Serving Athena
The Festival of the Panathenaia and the Construction of Athenian Identities
Author: Julia L. Shear
Examines how the Panathenaia ('all Athenian'), the most important festival in ancient Athens, created identities for participants.
The first full-length treatment of the Panathenaia, the most important festival in ancient Athens. Investigates how individuals participated in this long-lived, all-Athenian celebration, and how their participation constructed and fostered both group and social identity. Essential for anyone working on ancient Greece and especially Greek religion.
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Summary
Examines how the Panathenaia ('all Athenian'), the most important festival in ancient Athens, created identities for participants.
The first full-length treatment of the Panathenaia, the most important festival in ancient Athens. Investigates how individuals participated in this long-lived, all-Athenian celebration, and how their participation constructed and fostered both group and social identity. Essential for anyone working on ancient Greece and especially Greek religion.
Description
In ancient Athens, the Panathenaia was the most important festival and was celebrated in honour of Athena from the middle of the sixth century BC until the end of the fourth century AD. This in-depth study examines how this all-Athenian celebration was an occasion for constructing identities and how it affected those identities. Since not everyone took part in the same way, this differential participation articulated individuals' relationships both to the goddess and to the city so that the festival played an important role in negotiating what it meant to be Athenian (and non-Athenian). Julia Shear applies theories of identity formation which were developed in the social sciences to the ancient Greek material and brings together historical, epigraphical, and archaeological evidence to provide a better understanding both of this important occasion and of Athenian identities over the festival's long history.
Critic Reviews
'Shear's approach is programmatically holistic; she uses literary, epigraphical, and archaeological sources as well as theories of the social sciences … This book provides impressive evidence for the festival throughout its history and thought-provoking insights into the logics of constructing identities for the various subgroups attested as participants over the course of time. Hopefully, it will motivate further discussion about the importance and relevance of cult practices for social history - and for the cult.' Marion Meyer, Bryn Mawr Classical Review
'Shear's long-awaited publication is a detailed and lengthy analysis which presents what is known of the festival's history, religious significance, and associated events.' Tyler Jo Smith, Religious Studies Review
About the Author
Julia L. Shear is a CHS Fellow in Hellenic Studies at the Center for Hellenic Studies of Harvard University and a Senior Associate Member of the American School of Classical Studies at Athens, having previously held a National Endowment for the Humanities Fellowship at the American School of Classical Studies at Athens and positions at Boğaziçi University, Istanbul and the University of Glasgow. She is the author of Polis and Revolution: Responding to Oligarchy in Classical Athens (Cambridge, 2011), which was shortlisted for the Runciman Award in 2012, and has published a significant series of articles on Athenian religion, memory, society and culture. She has also excavated extensively on various sites in Greece, Italy and Cyprus and especially in the Athenian Agora in Athens in Greece.
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