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	Chapter 49. Ancient Deities of Vegetation as Animals. § 2. Demeter, the Pig and the Horse. Frazer, Sir James ...
		And in fact the rites of one of her festivals, the Thesmophoria, bear out the view that originally the pig was an embodiment of the corn-goddess herself, either Demeter or her daughter and double Persephone.
		The Attic Thesmophoria was an autumn festival, celebrated by women alone in October, and appears to have represented with mourning rites the descent of Persephone (or Demeter) into the lower world, and with joy her return from the dead.
		Thus, to put it generally, the corn-spirit is killed in animal form in autumn; part of his flesh is eaten as a sacrament by his worshippers; and part of it is kept till next sowing-time or harvest as a pledge and security for the continuance or renewal of the corn-spirit’s energies.
	www.bartleby.com /196/116.html (1012 words)

	Thesmophoriazousae - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
		Thesmophoriazousae - translated as "Women Celebrating the Thesmophoria" - is a comedy written by the Greek playwright Aristophanes.
		In the fantasy, the character of Euripides learns that the women of Athens are secretly holding a trial of sorts to decide his fate.
		The female population is up in arms over the playwright's continual portrayal of women as mad, murderous, erotomaniac and suicidal (even as his most sympathetic protagonists), and they are using the festival of Thesmophoria, an annual fertility celebration dedicated to Demeter, as a cover for their plot to hold Euripides accountable for his slanderous words.
	en.wikipedia.org /wiki/Thesmophoriazousae (244 words)

	THESPIS (OF ICARIA) - LoveToKnow Article on THESPIS (OF ICARIA) (Site not responding. Last check: 2007-10-22)
		It is usual to interpret Thesmophorus " lawgiver " and Thesmophoria " the feast of the lawgiver." But the Greek for " lawgiver " is not Thesmophorus but Thesmothetes (or Nomothetes, when nomos displaced thesmos in the sense of " law ").
		From these statements we can only infer the similarity of the Thesmophoria to the Orphic rites and to the Egyptian representation of the sufferings of Osiris, in connection with which Plutarch mentions them.
		The Thesmophoria would thus form one of that class of rites, widely spread in Western Asia and in Europe, in which the main feature appears to be a lamentation for the annual decay of vegetation or a rejoicing at its revival.
	www.1911encyclopedia.org /T/TH/THESPIS_OF_ICARIA_.htm (1487 words)

	Dionysiac Mysteries and the Thesmophoria (Site not responding. Last check: 2007-10-22)
		The Thesmophoria was a fertility festival in honor of Demeter, the goddess of agriculture.
		Although the women left their domestic sphere for three days, that seemed to be all right because in return for the three days, the men would be ensured of good crops and lots of children to carry on the bloodlines.
		Chastity was strictly enforced at the Thesmophoria, and thus the men had no worries about the purity of their offspring or sexual impropriety of their wives.
	www.perseus.tufts.edu /classes/LAp.html (1773 words)

	Animus: Paul Epstein, ARISTOPHANES’ THESMOPHORIAZUSAE AND THE NATURE OF TRAGEDY
		This leads him to act as if the women celebrating the Thesmophoria are the enemies of his heroines; to the contrary, they have given up their earlier activity as a women’s caucus, to celebrate Demeter and Persephone.
		The Thesmophoria was a women’s festival held in the Fall which solemnly marked the descent of Persephone into Hades, Demeter’s mourning for her, and finally the return of Persephone.
		The women’s feeling of oppression by their husbands and their conversion of the Thesmophoria into a means of establishing what they take to be female freedom can have no meaning except as a revolt against the established institution of marriage.
	www.swgc.mun.ca /animus/2003vol8/epstein8.htm (4152 words)

	THE online news source for daily updates featuring politics, prophecy, science and mystery around the world. (Site not responding. Last check: 2007-10-22)
		Demeter, the Thesmophoria's primary goddess, boasted the most protected cult secrets of the mystery religions, because her rituals were performed inside the inner sanctum of the Temple of Demeter (the Telesterion) and were so well-guarded by the Temple devotees that little survived to enlighten us as to what actually occurred there.
		What is known is that the rituals of the Thesmophoria were based on the mythology of the abduction and rape of Persephone (Proserpina), and of Demeter's (Persephone's mother) subsequent actions in searching for her daughter.
		On earth she was the goddess of the spring and the friend of the nymphs who appeared in the blooming of the spring flowers (symbolizing her annual return from Hades), while in the underworld she was the dreaded wife of Hades and the Queen of the Darkness who controlled the fates of deceased men.
	www.raidersnewsupdate.com /matrixnew2.htm (1566 words)

	[No title]
		Concerning Demeter's initiation rite, which the Greeks call thesmophoria, let a holy silence be placed on it, except to the extent it is religiously lawful to speak.
		The solution is as follows: on the tenth day, the Thesmophoria is celebrated in Halimus, so that the third day from the tenth is the 12th, but it is the middle day, if the tenth is not included.
		In his deme, since he possessed a household with a worth of three talents, he would be obligated, if he were married, to give the feast of the Thesmophoria for the women and to perform, at his own expense, whatever was appropriate in the deme for his wife's sake in accord with such great wealth.
	www.msu.edu /~tyrrell/THESMOPH.htm (958 words)

	Greek Sacrifice Ritual - The Thesmophoria (Site not responding. Last check: 2007-10-22)
		The most widely practiced rites throughout the various Greek city-states was the festival known as the Thesmophoria.
		These rites, considered to be among the most ancient practiced in Greece, were conducted only by women and honored Demeter, the goddess of agriculture, and her daughter Persephone/Kore.
		Throughout the festival, the women reenact aspects of the myth of Demeter as she searched for her abducted daughter, ranging from ritualized mouring to celebration as the reunion of the goddess and her daughter revive the fertility of the earth.
	inside.bard.edu /academic/specialproj/ritual/Rituals/Thesmo/00.html (85 words)

	Bryn Mawr Classical Review 2003.11.27
		According to her the Hymn is an innovative and up-to-date reworking of some traditional elements, an ingenious and complex amalgamation of different and often divergent narratological and "theological" strands that are still recognizable and call for disentangling.
		In addition it is read as some sort of chronicle of Demeter's subordination of Persephone on a mythical and probably cultic level and as the Olympian/patriarchal subversion of the mother and daughter coming-of-age story (the core story) on a narratological level.
		He reads two myths in the hymn: that of la Mère éplorée, which was the hieros logos of the Thesmophoria and the myth of la nourrice divine, which was the hieros logos of the Eleusinian Mysteries.
	ccat.sas.upenn.edu /bmcr/2003/2003-11-27.html (1669 words)

	Stories (Site not responding. Last check: 2007-10-22)
		In this play, women meet at the festival of Thesmophoria, at which only women could attend, and plan in secret to kill the poet Euripides for his portrayal of them.
		They speak of revenge on Euripides, as Medea wanted on Jason and heroes want on their enemies, and plan a tragic end – the difference being that in comedy the tragedy is averted in lieu of a humourous conclusion.
		The premise of Lysistrata is again one that echoes that of Medea and that of Women at the Thesmophoria, with a seemingly beneficial look at women that on closer inspection is far from flattering.
	www.qthelights.com /writing/greece.html (2795 words)

	Homeric Hymn to Demeter: Background Notes
		The Thesmophoria is sometimes contrasted with the festival of Adonis, an annual rite that was not, like the Thesmophoria, part of the Athenian festival calendar.
		The fertility represented by this festival is the opposite to that which the Thesmophoria sponsor: both the child and the plants flourish initially but then perish.
		Associated with the Adonia also was the use of perfumes,oils, and jewelry, in contrast to the noxious odors characteristic of the Thesmophoria, and the practice of sexual abstinence associated with it.
	mkatz.web.wesleyan.edu /cciv110x/hhdemeter/cciv110.back.demeter.html (2197 words)

	Harvest Festivals in Ancient Cultures
		Although the practices are a mystery, the matrons appear to have symbolically relived the anguish of Demeter and to have asked for her help in obtaining a bountiful harvest.
		The first day of the Thesmophoria itself was Anodos, the ascent.
		The second day of the Thesmophoria was the Nesteia (Fast) when women fasted.
	www.twilightbridge.com /hobbies/festivals/thanksgiving/harvest.htm (1293 words)

	Thesmophoria and mystery cults among the Messapians at Monte Papalucio (Oria, Brindisi, Southern Italy)
		Thesmophoria and mystery cults among the Messapians at Monte Papalucio (Oria, Brindisi, Southern Italy)
		The rites of the Thesmophoria (from one of the attributes of Demeter, as law- bearer, or law-giver: from thesmoi = laws, and phoria = bearer), resembled much the Eleusinian Mysteries, and were open only to women who celebrated them all over Greece, in late October, during the month of Pyanepsion.
		The sacrifice of piglets was specific to this celebrations, for the symbolic and analogical associations of these animals with fertility and the power of their blood.
	www.ayahuasca-shamanism.co.uk /mysteries.htm (3262 words)

	Greek, Roman and Byzantine Studies: odd Thesmophoria of Aristophanes' Thesmophoriazusae, The (Site not responding. Last check: 2007-10-22)
		Cf K. Clinton, "The Thesmophorion in Central Athens and the Celebration of the Thesmophoria in Attica," in R. Hagg, ed., The Role of Religion in the Early Greek Polis (=Proceedings of the Third International Seminar on Ancient Greek Cult [Stockholm 1996]) 114f.
		This passage, however, is inconclusive: a slave merely mentions that her mistress attended the festival with her lover's mother.
		Raffan (Cambridge [Mass.] 1985) 243, does not think, however, that the remains of the pigs fetched up during the Thesmophoria had to be the remains of pigs thrown into the megaron during the Skira.
	www.findarticles.com /p/articles/mi_qa3684/is_199704/ai_n8776683/pg_5 (1114 words)

	Thesmophoria (Site not responding. Last check: 2007-10-22)
		The festival of the Thesmophoria took place in the Athenian month Pyanepsion (approximately October) and was reserved for women only.
		The association of this festival with women was natural to the Greeks, because they saw agricultural and human fertility as all part of the same process of reproduction.
		The name of the festival means 'the carrying of the thesmoi' and it has been conjectured that the thesmoi were these decayed remains.
	depthome.brooklyn.cuny.edu /classics/dunkle/athnlife/thesmoph.htm (240 words)

	In looking through the comic lens at Agathon in Aristophanes’ The Women at Thesmophoria, the reader is presented ...
		In looking through the comic lens at Agathon in Aristophanes’ Women at the Thesmophoria, the reader is presented with a portrayal of an effeminate man with a flair for the dramatic and a queenly attitude.
		Looking at Aristophanes’ portrayal of Agathon in both Symposium and Women at the Thesmophoria and in looking at the general treatment given to Agathon in Symposium, a basis for this interpretation is created, allowing the modern reader a clearer look at Greek life.
		Aristophanes’ Agathon in Women at the Thesmophoria is one that is seen by the average citizen as unmanly and as a target for degradation.
	www.acad.carleton.edu /curricular/CLAS/courses/CL114/special/jodi.htm (1479 words)

	Goddess Worship in Ancient Greece (Site not responding. Last check: 2007-10-22)
		In the Myth of Demeter and Persephone, Demeter begins ignoring her duties to the underworld, and the dead roam restlessly on earth.
		The first day of Thesmophoria was called "Kathaodos" and "Anados", "the down-going and uprising", and it was on this day that they brought up from a megara the flesh of decaying pigs, probably left there a year earlier.
		The Thesmophoria was, until at least Olympian times, a festival for married women, in which men could not participate or even be told of its secrets.
	www-unix.oit.umass.edu /~clit387/Worship.html (10989 words)

	Roman Calendar - October (Site not responding. Last check: 2007-10-22)
		The priestesses would offer themselves freely as public prostitutes as a means of ensuring the fertility of the cornfields.
		This is the third and final day of the Thesmophoria in Greece.
		This is one of the dies comitiales (C), when committees of citizens could vote on political or criminal matters.
	www.personal.psu.edu /users/w/x/wxk116/RomanCalendar/oct11.htm (702 words)

	Thesmophoria
		Thesmophoria is one of the topics in focus at Global Oneness.
		This Agnus-Castus plant was used also in the fete of the Thesmophoria, in honour of Demeter -- the law -- 'nomos' -- bringer, whose priestesses slept on its leaves as encouraging chaste desires.
		I must observe a discrete silence; and respecting the sacred rites of Ceres, which the Greeks call Thesmophoria although I am acquainted with them, I must observe silence,.
	www.experiencefestival.com /thesmophoria (745 words)

	performing aristophanes (Site not responding. Last check: 2007-10-22)
		At the heart of the dramatic plot lie issues of dramatic imitation, specifically, the representation of women by male poets and the convention of men acting the parts of women in Athenian theater.
		The Thesmophoria provides the setting for performing both parodies of scenes drawn from Euripides' rescue tragedies and a comedy.
		The performance of the comic Thesmophoria itself underscores the contribution of women's myths and rituals in promoting the fertility and creativity of Athenian theater.
	www.cwru.edu /artsci/bakernord/aristophanes/speakers.html (1325 words)

	Women at the Thesmophoria (from Aristophanes) -- Encyclopædia Britannica (Site not responding. Last check: 2007-10-22)
		Euripides tries to persuade the effeminate Agathon, a tragic poet, to plead his cause.
		More results on "Women at the Thesmophoria (from Aristophanes)" when you join.
		Or, the name Thesmophoria is perhaps the primary one,...
	www.britannica.com /eb/article-30192?tocId=30192 (831 words)

	Classics Network -- Essay -- Setting and Meaning
		This year, they are plotting to kill the tragic Greek poet, Euripides (as the First Woman points out when she says: “In conclusion, ladies, I feel that somehow or other we have got to devise a nice sticky end for him: perhaps poison might be a suitable method”).
		The setting of the Thesmophoria is a prime example of how suppressed women really were at that time.
		Since the Thesmophoria is situated on a hill outside of town, the women were essentially outside of male control and the normal rules, regulations and perfection of Classical Greek life.
	www.classicsnetwork.com /showessayprint.asp?IDNo=104 (1014 words)

	Festivals
		The Thesmophoria is a celebration of Sporetos (Seed-time), the autumn sowing, dedicated to Demeter and restricted to women.
		During the Thesmophoria proper the women camp for three days in the Thesmophorion, the hillside sanctuary of Demeter Thesmophoros.
		Thesmophoria) This ceremony recalls the swineherd Eubouleus who was swallowed up with his pigs when Persephone was abducted into the underworld by Hades.
	www.geocities.com /Athens/Delphi/3310/festival.html (8122 words)

	Ø Wilson's Almanac free daily ezine \| Book of Days \| October 5 \| Thesmophoria ancient Greece Chief Joseph Nez ...
		After the Thesmophoria ended, the priests would gather up the large numbers of female figurines that had been used in the rituals, and bury them.
		It is also associated with death, perhaps because of the image of the sow eating her piglets.
		During the Thesmophoria, the pig represented both abundance and life, the seed that is buried in the earth to sprout again, like the corn puppet representing Kore which was thrown into the earth during the winter rituals to be brought back up again in spring when it was sprouting.”
	www.wilsonsalmanac.com /book/oct5.html (3414 words)

	Goddess in the Wheel of the Year, "Lammas, Goddess of the Grain Reborn," MatriFocus Web Magazine (Site not responding. Last check: 2007-10-22)
		Demeter is best known as the goddess who brings winter to the earth when her beloved daughter, Persephone, is in the underworld with her consort, Hades.
		In ancient Greece, the Thesmophoria was celebrated in the fall.
		It is appropriate, however, to invoke Demeter as the goddess of grain at Lammas, the earliest harvest festival.
	www.matrifocus.com /LAM03/wheel.htm (1262 words)

	Bryn Mawr Classical Review 04.03.22
		C finds the kykeon with its kourotrophic pennyroyal better suited to the Thesmophoria than the Mysteries and interprets the Hymn's comment (221) that Demeter drank it "for the rite" as a reference to the older ritual of the Thesmophoria not the not-yet-established Mysteries.
		He thereby removes a strong reason for treating the Hymn as cult myth but must at the same time ignore what most scholars consider a key testimony to the Mysteries, Clement's description of the "password" ("I fasted, I drank the kykeon.
		Finally C appears to find no place in the Hymn for some central elements of the Thesmophoria: tent, rotted pigs, phallic loaves, willow branches, Chalcidian pursuit, pomegranate seeds (cf.
	164.107.4.25 /mailing_lists/BMCR-L/Mirror/1993/04.03.22.html (388 words)

	RAIDERS OF THE LOST TRUTH!
		The Thesmophoria was the most popular of the ancient Greek fertility festivals.
		Held in honor of Demeter—whose cult secrets were the most protected of the mystery religions—the rituals were performed inside of the inner sanctum of the Temple of Demeter (the Telesterion) and were so well-guarded by the Temple devotees that little survived to enlighten us as to what actually occurred there.
		On earth she was the goddess of the young and the friend of the nymphs who appeared in the blooming of the spring flowers (symbolizing her annual return from Hades), and in the underworld she was the dreaded wife of Hades and the Queen of Darkness who controlled the fates of deceased men.
	raidersnewsupdate.blogspot.com (3802 words)

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