Abstract
Athenian religious life was distinguished by a variety of cults, each of which was “assigned” to a certain association, which financed this cult, organized related festivals and sacrifi ces and nominated the cult personnel: so, there were cults that were in the competence of the polis, demes, clans, phratries, private cult associations. The phyle was also such an association, which had its own cult system. The cult activity of phylai was reduced mainly to a single cult – the cult of the eponymous hero of a phyle, and this is an essential feature of the sacral life of a phyle, unlike other associations, where the number of deities was unlimited. Each eponym had its own sanctuary, near which meetings of the phyle took place and where sacrifi ces were made. Priests from the phyle were originally clan’s priests, who served the cult of the eponymous hero from ancient times. From the end of the 5th – beginning of the 4th century BC, changes begin in the structure of the priesthood, and persons elected from among the phyletai could become the priests; however, connections with the ancestral priesthood were never interrupted. Each phyle had its own land estates, the proceeds from which went to the structure of its cult. Phylai as the structuring units of the polis took part in organizing the religious life of Athens, undertaking the duties of recruiting and training teams for festival competitions, as well as the task of recruiting ephebes who took an active part in religious ceremonies of the polis.
Keywords
Ancient Greece, Athens, religion, phyle, priests, eponymous hero.
Blok, J.H., Lambert, S.D. 2009: The Appointment of Priests in Attic Gene. ZPE 169, 95–121.
Bondar, L.D. 2009: Afi nskie liturgii V–IV vv. do n.e. [Athenian liturgies of the 5th – 4th centuries BC]. Saint Petersburg.
Camp II, J. McK. 1986: The Athenian Agora. London.
Clinton, K. 1974: The Sacred Offi cials of the Eleusinian Mysteries. Philadelphia.
Davies, J.K. 1971: Athenian Propertied Families 600–300 B.C. Oxford.
Dow, S. 1937: Prytaneis. A Study of the Inscriptions Honoring the Athenian Counillors. Hesperia Supplements 1, 1–258.
Ekroth, G. 2002: The sacrifi cial Rituals of Greek Hero-Cults. Liège.
Ferguson, W.S. 1938: The Salaminioi of Heptaphylai and Sounion. Hesperia 7, 1–74.
Finley, M. 1973: Studies in Land and Credit in ancient Athens, 500–200 B.C. The Horos Inscriptions. New York.
Goette, H.R. 2007: “Choregic” or victory monuments of the tribal Panathenaic contests. In: O. Palagia, A. Choremi-Spetsieri (eds.), The Panathenaic Games. Proceedings of an international conference held at the University of Athens, May 11–12, 2004. Oxford–Oakville, 177–126.
Grote, O. 2016: Die Griechischen Phylen. Stuttgart.
Henderson II, Th. 2011: A History of the Athenian Ephebeia: 335–88 BC. PhD (The Florida State University).
Jones, N.F. 1987: Public Organization in Ancient Greece: A Documentary Study. Philadelphia.
Jones, N.F 1999: The Associations of Classical Athens. The Response to Democracy. N.-Y., Oxford.
Kearns, E. 1989: The Heroes of Attica. London.
Kirchner, J.1901: Prosopographia Attica. I. Berolini.
Kron, U. 1976: Die zehn attischen Phylenheroen. Geschichte, Mythos, Kult und Darstellungen. Berlin.
Lenskaya, V.S. 2012: Ieropei v drevney Gretsii [The Hieropoioi in Ancient Greece]. Problemy istorii, filologii, kul’tury [Journal of Historical, Philological and Cultural Studies] 4, 179–191.
Lenskaya, V.S. 2015: Chuzhezemnye bogi v Afi nakh v V–IV vv. do n.e. [Foreign Gods of Athens in the 5th–4th centuries BC]. Mnemon 15, 386–402.
Lenskaya, V.S. 2016: Problemy fi nansirovaniya polisnykh kultov v Afi nakh v V–IV vv. do n.e. [Problems of Polis Cults Financing in Athens in the 5th–4th centuries BC]. Vestnik drevney istorii [Journal of Ancient History] 76/4, 902–918.
McLeod, W. 1959: An Ephebic Dedication from Rhamnous. Hesperia 28, 121–126.
Mikalson, J. 1998: Religion in Hellenistic Athens. Berkeley–Los Angeles–London.
Mommzen, A. 1889: Die zehn Eponymen und die Reihenfolge der nach ihnen benannten Phylen Athens. Philologus 47, 449–486.
Muñiz Grijalvo, E. 2005: Elites and Religious Change in Roman Athens. Numen 2, 255–282.
Papazarkadas, N. 2011: Sacred and Public Land in ancient Athens. Oxford.
Parker, R. 1996: Athenian Religion: A History. Oxford
Pélékidis, Ch. 1962: Histoire de l’éphébie attique des origines à 31 avant Jésus-Christ. Paris.
Pouilloux J. 1954: La Forteresse de Rhamnonte. Paris.
Reinmuth, O. 1952: Genesis of the Athenian Ephebia. TAPA 83, 34–50.
Reinmuth, O. 1971: The Ephebic Inscriptions of the Fourth Century B.C. Leyden.
Schlaifer, R. 1940: Notes on Athenian Public Cults. Harvard Studies in Classical Philology 51, 233–260.
Shear, T.L. 1970: The Monument of the Eponymous-Heroes in the Athenian Agora. Hesperia 39, 145–222.
Surikov, I.E. 2000: Iz istorii grecheskoy aristokratii pozdnearkhaicheskoy i ranneklassicheskoy epokh: Rod Alkmeonidov v politicheskoy zhizni Afi n VII–V Cent. BC [From the History of Greek Aristocracy of Late Archaic and Early Classic Periods: the Alcmaeoinidae Family in the Political Life of Athens in the 7th –5th centuries BC]. Moscow.
Szanto, E. 1902: Die griechischen Phylen. Wien.
Thompson, H.A., Wycherley, R.E. 1972: The Agora of Athens. The History, Shape and Uses of an Ancient City Center. Princeton–New Jersey. (The Athenian Agora. XIV).
Töpffer, J. 1889: Attische Genealogie. Berlin.
Traill, J. 1975: The Political Organization of Attica. A Study of the Demes, Trittyes and Phylai and their Representation in the Athenian Council. Princeton–New Jersey.
Vidal-Nake, P. 2001: Chernyy okhotnik. Formy myshleniya i formy obshhestva v grecheskom mire [Le chasseur noir. Formes de pensées et formes de société dans le monde grec]. Moscow.
Whitehead, D. 1986: The Demes of Attica 508/7–250 B.C. A Political and Social Study. Princeton.
Wilamowitz-Moellendorff, U. 1893: Aristoteles und Athen. I. Berlin.
Wycherley, R.E. 1957: The Athenian Agora. III. Literary and Epigraphical Testimonia. Princeton– New Jersey.