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Sharing the Civic Sacrifice: Between Honorific Portions and Equal Division
Carbon, Jan-Mathieu; Paul, Stéphanie
2014Feasting and Polis Institutions
 

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Keywords :
Greek Religion; Greek Sacrifice; Greek Feast; Greek Epigraphy
Abstract :
[en] The granting of a sacrificial portion, much like dinner in the prytaneion (sitesis, deipnon), is one of the major benefits bestowed to recipients of Greek honorific and proxeny decrees, across all regions and periods. Yet the highlighting of an individual over and above his peers runs to some extent counter to his inclusion into a citizenship or another form of civic parity. Various inscriptions attest to this sort of tension, which can in fact be viewed as representative of the dialectic between hierarchy and equality that is characteristic of Greek sacrifice: between gods and priests, for instance, or between priests and other worshippers. These relationships were articulated in all manner of sacrifices and civic feasts, from the offering of a divine portion on the altar or cult-table, to the attribution of priestly and honorific portions of meat which were anatomically related to this divine portion, and finally to the distribution of the remaining meat among the other participants (cp. Ekroth). Several important questions can be raised concerning honorific decrees and similar epigraphic materials: Why was a specific portion sometimes, albeit not usually, granted to honoured individuals in these texts? What did the difference between a generic portion or a priestly portion (a leg, an osphys, etc.) entail concerning the status of these honourees? Did it reflect only a local custom or rather a specific intention by the polis in recognising these individuals? And what were the practical and the conceptual differences between direct participation in a civic feast (such as a demothoinia, the civic banquet par excellence) and the sending (apostellein) of perquisites to honoured individuals absent from the feast? In the end, could a distribution of meat (dais, kreanomia) ever be truly "equal", regardless of what a polis might affirm to the contrary? This paper will explore these questions in a more systematic light than has been shed on them up to the present (Schmitt Pantel, Jacquemin). One of the implications will be a partial reconsideration of the prevalent notion of "equal" division (isomoiria) with regard to Greek sacrificial animals. Despite a rhetorical emphasis on commensality and equal sharing, some individuals in the polis were necessarily "more equal than others". In certain cases, the issue was simply the inclusion of a given honouree within the sacrificial community, while in others, the prerogatives at a feast were used to indicate a special status. From a realistic perspective, one can clearly see that the dialectical tension between sacrificial hierarchy and equality was a tool, which was expressed by the varying forms of commensality in civic feasts, and which could be moulded by the polis to suit its needs.
Disciplines :
History
Classical & oriental studies
Author, co-author :
Carbon, Jan-Mathieu ;  Université de Liège - ULiège > UER en histoire et anthropologie des religions
Paul, Stéphanie ;  Université de Liège - ULiège > Sciences de l'Antiquité > UER en histoire et anthropologie des religions
Language :
English
Title :
Sharing the Civic Sacrifice: Between Honorific Portions and Equal Division
Publication date :
18 January 2014
Event name :
Feasting and Polis Institutions
Event organizer :
Utrecht University, Department of History and Art History, Section Ancient History
Event place :
Utrecht, Netherlands
Event date :
du 16 au 18 janvier 2014
By request :
Yes
Audience :
International
Available on ORBi :
since 18 January 2014

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