DOI Seite / Zitierlink:
https://doi.org/10.11588/diglit.9804#0237
CREMATION
211
The scorching might, in some cases, go as far as complete
burning,1 but this would seldom be the case unless a
man died abroad, and wished to be buried at home.
Even then the important thing was the collecting of the
bones after burning, and the burying of them at home,
as is shown by Homer's account of the funeral rites of
Patroktos.'
There is no doubt that this theory accounts in an
ingenious and attractive way for a situation that is
admittedly difficult. The objection is that at present
there is practically no direct evidence to support it. If
it is true, there ought to be traces of " scorching " in
every burial interment of Minoan and Classical times.
Yet in many hundreds of such graves that have been
opened, there is nothing of the kind. Some traces of
partial burning noticed by Dr. Orsi and Professor von
Stern,' and some charred fragments found in tombs at
Mycenae, do not carry us far. The latter are partly due
to sacrifices,' partly to charcoal brought in to comfort
and warm the dead. Clay chafing-pans filled with charcoal
are actually found in several of the Zafer Papoura graves.
In one of them, and also in the Royal Tomb at Isopata,
(dry or scorch) the rap^fi» of //. vii. 85. In Hdt. ix. 120, the
hero Protcsilaos is a rdpi^of, a cured or dried object, like a salt
fish.
1 For this Dorpfcld thinks the specific word would not be Kaita
but KaranaUtv. Thus he explains Phado, II5E, tj Kaio^tvov, rj (cnropvT-
T('ifiev<w, not as two alternatives (= aut . . . aut . . . ) but as two
stages in one process (= sive . . . sive), Socrates did not wish
Grito to see his body either in the preliminary stage of being
scorched or in the concluding stage of being buried. The f'pwrn fii)
nms/ie demrj] of the immediately preceding 115C is against the
ingenious hypothesis. Socrates has without doubt got into his
head at the moment alternative methods of burial.
2 II. xxiii. 239-40, 251-4.
3 Quoted by Dorpfcld, op. cit. It should be noticed, however,
that Von Stern does not himself agree with Diirpfeld's theory. See
P.K.S.R. 1905, p. 71, note.
4 S.S. p. 158; Frazcr, Paasamas, iii. p. 107.
211
The scorching might, in some cases, go as far as complete
burning,1 but this would seldom be the case unless a
man died abroad, and wished to be buried at home.
Even then the important thing was the collecting of the
bones after burning, and the burying of them at home,
as is shown by Homer's account of the funeral rites of
Patroktos.'
There is no doubt that this theory accounts in an
ingenious and attractive way for a situation that is
admittedly difficult. The objection is that at present
there is practically no direct evidence to support it. If
it is true, there ought to be traces of " scorching " in
every burial interment of Minoan and Classical times.
Yet in many hundreds of such graves that have been
opened, there is nothing of the kind. Some traces of
partial burning noticed by Dr. Orsi and Professor von
Stern,' and some charred fragments found in tombs at
Mycenae, do not carry us far. The latter are partly due
to sacrifices,' partly to charcoal brought in to comfort
and warm the dead. Clay chafing-pans filled with charcoal
are actually found in several of the Zafer Papoura graves.
In one of them, and also in the Royal Tomb at Isopata,
(dry or scorch) the rap^fi» of //. vii. 85. In Hdt. ix. 120, the
hero Protcsilaos is a rdpi^of, a cured or dried object, like a salt
fish.
1 For this Dorpfcld thinks the specific word would not be Kaita
but KaranaUtv. Thus he explains Phado, II5E, tj Kaio^tvov, rj (cnropvT-
T('ifiev<w, not as two alternatives (= aut . . . aut . . . ) but as two
stages in one process (= sive . . . sive), Socrates did not wish
Grito to see his body either in the preliminary stage of being
scorched or in the concluding stage of being buried. The f'pwrn fii)
nms/ie demrj] of the immediately preceding 115C is against the
ingenious hypothesis. Socrates has without doubt got into his
head at the moment alternative methods of burial.
2 II. xxiii. 239-40, 251-4.
3 Quoted by Dorpfcld, op. cit. It should be noticed, however,
that Von Stern does not himself agree with Diirpfeld's theory. See
P.K.S.R. 1905, p. 71, note.
4 S.S. p. 158; Frazcr, Paasamas, iii. p. 107.