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hawkwing_lbBefore, or just upon, entering the sanctuary of Asklepios, it was probably customary to have a ritual wash: to pour water over one's head and shoulders as a gesture towards purification. There is neither fountain nor well by the entrance to the sanctuary, so perhaps this was not done here - or perhaps our example, Alexandros, would have found a pithos filled with water and a dipper with which to pour it out over his head.
Whether he (and his slave, who is still carrying the cock in a basket) washes here or not, whether he's still sweaty-faced or whether he feels the breeze cold on his freshly-wet head and beard, he's faced with the rear of the temple of Asklepios. We don't know, at this remove, how it was decorated: whether there were wooden dedicatory pinakes or cloth banners or pleasantly-scented wreathes or wall-paintings or a wax board or piece of slate chalked with a list of days and times during which the iereus (who held the priesthood for life) or his underling, the zakoros (who was required to be an Athenian citizen) would be present to oversee private sacrifices. At this remove, we don't know. Nor do we know where the inventory lists, which listed the dedications previously displayed inside the temple (but removed at intervals to make way for new ones), would have stood: perhaps under one of the stoas.
Alexandros goes either right or left around the temple, perhaps going in under one of the stoas to get out of direct sun. Probably there are a handful of other people present, admiring the dedications or the votive statues (including one of Herodes Atticus and his daughter) or just hanging out having a conversation. Perhaps he knows one or two of them and joins in. Perhaps one of them is the zakoros, or the iereus, with a gathering of friends discussing regimen and dreams from the god. Perhaps Alexandros wanders around for a bit, admiring the dedications inside the temple, or perhaps he goes straight to the temple personnel to make his sacrifice and discuss incubating within the sanctuary.
Perhaps there are no sacrifice-overseeing personnel there, and he has to send his slave or bribe one of the sanctuary's slaves into running a message to them at home inquiring when they might actually be present, who knows?
So say he makes his sacrifice - giving the cock to the temple's throat-cutting slave to kill over the alter while the priest makes a prayer - and makes his arrangements to incubate, discussing what kind of monetary offering he should give the god in order to have a chance of healing dreams. Maybe he makes the arrangements for that night, or maybe he arranges to come back. If it's for that night, maybe he sends his slave home with the leftover sacrificial chicken for his wife and hangs out in the sanctuary until it is time for the purificatory ceremony. Maybe there is singing of praise to the god. Maybe he hears choirs performing in the Theatre of Dionysos or the Odeion, or up at the Parthenon. Maybe he hears a minor procession go by. Maybe he smells incense or sweet flowers from ceremonies, or maybe the air is thick with the smell of offal and burned meat and someone vomiting from a purge prescribed by a doctor or by the god. Maybe he and a couple of other incubants wash in water from the sacred well and make offerings of wheatcakes and fruit and other appropriate things before the priest sends them to lie on a couch either inside the temple or somewhere within the sanctuary enclosure, presumably after dark. All of Alexandros' somatic attention is on the possibility of relief from his ongoing complaint. The lights are doused, and the priest enjoins the incubants and their slaves to keep silent.
And then, presumably, they sleep.
Whether he (and his slave, who is still carrying the cock in a basket) washes here or not, whether he's still sweaty-faced or whether he feels the breeze cold on his freshly-wet head and beard, he's faced with the rear of the temple of Asklepios. We don't know, at this remove, how it was decorated: whether there were wooden dedicatory pinakes or cloth banners or pleasantly-scented wreathes or wall-paintings or a wax board or piece of slate chalked with a list of days and times during which the iereus (who held the priesthood for life) or his underling, the zakoros (who was required to be an Athenian citizen) would be present to oversee private sacrifices. At this remove, we don't know. Nor do we know where the inventory lists, which listed the dedications previously displayed inside the temple (but removed at intervals to make way for new ones), would have stood: perhaps under one of the stoas.
Alexandros goes either right or left around the temple, perhaps going in under one of the stoas to get out of direct sun. Probably there are a handful of other people present, admiring the dedications or the votive statues (including one of Herodes Atticus and his daughter) or just hanging out having a conversation. Perhaps he knows one or two of them and joins in. Perhaps one of them is the zakoros, or the iereus, with a gathering of friends discussing regimen and dreams from the god. Perhaps Alexandros wanders around for a bit, admiring the dedications inside the temple, or perhaps he goes straight to the temple personnel to make his sacrifice and discuss incubating within the sanctuary.
Perhaps there are no sacrifice-overseeing personnel there, and he has to send his slave or bribe one of the sanctuary's slaves into running a message to them at home inquiring when they might actually be present, who knows?
So say he makes his sacrifice - giving the cock to the temple's throat-cutting slave to kill over the alter while the priest makes a prayer - and makes his arrangements to incubate, discussing what kind of monetary offering he should give the god in order to have a chance of healing dreams. Maybe he makes the arrangements for that night, or maybe he arranges to come back. If it's for that night, maybe he sends his slave home with the leftover sacrificial chicken for his wife and hangs out in the sanctuary until it is time for the purificatory ceremony. Maybe there is singing of praise to the god. Maybe he hears choirs performing in the Theatre of Dionysos or the Odeion, or up at the Parthenon. Maybe he hears a minor procession go by. Maybe he smells incense or sweet flowers from ceremonies, or maybe the air is thick with the smell of offal and burned meat and someone vomiting from a purge prescribed by a doctor or by the god. Maybe he and a couple of other incubants wash in water from the sacred well and make offerings of wheatcakes and fruit and other appropriate things before the priest sends them to lie on a couch either inside the temple or somewhere within the sanctuary enclosure, presumably after dark. All of Alexandros' somatic attention is on the possibility of relief from his ongoing complaint. The lights are doused, and the priest enjoins the incubants and their slaves to keep silent.
And then, presumably, they sleep.
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no subject
Date: 2014-03-29 06:41 pm (UTC)I'm not sure if this is what you meant in the second paragraph.
no subject
Date: 2014-03-29 06:43 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2014-03-29 09:58 pm (UTC)I like both the evocation and the questioning: you can't know, but you are imagining vividly.
no subject
Date: 2014-03-29 10:22 pm (UTC)We can't even suggest how different aspects of sensory experience may have affected how people related to health and illness and healing and religious healing if we don't bring them into view, and so much of the work on religion and on medicine in the ancient world flattens the world to a two-dimensional picture, as though medicine is only texts and tools, religion only ground plans and processional routes and lists of dedicatory inscriptions. And it's not: its pain and sweat and suffering and stinks and hope and awkward conversations and inconvenient arrangements and friends unexpectedly met and strange dreams (and consulting a dream interpreter or handbook) and family obligations. And an entire universe of symbols that are felt at a pre-objective, pre-rational, subconscious level as much as they are articulated into conscious understanding.
...anyway.
no subject
Date: 2014-03-29 10:28 pm (UTC)You're talking about a process of recovery I care about very much (even if I've never focused on medicine): people rather than pageantry; earth under the nails. An entire day spent in prayer sounds awesome and austere. Please meet the Yom Kippur service I spent with a distinct and conscious awareness of my voice taking forever to warm up because with nothing in my stomach for hours, all systems were mildly offline.
no subject
Date: 2014-03-29 10:37 pm (UTC)People are people. People are what history is for and about. If history's just lists, if it's just data, it gets us information without understanding what it might have meant to the people who lived it. At least, this is my opinion, although the data itself is also vital or we couldn't reach for that understanding.