Dionysius Halicarnassensis, Antiquitates Romanae 4.25.4-5: female spectators at an ancient Ionian festival

Dionysius Halicarnassensis, Antiquitates Romanae 4.25.4-5: female spectators at an ancient Ionian festival

1st century BCE

Historiography

Literary source

Dionysius here clearly relies on Thucydides 3.104.3–4.

His example was followed by the Ionians who, leaving Europe, settled in the maritime parts of Caria, and also by the Dorians, who built their cities in the same region and erected temples at the common expense — the Ionians building the temple of Diana at Ephesus and the Dorians that of Apollo at Triopium — where they assembled with their wives and children at the appointed times, joined together in sacrificing and celebrating the festival, engaged in various contests, equestrian, gymnastic and musical, and made joint offerings to the gods. After they had witnessed the spectacles, celebrated the festival, and received the other evidences of goodwill from one another, if any difference had arisen between one city and another, arbiters sat in judgment and decided the controversy; and they also consulted together concerning the means both of carrying on the war against the barbarians and of maintaining their mutual concord.

Earnest Cary, Roman Antiquities. Dionysius of Harlicarnassus, vol. 2 (= Loeb Classical Library; 347), Cambridge, MA 1939.

παρ᾽ οὗ τὸ παράδειγμα λαβόντες Ἴωνές θ᾽ οἱ μεταθέμενοι τὴν οἴκησιν ἐκ τῆς Εὐρώπης εἰς τὰ παραθαλάττια τῆς Καρίας καὶ Δωριεῖς οἱ περὶ τοὺς αὐτοὺς τόπους τὰς πόλεις ἱδρυσάμενοι ἱερὰ κατεσκεύασαν ἀπὸ κοινῶν ἀναλωμάτων: Ἴωνες μὲν ἐν Ἐφέσῳ τὸ τῆς Ἀρτέμιδος, Δωριεῖς δ᾽ ἐπὶ Τριοπίῳ τὸ τοῦ Ἀπόλλωνος: ἔνθα συνιόντες γυναιξὶν ὁμοῦ καὶ τέκνοις κατὰ τοὺς ἀποδειχθέντας χρόνους συνέθυόν τε καὶ συνεπανηγύριζον καὶ ἀγῶνας ἐπετέλουν ἱππικοὺς καὶ γυμνικοὺς καὶ τῶν περὶ μουσικὴν ἀκουσμάτων καὶ τοὺς θεοὺς ἀναθήμασι κοινοῖς ἐδωροῦντο. θεωρήσαντες δὲ καὶ πανηγυρίσαντες καὶ τὰς ἄλλας φιλοφροσύνας παρ᾽ ἀλλήλων ἀναλαβόντες, εἴ τι πρόσκρουσμα πόλει πρὸς πόλιν ἐγεγόνει, δικασταὶ καθεζόμενοι διῄτων καὶ περὶ τοῦ πρὸς τοὺς βαρβάρους πολέμου καὶ περὶ τῆς πρὸς ἀλλήλους ὁμοφροσύνης κοινὰς ἐποιοῦντο βουλάς.

Karl Jacoby (ed.), Dionysii Halicarnasei Antiquitatum Romanarum quae supersunt, vol. 2, Leipzig 1888.