Greek Calendars Research Articles

The figure of the swallow in Greek calendar folklore from antiquity to the present day

The figure of the swallow in Greek calendar folklore from antiquity to the present day

The Transformation of Modern Greek Calendar Customs Associated with Fire. Tradition and contemporaneity

This article addresses some Greek traditions associated with fire: pirovasiya (fire-walking, which is also performed in some other regions of the Balkans; for example, in Bulgaria), the burning of Judas, and the fires burned during the Shrovetide carnival in Ioannina. The sources of the study were fieldwork and material from tourism sites describing regional customs and traditions. *** Članek obravnava nekatere grške tradicije, povezane z ognjem: Pirovasiya (hoja po žerjavici, ki jo izvajajo tudi v nekaterih drugih balkanskih regijah, na primer v Bolgariji), zažiganje Juda ter prižiganje kresov v pustnem času na Ioannini. Študija temelji na terenskem delu in na materialu, zbranem na turističnih straneh, ki opisujejo regionalne šege in tradicije.

Apollo, Helios, and the Solstices in the Athenian, Delphian, and Delian Calendars

AbstractThe mythical narrative of Apollo’s northern voyage and the place of his festivals in several Greek calendars, reflected also in local ritual practice, seems to reflect certain elements in his nature best explained through his association with the sun, more precisely, the annual solar movement. The association was noted long ago, but a selective analysis will show that both the narrative and the ritual reflect the model of annual solar motion expressed in terms of a suspended reference, a mythical metaphor, a linear narrative defined both by the very nature of language and the celestial phenomenon it is describing. The analysis of various Greek calendars supports the notion of the solstices as the most important defining moments in the annual solar motion, and their connection with Apollo reflects precisely this fact.

Greek Influence on the Composition of 2 Maccabees

AbstractThis paper is comprised of three parts. First, I compare festival motifs in 1 and 2 Maccabees to demonstrate that unlike 1 Maccabees, 2 Maccabees is holiday-centered and that it seems to equate holiday observance with religious piety. Because the abridger and audience of 2 Maccabees are familiar with the festival-centered Greek calendar, the observance of Jewish holidays is offered as an alternative to Hellenism. Second, I examine why prayer plays a more significant role in 2 Maccabees than 1 Maccabees. Although the prominence of prayer in 2 Maccabees might suggest a borrowing from biblical precedent, prayer passages in 2 Maccabees are more likely influenced by Greek drama and the genre of mimos. Finally, I attempt to demonstrate that, unlike 1 Maccabees, 2 Maccabees is temple-centered but not Judea-centered. This stems from the authors’ and audience’s unfamiliarity with the land of Israel but appreciation of temple-centralized worship. I conclude that 2 Maccabees is not necessarily intended as a refutation of the “Hasmonean propagandist’s” 1 Maccabees, but is a retelling of Hasmonean history which emphasizes religious themes familiar to a diasporan audience.

Jogos olímpicos da era moderna: uma proposta de periodização

Os Jogos Olímpicos da Era Moderna foram recriados por Pierre de Coubertin e tiveram sua primeira edição no ano de 1896. Respeitando o calendário grego, no qual foi espelhado, os Jogos de Olímpicos de Verão realizam-se de quatro em quatro anos, período de uma Olimpíada, e atravessaram o século XX sofrendo de perto toda intensa dinâmica de um momento histórico marcado por profundos conflitos sociais de ordem mundial. A partir da análise desses momentos, é possível observar as transformações vividas pelo Movimento Olímpico. A partir de então, pretende-se nesse artigo discutir e caracterizar esses momentos históricos propondo uma periodização para os Jogos Olímpicos. Intenta-se com isso criar parâmetros de análise para os acontecimentos olímpicos a partir de seu contexto histórico-social

The lost Roman calendars of ancient Macedonia

As a result of the conquests of Alexander the Great, the lunisolar Macedonian calendar became the most widely circulated among all the lunisolar Greek calendars. However, despite its spread, two Roman calendars, generally unknown in the scientific community, were developed and used inside Macedonia itself during the Roman occupation of Greece. The older calendar used the so-called ‘Macedonian year’. This system started in 148 BC to emphasize the importance of the victory of the Roman general Quintus Caecilius Metellus Macedonicus against Pseudo-Philippus Andriscus, King of Macedonia. The newer calendrical system, which absorbed the older system, used the ‘Augustian or respectable year’ bearing its name from Octavius Augustus; its starting point was the date of the catalytic victory of Octavius over Marcus Antonius and Cleopatra at Actium (31 BC). The solar Octavian calendar survived until the sixth or seventh century in the Macedonian Territory.

"Trabajo, descanso y refrigerio estival: un topos griego en el calendario medieval hispano"

In the earliest Greek calendar -Hesiod's Works and Days-, the author puts particular emphasis on the fatigue and thirst of the peasant labouring in canicular heat. In the Ancient calendars, whether illuminated with miniatures or mosaics, this literary motif became a figurative topos in the nude and seminuede personifications of Summer and August resting, fanning themselves or taking refreshment. The sam subjet survived as a representation of August in Byzantine art and literature. At the end of the 12th century it was incorporated into Italian and Spanish calendars as a consequence of the expansion of Byzantine models that characterized the art of the period, and which resulted in a wide range of themes related to the Greek tradition appearing in the calendar cycles of this period.

Seferis and England: A Greek Poet in an English Landscape

Seferis and England: A Greek Poet in an English Landscape George Thaniel The special relationship which George Seferis (1900-71) developed in the last 40 or so years of his life with Britain is obvious even to the casual observer of his life and his work. He started and finished the foreign part of his diplomatic career in London, and on various other occasions, before, during and after the Second World War, he had to deal with British politicians, diplomats, and military officers. Seferis developed a close tie with T. S. Eliot, but he had many connections with other influential English writers as well. It would be fair to say that without the publicity which these writers provided for his literary work and the honors which he received in Britain towards the end of his career (1960-62), the Swedish Academy could not have known enough about Seferis to consider him a candidate for the Nobel Prize for literature and finally to award it to him in 1963, the first Greek writer to have received it. The connections of Seferis with England and the English intelligentsia were celebrated, after his death, by exhibitions held in Athens and London, the eulogies which British friends published on his behalf, and the scholarship which his poetry and essays generated in the English-speaking world. One might add that the associations of Seferis with North American intellectuals and institutions seem really to postdate the awarding of the Nobel prize and may be seen as extensions of his longer-standing ones with Britain. These facts are fairly well known; yet, apart from Seferis' association with the poetry and critical thought of Eliot, there has never been an attempt, beyond generalities, to explore them. The topic has many ramifications and should be meaningful to comparatists as well as English and Greek specialists. I propose to investigate it, taking as my base Seferis' own work: poetry, essays, diaries, correspondence, and other relevant material. I begin with the question of Seferis' reactions to the natural and human landscape of Britain in the formative years of 1931-34, when he served his country as acting Consul 85 86 George Thaniel General in London, as well as in the summer of 1944, when Seferis flew to England from Egypt, carrying certain messages to the British Government from the Greek Government in exile. The recently published Meres F, which covers Seferis' second extended stay (195152 ) in England, mirrors his associations with a number of wellknown English writers and other intellectual men rather than his reactions to the natural and human landscape of Britain. Seferis' Meres G, which covers the years 1957-62 (when Seferis served as Greek Ambassador in Britain) is not available yet, with the exception of a few entries which have been printed in magazines. Seferis was born at Smyrna, in Asia Minor. He was raised both there and subsequently in Athens, and, for the rest of his life, he remained an emotional captive of the Greek landscape with its frequent views of the sea. Astrology-minded persons might see a significance in that Seferis was born under the sign of Pisces, on 29 February, by the old Greek Calendar (13 March, by the new), in 1900. Many of the happier notes in his poetry are related to the sea. The diaries reflect this fascination with the sea more directly: "My second swim, at Vouliagmeni. Magic of the sea hard to explain. How it changes me all at once: my wonder, a wonder deep to the bone. I cannot understand . I should go closer, I should try to cross that borderline into another world" (Meres E 1973: 33). Between 1918 and 1924 Seferis studied in Paris and, although he sometimes felt emotionally alienated, he loved the city and its rich cultural atmosphere. "I spent six and a half years in Paris," Seferis noted in his diary. "I lived fully and wholeheartedly, loving each moment, each corner of the city and each stone" (Meres B 1975: 80). In the second half of 1924, after he had received his diploma in law, Seferis traveled to London with the purpose of learning English, in view of the fact that his family wanted...

A new Greek Calendar and Festivals of the Sun

It is known that the Greeks found the means of time-reckoning when they began to observe and to record the rising and setting of the stars. Such recording had already been made in Babylonia and Egypt and taken up in Greece (and further developed) by Hesiod, Democritus, Eudoxus, and Ptolemy. Our knowledge of what they achieved was based until the end of the nineteenth century on the calendars of Geminus, Ptolemy, Aetius Amidenus, the Quintilii, Clodius Tuscus (and on some occasional references in other writers). In recent decades further examples have been found in astrological manuscripts and in papyri, amongst which the Calendar of Antiochus and that of the Pap. Hibeh 27 are the most prominent. Professor Rehm in his admirable Parapegmastudien has recently shown how much can be learnt from the simple entries in calendars about time-reckoning, astronomy, and, in general, about the cosmic system of a nation or a period. Religious entries on the other hand (which are of great importance for the origin and development of festivals) are less frequent—we find in the Hibeh Papyrus a number of local Egyptian festivals and in the Calendar of Antiochus two festivals of the Sun and a festival of the Nile.

Julian Dates and Greek Calendars

IN 1939, Professor W. B. Dinsmoor published an article titled Archaeology and Astronomy,' which, taken in conjunction with his several earlier articles and his two volumes on Athenian archons, contains virtually complete tables for equating Julian dates with days in the Athenian civil calendar throughout the five centuries from Solon to 100 B.C. and, at the same time, an explanation of the divergences between dates preserved in terms of the Athenian calendar and of the calendars of other Greek city-states. Dinsmoor's article is primarily concerned with the theory of temple-orientation, whereby it is argued that the axes of ancient temples were laid out along the direction of sunrise on the morning of certain religious holidays. For example, the temple known as the Older Parthenon would be dedicated presumably at the Panathenaic Festival on the twentyeighth day of the first Athenian month. Since the axes of ancient temples are known from archeological evidence, the exact year of the dedication can be determined by calculation and by observation of the direction of sunrise, provided that Julian dates for the festivals can be established. Dinsmoor's method of obtaining Julian dates involves the construction of schematic lunar calendars, astronomically more or less correct for Athens and incorrect for other city-states. He adopts assumptions which have been accepted in unbroken tradition from the publication of Scaliger's De emendatione temporum in 1583 through the recent investigations of

The Greek Calendar

The Greek calendar has not received as much attention from students of Greek religion as it deserves. The data have been collected by Bischoff. Nilsson has always appreciated its importance, and his contributions to the subject have laid a broad and solid foundation for further research. Both Farnell and Harrison neglected it, and Deubner's Attische Feste (1932) is less adequate in this respect than Mommsen's Feste der Stadt Athen (1898). The question of intercalation was raised in an acute form by Fotheringham, and has never been satisfactorily solved. Meanwhile progress has been made in the study of the Egyptian and Babylonian calendars, with results that have an important bearing on the Greek. This paper does not pretend to be exhaustive. It is merely a discussion of some of the wider issues that arose in the course of an attempt to solve a particular problem—the peculiar method adopted at Olympia for fixing the date of the Games.