MUNICHIE (Μουηχία). - Festivals celebrated in Attica on the 16th of Munichion in honor of Artemis Munichia, on the homonymous peninsula of Piraeus. They must have been quite important and to date back to great antiquity, both because they gave their name to the month (= March-April) and because in the myths connected with them there is some mention of human sacrifice.
It was in fact narrated that, because a bear (ἄρχτος), an animal sacred to Artemis Munichia, had been killed in the goddess's temple, she willed that, in order to put an end to the epidemic that had arisen from it, someone should sacrifice their own daughter to her: a sacrifice that was, however, cunningly replaced with an animal (cf. Suda, s. v. ἐμβάρος). Nevertheless this mythological link of Artemis Munichia with the bear had a counterpart in the cult, inasmuch as, while sacrifices of such animals were also made to her (to Artemis Laphria, in Achaea; cf. Pausanias, VII, 20, 12-13), the girls consecrated to her before marriage were called precisely ἄρχτοι: bears. But in the course of time the M. must have lost their original meaning, especially when an attempt was made to make the anniversary of the battle of Salamis (which took place in Sept.) coincide with them, it having been understood to consecrate « to Artemis the 16th of Munichion since then the lunar goddess shone upon the Greeks victorious at Salamis » (Plutarch, De glor. Athen., 349 F): that day was in fact the day of the full moon, and therefore sacred to Artemis πυναξέχτος.
The festival was celebrated by carrying to the goddess's sanctuary (represented as a huntress), in a festive procession, certain cakes around which were placed lighted candles (called ἀμφορῶντες, a clear link with the full moon). The ephebes also took part in the pomp and the sacrifice, and on « sacred » boats they held a regatta and later, in the time of the Empire, even a naumachia. Artemis Munichia was moreover known at Sicyon (where there was an ancient wooden simulacrum of her) and near Ephesus.
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Cesare D'Onofrio