Demeter and Persephone

Chapter 2 concentrates on representations of Demeter and Persephone in the Syracusan odes. The goddesses are important for two reasons. First, the Deinomenids were ancestral priests of Demeter and Persephone in Sicily and the goddesses therefore could easily be linked to the rule of this family of tyrants. On the other hand, worship of the two goddesses was widespread throughout Sicily. This chapter argues that references to Demeter and Persephone in epinician poetry for Hieron and members of his circle promote and celebrate Syracusan and Deinomenid expansion throughout the island of Sicily by aligning pan-Sicilian and Deinomenid interests and rooting them in the island’s landscape. The first section surveys the material remains for the goddesses in Sicily before exploring discussions of the goddesses in mythological, historical, and literary sources. An analysis of Pindar’s Nemean 1 then proposes that, while the link between Arethusa and Alpheos represents the close tie between Syracuse and the Panhellenic sanctuary at Olympia, Pindar’s references to Demeter and Persephone in epinician poetry define the relationship between Syracuse and the rest of Sicily under the rule of the Deinomenid tyrants. A final section argues that in contrast to the goddesses who celebrate uniquely Syracusan and Deinomenid interests, the hero Herakles articulates a role for Syracuse and the West more generally in the maintenance of the order of the Olympians.

Conclusions and Test Cases

Chapter 5 explores the odes for Psaumis of Kamarina and Ergoteles of Himera. After a brief survey of the history of the two cities and the cultural context for the poems, the chapter then argues that Psaumis and Ergoteles offer contrasting examples of the way that Pindar mitigates the status of hybrid citizens in Sicily by writing the victors themselves into their local landscapes and civic ideology that is bound to the landscape. As examples of an immigrant (Ergoteles) and, at least possibly, a Greek of Sikel ethnicity (Psaumis), Ergoteles and Psaumis contrast with the tyrants Hieron and Theron. The poet, it suggests, emphasizes Psaumis’ control of both the landscape and cityscape of Kamarina in Olympian 4 and Olympian 5 and converts him into a quasi-mythical benefactor of the city. On the other hand, Ergoteles, an exiled Cretan, is integrated into the civic fabric of Himera through a bath in the hot springs of the Nymphs. This chapter proposes that Pindar’s emphasis on landscape in the Sicilian odes is a feature that transcends the divide between tyrant and non-tyrant victors. As in the odes for Syracusans and Akragantines, local landscapes in the odes for Kamarina and Himera participate in the formation of civic traditions. It argues, however, that in the cases of odes for victors who are themselves establishing their civic status the victor himself becomes affiliated with the local landscape through Pindar’s poetry.

Fluid Identities

Chapter 4 argues that Pindar activates the River Akragas as a civic symbol in three of his five odes for victors from Akragas. Along with Syracuse, Akragas was one of the two most powerful Sicilian cities in the fifth century, and the influential Emmenid rulers celebrated their athletic successes by commissioning four odes by Pindar. A fifth ode for Akragas is unique as the only example of an ode in celebration of a victory in a musical competition that survives from classical Greece. A preliminary survey of local references in these odes suggests that the River Akragas became a recurring symbol that echoed the crab on Akragantine coinage of the period. Already in the earliest of the Akragantine odes, Pythian 12, the poet represents Akragas as a morphing figure that shifts from city to nymph to river, emphasizing the equivalency drawn between the three and the importance of the river as a symbol of civic identity. Later, in Olympians 2 and 3 (in celebration of Theron’s chariot victory of 476), Pindar draws a spatial analogy between the Akragantines and the inhabitants of the Isle of the Blessed and the mythical Hyperboreans, respectively, that depends on their link to the river. Through close reading and analysis of Olympian 2, this chapter suggests that the River Akragas becomes a locus of Akragantine civic identity in this poetry.

Locating Aitnaian Identity in Pindar’s Pythian 1

Chapter 3 proposes that in Pythian 1 Pindar uses two myths to map out and reinforce a sense of civic identity for the newly founded city of Aitna. Building upon other work that shows that Typho’s prison celebrates Hieron’s recent military and political victories, the chapter argues that this myth creates a significant place for Aitna within a Panhellenic mythical context. According to Hesiod, Typho is the final foe Zeus faces before becoming uncontested king of the Olympians (Theog. 821–80). Typho’s placement under Aitna thus transforms the landscape into an important site for stability of the cosmic order and elevates the new city to a place of Panhellenic significance. Second, it demonstrates that the myth of the Dorian migration supplies a myth of continuity for the new citizens of Aitna. While these citizens originate from different cities—half from Syracuse, half from the Peloponnese, according to Diodorus—the myth of the Dorian migration offers a shared narrative that unites them as an ethnic group. Taken together these two myths offer Aitna both a sense of place within a wider Greek narrative and a celebration of their ethnic heritage through their performances in Aitna, in Sicily more broadly, and throughout the Greek world.

Arriving in Syracuse

Chapter 1 focuses on the cult and mythical narratives of Arethusa and the related goddess, Artemis Alpheioa. It begins with a survey of the historical and material evidence for Arethusa in sixth- and fifth-century Syracuse. As a civic symbol for the polis, Arethusa endures despite political volatility in the period. Pindar, the chapter argues, recognizes the importance of Arethusa as a civic symbol and evokes the relationship between Arethusa and Alpheos in nearly every poem for Syracuse, signaling stability and continuity. Furthermore, it proposes that links between the cults in Syracuse and related worship of Artemis Alpheioa in the Peloponnese suggest that Pindar’s references to the cult highlight a mythic tradition shared by the Peloponnesians and Syracusans.

Introduction

The introduction presents the central questions and motivations of the book: How are the mythical narratives in poems for Sicilian Greek victors different from the mythical narratives in the remainder of Pindaric epinician poetry? If the Sicilian odes lack local myths, as has sometimes been argued, how does epinician poetry shape and reinforce identity in celebrations of victors from newly colonized cities? How are conventional elements of epinician poetry activated to signify more than formal aspects of genre? The chapter begins by briefly surveying mythical narratives in the odes for Aegina, Cyrene, and Thebes as points of comparison. It next defines the term “locality” as it is used throughout the study to refer to aspects that are unique to a city, by situating a conception of locality within current scholarly discussions of the notions of place and space in the fields of geography, philosophy, and Classics. After surveying previous studies of place in epinician poetry, the introduction concludes by proposing that while all of Pindar’s epinician odes delineate and redefine places, the Sicilian odes present unique strategies for the expression of identity through choral poetry because of the mixed populations and constant political and civic upheaval that took place in Sicily during the first half of the fifth century.