#eleusis mysteries

Ἕκτη Μεσοῦντος/ Ἕκτη ἐπὶ δέκα /Ἑκκαιδεκάτη, XVI day
From today’s sunset: sixteenth day of Boedromion.
‘Elasis’ (from Halade mystai- initiates to the sea’) - “Halade mystai: a day of the Mysteries celebrated in Athens.”

‘Halade mystai’ is the command of the Hierophant. At dawn, the initiates, each along with his/her mystagogos, go down to the sea-shore of Phaleros or Pireos (or at the Rheitoi, or in Eleusis), to purify themselves and the piglets they have to sacrifice to Demeter on their return to Athens (“as a mystic initiate was washing a pig in the harbour of Cantharus”). This day is associated then with purifications of all kinds (sea-water, water from the Rheitoi lakes, piglets’ blood, Dios koidion, etc…)

“Chabrias won the naval battle of Naxos on the sixteenth day of Boedromion, considering it as an auspicious day for that battle, because it was one of the days during which were celebrated the Mysteries…Chabrias had as ally the cry ‘initiates to the sea’.”

“So, to those that approach the Holy Celebrations of the Mysteries, there are appointed purifications and the laying aside of the garments worn before…”
(Plotinus, First Ennead VI, 7)

(See Hesychius, s.v. halade mystai; Plutarch, Phokion 28.3, de Glor. Ath. 349; Mylonas 1961, pp. 249-50; Polyaenos 3.11.2; Etym. M. s. v.: hiera hodos; Suda s.v. Dios koidion)

(Kore purifying a candidate for initiation; Museum of Eleusis)

Τετάρτη Μεσοῦντος/ Τετρὰς ἐπὶ δέκα/ Τεσσαρεκαιδεκάτη, XIV day
From today’s sunset: fourteenth day of Boedromion.
The epheboi escort back the Sacred objects from Eleusis to the Eleusinion in Athens.
“…it must be ordained to the cosmete of the epheboi to lead the youths at Eleusis in observance of the ancient customary rule on the 13th of the month Boedromion, in the usual form of the procession that accompanies the sacred objects, so that on the 14th they accompany back the sacred objects up to the Eleusinion in the City, so that there are more discipline and greater surveillance over the sacred objects, when the phaiduntés of the Two Goddesses, according to the traditions of the Homeland, announces to the priestess of Athena the arrival of the sacred objects and of the escort …” (IG II2 1078)

(Caryatid from the roof of the small Propylaea in Eleusis, bringing on her head the ciste, holding the Sacred objects. Eleusis Museum)

Τρίτη Μεσοῦντος/ Τρισκαιδεκάτη/ Τρίτη ἐπὶ δέκα, XIII day
From today’s sunset: thirteenth day of Boedromion.

Procession of the epheboi toward Eleusis.
“Driantianos, archon of Eumolpidai, said:
“As we celebrate even to this day and administer the Mysteries as in the past and as established by the traditional norm and by the Eumolpidai, it is up to the people to decide, with good fortune, the modes of transport in an orderly way of the sacred objects from Eleusis to here (Eleusinion in the City ) and then from the City to Eleusis, it must be ordained to the cosmete of the epheboi to lead the youths at Eleusis in observance of the ancient customary rule on the 13th of the month Boedromion, in the usual form of the procession that accompanies the sacred objects … “ (IG II2 1078)

(Pentelic marble caryatid: a woman dressed to take part in religious rites. In a style adapted from Athenian work of the 5th century BCE. One of a group of five surviving caryatids found at the site, arranged to form a colonnade in a Sanctuary, most probably of Demeter (also Isis has been suggested, cf. Cook 2011, nr. 264: ‘A Statue of Isis, six feet six inches high; upon the head is the calyx of the Lotus, the symbol of this deity; The rose, chaplets, and other emblems of production are placed on other parts of the head; It is draped in a similar manner to the statue of Libera’). The Sanctuary was built on land owned by Regilla, wife of Herodes Atticus. We ought not to forget that Regilla was a priestess of Demeter and that her husband, at her death, dedicated her garments and jewelry at the Sanctuary in Eleusis (cf. Jennifer Tobin, Herodes Attikos and the City of Athens: Patronage and Conflict under the Antonines; Walter Ameling, Herodes Atticus, 2 voll; B. F. Cook, The Townley Marbles)
The so called ‘Townley Caryatid’, now in the British Museum…)

Ἕκτη Φθίνοντος/ Ἕκτη μετ’εἰκάδας, XXV day
From today’s sunset: twenty-fifth (sixth waning of the third decade) of Anthesterion.
ΜΙΚΡΑ ΜΥΣΤΗΡΙΑ - VI day of the LESSER ELEUSINIAN MYSTERIES

“The cathartic (pertaining to purification) and the theoretic (virtues) are telestic (pertaining to mystic ceremonies). Hence, Olympiodoros adds, the cathartic virtues are denominated from the purification which is used in the Mysteries; but the theoretic from perceiving divine things. On this account, he accords with the Orphic verses, that
‘the uninitiated soul that dies
lies plunged in Hades in the blackest mire’
For initiation is the divinely inspired energy of the virtues.”
Iamblichus, Pythagorean Life 167

“For them (the Blessed Ones initiated in the Mysteries) in Elysium the Sun shineth in his strength, in the world below, while here ‘tis night; and, in meadows red with roses, the space before their city is shaded by the incense-tree, and is laden with golden fruits. Some of them delight themselves with horses and with wrestling; others with draughts, and with lures; while beside them bloometh the fair flower of perfect bliss. And over that lovely land fragrance is ever shed, while they mingle all manner of incense with the far-shining fire on the Altar of the Gods. From the other side sluggish streams of darksome night belch forth a boundless gloom.”
(Pindar, Dirges Fragment 129)

(Kore holding the torch; Museum of Cyrene)

Ἑβδόμη Φθίνοντος/ Ἑβδόμη μετ’εἰκάδας, XXIV day
From today’s sunset: twenty-fourth day of Boedromion.
Assembly in the City Eleusinion after the performance of the Mysteries.(And. 1. 111; IG II2 848)
“When we had returned from Eleusis, and the information had been presented and the King Archon had made his appearance, to deliver, as is a custom of the Prytanes, his report of what had taken place at Eleusis during the Festival, they requested that they might take him before the Senate and asked him to notify both Cephisius and me to be present at the Eleusinium. For the Senate was about to sit there, according to the law of Solon which commands them to sit in the Eleusinium upon the day after the performance of the Mysteries.”
Andocides, On the Mysteris, 1. 111

(Marble statuette of Persephone wearing a high polos and holding a pomegranate flower. From the Sanctuary of Underworld Deities in  Knidos, circa 350-300 BCE. Now in the British Museum…)

Ὀγδόη Φθίνοντος/ Ὀγδόη μετ’εἰκάδας, XXIII day
From today’s sunset: twenty-third day of Boedromion.
Epistrophè. The mystai return to their own City, in small groups and not with a procession; Strabo tells us that, on this day, ‘gephyrismoi’ took place at the passing of the Athenian Kephisos (Strabo IX, 1, 24). Meeting of the Sacred Assembly in Eleusis. (IG II2 1072, 1-3)

(Domitia as Demeter, Roman statue after a Greek original, 1st century CE. Now in the Musée d'Art Classique, Mougins…).

Ἐνάτη Μεσοῦντος/ Ἐνάτη ἐπὶ δέκα / Ἐννεακαιδεκάτη, XIX day
From today’s sunset: nineteenth day of Boedromion.
Iakchos- day of the procession’ (from the nineteenth to the twentieth day of Boedromion)

The initiates, each one along with his/her mystagogos, meet at the Kerameikos, between the Dipylon and the Sacred Gate- where the Hiera Odos begins- where there is the Pompaion. The Eleusinian priests carry the Hierà from the Eleusinion to the Sacred Gate where the meeting is; the armed epheboi, organized by their kosmetes, escort back the procession.
“According to the same rules, the 19th of the month of Boedromion it has to be ordained to the cosmete of the epheboi to lead them again to Eleusis, to act as escort to the sacred objects in the same form; the cosmete in office during the year has to ensure that these rules are never overlooked and that there is never negligence in the acts of piety dedicated to the Two Goddesses; all the youths, wearing full armor, crowned with a wreath of myrtle, have to escort advancing in formation; since it has been given to the youths the order to travel this long road, it’s righteous that they take part in the sacrifices, and the libations and the choral songs that take place during the journey, so that the transport of the sacred objects is carried out with an effective supervision and with a very long procession , and the youths, following the practices of worship devoted to the deity by the City, become more pious men … ”

The great procession to Eleusis, bearing the God Iakchos in front, begins- wearing festive garments and garlands of myrtle on their heads, carrying bunches of myrtle twigs and bundles of provisions attached to the end of sticks, the mystai start the journey toward Eleusis in a joyous mood. “The initiates used a myrtle-crown, and not of ivy…because Demeter liked the myrtle and because it was consecrated to the Chthonian Gods.”
Much can be learned of this celebration from the chorus’s imitation of them in Aristophanes’ comedy, The Frogs…

“He declared that after the army of Xerxes had, in the absence of the Athenians, wasted Attica, he chanced to be with Demaratus the Lacedaemonian in the Thriasian plain, and that while there, he saw a cloud of dust advancing from Eleusis, such as a host of thirty thousand men might raise. As he and his companion were wondering who the men, from whom the dust arose, could possibly be, a sound of voices reached his ear, and he thought that he recognised the mystic hymn to Bacchus. Now Demaratus was unacquainted with the rites of Eleusis, and so he inquired of Dicaeus what the voices were saying. Dicaeus made answer- "O Demaratus! beyond a doubt some mighty calamity is about to befall the king’s army! For it is manifest, inasmuch as Attica is deserted by its inhabitants, that the sound which we have heard is an unearthly one, and is now upon its way from Eleusis to aid the Athenians and their confederates.”
(Er. VIII 65)

“At this stage of the struggle they say that a great light flamed out from Eleusis, and an echoing cry filled the Thriasian plain down to the sea, as of multitudes of men together conducting the mystic Iacchus in procession. Then out of the shouting throng a cloud seemed to lift itself slowly from the earth, pass out seawards, and settle down upon the triremes. Others fancied they saw apparitions and shapes of armed men coming from Aegina with their hands stretched out to protect the Hellenic triremes. These, they conjectured, were the Aeacidae, who had been prayerfully invoked before the battle to come to their aid.”
(Plut. - Them. 15)

Many shrines to be visited and many sacrifices to be made during the journey along the Sacred Way - as for example…

- Sanctuary of Apollo

- Temple of Aphrodite

- Rheitoi (apotropaic rites of the Krokonidai: they put on each initiate a wool band of the color of the crocus, on the right hand and left feet- to avert the evil-eye). “The mystai bind their right hand and the left foot with a piece of cloth and this is called ‘to crown with saffron’.” (Anecd. graec. P. 273, 25)

- Eleusinian Kephisos- Gephyrismoi - “Gephyristai: mockers, because at Eleusis, sitting on the parapet of the bridge, they mocked the passers-by.” “.. Gephyris.. a hooded man who, by sitting there in the course of the Mysteries of Eleusis, directed coarse jokes towards the illustrious citizens, indicating them by name.”

- Arrival to the Sanctuary by night (already Boedromion 20):

Welcome to Iakchos, dances around the Kallichoron well and kernophories.

(cfr. IG II2 1078; Arist. Ranae 324ff; Plut. Phoc. 28, Cam. 19; Esych. s.v. Gephyris, gephyristés; Tzetzes ad Arist. Ran. 330a; Eur. Ion 1076; Dione Cris. Or. 12, 33)

(Detail of a scene of the Eleusinian Mysteries: the central figure of Iakchos wearing short patterned long-sleeved chitoniskos and boots, ivy wreath in His hair, holding two torches; a satyr seated to the left with his head turned back, holding the typical branch held by the initiates during the Sacred Procession to Eleusis, in his right hand; by his side a Maenad wearing a patterned chiton; a seated nude youth to the right holding a branch in his left hand, his right arm upraised; a female to the right wearing patterned chiton, holding the drapery at her shoulder with her right hand, her hair bound in a sakkos. A large female bust of Demeter, emerging from the ground line, face tilted up towards Iakchos, wearing diadem in Her curling hair, tresses falling onto Her shoulders; sacred branches in the field.
Attic krater, second quarter of the 4th century BCE. Now in a private collection……)