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Search results for tau,1065 in Adler number:
Headword:
Trophôniou
kata
gês
paignia
Adler number: tau,1065
Translated headword: Trophonius' underground games
Vetting Status: high
Translation: In
Lebadeia[1] there was an oracle, which they used to call the Katabasion [Descent]; for it had so narrow an opening that only the extremities of the feet could get in. So those consulting the god, after keeping themselves pure for a specified number of days and having adorned themselves in a particular sacred manner, took in both hands honeycakes, i.e. cakes soaked in honey, and sat at the narrow mouth, whereupon they were suddenly snatched and conveyed underground. The cakes they used to take in order not to be harmed by the snakes they encountered; instead they gave them these as food. Accordingly many people were immediately sent up again from the narrow opening through which they had descended, but many [stayed underground] for several days.[2] Trophonios was the son of Ersinos[2] and brother of Agamedes; [and this place was] where there was a prophesying snake, to which the inhabitants used to throw pastries.
Greek Original:Trophôniou kata gês paignia. en Lebadeiai chrêstêrion ên, ho Katabasion ekaloun: stomion gar ti ên, hôs ta akra dunasthai mona tôn podôn chôrêsai. hoi oun tôi theôi chrômenoi, hagneusantes prôton hôrismenais hêmerais kai kosmêsantes heautous hierôi tini schêmati, amphoterais tais chersi melitouttas labontes, ho esti mazas meliti dedeumenas, houtôs ekathizon epi to stomion kai aiphnidion hêrpazonto kai kateduon epi tês gês. tas de mazas elambanon huper tou mê adikêthênai hupo tôn sunantôntôn opheôn, all' ekeinas autois paraballein trophên. polloi men oun kai authêmeron anepemphthêsan di' hou stomiou katêlthon, polloi de kai dia pleionôn hêmerôn. ên de ho Trophônios Ersinou pais tadelphou Agamêdous: hopou ophis ên ho manteuomenos, hôi hoi katoikountes plakountas eballon.
Notes:
The unglossed headword phrase comes from Gregory of Nazianzus,
Orations 39.5 (PG 36, 340a). The body of the entry is from the
scholia to
Aristophanes,
Clouds 508, 'going down, as if into Trophonius' [domain]' (web address 1); cf.
mu 526,
epsiloniota 323. See generally
Pausanias 9.39.2-40.2 (web address 2), and A. Schachter in OCD(4) s.v., who calls the procedure 'spectacular, frightening, notorious, and expensive'.
[1] In Western Boiotia (central Greece).
[2] Or re-emerged elsewhere as did Apollonius of
Tyana (
Philostratus,
Life of Apollonius 8.19).
[3] More correctly Erginos (cf.
Pausanias 9.37.5: web address 3).
Associated internet addresses:
Web address 1,
Web address 2,
Web address 3
Keywords: architecture; Christianity; clothing; comedy; ethics; food; geography; mythology; proverbs; religion; rhetoric; zoology
Translated by: David Whitehead on 27 April 2003@06:35:05.
Vetted by:
No. of records found: 1
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