Chapter II: The Worship of the Dead

No Greek custom constituted a larger part of religious cultus than did the offerings to the dead. And no custom is more frequently portrayed on ancient vases. Such offerings did not begin merely with the funeral, but even earlier.

According to the beliefs of most barbarous or semi-barbarous races, the dead have needs and desires as imperious as those of the living. Indeed, the life of the next world is regarded as in the main a ghostly continuation of previous existence, a life marked by the same habits and requirements as that which men live on earth. But, as the dead man is less materialist in his needs, his wants may be supplied at smaller cost and in less completeness.

In many primitive countries we find the dead man living in his tomb as he had lived in his house, the tomb being often a copy of the house. There he treasures the goods which were buried with him, and there he receives the constant homage and frequent gifts of his descendants.

In Greece, as far back as we can trace burial customs, it was usual to deal liberally with chiefs and warriors when they went to their last resting-place. Indeed, the further back we go, the greater seems to have been the liberality. The richest graves yet discovered in Greece are those of the pre-historic rulers of Mycenae, spoiled by Dr. Schliemann in 1877. In these sepulchres were found treasures sufficient to stock a great museum--armour and ornaments of gold, swords and arrows, drinking-cups and sceptres, every kind of object in which the wealth of semi-barbarous chiefs is commonly displayed. In the historic age the profusion is less marked, but we yet find abundant proofs of the survival of the custom of fully equipping the dead for their existence in the world of shades. Mingled with human bones are sometimes those of horses and dogs, slain to accompany their master, sometimes those of flesh and fowl brought to him for food. Vessels for holding food and wine and oil are among the ordinary equipment of the tomb, lamps are very common, and jewelry and coins in which the thickness of the gold is reduced to that of paper shows the gradual growth of the belief that it is safe to cheat the dead. Ladies take with them to their graves their mirrors and the vessels which contained rouge and other necessaries of the toilet.

In later Greek graves terra-cotta plays a large part. Not only are vessels of this cheap material substituted for the golden or bronze vases and cups of early graves, but also loaves and animals of terra-cotta take the place of more genuine food. And terra-cotta images, sometimes of deities but more often apparently of mere human beings, are laid up in store by the corpse, each being broken, perhaps to render it unfit for the possession of the living. An engraving of a child’s coffin with its contents, which I reproduce from Stackelberg[12] (Fig. 7), will give some idea of the abundant contents of the richer Greek tombs. The symmetrical arrangement of the various vases and of the terra-cotta images is noteworthy; and as parts only of a human skeleton are present, it seems that in this case the body was not placed complete in the coffin, but only the skull, the shin-bones, and other parts of a corpse which had been for the most part disposed of in some other way.

I have been present at excavations at Terranova in Sicily, on which site the resting-places of the dead are formed of several slabs of terra-cotta. Around the skeletons are heaped vases, most commonly of the lekythos form, with occasional coins and other antiquities. But it would be a long task to give anything like a satisfactory account of the contents of tombs in various parts of the Greek world. Every district or city follows its own customs in the matter.

We turn to the sacrifices brought to the tomb. While the burial was taking place, the friends of the deceased threw into the grave terra-cotta figures, vases and the like, breaking them as they threw them. Such at least is the usage traced by Messrs. Pottier and Reinach at Myrina, and they observe that proofs of the existence of a similar custom have been found at Tanagra and Kertch[13]. Libations would take place at the same time from the vessels carried to the tomb for the purpose, as well as afterwards at the funeral feast.

Thenceforward at set seasons sacrifices were offered at the tomb. These seasons were, the third day after burial, τρίτα, the ninth day, ἔνατα, the thirtieth day, which came at the end of the mourning, besides the νεκύσια or general feast of the dead, corresponding to the All Souls’ Day of the Middle Ages, and the γενέσια or birthday of the deceased[14]. And such sacrifices were also made at irregular times, when any portent or significant dream made the survivors suppose that their ancestors were displeased with them. At the beginning of the _Choëphori_ of Aeschylus, of the _Electra_ of Sophocles, and of the _Electra_ of Euripides, mention is made of sacrifices at the tomb of Agamemnon, offered by Clytemnestra in consequence of a dream, which had disturbed her mind. In the _Iphigeneia in Tauris_ of Euripides, Iphigeneia prepares, also in obedience to a dream, to sacrifice to the spirit of her brother Orestes, whom she supposes to be dead.

These passages from the great dramatists exhibit the Athenian custom of the fifth century B.C. How late this custom lasted in Greece may be shown from the language of Lucian, in the second century A.D. Speaking with contempt of the popular beliefs, he writes[15]: ‘People fancy that souls rising from below dine as they can, flitting about the smell and the steam, and drink the honeyed draught from the trench.’ Again, in another place[16], Lucian writes: ‘The shades are nourished by our libations, and by the offerings at the tomb; so that those who have no friend or relative left on earth, live foodless and famished among the rest.’

The offerings brought to the dead were of a simpler and less sumptuous character than those dedicated to the gods. Through Greek history they tended to become less costly. In the _Iliad_ Achilles sacrifices to the spirit of Patroclus not only horses and dogs, oxen and sheep, but also twelve Trojan prisoners. At the taking of Troy, according to the legend, Polyxena was sacrificed on the tomb of Achilles. Not only did the custom of sending slaves to attend a dead chief, and horses for him to ride, die out, but the food of the dead became much less solid than beef and mutton. The laws of Solon forbade the sacrifice of oxen to the dead[17]. As late as the sixth century, an inscription of Ceos[18] speaks of sacrifice at tombs according to the old ritual; but after that time more serious sacrifices were reserved for actual heroes and exceptional tombs. A black ox, for example, was annually offered to the heroes of Plataea down to the time of Plutarch[19], with wreaths and fillets. Ordinary souls had to be content with something much simpler; cakes and flowers, with wine, honey, and milk, sometimes a fowl or a few eggs, sufficed for their somewhat ethereal needs. But in early, and still more in later times, the survivors would sometimes try to show their respect, in exceptional cases, by a great display of grief and by costly sacrifices.

Excavations sometimes reveal to us traces not merely of presents brought to the dead, but of actual sacrifices made to them. For example, when the mound which covered the bodies of those who fell at Marathon was recently excavated[20], traces were found in broken vessels and animals’ bones of the feast held by the survivors at the time of the burial, as well as a trench cut to receive offerings, and considerable masses of ashes, dating no doubt from the yearly sacrifices which in the month of Boedromion the people of Athens offered in gratitude to the heroes who had first dared to look the Mede in the face.

In historic Greece there were recognized heroes of every grade of dignity and importance. A few, such as Amphiaraus and Trophonius, rivalled the gods in their functions, in the number of their worshippers, and the splendour of their shrines. Others, such as Aeacus at Aegina, and Jason at Pherae, were venerated as semi-divine progenitors and supernatural defenders of the cities against all enemies. Others, such as Pelops at Olympia, and Hyacinthus at Amyclae, had tombs in close connexion with some of the most frequented and highly appreciated shrines of the Greek world. But beside these more dignified members of the clan of heroes there stood many whose influence and whose worship belonged only to a locality, to a clan, or a family. The Dorians in particular[21], like all conservative races, carried the worship of deceased parents and ancestors to the furthest point. But all over Greece there were small heroa or chapels belonging to families, the cultus of which was merely an extension of the worship which made sacred the domestic hearth. In modern cemeteries, and more especially in those of France, the tombs are frequently adorned with wreaths of real or artificial flowers, with crosses and designs of beadwork or with religious pictures. So in Greece it was usual to see in the neighbourhood of the tombs of those who had recently passed away, or who had left behind them many friends, the traces of libations, wreaths of flowers, sashes of various colours, even pieces of armour or other more solid gifts which were protected against theft by the sacred character of the spot.

Serious sacrifices to the dead are, as we shall see in a future chapter, a frequent subject of votive tablets and even of actual sepulchral reliefs. The lighter and less solemn offerings to the dead are commonly depicted on white Attic lekythi, which were specially made to be placed in graves, and which take their subjects from that use.

The simplest of these vase-paintings consist merely of representations of a gravestone, bound with sashes or with wreaths, on either side of which stands a survivor, male or female, holding a basket, wreaths, a sash, or the like. In our example (Fig. 8)[22] from a vase of Eretria in the Museum of Athens, the stele is truncated by a licence in drawing, but the relief on it, a woman seated on a chair and holding out a bunch of grapes to a seated boy, is similar to many of the groups in our plates. A mirror is represented as hung on the wall: this no doubt stands for a part of the marble relief. On one side of the stele stands a young man leaning on a staff, who seems to be directing a maiden who stands on the other side, where she shall place two wreaths which she carries. Our engraving makes no attempt to reproduce the brilliant colouring of the original, in which the dresses of the seated lady of the relief and the standing girl who ministers at the tomb are bright red, the garment of the youth brown, and the hair of all the figures a golden brown. In some of these scenes, the stele is hung with more serious offerings than flowers: sometimes a lekythos is suspended from the top or placed on the steps: in some cases, a sword is slung round it by means of a baldric[23]. Sometimes the attendant girls bring elaborate toilet-vases and flasks of oil.

By a curious convention, often the dead person is introduced into the scene, seated on the steps of the basis which supports the sepulchral slab, between the two ministrants. In one case[24] a lady thus seated holds on her finger two little birds, perhaps an indication of a sacrifice, ‘a pair of turtle-doves or two young pigeons.’ On other vases she holds an oil-flask or a toilet-vase. Sometimes, especially if the person represented be a man, he holds a lyre[25]. In our example (Fig. 9) of this curious scheme, a ghost is seen flitting through the air, and one of the attendants brings a little bird. The precise meaning of the lyre has been doubted. M. Pottier thinks that it represents music played before the dead, as part of their cultus. But this, of course, assumes the seated person to be a survivor, and we shall presently show this view to be untenable. It is, however, well known that to be able to play on the lyre as it passed from hand to hand at banquets was part of the training of the Athenian gentleman. It may well seem then that the musical employment of the dead man is merely an instance of the general rule that the Athenians loved to represent their dead in some employment which had been a favourite and characteristic one when they lived. And this view is confirmed by the occurrence on an early stele of the figure in relief of a man carrying a lyre[26].

That the seated personage who plays the lyre if a man, or who if a woman holds a tray of offerings or a lekythos, is not a survivor but a dead person, may be readily shown by a comparison of certain vase-paintings. For an example we may take two lekythi figured on one plate[27] in the _Sabouroff Collection_. On one of these is represented a young man seated beside a stele, playing on a lyre which he holds, while an attendant girl brings him a sash or fillet. On the other the stele is absent, and the scene, which is given in the text

(Fig. 10), seems one taken from daily life. A lady, fully draped, is seated on a chair; in her lap rests a flat box containing sashes; a maid-servant comes to her holding a smaller box with open lid, probably a casket of jewelry. This last scene is closely like many of the Attic sepulchral reliefs[28], and the artist who painted it can scarcely have had in his mind any other intention than that of representing a lady who had died. The former scene must be of parallel significance; and the man seated with the lyre can scarcely be other than the proprietor of the stele beside which he sits.

We add, from a late vase in the British Museum[29], a very interesting sepulchral group (Fig. 11). The tomb is in the form of a pillar with acanthus ornament at the base, resting on a flat slab or table[30]. This latter is heaped up with vases and sashes, the gifts of survivors. Among these gifts stands a female figure in sorrowful attitude, either a statue of the deceased, or more probably herself in spiritual presence. On one side a man raises his hand in greeting or adoration, on the other approaches a girl bearing some offering.