The deity’s share of the victim (fat, bones, gall-bladder) was burnt, while the meat fell to the worshippers. At these sacrifices, the animal was consecrated to the divinity and slaughtered. A couch could be prepared and the recipient of the sacrifices was invited to come and dine. They were usually placed on a table ( trapeza). 2 These offerings could consist of grain, fruit and cakes, but also of portions of meat, either cooked or raw. The term theoxenia ( heroxeinia exists but is very rare) here stands as a collective term for the offerings of food of the kind eaten by humans. These include the rituals at which the blood of the victim was of special importance, either because it was treated in a particular way, for example, poured out at a specific location, or because the animal was killed in a manner emphasizing the blood. This category also includes sacrifices at which a larger part of the animal was destroyed than was usual at a thysia (see below, no. The destruction could be accomplished by burning, by total immersion in water or simply by leaving the carcass at the place of the sacrifice. At this kind of sacrifice, the animal victim was totally destroyed and no meat was available for consumption.

Each category of ritual has been defined as follows: In order to test this assumption, the occurrence of these four kinds of rituals has been investigated. Thysia sacrifices, at which the animal was divided between the deity and the worshippers and the ritual was followed by dining, have been regarded as exceptions or late developments in the cult of the heroes. As in the preceding section, the epigraphical and literary sources will be examined separately.ĢAs I mentioned in the introduction, heroes have commonly been considered as having sacrificial rituals different from those of the gods: holocaustic sacrifices, libations of blood, offerings of meals. 1Chapter II deals exclusively with sources dating to before 300 BC, in order to distinguish the sacrificial rituals in hero-cults in the Archaic to early Hellenistic periods from the contemporaneous evidence alone.

Salt and Sacrifice instal