Aı‹Ó·˜ 1998–2003», in Vasilopoulou, V./ Katsarou-Tzeveleki, S., Afi Ù· MÂÛfiÁÂÈ· ÛÙÔÓ AÚÁÔÛ·-

ÚˆÓÈÎfi, B\ E¶KA TÔ ¤ÚÁÔ ÌÈ·˜ ‰ÂÎ·ÂÙ›·˜ 1994–2003 (2009) 593–612 esp. 597; id., «AÚÈÛÙÔÎÚ·ÙÈÎ¤˜ Ù·Ê¤˜ ·fi ÙÔ °ÂˆÌÂÙÚÈÎfi ÓÂÎÚÔÙ·ÊÂ›Ô ÙË˜ KËÊÈÛÈ¿˜», in Mazarakis Ainian (n. 8) 615–642. 39. Hom. Il. 23, 250–257; 24, 790–801. Antonaccio, C. M., «Lef kandi and Homer», in Andersen, O./Dickie, M. (eds.), Homer’s World: Fiction, Tradition, Reality (1995) 5–27; Popham, M. R./Sackett, L. H./Touloupa, E., «The Hero of Lef kandi», Antiquity 56 (1982) 169–174; Whitley 4, 216–217. 40. D’Agostino, B., «Funerary Ritual and Social Representation: Models and Perspectives», in Ancient Greece at the Turn of the Millennium. Proceedings of the Athens Symposium 2001 (2005) 187–197 esp. 190. 41. Dickinson (n. 20) 189. 42. (= ThesCRA II 3 d Heroization, Apotheosis 12 with bibl.) Popham, M. R./Calligas, P. G/Sackett, L. H., Lefkandi II 2 (1993); Lemos 140–146. 166–168.

5.2. The «Hero» of Lefkandi

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370


Fig. 5

5.3. Archaic and Classical burials

ent shaft close to the human burials (fig. 5). A large clay krater was placed after the burial and probably served as a recipient for liquid libations. Various interpretations have been suggested concerning the function of the building built over the tombs, which depends on the sequence of events from its construction to its abandonment and covering by an earth mound. It has been suggested in view of the presence of the knife and the fact that the burials were made simultaneously, that the woman was killed in order to be buried along with the male warrior43. This rite, similar to modern suttee, is mentioned by Herodotus for the Thracian kings. If this is the case then human along with horse sacrifices were part of the funeral rites for the dead hero at Lef kandi. Sacrifice of horses is a funeral rite known in the Early Iron Age44. Evidence for human sacrifice is fragmentary and rather ambiguous. The better documented and frequently discussed case comes from the cemetery of Orthi Petra at Eleutherna45, where a decapitated young male, probably a slave, was found at the area of the funeral pyre A.

The deposition of weapons in male graves declines rapidly in the early 7th cent. and disappears at least from central Greece at that time46. By contrast, warrior burials continue further north. In the Late Archaic cemetery at Sindos male warriors were interred along with their weapons and arms. Golden masks were occasionally placed on the face of the deceased, a custom that can not be associated exclusively with men but also with rich female interments (pl. 39, 3)47. Rich burials of the mid-7th and 6th cent. B.C. were also found at Iolkos and Krannon, where urn-cremations were placed inside the chamber tombs. A number of oπensive and also defensive weapons and armour accompanied the burials, among other rich oπerings48. Among the «warrior graves» found at Derveni, just north of Thessaloniki, tomb B is known for the elaborate bronze volute krater, used as the cinerary urn for the cremated remains of a middle-aged man and a younger woman49. A group of warrior burials has been found at Aigai dating to the 6th cent. B.C. The dead warriors were cremated and furnished with a number of oπerings and weapons. In one case a bronze cauldron contained the cremated remains wrapped in a cloth, while the «killed» sword of another warrior was found around the cinerary urn50.

43. Hughes, D. D., Human Sacrifice in Ancient Greece. The Literary and Archaeological Evidence (1989) 45–47; Lemos 167. 44. Kosmetatou, E., «Horse Sacrifices in Greece and Cyprus», JPR 7 (1993) 31–41. For 7th cent. B.C. horse burials from Crete, cf. Morris 6, 61; Rizza, G., «Tombes de chevaux», in The Relations between Cyprus and Crete, ca. 2000–500 BC (1973) 294–301. 45. (= ThesCRA I 2 Sacrifices, Gr. 614) Stampolidis 1, 289–308; id., Antipoina, ‘Reprisals’. Contribution to the Study of Customs of the Geometric-Archaic Period (1996) 164–200.

46. Morris 6, 19. 22. 54–55. 57 (Western Greece). 47. Vokotopoulou, I., et al., ™›Ó‰Ô˜. K·Ù¿ÏÔÁÔ˜ ÙË˜ ¤ÎıÂÛË˜ (1985) 80–81. 86–103. 120–127. 152–173. 48. Morris 6, 37–39. 50. 49. Yiouri, E., O ÎÚ·Ù‹Ú·˜ ÙÔ˘ ¢ÂÚ‚ÂÓ›Ô˘ (1978); Musgrave, J. H., «The Cremated Remains from Tombs II and III at Nea Mihaniona and Tomb Beta at Derveni», BSA 85 (1990) 301–325; Themelis, P. G./Touratsoglou, J. P., OÈ T¿ÊÔÈ ÙÔ˘ ¢ÂÚ‚ÂÓ›Ô˘ (1997); Barr-Sharrar, B., The Derveni Krater (2008). 50. Kottaridi 1, 359–361.

Fig. 4


371

Fig. 6

6. After the burial The rites performed on behalf of the dead following the interment are generally referred to as cult of the dead and varied widely both in origin and in actual ritual. Ceremonies were intended as commemorative actions by the family of the deceased after the burial, or to retain the memory of the dead as an ancestor or a hero, although the rituals performed are often di√cult to discern. Ceremonies at the grave were practised on certain days after the funeral. On the third day (Ùa ÙÚ›Ù·), the ninth (Ùa öÓ·Ù·) and a year after (Ùa âÙ‹ÛÈ·), when additional oπerings were made by the relatives to honour the recently deceased. Periodic oπerings were also made on special occasions, while visits to the tombs were fairly frequent judging by the very fact that laws had to be enacted in later periods. The family performed rites on the anniversary of the death, at the grave and at home, and participated in the most important annual public festival for the dead, the Genesia51. Ceremonies of purification were intended to purify the relatives and the house after the burial, as it was believed that death and accordingly the corpse caused pollution for the living52. Cult activities are expressed in an archaeological context by the deposition of oπerings as a ritual action. Liquid oπerings, namely wine and oil, were made on the grave or were directed inside

51. Alexiou, M., The Ritual Lament in Greek Tradition (1974) 7–10; Garland 1, 38–47; Johnston 39–43; Burkert, GrRel (Engl.) 192–193. 52. Garland 1, 43–47; Houby-Nielsen 5, 238–239; Shapiro 634–635; Parker, Miasma 33–39. 53. Kurtz/Boardman 200; Bohen 45; Wells, B., Asine II. Results of the Excavations East of the Acropolis 1970–1974. The Protogeometric Period (1983) 24; Rethemiotakis G./ Egglezou, M./Kritzas Ch., TÔ °ÂˆÌÂÙÚÈÎfi NÂÎÚÔÙ·ÊÂ›Ô ÙË˜ \EÏÙ˘Ó·˜ (2010) 80–82. 205. For the custom of anointing the grave monument, cf. Hägg, R., «A Scene of Funerary Cult from Argos», in Hägg, Iconography 169–176.

the grave through a libation vessel by a hole piercing the bottom53. Burnt deposits also occur54. In some cases ritual activities on contemporary structures can go beyond the private and domestic sphere and take a communal or public character. In these cases the distinguished status of the deceased is considered to function as the motive for such activities. At the site of Skala Oropou a group of stone structures over the partly destroyed oval house IA are dated to the early 7th cent. and were associated with the cult of a local hero. The oπerings and cult utensils included a pedestalled clay lamp, probably for ceremonial use, terracotta horse figurines and a terracotta boat model. The assemblage has been interpreted by the excavator as the cenotaph of a distinguished man who received exceptional honours55. The most important piece of evidence for the preparation and visit to the tomb are the white ground lekythoi, the production of which begins in the decade 470 to 460 B.C. Men and usually women are shown visiting the tomb bringing a variety of grave goods (fig. 6). Oπerings were transported in a wide shallow basket (kaneon or kaniskion), where wreaths, ribbons, lekythoi and food, mainly fruits, are shown arranged in the interior56. In addition to food and drink, some of the gifts were intended to decorate or simply deposited at the tomb.

54. Hägg, R., «Gifts to Heroes in Geometric and Archaic Greece», in Linders, T./Nordquist, G. (eds.), Gifts to the Gods, Boreas 15 (1987) 93–99. 55. (= ThesCRA II 3 d Heroization, Apotheosis 11 with bibl.) Mazarakis Ainian, A., in Stamatopoulou, M./Yeroulanou, M. (eds.), Excavating Classical Culture (2002) 161–164 fig. 8. 56. Garland 1, 104–120; Oakley 203–209. 214; Sourvinou-Inwood 2, 324–327; Shapiro 649–655.

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Ritual activities as expressions of veneration of the dead ancestors or the heroized dead present local variation and are linked in most cases to an older grave, where cult is carried out. Tomb cult is a type of ancestor cult, which by returning to Bronze Age tombs «creates ancestors by the adoption of ancient dead unrelated by linear descent and unacknowledged for centuries»57. The term is employed to diπerentiate the rituals performed at

the tomb from hero cult at formal shrines. Depositions of later material at Bronze Age tombs indicate cult activities carried out either by a single visit to the tomb during the 8th cent. B.C. or during a longer period, from the Late Geometric to the Classical period. Cult in relation to Bronze Age tombs seems to appear in areas where burial customs changed radically during the Early Iron Age58 and has been extensively discussed in relation to social changes and the formation of early states59. The cult of the dead may rarely be related to eponymous heroes from the epics and the mythic cycles. At Eleusis, an enclosure of the Geometric period was constructed to surround a group of seven Bronze Age cist graves. A rather appealing suggestion identified the group of graves with a «Heroon of the Seven against Thebes»60. Excavations at Grotta and Mitropolis on Naxos revealed the successive stages of ancestral cult including pyres and the use of an heirloom hydria as the grave marker of a Protogeometric tomb61. In the Geometric period platforms were made of stones and pebbles, which were used for libations and other rituals addressed to the ancestors buried below. The cult continued at least to the end of the 6th cent. B.C. around a low mound of mud bricks which covered the funerary enclosures in the Late Geometric period. Similar forms of ancestral cult consisting of libations and other rituals including funerary meals on pebble platforms have also been found at Tsikalario on Naxos and at Xombourgo on Tenos (pl. 39, 4), in Euboea, in the Peloponnese62. Warrior graves could also become the focus of cult activities. Among the seventeen burials of the small necropolis by the West Gate of Eretria, at least seven were secondary cremations (fig. 7, pl. 39, 5)63. The cremated remains had been gathered in a cloth and placed in bronze cauldrons which were then positioned in stone boxes formed by

57. Antonaccio 1, 400; Snodgrass 1, 107–108; id. 2; Mazarakis Ainian, A., «Reflections on Hero Cults in Early Iron Age Greece», in Hägg, AGHC 9–36; id., ThesCRA II 3 d Heroization, Apotheosis II.B.1. 58. Coldstream 2, 8–17. 59. Whitley 1, 173–182; Snodgrass, A. M., Archaic Greece. The Age of Experiment (1980) 38–40; Polignac, Naissance 127–151; Antonaccio 2; ead., «The Archaeology of Ancestors», in Dougherty, C./Kurke, L. (eds.), Cultural Poetics in Archaic Greece. Cult, Performance, Politics (1993) 46–70. 60. (= ThesCRA II 3 d Heroization, Apotheosis 4 with bibl.) Mylonas, G., Prakt 108 (1953) 81. 61. (= ThesCRA II 3 d Heroization, Apotheosis 14 ) Lambrinoudakis, V., «Veneration of Ancestors in Geometric Naxos», in Hägg/Marinatos, EarlyGCP 235–246; id., «Die Rolle der heroischen Vergangenheit bei der Entwicklung der griechischen Städte», in Agathos Daimon. Mél. Kahil 299–310. 62. Zaphiropoulou, Ph., «La necropoli geometrica di Tsikalario a Naxos», Magna Grecia 18, 5–6 (1983) 1–4; ead. (n. 31) 49–55; Kourou, N., «Tenos-Xobourgo. From a Refuge Place to an Extensive Fortified Settlement», in Stamatopoulou, M./Yeroulanou, M. (eds.), Excavating

Classical Culture (2002) 258–262; ead., «The Dawn of Images and Cultural Identity: The Case of Tenos», in Alba della citta, alba delle immagini?, Tripodes 7 (2008) 63–90; Sapouna-Sakellaraki, E., «Geometric Kyme. The Excavation at Viglatouri, Kyme, on Euboea», in Bats, M./d’Agostino, B. (eds.), Euboica. L’Eubea e la presenza euboica in Calcidica e in Occidente (1998) 69–70. 85–86; Hägg, R., «Funerary Meals in the Geometric Necropolis at Asine?», in id. (ed.), The Greek Renaissance of the Eighth Century BC. Tradition and Innovation (1983) 189–194. 63. (= ThesCRA II 3 d Heroization, Apotheosis 13 with bibl.) Bérard, Cl., L’hérôon à la porte de l’ouest, Eretria III (1970); id., «Récupérer la mort du prince. Héroïsation et formation de la cité», in Gnoli/Vernant 89–106; Crielaard 45–47; Bettelli, M., «A Supposed Mycenaean Spearhead from Eretria», SMEA 43 (2001) 189–193; Blandin 40–58 pls. 55–112; Schweizer, B., «Fürstengräber – Heroengräber: Zwei Modi der Distinktion im archaischen Griechenland und Italien», in Kümmel, Chr./Schweizer, B./Veit, U. (eds.), Körperinszenierung – Objektsammlung – Monumentalisierung. Totenritual und Grabkult in frühen Gesellschaften: archäologische Quellen in kulturwissenschaftlicher Perspektive (2008) 233–270.

Fig. 7

7. The cult of the dead in Early Greece

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•

•

addendum vi 1.e. tod und bestattung, gr./morte e inumazione, gr. stone slabs. Oπensive weapons such as iron spearheads and swords constitute the oπerings of four of those cremations which were identified as males according to anthropological analysis. The central cauldron of tomb 6 which is considered also to be the earliest was furnished with Phoenician double scarab of serpentine and a total of ten weapons, including a bronze spearhead that was originally interpreted as the scepter of the dead «prince». Around 680 B.C. a triangular structure was erected over the tombs, where cultic rituals were taking place for over a century according to the votive oπerings from the interior of the triangle construction and the bothros found nearby64. The burials of the necropolis by the West Gate have been attributed to a privileged genos, while the dead warriors are usually connected with the Lelantine war. The cult of the heroized warriors was integrated within the framework of the cults of the polis and is directly related to the rise of the polis. A diπerent form of heroized warriors’ cult was identified at Paroikia on Paros (pl. 40, 3). A communal burial there contained forty cremation amphorae inside a rectangular trench with stoned paving. The neck-handled amphorae contained the burnt bones of young men, aged around 30 years old, which had been cleaned from the ashes and perhaps washed before their placement inside the vases. A second pit was also discovered in the same area containing 120 amphorae arranged in two successive rows, most of them bearing the burnt remains of young males. In the 7th cent. B.C. the polyandrion was marked by a huge marble stele and for at least two centuries oπerings and sacrifices took place in honour of the dead65.

8. Burial practices in Archaic Athens Primary cremations, in which the deceased was cremated inside the grave, predominate after 700 B.C. The best evidence for the adult graves of the 7th cent. comes from the Kerameikos cemetery, where the large scale excavations and detailed publication oπer a constant reference for most scholars66. The funeral pyres were built inside the grave shaft which attains larger dimensions than in the earlier periods (fig. 8). After the cremation was completed, human remains were left at the bottom of the shaft which was then filled with earth.

64. Descoeudres, J.-P., «Die vorklassische Keramik aus dem Gebiet des Westtors», in Eretria V (1976) 13–58. 65. (= ThesCRA II 3 d Heroization, Apotheosis 15) Zapheiropoulou, Ph., «I due polyandria dell’antica necropoli di Paros», AION n.s. 6 (1999) 13–24; ead., «K·‡ÛÂÈ˜ ÛÙÈ˜ °ÂˆÌÂÙÚÈÎ¤˜ K˘ÎÏ¿‰Â˜. OÈ ÂÚÈÙÒÛÂÈ˜ ÙË˜ ¶¿ÚÔ˘ Î·È ÙË˜ N¿ÍÔ˘», in Stampolidis 2, 295–297; ead., «Geometric Battle Scenes on Vases from Paros», in Rystedt, E./Wells, B. (eds.), Pictorial Pursuits. Figurative Painting on Mycenaean and Geometric Pottery (2006) 271–277.

373

Fig. 8

The deposition of burial gifts inside the grave is far less common during this period. Oπerings were usually placed on perishable constructions in the oπering channels or areas close to the grave during the cremation. At the end of the 7th cent. cremation ceased to be the norm for adult burials. Oπering channels became rare and oπerings were once more placed inside the grave, consisting almost exclusively of pottery. Earth mounds were raised directly over cremation and inhumation graves, either to cover single graves or groups of burials. Whether we can identify family or social groups in the case of very closely situated or even superimposed earth tumuli and built tombs, remains uncertain. In only a few cases can this be established on solid arguments, while it seems that social relations were much more taken into account during the 7th and early 6th cent. B.C.67. The diameter of the round mounds reaches usually 4 to 6 m and a height of 50 cm, while the large reach 6 to 10 m in diameter and 1 m in height. Rectangular mounds of generally smaller size were also in use from the early 7th cent., with flat roof and sloping walls68. Around the end of the 7th cent., built tombs with vertical brick walls and a probably flat roof with sloping sides were introduced in the cemetery of Kerameikos, perhaps as an answer to the limited space left from the construction of the large earth mounds of the earlier period. Built tombs stood over the earth fill that covered a single grave69.

66. Kübler 2, 87–92; Morris 3, 128–137; Kurtz/Boardman 68–90; Houby-Nielsen 1, 345–346 table 2; HoubyNielsen 2, 129–191. 67. Kübler 2, 16; Humphreys 106–108; Houby-Nielsen 2, 144–146. 153–156; Morris 1, 90; Alexandridou, A., The Early Black-Figured Pottery of Attica in Context (c. 630–570 BCE) (2011) 210–211. 68. Kurtz/Boardman 81. 69. Kurtz/Boardman 81–83; Boardman 1, 52.

374

addendum vi 1.e. death and burial, gr./mort et inhumation, gr. fragments were found inside the shafts, apparently from the exterior decoration of the funeral klinai, used probably for the prothesis of the deceased and then buried with him. A number of mounds have been detected in the Attic countryside, at Anavyssos, Vari, Velanideza, Petreza72 and most recently at Oropos73. After the Persian Wars, archaeological evidence in Attica is significantly restricted, although a few Classical mounds have also been excavated, presumably undermining the uniform simplicity of the contemporary burial rites74.

9. Archaic funerary rituals: the «Opferrinnen» ceremony

Fig. 9 The «mound G»70 was erected some time before the middle of the 7th cent. in the cemetery of Kerameikos and the «South Mound»71 was raised around 540 B.C. Both mounds attain extremely large dimensions and were raised over large primary burials in deep shaft graves. Few oπerings were placed inside the shaft around the body, consisting mainly of oil containers. A number of ivory

70. Kübler 3, nos. 2–12, 5–16, 207–218; Knigge, U., The Athenian Kerameikos (1991) 105–107. On attributions and connections of mound G to Solon or the Alkmaionid kinship, cf. Kübler, K., «Eine archaische Grabanlage von dem Heiligen Tor und ihre Deutung», AA (1973) 172–193; Stahl, M., Aristokraten und Tyrannen im archaischen Athen. Untersuchungen zur Überlieferung, zur Sozialstruktur und zur Entstehung des Staates (1987) 138–197. 230–231; HoubyNielsen 2, 156–163; Knigge, U., «Ein Grabmonument der Alkmeoniden im Kerameikos», AM 121 (2006) 127–163. 71. Knigge, U., Kerameikos IX. Der Südhügel (1976). 72. Humphreys 105–112; Whitley 3, 222–227; HoubyNielsen 2, 153–163; Houby-Nielsen 3, 44–46, especially n. 16. 73. Mazarakis Ainian, A., Prakt (1996) 85–88. 74. Morris 3, 132–133 n. 5; id., «Everyman’s Grave», in Boegehold, A. L./Scafuro, A. C. (eds.), Athenian Identity and Civic Ideology (1994) 67–101.

Although the deposition of gifts inside the grave had been the normal practice during the earlier periods, a significant change is observed in Protoattic burials. The appearance of long oπering trenches and special areas close to the grave can be traced towards the end of the Late Geometric period75, while they appear for burials in the 7th and early 6th cent. only in Athens and Attica. Oπerings in clay and perhaps also small animals were placed on table-like structures that stood in shallow trenches («Opferrinnen»), between 3 and 12m long and 1m wide for carrying and displaying the objects (fig. 9). Rows of mudbricks limited the sides of the trenches and often a row of mud-bricks ran lengthwise in the middle. After the inhumation or cremation of the body was completed, the oπering trenches were covered, probably simultaneously with the grave, and never used again76. The oπerings in the trenches consisted of elaborate vases which could have been used for dining and feasting or clay vessels and funerary votives of cultic character, such as clay cauldrons with clay attachments and occasionally impressive thymiateria in the form of a sphinx, which were meant to recall the activities and lifestyle led by the deceased77. The oπerings were placed in the trenches while the grave was still open and covered with

75. Kerameikos: Opferinnen 1–2, Grab 51. Agora: Pyre XII. Kübler 1, tables 132–138. Young, R. S., Late Geometric Graves and a Seventh Century Well in the Agora, Hesperia Suppl. 2 (1939) 55–67; Houby-Nielsen 3, 46 n. 17. 76. Houby-Nielsen 1, 343–374; Houby-Nielsen 2, 129–192; Houby-Nielsen 3, 41–54; Kistler 31–77. 147–171; d’Onofrio 3, 143–171. For the oπering trenches from Attica cf. Houby-Nielsen 3, 45–46 n. 16; Kurtz/Boardman 75. 77. Kübler 3, 453–454 pls. 32–35; 461–464 pls. 43–45 (Anlage XI. Opferrinne Á); Houby-Nielsen 1, 354–357; Houby-Nielsen 3, 42–48; Sabetai 301. On the production and use of Protoattic pottery in relation to Athenian nobles, cf. Whitley, J., «Protoattic Pottery. A Contextual Analysis», in Morris, I. (ed.), Classical Greece. Ancient Histories and Modern Archaeologies (1994) 51–70; Rotroπ, S. I., BMCR 6.2 (1995) 221–228.

addendum vi 1.e. tod und bestattung, gr./morte e inumazione, gr. earth along with the grave. The sacrificial pyres in the trenches involved the presentation, but not the preservation of the highly decorated vases and other clay objects, as the ceremony involved their ritualised destruction. Oπerings were probably deposited on the wooden constructions over the length of the trench, which under the eπect of the fire collapsed with them. The vessels were thus smashed and burnt in the fire and finally swept outside the grave into the Opferinnen. The same ritual can be traced again (sporadically) in the Late Archaic and Late Classical periods, when pits could replace the long mud-brick trenches78. It becomes evident that in the 7th and early 6th cent. funerals and burial rites remain the main medium of competitive display among the wealthy landowners of Athens as well as those of the periphery. By the end of the 7th cent. oπering trenches in relation to cremation burials beneath mounds of earth can be found at Vourva (Spata)79 in the eastern part of Attica and Vari in the southern part80. Adult cremations, usually those of males, and the practice of cremation beneath tumuli, are interpreted as a deliberate evocation of «heroic» burial practices which is the manner in which the warrior heroes of the Iliad were interred81. The elaborate oπerings from the trenches have been associated with the aristocratic status of the deceased. The disposition of the oπerings in special areas outside but close to the grave as ritual behaviour towards the dead, may not substantially diπer from the ritual oπering of gifts to the gods and the heroes82. Oπering trenches became rare from 600 B.C. onwards and even rarer around the middle of the 6th cent. in Kerameikos83, a period that coincides in Athens with Solon and his reforms84. Nevertheless, wealthy families of the second half of the 6th cent., apparently unaπected by sumptuary legislation, set up beautiful and expensive monuments to their dead in family grave plots, especially when 78. Houby-Nielsen 3, 46–51; Sabetai 298. 79. Stais, V., «O T‡Ì‚Ô˜ ÂÓ BÔ˘Ú‚¿», AM 15 (1890) 318–329. 80. Humphreys 108–110; Stears 46; Alexandridou, A.F., «Oπering Trenches and Funerary Ceremonies in the Attic Countryside», ActaHyp 12 (2009) 497–522. 81. Garland, R. S. J., «Geras Thanonton: An Investigation into the Claims of Homeric Dead», BICS 29 (1982) 69–80 esp. 73–74;Whitley 4, 230; Houby-Nielsen 1; ead. 2; ead. 3. 82. Hägg (n. 53); Snodgrass, A., Archaic Greece. The Age of Experiment (1980) 38–40. 49–65; Houby-Nielsen 3, 51–54. 83. Kübler 2, 87; id., 4, 187–188. 84. Shapiro 630–631; Pomeroy 100–105; Blok, J. H./ Lardinois, A. P. M. H. (eds.), Solon of Athens. New Historical and Philological Approaches (2006). 85. Shapiro 644. 86. For a detailed treatment of the Archaic burials, cf. Morris 6, 1–91. 87. Variations of the funerary practices can be found on Thera, Eretria etc. Kurtz/Boardman 195–199; Schörner, H., Sepulturae graecae intra urbem: Untersuchungen zum Phä-

375

these were men who, like most epic heroes, died prematurely and/or in battle85. 10.

Burials of the Classical period

Burial practices of the Classical period demonstrate a certain degree of uniformity, in comparison to previous periods86. The cemeteries are situated outside the city’s walls and inhumation appears as the usual method of burial. Cremations are still found among the inhumations, although in smaller numbers than in the Archaic period87. Simple rectangular shafts dug in the ground or a variety of cist graves were in use, along with clay and stone sarcophagi. Clay roof tiles could be used as lids for cist graves and sarcophagi, and from the Late Archaic period they were used for the construction of the whole grave, usually of triangular shape88. Cremations in bronze cauldrons continue to be found in the 5th and 4th cent. B.C. The cremated remains were usually gathered in a cloth and put inside the cauldron which was then placed in stone cists, recalling parallels to «Homeric» burial rituals89. From around the end of the Archaic period lekythoi constitute the most common type of gift to the dead90, an oil container used according to the custom for anointing the deceased, or placed around his bedside during the prothesis in order to minimize pollution. The arrangement of these vases inside the graves is believed to imitate their arrangement during the prothesis91. It has been suggested that pots deposited inside the graves were especially chosen to suit the circumstances of a particular man or woman92. Occasionally metal objects such as mirrors, strigils or rings accompany the burial93. After 460 B.C. white-ground vessels, particularly lekythoi, are placed as grave oπerings. The distinctive iconography of those vessels refers to nomen der intraurbanen Bestattungen bei den Griechen (2007). Intramural burials are extremely rare except for the cases of Sparta and Taras, the Spartan colony in southern Italy. Intramural burial was customary in Archaic and Classical Sparta and is to be found even close to temples. 88. Kurtz/Boardman 188–194; Drakotou-Tsirigoti, I./ Chatzipouliou, E., ArchDelt 47 B 1 (1992) 22–23. 89. Guggisberg, M. A., «Gräber von Bürgern und Heroen: ‘Homerische’ Bestattungen im klassischen Athen», in Kümmel/Schweizer/Veit (n. 63) 287–317 (with detailed catalogue of the burials from the Geometric to Classical periods). 90. Houby-Nielsen 1, table 8. 91. Knigge (n. 71) 15; Kurtz/Boardman 207–209; Houby-Nielsen 5, 239–240. 92. Sourvinou-Inwood 2, 303–361; Osborne, R., «Death Revisited, Death Revised: The Death of the Artist in Archaic and Classical Greece», Art History 11 (1988) 1–16; Burn, L., «Honey Pots: Three White-ground Cups by the Sotades Painter», AntK 28 (1985) 93–105. 93. Houby-Nielsen 6, 245–246.

376


Fig. 10 scenes of mourning, preparing for a visit to the tomb or commemorating the deceased, limited to the closest family members, but also themes associated with the beliefs in an afterlife with Hermes as Psychopompos, escorting the dead to Hades. The quite limited range of imagery of white lekythoi is associated with their use as grave oπerings for private but also public burials94. Nonetheless, themes depicted on white lekythoi and mainly domestic subjects, the presence of women either as mourners or as the deceased, anticipate the production of the Classical gravestones95.

Evidence for family plots exists already in the 10th cent. and continues throughout the Geometric period96. However, an emphasis on family groupings in Athens and elsewhere during the 7th cent. B.C. has been strongly challenged97, in favour of the political and public role of the deceased. It is since the last quarter of 5th cent. B.C. that family plots, sometimes in use for several generations, were enclosed by a peribolos wall, where elaborate series of grave monuments were usually erected. The peribolos, a well-constructed tall façade wall, supported the earth of the burial ground enclosed, while the elaborate front side served as the

focal point for the visual display directed to the passerby. A variety of sculpted monuments were placed along the peribolos wall, such as inscribed rosette stelai, figural naiskoi, stone lekythoi and on occasion large clay vases (e.g. fig. 10: temenos of Hierokleos at Rhamnus). When inscriptions survive, they demonstrate a clear familial relationship between those commemorated in the plot98. Large and extensive family groupings are rare. Usually tomb enclosures were made to include from 2–3 up to 10 graves. Nevertheless, it is di√cult to be precise about the proportion of graves within 4th cent. monuments, since in many cases the excavation data are incomplete or still missing. Few periboloi were in use for several generations. The construction and use of such monuments, although wider during the 4th cent., would still be associated with only a relatively small group of people which Morris estimates as around 10% of the population99. The majority of the Athenian graves would have had a simple inscribed stele, as indicated by the number of such stelai that have been found, usually out of context. The peribolos tomb was not the only classical tomb structure that included multiple graves. Although Classical earth mounds have been excavated, their function in relation to family burials has been strongly debated100. Peribolos tombs are found both in urban and rural locations. They were set up individually, perhaps on private property, or

94. Shapiro 648–649; Oakley 215–216. 95. Humphreys 112–121; Shapiro 648–649. 653–654. On the date of the Classical marble stelai, cf. Clairmont, C. W., «Some Reflections on the Earliest Classical Attic Gravestones», Boreas 9 (1986) 27–50; Garland 2, 3–7; Stears 53; Leader, R. E., «In Death Not Divided: Gender, Family, and State on Classical Athenian Grave Stelae», AJA 101 (1997) 683–699. 96. Smithson, E. L., «The Protogeometric Cemetery at Nea Ionia», Hesperia 30 (1961) 147–178; Young (n. 75);

Brann, E., «Late Geometric Grave Groups from the Athenian Agora», Hesperia 29 (1960) 402–416. 97. Morris 2, 314–315; Humphreys 122–123; HoubyNielsen 2, 152–163. For a discussion on the use of family plots for several generations, cf. Whitley 1, 67; Morris 1, 90. 98. Stears 41–42; Closterman 2, 56–58; Garland, R., «A First Catalogue of Attic Peribolos Tombs», BSA 77 (1982) 125–176; Sabetai 302–303. 99. Morris 3, 135–138. 100. Houby-Nielsen 2; Closterman 2, 61.

11.

Classical family periboloi


377

grouped within cemeteries. The most common characteristic was their location along major roads, thus serving the accessibility of the family and visibility to others. The markers of the façade developed gradually, while names of the deceased could also be added to already existing markers101. Both inhumations and cremations are associated with peribolos tombs. 12.

Communal burials of the Classical period

12.1.

State burials

Funerals at public expense (‰ËÌÔÛ›0) were a great honour, reserved in Classical Athens for the war dead who were treated in this way as heroes102. According to Thucydides (2, 34), patrios nomos required the war dead to be transferred to Athens and buried collectively on a certain day each year. Honorific burial at public expense was not limited to members of the Athenian demos but was also given exceptionally to foreigners who died in Athens103. From 460 B.C. onwards the war dead were brought back to Athens, in order to be buried in a reserved area, the demosion sema. Public grave monuments were erected there in the 5th and 4th cent. along the road that led from the Dipylon Gate to the Academy. Details concerning the public funerals are only summarily described by Thucydides; the bones of the deceased were laid out in a public space, where oπerings were brought by each family. On the third day the bones were carried on wagons to the cemetery and were buried in the public tomb. Women and children were probably not meant to participate and women were allowed as mourners at the grave. The tombs were modest, marked by simple stone slabs giving only their names, arranged by tribe, the so-called casualty lists104. Public funeral games were instituted and a funeral speech, the epitaphios logos, was intended to honour and commemorate the war dead. At least four communal burials (polyandria) were investigated recently in the area north of Kerameikos and have been identified as part of the demosion sema, once located near the ancient street that led from the Dipylon Gate to the Acade-

my105. The cremated remains of at least 200 to 250 young males have been identified. A number of red-figure loutrophoroi decorated with battle scenes were presented to the young warriors who had died unmarried. Many polychrome white lekythoi were also deposited among the grave oπerings in the same way as they were deposited in private burials. The evidence from the unburnt pottery, as opposed to the cremated human remains, seems to reflect the Athenian custom of cremating the war dead abroad and bringing their ashes to Athens to receive a proper burial. Communal burials (polyandria) are attested from the end of the 6th cent. B.C. in Athens and elsewhere. One communal tomb stands out from the rest not only because of its date in the early 5th cent., but also as it is a public funerary monument. The tumulus at Marathon, the so-called soros, identified as the burial site of the 192 Athenians who fell at the battle of Marathon (fig. 11)106, echoes as to its form and oπering trenches, elements of the Archaic aristocratic burials. The dead were cremated and oπerings were placed in a long clay-lined trench, consisting primarly of lekythoi. Cremation burial beneath a tumulus, as in

101. Closterman 1, 292–296. 102. Thuk. 2, 34–46; Stupperich, R., «The Iconography of the Athenian State Burials in the Classical Period», in Coulson, W. D. E./Palagia, O., et al. (eds.), The Archaeology of Athens and Attica under the Democracy (1994) 93–103. 103. Loraux, N., The Children of Athena (1993) 20–24. 37–71; Clairmont; Patterson 21–31. 104. Thuk. 2, 34, 1–8; Clairmont 7–15. 46–59; Humphreys 123; Shapiro 646–647. 105. Rose, M., «Fallen Heroes», Archaeology 53, 2 (2000) 42–45; Oakley 215–216; for a recent discussion on the demo-

sion sema with a detailed treatment of the evidence, cf. Arrington. 106. Stais, V., «Ô âÓ M·Ú·ıáÓÈ T‡Ì‚Ô˜», AM 18 (1893) 46–63; Whitley 2. Mersch, A., «Archäologischer Kommentar zu den Gräbern der Athener und Plataier in der Marathonia», Klio 77 (1995) 55–64; Goette, H. R./Weber Th. M., Marathon: Siedlungskammer und Schlachtfeld – Sommerfrische und olympische Wettkampfstätte (2004) 79–83; Hsu, C.-L., «The Mounds associated with the Battle of Marathon in 490 BC and the Dating of Greek Pottery», in Kurtz, D. (ed.), Essays in Classical Archaeology for Eleni Hatzivassiliou (2008) 165–169.

Fig. 11

378


Fig. 12

the aristocratic burials of the 7th cent., has been taken as a deliberate allusion to the manner in which heroes were buried in the Iliad. This political monument, as Whitley stresses, is an example of public commemoration of the dead warriors who received heroic funeral honours from the state107. 12.2.

Mass burials

that new cemeteries appeared in the last quarter of the 5th cent., probably because of the outburst and spread of the plague. 13.

Marking the tombs

13.1.

Semata of the Early Iron Age

Mass burials of the 5th cent. are known from Attica, Central and Northern Greece108, but only a few may be related to extreme circumstances. An impressive mass burial dated around 430 B.C. or within the next decade may be associated with the events of the first years of the Peloponnesian war and the plague (loimos), the disease that erupted in Athens suddenly109. A simple pit 6.50 m long and 1.60 m deep that contained the inhumation of 150 adults and children was found to the west of the excavated part of the Kerameikos cemetery (fig. 12). The hasty and impious way of inhumation and the absence of proper funerary rites are related by the excavators to the turmoil caused by the spread of the disease. Only a few oπerings were found, establishing thus a secure date for the burials. Children, in contrast with the careless burial of the adults, were treated with some care as their bodies were covered by sherds of large vases. According to recent excavations in Athens, it seems

The chosen few were not simply buried but commemorated with imposing funerary monuments. After the burial, a grave marker was often set up. The practice of using large vases as grave markers goes back to at least 900 B.C. at Athens (fig. 13: Kerameikos). At the beginning of the Late Geometric period kraters and amphorae of monumental dimensions were specially commissioned by the Athenian nobles to mark the graves of their kin: amphorae were destined for women of high rank, while pedestalled kraters were the monuments for men110. Stone markers did not get a formal shape before the mid-7th cent. B.C. The practice of pouring oπerings into the graves and the heightened visibility of the place of burial is related to a change in the burial ritual and the social function of certain large ceramic vases111. Class identity and social beliefs were rea√rmed through the rituals of death which can be reconstructed from the lavish ceremonies and funeral processions depicted on the pottery.

107. Whitley 2, 226–230. For state burials in connection with heroic burials and honours, cf. Humphreys 123; Loraux, N., in Gnoli/Vernant 27–43. Contra, cf. Morris 3, 144. 108. Kurtz/Boardman 108. 247–259. 109. Baziotopoulou-Valavani, E., «A Mass Burial from

the Cemetery of Kerameikos», in Stamatopoulou, M./Yeroulanou, M. (eds.), Excavating Classical Culture (2002) 187– 201. 110. Bohen 48–50; Kurtz/Boardman 38. 111. Whitley 1, 117.

addendum vi 1.e. tod und bestattung, gr./morte e inumazione, gr. 13.2.

The Archaic grave markers

Monumental markers of various forms appear at the end of the 7th cent. B.C. as alternatives to ceramic vases112 which were placed on top of burials and burial monuments. Unlike the case of geometric markers, a tendency to frontal accentuation is now evident, a characteristic element of the funerary art of both Archaic and Classical periods. Wealthy graves were marked by stone shaft-stelai and sculptures, marble lions and sphinxes113. Kouroi and korai marked the graves of the wealthy elite and are considered as commemorative in nature114. A number of statues are known from Athens and the Attic countryside, but also from the islands and most recently Corinth. Statues of nude youths placed over the tombs of men seem to create a heroic allusion to the deceased, associated with heroes celebrated in the epics. The inscription on the base of Kroisos from Anavyssos informs us that he died in battle. Men in military garb and nude youths are commemorated on relief stelai accompanied by inscriptions that varied from a single name to short epigrams115. Women also received exceptional funerary monuments like Phrasikleia who died unmarried, according to her epigram, deprived of her nuptial rites because of her premature death and thus attained a special status. Long slabs with the name of the dead vertically inscribed were used during the 7th cent. at Thera and elsewhere. In the cemeteries of Thera there is also evidence for inscribed stone tables and blocks116. The Archaic grave stelai from East Greece carried no decoration until the later 6th cent., some time before the end of the Attic series. This transition is usually associated with the activity of artists from Attica117. 13.3.

379

Classical grave stelai

The disappearance of the Archaic funerary monuments around 480 B.C. has been associated 112. Kerameikos: High-footed cauldron, inv. 97–98, Kübler 2, 53–56. Kübler 3, pl. 80. Dinos, inv. 1295, Kübler 2, 43–45. Kübler 3, pl. 76. Krater, inv. 153, Kübler 3, pl. 60. Krater, inv. 98, Kübler 3, pl. 29. Krater, inv. 129, Kübler 2, 51–53. Kübler 3, pls. 78–79. Krater, inv. 801, Kübler 2, 72–73. Kübler 3, pls. 87–88. Amphora, inv. 658, Kübler 3, pl. 89. Athens, Agora: Morris, S. P., The Black and White Style. Athens and Aigina in the Orientalizing Period (1984) 9, 11. For a list of possible grave markers from Athens: Houby-Nielsen 3, 44 n. 14. 113. Richter, G. M. A., Archaic Gravestones of Attica (1961); Ridgway, B. S., The Archaic Style in Greek Sculpture (19932) 220–227; Sourvinou-Inwood 2, 221–278. 114. D’Onofrio 1; D’Onofrio 2; Kissas, K., Die attischen Statuen- und Stelenbasen archaischer Zeit (2000); Meyer, M./Brüggemann, N., Kore und Kouros. Weihegaben für die Götter (2007). On the new finds by the Sacred Gate at Kerameikos, cf. Niemeier, W. D., Der Kouros vom Heiligen Tor (2002); Stieber, M., «Homeric in Death: The Case of the Anavyssos Kouros. With an Appendix on the Discovery of the Statue», Boreas 28/29 (2005/06) 1–33. For a 7th cent. Daedalic kore and an early 6th cent. kouros from Eleuther-

Fig. 13

with the presumed legislation under Kleisthenes or Themistokles, with the latter being more favoured by scholars118. In addition, the war dead were the «o√cial heroes» of the democracy and private burials could not outshine them119. Outside Attica, decline in funerary art may be noticed in various regions; there is an end to the series of great tumuli at Vergina and a few years later to the chamber tombs on Aigina. The series of Thessalian grave stelai flourishes just when the Athenian series becomes rare120. The earliest gravestones in the Classical style appear after the middle of the 5th cent.121 and diπer from their Archaic predecessors both in form and in the way that they commemorate their subjects. The deceased is depicted as a member of the family group, a selection in accordance with the focus on family life and the family enclosures where those monuments were positioned (fig. 10)122. na, cf. Stampolidis 1, 289–308; id., «Eleutherna on Crete: an Interim Report on the Geometric-Archaic Cemetery», BSA 85 (1990) 375–403. 115. Clairmont, C. W., Gravestone and Epigram. Greek Memorials from the Archaic and Classical Period (1970); Peek, W., Attische Versinschriften (1980); Humphreys 103–104; Sourvinou-Inwood 2, 147–191. 279–297. 362–387; Day, J. W., «Rituals in Stone. Early Greek Grave Epigrams and Monuments», JHS 109 (1989) 16–28. 116. Kurtz/Boardman 235–236. 117. Kurtz/Boardman 223. For the insular stelai of the early 5th cent., cf. Hiller, H., Ionische Grabreliefs der ersten Häfte des 5. Jahrhunderts v. Chr. (1975); Despinis, G., «Kykladische Grabstelen des 5.–4. Jh. v. Chr.», AntPl 7 (1967) 77–86. 118. Clairmont, C. W., «Some Reflections on the Earliest Classical Attic Gravestones», Boreas 9 (1986) 27–50; Clairmont; Garland 2, 3–7. 119. Shapiro 646–647; Humphreys 123. 120. Biesantz, H., Die thessalischen Grabreliefs (1965). 121. Stears 53. 122. Leader (n. 95); Humphreys 112–121.

380


Groups of male and female figures of diπerent ages are depicted together and funerary scenes are only rarely included. During the late 5th and 4th cent. these private funerary monuments took elaborate architectural forms. The sequence of monuments comes to an end around 317 B.C., after the legislation of Demetrios of Phaleron prohibiting lavish sculptural display. Athenian citizens were now commemorated either by a monument called trapeza (mensa), or by a kioniskos (columella). The name of the deceased, his father’s name and his deme were inscribed on these monuments. This commemoration in the plainest style has been seen as an extreme expression of the polis ideology of isonomia, the essential equality of all citizens123. 13.4.

Clay plaques, pinakes and vessels

A series of clay plaques and pinakes are considered to have decorated the walls of the built tombs, by simple attachment on the plaster walls. Two types of plaques may be distinguished, those that form part of a series depicting a single subject and smaller single plaques. Their funerary iconography from the last quarter of the 7th cent. B.C. provides a number of details about funeral lament and the prothesis of the deceased, in addition to the funerary scenes painted on loutrophoroi (ThesCRA VI pls. 51–52)124. The focus of this period appears the private lamentation at home, as ostentatious ekphora scenes of the Geometric style were banned by law. The use of clay plaques and probably clay vases as grave markers is generally interpreted as a more modest alternative to the stone monuments. Although clay loutrophoroi cannot be securely identified as standing on a tumulus or a peribolos wall in any archaeological context, the variability of this particular shape in funerary customs proves such a use possible. Nevertheless, clay loutrophoroi are less common in less elaborate tombs after the middle of the 5th cent., white lekythoi stopped being produced around the end of the 5th cent. B.C., while funerary clay pinakes ceased to be made after 480 B.C. Marble loutrophoroi and lekythoi are documented from the last quarter of the 5th into the 4th cent. B.C. to mark low tumuli or stand on grave enclosures (fig. 10)125. Because of the close

123. Houby-Nielsen 6; Knigge (n. 70) 42. 124. Boardman 1, 51–66 pls. 1–8; Kurtz/Boardman 83; Huber (n. 8) 94–100; Shapiro 633–644; Papadopoulou, Loutrophoroi 16; Sourvinou-Inwood 2, 218–221. ThesCRA VI 1 e Death and burial, Gr. p. 23–25. 125. Schmaltz, B., Untersuchungen zu den attischen Marmor-Lekythen (1970); Kokula, G., Marmorloutrophoren (1984); Parlama, L./Stampolidis, N. Chr. (eds.), H fiÏË Î¿Ùˆ ·fi ÙËÓ fiÏË (2000) 369–370; Fabricius, J., «AÙÙÈÎ‹ ÂÈÙ‡Ì‚È· ÏÔ˘ÙÚÔÊfiÚÔ˜», in Vlizos, S. (ed.), EÏÏËÓÈÎ‹ Î·È PˆÌ·˚Î‹ °Ï˘ÙÈÎ‹ ·fi ÙÈ˜ Û˘ÏÏÔÁ¤˜ ÙÔ˘ MÔ˘ÛÂ›Ô˘ MÂÓ¿ÎË (2004) 151–161; Sabetai 303–304.

association of this particular shape with weddings, the loutrophoros was used to mark the tombs of young people who died unmarried, while a gender distinction is made in their use; loutrophorosamphorae are for burials of men and loutrophoroshydriae for those of women126. It has been suggested that grave monuments were set up by ordinary citizens, metics and slaves along with the wealthy and distinguished citizens, and thus has been challenged the assumption that grave stelai were indicative of wealth and pretension. Evidence from Attic tombstones of the 4th and 3rd cent. B.C. testifies that ordinary citizens could in fact aπord a grave monument inscribed with their name. Simple stelai and small columns inscribed with one or more names were set up in great numbers both before and after Demetrios’ law, of which a number is considered to commemorate ordinary citizens127. 14.

Macedonian tombs

Cremation is attested in Macedonia since the Archaic period for the burials of noble males, while inhumation is the norm for the richly furnished female burials of the same period128. Graves of the 6th and 5th cent. B.C. reveal a stratified society and the wealthy funerary oπerings reflect the prosperity of the individuals buried. Since the second half of the 5th cent. B.C., cremation burials are practised regardless of gender and later on, from the 4th cent. B.C. cremation is also practised regardless of social status. Macedonian chamber tombs reflect the wealth of the individuals buried, while their appearance and contents commemorated the royal and aristocratic. The rituals associated with the royal burials seem reminiscent of the Homeric funerary rites129. A number of tombs were found at Vergina, Pella and elsewhere in Macedonia dating from the 4th cent. B.C. to the Hellenistic period. Macedonian chamber tombs are very rare in the Northeast Aegean islands. A half-destroyed example was excavated in the town of Mytilene at Lesbos and one on Chios130. More Macedonian tombs (five in number) were found in the wider area around Eretria and are associated with the presence of members of the Macedonian garrison there131. Simpler

126. See ThesCRA V 2 b Cult instruments p. 176–178. 127. Nielsen, T. H., et al., «Athenian Grave Monuments and Social Class», GRBS 30 (1989) 411–420. 128. Kottaridi 1, 359–371; ead. 2; ead., «The Lady of Aigai», in Pandermalis, D. (ed.), Alexander the Great. Treasures from an Epic Era of Hellenism (2004) 139–147. 129. Huguenot 227–228; ead., «La réutilisation des édifices funéraires helladiques à l’époque hellénistique», QuadTic 31 (2003) 81–140, esp. 111–118. 130. Archontidou-Argyri, A., «Macedonian Tombs», in X›Ô˜ Ù\ öÓ·ÏÔ˜ fiÏÈ˜ OåÓÔ›ˆÓÔ˜ (2000) 310–317. 131. Huguenot.

addendum vi 1.e. tod und bestattung, gr./morte e inumazione, gr. rock-cut chamber tombs have been investigated at Veroia132, smaller chambers built of mud-brick were discovered at Vergina, plain pits lined with stone and covered with wooden or stone roofs concealed inside a tumulus, and simpler forms elsewhere in Macedonia133. Macedonian chamber tombs underneath tumuli are stone built chambers with stone barrel vaults, elaborate facades and imposing doorways (fig. 14: Vergina, tomb II)134. An antechamber and in some cases more than one chamber may be found. A passageway (dromos) stepped or slightly sloping leads to the entrance of the monument, filled with earth after the burial. The façades were generally elaborate, of finely dressed masonry which is either stuccoed or painted and imposing entrances, with marble doors and Ionic or Doric columns. The façade of the tomb at Lef kadia (Naousa)135 alludes to temple architecture and probably contemporary palatial exteriors. The tomb has a twostorey façade: Doric below and Ionic on the upper storey with false doors between the columns. Among the Doric columns four painted figures were arranged: the dead warrior, Hermes, who guided souls to Hades, Rhadamanthys and Aiakos, the Judges of the Dead. The deceased were laid on stone klinai or on wooden surfaces supported by stone or clay structures inside the main chamber of the tomb136. Otherwise stone sarcophagi contained the inhumation or cremation remains, or the walls of the tomb included niches to receive the ashes of the dead. An exaggerated example is the tomb at Lef kadia where twenty-two niches in two rows contained the ashes along with burial oπerings. The names of the deceased were painted over the niches. The earlier Macedonian tomb, dated just after the middle of the 4th cent. B.C. (344/3 B.C.), belongs to a woman, identified as Queen Eurydike, wife of Amyntas III137. A monumental funerary pyre was built for the cremation of the dead woman probably in the form of a square or rectangular wooden edifice with a façade and an elab-

132. Drougou, S./Touratsoglou, I., EÏÏËÓÈÛÙÈÎÔ› Ï·ÍÂ˘ÙÔ› Ù¿ÊÔÈ BÂÚÔ›·˜ (1998). 133. Kurtz/Boardman 273–283; Gossel, B., Makedonische Kammergräber (1980); Themelis, P./Touratsoglou, J., OÈ Ù¿ÊÔÈ ÙÔ˘ ¢ÂÚ‚ÂÓ›Ô˘ (1997); Chrysostomou P., Macedonian Tombs at Pella (1998). 134. Gossel (n. 133); Andronikos, M., Vergina. The Royal Tombs and the Ancient City (1984); id., «Some Reflections on the Macedonian Tombs», BSA 82 (1987) 1–16; Huguenot 38–43. 135. (= LIMC VIII Suppl. Nekyia 11*) Petsas, F., O T¿ÊÔ˜ ÙˆÓ §Â˘Î·‰ÈÒÓ (1966); Rhomiopoulou, K., «A New Monumental Chamber Tomb with Paintings of the Hellenistic Period near Lef kadia», AAA 4 (1973) 87–92; Miller, S. G., The Tomb of Lyson and Kallikles. A Painted Macedonian Tomb (1993). For the painted scenes of the Macedonian funerary monuments, cf. Brecoulaki, H., La peinture funéraire de Macédoine (2006).

381

Fig. 14 orate two-leaved wooden door. Remains of monumental funerary pyres have been discovered at Vergina reflecting a Macedonian tradition which recalls the exaggerated funerary pyre ordered by Alexander at the funeral of Hephaistion at Babylon138. A number of oπerings was presented to the deceased in order to be burnt on the funeral pyre, among which were silver vessels and clay vases full of food and liquids. Glass and ivory attachments which are usually found among the cremation remains indicate the richness of the funerary bier on which the deceased was laid out139. The cremated remains of the dead Queen were wrapped in a gold-purple cloth and placed in a marble chest on the gold-embellished marble throne inside the chamber of the tomb (pl. 40, 1). Four tombs and a heroon were excavated between 1976 and 1980 under the so-called Great Tumulus at Vergina, measuring 100 m in diameter and 13 m in height140. The Tomb of Philip has been identified as the tomb of Philip II, father of Alexander but also as Philip III Arrhidaios, halfbrother and successor to Alexander. The façade of the tomb was decorated with Doric columns and a Doric frieze, crowned by a painted frieze depict-

136. Huguenot 228–229. For the furniture inside the chambers, cf. Sismanidis, K., KÏ›ÓÂ˜ Î·È ÎÏÈÓÔÂÈ‰Â›˜ Î·Ù·ÛÎÂ˘¤˜ ÙˆÓ Ì·ÎÂ‰ÔÓÈÎÒÓ Ù¿ÊˆÓ (1997). 137. Kottaridi 1, 364–365. 368; ead., in Pandermalis, D. (ed.), Alexander the Great. Treasures from an Epic Era of Hellenism (2004) 139. 138. Huguenot 229–231 (with all the recent bibliography). 139. Ignatiadou, D., «Colorless Glass in Late Classical and Early Hellenistic Macedonia», JGlSt 44 (2002) 11–24, esp. 18; Andronikos 1, 220–221. 140. Andronikos (n. 134); Saatsoglou-Paliadeli, Ch., T· ÂÈÙ¿ÊÈ· ÌÓËÌÂ›· ·fi ÙË MÂÁ¿ÏË TÔ‡Ì· ÙË˜ BÂÚÁ›Ó·˜ (1984); Lehmann, P. W., «The so-called Tomb of Philip II: an Addendum», AJA 86 (1982) 437–440.

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ing young men hunting. Each chamber was approached through a two-leaved marble door. A marble sarcophagus containing a gold larnax was placed in the antechamber with the cremated remains of a woman wrapped in a gold-purple cloth. In the main chamber a second marble sarcophagus contained a second gold larnax, where the burnt bones of the male deceased were placed along with his golden wreath, undoubtedly a crown. The remains of the funerary kline were found in front of the sarcophagus while a number of precious objects and weapons were also placed in the chamber. Four horses and the dogs of the male royal were sacrificed on the funeral pyre. Food and liquid oπerings were also placed on the funerary pyre, along with fish, birds and small animals. After the deposition of the cremated remains the entrance of the tomb was sealed. For the most lavish burials which probably lasted several days, the richly decorated façade of the tombs would remain visible until the completion of the proper rituals and the deposition of the deceased in the interior. Funeral meals in order to honor the dead took place during the burials, as is suggested by the banquet services dispersed and mingled with the earth of the tumuli and in the area of the roads leading to the tombs. A unique painted frieze was placed above the lintel of the entrance of a Macedonian tomb found in the area of Ag. Athanasios between Thessaloniki and ancient Pella, dated to the last quarter of the 4th cent.141. The scene depicts a banquet comparable to the numerous Etruscan wall paintings and the «Diver’s Tomb» at Paestum142. The tomb is considered to belong to a high-ranking Macedonian military o√cer, in line with the iron weaponry found on the floor of the chamber tomb. The deceased was laid on a luxurious wooden couch with ivory decoration. Funeral games were attested as part of the rituals practised for the dead royal males143. From the same area a narrow chamber tomb with a cremation of a woman was found. The entrance was sealed by three massive stone blocks. The interior of the chamber was decorated with frescoes, a rather common element in Macedonia from the middle of the 4th cent. B.C. Inside the tomb a wooden chest, coated with a thick sheet of pure silver, was found on a stone base. Inside the chest the cremated remains of a woman, wrapped

Although it is di√cult to infer social structures based on the presence of infant and child burials within settlements or organized burial areas, the separation of infants and children from the rest of the dead is rather indicative of the functioning of the communities. It is generally accepted that the diπerential burial of infants and children reflects the family’s dominant role145. Although no special interest was invested in infants and small children until the 4th cent. B.C., when iconographic and textual references become plentiful, infants and small children seem to have held a special significance in burial customs. As E. Scott clearly pointed out, «at a bland level infancy equates to babyhood, but exactly when an infant ceases to be an infant and becomes a child is open to debate and varies from culture to culture»146. Houby-Nielsen suggests concerning the child burials in Athens, that from the way women often buried their infants and children, it is possible to distinguish up to three age groups during the «city–state period» as she calls the period of formation and peak of the Athenian city–state (720–400 B.C.): infants (0–1 year old), small children (1–3 to 4 years old) and older children (3–4 to 8–10 years old)147. The method of burial is always the same: infants and young children were inhumed inside pithoi, coarse jugs or amphorae (enchytrismos), their head placed towards the opening of the vase and their knees drawn up to the chest. The funerary vase was placed on its side inside a shallow pit (pl. 40, 2: Oropos). Generally no particular orientation has been noticed for the deposition of the funerary vases, although in some cases they may

141. (= ThesCRA II 4 a Banquet, Gr. 248 with bibl., VI 1 e Death and burial, Gr. pl. 60, 1) Tsibidou-Avloniti, M., M·ÎÂ‰ÔÓÈÎÔ› Ù¿ÊÔÈ ÛÙÔÓ ºÔ›ÓÈÎ· Î·È ÛÙÔÓ \AÁÈÔ Aı·Ó¿ÛÈÔ £ÂÛÛ·ÏÔÓ›ÎË˜: Û˘Ì‚ÔÏ‹ ÛÙË ÌÂÏ¤ÙË ÙË˜ ÂÈÎÔÓÔÁÚ·Ê›·˜ ÙˆÓ Ù·ÊÈÎÒÓ ÌÓËÌÂ›ˆÓ ÙË˜ M·ÎÂ‰ÔÓ›·˜ (2005). 142. (= ThesCRA II 4 a Banquet, Gr. 245 with bibl.) Napoli, M., La Tomba del Tuπatore (1970). 143. Kottaridi 1, 368. 144. Tsibidou-Avloniti, M., «…Ï¿ÚÓ·Î\ â˜ àÚÁ˘Ú¤ËÓ», in M‡ÚÙÔ˜. MÓ‹ÌË I. BÔÎÔÙÔÔ‡ÏÔ˘ (2000) 543–575 145. Hertz, R., Death and the Right Hand (1907, transl. 1960) 82–84; Binford, L. R. «Mortuary Practices: their

Study and their Potential», in id., An Archaeological Perspective (1972) 234. Much has been written since on the «social persona» of the dead infants and children in relation to their burial within the precincts of the family’s life space: Garland 1, 77–88; Sourvinou-Inwood 1, 44–45; ead. 2, 430–431; Golden, M., «Mortality, Mourning and Mothers», in Dasen, V. (ed.), Naissance et petite enfance dans l’Antiquité (2004) 145–157. Cf. ThesCRA VI 1 a Birth p. 7-8. 146. Scott, E., The Archaeology of Infancy and Infant Death (1999) 2–5. 147. Houby-Nielsen 4, 151–152; Golden, M., Childhood in Classical Athens (1990) 12–22.

in a gold-purple cloth, were placed. Among the few funeral oπerings placed close to the silver chest, two pairs of leather sandals were also found. On the floor of the tomb there was a bronze phiale and some clay vases of the late 4th cent. B.C. Just outside the entrance of the tomb the remains of the funeral pyre were discovered. The deceased woman was cremated on a luxurious wooden bed, decorated with inlaid glass and ivory figures which were found burnt in situ144. 15.

Child burials


383

follow the orientation of adult graves within the limits of the cemeteries148. Oπerings were placed inside the urn, or inside the pit, while a number of burials had no oπerings. The urn was sealed with a small stone, a sherd or a small vase. Some stones were often placed around the urn, in order to keep it in place. The pit was afterwards filled with earth. Inhumation in cist and shaft graves was more common for older children, buried in the same way as the adults, although this practice was not altogether excluded for younger children too. They were placed directly on the ground or in wooden co√ns, while they were only rarely cremated149. From around the end of the 5th cent. B.C. clay basins of 0,80 cm to 1 m long were used as co√ns for single or multiple child burials; the common position of the body was extended supine with both arms at the side. Grave goods oπered at infant and child burials usually relate to the particular age groups either by their miniature size or their function. Vases for food and drink, miniature and multiple vases, feeders, toys and jewelery were oπered probably by the dutiful parents150. Nevertheless, the number of child burials which were not at all provided with grave oπerings is rather large; oπerings are more common in pit inhumations rather than with pot burials. However, exceptions and variations as to the deposition or not of grave gifts make any general rule on the subject rather doubtful. Burnt or unburnt deposits as the remains of the rituals practised to honour the dead can only occasionally be found in relation to child burials. The absence of rituals should probably be ascribed to the plain character of those burials in general. Grave markers and funeral monuments were unfitted to child burials; however, child burials can be found among groups of adult burials commemorated in this way. The reaprisal of tomb H 16:6 in the area of the ancient Agora,

known as the tomb of the «rich Athenian Lady», brought to light the presence of a foetus and showed that the adult female died during pregnancy or premature childbirth. Special funerary rites, including the lavish outlay of funerary goods, might refer to the status of both individuals buried there151. During the Early Iron Age infant and child burials were either made «intramural», that is to say within the limits of the settlements152, or in small family cemeteries or in larger cemeteries along with adults, although usually on the periphery153. At the site of Oropos (Attica), the small funerary urns were placed at the bottom of deep circular pits, with a diameter around 0.90 m at the opening, while their depth varied from 0.95 m to 1.30 m. All pit-burials can be dated to the second half of the 8th cent. B.C. and were found within the limits of the settlement154; occasionally, stone cairns marked the exact place of the burials, recalling similar practices in the first Euboean settlement on the island of Ischia (Pithekoussai). This type of burial was reserved for the premature and newly born infants, according to few bone-fragments that were found inside one of the urns, and may represent a symbolic gesture related to the perception of infant death in the early community of Oropos. In a few cases, infant and child burials were excluded from «formal» burial to be deposited inside wells. At the Academy of Plato a deep pit contained around 40 small amphorae with the burials of small children in nine successive layers dated to the second half of the 8th and early 7th cent. B.C.155. In the area of the Agora of ancient Messene, P. Themelis excavated a well which contained a number of bones of infants, along with the burial amphorae (the upper part of which was missing in most cases) and a number of bones of dogs156. A Hellenistic well (G 5:3) from the Athenian Agora was also found half full of bones

148. Young (n. 75). For the case of Mende, cf. Vokotopoulou, I., ErgoMakThr 4 (1990) 411; ead., ErgoMakThr 3 (1989) 414–415. 149. For the case of 6th–5th cent. burials from Kerameikos, cf. Houby-Nielsen 2, 178 n. 348; Garland 1, 82. 150. Blandin, B., «Recherches sur les tombes à inhumation de l’Heroon d’Eretrie», in Bats, M./D’Agostino, B. (eds.), Euboica. L’Eubea e la presenza euboica in Calcidica e in Occidente (1998) 135–146; Kourou, N., «Silent Oπsprings and Dutiful Parents: Amphoriskoi and Multiple Vases in Early Iron Age Child Burials», in Simantoni-Bournia, E., et al. (eds.), \AÌ‡ÌÔÓ· öÚÁ·, ÙÈÌËÙÈÎfi˜ ÙfiÌÔ˜ ÁÈ· ÙÔÓ Î·ıËÁËÙ‹ B·Û›ÏË K. §·ÌÚÈÓÔ˘‰¿ÎË (2007) 62–76; Pomadère, M., «Un ‘héritier choyé d’innombrables biens’ (Il. IX, 482): Les enfants de l’élite sociale au début de l’âge du fer», in Mazarakis Ainian (n. 8) 501–509; Houby-Nielsen 4, 153–155. 151. Liston, M. A./Papadopoulos, J. K., «The ‘Rich Athenian Lady’ was pregnant. The Anthropology of a Geometric Tomb Reconsidered», Hesperia 73 (2004) 7–38. On the «special dead», cf. Garland 1, 77–103. 152. For an overview of the Early Iron Age, cf. Mazarakis Ainian, A., «Buried among the Living in Early

Iron Age Greece: Some Thoughts», in Bartoloni, G./ Benedettini, M. G. (eds.), Sepolti tra i vivi. Buried among the Living. Evidenza ed interpretazione di contesti funerari in abitato, ScAnt 14/1 (2007–08) 365–398. 153. Houby-Nielsen 4; Mariaud, O., «Rituel funéraire et transformations spatiales en Ionie archaïque: Le cas des tombes d’enfant à Smyrne», REA 108 (2006) 173–202. Blandin; Blandin, B., «Les enfants et la mort en Eubée au début de l’Age du Fer», in Guimier-Sorbets/Morizot 47–65; Moschonissioti, S., «Child Burials at the Seaside Cemetery of Ancient Mende», in Guimier-Sorbets/Morizot 207–225; 154. Vlachou, V., «Oropos: the Infant and Child Inhumations from the Settlement (late 8th – early 7th Centuries B.C.)», in Mazarakis Ainian, A. (ed.), Oropos and Euboea in the Early Iron Age (2007) 213–240. 155. Mazarakis Ainian, A., «Tombes d’enfants a l’intérieur d’habitats au début de l’Âge du Fer dans le Monde Grec», in Guimier-Sorbets/Morizot 70–71. 156. Themelis, P., Ergon (2004) 28–29; Bourbou, C./ Themelis, P., «Child Burials at Ancient Messene», in Guimier-Sorbets/Morizot 111–128.

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of animals, mostly dogs, and of approximately 447 infants157. An exceptional case of a child necropolis has been found on the island of Astypaleia158. A large area on the slope of the hill of Kylindra was reserved for the burials of the newborn and young children up to the age of three years old. Approximately 2754 burials have been discovered up to now, all inhumations inside clay vessels (enchytrismoi) which can be dated from the Geometric through the Roman period (pl. 40, 4). The vases were disposed on several layers and occasionally small stone structures were erected above them. According to the analysis of the bones from the vases, the great majority, about 77%, died during birth or soon afterwards. Only a few burials received oπerings, among which was a small figurine of the Egyptian god Bes which was placed with a burial of a young

child aged about one year and a half. In a single case two children were inhumed inside a pit; a small pyre was found in the vicinity of the burial with a few animal bones and a small hydria that may represent the remains of the funerary ritual practices. Evidence of rituals was also found around a stone construction, probably of the earlier phases of the necropolis according to the pottery. Adults and older children were buried in the cemeteries found at some distance from Kylindra159, while the large burial ground reserved for child enchytrismoi has been associated with the goddesses of childbirth, Artemis Lochia and Eileithyia named in two inscriptions from the Chora. Whether the site functioned as a necropolis of infants within the limits of a sanctuary is still rather ambiguous.

157. Colloquium: «The Reanalysis of a Well Deposit from the 2nd c. B.C. in the Athenian Agora: Animal Sacrifice and Infanticide in Late Hellenistic Athens?», AJA 103 (1999) 284–285; Papadopoulos, J. K., «Skeletons in Wells: Towards an Archaeology of Social Exclusion in the Ancient Greek World», in Hubert, J. (ed.), Madness, Disability and Social Exclusion. The Archaeology and Anthropology of «Diπerence», One World Archaeology 40 (2000) 96–118.

158. Michalaki-Kolia, M., «Un ensemble exceptionnel d’enchytrismes de nouveau-nés, de fœtus et de nourrissons découvert dans l’île d’Astypalée en Grèce: cimetière de bébés ou sanctuaire?», in Guimier-Sorbets/Morizot 161–205. 159. Farmakidou, E., in Stampolidis 2, 321–330; Clement, A./Hillsom, S./Michalaki-Kolia, M., «The Ancient Cemeteries of Astypalaia, Greece», Archaeology International 12 (2010) 17–21.

vicky vlachou

addendum vi 1.e. death and burial, gr. iv

1. Death and Burial, gr. (note 25)





39

40

addendum vi 1.e. death and burial, gr. iv





Death and Burial in the Greek Word

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