Gloria Ferrari

Hracls, Pisistratus and the Panathenaea

In: Mtis. Anthropologie des mondes grecs anciens. Volume 9-10, 1994. pp. 219-226.

Citer ce document / Cite this document :

Ferrari Gloria. Hracls, Pisistratus and the Panathenaea. In: Mtis. Anthropologie des mondes grecs anciens. Volume 9-10,
1994. pp. 219-226.
doi : 10.3406/metis.1994.1024
http://www.persee.fr/web/revues/home/prescript/article/metis_1105-2201_1994_num_9_1_1024

HERACLES, PISISTRATUS AND THE PANATHENAEA

Before the possibility of political symbolism was cast in high relief by John
Boardman in 1972, the idea that the images on Athenian vases express
political views dominant in their time seemed perfectly reasonable.
Boardman 's interprtation of the sixth century pictures of Hracls in a
chariot with Athena as Pisistratid propaganda has now made it difficult to be
so vague, to say that an image was "in the wind"1. His article addressed the
questions of just how an image became, as we say, "popular", how it was
controlled, and what rle, if any, the artisans who painted it had in shaping
public opinion. Hre I would like to focus precisely on the circumstances in
which the pictures of Hracls with a chariot and gods were painted and
viewed, and against which the pageantry of Pisistratus' return was meant to
be understood. That context is the main festival of the city and, I argue, its
foundation legend is the hub around which the imagery revolves.
The main points of the argument must be set out once more. First, the
scne of Pisistratus' return from his first exile, described by Herodotus, 1, 56,
5-6:
There was in the deme of Paeania a woman called Phye, nearly six feet tall
and good looking. They dressed this woman in full panoply and placed her in
a chariot in a pose that would make the best display, and drove into the city.
Heralds ran ahead and, when they came into town proclaimed, as they had
been told to do: "Welcome Pisistratus, Athenians, the man Athena honored
beyond ail men and now leads back to her own acropolis".
1. J. Boardman, "Herakles, 2;88^08 and Sons", Revue Archologique, 1972, pp.
57-72. R.M. Cook, "Pots and Pisistratan Propaganda", Journ. Hell. Stud., 107, 1987, pp.
167-169, proposes again the notion that an image may simply be "popular".

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GLORIA FERRARI

Herodotus tells the story but issues a disclaimer, calling this plan foolish
and strange, particularly because it meant to deceive Athenians, the cleverest
of ail Greeks2. One wonders what spcial pose the obliging Phye was made
to assume. Otherwise, the mental image that Herodotus' story conjures up
is uncanningly similar to what is offered by about 170 Athenian vases of the
sixth and fifth century, a scne whose essential ingrdients are the same as in
the Pisistratus' pisode: a chariot and Hracls and Athena3. Thse pictures
hve long been labeled the "apotheosis" of Hracls and taken to mark a
departure from an earlier version of the subject that shows the hero being led
to Zeus by Athena on foot. The chariot version of Hracls' apotheosis,
Boardman argued, was inspired by the staging of Pisistratus' return4. In
Hracls' Olympus the ancient viewer would hve read the Acropolis of
Athens, and in Hracls Pisistratus himself. Accordingly, the re-entry of
Pisistratus in Athens is the frame of rfrence in which the image is embedded
and within which it must be understood. The premise that the scnes show an
apotheosis and the conclusion that they refer to Pisistratus directly - the first
concerning the subject itself of the image, the other the discourse to which
it belongs - are the points I wish to re-examine.
The idea that the pictures, originate with the tyrant has difficulties, the
principal of which is chronological: the earliest instances of the chariot scnes
are dated in the 560s, before the earliest date that can be assigned to the Phye
pisode. What is worse, thse scnes corne in large numbers in the years after
510, when the tyranny cornes to an end, and continue into the 480s5. Yet,
there is something terribly right about Boardman 's idea, and that is that the
description of Pisistratus' return, however you visualize it, in some measure
resembles the chariot scnes painted on the vases, and the chances that this
is simply a concidence seem to me very small. To acknowledge that there
is a resemblance between the two, however, is not to say that the chariot
scnes represent Pisistratus' return. With others, I believe that there is more
2. But the story stands a good chance of being true, or, at least, of having been
considered true in later years, since it is repeated in the Aristotelian Ath. Pol., 14,4 and by
Clidemus (FrGrHist 323, F 15).
3. The bulk are listed in F. Brommer, Vasenlisten zur griechischen Heldensagerf,
Marburg, 1973, pp. 159-171.
4. J. Boardman, "Herakles, Peisistratos and Eleusis, Journ. Hell. Stud., 95, 1975, p.
1: "This pisode was mirrored by, or inspired a change in the usual iconography of
Herakles' introduction to Olympus by Athena on foot, to a version in which the goddess
is shown with the hero in a chariot'.
5. W.G. Moon, Ancient Greek Art and Iconography, Madison, Wisconsin, 1983, pp.
101-102.

HERACLES, PISISTRATUS AND THE PANATHENAEA

22 1

to the image of Hracls than a rfrence to Pisistratus, and that the opposite
is true, that Pisistratus' return staged a reprsentation of Hracls6. The
spectacle of the return was meant to persuade, to get its message across in
such a way that it would be strikingly clear to the man in the street. For that
to happen, there must hve existed the image of the hero in a chariot with
the goddess firmly in place in the popular culture, and this image will hve
been embedded in its own context - one that had, in the first place, nothing
to do with Pisistratus. With this in mind, let us turn to the question of what
the chariot scnes actually represent.
The label "apotheosii" implies that the story is about Hracls - his
translation to Olympus - and that the event takes place after the hero 's
death7. Being in the company of the gods at a time when, after ail, the gods
walked the earth is hardly sufficient indication of apotheosis, however. A
diffrent identification is suggested by the very iconography of the chariot
scnes, which is a variant of the species "festive processions" and, as
Boardman noted, follows the same scheme that serves to show, for example,
elaborate, mythical weddings. Slater has pointed to its correspondence to the
victor's triumphal parade to the king's palace, where the banquet will be held,
in the imagery of Pindar's odes. He has suggested, moreover, that the scnes
of Hracls apotheosis on vases should be viewed in connection with the
deed by which he gained immortality, that is, his rle in the Gigantomachy8.
A closer look at the vases will bring that connection into better focus.
6. R. Osborne, "The Myth of Propaganda", Hephaistos, 5-6, 1983-84, pp. 65-70. W.R.
Connor, "Tribes, Festivals and Processions; civic crmonial and political manipulation
in archaic Greece", Journ. Hell. Stud., 107, 1987, pp. 40-50 sets the Phye pisode against
the background of the custom of pageants in which citizens impersonated the divinities
honored.
7. P. Mingazzini, "Le rappresentazioni vascolari del mito dell'apoteosi di Herakles",
MAL6, Ser. 1, 1925, pp. 413-490. K. Schauenburg, "Herakles unter Gottern", Gymnasium,
70, 1963, pp. 113-133. A. Verbanck-Pierard, "Images et croyances en Grce ancienne:
reprsentations de l'apothose d'Hracls au Vie sicle", Images et socit en Grce
ancienne. Cahiers d'Archologie Romande, 36, 1987, pp. 187-199. Brommer, op.cit., p.
159, points out, however, that the scnes may well be about something else: the departure
to do battle with the Amazons, or with the Giants. On the vases, the Hracls 'death and
rescue from the pyre is represented in the years after 450 B.C. in imagery that has nothing
to do with the sixth century chariot scnes. See J. Boardman, "Herakles in Extremis",
Studien zur Mythologie und Vasenmaleri, E. Boehr and W. Martini, eds., Mainz/Rhein,
1986, pp. 127-132.
8. W.J. Slater, "Nemean One: The victor's return in poetry and politics", Greek Poetry
and Philosophy, D.E. Gerber, d., Chico, California, 1984, pp. 241-264, particularly pp.
241-244,249-251,256-64.

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Gloria Ferrari

In the corpus itself of chariot scnes, variations on the central thme show
that whatever it is that Hracls is doing, he is not the only one doing it. The
Antimenes Painter offers a full range of variations on the thme. Often,
although both Hracls and Athena are prsent, it is not at ail clear that they
are traveling together. On some vases Hracls seems to be taking off
without Athena, occasionally (and unaccountably) accompanied by Iolaus;9or
Athena is in the chariot and on her way without Hracls10. Sometimes
Athena mounts the chariot but Hracls is absent;11 sometimes her place is
taken by another divinity, such as Demeter, for whom divinization would be
pleonastic12. If we look for the occasion of a triumphal procession in which
both the gods and Hracls take on the rle of the Victor, we shall find it
precisely in the saga of the Gigantomachy: after the battle, we are told, the
hero joined the gods in clbration and, like them, performed the kallinikos
komos, the victory procession accompanied by song13. That is the occasion
where the hero would be greeted by the cry tenella kallinike, hurrah for the
winner! as in Archilochus' Hymn to Herakles. On a hydria in Florence the
image of Hracls in Athena' s chariot and the battle against the giants - an
armed goddess towering over a fallen Giant - are compressed into a single
frame for a good reason: they belong to the same narrative14.
This emphasis on Hracls reflects his crucial rle in the myth, since
without him the Olympians would hve lost the battle: "The gods had an
oracle that none of the giants could perish at the hand of gods, but that with
the help of a mortal they would be made an end of"15. For that reason, the
hero is also at center stage in the pictures of the battle itself, where he shoots
the Giants dead as they fall standing alongside Zeus and Athena16. Without
Hracls, there would be no happy ending to the Gigantomachy. Thanks to
him, there follows the collective clbration that the vases show. It may be
9. See the amphora Vatican 419, ABV 267.15; Burow, Der Antimenesmaler,
Mainz/Rhein, 1989, no. 16.
10. The hydria Frankfurt, Musum fur Vor-und Friihgeschichte b 345, ABV 267.18;
Burow, op. cit., no 93. Also Naples, Museo Nazionale Stg. 186, ABV 270.51; Burow,
op.cit., no. 117.
11. The amphora British Musum 203, ABV 274.131; Burow, op.cit., no. 85. Hydria
Wurzburg, Martin von Wagner-Musum L 320, ABV 267.18; Burow, op.cit., no. 123.
12. Demeter: WUrzburg, Martin von Wagner-Musum L 308, ABV 267.19; Burow,
op.cit., no. 92.
13. Euripides, Hracls furens, 179; Athenaeus, I, 22, c.
14. Florence, Museo Archologico 3803, ABV.
15. Apollodorus, I, 6, 1; translation by J.G. Frazer 1921.
16. F. Vian, LIMC1V (1988) 2456-57, 265, s.v. "Gigantes".

HERACLES, PlSISTRATUS AND THE PANATHENAEA

223

that his part in the war against the Giants earned him immortality and a place
among the gods, but the chariot scnes are not about dification. Rather than
as "apotheosis" (which is a modem label), the event depicted should be
recognized as an pisode of the Gigantomachy. The myth also tells of a
spcial connection of the hero to the goddess, since "by means of Athena Zeus
summoned Hracls to his help"17. In this light, images of Hracls led to Zeus
by Athena, but on foot and with no hint of clbration18, may show an earlier
pisode of the same story: the recruitment of the hero before the battle.
If the chariot scnes belong to the Gigantomachy as much as the flood of
pictures of the battle itself, which also begin to appear on Attic vases also
in the 560s, we should ask why the subject is so favored at this time. For once
it is not difficult to connect historical event and Visual culture. In 566 the
Panathenaic festival was revamped and enlarged, with the addition of a grand
quadriennial clbration19. As one would expect, the reform spurred the
production of imagery related to the clbration, most of ail images that
illustrate its foundation legend. That legend is the clbration of the victory
over the Giants, specifically, of Athena over Asterios, as we learn from a
fragment of Aristotle which gives a checklist of foundation legends for
important festival20. Unless one keeps in mind that the Panathenaea
commemorated the victory against the Giants, it is difficult to explain why
the Gigantomachy was the subject of the tapestry offered to Athena in the
festival21. Unless one locates the persona of Hracls the Giant-slayer not in
myth and poetry, but specifically in this most important Athenian cuit and
grand occasion for civic display, it becomes difficult to explain why he
appeared with Athena at the battle of Marathon and was so represented in
the Stoa Poikile - at Athena's side and with the hros Marathon and
Theseus22. It becomes hard to explain, as Woodford noted when she reviewed
17. Apollodorus, I, 6, 1.
18. Collectedby Brommer, op.cit., pp. 172-174.
19. Eusebius, Chronica, Olympiad53, 3-4.
20. Aristotle, Fragmenta, V. Ros, d., Stuttgart, 1967, no. 637. This fact was pointed
out in G. F. Pinney, "Pallas and Panathenaea", Ancient Greek and Related Pottery,
Copenhagen, 1988, pp. 467-477. As W. Burkert, Greek Religion, Cambridge, Mass., p.
233, points out, the Gigantomachy is precisely the kind of aition one would expect for
the festival.
21. The tapestry might hve included a "chariot scne"; see Euripides, Hecuba, 46674. For the Gigantomachy on the peplos, see B. Sismondo Ridgway, "Images of Athena
on the Akropolis", Goddess and Polis, J. Neils, d., Princeton, N.J., 1992, pp. 123-24, 127.
22. Pausanias, I, 15, 3. The connection with the Gigantomachy is briefly considered
and then rejected by Boardman, art. cit. (supra, n. 1), p. 59.

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Gloria Ferrari

the many cuits of Hracls in Attica, why there should be so many, including
probably one on the Acropolis, for this Dorian hero, whose connection with
Athens she took to be slight23.
There remains to be explained the curious painted inscription on the
hydria by the Priam Painter, the phrase placed by the heads of Hracls and
Athena which reads HERAKLEOUS KORE24. The puzzle is insoluble, I think,
so long as the two words are taken to be a phrase that is complte and ends
with Kore - a label or an acclamation. In that case we hve no choice but to
take the genitive as modifying and translate "Hracls'
girl" or "Hracls' daughter". I believe that this is not the case, and that the
inscription gives the start of a longer line which contained, among the words
that followed, a noun meaning someone or something that could be plausibly
said to belong to Hracls.
My reason for believing that the phrase is not
complte, and not a label, is that is scans. This is the first colon of a dactilic
hexameter with the word ending at the caesura, after the third long syllable:
' 25. One can go a little further, since the form of the
inscription gives some dues as to the genre of the poem: the spelling
excludes certain kinds of choral lyric, where the Dorian form would
appear. On the other hand, would not be found in an epic on
the Homeric model, where the genitive of this name is always given with heta
omicron26. This spelling of the hero's name might fit a number of genres,
including choral lyric, but the combination points to a hymn, such as the

23. S. Woodford, "Cuits of Hracls in Attica", Studies prsente to G. M. A.

Hanfmann, Mainz, 1971, pp. 21 1-225.
24. Oxford212; AJ3V331.5. Boardman, art. cit., pp. 64-65; id., "Herakles, Peisistratos
and the Unconvinced", Journ. Hell. Stud., 1989, p. 159, sought confirmation of the
hypothesis that Hracls is a transparent allegory for the real subject - Pisistratus - in a
riddling understanding of the inscription. A literal reading is simply not believable. Athena
cannot be said to be Hracls' daughter, and to take kore in the sens of "lover" runs
contrary everything we know about her. But if Hracls hre is not himself, but Pisistratus
- the argument goes - then an explanation is at hand. Because this would be not Athena
but the tall and comely Phye who drove Pisistratus to the Acropolis, and Phye was in a
sens Pisistratus' daughter - daughter-in-law, having married Pisistratus' son Hipparchus
(Clidemus, FrGrHist, 323, F 15). Voir, ci-dessous, fig. p. 226.
25. The long vowel in kore is expressed by the omicron sign, as in many Attic
metrical inscriptions of this time; see, e.g., P. A. Hansen, Carmina epigraphica graeca,
Berlin, 1983, nos. 24, 182, 195, 237, 282.
26. H. Ebeling, Lexicon Homericum, Leipzig, 1885, p. 546.

HERACLES, PISISTRATUS AND THE PANATHENAEA

225

Hymn to Hracls: ' 27. What

propose is that the phrase gives the first words of the first line of a song,
perhaps a hymn - something like [
], where the genitive refers not to but to : "Of Hracls the
Maiden on the well-crafted chariot"28.
My reconstruction of the context to which images involving Hracls, a
chariot, and Athena belong, and of the nature of its connection to Pisistratus
is then as follows. The image acquires wide currency and appears on the
painted vases following the reorganization of the Panathenaic festival in 566,
before the tyranny of Pisistratus. Like the pictures of the battle itself and the
figure of the pyrrhic-dancing Athena on the prize amphorae, thse
reprsentations of the kallinikos komos refer to the foundation legend of the
festival. In the manner of popular art, the vases do not propose a novel
Hracls but the familiar hero who made victory possible over the forces of
chaos. Thse images hve, to begin with, nothing to do with Pisistratus and
everything to do with the main festival of the city and that is why they survive
the fall of the tyrants. It is this rich web of associations of Hracls with Athena
and with the festival of the city, this pride in victory and in being Athenian,
that Pisistratus exploits when he drives up with Phye, fooling no one and
certain that the Athenians would not miss the point. Pisistratus' reprsentation
of Hracls articultes a metaphor by which the tyrant is like Hracls in that
he is the agent of Olympian order. In this respect the hero functions as a
suggestive paradigm for tyrants, kings, and emperors throughout antiquity.
The vase-paintings, I conclude, are explicitly concerned with the festival
and not with the tyrant. That is not to say that they are outside of political
discourse. The festival itself was patronized by Pisistratus and his sons. The
people of Athens who made and used the vases will hve been well aware of
the tyrant's effort to assimilate himself to Hracls - with his grand return and
his guard of club-bearers - and the connection with the images on the vases
27. Homeric Hymns, XV, 1. This form of the genitive occurs also in Euripides,
Hracls furens, 680-681 and Heraclidae, 93. Its occurrence on the Priam Painter's hydria
is among the earliest; the spelling out of the diphthong might hve been determined by the
dsire to avoid confusion with the Homeric form , which would be hre
metrically incorrect.
28. A line of Timocreon (probably from a hymn to Hracls), which was ridiculed by
Simonides, is metrically comparable: '
(Anth. Pal, XIII, 30). For much help in matters of meter I thank M.L. Lang. On dipinti
that give snatches of songs, see also G. Ferrari, "Menelas", Journ. Hell. Stud., 107, 1987,
pp. 180-182; F. Lissarrague, The Aesthetics of the Greek Banquet, Princeton, 1987,
chapter 7.

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Gloria Ferrari

will hve been made. In this fashion, I am prepared to believe that the vases
served the cause of Pisistratus' self-aggrandizement well, as Boardman
proposed. But the connection could also be ignored or severed, leaving ail that
Hracls stood for intact, when the analogy revealed itself to be, in the event,
a false one.
(University of Chicago)

Gloria FERRARI

Illustration non autorise la diffusion

Figure 1