Inconsistencies in Greek and Roman Religion 2: Transition and Reversal in Myth and Ritual [2] 9004092676, 9789004092679

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INCONSISTENCIES IN GREEK AND ROMAN RELIGION II

STUDIES IN GREEK AND ROMAN RELIGION EDITED BY H.S. VERSNEL IN CO-OPERATION

WITH F.T. VANSTRATEN

VOLUME 6, II

INCONSISTENCIES

IN GREEK AND ROMAN RELIGION

TRANSITION

AND REVERSAL IN MYTH AND RITUAL BY

H.S. VERSNEL

E.J. BRILL LEIDEN • NEW YORK • KOLN 1993

II

The paper in this book meets the guidelines for permanence and durability of the Committee on Production Guidelines for Book Longevity of the Council on Library Resources.

Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication (Revised for vol. 2)

Data

Versnel, H. S. Inconsistencies in Greek and Roman religion. (Studies in Greek and Roman religion, 0169-9512; 6) Includes bibliographical references and index. Contents: 1. Ter Unus. Isis, Dionysos, Hermes - 2. Transition and reversal in myth and ritual. I. Title. BL722.V47 1990 292 90-2301 ISBN 90-04-09266-8 (pbk.: v. 1) ISBN 90-04-09267-6 (cloth: v. 2) ISBN 90-04-09268-4 (set)

V.

ISSN ISBN ISBN ISBN

0169-9512 90 04 09267 6 (vol. 6, II) 90 04 09266 8 (vol. 6, I) 90 04 09268 4 (set)

© Copyright1993 by E. j. Brill, Leiden, The Nt!iherlands All rights reserved.No part of this publication may be reproduced,translated,stored in a retrievalsystem, or transmittedin arryform by any means, electronic, mechanical,photocopying,recordingor otherwise, without prior written permissionof the publisher. Authorization to photocopyitemsfor internalor personal use is granted by E. J. Brill providedthat the appropriatefees are paid directlyto Copyright ClearanceCenter, 27 CongressStreet, SALEM MA 01970, USA. Fees are subjectto change. PRINTED

IN THE

NETHERLANDS

FOR HADEWYCH the second

Toch hou ik er niet van, Marij"ke.Zeljs als 't iets zij"nzou waar het echteniettemin alsje het schrijft met een volmaaktetegenzin stralenduit oplicht-wie wordt er gelukkig van? Anton Korteweg, Stand van zaken, Amsterdam (met een kleine aanpassing)

1991

CONTENTS

PREFACE

.........................................

ABBREVIATIONS

XI

XIII

INTRODUCTION

1

Chapter I WHAT IS SAUCE FOR THE GOOSE IS SAUCE FOR THE GANDER: MYTH AND RITUAL, OLD AND NEW 1.

QUESTIONS

2.

THE

. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .

16

. . . .

20

1. Jane Ellen Harrison . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 2. Myth arisesfrom rite: the Cambridgeschool . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 3. Myth as a scenariofor dramatic ritual: the 'Myth and Ritual School' proper . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .

23 29

3.

THE

37

4.

CRITICISM

. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .

41

5.

INITIATION,

A MODERN

. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .

48

1. From Harrison to Burkert . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 2. Marginality: profits and pitfalls of a concept . . . . . . . . . . . . .

51 60

6.

EPPURE

. . . .

74

7.

PROSPECTS

. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .

79

RISE AND GROWTH

FUSES BLOW:

SI MUOVE

OF MYTH

AND RITUAL

THEORY

OUT AND OUT MYTH AND RITUAL THEORISTS

...

COMPLEX

: MYTH AND RITUAL

PARI

PASSU

32

Chapter II KRONOS AND THE KRONIA

90

1.

MYTH

2.

RITUAL

3.

CONTRADICTIONS

. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .

99 106

VIII

CONTENTS

4.

THE

FESTIVAL

5.

THE

AMBIGUITY

OF REVERSAL

. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .

OF THE KRONIA AND RELATED FESTIVALS

...

115 122

1. The paradox of the impossibleharmony . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 122

2. The paradox of thefestive conflict . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 126 6.

THE

7.

CONCLUSIONS

KING OF A PRIMEVAL

REVERSED

WORLD

129

............

. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .

132

Chapter III SATURNUS AND THE SATURNALIA 1.

THE

EVIDENCE

. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .

136

1. Saturn . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 136

2. Saturnalia . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 146 2.

SATURNIAN THE

MYTH AND RITUAL:

REVERSED

ORDER

THE CARNIVALESQUE

SIGNS OF

150

.............................

1. The eccentricgod . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 150 153 2. The cult ........................................ 3. Licence . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 157

3.

LOOKING

1. 2. 3. 4. 5. 6.

4.

BACK: ORIGINS

. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .

The implicationsof the calendricalposition . . . . . . . . . . . . . . The implicationsof the topographicalposition . . . . . . . . . . . . The contributionsof myth . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . An interim balancesheet . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . A new interpretationof Lua . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . The originof theSaturnalianimagery:therelationshipof myth and ritual . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .

LOOKING

FORWARD:

THE CONTINUING

164 165 171 176 180 181 184

STORY OF MYTH AND

. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .

190

1. The ambivalenceof theSaturnalianking: Mythical topicalities. . . a. Redeunt Saturnia Regna . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . b. Non semperSaturnaliaerunt ....................... 2. The king must die. Ritual re-enactments. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .

191 192 205

RITUAL

210

CONTENTS

Chapter IV FESTIVAL FOR BONA DEA AND THE GREEK THESMOPHORIA

THE ROMAN 1.

THE

IX

FESTIVAL

OF BONA

DEA

. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .

229

1. Traditional interpretations. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 230 2.

3.

. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .

235

1. The evidenceand the traditionalinterpretation. . . . . . . . . . . . 2. New directionsin interpretingthe Thesmophoria.......... 3. Numphai sleepingon lugos:theparadoxof the Thesmophoria. . . 4. The contributionof myth ............................

235 240 245 250

BACK

261

THE

1. 2. 3. 4.

THESMOPHORIA

TO BONA

DEA

Wine in, myrtle out . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . The presenceof wine ............................... Ambiguous virgins . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . The contributionof myth . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .

4.

Two

5.

GUNE-PARTHENOS:

FESTIVALS,

RACE

6.

................................

274

.......................

ON THE FATAL AMBIGUITY

OF THE FEMALE

276

...........................................

CONCLUSION

APOLLO

ONE PARADOX

284

......................................

Chapter V AND MARS ONE HUNDRED ROSCHER

1.

COMPARING

TWO GODS:

2.

COMPARING

TWO GODS: A STRUCTURALIST

3.

THE

ROOTS OF A STRUCTURAL

SOCIAL

RosCHER

261 264 269 272

YEARS AFTER

AND AFTER

290

VIEW

296

ANALOGY

313

1. Apollo . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 313 319 2. Mars .......................................... 5.

KINDRED

FUNCTIONS,

BIBLIOGRAPHY

DIFFERENT

IMAGES

...................................

...............

328 335

INDEXES . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 345

PREFACE

Some chapters ( or sections of chapters) of this book originated as short( er) essays-two of them in Dutch-and have been completely rewritten and elaborated. Others are original contributions. Accordingly, various people have read and criticized sections of the book in different phases between the status nascendi and the coming of age. Gerhard Binder, Josine Blok, Jan Bremmer, Fritz Graf and Renate Schlesier have offered helpful advice and valuable criticism on various sections, which will be accounted for in more detail in the introduction. I had the special privilege of trying out a number of issues during a visiting lectureship at the Ecole Pratique des Hautes Etudes (Section des Sciences Religieuses) in Paris. I drew lots of inspiration from the enthusiasm, the tokens of interest, and the always refreshing 'other' way of posing questions by colleagues of both this school and that of the Sciences Sociales. I trust nobody will be offended when I single out Stella Georgoudi, the mater castrorum, for a special tribute to her Greek hospitality and helpfulness. I am grateful to all these colleagues and friends for having helped to improve the book. This is no less, though in a different way, true of the students of my Leiden seminar on 'Ambiguities' in the academic year 1989-1990. Gradually I have come to realize that the topics broached during that seminar must have been a most alarming experience to students who are normally treated to the Second English war, the history of the slave trade, or the causes of the French revolution. Have I really succeeded in convincing Jan ter Horst that there must be an explanation for why a mythical father castigates his mythical daughter with a mythical rod of myrtle beyond the fact that myrtle was the most popular material for making besoms due to its abundance in Roman parks and gardens? However, when Jent Bijlsma, speaking on the goats of Polyphemos, could be heard explaining to the lesser-gifted: ''these are not natural goats, these are pre-cultural goats", I knew our common efforts had not been in vain. Add Lily Knibbeler's attempts to make me understand what I actually meant, and it must be clear that I have greatly benefitted from this experiment. I dedicate the footnotes of the

XII

PREFACE

present book to this happy class (the only part of the book, by the way, that does not provide full translations of all the quotations in foreign languages). Once more, a stay at Vandoeuvres and one in the Dutch Historical Institute in Rome offered the necessary rest and ideal academic circumstances to proceed. Once more, too, it was Peter Mason who conscientiously corrected most of the English text, though some sections, to be detailed in the introduction, had been translated by others in earlier stages. I am grateful to all of them for their efforts to improve the text, and apologize that the profusion of my later insertions, especially in the footnotes, has eventually distorted the picture.

ABBREVIATIONS Books and articles for which I use the name-date system are given in the bibliography. Other books (mainly works ofreference) which I cite simply by (name and) abbreviated title are given here. For the abbreviations of periodical titles I have followed the conventions of L 'Annie philologique.For the abbreviations of collections of papyri see: J. F. Oates, R. S. Bagnall and W. H. Willis, Checklistof Editions of GreekPapyri and Ostraca(BASP Suppl. 1, 19782). Corpora of inscriptions are referred to as (e.g.) I.Priene; these works are either listed inJ. J.E. Hondius, Saxa Loquuntur(Leiden 1939) and, currently, in SEC or form part of the series InschriftengriechischerStadte aus Kleinasien(1972- ). For a full list of the epigraphical corpora covering Asia Minor see: St. Mitchell, CR 37 [1987] 81 - 2). The exceptions are listed below.

Abh. Adonis AE AFA AL ANET

ANRW ARW BE

CGF

GIL CLE

Abhandlungen Adonis. Relazioni de! colloquiazn Roma 1981 (Rome 1984) L 'anneeepigraphique( 1888- ) G. Henzen, Acta Fratrum Arvalium (Berlin 1874) AnthologiaLatina J. B. Pritchard, Ancient Near Eastern Texts Relatingto the Old Testament(Princeton 19552 , 3d ed. with supp. 1969) Aufstieg und Niedergangder romischenWelt (ed. H. Temporini & W. Haase, Berlin 1972-) Archivfiir Religionswissenschaft Bulletinepigraphique(by J. & L. Robert, annually in REG until 1984, continued by a team of epigraphists, 1987- , cited by year and paragraph number) G. Kaibel, Comicorum GraecorumFragmenta (Berlin 1899) CorpusInscriptionumLatinarum (1863- ) Carmina Latina epigraphica(ed. F. Biicheler 1926)

XIV

Diet. Ant. FGrHist FHG GB GGR GR HrwG

IBM JG

IPhilae IGR ILS Kaibel KBO LEW LIMC LSAM LSCG LS] LSS OCT OF

ABBREVIATIONS

C. Daremberg & E. Saglio, Dictionnairedes antiquitesgrecqueset romaines(Paris 1877-1918) F. Jacoby, Die FragmentedergriechischenHistoriker (Berlin - Leiden 1923-58) FragmentahistoricorumGraecorum(ed. C. & T. Muller, 1868 - 78) J. G. Frazer, The GoldenBough I-XIII (London 1911-363) M. P. Nilsson, GeschichtedergriechischenReligion I-II (Munich 19673-1961 2) W. Burkert, GreekReligion. Archaicand Classical (Oxford 1985) Handbuchreligionswissenschaftlicher Grundbegrif.fe (ed. H. Cancik, B. Gladigow & M. Laubscher, 1988 - ) Inscriptionsof the British Museum InscriptionesGraecaeI-XIV (1873- ) A. & E. Bernand, Les inscriptionsgrecques[et latinesj de Philae (Paris 1969) InscriptionesGraecaead Res Romanas Pertinentes I-IV (ed. R. Gagnat et alii, Paris 1911-27) lnscriptionesLatinae SelectaeI-III (ed. H. Dessau, Berlin 1892 - 1916). G. Kaibel, EpigrammataGraecaex lapidibuscollecta(Berlin 1878) Keilschrifttexteaus Boghazkoi ( 1916- ) A. Walde &J. B. Hofmann, LateinischesEtymologischesWorterbuch(Heidelberg 1938-543) Lexicon lconographicum Mythologiae Classicae (Zurich 1981-) F. Sokolowski, Lois sacreesde l'Asie Mineure (Paris 1955) F. Sokolowski, Lois sacries des cites grecques (Paris 1969) H. G. Liddell, R. Scott, H. S.Jones,A GreekEnglish Lexicon (Oxford 19402) F. Sokolowski, Lois sacreesdes cites grecques. Supplement(Paris 1962) Oxford Classical Texts 0. Kern, OrphicorumFragmenta(Berlin 1922)

ABBREVIATIONS

OGIS OLD OMS PCG PG PCM

PMG PSI RAC RE

RML

Sb SEC

Syll. 3 Thes.L.L.

xv

OrientisGraecaeI nscriptionesSelectaeI -II (ed. W. Dittenberger, Leipzig 1903-5) OxfordLatin Dictionary L. Robert, OperaMinora SelectaI-IV (Amsterdam 1969), V (1989) Poetae comici graeci ( ed. R. Kassel & C. Austin 1983- ) Patrologiaecursus completus. Series Graeca(ed. J. P. Migne) Papyri GraecaeMagicae. Die griechischenZauberpapyri I-II ( edd. K. Preisendanz et alii, Stuttgart 1973-42) Poetaemelici graeci (ed. D. L. Page, Oxford 1926) Papyri SocietaItaliana (1912-) Reallexikonfur Antike und Christentum(ed. Th. Klauser et alii, Stuttgart 1950- ) Paulys Real-Encyclopadieder classischenAltertumswissenschaften(ed. G. Wisowa, E. Kroll et alii, Stuttgart-Munich 1893-) Ausfiihrliches Lexicon der griechischen und romischenMythologie(ed. W. H. Roscher et alii, Leipzig 1884-1937) Sitzungsberichte SupplementumEpigraphicumGraecum(ed. J.J.E. Hondius et alii 1923-71, continued by H. W. Pleket et alii, Amsterdam 1976- ) Sylloge lnscriptionum GraecarumI-IV (ed. W. Dittenberger et alii, Leipzig 1915-243). ThesaurusLinguae Latinae (Leipzig 1900- )

INTRODUCTION When we asked Pooh what the opposite of an Introduction was, he said: "The what of what?", which didn't help us as much as we had hoped, but luckily Owl kept his head and told us that the Opposite of an Introduction, my dear Pooh, was a Contradiction, and, as he is very good at long words, I am sure that that's what it is. A. A. Milne The House at Pooh Corner

Culture is a categorical construct. As a corollary, it cannot but provoke numerous and disquieting contradictions, anomalies, ambiguities and paradoxes-in short, all those inconsistencies which threaten to make the world a jelly. This is the keynote of Inconsistencies in Greekand Roman Religion as expounded in the introduction to the first volume. In that introduction I also sketched-heavily leaning on Mary Douglas' theories of cultural ambiguities and Leon Festinger's analyses of cognitive dissonance-the universal feelings of discomfort induced by disturbances of the cultural universe among such divergent categories as adolescents, adults-both Western and non-Western-scholars, theologians, politicians, and idiotai, with a special focus on historians' aversion to the paradoxical. Numerous and varied are the prevailing strategies to escape from unbearable clashes or to cope with irritating ones. One, for instance, is to reduce or deny the ambiguity by a deliberate choice for one of two contradictory options. The inherent rejection of the other option can take the form of abominating, tabooing, destroying, forbidding, but also of various types of denial. Denying the existence-or at least the relevance-of oneof two conflicting options is a prevailing course of action. More interesting, however, and less researched is the strategy of keeping the inconsistency from the retina altogether, for instance, by a virtuoso winking process, which enables the subject to save two conflicting realities or convictions by keeping them radically apart 1 . 1 After the first volume had appeared, Marliesjansen drew my attention to R. Foley, Is it possible to Have Contradictory Beliefs?, Midwest Studiesin Philosophy10

2

INTRODUCTION

The pervasive influence of this strategy in history, especially in the history of religions, and the fierce resistance of modern historians to perceiving, accepting or appreciating it 2 was the theme of the first chapter of the first volume: the curious Hellenistic paradox of simultaneously embracing both absolute freedom and total submission in relation to kings and gods. For all that, sooner or later such inconsistencies will attract attention, if not generally, then atleast in more critical circles. Even then, the two conflicting elements are sometimes saved, for instance, through the development of new hermeneutic systems. The inconsistency appears to be no inconsistency after all: the submission to a fatherly and righteous ruler is the highest form of democratic freedom, as second-century political philosophers contend; or the service of the Lord is the most sublime form ofliberation, as the apostle Paul taught. Finally, however, it also happens that people maintain two conflicting elements, while simultaneously acknowledging their incompatibility and the impossibility of denying or eliminating either of them. The aporia lies in the nature (or culture) of things. Instances of such paradoxes are the clash between the demands made by intransigent gods and those made by an equally intransigent social or political system; or the blatant paradoxes that emerge when mortals acquire divine traits. Two literary genres in particular have the natural mission of questioning, problematising and challenging society by tearing away the covers that hide such inconsistencies, and thus disclosing tensions and dissonances in religious, cultural and social life. These are tragedy and comedy, whose task is to explore, analyse and finally to communicate these fundamental tensions to their contemporaries. They are neither able nor expected to offer

(1986) 327-55, whose argument in favour of the answer "no" primarily shows that the gap between logical and psychological approaches is even wider then I supposed. 2 To the few exceptions in the study of ancient culture and history lauded in Inconsistencies I, 22 ff. I should add: N. H. Bluestone, Womenand theIdeal Society:Plato's Republicand ModernMyths of Gender(Oxford 1987), who provides a revealing discussion of the many desperate attempts to get rid of the inconsistencies in Plato's theories on the position of women in his ideal state. For D. Cohen, whose gratifyingly related approach I recorded (23 n.74), see now his Law, Society,and Sexuality: The Enforcementof Morals in ClassicalAthens (Cambridge 1991) esp. eh. 1-3, 6, 7, 9. A particularly relevant study by Mary Beard will be amply discussed and exploited in eh. IV of the present volume.

INTRODUCTION

3

solutions. The second chapter of the first volume treats Euripides' tragedy the Bacchae, staging the insoluble paradox between the totalitarian demands of a tyrannical god and the no less totalitarian claims of society. The third chapter illuminates the impossible consequences, indeed the absurdity, of divine praise when applied to a human being, as seen through the eyes of the satirist Martial. What the first volume did not discuss becomes the central issue of the second: Mary Douglas' fifth and last provision for dealing with ambiguous events, which is, in a way, the collective variant of the individual initiatives by tragedians and comedians just mentioned. Collective myths and rituals are often created and performed in order to expose in word or action anomalies and paradoxes of nature or society, thus reducing the threat of their inherent tensions. Both myth and ritual may even go further and devise a non-realistic, paradoxical and internally contradictory imagery in order to show what happens if one ventures outside the borders of orderly society. These strategies prevail especially in two types of festivals: festivals of licence,such as the Saturnalia and carnival; and rituals of initiation. Both carry the notion of 'transition'; both are marked by signs of reversal. The present volume discusses some focal issues connected with the relevant myth and ritual. By way of introduction, the first chapter3 presents a survey of the history and development of the myth and ritual debate. One of its objects is to discover why this debate started in the last quarter of the nineteenth century and why it was revived in the last quarter of the twentieth. Another purpose is to show that the two shifting paradigms, so conspicuous here, naturally exploited the same dramatic material of 'dying and rising heroes' . The reason is that the two festive types under discussion-the New Year festival and the rites of initiation-both involve the notion of transition as their central feature. The former type was discovered and researched in the framework of the 'fertility paradigm', the latter in that of the social interpretation of religion. The title of this chapter does not imply that nothing has changed between the two stages of the debate-on the contrary, the chapter shows exactly how much has changed-but it 3 The essay that was first published in the Dutch periodical Lampas 17 ( 1984) 194-246, was translated by P. P. J. van Caspel and edited by L. Edmunds for publication in Edmunds 1990. Renate Schlesier offered a shower of comments and suggestions on this version. Chr. Auffarth's pertinent reactions prompted me to clarify my argument further and to adjust my formulations.

4

INTRODUCTION

does give expression to views concerning both the identical thematic contents and the functionally related natures of these two types of festival. Myth and ritual of transition and reversal: even the outsider will expect an occasional paradox or inconsistency here. Yet it appears that many scholars, especially those of a previous generation, are unwilling to accept the internal inconsistencies in the myths and rituals of reversal. Once more, the 'strain towards congruence' (Q. Skinner) makes itself manifest. The thesis that these internal contradictions should not be smoothed over or-worse-explained away, for instance by assuming a fusing of traditions ( an overworked panacea in classical scholarship), is advanced in chapter II, on Kronos and the Kronia 4 • The utopian imagery of the Golden Race under king Kronos is reflected in the affluence and euphoria of the Attic festival of the Kronia; the dystopian traits of despotism, cruelty, savagery-in short, the radical abolition of moral standards-, which are another recurring characteristic of the mythical Kronos, can be recognized in some (alleged) Kronian cults and sacrifices. It is argued that the stark contradictions in these complexes of myth and ritual reveal the very essence of their function and message. The third chapter 5 has a similar objective with respect to the closely related Roman myth and ritual of Saturnus and the Saturnalia. Fortunately, the evidence here permits us to cast glances both backward and forward in time. Accordingly, there is an attempt to discover the origins of the Saturnalian festival and one of Saturnus' early functions, including the nature of the goddess Lua Saturni. On the other hand, the Saturnalian imagery provides an ideal opportunity for demonstrating how the contradictory-utopian and dystopian-components could be (and were) still eagerly exploited in the early imperial period. Their continuing power becomes apparent in expressions illustrating the reigns of two emperors: they give voice to the high expectations of the reign of Augustus and to the disillusion after the disconcertingly 'Saturnalian' emperor 4 A first, shorter version of this chapter was commented on and edited by Jan Bremmer for publication in Bremmer 1987a. 5 Jan Bremmer and Fritz Graf offered comments on the first three sections, and Gerhard Binder read the entire chapter. We also discussed the theme of section 4 during the 'Bochumer Altertumswissenschaftliches Colloquium', on: "Karnevaleske Phanomene in antiken und nachantiken Kulturen und Literaturen" in May 1992.

INTRODUCTION

5

Claudius. Finally, there is a sketch of the revival of Saturnian myth and ritual in the late Roman empire. While chapter II and chapter III deal with a Greek and a closely related Roman myth and ritual complex respectively, each of the next two chapters treats a pair of comparable instances of Greek and Roman myth and ritual. In chapter IV the Roman festival of Bona Dea is compared with the Greek Thesmophoria 6 . Both are women's festivals displaying a reversal of roles and, more generally, a suspension of normal routine. Here a focal problem emerges: how do we explain the paradox that, on the one hand, matrons celebrate their basic procreative qualities in rites that focus on sexual symbolism, while, on the other, they are rigorously prevented by antaphrodisiac symbolism from satisfying their erotic desires? It can even be argued that matrons were temporarily reduced to the status of virgins during these festivals. In both cases the concomitant myths help us to explain the ritual paradox in the light of the contrasting functions and images of matrons and virgins in ancient society. The conclusion is that, if there is a necessary return to 'precultural' circumstances during these festivals, matrons cannot continue to act as matrons. They must once again assume the status of maidens on the brink of marriage. Exactly hundred years have passed since Roscher claimed that Apollo and Mars shared so many elements of myth and ritual that they must originally have been identical gods. In accordance with the prevailing 'meteorological' preoccupations of the time, the gods were considered to be images of the Sun. This theory was sufficiently untenable to be completely discarded soon after its emergence. As a corollary, the similarities in the myth and ritual of Apollo and Mars disappeared from the discussion as well. Chapter V presents a reconsideration and elaboration of Rosch er' s arguments for his comparison 7 . For, as a matter of fact, they appear remarkable enough to require a new analysis and explanation. This explanation is sought in the gods' early roles in the context of initiation. With respect to Apollo, Jane Harrison' s earlier initiatory suggestions 6 The English version of an abridged draft of this chapter was corrected by P. Walcot for publication in the "European" issue of G&R 1992, appearing in the same year as the present book. Josine Blok and Fritz Graf contributed some comments. 7 An earlier version appeared in VisibleReligion4/5 (1985/6) 134-72. I benefitted from comments and suggestions by Jan Bremmer and Fritz Graf.

6

INTRODUCTION

have been circumstantially substantiated by Walter Burkert. I now argue for a similar function for early Mars, who, as both myth and ritual indicate (and as might be expected), is more directly concerned with the military aspects of Italic initiatory practice. Myth and Ritual of transition and reversal cannot but provoke paradoxes, ambiguities, contradictions-in short, inconsistencies; and that is what this book is about. However, as is evident from the above survey of contents, no chapter can ignore the history of the issue and the shift in the paradigms that form the frame of interpretation; indeed, some chapters actually make it their task to discuss these questions. In other words, this is myth and ritual in transition, which calls for a few further remarks. In a Dutch anthropological periodical 8 , the Indian anthropologist Rajendra Pradhan analyses a peculiar feature of the Dutch character: the obsession with the weather. In his attempt to detect why this is so, and more especially why this is manifested through frequent conversation on the topic, he distinguishes three types of explanation: a) the physical or climactic; b) the social; and c) the cultural. The first two explanations are offered by his Dutch informants themselves as follows: a. we talk about weather because, unlike the inhabitants of more privileged regions, we have weather, and very bad, ever-changing and unpredictable weather at that, b. we talk about weather because, since it is uncivil to keep silent in the presence of fellow humans, it is a neutral topic, useful as an initial point of contact with a stranger or as a stopgap when an angel is passing over 9 . Talking about weather therefore involves a stark paradox: it functions as an instrument for maintaining social cohesion by the act of not really saying anything. These two explanations belong to 'native exegesis', to use V. W. Turner's phrase. For this very reason, they are liable to serious suspicion in anthropological circles. Consequently, Pradhan considers

8 Mooi weer, meneer. Why do the Dutch speak so often about the weather? Etnofoor2 (1989) 3-14, with thanks to Marliesjansen for drawing my attention to it. 9 G. Leech, Semantics. The Study of Meanings (Harmondsworth 1981) calls this the 'phatic function oflanguage', and defines it as (41 ): "the function of keeping communication lines open, and keeping social relationships in good repair ... it is not what one says, but the fact that one says it at all, that matters". On phatic speech and its insidious consequences for the interpretation of written or spoken source material see: InconsistenciesI, Introduction.

INTRODUCTION

7

these explanations inadequate, or at least not exhaustive, without discarding them completely. The real solution, he argues, is to be sought in a third option, the cultural explanation, which answers to the demands of the 'collective mentality': c. the Dutch are obsessed with the weather for the very reason that it does not fit neatly into their scheme of things, which is based on order, regularity and control. The Dutch, he states, prefer everything to be regular, ordered and controlled: you have only to look at the polders with their straight canals, the neat gardens, the rigid temporal framework of social life, with fixed times to eat, to pay visits, to work and to interrupt work, etc., etc. Now, the ever-changing and unpredictable Dutch weather is a metaphor for all that is irregular, disorderly and uncontrollable. That is why it is discussed, not only with an occasional stranger but also and even more 'ritually' in the private domain of the family, till death us do part. I mention this discussion because it is a splendid and very recognizable illustration of one of the implicit (and sometimes explicit) premises of the present book: that in explaining codes and conventions-in our case: myths and rituals-it is most naive, unprofitable, unwise and therefore inadmissible to adopt a single, monolithic clue and to ignore or decline all others unconditionally as being superseded, short-sighted or downright stupid. If we transpose the above three options to the conceptual categories of the well-known scholarly approaches to the interpretation of religion, anybody will immediately recognize the three major schemes connected with the names of Tylor, Durkheim and (for instance) Geertz respectively, i.e. with 1) the substantive, 2) the functionalist, and 3) the cosmological, symbolic-perhaps including structuralist and semiotic-, cultural approaches to religion; or, to put it another way, religion as communication, as social cohesion and as orientation 10 . "Belief in spiritual beings" was Tylor's "rudimentary [or] minimum definition of religion" 11 . Belief in these beings involved the 10 It is unnecessary, of course, to dwell on this classification, which can be found in any historical survey of anthropology, especially anthropological approaches to religion. I have especially consulted: Kardiner & Preble 1962; Van Baal 1971; Waardenburg 1974; Lewis 1976; Sharpe 1980; Evans-Pritchard 1981; Kuper 1985; Doty 1986; Harris 1986; Morris 1987. Cf. below p.15 n.1. For a recent, stimulating and critical summary I refer to Platvoet 1990, to whose discussion I am much indebted. 11 For a long list of sympathizers up to 1966 see Platvoet 1990, n.29. For a short

8

INTRODUCTION

necessity of communicating with them. Tylor and his contemporaries, especially J. G. Frazer, viewed this communication first and foremost from the perspective of the wish to achieve direct goals: fertility of the human population, of cattle and fields, and defence against illness and enemies. 'Religion as communication' one might also call it 12 , albeit in the strict sense of communication with addressable objects of religion and in the context of generally clearly defined, specific goals. Though it has been heavily censured by representatives of later schools for its 'individualism', 'intellectualism', 'utilitarianism', 'evolutionism', and a craving for 'origins' 13 , more recent investigators-even in the field of sociology 14-are heading for a re-evaluation of the Tylorian position 15 . "Religion as social cohesion" is the well-known Durkheimian definition. Durkheim's phrase "The reality expressed by religious thought is society'' 16 highlights a radical farewell to any religious discussion: B. Gladigow, HrwG I (1988) 26-40. Of course, the phenomenological school is the most conspicuous inheritor, with R. Otto and, in a different way, M. Eliade as the most important names. Cf. for instance R. Otto's attack on the functionalist approach (Das Heilige [Breslau 1917] 8): "Wer das nicht kann (i.e. 'sich besinnen') oder wer solche Momente iiberhaupt nicht hat, ist gebeten nicht weiter zu lesen. Denn wer sich zwar auf seine Pubertiits-gefiihle Verdauungs-stockungen oder auch Sozial-Gefiihle besinnen kann, auf eigentiimlich religiose Gefiihle aber nicht, mit dem ist es schwierig Religions-psychologie zu treiben." 12 As does Platvoet 1990. 13 In the background there is sometimes fear of Western ethnocentric projection in the Tylorian model. In general, these warnings are salutary. I refer for instance to H. G. Kippenberg, Diskursive Religionswissenschaft, in: B. Gladigow & H. G. Kippenberg (edd.), Neue Ansi.itzein tier Religionswissenschaft(Munich 1983) 9-28; idem, Introduction, in: H. G. Kippenberg&B. Luchesi(edd.),Magie. Diesozialwissenschaftliche Kontroverseiiberdas Verstehenfremden Denkens(Frankfurt 1978). However, one detects traces of paranoia here and there, especially in the sheer spasmodic fear of the use of the term magic. I have discussed this in: H. S. Versnel, Some Reflections on the Relationship Magic-Religion, Numm 38 (1991) 177-97. In my view, it is an illusion to believe that the substantive approach is more ethnocentric than, say, the semiotic. 14 One of the most impressive: P. L. Berger, Some Second Thoughts on Substantive versus Functional Definitions of Religion, Journalfor the ScientificStudy of Religion13 (1974) 125-33. He reproaches the functionalists for an "interest in quasiscientific legitimation of the avoidance of transcendence''. 15 See for instance: R. Horton, A Definition of Religion and Its Uses, Journal of the Royal AnthropologicalInstitute 90 ( 1960) 201-20; idem, N eo-Tylorianism: Sound Sense or Sinister Prejudice?, Man 3 (1968) 625-34; E. Ross, Neo-Tylorianism: A Reassessment, Man 6 (1971) 105-16. 16 "La realite qu'exprime la pensee religieuse est la societe", Les fomu:s elbnentairesde la vie religieuse(Paris 1912) 616, and cf. the statements quoted below p.26 n.22.

INTRODUCTION

9

objective beyond the social function as a cohesive instrument. Again, later specialists 17 have mercilessly denounced its deficiencies: it is a (deliberately) reductionist 18 definition, which aims to explain religion fully in terms of one of its non-religious social functions. It has been correctly objected that, on the one hand, it is not applicable to all religious behaviour 19 , and, on the other, it is applicable to many non-religious rites. Furthermore, there is the persistent danger of petitioprincipii in the analysis and interpretation of (religious) motives, most conspicuous in the frequent confusion of intent and effect. 20 Yet few will deny that the study of the social functions of religion has been and still is an important and most productive branch of religious studies 21 . "Religion as orientation" 22 , "to create a world of meaning in the context of which human life can be significantly lived" 23, is the third of the major definitions. The differencewith the previous one is that it does not primarily ask what religion does for society, but what 17 H. H. Penner, The Poverty of Functionalism, HR 11 (1971) 91-7; idem, Impasse and Resolution:A Critiqueofthe Study ofReligion (New York 1989); H. Burhenn, Functionalism and the Explanation of Religion, journal for the Scientific Study of Religion 19 (1980) 350-60; Berger, o.c. (above n.14). Cf. M. E. Spiro, Religion: Problems of Definition and Explanation, in: Banton 1966, 85-126, against interpreting religion in terms of the non-religious aspects of religion instead of its religious aspects. 18 On types ofreduction see: E. H. Pyle, Reduction and the 'Religious' Explanation of Religion, Religion 9 (1979) 197-214. 19 Particularly aggravating is the fact that functionalism cannot account for the revolutionary and sometimes anti-social aspects of religion, and its failure to account for social change: I. C. Jarvie, The Revolutionin Anthropology(London 1964). 20 R. K. Merton, Social Theory and Social Structure part 1, published separately as idem, On TheoreticalSociology(New York-London 1967) is still a lucid introduction to the merits and pitfalls of the functionalist approach. Cf. also: G. W. Stocking Jr. (ed.), FunctionalismHistoricized(Madison 1984), esp. 106-30. 2 1 Cf. for instance: R. N. McCauley & E. Th. Lawson, Functionalism Reconsidered, HR 23 (1984) 372-81. 22 Best-known in the form in which it was introduced by C. Geertz, Religion as a Cultural System, in: Banton 1966, 1-46 = Geertz 1973, 87-125, from which I quote his well-known definition ofreligion (p. 90): "a system of symbols which acts to establish powerful, pervasive, and long-lasting moods and motivations in men by formulating conceptions of a general order of existence and clothing these conceptions with such an aura of factuality that the moods and motivations seem uniquely realistic". Geertz had predecessors, among whom I single out Mary Douglas. Segal 1980, 181 contrasts her to Hooke, Durkheim, Malinowski, and Radcliffe Brown (while Penner 1968, 51, adds: Kluckhohn, Spiro and Leach) and praises her for concentrating on the meaning, not the effectof ritual. See below eh. I, nn.67 f. Cf. Platvoet 1990, 202 n.34. 2 3 T. F. O'Dea, The Sociologyof Religion (Englewoods Cliffs 1966) 5.

10

INTRODUCTION

it says about society (and culture). The focus is on 'meaning' 24 instead of 'effect'; on 'making sense', instead of 'effectuating cohesion'. The similarity with the Durkheimian definition is that both nonetheless are essentially 'functionalist': in the service of society, either as an instrument for maintaining its coherence or as an instrument for constructing a cosmology 'to live by' 25 . Another point of similarity is that this symbolic-cosmological function is not restricted to religion either. It is therefore legitimate to lump together the latter two options as an instrumental and a symbolic functionalist 26 definition respectively, and to contrast this functionalist category with the Tylorian substantivist-communicative definition. In the domain of myth and ritual, a good illustration of what I mean is offered by W. R. Comstock 27, who distinguishes inter alia the following aspects in the functions of myth and ritual: they 1) provide" assistance in the symbolic articulation of the social patterns and relationships themselves", 2) serve to "validate the society", 3) contain a "performatory function", 4) have a "heuristic, educative" function, and 5) are helpful in "solving personal and social dilemmas". It will be immediately apparent that here symbolic and instrumental functions, if distinguishable at all, cannot be separated, since one is often dependent on the other. 24 Geertz accepts the challenge conveyed by S. Langer, PhilosophicalSketches (Baltimore 1962), that "the concept of meaning, in all its varieties, is the dominant philosophical concept of our time'', that ''sign, symbol, denotation, signification, communication ... are our (intellectual] stock in trade." And, with Max Weber, he basically believes that man is "an animal suspended in webs of significance he himself has spun", Geertz 1973, 5. 25 Geertz 1973, 118, himself, speaking of the effects of a special ritual, says: "By inducing a set of moods and motivations-an ethos-and defining an image of cosmic order-a world view-by means of a single set of symbols, the performance makes the model for and model of aspects of religious belief mere transpositions of one another." 26 Instrumental and expressive symbols are distinguished by Mary Douglas 1970, 3. Cf. particularly the phrase ofGeertz quoted in the preceding note. In the same vein already: W. J. Goode, Religionamongthe Primitives(New York 1951) 223: "Religion expressesthe unity of society, but it also helps to createthat unity". Cf. Doty 1986, 44 ff. There is also a higher common multiple of the two 'functions' "doing for" and "saying about", in a statement made by P. Berger o.c. (above n.14) 127, in his discussion of the 'functionalists' R. Bellah, C. Geertz, and Th. Luckmann: ''In all three cases, religionis definedin termsof what is does-be it for society, for the individual, or for both. And this, of course, is what the word 'functional' essentially means." Cf. also Platvoet 1990, 202 n.33. 27 The Study of Religion and Primitive Religions (New York 1972) 38-40. For an evaluation see: Doty 1986, 48 f.

INTRODUCTION

11

In distinguishing 'substantive' and 'functional' approaches to religion one may feel tempted to apply the term 'paradigm', and I have occasionally yielded to that temptation. In doing so, I am consistently referring to the division between the nineteenth-century 'substantive' paradigm with its focus on individual and often utilitarian motives, and the twentieth-century 'socio-cultural' paradigm, with its emphasis on collective mentality and behaviour. I mention the term 'paradigm' especially because the recent discussion of this concept may help to clarify one of the main themes in the present volume: the reluctance to select a single clue as a unique, monolithic and exclusive definition, while radically rejecting other ones. Th. S. Kuhn recently complained that his concept 'paradigm' is being grossly abused and misinterpreted in the modern discussion28. Though understandable, this reaction seems a bit naive. The inventor of a concept should be delighted that the invention is so widely acknowledged that it has found a niche in everyday jargon, which simply needs 'broad definitions' 29. The same has happened to terms like 'taboo', though the Polynesians have not drawn much glory from their contribution to our language. After all, we all have a broad idea of what we are talking about when we use the term 'structuralist', however vague the concept may be, and few will need (or could stand) Fx(a): F/b) = Fx(b):Fa-1(y), to further a better understanding of what is really intended. However, there was yet another target for Kuhn's displeasure. While some applications of Kuhn's concept of 'paradigm' in the natural sciences are open to criticism 30 , the concept has proved ScientificAmerican (May 1991) 14 f. This is not to say that the use of the term paradigm should be open to any whim of any speaker. M. Bernal's flirtation with "a post-Kuhnian age, (in which) paradigm shifts or flip-flops of a fundamental sort are now seen as possible", (Arethusa,special issue 1989, 17; on p.55 he is even praised for having offered several paradigms in his Black Athena!) is verging on improper use (in more than one sense of the word). Cf. M. B. Skinner, CJ83 (1987) 70-1, who refers to the 1973 and 1978 issues of Arethusa, which made isolated researchers (in women's studies) suddenly aware of a common endeavour, as "Clearly an example of a Kuhnian 'paradigm-shift' in operation." It may be so, but one should beware of inflation. For a similar criticism ofGinzburg's use of the concept 'paradigm' see: P.H. H. Vries, De historicus als spoorzoeker, TheoretischeGeschiedenis15 ( 1988) 163-83, revised in: idem, Vertellersof drift. Een verhandelingoverde nieuwe verhalendegeschiedenis (Hilversum 1990) 86-107, esp. 98. For a balanced account of paradigms and ancient history see: J. Ober, Models and Paradigms in Ancient History, The Ancient History Bulletin 3 ( 1989) 134-7. 30 After The Structureof Scientific Revolutions(Chicago 19702 ), Kuhn revised his 28

29

12

INTRODUCTION

helpful in analysing developments in the social sciences. However, it has been pointed out that in this sector paradigms are, as a rule, not radically exclusive. This tolerance has earned anthropology the qualification: 'polyparadigmatic' 31 , which is exactly what I had in mind with the rainy introduction to this theoretical discussion. If you arrive soaking wet (and late) at work, you will talk about the rain, but not necessarily in order to foster communication. What you really ( want to) do is to curse your beastly climate. This perfectly substantive behaviour may even lead to a direct communication with the rain, such as by cursing it all the way to your office in a monologueinterieur. You may also use your climatological comments in the Durkheimian functionalist sense, to fill a gap. It happens all the time, and it is subject to the same restrictions as the Durkheimian interpretation of religion, since a discussion of politics or the price of vegetables may function in the same way. Finally, your comments may also very well be taken as an expression of the collective mentality, in the sense of cultural or cosmological interpretation, although, as a rule, this will be harder to substantiate. Similarly, whoever throws pigs into a chasm and after some time places the putrefied remains on an altar before spreading them over the fields is acting in an essentially substantive manner. Ignoring, neglecting or playing down this aspect, as overenthusiastic addicts to the social or cultural interpretation of religion are sometimes tempted to do, cannot but result in desperately cramped interpretations. However, this does not mean that different connotations of the ritual do not deserve serious attention 32 , nor that the 'fertility' interpretation should reign supreme 33 . In fact, it is even less recomideas in The Essential Tension (Chicago 1977). For criticism see for instance: I. Lakatos, Falsification and the Methodology of Scientific Research Programmes, in: I. Lakatos and A. Musgrave (eds.), Criticism and the Growth of Knowledge (Cambridge 1970) 91-196; P. Feyerabend, Against Method (London 1975). 31 For application of the concept 'paradigm' to social theory see: B. Barnes, T. S. Kuhn and Social Science(London 1982). On 'tolerance': S. Seiler, Wissenschajtstheoriein derEthnologie.Zur Kritik und Weiterfohrungder Theorievon ThomasS. Kuhn anhand ethnographischen Materials (Berlin 1980); P. Kloos, Culturele antropologie als polyparadigmatische wetenschap, in: A. de Ruijter (ed.), Beginselenin botsing (Utrecht 1981). 32 For a different (additional) meaning of the pigs see: p.256 33 In fact, much of the criticism of the monomaniac fertility interpretation is fully justified and convincing. See for instance: H. Cancik, Fruchtbarkeit, HrwG 2 (1990) 447-50.

INTRODUCTION

13

mendable to start a total war against Durkheimian and Turnerian explanations and stubbornly adhere to the old rule of rain magic and fertility 34. Nor is it necessary to swap instrumental functionalist interpretations completely for semiotic/symbolic ones 35 . In my view, the three types of interpretation should be put to the test in any issue, for they say different things about religion, myth and ritual. Each of them may turn out to be helpful in explaining elements that cannot be explained by others 36. That they are not mutually exclusive I hope to show in every chapter of this book. The (new) fascination for 'initiatory' interpretations 37, for instance, is 34 N. Robertson is perhaps the most characteristic-and militant-representative of this attitude. Cf. for instance, The Riddle of the Arrhephoria at Athens, HSCPh 87 (1983) 241-88, esp. 280,: "the concept of 'initiation rites' in ancient Greece needs to be contested on the whole broad front where its proponents are entrenched". Why this crusade? The curious results of his most learned but genuinely regressive approach will become apparent at various points in the present book. See for instance his interpretation of the Thessalian Peloria ("festival of the giants") as tables heaped with food, below Ch. II p.131 n.136. For a more differentiated approach see below n.36. 35 As F. Zeitlin is in danger of doing in an exclamation quoted below p.244, though in the same article she convincingly combines the agricultural and the social 'paradigms' in the context of the Oschophoria, Pyanopsia and Theseia festivals. Cf. also the criticism by D. Sider, CW82 (1988) 127, of Bremmer 1987a, as cited in InconsistenciesI, 30 n. 93. 36 I find this exemplarily demonstrated by A. F. C. Wallace, Religion: An AnthropologicalView (New York 1966) 168 ff., though he restricts himself to biological, psychological and sociological functions. In a different way, this is expressed by G. J. Baudy, Exkommunikation und Reintegration.Zur Geneseund Kultu,junktion Jrii.hgriechischerEinstellungenzum Tod (Frankfurt 1980) 574 n.137: "Wer ( ... ) neue Komponenten zu isolieren versteht, sollte das bereits Entdeckte nicht beiseiteschieben, damit die eigene Leistung in umso hellerem Licht erstrahle, sondern sich um eine Integration bemiihen.'' The same author offers some valuable remarks on the ever important agricultural aspects of early religions in his: Das alexandrinische Erntefest: Ein Rekonstruktionsversuch, Mitteilungenfur Anthro6 (1991) 5-110, esp. p.6 with n.1. And cf. below p.167 pologieund Religionsgeschichte n.136. 37 Initiation, or more generally 'transition', is as popular an issue within the present socio-cultural paradigm as was Frazer's dying and rising king/god in his substantive one. There is a hectic activity in the application of initiatory elements these days, which will be treated in chapter I. In his review of Bremmer 1987a, containing contributions by a great number of scholars, C. Grottanelli, HR 29 (1989) 58-64, esp. 63, writes: "This book is not the only sign that initiation ( .... ) may be the new (though not so new) demiercri", followed by a few warning remarks. There is a spate ofrecent or planned monographs: Chr. Sourvinou-Inwood, Studies in Girl's Transitions:Aspects of the Arkteia and Age Representationin Attic Iconography (Athens 1988); K. Dowden, Death and the Maiden: Girl's Initiation Rites in Greek Mythology (London-New York 1989); Y. Dacosta, Initiations et societessecretesdans l'antiquite greco-romaine(Paris 1991). J. N. Bremmer's forthcoming book Birth,

14

INTRODUCTION

certainly helpful and revealing in a number of instances but, as will be argued in the first chapter, it runs the same risks ofmonopolisation and dogmatism as did the dying and rising god in the paradigm of Frazer's magico-religious views. However, trying to be as inconsistent as possible, I shall add a new initiatory god to the rapidly expanding list in the fifth chapter, while also trying to show that a (mildly) structuralist analysis may very well be combined with questions of social origins. Something comparable is attempted in the combination of the socio-cultural interpretation of the Saturnalia and the enquiry into its agricultural background (indeed, a question of origins). The three approaches will be most apparent in the fourth chapter. The women's festivals include aspects offertility, of social function, and of cultural meaning. All this means that there is an ambiguity in the title, as is fitting for a book in a series on inconsistencies: transitions and reversals are not only the themes of the myths and rituals under discussion, but they also indicate the changes in the interpretation of myth and ritual during the last hundred years. Maturity, and Deathin Ancient Greecefocuses on related issues. For more literature see eh. I below. Furthermore, there have been two conferences on the theme in recent years, one in Montpellier in 1991, and one in Rome, which resulted in a special fascicle of MEFRA 102 (1990) 1-137. And, of course, there is the present volume.

CHAPTER

ONE

WHAT IS SAUCE FOR THE GOOSE IS SAUCE FOR THE GANDER: MYTH AND RITUAL, OLD AND NEW And it was in this way that the complex of myth and ritual, though not indissoluble, became a major force in forming ancient cultures, and as it were, dug those deep vales of human tradition in which even today the streams of our experience will tend to flow. W. Burkert

The debate on the complex of problems concerning the interrelation of myth and ritual is exactly a century old by now. The primary aim of the present chapter is to obtain an insight into its history and development. I have found that it is impossible to gain an adequate impression of the present state of theory in this field if its previous history is overlooked or is sketched along too rudimentary lines. Naturally, a survey of the evolution in toto means entering an already well-ploughed field. There is no lack of historical and critical surveys of earlier views and I have made grateful use of them 1• The 1 This is only a selection of titles on the theory of myth and ritual (for literature on specific myth and ritual complexes see below nn.21 ff. and 35 ff.): C. Kluckhohn, Myths and Rituals. A General Theory, HThR 35 (1942) 45-79, reprinted in: J. B. Vickery (ed.), Myth and Literature(Lincoln 1969) 33-44; L. Raglan, Myth and Ritual, and S. E. Hyman, The Ritual View of Myth and the Mythic, both in: Sebeok 1974, 122-35 and 136-53; W. Bascom, The Myth-Ritual Theory,Journal of AmericanFolklore70 (1957) 103-14; Ph. M. Kaberry, Myth and Ritual: Some Recent Theories, BICS 4 (1957) 42-53; J. Fontenrose, The Ritual Theory of Myth (Berkeley-Los Angeles 1966); H. H. Penner, Myth and Ritual: A Wasteland or a Forest of Symbols? H&TBeiheft 8 (1968) 46-57; R. A. Segal, The Myth-Ritualist Theory of Religion, Journal of the ScientificStudy of Religion 19 (1980) 173-85. Also important are the relevant passages in Kirk 1971, 8-31; Kirk 1974, 66-8; 223-53; Burkert 1979, 34-9; 56-8; Burkert 1980, 172-82; Graf 1985a, 43-57. The title ofW. G. Doty, Mythography.The Study of Myths and Rituals (Alabama 1986), is slightly misleading in so far as the bulk of the book consists of a (good) discussion of various theoretical approaches to myth, though including two (good) chapters on myth and ritual. I would also mention the interesting chapter 'La ripetizione miticorituale' in Di Nola 1974, which treats the subject from the perspective of 'repetition phenomena'. Not all of these publications, which will be henceforth cited by name and date, are of equal value. The article by Kaberry, for instance, is insignificant; both Penner and Segal fail to draw the necessary distinctions

16

CHAPTER

ONE

emphasis here is on those aspects of the theories of myth and ritual that relate to the ancient cultures of the Mediterranean world, a feature that distinguishes this essay from, for instance, Kluckhohn 1942, Kaberry 1957, Penner 1968, and Segal 1980, all of them studies offering a broader, notably anthropological perspective. I have tried, moreover, to prevent the critical element from dominating: Bascom 1957 and Fontenrose 1966 contain many valuable thoughts, but, because of their strongly negative bias, are not the appropriate tools for an introduction to the subject. In plan and approach my introduction is closest to the survey by Burkert 1980, which, however, does not go beyond a summary view. What distinguishes the present effort from all its predecessors is that it does not stop short at those theories that, until now, have been associated with the phrase 'myth and ritual', but pays special attention to the newest trends in classical studies. The main task I have set myself is to show where the roots of the recent approach are to be found; to what extent there is a connection between the old and the new points of view; and, finally, to pose the question whether the gap that separates them is as unbridgeable as is commonly believed. The way I have arranged the material is unorthodox and some aspects of the disposition are no doubt debatable. The two phases are characterized by two names: Jane Ellen Harrison and Walter Burkert. The overall structure, moreover, is based on Harrison's suggestions about the various ways in which myth and ritual may be connected. 1.

QUESTIONS

Myth was the dominant factor in nineteenth century (and earlier) studies of the history of religion until a change took place somewhere in the last quarter of the century. Textbooks that nowadays would carry 'Religionsgeschichte', 'history of religion', in the titles were then classified regularly as 'mythology', as witness the well-known works by Gruppe, Preller and Roscher. Ritual dominates the scene in practically all the textbooks on Greek and Roman religion during most of the twentieth century.

between the theories of Harrison and Hooke (see below pp.23-37). In the otherwise important article of Segal one reads: '' According to myth and ritualist theory religion is primitive science", which is, as a general rule, quite mistaken.

MYTH AND RITUAL,

OLD AND NEW

17

This is what M.P. Nilsson says when speaking about the protagonists in this field from around the turn of the century, H. Usener 2 and A. Dieterich 3 : "Der Umschwung war vollendet: statt der Mythen waren die Riten in den Vordergrund getreten" ("The reversal was complete: instead of myths, rites had come to the fore''). Nilsson, author of the two monumental volumes of Geschichte dergriechischenReligion4 , ''that masterpiece of patient brilliance'', as it has been called5, died in 1967, the year in which the third edition of volume I was published. On the same page I quoted from, Nilsson continues: "Seitdem ist keine durchgreifende oder grundsatzliche Anderung der Methode und der Richtung der Forschung eingetreten'' (''Since then there has not been any radical or essential change in method and direction ofresearch"). In this nonagenarian's view, then, rite, cult, and ceremonial action had carried the day, once and for all. Only recently, nonetheless, an American scholar, B. Lincoln, complained that' 'ritual (is) a neglected area for study ( ... ) for most scholars have tended to give far more attention to myth than to ritual", and "there still exists a grievous imbalance in favor of myth" 6 . 2 On this 'herosktistes der modemen Religionswissenschaft' (thus his son-in-law, A. Dieterich, in ARW 8 [1905] p.X.) see: H.-J. Mette, Nekrolog einer Epoche: Hermann Usener und seine Schule, Lu.strum22 (1979/80) 5-106; A. Momigliano, New Paths of Classicism in the Nineteenth Century, H&TBeiheft 21 (1982) 33-48; Aspetti di Hermann Usener,jilologo dellareligione.Seminario della Scuola Normale Superiore di Pisa (Pisa 1982); J. N. Bremmer, Hermann Usener,in: Briggs & Calder 1990, 127-41. Cf. also: R. Kany, Mnemosyneals Programm.Geschichte,Erinnerungund die Andacht zum Unbedeutendenim Werk von Usener, Warburgund Benjamin (Tubingen 1987). 3 There is a bibliography of this 'founding father' of the German 'religionsgeschichtliche' school in his Kleine Schriften(Leipzig-Berlin 1911) 11-42. 4 Nilsson I (Munich 19673, 19401>,II (Munich 19612 , 19501>.A bibliography of Nilsson's works: E. J. Knudtson, Beitriige zu einer Bibliographie Martin P. Nilsson, in: Dragma:FestschriftM. P. Nilsson (Lund 1939) 571-656, reprinted in Scripta Minora (1967-68, Lund 1968) 29-116; C. Callmer, The Published Writings of Prof. M. P. Nilsson 1939-1967, ibid. 117-39. Cf. Waardenburg 1974, 191-7. Biographical sketches and evaluations of his works are given by E. Gjerstad, M. P. Nilsson in memoriam, Scripta Minora (1967-68) 17-28; C.-M. Edsman, Martin P. Nilsson 1874-1967, Temenos3 (1968) 173-6; McGinty 1978, 104-40; J. Meijer, in: Briggs & Calder 1990, 335-40. 5 Thus A. D. Nock, who was honoured by his fellow students with the proud title of 'the greatest living authority on Pauly-Wissowa', and who was lauded by Nilsson (GGR Vorwort) as "der bewiihrteste Kenner der spiitantiken Religion". For an epistolary contact between the two giants see: M. P. Nilsson, Letter to Professor A. D. Nock, HThR 42 (1949) 71-107; 44 (1951) 143-51. There is a bibliography in Nock 1972, II, 966-86. 6 B. Lincoln, Two Notes on Modern Rituals,JAAR 45 (1977) 149.

18

CHAPTER

ONE

What actually happened, then, in the interval between Nilsson's complacent statement, dating from the middle of this century, and Lincoln's complaint in 1977? Has the evident shift of interest from myth to ritual round 1900 been followed by a reverse movement in recent decades? In a way, this is indeed what has happened, as can be seen from a comparison of Nilsson's work referred to above with W. Burkert's textbook of Greek religion (Burkert 1985) or his more explicit study of myth and ritual (Burkert 1979). Like other modern scholars, Burkert has given myth its due once again. A theory of myth and ritual worthy of the name should focus on myth and ritual; it is therefore no coincidence that both the myth and ritual complexes I plan to discuss were discovered at a time when-precisely because of the shift of interest-both elements were topics of debate: the last quarter of the 19th and the last quarter of the 20th century. A qualification might be in order, though: myth, of course, has never been supplanted completely by ritual. Some scholars have set great store by myth, such as Freud, Jung, and Kerenyi from a psychological viewpoint; Dumezil, whose comparative mythology, as far as the classical cultures are concerned, focuses specially on Rome-a subject that I shall leave out of account here-or Mircea Eliade, whose phenomenological school includes Lincoln, quoted above. Furthermore, myth, of course, takes pride of place in the studies of the Paris school ofVernant, Vidal-Naquet and Detienne 7 , and in other recent, especially semiotic, studies. It may not be too 7 A discussion of Kerenyi and Dumezil would be beyond the scope of the present chapter. On the latter see: C. S. Littleton, The New ComparativeMythology. An AnthropologicalAssessmentof the Theoriesof GeorgesDumezil (Berkeley-London 1966, 19823); 'Aspetti dell'opera di Georges Dumezil', Opus 2 (1983) 327-421; J.-C. Riviere, GeorgesDumezil ala decouvertedes Indo-Europeens(Paris 1979); J. Ries, L' apport de Georges Dumezil a l'etude comparee des religions, RTh 20 (1989) 440-66; Belier 1991. Neither do I discuss the representatives of the Paris school here, not because their work is of no interest for the study of myths and rituals-cf. for the contrary InconsistenciesI, eh. 2, and various sections of the present book-, but because whenever they try to bring them into a cohesive pattern, they practically never do so in the usual sense of 'myth and ritual'. Gordon 1981 offers an excellent introduction to their ideas. See also: Ch. Segal, Jean-Pierre Vernant and the Study of Ancient Greece, Arethusa 15 (1982) 221-34; R. di Donato, Aspetti e momenti di un percorso intellettuale: Jean-Pierre Vernant, RSI 96 (1984) 680-95; W. B. Tyrrell & F. S. Brown, Athenian Myths and Institutions: Words in Action (Oxford 1991). For Eliade on Eliade see: M. Eliade, Journey East, Journey West I, II (San Francisco 1981). See further: J .A. Saliba, 'Homo Religiosus' in Mircea Eliade. An Anthropological Evaluation (Leiden 1976) and I.P. Culianu, Mircea Eliade (Assisi 1978). Critical views in: G. Dudley, Religion on Trial: Mircea Eliade and his Critics( 19 77); L. Alfieri,

MYTH

AND RITUAL,

OLD AND NEW

19

adventurous to say that the concept of myth and ritual was engendered by the tension that sprang from having to choose between myth or ritual. That, however, is not the only kind of tension. Here is another instance: in his Myth: Its Meaning and Functions in Ancient and Other Cultures (1971) 31, G.S. Kirk states categorically: "Therefore it will be wise to reject from the outset the idea that myth and religion are twin aspects of the same subject, or parallel manifestations of the same psychic condition just as firmly as we rejected the idea that all myths are associated with rituals". Incidentally, both in this book-embodying his Sather Lectures-and in his still better known The Nature of Greek Myths (1974), one of Kirk's explicit aims is to refute all general theories of the origin, meaning, and function of myth. One of the five 'overall' theories he eliminates is the theory that there is always (at least originally) a link between myth and ritual-the minimum definition of the myth and ritual theory. In 1979, however, Burkert's Sather Lectures appeared in print: Structure and History in Greek Mythology and Ritual. He had certainly read Kirk, but still he states (p.58): "And it was in this way that the complex of myth and ritual, though not indissoluble, became a major force in forming ancient cultures, and as it were, dug those deep vales of human tradition in which even today the streams of our experience will tend to flow". This has quite a different ring. Indeed, to refer to the evident contrast between the views of these two scholars as a 'tension' would be rather a euphemism. Both views will be discussed later on. For present purposes, it may suffice to ask two obvious questions, to be dealt with consecutively: a. How and when did the idea arise that myth and ritual might be closely related, a view that was evidently so successful that Kirk thought it worthwhile to oppose it emphatically? b. How is one to explain the fact that practically simultaneously two eminent scholars entertain such totally different views of this interrelation?

Storiae mito. Una criticaa Eliade (Pisa 1978); C. Tacou (ed.), Mircea Eliade (Cahier de l'Herme, Paris 1978). Cf. Smith 1978, 88 ff.; I. Strenski, Four Theoriesof Myth in Twentieth-CenturyHistory (Iowa City 1987) 70-128; Auffahrt 1991, 6-21, whose views will be discussed infra. Eliade phrases his own preference for myth above rite (Methodological Remarks on the Study of Religion, in: M. Eliade andJ. Kitagawa (edd.), The History of Religions [Chicago 1959], 86-107) as follows: "Symbol and myth will give a clear view of the modalities (of the sacred) that a rite can never do more than suggest''.

20

CHAPTER

2.

THE

RISE AND GROWTH

ONE

OF MYTH AND RITUAL

THEORY

Interest in ritual in primitive cultures arose in Germany and Britain more or less simultaneously. In a period in which Max Miiller's theories 8 reigned supreme and every single myth was thought to be an allegory of meteorological and atmospheric phenomena, W. Mannhardt 9 dispatched questionnaires all over Europe in search of traces of belief in vegetation, grain, and wood spirits and related manners and customs. About the same time E. B. Tylor 10 managed to interest the Anglo-Saxon public in the peculiar features of primitive cultures outside Europe. Darwin 11 published his Originof Species in 1859 and evolution and progress were in the air: might not Mannhardt's rye wolves and stalk hare be the very archetypes from which, much later, the radiant figures of Demeter, Dionysus or Adonis emerged? Might not religion have had its origin in spirit worship? Tylor himself professed a straightforward evolutionism: unable to understand nature around him, primitive man tried to influence his environment. To achieve this he practised magic rites (which did not work, but he did not realize this) and in a later stage 8 J. H. Voigt, Max Muller. The Man and his Ideas (Calcutta 1976). Shorter studies: Van Baal 1971, 20-6; R. M. Dorson, The Eclipse of Solar Mythology, in: Sebeok 1974, 25-63; Sharpe 1975, 35-46; Burkert 1980, 166; Lloyd-Jones 1982, 155-64. More in: Graf 1991, 339 n.32. Cf. also F. M. Turner, The GreekHeritage in VictorianBritain (New Haven-London 1981) 77-134, on 'Greek Mythology and Religion' in this period. 9 W. Mannhardt, Roggenwolfund Roggenhund(Danzig 1865-66); Die Korndii.monen (Berlin 1868); Antike Wald- und Feldkulte (Berlin 1875-77, Darmstadt 1904-52 ); MythologischeForschungen(Strassburg-London 1884). On his work and influence see: Frazer GB I, p. XII-XIII; De Vries 1961, 212-6; Waardenburg 1974, 173. IO E. B. Tylor, Primitive Culture (London 1871). An assessment of his work: Kardiner 1962, 56-77; F. Golz, Der primitive Mensch und seine Religion (Giitersloh 1963) 12-40; Van Baal 1971, 30-44; Waardenburg 1974, 288-9; Sharpe 1975, 53-8; U. Bianchi, The HistoryofReligions(Leiden 1975) 83-6; Evans-Pritchard 1981, 91-4; Morris 1987, 91-106, on the 'intellectualists'. Recently, there is a revival of interest in Tylor's evolutionism and its background. See for instance: G. W. Stocking Jr., Matthew Arnold, E.B. Tylor and the Uses of Invention, AmericanAnthropologist65 (1963) 783-99; M. Opler, Cause, Process, and Dynamics in the Evolutionism of E. B. Tylor, South-Westernjournal of Anthropology20 (1964) 123-44; J. W. Burrow, Evolution and Society:A Study in VictorianSocial Theory(London 19702) 228-59. Cf. Smith 1978, 261 n.58. 11 G. Himmelfarb, Darwin and the Darwinian Revolution(London 1959). Interesting on the social and mental context: J. W. Burrow, o.c. (preceding note); D. F. Bratchell, The Impact ofDarwinism. Texts and CommentaryIllustratingJ 9th-centuryReligious, Scientificand LiteraryAttitudes (London 1981) and R. J. Richards, Darwin and the Emergenceof EvolutionaryTheoriesof Mind and Behavior(Chicago-London 1987). A full biography: P. Brent, CharlesDarwin (London 1981, Feltham 19832).

MYTH AND RITUAL,

OLD AND NEW

21

he tried to explain this no longer understood ritual and other riddles by means of some myth (which did not fit in, but he did not realize this either)-a twofold misinterpretation, therefore, for which only Germans could have invented a term such as 'Urdummheit' ('primeval stupidity'), a phrase that did not fail to find a comfortable niche in anthropological jargon 12 . Certain vague relations between myth and ritual can be glimpsed, but credit for the first clear-cut theory is due to the Scottish Semitist and theologian W. Robertson Smith, whose famous and influential Lectureson the Religion of the Semitesintroduced his well-known theory of sacrifice 13 . His interest in 'ritual institutions' as social instruments influenced both Durkheim and Freud; offundamental importance for our subject is the fact that in his view, sacrifice as communion-man shares in the vital force of the consumed animal-acquires an additional mythical dimension: as a totem animal, the sacrificial victim is raised to divine status. Myth arises from a social rite. These are the indispensable preliminary stages. It was, after all, Robertson Smith who pointed out the road taken by his student and friend James Frazer 14 . The twelve volumes of Frazer's The Golden Bough-next to the Bible and Kitto's The Greeks-still adorn many a British upper middle class drawing room 15 . The work has been 12 F. R. Lehmann, Der Begriff 'Urdummheit' in der ethnologischen und religionswissenschaftlichen Anschauungen von K. -T. Preuss, A. E. Jensen und G. Murray, Sociologus2 (1952) 131-45. 13 W. Robertson Smith, Lectureson the Religion of the Semites(Edinburgh 1889, 18942). The German translation Die Religion der Semiten (Tubingen 1899) was reprinted in 1967. Biographical surveys: J. S. Black and G. Chrystal, The Life of William RobertsonSmith (London 1912); T. 0. Beidelmann, William RobertsonSmith and the SociologicalStudy of Religion (Chicago 1974); M. Smith, in: Calder 1991, 251-61. Cf. also: Van Baal 1971, 45-53; Waardenburg 1974, 265; Evans-Pritchard 1981, 69-81. E. Durkheim, L'annee sociologique12 (1913) 326, already referred to "all that we owe to Robertson Smith ... ", and Douglas 1970, 25, states: "Robertson Smith founded social anthropology". 14 "But for Smith", said Frazer, "my interest in the subject [anthropology. H.S.V.] might have remained purely passive and inert" (quoted by Kardiner 1962, 82). See: Ackerman o.c. (next note) 58-63; R. A.Jones, Robertson Smith and James Frazer on Religion, in: G. Stocking Jr. (ed.) FunctionalismHistoricized,History of Anthropology 2 (Madison 1984) 31-58. 15 J. G Frazer, The Golden Bough I-II (London 1890); I-III 2 (1900); I-XII 3 (1907-1915r Volume IV, Adonis, Attis, Osiris, was published separately: London 1906, 1907 . An abridged edition appeared in 1922 = New York 1950. Other revisions and abridged editions: Theodor Gaster, The New GoldenBough (New York 1959); M. Douglas and S. MacCormack, J. G. Frazer. The IllustratedGoldenBough:

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ONE

praised as "perhaps the greatest scientific Odyssey in modern humanism" (Malinowski) and disparaged as "part of what every schoolboy knows, and what every gentleman must at least have forgotten" (Marett). In a book in which people were asked about their experiences with ecstasy (Ecstasy, London 1961), one person answered the question "What has induced ecstasy in you?" as follows: "Reading The Golden Bough for the first time". And this informant was not such a fool either, for he had also gone into ecstasies "finding ten chromosomes when I knew they ought to be there''. So it must surely be a marvelous book. In the definitive version (there had been earlier, shorter editions) the first two volumes are called The Magic Art and the Evolution of Kings, and this title provides the code words: magic lay at the roots ofreligion, and the most important means with which primitive man tried to control nature and vegetation lay in magic-sacral kingship. Just as nature goes through an annual cycle of budding, flowering, bearing fruit, withering and dying, so each year the 'aged' king had to be supplanted by a new vigorous successor, for it is the king's magic power that sympathetically influences and even controls vegetative life. Nature's death has to be overcome by a new, young king who defeats the old one in a ritual fight-or somehow supplants him. The King Must Die is the title of a best-seller by Mary Renault, a book one might read as a kind of romanticized 'Frazer abridged'. So much for rite. There is, however, also a mythical representation or transposition of the natural cycle, dealt with by Frazer in other parts of his series: Adonis, Attis, Osiris, published originally in 1906

A Study in Magic and Religion (London 1978). Biographical works: R. A. Downie, James GeorgeFrazer. The Portraitofa Scholar(London 1940); idem, Frazerand the Golden Bough (London 1970). They are all superseded now by R. Ackerman,]. G. Frazer: His Life and Work (Cambridge 1987) (highly praised by C. R. Phillips III, Classical Scholarship against its History, AJPh 110 [1989] 636-57, esp. 644-50, in an impressive plea for 'Wissenschaftsgeschichte' as an indispensable tool for 'sociology of knowledge'. His own contribution: The Sociology of Religious Knowledge in the Roman Empire, ANRW II, 16, 3, 2677-2773, is a model in this respect). Cf. also: Kardiner 1962, 78-109; Sharpe 1975, 87-94; Evans-Pritchard 1981, 2-52; R. Ackerman, in: Briggs & Calder 1990, 77-83. A comprehensive list of works on Frazer: Waardenburg 1974, 59-60. A critical account: M. J.C. Hodgart, In the Shadow of the Golden Bough, The Twentieth Century 97 (1955) 111-19; S. MacCormack, Magic and the Human Mind: A Reconsideration ofFrazer's Golden Bough, Arethusa 17 (1984) 151-76; Auffarth 1991, 16 f.; R. Fraser, The Making ofthe 'GoldenBough'. The Originsand Growthofan Argument(London 1990). For more criticism see below section 4.

MYTH AND RITUAL,

OLD AND NEW

23

as a separate volume; The Dying God, Spirits of the Corn and of the Wild (with thanks to Mannhardt) and Balder the Beautiful. A great many cultures, notably those of the Mediterranean world and the Near East, so Frazer contended, have their 'dying and rising gods'. They represent grain, green plants and trees. Their myths tell of menace, downfall, sojourn in the underworld and death, but also ofresurrection. During the annual New Year festivities lamentations are heard bewailing the god who has died, but it is not long before they are replaced by hilarious joy: the god has risen or has manifested himself again, heralding a promise of new life. There thus emerges an almost ideal parallelism of myth and ritual, both reacting to or reflecting the vegetative cycle of nature: RITE

MYTH

Sacral year king guarantees fertility of nature; suffers ritual death;

Year god represents natural vegetative force; dies, is imprisoned in underworld; rises again, is reborn.

new, vigorous king succeeds.

This scheme is a fundamental one: it is invoked by all myth and ritual theories of the first phase. As a matter of fact, until a few decades ago the twentieth century remained 'in the shadow of the golden bough'. We shall concentrate, primarily, on two schools: the 'ritualist' Cambridge school, which in the area of classical studies applied itself above all to the Greek material, and the Myth and Ritual school proper, which centered on the pattern of the ancient Near East. Before dealing with these schools, however, we must focus on one specific figure, even though she herself, without any doubt, belongs to the former school. The reason for this preferential treatment will soon become evident.

1. Jane Ellen Harrison Robertson Smith and Frazer both taught in Cambridge. So didjane Ellen Harrison 16 . 'Bloody Jane' to friends, a 'blasphemous Ker' as 16 Autobiographical data in her books Reminiscenses of a Student's Life (London 1925), and Alpha and Omega. Essays (London 1915). Biographical information: J. G. Stewart,Jane Ellen Harrison. A Portraitfrom Letters (London 1959); R. Ackerman, J. E. Harrison: The Early Work, GRBS 13 (1972) 209-30; McGinty 1978, 71-103; S. J. Peacock, Jane Harrison: The Mask and the Self (New Haven 1988), with the rather severe review by W. M. Calder III, Gnomon 63 (1991) 10-13; R. Schlesier, Jane

24

CHAPTER

ONE

she said herself 17, and the last maenad found running wild according to many others, she led an unorthodox life, which gave rise to many rumours, with such standard ingredients as libertinism in matters of sex and religion, more or less pronounced feminism, and hovering between the extremes of esthetic refinement on the one hand and the "beastly devices of the heathen" on the other. I note this for the sole reason that later criticism seems to have been inspired, at least partly, by the aversion aroused by these in themselves less relevant features of her life. Additional information about her may be gleaned, for instance, from her Reminiscencesof a Student'sLife (London 1925). From her best known and most important works, Prolegomenato the Study of GreekReligion (1903) and Themis (1912) 18 she emerges as someone who boasts a vast knowledge of Greek, above all archaeological, material (archaeology had been her starting point), has an unmistakable tendency to follow and practise the most recent trends rather uncritically (she herself mentions-in chronological order-Frazer, Durkheim, Bergson and Freud) 19 , and who is criticized by Kirk 1971, 3, for being "utterly uncontrolled by anything resembling careful logic". When "her customary lack of consistency'' is referred to 20, this may be taken, not Ellen Harrison, in: Briggs & Calder 1990, 127-41. Several contributions to Calder 1991, among which the most perceptive introduction to Harrison's intellectual position and achievement by Schlesier (Schlesier 1991, in a German version also in Kippenberg & Luchesi 1991, 193-235). See also the literature mentioned by P. G. Naiditch, in: Calder 1991, 124 n.2. 17 In a letter to G. MurraI, in: Stewart o.c. (preceding note) 113. 18 Prolegomena(1903, 1907 , 19223 ), reprinted by Meridian Books 1955 and Merlin Press (London 1961), recently also by La Haule Press. Themis: A Study in the Social Origins of GreekReligion (1912 1, 19272), reprinted by University Books (New York) together with Epilegomena(1962), and Merlin Press (London 1963). 19 In Epilegomenato theStudy of GreekReligion (Cambridge 1921) p. XXII, she formulates her own scientific achievements thus: (1) Totem, Tabu and Exogamy, (2) Initiation Ceremony, (3) The Medicine-Man and King-God, (4) The Fertility-Play or Year Drama. This is precisely the reverse order of her Werdegangfrom Frazer via "the genius ofDurkheim" (ibid. n.1) towards Freud. McGinty 1978, 79: "As a result, to read her oeuvre in chronological order is almost like reading a multivolume history of the discipline of comparative religion disguised as a series of histories of Greek religion", (and cf. ibid. 2 n.35). Cf. also Schlesier 1991, n.73. 20 McGinty 1978, 96. W. J. Verdenius, in his review of Epilegomenaand Themis, Mnemosyne4th ser. 16 (1963) 434: "Her principal weakness was the susceptibility which induced her to adopt the latest fashion in philosophy, psychology and ethnology". And long before this G. van der Leeuw, who admired her, betrayed irritation when confronted with her volatility. See: J. N. Bremmer, Gerardus van der Leeuw andJane Ellen Harrison, in: Kippenberg & Luchesi 1991, 237-41. For some more contemporaneous criticism see: Th. W. Africa in: Calder III 1991, 29 ff.

MYTH

AND RITUAL,

OLD AND NEW

25

unjustly, to sum up a virtually unanimous verdict. Still, I should like to show that at least part of the inconsistencies found in her studies may be caused, to a certain extent at any rate, by the unmanageable and intrinsically contradictory subject of her choice. In 1890, a year after the publication of Robertson Smith's major work and in the very year in which the first two-volume edition of Frazer' s GoldenBoughwas published, Harrison' s MythologyandMonumentsof AncientAthens appeared. In the introduction she says (p. Ill): "My belief is that in many, even the large majority of cases ritual practicemisunderstoodexplains the elaboration of myth''. In the last analysis, even the most beautiful, the loveliest Greek myths derive from "always practical ritual". A quite telling phrase in an 1891 paper-"a solution I believe to be wholly novel"-shows that she expects to be the first to offer this solution 21 . Without doubt, she is being sincere in this respect. Frazer, who, as we have seen, had opted for the very same starting point, did not feel any forceful urge to put the presumed interrelation of myth and ritual on a solid theoretical basis, and Robertson Smith was publishing at practically the same time. It just so happened, as is often the case, that either direct or indirect mental contact gave rise, almost simultaneously, to related viewpoints. However, a glance in modem surveys and textbooks of anthropology and the history of religion will show that, in this broad perspective, the other two scholars have ousted Jane Harrison. I wish to show that, at least in the context of myth and ritual, Harrison deserves more credit than she was given and that in her works all the problems were touched upon that later authors dealt with in their way. In the ProlegomenaHarrison still adheres to the view, quoted above, that myths were created in order to account for rites. In line with nineteenth century ideas, the gods were supposed to belong to the domain of myth. They arise as a kind of personification from

21 JHS 12 (1891) 350. Actually, this refers to her interpretation of the Kekropides myth, which she was the first to explain from the perspective of myth and ritual. J. N. Bremmer, o. c. (preceding note) 238, finds it hard to believe that Harrison had neither heard about Smith's lectures nor read his book before her own publication, but Schlesier 1991, 187 n.11, makes a good case for Harrison' s ignorance. That Harrison was later on influenced indirecty by Smith via Durkheim (Bremmer ibidem)is a different matter ( see next note). Burkert 1980, 174, has pointed out that previous initiatives in this direction had already been taken by K. 0. Miiller and von Wilamowitz. On Harrison and Miiller see: Schlesier 1991, 191 ff.

26

CHAPTER

ONE

rites, especially apotropaic ones, meant to protect crops and settlements. These daimones are products of an almost intellectual explanatory process, and in her Themis Harrison systematises these numerous demons into one prototypical, genuinely 'Frazerian' year god, denoting him, for the occasion, by a home-made Greek term as the eniautos daimon. In the same Themis, however, there is a sudden emphasis on the social component of the myth-making process: ''Strong emotion collectively experienced begets this illusion of objective reality; each worshipper is conscious of something in his emotion not himself, stronger than himself. He does not know it is the force of collective suggestion, he calls it a god" (Themis, pp. 46-47). Dionysos, for instance, who was first a typically 'Frazerian' eniautos daimon, is now called "his thiasos incarnate" (p. 38). Here Durkheim has ousted Frazer 22 . It is necessary to realize the implications of this step. In the Frazerian scheme, man is the manipulator:he believes he can control externalprocessesby means of specific, above all magical methods, rites. Myth, then, is a kind of verbal account of these rituals. In the new interpretation, on the other hand, man is theonewho is manipulated: however the ritual may relate to external data like fertility of the soil, what counts is what theparticipant himself experiences,his own emotion. The mythical images, therefore, are products, first and foremost, of spontaneous,collectiveemotions23 . I do not think it an exagger22 Humphreys 1978, 96, suggests that her attention was drawn to Durkheim by the lectures of Radcliffe-Brown, which she attended at Cambridge in 1909. Humphreys also gives a good assessment of Durkheim's work. See also: Harris 1968, 464-82; S. Lukes, Emile Durkheim. His Life and Work (1973 1 , Harmondsworth 1975); Kardiner 1962, 108-33; Evans-Pritchard 1981, 153-69; Morris 1987, 106-40; F. Pearce, The RadicalDurkheim(London 1989). The remarkable similarity appears inter alia from the following quotations from Durkheim, Lesformes ilemen· tairesde la vie religieuse(Paris 1912 1, 19685) 597: "!'experience religieuse, c'est la so· ciete"; 603: "la formation d'un ideal( ... ) c'est un produit nature! de la vie so· ciale"; 606: "la religion est un produit de causes sociales". On this aspect of Durkheim's theory see especially: R. N. Bellah, Religion, Collective Representa· tions and Social Change, in: R. A. Nisbet (ed.), Emile Durkheim(Englewood Cliffs 1965) 166-72. On Durkheim's influence on Radcliffe-Brown see: A. Kuper 1985, 49 ff., with Harrison on p. 38. On the possible influence of Robertson Smith on Durkheim see: R. A.Jones, La genese du systeme? The Origins ofDurkheim's Sociology of Religion, in: Calder 1991, 97-121, and other works cited there. 23 Harrison herself recognized this evolution: "Primitive religion was not, as I had drifted into thinking, a tissue of errors leading to mistaken conduct; rather it was a web of practices emphasizing particular parts of life, issuing necessarily in

MYTH

AND RITUAL,

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27

ation to maintain that the seeds of one of the great controversies in twentieth century approaches to ancient religions can be detected here. The two lines may be illustrated by comparing two types of approach: that of such scholars as Deubner, Nilsson and Latte, in which rites are studied primarily with regard to their external functions and aims, and in which there is hardly any room for myth, except as an aetiological explanation of the ritual acts; and the approach of a very disparate group of modern scholars, guided by Burkert and Vernant, on the other; here myth and rite are considered to be, in the first place, forms of expression which identify or integrate the cultural community itself. I shall come back to this subject. Just as the year king-god scheme represented Harrison's first approach, for which she had invented the term eniautos daimon, so her second approach can be exemplarily illustrated by a hymn from Palaikastro in Eastern Crete that had recently been discovered 24 . The inscription probably dates from the third century BC, but certain elements of the text indicate a much older period. In this hymn the Megistos Kouros, identified as the young Zeus, is invited to come to Mount Dikte, heading the daimones for this year, and "to spring into the wine vats, the herds, the crops, the cities, the ships, the young citizens and Themis". Here she is at last: Themis. Now, no true Frazerian would hesitate to recognize the year god in this Megistos Kouros, especially if one accepts the most recent interpretation by M. L. West of a corrupt fragment of the text which says, in his view, that the god first "has gone into the earth" 25. Harrison, however, thinks otherwise. In her view, the hymn points to the mythical Kouretes 26 , who representations and ultimately dying out into abstract conceptions" (Themis p. XII). 24 M. Guarducci, I. Cret. III, II, 2. Cf. eadem,Antichita Cretesi, in: Studi in onore di D. Levi II (Catania 1974) 36 f.; eadem, Epigrafia GrecaIV (Rome 1978) 128 f. 25 M. L. West, The Dictaean Hymn to the Kouros,JHS 85 (1965) 149-59, proposed to replace Harrison's "Lord of all that is wet and gleaming, thou art come. .. " by an interpretation which results in: "master of all, who to earth art gone''. Later on he recanted his metrical suggestions, while maintaining his textual conjectures (ZPE 45 [ 1982] 9 ff.). West's reading, which completely ignores Harrison's treatment of the text, seems very improbable to me and has, as far as I know, not provoked much enthusiasm. See: Guarducci o.c. (preceding note) and J. M. Bremer, Greek Hymns, in: Versnel 1981a, 205 f. Cf. also Motte 1970, 56-60. 26 There are also historical Kouretes: S. Luria, Kureten, Molpen, Aisymneten, AAntHung 11 (1963) 11-6; D. Knibbe, Forschungenin Ephesos IX, Fasz. I, 1: Die Kureteninschriften (Ost err. Arch. Inst. 1981).

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perform a war dance at the birth of the Cretan Zeus. As such, it reflects a social event of central importance in all primitive communities: the rites of initiation that turn boys into men, admitting them to the community of adult men. The elements of threat, torture and death that, as we will see below, often play a role in initiatory rites, can be recognized, she believes, in the myth of the Titans, by whom the Dionysos-Zagreus infant (closely related to Zeus Kretagenes) is torn to pieces. They are the mythical reflections of the elder members of the tribe, disguised as spirits of the deceased, who 'kill' the initiation candidate, reduced to the status of a baby, so that a new human being may arise. The MegistosKourosthat is invoked "is obviously but a reflection or impersonation of the body of Kouretes" (p.27), who in their turn are mythical reflections of the human epheboi. In other words, the mythical characters '' arise straight out of a social custom" (p.28) and this amounts to saying (p.29) that "The ritual act, what the Greeks called the dromenon,is prior to the divinity" (in other words: "is prior to myth"). That much we knew already, but now we are in for a surprise: in a related discussion a dozen pages earlier, Harrison maintained that investigation of the ritual is a primary condition in order to fathom the religious intention of a particular complex. She then continues: "This does not, however, imply, as is sometimes supposed, that ritual is prior to myth; they probably arose together. Ritual is the utterance of an emotion, a thing felt in action, myth in words or thoughts. They arise pari passu. The myth is not at first aetiological, it does not arise to give a reason; it is representative, another form of utterance, of expression" (p.16). When she returns to this relationship at greater length later on in the book (pp.327 ff.), she describes myth as the words uttered by the participants in a ritual, originally probably no more than cries and interjections. In fact, this explains their simultaneous occurrence: "(myth) is the spoken correlative of the acted rite, the thing done; it is to legomenonas contrasted with or rather as related to to dromenon" (p.328). This may suffice to explain the irritation felt by many a reader used to more consistent reasoning; in particular, the parenthetical clause, "as is sometimes supposed," is a jewel. But this does not diminish the fact that she has outlined a novel and serious possibility: that of the simultaneous origin of myth and ritual in certain situations. And she even appears to introduce yet a third possibility when she writes: ''When we realize that the myth is the plot of the dromenon

MYTH AND RITUAL,

OLD AND NEW

29

we no longer wonder that the plot of a drama is called its 'myth'" (p. 331). Actually, the suggestion that myth can also function as the scenario of a (dramatic) ritual seems to be formulated here in nuce. It is difficult to say what exactly she meant by this expression, which was, as a matter of fact, exploited by a school of later scholars who indeed maintained that myth could be the scenario of dramatic action 27 . To sum up: in sometimes rudimentary form and with often dubious argumentation Harrison offered three suggestions on the interrelation of myth and ritual. These are: 1. 2. 3.

myth arises from rite, myth and rite arise pari passu, myth is the scenario of a dramatic ritual.

Moreover, she tested these theoretical possibilities in two cases of a specific myth and ritual complex: A. the Frazerian complex of year king, year god and New Year festival, B. the initiation complex.

We shall now see that for decades to come it was only types 1) and 3) of these theoretical possibilities that attracted any attention, and that in the initial phase interest was focused almost exclusively on A) the New Year myth and ritual complex. The remaining two suggestions, 2) and B), did not receive much credit or attention until very recently. As stated earlier, I shall structure my remarks according to the patterns of interrelation put forward by Harrison.

2. Myth arisesfrom rite: the Cambridge schoo/28 Two genuine classical philologists, G. Murray and F.M. Cornford, each contributed a chapter to Themis. In his 'Excursus on the Ritual 27 In Themis, 331-4, she says that "the mythos is the plot which is the lifehistory of an Eniautos-daimon" and in Ancient Art and Ritual (London-New York 1913) eh. V: "From ritual to art: the dromenon and the drama" she elaborates upon this theme. But it is problematic whether we may call this "myth as the scenario for ritual" since she regards both the god (eniautosdaimon) and the drama as having developed from one and the same annual rite. 28 On the Cambridge ritualists see now: Calder 1991; R. Ackerman, The Myth and Ritual School:J. G. Frazerand the CambridgeRitualists (New York-London 1991); Doty 1986, 73-8. A complete bibliography: Sh. Arlen, The CambridgeRitualists:An AnnotatedBibliography(London 1990).

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Forms preserved in Greek Tragedy' (pp.341-63) Murray explains the rise of tragedy from a dancing ritual around the eniautosdaimon Dionysos. In tragedy, Murray-adopting Harrison's schemesholds, the following underlying pattern may be discovered: 1) agon, a fight between the year god and his enemy; 2) pathos, the year god suffers sacrificial death; 3) messengerarrives, bringing word of the god's death; 4) threnos,lamentation; 5) anagnorisis,the killed god is recognized; 6) theophany,the god's resurrection and manifestation. The very next sentence in Murray's paper is: "First, however, there is a difficulty to clear away" (p.344), and that is precisely what the reader had already suspected. After all, we are always told that a tragedy that ends well is not a very good tragedy, and that this is the reason why the rare tragedies with happy endings run the risk of being assigned a place among the satyr plays. In order to solve his difficulty, Murray assumed that the positive final chords had become detached from the tragedy proper and ended up as a separate theme in the satyr plays. This is one of the first explicit invocations of the 'disintegration of the pattern', a stereotyped plea in the myth and ritual debate. In later works Murray repeatedly returned to the myth and ritual notion 29 , for instance in the initial chapters of his popular Five Stages of GreekReligion30 . He also wrote the preface to Th. Gaster's corn-

29 For Murray's scholarly achievements see: F. West, GilbertMurray: A Biography (London 1984) and D. Wilson, GilbertMurray OM 1866-1957 (Oxford 1988). A short impression: Lloyd-Jones 1982, 195-214. Cf. also: R. L. Fowler, in: Briggs &Calder 1990, 321-34; idem, in: Calder 1991, 79-95; P. G. Naiditch, ibid. 124n.3. Murray returned to myth and ritual theories in other works: Euripidesand his Age (New York 1913, Oxford 19462) 28-32; Aeschylus, the Creatorof Tragedy(Oxford 1940) 145-60; cf. R. L. Fowler, in: Calder 1991, 90 n.25. Criticism in A. W. Pickard-Cambridge, Dithyramb, Tragedyand Comedy(Oxford 1927) 185-206. In his reissue of this book (1962) 126-29, T. B. L. Webster gives a reassessment of Murray's achievement. For other theories on the origin of tragedy, see: H. Patzer, Die AnfangedergriechischenTragodie(Wiesbaden 1962); G. F. Else, The Originand Early Form of GreekTragedy(Cambridge MA 1965). Recent theories on the ritual origins of tragedy: Burkert 1966a = 1990, 13-39; F. R. Adrados, Festival,Comedyand Tragedy. The GreekOriginsof Theatre(Leiden 1975); idem, The Agon and the Origin of the Tragic Chorus, in: Serta Turyniana. Studies A. Turyn (Urbana 1974) 436-88; J. J. Winkler, The Ephebes' Song: Tragoidiaand Po/is, Representations11 (1985) 26-62 = J. J. Winkler & F. I. Zeitlin (edd.), Nothing to Do with Dionysos?Athenian Drama in Its Social Context(Princeton Univ. Press 1990) 20-62. 3 Four Stages of GreekReligion originated as a series of lectures at Columbia University in 1912. It was revised and enlarged with an additional chapter as Five Stagesof GreekReligion (London 1935, 19463).

°

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AND RITUAL,

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31

prehensive book Thespis: Ritual, Myth and Drama in the Ancient Near East (1950), discussed below. Here at last a connection emerges between Greece and the ancient Near East, which had been exploited hardly or not at all in the Cambridge school since Frazer. It was F.M. Cornford who went farthest in this respect. In his The Origin of Attic Comedy ( 1914) he held the rather surprising view that comedy, no less than tragedy, arose from a ritual New Year festival around the death and rebirth of the god. He had already adumbrated this theory in his contribution to Themis, in which he discussed the origin of the Olympic games: the winner in the contest, the Megistos Kouros of the year, is led in a wild komos, and celebrates a sacral marriage with the king's daughter. These, he held, are also the ingredients of comedy. In his later work, however, Cornford 31 extended his vision further: man evolves from the magical (Frazer) through the mythical (Frazer/Harrison) to the philosophical/rational stage, the stage to which Cornford in fact devoted the bulk of his studies. The contacts with the cultures of the Near East were specified by Cornford in a posthumous publication, The Unwritten Philosophy (1950), in which he linked motifs from Hesiod's Theogony with seasonal myths from the Near East, an initiative that has had a highly productive sequel in the last twenty years or so32 . This means that the Cambridge school 33 was eventually posthumously freed from a certain Greece-oriented position of isolation,

31 On Cornford see: D. K. Wood, in: Briggs & Calder 1990, 23-36; M. Chambers, in: Calder 1991, 61-77; the rich bibliographical note by P. G. Naiditch, ibid. 125 n. 4. Remarkably, the leading French structuralist in the classical field, J. -P. Verna"nt, highly appreciates the works of Cornford, whereas his mentor Louis Gernet, a pupil of Durkheim, had little or no appreciation for the works of Harrison and Cornford. Cf. also Loraux 1981, 35-73, and below n.88. On Gernet see: S. Humphreys, The Work of Louis Gernet, in Humphreys 1978, 76-106; A. Maffi, Le 'Recherches' di Louis Gernet nella storia del diritto greco, QS (1981) 3-54; C. Ampolo, Fra religione e societa, StudStor25 (1984) 83-9; R. di Donato, Une oeuvre, un itineraire, in: L. Gernet, Les Grecssans miracle(Paris 1983) 403-20. 32 H. Otten, Vorderasiatische Mythen als Vorlaufer griechischer Mythenbildung, FuF (1949) 145-7; A. Heubeck, Mythologische Vorstellungen des alten Orients im archaischen Griechentum, Gymnasium62 (1955) 508-20; G. Steiner, Der Sukzessionsmythosin Hesiods Theogonieund ihrenorientalischenParallelen(Diss. Hamburg 1958); P. Walcot, Hesiod and the Near East (Cardiff 1966); M. L. West, Early Greek PhilosophJ!and the Orient (Oxford 1971); Kirk 1971, 2-20; Burkert 1979 and 1984. 33 I leave aside A. B. Cook with his massive monograph Zeus 1-111(Cambridge 1914-1942). He is perhaps the most typical disciple of Frazer, but he did not contribute to myth and ritual theory. On this scholar see: H. Schwab! in: Calder 1991, 227-49.

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partly under the influence of another Myth and Ritual school which-in similar isolation-directed attention to the Near East. I now turn to this other school. 3. Myth as a scenariofor dramatic ritual: the 'Myth and Ritual School' proper In 1933 the Old Testament scholar S. H. Hooke edited a volume of studies to which many scholars contributed: Myth and Ritual: Essays on the Myth and Ritual of the Hebrews in Relation to the Culture Pattern of the Ancient East, and 25 years later he edited another volume titled Myth, Ritual and Kingship (1958), in which both opponents and sup-

porters had their say-an ideal state of affairs for later historians 34 . It was this school of myth and ritual theorists that gave this complex its characteristic name and content 35 . The titles of these books are programmatic, pointing as they do to cultures of the ancient Near East, including the Israelite one, and the theme is the interrelation of myth and ritual in a context in which kingship plays an important role 36 . The thesis is that in these areas there existed an 34 His earlier collection The Labyrinth (London 1935) has no bearing on the new ideas. Hooke's try-out was: The Babylonian New Year Festival,Journal of theManchesterEgyptologicaland Oriental Society 13 (1927) 29-38. The most convenient introduction to his ideas is his Middle EasternMythology(Harmondsworth 1963). On the scholar Hooke see: E. C. Graham, Nothing is Herefor Tears. A Memoir of S. H. Hooke (Oxford 1969). 35 Several studies have been devoted to the 'Myth and Ritual School'. In Myth, Ritual and Kingship (Oxford 1958), Hooke gives a historical survey of this approach, which he refuses to call a 'school'. There is also a critical essay by S. G. F. Brandon in the same collection. Cf. also: J. Weingreen, The Pattern Theory in Old Testament Studies, Hermathena108 (1969) 5-13; E. O.James, Myth and Ritual in theAncient Near East (London 1958); Versnel 1970, 201-35; J. W. Rogerson, Myth in Old Testament Interpretation(Berlin 1973) 66-84 and literature below nn. 75 ff. Recently Auffarth 1991, 38-118, presented a reconsideration of the main issues of the Myth and Ritual school. 36 So recently: Auffarth 1991, who holds that the festivals marking the turn of the year should not be seen as an annual recreation of the natural world (in the sense of Eliade's 'eternal return', which he rejects) but rather as periods in which people experience and dramatize the catastrophes that would occur if the gods were not there to protect order and prosperity. Now, these gods (more often the God) might decide to surrender the nation to chaos if the king, guarantor of justice, would fail to do his duty. Thus, according to Auffarth, the festivals in discussion, which are all marked by signals of reversal (for this aspect see below and chapter II) have their focus in the legitimation and evaluation of kingship, rather than in issues of fertility or cyclical re-creation. It is impossible to discuss this rich and provocative book in any detail here. But as it deals with two major issues of the present chapter it may serve clarity if I just mention in general terms where I agree and where I do not. Of the two major characteristics marking these festivals of transition in the Ancient

MYTH

AND RITUAL,

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33

endemic, widespread 'cult pattern'. What did this pattern look like and how was the idea conceived? It all began with the Babylonian New Year festival, the so-called Akitu festival 37 • All the gods, headed by Marduk, come to Babylon to celebrate the New Year in ceremonies that include a sacred marriage. The king is subjected to a curious ritual: the insignia of his dignity, his scepter, ring and crown are taken from him and laid down in front of Marduk's statue. The king kneels down and the priest pulls one of his ears; the king professes his innocence and is given the promise that his kingship will prosper. The insignia are returned to him and he is struck by the priest, which makes the king cry. From other sources we learn that the king then rides through the city in a kind of triumphal procession, together with Marduk. That is, in itself, already more than enough for a Frazerian scheme, as Frazer himself had not failed to notice 38 . Here we seem to have a variant of the ancient regicide, toned down into abdication, humiliation, and re-investiture. So much for the rite. As for the myth, the Enuma Elish, the Creation Epic, was recited during these New Year festivals. It told how Marduk (originally, of course, an older, in fact Sumerian, god) led the gods to war against Tiamat, the chaos monster of the primeval flood; how he defeated Tiamat's Near East: 'royal ideology' and 'reversal', A. takes kingship as the kernel. Ifwe restrict ourselves to the Ancient Near East this will not raise much protest. But looking at other cultures and watching A. 's attempts to demonstrate the same emphasis for instance in Greek festivals, problems loom up. The Kronia-not having any visible relationship with kingship (see the next chapter)-are left out of the discussion and the Anthesteria resorted to, where the (scarce) royal elements have to support a heavy ideological construction. It soon appears, as will be amply shown in the present book, that the basic common denominator of such festivals of the turning of the year is an, often carnivalesque, demonstration of the stagnation of any official form of power, both political and social-involving a temporary anomiawith social reversal-including (where it exists) kingship. This does not detract at all from the great value of A. 's analyses of the royal elements in the Near Eastern festivals, where he in fact can and does follow a long series of predecessors, and where I generally agree with him. But it does mean that it is unnecessary (and may be even damaging) to search for royal interpretations at all costs and play down other characteristic elements such as references to fertility or, especially, references to 'recreational' aspects. A. 's rejection of Eliade's 'eternal return' seems to have been very much inspired by his own point of departure. See my remarks below p.120 n.102. 37 This festival figures in all myth and ritual studies. There is a very circumstantial treatment by S. A. Pallis, The BabylonianAkitu Festival(Copenhagen 1926). See now: Auffarth 1991, 45-55. 38 In two volumes of the GoldenBough(see above n. 15): The Dying God, 111; The Scape Goat, 354 ff.

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forces, sliced her in two and fashioned heaven and earth from the two pieces. What we have here, then, is a case of perfect parallelism: the rite performed by the king is a reflection, in human terms, of what happened to the god in primordial mythical times, 'in illo tempore'39. Creation of the cosmos after a victory gained over chaos corresponds to the regeneration of kingship after a period of chaotic anarchy during the king's absence, a correspondence confirmed by the mention of the king's sacred marriage 40 . For the correspondence to be perfect, the myth would have to contain the element of the god's downfall, too, as is fitting for a 'dying and rising' god and as is told, for instance, of other Near Eastern gods (notably Tammuz). Did Marduk, too, perish first? In the Enuma Elish this is not the case, but on a sorely damaged tablet from the sixth century BC 41 it is recorded that Marduk is imprisoned, beaten and wounded: "People are looking in the streets for Marduk. Where is he held captive? ( ... ) The Enuma Elish they sing in Nisan is about him who is in prison ... ''. This, then, would complete the myth and ritual pattern, the 'cult pattern': RITE

MYTH

Crisis situation between old and new, King is dethroned and humiliated, King is reinstated,

Threat by primeval chaos in the shape of a monster, Marduk taken prisoner, Marduk gains victory, becomes king, Triumphal pageant, Sacred marriage (celebrated on New Year's day).

Triumphal pageant, Sacred marriage.

Numerous scholars, especially in Britain and Scandinavia, (for instance, C.J. Gadd, E.O.James, A.R.Johnson, K.I.A. Engnell and 39 According to the famous expression coined by M. Eliade. He has certain connections with the myth and ritualists, for instance in Eliade 1949, chapter II, and 19642 , 335 ff. 40 E. D. van Buren, The Sacred Marriage in Early Times in Mesopotamia, Orientalia13 (1944) 2 ff.; S. N. Kramer, The Sumerian Sacred Marriage Texts, PAPhS 107 (1963) 485 ff.; W. H. Ph. Romer, Sumerische'Konigshymnen'der /sin Zeit (Diss. Utrecht 1965). Cf. for more literature Auffarth 1991, 52 n. 22, who does not see any relationship with fertility in this rite. 41 There are ample commentaries by H. Zimmern, Zurn babylonischen Neujahrsfest, Ber. Sachs. Ges. Wiss. 70 (1918); F. Thureau-Dangin, Rituels accadiens (Paris 1921) 127 ff. S. H. Langdon, The Epic of Creation(Oxford 1923) 20 ff. provided another edition under the title 'The Death and Resurrection of Bel-Marduk'. Cf. Auffarth 1991, 51, with more recent literature in n.18.

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AND RITUAL,

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35

G. Widengren) have tried to discover this New Year complex in other Near Eastern cultures as well 42 . According to Hooke and others, the theory is not to blame for the unavoidable problems that arise. In many cultures, only the mythic component has been preserved; everywhere we have to allow for disintegration of the pattern due to migration, retouching or theological intervention 43 . As for Israel, one could already hark back to the fundamental studies by S. Mowinckel, who had recognized in some psalms mythic-ritual texts accompanying the king's enthronement as Yahweh's representative44. As stated earlier, this myth and ritual school had hardly any contact with the earlier Cambridge school 45 . Frazer, who was honoured by the Cambridge group 46 , is virtually ignored by Hooke and his followers. One sometimes gets the impression that they feel embarrassed when reminded of the unmistakably Frazerian aspect of their cult pattern. Hooke even strongly opposes Frazer's "nonhistorical method of the purely comparative approach'', and this leads to several other characteristic differences between Hooke and Harrison, to single out these two scholars. As Harrison saw it, in the last analysis everything had started with magic and had developed gradually 47 . Hooke, on the other hand, was not interested in the magical origins of sacral kingship, if any. Whereas Frazer and Harrison held that all over the world rite and myth developed in corn-

42 Most enthusiastically by K. I. A. Engnell, Studies in Divine Kingship in the Ancient Near East (Uppsala 1943) and G. Widengren, Sakrales Konigtum im Alien Testament und imjudentum (Stuttgart 1955). 43 This is the most conventional-and convenient-escape for desperate defenders of a pattern, exploited by Murray as well as by the 'Out-and-out myth and ritualists' (see below). 44 S. Mowinckel, Psalmenstudien I-IV (1922-24), II: Das Thronsbesteigungsjestjahwiihs und der Ursprung der Eschatologie. See Auffahrt 1991, 65-76, with recent literature 66 n.7. 45 S. A. Hooke gave one of his books, Alpha and Omega. A Study in the Pattern of Revelation (Welyn 1961), the same title as the one Jane Harrison had chosen for one of her books. In the collections, however, there is hardly any reference to the Cambridge school. 46 Frazer later distanced himself from the Cambridge movement, as is evident from his correspondence with Marett, in which he also belittles the influence of Robertson Smith. See: R. Ackerman, Frazer on Myth and Ritual,JHI 36 (1975) 115-34, and his book (1991) cited above n.28. 47 McGinty 1978, 79: "Harrison depended so heavily on evolutionism that, the general theory of evolution of primitive religion having been overturned, her analysis has lost most if not all of its cogency. ''

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parable ways through spontaneous evolution, Hooke adopted a diffusionist view. He thus betrayed his own origin, the Pan- Egyptian diffusionism advocated by G. Elliot Smith and W. J. Perry and the Pan-Babylonian version defended by A. Jeremias and others 48 . There are further differences, such as the stronger emphasis on kingship, which is understandable against the background of the culture of the ancient Near East. By far the most significant one, however, is the fact that in the relation of myth and rite the order is reversed, or at least given a reversed bias. Whereas the Cambridge ritualists in general, in spite of variants, believed in the rise of myth from rite, the new Orientalist myth and ritual theorists shifted the emphasis. Hooke did not exactly exclude this sequence, but he side-stepped the question of origin. Taking a synchronic viewpoint, he regarded royal ritual as a dramatic representation of the mythical scenario. In his first volume of papers he writes: "In general the spoken part of a ritual consists of a description of what is being done, it is the story which the ritual enacts. This is the sense in which the term 'myth' is used in our discussion. The original Myth, inseparable in the first instance from its ritual, embodies in more or less symbolic fashion, the original situation which is seasonally reenacted in the ritual" (p.3). The passage is not free from ambiguity 49 , but it does give a clear indication of what the author does and does not accept. It is at any rate the shortest statement of this myth and ritual approach 50 and as such a direct heritage from the Pan-Babylonian J eremias 51 , 48 G. Elliot Smith, The Ancient Egyptians and the Origins of Civilisation (London 1911, 19232 ); Human History (London 1930); W. J. Perry, The Children of the Sun: A Study in the Early History of Civilization (London 1923); The Growth of Civilization (London 1924). See: A. J. Toynbee, A Study of History I (London 1955) 424-46. The strongly astral emphasis in these positions may be considered a late offshoot of Max Miiller's astral mythology. On astral mythology in Old Testament and related studies: J. W. Rogerson o.c. (above n.35) 45-84. 49 To quote from another collection, The Siege Perilous (London 1956) 43: " ... the ritual myth which is magical in character, and inseparable from the ritual ( ... ) is older than the aetiological myth which has no magical potency ... ''. 50 That this order does indeed occur can be documented by the coronation ritual of the Japanese emperor, in which what happened in illo tempore is imitated in a ritual form: M. Waida, Conceptions of State and Kingship in Early Japan, ZRGG 28 (1976) 97-112. Eliade has unequivocally opted for this view of the relationship between myth and ritual. A. E. Jensen, Mythos und Kull bei Naturviilkern (Wiesbaden 1951), translated as Myth and Cult among Primitive Peoples (Chicago 1963), gives precedence to myth as well. However, his definition of myth is so broad that it practically covers the concept 'content of belief. 51 A. Jeremias, Handbuch der altorientalischen Geisteskultur (Leipzig 19292 ) 171.

MYTH AND RITUAL,

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37

who wrote in 1929 that '' alles irdische Sein und Geschehen einem himmlischen Sein und Geschehen entspricht'' (' 'everything that exists and happens on earth reflects something that exists and happens in heaven'') and that the earthly king is an'' Abbild des himmlischen Konigs" (" an image of the heavenly king"). Thus the flock of the faithful need not worry: whatever was said of Him, God came first and had always done so. Those who preferred to think that He Himself might have arisen from some earlier social ritual were always welcome in libertine Cambridge. 3.

THE

FUSES BLOW:

OUT AND OUT MYTH

AND RITUAL

THEORISTS 52

In one of her later works, with the appropriate title Epilegomenato the Study of GreekReligion ( 1921), Jane Harrison threatened to prove that the well-known legend ofDonjuan had arisen from a fertility ritual (p. xlii n. 1). Murray had already preceded her by applying the myth and ritual scheme to Shakespeare's works 53 . It was to be expected-why should diffusion be confined to the Near East? Why would evolution obtain only in Greece? Patelmundus. One of the contributors to another volume of essays edited by Hooke, The Labyrinth (1935) was A. M. Hocart. The final sentence of his paper 54 , which also concludes the book, is: ''Thus we have gone round the world in search of the true myth, the myth that is bound up with life. We have found it in India, beneath the Southern Cross, in the plains of North America. We have come to find it at our doors". We would not be wrong to think of Hocart as the founder of what we might call "out and out myth and ritualism". In an earlier work, Kingship (1927), he had already discovered a coronation ritual that had spread all over the world, starting from Mesopotamia. It was based completely on the New Year scheme but consisted of a much greater number of elements, twenty-six in fact, which are consequently His 'catechism' Die Panbabylonisten,deralte Orientund die AegyptischeReligion(Leipzig 1907) is still worth reading. 52 A survey of the themes discussed in this section minus the anthropological data is given by Hyman 1974. 53 Hamlet and Orestes. The Annual ShakespeareLecture before the British Academy (1914). 54 This contribution is incorporated in the collection edited by A. M. Hocart, The Life-givingMyth and OtherEssays (London 1952, 19702). A bibliography and assessment: R. Needham, A Bibliographyof Arthur Maurice Hocart(Oxford 1967) and Man 4 ( 1969) 292. His most influential books are Kingship (London 1927) and Kings and Counce/ors(Cairo 1936, Chicago 19702).

38

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arranged from a to z. This opened the floodgates. Lord Raglan, in a book that became very popular, The Hero: A Study in Tradition, Myth and Drama ( 1936) 55 , maintained that all myths in the whole world, without exception, were based on a single primordial rite, sacral regicide, and had their origin in Mesopotamia. And soon Guy Fawkes, William Tell, Robin Hood and Thomas a Becket came to follow suit 56 . It all looks like a serious application of the witty argument by one of his students who proved irrefutably that G. Murray himself must be a dying and rising god. Jane Harrison, by contrast, is cautious for once in her pious wish: "It would be convenient if the use of the word myth could be confined to such sequences, such stories as are involved in rites" (Themis, p.331). S. E. Hyman 57 , a forceful advocate of the myth and ritual theory and admirer ofHarrison's Themis, "the most revolutionary book of the 20th century" 58 , not only asserted that myth was always concomitant with rite, "like a child's patter as he plays'', but also showed that Darwin's evolutionary theories followed the myth and ritual pattern 59 : the 'struggle for life' is the agon, the 'survival of the fittest' the theophany of Murray's tragic scheme. The wildest excesses, however, were due to Murray's namesake, the well-known Margaret Murray 60 , with her theories 55 The book was reprinted in New York-London 1979. For a short survey of his ideas see Raglan 1974. Raglan was a faithful disciple ofHocart. In the introduction to The Life-giving Myth (p. XIII) he writes: "Since none of these rites and customs can reasonably be supposed to arise naturally in the human mind, their distribution must be due to historical causes.'' Diffusionism is hard to kill as witness for instance N. S. Josephson, GreekLinguistic Elements in the PolynesianLanguages(Heidelberg 1989). 56 On Becket and Guy Fawkes see: Fontenrose 1966, 14 ff. 57 Leaping for Goodly Themis, New Leader45 ( 1962), 25 f. ( cited by Fon ten rose 1966, 26). Other works by Hyman: TheArmed Vision(New York 1948); Myth, Ritual and Nonsense, Kenyon Rev. 11 (1949) 455-75; and Hyman 1974. 58 In a review of Fontenrose, Python, in: CarletonMiscellany 1 (1960) 124-7 (cited by Fontenrose 1966, 26). 59 The Tangled Bank: Darwin, Marx, Frazer and Freud as Imaginative Writers (New York 1962). 60 M. A. Murray, The Witch-Cult in Western Europe (Oxford 1921, many reprints); The Godof the Witches(London 1933 = Oxford 1981). For a short account of Murray, her followers and her critics see: K. Thomas, Religion and the Declineof Magic (Harmondsworth 1973) 614 ff. Some recent, though quite different, theories on the relationship between witches and pagan myth and ritual: H. P. Duerr, Dreamtime:Concerningthe BoundarybetweenWildernessand Civilization (Oxford 1985); C. Ginzburg, / Benandanti: Stregoneriae culti agrari tra Cinquecentoe Seicento(Turin 1966); idem, Storianotturna. Una decifrazionedel sabba(Turin 1989). Especially the latter books are fascinating and innovative.

MYTH

AND RITUAL,

OLD AND NEW

39

about witches as later priestesses of ancient pagan rituals. She manages to demonstrate that '' at least in every reign from William the Conqueror to James I the sacrifice of the incarnate God was consummated either in the person of the king or in that of his substitute "61. To be frank, I prefer the explicitly romanticised fictions of Robert Graves, Shirley Jackson (Hyman's wife), and J. B. Vickery 62 , who introduced the theme in literature. When I first became acquainted with myth and ritual theory more than twenty years ago, I had not the faintest notion that I would ever call Gaster's comprehensive work Thespis (above p.31) a moderate book. This study gives a concise survey of what is known about the 'Seasonal Pattern' of the Near East and discusses the related Canaanite, Hittite and Egyptian myths, with a few excursions into Greek drama and English mummery play. After our voyage across the seething waters of so much wilder seas, I am inclined to consider this book as a relatively calm and clear fairway and to recommend it-as a first introduction to a limited part of the myth and ritual approach-to those interested readers who are firmly resolved not to take the author's word for everything he claims 63 . As far as myth and ritual theory in anthropological literature is concerned, a few remarks will suffice, from which it may become clear that some anthropologists have not wholly unjustly been included in the present section. Here we should especially mention B. Malinowski 64 , who found his source of inspiration in Frazer and 61 M. A. Murray, The Divine King in England (London 1954). For an assessment of these and similar theories see: E. Rose, A Razor for a Goat (Toronto 1962). 6 2 Robert Graves, The White Goddess (New York 1958); S. Jackson, in: The Lottery (I owe this information to Burkert 1980, 181 f.); J.B. Vickery, The Scapegoat (New York 1972), 238-45. Cf. Jessie L. Weston, From Ritual to Romance (Cambridge 1920), which book had a great influence. More data in: Hyman 1974. 63 Theodor Gaster is perhaps the last true Frazerian. Next to the abridged Golden Bough (above n.15), he also edited Myth, Legend and Custom in the Old Testament.

A Comparative Study with Chaptersfrom Sir James Frazer's 'Folklore in the Old Testament'

I, II (1969, New York-London 19752). 6 4 His most famous book, Argonauts of the Western Pacific (London 1922, New York 19612) contained a preface by Frazer. See on this work: M. W. Young (ed.), The Ethnography of Malinowski: The Trobriand Islands 1915-1918 (London 1979). On Malinowski's place in anthropology: R. Firth (ed.), Man and Culture. An Evaluation of the Work of Bronislaw Malinowski (London 1957); Kardiner 1962, 160-86; Harris 1968, 547-67; Waardenburg 1974, 169-72; M. Panoff, Bronislaw Malinowski (Paris 1972); S. Silverman (ed.), Totems and Preachers:Perspectiveson the History of Anthropology (New York 1980); Kuper 1985, 1-35. On his influence on the study of myth: I. Strenski (ed.), Malinowski and the Work of Myth (Princeton UP 1992).

40

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ONE

Robertson Smith and also quoted Harrison approvingly. A practising anthropologist himself, he gave a definition of myth as, above all, 'charter', an explanation providing legitimation and foundation of customs, rules, moral codes and rites: "There is no important magic, no ceremony, no ritual without belief; and the belief is spun out into accounts of concrete precedent. The union is very intimate, for myth is not only looked upon as a commentary or additional information, but is a warrant, a charter, and often even a practical guide to the activities with which it is connected" 65 . This is one of the monolithic theories of myth attacked by Kirk and others. In this respect Malinowski still betrays the influence of his mentors, without being a genuine myth and ritual theorist: other phenomena besides rites also find their legitimation in myths, and he later speaks of "myth as a dramatic development of dogma" 66 , thus following a different course. Nevertheless, it is remarkable to see how other anthropologists venture very far-reaching statements about the interrelation of myth and rite. Kluckhohn 194 2, 58, claims that we cannot speak of priority in the relation between myth and ritual: "The myth is a system of word symbols, whereas ritual is a system of object and act symbols. Both are symbolic processes for dealing with the same type of situation in the same affective mode''. That is why they are interdependent, and the task they have in common is to "reduce the anticipation of disaster" (p. 69). E. Leach puts it in an even less equivocal way: "myth, in my terminology, is the counterpart of ritual: myth implies ritual, ritual implies myth, they are one and the same" 67 . Such statements can be explained if we think of the functionalist 65 Magic, Science and Religion and Other Essays (Glencoe 1948) 85. 'Explanation' this time not in the intellectualist sense used by Tylor and Frazer. 66 The essay under this name appeared in: Sex, Culture and Myth (London 1963). 67 E. R. Leach, The Political Systems of Highland Burma (London 1954) 13. Although Kluckhohn, contrary to the tendency of functionalism, paid due attention to the needs of the individual and Leach, later on, dissociated himself from functionalism and embraced structuralism, in this case the functionalist background is clear. This has been convincingly shown by Penner 1968, 51: "they share one basic assumption. This is the assumption that myths and rituals are to be explained by reference to their function for the solidarity or unity of society and the psyche''. In this context he refers to Harrison, Hooke, Gaster, Malinowski, Kluckhohn, Spiro and Leach. His criticsm of this functionalistic approach, which often confuses goal with effect, is refreshing. Kluckhohn's views on the function of myth and ritual as presented in the text is largely adopted by Burkert (see below) and for instance also by Auffahrt 1991, 32-5, where he attractively concludes: "Ein wichtiger Gesichtspunkt ist, dass der Untergang gerade nicht Realitiit wird, es bei Spiel mit einer suspendierten Realitiit bleibt". See also below eh. II.

MYTH

AND RITUAL,

OLD AND NEW

41

perspective from which these anthropologists operated. Others put more emphasis on myth and ritual as symbolic means of giving sense, form and definition to the social universe within which man functions as a social being. In Natural Symbols Mary Douglas maintains that "Ritual is the institutionalized rhetoric of symbolic order' ' 68 , an absolute condition for the idenfication of the group and the integration of the individual in the group. Substitute 'myth' for 'ritual' in this statement and the truth value remains the same 69 . Many objections have been raised against the generalizing and totalizing claims of the statements quoted above 70 . In anthropological circles the discussion is still in full swing, offering many scholars ample opportunity to prove their skills in matters of jargon, analysis and polemics. Let us hasten back to our own limited territory, where, for that matter, we shall meet with the very same discussion. 4.

CRITICISM

There is a story that Bertrand Russell once proposed to get Jane Harrison a bull on condition that she and her lady friends would demonstrate how maenads managed to tear such a beast to pieces with their bare hands. Russell, the logician, simply could not believe that the unaided human hand was capable of such an act. His proposal is a mild form of criticism, but matters could be different,

68 Douglas 1973. The phrase quoted is by an anonymous reviewer in TLS (1970) 535. Segal 1980, 181, rightly points out the difference between Douglas and her predecessors: ''The real difference between Douglas and her antagonists is that she concentrates on the meaning, not the effect, ofritual, if not myth. For Harrison and Hooke, Durkheim, Malinowski and Radcliffe-Brown, the meaning of myth and ritual is secondary. Its effect, on either society or the individual, is primary. The meaning is at most a means to that effect. For Douglas the reverse is true." 69 Cf. Leach o.c (above n.67) 15: "ritual action and belief alike to be understood as forms of symbolic statement about social order''. Very interesting on the neurobiological origins of the connections between myth and ritual: E.G. d' Aquili, Ch. D. Laughlinjr,J. McManus, TheSpectrumof Ritual. A Biogenetic StructuralAnalysis (New York 1979), who write for instance on p. 160: "In this regard is the function of myth to supply a solution to the problem raised at the conceptual level and the function of concomitant ritual to supply a solution at the level of action". 70 In addition to the works mentioned in n.1 I mention: H. Baumann, Mythos in ethnologischer Sicht I, II, Studium Generate12 (1959) 1-17 and 583-97; P.S. Cohen, Theories of Myth, Man 4 (1969) 337-53; J. A. Saliba, Myth and Religious Man in Contemporary Anthropology, Missiology1 (1973) 282-93.

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ONE

as witness the judgment of the Plato specialist P. Shorey 71 : ''Professor Murray has done much harm by helping to substitute in the minds of an entire generation for Arnold's andjebb's conception of the serene rationality of the classics the corybantic Hellenism of Miss Harrison and Isadora Duncan and Susan Glaspell and Mr. Stark Young's 'Good Friday and Classical Professors', the higher vaudeville Hellenism of Mr. Vachel Lindsay, the anthropological Hellenism of Sir James Frazer, the irrational, semi-sentimental, Polynesian, free-verse and sex-freedom Hellenism of all the gushful geysers of 'rapturous rubbish' about the Greek spirit". That is how real classical scholars judged the Cambridge school, and Dodds, therefore, with his irrational Greeks was not always taken seriously either. Indeed, Cambridge was in such bad odour that M. I. Finley 72, the best-known ancient historian there, saw fit to point out en passant that he wrote his World of Odysseusbefore he ever set foot in Cambridge, and Kirk his Myth after he left his Cambridge post for Yale. Both books were said to exude a Cambridge odour. Murray, by the way, was an "unregenerate Oxford Australian". From all this one can perhaps imagine the emotional responses the other myth and ritual school elicited in contemporary orthodox clerical circles. Robertson Smith had already had to listen to this 73: "His mind is like a shop with a big cellar behind it, and having good shelves and windows ( ... ). But he doesn't grow his own wool, nor does he spin the thread, nor weave the webs that are in his cellar or on his shelves. All his goods come in paper parcels from Germany''. Behind all this is the aversion to ethnological comparativism, especially if this refuses to stop short at Genesis 1: 1. And Robertson Smith did not stop. A notorious 'Robertson Smith case' resulted, partly in reaction to his blasphemous conviction that Moses could never have written the entire Pentateuch. This led to his dismissal from the chair of Old Testament studies of Free Church College in Aberdeen in 1881. Two years later he moved to Cambridge, where he came to hold a chair of Arabic. I have not heard about any early retirement among later myth 71 P. Shorey, in Saturday Review of Literature 4 (1928) 608, as quoted by Cl. Kluckhohn, Anthropologyand the Classics(Providence 1961) 20. 72 M. I. Finley, Anthropologyand the Classics(The Jane Harrison Memorial Lecture 1972), also in: Finley 1975, 105, where I also found the preceding quotation. 73 J. S. Black and G. Chrystal, The Life of William RobertsonSmith (London 1912) 401.

MYTH

AND RITUAL,

OLD AND

NEW

43

and ritual theorists, but the accusation of having "recklessly imposed their pattern" on Israelite religion 74 is only a mild version of what has also been voiced in stronger terms. This kind of emotional criticism is highly interesting from the point of view of cultural history, but it does not allow of any reasonable discussion. In this respect it is radically different from other forms of critical approach. For example, the building blocks of a theory can be tested for hardness: the tablet on which Marduk's downfall is described may be interpreted as Assyrian war propaganda against the hostile supreme deity75; the hymn of the Kouretes itself hardly contains any reference to initiation elements; in many ways it seems rather to refer to the New Year complex 76 ; in tragedy there are simply no traces of Murray's theophany and resurrection. Or we can tackle the pillars of the building: P. Lambrechts 77 was the first to aver that some alleged dying and rising gods, such as Attis or Adonis, did die in the myth but did not disertis verbis rise again.

74 Thus H. Frankfort, The Problemof Similarity in Ancient Near Eastern Religions (Frazer Lecture 1951) 8, an important criticism. 75 W. von Soden, Gibt es ein Zeugnis dafiir class die Babylonier an die Wiederaufstehung Marduks geglaubt haben?, ZA NF 17 (1955) 130-66; cf. Auffarth 1991, 50 f. Very sceptical also: J. Z. Smith, A pearl of Great Price and a Cargo of Yams: A Study in Situational Incongruity, History of Religions 16 (1976) 1-19, reprinted in revised form in Smith 1982, 90-101. He argues that the New Year complex was the product of Hellenistic apocalyptic ideas. Cf. idem, 1978, 72-4, and, Dying and Rising Gods, in: M. Eliade (ed.), The Encyclopediaof Religion 4 (1987) 520-7, ignoring the work by Italian scholars mentioned in the following notes. J. A. Black once more explored the whole Akitu complex: The New Year Ceremonies in Ancient Babylon: 'Taking Bel by the Hand' and a Cultic Picnic, Religion 11 (1981) 39-59. Although he rejects the idea of a dying and rising god, he accepts a parallelism between the enthronement rites of Marduk and those of the king. Cf. also: Z. BenBarak, The Coronation Ceremony in Ancient Mesopotamia, OrientaliaLovan. Period. 11 ( 1980) 55-67, with new evidence. See A. Livingstone, Mystical and Mythological Explanatory Works of Assyrian and BabylonianScholars(Oxford 1986) 156-8 for the political significance of the combat between Marduk and Tiamat. Auffarth 1991, 49, 60 n.13, mentions the possibility that the Epic of Creation after all is not as old as is usually assumed and may have been created in praise of Marduk as the royal god of Babylon. 76 See: West o.c. (above n.25) and Fontenrose 1966. 77 Lambrechts, Les fiites 'phrygiennes' de Cybele et d'Attis, BIBR 27 (1952) 141-70; La 'resurrection' d'Adonis, in: Melanges I. Levy (Bruxelles 1955) 207-40. Cf. more recently: D. M. Cosi, Salvatore e salvezza nei misteri di Attis, Aevum 50 (1976) 42-71; U. Bianchi, Adonis: Attualita di una interpretazione 'religionsgeschichtlich', and P. Xella, Adonis oggi: Un bilanco critico, both in: Adonis. Relazioni delcolloquioin Roma 1981 (Rome 1984); S. Ribichini, Salvezza ed escatologia nella vicenda di Adonis? in: Bianchi & Vermaseren 1982, 633-47.

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ONE

A similar statement was made about Tammuz by other scholars 78, and it has been suggested that a christological perspective imposed a pattern upon the gods of the Near East, only half of which has actually been attested. Moreover, it has been pointed out that for Greece we do not know anything about either sacral kingship or coherent complexes of myth and ritual 79 . Even the actual existence of sacral regicide, so often recorded in anthropological literature, has been questioned. Informants too often refer to former times: "We ourselves do not practise this any more, but our grandparents still chopped up a king" 80 . We might consider introducing a category 78 E. M. Yamauchi, Tammuz and the Bible, JBL 84 (1965) 283-90. C. H. FestRatschow, Heilbringer und sterbende Gotter, in: Antike und Universalgeschichte. schriftH. Stier ( 1972) 398 ff., argues that the act of dying itself is the symbol of salvation. See also: C. H. Talbert, The Myth of a Descending and Ascending Redeemer in Mediterranean Antiquity, NTS 22 (1976) 418-40. There is a reassessment of the problems in: S. Ribichini, Adonis. Aspetti 'orientali' di un mito greco (Rome 1981) 181-97. Very explicit on the emphasis on death: Th. Podella, Som-Fasten.Kollektive Trauerum den verborgenenGott im Alten Testament(Neukirchen-Vluyn 1989) 35-7. An entirely different position has been taken by Burkert 1979, 99 ff.; 129 ff. and cf. idem, Literarische Texte und Funktionaler Mythos: Zu Istar und Atrahasis, in: J. Assman, W. Burkert, F. Stolz, Funktionenund Leistungendes Mythos. Drei altorientalischeBeispiele (Gottingen 1982) 63-82. 79 H.J. Rose, Myth and Ritual in Classical Civilisation, Mnemosyne 3 (1950) 281-7; M. P. Nilsson, Cults, Myths, Oracles,and Politics in Ancient Greece(New York 1951) 10-12. On the supposed cohesion of myth and ritual M. Eliade, Antaios 9 (1968) 329, says "137 and shows the ambivalence of "damonische Bedrohung oder die eschatologische Verheissung'' (demonic threat or the eschatological promise) 138. In the form of the Kares or Keres the two images of primeval creatures and the dead seem to intermingle 139. Kronos is the god in chains: already in Hesiod the terms 'binding' and 'fettering' are typically connected with his myth. His statue is 'chained', perhaps already in the Hellenistic period, certainly in Rome. Kronos does exist, but only in mythical times: before the present reality ( during the primeval era), or after it (death), or at the outermost edges of this reality (the eschatiaz).He is either a prisoner or asleep. In this perspective I would tentatively propose to interpret his representations with covered head as follows: generally, in the Greek and Roman world, covering or wrapping up the head indicates that the person concerned is (temporarily) withdrawn from the present reality and is in ( or in immediate contact with) 'the other reality' 140 . This is precisely the essence of Kronos. His era, however, returns once more in the chaos of the Festival of Old and New: he is unchained, he wakes up or he is revived and again assumes kingship for a limited period: the return of the basileus, a term and a concept that for Greek and certainly for Athenian ears carries the primordial connotation of the beginning of time 141 , as elsewhere, too, the return of the wish-time is closely connected with the figure of a king (the return of the 'sleeping' king, Saturnaliusprinceps, rex,prince Carnival, slave risings with 'royal' leaders such as Eunous). kleineSchrijten(Basel 1975) 436-41. Cf. Bremmer 1983a, 123. Even less can I accept that "the name Peloriais most naturally taken as designating the tables heaped with food": Robertson o.c. (above n.45) 8. 137 Smith 1978, 141-71. 138 B. Gladigow, Jenseitsvorstellungen und Kulturkritik, ZRGG 26 (1974) 308; cf. n.28 above on the similarities between the imagery of Utopia and the Isles of the Blessed. 139 Auffarth 1991, 233-5, offers the most fortunate discussion of this 'double identity', adducing the illuminating parallel of the Israelite Rephaim. 140 H. Freyer, Caput velare(Diss. Tiibingen 1963) gives the (Roman) evidence but is not very satisfactory in his interpretations. Cf. below, chapter V, on the human victims of the versacrum,who were made sacerand forced to leave their country capite velati. 141 See e.g.: R. Drews, Basileus. The Evidencefor Kingship in GeometricGreece (New Haven and London 1983) 7-9.

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His rule refers to the dual freedom of unlimited abundance and abolition of the established hierarchy, on the one hand, and of the absence oflaw and standards, including rebellion, on the other. All this is expressed by the mythical and ritual images that we have described in the first part of this chapter, the Utopian images of abundance and euphoria and the opposite ones of the absence of moral standards, inhumanity and revolt.

7.

CONCLUSIONS

Our conclusions can be expressed concisely because they are in fact obvious from and implied in the foregoing. We have asked how we can explain the violent contradictions in Kronos' myth and ritual if we are not satisfied with the emergency solutions that resort to the fortuities of derivation, acculturation and evolution. Our solution142 is that the contradiction between the joyous and the frightening aspects of the Kronos complex is a structural characteristic of the god and his religious context. The explanation of this lies in his function as god of the periods of reversal and chaos. We have found that there are ambiguities on two levels. In the functionalist view, the legitimate anarchy comes close to the limits of the permissible. The collective culinary orgy as well as, afortiori, the reversed hierarchy contain the seeds of the socially impossible and undesirable. The oxymoron of euphoria and panic reaches a paroxysm in the Rhodian Kronia: the victim is given large amounts of wine to drink and then murdered. In the cosmic-religious view, on the other hand, abundance and role-reversal appear to be images of the renewed experience of primeval chaos that is simultaneously Utopia and its reverse: the relaxation of the banquets of the Golden Age under Kronos in one and the same image as the 'sardonic' tension of Kro142 There have been stimulating suggestions in previous works. I mention in particular: Meuli 1975 II, 1043-82, and 'Der Ursprung der Fastnacht', ibid. I, 283-99; Brelich 1949/50, and 1976, 83-95; Graf 1985b, 83. Cf. Burkert GR, 198: "Kronos, the god of the first age, of reversal, and possibly of the last age", and 232: "and so at his festival there is a reversion to that ideal former age, but a reversion th~t of course cannot last''. More generally, G. Dumezil, Le problemedes Cen(Paris 1929) had a keen eye for the taures.Etude de mythologiecompareeindo-europeenne ambiguities of carnivalesque New Year festivals. That Utopian expectations concerning a near or far future are so scarce in Greece can be explained from the general fact that "while speculations about the past were abundant, explicit pronouncements about the future are surprisingly rare": E. R. Dodds, The Ancient Conceptof Progress(Oxford 1973) 2. Cf. B. A. van Groningen, In the Grip of the Past (1953).

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AND THE

KRONIA

133

nos' Thyestian repasts 143 . This means that on both levels the contradiction is a structural characteristic of Kronos' myth and ritual. In this connection the words of B. Lincoln, speaking of 'interstitial' situations, are worth quoting: "What is constant in all instances is the fundamental perception that it is anomalies such as theseplaces outside space, moments outside time; people and things beyond easy classification-that are most dangerous and most creative as well 144 ". Consequently, attempts to soften the contradiction or 'render it harmless' via an exclusive appeal to historical development or elimination of one of the contrasting components are not only superfluous but fatefully veil its essential meaning. Our initial question concerned the relationship between myth and ritual. How are we to see this relationship in the case at hand and to what extent is mutual dependence present here? W. B. Kristensen wrote long ago: "Saturnus was a slave himself '1 45 . He was berated for his folly and praised for his courage 146 . The brachylogy of this phrase inevitably led to misunderstandings. None the less it refers directly to the question we have asked ourselves. Is the mythical 'unchaining' of Kronos a projection of the slave's freedom at festivals such as the Kronia? Or, on the other hand, was the myth of the Golden Age the model for the relaxation of the Kronian festivals? Furthermore, how are we, then, to interpret the dependence of the dark and cruel aspects of myth and rite: was human sacrifice the example or the imitation of Kronos' mythical atrocities? It will be clear by now that in this case there can be no question of such a one-sided dependence of myth and rite, in any direction. By no means do I deny that the myth and ritual complex we have described is a crystallised product of processes to which many influences-non-Greek as well as Greek-have contributed and

143 Katepine-not only in Hes. Theog. (above p.91; cf. W. Burkert in: Bremmer 1987a, 38 n.57) but also in Plato, Euthyphro 6A and Apollod. 1, 1, 5-is the very expression of this gluttony run wild. 144 Lincoln 1982. Comparably, V. W. Turner in: Babcock 1978, 279, on liminal situations: "Liminal symbols tend to be ambiguous, equivocal, neutral, ambisexual rather than classificatory reversals. This is because liminality is conceived of as a season of silent, secret growth, a mediatory movement between what was and what will be where the social process goes inward and underground for a time that is not profane time". 145 Kristensen o.c. (above n.26) 15. 146 "Einfach absurd": Bomer 1961 III, 425; "un lavoro geniale per impostazione e per alcuni intuizioni": Brelich 1949/50, 16 n.3.

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whose details escape us 147 . But the tenets of anthropology and comparative religion now enable us to outline a fresh hypothesis about the fundamental connection between the mythical and ritual components underlying this process of assimilation and evolution. In the domain of ritual it all started with a-presumably agricultural-festival. Perhaps this festival was somehow connected with the stagnation in the 'cereal' year in July and August (did it clinch the storage of the corn harvest, as did the Roman Consualia, similarly in August, as we shall see in the next chapter?). For reasons that escape us the festival was devoted to the god Kronos. We do know that, in historical times, it was firmly anchored in a festive complex which marked the transition from the old to the new year and that, accordingly, it was celebrated with rites of role reversal. In the domain of myth our starting point is the observation that Kronos, for whatever reason, disappeared from active cult and became a 'mythical' god, and that this god (consequently?) was considered to be a representative of the mythical era before history proper, which began with Zeus and the Olympians. As far as we can see, these two sets of data, the ritual and the mythical, represent independent phenomena. However, both were open to closely related associations, which can be summarized in the notion of 'absence of order'. The ritual displayed an atmosphere which the myth projected onto the precosmic era. Mythically, the primeval era is represented in many cultures as a chaos of an ambig147 Perhaps a new piece of evidence may eventually throw more light on the origins of the relationship ofKronos and the Kronia. I owe this information to W. Burkert by a letter d.d. 19-1-1992. It concerns a new Hurritic-Hittite bilingual, published in KBo 32 (1990), and discussed by E. Neu, Das Hurritische: Eine altorientalische Sprache in neuem Licht, Abh.Mainz (1988) 3. The text contains a "Song of release', referring to the liberation of slaves and the remission of debts, well-known from ancient Near-Eastern cultures (cf. the Hebrew 'Jubilee'). However, the text offers also a mythological introduction: "The Sungoddess of the Earth" invites the Weathergod Teshub, and together they descend into the dark earth, the abode of the 'primeval gods', with whom they celebrate a feast. During that feast they confirm king Emar's obligation to implement the 'release'. In his analysis of this fascinating piece of evidence (forthcoming in: KarnevaleskePhiinomene in antikenund nachantikenKulturenund Literaturen(Boch um 1993]) Burkert argues that, as Neu had already seen, this ritual of slave release goes together with a temporary suspension of the separation of heaven and earth, including the separation of the "primeval gods" [now out of action] and the reigning generation of gods. He points out the striking analogy with Greek Kronos and the Kronia. All this might indicate a more pervasive (and complex) influence of oriental prototypes then was so far assumed.

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AND THE KRONIA

135

uous nature: there is a positive, Utopian side coupled with references to the catastrophic aspects of the annihilation of human values. Equally, we find the same ambiguity in the absence of order in ritual: abundance, on the one hand, and reversal of roles on the other. Here 'abnormality' may lead to associations with murder in the form of human sacrifice. Both myth and rite 'say' the same thing: the Utopian cannot, the reverse Utopian must not exist in reality. In myth, this is expressed by the projection of these images onto the eschatiai of time and space, Kronos' mythical territory. In ritual it is expressed by realising the impossible for just a few hours or days and thus underlining its exceptional character: the relaxation and reversal are indeed subservient to society's proper functioning, but as images of either the impossible or the undesirable and therefore as exceptions-"denn Freiheit ist etwas, das womoglich noch schwerer zu ertragen ist als Herrschaft" (for perhaps freedom is even harder to endure than dominion) 148 . Whereas such festivals are understood widely as a temporary return to chaos-and show by their nature every characteristic of it-, in Greece it was natural to associate them with the precosmic era of myth, which was thought to return for one day. Both, however, though-as far as we can see-for quite different reasons, were associated with the god Kronos. All this justifies the conclusion that we have in this complex an example of correspondence between myth and rite in '' structure and atmosphere", and in such a way that both "symbolic processes deal with the same type of experience in the same affective mode'', and this "pari passu", according to the postulates referred to in the introductory section of the present chapter. 148 Weidkuhn 1969, 302. Cf. Balandier 1972, 116. I have discussed the ambiguity of freedom in the Hellenistic world at length in the first chapter of Inconsistencies I.

CHAPTER THREE

SATURNUS

AND THE SATURNALIA

Liminal symbols tend to be ambiguous, equivocal, neutral, ambisexual rather than classificatory reversals. This is because liminality is conceived of as a season of silent, secret growth, a mediatory movement between what was and what will be, where the social process goes inward and underground for a time that is not profane time. V.W. Turner

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1. Saturn The many conspicuous features that Roman Saturn and Greek Kronos had in common encouraged an early assimilation. We are wellinformed about some common traits, especially the nature of their festivals, the Saturnalia and the Kronia. But the gods share enigmatic aspects too: the mystery of their 'original' nature; their provenance; and the question of alleged derivations of cult elements from foreign sources. I shall first give a survey of the most relevant evidence-for full information the reader should consult the abundant modern literature 1•

1 Besides the articles in the well-known handbooks or encyclopedias (especially the one by M. P. Nilsson in RE II, 2, 1 [1921] 201-11) and articles on special details mentioned in the footnotes below, the following works are basic: J. Albrecht, Saturnus. Seine Gestaltin Sage und Kutt (Diss. Halle 1943); F. Bomer, Untersuchungenii.her die Religion der Sklaven in Griechenlandund Rom III (AbhMainz 1961) 173-95 (= 415-37); M. Le Glay, Saturneafricain. Histoire(Paris 1966), esp. 449-78; A. Brelich, Tre variazioni romane sul tema delle origini (Rome 19762) 83-95; Ch. Guittard, Recherches sur la nature de Saturne des origines a la reforme de 21 7 avant J.-C., in: R. Bloch (ed.), Recherchessur les religionsde l'ltalie antique (Geneve-Paris 1976) 43-71; idem, Saturnifanum infaucibus (Varro LL 5, 42): apropos de Saturne et de !'asylum, in: Melanges P. Weuilleumier(Paris 1980) 159-66; idem, Saturnia Terra: mythe et realite, Caesarodunum15 bis (1980) 177-86; D. Briquel, Iuppiter, Saturne et le Capitole. Essai de comparaison indo-europeenne, RHR 198 (1981) 131-62; P. Pouthier,Ops et la conceptiondivine de l'abondancedans la religionromaineJusqu'ala mort d'Auguste (Rome 1981); B. H. Krause, luppiter OptimusMaximus Saturnus. Ein Beitrag

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Like Kronos in Greece, Saturn had scarcely any cultic reality in Italy pace Dion. Hal. 1, 34, 52 . In Rome his cult was restricted to one sanctuary, the famous temple 3 on the slopes of the Capitoline hill, eight columns of which are still in situ. The treasure of state, the aerarium Saturni, was kept in the cellars of this temple. It was also the place where the quaestors administered the mint. Various series of Roman coins bore the portrait of the god. There was an official pair of scales in the temple and official charters are reported to have been published on walls in the immediate neigbourhood 4 . This unique temple of Saturn constitutes one of the oldest cult places of Rome. Before its foundation there had been a very ancient altar 5 and the temple itself was said to have been founded in or around 497 BC 6 ,

zur ikonographischen DarstellungenSatums (Trierer Winckelmannsprogram 5, 1983). These works will be cited by name and date henceforth. As I had originally planned this chapter as a section of my contribution to Bremmer 1987a, together with my paper on Kronos, the basic parts had been written when I saw Graf 1985, who provides a short but perceptive analysis of the main features of the Saturnalian festival on p.90-93. 2 Dion. Hal. 1, 34, 5, tells us that sanctuaries of 'Kronos' were ubiquitous in Italy, but archaeology by no means confirms this view. Nor does epigraphy: in his appendix 'Inscriptions a Satume hors d 'Afrique', Le Glay 1966, 340-3, records only 33 instances. As far as they are Italic (27 x ) there are only 7 inscriptions from central Italy; the rest are from North Italy, where a Celtic God hides behind this name. Cf. C. B. Pascal, The Cults of CisalpineGaul (Bruxelles 1964) 176-9; F. Sartori, Un dedica a Satumo in Val d'Ega, Atti VII Ge SDIR (1975-6) 583-600. 3 H. Jordan, Topographieder Stadt Rom I, 2 (Berlin 1871) 360 ff.; S. B. PlatnerTh. Ashby, A TopographicalDictionaryof Ancient Rome (Oxford-London 1929) 463 f.; G. Lugli, RomaAntica. Ilcentromonumentale(Rome 1946) 148-51; F. Castagnoli, Foro Romano (Rome 1957); Coarelli 1983, 199 ff.; P. Pensabene, Tempio di Saturno.Architetturae decorazione(Rome 1984). 4 AerariumSaturni: Thes.L.L. I, 1055 ff.; Plut. Poplic. 12; QR 42; Paul. ex Festo 2, 14 (L); Macrob. Sat. 1, 8, 3; Serv. Georg.2, 502. See: M. Corbier, L'Aerarium Satumi et l'Aerarium militare (Rome 1974). Coins: Babelon, Monnaie de la republique romaineI, 288 no. 5; 399 no. 24; II, 188 no. 14 f.; 214 no. 2; 216 no. 8; Sydenham, TheCoinageoftheRomanRepublic(London 1952)nos. 73, 79, 90,102,123,124. Cf. Krause 1983, passim. The balance: Varro, L.L 5, 183. On the enigmatic text in Varro L. L 5, 42: post aedemSaturni in aedificiorumlegibusprivatis parietes 'posticimuri' sunt scripti, generally interpreted as 'charters' (cf. Cass. Dio 45, 17, 3); see also: H. Erkell, Varroniana, ORom 13 (1981) 35. 5 Fest. 430, 35 (L); Serv. Aen. 2, 116; 8,319; Macrob. Sat. 1, 8, 2; Varro L.L. 5, 42:fanum infaucibus. Cf. Guittard 1980a and the discussion below p.179. 6 Dion. Hal. 6, 1, 4; Liv. 2, 21, 2, with Ogilvie's note. Pensabene o.c. (above n.3) 12-5, gives the full evidence. Cf. E. Gjerstad, The Temple of Saturn in Rome: Its Date of Dedication and the Early History of the Sanctuary, in: HommagesA. GrenierII (Bruxelles 1962) 757-62. Latte 1960, 254 n.2, thinks that the temple was founded circa 400 BC, but this must be the second temple.

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on the 17th of December, the day of the Saturnalia 7. However, like Kronos, the god who was worshipped here was ''une divinite dechue" ( a fallen god) 8 • The origins of the god and his name are lost in the haze of prehistory. Etymologies which connect the name with Latin sero/ satus are linguistically untenable 9 • Connections with Etruscan Satre deserve more serious consideration 10 . More distant relations with a great Phrygian god Satre have been suggested 11. But even if Etruscan influences could be ascertained, the fixed position of the festival in the oldest Roman festive calendar 12 and the occurrence of the name in the ancient carmenSaliare13 seem to betray an ltalo-Roman origin of the god. The Romans themselves regarded Saturn as the original ruler of the Capitolium, which, as they asserted, was called Mons Saturnius in ancient times 14 . 7 Fest. 432, 9 (L), Satumo dies festus celebraturmense Decembre,quod eo aedis est dedicata;Fasti Amit. 17 Dec. 8 Le Glay 1966, 450, adding: "mais nous devinons son antique grandeur". 9 Fest. 202, 17 (L); 432, 19 (L); Varro, L.L. 5, 64; Macrob. Sat. 1, 10, 20; Arnob. 4, 9; Lact. Div. Inst. 1, 23, 5; Aug. G.D. 7, 13. The connection with sero is still defended by some modern scholars (see the survey in Le Glay 1966, 450 n.10) but is refuted by the length of the a in Satumus. Cf. Saeturnusin GIL I2 449; Paul. ex Fest. 323 (L) Sateurnus. Cf. Bomer 1961 III, 183; idem, Ovids Fasten I, 234 and see: LEW s.v. Radke 19792 still defends derivation from sa- and explains the name as "der die Absicht, (sc. den Menschen) die Veranlassung zum Siien zu bringen, sie das Siien zu lehren, ausgefiihrt hat" (!). Cf. idem 1987, 84 ff. See for the agrarian function of Saturn below pp .165-1 71. lO W. Schulze, Zur GeschichtelateinischerEigennamen(Berlin 1904) 181; G. Herbig, Satre-Saturnus, Philologus74 (1917) 446-59. On the element ae in Saeturnusas an indication of Etruscan influence: A. Ernout, Les elements etrusques du vocabulaire latin, in: idem, PhilologicaI (Paris 1946) 50. An Etruscan origin of the name had already been proposed by J. Scaliger, M. Ter. Varronis 'De lingua latina' (1581) 30: "Porro Saturni nomen Tuscum esse omnes mihi concedent". Cf. Guittard 1976, 50. Etruscan influence is perhaps also confirmed by the fact that Saturn figures conspicuously in the Libri Sibyllini, which betray Etruscan influences: R. Bloch, Origines etrusques des Livres Sibyllins, MelangesA. Ernout (Paris 1940) 25 f.; Pfiffig 1975, 312 f. Van der Meer 1987, 126-8, regards Etruscan Satre as an Etruscization of Italo-Roman Saturn, which does not convince me. 11 P. Kretschmer, Saturnus, Die Sprache2 (1950) 65-71. Different suggestions: Kleine Pauly s.v. Saturnus, 1570 f.; Guittard 1976, 43 f. 12 See the evidence in Le Glay 1966, 453 n.6. The low dating of the Numanic calendar by A. Kirsopp Michels, The Calendarof theRoman Republic(Princeton 1967) 125-7 and 207-20 (so already eadem,The Calendar of Numa and the Prejulian Calendar, TAPhA 80 [1949] 320-46), has been rightly attacked by A. Degrassi, Fasti anni Numani et Iuliani. Inscr. Italiae XIII 2 (1963) pp. XIX f.; Le Bonniec 1958, 110 ff., with bibliography. Coarelli 1983, 206, dates the calendar to circa 600 BC. 13 Fest. 432, 19 (L). 14 VarroL.L. 5, 42; Dion. Hal. 1, 34; 2, 1; Iustin. 43, 1, 5; Macrob. Sat. 1, 7, 27; Fest. 430, 30 (L). See: Poucet 1967, 76-98.

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Here we are confronted with a first inconsistency in the imagery of the god. On the one hand, Saturn was regarded as autochthonous and as belonging to the first stratum of Latin settlers. Consequently, he was often regarded as the first king of Latium or even of Italy 15 • On the other hand, he is generally depicted as an immigrant. According to Hyginus apud Macrobius Sat. 1, 7, 21 ff., for instance, !anus was the first king of Latium and he received Saturn after his wanderings and settled him in his country 16 . According to Varro L.L. 5, 74 17 , he arrived, just as other gods, from the Sabine territory-a view, of course, that is more informative on later Saturnian ideology than on the actual roots of the god 18 . So Saturn unites the connotations of the arch-Roman and the prototypical foreigner 19 . This is only the first of a series of paradoxes that we shall gradually discover. The foreign nature of Saturn seems to be ritually reflected in the fact that his sacrifice was performed according to the ritus graecus, that is capite aperto: with uncovered head 20 . This custom is attested

15 Latium: Verg. Aen. 7,203: Saturniagens; Sil. Ital. 3, 11; Italy: EnniusAnn. 25: Saturniaterra;Varro L.L. 5, 42; Verg. Georg.2, 173: Saturnia tellus;Aen. 8,329; lustin. 43, 1, 5, ltaque Italia regisnomineSaturnia appellata.On Italy as Saturnia terra see: Guittard 1980b, who thinks that the Saturnia terra "n'a pu se developper qu'apres !'assimilation de Saturne a Kronos et comme une consequence des theories euhemeristes" (183); Briquel 1984, index s.v. Saturn is ranged among the Laurentan kings: RML IV, 433 ff., with sources on his arrival in Italy. The high antiquity of Saturn and his ambiance is also indicated by the versusSaturnii, which are versusantiquissimi (Fest. 4 32 L). 16 On !anus and Saturn as prototypical kings: A. Brelich, I primi re latini, in: idem 1976, 57-103; Guittard 1976, 64 f. 17 Cf. Dion. Hal. 2, 50, 3; Augustin. G.D. 4, 23. 18 See on the historical value of the list of the 'Sabine gods' in Varro: E. C. Evans, The Cults of theSabine Territory(PMAAR XI [1939]) 152 ff. ;J. Collart, Varron, grammairienlatin (Paris 1954) 189-92; Poucet 1967, 47-51; Guittard 1976, 54 ff. On the ideological implications of these Sabine connections as references to the 'third function' of rural affluence: Pouthier 1981, 39 f. As a signum for ancient Italic agrarian origin: Le Glay 1966, 454 ff.; Guittard 1976, 53 ff. 19 As far as I know, Brelich 1976 is the only one who has noticed and valued this paradox, to which we shall return. 20 Already Cato apud Prise. 8, p. 377 H ( = Malcovati p. 35 no. 77) says: Graeco ritufiebanturSaturnalia.Cf. Fest. 432, 1 (L ): apud earn(sc. aramSaturni) supplicantapertis capitibus.Nam ltalici (. . ... ) velantcapita; ibid. 462, 29 (L); Paul. 106 (L); Macrob. Sat. 3, 6, 17. Serv. Aen. 3,407, even contends that this was done exclusively in the case of Saturn: sacrificantesdiis omnibuscaput velareconsuetos(. .. ) exceptotantum Saturno. On ritus graecussee: J. Gage, Apollon romain. Essai sur le culte d'Apollon et le diveloppementdu 'ritusgraecus'aRome des originesaAuguste (Paris 1955); Rohde 1936, 138 ff.;J. Linderski, The Augural Law, ANRWII, 16 (1986) 2219.

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for only a few other cults, the sacrifice for Hercules at the Ara Maxima being the least problematic 21 , since this cult is incontestably of Greek origin. However, in the case of Saturn and, for instance, that of Honas, to whom people used to sacrifice with bare heads, according to Plutarch QR 13, serious problems loom up, for neither of these gods had Greek roots. The desperation of modern scholarship is exemplarily illustrated by Latte 22 • He explains the capite aperto sacrifice for Honas as a human imitation of the god (who was represented with uncovered head), whereas ancient explanations of the same sacrifice for Saturn were based precisely on the opposition between the covered god and the uncovered worshippers 23 . The least we can do for the moment is to point out the problem: an essentially nonGreek, though definitely eccentric, god is worshipped in a rite which is usually qualified as ritu graeco24 . In searching for a solution to this riddle, scholars have also referred to the later Hellenization of Saturn. For it is undoubtedly true that Saturn adopted Greek traits from his Greek pendant Kronos. The covered head is no less unusual for a Roman than for a Greek god: it must have been borrowed from the imagery of Kronos 25 • The sickle is another Kronian emblem 26. The identity of the two gods was already fully acknowledged and exploited by Livius Andronicus 27 .

21 See: Freier 1963, 109-13. On the iconography see: C. Reinsberg, Das Hochzeitsopfer eine Fiktion. Zur Ikonographie der Hochzeitssarkophage, ]DAI 99 (1984) 291-317. 22 Latte 1960, 236: "Die ~.eziehung zu dem Graecusritus versagt bei der Gestalt, fur die wir kein griechisches Aquivalent kennen, ebenso wie bei Saturnus". On p. 256 n.4, he states that the uncovered head does not unequivocally prove Greek origin. Guittard 1976, 46 f., recognizes the problem and tries to solve it by emphasizing the strong relationship between Saturn and Hercules. Rohde 1936, 143, speaks of the: ''sogenannte Graecusritus im Saturnkult'' and thinks that this ritual is as old as the cult of Saturn itself, possibly deriving from Etruria. Cf. also Brelich 1976, 86, to whose pertinent questions I shall return. 23 Serv. Aen. 3, 407: ne numinis imitatio esse videretur;Macrob. Sat. 3, 6, 17: ut omnesapertocapitesacrafaciant; hoefit, ne quis in aededei habitum eius imitetur; nam ipse ibi opertoest capite. 24 This is another illustration of the great antiquity of the cult of Saturn in the view of those ancient historiographers who wished to identify the early Romans as Greeks: Dion. Hal. 1, 34, 4; 6, 1, 4; Plut. QR 11; Macrob. Sat. 1, 8, 2; 10, 22; Serv. Aen. 3, 407; Fest. 432 (L). See: Briquel 1984, 419 ff. 25 See for this tradition: Alfoldi 1979, 20 f.; Krause 1983, esp. 5. 26 Fest. 202, 17 (L); 423, 12 (L); Macrob. Sat. 1, 7, 24; Plut. QR 42; Serv. Georg.2, 406; Ovid. Fast. 1, 234. Cf. Krause 1983, 5. 27 Fr. 2 Morel: (lupiter) Saturnijilius; cf. fr. 15; Enn. Ann. 456 Yahl.

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According to a number of scholars, the Hellenization of Saturn took place in a rather abrupt way in the year 21 7 BC, when, among a series of piacular rites, ''there was a sacrifice at the temple of Saturn and it was ordered that a lectisterniumshould be held and that a public meal should be organized (the cry 'Saturnalia' resounded through the city day and night) and that this would for always remain a festive day for the people" 28 . Livy's description of the measures of the year 217 BC provides a good deal of the well-known features of the Saturnalia of historical times. Many have accepted the conclusion drawn by Wissowa 29 : "die Festfeier des alteinheimischen Gottes Saturn us erfahrt eine vollige U mgestalltung nach griechischen V orbilde" (the festival of the indigenous god Saturn undergoes a complete transformation after a Greek model). Its success does not alter the fact that this remark is a mere guess. It is at least equally probable that age-old Roman customs were now officially recorded and ritually fixed 30 , perhaps after having been enriched with Greek elements (like the lectisternium31 for instance). This assumption would receive additional support if it were true that the cult of Saturn received particular attention during the second Punic war in order to provide a kind of counterpoise to the Punic Ba'al Hammon, who was identified with Saturn, by an act of evocatio, as R. Bloch 32 has suggested. In that case an emphasis on au-

28 Liv. 22, 1, 19: Postremo,Decembriiam mense, ad aedemSaturni Romae immolatum est, lectisterniumqueimperatum-et eum lectumsenatoresstraverunt-et conviviumpublicum, acper urbemSaturnaliadiem ac noctemclamata,populusqueeum diemfestum habereac servare in perpetuum iussus. 29 Wissowa 1912, 61. Cf. p.205: "Der Zeitpunkt der Umwandlung des latinischen Kultes in einen griechischen ist in diesem Falle bekannt: ( .... ) 217 ( .. )". 30 Thus convincingly: Nilsson 1921, col. 206. Cf. Latte 1960, 254/5: "Es ist nichts in den Riten, was nicht in dem Bauernkult entstanden sein konnte". Bomer 1961 III, 423: "Die These uber den griechischen Ursprung der privaten Gastmiihler in 217 unhaltbar", and ibid. 425: "Wir durfen getrost annehmen, class die Romer fur die Art, wie sie mit ihren Sklaven feierten, ihren eigenen Stil hatten und dafur nicht auf griechische Importe angewiesen waren." Cf. Graf 1985b, 93. 31 However, Guittard 1976, 47 f. is right in pointing out that Greek influence must have been at work long before 217 BC. Cf. the important observation by Rohde 1936, 143: "Catos Worte Graecoritufiebantur Saturnaliaklingen eher so, als ob sie van einem alten Brauche gesagt wiiren, nicht van einem zu seinem Lebzeiten eingefuhrten.'' 32 Bloch 1976, 35 f., followed by Guittard, ibid. 49. Long before him E. Manni, A proposito de! culto di Saturno, Athenaeum16 (1938) 223-32, had developed similar ideas. Cf. also V. Basanoff, Evocatio (Paris 1947) 63-6.

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thentic and ancient Roman ritual to attract the foreign god would be quite appropriate. Unfortunately we do not know the exact date of the only contemporary Greek author who mentioned the Saturnalia. Baton from Sinope probably lived in the second part of the third century BC and he tells us that the Roman Saturnalia were a completely Greek festival, the same festival that was called Peloria in Thessaly 33 . If he wrote this before 217 BC, this would definitely prove that the Roman Saturnalia possessed features that reminded the author of Greek customs. But even if he wrote (shortly) after this year it would be curious that he did not refer to the recent 'Hellenization' of the festival in order to add force to his demonstration. As we have seen in the previous chapter, there is no unequivocal evidence on fettered statues of the Greek Kronos 34 . On the other hand, this is one of the most characteristic marks of Roman Saturn: the feet of the statue were 'chained' with woollen threads or fetters, which were released on the day of the Saturnalia 35 . Another datum without a parallel in Greece is handed down by Pliny NH 15, 32, who tells us that the statue of Saturn was filled with oil 36 . This custom has been compared with the shedding of oil on the Kronos stone at Delphi but this is not exactly identical and a convincing explanation of this curious practice has not yet been proposed. The inconsistencies discovered so far-a prototypical Roman god who is at the same time a foreigner; a god with one of the oldest sanctuaries in Rome and yet worshipped ritugraeco;a god who is in fetters

33 Apud Athen. 14, 639D-640A = FGrHist 268 F 5. G. Kaibel, in his Teubner edition (1890) p.412, argues that it was not Baton but Athenaeus himself who inserted this piece of information, but F. Jacoby has shown that it is probably based on authentic information: Cf. Briquel 1984, 421 f. 34 Cf. above p.105. I would recall, however, the information given by Pausanias 10, 24, 6 on the Kronos stone at Delphi: "every day they shed oil over it and during every festival they place threads of unworked wool on it." 35 Verrius Flaccus apud Macrob. Sat. 1, 8, 5; Stat. Silv. 1, 6, 4, compedeexsoluta; Arnob. 4, 24, numquisparricidiicausavinctum esseSatumum et ablui diebusstatis vinculorum ponderibuset Levan"? Min. Fel. 23, 5. 36 Existimaturqueet eborivindicandoa carieutile esse:certesimulacrumSaturni Romae intus oleorepletumest. Pausan. 5, 11, 10, has something of the kind on the ivory statue of Zeus at Olympia. Krause 1983, 5, regards this as an exact parallel and accepts the cosmetic motive for this strange custom as given by P!iny. However, there is a difference: at Olympia the oil is poured over the statue; in Rome it is poured into the hollow statue. Cf. also Piccaluga 1974, 312 f. and below p.189. On the libation of oil over sacred stones see Burkert 1979, 42.

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but is liberated for one day (after which he is chained again)-are matched by the paradoxes in his character as it appears from Roman literature. No god in the Roman pantheon can boast a more paradoxical character. Although his name cannot be connected with the stem of the verb "to sow", Saturn undoubtedly had connections with cereal activities, especially with the corn harvest. As we shall investigate his functions in more detail below, it will suffice here to point out the calendrical position of his festival between the two festivals of Ops and Consus in December. Consequently, later Roman myth made him the husband of Ops, the goddess who personified the wealth of the corn supply. In the imperial age Saturn was worshipped side by side with Ops under the name of Frugifer 37 . Accordingly and significantly, he was generally lauded as the god and king who had introduced agriculture in Italy and thus had given the decisive impulse to the development of civilization. The locus classicus38 , Verg. Aen. 8, 314 ff., describes how in the primeval era of Fauni and Nymphs man led a beastly life without laws, agriculture or civilization. Then came Saturn as an exile from the Olympus, dethroned and fugitive (320-325): "He gathered together the unruly race, scattered over mountain heights, and gave them laws, and chose that the land be called Latium, since in these borders he had found a safe hiding place. Under his reign were the golden ages men tell of: in such perfect peace he ruled the nations". (translation: H. Rushton Fairclouch, Loeb)

So Saturn's sickle may be viewed as a sign of affluence, peace, order and stability. But it can also change into a bloody weapon in the hands of a fearful and even horrible god. As we shall have to return to the following issues in a different context, I shall now only succinctly mention some major aspects which betray the less agreeable sides of the god. In the first place, Saturn

37 At Lambaesis a temple was dedicated Saturnodominoet Opi Reginae(GIL VIII, 2670); there is a dedication FrugiferoSaturno aug(usto)sacr(um) (GIL VIII, 2666). Combinations with Nutrix in Wissowa 1912, 208 n.5. Cf. Le Glay 1966, index s.v. Frugifer. 38 Other sources on Saturn as culture hero: Fest. 202 (L); Macrob. Sat. 1, 7, 21-32; Plut. QR 12 and 42. Cf. the surveys in: Wissowa, in: RML col. 433 f.; Gatz 1967, 125; Brelich 1976, 92. On the development of the idea in Hellenistic times: A. Alfoldi, From the Aion Plutonius of the Ptolemies to the Saeculum Frugiferum of the Roman Emperors, in: Greeceand the EasternMediterraneanin Ancient Historyand Prehistory.Studies presentedto F. Schachermeyr(Berlin-New York 1977) 1-30.

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was closely connected with a deity called Lua. Now, a goddess called Lua Mater presided over the destruction of the enemy weapons, which were burnt and thus rendered harmless 39 • Her name is therefore associated with the concept of lues, 'destruction'. Romans of the historical period seem to have identified Lua Mater and Lua Saturni-erroneously, as I hope to show-; hence Lua Saturni 40 is sometimes saddled with equally negative, or at least ambivalent, traits. Serv. Aen. 3, 139, while commenting upon the phrase arboribusquesatisque lues, says that some numina are liable to perform both good and evil deeds: ut (. .... ) sterilitatemtarn Saturno, quam Luae 41 ; hanc enim sicut Saturnum orbandipotestatemhabere(for instance sterility is attributed to both Saturn and Lua; for just as Saturn, the goddess Lua has the power of making people childless). Apparently, Lua could be both beneficent and malevolent, a fickleness she shared with Saturn. I shall pay attention to the nature of the relationship between these two gods in a later section. Saturn had connections with the underworld, as may appear from the position of his festival in December, a month which was apparently reserved for gods with infernal or chthonic functions: Consua~ lia, Opalia, Angeronalia 42 . The ban on the performance of such official acts as declaring war applied to both the Saturnalia (see below) and to the days marked by mundus patet according to Varro 43 •

Liv. 8, 1, 6; 45, 33, 2, quibus spolia hostium dicare iusfasque est. Varro L.L. 8, 36; Gell. 13, 23, 2. 41 Mss. Lunae. The conjecture Luae, proposed by Preller, Riimische Mythologie II, 22 n.3, is absolutely convincing and has been generally accepted. The counterarguments put forward by H.J. Rose, Fire, Rust and War in Early Roman Cult, CR 36 (1922) 15 ff., followed by Dumezil 1956, 100, fail to convince. A number of modern scholars deny the negative or disquieting aspects of Lua, since, in their opinion, she was supposed to be a benevolent goddess connected with fertility or agriculture: "Eigenschaft die das Keimen der Saaten befordert" (A. v. Domaszewski, Abhandlungen zur romischen Religion [1909] 109); "frisches Grun, spriessende Saat" (Radke 1965, 186). I shall return to this problem in more detail below pp.181-184. 42 The chthonic aspects have been particularly emphasized by Albrecht 1943, 36 ff. Cf. also Le Glay 1966, 460 ff. According to Plut. QR 11, some range the god among the chthonic gods as belonging to the Nether World. Varro L.L. 5, 74, mentions him side by side with the chthonic V ediovis and in the cosmic system of Martian us Capella Saturn occupies the 14th region between the Manes and Vediovis: Guittard 1980a, 164 (who should, however, not adduce 'the human sacrifice' to Vediovis as an argument, since ritu humano in Gell. 5, 12, 12, has a different meaning). 43 Apud Macrobius, Sat. 1, 16, 16-8. Cf. Fest. 145, 28 (L). 39

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Of course, a chthonic nature does not necessarily carry negative or unpleas;mt connotations. However, Etruscan Satre, who is almost certainly related to Saturn, occupies a region in the dark and negative side of the liver of Piacenza, and so does Saturn in the related description by Martianus Capella 44 . Satre is undoubtedly a frightening and dangerous god who hurls his lightning from his abode deep in the earth 45 . It was commonly believed that the planet Saturn exercised harmful influences, as is witnessed by Cicero and literature from the Augustan period 46 and elaborated in later commentaries and astrological works 47 . It is summarized by Servius Aen. 4, 92: Saturni stellam nocendifacultatem habere(Saturn's star has the capacity to do harm). The poetical use of his name, especially as a patronymic of lupiter or Iuno, is often explained as a means to evoke a threatening or cruel atmosphere: crudelitatemaptum (inclined to cruelty, Serv. Aen. 1, 23) 48 . The deities of the tertian fever are called his daughters 49 • These traits suffice as references to a gloomy and precarious atmosphere in violent contrast to the image of peace, well-being and order that we found before. The frightful side of the god's nature would be even more evident if it could be proven that Saturn originally, or at least in an early phase, was the god of the gladiatorial munera,as many scholars have contended. As we shall return to this problem as well, it may suffice for the moment to point out that we have no single testimony from republican times that could unequivocally bear out a connection of Saturn with gladiatorial shows. 44 C. Thulin, Die Gotterdes Martianus Capella (RVV 1907) 29; Van der Meer 1987, 126-8. 45 Plin. NH 138, 52. Cf. Pfiffig 1975, 312 f., although Van der Meer 1987 doubts the value of this testimony. 46 Cic. De div. 1, 85; Prop. 4, 1, 84: et graveSaturni sidus in omnecaput; Hor. C. 2, 17, 23: impioSaturno;Ov. lb. 215 f.; Luc. 1, 652;Aetna 243;Juv. 6,569 f.; Nicarchus AP 2, 114, 3 f. He causes fever: Ptolem. tetr. 2, 83; cat. cod. astr. 7, 215, 28; Firm. Mat. Math. 3, 2, 8; 3, 2, 26; 4, 19, 8. Cf. A. Le Boeuffie, Astronomie,astralogie. Lexique latin (Paris 1987) 234. 47 Into the medieval and early modern period. See: F. Boll, C. Bezold, W. Gundel, Stemglaubeund Sterndeutung.Die Geschichteund das WesenderAstrologie(Darm· stadt 19745) index s.v. Saturn. On the 'melancholic' interpretation of Saturn: R. Klibanski, E. Panofsky and F. Saxl, Saturn and Melancholy.Studies in the History of Natural Philosophy,Religion and Art (London 1964). 48 Cf. idemadAen. 4,371: Saturnium(. ... )hocest, nocentem,and 372: ubicumque infestosvult ostenderevel Iunonem vel Iovem, Saturniosappellat. 49 Theod. Prise. Phys. 4, 3 p. 250 Rose.

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The notion of Saturn as a blood-thirsty god to whom gladiators were sacrificed as human victims, which is indeed alluded to or even explicitly mentioned in sources from the third century AD onwards, has been explained from the close vicinity of the Saturnalia and the official munera in December. However, as we shall see, Piganiol has at least succeeded in irrefutably demonstrating that the production of gladiatorial munerabelonged to the tasks of the quaestors and was paid with funds from the aerariumSaturni. And it is also evident that the bloody and cruel atmosphere apparently associated with Saturn provoked phantasies of primeval human sacrifices in the cult of Saturn. Macrob. Sat. 1, 7, 31: cumquediu humaniscapitibusDitem et virorumvictimisSaturnumplacarese crederent(during a long period people had the idea that they could placate Dis Pater with human heads and Saturn with human sacrifices). Altogether we notice a striking ambiguity in the nature and atmosphere of the myth and ritual of Saturn: just as in the case of Kronos, there are joyful and utopian aspects of careless well-being side by side with disquieting elements of threat and danger.

2. Saturnalia The 17th of December, the founding day of the temple, was also the day of Saturn's festival, the Saturnalia 50 . Its increasing popularity entailed a gradual extension of the festival, eventually over more than a week, although the additional days never acquired official status. Already in the first century BC the Atellane poets Novius and Mummius spoke of septemSaturnalia51 . The festival is mentioned in the calendar ofNuma and consequently belongs to the genuinely ancient Roman celebrations.

50 Besides the literature mentioned above n.1, see on this festival: V. d' Agostino, Sugli antichi Saturnali, RSC 17 (1969) 180-7, with a useful survey of the evidence in literary texts from Catullus to Macrobius; M. Grondova, La religionee la superstizionenellaCena Trimalchionis(Bruxelles 1980) 89-94, an analysis of the Saturnalia model in the Cena.Cf. on related literary genres: Von Premerstein 1904, esp. 342 ff. On the ritual of reversal Kenner 1970, 88-92. 51 Macrob. Sat. 1, 10, 3. The characteristic suspension of the administration of justice was similarly extended over several days: Macrob. Sat. 1, 10, 4 and 23.

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The festival opened with a public meal in front of the temple of Saturn 52 , after which the cry 'io Saturnalia' was raised 53 , the starting shot for the private merry-making. It was an occasion for all Romans, citizens and slaves, to enjoy a holiday: schools were closed 54 , physical exercises were suspended 55 as was the course of justice since courts did not convene 56 : in other words, there was a iustitium 57 . On this day it was forbidden to declare war 58 . Roman citizens put off their togas 59 and covered their-normally bareheads with the pilleus 60 , the felt cap of the freedmen. There were exuberant gorgings 61 and even more excessive drinking bouts. Sober people were conspicuous exceptions 62 . Not even the strict and frugal Cato would deny his slaves an extra ration of wine 63 . Anarchy

52 Liv. 22, 1, 19 (for the text see above n.28); Macrob. Sat. 1, 10, 18. Liv. 5, 13, 6, gives a number of Saturnalian features as characteristics of the first lectisternium of 399 BC: private meals to which even enemies were invited; the suspension of iurgiaand litia; the liberation of chained people. Since Dion. Hal. 12, 9, provides the same information, the source must be Piso, who probably has mixed up various elements known to him from various festivals and ceremonies: Latte 1960, 242, n.2; Ogilvie ad Liv. loc. cit. 53 Liv. 22, 1, 19; Macrob. Sat. 1, 10, 18; Dion. Hal. 6, 1, 4; Petron. 58, 2; Mart. 11, 2, 5; Dio Cass. 60, 19, 3. 54 Plin. Ep. 8, 7, 1; Mart. 5, 84; 12, 81. Freedom from work for both slaves and school-children is a fixed combination in Hellenistic and Roman decrees concerning festivals in general: L. Robert, BCH 108 (1984) 490 n.10. Cf. Dunand 1978, 201-18. 55 Lucian Cron. 13. 56 Macrob. Sat. 1, 10, 4 and 23. Cf. 1, 10, 1: poenasa nocenteexigerepiaculareest. 57 See on the concept ofiustitium: Versnel 1980, 6-05ff. Significantly, Varro in Macrob. Sat. 1, 16, 16, says that the o,nly other occasions when official political actions were suspended were the days marked by mundus patet. We shall come back to this relationship below p.175. 58 Macrob. Sat. 1, 10, 1. 59 Mart. 6, 24; 14, 1; Sen. Ep. 18 with the commentary ofV. d'Agostino, L. Anneo Seneca.Paginedi vitae di culturaromana(Torino 19686 ) 12-4. That the putting off of the toga and the concomitant adoption of the synthesisare indeed demonstrative, in fact ritual, acts appears from reports that the wearing of the synthesisin everyday life was strongly disapproved of (Suet. Nero 51) and even punished (Lucian Nigrin. 14). 60 Mart. 14, 1; 11, 6, 4: pilleata Roma; Sen. Ep. 18. Cf. Grondova o.c. (above n.50) 90 n.275, who compares the reaction after the death of Nero: Sueton. Nero 57, 1, tantumquegaudium publicepraebuit ut plebs pilleata Iota urbediscurreret. 61 Cato, De agr. 57; Gell. 2, 24, 3; SHA Alex. Sev. 37, 6; Mart. 14, 70, 1. Lex Fannia Satumalibus in singulosdies centenosaeris insumi concessit.In Petron. Cena Trim. 69, 9, Encolpius says at the sight of a rich dish: vidi Romae Satumalibuseiusmodi cenarum effigiem. · 62 Hor. Sat. 2, 3, 5; Mart. 14, 1, 9: madidi dies; Lucian. Cron. 13. 63 Cato, De agr. 57.

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was pushed so far as to allow gambling and dice-playing, which was prohibited in everyday life 64 . The stakes were coins and nuts 65 . The representation of the Saturnalia in the calendar of Philocalus 66 shows a man in a fur coat and with a torch, standing beside a table on which dice are displayed. The legend runs: nunc tibi cum domino ludere,verna, licet(now, slave, you have permission to play dice with your master). A bunch of poultry symbolizes the festive meal. The intellectual elite used to spend the holiday in learned improvisations and table talk, as exemplified in Macrobius' Saturnalia.Satire and derision were given free rein as lulian' s Symposiondemonstrates. In less sophisticated circles the playful mood expressed itself in the propounding and solving of riddles 67 • The temporary experience of affluence was also reflected in the exchange of presents. Frequently referred to by Martial, they often bore satirical or enigmatic inscriptions 68 • The title of Martial' s 14th book, Apophoreta,refers to the custom of taking presents home 69 . Their contents could hide facetious surprises 70 • The principle of mutuality confronted the less opulent party with serious financial problems 7 1 . Therefore it was allowed to give a substitute present instead, in the form of candles 72 or figurines made of wax or clay, the sigillaria73 . There was even a special market 74 for these specifically 64 Suet. Aug. 71; Mart. 4, 14, 7; 5, 84; 11, 6,; 14, 1; Lucian Sat. 2. On prohibition of gambling see: M. Kurylowicz, Das Gliicksspiel im ri:imischen Recht, ZSSR 102 (1985) 184-219; Baltrusch 1988, 103 f. 65 Mart. 5, 84; 7, 91, 2; 13, 1, 7; 14, 1, 12. 66 H. Stern, Le calendrierde 351:. Etude sur son texte et sur ses illustrations(Paris 1953). On this calendar see now: M. R. Salzman, On Roman Time. The CodexCalendarof 351: and the Rhythms of UrbanLife in Late Antiquity (Berkeley 1990). 67 AP 286 Riese provides a collection of these Saturnalian riddles. 68 Suet. Aug. 75: titulis obscuriset ambiguis. 69 Suet. Vesp. 19, but they were sometimes dispatched, as very often in Martial. See V. d'Agostino o.c. (above n.50) 183 f. 7 Catull. 14; Suet. Aug. 75. They could consist of bantering verses. Ovid Trist. 2, 491 f. talia (carmina)ludunturfumoso mensedecembri,quaedamnonulli composuisse fuit. 71 See Lucian Kronossolon,who is fully aware of the problem. The principle of mutuality is also present in the strenarumcommercium(Sueton. Tib. 34, 2) of the 1st of January. See: D. Baudy 1987, who provides an interesting discussion of the social meaning of this lopsided exchange of gifts. 72 Varro, L.L. 5, 64: cereisuperioribusmittuntur; Paul. ex Fest. 47, 27 (L); AP6, 249; Macrob. Sat. 1, 7, 32; 1, 11, 49. In Sat. 1, 7, 33, Macrobius even mentions a law proposed by a tribune of the plebs non nisi cereiditioribusmissitarentur.Similar substitutions of the strena:D. Baudy 1987, 2. 73 Macrob. Sat. 1, 11, 49; Sen. Ep. 12, 3. 74 Macrob. ibid..

°

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Saturnalian objects and slaves and poor clients would receive an allowance (the sigillaricium)75 from their masters or patrons to enable them to procure presents-an ideal economic circle. The most remarkable and characteristic trait of the Saturnalia was the temporary suspension of the social distinctions between master and servant. Saturnalibusto ta servislicentiapermittitur(during the Saturnalia every kind of licence is permitted to the slaves), as Macrobius Sat. 1, 7, 26, summarizes the prevailing liberty. One of the extraordinary aspects of the communal meals was that masters and slaves dined together 76 or that slaves even took precedence over 77 or were served by their masters 78. Slaves and servants were free to join their lords in gambling 79 and to tell them the truth or criticise their conduct 80 . Of course, a few details may be the products of later additions or transformations, but the Accius fragment, for instance, unequivocally proves that freedom of the slaves and equality with their lords belonged to the most ancient features of the festival. There is one other interesting but controversial piece of evidence: Seneca, Ep. Luc. 5, 6 ( 4 7) 14, seems to say that during the Saturnalia slaves held the reins of government in the household, performed official functions in imitation of public offices and administered justice 75 Macrob. Sat. 1, 10, 24; 1, 11, 49; Suet. Claud. 5; SHA Hadrian. 17, 3; Carac. 1, 8; Aurelian. 50, 3. 76 Macrob. Sat. 1, 11, 1: quod servicum dominis vescerentur, and this, as Iustin. 43, 1, 4, says: exaequatoomnium iure. Even at the imperial court: SHA Verus 7, 5. 77 Macrob. Sat 1, 24, 23, religiosaedomus prius famulos instructis tamquam ad usum domini dapibus honorantet ita demum patribusfamilias mensaeapparatusnovatur. 78 This is already reported by Accius (Ann. fr. 3M. Bae; Fr. Poet. Lat. Morel p. 34) quoted above p.103, but it cannot be ascertained whether the waiting on by the master actually refers to Roman custom. See for instance Bomer 1961 III, 174. Further: Iustin. 43, 1, 4; Athen. 14, 639B: children of Roman citizens wait upon their slaves. Auson. De fer. 15, festaque servorumcumfamulantur eri. Luc. Cron. 18; Cass. Dio 60, 19: "at the Saturnalia slaves adopt the roles of their masters". These testimonies in my view exclude the explanation advanced by D. Baudy 1986, 223 n.80, that this is not an instance ofrole reversal but of the hierarchic act of the distribution of food by the master. Although this function is, of course, fundamental, rites should be assessed in their context. In this case it is clearly the complex of status reversal, as all other indications prove. 79 Cf. the text quoted above p.148 from the calendar of Philocalus ( = AL 395, 48). 80 In Hor. Sat. 2, 7, the slave Davus tells his master the truth. This whole satire is based on the principle of the suspension and reversal of social distinctions: the master becomes slave (of his passions) whereas the slave has a free mind-a clear allusion to the libertasdecembris.

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in the family, including their masters: institueruntdiemfestum, non quo solocum servisdomini vescerentur, sedquo utique;honoresillis in domogerere, ius dicerepermiseruntet domum pusillam rem publicam esse iudicaverunt. However, there is room for disagreement on the constitution of the text and its interpretation, so it may be advisable to approach it with due reserve 81 . After this rapid survey of the evidence we now tum to the major questions regarding its meaning and its implications for the cult and rite of Saturn.

2.

SATURNIAN

THE CARNIVALESQUE

MYTH AND RITUAL:

SIGNS OF THE REVERSED

ORDER

1. The eccentricgod When we survey the evidence given above and compare Kronian myth and ritual, the prevalence of the ritual aspects is striking. Of course, in dealing with a Roman god this should not surprise us too much. As for the mythical data, it is even less feasible to isolate them from Greek models than it is in the case of presumed ritual derivation. This is particularly true for the notion of the Saturniaregna,the celebrated theme of Augustan poetry which was for the first time emphatically exploited by Vergi182 . The imagery of a Utopian reign 81 Many scholars paraphrase tile passage as follows: "Den Sclaven, die in diesen Tagen von ihren Herren bewjrtet wurden, wares erlaubt, Magistrate und Richter nach zu iiffen" (Von Premerstein); "Nachricht bei Seneca, nach der man im Hause nicht nur mit den Sklaven zusammen speiste, sondern ihnen auch die Befehlsgewalt und die Rechtsprechung iibertrug: das Haus wurde in eine Art von Miniatl!~staat verwandelt" (Weinstock); "von selbst folgte die Konsequenz, auch andere Amter nachzuaffen, ( ..... ): Lucian. Sat. 2; besonders Seneca Ep. 47, 14" (Nilsson); "jegliche Ehre wurde ihnen im Hause erwiesen, das Arnt, das sonst im Haus nur der Patee familias und im Staate nur der hohe Beamte ausiiben durfte, niimlich das der Rechtsprechung, konnte scherzhaft im privaten Kreis von ihnen demonstriert werden" (Kenner). Apparently these authors do not read a stop between utiqueand honores.When I at first tended to accept this interpretation, my colleagues 0. Schrier and R. Nauta, warned me that it was based on a mistaken text constitution. They put forward several arguments among which the most important was that non quosolomust be opposed to sed quo utiqueand cannot be identical to non solum quo. Since utiquemeans 'at any rate', 'certainly', the first part of the sentence means: "a festive day, with the purpose that they would dine together, not exclusivelyon that day but at any mte on that day." Cf. Nauta 1987, 87 n.57. Graf reminds me of Varro, R.R. 1, 17, where slaves are ranged in a hierarchical structure. Cf. also Plin. Ep. 8, 16, 2, !ervisrespub/icaquaedamet quasi civitasdomusest. 82 Loci classici:Verg. Eel. 6,41; Georg.2, 173; 2,538; Aen. 7, 49; 7,203; 8,319.

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of bliss and peace that prevailed in a hoary past and which is now bound to return, immediately recalls the idea of the golden race of Kronos. However, this should not make us close our eyes to the essential differences between Greek and Roman imagery. One distinction lies in the way this Saturnian image was represented 83 . The Greeks expressed their 'wishing' images in terms of 'the golden race' and of 'Kronian life', thus understanding the myth primarily from a theological or anthropological point of view. The Romans, on the other hand, viewed the Saturnia regnaprimarily as Saturnia saecula, i.e. as a historical period: Saturn, though a god, was also a (pseudo-)historical king. This is only one of numerous instances in which Rome tended to express myth principally in historical terms 84 . Another important distinction is closely bound up with the first one. Whereas in the case of Kronos affluence was basically seen as an automatic, spontaneous and effortless gift in a genuinely Utopian fashion, in the Roman view Saturn's greatest contribution to human well-being was his introduction of agrarian, above all cereal, culture and, consequently, of civilized life. Later on we shall pursue the development of this representation towards the overt Utopian images of Augustan literature. In the meantime it will be useful to keep in mind this typically Roman conception of the Saturnian contribution when we shall undertake to explain the Roman origins of the Saturnian complex in the next section. As we have seen, the Roman myth of Saturn combines the conThe return of the Saturnian realm: Eel. 4; Aen. l, 291 ff.; 6, 791 ff. Discussion of the development of the idea: Gatz 1967, 207; A. Alfoldi, in a series of publications under the title RedeuntSatumia regna,the last of which appeared in Chiron 9 (1979) 553-606, where on p.553 a survey of the earlier articles. See especially his Der neue W eltherrscher der vierten Ekloge Vergils, Hermes 65 ( 1930) 369-84 = G. Binder (ed.), SaeculumAugustum II (Darmstadt 1988) 197-215. Cf. the discussion below pp.191-205. 83 This was observed by Gatz 1967, 204 ff.: "In Rom konnte der Mythos nur nach politischer und, in antikem Sinn, historischer Aufladung tragfii.hig werden, d.h. er musste 'saecula-risiert' werden." Cf. the discussion by H. C. Baldry, Who invented the Golden Age?, CQ NS 2 (1952) 83-92. 84 "Alles das, was man iiber das Leben im Mythos der archaischen Kulturphasen sagen kann, mit der vollen Prasenz und Giiltigkeit des vorzeitlichen Geschehens, gilt fur das romische Verhaltnis zur Geschichte, es ist ein Leben in der Geschichte. Die archetypischen Situationen des Mythos, an denen der Grieche sich, sein Verhalten, orientieren konnte, sind fur den Romer Situationen der eigenen Geschichte, die moresmaiorum iibernehmen die Rolle mythischer exempla": B. Gladigow, Macht und Religion, in: Spielarteder Macht. HumanistischeBildung 1 (1977) 16-a very felicitous phrasing of a well-known fact.

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trasting themes of the despised fugitive foreigner 85 and the idea of the primeval good king, bringer of culture to Italy. In addition it should be noted that just as in the case of Kronos, the Saturnian reign was limited in time. Not only did Saturn suddenly arrive, he also unexpectedly disappeared: subito non comparuisset(Macrob. Sat. 1, 7, 24). In this respect he closely resembles other founding heroes of Rome such as Aeneas, Latinus, Romulus 86 , a tertium comparationis which has been attractively explained by Brelich 87 as one of the standard characteristics of the universal culture bringer, who after having prepared the conditions for human social life, retires and becomes a deus otiosusor continues his reign in a mythical abode. The Roman myth expresses this by telling that Iupiter expelled Saturn from the Capitolinus. Saturn was so solidly associated with the notion of concealment that the name of his own country Latium could be derived a latentedeo (the hidden god) 88 • Apparently it is not only in a historical, but also in a mythical sense that Saturn was a "divinite dechue". The cultic shadiness of Greek Kronos is parallelled in Rome by the fact that Saturn had only one annual sacrifice, which, moreover, did not display a single normal feature. Undoubtedly, however, Saturn had in many respects more 'reality' than his Greek pendant: his mighty temple in Rome, the vital economic function of his aerarium. Saturn, who had once introduced cereal wealth, continued to represent its affluence and accordingly boasted the lasting respect of the Roman people. Just as in the case of Kronos, the disturbing ambiguities in the god's cultic and mythical existence have provoked the usual escapist mechanisms among modern scholars. On the one hand, for instance, the negative and disquieting aspects were largely ignored or denied, a denial which admittedly owes some justification to

85 According to Gatz 1967, 125, the motifs of flight and exile are not attested before the Augustan period in Roman literature. This may be true but it should be recalled that the story of Saturn's banishment by Juppiter already occurred in Ennius' adaptation of Euhemeros' SacredHistory(apudLact. D.I. 1, 14, 1 = E. H. Warmington, Remainsof OldLatin I, 418 ff.). Did every reader (want to) realize that this Saturn actually was not Saturn but Kronos? It was particularly Ovid's Fasti 5, 191 ff.; 235 ff. that exercised such an influence that it was a matter of course for Iuven. Sat. 13, 39, to speak of a Saturnusfugiens.See on this development: Johnston 1977. 86 This was observed by Preller, RomischeMythologieIII, 95 f. 87 Brelich 1976, 94 f. 88 Verg. Aen. 8, 322 f.; Ovid Fast. 1, 238; Herodian 1, 16; Min. Felix, Oct. 21, 6.

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the less unequivocal evidence. On the other hand, it was also contended that the nice ancient Roman agrarian god derived his more doubtful qualities from abroad: just as Kronos had been denatured by the Hittite Kumarbi, so Etruscan Satre had infected the gentle chthonic agrarian god with the cruel excesses of his Etruscan nature: human sacrifice, gladiatorial blood and the negative connotations of his lightning. Instead of circumstantially contesting such suppositions, one pertinent question suffices: why Saturn? Roman religion simply bristles with chthonic deities more (or at least equally) appropriate to having negative qualities grafted upon them. For instance, Vediovis, Dispater, or Angerona would have been excellent candidates. At all events the alleged derivation of negative elements is most unlikely if the god in question did not possess the proper predisposition. In other words: it is methodically preferable to explore whether the ambiguous nature of the god cannot be explained by his authentic nature and function. In my opinion this can be done for Saturn as we have done it for Kronos. However, there is one fortunate difference, namely that in this case we shall be able to trace the god's most prominent original functions in the agricultural year, a function which, as I hope to show, can explain both his own intrinsic ambivalence and the specific ambivalent nature of his festival, to which we shall now turn.

2. The cult On the 17th of December things happened which did not occur in this combination in any other Roman festival. Saturnus really is different. A chained god was freed from his bonds, a covered god was worshipped capiteaperto.The chains may be authentically Roman, the veiled head is almost certainly a Greek heritage. The following observations are intended to contribute to the solution of the problems implied in these two data. We have already made some comments on the meaning of the mythical fettering of Kronos. Let us now add a few words on the meaning of ritual chains of divine statues in general. Fettered statues are a common phenomenon, both in and outside the Mediterranean world 89 . Two explanations

89 See the literature above p.105 n.45 and p.114 n.85. And add: Graf 1985b, 81 ff. On the specific ritual with the lugos:D. Baudy 1989, with further literature.

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are usually advanced. One is that by binding the god people try to keep their divine protector and benefactor for themselves. The god is thus prevented from leaving his sanctuary and city 90 . The other supposed motive is exactly the reverse: viz. to prevent a dangerous god or demon from exercising his harmful influences 91 . Although these explanations undoubtedly hold good for some instances, they obviously do not cover the total range of the phenomena. As we have seen, Meuli distinguished a third category next to benevolent and malevolent gods, namely the gods of an ambivalent type 92. They are freed in-and as the symbolization of-periods of exception. Kronos' chains-or sleep-were the symbolic expression of his being 'out of action'. His liberation temporarily revived his activity and restored his reign. This means that his chains are more or less a function of his liberation: in order to be freed he must first have been in chains. Or, to quote a variant expression from an agricultural context: nemo condit nisi ut promat (nobody stores [the products of the farm] except to bring them forth later, Varro, R.R. 1, 62). Another example is the way modern scholarship views ( some of) the gods that were formerly called 'dying and rising gods'. As we have seen, according to recent theories Adonis was not 'reborn'. At least, this is no longer regarded as the essential element of the ritual. The fact that he had to return to some form of existence was merely necessary for creating a new opportunity to die again 93 . In other words: the abnormal rite of exception-in this case the liberation of Saturn-can only exist thanks to the existence of the norm to which the rite is an exception. Once we have learned to interpret Saturnus' liberation as a signal of the period of exception-an interpretation which will receive decisive support from our assessment of the nature of the Saturnalia in the next section-, a solution presents itself for a problem which has 90 So already in antiquity: Polemon fr. 90 FHG 3, 146; Ar. fr. 194; Plato, Men. 970; Diod. 17, 41, 8; Curt. Ruf. 4, 13, 22; Plut. Alex. 24, 6f. 678C. Cf. Graf 1985b, 81. 91 Also noted in antiquity: Pausan. 9, 38, 5, on the malicious hero Actaion. Cf. L. Robert, Documentsd'Asie Mineuremiridionale(Paris 1966) 91-9, on oracles with instructions to bind the obnoxious god Ares. See now: Chr. A. Faraone, Talismans and TrojanHorses:GuardianStatuesin Ancient GreekMyth and Ritual (New York-Oxford 1992) 74-93. 92 Cf. also Graf 1985b, 81 ff. Piccaluga 1977, 48 f. argues that the liberation of Saturn temporarily re-establishes the mythical reign of Saturn in historical reality. 93 See: C. Grottanelli, Da Myrrha alla Mirra: Adonis e ii profumo dei re siriani (p. 36), and U. Bianchi, Adonis: Attualita di una interpretazione religionsgeschichtlich (p.73-81), both in: Adonis 1984, and above p.44 for the recent discussion.

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so far resisted interpretation: the question of the capite aperto sacrifice. Above we noticed the problem: why did Romans follow a so-called Greek rite in a sacrifice to a non-Greek god? Curiously enough, the problem was already seen in antiquity, since it was only in this case (contrary to the case of the same rites in the cults of Honos and Hercules) that ancient authors searched for an explanation. As we saw, the most adventurous modern suggestion was that, since Saturn was not Greek, the rite, though capiteaperto,did not refer to ritus Graecus.Even Brelich, the only one to my knowledge who has neatly formulated the crux, did not risk going further than the ''meagre but perhaps not totally void'' suggestion, as he calls it, that perhaps in the cult of Saturn the order of cultic action itself was reversed, just as other elements were 94 . I believe that with this casual and tentative suggestion he has hit the mark and that it can be considerably substantiated by the total context of the Saturnalia festival as well as by a piece of evidence that has been neglected so far. Among the many ways of visualising a reversal, none is so obvious, unequivocal and popular as the reversal in attire. The most easy and effective way to turn reality upside down is to change your clothes for the garment of the opposite sex or of social antipodes, or for distinguishing marks of animals or gods. Circumstantial information has been presented on these forms of disguise and their function in the first chapter of this book 95 . By thus inverting normality the new situation is marked as exceptional and abnormal. It is noteworthy that among the signs that mark Greek sacrifices as exceptional or extraordinary-such as the absence of wine or the presence of milk-one is that the sacrificers do not wear the wreaths that are normally one of the most characteristic signs of sacrificial ceremonies 96 . This provides a perfect parallel for the reversal of the

94 Brelich 1976, 86 f.: "ci dobbiamo accontentare della magra, ma forse non de! tuto vuota constatazione, che nel culto di Saturn us si rovescia anche I' ordine de! rito sacrificiale ... ". He is followed by Briquel 1981, 148: "un processus d'inversion". 95 On clothes as an important index of social position in antiquity and the implications of reversal, recently: Bremmer 1987b, 78 f., who rightly points out that we nowhere read of masters assuming their slaves' clothes on the Saturnalia. So here the aspect of 'harmony', as discussed in the preceding chapter, prevails in the commonwearing of the pilleus. In other Saturnalian customs, however, we notice aspects of 'conflict'. As usual, both opposites go together in these feasts of fools. 96 On signals of abnormality in the sacrificial atmosphere: Graf 1980; on the absence of wreaths: Graf 1985b, 27 f.

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Saturnian sacrifice. During the festival everything is out of order, above all clothing regulations. Moreover, Saturn himself is the marker of abnormality par excellence.His veiled head-irrespective whether this is an originally Roman element or a Greek heritagestamps him as 'different' and exceptional. Another way of expressing a reversal of ordinary life is by imitating odd customs of foreign nations. Romans could and did give expression to abnormality by allusions to 'the Greek way of life'. In the (Roman) fabula togatait was not allowed to stage slaves that outwitted their masters, whereas this was accepted in the fabula palliata97 , the pallium conveniently evoking a Greek atmosphere. In Greece, as any decent Roman knew, odd things happened that were quite incompatible with Roman customs. Graeculijust had a habit of mixing up the normal order. Viewed in this light, it is very well possible and in my view becomes very likely that sacrificing ritu Graeco was just another reference to the eccentric nature of the total ritual. This supposition is supported by a tiny piece of evidence on Saturn himself which has remained unnoticed so far. Apart from the covering of his head there is another trait that sets him apart. The ivory 98 statue in his temple was clothed with a purple-coloured cloak, as Tertullian, Testim. anim. 2, 137, 12, testifies. His exact words are: pallio Saturni coccinato. It is true that in the course of time pallium has become the term for any kind of garment 99 . In this case, however, a positively unRoman pallium is meant-the extrinsecushabitus sharply censured by the same Tertullian, De pallio 4, 9: Galaticiruborissuperiectio(a wrap of Galatian red). Now, the pallium never quite lost the negative connotations of its Greek or, more generally, foreign flavour. It characterized (Greek) philosophers, especially the Cynics and other dubious specimens, and prostitutes; in short, those marginals who refused to subject themselves to the norms and codes of civilized society 100 . A fortiori a purple pallium was the very opposite of what could be regarded as normal Roman custom. 97 Donat. in Ter. Eun. 57: concessumest in palliata poetis comicisservosdominis sapientioresfingere, quodidemin togatanonJerelicet. Cf. Plaut. Menaechm.Pro!. 7-9: atque hoepoetaefaciunt in comoediis:omnisresgestasesseAthenisautumnant,quoillud vobisgraecum videaturmagis. On this alienating effect and the Saturnalian elements in Roman comedy: Segal 1970. 98 If that is what Plin. NH 15, 32, means. 99 G. Leroux in: Diet. Ant. IV, 285-93. too Whereas the stolafor instance developed into a genuine status-marker. In the third century AD a matronastolataor femina stolataindicated a woman belonging to the provincial, mostly equestrian, aristocracy: B. Holtheide, ZPE 38 (1980) 127-34.

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So here we have another feature which, together with the elements collected above, stamps Saturn as the god of the reversed world. His function-at least in historical times-was to embody references to an alternative world which, in periods of exception, interrupted the steady course of normal life. The god of this period was worshipped with reversed ('Greek') rituals. The god was different and so was the behaviour of his followers during these liminal periods 101 . We shall now reconsider their actions from the perspective of 'Saturnalian' ideology.

3. Licence The god was not the only one to wear uncommon clothes or to break his chains. The Saturnalian revellers had little to learn from him, as we saw. The evidence collected above of course immediately calls to mind comparable modern festivals like Carnival, Christmas or Santa Claus. The carnivalesque nature manifests itself in egalitarian aspects such as the communal consumption of large quantities of food and drink, the suspension of social distinctions and in general an atmosphere of elation. On the other hand, there are also elements of 'conflictive' demonstrations: a variety of role-reversals in which the master serves the slave and may be criticized and rebuked. The similarities with Christmas or New Year festivals are evident in the exchange of presents and the concomitant atmosphere of mockery, satire and surprise. Similarly, the candles form a trait d'union. The most conspicuous signs of the Saturnalian anomiewere embodied in the reversal of normal clothing customs. A Roman who puts off his 101 The above interpretation of various aspects of myth and ritual as having reference to the 'exceptional' nature of Saturn seems to be strongly supported by remarkable parallels in the myth and ritual of Greek Ares, especially a regulation at Tegea, as they are convincingly explained by Graf 1984, esp. 252. First of all, legend makes him come from Thrace, which historically is not true. The legend, rather, points out his essential foreignness, as do the derivations ofDionysos from Lydia or Thrace. Homer tells us that the giants Otos and Ephialtes locked him up in a barrel, from where Hermes freed him again in the thirteenth month. More than one scholar recognized a period oflicence behind this Homeric myth. M. Riemschneider gives a comparative study: AAntHung 8 (1960) 4-34; cf. Burkert 1985, 169. 'the feaster of womAt Tegea there existed a stele representing Ares Gunaikothoinas, en' or 'the one whom the women feast'. Again Graf convincingly interprets this epiclesis (together with the aetiological explanations) as a signal of licence: the honouring the very male god women feast at the agora(men's place par excellence), whom they are usually to shun. All this closely resembles the elements ofSaturnian myth and ritual as analysed and explained above.

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togaand adopts a synthesisdoes not become a Greek, but he certainly renounces the identity of the Roman citizen. If the total population of Rome wears the pilleus, a complicated situation emerges: by becoming 'freedmen' the slaves' status is enhanced, while the citizens' status is devalued. Increase and decrease lead to equality in a common freedom: the libertasdecembris. The variegated symbolism ofliberation was by no means restricted to the Saturnalia. Its application in different contexts may help to clarify the implications of their Saturnalian meaning. The pilleus was frequently applied as the symbol of freedom in political propaganda 102 . For instance, the coins issued by Brutus bore a picture of this cap of freedom, and as we saw above "the death of Nero produced such joy that the plebs ran about through the whole city, their heads covered with the pilleus''. Nor was role-reversal or status-reversal restricted to the Saturnalia. The Compitalia, too, were marked as a holiday for slaves. The Matronalia of the 1st of March were a New Year festival during which the matrons '' served dinner for their slaves as did the masters at the Saturnalia" 103 . It was perhaps on that same New Year day that another role-reversal took place: the so-called Saliae virgines performed a sacrifice in the Regia together with the pontifices and wore the paludamentum and the apex of the Salii 104 . 102 On the pilkus see: R. Kreis-von Schaewen, RE 20, 1329; Meuli 1975 I, 268 ff.; D. Briquel, Tarente, Locres, les Scythes, Thera, Rome: precedents antiques au theme de l'amant de Lady Chatterley?, MEFRA 86 (1974) 673-705, esp. 678-82, discusses various forms of impositiopillei as a symbol of liberation. I0 3 Macrob. Sat. 1, 12, 7, serviscenasadponebantmatronae,ut domini Saturnalibus. Particularly interesting is the report by Asconius p. 7 (Clark) that during the Compitalia the magistrivicorum,who were freedmen, were allowed to wear the togapraetexta: sokbantautemmagistricollegiorumludosfacert, sicutmagistrivicorumfaciebantcompitaliciospraetextati. 104 Fest. 439 (L) Salias VirginesCinciusait esseconducticias,quaead Saliosadhibebantur, cum apicibuspaludatas;quasAelius Stilo scribsitsacrificiumfacerein regiacum pontijicibuspaludatascum apicibusin modumSaliorum. The traditional explanation proposed by L. Deubner, Zur romischen Religionsgeschichte, RM 36-7 (1921-2) 14 ff., that the virginesplayed the role of the absent warriors for reasons of propitiation, is not very satisfactory. When I suggested that this may have been connected with the reversal in initiation ritual (in: VisibleReligion 4/5 (1985/6] 134-72-revised as eh. V in this book-158 n.112), I was not aware that Torelli 1984, 76 ff. and 106 ff. had made the same suggestion: "rito di travestimento 'carnevale' parallelo (anche questo il 1 Marzo?) ai Matronalia.'' See for a remarkable Greek parallel in the ambiance of Greek Ares and other instances of women adopting 'warrior roles': Graf 1984. For other Roman festivals with elements of role-reversal-the Nonae Capratinaeand the festival of Bona Dea-see: Bremmer 1987b, 76-88, and below chapter IV.

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In the previous chapter we discussed the social and sociopsychological functions of these festivals ofreversal: the channelling of agressive impulses fostered by continuous repression, on the one hand, and confirmation of the status quo by the exposure of the impossible reversed world, on the other. It is satisfying to note that this appears to be more than a mere invention of modern anthropologists 105: Latin authors explicitly discerned these functions. Columella R.R. 1, 8, 15-19, makes the general statement that a humane treatment will yield willing slaves: "When I realised that such friendliness on the master's part relieved the burden of their continual labour, I often joked with them and allowed them to joke more freely". Solinus 1, 35, and Macrobius, Sat. 1, 12, 7, assert that slaves were given cenaeon March 1 and at the Saturnalia by their owners in order to foster obsequiumfor the immediate future. Dion. Hal. 4, 14, 4 (cf. Cic. De leg. 2, 19, 29) says that at the Compitalia the slaves are freed of their chains: ''in order that the slaves, being softened by this instance of humanity, which has something great and solemn about it, may make themselves more agreeable to their masters, and be less sensible of the severity of their condition.'' Another essentially 'Saturnalian' relaxation was constituted by Roman comedy. The fabula palliata provides an image of the 105 K. R. Bradley, Holidays for Slaves, SO 54 (1979) 111-8 = idem, Slaves and Masters in the Roman Empire. A Study in Social Control(Bruxelles 1984) 40-44. To the literature cited above p.116 n.88 add: K. H. Stampp, The PeculiarInstitution (New York 1956) 170; 168; 365: letting out pent-up discontent; R. W. Fogel and S. L. Engerman, Time upon the Cross(Boston 1974) I, 148; 240 ff.: "contribution to the paternalistic nature of Southern slave society and engendering a 'sense of community' both among Negro slaves themselves and with their white masters." The Saturnalia display another basic socializing rite in the gift-giving, which inculcates both hierarchy and social 'belonging': G. J. Baudy 1983, esp. 142: the beneficiary remains in the debt of, that is dependent on, the benefactor. Cf. also B. Gladigow, Die Teilung des Opfers. Zur Interpretation von Opfern in vor- und friihgeschichtlichen Epochen, in: K. Hauck (ed.), Fruhmittelalterliche Studien (Berlin 1984) 19-43, esp. 22 f.; D. Baudy 1987, 7 ff. and 25: "So wiejedes Festmahl, auch das am Neujahrstag, zwar soziale Bindungen, zugleich mit ihnen aber auch eine Hierarchie der Teilnehmer schafft, ist das strenarumcommerciumdurchaus ein Ritual zur Bewii.1tigung sozialer Differenzen und Antagonismen, hebt sie aber nicht auf'. Again this is a general principle: the birthday festivities of the aristocracy in 18th century England "promoted social harmony while reinforcing influence within a deeply hierarchical society'': J. H. D' Arms, Control, Companionship and Clientela: Some Social Functions of the Roman Communal Meal, EMC 28 (1984) 327-48, esp. 343, who applies this to the public feasts given by emperors where the emperor's accessibility as a God among human beings was staged. Cf. also J. Scheid, La spartizione a Roma, StudStor 4 (1984) 945-56.

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reversed world, where respectable Roman senators are worsted and become puppets in the hands of their cunning slaves. Falli per servom senem(A slave cheating his aged master) is the shortest summary of Roman comedy. Here we have indeed a typical topsy-turvy world, which sometimes presents itself in drastically realistic performances. In Plautus, Asinaria 702, we see the young master on hands and knees serving as a mount for his slave, who exultantly shouts: sic isti solentsuperbisubdomari:"see, how the haughty are subdued." The servuscallidus (the cunning slave) exults over his master and defies the social order, exactly as it happened during the Saturnalia. This resemblance has been often indicated, most emphatically by E. Segal 106 and so have the strong similarities with medieval carnival 106 Segal 1970, who regrets having to admit that there are no ritual connections between comedy and Saturnalia. However, it could be relevant that the name of one of the first-known Oscan farces is Satoumos, written by Blaesus of Capreae in the third century BC: M. Gigante, Rintone e il teatroin Magna Graecia(Naples 1971) 82, though we should not make too much of this. Of course, the most celebrated name in this connection is Bakhtin, whose views of the carnivalesque aspects of ancient comedy have been analyzed and partially criticized by Rosier 1986. Cf. also E. Lefevre, Saturnalien und Palliata, Poetica20 (1988) 32-46, and above p.122. For further critical views on Bakhtin see: Auffarth 1991, 27 n.9. Comedy, like satire, serves one of the functions ofliterature in general, viz. the "displacement of social problems into an imaginary realm" (H. White, Literature and Social Action: Reflections on the Reflective Theory of Literary Art, New LiteraryHistory 11 [ 1980] 166). Even more than other literature, comedy tends "to reaffirm the validity of the strategies and conventions that they, the readers, have for making meaning of the world" Q. A. Radway, Phenomenology, Linguistics and Popular Literature, Journal of PopularCulture12 [ 1978] 96). But comedy, being a Saturnalian genre, utilizes specific tools: the inversion ofreality. It also, in the end, takes the public back to 'normal' reality, for instance by the stereotyped marriage-scenes: "Marriage as a resolution pleases audiences because it displays the protagonists reintegrated into their society; it is a social judgment reaffirming the worth of human society, both its present and its anticipated future" Q. Perkins, Arethusa 18 [1985] 213, on the ancient novel). However true this is, I, for one, would not over-emphasize this final reconciliation at the cost of the basic topsy-turvy nature that characterizes the major part of the plays, as M. Fuhrmann risks to do: Lizenzen und Tabus des Lachens. Zur sozialen Grammatik der hellenistischen-romischen Komodie, Poetik und Hermeneutik7 (1976) 65-102. Nor do other 'escapes' seem very convincing: for instance the view that masters sometimes got what they deserved CT.Dingel, Herren und Sklaven bei Plautus, Gymnasium88 [1981] 4-89-504). Or the common explanation that the Greek nature of comedy and its characters maintained sufficient distance to render the palliata acceptable to the Roman public. This idea was coined by F. Leo, GeschichtederriimischenLiteraturI (Berlin 1913) and has been adopted by many since. See for instance: P. P. Spranger, Historische Untersuchungen zu den Sklavenfiguren des Plautus und Terenz, Abh.Mainz (1960) 110-3. In my view the essential nature of Roman comedy is determined by a mixture of alien and familiar traits ending up in a 'never-never-land' (the term is used by W. G. Arnott,

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and the feast of fools 107 • Finally, a peculiar Saturnalian genre is represented by the so-called 'Kneipgesetze': mock laws with instructions concerning the stomaching of impossible amounts of food or drink. One of these legesconvivales,a lex Tappula, was mentioned by Festus 108 and a bronze tablet with its very mutilated text turned up a hundred years ago. Published by Mommsen, its interpretation was considerably improved by Von Premerstein 109 , who convincingly argued for a date in the second century BC. Although the content of the law is lost, the praescriptio,which parodies official legislation, has been preserved. The names of the rogatoresare mentioned: Multivorus, Properocibus, Mero, which obviously refer to gluttony and drinking. The name Tappa Tapponis f. itself, though an existent name, is generally connected either with the notion of 'clown' (von Premerstein) or with 'gluttony' (Mommsen). Recently, Konrad suggested an etymological relationship with German 'Depp' (fool, idiot), which still has parallels in modern North Italian. However this may be, these rogatoresallegedly form the college of the cissiberes,minor police officials who supervised the private conviviaor perhaps rather the epula publica110, which became increasingly freMenander,Plautus, Terence[London 1975] 46). Like Utopia, comedy is a mundusalter et idem as Mercurius Britannicus ( = Joseph Hall) called his book on imaginary expeditions to the Antipodes (ed. W. Knight, Frankfurt a. M. circa 1605). For the aspects of 'metatheatre' in Plautus see: N. W. Slater, Plautus in Performance.The Theatreof the Mind (Princeton 1985). l07 Most emphatically by P. Toschi, Origini del teatroItaliano (Turin 1955). P. Burke, PopularCulturein Early ModernEurope(London 1978), describes the medieval carnival as a gigantic theatrical performance all over the town with a great variety of scenes in which the weak gain the victory over the strong, the young chastise the old, the servants outwit the masters. Moreover, he discerns three central themes: "food, sex, violence". This is Roman comedy .... and Saturnalia. This does not necessarily imply that carnival also originatedin the Roman Saturnalia (or the comic theatre): R. Tamassia, Saturno e ii carnevale, AFL Siena 5 (1984) 363-76 (non vidi); G. Brugnoli, II carnevale e ii Saturnalia, in: P. Clemente (ed.), I jrutti del Ramo d'Oro. James G. Frazer e le ereditadell'antropologia= La RicercaFolklorica10 (1984) 49-54, an article which was communicated to me through the kind offices of C. Grottanelli; Auffarth 1991, 24 f. However, it is likely that elements of Roman ritual landed in the carnival as for instance the LexTappula, with its comic stress on the number eleven, illustrates. l08 Festus 496 (L), Tappulam legernconvivalernfictonomineconscripsitiocosocarmine ValeriusValentinus,cuius meminit Lucilius hoe modo(1370 Marx): "Tappulam ridentlegern, conteruntOpimi". (canter,conterere,committere,confercodd. CongerraeScaliger). 109 Th. Mommsen, Bull. dell' 1st. di Corresp.archeol.(1882) 186-9; A. von Premerstein, Lex Tappula, Hermes 39 (1904) 327-47. ILS 8761. A recent discussion: Chr. F. Konrad, Quaestiones Tappulae, ZPE 48 (1982) 219-34. 110 This suggestion was made by G. Wissowa, Hermes 49 (1914) 628 f.

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quent in late republican times. One of the most interesting features is its dating: a.d. XI K Und[ecembr(es)j:'the eleventh day before the Kalends of the [non-existent] eleventh month', which is clearly a joke and strongly reminiscent of the number eleven as the fool's number in modern carnival tradition. What is more, whatever the precise calculation 111 , it will always fall in the Saturnalian period. Nor does this exhaust the allusions to the Saturnalia: the first vote lies with the tribus Satureia. This can be understood as a word play on both satur and Saturnalia, but at the same time as a political pun on the tribunus plebis Saturninus who had issued a series of coins showing the head of Saturn in the decade before 100 BC and who was continuously involved in tribunician legislation concerning free corn supply 112 . So Konrad and others venture the suggestion that this 'Saturnalian' mock law contains a political joke at the expense of the demagogue of the year 100 BC . 113 The latter suggestion, if correct, is highly illuminating of the ambivalent atmosphere surrounding these types of Saturnalian expression. Theatrical status-reversal often functions as the conductor of social or political tensions 114 . And just as frequently happened during Carnival in early modern history 115 , people might be suddenly tempted to change illusion into reality. After all, the imagery is See Konrad o.c. (above n.109) for various calculations. This might be the background of the enigmatic pane repeti[toin the text, as Konrad suggests. 113 This would receive strong support if Scaliger's conjecture in the Festus text (above n.108) should be correct: Tappulam legemridentcongerraeOpimi. Opimius was consul in 121 BC and a fierce opponent of the popular measures: he was responsable for the slaying of C. Gracchus in that year. 114 Comedy provided an ideal platform for criticizing actual political issues. At Asculum, at the outbreak of the Social War in 91 BC, part of the audience objected to a komoidoswho was not playing his part properly-apparently by giving inappropriate emphasis to lines with an implicit political meaning, and they lynched him: Diod. 37, 12; cf. Appian. BC 1, 38; Obsequ. 54; Florus 2, 6, 9. Similar references to political actuality in Rome: Cic. pro Sest. 106, and of course the famous instance of the Metelli censured by Naevius. See: E. Frezouls, La construction du theatrumlapideumet son contexte politique, in: Theatreet spectaclesdansl'antiquiti. Actes du Colloquede Strasbourg(Strasbourg 1983) 193; E. Rawson, Theatrical Life in Republican Rome and Italy, PBSR 53 (1985) 97-113, esp. 98 f.; N. Zorzetti, La protestae il teatrolatinoarcaico(Forme, materiali e ideologie fluid water. 181 G. Dumezil, La courtisaneet Lesseigneurscoloris(Paris 1983) 172, does explain Lua as ''la Dissolution'', but tries to interpret her function in the context of the "crise hivernale" with the associated dissolution of the social hierarchy. Independently, J. Scheid, Romulus et sesfreres: le collegedesfreres arvales, modeledu cultepublic dans la Rome des empereurs(Paris-Rome 1990) 219, comes very close to my position when, in an aside and without reference to Lua, he suggests that Saturn's main function is that of "dissolveur" connected with the opening of the earth and the production of the corn reserves. Both in Paris and in Leiden, colleagues reacting to my paper on this subject, pointed out that the parallelism with the threatening intermezzo of Vulcanus in August would be even closer if Lua could be seen as a negative quality of the ambivalent Saturn (thus unconsciously reviving the ideas first phrased by Wissowa [see above n.175]). This suggestion might also restore the identification with Lua Mater, since the enemy weapons were also said to be sacred to Vukanus. Though I would not principally rule out the possibility of Lua Saturni being a negative quality of Saturn ( as the originator of overheating or decay of the corn?), I still prefer the ideas as presented in the text. The day of the opening of

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ambivalent nature in terms of the peculiar mixture of expectation and anxiety of his festival, she is not to be identified with the Lua mater who presided over the destruction of the enemy weapons and who represented a different aspect of luo.

6. The originof the Saturnalianimagery:the relationshipof myth and ritual As I remarked before, I do not claim to have detected theoriginal nature of Saturn. I fear that our evidence is too lacunary ever to arrive at definitive and all-embracing conclusions. However, our new interpretation certainly does nothing to contradict the general surmise that the god was somehow connected with the stored corn and its chthonic ambiance. This function associates him with Consus 182, but we are now able to distinguish the differences between their functions as well. Whereas Consus protects the hidden corn supplies, Saturn-assisted by, or in his quality of, Lua Saturnicontrols the critical moment of the opening and release of the supplies. My suggestions thus focus on the specific function during his unique festival of December 17th. It now remains to investigate whether this interpretation can indeed elucidate other remarkable traits of his cult and ritual. If so, this would lend additional support to our theory. Let us begin with the iconographical peculiarities. The god's structural condition of being in chains, as opposed to his exceptional liberation on the day(s) of the Saturnalia-probably an authentically Roman representation-is perfectly understandable as an image of the 'liberation' of the 'imprisoned' corn. This may have fostered the adoption of the Greek Kronos iconography: the iconographic feature of the veiled head suits the 'hidden' god of the corn supply, just as the mythical sickle suits his connections with the reapedcorn (and not with sowing). As the festival of the opening of the barns, the Saturnalia bears the nature of an interstitial festival, an anomic stagnation of the nor-

the stores is in itselfsufficiently precarious and threatening to explain the parallelism with the Volcanalia in August. And there is not one parhedrosin the list of Gellius which in itself carries a negative notion. Only in combination with a negative god (such as Vulcanus) the qualification may attract a negative connotation as well. 182 V. Basanoff, Regifugium(Paris 1943) 61-9, explains Saturn as the god who has control of the aerariumin the cellars of his temple, and who functions as ''le 'conditor' de la moisson commerciale".

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mal course of the year. The elements ofiustitium, role-reversal, orgy, licence and, more particularly, the freedom to gamble-an implicit allusion to the open options during the anomic situation-are markers of the ambiguous atmosphere of these festivals of crisis. It is these aspects, in addition to the calendrical position close to the end of the year, which have.led some scholars to isolate the Saturnalia from the agrarian festive complex of December and to view it as a festival that marked the end of the (solar) year 183 • One of their arguments is the use of candles at the Saturnalia. Given its phenomenology there is no objection whatsoever to calling the Saturnalia a New Year festival 184 , provided it is not deprived of its originally cereal nature. Though an amalgamation with the solar incision of the winter solstitium was a matter of course 185 , I hope to have demonstrated that it is a mistake to regard the Saturnalia itself as a solar New Year festival. As to the candles, they may have been derived from a ritual accompanying a neigbouring caesura in the solar year. However, it would be rash to deny them an authentic place in the original Saturnalian rites out of hand. The opening of the subterranean barns and the production of affluence from their dark abode may have elicited associated rituals such as making light by

183 See the literature mentioned above p.167. Bomer 1961 III, 428 ff., in particular, has attempted to deny the Saturnalia their agrarian functions. Cf. L. Deubner, Kleine Schriften(Konigstein 1982) 119 f.: "Die Saturnalien sind ein Neujahrsfest, weil man das neue Jahr auch mit der Wintersonnenwende anfangen !assen konnte''. More recently, Graf 1985b, 91, adopted a similar position: ''Dass es dabei urspriinglich um ein Neujahrsritual handle, wurde schon lange vermutet und diese Deutung verdient gegeniiber der gelaufigen eines Festes von Ackerbauern am Ende der Aussaat den Vorzug''. However, agrarian festivals, and especially festivals of the primitiae (compare above all the Greek Anthesteria and the discussion above p.170), can and often do develop features of a New Year festival. Moreover, in the New Year theory the indisputable cohesion with the other two festivals of the corn complex (Consualia and Opalia) is ignored. The originof the Saturnaliaas a festival of Saturn at least requires an attempt to explain its originalfunction from the calendrical context. And, last but not least, it is very hard to imagine a Roman god having originated as the personification of such an abstract idea as New Year. These objections by no means affect the value ofGrafs analysis of the Saturnalian features of the festival, nor do they question the fact that in later times the Saturnalia unmistakably developed into a genuine New Year festival. See the following foot-notes. 184 Pouthier 1981, 125, somewhat poetically calls the Saturnalia "un sacre de transgression, qui permet de depasser le 'tunnel saturnal' ". 185 Solstitialis dies qui Satumaliorumfesta consecutusest, Macrob. Sat. 1, 2. The Saturnalia were, in later times, amalgamated with the Brumalia and the ceremonies of the 1st of January. See: Meslin 1970, passim.

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the kindling of candles. At first sight this may perhaps seem a rather adventurous construction, but this is precisely the way that free association works 186 . Recognition of this function might even help to explain an enigmatic expression handed down by Festus 106 (L) in the context of the Saturnalian sacrifice: Lucemfacere dicuntur Saturno sacrificantes,id est capita detegere('making light' is said of those who are sacrificing to Saturn: it means that they uncover their heads). The problem is that the well-known custom of sacrificing capiteapertoto Saturn cannot possibly explain nor have given rise to the curious expression lucemfacere. Festus' explanation that lucemfacere originally meant 'to uncover the head' looks very much like a secondary autoschediasma. What then can its original meaning in the context of the cult of Saturn have been? The expression calls to mind technical terms such as sublucareand conlucare,which, as Festus 474 (L) says, mean: ramos earum(i.e. arborum)supputareet velutisuptus lucemmittere.Conlucareautem succisisarboribuslocum inplereluce187 . At the very least these expressions confirm that abstract formulas such as 'to make light' may refer to very practical and concrete actions like removing the obstacles which prevent the daylight from shining through. This could also be implied in lucemfacere as terminus technicus for the removal of the barrier to the subterranean supplies, which was perhaps ritually celebrated with the kindling of candles and certainly with a capite apertosacrifice to Saturn, and thus came to be projected on this more visible rite of 'disclosure'. Finally, there remain two questions of priority: the priority of the liberation of Saturn as compared to the 'liberation' of the revellers, especially the slave population, and the priority of myth and ritual. As to the former issue, the question of 'which was first?' is particularly justified if we recall that Macrobius Sat. 1, 8, 5 and Statius Silv. 1, 6, 4, denote the fetters of Saturn by the term compedes(slave186 It is certainly not more adventurous than the current interpretation of the kindling of candles during Easter night in the orthodox liturgy. It is understood as the sign that Christ has risen from the grave and so has returned to the light oflife and that now light shines in the dark announcing the hope of a new salvation. Although associations with the rising sun (or the New Year) no doubt may intermingle, it would be reductionist to derive the rite from such 'natural' origins. 187 "Sublucare is to cut off the lower branches of trees and thus-as it were 'suptus' [the meaning of this old word is unknown H.S.V.]-make light. Conlucare,on the other hand, is a to enlighten a place by cutting down trees''. Cf. Cato De agr. 139, lucum conlucare;Colum. 2, 21, 3.

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chains). Nobody to my knowledge ever gave a more lapidary view of this relationship than W. B. Kristensen in his expression already quoted above: "Saturn was a slave himself' 188 . When Bomer judged this to be '' einfach absurd'', his negative verdict was dictated not in the last place by his wish to dissociate the religious aspects of the Saturnian cult entirely from the carnivalesque relaxation of the Saturnalia, an objectionable point of view. As a result of our investigation we are now able to formulate some conclusions with more conviction and on a more solid basis than has hitherto been possible. First of all, it will be useful to outline the difference with the case of Kronos. In his case, it proved impossible to establish a particular agrarian or social activity which could serve as the kernel of the myth and ritual complex. If there had been an agrarian origin of the festival, it may have been of the nature of the Roman Opiconsivia and Consualia of August: celebrations of the end of the harvest and of the storage of the corn. But we cannot be sure. However, whatever its original nature, myth and ritual should be understood as two parallel expressions of the climate of ambiguity surrounding the break between the Old Year and the New, an interpretation which, of course, was supported by the calendrical position of the Kronia in the final month of the Athenian year. In Rome the situation is different. Here I do believe that I have found the original agrarian kernel of the festival. Its nature as a primitiae festival provides a most natural explanation for both the images of abundance and the tension and ambiguity in Saturnian cult and ritual. We have analysed Saturn's basic function on the 17th of December and concluded that all the characteristic features of the god and his festival can be naturally explained as metaphors, transformations and ritualizations of this function: his nature as a deus otiosus during the rest of the year, his 'liberation' (luere) and activity on the day of his festival, his iconography and various rites. Hence we drew our conclusion that (supposed) connections with the caesura in the solar year must have been the result of a secondary assimilation with neighbouring festivals, an assimilation which no doubt was fostered by the typical atmosphere of crisis common to both types of caesura. It is this very nature of a crisis festival that also provoked a ritual

188

Above p.133.

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celebration with demonstrative role-reversal, suspension of norms and law, and licence. We have repeated time and again that this ritual was characteristic of various ki~ds of critical periods: the calendrical (solar) end of the Old Year, agrarian incisions such as primitiaefestivals 189 , social events such as initiation, the temporary return of the dead, etc. Consequently, it is hardly justified to isolate the liberation of the slaves from the total complex and take it either as an imitation of or as a model for the liberation of Saturn. The temporary liberty of the subdued, being a typical aspect of anomic licence, simply belongs to the fixed taxonomy of crisis festivals in general. On the other hand, we should not forget that this specific festival of reversal focused on slaves and servants, while other rites ~oncentrate on different groups of those deprived of rights, such as women. The very concrete liberation of Saturn from his bonds, as an image of the 'liberation' of the cereal stores, may have fostered this specificfocus of the festival. So I would conclude that the redemption of the god and the liberation of the slaves both reflect different though closely associated aspects of the 'original Saturnalia': one as an image of the opening of the corn supplies, the other as a more general concomitant of the critical nature of this festival. Of course,

189 It may be worthwhile to pay attention to a curious and unexplained ritual connected with the parallel complex of the festivals in August. They, too, bore a critical nature as we have seen: there is elation and freedom at the Consualia (Dion. Hal. 2, 31, 2: primitiaesacrifices; Varro ap. Non. p. 21: gymnastic games; Plut. QR 48, Dion. Hal. 1, 33, 2, Fast. Praen. 15 Dec. holidays for horse and donkey; tu.di in the circus), followed by the cruel sacrifices at the Volcanalia. The Volcanalia themselves were marked by the fact that people celebrated the festivities in 'huts' (Paul. Nola Carm. 32, 137 ff.; cf. I. Opelt, Die Volcanalia in der Spatantike, VChr 24 (1970) 59-65), a sign of 'interstitial' relaxation: Bremmer 1987b, 81, but this is only attested for late antiquity. More important is an enigmatic note by Varro L. L. 6, 21, on the Opiconsivia of the 25th of August. On this day a sacrifice was made in the shrine of Ops Consiva in the regia, access to which was restricted to the Vestales and the sacerdospublicus (probably the pontifex maximus). Varro continues: "Is cum eat, sujfibulum ut (aut mss.) habeat", scriptum.Aut in the manuscript tradition does not make sense at all; the correction haul Uordan, TopographieII, 273 f.) yields nonsense, since in that case the restriction cannot but refer to the Vestales, which is definitely refuted by is. So the only alternative is ut, generally accepted by the editors. However, this conjecture has not at all elucidated the meaning of the text, as Pouthier 1981, 60 f., demonstrates. The problem is that according to Festus 4 74 (L) the sujfibulumis an oblong piece of white cloth with a coloured border which the Vestals used to wear whenever they offered sacrifice. I think that the enigma of the male priest wearing a garment normally restricted to the Vestales on one specific occasion can be solved elegantly by taking it as an instance of ritual reversal.

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given the common source of these two separate lines and the relationship of their imagery, it was, right from the beginning, impossible to keep them apart. A number of ancient authors expressed their views on the priority of myth and ritual explicitly. Iustinus 43, 1, 3, writes: "The first inhabitants of Italy were the Aborigines, about whose king Saturn it is told that he was so righteous that under his rule nobody had a subordinate function (neque servierit) nor private possessions. All things were common property and this was not distributed, as if there was one patrimony for all people together. By way of commemoration of this example it was instituted that during the Saturnalia all differences in juridical position are suspended (exaequatoomnium iure) and that everywhere slaves dine with their masters". Thus Iustinus views the myth (which is in his perception [legendary] history) as the scenario for the rite and, as we have seen, many Romans shared this view. In his defence of a humanitarian treatment of slaves, Seneca refers to the Golden Age, arguing that it was this period which saw the origin of the Saturnalia with their one day of liberty for the subjected. Similarly, Lucan regards the Saturnalia as a present given by Saturn. In contradistinction to the scholarly dissension on the very same question concerning Kronian myth and ritual, modern scholars are unanimous in their condemnation of the ancient Roman view. This is quite understandable, given the common hesitation to grant early Rome her own mythology 190-let alone to grant it priority over ritual-and the obvious Greek origin of numerous mythical elements. The smooth assimilation of Greek mythical material by Rome was, of course, highly fostered by the similarity between Kronia and Saturnalia. It has to be admitted that we know nothing about the existence of an early Roman myth of Saturn. The possibility should not be discarded that the function of Saturn generated a spontaneous autochthonous representation of a god/king who introduced the cultivation of corn and civilization and as such was the signum for affluence 191 , peace and order, but we shall never reach 190 See the surveys of the debate on Rome's mythology in: E. Gabba, Dionigi, Varrone e la religione senza miti, RS/96 (1984) 855-70; E. Montanari, Problemi della demittizzazione romano, SMSR NS 10 (1986) 73-100; idem, Identitaculturale (Rome 1988). e conflittireligiosinellaRoma repubblicana 191 It would be helpful if we could prove 1) that the ivory statue of Saturn mentioned by Plin. NH 15, 32, was an old relic, and 2) that the fact that this statue was

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beyond the realm of hypotheses. At most we can conclude that for Saturnalian ritual an often assumed Greek origin is both unnecessary and unlikely. The origin of Saturnian myth cannot be determined unequivocally, although Greek components cannot be denied. However, its relevance is not dependent on origins, as I shall show in the next section.

4.

LOOKING

FORWARD:

THE CONTINUING

STORY OF MYTH AND RITUAL

The preceding sections of this chapter have confronted us with ambiguities and paradoxes which were connected, directly or indirectly, with the ambiguous nature of the Saturnian festival in December. I have argued that the specific tension connected with the ritual opening of the new stores naturally entailed other rituals displaying a similar mixture of both cheerful and disquieting aspects: the Saturnalia as we know them from late republican and early imperial times. We also perceived traces of a myth which, probably derived from Greek models, moulded the atmosphere surrounding the Saturnian ritual into the image of a mythical reign of king Saturn, which betrays comparable elements of ambiguity. Though on the one hand generally pictured as a realm of bliss and happiness on the brink of history, it is also described as the amorphous period before human civilization during which man led a slothful, and indeed beastly life 192 . This ambiguity, as we have seen, is common to various representations of the alternative world: images of the hereafter, the new heaven and earth of messianic movements, the Never Never Land of fairy tales, and fantastic descriptions of foreign nations. These images also developed in Rome outside the limited region of myth and ritual discussed so far, and they sometimes betray strong influences of Saturnian ideology, including its ambiguous nature.

filled with oil indicates in the statue ''ii depositario di quella possibilita di interruzione per un ritorno, sia pure momentaneo, alla dimensione mitica", as Piccaluga 1974, 312 f. tentatively suggests. Personally I would explain this strange custom as a sign of the material affluence produced by the god. 192 On the development of this contradiction, which does not specifically concern us here, and its two constituents see: Gatz 1967, passim; F. Bomer, P. Ovidius Naso. Die FastenII (Heidelberg 1959) 242. There are very complete discussions in Novara 1983 and Kubusch 1986. For further references to specific ancient authors see below n.199.

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The following short impressions do not claim to give a thorough reconsideration of these much discussed topics, but aim to illustrate the vitality of these concepts, to expose the astonishing inconsistencies they may provoke, and to offer some suggestions which may help to solve-or at least place in a different light-a number of vexed problems that haunt the discussion of Saturnian topics of late antiquity.

1. The ambivalenceof the Saturnalian king: Mythical topicalities The aureasaeculaof Saturn have disappeared. To go by the Augustan poets this is a tragic and regrettable loss. The Saturnalia, generally conceived as an imitation of this Golden Age, lasted only a few days: non semperSaturnaliaerunt.Judging from Roman religious and secular laws and customs, this was considered a necessary and fortunate restriction. In the paradox manifest from these two observations we encounter the fundamental ambivalence of the Saturnalian dream. One can focus either on the benificent or on the disquieting aspects of the alternative world and the choice for either one is basically dependent upon one's representation of the alternatives. The happy vision of the Saturnia regnaisolates the blissful aspects and closes its eyes to the precarious side of the picture. In this view it is deeply to be regretted that Utopia only exists in myth or-for a restricted period-in ritual. But to regret a loss is to desire: is it really unimaginable that the blissful reign of Saturn should regain a historical existence, for instance under the ideal rule of a divine prince? Is Saturnian Utopia really unreal? This is the-hopeful-question that resounds in Augustan poetry. The opposite reaction of reserved refusal, on the other hand, focuses on the anomic features of Utopian imagery as an undesirable alternative to the law and order of regular society. Its advocates hail the restrictions of Utopia as embodied in its relegation to myth or to brief ritual. But applause may conceal anxiety. Can we be sure that anomic Saturnia regnanever come to reality, for instance under the reign of an arbitrary autocrat who creates his own insane topsythat resounds, half a centurvy world? It is this-anxious-question tury after Augustus, in a very peculiar piece of literature. Two Saturnalian kings each represent one of the two polar connotations of Saturnalian Utopia. They call to mind the two tyrants of the first chapter of InconsistenciesI, each of which embodied one of the qualities of arbitrariness: the blessed high-handedness of the

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good and beneficent father, the sinister despotism of the cruel dictator. The following sketches will illustrate the paradoxical coexistence of these opposites in one period of Rome's history. a. Redeunt Saturnia Regna With his fourth Eclogue, Vergil coined the literary concept of the returning Golden Age 193 for ages to come. The questions concerning the previous history of the idea and of its literary models have sollicited an awe-inspiring quantity of studies, which I shall not even begin to cite 194 . The particular aspects I am interested in here may well be treated without the burden of an extensive bibliography. The Saturnia regnaof the fourth Eclogue bear the typical characteristics of an utopia d 'evasione195 . Not only will human society be freed from the stains of war and sin, but nature itself will recover its original automatonaspects. Not a little part of the poem's beauty, however, is due to the amalgamation of mythical references and what can at least be understood as references to actual history. The new born child, though anchored in actual history, remains sufficiently anonymous to allow the application of mythical predicates and-for that matter-to defy all the desperate scholarly attempts at identification 196 . In other words, the deliberate vagueness surrounding the protagonist and the emphatically mythical context allow an unrestricted Utopian, if not messianic, imagery. However, 193 Though it is incorrect to say that "The Augustan period was the time when the myth of the Golden Age stopped developing and became a fixed poetic, political, and philosophic symbol": K. J. Reckford, Some Appearances of the Golden Age, CJ54 (1958) 79, rightly contested by Galinsky 1981, 193. 194 On the prehistory of the idea see above all: A. Alf