![]() ![]() ![]() Considering the direct and circumstantial evidence for thysia sacrifices followed by collective dining in hero-cults, it seems safe to conclude that, when no particular details are given as to how the sacrifices were performed or in what context the sacrifices took place, the ritual was centred on the consumption of the meat from the animal victims. There is also a number of cases, mainly epigraphical but also literary, in which it can be argued from the contexts in which the sacrifices are found, that dining must have formed a part of the ritual. In many cases, when dining is documented, particularly in the inscriptions, no specific term is given covering the actual sacrifice, indicating that thysia sacrifices were so universal that there was no need for any particular elaboration.ģThe fact that the meat was not destroyed, but kept and eaten, is clear from the direct evidence for the actual handling and division of the meat, dining facilities and references to eating. The terminology used for these sacrifices is thyein and thysia, as well as various terms referring to the honouring of heroes. Thysia followed by diningĢContrary to the previous opinion, the most frequently performed ritual in hero-cults was animal sacrifice, at which the meat was kept and eaten by the worshippers. The basic conclusion is that the prevalent notion of how sacrifices to heroes were performed in the Archaic to early Hellenistic periods is in need of substantial revisions. This chronological restriction has been considered as particularly important, since the notion that the sacrifices to heroes were distinct from the sacrifices to the gods is mainly based on Roman and Byzantine sources. The investigation has been focused on the epigraphical and literary evidence from the Archaic to early Hellenistic periods, both in defining the sacrifices to heroes and in relating them to the rituals of the gods and the ordinary dead. The sacrificial rituals of Greek hero-cultsġThis study has had two aims, first of all, to establish the sacrificial rituals of Greek hero-cults in the Archaic to the early Hellenistic periods and, secondly, to investigate how these rituals are to be explained and interpreted and what they can tell us about the place and function of the cult of heroes in Greek religion.
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