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

52 The Kouretes, Thunder-Rites and Mana [ch.
of infancy or adolescence, but ceremonies that have become in the
later sense mysteries, rites to which only a chosen few were
admitted. This seems clear from the asceticism of the avowal
in the last lines. It is obvious that the whole of the initiated
youth of a tribe would not be vegetarians, nor could they preserve
life-long ceremonial purity from the contagion of child-birth and
funerals. Moreover the initiated man in these rites was, when
fully consecrated, called a Bacchos, and the Bacchoi were always
a select congregation. Plato 1
rites of initiation used to say
tells us that those concerned with
Few are the Bacchoi, many bear the Wand.
It may be conjectured that the rite here administered by the
Kouretes was some sort of rite of ordination of a medicine-man.
In this connection it is interesting to note that Epimenides of
Crete, the typical medicine-man of antiquity, was called by his
contemporaries the 'new Koures.' Plutarch 2 in his account of the
purification of Athens in the days of Solon says of Epimenides
that he was a man of Phaistos, son of the. nymph Balte, 'beloved
of the gods/ and ' an adept in religious matters dealing with the
lore of orgiastic and initiation rites.' It was because of this that
he was reputed to be son of a nymph and gained his title of
Koures. Koures, as has already been noted, can only mean Young
Man in a specialized sense. We may conjecture—though it is only
a conjecture—that the Kouretes were Young Men selected from
the general band of initiated youths. One of their functions was,
it appears, the consecration of the Bacchoi.
Plutarch naturally regards Epimenides as ' dear to the gods/
and an adept in matters religious, but the traditions that gathered
round his name are those of magic and medicine rather than of
religion. He is credited 3 indeed, and perhaps rightly, with the
authorship of a Theogony as well as an Argonautika, a Kretika,
1 Phaed. 69 C eial yap 8rj cu'o"rios—
'E56/cet Se tls elvai
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