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CARNEA

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Originally appearing in Volume V05, Page 363 of the 1911 Encyclopedia Britannica.
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CARNEA , one of the See also:

great See also:national festivals of See also:Sparta, held in See also:honour of See also:Apollo Carneus. Whether Carneus (or Carnus) was originally an old Peloponnesian divinity subsequently identifiedwith Apollo, or merely an " See also:emanation " from him, is uncertain; but there seems no See also:reason to doubt that Carneus means " the See also:god of flocks and herds " (See also:Hesychius, s.v. Kapvos), in a wider sense, of the See also:harvest and the vintage. The See also:chief centre of his See also:worship was Sparta, where the Carnea took See also:place every See also:year from the 7th to the 15th of the See also:month Carneus (=Metageitnion, See also:August). During this See also:period all military operations were suspended. The Carnea appears to have been at once agrarian, military and piacular in See also:character. In the last aspect it is supposed to commemorate the See also:death of Carnus, an Acarnanian seer and favourite of Apollo, who, being suspected of espionage, was slain by one of the See also:Heraclidae during the passage of the See also:Dorians from See also:Naupactus to See also:Peloponnesus. By way of See also:punishment, Apollo visited the See also:army with a pestilence, which only ceased after the institution of the Carnea. The tradition is probably intended to explain the See also:sacrifice of an See also:animal (perhaps a later substitute for a human being) as the representative of the god. The agrarian and military sides of the festival are clearly distinguished. (I) Five unmarried youths (Kapveanac) were chosen by See also:lot from each [tribe] for four years, to superintend the proceedings, the officiating See also:priest being called 6y17Tiis (" See also:leader "). A See also:man decked with garlands (possibly the priest himself) started See also:running, pursued by a See also:band of See also:young men called v- e/N Ao*pbuom (" running with bunches of grapes in their hands ") ; if he was caught, it was a See also:guarantee of See also:good See also:fortune to the See also:city; if not, the See also:reverse.

(2) In the second See also:

part of the festival nine tents were set up in the See also:country, in each of which nine citizens, representing the phratries (or obae), feasted together in honour of the god (for huts or booths extemporized as shelters compare the Jewish feast of See also:Tabernacles; and see W. Warde See also:Fowler in Classical See also:Review, See also:March 1908, on the country festival in See also:Tibullus ii. I). According to See also:Demetrius of Scepsis (in See also:Athenaeus iv. 141), the Carnea was an See also:imitation of See also:life in See also:camp, and everything was done in accordance with the command of a See also:herald. In regard to the sacrifice, which doubtless formed part of the ceremonial, all that is known is that a See also:ram was sacrificed at See also:Thurii. Other indications point to the festival having assumed a military character at an See also:early date, as might have been expected among the warlike Dorians, although some scholars deny this. The See also:general meaning of the agrarian ceremony is clear, and has numerous See also:parallels in See also:north See also:European harvest-customs, in which an animal (or man disguised as an animal) was pursued by the reapers, the animal if caught being usually killed; in any See also:case, both the man and the animal represent the vegetation spirit. E. H. See also:Binney in Classical Review (March 1905) suggests that the See also:story of See also:Alcestis was performed at the Carnea (to which it may have become attached with the name of Apollo) as a vegetation See also:drama, and " embodied a Death and Resurrection ceremony." The great importance attached to the festival and its month is shown in several instances. It was responsible for the delay which prevented the Spartans from assisting the Athenians at the See also:battle of See also:Marathon (See also:Herodotus vi. ro6), and for the despatch of a small advance guard under See also:Leonidas to hold See also:Thermopylae instead of the See also:main army (Herodotus vii.

206). Again, when See also:

Epidaurus was attacked in 419 by See also:Argos, the movements of the Spartans under See also:Agis against the latter were interrupted until the end of the month, while the Argives (on whom, as Dorians, the See also:custom was equally binding), by manipulating the See also:calendar, avoided the See also:necessity of suspending operations (see See also:Grote, Hist. of See also:Greece, ch. 56; See also:Thucydides v. 54). See S. Wide, Lakonische Kulte (1893), and See also:article " Karneios " in See also:Roscher's Lexikon; L. Couve in Daremberg and Saglio's Dictionnaire See also:des antiquitis; W. Mannhardt, Mythologische Forschungen (1883), p. 170, and Wald- and Feldkulte (2nd ed., 1905), ii. 254; L. Farrell, Cults of the See also:Greek States, iv. (1907) ; G.

See also:

Schumann, Griechische Altertumer (ed. J. H. See also:Lipsius, 19o2); J. G. Frazer on See also:Pausanias, iii. 13, 3; H. Usener in Rheinisches Museum, liii. (1898), p. 377; J. Vurtheim in Mnemosyne, xxxi. (1903), p.

234.

End of Article: CARNEA

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CARNEADES (214–129 B.C.)

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