Funeral oration (ancient Greece)

A funeral oration or epitaphios logos () is a formal speech delivered on the ceremonial occasion of a funeral. Funerary customs comprise the practices used by a culture to remember the dead, from the funeral itself, to various monuments, prayers, and rituals undertaken in their honour. In ancient Greece and, in particular, in ancient Athens, the funeral oration was deemed an indispensable component of the funeral ritual.
The "epitaphios logos" is regarded as an almost exclusive Athenian creation, although some early elements of such speeches exist in the epos of Homer and in the lyric poems of Pindar. Pericles' Funeral Oration is the earlier extant of the genre. The Athenians are those who set the standard and, therefore, Demosthenes praises them, saying that "you alone of all mankind publicly pronounce over your dead funeral orations, in which you extol the deeds of the brave".
Homer and Pindar.
In Homer very few elements of "epitaphios logos" or laudation are found. At the funeral of Patroclus chief in all the mourning is Achilles; the son of Peleus laid his bloodstained hand on the breast of his friend and cried, "Fare well Patroklos, even in the house of Hades. I will now do all that I erewhile promised you; I will drag Hector hither and let dogs devour him raw; twelve noble sons of Trojans will I also slay before your pyre to avenge you." As he spoke he treated the body of Hector with contumely, laying it at full length in the dust beside the bier of Patroklos. At the funeral of Hector the women, Andromache, his mother and Helen, deliver the final public statements over the dead body. Andromache laments the loss of her husband with these emotional words:
In the "Sixth Olympian For Hagesias of Syracuse", the poet mentions a characteristic example of an epitaph high praise:
Nicole Loraux observes that the "epitaphios" was "born of lyric poetry and in competition with it", since the funeral oratory "uses poetic themes but reinterprets them from a resolutely political perspective".
Athens.
The orator Anaximenes of Lampsacus claimed that the funeral oration had been originated in the 6th-century BC in Athens by Solon, but this is widely doubted by historians. More plausible, but not beyond doubt, is the statement by Dionysius of Halicarnassus that the Athenians instituted the funeral oration "in honour or those who fought at Artemisium, Salamis, and Plataea, and died for their country, or to the glory of their exploits at Marathon."
Thucydides describes in detail the funeral rituals and points out that "the dead are laid in the public sepulchre in the most beautiful suburb of the city, in which those who fall in war are always buried". This suburb was Kerameikos, where there was a monument for all the Athenians fell in battle, except such of them as fought at Marathon.
Historians now believe that the "demosion sema" (a collective burial site for the war dead) and the "epitaphios logos" were first established around 470 BC, customs that continued during the Periclean period. The earliest preserved casualty list, giving the names of those who died fighting for their city in a given year, dates to 490–480 BC and it is associated with the battle of Marathon, and white-ground lekythoi depicting funerary scenes started around 470 BC. The funeral oration of Pericles, as reported by Thucydides, is the earliest "epitaphios" presented in full. The burial of the war dead in the first year of the Peloponnesian War is regarded as reflecting the fifth-century dominance of the public co-memorial.
Scheme and structure.
Though Plato is consistently suspicious of the ability of oratory to teach, in the "Menexenus" he demonstrates a theoretical interest in the project of funeral oratory. He actually describes the scheme of the traditional Athenian funeral oration with the following succinct phrase:
Thereby, the traditional "epitaphios" must contain: a "eulogy" of the war dead and the city, an "exhortation" to the relatives to copy the virtues of the war dead and a "consolation" for the living members of their families.
Therefore, the "epitaphios" consists of the following parts:
Function and critics.
The primary function of the funeral oration was to give public expression to the conception of the potential excellence of polis. It was an occasion on which Athens "invented" and "reinvented" itself in narrative form. The city displayed its achievements, as well as the civic and personal virtues to which the citizens could aspire. The secular prose of the funeral oration dedicates itself to celebrating the ideal of the democratic Athenian city. Through the "epitaphios", a civic discourse, the city recognizes itself as it wishes to be.
It is for this reason that Plato has chosen the funeral oration as a main target of him. In "Menexenus" he engages the concerns of funeral oratory and appropriates for philosophy part of the intellectual mission that the Athenians associated with the most celebrated and democratic form of epideictic, the funeral oratory.
Extant speeches.
Whereas the "epitaphios" originated itself as a public speech composed for a specific occasion, a number of specimens of this genre were not composed for delivery at the public burial. They would have been read to small audiences at the intellectual gatherings that met at so many venues. Gorgias' funeral oration, maybe that of Lysias and clearly Plato's parodic "epitaphios" in "Menexenus" were not designed to be delivered before the Athenian people.
References.
Primary sources
Secondary sources