Author: M. de Cesare
Download article as .pdf: Il culto degli antenati in Sicilia tra Greci e indigeni. Il caso di Eolo a Lipari

The contribution re-examines the so-called Bothros of Aeolus, a device found on the Acropolis of Lipari and connected, thanks to a dedicatory inscription on an olpe, to a cult of Aeolus, a related ancestor – according to Diodorus Siculus (5.9.1-3) – to the Cnidian colonists and the indigenous peoples of the island. This cult was probably established at the time of the colony’s foundation, in 580-576 BC, or shortly afterwards, and lasted until at least up to the end of the 4th century BC. It is impossible, due to the settlement stratification of the area, to draw a precise picture of the monumental layout of the Acropolis and of any sacred areas located there. However, the evidence from the votives included in the fill of the bothros, cross-referenced with Callimachus’ famous testimony ( fr. 43 Pf, v. 77) on the cult of the ecists of Zancle, and the well-known Lex sacra of Selinunte , allows us to detect certain elements, which may point towards a correlation between the context and an ancestor cult combined with that for a female divinity. The ceramics, in particular, give evidence of the practice of animal sacrifices and food offerings, libations and the collective consumption of meals, which we do not know precisely in what setting and type of structures they took place. However, Diodorus’ mention (20, 101, 1-3) of votives dedicated to Aeolus and Hephaestus in the city’s pritaneum could even indicate, at least in the Classical period, the use of such a building.