Note 42 — Chapter V · THE CULT OF SOULS

Permission to attend either the πρόθεσις of the corpse (and the funeral lamentation) or the funeral procession (the ἐκφορά) given only to women of kinship μεχρὶ ἀνεψιότητος: Law ap. Dem. 43, 62–3: i.e. within the ἀγχιστεία, to which alone the duty of the cult of the dead belonged in principle. Only these women of the immediate kin are μιαινόμεναi in the case of death: cf. Hdt. vi, 58; this is the reason for the restrictions laid down by the funeral regulation from Keos (SIG. 877, 25 ff.), which makes an even narrower selection within the ranks of the ἀγχιστεία. (From l. 22 μὴ ὑποτιθέναι, etc., the law speaks of the πρόθεσις, even though at the beginning only the ἐκφορά is in question.)