When a recognizable ritual is performed on stage, whether in tragedy or comedy, it has the ability to communicate to the audience the appearance of a socio-political order within the reality of the play. In comedy, I suggest, it creates a sense of community and an obligation to familiar acts of social structuring. In this way ritual reinforces the political and social dimensions of the comic action. These dimensions have been drawn out of Aristophanes' plays by numerous scholars and analyzed as either serious or quasi-facetious reflections of Athens. But the significance of Greek comedy's place among the social and political institutions that were an integral part of Athenian democracy in the late fifth century has for most been clearly established; despite the fact that among the fragmentary comic playwrights no one seems to have been as concerned with what was best for the polis as Aristophanes.[1]

At the City Dionysia the potential for displaying Athenian society, both political and religious, was great since not only Athenians but also allied city states were present in the audience. The ten generals from the ten tribes of Attika poured libations to the gods; the yearly tribute from the allied cities was brought on stage; honors were bestowed on individuals for their contributions to the city; and those orphans of the war who had come of age were brought forward with new armor provided by the state, thus ready to participate in Athenian society.[2] At this dramatic festival Athens was able to see itself being both shown off and performed.

Within Aristophanes' comedies we can see how Athens and these various facets are presented to the audience. In the two plays I discuss here, Peace — produced at the City Dionysia in 421 just weeks before the mutual oaths were given for the Peace of Nikias[3] — and Birds also produced in 414 at the City Dionysia — less than a year after Athens sailed for Sicily in that tragic mission — Aristophanes works on several levels to present his view of Athens. The element of fantasy is predominant in both plays, but by the end of each we are left with a fantasy world that is not so far removed from real possibilities. How Aristophanes was able to combine elements of fantasy and reality to create a comprehensible, believable plot can be partially answered by examining his use of ritual, and particularly his use of ritual sacrifice.

While there are many examples of ritual in Greek life, and many of these make their way into Aristophanes’ comedies, the ritual of sacrifice seems to be the paradigmatic ritual from which other rituals proceed. As a general guideline for the meaning of ritual, I quote a recent book on Greek religion:

"A ritual is a complex of actions effected by, or in the name of, an individual or community. These actions serve to organize space and time, to define relations between men and gods, and to set in their proper place the different categories of mankind and the links which bind them together."[4]

Peace and Birds have the ritual of sacrifice as the central feature of the comic plot.

At Peace 924-1116 we have as detailed a description of Greek sacrifice as we do anywhere else among the ancient evidence. Why does Aristophanes give so much stage time to a process that was so well known to his audience? One answer might be that it was the appropriate action for the establishment of the goddess Peace: fldrut°on as Trygaios’ slave says of the goddess at 924. Any Greek would have agreed. In this way the ritual action is an echo of the reality outside the play. But this still does not answer why for the next 190 lines or so the ritual is enacted on stage.

Similarly in Birds, the ritual of sacrifice is performed on stage from 848-1057, although less verbally detailed in the text and with the intrusion of several Nephelokokkygian want-to-bes. This sacrifice, with procession and music, is for the new bird gods (to›!i kaino›!i yeo›! at 848; note the uncomic dative forms appropriate for religious ritual).[5] These new bird gods replace both the Olympians in their divine duties and the Athenians in their civic role. Despite the intruders, the performance of the ritual is before the audience for over 200 lines.

These ritual actions are sustained for a remarkable portion of the dramatic action and are clearly set apart from the other actions of the play in that they are not entirely typical of the comic fantasy. They are part of the real world in a way that flying dung beetles and winged humans are not. This is not to say that they are not humorous. They are. But only because they are placed within the context of a comedy. The ritual itself is not mocked. It is not used inappropriately.

There is one more point I would bring out. In each of these plays the sacrificial victim is not slaughtered on stage, but rather off stage. At Peace 1020 Trygaios tells his slave to go inside and sacrifice (yÊ!a! tå mhr€a) and at Birds 1057 Peisetairos says the same to one of the slaves on stage (yÊ!onte! e‡!v). This, in my opinion, does not weaken the power or significance of the sacrifice, for nowhere in representations of sacrifice is the act of slaughter depicted. This seems to suggest that doing so was taboo. Therefore, the audiences of Peace and Birds would not have thought the absence of blood-spilling unusual, even for comedy.

More importantly, it is from the perspective of performance and the function of ritual action that we can begin to look at comedy in a different way, namely, that at these dramatic festivals in the city’s continuous efforts to define itself, comedy’s use of ritual valorizes its discoursive function. Ritual also engages the audience in the fantasy it sees on stage. My analysis reveals three dimensions of the function of ritual in comedy: ritual as metaphor for dramatic action; ritual as valorization of the comic fantasy; and ritual as representative of the Dionysian spirit of comedy. In these three aspects, ritual serves to involve the audience in the action of the play by its performance on stage.

In Peace the performance of sacrifice serves to legitimize Trygaios’ rescue of the goddess Peace. The power inherent in the act is metaphorical of the power Peace herself can bring to the Greeks. Trygaios’ flight to Olympos on the dung beetle and his encounter with Hermes are all suggestive of Athenian frustration with the war, but they are ridiculous in nature and therefore cannot fully persuade the audience of Aristophanes’ effort of genuine encouragement for a permanent peace, which even at the moment of the play, days before the Peace of Nikias was to be signed, was still in possible jeopardy of dissolution at the hands of demagogues like Hyperbolos. Trygaios seems to allude to this at 918 where amidst his joy at setting free the goddess Peace he mentions ‘stopping Hyperbolos’ (ÑHp°rbolÒn te paÊ!a!). We know that the peace does not last. There is trouble right away in Amphipolis, which was supposed to surrender to Athens, while the surrounding cities were to accept the treaty. Neither of these things happened, and this was endemic of the whole atmosphere of the peace.

Rather than allude to or report that there was a sacrifice made to establish the goddess Peace, Aristophanes has his actors perform the ritual on stage. The suggestive power and significance of sacrifice, brought out by the performance and its parallels to real sacrifice, is a metaphor for the reunion of the Greeks both with themselves and with their own gods, whom Aristophanes suggests have abandoned them because of their continuation of the war.

The sacrifice also marks a change in the metaphorical nature of the plot. Up to the rescue of the goddess Peace, Aristophanes has used scatological and pathic homosexual metaphors to emphasize the wayward state of affairs as they stand with Athens and Sparta and their allies. When the goddess is rescued the language of the play moves toward heterosexual relationships — §n to›! égro›!/ ëpanta! ˆnta! é!fal«!/ bine›n te ka‹ kayeÊdein, Trygaios sings at 867-9. This is particularly evident in the sexual relations with the attendants of Peace, Opora and Theoria. The performance of the sacrifice occurs after this shift and anticipates the final marriage scene.

While the sacrifice in Birds also anticipates the marriage of Peisetairos and Basileia, it also responds metaphorically to the actions of the play. Concord is a major motif in Birds as it is in Peace. Contrary to what some critics of this play contend, I believe that Peisetairos' new world benefits the birds as much as it does Peisetairos, whose enactment of ritual on stage stresses his sincerity and defines his dependence on these new divinities, who in turn provide him with a new world, redefined from the world of Athens and its Olympian deities. In this regard, Peisetairos should not be seen as a self-promoting demagogue but as an elite leader who works within the democratic process to attain prominence.

This mutually beneficial relationship between the birds and Peisetairos, I submit, is representative of the relationship between the Athenian demos and its elite leaders. After the failure of the Peace of Nikias and the troubles involved in the expedition to Sicily, Aristophanes encourages his audience to recast its trust in the kind of elite leaders who once guided Athens. This seems especially possible in 414 as the demagogue Hyperbolos, who took over the reins of control after Kleon's death in 422, was probably exiled sometime before the spring of 416.[6] Peisetairos, however, speaks for both the old and young generations of elites. In a sense he bridges the so-called generation gap by appealing to the older apragmones and younger elites who were trying to make their way into the democratic system. Peisetairos comprises the older generation's desire to distance itself from the demagogic trudge of Kleons who would prevent them from governing by imposing intimidating if not fraudulent audits; and the younger generation's desire to expand the empire.

The sacrifice scene in Birds, with its music and procession, metaphorically serves, I think, as a kind of liturgy like those often offered by wealthy elites. But it is special within the context of comedy, for it is an exclusive festival that admits only those who support the precepts of the comic polis. Something similar happens in Peace, though the entire audience is invited to partake of the sacrifice. But figures like Hierokles in Peace, and in Birds the oracle-monger, the inspector and the decree-seller are purposefully excluded not only from the fruits of the comic polis but also the sacrifice that celebrates that polis. There is then, a solidarity established, as there is in a liturgy, between the individual who offers and pays for the rites and the supporting members of the demos. It is no coincidence that this type of exclusion from the comic fantasy occurs in the context of ritual sacrifice, for it is in ritual that exclusion has its greatest significance.

It has been said that Peace is a celebration of the triumph of the peace of Nikias,[7] or the good sense that the Spartans and Athenians finally had with regard to stopping the war. I would like to modify this idea somewhat by arguing that Peace is not a celebration but an encouragement and that the performance of ritual gives more significance or value to this encouragement. Aristophanes was aware, as other Athenians must have also been, that the peace of Nikias was precarious. There was no certainty that the treaty would last, as the brief peace of 423 had shown. This play addresses that concern by showing in comic fashion what could be, not what already was. The sacrifice scene plays a vital role in this respect. The performance of a sacrifice on stage gives greater significance to the peace; it brings the unreal world of comic fantasy into the real world through this religious act.

But it is does even more than this. The ritual of sacrifice serves not only as metaphor but also as a point of mediation between two planes of action within the plots: the original dilemma explained in the prologue and the resolution of this dilemma. Just as the ritual of sacrifice delineates between the sacred and profane, so too the actual bodily performance of ritual sacrifice on stage in these comedies creates a ritual space in which the original dilemma of the comedy may be resolved. In this way the ritual act makes real the fantastical actions of the comedy and therefore the comic reality that is produced from them. Hence, Trygaios’ complaint to Zeus at Peace 62, t€ dra!e€ei! poy' ≤m«n tÚn le≈n, is answered with the rescue of the goddess Peace and the establishment of her cult.

Furthermore, because ritual is always an act of participation, not a spectacle, both the characters of the play and the audience are placed together in the comic reality of the action through the enactment of ritual. The audience of Peace, I argue, participates in the comic peace on stage and by extension the real peace treaty that was to be signed in a few days. At Peace 962, still the beginning of the sacrifice, Trygaios tells his slave to scatter barley on the audience. While this is not typical of an ordinary sacrifice, since the barley is usually intended for the sacrificial victim, I do not think this scattering is only a comic gag meant to win the audience's favor, as Aristophanes complains about such practices at Wasps 58 or Wealth 797-801, precisely because it happens during the sacrifice. Rather, the scattering involves the audience in the stage action. Finally, at the end of the sacrifice, just after he dismisses Hierokles, a representative of those who would obstruct the success of the peace treaty, Trygaios invites the audience to share the meat of the sacrifice, êge dØ, yeata€, deËro !u!plagxneÊete metå n«in, 1115-6. With these words the audience is explicitly asked to partake of the sacrifice as well as the prosperity of the comic polis. This is natural since ritual necessarily demands participation. I suggest that this enactment of sacrifice and the theatrical participation of the audience, composed of Athens' citizens and her allies, predicts the success of the peace, as if the audience at the Dionysia had already committed itself to the peace through the comic sacrifice.

Birds has always been a difficult play to approach from any direction. One is often uncertain whether Peisetairos' comic polis is better off or worse than Athens. But there are illuminating parallels between Peace and Birds that might offer an answer. The sacrifice scenes in each play provide a focal point.

From a larger perspective, Peace and Birds are similar in the idea of abandonment. In Peace the gods abandon the Athenians, and in Birds Peisetairos and Euelpides abandon not only Athens but also the Olympian gods. There is also the similar idea of replacement. In Peace, the goddess Peace replaces the Olympians as a new goddess of hope. Even Hermes becomes a new god, in a fashion, since after his help with the rescue Trygaios says that Greeks will celebrate the Panathenaia, traditionally Athena's festival, in his honor, as well as the mysteries of Demeter and Kore, the Dipolieia of Zeus Polieus, and the Adonia, usually held in honor of Adonis and Aphrodite. Hermes will also become Alexikakos, an epithet used of Apollo and Herakles. Therefore, Hermes, because of his help with the return of the goddess Peace, assumes the roles of nearly all the Olympians. In Birds the replacement is more severe since the birds themselves replace Olympian power and worship.

Ritual plays an important part in valorizing these revolutionary comic upheavals. Trygaios' sacrifice to Peace to establish her cult is an example already taken into consideration. But Trygaios also initiates a libation ritual for Hermes, which from the language of the text, also appears to have been performed on stage. But it is Hermes who pours the libation to himself:[8] !pondÆ, !pondÆ: eÈfhme›te, eÈfhme›te, Hermes cries extra metrum, indicating religious action. Trygaios answers Hermes' prayer, directed against those who would continue the war, by praising not only Hermes, but also the Graces, the Horai, Aphrodite and Pothos. These last four are divine abstractions that point toward the prosperity of the new goddess, her peace, and the right relations between men and women, humans and the land, and humans and the gods. Therefore, in both Peace and Birds, where the themes of abandonment and replacement are similar, the comic poleis, though fantastical, are meant to be better than Athens. In Birds the comic polis is meant to be stripped of the over-taxing nomoi of Athens that complicate one's natural desires to eat, make love, and rule as nature prescribes.

The power and effect of performed ritual in each play suggests the validity of the comic polis. Ritual makes real the fantasy and its claims of prosperity for those willing to partake.

Part III. Ritual and the Dionysian Spirit

From the preceding discussion, I would now like to make some general observations about the performance of ritual in comedy. It may not be a coincidence that comedy, not tragedy, actually performs ritual on stage to the degree it does. Rituals, of course, have an important function in tragedy. But none are performed on stage as explicitly and for such duration as in comedy. Comedy, I think, is an ideal vehicle for this kind of religious expression.

An Athenian's daily contact with Olympian or even chthonian deities was quite different from the contact that that Athenian might perceive in literary or artistic descriptions of gods interacting with mortals. More specifically, in tragedy the gods have a certain distance to themselves, and their associations with mortals are typically epiphanies, almost dreamlike in their abstraction and potential for destruction. The function of the gods in tragedy, if one may reduce the gods to a single function, is didactic: they represent both natural forces beyond human control and human forces often within our reach but which finally elude our grasp. The use of ritual and ritual language in tragedy tries to make sense and order out of our efforts to understand a person's place within society and nature. But in comedy, where the usual boundaries between individuals in society and those individuals and the gods are easily controlled, everyday humans converse and interact with the gods. Humans may even insult or threaten the gods face to face with violence as Peisetairos does in the case of Iris.

There is, I believe, a significant reason for these differences between tragedy and comedy, beyond the obvious fact that comedy is always after a joke, whatever the expense. Because comedy, like tragedy, took place at a festival in honor of Dionysos, it responds to the nature of what is Dionysian. This may either be the potentially destructive nature of Dionysos as Euripides portrays him in Bacchae, that final statement on the nature of tragedy itself. Or, it may be the ritualistic Dionysian spirit of release and revelry, well-known in ecstatic cult, but quite without the mythic bloodshed that the story of Pentheus provides. Comedy, I think, responds to the latter type.

Therefore, it is within this spirit, and its juxtaposition to tragedy that comedy is able to bring the gods down to earth, so to say, and make them readily accessible to humanity. Comedy, perhaps more than any other means of expressing the divine, serves the important function of keeping the gods close to humans. It nearly mocks tragedy in this respect, as it mocks tragedy in so many others. Lady Comedy might say, 'tragedy makes you think that the gods are incomprehensible and that they are only forces serving as correctives of our behavior, but that isn't the whole picture; comedy will show you that the gods aren't so unintelligible and that with the right kind of action you can make the world a very suitable place in relation to them.'

But it is, I reiterate, the performance of ritual in comedy that manipulates the gods and the polis in such a way that the comic fantasy comes true. Or as true as fantasy can be, for ritual, when its is seen and performed, mediates the discourse not only between gods and men, in the manner of 'do ut des', but also between individuals in their varying positions in society. And this specific kind of discourse is most convincingly, most realistically presented on the comic stage.

[1] Cf. A. H. Sommerstein in Antike Dramatheorien und ihre Rezeption = Drama 1, ed. B. Zimmermann, 1992, pp. 14-23; and MacDowell, Aristophanes and Athens, pp. 3-4.

[2] S. Goldhill, "The Great Dionysia and Civic Ideology," in J. Winkler and F. Zeitlin (eds.), Nothing to Do with Dionysos? (Princeton 1990) 100-6.

[3] The treaty was signed on 25 Elaphebolion; the last day of the City Dionysia was 13 Elaphebolion.

[4] L. B. Zaidman and P. S. Pantel, Religion and the Ancient Greek City, trans. by P. Cartledge (Cambridge 1992) 27.

[5] N. Dunbar, Aristophanes' Birds (Oxford 1995) 501 ad 848-9.

[6] See M. Ostwald, From Popular Sovereignty to the Sovereignty of Law (Berkeley, etc. 1986) 302 n. 39.

[7] Dover, Aristophanic Comedy (Berkeley and Los Angeles 1972), p. 137.