Epigraphy and Greek Religion1

The main part of this chapter reviews the role of texts and writing within the practice of ancient Greek religion, and seeks to modify the common view that oral tradition provided most Greek ritual knowledge. True, most information from inscribed ‘sacred laws’ is administrative and financial: written information — which exists in quantity, especially with the so-called ‘calendars of sacrifices’ — tends to specify exceptions and innovations or to provide precise detail in response to unusual needs. Documentation from the Aegean (Kos) and Asia Minor (Miletos) is cited to illustrate the former, while inscriptions from Sicily (Selinous) and N. Africa (Kyrene) are quoted to show that rituals of purification could occasionally require ‘how to’ instructions.