The sanctuary of Artémis Orthia is one of most important centers religious Greek Cité of Sparte.

The sanctuary

The worship of Orthia is common to the four villages constitutive of Sparte original, Limnai, Pitana, Kynosoura and Mesoa. It is probably preceded, chronologically speaking, by the worship of the divinity poliade of Sparte, Athéna, Πολιοῦχος / Polioũkhos (“protective of the city”) or Χαλκίοικος / Khalkíoikos (“at the Bronze House”).

The sanctuary is located between Limnai and the Western bank of the river Eurotas, in a natural basin. The oldest vestiges, to the fragments of Pottery of the geometrical period, testify to the existence of the worship as of In the beginning, the worship is celebrated on a made rectangular furnace bridge of lumps of earth. With the whole beginning of, the téménos is equipped with a stone pavement drawn from the river and is surrounded by a wall of trapezoidal form. A furnace bridge out of stone and wooden is then built, as well as a temple. The wars carried out by Sparte make it possible to finance work.

A second temple is built towards 570 av. J. - C., under the joint reign of Leon and Agasiclès (towards 575 - 560), whose military successes provide the funds for work. Initially, the ground is raised, undoubtedly following a overflow of Eurotas, then consolidated. On the stream sand bed is high a calcareous stone furnace bridge and temple, directed like the preceding buildings. The enclosing wall is widened and takes a rectangular form. The second temple is entirely remade at second century BC, except for the furnace bridge, which is replaced in its turn when the Romains build with the {{IIIe}} century ap.  J. - C. a Amphitheater to accommodate the tourists of the diamastigosis (cf below).

The worship

Primitive elements of the worship

In the beginning, the worship of Orthia is that of an pre-anthropomorphic and pre-Olympian religion. The inscriptions mention “Orthia simply” (or other alternatives like Orthria), following the example lyric poet Alcman ( Parthénies , I, v. 61), which also calls it Aotis (“that of the dawn”, v. 87).

The worship is addressed to a xoanon (coarse effigy out of wooden) considered malefic. Pausanias (III, 16,9-11) tale indeed that, originating in Tauride, it was stolen by Oreste and Iphigénie. Making insane those which find it, it makes to entretuer the Spartans who sacrifice to Artémis. Only the intervention of a oracle makes it possible to tame the statue. Human blood is widespread on the furnace bridge, which accommodates then human sacrifices by drawing lot. The legislator Lycurgue then replaces them by the ritual scourging of the beautiful young man S, the diamastigosis . According to Plutarque ( Life of Aristide , 17,10), it is necessary to see rather there the commemoration of an episode of the medic Guerres.

Artémis is venerated there under the épiclèse of Λυγοδέσμα / Lygodésma , literally “with the bond of wicker”, which suggests a blocked statue, typical of the primitive Greek worships. For Pausanias ( ibid ) however, the name is explained because one would have found the xoanon in a bush of wicker which maintains the statuette orthia , i.e. “right”. Its worship includes/understands, in addition to scourging, of the individual dances of young people and the dances of choruses of young girls. For the boys, the price of the contest is a sickle, which lets suppose an agrarian rite.

The presence of ex-voto attests popularity of the worship: clay masks representing of the old women or the Hoplite S as well as terra cotta lead figurines, showing men and women playing of the flute, the Quadrant or of the Cymbal S, or amount with horse.

The diamastigosis

The worship of Orthia gives place to διαμαστίγωσις / diamastigosis (of διαμαστιγῶ/ diamastigô , “to whip hard”), the scourging of the beautiful young men (cf above), described by Plutarque, Xénophon and Plato. Cheeses are piled up on the furnace bridge and are protected by adults armed with whips. Young people must seize some, facing the whiplashes. At least at the time Roman, the priestess can control the force of the blows: according to Pausanias (III, 16,10-11), this one carries during the ritual the xoanon of Orthia. When one of the carry-whips retains its blows, not to disfigure a pretty boy or by regard for his family, the xoanon is supposed to be weighed down. The priestess reprimand then the faulty fouettor.

At the time Roman, according to Cicéron ( Tusculanes , II, 34), the ritual was moulted in bloody spectacle going sometimes until the death of a boy, under the eyes of spectators come from all the Empire. An amphitheater must even be built at the 3rd century to accommodate the tourists. Libanios indicates that at the 4th century still, the spectacle attracts the curious ones.

The exploration of the site

The sanctuary is put at the day at the beginning of the 20th century by the British School of archeology, during its excavations in Laconie. At the time, the site shelters only the ruins of a Roman theater, largely plundered after the foundation of modern Sparte in 1834 and the way to be enlized by the river. Quickly, the archeologists, under the control of R.M. Dawkins, find vestiges Greek. Written Dawkins: “ the Roman theater effectively could protect (…) a great quantity of antiquated objects which, by the light that they throw on Sparte primitive, gave to this excavation an major importance. ”

The first excavation campaign lasts five seasons, at the end which Dawinks publishes in 1910 a Histoire of the sanctuary . It is marked by an intensive recourse to the Stratigraphie. The countryside of 1924 - 1928 with Sparte also includes/understands an episode of cleaning in Orthia in 1928.

See too

Related articles

• worship Spartan of Artémis Corythalia during the festival of the Tithénidies (festival of the nurses);

• another sanctuary with Artémis: Temple of Artémis with Éphèse (Artémision);
• other sanctuaries Spartans: Ménélaion;
• other festivals Spartans: Karneia, Hyacinthies, Gymnopédies.