In 476/5 the Athenian general Cimon recovered the bones of Theseus from the island Scyros and returned them to Athens, thereby establishing or reinvigorating the hero’s cult there. On his return Theseus received both a major sanctuary, the Theseion, east of the Agora and on the lower north slope of the Acropolis, and a festival, the Theseia, celebrated in the days just before his great sacrifice on Pyanopsion 8.[21] In 332/1 and 331/0 the Theseia was still a major festival, rivaling the annual Panathenaia in number of sacrificial victims (IG II2 1496.134–35, 143), but then the Theseia disappears from the record until the middle of the second century.
Theseus was also linked legendarily and etiologically with several major Athenian festivals of the classical period, including the Pyanopsia, Oschophoria, Delphinia, and Synoikia. Most of these myths involve Theseus’ expedition to Crete to kill the Minotaur, and in his life of Theseus Plutarch draws from the Atthidographers and other sources to weave these tales together, as in this passage treating the Pyanopsia and Oschophoria:
As they were approaching Attica, Theseus and his pilot both, in their joy, forgot to raise the sail by which they were to make known to Aigeus their safety. Aigeus in despair hurled himself down from the rock and perished. After Theseus landed, he himself was sacrificing the sacrifices which he had vowed to the gods at Phaleron when he was departing, and he sent a herald to the city to report his safe return. The herald came upon many people who were bewailing the death of their king and upon others who were rejoicing, as was natural, and were eager to embrace and garland him for (his good news of) the safe return. The herald accepted the garlands and put them on his herald’s staff. When he returned to the sea, he waited outside (the sanctuary) since Theseus had not yet made the libations and the herald did not wish to disturb the sacrifice. But after the libations were made, the herald announced the death of Aigeus. And then, hastening amid weeping and confusion, they went up into the city. As a result still even now, they say, in the Oschophoria not the herald but his staff is garlanded and in the libations those present cry out “Eleleu! Iou! Iou!” The first of these cries those make who are hurrying and singing a victory song. But “Iou” is a sign of astonishment and confusion.
After he buried his father, Theseus repaid to Apollo his vow, on the seventh day of the month Pyanopsion, because on this day, safe, they went up to the city. The boiling of the pulse (on this day) is said to occur because Theseus and his men, saved, mixed into one pot the remnants of their provisions and, after having boiled them in one common pot, feasted and dined together. And (the Athenians) bring out the eiresiōnē, an olive branch garlanded with wool, just as the suppliant bough then, and full of all kinds of first-fruit offerings, because (Theseus and his companions) had brought to an end their lack of provisions, and (the Athenians) sing,
The eiresiōnē brings figs and rich breads, and honey in a cup, and olive oil to wash with, and a cup of unmixed wine, so that, getting drunk, a woman may sleep well.… Until the time of Demetrios of Phaleron the Athenians preserved the boat on which Theseus sailed and returned safely with the young men. They removed the old wood and put in other, strong pieces and fitted them together. And so the boat served as a model for philosophers on the uncertain question of “growth.” Some philosophers said that it remained the same boat, others said not.
And (the Athenians) also celebrate the festival of the Oschophoria as Theseus established it. For he did not take with him (to Crete) all the maidens who then were selected by lot, but (in place of two) he put two of his young male companions who looked fresh and girlish but were manly and eager in their hearts. He changed their appearance as much as possible by warm baths, by keeping them away from the sun, by jewelry, and by unguents for their hair and for the smoothness of their skin and for their complexion. He taught them to become like, as much as possible, maidens in their voice, dress, and gait. He then put them among the maidens, and no one noticed. And, after he returned, he and the young men held a procession dressed as now they dress (in the festival), carrying the ōschoi (“vine branches”). They carry those to show their gratitude to Dionysos and Ariadne because of (their role in) the story, or else because Theseus and his companions returned when the (grape) harvest was being collected. And the deipnophoroi (“dinner carriers”) are taken along (in the procession) and share in the sacrifice, imitating the mothers of those young people who were selected by lot (to go to Crete). Their mothers had come bringing meat and provisions for them. And stories are told (at the festival) because then those mothers told stories to their children to encourage and inspire them. Demon has written a study of these matters. A sanctuary was set aside for Theseus, and Theseus ordered that members of the families who provided the tribute (to the Minotaur) contribute for the sacrifice to himself. The Phytalidai oversee the sacrifice, (an honor) which Theseus gave to them in return for their hospitality. (Plut. Thes. 22.1–23.3)
By myths such as these Plutarch and others, using fourth-century sources, associated Theseus not only with the Pyanopsia and Oschophoria, but also with the Delphinia and the festival of Athenian unification, the Synoikia.[22] These festivals, however, like the Theseia and the maintenance of Theseus’ ship, were all apparently discontinued after the fourth century. The Oschophoria is last found in the decree of the Salaminioi of 363/2, the Pyanopsia in the calendars of the demes Thorikos (ca. 430–420) and Eleusis (ca. 330–270).[23] There are no attestations after the fifth century for the Delphinia or for what should be a particularly important festival, the Synoikia.
Theseus was the synoikistēs of Attica and, in some traditions, the founder of Athenian democracy,[24] and the disappearance of him, the Synoikia, and of other festivals particularly associated with him may, in fact, be owed to the political and geographical disunity of Attica after the fourth century. Apart from the physical difficulties of celebrating these mostly rural festivals at these times, the Athenians may have felt little inclined, when their countryside was under foreign control, to honor the hero who had once unified this territory. It is not coincidental that in 165/4 or 161/0, after the Athenians had regained control of her territory and even of previously subject states, the Theseia reemerges. We have, beginning then, a series of decrees honoring the agōnothetēs of a major quadrennial festival for Theseus: a festival that included a procession and sacrifice, competitions for trumpeters and heralds,[25] reviews of the troops and ephebes, torch races, and a host of other athletic, equestrian, and military contests rivaling those of the Panathenaia.[26] This is a new festival, and the first of these decrees, IG II2 956 of 161/0, records the second celebration of the festival. The first celebration was held in 165/4 to mark Athens’ recovery, along with Delos, of Scyros, the island from which Theseus’ bones had been retrieved in 476/5.[27] From the ephebic inscriptions we know that there must have also been annual Theseia in the years between the quadrennial “Great” Theseia.[28] This festival, once begun, was then held down into the Roman period.[29]
The new Theseia after 165/4 would thus celebrate, virtually, the second synoikismos of Athens, in a sense a reestablishment, in geographical terms at least, of pre-Macedonian Athens.[30] Public and ephebic participation in this and in other festivals we have seen in the ephebic decrees point to a national interest—whether it be labeled nostalgic or not—to celebrate great events (Marathon and Salamis) and great figures (Theseus and the war dead) of the Athenian past, and to do this through religious festivals and rituals. These activities all must be associated with Athens’ newly won independence and reestablishment of its own territories after 229. We have seen, throughout this study, smaller attempts to reassert Athenian traditions in other moments of independence, but the closest parallel to this range of nationalistic activities after 229 are those led by Lycourgos after Chaeroneia in 338. Athens then was more wealthy, more democratic, and more free, but the instincts and the direction were the same. And here, with the Theseia, we see second-century Athenians reestablishing a festival of their national hero and returning it to the status that it had last had in the Lycourgan period.