SPECIAL HANDLING HOMICIDES IN ANCIENT ATHENS
Religious pollution was a genuine fear for the Athenians. Murderers made themselves unclean by provoking a premature death. The only recompense for such a heinous deed was the punishment of the killer. No one could forgive the murderer, or legally protect him from prosecution or punishment, except the victim. The Athenian orator, Demosthenes, explained: “If the victim himself, before his death, releases the murderer from blood-guiltiness, it is not lawful for any of the remaining kinsmen to prosecute” (37.59). Justice was satisfied by this arrangement.
However, neglecting to avenge the deceased could attract the wrath of the gods, and not just upon the murderer. Such ritual ‘pollution’ (Greek: miasma, literally ‘a stain’) was viewed as an easily transferable contagion, both to individuals who consorted with the killer, or to any city that housed him. The Athenian playwright, Sophocles, in his play, Oedipus the Tyrant, had a priest of Zeus describe the conditions in Thebes when an unknown killer walked amongst them: “I have lost count of [our] sufferings. All the people of my city are sick … Nothing grows from our rich soil; our women have no live births … One after another you can see the dead” (168–175).
The responsibility of effecting justice and securing vengeance for the deceased is clearly outlined in the words of a murdered man’s brother-in-law when he addressed the court: “We [the family]
