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Athens would honour those who had fallen in battle with a public burial and special rites. To be exact, the funeral, paid for out of the public purse, was followed by an oration, although this was not originally an integral part of the funeral (Thucydides 2.35,1). Our ancient sources disagree on when the custom started. The earliest Funeral Oration we have is the one which Pericles delivered for the citizens who fell in battle against the Samians in 439 B.C. But according to later writers the custom was already in existence by the end of the Persian Wars. As a finale, there was a ceremony at the graveside on the same day as the funeral: this is mentioned in Pericles' Funeral Oration, but we have few details about how it was performed. |
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Gravestones (stelai) with the names of the fallen were placed over the public grave. There were originally ten markers with the lists of the fallen, corresponding to the ten tribes of Attica. Later there was just one monument, but it often had vertical furrows to simulate the ten markers. The earliest list of dead found on a public grave can be dated to 464 B.C.
The annual ceremony in honour of the fallen was the analogue of the household's annual nomizomena for its dead. It was a public ritual, funded by the city and organized by the Polemarch. Competitions in music, athletics and horsemanship were part of the ceremonies (Plato, Menexenus 249B).
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