Between ritual and theatre: political performance in Seleucid Babylonia

Abstract

In Seleucid Babylonia, performance was politics. In this colonial state, the temple, theatre and ritual were established as a middle ground between the different populations. ‘Greek’ theatres were constructed to look like Babylonian temples, and both institutions served as loci of civil authority. Moreover, the staging of the Babylonian Akitu influenced the mise-en-scène of the Greek pompe at Daphne, and exposure to Greek drama shaped audience response to religious ceremonies. State rituals were more than occasions for kings to assert their legitimacy, they were also spaces in which the Babylonian priesthood, Greek politai and Babylonian citizens could debate Seleucid hegemony and imagine an alternative to the empire.

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