Gamelion – the Ancient Greek Month of February – Love – Lust and Marriage

 

 

Gamelion; the month of marriage, was the seventh month of the Attic calendar of ancient Greece which coincides with the modern day month of February.

The word derives from the Greek γαμηλίᾰ (gamēlía), meaning “wedding feast”, as it was the most popular month for weddings;

(γάμος –  gámos – wedding in greek).

 

 

Gamelion:

A month of marriages and festivals

 

As the ancient Greek wedding consisted of a three part ceremony which lasted for three days, held outdoors and usually at night, the weather had to be taken into consideration.

Gamelion, then, was the perfect month, as this is the month of theHalcyon Days, days of warm sun and calm seas, Alkionides Meres, as the Greeks call them, which appear in mid January.

These glorious Halcyon days of the month of Gamelion, also played a role in the reason certain dates were chosen for so many ancient Greek feasts, festivals and theatre, which were always held outdoors.

 

The sacred Marriage

 

Another reason the month of Gamelion is the month of marriages, is to commemorate the sacred Marriage, or Hieros gamos or Hierogamy, of Goddess Hera and Zeus; king of Greek gods.

The wedding took place, with much pomp and glory, in the Garden of Hesperides, where Gaia, Mother Earth, overcome with happiness, caused a tree to bloom with golden apples and was watched over bythe dreaded fates (The Moirai) of ancient Greece, who were probably comparing notes with each other and deciding the destiny of this sacred coupling!

The wedding between Hera and Zeus was followed by a three hundred year honeymoon.

The Theogamia or Hieros Gamos, a sexual ritual, or fertility rite, which performs a marriage between a god and a goddess, an annual festival celebrating the marriage of the gods Zeus and Hera, a sort of wedding anniversary, took place in the temple of Hera in honor of the goddess as protector of Marriage.

 The wedding of Zeus and Hera was celebrated at the Heraion of Samos.

 

 

Tricked into marriage

 

Zeus had fallen madly in love with the beautiful Hera but he was out of luck, he just didn’t seem tick all of Hera’s boxes.

Each time Herea rejected his advances, Zeus resorted to underhand tricks.

Knowing Hera had a kind heart and a soft spot for animals, Zeus transformed himself into a cuckoo and flew to her window, where he pretended to shiver with cold.

On seeing the poor bird, Hera immediately opened her window, let it in, and held it against her breast for warmth; Zeus took this opportunity to revert to his former self and ravished the astonished Hera.

Mortified with shame, at being taken advantage of, Hera agreed to let Zeus make an honest woman of her and married him.

 

 

Marriage in Ancient Greece

 

Marriage, in ancient Greece, had not much to do with love; it was more of a social obligation and was usually arranged by the parents or professional matchmakers.

For the marriage to be legal, the woman’s father must give his permission to a man who had the means to keep her in the manner to which she was accustomed.

Orphaned daughters were usually married to uncles or cousins.

Marriages, then, as today, were intended to be monogamous.

According to Plato, any man who was not married by age thirty-five was liable to lose his civil rights and goes on to say, that when choosing a wife, men should always consider the interests of the state and not their own desires!

 

The Ancient Greek wedding:

A three part ceremony lasting three days

 

 

 

 

1. The Proaulia

 

The proaulia, is the first ceremony of the Ancient Greek wedding, a pre-wedding ceremony, held at her father’s house, where the bride spent her last few days in her family home, with her mother, female relatives and friends, preparing for the wedding.

The bride would present offerings, called the proteleia, to gods such as Aphrodite (goddess of love and beauty) Artemis (goddess of the hunt) and Athena (goddess of wisdom).

Toys would be dedicated to Artemis by young, unmarried girls, in the hope that Artemis would help them to find a suitable husband and ensure many offspring.

Before the marriage, the bride would cut off a lock of her hair and along with the girdle she had worn as a young girl, would offer them to these goddesses.

These offerings represented  the bride’s departure from childhood and her entrance into adulthood.

They also created ties between the bride and the gods, who protected the bride during this transition of childhood to womanhood.

 

2. The Gamos

 

The gamos, the second ceremony, was the actual wedding day when a series of rituals were performed during the bride’s journey from her father’s home to that of her new husband.

The first ritual of the day was a nuptial bath given to the bride, symbolizing purification as well as fertility, the water would have been brought from a special location in a container called the loutrophoros.

 

 

The bride and groom then visited the temple where they made offerings as a safeguard to producing many children.

The wedding feast was held at the home of the father of the bride, where both families made an appearance but men and women sat at different tables, the women would sit and wait patiently until the men had eaten, before putting  even a morsel into their own mouths.

The most important ritual of the wedding day was the anakalupteria, the lifting of the bride’s veil which signified the bride was now essentially, the property of her husband.

The highlight of the day was the marriage procession; a chariot driven by the groom brought the still-veiled bride to his home, followed by relatives laden with gifts for the couple.

The route would be lit by torches and the wedding presents would often be decorated with romantic images of marriage and newlyweds.

Once home, the happy couple (debatable!), were greeted by the mother-in-law and would be showered with dried fruits and nuts to bless them with fertility and prosperity, now came the moment the groom had been waiting for, and the bride probably dreading; the groom would lead the bride to the bridal chamber and…

 

3. The Epaulia

 

 

The epaulia, the post-wedding ceremony, took place on the day after the wedding.

This is when the gifts were given by the relatives of the couple and formally carried into the house.

The gifts often lent reference to the new sexual and domestic role of the wife; usual gifts were jewellery, gowns, perfume, pots, and furniture.

 

Divorce in Ancient Greece

 

 

Divorce was not frowned upon in ancient Greece, so Greek historians tell us, any stigma around divorce, back in the day, would have been related to any juicy scandals rather than the divorce itself.

In ancient Athens, both husband and wife, had the right to ask for a divorce.

The husband could, if he wished, simply boot out his wife, send her back to her father and that my friends, was the end of the marriage.

For the wife to obtain a divorce though, she had to appear before the archon (in modern day language, the divorce courts), who had no power to make any decision on the matter, only to record it.

 

 

Luckily for the wife, she was financially protected by laws stating that she could get her money back, for dud goods, so to speak and her dowry must be returned in cases of divorce.

There were two occasions where divorce in ancient Greece, could be instigated by people other than the husband and wife.

The wife’s father but only if the couple had not produced any children, was allowed to file for divorce on behalf of his daughter.

The other instance, is if a woman became epikleros; an heiress, specifically a daughter of a man who had no male heirs,

after the event of her marriage, in order to keep money in the family, her closest male relative, upon her father’s death, was expected to end both his and her marriage in order to marry her.

If a woman was found to have committed adultery the husband was obliged to divorce her under threat of arrest.

You can understand why many husbands did not abide by this law; did they want the whole of Athens to know they were a cuckold?

 

Festivals held in the ancient Greek month of Gamelion.

 

There is some confusion as to which months these festivals were held, Greek festivals were known to be moveable feasts, the below festivals were always held in early spring and the general consensus, is the month of Gamelion.

 

The Festival of the Arcadian Lykaia

 

 

There’s a Greek connection to everything and it seems it’s no coincidence thatSaint Valentine’s Day, which originated in ancient Greece, fell in the month of Gamelion, the month of love and marriage!

In ancient Greece, at the beginning of  spring, among the Mythical green meadows of Arcadia,here the God of  nature, and rustic music, Pan, frolicked with the nymphs, wooing them with his magical pipe, there was held a festival; a ritual of spring cleaning.

 

 

The Festival of the Arcadian Lykaia, held on the slopes of Mount Lykaion, “Wolf Mountain”, where the first werewolf originated, was celebrated around the fifteenth of February in ancient Greece, to honour the God Pan and to commemorate the day he founded his temple.

It was a day when the city was cleansed of evil spirits and people’s souls were purified, bringing health and fertility,

 

 

As often happened, when Christianity reared its head, many pagan festivals were renamed, usually after saints and so, in 496 AD, Pope Gelasius, so it is said, outlawed this pagan festival of “Lupercalian”, renaming it “The Feast of Saint Valentine”, to be celebrated on the fourteenth of February.

 

The Lenaia

 

 

The Lenaia was one of the smaller annual Athenian festivals, which took place in the month of Gamelion in honour of Dionysus, also known as Bacchus, the god of the grape-harvest, winemaking and wine and also of fertility, ritual madness.

The word “Lenaia” derives comes from lenos, wine-press or from lenai, another name for the Maenads (the female worshippers of Dionysus), the Lenaia festival may also have been known as the Dionysia.

 

The Dionysia

 

 

One of the best-known of the Athenian festivals is the City Dionysia.

The Dionysia were held in the spring, after the last stages of the fermentation of wine, just after the winter solstice in the month of Poseidon.

  It was a celebration of rebirth, of the earth awakening after winter, when the first leaves appeared on the vine.

The Dionysia, dedicated to Dionysus, god of wine, the most important festival of the year, was celebrated all over Greece; the main attraction though, was Athens.

Thousands of people made their way to the big city, for the event, literally, “Let it all hang out”, days of wine, women and song.

Back in the day, Dionysus, with the looks any Greek God would have been proud of, andhis crazy cult of followers, eagerly awaited this yearly blow out, which is exactly what it was.

 

 

The females, “Maenads” (The word comes from the Greek maenades, meaning mad or demented) wild, drunk women, dressed as Ariadne, wife of Dionysus, with animal skins draped over their shoulders, carrying their ancient Greek magic wands: a “Thyrsus”, a rod topped with a pine cone and his male devotees, satyrs; men with goat-like features, in a permanent state of arousal gathered together in the woods, for what can only be dubbed as a rave party!

 

 

The copious amounts of wine knocked back, trance-inducing music, strange herbs ingested and wild singing and dancing; all produced a state of complete abandon, a total lack of inhibition.

Baby, this was the original sex, drugs and rock and roll!

Well, they do say The Greeks invented everything!

As with many pagan celebrations, the heathens, when converted to Christianity, may have allowed themselves to become Christians but no way were they about to give up their festivities!

The priests of the day, unable to persuade the newly-converted to forego their jollies, simply changed the name and dedicated the celebration, to some other Christian occasion.

In this way, The Dionysia, became Apokries, Greek carnival (meaning, without meat, a getting ready for the 40 days of Lent).

 

Happy ever after

 

Καλό μήνα – Kalo mina, – have a good month and to all of you getting married in this wild month of Gamelion, ‘Να ζήσετε ευτυχισμένοι και αγαπημένοι’ – ‘Na zisate eftihismeni kai agapimenoi’ –‘ May you live happily and in love’.