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Lyres, melodious shawms, and the clatter of castanets
blended there, and the voices of girls in the holy song;
up to heaven the glorious clamour arose. . . |
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There is drinking in the streets, a riot of incenses and perfumes; matrons ululate, while the men sing a paean that incorporates a celebration of the bridal couple.36 |
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After the newly-weds had gone in for the night, the singing continued outside the closed door. Pindar refers to the songs that unmarried girls sing in the evening for their friend, the bride, and several fragments of them occur among the remains of Sappho's work. One of these fragments implies that the epithalamia went on throughout the night.37 |
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Another, rarer occasion for personal celebration was provided by victory in a sporting event, especially if it was at one of the prestigious festivals such as the Olympic, Pythian, Isthmian, or Nemean Games. The Epinician Odes of Pindar and Bacchylides (and fragments of some by Simonides) show us what fine and elaborate songs a wealthy victor might commission. The less wealthy, no doubt, also made merry with such music as they could command. The victor's friends might sing in his honour on the very day of the victory, as they dined and drank in the evening.38 When he returned to his home, a less impromptu celebration awaited him, with a chorus of local young men39 performing another, perhaps longer song in a festive settingan enkomionat his house, or in front of it,40 or at some public altar where he was sacrificing. People beyond his immediate circle might well take an interest, as his success brought glory on the whole town. As with wedding songs, we hear of lyres and pipes providing accompaniment jointly.41 |
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36 Sappho fr. 44. Cf. also Pind. Pyth. 3.88ff., Aesch. Ag. 705-8, Soph. Ant. 813-15 with Jebb's note, Eur. Tro. 308-41, HF 10-12, IA 1036-57, Ar. Pax 1316-66, Av. 1728-65, Thesm. 1034f., Catull. 61. 123, and for vase-paintings Wegner, Musikleben 95, 191. |
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37 Sappho frs. 30, 104-17; Pind. Pyth. 3. 17-19. Later literary compositions based on the epithalamion are Theoc. Id. 18 (where the girls sing in the evening and say they will return at dawn; cf. Aesch. fr. 43); Catull. 62. Cf. also Ap. Rhod. Argon. 4. 1160, Procl. ap. Phot. Bibl. 321 a 17; H. W. Smyth, Greek Melic Poets, pp. cxii-cxx; P. Maas, RE ix. 130-4; E. Contiades-Tsitsoni, Hymenaios und Epithalamion (Stuttgart, 1990). |
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38 Cf. Pind. Nem. 6. 37f. Bacchylides' short Odes 2 and 7 were composed in these circumstances. |
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39 Pind. Ol. 6. 87, Pyth. 10.55, Nem. 2. 24, 3. 4, 66, Isthm. 8. 1; Bacchyl. 11. 10. |
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40 Bacchyl. 6.14. |
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41 See p. 346. |
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