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DANIELLE KELLOGG

Brooklyn College and the Graduate Center, CUNY

Located on the east coast of Attica at the mouth of the Eridanos River, Brauron was the site of an important sanctuary of ARTEMIS (BA 59 C3; Müller I, 639–41). Archaeological evidence indicates habitation in the area from the Neolithic period; Philochorus (BNJ 328 F94) includes Brauron on his list of the twelve settlements synoecized by THESEUS. Some literary sources associate the PEISISTRATIDS with the area: Photius links them with the sanctuary itself (Lexicon, s.v. Brauronia (B 264)), while Plato ([Hipparch.] 228b) associates them with the nearby DEME of Philaidai (see AJAX).

The sanctuary shows RITUAL evidence from the Protogeometric period through to the third century BCE, when flooding led the site to be abandoned. Brauron was particularly associated with the arkteia, a ritual in which young Athenian girls “played the bear,” which modern scholars associate with a rite of passage marking the onset of puberty. The ritual’s aetiological MYTH explains that a bear belonging to the sanctuary had been killed after becoming savage with a young girl (schol. Ar. Lys. 645). In addition to Artemis Brauronia, IPHIGENEIA was also worshipped at the site, and DEDICATIONS were made there in celebration of successful childbirths.

Herodotus mentions Brauron twice, both times in connection with the legend of PELASGIANS abducting Athenian woman from there during the celebration of the FESTIVAL and taking them to LEMNOS (6.138.1; 4.145.2).

SEE ALSO: Athens; Children; Rape; Temples and Sanctuaries; Women in Ancient Greece