Themis, a study of the social origins of Greek ... - Warburg Institute

VIIl] The Oschophoroi 325
with leaf-sprays. The robe is manifestly a ritual vestment : its
elaborate decoration reminds us of the robe worn by Demeter at
Eleusis on the Hieron vase 1 . The lekane is filled with water. The
youth (or maiden) is, it may be, about to plunge the great bough
into the water. Is it for a rain-charm, or will he asperge the
people ? We cannot say. One thing, and perhaps only one, is
certain : the figure, be it maid or man, is a Thallophoros, possibly
an Oschophoros, though no grape-bunches are depicted.
The moral of Plutarch's clumsy aetiological tale is clear ; had
it been made for our purpose it could scarcely have been clearer.
Fig. 94.
It embodies the very act of transition from the periodic festival
with its Eniautos-daimon to the cult of the individual hero ; from,
in a word, the functionary to the personality. It is along this
well-trodden road that each and every hero, each and every god,
must travel before the parting of their ways.
There is competition among the saga-heroes as to who shall
seize the function-festival for his own. Plutarch, as usual, is
instructive through his very naivete. Some said that the cere-
monies of Pyanepsion '
began
to be done on account of the
1 Prolegomena, p. 556, Fig. 158.