the people known to be more devoted than any other tota theia. So we will leave
Herodotus to one side, and focus on the messages and allusions conveyed by what
Peisistratos did.
Athena was never simply thought of as a figurehead by the Athenians; so intimate was
her bond with the city that she was thought to be willing to intervene on its behalf. To
an extent what Peisistratos was doing was acting out the sentiments expressed in the
poem of Solon we looked at earlier. By riding alongside the ‘‘goddess,’’ he was
signaling her approval of himself as the rightful leader of Athens. What he was also
doing, however, was evoking Athena’s wider, panhellenic, persona as the patron of
heroes. Peisistratos was in effect setting himself up as a new prote ́ge ́of the goddess: an
individual who merited her assistance just like the heroes of old. What is more, the fact
that the entry to Athens took place on a chariot suggests that he had one particular
heroic antecedent in mind above all others: Heracles. A hero with considerable popu-
larity in archaic Athens, Heracles was frequently depicted riding in a chariot driven by
Athena (see Boardman 1972). But what was so clever was Peisistratos’ avoidance of
specific comparison with the hero because he was not dressed as him. In effect, he was
having it both ways. Not only did the chariot ride evoke Heracles’ journey, but he
managed to construct his own particular special bond with the goddess.
Also, we have to remember that Peisistratos seems to have been aware of the
potential for large-scale communal occasions to unite the people. It is unlikely to
be a coincidence that the figure that founded the Great Panathenaea was able to use a
religious event for his own political ends. From this, I would suggest one further
heroic parallel: Erichthonius, the hero specially favored by Athena, and who founded
the Panathenaea. We might also interpret Peisistratos in this context as a sort of
second Erichthonius – effectively a second founder, or even re-founder, of the festival.
We could go further still and see the Panathenaea, with its great procession in
honor of Athena, as a cultic parallel for what took place. But again, straightforward
comparison is impossible, because the Panathenaic procession did not include trans-
portation of an image of the goddess. To find a better ritual parallel, we need to look
to another of Athena’s festivals, the Plynteria, when the statue of Athena was un-
dressed and conveyed, probably by a procession, to the sea to be bathed. Or for a
closer parallel still, we might look beyond the cult of Athena, to festivals such as the
Great Dionysia, which involved the transportation of the god’s cult image between
various sites: its home on the Acropolis slopes, a temple near the Academy, and the
theater. But to seek a single candidate or even group of candidates for the inspiration
behind the festival risks missing the genius of what Peisistratos did. His chariot ride
was an act packed with religious allusions that produced such a show of communality
that he was able to unite the people behind him and regain political supremacy.
We turn now to events that generated a religious outburst during a later period in
Athenian history. But whereas Peisistratos inspired the community to respond as a
group to the messages conveyed by his actions, these events contributed to an already
existing state of political instability and culminated in a major impiety scandal. At this
time, Athens was lacking a single strong leader to direct religious feeling. The
politician who had come closest to doing this was Pericles, but he had been dead
for many years, while the most dominant active politician, Alcibiades, was one of
those implicated in the scandal.
232 Susan Deacy