Note 425 — Chapter XLIII · EVENTS IN SICILY DOWN TO THE EXPULSION OF THE GELONIAN DYNASTY AND THE ESTABLISHMENT OF POPULAR GOVERNMENTS THROUGHOUT THE ISLAND.
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See about Têlinês and this hereditary priesthood, Herodot. vii, 153. τούτους ὦν ὁ Τηλίνης κατήγαγε ἐς Γέλην, ἔχων οὐδεμίαν ἀνδρῶν δύναμιν, ἀλλ’ ἱρὰ τούτων τῶν θεῶν· ὅθεν δὲ αὐτὰ ἔλαβε, ἢ αὐτὸς ἐκτήσατο, τοῦτο οὐκ ἔχω εἶπαι. τούτοισι δὲ ὦν πίσυνος ἐὼν, κατήγαγε, ἐπ’ ᾧ τε οἱ ἀπόγονοι αὐτοῦ ἱροφάνται τῶν θεῶν ἔσονται: compare a previous passage of this history, vol. i, chap. i, p. 26.
It appears from Pindar, that Hiero exercised this hereditary priesthood (Olymp. vi, 160 (95), with the Scholia ad loc. and Scholia ad Pindar. Pyth. ii, 27).
About the story of Phyê personifying Athênê at Athens, see above, vol. iv of this history, chap. xxx, p. 105.
The ancient religious worship addressed itself more to the eye than to the ear; the words spoken were of less importance than the things exhibited, the persons performing, and the actions done. The vague sense of the Greek and Latin neuter, ἱερὰ, or sacra, includes the entire ceremony, and is difficult to translate into a modern language: but the verbs connected with it, ἔχειν, κεκτῆσθαι, κομίζειν, φαίνεν, ἱερὰ—ἱεροφάντης, etc., relate to exhibition and action. This was particularly the case with the mysteries (or solemnities not thrown open to the general public but accessible only to those who went through certain preliminary forms, and under certain restrictions) in honor of Dêmêtêr and Persephonê, as well as of other deities in different parts of Greece. The λεγόμενα, or things said on these occasions, were of less importance than the δρώμενα and δεικνύμενα, or matters shown and things done (see Pausanias, ii, 37, 3). Herodotus says, about the lake of Sais in Egypt, Ἐν δὲ τῇ λίμνῃ ταύτῃ τὰ δείκηλα τῶν παθέων αὐτοῦ (of Osiris) νυκτὸς ποιεῦσι, τὰ καλέουσι μυστήρια Αἰγύπτιοι: he proceeds to state that the Thesmophoria celebrated in honor of Dêmêtêr in Greece were of the same nature, and gives his opinion that they were imported into Greece from Egypt. Homer (Hymn. Cerer. 476): compare Pausan. ii, 14, 2.
Δεῖξεν Τριπτολέμῳ τε, Διόκλεΐ τε πληξίππῳ Δρησμοσύνην ἱερῶν· καὶ ἐπέφραδεν ὄργια παισὶ Πρεσβυτέρῃς Κελέοιο... Ὄλβιος, ὃς τάδ’ ὄπωπεν ἐπιχθονίων ἀνθρώπων, etc.
Compare Euripid. Hippolyt. 25; Pindar, Fragm. xcvi; Sophocl. Frag. lviii, ed. Brunck; Plutarch, De Profect. in Virtute, c. 10, p. 81: De Isid. et Osir. p. 353, c. 3. ὡς γὰρ οἱ τελούμενοι κατ’ ἀρχὰς ἐν θορύβῳ καὶ βοῇ πρὸς ἀλλήλους ὠθούμενοι συνίασι, δρωμένων δὲ καὶ δεικνυμένων τῶν ἱερῶν, προσέχουσιν ἤδη μετὰ φόβου καὶ σιωπῆς: and Isokratês, Panegyric. c. 6, about Eleusis, τὰ ἱερὰ καὶ νῦν δείκνυμεν καθ’ ἕκαστον ἐνιαυτόν. These mysteries consisted thus chiefly of exhibition and action addressed to the eyes of the communicants, and Clemens Alexandrinus calls them a mystic drama—Δηὼ καὶ Κόρη δρᾶμα ἐγενέσθην μυστικὸν, καὶ τὴν πλάνην καὶ τὴν ἀρπαγὴν καὶ τὸ πένθος ἡ Ἐλευσὶς δᾳδουχεῖ. The word ὄργια is originally nothing more than a consecrated expression for ἔργα—ἱερὰ ἔργα (see Pausanias, iv, 1, 4, 5), though it comes afterwards to designate the whole ceremony, matters shown as well as matters done—τὰ ὄργια κομίζων—ὀργίων παντοίων συνθέτης, etc.: compare Plutarch, Alkibiad. 22-34.
The sacred objects exhibited formed an essential part of the ceremony, together with the chest in which such of them as were movable were brought out—τελετῆς ἐγκύμονα μυστίδα κίστην (Nonnus, ix, 127). Æschines, in assisting the religious lustrations performed by his mother, was bearer of the chest—κιστόφορος καὶ λικνόφορος (Demosthen. de Coronâ, c. 79, p. 313). Clemens Alexandrius (Cohort. ad Gent. p. 14) describes the objects which were contained in these mystic chests of the Eleusinian mysteries,—cakes of particular shape, pomegranates, salt, ferules, ivy, etc. The communicant was permitted, as a part of the ceremony, to take these out of the chest and put them into a basket, afterwards putting them back again: “Jejunavi et ebibi cyceonem: ex cistâ sumpsi et in calathum misi: accepi rursus, in cistulam transtuli,” (Arnobius ad Gent. v, 175, ed. Elmenherst,) while the uninitiated were excluded from seeing it, and forbidden from looking at it “even from the house-top.”
Τὸν κάλαθον κατιόντα χαμαὶ θασεῖσθε βέβαλοι Μήδ’ ἀπὸ τῶ τέγεος. (Kallimachus, Hymn. in Cererem, 4.)
Lobeck, in his learned and excellent treatise, Aglaophamus (i, p. 51), says: “Sacrorum nomine tam Græci, quam Romani, præcipuè signa et imagines Deorum, omnemque sacram supellectilem dignari solent. Quæ res animum illuc potius inclinat, ut putem Hierophantas ejusmodi ἱερὰ in conspectum hominum protulisse, sive deorum simulacra, sive vasa sacra et instrumenta aliave priscæ religionis monumenta; qualia in sacrario Eleusinio asservata fuisse, etsi nullo testimonio affirmare possumus, tamen probabilitatis speciem habet testimonio similem. Namque non solum in templis ferè omnibus cimelia venerandæ antiquitatis condita erant, sed in mysteriis ipsis talium rerum mentio occurrit, quas initiati summâ cum veneratione aspicerent, non initiatis ne aspicere quidem liceret.... Ex his testimoniis efficitur (p. 61) sacra quæ Hierophanta ostendit, illa ipsa fuisse ἄγια φάσματα sive simulacra Deorum, eorumque aspectum qui præbeant δεῖξαι τὰ ἱερὰ vel παρέχειν vel φαίνειν dici, et ab hoc quasi primario Hierophantæ actu tum Eleusiniorum sacerdotum principem nomen accepisse, tum totum negotium esse nuncupatum.”
Compare also K. F. Hermann, Gottesdienstliche Alterthümer der Griechen, part ii, ch. ii, sect. 32.
A passage in Cicero de Haruspicum Responsis (c. 11), which is transcribed almost entirely by Arnobius adv. Gentes, iv, p. 148, demonstrates the minute precision required at Rome in the performance of the festival of the Megalesia: the smallest omission or alteration was supposed to render the festival unsatisfactory to the gods.
The memorable history of the Holy Tunic at Treves, in 1845, shows what immense and wide-spread effect upon the human mind may be produced, even in the nineteenth century, by ἱερὰ δεικνύμενα.