Note 176 — Chapter V · THE CULT OF SOULS

I set down here the expressions occurring in the speeches and the (at any rate contemporary [see Appendix iv]) Tetralogies of Antiphon, which throw light on the religious ideas lying behind the procedure in trials for murder. In the prosecution of the murderer the following are concerned: ὁ τεθνεώς, οἱ νόμοι, and θεοὶ οἱ κάτω, Or. 1, 31. The vigorous prosecution of the case on the part of the relations of the dead is βοηθεῖν τῷ τεθνεῶτι: 1, 31. Tetr. 1 β, 13. The condemnation of the murderer is τιμωρία τῷ ἀδικηθέντι, his personal revenge: 5, 88 = 6, 6. The accusing relatives come before the court as representatives of the dead man, ἀντὶ τοῦ παθόντος ἐπισκήπτομεν ὑμῖν, as they say to the judges, Tetr. 3 γ, 7. The duty of accusing as well as the ἀσέβημα of the deed of bloodshed rests upon them until satisfaction is made for it: Tetr. 1 α, 3. But the μίασμα of the deed attaches to the whole city in which the murderer lives. All who sit at table with him, or live under the same roof, even the temples he walks in, are polluted by his mere presence: hence come ἀφορίαι and δυστυχεῖς πράξεις on the city. It is to the greatest interest of the judges to avert this pollution by giving a propitiatory judgment: Tetr. 1 α, 10; Or. 5, 11, 82; Tetr. 1 α, 3; 1 γ, 9, 11; 3 γ, 6, 7. Above all it is necessary to find the real criminal and to punish him. If the relatives of the dead prosecute some one other than the real doer of the deed, it is they, and not the judges (on account of their wrong decision), who will have to bear the wrath of the dead man and of the avenging spirits: Tetr. 1 α, 3; 3 α, 4; 3 δ, 10; for in this case the murdered man is deprived of his τιμωρία: 3 α, 4. But perjured witnesses and unjust judges are liable to a μίασμα, too, which they then introduce into their own houses: Tetr. 3 α, 3; or at least, if they give a false condemnation (but not a false acquittal) of the accused, they incur the μήνιμα τῶν ἀλιτηρίων acc. to Tetr. 3 β, 8—i.e. that of the falsely condemned person (whereas the murdered man still continues angry with his own relatives). If they knowingly acquit the murderer contrary to justice, the murdered man becomes ἐνθύμιος to the judges and no longer to his relatives: Tetr. 1 γ, 10.—The source of the resentment is said to be the dead man himself: προστρόπαιος ὁ ἀποθανών, Tetr. 1 γ, 10; cf. 3 δ, 10; where he is parallel with τὸ μήνιμα τῶν ἀλιτηρίων. The murdered man leaves behind him τὴν τῶν ἀλιτηρίων δυσμένειαν (and this is what the μίασμα really is—not as some modern writers have imagined, any sort of “moral” pollution—as is clearly stated in this passage: τὴν τῶν ἀλιτ. δυσμένειαν, ἢν . . . μίασμα . . . εἰσάγονται): Tetr. 3 α, 3; cf. Again 3 β, 8; 3 γ, 7. In this case the avenging spirits substitute themselves for the soul of the dead man (just as in the case where a προστρόπαιος τοῦ ἀποθανόντος is spoken of: cf. above, n. 148). The προστρόπαιοι τῶν ἀποθανάντων become themselves δεινοὶ ἀλιτήριοι of the dilatory relatives: Tetr. 3 α, 4. There is no essential distinction between the two (cf. Poll. 5, 131). Elsewhere we hear of τὸ προστρόπαιον as the special attribute or feeling of the murdered man himself: Tetr. 2 δ, 9. Thus also we have the alternatives ἐνθύμιος ὁ ἀποθανών (1 γ, 10) and τὸ ἐνθύμιον (2 α, 2; 2 δ, 9). In this connexion it is clear that ἐνθύμιον (as the fixed and conventional expression for these superstitions) means the indignant memory, the longing for revenge of the murdered man (—ἐνθύμιον ἔστω Δάματρος καὶ Κούρας, GDI. 3541, 8). The proper understanding of this word will help us to see what is meant by the expression ὀξυθύμια used of the meal offered to the dead and Hekate, and the almost identical purificatory offerings, that after the religious cleansing of a house were thrown out at the cross-roads (Harp. s.v. Phot. s.v. Art. 1, 2, 3; AB. 287, 24, 288, 7; EM. 626, 44 ff.). They are intended to appease the easily awakened anger of the souls (and of their patroness Hekate), their ὀξύθυμον, a stronger version of ἐνθύμιον, by apotropaic sacrifice.