Ancient Greek Ghost Stories, Part One: Athenodoros and the Haunted House

In his letter To Sura, the ancient Roman writer Pliny the Younger recounts one of the oldest and most famous ghost stories of all time.

There was once a Stoic philosopher named Athenodoros of Tarsos. Athenodoros came to the city of Athens, where he learned that there was a large house for sale at an extraordinarily cheap price. When Athenodoros asked why the house was available at such a low price, he was informed that, every night, the clashing of chains could be heard coming from a certain room in the house and that, after a while, the sound of clattering chains would grow louder and louder until, at last, the terrifying apparition of an old, decrepit man would appear, standing in the room with iron chains attached to his arms and dragging along on the floor behind him. The man was said to be extremely emaciated, as though he had been starved to death, and his hair and beard were said to be tangled and matted.

Athenodoros bought the house without hesitation. That night, he set up his writing desk in the room where the ghostly specter was said to appear. For the first few hours of the night there was no sign of paranormal activity. Then, around midnight, sure enough, just as he had been told, Athenodoros could hear the sound of the clashing of irons coming from somewhere within the house. He ignored the sound, however, and continued writing. Soon, the clashing grew louder, but Athenodoros continued to ignore it.

Finally, the ghost itself appeared in the room, rattling its chains and moaning in agony. Athenodoros ignored the specter and continued writing. The ghastly figure walked over to Athenodoros and made a signal for Athenodoros to follow him. Athenodoros glanced up at the apparition and signaled to the spirit to wait for him to finish what he was writing.  The ghost, however responded by rattling its chains directly in Athenodoros’s face to attract his attention and making the sign indicating for Athenodoros to follow him once again. Athenodoros stood up, picked up his lamp, and followed after the spirit.

The apparition led Athenodoros out into the courtyard of the house, stood over a certain spot, and then vanished into thin air. Athenodoros carefully marked the spot where the ghost had disappeared with leaves and waited until morning. Then, he contacted the magistrates and advised them to dig up the spot where the ghost had vanished. When they dug up the spot, they discovered the skeleton of a man with iron chains around his wrists. The skeleton had clearly lain there unmarked for many years.

At Athenodoros’s request, the skeleton was given a public funeral with full honors. After that day, the ghost was never seen again.

This story has been retold many times and many modern ghost stories are directly based off of it. It is, however, merely the best-known example of the many ghost stories that have survived from classical antiquity. Be sure to read my future articles in this series, in which I will retell some of the other, less widely known ancient Greek and Roman ghost stories.

SOURCES
Pliny the Younger. To Sura.
IMAGE CREDITS
The featured image at the beginning of this article is an illustration created by Henry Justice Ford sometime around 1900 or thereabouts entitled Athenodorus Confronts the Spectre. This image was retrieved from Wikimedia Commons. This image is in the public domain in the United States of America.

Author: Spencer McDaniel

I am a historian mainly interested in ancient Greek cultural and social history. Some of my main historical interests include ancient religion and myth; gender and sexuality; ethnicity; and interactions between Greeks and foreign cultures. I hold a BA in history and classical studies (Ancient Greek and Latin languages and literature), with departmental honors in history, from Indiana University Bloomington (May 2022) and an MA in Ancient Greek and Roman Studies from Brandeis University (May 2024). View all posts by Spencer McDaniel