IEleus 233 Decree of [Eumolpidai] honouring Aristokles of Perithoidai, the hierophant

Decree of [Eumolpidai] honouring Aristokles of Perithoidai, the hierophant

I Eleusis 233 Date: ca. 149/8 BC

In the archonship of Lysiades (ca. 149/8), on the sixteenth of Pyanopsion by divine reckoning (kata theon), but the fifth according to the archon, at the principal meeting (agorai kuriai) in the [Eleusinion?],^[1] Amynomachos son of Eukles of Halai proposed: since the hierophant (5) Aristokles of Perithoidai continues to be well-disposed towards the Eumolpidai, privately to each and collectively to all, and appointed hierophant in the archonship of Hermogenes (183/2) he renewed the writing up of the - ? from the ancient archives (grammateiōn) in the [Eleusinion]^[2] (10) according to which the hierophant in office was required to . . . the Eumolpidai wrote down (sunegrapsan) . . . and in accordance with the decree of Philonautes and the other decrees of the People, wrote down finely the instructions for the introductory sacrifices (eisagōgeia) with the participation of the Eumolpidai, with every [preparation (paraskeuēs)?] (15) and love of honour (philotimias), and introduced a decree that the (scil. procedure for the) introduction should be written up on a stone stele in the Eleusinion; and when many sacrifices had been omitted for a number of years because of the critical times, he both sacrificed in every year himself, and having made (20) an approach to the Council and explained about them he sanctioned a decree in order that there should be many sources of revenue from which sacrifices for the rites might be carried out for the gods according to ancestral tradition . . . of the traditional competition . . . ^[3] (25) . . . . . .

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References:

I Eleusis 233 (Translated text) (PHI)

Agora XVI 306 (PHI) (PHI)

Translation by: Stephen Lambert

Images: Agora Excavations - (1, 2)
Ohio - (1)

Monument type: Stele

Inscription type: Decree (genos Eumolpidai?)

Original location: [City Eleusinion]

Findspot: In or near City Eleusinion (Ag. I 4389 + 5556)

Transliterations on Places on

[1] This inscription is a work of Tracy’s “Cutter of Ag. I 6006”, 169/8-ca. 135/4 BC (for the dates see Tracy, ALC, 155-56, with Horos 26-31, 2014-2019, 48-49). Its two fragments were found in or near the City Eleusinion and may be from the City Eleusinion copy of the same decree as I Eleusis 234 (Clinton. From l. 15 of that inscription it is clear that one of the three copies of it was set up in the City Eleusinion). In l. 3 the Greek text reads ἐν̣ [. . . ca. 6 . . .]νδίωι. Woodhead (Agora XVI) attractively suggests the delta was inscribed in error, restoring [Ἐλευσι]ν{δ}ίωι. For the year of the archon Lysiades see Habicht, Hesp. 57, 1988, 242 (noting that I Délos 1505 shows that Lysiades preceded Archon, 148/7, and Epikrates, 147/6 BC. John Morgan pers comm. writes: "I tentatively put Lysiades in 149/8, though I suppose his archonship could fall a few years earlier. The demotic of the secretary of Lysiades' year is not known, nor do we have a calendar equation which would indicate whether his year was ordinary or intercalary"). The unusual format of the date shows that, at this period, there might be a calculable discrepancy between the date “according to the god”, i.e. the “real” date derived from lunar and/or solar observation, and the official date propagated by the archon. Natural discrepancies between the lunar and solar cycles were usually accounted for by periodic insertion of an intercalary month. The hierophant was appointed from the genos Eumolpidai, who honour him in this decree for reviving the fortunes and rites of the genos. On this hierophant, who is well-attested, and is the first for whom the practice of hieronymy (i.e. reference as “Hierophantes” in place of his real name) is documented, see Tracy, ALC 155-56; Blok and Lambert, ZPE 169, 2009, 115 no. 10 (honoured as ephebe at IG II³ 1, 1169, l. 28). He was succeeded in office by the proposer of this decree, who was his natural brother (cf. Blok and Lambert, 116). On the Eleusinian genē and their decrees see I Eleusis 87, with notes. [2] This seems to imply that the city Eleusinion was the location of an archive. [3] The measures referred to in this decree are very characteristic of the well-documented revival of the Attic genē in the mid-second century BC, cf. [Aleshire] and Lambert, in J. H. Richardson and F. Santangelo eds., Priests and State in the Roman World, 2011, 553-75 at 557-59.

Added: 14 Apr 2021
Updated: 14 Mar 2023
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