UNIVERSITY OF CINCINNATI

Date: 3 February 2006

I, Katherine M. Swinford ,
hereby submit this as part of the requirements for the degree of:
Master of Arts
in:
Department of Classics of the College of Arts and Sciences
It is entitled:
The Semi-Fixed Nature of Greek Domestic Religion





This work and its defense approved by:

Chair: Kathleen M. Lynch
Jack L. Davis











The Semi-Fixed Nature of Greek Domestic Religion


A thesis submitted to the

Division of Research and Advanced Studies
of the University of Cincinnati

in partial fulfillment of the requirements for the degree of

MASTER OF ARTS

in the Department of Classics
of the College of Arts and Sciences


2006


by

Katherine M. Swinford
B.A., University of Wisconsin-Madison, 2002










Committee: Kathleen M. Lynch, Chair
Jack L. Davis







i
ABSTRACT

The present thesis is concerned with household religion practiced during the Classical period in
ancient Greece. In the past, the study of domestic cult was overlooked, and instead scholars
focused on the public religion of the Greeks. These studies used literary evidence in order to
describe civic religion. However, ancient texts also provide evidence for rituals practiced and
gods revered in the Greek household. Literary sources indicate that domestic rituals did not
require specialized equipment, and therefore, such equipment is difficult to identify in the
archaeological record. This study attempts to identify such implements and examines material
excavated from domestic contexts in three cities: Olynthus, Halieis, and Athens. The integration
of literary sources and archaeological evidence demonstrates that common household items were
used as the implements of domestic ritual. Thus, it seems that everyday, household objects
assumed religious significance in certain contexts.



ii




The Semi-Fixed Nature of Greek Domestic Religion


Katherine M. Swinford, M. A.

University of Cincinnati, 2006









Copyright 2006 by Swinford, Katherine M. All rights reserved.


iii
ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS

My sincerest thanks go to Kathleen Lynch, not only for her practical advice and direction, but
also for offering the brilliant seminar, Greek Houses and Households, whence this paper
originated. Her encouragement has been invaluable. I especially thank Barbara Breitenberger
for her guidance and knowledge in all aspects of ancient Greek religion.

Thanks are due to the wonderful staff of the Classics Library, as well as to the patient Graduate
Committee.

Without the confidence of the ladies on the metal side and the steady smiles of Joel and Lula, I
would never have accomplished this task - thank you.




















1
TABLE OF CONTENTS

Abstract _____________________________________________________________________ i

Acknowledgements ___________________________________________________________ iii

Table of Contents _____________________________________________________________1

List of Tables _________________________________________________________________3

List of Plates _________________________________________________________________4

Chapter 1. Introduction ________________________________________________________5

Previous Scholarship____________________________________________________________6
Methodology_________________________________________________________________10
Literary Evidence _____________________________________________________________11
Iconographic Evidence _________________________________________________________12

Chapter 2. Household Gods ____________________________________________________14

Domestic Deities______________________________________________________________14
Hestia ___________________________________________________________________14
The Hearth in Public________________________________________________________17
Zeus Ktesios ______________________________________________________________18
Zeus Herkeios _____________________________________________________________21
Doorway Gods ____________________________________________________________22

Chapter 3. Domestic Rituals ___________________________________________________25

The Sacred Hearth_____________________________________________________________25
Amphidromia______________________________________________________________25
Gamos ___________________________________________________________________26
Last Rites_________________________________________________________________28

Miasma _____________________________________________________________________30
Birth Pollution ____________________________________________________________31
Death Pollution____________________________________________________________33
Ritual Pyres_______________________________________________________________33

Ritual Washing _______________________________________________________________34

Chapter 4. Domestic Religion in Practice_________________________________________37

Three Cities__________________________________________________________________40
Olynthus _________________________________________________________________40


2
Halieis___________________________________________________________________42
Athens ___________________________________________________________________43

Artifact Analysis ______________________________________________________________44
The Hearth-Altar___________________________________________________________44
Louters __________________________________________________________________48
Thuribles _________________________________________________________________49

Ritual Implements_____________________________________________________________49
Domestic Sacrifice _________________________________________________________49
Ritual Washing ____________________________________________________________50
The Apparatus of Ritual Washing______________________________________________51

Chapter 5. Conclusions________________________________________________________53

Tables ______________________________________________________________________55

Works Cited_________________________________________________________________60

Plates ______________________________________________________________________65



3
LIST OF TABLES

Table 1. Comparison of built and portable hearths and altars in Athens, Halieis, and
Olynthus ____________________________________________________________________55

Table 2. Olynthus: Distribution of ritually significant artifacts by house name _____________56

Table 3. Halieis: Distribution of ritually significant artifacts by house name _______________58

Table 4. Athens: Distribution of ritually significant artifacts by house name _______________59


4
LIST OF PLATES

Plate 1. Map of Greece_________________________________________________________65

Plate 2. Attic red-figure loutrophoros (Oakley and Sinos 1993, fig. 18). Jerusalem, Bible Lands
Museum 4641; ARV
2
1102, no. 2; Add
2
329______________________________________66

Plate 3. Attic red-figure loutrophoros (Oakley and Sinos 1993, fig. 19). Jerusalem, Bible Lands
Museum 4641; ARV
2
1102, no. 2; Add
2
329______________________________________67

Plate 4. Attic red-figure cup by the Amphitrite Painter (Oakley and Sinos 1993, fig. 91). Berlin,
Antikensammlung F2530; ARV
2
831, no. 20, 1702; Add
2
295________________________68

Plate 5.1. White-ground pyxis by the Splanchnopt Painter (Oakley and Sinos, fig. 97). London,
British Museum D11; ARV
2
899, no. 146; Add
2
303 _______________________________69

Plate 5.2. White-ground pyxis by the Splanchnopt Painter (Oakley and Sinos, fig. 98). London,
British Museum D11; ARV
2
899, no. 146; Add
2
303 _______________________________69

Plate 6. Marble louter from the Villa of the Bronzes at Olynthus (Olynthus XII, pl. 218) _____70

Plate 7. Plan of Olynthus (Cahill 2002, fig. 6)_______________________________________70

Plate 8. Plan of Halieis after Boyd and Jameson 1981, fig. 2 ___________________________72

Plate 9. Plan of the Agora Excavations in Athens after Agora XXIV, pl. 3 ________________73

Plate 10. Plan of the Late Archaic Athenian Agora, showing the distribution of wells and debris
pits after Shear 1993, fig. 1___________________________________________________74

Plate 11.1. Built hearth in House A vi 10 (Olynthus VIII, pl. 52.2) ______________________75

Plate 11.2. Restoration of the built altar in House A vi 5 (Olynthus VIII, pl. 73) ____________75

Plate 12.1. Brazier from House A xi 10 (Olynthus VIII, pl. 52:1)________________________76

Plate 12.2. Altars from from the House of the Tiled Prothyron; left: red clay, right: stone
(Olynthus XII, pl. 188:1-2) ___________________________________________________76

Plate 13.1. Red-figure column krater (Ginouvs 1962, pl. 18:53). Vienna, Kunsthistorisches
Museum 2166; ARV
2
1111, no. 1; Add
2
330______________________________________77

Plate 13.2. Red-figure lekanis by the Eleusinian Painter (Oakley and Sinos 1993, fig. 44). St.
Petersburg, State Hermitage Museum ST1791; ARV
2
1476, no. 3; Add
2
381 ____________77

Plate 14. Plan of House A iv 9 at Olynthus after Cahill 2002, fig. 24_____________________78


5
CHAPTER 1. INTRODUCTION


\ou+oi, +. viv .o0q+i +' .Lqoiqoov voi(.+oi.
(Sophocles, Oedipus at Colonus, 1604)

They bathed him and dressed him in the way which was customary.
1


Much of ancient Greek religion comprised ephemeral aspects, such things as burnt sacrifices and
spoken prayers, and of these two, little archaeological evidence survives.
2
These features of
ancient religion were apparently so well known in ancient Greece that contemporary authors
rarely describe every component of the rite and instead note that ritual progressed according to
what was customary, just as Oedipus daughters prepare him for his death in the quote above.

Heretofore, the study of ancient Greek religion has focused upon the remains of public
sanctuaries and extant literature and inscriptions which describe the rituals of the ancient Greeks.
By analyzing these references, scholars focus on the festivals and rites that defined the public
religion of the ancients. These studies often overlook cultic activity that took place in the ancient
household, or oikos. Some ancient texts, however, do portray rituals taking place in the home,
and archaeological evidence exists that might support some of these literary references. At
times, the literary and archaeological evidence are in agreement about household ritual practice,
while at others, there is disjunction. For example, the literature might embellish the character of
a ritual to suit the dramatic context, while the archaeological evidence indicates that the ritual
occurred, but in a more attenuated or ad hoc manner. In other cases, archaeological evidence
documents rituals on which literature is silent. Thus, it is my intent to examine and synthesize

1
All translations are my own.
2
Some ancient prayers are documented. See Pulleyn 1997.


6
both types of evidence, ancient literature and archaeological material, in order to describe more
clearly aspects of ancient Greek domestic religion. In particular, this synthetic view of ancient
evidence reveals an important temporal component to household religion. My analyses will
show that the implements within a house were both multi-functional and often portable. The
multi-functional household objects in this study served at least one ritual use beyond their other
functions. Domestic spaces including the entire structure also bore ritual specific meaning,
but only at certain times.
3
It is important to note that these implements and space assumed their
religious significance as necessary, that is, they were ritually significant only when household
ritual required them to function as sacred objects or environments.

Previous Scholarship
There is a plethora of scholarship concerning the study of ancient Greek civic religion. Walter
Burkerts Griechische Religion der archaischen und klassischen Epoche, first published in 1977
and in English in 1985, is a popular, accessible handbook for any student of Greek religion.
4
The
1999 book Religions of the Ancient Greeks, by Simon D. Price, uses literary, epigraphical and
archaeological evidence to explore ancient Greek religious practices from the eighth century
B.C.E. to the fifth century C.E.
5
While books like these contain ample information regarding
Greek civic religion, they often lack sections devoted exclusively to domestic cult.
6


3
The concepts of multi-functionality and portability will be discussed further in Chapter 4. They refer to an
individual household object being used for various activities and assuming a unique identity for each activity.
4
Burkert 1985.
5
Price 1999, pp. 89-99. In his chapter entitled, Girls and Boys, Women and Men, Price does mention a few
domestic rites in the context of coming of age rituals.
6
Burkert discusses small cult chambers in Minoan houses and palaces. In the section of the book devoted to
individual gods, he mentions briefly the domestic epithets of these gods: Zeus, p. 130; Hestia, p. 170; Hekate, p.
171.


7

Early studies of household religion focused primarily on literary sources. In 1940, Martin P.
Nilsson published Greek Popular Religion, a volume which explores the beliefs and religious
practices of whom he calls the commoner or rural peasant.
7
Nilsson dedicates one chapter of
his book to The House and the Family. In a review based largely on literary evidence, Nilsson
examined the gods which occurred in household religion. In 1954, Nilsson wrote an article
entitled Roman and Greek Domestic Cult which compares and contrasts Roman and Greek
household religion.
8
While both his book and article are based largely on literary evidence, they
do employ some epigraphical and archaeological evidence. Three years later, Heidrun Rose
expanded Nilssons article, in The Religion of a Greek Household.
9
The literary examples
employed by Burkert and Nilsson demonstrate the broad range of sources available for this type
of study, from Homers epic poetry to the speeches of fifth-century B.C.E. orators.

In the more recent decades, scholars have focused less on the grand public festivals and more on
the everyday religion practiced by the ancient Greeks. In his 1983 volume, Athenian Popular
Religion, Jon D. Mikalson discusses the religion of the city, defining popular religion as public
or civic religion. He separates the sources for ancient Greek religion into two types: the poetic
and philosophic and the scholastic and archaeological.
10
While he does not specifically discuss
domestic religion in Athens, his methods of employing different types of evidence helped to
shape my own. Like Mikalson, Christiane Sourvinou-Inwood seeks to define polis religion.
11


7
Nilsson 1940 [1961].
8
Nilsson 1954.
9
Rose 1957.
10
Mikalson 1983, p. 1.
11
Sourvinou-Inwood 1988 and 1990.


8
Unlike Mikalson, she discusses oikos religion, although, it is entirely within the framework of
describing the interconnected subdivisions of polis religion.
12
The present study focuses
specifically on the religion practiced in the oikos, and will incorporate not only literary sources,
but also archaeological evidence.

Excavations in the Athenian Agora and in the ancient cities of Olynthus and Halieis, among
others, provide archaeological evidence for the oikos. These undertakings primarily focused on
typologies and analyses of domestic architecture. Artifact assemblages were reported in site
summaries and excavation reports. However, in these early publications, household assemblages
were not rigorously examined. In 1981, Charles K. Williams II, director of the excavations at
Corinth, published a paper in the journal Hesperia in which he discussed the domestic religion of
ancient Corinth.
13
This article was the first archaeology-based, rather than text-based, discussion
of household cult.

David M. Robinson and J. Walter Graham, in the eighth volume of the Olynthus publication,
titled The Hellenic House, report the results of archaeological investigation of the many houses
at the site with limited reference to relevant literary evidence.
14
The authors briefly mention
household religion when describing the altars found in Olynthian households.
15



12
Sourvinou-Inwood 1988, pp. 271-273.
13
Williams 1981.
14
Robinson does include an appendix of testimonia relevant to the Greek house in Olynthus XII, pp. 399-452.
15
Olynthus VIII, pp. 321-325.


9
Nicholas Cahill restudies the artifacts from Olynthian houses in his 2002 book, Household and
City Organization at Olynthus, based on his 1991 dissertation.
16
This groundbreaking study
looked specifically at the household assemblages, in each room, in each house. Within his study,
Cahill noted a few assemblages that may be indicative of domestic religion.

The Olynthus volumes, along with Cahills books, provide the bulk of the archaeological
evidence used in my research of Olynthian households.
17
I will expand on Robinson and
Grahams archaeological descriptions and analyze the ritually significant artifacts in light of
literary evidence.

Like Cahill, Bradley Ault also studies household assemblages. He tackles household religion at
Halieis in his 1994 dissertation, Classical Houses and Households: an architectural and
artifactual case study from Halieis, Greece.
18
Both Cahill and Ault examine household
assemblages in order to determine their cultural functions. Their methods have influenced my
study of domestic religion in Greek houses.

To this trend of oikos-based scholarship, this paper will contribute a discussion of household
religion in ancient Greece specifically, and more generally, a model for analyzing the multi-
functionality of domestic artifacts. Unlike objects that seem to have been purpose-made, such as
pinakia (voting ballots) found in the agora, household artifacts often serve more than one
purpose. It is not intuitive to assume, for instance, a grill or brazier would be used as an altar in

16
Cahill 2002.
17
Olynthus II 1930, VII 1933, VIII 1938, XII 1946, XIV 1952; Cahill 1991 and 2002.
18
Ault 1994.


10
religious rites, or that a washbasin before an oikos door meant the house was polluted. Thus, the
ritual function of domestic artifacts is not immediately apparent. Instead, it is necessary to
analyze the literary evidence for domestic ritual and ritually significant artifacts in order to
determine these less than obvious religious functions.

Methodology
It is my intent to draw upon both types of evidence, literary and archaeological, to produce a
coherent synthesis of domestic cult in ancient Greece as well as to substantiate the idea that
domestic religion had an aspect of multi-functionality and portability. Nevertheless, such an
undertaking is replete with problems. In aiming to describe the domestic religion of ancient
Greece, I would be assuming that there existed a pan-hellenic concept of religion which
permeated every ancient community in a country which did not exist until the nineteenth
century.
19
If literature indicates that a ritual or belief existed in one city-state, it does not mean
that the practice was the same in all city-states. Because most of the literary evidence that I
utilize in this study originated in Athens, where the complementary archaeological evidence does
not survive, the picture of domestic religion I propose will largely be that of Classical Athens.
Therefore, in order to present a broader view of domestic cult and to look for trends and shared
characteristics, I have included archaeological case studies of three cities: Athens, Halieis and
Olynthus (Plate 1). These three Classical and Hellenistic cities represent mainland sites that
have been well-excavated and well-published. The two non-Athenian cities will provide a
supplement to the Athenocentric view of domestic religion illustrated in ancient literature.


19
Price 1999, p. 3.


11
Literary Evidence
In this study, I have employed references from comedy, tragedy, oratory, lyric poetry and
historical writings. Each of these genres can provide valuable clues about the daily life of the
ancients, but it is essential to consider the context in which the work originated; all authors have
their own biases and assumptions which may not be explicitly stated in their work. I have
attempted to limit my use of sources to those from the 6
th
to the 4
th
centuries B.C.E. At times,
the dearth of evidence has forced me to use examples beyond these limits.
20
In these
circumstances, they are used to illustrate a point which I have already demonstrated with
evidence from within these chronological boundaries. A few of the later sources, such as
Pausanias, a mid-second century C.E. periegetic writer, and Athenaeus, who wrote in the late
second century C.E., preserve fragments of earlier writers, and therefore, preserve remnants of
daily life in an earlier time.

Oratory, comedy and tragedy share one characteristic: they were written for public delivery and
performance. Kenneth Dover further subdivides these into four genres, one of which, forensic
oratory, Jon Mikalson, in Athenian Popular Religion, asserts is the best evidence available for
popular religious beliefs.
21
Speakers in law courts, who surely had property or rights at stake,
would attempt to appeal to as much of the jury as possible by making familiar and indicative
political, moral or religious statements. Political oratory may be just as informative as forensic
oratory, if treated with slightly more skepticism. Demosthenes, for example, probably used

20
I have also made use of scholia to these literary genres. Scholia were later copyists or scholars who wrote
comments, usually explanatory, in the margins of earlier texts. Sometimes, later scholia were commenting on the
comments of earlier scholia.
21
Dover 1994, pp. 5-8; Mikalson 1983, p. 7.


12
religious references as persuasive devices rather than as mechanisms to influence religious
beliefs.
22


Comedy, on the one hand, parodies daily life and is an exaggeration of itself. However, it can be
used to create a vision, albeit a skewed one, of some aspects of ancient Greek life. Like oratory,
comedy was was meant to appeal to the average audience member. Tragedy, on the other hand,
comprises fictional characters in fictional situations.
23
Tragedy cannot be used without a more
individual interpretation, given its often mythological framework and enigmatic dialogue.
24


While ancient literary sources carry their own set of limitations, the evidence they provide is
invaluable. Ancient authors provide significant clues about the daily lives of their
contemporaries, and I have confidently incorporated their texts while allowing for the
aforementioned caveats.

Iconographic Evidence
Vase-painting provides another important source for domestic religion, but not without its own
interpretive challenges. The only extant evidence for several of the household rituals described
in ancient literature comes from vase-painting imagery. Due to the restricted space available on
vase shapes, vase-painters employed a wide range of iconographic conventions in order to
convey extended meaning in a very compressed image, and it must be remembered that these
shorthand representations are not snapshots of daily Greek life. Some types of pots had very

22
Mikalson 1983, p. 8.
23
Parker 1997, p. 148.
24
Dover 1994, pp. 18-19.


13
specific functions, such as funerary vases which were decorated and then interred with the dead.
It is also important to consider where Greek vases were painted. Attic vase-painting most likely
reflects Athenian ritual practices, and therefore, does not reflect practices throughout all the
cities of ancient Greece.
25
With these limitations in mind, it is possible to use vase-painting
iconography cautiously as evidence for some of the rituals portrayed in ancient literature.

In the following chapters, I attempt to synthesize literary and archaeological evidence in order to
clarify some aspects of ancient Greek domestic religion. I first address the mostly literary
evidence for the presence of specific gods in the household. I examine the literary and
archaeological evidence for rituals occurring in the home, a study which also draws upon vase-
painting iconography. I then present case studies of the three Classical/Hellenistic, mainland
Greek sites: Athens, Halieis and Olynthus. Finally, I analyze the archaeological data in light of
the aforementioned caveats and present concluding remarks.

25
Sparkes 1996, p. 10.


14
CHAPTER 2. HOUSEHOLD GODS

In this chapter, which is primarily based on literary evidence, I will consider the gods whose
household cult is mentioned prominently in ancient sources. These gods include Hestia, Zeus,
Hermes, Hekate and Apollo Agyieus. Hestia is also the central focus of many household rituals
which will be discussed in Chapter 3.

Domestic Deities
Hestia
ou yo o+. oof
.i\oivoi 0vq+oioiv v' ou o+ uo+ +.
To+i o_o.vo, o.vo.i .\iqo.o ovov.
(Homeric hymn to Hestia, 29.4-6)

For mortals have no feasts without you where the libation-pourer does not begin
by offering honey-sweet wine to Hestia in first place and last.


In literature, Hestia is the Greek goddess of the hearth and is the metonymic symbol for an entire
household. Diodorus Siculus, a historian writing in the first century B.C.E., recounts that Hestia
invented the building of houses, thus she has a shrine in every home and receives her share of
worship and sacrifices within these homes (Diodorus Siculus 5.68.1). The hearth not only serves
as the locus for domestic activities such as cooking and heating, but also as the sacred center of
the household, or oikos. Because the hearth is an altar within the oikos, Hesiod instructs
household members to act accordingly around the hearth, saying,




15
qo' oiooio yov .o\oy.vo, .voo0i oiiou
io+i ..\ooov oooiv..v, o\\' o\.oo0oi.
(Hesiod, Op. 734)

Do not expose yourself befouled by the fireside in your house, but avoid this.

Hestia is often invoked first among the gods, in private as well as public rituals.
26
Socrates
suggests to Hermogenes that in making an announcement to the gods, they shall start with
Hestia, according to the custom (Plato, Cra. 401b). A priest, when beginning his sacrifices to the
gods, calls first upon Hestia (Aristophanes, Av. 865ff).
27
To begin from Hestia became a
proverb due to its indication of a prosperous or well-omened beginning.
28
These examples
demonstrate the prominent position Hestia held among the gods.

Ancient literature provides further evidence for the sanctity of the hearth. Sacrifices took place
at the hearth of the household, which is corroborated by different genres of literature.
Klytaemnestra mentions the victims awaiting sacrifice at the central hearth (Aeschylus, A. 1055-
1057).
29
Oaths sworn upon the hearth or to Hestia were powerful. Herodotus writes that the
Scythians mightiest oaths were sworn at the kings hearth. They believed that if the king fell ill,
the cause was a falsely sworn oath made at the kings hearth.
30
In Aristophanes Plutos,

26
Demosthenes, 2.45f.; Aristophanes Av. 865-868; Vesp. 846-847 and schol. ad 846, pp. 134-135 (ed. Koster);
schol. ad Ar. Thesm. 299, p. 266 (ed. Dbner); Euripides TGrF 5.2 F781.35; Homeric Hymn to Hestia 29.4-6;
Pausanias 175; Plato Cra. 401b; Leg. 745b.
27
See also Aristophanes, Vesp. 846 and schol. ad 846, pp. 134-135 (ed. Koster); schol. ad Ar. Thesm. 299, p. 266
(ed. Dbner); Euripides, F781.35; Homeric hymn 29.
28
Pausanias 175.
29
See also Plato, Resp. 328c.
30
Herodotus 4.68.1ff.


16
Blepsidemos makes Chremylos swear by Hestia that he is telling the truth (Aristophanes, Pl.
395). It is clear, from these examples, that oaths sworn to Hestia were held in the highest regard.

Hestia, as the guardian of the hearth, served as the protector of the household and its occupants.
Euripides Alkestis, before she sacrifices her life in exchange for her husbands, invokes Hestia
to protect and provide for her children (Euripides, Alc. 158ff). According to references in
Aristophanes and Plato, symbols of Hestias protection of the oikos, in the form of idols, were
placed on or near the hearth in order to protect the household and keep its members safe and
healthy.
31
Hestia provides shelter not only for the members of a household, but also for
outsiders. The hearth, as an altar of the goddess, functions as a refuge for suppliants, and those
who seek refuge at the hearth are protected, just as those who seek haven at altars within temples
are inviolable.
32
Themistokles sits at the hearth of Admetus as a suppliant, though the two were
not on friendly terms, and is thus safe from Admetus wrath when he returns home.
33
Euphiletos,
while trying to convince the jury that he has justly killed Eratosthenes, states that the perpetrator
never took refuge at the hearth.
34
These examples from ancient literature demonstrate that the
hearth and its protector, Hestia, were the sacred focus of the household. The hearth, and by
extension, Hestia, was a safeguard for members of an oikos, and even for individuals outside the
oikos. Gustave Glotz discusses how the hearth is symbolically sacred to an extended household:

31
Aristophanes, Av. 435; Plato, Leg. 931a. It is unclear if terracotta figurines recovered from domestic contexts were
used as idols, but this function might provide one interpretation.
32
See also Aeschylus, Ag. 1587; Supp. 77; and Sophocles, OC. 629.
33
Thucydides 1.136.1ff.
34
Lysias 1.27.


17
To overthrow this house, to demolish the altar (within it), is a punishment which
strikes at the same time at the living generation and at all the line of dead
ancestors and of descendants yet to be born.
35


Thus, the hearth, as an altar of Hestia, represents and preserves households past, present and
future.

The Hearth in Public
Not only was the hearth the ritual center of the ancient Greek oikos, but it also served to
represent the home to the rest of the community. When Kleomenes banishes from Athens the
Kleisthenic faction, which consisted of Kleisthenes and seven hundred Athenian households,
Herodotus refers to the banished households by using the word epistia.
36
Literally, epistia means
those at the hearth, i.e. the household members. Thus, in Herodotus, epistia indicates the
households. This demonstrates that in Athens, oikoi were referred to by their hearth and that the
hearth, indeed, metonymically represented the oikos.

As an extension of the private hearth, Greek communities had a public hearth, which represented
the center of the polis. When Mantitheus and Apsephion were accused of involvement in the
mutilation of the herms in Athens, they took sanctuary upon the hearth of the Council in order to
avoid punishment.
37
Hestia was also the guardian of the public hearth, which was housed in the
Prytaneion.
38
The hearth in the Prytaneion was considered a symbol of the city, just as the
household hearth symbolized the entire household.
39
When founding a colony, colonists brought

35
Glotz 1904, p. 477.
36
Herodotus 5.73.1-2.
37
Andokides 1.44.2.
38
Pindar Nem. 11; Aeschines 2.45.
39
Miller 1978, pp. 13-16.


18
a spark from the hearth of their metropolis Prytaneion in order to kindle the public hearth in
their new city.
40
The public hearth would represent and preserve the city, just as the private
hearth did the oikos.

While Hestia occupied the central focus of domestic ritual, there were other gods who played a
role in household religion. Zeus appears in the Greek home in two different epithets, Ktesios and
Herkeios. In addition, a representation of Hermes in the form of an ithyphallic post with an
attached head may have stood before the doors of private dwellings, alongside or instead of an
altar to Apollo Agyieus or a shrine to Hekate, in order to protect the members of the household.

Zeus Ktesios
Zeus Ktesios, or Zeus of the property,
41
guards and increases the provisions and wealth of the
Greek house.
42
This seems to be reflected in early tragedy, where the king in Aeschylus
Suppliant Women states that when property is plundered from a home, other goods may be
provided by the grace of Zeus Ktesios (Aeschylus, Supp. 443-445). Lexicographers wrote that
the ancients used to install Zeus Ktesios in their storerooms.
43
Philemon, a late third, early
second century author, states that the kadiskos is the vessel in which they set up Ktesian Zeus.
44


40
schol. ad Aelius Aristides 103.16, pp. 47-48 (ed. Dindorf).
41
A.B. Cook dedicates an appendix (H) of his monumental 1964-1965 work, Zeus: A Study in Ancient Religion, to
Zeus Ktesios.
42
LSJ
2
defines i+qoio,, I. belonging to propertyII. domestic, . the protector of house and property. For
further etymology, see Pierre Chantraine, Dictionnaire tymologique de la Langue Grecque, Paris, 1999.
43
Harpokration K85, pp. 156-157 (ed. Keaney); Suda, s.v. K+qoiou Aio,.
44
Philemon apud Athenaeus 11.473.b-c. See RE XXXVIII, col. 2137 (13), s.v. Philemon (J. Sieveking).


19
A fragment of the Exegetikon from Antikleides, a 3
rd
century B.C.E. historian, describes or
prescribes how one should make the installation of a kadiskos to Zeus Ktesios.
Aio,
i+qoiou oq.io iou.o0oi _q oo. iooioiov ioivov
oio+ov .i0qo+ofv+o o+.oi +o o+o .io \.uio ioi
.i +of oou +of o.Liof ioi .i +of .+oou .... +of
ioiiou, ioi .o0.ivoi o +i ov .u, ioi .io_.oi o-
ooiov. q o' oooio uoo oioiv.,, .\oiov,
oyioio o. .o\..
(Antikleides 140 F22 FGrH)

It is necessary to set up the symbol of Ktesian Zeus: a new, two-eared kadiskos,
wreath the ears with white wool, a saffron-thread from its right shoulder to its
front and put into it whatever you find and pour into it ambrosia. Ambrosia is
pure water and oil and pankarpia. Pour in these.

While this vessel must have represented the cult of Zeus Ktesios in the household, there is no
explicit archaeological evidence to support this identification. The vessel itself (kados, or its
diminutive form kadiskos) often shows up in archaeological excavations and is even listed on the
Attic Stelai.
45
The Attic Stelai record the sale of the personal property of those who mutilated
the herms on the eve of the Sicilian expedition in 415 B.C.E. The kados is a coarse-ware
container with no painted decoration. It seems to have been an all-purpose vessel with an
ergonomic shape and light weight.
46
The appearance of the kadoi on the Attic Stelai and also in
the fill of many of the wells around the Athenian Agora demonstrates that they were a common
household item.
47
Because the kados is an ordinary domestic vessel, it is appropriate that the
form becomes the locus for Zeus Ktesios, who protects the stores of the house, and
sympathetically ensures the protection of all household items.

45
Amyx 1958, pp. 186-190.
46
Agora XII, pp. 201-203.
47
Amyx 1958, pp. 189-190; Agora XII, p. 201.


20

There is textual evidence for the worship of Zeus Ktesios in the household. A reference from
Aeschylus indicates that Zeus Ktesios had an altar within the home. In the Agamemnon, he has
Klytaemnestra order Kassandra to stand inside the house at the side of the altar of Zeus Ktesios
(Aeschylus, A. 1035-1038). Furthermore, there is evidence that sacrifices, libations and incense
were dedicated to Zeus Ktesios. In a fifth century B.C.E. oration by Antiphon, Philoneos and his
companion make a sacrifice to Zeus Ktesios, pouring out libations and placing incense on an
altar.
48
In a mid-fifth to mid-fourth century B.C.E. speech by Isaeus, two granddaughters,
describing their relationship with their grandfather, state that whenever he sacrificed to Zeus
Ktesios, they went to his house and participated in the ritual, placing their offerings side by side
with his.
49
To complement these literary examples for worship of Zeus Ktesios in the home,
there are a few inscribed dedications to Zeus Ktesios found on altars and relief sculptures. There
is an inscription from the Asklepion in Athens that names Zeus Ktesios.
50
A small, Hellenistic
altar from Thera is dedicated to Zeus Ktesios,
51
and a stele from Thespiai in Boeotia, dating from
the 3
rd
century B.C.E., contains a relief of a snake and is inscribed as belonging to Zeus
Ktesios.
52
Nilsson posited that Zeus Ktesios is represented by a snake as a remnant of an earlier
belief that the storeroom and its contents were protected by the house snake. The Greeks did
not condone the worship of theriomorphous gods, and so transferred to Zeus the responsibilities
of the house snake, that is to protect the stores of the house.
53


48
Antiphon 1.16-19.
49
Isaeus 8.16.
50
IG III ii 3854.
51
IG XII iii Suppl. 1361; Thera III, p. 154.
52
Nilsson 1908, pp. 279-288; Harrison 1927, p. 297.
53
Nilsson 1954, p. 79.


21

Zeus Ktesios seems to have been an important domestic deity. The literary, archaeological, and
epigraphical evidence indicates that Zeus Ktesios and his rituals occupied a key role in
household religion.

Zeus Herkeios
Zeus Herkeios is the god of the enclosure or courtyard. This epithet must indicate another
domestic aspect of the same god, Zeus, that is different from his other household guise. The
scholia to Plato say that the Athenians called their homes herkos,
54
the enclosed area or
courtyard, and so they have a Zeus Herkeios, whom they installed in their houses for
protection.
55
A fragment from Aristophanes might describe an offering to this aspect of Zeus,
where it is recommended that the head of a squill be buried by the courtyard door (PCG 3.2
F266).
56
It seems that Zeus Herkeios was another household god whose worship demanded
certain rites and shrines; when men returned from military service or war, they paid honor to
their Zeus Herkeios,
57
and during the examination of officials who wished to hold office, the
potential official was asked if he had a Zeus Herkeios and where his shrine was.
58
This latter
reference suggests that a shrine to Zeus Herkeios was commonly found in the home of Athenian
citizens.


54
LSJ
2
p. 690, defines fence, enclosure; also, the place enclosed, court-yard.
55
schol. ad Pl. Euthyd. 302d, pp. 124-125 (ed. Greene).
56
Perhaps another indication that Zeus Herkeios protected an enclosed area is the boundary stone found at Caria, in
Asia Minor, which was dedicated to Zeus Herkeios, along with Zeus Ktesios and Zeus Patroos (SEG
2
576).
57
Cratinus Jr. CAF 2 F9.
58
Aristotle, Ath. Pol. 55.3.


22
The better-known guise of the god, Zeus the Olympian, does not appear in the Greek household.
Instead, his domestic cult is rather homely. There are no extant temples or statues for the Zeus
Ktesios or Herkeios, rather, there are the simple kadiskoi shrines of Zeus Ktesios, or small altars
dedicated to the domestic Zeus.

Doorway Gods
While Hestia and Zeus were venerated within the house, a few gods, such as Hermes, Apollo
Agyieus, Apollo of the streets and Hekate, received their due directly outside the Greek home.
Literature describes the shrines or altars to these gods, who were guardians of the pathways and
of traveling, as standing before the doorways of private dwellings.
59
These shrines functioned as
protection against illness, enemies and other types of evil.
60


Doorway gods were significant to the ancient Greeks, judging from the outrage caused in Athens
by the mutilation of the hermai at the end of the 5
th
century B.C.E.
61
Another example of the
sanctity of doorway shrines is that Klearchos of Methydrion, a pious man, took care to garland
and clean his Hermes and Hekate each month.
62
This reference indicates that individuals may
have had more than one doorway shrine which may have been dedicated to more than one god.

The herm, the embodiment of the god Hermes, was a square shaft topped with a head and was
always ithyphallic. Herms were often used as boundary markers and stood outside of public

59
Aristophanes Plut. 1152-1154; Vesp. 804 and 875; schol. ad Eur. Phoen. 631, pp. 175-176 (ed. Dindorf);
Sophocles TGF 4 F370; Thucydides, below n. 61.
60
Faraone 1992, p. 8.
61
Thucydides 6.27.1 ff. and Andokides 1.37 ff.
62
Theopompous FGrH 140 F22.


23
sanctuaries, between the city and the country, as well as before the doors of private dwellings.
63

In Aristophanes Plutos, Hermes requests that Kario set him up before the door (Aristophanes,
Pl. 1152-1154). An Attic red-figure loutrophoros depicts a procession coming home from the
fountainhouse (Plates 2-3).
64
Standing before the doorway of the house is an altar and a bearded
herm (Plate 2). The altar may have been an altar to Hermes, or perhaps it functioned to represent
one of the two other doorway gods. In Wasps, Philokleon mentions the altars of Hekate, set up
before the doors of every citizen (Aristophanes, V. 804). The scholia to Aristophanes note that
the altars erected to Apollo Agyieus were square in shape.
65


While these doorway gods are mentioned in literature and depicted in vase painting, there is little
archaeological evidence which corroborates the existence of doorway shrines. While herms have
been found inside the Late Hellenistic houses at Delos, no remains of doorway shrines, nor their
bases, have been found in situ before the doors of houses in the three cities which comprise this
study.
66
Michael Jameson posits that a shallow recess near the street-side door, which he
identifies as a feature common to many Classical houses, may have served as the locus for such
shrines.
67
It is plausible that such installations were made of perishable materials and therefore
nothing is extant, or that they were small figurines set into niches near the doorway.
68



63
Thucydides 6.27.1 ff. and Plato, Hipparch. 228.
64
Jerusalem, Bible Lands Museum 4641; ARV
2
1102, no. 2; Oakley and Sinos 1993, figs. 16-19.
65
schol. ad Ar. Thesm. 489, p. 267 (ed. Dbner).
66
Sanders 2001, pp. 90-93. Herms are also found as dedications in public spaces; see Agora XI, pp. 108-124.
67
Jameson 1990a, p. 105.
68
Faraone 1992, p. 8; Charitonides 1960; Maier 1961. Apotropaic figurines were set into niches found in the city
walls near gates, such as the fourth-century B.C.E. niche in the city wall near the main gate at Messenian
Megaopolis (Faraone 1992, note 40). Perhaps houses had similar niches for apotropaic figurines.


24
The contents of this chapter have indicated that numerous gods were honored in the ancient
Greek household. There may have been other deities who played a role in domestic religion, for
which neither literary nor archaeological evidence survives. The gods mentioned here have been
included in the discussion because their presence was documented in some way, and it seems as
though they might have enjoyed more prominence than other gods in the home. While literature
has provided evidence that the oikos took care to worship and revere its domestic deities, they
also describe several household rituals which are discussed in the following chapter.


25
CHAPTER 3. DOMESTIC RITUALS

This chapter considers the different rites known to have occurred within the oikos and
superstitions associated with the oikos. It begins with the rituals which focus upon the hearth of
a household and continues with others which take place in the home, though not necessarily at
the hearthside. There follows a discussion of the ancient Greek conception of ritual pollution, or
miasma, which is often directly linked with several household rites.

The Sacred Hearth
Hestia, as observed in the previous chapter, stands both literally and figuratively at the center of
household religion. It seems that her cult occupied an important position in domestic worship
and was manifest in rituals which focused upon the physical embodiment of Hestia, the hearth.
Three hearth-centered rituals are associated with transitional stages of life: birth, marriage, and
death.

Amphidromia
In many homes, both ancient and modern, a newborn baby must pass through a rite of initiation
for acceptance into the household, rites such as a baptism, naming, or some other ritual. In
ancient Athens, if a baby survived through its first few days of life, the household performed the
amphidromia, a ceremony which welcomed the child into the oikos and introduced it to the
deities of the oikos. On the fifth or tenth day after its birth (there is an unhappy tangle of
conflicting and deficient lexicographical evidence concerning on which day the amphidromia


26
occurred),
69
the child was carried at a run around the family hearth.
70
Heidrun Rose suggests that
this exposed the child to the beneficent radiation of Hestia, and emphasized the connection
between the baby and the adults who were to be his kin.
71
On this day, too, those who were
involved in any way with the birth performed ritual washing. This was to eradicate the birth-
pollution. Robert Parker states that the amphidromia probably served to unite symbolically the
newborn with the sacred center of the house, much like the katachysmata, a ritual which served
to join brides and newly-bought slaves to their new homes.
72
Later in a male childs life, he
would gain membership in other social units outside the oikos, such as the deme and phratry.
The amphidromia, a domestic ritual, mirrors the public rites which accompany acceptance into
these extra-oikos social groups.
73


Gamos
The wedding procession, or gamos, began and ended with the hearth and marked the brides
transition into her new oikos. Vase paintings often show both mothers; the brides mother
carried torches lit from her home-hearth, which protected her daughter during the procession,
while her mother-in-law, who held torches lit from her respective hearth, received the bride into
her new husbands home.
74
An Attic red-figure cup by the Amphitrite Painter, depicts both of
the mothers flanking the newlywed couple (Plate 4).
75
John Oakley and Rebecca Sinos conclude

69
Parker 1983, p. 51; schol. ad Pl, Tht. 160e, p. 240 (ed. Hermann); schol. ad Ar. Lys. 757, p. 258 (ed. Dbner).
70
Plato, Tht. 160e.
71
Rose 1957, p. 110.
72
Parker 1983, p. 51. The katachysmata is discussed below.
73
Golden 1990, pp. 25-29.
74
Oakley and Sinos 1993, p. 26.
75
Berlin, Antikensammlung, F2530; ARV
2
831, no. 20, 1702; Add
2
295; Oakley and Sinos 1993, fig. 91.


27
that the mothers of the bride and groom direct the transfer of the bride to her new home.
76

Carrying the wedding torches was a significant role for Greek mothers. For example, in
Euripides Phoenissae, Jocasta laments that she was unable to raise the wedding torches at her
sons wedding.
77


After the bride left her mother, and thus, the protection of her household hearth, she joined her
new oikos in the rituals of incorporation. The first ritual, the katachysmata, is mentioned in a
fragment of the 5
th
century B.C.E. comedian Theopompous,
.. ou +o io+o_uoo+o
+o_.o, io+o_.i +of vuiou ioi +q, ioq,.
(Theopompus, F15 PCG VII=F14 CAF I)

Bring the katachysmata; quickly pour them over the groom and the bride!

According to Hesychius and the scholia to Aristophanes Ploutos, this ritual took place at the
hearth.
78
There is a depiction of this rite on a red-figure loutrophoros by the Phiale Painter, 450-
425 B.C.E.
79
This painting is fragmentary and does not depict the ritual taking place at the
hearth, though Hesychius describes it as such. The katachysmata was also poured over the heads
of another category of household inductees, newly-bought slaves. This mixture contained dates,
coins, dried fruits, figs, and nuts and was meant to represent good seasons, and thus good
auspices for the new member of the household.
80



76
Oakley and Sinos 1993, p. 26.
77
Euripides, Phoen. 344-346.
78
Hesychius s.v. i o+ o_ u o o+ o ; schol. ad Ar. Plut. 768a, p. 366 (ed. Dbner).
79
Boston, Museum of Fine Arts 10.223; ARV
2
1017, no. 44; Add
2
315; Oakley and Sinos 1993, figs. 60-61.
80
schol. ad Ar. Pl. 768a, p. 366 (ed. Dbner); Suda s.v. i o+ o_ u o o+ o ; Sutton 1989, pp. 353-354.


28
There is vase-painting evidence for an introduction ritual occurring at the hearthside; a white-
ground pyxis, by the Splanchnopt Painter, 470-60 B.C.E., depicts a groom leading his bride
toward a flaming altar (Plate 5.1-2).
81
In this instance, the flaming altar must represent the
hearth of the grooms household.
82
A female figure holding a scepter stands behind the altar
(Plate 5.2). She is also distinguished by her himation, or cloak, of deep purple. Some scholars
interpret this figure as the goddess Hestia.
83
In the same way that the image of the elaborate,
built altar is conceptual, so too is the presence of the goddess. This image, then, probably refers
to the groom leading his new wife to the sacred hearth of her new oikos. Perhaps this scene
portrays an introduction rite which parallels the amphidromia for newborn children. The bride,
like the newborn or slave, is a new member in the oikos, a transition which demands the proper
hearthside rites for acceptance into the oikos.

Last Rites
Several rituals associated with death and burial preparations occur in the ancient Greek home.
First, when a family member dies, the home is polluted. This pollution requires its own cathartic
rituals, which I will discuss below. Second, the washing and laying out of the corpse takes place
within the oikos. Third, after the funeral, the oikos must be cleansed of the death pollution, and
the sweepings of the home are offered to Hestia in the hearth-fire.


81
London, British Museum D11; ARV
2
899, no. 146; Add
2
303.
82
Built altars are comparatively rare in classical Greek houses. In Chapter 4, I discuss other alternatives to built
altars for domestic rituals.
83
Oakley and Sinos 1993, pp. 34-35.


29
Several tragic characters have prior knowledge of their deaths and carry out some of the
necessary rituals beforehand. In Euripides Alkestis, the title character knows that she is going to
sacrifice her own life for her husbands.
84
Sophocles Oedipus, too, has foreknowledge of his
death. Both of these characters perform their own last rites: they bathe in ritual water, array
themselves in the proper funereal attire, say a prayer to the goddess of the hearth, Hestia, and bid
farewell to their loved ones.
85
These characters actions are dramatic because they perform for
themselves the rites customarily performed for the deceased.
86


After a member of the oikos died, the surviving members of the household washed the body.
87

Often, women were charged with this task.
88
Most likely, this was considered a womans duty
because it fell within the domestic sphere, and thus, within the sphere of the women of the
household. The prothesis, or the laying out of the body, also occurred within the house.
89
The
body was laid on a kline, or couch, and lekythoi, or other small jars of oil, were placed around
it.
90


After the funeral took place, it was necessary to cleanse the house where the death had occurred.
For example, an inscription from Keos, dating to the second half of the fifth century B.C.E.,
states that the house was purified the day after the funeral with seawater and the ceremony

84
Euripides, Alc. 158ff.
85
Above note 84; Sophocles, OC 1586 ff.
86
Garland 2001, p. 24.
87
Euripides, Phoen. 1667.
88
Plato, Phdr. 115a; Kurtz and Boardman 1971, pp. 143-144.
89
Pseudo-Demosthenes 43.56-62; Plutarch, Vit. Sol. 21.
90
Aristophanes, Eccl. 538 and 996; Berlin, Antikensammlung, F2684; ARV
2
1390, no. 3; Add
2
373; Kurtz 1975, pl.
54:2.


30
terminated with offerings to Hestia at the hearth.
91
This final rite, the offering to Hestia, must
have concluded an ancient Greeks circle of life. From the first rite of life, the amphidromia,
which centered around the hearth, to the last, the final cleansing of ones soul from the house in
which it died, returned back to Hestia. These rituals emphasize the importance of the household
hearth as the focus of the domestic cult practiced in ancient Greek oikoi.


Miasma
Pollution, or miasma, wholly occupies the thoughts of Theophrastus Superstitious Man.
92
He is
an extreme example and goes to incredible lengths to protect himself from incurring pollution.
The Superstitious Man is constantly calling out curses, performing anti-pollution rituals, and
cleansing himself and his household in order to protect them from pollution. If this is the routine
which the overly Superstitious Man lived by, his contemporaries probably performed similar
rituals, though in a less compulsive manner.
93


Ancient Greek houses were considered polluted when a death or birth occurred within. In order
to avoid these types of pollution, the Greeks created cleansing rituals. Water is the most
widespread agent of purification in Greek cathartic rituals. It was required that a person was
ritually clean before sacrificing or pouring libations, and by extension, this requirement probably
applied to other religious activities.
94
One prescription for purification was to wash ones hands

91
LSG 97 A15-18.
92
Theophrastus, Char. 16.
93
Rose 1957, p. 109.
94
Homer, Il. 6.266-268.


31
or bathe. The water for ritual washing often had to be drawn from a specific source, most often a
source from outside the house. For example, Thucydides tells us that in Athens, the source for
water for religious ceremonies is the Enneakrounos, the fountainhouse for the spring
Kallirrhoe.
95


Outside of homes where a birth or death had occurred, the household set up a perirranterion, a
basin which stood on a pedestal, filled with water (Fig. 6).
96
Not only did this basin serve as
water for the purification of those entering and leaving the house, but it also served as a token of
warning to those who wished to avoid coming into contact with impure, or polluted, households.
Perirranteria have been found in the excavations of Greek houses as well as in sanctuaries,
which is indicative of their sacred associations.
97
In the inventories of these excavations, the
basins are sometimes called louters and can be made of stone or terracotta.
98
The broad basin is
usually supported by a stand of the same material.

Birth Pollution
While the birth of a child temporarily polluted the ancient Greek household, pregnant women
were sometimes the cause of, and also subject to, miasma. During the first forty days of
pregnancy, a pregnant woman was not allowed to enter a shrine. However, in the later stages of

95
Thucydides, 2.15.5.
96
Burkert 1985, p. 77.
97
Louters have been found in the sanctuary of Demeter and Kore in Ancient Corinth, Corinth XVIII, part 3; on the
Athenian acropolis, Raubitschek 1949, pp. 370-413.
98
Amyx 1958, pp. 221-225, discusses the terms \ou+q and .iov+qiov. He presents that in domestic
contexts the basin have be called \ou+q, and in sanctuaries .iov+qiov, but that such a distinction is
unnecessary.


32
pregnancy, women were urged to visit the sanctuaries of those deities who oversee childbirth.
99

When outside of her oikos, a pregnant woman was not a source of pollution to others, but instead
must be wary of incurring the pollution of others.
100
Iphigenia, while leading the polluted
Orestes through the streets, calls out a warning to three types of people: priests, pregnant women,
and those about to marry.
101
Pregnant women and those who are about to marry are two classes
of people who stand on the cusp of an important transition and are thus susceptible to pollution.

There is a cathartic law from Cyrene, dating from the end of the fourth century B.C.E., which
specifies that those who came into the house where a pregnant woman lay were polluted for three
days.
102
This birth-pollution could not be passed on and after three days the impure person was
cleansed of the miasma. Other purificatory measures were taken in order to eradicate the
household of birth-pollution. A babys naming ceremony and its amphidromia took place on
either the fifth or the tenth day after birth.
103
Each of these initiation rites for the newborn was
accompanied by rituals and sacrifices. These rites, which probably took place in the courtyard of
the house,
104
might have served not only to introduce the child to the oikos, but also to purify
anyone involved in the birth, as well as the entire oikos.




99
Aristotle, Pol. 1335b 13-17.
100
Parker 1983, p. 49.
101
Euripides, IT 1226-1229.
102
SEG ix 72 A16-20 = LSS 115 A16-20
103
Above note 69.
104
Plato, Resp. 328c.


33
Death Pollution
The ancient household was polluted when a death occurred within. Similar to childbirth, at this
time a basin of water, drawn from a specific source, was placed before the door of the house as a
token of warning to those who wished to avoid miasma. It also functioned as water with which
visitors could purify themselves after having encountered the pollution within the house. In
Euripides Alkestis, the chorus exclaims:
u\ov ooi0. o' ou_ o
qyoiov o, voi(.+oi
_.vi' .i 0i+ov u\oi,.
(Euripides, Alc., 97-99)

I do not see before the gates the basin for hand-washing which is customary at the
doors of those who have died.

As aforementioned, water was the primary cathartic element in purificatory rites. In order to
eliminate the pollution incurred after coming into contact with a polluted household, one needed
only wash his or her hands with purifying water. This was similarly true for the house which
was polluted by death. After their family member was buried, the family cleansed the house
with seawater.
105
This rite served to purify the house of residual miasma.

Ritual Pyres
David Jordan and Susan Rotroff have recently re-examined an unusual class of mostly fourth and
third centuries B.C.E. deposits from the houses and workshops around the Athenian Agora.
106

The deposits show evidence of burning and contain a range of shattered, usually miniature,

105
Above note 91.
106
Agora XXIX, pp. 212-217; Jordan and Rotroff 1999, pp. 147-154. Such deposits have also been found in the
Kerameikos, indicating some funerary significance, as well. See Knigge and Kovacsovics 1981, pp. 385-396.


34
vessels and sometimes tiny fragments of calcined bone.
107
Originally interpreted as infant
cremations, the bones have been identified since as animal bones, not human.
108
The evidence
indicates that the associated ritual may have involved sacrifice, burning, the smashing of pottery,
and perhaps a libation.
109
Rotroff posits that the deposits might represent a ritual associated with
the remodeling of a building after a death within it, a commemoration of ones ancestors, or the
new construction of a building.
110
Perhaps such deposits, especially those that are dug through
the original floors of the building,
111
serve to purify or cleanse the space from some type of
miasma.

Ritual Washing
Several domestic rites have a component of ceremonial bathing or hand-washing. During her
wedding preparations, the brides ritual bath required elaborate ceremony. The loutrophoros,
which literally means one who carries bathwater, was a vessel used specifically for
transporting the water for prenuptial baths from the source prescribed for religious
ceremonies.
112
Vase-painting preserves many scenes of these processions, which are more
common than scenes of the actual bath. Furthermore, because of the loutrophoross unique
function, unlike the all-purpose hydria or amphora, it came to indicate marriage-related scenes in
vase-painting iconography. The women of the family joined the bride to parade to the
fountainhouse, usually with a young girl carrying the vase; a red-figure loutrophoros, depicts this

107
Agora XIV, p. 16; Agora XXIX, p. 212.
108
See Young 1951, pp. 111-112 for the original interpretation. Agora XIV, p. 16, re-interprets the pyres.
109
Agora XXIX, p. 212. Rotroff notes that the pyres frequently contained drinking cups.
110
Agora XXIX, p. 213; Jordan and Rotroff 1999, p. 147.
111
Agora XXIX, p. 213.
112
Thucydides 2.15.5.


35
procession (Plates 2-3). After the procession, the bride would bathe in preparation for her
upcoming nuptials. The loutrophoros, which symbolized the ritual prenuptial bath, became
synonymous with ancient Greek marriage. For this reason, the vessel shape, either ceramic or
stone, came to be used as a grave marker or funerary offering for someone who died before he or
she was married.
113


The death of a family member also necessitated ritual washing. The corpse was given a ritual
bath by the women of the oikos.
114
Seawater was the primary cathartic element in funerary rites,
and so, it was the type of water used for washing the body.
115
This rite could be compared to the
ritual bathing of the bride and groom before their marriage. While the latter bath serves as a
ritual in the transition from one stage of life to the next, the bathing of the corpse marked the end
of a life, itself a transition.
116


This chapter has outlined the different rites which occurred within the ancient Greek oikos, based
on literary sources. However, it has not addressed how archaeologists can discern ritual
behaviors in the archaeological record. Ancient texts are not explicit about what implements
were used during domestic rituals. They give the impression that sacred implements were

113
Pseudo-Demosthenes 44.18; Harpokration, s.v. ; Pollux 8.66. Travlos 1971, p. 361 mentions that
loutrophoroi were often dedicated by unwed girls, and also by a bride after her wedding, to The Nymph or
Artemis Brauronia, two goddesses who preside over young girls and their maidenhood. Kurtz and Boardman 1971,
pp. 111, 241, 315. Kurtz and Boardman note that loutrophoroi commonly appear in funerary relief sculpture, pp.
127, 134, 167-168. Beyond wedding imagery, funerary scenes are also a common iconographic style of
loutrophoroi, Kurtz and Boardman 1971, pp. 129, 149.
114
Discussed above, p. 28.
115
Euripides, Hec. 610 and 780; IT 1193.
116
Garland 1985, p. 24.


36
everyday, household objects which took on religious significance when they were being used for
domestic ritual. Chapter 4 will examine the multi-functionality of sacred objects and how they
served domestic functions beyond their religious role.


37
CHAPTER 4. DOMESTIC RELIGION IN PRACTICE

Ancient literature provides extensive evidence for the gods worshipped and the rituals performed
in the oikos. However, these texts do not always detail the implements required for domestic
rites. How then, are we to identify what artifacts in the archaeological record were used for
household ritual? By integrating evidence for domestic deities from Chapter 2 with the evidence
for household rituals from Chapter 3, it is possible to identify the tools of household cult
excavated from domestic contexts.

Through the examination of ancient texts which detail household ritual, the following types of
artifacts have been determined to be ritually significant: altars, hearths, louters, vessels which
hold, transport and pour liquid, and thymiateria (also called thuribles).
117
There is little literary
evidence for the use of figurines and miniature vessels in domestic ritual.
118
Aristophanes and
Plato both mention idols being placed near the hearth in order to protect the oikos (Aristophanes,
Av. 435; Plato, Leg. 931a). This might suggest at least one ritual use of figurines in the house.
Ancient literature is also ambiguous about the use of miniature vessels in domestic rites. Some
ancient texts refer to a ritual implement in its diminutive form. The vessel associated with the
worship of Zeus Ktesios is called kadiskos, which is the diminutive form of kados.
119
It is
dubious if this refers to a miniature vessel, or simply a smaller form of the usual kados.
120



117
Thuribles have not yet been discussed; they are not specifically referred to in ancient sources. There are literary
references to burning incense, but it is unclear if the ritual occurs in a domestic setting.
118
Although both types are associated with ritual in public sanctuaries.
119
Antikleides 140 F22 FGrH.
120
For a discussion of the kados, see Amyx 1958, pp. 186-189.


38
Many of the artifacts which served a ritual function may have served an ordinary day-to-day
function, as well. Lisa Nevett, in her 1999 book House and Society in Ancient Greece, analyzed
a sample of artifact types that appear in various iconographic contexts on vases. She
demonstrated that the same objects were depicted in different contexts and that some objects
seemed to have had a wider range of potential uses.
121
While these objects are depicted in
vase-painting, by extension such objects might correspond to archaeologically recovered
artifacts. Objects like louters, hearths, and pouring vessels must have had multiple uses. Thus,
because of their multi-functionality, it is limiting to define these objects in terms of a single use.

Amos Rapoport, in his 1990 article entitled, Systems of Activities and Systems of Settings,
describes a type of analysis which looks at the many functions of a single artifact in order to
determine the different human behaviors attending those functions.
122
He conceptualizes the
past environment as consisting of different feature elements: fixed, semi-fixed, and non-fixed.
The fixed-feature, or built, elements include floors and walls. The semi-fixed-feature elements
consist of interior and exterior furnishings of all sorts, such as tables, dishware and drapery.
Non-fixed-feature elements denote people and their behavior. He notes that within the built
environment, the semi-fixed-feature elements act as cues for human behavior. In the study of
past society, unavoidably, people and their behavior are absent. Thus, the analysis of semi-fixed-
feature elements is crucial for understanding human behavior in the past.
123
The ritually
significant artifacts in the following discussion are semi-fixed-feature elements. Furthermore,
the cultural function of an artifact at a given time determines the behavior of its users and the

121
Nevett 1999, pp. 43-49.
122
Rapoport 1990.
123
Rapoport 1990, p. 13.


39
reverse is also true. For example, on the one hand, the household hearth may be used for
cooking, in which instance the occupants of the house will attend to the hearth in its function as
the place for food preparation. On the other hand, if the same hearth is being used for ritual, the
occupants will interact with the hearth in its function as the religious center of the home. This
multi-functionality is indicative of situations where a semi-fixed-feature element had no single,
fixed function or meaning, but modulated between meanings defined by the culturally significant
purposes it served.

The theoretical approaches in the research of Nevett and Rapoport have inspired the framework
for this thesis.
124
The concept of multi-functionality and the analysis of semi-fixed-feature
elements are crucial for recognizing different ancient behaviors. While textual and iconographic
sources help to shape the picture of ancient Greek behavior they do not include many of the
incidental details relating to domestic life.
125
Therefore, the following analysis will explore how
the multi-functionality of semi-fixed-feature elements in the archaeological record might reflect
ritual behavior in domestic settings.

After identifying the implements of household ritual in ancient literature (see Chapter 3), I then
isolated them in the published excavation reports of Classical and Hellenistic houses in three
cities - Athens, Halieis and Olynthus, and then analyzed. In total, artifacts from sixty-seven
houses, and twenty-one pits and wells, are examined in this study. Athens provides a wealth of

124
Nevett 1999; Rapoport 1990.
125
Nevett 1999, pp. 34-35.


40
ancient source material for domestic religion, but the archaeological evidence is scanty.
126

Alternatively, Halieis and Olynthus supply more archaeological evidence than literary sources,
due to the larger numbers of houses excavated in these cities.
127


The different methods of deposition and subsequent disturbance at each site have influenced the
context of ritually significant, as well as all other, artifacts. On the one hand, at Olynthus and
Halieis, household artifacts can be studied as from near primary contexts, since these cities were
abruptly abandoned and their inhabitants left behind their household possessions just as they
were. On the other hand, Athens has been continuously inhabited, and houses of the earlier
periods were reused, remodeled, or destroyed to make way for later construction. Thus, most of
the domestic material from ancient Athenian houses is not in its primary use context. In order to
clarify the different depositional processes at work in these three cities, a short description of
each site and its state of preservation follows, preceding the artifact analysis.

Three Cities
Olynthus (Plate 7)
The Classical city of Olynthus, on the Chalcidic peninsula in northern Greece, was occupied
from the later fifth to fourth centuries B.C.E.
128
In 348 B.C.E. the polis was violently destroyed
by Philip II of Macedon. Olynthus was largely abandoned at this time. The Olynthians left their

126
Only two houses from Athens provided relevant data for this thesis, while the twenty-one wells and pits which
contain material from the Persian destruction of Athens contributed the bulk of Athenian data considered in the
present study. See Table 4.
127
Material from fifty-eight houses at Olynthus (Table 2) and seven houses at Halieis (Table 3) has been considered
in this study.
128
There was a settlement on the south hill at Olynthus for the first half of the first millennium B.C.E.


41
homes nearly intact, leaving behind objects which they would have brought along if the city had
been peacefully abandoned.

Between 1928 and 1938, much of the city was excavated by David M. Robinson. The results of
these campaigns were published in fourteen volumes.
129
Nicholas Cahill restudied and analyzed
many of the household assemblages in his 2002 volume Household and City Organization at
Olynthus, which was based on his 1991 dissertation.
130
The thorough excavation and publication
of Olynthus, its sudden destruction and abandonment in 348, and the good preservation of house
plans makes the site exceptional for the study of the Classical Greek house.

I have already mentioned that Olynthian houses contain unique assemblages due to the fact that
these houses were quite suddenly abandoned. Nevertheless, there are many human and natural
processes that have disturbed the preservation of artifact assemblages in these houses. The
citizens of Olynthus must have lived for a time under pressure from Philip II which must have
affected what constituted their household property. Perhaps expensive or more useful
implements were sent away to relatives homes. Citizens may have abandoned their houses
before the siege and taken with them their most valuable items. Another human influence on the
context of the household assemblages is looting. After the capture in 348, the city was looted to
a large extent, not only by Philips soldiers, but also by later foragers. The northwest corner of
the city seems to have suffered the most disruption from later occupation.
131
Plowing, erosion

129
Olynthus I-XIV (1929-1952).
130
Cahill 1991 and 2002.
131
Olynthus IX, p. 370. Prior to 1934, Robinson argued that Olynthus was never reoccupied after 348 B.C.E.
However, after the season of 1934, the excavators found coins dating to the reigns of Alexander the Great and his
successors in the Northwest Quarter, which forced them to admit that this area of the city saw later activity.


42
and other natural disturbances have affected the archaeological context. Generally, houses
buried under a deeper layer of fill (greater than 20 cm to 2 m) than others have preserved a larger
number of artifacts.
132
Cahill demonstrates that household deposits buried deeper than half a
meter were not significantly affected by erosion, plowing or looting. Those that were closer to
the modern ground surface were more affected by such processes and thus must be interpreted
with care.
133


Halieis (Plate 8)
The city of Halieis sits on the southern side of a harbor at the southern end of the Argolic
peninsula.
134
The water in the harbor was 3-5 meters shallower in antiquity, and at present the
northern section of the site lies underwater.
135
While there are unstratified finds from earlier
periods at Halieis, the first architectural remains of a settlement are from the Archaic period.
Shortly after the destruction of the Archaic settlement in the early sixth century B.C.E., the
Classical city was planned on an orthogonal grid and was occupied until the late fourth or early
third century B.C.E., when it was thoroughly abandoned. Scholars associate the abandonment
with Demetrios Poliorketes; however, there is little evidence of a widespread destruction in the
city.
136
An alternate theory for the abandonment of the city is one of natural, rather than cultural,
agency. John McK. Camp suggests that much of Greece suffered a severe drought in the late
fourth century B.C.E., which caused the abandonment of Halieis, and the southern Argolid, in

132
Cahill 2002, pp. 68-70, fig. 11.
133
Cahill 2002, pp. 68-69.
134
Rudolph 1984, p. 144.
135
Ault 1994, pp. 32-33.
136
There is some destruction on the acropolis, see Jameson 1969, pp. 320-321.


43
general. He bases this theory upon evidence from Athenian houses; in the late fourth century
B.C.E., household wells were replaced with cisterns.
137


The artifactual assemblages at Halieis share the unique fortune of those at Olynthus of being
quite suddenly abandoned. However, like those at Olynthus, the artifacts at Halieis have endured
cultural and natural processes that have disrupted the primary context of their deposition.
Specifically, there was a late Roman presence at the site, and an early Byzantine bath was built
over the now submerged Hermione gate.
138


Athens (Plate 9)
The state of preservation of the Late Archaic/Early Classical city of Athens is quite different
from that of Olynthus and Halieis. The city has been continuously inhabited since prehistoric
times and presents interpretive difficulties for archaeologists. Houses were reused and
remodeled, or simply demolished to make way for ancient buildings and modern structures.
However, in the area of the Classical Athenian Agora it is possible to investigate Late
Archaic/Early Classical Athenian houses. The houses have been excavated and published over
the last seventy-five years by the American School of Classical Studies in Athens.
139
Due to the
different cultural processes in and around the Agora, houses are preserved to varying degrees.
For example, the houses at the north foot of the Areopagus hill are better preserved toward the
south, where hillslope erosion silted them over more quickly and deeply than those to the north,

137
Camp 1977, pp. 145-159; 1982, pp. 15ff.
138
Jameson 1969, p. 325.
139
Young 1951a, 1951b; Thompson 1954, 1959; Shear 1969, 1973, 1993; Agora XIV.


44
which have been almost totally destroyed by modern building activity.
140
Houses atop the
Areopagus were nearly obliterated by the construction of a Roman Basilica.
141
Just southwest of
the Agora, the plans of two Classical houses were recovered, though the area is much disturbed
by later construction and pit digging.
142


While the preservation of Athenian houses is not as ideal as at Olynthus and Halieis, it does have
its own unique source of evidence for Late Archaic/Early Classical houses. In and around the
Agora there are a series of twenty-two wells and pits which contain closed deposits dating from
just after the Persian destruction of Athens in 480 B.C.E. (Plate 10).
143
It seems that after the
attack, the Athenians swept up the debris from their wrecked homes and dumped it into well-
shafts which they no longer considered a suitable source of water. T. Leslie Shear Jr. explains
that these deposits contain absolutely homogenous material, plainly thrown into the open well
shaft at one time, and that the majority of the material undoubtedly originated in the china
cupboards of Athenian households.
144
These deposits provide scholars of Athenian houses with
a quantity of evidence for domestic ceramic assemblages in Late Archaic/Early Classical Athens.

Artifact Analysis
The Hearth-Altar
Chapter 3 outlined the different rituals practiced in the ancient Greek home according to literary
sources. Many of these rites focus around the hearth of the household and others require the use

140
Thompson 1959, p. 99.
141
Shear 1973, p. 138.
142
Young 1951b, p. 187; Agora XIV, pp. 174-177.
143
This paper considers only the twenty-one deposits examined in Shear 1993.
144
Shear 1993, p. 393.


45
of an altar. Today, we tend to think of the hearths and altars mentioned in ancient literature as
built or fixed-feature elements in a setting. The extant built hearths at Olynthus, Halieis and
Athens are usually curbed by stone or earth and are often filled with layers of ash, potsherds,
bones and other household debris (Plate 11.1).
145
Built altars, which have been found at
Olynthus, are classified as ceremonial altars by Yavis (Plate 11.2).
146
In most Olynthian houses,
the position of the built, or ceremonial, altar is indicated by a base of stone, or a rectangular or
square-shaped gap in the pavement of the room.
147
Many of the houses in Athens, Halieis, and
Olynthus did not contain evidence for a fixed-feature altar nor hearth (Tables 2-4). However,
portable, or semi-fixed-feature, hearths and altars have been found during the excavations of
these three cities (Table 1).
148


An alternative to built hearths are portable ones, called braziers or eschara (Plate 12.1).
Aristophanes illustrates the portability of the hearth, having Dikaeopolis request,
Ao.,, .L.v.yio+.
+qv .o_oov oi o.fo ioi +qv iioo.
(Aristophanes, Ach. 887-888)

Servants, fetch me forth the brazier and the fan.
Both terracotta and metal braziers have been found in archaeological investigations. In House A
xi 10, at Olynthus, a brazier was buried in the floor of room i, presumably to protect it from

145
Olynthus VIII, p. 187; Ault 1994, pp. 99 and 167.
146
Yavis 1949, pp. 177-183.
147
Olynthus VIII, p. 159.
148
However, each city does not contain every category of hearth and altar. See Tables 1-4.


46
being looted.
149
This example demonstrates that the portable hearth must have been valuable
object.

Small altars, or arulae, are more common than built altars at Olynthus, Halieis and Athens.
Arulae can be of stone or terracotta, painted or plain, the stone worked or unworked (Plate 12.2).
The shape and size varies as well; those found in houses are usually shorter than half a meter
high,
150
as opposed to the fixed-feature altar found in House A 10 at Olynthus.
151
Arulae,
regardless of their exact dimensions and material, are moveable and light enough that a capable
person could lift them. The portability of the arula and the brazier would facilitate the
interchangeable ritual relationship that I suggest below.

Not every house in this study contains both an altar and a hearth, a fact that might indicate that in
household ritual the hearth or altar may have been used instead of, or substituted for, the other.
Constantine Yavis defines an altar as any object or structure, temporary or permanent, which
served the purpose of receiving the fire in which flesh offerings for the god were burned.
152

According to Yavis definition, the hearth is a type of altar. Therefore, it could have functioned
as an altar in the rituals described in ancient literature. However, if a house contained a proper
altar, preference might have been given to this object in domestic ritual. Nonetheless, it seems
that the hearth and altar may have enjoyed an interchangeable relationship. Perhaps then, their
meaning and function in household ritual can be shared, or even substituted for one another.

149
Olynthus VIII, p. 129.
150
The portable altars at Olynthus range from 12 to 25 centimeters in width, and from 10 to 30 centimeters in height.
See the table in Olynthus VIII, pp. 322-323.
151
Approximate dimensions: 1.02 meters long, 0.74 meters wide, 0.61 meters high, Olynthus VIII, p. 320.
152
Yavis 1949, p. 54.


47
Assuming this reciprocal religious relationship, hereafter I use the term hearth-altar to indicate
the transposable ritual use of the hearth and altar.

When a ritual required the use of the hearth-altar, the portable form, either brazier or arula, could
be used instead of a built version. Furthermore, if these semi-fixed feature elements share this
interchangeable characteristic, then their ritual meaning and function can be shared, or even
substituted for one another. The portability and interchangeability of the hearth-altar affords
more spatial flexibility within the house, as well as efficient use of domestic space. In light of
the above, we can envision rituals such as the amphidromia, which ancient literature describes as
family members carrying a newborn baby around the hearth at a run, occurring around one type
of the hearth-altar, either a built hearth, a built altar, a brazier or an arula! The portable and
interchangeable nature of the hearth-altar allows us to form new and varied pictures of hearth-
centered household cult (see Chapter 3 for other examples of rituals focused around the hearth).

The evidence from the houses indicates that not every house had a hearth or altar, though some
had both.
153
Ten of the fifty-eight houses examined at Olynthus contain a combination of built
and portable hearths and altars (Table 1). Some houses contain both the built and portable
versions of an altar or hearth.
154
Domestic rituals in these households may have occurred around
a hearth-altar which did not share its function with other household activities. Perhaps their
hearth had one function and their altar quite another, unlike the multi-functional hearth-altars I
propose here.

153
See tables 2-4 for the number of hearths and altars found in each house, in each city.
154
Houses A 10, A viii 3, A viii 5, A viii 8, the House of Many Colors, the House of the Comedian, the House of the
Tiled Prothyron, and the Villa of the Bronzes.


48

Louters
The louter, like the household hearth, probably served functions beyond its ritual use (discussed
in Chapter 3). The louter could also be used in food preparation and other day-to-day
washing.
155
Vase-painting preserves scenes of both men and women using the louter for sponge
baths (Plate 13.1), and hand-washing (Plate 13.2). In domestic cult, the louter is associated with
ritual washing and miasma. As discussed in Chapter 3, a louter was set up in front of houses
which were polluted by birth or death in order to warn passersby that the house was polluted. It
also served to hold water for ritual baths as well as for the purification of those who entered or
exited an impure house.

Thuribles
Thuribles, or thymiateria, were used to burn incense. Incense was sprinkled onto the thurible,
which held hot coals.
156
There are a few vase-paintings that depict a winged figure holding a
thurible.
157
In one, smoke billows out of the perforations in the top of the thurible.
158
These
openings allowed the burning incense fumes to escape, once it was sprinkled onto the smoldering
coals. Thuribles were recovered in the excavations of all three of the cities which comprise this
study (see Tables 2-4) and are often found in the sacred context of sanctuaries, which is

155
Pease 1937, pp. 296-297; Amyx 1958, pp. 222-226.
156
Agora XII, p. 182.
157
Oxford, Ashmolean Museum, 1879.172; ARV
2
560, no. 6; Para 388; CVA Oxford 1 [Great Britain 26], pl. 33
[125]: 4; Oxford, Ashmolean Museum, 1879.173; ARV
2
560 no. 7; Para 388; CVA Oxford 1 [Great Britain 26], pl.
33 [125]: 3.
158
Paris, Louvre G119A, G119; ARV
2
199, no. 35; Add
2
191; Oakley et al. 1997, fig. 13A.


49
indicative of their ritual significance.
159
Their use in domestic cult, or public cult, is not well-
documented in ancient literature. However, there are numerous references to ritual incense-
burning.
160
Antiphon, in the reference made in Chapter 2, mentions two men sprinkling incense
during a household sacrifice to Zeus Ktesios.
161


Ritual Implements
Domestic Sacrifice
Household sacrifices formed one aspect of domestic cult and accompanied many of the rituals
discussed in Chapter 3. For example, in Platos Republic, the elderly Kephalos sits on a couch
with a wreath on his head, for he had just finished sacrificing in the courtyard of his house.
162

Xenophons Oeconomicus reports that the implements for sacrifice were stored in the home.
Isomachus describes that he and his wife set about separating their household possessions by
category, and that they began by collecting together the vessels they used for sacrificing.
163
A
reference from Aeschylus Agamemnon provides evidence that household sacrifice occurred in
the house. Klytaemnestra speaks of victims awaiting sacrifice at the central hearth.
164
This
indicates that domestic sacrifice took place at the hearth in its role as the hearth-altar. Thus,
household sacrifice would take place upon a hearth-altar capable of receiving the flesh offerings
for the gods. As previously determined, there are several varieties of hearth-altars, built or
portable, and any of these types could have been used for domestic sacrifices (Table 1). This

159
Corinth XVIII, part 3, note 4 and pp. 130-131.
160
Herodotus 1.183.2, 2.40.3; Aristophanes Nub. 426, Vesp. 96, Ran. 871.
161
Antiphon 1.18.
162
Plato Resp. 328c.
163
Xenophon, Oec. 9.7
164
Aeschylus, Ag. 1055-57.


50
range of possibilities indicates the flexibility of domestic cult. Once an oikos finished sacrificing
at its hearth-altar, it would be transformed from its ritual function into its cooking function, much
like the sacrifices at large public festivals. At civic religious festivals, a large quantity of
livestock was sacrificed. The choicest bits were sacrificed to the gods and afterwards the
remaining meat was given to the public for feasting. In this way, the public altar upon which the
animals were sacrificed, like the hearth-altar in domestic ritual, first served its function as the
sacrificial altar and then its function as a place for cooking.

Ritual Washing
As discussed in Chapter 3, ritual washing played an important role in domestic rituals such as the
Greek marriage. In vase-painting iconography, the presence of the loutrophoros, due to its
distinctive function as a vessel used for prenuptial baths, denotes a scene associated with
prenuptial baths and by extension, marriage itself.
165
Vase-paintings depict the procession of the
bride and her family to fetch the bathwater, and in these paintings, the loutrophoros is used
(Plates 2-3).
166
This evidence, therefore, illustrates that the ritual washing which preceded
marriage rites required a loutrophoros for transporting and pouring the bathwater.

Two loutrophoroi were recorded from the closed deposits around the Athenian Agora. Unlike
the hearth and louter, the function of the loutrophoros was limited to ritual circumstance
although its form is based on the more practical shape of a household neck amphora.
167
Few

165
Oakley and Sinos 1993, p. 15.
166
Jerusalem, Bible Lands Museum 4641; ARV
2
1102, no. 2; Oakley and Sinos 1993, figs. 16-19. Athens, National
Museum 1453; ARV
2
1127, no. 18; Add
2
332; Para 453; Oakley and Sinos 1993, figs. 14-15.
167
Kanowski 1984, pp. 100-103.


51
survive from household contexts, perhaps because in ancient Athens, it was common practice to
place a loutrophoros upon the grave of one who died unmarried.
168
Thus, funerary use might
limit the number of loutrophoroi which remain in domestic contexts. Loutrophoroi were also
dedicated by unwed girls, and those who had recently married, to The Nymph or Artemis
Brauronia, goddesses who were the guardians of girls youth and maidenhood.
169


Funerary rites also required ritual washing. It was customary for the women of the oikos to bath
the corpse before the prothesis. Aristophanes, in the Ekklesiazusae, prescribes that lekythoi be
placed around the couch upon which the corpse lie.
170
Perhaps the lekythoi and other small
pitchers excavated from Greek houses are those that were on hand to be used in funeral rites.
Several Olynthian houses and the closed deposits in the Athenian Agora contained lekythoi.
171

Lekythoi, like amphorai and louters, also had non-ritual functions. The iconography of lekythoi
ranged from funerary scenes to Dionysiac scenes, which demonstrate that the vessels might also
have sympotic connections. The lekythos, then, is yet another household vessel form with a
variety of contextual uses.

The Apparatus of Ritual Washing
Nicholas Cahill suggests that room c in House A iv 9, at Olynthus, which contained a louter
along with a portable altar, was a domestic shrine (Plate 14). In the southeast corner of the room
was a rectangle made of mudbrick and stone, plastered in some places and drained by a channel

168
Above note 113.
169
Travlos 1971, p. 361.
170
Aristophanes, Ecc. 1030ff. This is also depicted in a vase-painting, see Berlin, Antikensammlung, F2684; ARV
2

1390, no. 3; Add
2
373; Kurtz 1975, pl. 54:2.
171
Cahill 2002, pp. 88-147; Shear 1993, pp. 389-391.


52
made of rooftiles. The space contained an upright, marble louter stand and a portable terracotta
altar. Cahill suggests that this louter was used specifically for ritual washing.
172
Furthermore, in
the court of the House of Many Colors at Olynthus, a marble louter was found with a storage
amphora. Perhaps these two objects, or variations on them, would function together as the most
basic implements for ritual washing in the home, such as for prenuptial baths and the bathing of
corpses. The evidence from Olynthus indicates that an altar might be another item used for ritual
bathing, alongside the louter and pouring vessel.

Tables 2-4 demonstrate that not every house in every city contained each or any of these ritually
significant objects. However, due to the multi-functionality of many household items, it is
possible that non-specific forms could have been used in the place of or in conjunction with a
specifically sacred object. The flexibility of domestic implements allows for household cult to
be similarly flexible.

172
Cahill 2002, pp. 108-111.


53
CHAPTER 5. CONCLUSIONS

Hestia and the household hearth have rightfully stood at the center of this discussion of domestic
religion in ancient Greek households. While domestic cult may be focused upon the hearth,
specifically, the actual hearth can be interpreted much more loosely. Much as Hestia, herself, is
a metonym for the household hearth and by extension, the entire household, so is the term
hearth for its many archaeological manifestations.

The synthesis of ancient literary sources and archaeological evidence helps to clarify our
conception of ancient domestic cult. Although there is literary evidence for the worship of gods
in the house, such as Hestia, Zeus, Hermes, Apollo and Hekate, the rituals associated with these
gods did not require specialized equipment, and thus are difficult to identify in the archaeological
record. The reality seems to be that common household items were used for domestic rituals,
and assumed religious importance only at certain times. Therefore, for indoor sacrifices, or an
offering to Hestia, any form of the hearth-altar could be used, due to the reciprocal ritual
relationship shared between the hearth and altar. This flexibility allowed one form to be
substituted for the other during sacred rites. Ritual washing, such as that which occurs before a
wedding and after a birth, may have required a louter together with a vessel capable of holding
and pouring water, such as an amphora or hydria.
173
These artifacts can serve multiple functions
within the household. A basin like the louter was used not only for rituals, but also for more
mundane household tasks. Similarly, hydriae and amphorae served daily functions other than
their ritual role. It seems that categorizing an artifact according to a single function might

173
Prenuptial baths would require a loutrophoros, as well.


54
diminish its varied role.
174
It is this multi-functionality that characterizes household objects and
might offer the most insight into the daily life of the Greek oikos.

Ancient sources for domestic cult integrated with archaeological material from excavated houses
seem to demonstrate that everyday, household objects were used as the implements for
household ritual. Thus, depending on the behavioral context of their user, such objects
modulated between different uses, taking on religious significance as necessary.


174
The loutrophoros, however, had a limited range of functions.
55
Table 1. Comparison of built and portable hearths and altars.

Built Hearth Portable Hearth
(brazier)
Built Altar Portable Altar
(arula)
Athens 1 7 0 0
Halieis 2 2 0 1
Olynthus 11 11 16 34


OLYNTHUS
Table 2. Distribution of ritually significant artifacts by house name
Brazier Built
Hearth
Built
Altar
Portable
Altar
Louter Thurible T/C Figurine Miniature
Vessel
A 1 1 4
A 3 1
A 5 Unknown
quantity
Unknown
quantity

A 8 4
A 10 1 4 1 2
A 11 2 2
A iv 1 1
A iv 3 2
A iv 5 2 1
A iv 7 1 10 1
A iv 9 1 4 1 1
A v 1 1 7
A v 6 1 1
A v 9 2 1 3
A v 10 2 2
A vi 2 1
A vi 3 1
A vi 5 1
A vi 6 1
A vi 10 1 1
A vii 2 1
A vii 4 4
A vii 6 1
A vii 9 3 1 Unknown quantity
A viii 1 1
A viii 3 1 1 4 1
A viii 4 2 1
A viii 5 1 3 1
A viii 6 1
A viii 7 4 Unknown quantity
A viii 8 2 2 4
A viii 9 1
A viii 10 1 3 2 3

5
6

OLYNTHUS
Table 2. Distribution of ritually significant objects by house name


Brazier Built
Hearth
Built
Altar
Portable
Altar
Louter Thurible T/C Figurine Miniature
Vessel
A xi 10 1 Unknown quantity
B i 5 1 Unknown quantity
B vi 2 1
B vi 3 1
B vi 4 3
B vi 5 1 5
B vi 6 4
B vi 7 1 7
B vi 8 1 1
B vi 9 1 5
C-x5 2
C-x7 2
D v 6 4
House of Many Colors 1 1 2 1 1 12
House of the Comedian 1 1 27
House of the Tiled
Prothyron
1 2 6 4 2 2
SE House with Triangle
Front
4 1
South Villa 6
Villa CC 1 Unknown quantity
Villa of Good Fortune 1
Villa of the Bronzes 1 2 1 25
Villa of the Twin Erotes 1 1 2
Building A 2 15
East Spur Hill 1 1
East Spur Hill 4 1 Unknown quantity

5
7

HALIEIS

Table 3. Distribution of ritually significant artifacts by house name
Brazier Built
Hearth
Built
Altar
Portable
Altar
Louter Thurible T/C Figurine Miniature Vessel
House A 1 1 10
House C 1 12
House D 1 2 1 6
House E (NE) 1 1 1 17
House E (SE) 1 1
House E (SW) 1 4 3
House 7 1 2 17


5
8

ATHENS
Table 4. Distribution of ritually significant artifacts by house name
Brazier Built
Hearth
Built
Altar
Portable
Altar
Louter Thurible T/C Figurine Miniature
Vessel
Loutrophoros Lekythos
House D 1
Houses on the
North Foot of the
Areopagus

1

B 18:6 1 1
B 19:10 1 1
D 15:1 (15:2) 1 3 3 1
D 17:10 2 3 1 7
D 17:2 1 1 8
E 14:5 1 3
E 15:6 1 1 1 6
E 19:5 1 10 4
G 3:1 1 2 10
G 6:3 1 1 9 1 10
G 11:3 1 3 1
G 11:8 1 3
H 12:15 4 1 2
H 13:5 1 3 3 5 3 59
L 5:2 2 2 3
M 17:4 1 5 16 1 42
Q 12:3 1 4 258
Q 20:1 1 8
Q 21:3 1 1
R 12:1 3 3 8
R 12:4 5 1


5
9



60
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65
PLATES



Plate 1. Map of Greece.



66


Plate 2. Attic red-figure loutrophoros (Oakley and Sinos 1993, figs. 18).
Jerusalem, Bible Lands Museum 4641; ARV
2
1102, no. 2; Add
2
329.



67


Plate 3. Attic red-figure loutrophoros (Oakley and Sinos 1993, fig. 19).
Jerusalem, Bible Lands Museum 4641; ARV
2
1102, no. 2; Add
2
329.


68


Plate 4. Attic red-figure cup by the Amphitrite Painter (Oakley and Sinos, fig. 91).
Berlin, Antikensammlung F2530; ARV
2
831, no. 20, 1702; Add
2
295.





69




Plates 5.1-2. White-ground pyxis by the Splanchnopt Painter (Oakley and Sinos, fig. 97-98).
London, British Museum D11; ARV
2
899, no. 146; Add
2
303.


70


Plate 6. Marble louter from the Villa of the Bronzes at Olynthus
(Olynthus XII, pl. 218).




71


Plate 7. Plan of Olynthus (Cahill 2002, fig. 6).



72


Plate 8. Plan of Halieis after Boyd and Jameson 1981, fig. 2.





73


Plate 9. Plan of the Agora Excavations in Athens after Agora XXIV, pl. 3.



74


Plate 10. Plan of the Late Archaic Athenian Agora, showing the distribution of wells and
debris pits after Shear 1993, fig. 1.


75


Plate 11.1. Built hearth in House A vi 10 (Olynthus VIII, pl. 52.2).





Plate 11.2. Restoration of the built altar in House A vi 5 (Olynthus VIII, pl. 73).


76


Plate 12.1. Brazier from House A xi 10 (Olynthus VIII, pl. 52.1).



Plate 12.2. Altars from from the House of the Tiled Prothyron; left: red clay,
right: stone (Olynthus XII, pl. 188:1-2).


77


Plate 13.1. Using the louter for bathing. Red-figure column krater (Ginouvs
1962, pl. 18:53). Vienna, Kunsthistorisches Museum 2166; ARV
2
1111, no. 1;
Add
2
330.



Plate 13.2. Using the louter for handwashing. Red-figure lekanis by the Eleusinian
Painter (Oakley and Sinos 1993, fig. 44). St. Petersburg, State Hermitage Museum
ST1791; ARV
2
1476, no. 3; Add
2
381.



78


Plate 14 Plan of House A iv 9 at Olynthus after Cahill 2002,
fig. 24.