The Golden Bough (Third Edition, Vol. 7 of 12) - Mirrors

64 The Golden Bough (Third Edition, Vol. 7 of 12)[051]The Proerosiaseems to havebeen held beforethe ploughing inOctober but afterthe Great Mysteriesin September.However, thedate of theGreat Mysteries,being determinedby the lunarcalendar, musthave fluctuatedin the solar year;whereas the dateof the Proerosia,being determinedby observation ofArcturus, musthave been fixed.thus raised from the humble rank of rural festivities to thedignity of national celebrations; 174 and in ancient Greece a likedevelopment may be traced in the religion of Demeter. If theGreek ploughman prayed to Demeter and Underground Zeus fora good crop before he put his hand to the plough in autumn, theauthorities of the Athenian state celebrated about the same timeand for the same purpose a public festival in honour of Demeterat Eleusis. It was called the Proerosia, which signifies “Beforethe Ploughing”; and as the festival was dedicated to her, Demeterherself bore the name of Proerosia. Tradition ran that once ona time the whole world was desolated by a famine, and that toremedy the evil the Pythian oracle bade the Athenians offer thesacrifice of the Proerosia on behalf of all men. They did so, andthe famine ceased accordingly. Hence to testify their gratitudefor the deliverance people sent the first-fruits of their harvestfrom all quarters to Athens. 175But the exact date at which the Proerosia or Festival beforePloughing took place is somewhat uncertain, and enquirers aredivided in opinion as to whether it fell before or after the174 See Adonis, Attis, Osiris, Second Edition, pp. 283 sqq.175 Scholiast on Aristophanes, Knights, 720; Suidas, s.vv. εἰρεσιώνη andπροηροσίαι; Etymologicum Magnum, Hesychius, and Photius, Lexicon, s.v.προηρόσια; Plutarch, Septem Sapientum Convivium, 15; Dittenberger, SyllogeInscriptionum Graecarum, 2 No. 521, line 29, and No. 628; Aug. Mommsen,Feste der Stadt Athen im Altertum (Leipsic, 1898), pp. 192 sqq. The inscriptionsprove that the Proerosia was held at Eleusis and that it was distinct from theGreat Mysteries, being mentioned separately from them. Some of the ancientsaccounted for the origin of the festival by a universal plague instead of auniversal famine. But this version of the story no doubt arose from the commonconfusion between the similar Greek words for plague and famine (λοιμόςand λιμός). That in the original version famine and not plague must havebeen alleged as the reason for instituting the Proerosia, appears plainly fromthe reference of the name to ploughing, from the dedication of the festival toDemeter, and from the offerings of first-fruits; for these circumstances, thoughquite appropriate to ceremonies designed to stay or avert dearth and famine,would be quite inappropriate in the case of a plague.