The Pelion sacrifice also shares certain features with other, more sinister cults and myths of Zeus. A Thessalian example concerns king Athamas, who attempted to sacrifice his son Phrixos and his daughter Helle to Zeus Laphystios (the Devourer) in order to stop a drought. Either Zeus himself or the children’s mother Nephele (Cloud) arranged their escape on a flying golden ram, and this miraculous creature was the source of the famous Golden Fleece. Here again we see the juxtaposition of drought, sacrifice to Zeus, and the skin of a sheep that is thought to possess special powers or attributes. A related myth declared that Athamas himself was to be killed as a scapegoat to purify the land, but was rescued in the nick of time, just as Phrixos had been. According to Herodotus (7.197), the descendants of Athamas in Thessaly were liable to be sacrificed to Zeus Laphystios if they set foot in the town hall, which for some reason they were constrained to do (there are problems with the text in this passage). Herodotus himself seems convinced that such sacrifices took place, but it is also possible that the ritual involved an elaborate “rescue” reflecting the mythic rescues of Phrixos and Athamas, or that a ram was substituted for the human victim.4
Rain-making and human sacrifice are associated with yet another of Zeus’ mountain peaks, Mt. Lykaion in Arkadia. The inhabitants of this remote area in the central Peloponnese were widely considered backward and primitive, and they preserved a number of customs and rituals that seemed strange to other Greeks. Mt. Lykaion, the birthplace of Zeus and the center of religious life in the district, was an important focus of ethnic unity for Arkadians. Fifth-century coins from Arkadia display the image of Lykaian Zeus, and the annual festival of Zeus, known as the Lykaia, included athletic competitions and attracted participants from other districts. Xenophon (An. 1.2.10) reports that the four thousand Arkadian mercenaries who served the general Kyros c. 400 stopped their march to celebrate the Lykaian
Figure 2.1 Votive bronze from Mt. Lykaion, Arkadia. Enthroned Zeus holds the thunderbolt (left hand) and an unidentified attribute (right hand). Sixth century. Ht 12 cm. National Archaeological Museum, Athens. Erich Lessing/Art Resource.
Games, even though they were far from home. On the mountain, there was a sacred enclosure of Zeus where none might enter (it was said that anyone who did cast no shadow and would die within the year). During times of prolonged drought, the priest of Zeus made a sacrifice and stirred the waters of the spring Hagno (the Pure) with an oak branch in order to bring rain.5
But the most mysterious activity of the cult took place on the summit of the mountain. At the very top, a large mound of ashes and blackened soil contained knives, small tripods and burnt bones, while the sanctuary 20 m below included two fifth-century Doric columns topped by gilded eagles. Here, a secret nocturnal sacrifice was held during which participants ate portions of “mystery meat” from a tripod kettle reputed to contain not only entrails of animals, but also a piece taken from a human victim. According to Plato (Resp. 565d) “he who tastes of the human entrails minced up with those of other victims inevitably becomes a wolf (lukos).” Tradition said that at least one person at the sacrifice was always transformed; if during his time as a wolf he abstained from human flesh, he would become human again after ten years, but otherwise he would remain a wolf forever. What are we to make of this ancient story of lycanthropy? And could it be true that people were regularly sacrificed to Zeus Lykaios? The latter possibility is not the most likely, considering that no human remains have been found in the excavation of the site, and that human sacrifice seems to have been far more common in Greek myths and symbolic rites than in actual practice. On the other hand, the participants in the ritual may well have believed that the pot contained forbidden meat. As for the werewolves, it has been suggested that the ritual originally served as a rite of passage, through which youths entering adolescence (girls were apparently excluded) began a period of rugged training as warriors by hunting and living in the wild as “wolves.” After this probationary period, the young men would be eligible to marry and enjoy other rights of full manhood.6
The Arkadians believed that their ancestral king Lykaon and his fifty sons once played host to the gods, who in those days dined among humans. They incurred the wrath of Zeus, however, by serving a cannibalistic feast that contained the flesh of a slaughtered boy, in some accounts the king’s own grandson Arkas. Lykaon’s punishment was to be turned into a wolf. Thus, the re-enactment of the meal was an annual reminder of a past epoch in which the savage ancestor of the Arkadians failed to distinguish properly between human and animal, and offended the gods with a perverted sacrifice. The descendants of Lykaon were fated to suffer his punishment, but this special burden of identity with the wolf also set them apart from other Greeks. In spite of the Arkadians’ belief in the great antiquity of this custom, the oldest artifacts in the sanctuary are no earlier than the seventh century.7
World History
