APATURIA (Άπατούρια), an ancient Greek festival held annually by all the Ionian towns except Ephesus and Colophon (Herodotus i. 147). At Athens it took place in the month of Pyanepsion (October to November), and lasted three days, on which occasion the various phratries (i.e. clans) of Attica met to discuss their affairs. The name is a slightly modified form of ἀπατόρια = ἀμαπατόρια, ὁμοπατόρια, the festival of “common relationship.” The ancient etymology associated it with ἀπάτη (deceit), a legend existing that the festival originated in 1100 B.C. in commemoration of a single combat between a certain Melanthus, representing King Thymoetes of Attica, and King Xanthus of Boeotia, in which Melanthus successfully threw his adversary off his guard by crying that a man in a black goat’s skin (identified with Dionysus) was helping him (Schol. Aristophanes, Acharnians, 146). On the first day of the festival, called Dorpia or Dorpeia, banquets were held towards evening at the meeting-place of the phratries or in the private houses of members. On the second, Anarrhysis (from ἀναρρύειν, to draw back the victim’s head), a sacrifice of oxen was offered at the public cost to Zeus Phratrius and Athena. On the third day, Cureotis (κουρεῶτις), children born since the last festival were presented by their fathers or guardians to the assembled phratores, and, after an oath had been taken as to their legitimacy and the sacrifice of a goat or a sheep, their names were inscribed in the register. The name κουρεῶτις is derived either from κοῦρος, that is, the day of the young, or less probably from κείρω, because on this occasion young people cut their hair and offered it to the gods. The victim was called μεῖον. On this day also it was the custom for boys still at school to declaim pieces of poetry, and to receive prizes (Plato, Timaeus, 21 B). According to Hesychius these three days of the festival were followed by a fourth, called ἐπίβδα, but this is merely a general term for the day after any festival.
APE (Old Eng. apa; Dutch aap; Old Ger. affo; Welsh epa; Old Bohemian op; a word of uncertain origin, possibly an imitation of the animal’s chatter), the generic English name, till the 16th century, for animals of the monkey tribe, and still used specifically for the tailless, manlike representatives of the order Primates (q.v.). The word is now generally a synonym for “monkey,” but the common verb for both (as transferred figuratively to human beings) is “to ape,” i.e. to imitate.
APELDOORN, a town in the province of Gelderland, Holland, and a junction station 26½ m. by rail W. of Amersfoort. It is connected by canal north and south with Zwolle and Zutphen respectively. Pop. (1900) 25,834. The neighbourhood of Apeldoorn is very picturesque and well wooded. The Protestant church was restored after a fire in 1890. Close by is the favourite country-seat of the royal family of Holland called the Loo. It was originally a hunting-lodge of the dukes of Gelderland, but in its present form dates chiefly from the time of the Stadtholder William III., king of England. Apeldoorn possesses large paper-mills.
APELLA, the official title of the popular assembly at Sparta, corresponding to the ecclesia in most other Greek states. Every full citizen who had completed his thirtieth year was entitled to attend the meetings, which, according to Lycurgus’s ordinance, must be held at the time of each full moon within the boundaries of Sparta. They had in all probability taken place originally in the Agora, but were later transferred to the neighbouring building known as the Skias (Paus. iii. 12. 10). The presiding officers were at first the kings, but in historical times the ephors, and the voting was conducted by shouts; if the president was doubtful as to the majority of voices, a division was taken and the votes were counted. Lycurgus had ordained that the apella must simply accept or reject the proposals submitted to it, and though this regulation fell into neglect, it was practically restored by the law of Theopompus and Polydorus which empowered the kings and elders to set aside any “crooked” decision of the people (Plut. Lycurg. 6). In later times, too, the actual debate was almost, if not wholly, confined to the kings, elders, ephors and perhaps the other magistrates. The apella voted on peace and war, treaties and foreign policy in general: it decided which of the kings should conduct a campaign and settled questions of disputed succession to the throne: it elected elders, ephors and other magistrates, emancipated helots and perhaps voted on legal proposals. There is a single reference (Xen. Hell. iii. 3. 8) to a “small assembly” (ἡ μικρὰ καλουμένη ἐκκλησία) at Sparta, but nothing is known as to its nature or competence. The term apella does not occur in extant Spartan inscriptions, though two decrees of Gythium belonging to the Roman period refer to the μεγάλαι ἀπέλλαι (Le Bas-Foucart, Voyage archéologique, ii., Nos. 242a, 243).
See G. Gilbert, Constitutional Antiquities of Sparta and Athens (Eng, trans., 1895), pp. 49 ff.; Studien zur altspartanischen Geschichte (Göttingen, 1872), pp. 131 ff.; G.F. Schömann, Antiquities of Greece: The State (Eng. trans., 1880), pp. 234 ff.; De ecdesiis Lacedaemoniorum (Griefswald, 1836) [= Opusc. academ. i. pp. 87 ff.]; C.O. Müller, History and Antiquities of the Doric Race (Eng. trans., 2nd ed. 1839), book iii. ch. 5, §§ 8-10; G. Busolt, Die griechischen Staats- und Rechtsaltertümer, 1887 (in Iwan Müller’s Handbuch der klassischen Altertumsiuissenschaft, iv. 1), § 90; Griechische Geschichte (2nd ed.), i. p. 552 ff.
(M. N. T.)