worshipers move away from profane space in a small (or vast) procession which
includes the sacrificial animals and equipment. When they arrive at the god’s altar
they perform a number of actions focusing on the victim, which Burkert interprets as
attempts to kill pleasingly, with the animal’s consent, so as not to offend deity (cf.
Chapter 8 in this volume). But the sequence of events could be interpreted quite
differently, namely as actions framing the main purpose: making a petition to god.
The petition is expressed in words of prayer; all preliminary and subsequent actions
prepare for, and promote, the effectiveness of the petition. That is, the animal sacrifice
is not thepointof the ritual, it is rather the way of calling the god’s attention to a
matter of great importance for the humans gathered. As god can take or grant human
life, so humans ‘‘give’’ an animal life to god in the hope of recompense. But it is the
recompense (charis) which counts; in what form the recompense should be given is
formulated by the prayer. Hence we could say that the prayer is thepointof the ritual;
everything else goes toward giving this maximum emphasis and persuasiveness.
A parody of sacrifice, hymn-singing, and prayer is given by Aristophanes in his
Birds, when ‘‘Bird-City,’’ Nephelokokkygia, is founded in an inaugural act. A parody
is only funny if based on reality: the audience must recognize the perversion of reality
in order to laugh. Hence this passage is as serious a witness to the points made above
as one could wish. Peisthetairos announces his intention of sacrificing to the new gods
of the bird-city; he calls for a priest to lead the procession, and a slave to fetch the
basket with sacrificial knife and lustral water (848–50). At this point the Chorus
promptly strikes up an enthusiastic response, saying it wishes to approach the gods
with ‘‘great and solemn processionals’’ (851–3); likewise, it wishes to sacrifice a sheep
‘‘for the sake ofcharis’’ (854–5). It exhorts itself to strike up a ‘‘Pythian cry,’’ that is,
a paean orprosodionto Apollo, which a piper called Chairis should accompany on the
aulos(857–8). We have here, then, the classical elements of public worship: animal
sacrifice prefaced by a procession which moves along to the tune of processional
hymns to the gods. They carry the utensils (basket, knife, lustral water) necessary for
the actual sacrifice (cf. Figure 7.1).
Then in line 862 they reach their destination (presumably an altar on stage) and
Peisthetairos admonishes the priest to sacrifice to the new gods. He agrees, having first
called for the basket-with-knife. Then, basket (or knife) in hand, heproceeds to pray–toa
long list of gods designed to raise a laugh from the audience as it combines the traditional
selection and order (as we know from other documents) with bird attributes; thus the
priest tells the congregation to pray to ‘‘avian Hestia and hearth-holding kite and all the
Olympianbirdsand lady-birds...’’ (865–7). The list gets longer and longer – clearly a
parody of state ceremonial which tended to become overblown with pomp – until
Peisthetairos cuts the priest off short, asking how he can call vultures and eagles to the
sacrifice when one kite could carry the victim off. He, Peisthetairos, founder of bird-city,
will complete the prayer and sacrifice alone. At this cue the Chorus strikes up an
antistrophe, a ‘‘second pious, holy, song,’’ this time to accompany the sprinkling of
water on the victim’s head, and to summon the deities, one by one – assuming,
that is, they add, there’s enough meat on the victim to go round. Peisthetairos completes
the ceremony – probably with a symbolic swipe of the knife, rather than with true
slaughter – saying ‘‘sacrificing, let us pray to the bird-gods’’ (903).
This wonderful parody of solemn ceremonial shows exactly how hymn-singing and
prayer dove-tailed with the act of sacrifice itself. Hymns accompanied the procession;
120 William D. Furley