The gate of the year

Red-figure pyxis lid, from Athens (about 430 B.C.), now in the National Museums (Staatliche Museen), Berlin, Germany.
The scene shows the moment of the rising of the sun, represented as a horse-drawn chariot driven by the god Helios. He is preceded by the goddess of Dawn, Eos, who drives also a chariot, while on the other side the Moon goddess, Selene, riding her horse, goes below the horizon. Both the Sun and the Moon were regarded by the Greeks as children of the Titans, and thus pertaining to the most ancient generation of the deities. Their cult was not too common, nevertheless they personified the heavenly bodies which had an essential function in the reckoning of time and, as a consequence, in the organization of socio-economic activities, as well as in the scheduling of the festivities (eortái). The calendar established in a precise way the date in which every feast had to be celebrated. But the calendar system varied from one city to the next, and it is not simple to determine with precision the equivalences between the calendars of Antiquity and the modern one. Only for Athens, we have more complete and detailed information about the festive cycle and its seasonal rhythm.

[Source: http://library.artstor.org/library/]




Seasonal Cycles

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Red-figure pyxis lid, from Athens (about 430 B.C.), now in the National Museums (Staatliche Museen), Berlin, Germany. The scene shows the moment of the rising of the sun, represented as a horse-drawn chariot driven by the god Helios. He is preceded by the goddess of Dawn, Eos, who drives also a chariot, while on the other side the Moon goddess, Selene, riding her horse, goes below the horizon. Both the Sun and the Moon were regarded by the Greeks as children of the Titans, and thus pertaining to the most ancient generation of the deities. Their cult was not too common, nevertheless they personified the heavenly bodies which had an essential function in the reckoning of time and, as a consequence, in the organization of socio-economic activities, as well as in the scheduling of the festivities (eortái). The calendar established in a precise way the date in which every feast had to be celebrated. But the calendar system varied from one city to the next, and it is not simple to determine with precision the equivalences between the calendars of Antiquity and the modern one. Only for Athens, we have more complete and detailed information about the festive cycle and its seasonal rhythm. [Source: http://library.artstor.org/library/]