What did Athenians ask the Delphic
Oracle?
Sources for our knowledge
- Some ancient authors report oracular
responses
- a few inscriptions survive
Methodological issue> how typical were
those consultations?
Critical approach necessary

When oracle was consulted, for
what?








-Plague, famine, drought, catastrophe
War or casus belli
Portents, prodigies
Problems of rulership
Welfare of city or state
Desire to found a city or colony
Worship of gods, how to honor and please them
Religious problems
Examples of oracle consultation for
plague, famine, catastrophe

The following example recorded by a later
historian (Diogenes Laertius, 3rd century
AD) writing about the 6th century
“When the Athenians were attacked by a
plague, the Pythia told them to purify the
city. And he came in the 46th Olympiad
(595-2 BC) and purified the city and
stopped the plague in this way.
Plato writing on the same episode
 Plato’s Laws 642 d

You have probably heard how that inspired
man Epimenides…was born in Crete, and
how ten years before the Persian War (i.e.
500BC) in obedience to the oracle of a
god he went to Athens and offered certain
sacrifices which the god had ordained.
Methodological problems when
comparing two sources about same
incident
Note difference in date
 For Diogenes Laertius (who has most
likely the correct date) the incident was
placed in the early 6th century, whereas
for Plato in late 6th, beginning 5th (note
that ten years before persian wars puts us
in 500 BC, persian wars 490)

Another example- PLAGUE
Plague of 430, just after the outbreak of the
Peloponnesian War (of 431BC)
 Athens was struck by a very serious plague,
perhaps smallpox or a form of typhus according
to University of Athens team
 The plague killed about 1/3 of the population of
Athens. See archaeological record, and article in
Archaeology magazine.

Plague in Athens



Recent findings from a mass grave in the Ancient
Cemetery of Kerameikos in central Athens show typhoid
fever may have caused the plague of Athens, ending
centuries of speculation about what kind of disease killed
a third of the city’s population and contributed to the
end of its Golden Age.
Examined by a group of Greek scientists coordinated by
Dr Manolis Papagrigorakis of Athens University’s School
of Dentistry, the findings provide clear evidence that
Salmonella enterica serovar Typhi was present in the
dental pulp of teeth recovered in remains from the mass
grave.
Fromhttp://www.ekathimerini.com/4dcgi/news/content.a
sp?aid=65444



The plague that decimated the population of Athens in
430-426 BC was a deciding factor in the outcome of the
Peloponnesian Wars, ending the Golden Age of Pericles
and Athens’s predominance in the Mediterranean.
It broke out during the siege of the city by the Spartans
in the early summer of 430 BC; after a brief hiatus in
428 BC, the epidemic returned in the winter of 427 BC
and lasted until the winter of the following year. It is
assumed that one-third of the Athenians, including onefourth of their army and their charismatic leader,
Pericles, perished in the epidemic.
Quoted from:
http://www.ekathimerini.com/4dcgi/news/content.asp?ai
d=65444

Kerameikos, the Athens cemetery, is
named after Keramos, son of Dionysios
and Ariadne, hero of potters.

Connect that with our discussion on hero
cults.
Kerameus in greek means potter
The site of a mass grave and nearly
1,000 tombs from the fourth and
fifth century B.C.
From Archaeology magazine



A unique mass grave and nearly 1,000 tombs from the fifth and
fourth century B.C. were recovered during excavations prior to
construction of a subway station just outside Athens' ancient
Kerameikos cemetery. Both the mass grave and the tombs were
destroyed after rescue excavations.
Located near the surface, the mass grave was excavated during
1994-95 by Efi Baziotopoulou-Valavani of the Third Ephoreia
(Directorate) of Antiquities. Inside a shaft were some 90 skeletons,
ten belonging to children. Baziotopoulou thinks a tumulus crowning
the shaft may have contained 150 people. Skeletons in the graves
were placed helter-skelter with no soil between them. It was
bordered by a low wall that seems to have protected the cemetery
from a marsh. Along with the skeletons, various ceramic burial
offerings were found, far fewer than excavators expected.
http://www.archaeology.org/online/news/kerameikos.html
The fifth-century B.C. Greek historian
Thucydides detailed the panic caused by the
plague, which struck Athens and Sparta in 430
and lasted two years, killing nearly a third of the
population. He wrote that bodies were
abandoned in temples and streets, where they
were collected and hastily buried. The disease
reappeared in the winter of 427 B.C.
 http://www.archaeology.org/online/news/keram
eikos.html


A white-ground
lekythos (oil flask),
left and a blackglazed pot, right
[were recovered from
a mass grave.
Plague could be associated with problems
in communication with the divine, see
begnning of Iliad
 Displeasure of gods
 Need to please the gods
 Purification/cleansing rites

The Plague of Athens and the Cult
of Asclepius
The plague had an enormous effect on the
imagination, self-esteem of the city
 Influences in literary genres, especially tragedy.
 Robin Mitchell-Boyask’ s work studies the impact
of the plague on Athenian tragedy in the 420s
and argues that the development of the cult of
Asclepius (healer god) is related, investigating
the relations between drama, healing and the
polis afflicted by the plague.

Asclepius
Healing god,
 Son of Apollo and Coronis (his mother was killed, laid
out on a funeral pyre to be consumed, but the unborn
child was rescued from her womb
 parallel with Dionysus story.
 The cult of Asclepios was very popular. His healing
temples were called Asclepieion; pilgrims went to them
to be healed. They slept overnight and reported their
dreams to a priest the following day to find a cure.
 Famous Asclepieion near theater of Epidaurus
 Ritual of incubation

Roman statue of
Asclepius
