Death and burial practices among the ancient Greeks reflected their cultural beliefs in magic and in an afterlife that resembled a pale continuation of the person’s earthly existence.
Date: c. 1200-31 b. c.e.
Category: Daily life; religion and mythology
Death and Magic The ancient Greeks regarded death from old age as the most natural form of death—indeed, its only natural form. The concept of “accidental” death was quite foreign to the ancient Greeks, for whom nothing occurred simply by chance or accident. Deaths caused by mishap, disease, or violence were all considered unnatural and, therefore, rendered the deceased unclean. Untimely deaths were suspected of resulting from the deceased’s having displeased one of the vindictive Olympian gods, or perhaps having incurred the wrath of a witch or an amateur sorcerer who, it was believed, were fully capable of commanding demoniac powers to control the weather, ruin crops, or strike down an enemy. Instances of unnatural death obligated the surviving relatives to perform rites of expiation that were thought to diminish the offense and thereby benefit the deceased in the other world. Murder always necessitated blood vengeance.
Burial Customs The ancient Greeks believed that at the moment of death the psyche (soul) would depart from the body. If denied a proper burial, the soul would be doomed to wander the earth as a ghost, unable to enter into the underworld, the Land of the Dead (Hades). The responsibility for burial usually fell to the children of the deceased; this was a serious obligation. Failure to bury a deceased person under one’s care was not only considered an egregious breach of filial duty but also regarded as a crime punishable by execution. In one notable instance, victorious Athenian generals were put to death for neglecting their duty to recover and bury the dead bodies of soldiers under their command following the Battle of Arginusae.
Following the death of an individual, the person’s body was washed by the closest family members, perfumed, and dressed in fine white garments.
Articles of jewelry were often interred with the body, as well as a coin (placed into the mouth) for Chiron, the mythical ferryman who, according to tradition, rowed newly departed souls across the River Styx to the gloomy Land of the Dead. The body was laid in a coffin and displayed to mourners in the home of the deceased. Loud displays of anguish and ostentatious grief (rending of clothes, shearing of hair) were customary.
On the second day, relatives or slaves bore the funerary coffin in a solemn procession through the city streets to a cemetery precinct set aside as a necropolis (literally, “city of the dead”) outside the city walls. There the
In Greek mythology, destiny and death are determined by three old women known as the Fates. (F. R. Niglutsch)
After being sentenced to die, the philosopher Socrates drinks hemlock as his followers begin the customary displays of grief. (F. R. Niglutsch)
Body was formally interred. At the gravesite, a large decorated vase, a stone statue, a stele (monumental stone marker), or a simple altar—the size and elaborateness of which mirrored the person’s prominence in life—was erected as a memorial to the deceased. After the burial, libations were poured. Then, mourners returned to the house of the deceased, where complex purification rituals were performed. All those who had been defiled by contact with the dead were required to bathe prior to the funerary feast. Later, the entire house was washed with seawater.
Burials during the earlier Homeric Age (c. 1200-800 b. c.e.) typically involved cremation of the remains on a wooden bier, as was typical during unsettled or seminomadic cultural periods, when the tending of gravesites proved impractical. In contrast, burials during the later Archaic, Classical, and Hellenistic periods (c. 800-31 b. c.e.) reflect funerary customs more in keeping with traditional ground burial of the body and veneration of the gravesite. A cult of the dead required that special observances be held on the third, ninth, and thirtieth days following the burial, as well as upon each anniversary of the person’s passing.
Grave Statuary The ancient Greeks revered the period of young adulthood when individuals reach their physical prime. It is notable, in this respect, that virtually all grave statues depict the deceased as idealized youths, irrespective of the deceased’s actual age. Beginning with the Archaic period, the most notable form of memorial statue was the male kouros, an athletic striding nude, fully six feet in height, with arms held rigidly at his sides. The female counterpart, the kore, was always depicted dressed in a woolen peplos, most often in a frontal pose. The kouros and kore figures, like all ancient Greek sculpture, were originally painted at the hair, eyes, and mouth in order to achieve a more lifelike appearance. It is interesting to note that the enigmatic “archaic smile” found invariably on kouroi and other sculptural portraits probably alludes to the so-called death smile caused by the onset of muscular rigor shortly after death, thus identifying the subject of the work as a person deceased.
In addition to these statues, large vases of the krater or dipylon type were used as grave ornaments. Since the dead were believed to inhabit the underworld, these vessels had holes pierced in their bases through which offerings of wine or milk could be channeled into the grave. Both the statuary and the vase forms of memorial continued in use through the Classical period. In addition to grave monuments, it was customary to place an image or a small statue of the deceased at the home altar. These ancestral images were crowned with laurel twice each month, as well as at the appearance of the new Moon—that time each month when the Moon disappears only to be “reborn” three days later.
Further Reading
Baroja, Julio Caro. “Magic and Religion in the Classical World.” In Witchcraft and Sorcery, edited by Max Marwick. Baltimore: Penguin, 1970. Durant, Will. The Life of Greece. Norwalk, Conn.: Easton Press, 1992. Flaceliere, Robert. Daily Life in Greece at the Time of Pericles. London: Phoenix Press/Orion House, 1996.
Stokstad, Marilyn. Art History. New York: Harry N. Abrams, 1995.
Larry Smolucha
See also: Art and Architecture; Daily Life and Customs; Halicarnassus Mausoleum; Mythology; Religion and Ritual.
World History
