The Pallakai of Zeus Larasios

Abstract

Two inscribed bases of votive offerings to Zeus Larasios from Tralleis (Aydin), dating from the late second or early third century AD, have been repeatedly discussed ever since the first of them was published in the 19th century. The starting point of the discussion has been the fact that the women who dedicated the offerings identify themselves as pallakai (concubines), a sacred function that was hereditary and could be held only once (or in exceptional cases twice) in a lifetime. There is no agreement among scholars on the duties performed by the pallakai every four years, on the occasion of the penteteric festival of Zeus Larasios. The hypothesis that they were sacred prostitutes, put forward by W. Ramsey in 1883, has been abandoned. The proposal of K. Latte to recognize the pallakai as prophetesses (on the model of the Pythia) is also problematic. The explanation of the term pallake or pallakis by ancient lexicographers as a young girl at the beginning of puberty suggests that the pallakai of Zeus Larasios performed a ritual signaling the transition from childhood to reproductive age. Strabo records a ritual of this kind in Egyptian Thebes.