Where Have All the Heroes Gone?: Cenotaphs and Remains’ Agency in Ancient Greek Hero Cult

This paper challenges a dominant axiom in the field of ancient Greek religion: that remains were essential to the cult of heroes. The prevailing notion is that the bones of illustrious people, whether mythological or historical, were held as relics imbued with power (Nagy, 115–6; Burkert, 199–203). This model mainly relies on evidence from two famous accounts: first, the Spartans’ retrieval of Orestes’ bones which was a prerequisite for their triumph over the Tageans (Hdt. 1.67.2–4), and second, the repatriation of the remains of Theseus to Athens (Plut. Thes. 23.3). However, we also have substantial evidence for cultic activities that took place at graves that were, or at least were believed to be, empty. These cenotaphic hērōa ought to make us reconsider the role of remains in the Greek hero cult.

Cenotaphic hērōa were by no means the majority of cases, but the quantity of their attestation—both archeological and literary—demands a serious consideration, for which scholars of ancient Greek religion have yet to account. We can delineate three groups of such cult sites with examples (although a full compendium is beyond the scope of this paper):

1. Cities that worshipped an indigenous hero believed to have died in a foreign land or at sea. Such was the case of Ajax the Younger who was commemorated in Lokris, after he drowned (Pind. O. 9.112; sch. in Pind. O. ad loc.).
2. Empty hērōa that were established due to divine intervention. The Pythia, for example, bid the people of Astypalaia to worship the athlete Kleomedes after his mysterious disappearance (Paus. 6.9.6–8).
3. Cults for founders whose remains were no longer available. The cenotaph found in the agora of Poseidonia is commonly attributed to Is of Helike, the founder of Sybaris, whose cult was reinstituted by refugees from the original settlement (Pedley, 28). Battos I was likewise honored with a second, empty, grave at the agora of Kyrene, about fifty years after his tomb was destroyed (Bacchielli, 10–12).

The cultic activities at cenotaphs stand in sharp juxtaposition to the familiar stories that underscore the importance of heroes’ remains. To bridge this gap, we can draw from theories of object agency and abjections; scholars have noted the unique position of corpses as objects that maintain the deceased’s subjectivity (Nilsson–Stutz, 2008). The funeral serves as a rite of passage that transmutes the corpse into an object and nullifies its agency, which is subsequently transferred to the gravesite. For example, Achilles drags Hector’s corpse around the cenotaph of Patroklos, and not his own hut, where Patroklos’ remains are held (Sourvinou–Inwood, 120–1). In the cases of Orestes and Theseus, each hero has yet to receive his due rites, and hence his remains are still charged with power. However, the remains lose these functions once the funeral has been completed and the grave–marker assumes the agency of representing the mighty dead.