Carneia

Carneia (Ancient Greek: Κάρνεια or Καρνεῖα) or Carnea (Κάρνεα) was one of the tribal traditional festivals of Sparta, the Peloponnese and Doric cities in Magna Grecia, held in honor of Apollo Karneios.

In the last aspect it is supposed to commemorate the death of Carnus, an Acarnanian seer and favourite of Apollo, who, being suspected of espionage, was slain by one of the Heraclidae during the passage of the Dorians from Naupactus to Peloponnesus.

[3] Again, when Epidaurus was attacked in 419 by Argos, the movements of the Spartans under Agis against the latter were interrupted until the end of the month, while the Argives (on whom, as Dorians, the custom was equally binding), by manipulating the calendar, avoided the necessity of suspending operations.

[2][6] The Carneia was also celebrated in the city of Cyrene in North Africa, as attested in Pindar's fifth Pythian ode and Callimachus's hymn to Apollo.

E. H. Binney in Classical Review (March 1905) suggests that the story of Alcestis was performed at the Carneia (to which it may have become attached with the name of Apollo) as a vegetation drama, and "embodied a Death and Resurrection ceremony.