The attributes of Athena

T h e a t t r i b u t e s o f A t h e n a
The duality of aspects appeared also in the attributes of certain cultic images of the Goddess. According to one description, even the Palladium [Image: Diomedes with the Palladium], that ancient sacred image of Pallas which, as one version has it, fell from heaven, already showed two aspects. In the right hand the statue carried a raised lance, in the left a distaff and spindle, tools of feminine handiwork and of the household. It was not merely novel invention that attributed them to the mysterious statue; coins from Troy show the statue equipped in this way in accordance with ancient tradition. The statuette of an owl holding the distaff -- a symbolic representation of the Goddess -- has been preserved for us. Of an archaic cultic image of Athena Nike, it is attested that the simple statue held a pomegranate in the right hand and a helmet in the left. The helmet undoubtedly refers to the "palladium" aspect. The pomegranate belongs to her as an attribute of mature womanhood. Even without reflecting on the mythological background, the meaning of this statue can be explicated: through it Athena is characterized as a guardian of human and vegetative fecundity.

Yet this symbolism has a solid mythological background. The symbol of the pomegranate belongs to Persephone, most likely since the pre-Greek period when the underworld Goddess was not yet associated with Demeter but with Rhea. It is not only a fertility symbol, but points also to a specific aspect of the realm ruled over by the Great Mother Goddess Rhea -- its underworldly aspect. Persephone ate some of the pomegranate, and since then she has belonged to Hades. This has been classically understood as implying the fruit made her unfruitful. But, according to the understanding of all antiquity, she became the Queen of the realm of the dead. The pomegranate, with its internal richness of myriad kernels, is a miniature copy of the underworld's richness in souls, even of its fruitfulness, if it is believed that souls of the living have come here from there or have returned here from there. Internal to this symbolism is the realm of death as the realm of souls.

The symbolic animal of Athena, the owl, was also related to the realm of the dead. According to one story, Ascalaphus, the son of Acheron and Gergyra (which is a variant of Gorgon and thereby has a relation to Athena), was to blame for Persephone's enthrallment with Hades -- he revealed that she had eaten part of the pomegranate, or he even seduced her into doing it. For punishment he was turned into a type of owl, which was called Ascalaphus. The similarity of the one aspect of Athena to Persephone is attested by the pomegranate and possibly also by the owl. Festivals such as the Procharisteria or the Skira, which could be confused with festivals of Persephone, can be merely mentioned as a further bit of evidence. In her temple near the Boeotian town of Koroneia, Athena was worshipped together with Hades. Our source, Strabo, does not reveal the guarded secret of the mythologem which clarifies this association, but he does say explicitly that it came about "for some kind of mystical reason." The Athenian in Plato's Laws names Athena frankly "our Kore and Despoena," or in other words "our Persephone."

Less certain is the duality of attributes in Athena as a city Goddess. It is present, however, at least on the vase painting that shows the seated cultic image of Polias: beside her is the serpent, before her the priestess, the altar, and the steer being led to sacrifice. In her left hand she holds the helmet, in her right a bowl for catching the liquid sacrifice. It is a sacred vessel, without special reference to the art of pottery but perhaps with meaning in the Athena religion [Image: The offerings to Athena]. It is striking how often since mythical and heroic times bowls are named in the lists of votive offerings brought to the Goddess in her famous cult in Lindus on Rhodes. The bowl, in contrast to the helmet, characterizes the Goddess as recipient and thereby perhaps more her feminine side, more the "Athena" than the "Pallas."

Athena, Virgin and Mother in Greek Religion

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