Notes on matrimonial strategies in civic contexts

Rendus des Séances de l'Académie des Inscriptions et Belles-Lettres: 1361-79. Rome's victory over the Antigonid kingdom triggered different local responses among the cities and leagues of mainland Greece. In Larisa, situated on the banks of the Peneios River in Thessaly, it inspired the establishment of a freedom festival that echoed Titus Quinctius Flamininus' declaration of Greek freedom from 197 BCE. Scholars typically place the festival for Zeus Eleutherios in the context of global transformation and its translation into the regional arena of the rejuvenated Thessalian League. Denver Graninger pays due attention to these spatial vectors. His main focus, however, is directed at the local horizon of the festival: its place in societal interactions in Larisa, in particular its twofold role as a feeder and a platform for the prioritization of local meaning. The chapter begins with observations on the Larisan matrix of space and place. The main agents to tie the people to their land, Graninger argues, were the local founding hero Akrisios and an eponymous nymph. We encounter here once again the inherent quality of nymphs to foster connections to the local (chapter 1). Tracing the salient nature of Larisa outside the framework of the Thessalian League, the article next turns to a curious compression of local and non-local realms, a creative mixing and blending that energized local and regional conversations. Most prominently, the compression condensed in the notion of Pelasgians, a notorious people from the time before the arrival of the Hellenes. Stigmatized as uncivilized rogues by others, the Larisans positively identified with the Pelasgians, who were assigned a real presence in the built environment of the city and in corresponding discourses. Over time, they also shaped the way in which local champions were recorded in the victory lists of the Eleutheria. Resonating with other media, Graninger concludes, such a designation deeply imprinted on quotidian discourses on the ground, drawing the people of Larisa to their city and community as prime sources of meaning and orientation.