Note 112 — Chapter II · THE ANTHESTERIA. The Ritual of Ghosts and Sprites.
Reading edition
Dr Wuensch in his instructive pamphlet Ein Frühlingsfest auf Malta (Leipzig, 1902) discusses a spring festival of the flowering of beans which he believes to be analogous to the Anthesteria, but the rites practised are wholly different. Dr Hiller von Gaertringen (Festschrift für O. Benndorf) calls attention to the title Anthister which occurs in an inscription found on Thera, but the inscription is of the second century B.C., the festival of the ‘Anthesteria’ was celebrated on Thera, as indeed wherever there was a primitive population, and Anthister must have borrowed rather than lent his name.