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Ares' attributes are instruments of war: a helmet, shield, and sword or spear.<ref name=":2" /> [[Libanius]] "makes the apple sacred to Ares", but "offers no further comment", nor connections to any aetiological myth. Apples are one of Aphrodites' sacred or symbolic fruits. Littlewood follows [[Artemidorus]] claim that to dream of sour apples presages conflict, and lists Ares alongside [[Eris (mythology)|Eris]] and the mythological "Apples of Discord".<ref>[[Libanius]], ''[[Progymnasmata]]'', ''Model Exercises in Greek Prose Composition and Rhetoric,'' Translated and with an Introduction and Notes by Craig A. Gibson, 2008, [https://books.google.com/books?id=kRi-If9IAOYC&pg=PA263] p. 263, particularly note 270: and Littlewood, A. R. "The Symbolism of the Apple in Greek and Roman Literature." Harvard Studies in Classical Philology 72 (1968): pp. 161-162. https://doi.org/10.2307/311078.</ref> | Ares' attributes are instruments of war: a helmet, shield, and sword or spear.<ref name=":2" /> [[Libanius]] "makes the apple sacred to Ares", but "offers no further comment", nor connections to any aetiological myth. Apples are one of Aphrodites' sacred or symbolic fruits. Littlewood follows [[Artemidorus]] claim that to dream of sour apples presages conflict, and lists Ares alongside [[Eris (mythology)|Eris]] and the mythological "Apples of Discord".<ref>[[Libanius]], ''[[Progymnasmata]]'', ''Model Exercises in Greek Prose Composition and Rhetoric,'' Translated and with an Introduction and Notes by Craig A. Gibson, 2008, [https://books.google.com/books?id=kRi-If9IAOYC&pg=PA263] p. 263, particularly note 270: and Littlewood, A. R. "The Symbolism of the Apple in Greek and Roman Literature." Harvard Studies in Classical Philology 72 (1968): pp. 161-162. https://doi.org/10.2307/311078.</ref> | ||
===Chained statues=== | |||
Gods were immortal but could be bound and restrained, both in mythic narrative and in cult practice. There was an archaic [[Sparta]]n statue of Ares in chains in the temple of [[Enyalios]] (sometimes regarded as the son of Ares, sometimes as Ares himself), which Pausanias claimed meant that the spirit of war and victory was to be kept in the city.{{refn|group=n|"Opposite this temple [the temple of Hipposthenes] is an old image of Enyalius in fetters. The idea the Lacedaemonians express by this image is the same as the Athenians express by their Wingless Victory; the former think that Enyalius will never run away from them, being bound in the fetters, while the Athenians think that Victory, having no wings, will always remain where she is".<ref>[[Pausanias (geographer)|Pausanias]], [http://data.perseus.org/citations/urn:cts:greekLit:tlg0525.tlg001.perseus-eng1:3.15.7 3.15.7].</ref>}} The Spartans are known to have ritually bound the images of other deities, including [[Aphrodite]] and Artemis (cf Ares and Aphrodite bound by Hephaestus), and in other places there were chained statues of Artemis and Dionysos.<ref>Gonzales, 2005, p. 282</ref><ref>Burkert, [https://archive.org/details/greekreligion0000burk/page/92/mode/2up?view=theater p. 92].</ref> | |||
Statues of Ares in chains are described in the instructions given by an oracle of the late Hellenistic era to various cities of [[Pamphylia]] (in Anatolia) including [[Syedra]], [[Lycia]] and [[Cilicia]], places almost perpetually under threat from pirates. Each was told to set up a statue of "bloody, man-slaying Ares" and provide it with an annual festival in which it was ritually bound with iron fetters ("by [[Dike (mythology)|Dike]] and Hermes") as if a supplicant for justice, put on trial and offered sacrifice. The oracle promises that "thus will he become a peaceful deity for you, once he has driven the enemy horde far from your country, and he will give rise to prosperity much prayed for". This Ares ''karpodotes'' ("giver of Fruits") is well attested in Lycia and Pisidia.<ref>Gonzalez, 2005, p. 282</ref> | |||