Daedala

In <a href="/facts/Ancient_Greece/PTVBrWXq">Ancient Greece</a>, the Daedala (Greek: δαίδαλα) was a <a href="/facts/Festival/JAg4y9fD">festival</a> of reconciliation that was held every few years in honor of <a href="/facts/Hera/Jw5Km2DP">Hera</a>, consort of the supreme god <a href="/facts/Zeus/9wTwkEDt">Zeus</a> at <a href="/facts/Plataea/GE3lXI70">Plataea</a>, in <a href="/facts/Boeotia/V8Prmucy">Boeotia</a>, being one of the major cults of the city.
According to <a href="/facts/Pausanias_(geographer)/3jMP2VVl">Pausanias</a>, there was a "lesser Daedala" (Δαίδαλα μικρά), celebrated every four years or so exclusively by the Plataeans, and a "greater Daedala" (Δαίδαλα μεγάλα), celebrated by all of Boeotians every fourteen cycles (approx. 60 years).
In the lesser Daedala, the people of <a href="/facts/Plataea/GE3lXI70">Plataea</a> went to an ancient oak grove and exposed pieces of cooked meat to ravens, attentively watching upon which tree any of the birds, after taking a piece of meat, would settle. Out of this tree they carved an image, and having it dressed as a bride, they set it on a <a href="/facts/Bullock_cart/PzXuyWY0">bullock cart</a> with a bridesmaid beside it. The image seems then to have been drawn to the bank of the river <a href="/facts/Asopus/17RIIW29">Asopus</a> and back to the town, attended by a cheering crowd.
These adorned <a href="/facts/Xoanon/zmLfTc4J">xoana</a> were also called "<a href="/facts/Daidala/3rJtsxI0">daidala</a>" (δάιδαλα or δαιδάλεια), with the connotation that they were "crafted" or "fashioned" (compare <a href="/facts/Daedalus/onRnV8sh">Daedalus</a>, "daidalos" (δαίδαλος) meaning "cunning worker").
After fourteen of these cycles, the great Daidala was celebrated by all the people of <a href="/facts/Boeotia/V8Prmucy">Boeotia</a>; and at its start one wooden figure was chosen from the many that had accumulated through the years and designated the "bride". The wooden figure was prepared as a bride for a wedding, ritually bathed in the <a href="/facts/Asopus/17RIIW29">Asopus</a>, adorned and raised on a wagon with an attendant. This wagon led a procession of wains carrying the accumulated daedala up to the summit of <a href="/facts/Cithaeron/kyxHoCoV">Mount Cithaeron</a>, where a wooden sacrificial altar was erected out of square pieces of wood. This was covered with a quantity of dry wood, and the towns, persons of rank, and other wealthy individuals, offered each a heifer to Hera and a bull to Zeus with plenty of wine and incense, while at the same time all of the daedala were placed upon the altar. For those who did not possess sufficient means, it was customary to offer small sheep, but all these offerings were immolated in a <a href="/facts/Hecatomb/sAnB4Ej9">hecatomb</a> in the same manner as those of the wealthier persons. The fire consumed both offerings and altar.
This archaic custom was explained with an <a href="/facts/Aition/bYbjqtWn">aition</a> or "origin myth" about <a href="/facts/Hera/Jw5Km2DP">Hera</a> and <a href="/facts/Zeus/9wTwkEDt">Zeus</a>, which is related by <a href="/facts/Pausanias_(geographer)/3jMP2VVl">Pausanias</a>:

<a href="/facts/Hera/Jw5Km2DP">Hera</a>, they say, was for some reason or other angry with <a href="/facts/Zeus/9wTwkEDt">Zeus</a>, and had retreated to <a href="/facts/Euboia/YEvmF1Eb">Euboia</a>. <a href="/facts/Zeus/9wTwkEDt">Zeus</a>, failing to make her change her mind, visited Kithairon, at that time despot in <a href="/facts/Plataea/GE3lXI70">Plataea</a>, who surpassed all men for his cleverness. So he ordered <a href="/facts/Zeus/9wTwkEDt">Zeus</a> to make an image of wood, and to carry it, wrapped up, in a bullock wagon, and to say that he was celebrating his marriage with <a href="/facts/Pegaeae/eTyQ3o1m">Plataia</a>, the daughter of <a href="/facts/Asopus/17RIIW29">Asopus</a>. So <a href="/facts/Zeus/9wTwkEDt">Zeus</a> followed the advice of Kithairon. <a href="/facts/Hera/Jw5Km2DP">Hera</a> heard the news at once, and at once appeared on the scene. But when she came near the wagon and tore away the dress from the image, she was pleased at the deceit, on finding it a wooden image and not a bride, and was reconciled to <a href="/facts/Zeus/9wTwkEDt">Zeus</a>. To commemorate this reconciliation they celebrate a festival called Daidala, because the men of old time gave the name of daidala to wooden images... the Plataeans hold the festival of the Daidala every six years, according to the local guide, but really at a shorter interval. I wanted very much to calculate exactly the interval between one Daedala and the next, but I was unable to do so. In this way they celebrate the feast.
—Pausanias (IX.3 § 1, &c.)
The account of the origin of the Daedala given by <a href="/facts/Pausanias_(geographer)/3jMP2VVl">Pausanias</a> agrees in the main points with the story related by <a href="/facts/Plutarch/p3bywktN">Plutarch</a>, who wrote a work on the plataean Daedala; the only difference is that <a href="/facts/Plutarch/p3bywktN">Plutarch</a> represents <a href="/facts/Zeus/9wTwkEDt">Zeus</a> as receiving his advice to deceive <a href="/facts/Hera/Jw5Km2DP">Hera</a> from <a href="/facts/Alalcomenes/9SAMrcRl">Alalcomenes</a> (instead of Kithairon), and that he calls <a href="/facts/Plataea/GE3lXI70">Plataea</a>, "Daedala".

Daedala open-in-new

Daedala