Content deleted Content added
m moved Oscophoria to Oschophoria: Google gives only 134 results for "oscophoria" and a suggestion to change the spelling to "oschophoria," which gives north of 1500. |
|||
| (33 intermediate revisions by 20 users not shown) | |||
Line 1:
The '''Oschophoria''' ({{langx|el|ὠσχοφόρια}}) were a set of [[Ancient Greece|ancient Greek]] festival rites held in [[Athens]] during the month [[Pyanepsion]] (autumn) in honor of [[Dionysus]], the god of the vine. The festival may have had both agricultural and initiatory functions.<ref>O. Pilz, “The Performative Aspect of Greek Ritual: The Case of the Athenian Oschophoria,” in M. Haysom and J. Wallensten (eds.), ''Current Approaches to Religion in Ancient Greece: Papers Presented at a Symposium at the Swedish Institute at Athens, 17–19 April 2008'' (Stockholm: 2011), 151-67.</ref> Amidst much singing of special songs, two young men dressed in women's clothes would bear branches with grape-clusters attached (ὠσχοί) from Dionysus to the sanctuary of [[Athena]] Skiras, and a footrace followed in which select [[ephebes]] competed.<ref>I. Rutherford and J. Irvine, "The Race in the Athenian Oschophoria and an Oschophoricon by Pindar," ''Zeitschrift für Papyrologie und Epigraphik'' 72 (1988), 43-51.</ref> Ancient sources<ref>E.g., Plutarch, ''Theseus'' 22.</ref> connect the festival and its rituals to the Athenian hero-king [[Theseus]] and specifically to his return from his [[Theseus#Theseus and the Minotaur|Cretan adventure]]. According to that myth, the Cretan princess [[Ariadne]], whom Theseus had abandoned on the island of [[Naxos]] while voyaging home, was rescued by an admiring Dionysus; thus the Oschophoria may have honored Ariadne as well.<ref>''ibid''. 23</ref> A section of the ancient [[Attic calendar|calendar]] frieze incorporated into the Byzantine [[Little Metropolis|Panagia Gorgoepikoos]] church in Athens, corresponding to the month Pyanopsion (alternate spelling), has been identified as an illustration of this festival's procession.<ref>See further L. Deubner, ''Attische Feste'' (Berlin: 1956), 142-51, with plate 35.</ref>
==See also==
* [[Athenian festivals]]
==References==
{{Reflist}}
[[Category:Festivals in
[[Category:Greek festivals of Dionysus]]
[[Category:October observances]]
[[Category:November observances]]
{{AncientGreece-stub}}
{{Athens-stub}}
| |||