The Eleusinian Mysteries were the most famous of the secret religious rites of ancient Greece. They consisted of the Lesser Mysteries and the Greater Mysteries. These were ceremonies for the cult of Demeter and Persephone based at Eleusis in ancient Greece. Of all the mysteries celebrated in ancient times these were held to be the ones of greatest importance. The Lesser Mysteries were held annually and it is known that these contained rites of cleansing. The Greater Mysteries were held every fourth year. They included a week of special rites, culminating in the Great Mystery rites that took place inside the Temple of Demeter. These myths and mysteries later spread to Rome. The rites and cultic worships and beliefs were kept secret, and initiation rites united the worshipper with god including promises of divine power and rewards in life after death.

Eleusis (modern-day Elefsina) was a small town located about 30 km NW of Athens. It was an agricultural town, producing wheat and barley. The city of Eleusis was named after Eleusis, also called Eleusinus. Some have said that Eleusinus was the son of Ogygus, the Boeotian king who lost his land to the Phoenician immigrant or invader Cadmus, the founder of Thebes. Others told that Eleusinus was the son of Hermes and Daira, one of the Oceanids.

The Mysteries were based on a legend revolving around Demeter.

Her daughter, Persephone, was kidnapped by Hades, the god of death and the underworld. Demeter was the goddess of life, agriculture and fertility. She neglected her duties while searching for her daughter; causing a dry season (summer in Greece) in which people starved - today, we associate this with the first winter.

During this time Demeter taught the secrets of agriculture to Triptolemus. Finally Demeter was reunited with her daughter and the earth came back to life - the first spring.

Persephone was unfortunately unable to stay permanently in the land of the living, because she had eaten six seeds of a pomegranate that Hades had given her. Those that eat the food of the dead may not return.


The Eleusinian Mysteries celebrated Persephone's return, for it was also the return of plants and of life to the earth. She had eaten the six pomegranate seeds (symbols of lives) while in the underworld (underground, like seeds in the winter) and her rebirth is therefore symbolic of the rebirth of all plant life during the spring and, by extension, all life on Earth.



Following are descriptions of the days in the Sacred Week that led up to the night of the Greater Mysteries.


They first sacrificed a pig to Demeter and then purified themselves.


On 15th Boedromion, the hierophantes (priests) declared prorrhesis, the start of the rites.The ceremonies began in Athens on 16th Boedromion with the celebrants washing themselves in the sea at Phaleron and sacrificing a young pig at the Eleusinion on 17th Boedromion.


The procession also shouted "Iakch' o Iakche!", referring to Iacchus, possibly an epithet for Dionysus, or a separate deity, son of Persephone or Demeter.Upon reaching Eleusis (along what was called the "Sacred Way"), there was a day of fasting in commemoration of Demeter's fasting while searching for Persephone. The fast was broken while drinking a special drink of barley and pennyroyal, called 'kykeon.'





That day (22nd Boedromion), the initiates honored the dead by pouring libations from special vessels.On 23rd Boedromion, the Mysteries ended and everyone returned home.In the center of the Telesterion was the Anaktoron ("palace"), a small stone building which only the hierophantes could enter.

The sacred objects were stored there.There were four categories of people who participated in the Eleusinian Mysteries:


The Mysteries are believed to have been begun about 1500 BCE, during the Mycenean Age. It was held annually for about two thousand years.Under Pisistratus of Athens, the Eleusinian Mysteries became pan-Hellenic and pilgrims flocked from Greece and beyond to participate.



End of the Eleusinian Mysteries

The Roman emperor Theodosius I closed the sanctuaries by decree in CE 392 in an effort to destroy pagan resistance to the imposition of Christianity as a state religion.

The last remnants of the Mysteries were wiped out in CE 396, when Alaric, King of the Goths, invaded accompanied by Christians "in their dark garments", bringing Arian Christianity and desecrating the old sacred sites.


There are, quite naturally, a great many paintings and pieces of pottery that depict various aspects of the Mysteries. The Eleusinian Relief, from late 5th century BCE, stored in the Archaeological National Museum in Athens is a representative example.


Vases and other works of relief sculpture, from the 4th, 5th and 6th centuries BCE depict Triptolemus, holding an ear of corn, sitting on a winged throne or chariot, surrounded by Persephone and Demeter with pine torches.



Entheogenic theories

Some scholars believe that the power of the Eleusinian Mysteries came from the kykeon's functioning as a psychedelic agent; this was argued most extensively in The Road to Eleusis, by R. Gordon Wasson, Albert Hoffman, and Carl A. P. Ruck. Barley may be parasitized by the fungus ergot, which contains LSA, a precursor to LSD. It is thus possible that the initiates, sensitized by their fast and prepared by preceding ceremonies, were propelled by the effects of a powerful psychoactive potion into revelatory mind states with profound spiritual and intellectual ramifications.This theory remains controversial, as modern preparations of kykeon using ergot-parasitized barley have yielded inconclusive results. It has been argued by Terence McKenna that the mysteries were focused around a variety of Psilocybe mushrooms, although there seems to little evidence for this. Various other entheogenic plants, such as Salvia and the Amanita mushroom, have also been suggested, but all of these theories lack any hard evidence.

Eleusinian Mysteries