VIDEO LINK:  www.youtube.com/watch?v=noGmCvVc9Gw

PRIESTESS PYTHIA, PRIESTESS OF ANCIENT DELPHI

                                PART I

The Pythia commonly known as the “Oracle of Delphi,” was the priestess at the Temple of Apollo at Delphi, located on the slopes of Mount Parnassus.  It is said that the Pythia was widely credited for her prophesies inspired by Apollo.

The earliest account of the origin of the Delphic oracle is provided in the Homeric Hymn to Delphic Apollo, which recent scholarship dates within a narrow range, ca 580-570 BC.  Some historians state that it dated back to the 13^th century B.C. During this period the Delphic Oracle was the most prestigious and authoritative oracle among the Greeks.  The oracle is one of the best-documented religious institutions of the Classical Greeks.  The last recorded response was given during AD 393, when the emperor Theodosius I ordered pagan temples to cease operation.

Authors who mention the oracle include: Aeschylus, Aristotle, Clement of Alexandria, Diodorus, Diogenes, Euripides, Herodotus, Julian, Justin, Livy, Luca, Ovid, Pausanias, Pindar, Plato, Plutarch, Sophocles, Strabo, Thucydides and Xenophon.

The name “Pythia” derived from Pytho, which in myth was the original names of Delphi.  The Greeks derived this place name from the verb, pythein (to rot), which refers to the decomposition of the body or the monstrous Python after she was slain by Apollo.

No major decision was made without consulting the Oracle of Delphi first.  Greek leaders, foreign kings, generals and common folk made the pilgrimage to the Delphi sanctuary, paying great sums for the Pythias’s oracles.

The prophesies of the Pythia would determine the course of everything from when a farmer planted his seeds to when an empire declared war.  Arguments over the correct interpretation of an oracle were common.  The oracle was sought for every question of life. 

Pilgrims would first bathe in the Castalian spring, ritually sacrifice a sheep and then put their questions to the god.  The King of Lydia and Phrygia traveled to ask on matters of civic governance and outcasts arrived seeking purification.

The Pythia played a major role in Greek Colonization too.  She advised on likely sites for settlement, suggested patron deities, and was overall a key agent in the spread of Greek culture throughout the Mediterranean.

The Oracle of Delphi functioned in a specific place, the adytum, or “no entry” area of the temple’s core, and through a specific person, the Pythia who was chosen to speak as a possessed medium, for Apollo, the god of prophesy.  Apollo was known as an oracular god, a prophetic deity, and known to his fellow Olympians as a legislator.  From Delphi, we are told by historian Herodotus, he dictated the constitution of Sparta.

Part II is scheduled toward the beginning of December.  We will explore how the priestess was chosen, the 4 step-process that  the visitors would go through before consulting the Oracle and the vapors that were said to have played a role in her inspirations and prophesies (based upon research by Joseph Fontenrose).

CONTRIBUTING WRITER:  PATRICIA BOWMAN

November 14, 2014

VIDEO LINK:  www.youtube.com/watch?v=noGmCvVc9Gw