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The Apaturia (see Töppfer in P.-W. s. v.) was the festival (in the month Pyanepsion) of the Phratries at Athens, at which new members were enrolled; cf. Schol. Aristoph. Ach. 146, where its three days are described, and Xen. Hell. i. 7. 8 (its fatal influence on the trial of the generals in 406 B.C.). Various deities were connected with it, especially Zeus Phratrios and Athena Phratria. The derivation from the ἀπάτη of Melanthus is an etymological legend; it really = ὁμοπατόρια, the gathering of ‘fathers’ (cf. ἄκοιτις). We can trace the festival widely, e.g. in the Aegean, at Cyzicus, and at Olbia; but the only inscription found as to it comes from the Crimea (? Phanagoria), I. G. A. 350.

No doubt the cause of the absence of the Apaturia at Ephesus was the Orientalized character of that city; it was divided into five tribes, which are independent of the four Ionic tribes (c. 142 n.), except that one of its five had a sub-division ‘Argadis’. Its worship of Artemis too was full of Eastern elements (cf. Strabo, 641). So Ephesus takes little part in Ionic revolt (vi. 8 n.; 16. 2).

For an Oriental party in Colophon cf. Thuc. iii. 34. 1.

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