Greek Myth and Religion

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Article

temple  

Richard Allan Tomlinson

Article

Publication History:

Published online:
07 March 2016
Subjects:
  1. Greek Material Culture
  2. Greek Myth and Religion
  3. Roman Material Culture
  4. Roman Myth and Religion
The Greek temple was the house of the god, whose image it contained, usually placed so that at the annual festival it could watch through the open door the burning of the sacrifice at the altar which stood outside (see statues, cult of). It was not a congregational building, the worshippers instead gathering round the altar in the open air, where they would be given the meat of the victims to consume (see sacrifice, greek). *Orientation was generally towards the east, and often towards that point on the skyline where (allowing for the vagaries of ancient Greek calendars) the sun rose on the day of the festival. The temple also served as a repository for the property of the god, especially the more valuable possessions of gold and silver *plate (see votive offerings).The core of the temple is the cella, a rectangular room whose side walls are prolonged beyond one end to form a porch, either with columns between them (in antis) or in a row across the front (prostyle). More prestigious temples surround this with an external colonnade (and are described as peripteral). They generally duplicate the porch with a corresponding prolongation of the walls at the rear of the cella, without, however, making another doorway into the cella (the opisthodomus, or false porch).

Article

temple officials  

John North

Article

Publication History:

Published online:
07 March 2016
Subjects:
  1. Greek Myth and Religion
  2. Roman Myth and Religion
Greek and Roman temples served as the houses of gods and goddesses, but also as centres of religious activity, meeting-places, storehouses for dedications, and secure locations for the keeping of valuables. They do not seem in general to have played as great a role in the social and economic life of the cities as did the great temples of Egypt and the near east, but all the same they must have required regular control, care, and funding in fulfilling their tasks and maintaining their fabric.In Greece we have a picture of how the temples operated. There were normally *priests or priestesses in charge of each; in any large temple they would be assisted by minor officials. *Aristotle (Pol. 6. 1322b) distinguishes three types of these: first, there were cult officials who assisted in the sacrifices and rituals (hieropoioi), who would have received their share of the sacrificial meat and other perquisites; secondly, there were wardens or caretakers (neōkoroi, naophylakes) who controlled access to the sanctuary, carried out purifications of those entering, and cleaned the sanctuary; thirdly, there were treasurers (hierotamiae), who assisted with financial administration, took care of treasures and votives, and oversaw the raising of revenue.

Article

Tenes  

Emily Kearns

Article

Publication History:

Published online:
07 March 2016
Subjects:
  1. Greek Myth and Religion

Tenes or Tennes, eponymous hero (see eponymoi; hero-cult) of *Tenedos and owner of a *sanctuary there. Son of *Apollo or of Cycnus (3), king of Colonae in the Troad (see troas), he was falsely accused of rape by his stepmother, and Cycnus set him and his sister *Hemithea adrift in a chest which landed at Tenedos. Later, Cycnus discovered the truth and attempted a reconciliation, but Tenes with an axe cut the moorings of his boat when Cycnus visited Tenedos, hence the proverb ‘Tenedian axe’ for a refusal to be addressed. Tenes was finally killed by *Achilles while defending Hemithea; this was the mythological explanation for the taboo on the name Achilles at the hērōon of Tenes, just as flute-players were forbidden entry because a flute-player had denounced Tenes to Cycnus. Both types of taboo can be paralleled elsewhere.

Article

Tethys  

Herbert Jennings Rose

Article

Publication History:

Published online:
22 December 2015
Subjects:
  1. Greek Myth and Religion
Tethys (Τηθύς), in mythology, daughter of Earth (*Gaia) and Heaven, sister of Ocean (Hes.Theog. 136; see oceanus (mythological)); becomes the consort of Ocean and bears the Rivers, also the three thousand Oceanids (see nymphs), whose work it is to aid the rivers and *Apollo to bring young men to their prime, and *Styx, chief of them all (ibid.

Article

Teucer  

Herbert Jennings Rose and Jenny March

Article

Publication History:

Published online:
22 December 2015
Subjects:
  1. Greek Myth and Religion
Teucer (Τεῦκρος)(1) In mythology, son of the river *Scamander and a nymph Idaea, and ancestor of the Trojan kings. He married his daughter Bateia (or Arisbe) to *Dardanus, and from this marriage was born Erichthonius, father of Tros (Apollod. 3.12, which also gives the later genealogy).(2) Son of *Telamon(1) by *Hesione. Throughout Homer's Iliad he is a valiant archer, and faithful comrade of his half-brother, the greater Ajax (*Aias(1)). His character is similarly depicted in later works, e.g. the Ajax of *Sophocles(1). He was absent at the time of Ajax's suicide (Ajax342–343), but returned (974) in time to take a leading part in the struggle to secure him honourable burial. After his banishment (see telamon(1)) he founded *Salamis (2) in Cyprus (Hor., Odes 1.

Article

Thamyris or Thamyras  

Herbert Jennings Rose

Article

Publication History:

Published online:
07 March 2016
Subjects:
  1. Greek Myth and Religion

Thamyris (Θάμυρις) or Thamyra (Θαμύρας), a Thracian bard, who boasted that he would win a contest even if the *Muses opposed him, whereat they maimed or blinded him and made him forget his skill (Il. 2. 594 ff.). Later authors attribute musical inventions to him.

Article

Thanatos  

Christiane Sourvinou-Inwood

Article

Publication History:

Published online:
07 March 2016
Subjects:
  1. Greek Myth and Religion
Thanatos, mythological figure personifying death, the son of *Nyx or Night (Hes. Theog.211–12). In *Homer he is not an agent of death. He and his twin *Hypnos carried *Sarpedon's corpse to *Lycia for burial (Il. 16. 671–5), an incident represented in art which also inspired the creation of images on white-ground lecythi in which the two carry the corpse of ordinary people, representing the notion ‘good death’. Thanatos is winged and usually has an ordinary regular face, but sometimes he has an ugly rough one. In post-Homeric times he is the agent of death, most notably in Eur. Alc., where he has a prominent role (and where (5. 262) he is also metaphorically described as pterōtos Haidas, ‘winged *Hades’); also, in one version of *Sisyphus' myth (Pherecydes FGrH 3 F 119) Sisyphus bound up Thanatos when the latter came to collect him so that no one could die, until *Ares freed Thanatos—and handed Sisyphus over to him.

Article

Thargelia  

Fritz Graf

Article

Publication History:

Published online:
07 March 2016
Subjects:
  1. Greek Myth and Religion

A festival of *Apollo and held in Athens (7th of Thargelion, late May), some *Ionian cities, and their colonies; it belongs to the pre-colonial calendar (see colonization, greek; calendar, greek). Scholars in antiquity explained its name from a *first-fruits sacrifice, a pot with the first cereals which was offered in Athens; the festival marks the beginning of the harvest season. At the same time, it had a manifestly cathartic character (cf. purification), which explains the presence of Apollo: on the previous day in Athens, in the course of the festival in the Ionian towns, the citizens expelled the *pharmakos, the ‘scapegoat’. The rite is well attested with only minor local variations: the city fed a marginal person, often a criminal, for a certain time; during the festival he was decked out, led around the town, and driven out or even thrown from a cliff. At a crucial junction of the year, the expulsion of a member of society cleanses the town and prepares for the new harvest.

Article

Themis  

Christiane Sourvinou-Inwood

Article

Publication History:

Published online:
07 March 2016
Subjects:
  1. Greek Myth and Religion
Themis, daughter of *Gaia and *Ouranos (Hes.Theog.135). She is associated with Gaia in the myth of previous owners of the *Delphic oracle. Her identification with Gaia in Aesch. PV 211 ff. (where Themis is Prometheus' mother and utters prophecies) is a theological statement, not a reflection of cult. In Pind.Isthm. 8. 31–6 she gave a prophecy to *Zeus and *Poseidon. On the cup Berlin 2538 (ARV 1269. 5; Para471; Add356) she is represented in the role of the Delphic Pythia, delivering prophecies while sitting on a tripod holding a laurel-branch. She is a primordial goddess, but she is closely associated with Zeus' order, and with justice, with right, law, ordinances. In Hes. Theog.901–6 she is Zeus' second wife and she bore him the Hours (*Horae), Good Order (*eunomia), Justice (*Dike) and Peace (*Eirene), and the Fates (see fate).

Article

Themisto  

Herbert Jennings Rose

Article

Publication History:

Published online:
22 December 2015
Subjects:
  1. Greek Myth and Religion

Themisto, name of several heroines, the only one of importance being the daughter of Hypseus (Nonnus, Dion. 9.305 f.), wife of *Athamas. Herodorus (schol. Ap. Rhod. 2.1144), makes her his first wife and mother of several children, including Phrixus and Helle.

Article

theōroi, 'observers'  

Joseph Eddy Fontenrose and Antony Spawforth

Article

Publication History:

Published online:
07 March 2016
Subjects:
  1. Greek Myth and Religion
Theōroi (θεωροί) ‘observers’, a word originally applied to sight-seeing travellers (see tourism) and to those attending at festivals in distant cities. It became the title of a magistracy in some Greek cities and was an official title given to a city's representatives at another city's festival. The great panhellenic festivals (see agōnes; panhellenism) were attended by theoric delegations (θεωρίαι) from every Greek state. Cities to which theōroi regularly came assigned the duty of receiving them to official theōrodokoi (θεωροδόκοι). At the festivals the theōroi offered sacrifices in the name of their cities, and so the title was likewise given to the envoys that a city sent to a distant shrine to offer sacrifice in its name and to the envoys that it sent to consult a distant oracle. The envoys that were sent round to announce the coming celebration of a festival and, after the creation of new panhellenic agonistic festivals in the 3rd cent. bce and later, to announce the new games to all the Greek states were also called (usually) theōroi.

Article

theoxenia  

Emily Kearns

Article

Publication History:

Published online:
07 March 2016
Subjects:
  1. Greek Myth and Religion
Theoxenia (‘theoxeny’), in myth and cult the entertaining of a god or gods by humans, usually at a meal. The thought pattern is old, and reaches beyond the Graeco-Roman world. In Homer, the gods are said to ‘meet’ or be present at a sacrifice; more specifically, at Od. 17. 485–8 they roam the earth in disguise, testing the moral qualities of mortals. This is the germ of the typical theoxeny myth, in which a deity is given—or refused—hospitality, and after an *epiphany effects a reward or punishment. ‘Failed’ theoxenies are exemplified by the story of *Pentheus, while successful ones form an aetiology for very many cults, especially of *Demeter and *Dionysus. In this pattern the host is often worshipped as a hero (see hero-cult), having been instructed by the deity and thus become the cult's first priest or the introducer of a new technique such as viticulture (see culture-bringers).

Article

Thermum  

Richard Allan Tomlinson

Article

Publication History:

Published online:
07 March 2016
Subjects:
  1. Greek Myth and Religion
Thermum, fortified religious and political centre of *Aetolia. Situated north-east of Lake Trichonis on a natural rock-castle, it commanded the central plains of Aetolia and formed the meeting-place for the *Aetolian Confederacy. Extensive excavation has revealed its occupation from the bronze age and its importance as a cult centre for the worship of *Apollo Thermios, Apollo Lykeios, and Artemis; oval houses, a horseshoe-shaped building surrounded by wooden posts (Megaron B, probably of Geometric date), and three superposed temples, two Archaic, the third Hellenistic, are the most important discoveries.Painted terracotta metopes from one of these temples date to about 625 bce, and are either Corinthian or made under direct Corinthian influence (see painting, greek); traces of Hellenistic restoration are detectable. Antefixes in the form of heads also reveal Corinthian influence. Thermum's historical importance derives from its status as the administrative centre of the Aetolian Confederacy, though it was never a city. It was sacked in 218 bce by *Philip (3) V of Macedon.

Article

Thersander  

Herbert Jennings Rose

Article

Publication History:

Published online:
07 March 2016
Subjects:
  1. Greek Myth and Religion

Thersander, name of five mythological characters; the one of most importance in terms of *genealogy is son of Polynices and Argela, from whom *Theron of Acragas claimed descent (Pind.Ol. 2. 43 ff.). He was one of the *Epigoni.

Article

Thersites  

Jenny March

Article

Publication History:

Published online:
22 December 2015
Subjects:
  1. Greek Myth and Religion
Thersites, according to Homer the ugliest man at Troy, lame, bow-legged, round-shouldered, almost bald, who abuses Agamemnon until beaten into silence by *Odysseus (Il. 2. 212 ff.). Here, evidently, he is of low birth; but in post-Homeric tradition (schol. Il. 2. 212) he is of good family, son of Agrius brother of *Oeneus, and therefore related to *Diomedes(2).

Article

Theseus, mythical king of Athens  

Emily Kearns

Article

Publication History:

Published online:
07 March 2016
Subjects:
  1. Greek Myth and Religion
Theseus, a legendary king of Athens, who came to embody many of the qualities Athenians thought important about their city. Apparently originating without special Attic connections, he may perhaps have merged with a local hero of northern *Attica, where several of his myths are situated, and his prominence in Athenian tradition seems not to pre-date the 6th cent. bce, deriving at least in part from an epic or epics; the developed tradition of his life indicates a very different figure from older Athenian heroes such as *Cecrops or *Erechtheus. Detailed accounts of his life are given in Apollod. 3. 16. 1 continued by Epit. 1. 24 and Plutarch's Life of Theseus.Theseus' claim to membership of the Athenian royal line is somewhat shaky, since his father king *Aegeus was probably a late addition to the stemma, made precisely to accommodate Theseus. The alternative version, that his real father was *Poseidon, scarcely helps.

Article

Theseus in art  

Karim Arafat

Article

Publication History:

Published online:
07 March 2016
Subjects:
  1. Greek Myth and Religion
The fight with the Minotaur, the only Theseus story regularly shown in Archaic art, is among the most popular of all scenes, continuing to imperial times in many media. The Minotaur is shown with bull's head (early, with human head), being killed; on the Amyclaean throne (mid-6th cent.), it was merely captured (Paus. 3. 18. 11; cf. amyclae). Roman paintings often show the aftermath rather than the fight.From the late 6th cent. a cycle of Theseus' adventures on the road from Troezen appears, perhaps derived from poetry, or the adoption of Theseus as hero of the new democracy, resulting in the creation of a complementary series of ‘Labours’ to those of the Pisistratid hero, Heracles. Such cycles appear on the metopes of the late Archaic Athenian treasury at Delphi, the Hephaesteion in Athens c.450 (see athens, topography), and the frieze of Gjölbaschi-Trysa (*Lycia), c.

Article

Thesmophoria  

Nils Martin Persson Nilsson, Michael H. Jameson, and Kevin Clinton

Article

Publication History:

Published online:
07 March 2016
Subjects:
  1. Greek Myth and Religion
Thesmophoria, a women's festival in honour of *Demeter, common to all Greeks, celebrated in the autumn (in Attica on 11-13th Pyanopsion for the most part), before the time of sowing. Men were excluded and the women were secluded in Demeter sanctuaries. In Attica (where the celebration is securely attested only in sanctuaries, currently or originally, in demes) the first day was the anodos, ‘way up’, the second nēsteia, ‘fasting’, the third kalligeneia, referring to a goddess of ‘Fair Birth’. Pigs were thrown into pits or caves, such as have been found at some Demeter shrines. The putrified remains brought up by ‘Bailers’, antlētriai, and placed on altars of Demeter and Kore (see persephone), ensured a good harvest when mixed with the seed corn. (The pigs were cast down presumably at the preceding celebration, at Eleusis, perhaps also at the Mysteries.) The festival included obscenity and a sacrifice. Otherwise, the secrets of the Thesmophoria have been well kept. *Aristophanes (1), Thesmophoriazousae, is largely uninformative but suggests a celebration held in the City Eleusinion, probably a former deme sanctuary.

Article

Thestius  

Article

Publication History:

Published online:
22 December 2015
Subjects:
  1. Greek Myth and Religion

Thestius, in mythology, king of Pleuron, father of Lynceus and Idas (*Argonauts and hunters of the Calydonian boar (see meleager)) and of Althaea, wife of *Oeneus (Ov.Met. 8. 304, 446, and elsewhere).

Article

Thestor  

Article

Publication History:

Published online:
22 December 2015
Subjects:
  1. Greek Myth and Religion

Of the five persons so called (Höfer in Roscher, Lex.), the least obscure is the father of *Calchas (Il. 1. 69). He has no legend, the tale in Hyginus, Fab. 190, being manifestly late romance.