[84] The Greek name t??a???? cannot be properly rendered tyrant; for many of the t??a???? by no means deserved to be so called, nor is it consistent with the use of language to speak of a mild and well-intentioned tyrant. The word despot is the nearest approach which we can make to it, since it is understood to imply that a man has got more power than he ought to have, while it does not exclude a beneficent use of such power by some individuals. It is, however, very inadequate to express the full strength of Grecian feeling which the original word called forth.

[85] The PhÆakian king Alkinous (Odyss. vii. 55-65): there are twelve other PhÆakian ?as???e?, he is himself the thirteenth (viii. 391).

The chief men in the Iliad, and the suitors of PenelopÊ in the Odyssey, are called usually and indiscriminately both ?as???e? and ??a?te?; the latter word, however, designates them as men of property and masters of slaves, (analogous to the subsequent word desp?t??, which word does not occur in Homer, though d?sp???a is found in the Odyssey,) while the former word marks them as persons of conspicuous station in the tribe (see Odyss. i. 393-401; xiv. 63). A chief could only be ?as??e?? of freemen; but he might be ??a? either of freemen or of slaves.

AgamemnÔn and Menelaus belong to the most kingly race (????? as??e?te???: compare TyrtÆus, Fragm. ix. v. 8, p. 9, ed. Schneidewin) of the Pelopids, to whom the sceptre originally made for Zeus has been given by HermÊs (Iliad, ii. 101; ix. 160; x. 239); compare Odyss. xv. 539. The race of Dardanus are the favorite offspring of Zeus, as??e?tat?? among the Trojans (Iliad, xx. 304). These races are the parallels of the kingly prosapiÆ called Amali, Asdingi, Gungingi, and Lithingi, among the Goths, Vandals, and Lombards (Jornandes, De Rebus Geticis, c. 14-22; Paul Warnefrid, Gest. Langob. c. 14-21); and the ??????? ????? among the Chaonian Epirots (Thucyd. ii. 80).

[86] Odyss. i. 392; xi. 184; xiii. 14; xix. 109.—

Iliad, ix. 154-297 (when AgamemnÔn is promising seven townships to Achilles, as a means of appeasing his wrath):—

See Iliad, xii. 312; and the reproaches of ThersitÊs (ii. 226)—as???a? d???f????? (Hesiod, Opp. Di. 38-264).

The Roman kings had a large t?e??? assigned to them,—“agri, arva, et arbusta et pascui lÆti atque uberes” (Cicero, De Republ. v. 2): the German kings received presents: “Mos est civitatibus (observes Tacitus, respecting the Germans whom he describes, M. G. 15) ultro ac viritim conferre principibus, vel armentorum vel frugum, quod pro honore acceptum etiam necessitatibus subvenit.”

The revenue of the Persian kings before Darius consisted only of what were called d??a, or presents (Herod. iii. 89): Darius first introduced both the name of tribute and the determinate assessment. King PolydektÊs, in Seriphos, invites his friends to a festival, the condition of which is that each guest shall contribute to an ??a??? for his benefit (PherekydÊs, Fragm. 26, ed. Didot); a case to which the Thracian banquet prepared by SeuthÊs affords an exact parallel (XenophÔn, Anab. vii. 3, 16-32: compare Thucyd. ii. 97, and Welcker, Æschyl. Trilogie, p. 381). Such Aids, or Benevolences, even if originally voluntary, became in the end compulsory. In the European monarchies of the Middle Ages, what were called free gifts were more ancient than public taxes: “The feudal Aids (observes Mr. Hallam) are the beginning of taxation, of which they for a long time answered the purpose.” (Middle Ages, ch. ii. part i. p. 189.) So about the Aides in the old French Monarchy, “La Cour des Aides avoit ÉtÉ instituÉe, et sa jurisdiction s’Étoit formÉe, lorsque le domaine des Rois suffisoit À toutes les dÉpenses de l’Etat, les droits d’Aides Étoient alors des supplÉmens peu considÉrables et toujours temporaires. Depuis, le domaine des Rois avoit ÉtÉ anÉanti: les Aides, au contraire, Étoient devenues permanentes et formoient presque la totalitÉ des ressources du trÉsor.” (Histoire de la Fronde, par M. de St. Aulaire, ch. iii. p. 124.)

[87] ?p? ??t??? ???as? pat???a? as??e?a?, is the description which ThucydidÊs gives of these heroic governments (i. 13).

The language of Aristotle (Polit. iii. 10, 1) is much the same: ? as??e?a—? pe?? t??? ???????? ???????—a?t? d? ?? ????t?? ??, ?p? t?s? d? ???s?????? st?at???? d? ?? ?a? d??ast?? ? as??e??, ?a? t?? p??? t??? ?e??? ??????.

It can hardly be said correctly, however, that the king’s authority was defined: nothing can well be more indefinite.

AgamemnÔn enjoyed or assumed the power of putting to death a disobedient soldier (Aristot. Polit. iii. 9, 2). The words which Aristotle read in the speech of AgamemnÔn in the Iliad—??? ??? ??? ???at??—are not in our present copies: the Alexandrine critics effaced many traces of the old manners.

[88] Striking phrases on this head are put into the mouth of SarpÊdÔn (Iliad, xii. 310-322).

Kings are named and commissioned by Zeus,—?? d? ???? as???e? (Hesiod, Theogon. 96; Callimach. Hymn. ad Jov. 79): ??at??? ?e??p??te ???? is a sort of paraphrase for the kingly dignity in the case of Pelias and NÊleus (Odyss. xi. 255; compare Iliad, ii. 204).

[89] Odysseus builds his own bed and bedchamber, and his own raft (Odyss. xxiii. 188; v. 246-255): he boasts of being an excellent mower and ploughman (xviii. 365-375): for his astonishing proficiency in the athletic contests, see viii. 180-230. Paris took a share in building his own house (Iliad, vi. 314).

[90] Odyss. xi. 496; xxiv. 136-248.

[91] See this prominent meaning of the words ??a???, ?s????, ?a???, etc. copiously illustrated in Welcker’s excellent Prolegomena to Theognis, sect. 9-16. Camerarius, in his notes on that poet (v. 19,), had already conceived clearly the sense in which these words are used. Iliad, xv. 323. ??a te t??? ??a???s? pa?ad???s? ????e?. Compare Hesiod, Opp. Di. 216, and the line in AthenÆus, v. p. 178, ??t?at?? d? ??a??? de???? ?p? da?ta? ?as??.

“Moralis illarum vocum vis, et civilis—quarum hÆc a lexicographis et commentatoribus plurimis fere neglecta est—probe discernendÆ erunt. Quod quo facilius fieret, nescio an ubi posterior intellectus valet, majuscul scribendum fuisset ??a??? et ?a???.”

If this advice of Welcker could have been followed, much misconception would have been obviated. The reference of these words to power and not to worth, is their primitive import in the Greek language, descending from the Iliad downward, and determining the habitual designation of parties during the period of active political dispute. The ethical meaning of the word hardly appears until the discussions raised by Socrates, and prosecuted by his disciples; but the primitive import still continued to maintain concurrent footing.

I shall have occasion to touch more largely on this subject, when I come to expound the Grecian political parties. At present, it is enough to remark that the epithets of good men, best men, habitually applied afterwards to the aristocratical parties, descend from the rudest period of Grecian society.

[92] Aristot. Polit. i. 1, 7.

[93] ?a? d?? t??t? ?s?? ?as??e???t? p??te???, ?t? sp????? ?? e??e?? ??d?a? d?af????ta? ?at? ??et??, ????? te ?a? t?te ????? ??????ta? p??e?? (Polit. iii. 10, 7); also the same treatise, v. 8, 5, and v. 8, 22. ?? ?????ta? d? ?t? as??e?a? ???, etc.

Aristotle handles monarchy far less copiously than either oligarchy or democracy: the tenth and eleventh chapters of his third book, in which he discusses it, are nevertheless very interesting to peruse.

In the conception of Plato, also, the kingly government, if it is to work well, implies a breed superior to humanity to hold the sceptre (Legg. iv. 6. p. 713).

The Athenian dramatic poets (especially EuripidÊs) often put into the mouths of their heroic characters popular sentiments adapted to the democratical atmosphere of Athens—very different from what we find in Homer.

[94] ?????? d? p??t?? e?a???? ??e ?e???t?? (Iliad, ii. 53): compare x. 195-415. ????, pa?a??? d???????t?? (xi. 371).

[95] Iliad, xviii. 313.—

Also, xii. 213, where Polydamas says to HectÔr,—

[96] Iliad, ix. 95-101.

[97] Iliad, vii. 126, ???e??—?s???? ????d???? ????f???? ?d? ?????t??.

[98] Considerable stress seems to be laid on the necessity that the people in the agora should sit down (Iliad, ii. 96): a standing agora is a symptom of tumult or terror (Iliad, xviii, 246); an evening agora, to which men come elevated by wine, is also the forerunner of mischief (Odyss. iii. 138).

Such evidences of regular formalities observed in the agora are not without interest.

[99] Iliad, ii. 100.—

Nitzsch (ad Odyss. ii. 14) controverts this restriction of individual manifestation to the chiefs: the view of O. MÜller (Hist. Dorians, b. iii. c. 3) appears to me more correct: such was also the opinion of Aristotle—f?s? t????? ???st?t???? ?t? ? ?? d??? ???? t?? ????sa? ?????? ??, ?? d? ??e??e? ?a? t?? p???a? (Schol. Iliad, ix. 17): compare the same statement in his Nikomachean Ethics, iii. 5.

[100] See Iliad, ix. 635; Odyss. xi. 419.

[101] Odyss. ii. 25-40.

[102] Odyss. ii. 43, 77, 145.—

[103] A similar character is given of the public assemblies of the early Franks and Lombards (Pfeffel, Histoire du Droit Public en Allemagne, t. i. p. 18; Sismondi, Histoire des RÉpubliques Italiennes, t. i. c. 2, p. 71).

Dionysius of Halikarnassus (ii. 12) pays rather too high a compliment to the moderation of the Grecian heroic kings.

The kings at Rome, like the Grecian heroic kings, began with an ???? ???pe??????: the words of Pomponius (De Origine Juris, i. 2,) would be perhaps more exactly applicable to the latter than to the former: “Initio civitatis nostrÆ Populus sine cert lege, sine jure certo, primum agere instituit: omniaque manu a Regibus gubernabantur.” Tacitus says (Ann. iii. 26), “Nobis Romulus, ut libitum, imperitaverat: dein Numa religionibus et divino jure populum devinxit, repertaque quÆdam a Tullo et Anco: sed prÆcipuus Servius Tullius sanctor legum fuit, quis etiam Reges obtemperarent.” The appointment of a Dictator under the Republic was a reproduction, for a short and definite interval, of this old unbounded authority (Cicero, De Repub. ii. 32; Zonaras, Ann. vii. 13; Dionys. Hal. v. 75).

See Rubino, Untersuchungen Über RÖmische Verfassung und Geschichte, Cassel, 1839, buch i. abschnitt 2, pp. 112-132; and Wachsmuth, Hellenische Alterthumskunde, i. sect. 18, pp. 81-91.

[104] Iliad, ii. 204. AgamemnÔn promises to make over to Achilles seven well-peopled cities, with a body of wealthy inhabitants (Iliad, ix. 153); and Menelaus, if he could have induced Odysseus to quit Ithaka, and settle near him in Argos, would have depopulated one of his neighboring towns in order to make room for him (Odyss. iv. 176).

Manso (Sparta, i. 1, p. 34) and Nitzsch (ad Odyss. iv. 171) are inclined to exclude these passages as spurious,—a proceeding, in my opinion, inadmissible, without more direct grounds than they are able to produce.

[105] Iliad, ii. 74. ???ta d? ???? ?pes?? pe???s?a?, etc.

[106] Iliad, ii. 188-196.—

[107] Iliad, ii. 213-277.

[108] Iliad, ii. 284-340. Nor does ThersitÊs, in his criminatory speech against AgamemnÔn, touch in any way upon this anomalous point, though, in the circumstances under which his speech is made, it would seem to be of all others the most natural,—and the sharpest thrust against the commander-in-chief.

[109] See this illustrated in the language of Theseus, Eurip. Supplic. 349-352.

[110] XenophÔn, Memorab. i. 2, 9.

[111] Aristot. Polit. vii. 6, 1; Hippocrat. De AËre, Loc. et Aq. v. 85-86; Herodot. vii. 135.

[112] The s??pt???, ???ste?, or ????, and ?????, go together, under the presiding superintendence of the gods. The goddess Themis both convokes and dismisses the agora (see Iliad, xi. 806; Odyss. ii. 67; Iliad, xx. 4).

The ???ste?, commandments and sanctions, belong properly to Zeus (Odyss. xvi. 403); from him they are given in charge to earthly kings along with the sceptre (Iliad, i. 238; ii. 206).

The commentators on Homer recognized ????, rather too strictly, as ?????? ?a? ????? ????? (see Eustath. ad Odyss. xvi. 403).

The presents and the ??pa?a? ???ste? (Iliad, ix. 156).

[113] Hesiod, Theogon. 85; the single person judging seems to be mentioned (Odyss. xii. 439).

It deserves to be noticed that, in Sparta, the senate decided accusations of homicide (Aristot. Polit. iii. 1, 7): in historical Athens, the senate of Areiopagus originally did the same, and retained, even when its powers were much abridged, the trial of accusations of intentional homicide and wounding.

Respecting the judicial functions of the early Roman kings, Dionys. Hal. A. R. x. 1. ?? ?? ???a??? ?? as??e?? ?f? a?t?? ?tatt?? t??? de?????? t?? d??a?, ?a? t? d??a????? ?p? ??e????, t??t? ???? ?? (compare iv. 25; and Cicero, Republic. v. 2; Rubino, Untersuchungen, i. 2, p. 122).

[114] Iliad, xviii. 504.—

Several of the old northern Sagas represent the old men, assembled for the purpose of judging, as sitting on great stones in a circle, called the Urtheilsring, or Gerichtsring (Leitfaden der NÖrdischen AlterthÜmer, p. 31, Copenhag. 1837).

[115] Homer, Iliad, xviii. 497-510.

[116] Hesiod, Opp. Di. 37.

[117] Hesiod, Opp. Di. 27-33.

[118] Hesiod, Opp. Di. 250-263; Homer, Iliad, xvi. 387.

[119] Tittmann (Darstellung der Griechischen Staatsverfassungen, book ii. p. 63) gives too lofty an idea, in my judgment, of the condition and functions of the Homeric agora.

[120] Iliad, i. 520-527; iv. 14-56; especially the agora of the gods (xx. 16).

[121] Odyss. ix. 114.—

These lines illustrate the meaning of ????.

[122] See this point set forth in the prolix discourse of Aristeides, ?e?? ??t?????? (Or. xlv. vol. ii. p. 99): ?s??d?? ... ta?t? ??t????? ???? ????? ... ?t? te ? ??t????? s??ed??? t?? as??????, etc.

[123] PÊleus, king of the Myrmidons, is called (Iliad, vii. 126) ?s???? ????d???? ????f???? ?d? ?????t??—Diomedes, ????? d? t? ?e??? (iv. 400)—NestÔr, ????? ?????? ?????t??—SarpÊdÔn, ?????? ????f??e (v. 633); and Idomeneus, ???t?? ????f??e (xiii. 219).

Hesiod (Theogon. 80-96) illustrates still more amply the idÉal of the king governing by persuasion and inspired by the Muses.

[124] See the striking picture in ThucydidÊs (ii. 65). XenophÔn, in the CyropÆdia, puts into the mouth of his hero the Homeric comparison between the good king and the good shepherd, implying as it does immense superiority of organization, morality, and intelligence (CyropÆd. viii. p. 450, Hutchinson).

Volney observes, respecting the emirs of the Druses in Syria: “Everything depends on circumstances: if the governor be a man of ability, he is absolute;—if weak, he is a cipher. This proceeds from the want of fixed laws; a want common to all Asia.” (Travels in Egypt and Syria, vol. ii. p. 66.) Such was pretty much the condition of the king in primitive Greece.

[125] Nevertheless, the question put by Leotychides to the deposed Spartan king Demaratus,—?????? t? e?? t? ???e?? et? t? as??e?e?? (Herodot. vi. 65), and the poignant insult which those words conveyed, afford one among many other evidences of the lofty estimate current in Sparta respecting the regal dignity, of which Aristotle, in the Politica, seems hardly to take sufficient account.

[126] O. MÜller (Hist. Dorians, book iii. i. 3) affirms that the fundamental features of the royalty were maintained in the Dorian states, and obliterated only in the Ionian and democratical. In this point, he has been followed by various other authors (see Helbig, Die Sittlich. ZustÄnde des Heldenalters, p. 73), but his position appears to me substantially incorrect, even as regards Sparta; and strikingly incorrect, in regard to the other Dorian states.

[127] CÆsar, Bell. Gallic. vi. 12.

[128] Seneca, Epist. xc.; Tacitus. Annal. iii. 26. “Vetustissimi mortalium (says the latter), null adhuc mal libidine, sine probro, scelere, eoque sine poen aut coËrcitione, agebant: neque prÆmiis opus erat, cum honesta suopte ingenio peterentur; et ubi nihil contra morem cuperent, nihil per metum vetabantur. At postquam exui Æqualitas, et pro modesti et pudore ambitio et vis incedebat, provenÊre dominationes, multosque apud populos Æternum mansere,” etc. Compare Strabo, vii. p. 301.

These are the same fancies so eloquently set forth by Rousseau, in the last century. A far more sagacious criticism pervades the preface of ThucydidÊs.

[129] SeuthÊs, in the Anabasis of XenophÔn (vii. 2, 33), describes how, when an orphan youth, he formerly supplicated MÊdokos, the Thracian king, to grant him a troop of followers, in order that he might recover his lost dominions, ??a?e???? ??d?f???? a?t? ???t?? d???a? ?? ??d?a?.

ThucydidÊs gives an interesting description of the arrival of the exile ThemistoklÊs, then warmly pursued by the Greeks on suspicion of treason, at the house of AdmÊtus, king of the Epirotic Molossians. The wife of AdmÊtus herself instructed the fugitive how to supplicate her husband in form: the child of AdmÊtus was placed in his arms, and he was directed to sit down in this guise close by the consecrated hearth, which was of the nature of an altar. While so seated, he addressed his urgent entreaties to AdmÊtus for protection: the latter raised him up from the ground and promised what was asked. “That (says the historian) was the most powerful form of supplication.” AdmÊtus,—????sa? ???st?s? te a?t?? et? t?? ?a?t?? ?????, ?spe? ?a? ???? a?t?? ??a???et?, ?a? ???st?? ???te?a ?? t??t? (Thuc. i. 136). So TÊlephus, in the lost drama of Æschylus called ??s??, takes up the child OrestÊs. See Bothe’s Fragm. 44; Schol. Aristoph. Ach. 305.

In the Odyssey, both Nausikaa and the goddess AthÊnÊ instruct Odysseus in the proper form of supplicating Alkinous: he first throws himself down at the feet of queen ArÊtÊ, embracing her knees and addressing to her his prayer, and then, without waiting for a reply, sits down among the ashes on the hearth,—?? e?p??, ?at? ??? ??et? ?p? ?s???? ?? ?????s?,—Alkinous is dining with a large company: for some time both he and the guests are silent: at length the ancient EchenÊus remonstrates with him on his tardiness in raising the stranger up from the ashes. At his exhortation, the PhÆakian king takes Odysseus by the hand, and, raising him up, places him on a chair beside him: he then directs the heralds to mix a bowl of wine, and to serve it to every one round, in order that all may make libations to Zeus HiketÊsios. This ceremony clothes the stranger with the full rights and character of a suppliant (Odyss. vi. 310; vii. 75, 141, 166): ?at? ????? ?f??t????, Æschyl. Supplic. 242.

That the form counted for a great deal, we see evidently marked: but of course supplication is often addressed, and successfully addressed, in circumstances where this form cannot be gone through.

It is difficult to accept the doctrine of Eustathius (ad Odyss. xvi. 424), that ???t?? is a vox media (like ?e????), applied as well to the ??et?d???? as to the ???t??, properly so called: but the word ???????s??, in the passage just cited, does seem to justify his observation: yet there is no direct authority for such use of the word in Homer.

The address of Theoclymenos, on first preferring his supplication to Telemachus, is characteristic of the practice (Odyss. xv. 260); compare also Iliad, xvi. 574, and Hesiod. Scut. Hercul. 12-85.

The idea of the ?e???? and the ???t?? run very much together. I can hardly persuade myself that the reading ???te?se (Odyss. xi. 520) is truly Homeric: implying as it does the idea of a pitiable sufferer, it is altogether out of place when predicated of the proud and impetuous Neoptolemus: we should rather have expected ????e?se. (See Odyss. x. 15.)

The constraining efficacy of special formalities of supplication, among the Scythians, is powerfully set forth in the Toxaris of Lucian: the suppliant sits upon an ox-hide, with his hands confined behind him (Lucian, Toxaris c. 48, vol. iii. p. 69, Tauchn.)—the e??st? ??et???a among that people.

[130] Iliad, xxiii. 142.

[131] Odyss. xiv. 389.—

[132] NÄgelsbach (Homerische Theologie, Abschn. v. s. 23) gives a just and well-sustained view of the Homeric ethics: “Es ist der charakteristische Standpunkt der Homerischen Ethik, dass die SphÄren des Rechts, der Sittlichkeit, und ReligiositÄt, bey dem Dichter, durchaus noch nicht auseinander fallen, so dass der Mensch z. B. d??a??? seyn konnte ohne ?e??d?? zu seyn—sondern in unentwickelter Einheit beysammen sind.”

[133] ????, laws, is not an Homeric word; ????, law, in the singular, occurs twice in the Hesiodic Works and Days (276, 388).

The employment of the words d???, d??a?, ????, ???ste?, in Homer, is curious as illustrating the early moral associations, but would require far more space than can be given to it in a note; we see that the sense of each of these words was essentially fluctuating. Themis, in Homer, is sometimes decidedly a person, who exercises the important function of opening and closing the agora, both of gods and men (Iliad, xx. 4: Odyss. ii. 68), and who, besides that, acts and speaks (Iliad, xiv. 87-93): always the associate and companion of Zeus, the highest god. In Hesiod, (Theog. 901,) she is the wife of Zeus: in Æschylus, (Prometh. 209,) she is the same as Ga?a: even in Plato, (Legg. xi. p. 936,) witnesses swear (to want of knowledge of matters under inquest) by Zeus, Apollo, and Themis. Themis as a person is probably the oldest sense of the word: then we have the plural ???ste? (connected with the verb t??e?, like ?es?? and te???), which are (not persons, but) special appurtenances or emanations of the supreme god, or of a king acting under him, analogous to and joined with the sceptre. The sceptre, and the ???ste? or the d??a? constantly go together (Iliad, ii. 209; ix. 99): Zeus or the king is a judge, not a lawmaker; he issues decrees or special orders to settle particular disputes, or to restrain particular men; and, agreeable to the concrete forms of ancient language, the decrees are treated as if they were a collection of ready-made substantive things, actually in his possession, like the sceptre, and prepared for being delivered out when the proper occasion arose: d??asp????, ??te ???sta? ???? ???? e???ata? (Il. i. 238), compared with the two passages last cited: ?f???a t??t?? ????ta?, ?? ??t??a ??de ???sta (Il. v. 761), ??????, ??te d??a? e? e?d?ta ??te ???sta? (Odyss. ix. 215). The plural number d??a? is more commonly used in Homer than the singular: d??? is rarely used to denote Justice, an an abstract conception; it more often denotes a special claim of right on the part of some given man (Il. xviii. 508). It sometimes also denotes, simply, established custom, or the known lot,—d??? d???, ?e???t??, ?e??? as?????, ?e?? (see Damm’s Lexicon, ad voc.) ???? is used in the same manner.

See, upon this matter, Platner, De Notione Juris ap. Homerum, p. 81, and O. MÜller, Prolegg. Mythol. p. 121.

[134] ??d? t??e?s? T??pt?a f????? ?p?d??e (Il. iv. 477): ???pt?a or ??ept???a (compare Il. ix. 454; Odyss. ii. 134; Hesiod, Opp. Di. 186).

[135] Aristot. Polit. ii. 5, 11. The ?d?a, or present given by the suitor to the father, as an inducement to grant his daughter in marriage, are spoken of as very valuable,—?pe?e?s?a ?d?a (Il. xi. 244; xvi. 178; xxii. 472): to grant a daughter without ?d?a was a high compliment to the intended son-in-law (Il. ix. 141: compare xiii. 366). Among the ancient Germans of Tacitus, the husband gave presents, not to his wife’s father, but to herself (Tacit. Germ. c. 18): the customs of the early Jews were in this respect completely Homeric; see the case of Shechem and Dinah (Genesis, xxxiv. 12) and others, etc.; also Mr. Catlin’s Letters on the North American Indians, vol. i. Lett. 26, p. 213.

The Greek ?d?a correspond exactly to the mundium of the Lombard and Alemannic laws, which is thus explained by Mr. Price (Notes on the Laws of King Ethelbert, in the Ancient Laws and Institutes of England, translated and published by Mr. Thorpe, vol. i. p. 20): “The Longobardic law is the most copious of all the barbaric codes in its provisions respecting marriage, and particularly so on the subject of the Mund. From that law it appears that the Mundium was a sum paid over to the family of the bride, for transferring the tutelage which they possessed over her to the family of the husband: ‘Si quis pro muliere liber aut puell mundium dederit et ei tradita fuerit ad uxorem,’ etc. (ed. Rotharis, c. 183.) In the same sense in which the term occurs in these dooms, it is also to be met with in the Alemannic law: it was also common in Denmark and in Sweden, where the bride was called a mund-bought or a mund-given woman.”

According to the 77th Law of King Ethelbert (p. 23), this mund was often paid in cattle: the Saxon daughters were p???e??? ??fes???a? (Iliad, xviii. 593).

[136] Odyss. i. 430: Iliad, ix. 450: see also Terpstra, Antiquitas Homerica, capp. 17 and 18.

Polygamy appears to be ascribed to Priam, but to no one else (Iliad, xxi. 88).

[137] Odyss. xiv. 202-215: compare Iliad, xi. 102. The primitive German law of succession divided the paternal inheritance among the sons of a deceased father, under the implied obligation to maintain and portion out their sisters (Eichhorn, Deutsches Privat-Recht. sect. 330).

[138] Iliad, ii. 362.—

These three epithets include the three different classes of personal sympathy and obligation: 1. The Phratry, in which a man is connected with father, mother, brothers, cousins, brothers-in-law, clansmen, etc.; 2. The ???ste?, whereby he is connected with his fellow-men who visit the same agora; 3. His Hestia, or Hearth, whereby he becomes accessible to the ?e???? and the ???t??:—

[139] It must be mentioned, however, that when a chief received a stranger and made presents to him, he reimbursed to himself the value of the presents by collections among the people (Odyss. xiii. 14; xix. 197): ???a???? ??? ??a p?????? ?a??sas?a?, says Alkinous.

[140] Odyss. i. 123; iii. 70, etc.

[141] Odyss. xvii. 383.—

which breathes the plain-spoken shrewdness of the Hesiodic Works and Days, v. 355.

[142] See the illustrative case of Lykaon, in vain craving mercy from Achilles. (Iliad, xxi. 64-97. ??t? t?? e?? ???ta?, etc.)

Menelaus is about to spare the life of the Trojan Adrastus, who clasps his knees and craves mercy, offering a large ransom,—when AgamemnÔn repels the idea of quarter, and kills Adrastus with his own hand: his speech to Menelaus displays the extreme of violent enmity, yet the poet says,—

Adrastus is not called an ???t??, nor is the expression used in respect to Dolon (Il. x. 456), nor in the equally striking case of Odysseus (Odyss. xiv. 279), when begging for his life.

[143] Odyss. ix. 112-275.

[145] Respecting the Thracians, compare Herodot. v. 11; Thucydid. vii. 29-30. The expression of the latter historian is remarkable,—t? d? ????? t?? T?????, ???a t??? ???sta t?? a?a?????, ?? ? ?? ?a?s?s?, f?????tat?? ?st?.

Compare Herodot. viii. 116; the cruelty of the Thracian king of the BisaltÆ towards his own sons.

The story of Odysseus to EumÆus in the Odyssey (xiv. 210-226) furnishes a valuable comparison for this predatory disposition among the Thracians. Odysseus there treats the love of living by war and plunder as his own peculiar taste: he did not happen to like regular labor, but the latter is not treated in any way mean or unbecoming a freeman:—

[146] Ilias Minor, Fragm. 7, p. 18, ed. DÜntzer; Iliad, xxiii. 175. Odysseus is mentioned once as obtaining poison for his arrows (Odyss. i. 160), but no poisoned arrows are ever employed in either of the two poems.

The anecdotes recounted by the Scythian Toxaris in Lucian’s work so entitled (vol. ii. c. 36, p. 544, seqq. ed. Hemst.) afford a vivid picture of this combination of intense and devoted friendship between individuals, with the most revolting cruelty of manners. “You Greeks live in peace and tranquillity,” observes the Scythian,—pa?? ??? d? s??e?e?? ?? p??e??, ?a? ? ?pe?a???e? ??????, ? ?p??????e? ?p???ta?, ? s?pes??te? ?p?? ???? ? ?e?a? a??e?a? ???a ???sta de? f???? ??a???, etc.

[147] Odyss. xxi. 397; PherekydÊs, Fragm. 63, ed. Didot; Autolykus, p?e?sta ???pt?? ???sa????e?. The Homeric Hymn to HermÊs (the great patron-god of Autolykus) is a farther specimen of the admiration which might be made to attach to clever thieving.

The ?e?????t?? ????, likely to rob the farm, is one great enemy against whom Hesiod advises precaution to be taken,—a sharp-toothed dog, well-fed, to serve as guard (Opp. Di. 604).

[148] Iliad, xi. 624; xx. 189. Odyss. iv. 81-90; ix. 40; xiv. 230; and the indirect revelation (Odyss. xix. 284), coupled with a compliment to the dexterity of Odysseus.

[149] Even in the century prior to ThucydidÊs, undistinguishing plunder at sea, committed by Greek ships against ships not Greek, seems not to have been held discreditable. The PhokÆan Dionysius, after the ill-success of the Ionic revolt, goes with his three ships of war to Sicily, and from thence plunders Tyrrhenians and Carthaginians (Herod. vi. 17).—???st?? ?atest??ee, ??????? ?? ??de???, ?a???d????? d? ?a? ???s????. Compare the conduct of the PhokÆan settlers at Alalia in Corsica, after the conquest of Ionia by Harpagus (Herodot. i. 166).

In the treaty between the Romans and Carthaginians, made at some period subsequent to 509 B.C., it is stipulated,—??? ?a??? ????t?????, ?ast?a?, ?a?s????, ? ????es?a? ?p??e??a ??a???? ?d? ?p??e?es?a?, ?d? p???? ?t??e?? (Polyb. iii. 24, 4). Plunder, commerce, and colonization, are here assumed as the three objects which the Roman ships would pursue, unless they were under special obligation to abstain, in reference to foreigners. This morality approaches nearer to that of the Homeric age, than to the state of sentiment which Thucydides indicates as current in his day among the Greeks.

[150] See the interesting boastfulness of NestÔr, Iliad, xi. 670-700; also Odyss. xxi. 18; Odyss. iii. 71; Thucyd. i. 5.

[151] Odyss. iv. 165, among many other passages. Telemachus laments the misfortune of his race, in respect that himself, Odysseus, and LaËrtÊs were all only sons of their fathers: there were no brothers to serve as mutual auxiliaries (Odyss. xvi. 118).

[152] Opp. Di. 182-199:—

[153] Iliad, xxii. 487-500. Hesiod dwells upon injury to orphan children, however, as a heinous offence (Opp. Di. 330).

[154] Iliad, xxii. 371. ??d? ??a ?? t?? ????t?t? ?e pa??st?. Argument of Iliad. Minor. ap. DÜntzer, Epp. Fragm. p. 17; Virgil, Æneid, vi. 520.

Both AgamemnÔn and the Oiliad Ajax cut off the heads of slain warriors, and send them rolling like a ball or like a mortar among the crowd of warriors (Iliad, xi. 147; xiii. 102).

The ethical maxim preached by Odysseus in the Odyssey, not to utter boastful shouts over a slain enemy (??? ?s??, ?ta????s?? ?p? ??d??s?? e??et?as?a?, xxii. 412), is abundantly violated in the Iliad.

[155] Herodot. ix. 78-79. Contrast this strong expression from Pausanias, with the conduct of the Carthaginians towards the end of the Peloponnesian war, after their capture of Selinus in Sicily, where, after having put to death 16,000 persons, they mutilated the dead bodies,—?at? t? p?t???? ???? (DiodÔr. xiii. 57-86).

[156] The Mosaic law recognizes this habit and duty on the part of the relatives of the murdered man, and provides cities of refuge for the purpose of sheltering the offender in certain cases (Deuteron. xxxv. 13-14; Bauer, Handbuch der HebraÏschen AlterthÜmer, sect. 51-52).

The relative who inherited the property of a murdered man was specially obliged to avenge his death (H. Leo, Vorlesungen Über die Geschichte des JÜdischen Staats.—Vorl. iii. p. 35).

[157] “Suscipere tam inimicitias, seu patris, seu propinqui, quam amicitias, necesse est. Nec implacabiles durant: luitur enim etiam homicidium certo pecorum armentorumque numero, recipitque satisfactionem universa domus.” (Tacit. German. 21.) Niebuhr, Beschreibung von Arabien, p. 32.

“An Indian feast (says Loskiel, Mission of the United Brethren in North America,) is seldom concluded without bloodshed. For the murder of a man one hundred yards of wampum, and for that of a woman two hundred yards, must be paid by the murderer. If he is too poor, which is commonly the case, and his friends cannot or will not assist him, he must fly from the resentment of the relations.”

Rogge (Gerichtswesen der Germanen, capp. 1, 2, 3), Grimm (Deutsche RechtsalterthÜmer, book v. cap. 1-2), and Eichhorn (Deutsches Privat-Recht. sect. 48) have expounded this idea, and the consequences deduced from it among the ancient Germans.

Aristotle alludes, as an illustration of the extreme silliness of ancient Greek practices (e???? p?pa?), to a custom which he states to have still continued at the Æolic KymÊ, in cases of murder. If the accuser produced in support of his charge a certain number of witnesses from his own kindred, the person was held peremptorily guilty,—???? ?? ??? pe?? t? f????? ???? ?st??, ?? p????? t? pa??s??ta? a?t???? ? d????? t?? f???? t?? a?t?? s???e???, ?????? e??a? t? f??? t?? fe????ta (Polit. ii. 5, 12). This presents a curious parallel with the old German institution of the Eideshelfern, or conjurators, who, though most frequently required and produced in support of the party accused, were yet also brought by the party accusing. See Rogge, sect. 36, p. 186; Grimm, p. 862.

[158] The word p???? indicates this satisfaction by valuable payment for wrong done, especially for homicide: that the Latin word poena originally meant the same thing, may be inferred from the old phrases dare poenas, pendere poenas. The most illustrative passage in the Iliad is that in which Ajax, in the embassy undertaken to conciliate Achilles, censures by comparison the inexorable obstinacy of the latter in setting at naught the proffered presents of AgamemnÔn (Il. ix. 627):—

The p???? is, in its primitive sense, a genuine payment in valuable commodities serving as compensation (Iliad, iii. 290; v. 266; xiii. 659): but it comes by a natural metaphor to signify the death of one or more Trojans, as a satisfaction for that of a Greek warrior who had just fallen (or vice versÂ, Iliad, xiv. 483; xvi. 398); sometimes even the notion of compensation generally (xvii. 207). In the representation on the shield of Achilles, the genuine proceeding about p???? clearly appears: the question there tried is, whether the payment stipulated as satisfaction for a person slain, has really been made or not,—d?? d? ??d?e? ??e??e?? e??e?a p????? ??d??? ?p?f??????, etc. (xviii. 498.)

The danger of an act of homicide is proportioned to the number and power of the surviving relatives of the slain; but even a small number is sufficient to necessitate flight (Odyss. xxiii. 120): on the other hand, a large body of relatives was the grand source of encouragement to an insolent criminal (Odyss. xviii. 141).

An old law of Tralles in Lydia, enjoining a nominal p???? of a medimnus of beans to the relatives of a murdered person belonging to a contemptible class of citizens, is noticed by Plutarch, QuÆst. GrÆc. c. 46, p. 302. Even in the century preceding Herodotus, too, the Delphians gave a p???? as satisfaction for the murder of the fabulist Æsop; which p???? was claimed and received by the grandson of Æsop’s master (Herodot. ii. 134. Plutarch. Ser. Num. Vind. p. 556).

[159] See Lysias, De CÆde Eratosthen. Orat. i. p. 94; Plutarch. Solon, c. 23; Demosthen. cont. Aristokrat. pp. 632-637.

Plato (De Legg. ix. pp. 871-874), in his copious penal suggestions to deal with homicide, both intentional and accidental, concurs in general with the old Attic law (see MatthiÆ, Miscellanea Philologica, vol. i. p. 151): and as he states with sufficient distinctness the grounds of his propositions, we see how completely the idea of a right to private or family revenge is absent from his mind. In one particular case, he confers upon kinsmen the privilege of avenging their murdered relative (p. 871); but generally, he rather seeks to enforce upon them strictly the duty of bringing the suspected murderer to trial before the court. By the Attic law, it was only the kinsmen of the deceased who had the right of prosecuting for murder,—or the master, if the deceased was an ????t?? (Demosthen. cont. Euerg. et Mnesibul. c. 18); they might by forgiveness shorten the term of banishment for the unintentional murderer (Demosth. cont. Makart. p. 1069). They seem to have been regarded, generally speaking, as religiously obliged, but not legally compellable, to undertake this duty; compare Plato, Euthyphro, capp. 4 and 5.

[160] Lysias, cont. Agorat. Or. xiii. p. 137. Antiphon. Tetralog. i. 1, p. 629. ?s?f???? d? ??? ?st? t??de, ?a??? ?a? ??a???? ??ta, e?? t? te??? t?? ?e?? e?s???ta ?a??e?? t?? ???e?a? a?t??, ?p? d? t?? a?t?? t?ap??a? ???ta s???atap?p???a? t??? ??a?t????? ?? ??? t??t??? a? te ?f???a? ?????ta?, d?st??e?? ?? a? p???e?? ?a??sta?ta?.

The three Tetralogies of Antipho are all very instructive respecting the legal procedure in cases of alleged homicide: as also the Oration De CÆde Herodis (see capp. 1 and 2)—t?? ???? ?e?????, t?? ?p??te??a?ta ??tap??a?e??, etc.

The case of the Spartan Drakontius, one of the Ten Thousand Greeks who served with Cyrus the younger, and permanently exiled from his country in consequence of an involuntary murder committed during his boyhood, presents a pretty exact parallel to the fatal quarrel of Patroklus at dice, when a boy, with the son of Amphidamas, in consequence of which he was forced to seek shelter under the roof of PÊleus (compare Iliad, xxiii. 85, with Xenoph. Anabas. iv. 8, 25).

[161] Odyss. xvii. 384; xix. 135. Iliad, iv. 187; vii. 221. I know nothing which better illustrates the idea of the Homeric d???e????,—the herald, the prophet, the carpenter, the leech, the bard, etc.,—than the following description of the structure of an East Indian village (Mill’s History of British India, b. ii. c. 5, p. 266): “A village, politically considered, resembles a corporation or township. Its proper establishment of officers and servants consists of the following descriptions: the potail, or head inhabitant, who settles disputes and collects the revenue, etc.; the curnum, who keeps the accounts of cultivation, etc.; the tallier; the boundary-man; the superintendent of tanks and water-courses; the Brahman, who performs the village worship; the schoolmaster; the calendar Brahman, or astrologer, who proclaims the lucky or unpropitious periods for sowing or thrashing; the smith and carpenter; the potter; the washerman; the barber; the cowkeeper; the doctor; the dancing-girl, who attends at rejoicings; the musician, and the poet.”

Each of these officers and servants (d???e????) is remunerated by a definite perquisite—so much landed produce—out of the general crop of the village (p. 264).

[162] Iliad, xii. 421; xxi. 405.

[163] Iliad, i. 155; ix. 154; xiv. 122.

[164] Odysseus and other chiefs of Ithaka had oxen, sheep, mules, etc., on the continent and in PeloponnÊsus, under the care of herdsmen (Odyss. iv. 636; xiv. 100).

Leukanor, king of Bosporus, asks the Scythian Arsakomas—??sa d? ?s??ata, ? p?sa? ???a? ??e??, ta?ta ??? ?e?? p???te?te; (Lucian, Toxaris, c. 45.) The enumeration of the property of Odysseus would have placed the ?s??ata in the front line.

[165] ??a? d? ?? ????e?? ???ssat? (Iliad, xviii. 28: compare also Odyss. i. 397; xxiii. 357; particularly xvii. 441).

[166] Odyss. xiv. 64; xv. 412; see also xix. 78: Eurykleia was also of dignified birth (i. 429). The questions put by Odysseus to EumÆus, to which the speech above referred to is an answer, indicate the proximate causes of slavery: “Was the city of your father sacked? or were you seized by pirates when alone with your sheep and oxen?” (Odyss. xv. 385.)

EumÆus had purchased a slave for himself (Odyss. xiv. 448).

[167] Tacitus, Mor. Germ. 21. “Dominum ac servum nullis educationis deliciis dignoscas: inter eadem pecora, in eÂdem humo, degunt,” etc. (Juvenal, Sat. xiv. 167.)

[168] Odyss. vii. 104; xx. 116; Iliad vi. 457; compare the Book of Genesis, ch. xi. 5. The expression of Telemachus, when he is proceeding to hang up the female slaves who had misbehaved, is bitterly contemptuous:—

The humble establishment of Hesiod’s farmer does not possess a mill; he has nothing better than a wooden pestle and mortar for grinding or bruising the corn; both are constructed, and the wood cut from the trees, by his own hand (Opp. Di. 423), though it seems that a professional carpenter (“the servant of AthÊnÊ,”) is required to put together the plough (v. 430). The Virgilian poem Moretum, (v. 24,) assigns a hand-mill even to the humblest rural establishment. The instructive article “Corn Mills,” in Beckmann’s Hist. of Inventions (vol. i. p. 227, Eng. transl.), collects all the information available about this subject.

[169] See Lysias, Or. 1, p. 93 (De CÆde Eratosthenis). Plutarch (Non posse suaviter vivi secundum Epicurum, c. 21, p. 1101),—?a??s?e??? ??et??? p??? ???? ????????,—and Kallimachus, (Hymn. ad Delum, 242,)—?d? ??? de??a? ??st???e? ?????s?? ??et??de?,—notice the overworked condition of these women.

The “grinding slaves” (??et??de?) are expressly named in one of the Laws of Ethelbert, king of Kent, and constitute the second class in point of value among the female slaves (Law xi. Thorpe’s Ancient Laws and Institutes of England, vol. i. p. 7).

[170] Odyss. iv. 131; xix. 235.

[171] Odyss. vi. 96; Hymn, ad DÊmÊtr. 105.

[172] Herodot. viii. 137.

[173] Odyss. iv. 643.

[174] Odyss. xiv. 64.

[175] Compare Odyss. xi. 490, with xviii. 358. KlytÆmnÊstra, in the AgamemnÔn of Æschylus, preaches a something similar doctrine to Kassandra,—how much kinder the ???a??p???t?? desp?ta? were towards their slaves, than masters who had risen by unexpected prosperity (Agamemn. 1042).

[176] Thucydid. i. 5, ?t??p??t? p??? ??ste?a?, ???????? ??d??? ?? t?? ?d??at?t?t??, ???d??? t?? sfet???? a?t?? ??e?a, ?a? t??? ?s?e??s? t??f??.

[177] Hesiod, Opp. Di. 459—?f??????a?, ??? d??? te ?a? a?t??—and 603:—

The two words ?????? p??e?s?a? seem here to be taken together in the sense of “dismiss the ThÊte,” or “make him houseless;” for when put out of his employer’s house, he had no residence of his own. GÖttling (ad loc.), Nitzsch (ad Odyss. iv. 643), and Lehrs (QuÆst. Epic. p. 205) all construe ?????? with ??ta, and represent Hesiod as advising that the houseless ThÊte should be at that moment taken on, just at the time when the summer’s work was finished. Lehrs (and seemingly GÖttling also), sensible that this can never have been the real meaning of the poet, would throw out the two lines as spurious. I may remark farther that the translation of ??? given by GÖttling—villicus—is inappropriate: it includes the idea of superintendence over other laborers, which does not seem to have belonged to the ThÊte in any case.

There were a class of poor free women who made their living by taking in wool to spin and perhaps to weave: the exactness of their dealing, as well as the poor profit which they made, are attested by a touching Homeric simile (Iliad, xiii. 434). See Iliad, vi. 289; xxiii. 742. Odyss. xv. 414.

[178] Herodot. iv. 151. Compare Ukert, Geographie der Griechen und RÖmer, part i. pp. 16-19.

[179] Odyss. xx. 383; xxiv. 210. The identity of the Homeric Scheria with Korkyra, and that of the Homeric Thrinakia with Sicily, appear to me not at all made out. Both Welcker and Klausen treat the PhÆakians as purely mythical persons (see W. C. MÜller, De CorcyrÆorum RepublicÂ, GÖtting. 1835, p. 9).

[180] Herodot. i. 163.

[181] Nitzsch. ad Odyss. i. 181; Strabo, i. p. 6. The situation of Temesa, whether it is to be placed in Italy or in Cyprus, has been a disputed point among critics, both ancient and modern.

[182] Odyss. xv. 426. ??f???, ???st??e? ??d?e?; and xvi. 426. Hymn to DÊmÊtÊr, v. 123.

[183] Hesiod. Opp. Di. 615-684; Thucyd. i. 13.

[184] Odyss. xiv. 290; xv. 416.—

The interesting narrative given by EumÆus, of the manner in which he fell into slavery, is a vivid picture of Phoenician dealing (compare Herodot. i. 2-4. Iliad, vi. 290; xxiii. 743). Paris is reported to have visited Sidon, and brought from thence women eminent for skill at the loom. The Cyprian Verses (see the Argument. ap. DÜntzer, p. 17) affirmed that Paris had landed at Sidon, and attacked and captured the city. Taphian corsairs kidnapped slaves at Sidon (Odyss. xv. 424).

The ornaments or trinkets (????ata) which the Phoenician merchant carries with him, seem to be the same as the da?da?a p????, ???pa? te ??apt?? ?? ????a?, etc. which HÊphÆstus was employed in fabricating (Iliad, xviii. 400) under the protection of Thetis.

“Fallacissimum esse genus Phoenicum omnia monumenta vetustatis atque omnes historiÆ nobis prodiderunt.” (Cicero, Orat. Trium. partes ineditÆ, ed. Maii, 1815, p. 13.)

[185] Ivory is frequently mentioned in Homer, who uses the word ???fa? exclusively to mean that substance, not to signify the animal.

The art of dyeing, especially with the various shades of purple, was in after-ages one of the special excellences of the Phoenicians: yet Homer, where he alludes in a simile to dyeing or staining, introduces a MÆonian or Karian woman as the performer of the process, not a Phoenician (Iliad, iv. 141).

What the electrum named in the Homeric poems really is cannot be positively determined. The word in antiquity meant two different things: 1, amber; 2, an impure gold, containing as much as one-fifth or more of silver (Pliny, H. N. xxxiii. 4). The passages in which we read the word in the Odyssey do not positively exclude either of these meanings; but they present to us electrum so much in juxtaposition with gold and silver each separately, that perhaps the second meaning is more probable than the first. Herodotus understands it to mean amber (iii. 115): SophoklÊs, on the contrary, employs it to designate a metal akin to gold (Antigone, 1033).

See the dissertation of Buttmann, appended to his collection of essays called Mythologus, vol. ii. p. 337; also, Beckmann, History of Inventions, vol. iv. p. 12, Engl. Transl. “The ancients (observes the latter) used as a peculiar metal a mixture of gold and silver, because they were not acquainted with the art of separating them, and gave it the name of electrum.” Dr. Thirlwall (Hist. of Greece, vol. i. p. 241) thinks that the Homeric electrum is amber; on the contrary, HÜllmann thinks that it was a metallic substance (Handels, Geschichte der Griechen, pp. 63-81).

Beckmann doubts whether the oldest ?ass?te??? of the Greeks was really tin: he rather thinks that it was “the stannum of the Romans, the werk of our smelting-houses,—that is, a mixture of lead, silver, and other accidental metals.” (Ibid. p. 20). The Greeks of Massalia procured tin from Britain, through Gaul, by the Seine, the Saone, and the Rhone (DiodÔr. v. 22).

[186] Herodot. ii. 44; vi. 47. Archiloch. Fragm. 21-22, ed. Gaisf. Œnomaus ap. Euseb. PrÆp. Ev. vi. 7. Thucyd. i. 12.

The Greeks connected this Phoenician settlement in Thasus with the legend of Kadmus and his sister EurÔpa: Thasus, the eponymus of the island, was brother of Kadmus. (Herod. ib.)

[187] The angry LaomedÔn threatens when PoseidÔn and Apollo ask from him (at the expiration of their term of servitude) the stipulated wages of their labor, to cut off their ears and send them off to some distant islands (Iliad, xxi. 454). Compare xxiv. 752. Odyss. xx. 383: xviii. 83.

[188] Odyss. iv. 73; vii. 85; xxi. 61. Iliad, ii. 226; vi. 47.

[189] See Millin, MinÉralogie Homerique, p. 74. That there are, however, modes of tempering copper, so as to impart to it the hardness of steel, has been proved by the experiments of the Comte de Caylus.

The MassagetÆ employed only copper—no iron—for their weapons (Herodot. i. 215).

[190] Hesiod, Opp. Di. 150-420. The examination of the various matters of antiquity discoverable throughout the north of Europe, as published by the Antiquarian Society of Copenhagen, recognizes a distinction of three successive ages: 1. Implements and arms of stone, bone, wood, etc.: little or no use of metals at all; clothing made of skins. 2. Implements and arms of copper and gold, or rather bronze and gold; little or no silver or iron. Articles of gold and electrum are found belonging to this age, but none of silver, nor any evidences of writing. 3. The age which follows this has belonging to it arms of iron, articles of silver, and some Runic inscriptions: it is the last age of northern paganism, immediately preceding the introduction of Christianity (Leitfaden zur NÖrdischen Alterthumskunde, pp. 31, 57, 63, Copenhagen, 1837).

The Homeric age coincides with the second of these two periods. Silver is comparatively little mentioned in Homer, while both bronze and gold are familiar metals. Iron also is rare, and seems employed only for agricultural purposes—???s?? te, ?a???? te ????, ?s??ta ?? ?fa?t?? (Iliad, vi. 48; Odyss. ii. 338; xiii. 136). The ???s????? and the ?a??e?? are both mentioned in Homer, but workers in silver and iron are not known by any special name (Odyss. iii. 425-436).

“The hatchet, wimble, plane, and level, are the tools mentioned by Homer, who appears to have been unacquainted with the saw, the square, and the compass.” (Gillies, Hist. of Greece, chap. ii. p. 61.)

The Gauls, known to Polybius, seemingly the Cisalpine Gauls only, possessed all their property in cattle and gold,—???ata ?a? ???s??,—on account of the easy transportability of both (Polyb. ii. 17).

[191] TyrtÆus, in his military expressions, seems to conceive the Homeric mode of hurling the spear as still prevalent,—d??? d? e?t???? ?????te? (Fragm. ix. Gaisford). Either he had his mind prepossessed with the Homeric array, or else the close order and conjunct spears of the hoplites had not yet been introduced during the second Messenian war.

Thiersch and Schneidewin would substitute p?????te? in place of ?????te?. EuripidÊs (Androm. 695) has a similar expression, yet it does not apply well to hoplites; for one of the virtues of the hoplite consisted in carrying his spear steadily: d???t?? ????s?? betokens a disorderly march, and the want of steady courage and self-possession. See the remarks of Brasidas upon the ranks of the Athenians under Kleon at Amphipolis (Thucyd. v. 6).

[192] Euripid. Andromach. 696.

[193] ? pa?a?? p???? in Ægina (Herodot. vi. 88); ?st?p??a?a in Samus (PolyÆn. i. 23. 2; Etymol. Magn. v. ?st?p??a?a): it became seemingly the acropolis of the subsequent city.

About the deserted sites in the lofty regions of KrÊte, see Theophrastus, De Ventis, v. 13, ed. Schneider, p. 762.

The site of ?a?a?s????? in Mount Ida,—?p??? ??????? ?at? t? ete???tat?? t?? ?d?? (Strabo, xiii. p. 607); ?ste??? d? ?at?t??? stad???? ??????ta e?? t?? ??? S????? et???s??sa?. Paphos in Cyprus was the same distance below the ancient PalÆ-Paphos (Strabo, xiv. p. 683).

Near Mantineia in Arcadia was situated ???? ?? t? ped??, t? ??e?p?a ?t? ?a?t??e?a? ???? t?? ???a?a?? ?a?e?ta? d? t? ?????? ?f? ??? ?t???? (Pausan. viii. 12, 4). See a similar statement about the lofty sites of the ancient town of Orchomenus (in Arcadia) (Paus. viii. 13, 2), of Nonakris (viii. 17, 5,) of Lusi (viii. 18, 3), Lykoreia on Parnassus (Paus. x. 6, 2; Strabo, ix. p. 418).

Compare also Plato, Legg. iii. 2, pp. 678-679, who traces these lofty and craggy dwellings, general among the earliest Grecian townships, to the commencement of human society after an extensive deluge, which had covered all the lower grounds and left only a few survivors.

[194] Thucyd. i. 2. Fa??eta? ??? ? ??? ????? ?a??????, ?? p??a? ea??? ????????, ???? eta?ast?se?? te ??sa? t? p??te?a, ?a? ??d??? ??ast?? t?? ?a?t?? ?p??e?p??te?, ?a??e??? ?p? t???? ?e? p?e?????? t?? ??? ?p???a? ??? ??s??, ??d? ?p??????te? ?de?? ????????, ??te ?at? ??? ??te d?? ?a??ss??, ?e?e??? d? t? a?t?? ??ast?? ?s?? ?p????, ?a? pe????s?a? ????t?? ??? ????te? ??d? ??? f?te???te?, ?d???? ?? ?p?t? t?? ?pe????, ?a? ?te???st?? ?a ??t??, ????? ?fa???seta?, t?? te ?a?? ???a? ??a??a??? t??f?? pa?ta??? ?? ????e??? ?p???ate??, ?? ?a?ep?? ?pa??sta?t?, ?a? d?? a?t? ??te e???e? p??e?? ?s????, ??te t? ???? pa?as?e??.

About the distant and unfortified villages and rude habits of the Ætolians and Lokrians, see Thucyd. iii. 94; Pausan. x. 38, 3: also of the Cisalpine Gauls, Polyb. ii. 17.

Both ThucydidÊs and Aristotle seem to have conceived the Homeric period as mainly analogous to the ??a??? of their own day—??e? d? ???st?t???? ?????, ?t? t??a?ta ?e? p??e? ????? ??a ?? t?te? ?? d? t??a?ta t? pa?a?? ???pe? ?a? ??? ?? t??? a?????? (Schol. Iliad. x. 151).

[195] Odyss. vi. 10; respecting Nausithous, past king of the PhÆakians:

The vineyard, olive-ground, and garden of LaËrtes, is a model of careful cultivation (Odyss. xxiv. 245); see also the shield of Achilles (Iliad, xvii. 541-580), and the KalydÔnian plain (Iliad, ix. 575).

[197] Thucyd. i. 10. ?a? ?t? ?? ?????a? ????? ??, ? e? t? t?? t?te p???sa ??? ? ??????e?? d??e? e??a?, etc.

[198] NÄgelsbach, Homerische Theologie, Abschn. v. sect. 54. Hesiod strongly condemns robbery,—??? ??a??, ??pa? d? ?a??, ?a??t??? d?te??a (Opp. Di. 356, comp. 320); but the sentiment of the Grecian heroic poetry seems not to go against it,—it is looked upon as a natural employment of superior force,—??t?at?? d? ??a??? de???? ?p? da?ta? ?as?? (AthenÆ. v. p. 178; comp. Pindar, Fragm. 48, ed. Dissen.): the long spear, sword, and breastplate, of the Kretan Hybreas, constitute his wealth (Skolion 27, p. 877; Poet. Lyric. ed. Bergk), wherewith he ploughs and reaps,—while the unwarlike, who dare not or cannot wield these weapons, fall at his feet, and call him The Great King. The feeling is different in the later age of DemÊtrius PoliorkÊtÊs (about 310 B.C.): in the Ithyphallic Ode, addressed to him at his entrance into Athens, robbery is treated as worthy only of Ætolians:—

(Poet. Lyr. xxv. p. 453, ed. Schneid.)

The robberies of powerful men, and even highway robbery generally found considerable approving sentiment in the Middle Ages. “All Europe (observes Mr. Hallam, Hist. Mid. Ag. ch. viii. part 3, p. 247) was a scene of intestine anarchy during the Middle Ages: and though England was far less exposed to the scourge of private war than most nations on the continent, we should find, could we recover the local annals of every country, such an accumulation of petty rapine and tumult, as would almost alienate us from the liberty which served to engender it.... Highway robbery was from the earliest times a sort of national crime.... We know how long the outlaws of Sherwood lived in tradition; men who, like some of their betters, have been permitted to redeem, by a few acts of generosity, the just ignominy of extensive crimes. These, indeed, were the heroes of vulgar applause; but when such a judge as Sir John Fortescue could exult, that more Englishmen were hanged for robbery in one year than French in seven,—and that, if an Englishman be poor, and see another having riches, which may be taken from him by might, he will not spare to do so,—it may be perceived how thoroughly these sentiments had pervaded the public mind.”

The robberies habitually committed by the noblesse of France and Germany during the Middle Ages, so much worse than anything in England,—and those of the highland chiefs even in later times,—are too well known to need any references: as to France, an ample catalogue is set forth in Dulaure’s Histoire de la Noblesse (Paris, 1792). The confederations of the German cities chiefly originated in the necessity of keeping the roads and rivers open for the transit of men and goods against the nobles who infested the high roads. Scaliger might have found a parallel to the ??sta? of the heroic ages in the noblesse of la Rouergue, as it stood even in the 16th century, which he thus describes: “In Comitatu Rodez pessimi sunt; nobilitas ibi latrocinatur: nec possunt reprimi.” (ap. Dulaure, c. 9.)

[199] Thucyd. i. 4-8. t?? ??? ????????? ?a??ss??.

[200] Herodot. i. 171; Thucyd. i. 4-8. IsokratÊs (Panathenaic. p. 241) takes credit to Athens for having finally expelled the Karians out of these islands at the time of the Ionic emigration.

[201] Thucyd. i. 4. t? te ??st????, ?? e????, ?a???e? ?? t?? ?a??ss?? ?f? ?s?? ?d??at?, t?? t?? p??s?d??? ????? ???a? a?t?.

[202] See the preceding volume of this History, Chap. xii. p. 227.

[203] Thucyd. i. 10. t? pa?a?? t??p? ??st???te??? pa?es?e?as??a.

[204] Thucyd. i. 13.

[205] See Voelcker, Homerische Geographie, ch. iii. sect. 55-63. He has brought to bear much learning and ingenuity to identify the places visited by Odysseus with real lands, but the attempt is not successful. Compare also Ukert, Hom. Geog. vol. i. p. 14, and the valuable treatises of J. H. Voss, Alte Weltkunde, annexed to the second volume of his Kritische BlÄtter (Stuttgart, 1828), pp. 245-413. Voss is the father of just views respecting Homeric geography.

[206] Hesiod. Theog. 338-340.

[207] Hesiod. Theogon. 1016; Hesiod. Fragm. 190-194, ed. GÖttling; Strabo, i. p. 16; vii. p. 300. Compare Ukert, Geographie der Griechen und RÖmer, i. p. 37.

[208] The Greeks learned from the Babylonians, p???? ?? ??? ?a? ?????a ?a? t? d???a?de?a ??ea t?? ????? (Herodot. ii. 109). In my first edition, I had interpreted the word p???? in Herodotus erroneously. I now believe it to mean the same as horologium, the circular plate upon which the vertical gnomon projected its shadow, marked so as to indicate the hour of the day,—twelve hours between sunrise and sunset: see Ideler, Handbuch der Chronologie, vol. i. p. 233. Respecting the opinions of Thales, see the same work, part ii. pp. 18-57; Plutarch. de Placit. Philosophor. ii. c. 12; Aristot. de Coelo, ii. 13. Costard, Rise and Progress of Astronomy among the Ancients, p. 99.

[209] We have very little information respecting the early Grecian mode of computing time, and we know that though all the different states computed by lunar periods, yet most, if not all, of them had different names of months as well as different days of beginning and ending their months. All their immediate computations, however, were made by months: the lunar period was their immediate standard of reference for determining their festivals, and for other purposes, the solar period being resorted to only as a corrective, to bring the same months constantly into the same seasons of the year. Their original month had thirty days, and was divided into three decades, as it continued to be during the times of historical Athens (Hesiod. Opp. Di. 766). In order to bring this lunar period more nearly into harmony with the sun, they intercalated every year an additional month: so that their years included alternately twelve months and thirteen months, each month of thirty days. This period was called a Dieteris,—sometimes a Trieteris. Solon is said to have first introduced the fashion of months differing in length, varying alternately from thirty to twenty-nine days. It appears, however, that Herodotus had present to his mind the Dieteric cycle, or years alternating between thirteen months and twelve months (each month of thirty days), and no other (Herodot. i. 32; compare ii. 104). As astronomical knowledge improved, longer and more elaborate periods were calculated, exhibiting a nearer correspondence between an integral number of lunations and an integral number of solar years. First, we find a period of four years; next, the OctaËteris, or period of eight years, or seventy-nine lunar months; lastly, the Metonic period of nineteen years, or 235 lunar months. How far any of these larger periods were ever legally authorized, or brought into civil usage, even at Athens, is matter of much doubt. See Ideler, Uber die Astronomischen Beobachtungen der Alten, pp. 175-195; Macrobius, Saturnal. i. 13.

[210] Herodot. i. 74; Aristot. Polit. i. 4, 5.

[211] Odyss. iii. 173.—

Compare Odyss. xx. 100; Iliad, i. 62; Eurip. Suppl. 216-230.

[212] The s?ata ????? mentioned in the Iliad, vi. 168, if they prove anything, are rather an evidence against, than for, the existence of alphabetical writing at the times when the Iliad was composed.

[213] Aristot. Poet. c. 17-37. He points out and explains the superior structure of the Iliad and Odyssey, as compared with the semi Homeric and biographical poems: but he takes no notice of the Hesiodic, or genealogical.

[214] Aristot. Poetic. c. 41. He considers the Hexameter to be the natural measure of narrative poetry: any other would be unseemly.

[215] Ulrici, Geschichte des Griechischen Epos, 5te Vorlesung, pp. 96-108; G. Hermann, Ueber Homer und Sappho, in his Opuscula, tom. vi. p. 89.

The superior antiquity of Orpheus as compared with Homer passed as a received position to the classical Romans (Horat. Art. Poet. 392).

[216] Respecting these lost epics, see DÜntzer, Collection of the Fragmenta Epicor. GrÆcorum; WÜllner, De Cyclo Epico, pp. 43-66; and Mr. Fynes Clinton’s Chronology, vol. iii. pp. 349-359.

[217] Welcker, Der Epische Kyklus, pp. 256-266; ApollodÔr. ii. 7, 7; DiodÔr. iv. 37; O. MÜller, Dorians, i. 28.

[218] Welcker (Der Epische Kyklus, p. 209) considers the AlkmÆÔnis as the same with the Epigoni, and the Atthis of Hegesinous the same with the Amazonia: in Suidas (v. ?????) the latter is among the poems ascribed to Homer.

Leutsch (Thebaidos CyclicÆ ReliquiÆ, pp. 12-14) views the ThebaÏs and the Epigoni as different parts of the same poem.

[219] See the Fragments of Hesiod, EumÊlus, KinÆthÔn, and Asius, in the collections of Marktscheffel, DÜntzer, GÖttling, and Gaisford.

I have already, in going over the ground of Grecian legend, referred to all these lost poems, in their proper places.

[220] Pausan. ix. 38, 6; Plutarch, Sept. Sap. Conv. p. 156.

[221] See Mr. Clinton’s Fasti Hellenici, about the date of Arktinus, vol i. p. 350.

[222] Perhaps Zenodotus, the superintendent of the Alexandrine library under Ptolemy Philadelphus, in the third century B.C.: there is a Scholion on Plautus, published not many years ago by Osann, and since more fully by Ritschl,—“CÆcius in commento Comoediarum Aristophanis in Pluto,—Alexander Ætolus, et Lycophron Chalcidensis, et Zenodotus Ephesius, impulsu regis PtolemÆi, Philadelphi cognomento, artis poetices libros in unum collegerunt et in ordinem redegerunt. Alexander tragoedias, Lycophron comoedias, Zenodotus vero Homeri poemata et reliquorum illustrium poetarum.” See Lange, Ueber die Kyklischen Dichter, p. 56 (Mainz. 1837); Welcker, Der Epische Kyklus, p. 8; Ritschl, Die Alexandrinischen Bibliotheken, p. 3 (Breslau, 1838).

Lange disputes the sufficiency of this passage as proof that Zenodotus was the framer of the Epic Cycle: his grounds are, however, unsatisfactory to me.

[223] That there existed a cyclic copy or edition of the Odyssey (? ???????) is proved by two passages in the Scholia (xvi. 195; xvii. 25), with Boeckh’s remark in Buttmann’s edition: this was the Odyssey copied or edited along with the other poems of the cycle.

Our word to edit—or edition—suggests ideas not exactly suited to the proceedings of the Alexandrine library, in which we cannot expect to find anything like what is now called publication. That magnificent establishment, possessing a large collection of epical manuscripts, and ample means of every kind at command, would naturally desire to have these compositions put in order and corrected by skilful hands, and then carefully copied for the use of the library. Such copy constitutes the cyclic edition: they might perhaps cause or permit duplicates to be made, but the ??d?s?? or edition was complete without them.

[224] Respecting the great confusion in which the Epic Cycle is involved, see the striking declaration of Buttmann, Addenda ad Scholia in Odysseum, p. 575: compare the opinions of the different critics, as enumerated at the end of Welcker’s treatise, Episch. Kyk. pp. 420-453.

[225] Our information respecting the Epic Cycle is derived from Eutychius Proclus, a literary man of Sicca during the second century of the Christian era, and tutor of Marcus Antoninus (Jul. Capitolin. Vit. Marc. c. 2),—not from Proclus, called Diadochus, the new-Platonic philosopher of the fifth century, as Heyne, Mr. Clinton, and others have imagined. The fragments from his work called Chrestomathia, give arguments of several of the lost cyclic poems connected with the Siege of Troy, communicating the important fact that the Iliad and Odyssey were included in the cycle, and giving the following description of the principle upon which it was arranged: ??a?a??e? d? pe?? t?? ?e?????? ?p???? ??????, ?? ???eta? ?? ?? t?? ??????? ?a? G?? ??????????? ??e?? ... ?a? pe?at??ta? ? ?p???? ??????, ?? d?af???? p???t?? s?p?????e???, ???? t?? ?p??se?? ?d?ss???.... ???e? d? ?? t?? ?p???? ?????? t? p???ata d?as??eta? ?a? sp??d??eta? t??? p??????, ??? ??t? d?? t?? ??et??, ?? d?? t?? ????????a? t?? ?? a?t? p?a??t?? (ap. Photium, cod. 239).

This much-commented passage, while it clearly marks out the cardinal principle of the Epic Cycle (????????a p?a??t??), neither affirms nor denies anything respecting the excellence of the constituent poems. Proclus speaks of the taste common in his own time (sp??d??eta? t??? p??????): there was not much relish in his time for these poems as such, but people were much interested in the sequence of epical events. The abstracts which he himself drew up in the form of arguments of several poems, show that he adapted himself to this taste. We cannot collect from his words that he intended to express any opinion of his own respecting the goodness or badness of the cyclic poems.

[226] The gradual growth of a contemptuous feeling towards the scriptor cyclicus (Horat. Ars. Poetic. 136), which was not originally implied in the name, is well set forth by Lange (Ueber die Kyklisch. Dicht. pp. 53-56).

Both Lange (pp. 36-41), however, and Ulrici (Geschichte des Griech. Epos, 9te Vorles. p. 418) adopt another opinion with respect to the cycle, which I think unsupported and inadmissible,—that the several constituent poems were not received into it entire (i. e. with only such changes as were requisite for a corrected text), but cut down and abridged in such manner as to produce an exact continuity of narrative. Lange even imagines that the cyclic Odyssey was thus dealt with. But there seems no evidence to countenance this theory, which would convert the Alexandrine literati from critics into logographers. That the cyclic Iliad and Odyssey were the same in the main (allowing for corrections of text) as the common Iliad and Odyssey, is shown by the fact, that Proclus merely names them in the series without giving any abstract of their contents: they were too well known to render such a process necessary. Nor does either the language of Proclus, or that of CÆcius as applied to Zenodotus, indicate any transformation applied to the poets whose works are described to have been brought together and put into a certain order.

The hypothesis of Lange is founded upon the idea that the (????????a p?a??t??) continuity of narrated events must necessarily have been exact and without break, as if the whole constituted one work. But this would not be possible, let the framers do what they might: moreover, in the attempt, the individuality of all the constituent poets must have been sacrificed, in such manner that it would be absurd to discuss their separate merits.

The continuity of narrative in the Epic Cycle could not have been more than approximate,—as complete as the poems composing it would admit: nevertheless, it would be correct to say that the poems were arranged in series upon this principle and upon no other. The librarians might have arranged in like manner the vast mass of tragedies in their possession (if they had chosen to do so) upon the principle of sequence in the subjects: had they done so, the series would have formed a Tragic Cycle.

[227] Welcker, Der Epische Kyklus, pp. 37-41; Wuellner, De Cyclo Epico, p. 43, seq.; Lange, Ueber die Kyklischen Dichter, p. 47; Clinton, Fasti Hellenici, vol. i. p. 349.

[228] Schol. Pindar. Olymp. vi. 26; AthenÆ. xi. p. 465.

[229] It is a memorable illustration of that bitterness which has so much disgraced the controversies of literary men in all ages (I fear, we can make no exception), when we find Pausanias saying that he had examined into the ages of Hesiod and Homer with the most laborious scrutiny, but that he knew too well the calumnious dispositions of contemporary critics and poets, to declare what conclusion he had come to (Paus. ix. 30, 2): ?e?? d? ?s??d?? te ?????a? ?a? ?????, p???p?a????sa?t? ?? t? ?????stat?? ?? ?? ???fe?? ?d? ??, ?p?sta??? t? f??a?t??? ????? te ?a? ??? ???sta ?s?? ?at? ?? ?p? p???se? t?? ?p?? ?a?est??esa?.

[230] See the extract of Proclus, in Photius Cod. 239.

[231] Suidas, v. ?????; Eustath. ad Iliad. ii. p. 330.

[232] Pausan. ix. 9, 3. The name of Kallinus in that passage seems certainly correct: ?? d? ?p? ta?ta (the ThebaÏs) ?a??????, ?f???e??? a?t?? ?? ????, ?f?se? ????? t?? p???sa?ta e??a?? ?a????? d? p????? te ?a? ????? ????? ?at? ta?t? ????sa?. ??? d? t?? p???s?? ta?t?? et? ?e ????da ?a? ?d?sse?a? ?pa??? ???sta.

To the same purpose the author of the Certamen of Hesiod and Homer, and the pseudo-Herodotus (Vit. Homer, c. 9). The ?f?a??? ??e?as?a, alluded to in Suidas as the production of Homer, may be reasonably identified with the ThebaÏs (Suidas, v. ?????).

The cyclographer Dionysius, who affirmed that Homer had lived both in the Theban and the Trojan wars, must have recognized that poet as author of the ThebaÏs as well as of the Iliad (ap. Procl. ad Hesiod. p. 3).

[233] Herodot. v. 67. ??e?s????? ??? ???e???s? p??e?sa?—t??t? ??, ?a??d??? ?pa?se ?? S?????? ??????es?a?, t?? ???e??? ?p??? e??e?a, ?t? ???e??? te ?a? ????? t? p???? p??ta ???ata?—t??t? d?, ????? ??? ?? ?a? ?st? ?? a?t? t? ????? t?? S???????? ?d??st?? t?? ?a?a??, t??t?? ?pe???se ? ??e?s?????, ???ta ???e???, ??a?e?? ?? t?? ?????. Herodotus then goes on to relate how KleisthenÊs carried into effect his purpose of banishing the hero Adrastus: first, he applied to the Delphian Apollo, for permission to do so directly, and avowedly; next, on that permission being refused, he made application to the Thebans, to allow him to introduce into SikyÔn their hero Melanippus, the bitter enemy of Adrastus in the old Theban legend; by their consent, he consecrated a chapel to Melanippus in the most commanding part of the Sikyonian agora, and then transferred to the newly-imported hero the rites and festivals which had before been given to Adrastus.

Taking in conjunction all the points of this very curious tale, I venture to think that the rhapsodes incurred the displeasure of KleisthenÊs by reciting, not the Homeric Iliad, but the Homeric ThebaÏs and Epigoni. The former does not answer the conditions of the narrative: the latter fulfils them accurately.

1. It cannot be said, even by the utmost latitude of speech, that, in the Iliad, “Little else is sung except Argos and the Argeians,”—(“in illis ubique fere nonnisi Argos et Argivi celebrantur,”)—is the translation of SchweighÄuser: Argos is rarely mentioned in it, and never exalted into any primary importance: the Argeians, as inhabitants of Argos separately, are never noticed at all: that name is applied in the Iliad, in common with the AchÆans and Danaans, only to the general body of Greeks,—and even applied to them much less frequently than the name of AchÆans.

2. Adrastus is twice, and only twice, mentioned in the Iliad, as master of the wonderful horse Areion, and as father-in-law of Tydeus; but he makes no figure in the poem, and attracts no interest.

Wherefore, though KleisthenÊs might have been ever so much incensed against Argos and Adrastus, there seems no reason why he should have interdicted the rhapsodes from reciting the Iliad. On the other hand, the ThebaÏs and Epigoni could not fail to provoke him especially. For,

1. Argos and its inhabitants were the grand subject of the poem, and the proclaimed assailants in the expedition against ThÊbes. Though the poem itself is lost, the first line of it has been preserved (Leutsch, Theb. Cycl. Reliq. p. 5; compare SophoclÊs, Œd. Col. 380 with Scholia),—

2. Adrastus was king of Argos, and the chief of the expedition. It is therefore literally true, that Argos and the Argeians were “the burden of the song” in these two poems.

To this we may add—

1. The rhapsodes would have the strongest motive to recite the ThebaÏs and Epigoni at SikyÔn, where Adrastus was worshipped and enjoyed so vast a popularity, and where he even attracted to himself the choric solemnities which in other towns were given to Dionysus.

2. The means which KleisthenÊs took to get rid of Adrastus indicates a special reference to the ThebaÏs: he invited from ThÊbes the hero Melanippus, the Hector of ThÊbes, in that very poem.

For these reasons, I think we may conclude that the ???e?a ?p?, alluded to in this very illustrative story of Herodotus, are the ThebaÏs and the Epigoni, not the Iliad.

[234] Herodot. ii. 117; iv. 32. The words in which Herodotus intimates his own dissent from the reigning opinion, are treated as spurious by F. A. Wolf, and vindicated by SchweighÄuser: whether they be admitted or not, the general currency of the opinion adverted to is equally evident.

[235] The Life of Homer, which passes falsely under the name of Herodotus, contains a collection of these different stories: it is supposed to have been written about the second century after the Christian era, but the statements which it furnishes are probably several of them as old as Ephorus (compare also Proclus ap. Photium, c. 239).

The belief in the blindness of Homer is doubtless of far more ancient date, since the circumstance appears mentioned in the Homeric Hymn to the Delian Apollo where the bard of Chios, in some very touching lines, recommends himself and his strains to the favor of the Delian maidens employed in the worship of Apollo. This hymn is cited by ThucydidÊs as unquestionably authentic, and he doubtless accepted the lines as a description of the personal condition and relations of the author of the Iliad and Odyssey (Thucyd. iii. 104): SimonidÊs of KeÔs also calls Homer a Chian (Frag. 69, Schneidewin).

There were also tales which represented Homer as the contemporary, the cousin, and the rival in recited composition, of Hesiod, who (it was pretended) had vanquished him. See the Certamen Homeri et Hesiodi, annexed to the works of the latter (p. 314, ed. GÖttling; and Plutarch, Conviv. Sept. Sapient. c. 10), in which also various stories respecting the Life of Homer are scattered. The emperor Hadrian consulted the Delphian oracle to know who Homer was: the answer of the priestess reported him to be a native of Ithaca, the son of Telemachus and EpikastÊ, daughter of NestÔr (Certamen Hom. et Hes. p. 314). The author of this Certamen tells us that the authority of the Delphian oracle deserves implicit confidence.

Hellanikus, Damastes, and PherekydÊs traced both Homer and Hesiod up to Orpheus, through a pedigree of ten generations (see Sturz, Fragment. Hellanic. fr. 75-144; compare also Lobeck’s remarks—Aglaophamus, p. 322—on the subject of these genealogies). The computations of these authors earlier than Herodotus are of value, because they illustrate the habits of mind in which Grecian chronology began: the genealogy might be easily continued backward to any length in the past. To trace Homer up to Orpheus, however, would not have been consonant to the belief of the HomÊrids.

The contentions of the different cities which disputed for the birth of Homer, and, indeed, all the legendary anecdotes circulated in antiquity respecting the poet, are copiously discussed in Welcker, Der Epische Kyklos (pp. 194-199).

[236] Even Aristotle ascribed to Homer a divine parentage: a damsel of the isle of Ios, pregnant by some god, was carried off by pirates to Smyrna, at the time of the Ionic emigration, and there gave birth to the poet (Aristotel. ap. Plutarch. Vit. Homer. p. 1059).

Plato seems to have considered Homer as having been an itinerant rhapsode, poor and almost friendless (Republ. p. 600).

[237] Pindar, Nem. ii. 1, and Scholia; Akusilaus, Fragm. 31, Didot; Harpokration, v. ????da?; Hellanic. Fr. 55, Didot; Strabo, xiv. p. 645.

It seems by a passage of Plato (PhÆdrus, p. 252), that the HomÊridÆ professed to possess unpublished verses of their ancestral poet—?p? ?p???ta. Compare Plato, Republic, p. 599, and Isocrat. Helen, p. 218.

[238] Nitzsch (De Histori Homeri, Fascic. 1, p. 128, Fascic. 2, p. 71), and Ulrici (Geschichte der Episch. Poesie, vol. i. pp. 240-381) question the antiquity of the HomÊrid gens, and limit their functions to simple reciters, denying that they ever composed songs or poems of their own. Yet these gentes, such as the EuneidÆ, the LykomidÆ, the ButadÆ, the TalthybiadÆ, the descendants of CheirÔn at PeliÔn, etc., the HesychidÆ (Schol. Sophocl. Œdip. Col. 489), (the acknowledged parallels of the HomÊridÆ), may be surely all considered as belonging to the earliest known elements of Grecian history: rarely, at least, if ever, can such gens, with its tripartite character of civil, religious, and professional, be shown to have commenced at any recent period. And in the early times, composer and singer were one person: often at least, though probably not always, the bard combined both functions. The Homeric ???d?? sings his own compositions; and it is reasonable to imagine that many of the early HomÊrids did the same.

See Niebuhr, RÖmisch. Gesch. vol. i. p. 324; and the treatise, Ueber die Sikeler in der Odyssee,—in the Rheinisches Museum, 1828, p. 257; and Boeckh, in the Index of Contents to his Lectures of 1834.

“The sage Vyasa (observes Professor Wilson, System of Hindu Mythology, Int. p. lxii.) is represented, not as the author, but as the arranger and compiler of the Vedas and the PurÁnÁs. His name denotes his character, meaning the arranger or distributor (Welcker gives the same meaning to the name Homer); and the recurrence of many Vyasas,—many individuals who new-modelled the Hindu scriptures,—has nothing in it that is improbable, except the fabulous intervals by which their labors are separated.” Individual authorship and the thirst of personal distinction, are in this case also buried under one great and common name, as in the case of Homer.

[239] Thucyd. i. 3.

[240] See the statements and citations respecting the age of Homer, collected in Mr. Clinton’s Chronology, vol. i. p. 146. He prefers the view of Aristotle, and places the Iliad and Odyssey a century earlier than I am inclined to do,—940-927 B.C.

KratÊs, probably placed the poet anterior to the Return of the HÊrakleids, because the Iliad makes no mention of Dorians in PeloponnÊsus: EratosthenÊs may be supposed to have grounded his date on the passage of the Iliad, which mentions the three generations descended from Æneas. We should have been glad to know the grounds of the very low date assigned by Theopompus and EuphoriÔn.

The pseudo-Herodotus, in his life of Homer, puts the birth of the poet one hundred and sixty-eight years after the Trojan war.

[241] Herodot. ii. 53. HÊrakleides Ponticus affirmed that Lykurgus had brought into PeloponnÊsus the Homeric poems, which had before been unknown out of Ionia. The supposed epoch of Lykurgus has sometimes been employed to sustain the date here assigned to the Homeric poems; but everything respecting Lykurgus is too doubtful to serve as evidence in other inquiries.

[242] The Homeric hymns are prooems of this sort, some very short, consisting only of a few lines,—others of considerable length. The Hymn (or, rather, one of the two hymns) to Apollo is cited by ThucydidÊs as the Prooem of Apollo.

The Hymns to AphroditÊ, Apollo, HermÊs, DÊmÊtÊr, and Dionysus, are genuine epical narratives. Hermann (PrÆf. ad Hymn. p. lxxxix.) pronounces the Hymn to AphroditÊ to be the oldest and most genuine: portions of the Hymn to Apollo (Herm. p. xx.) are also very old, but both that hymn and the others are largely interpolated. His opinion respecting these interpolations, however, is disputed by Franke (PrÆfat. ad Hymn. Homeric. p. ix-xix.); and the distinction between what is genuine and what is spurious, depends upon criteria not very distinctly assignable. Compare Ulrici, Gesch. der Ep. Poes. pp. 385-391.

[243] Phemius, Demodokus, and the nameless bard who guarded the fidelity of KlytÆmnÊstra, bear out this position (Odyss. i. 155; iii. 267; viii. 490; xxi. 330; Achilles in Iliad, ix. 190).

A degree of inviolability seems attached to the person of the bard as well as to that of the herald (Odyss. xxii. 355-357).

[244] Spartian. Vit. Hadrian. p. 8; Dio Cass. lxix. 4: Plut. Tim. c. 36.

There are some good observations on this point in NÄke’s comments on Choerilus, ch. viii. p. 59:—

“Habet hoc epica poesis, vera illa, cujus perfectissimam normam agnoscimus Homericam—habet hoc proprium, ut non in possessione virorum eruditorum, sed quasi viva sit et coram populo recitanda: ut cum populo crescat, et si populus Deorum et antiquorum heroum facinora, quod prÆcipium est epicÆ poeseos argumentum, audire et secum repetere dedidicerit, obmutescat. Id vero tum factum est in GrÆciÂ, quum populus e Ætate, quam pueritiam dicere possis, peractÂ, partim ad res serias tristesque, politicas maxime—easque multo, quam antea, impeditiores—abstrahebatur: partim epicÆ poeseos pertÆsus, ex aliis poeseos generibus, quÆ tum nascebantur, novum et diversum oblectamenti genus primo prÆsagire, sibi, deinde haurire, coepit.”

NÄke remarks, too, that the “splendidissima et propria HomericÆ poeseos Ætas, ea quÆ sponte quasi su inter populum et quasi cum populo viveret,” did not reach below Peisistratus. It did not, I think, reach even so low as that period.

[245] Xenoph. Memorab. iv. 2, 10; and Sympos. iii. 6. ??s?? t? ??? ????? ??????te??? ?a??d??; ... ????? ??? ?t? t?? ?p????a? ??? ?p?sta?ta?. S? d? St?s???t? te ?a? ??a????d?? ?a? ?????? p?????? p??? d?d??a? ????????, ?ste ??d?? se t?? p????? ????? ?????e.

These ?p????a? are the hidden meanings, or allegories, which a certain set of philosophers undertook to discover in Homer, and which the rhapsodes were no way called upon to study.

The Platonic dialogue, called IÔn, ascribes to IÔn the double function of a rhapsode, or impressive reciter, and a critical expositor of the poet (IsokratÊs also indicates the same double character, in the rhapsodes of his time,—Panathenaic, p. 240); but it conveys no solid grounds for a mean estimate of the class of rhapsodes, while it attests remarkably the striking effect produced by their recitation (c. 6, p. 535). That this class of men came to combine the habit of expository comment on the poet with their original profession of reciting, proves the tendencies of the age; probably, it also brought them into rivalry with the philosophers.

The grounds taken by Aristotle (Problem. xxx. 10; compare Aul. Gellius, xx. 14) against the actors, singers, musicians, etc. of his time, are more serious, and have more the air of truth.

If it be correct in Lehrs (de Studiis Aristarchi, Diss. ii. p. 46) to identify those early glossographers of Homer, whose explanations the Alexandrine critics so severely condemned, with the rhapsodes, this only proves that the rhapsodes had come to undertake a double duty, of which their predecessors before SolÔn would never have dreamed.

[246] Plato, Apolog. Socrat. p. 22, c. 7.

[247] Aristotel. Poetic. c. 47; Welcker, Der Episch. Kyklos; Ueber den Vortrag der Homerischen Gedichte, pp. 340-406, which collects all the facts respecting the aoedi and the rhapsodes. Unfortunately, the ascertained points are very few.

The laurel branch in the hand of the singer or reciter (for the two expressions are often confounded) seems to have been peculiar to the recitation of Homer and Hesiod (Hesiod, Theog. 30: Schol. ad Aristophan. Nub. 1367. Pausan. x. 7, 2). “Poemata omne genus (says Apuleius, Florid. p. 122, Bipont.) apta virgÆ, lyrÆ, socco, cothurno.”

Not only Homer and Hesiod, but also Archilochus, were recited by rhapsodes (AthenÆ, xii. 620; also Plato, Legg. ii. p. 658). Consult, besides, Nitzsch, De Histori Homeri, Fascic. 2, p. 114, seq., respecting the rhapsodes; and O. MÜller, History of the Literature of Ancient Greece, ch. iv. s. 3.

The ideas of singing and speech are, however, often confounded, in reference to any verse solemnly and emphatically delivered (Thucydid. ii. 53)—f?s???te? ?? p?es?te??? p??a? ?des?a?, ??e? ????a??? p??e?? ?a? ????? ?? a?t?. And the rhapsodes are said to sing Homer (Plato, Eryxias, c. 13; Hesych. v. ??a????????); Strabo (i. p. 18) has a good passage upon song and speech.

William Grimm (Deutsche Heldensage, p. 373) supposes the ancient German heroic romances to have been recited or declaimed in a similar manner with a simple accompaniment of the harp, as the Servian heroic lays are even at this time delivered.

Fauriel also tells us, respecting the French Carlovingian Epic (Romans de Chevalerie, Revue des Deux Mondes, xiii. p. 559): “The romances of the 12th and 13th centuries were really sung: the jongleur invited his audience to hear a belle chanson d’histoire,—‘le mot chanter ne manque jamais dans la formule initiale,’—and it is to be understood literally: the music was simple and intermittent, more like a recitative; the jongleur carried a rebek, or violin with three strings, an Arabic instrument; when he wished to rest his voice, he played an air or ritournelle upon this; he went thus about from place to place, and the romances had no existence among the people, except through the aid and recitation of these jongleurs.”

It appears that there had once been rhapsodic exhibitions at the festivals of Dionysus, but they were discontinued (Klearchus ap. AthenÆ. vii. p. 275)—probably superseded by the dithyramb and the tragedy.

The etymology of ?a??d?? is a disputed point: Welcker traces it to ??d??, most critics derive it from ??pte?? ???d??, which O. MÜller explains “to denote the coupling together of verses without any considerable divisions or pauses,—the even, unbroken, continuous flow of the epic poem,” as contrasted with the strophic or choric periods (l. c.).

[248] Homer, Hymn to Apoll. 170. The ???a???, ???d?, ???????, are constantly put together in that hymn: evidently, the instrumental accompaniment was essential to the hymns at the Ionic festival. Compare also the Hymn to HermÊs (430), where the function ascribed to the Muses can hardly be understood to include non-musical recitation. The Hymn to HermÊs is more recent than Terpander, inasmuch as it mentions the seven strings of the lyre, v. 50.

[249] Terpander,—see Plutarch, de MusicÂ, c. 3-4; the facts respecting him are collected in Plehn’s Lesbiaca, pp. 140-160; but very little can be authenticated.

Stesander at the Pythian festivals sang the Homeric battles, with a harp accompaniment of his own composition (AthenÆ. xiv. p. 638).

The principal testimonies respecting the rhapsodizing of the Homeric poems at Athens, chiefly at the Panathenaic festival, are IsokratÊs, Panegyric. p. 74; Lycurgus contra Leocrat. p. 161; Plato, Hipparch. p. 228; Diogen. LaËrt. Vit. Solon. i. 57.

Inscriptions attest that rhapsodizing continued in great esteem, down to a late period of the historical age, both at Chios and TeÔs, especially the former: it was the subject of competition by trained youth, and of prizes for the victor, at periodical religious solemnities: see Corp. Inscript. Boeckh, No. 2214-3088.

[251] See this argument strongly put by Nitzsch, in the prefatory remarks at the beginning of his second volume of Commentaries on the Odyssey (pp. x-xxix). He takes great pains to discard all idea that the poems were written in order to be read. To the same purpose, Franz (EpigraphicÊ GrÆc. Introd. p. 32), who adopts Nitzsch’s positions,—“Audituris enim, non lecturis, carmina parabant.”

[252] Odyss. viii. 65; Hymn. ad Apoll. 172: Pseudo-Herodot. Vit. Homer. c. 3; Thucyd. iii. 104.

Various commentators on Homer imagined that, under the misfortune of Demodokus, the poet in reality described his own (Schol. ad Odyss. 1. 1; Maxim. Tyr. xxxviii. 1).

[253] Xenoph. Sympos. iii. 5. Compare, respecting the laborious discipline of the Gallic Druids, and the number of unwritten verses which they retained in their memories, CÆsar, B. G. vi. 14; Mela. iii. 2; also Wolf, Prolegg. s. xxiv. and Herod. ii. 77, about the prodigious memory of the Egyptian priests at Heliopolis.

I transcribe, from the interesting Discours of M. Fauriel (prefixed to his Chants Populaires de la GrÈce Moderne, Paris 1824), a few particulars respecting the number, the mnemonic power, and the popularity of those itinerant singers or rhapsodes who frequent the festivals or paneghyris of modern Greece: it is curious to learn that this profession is habitually exercised by blind men (p. xc. seq.).

“Les aveugles exercent en GrÈce une profession qui les rend non seulement agrÉables, mais nÉcessaires; le caractÈre, l’imagination, et la condition du peuple, Étant ce qu’ils sont: c’est la profession de chanteurs ambulans.... Ils sont dans l’usage, tant sur le continent que dans les Îles, de la GrÈce, d’apprendre par coeur le plus grand nombre qu’ils peuvent de chansons populaires de tout genre et de toute Époque. Quelques uns finissent par en savoir une quantitÉ prodigieuse, et tous en savent beaucoup. Avec ce trÉsor dans leur mÉmoire, ils sont toujours en marche, traversent la GrÈce en tout sens; ils s’en vont de ville en ville, de village en village, chantant À l’auditoire qui se forme aussitÔt autour d’eux, partout oÙ ils se montrent, celles de leurs chansons qu’ils jugent convenir le mieux, soit À la localitÉ, soit À la circonstance, et reÇoivent une petite rÉtribution qui fait tout leur revenu. Ils ont l’air de chercher de prÉfÉrence, en tout lieu, la partie la plus inculte de la population, qui en est toujours la plus curieuse, la plus avide d’impressions, et la moins difficile dans le choix de ceux qui leur sont offertes. Les Turcs seuls ne les Écoutent pas. C’est aux rÉunions nombreuses, aux fÊtes de village connues sous le nom de Paneghyris, que ces chanteurs ambulans accourent le plus volontiers. Ils chantent en s’accompagnant d’un instrument À cordes que l’on touche avec un archet, et qui est exactement l’ancienne lyre des Grecs, dont il a conservÉ le nom comme la forme.

“Cette lyre, pour Être entiÈre, doit avoir cinq cordes: mais souvent elle n’en a que deux ou trois, dont les sons, comme il est aisÉ de prÉsumer, n’ont rien de bien harmonieux. Les chanteurs aveugles vont ordinairement isolÉs, et chacun d’eux chante À part des autres: mais quelquefois aussi ils se rÉunissent par groupes de deux ou de trois, pour dire ensemble les mÊmes chansons.... Ces modernes rhapsodes doivent Être divisÉs en deux classes. Les uns (et ce sont, selon toute apparence, les plus nombreux) se bornent À la function de recueillir, d’apprendre par coeur, et de mettre en circulation, des piÈces qu’ils n’ont point composÉes. Les autres (et ce sont ceux qui forment l’ordre le plus distinguÉ de leur corps), À cette fonction de rÉpÉtiteurs et de colporteurs des poÉsies d’autrui, joignent celle de poËtes, et ajoutent À la masse des chansons apprises d’autres chants de leur faÇon.... Ces rhapsodes aveugles sont les nouvellistes et les historiens, en mÊme temps que les poËtes du peuple, en cela parfaitement semblables aux rhapsodes anciens de la GrÈce.”

To pass to another country—Persia, once the great rival of Greece: “The Kurroglian rhapsodes are called Kurroglou-Khans, from khaunden, to sing. Their duty is, to know by heart all the mejjlisses (meetings) of Kurroglou, narrate them, or sing them with the accompaniment of the favorite instrument of Kurroglou, the chungur, or sitar, a three-stringed guitar. Ferdausi has also his Shah-nama-Khans, and the prophet Mohammed his Koran Khans. The memory of those singers is truly astonishing. At every request, they recite in one breath for some hours, without stammering, beginning the tale at the passage or verse pointed out by the hearers.” (Specimens of the Popular Poetry of Persia, as found in the Adventures and Improvisations of Kurroglou, the Bandit Minstrel of Northern Persia, by Alexander Chodzko: London 1842, Introd. p. 13)

“One of the songs of the Calmuck national bards sometimes lasts a whole day.” (Ibid. p. 372.)

[254] There are just remarks of Mr. Mitford on the possibility that the Homeric poems might have been preserved without writing (History of Greece, vol. i. pp. 135-137).

[255] Villoison, Prolegomen. pp. xxxiv-lvi; Wolf, Prolegomen. p. 37. DÜntzer, in the Epicor. GrÆc. Fragm. pp. 27-29, gives a considerable list of the Homeric passages cited by ancient authors, but not found either in the Iliad or Odyssey. It is hardly to be doubted, however, that many of these passages belonged to other epic poems which passed under the name of Homer. Welcker (Der Episch. Kyklus, pp. 20-133) enforces this opinion very justly, and it harmonizes with his view of the name of Homer as coextensive with the whole Epic cycle.

[256] See this argument strongly maintained in Giese (Ueber den Æolischen Dialekt, sect. 14. p. 160, seqq.). He notices several other particulars in the Homeric language,—the plenitude and variety of interchangeable grammatical forms,—the numerous metrical licenses, set right by appropriate oral intonations,—which indicate a language as yet not constrained by the fixity of written authority.

The same line of argument is taken by O. MÜller (History of the Literature of Ancient Greece, ch. iv. s. 5).

Giese has shown also, in the same chapter, that all the manuscripts of Homer mentioned in the Scholia, were written in the Ionic alphabet (with ? and O as marks for the long vowels, and no special mark for the rough breathing), in so far as the special citations out of them enable us to verify.

[257] Nitzsch and Welcker argue, that because the Homeric poems were heard with great delight and interest, therefore the first rudiments of the art of writing, even while beset by a thousand mechanical difficulties, would be employed to record them. I cannot adopt this opinion, which appears to me to derive all its plausibility from our present familiarity with reading and writing. The first step from the recited to the written poem is really one of great violence, as well as useless for any want then actually felt. I much more agree with Wolf when he says: “Diu enim illorum hominum vita et simplicitas nihil admodum habuit, quod scriptur dignum videretur: in aliis omnibus occupati agunt illi, quÆ posteri scribunt, vel (ut de quibusdam populis accepimus) etiam monstratam operam hanc spernunt tanquam indecori otii: carmina autem quÆ pangunt, longo usu sic ore fundere et excipere consueverunt, ut cantu et recitatione cum maxime vigentia deducere ad mutas notas, ex illius Ætatis sensu nihil aliud esset, quam perimere ea et vitali vi ac spiritu privare.” (Prolegom. s. xv. p. 59.)

Some good remarks on this subject are to be found in William Humboldt’s Introduction to his elaborate treatise Ueber die Kawi-Sprache, in reference to the oral tales current among the Basques. He, too, observes how great and repulsive a proceeding it is, to pass at first from verse sung, or recited, to verse written; implying that the words are conceived detached from the Vortrag, the accompanying music, and the surrounding and sympathizing assembly. The Basque tales have no charm for the people themselves, when put in Spanish words and read (Introduction, sect. xx. p. 258-259).

Unwritten prose tales, preserved in the memory, and said to be repeated nearly in the same words from age to age, are mentioned by Mariner, in the Tonga Islands (Mariner’s Account, vol. ii. p. 377).

The Druidical poems were kept unwritten by design, after writing was in established use for other purposes (CÆsar, B. G. vi. 13).

[258] Mr. Fynes Clinton (Fasti Hellenici, vol. i. pp. 368-373) treats it as a matter of certainty that Archilochus and Alkman wrote their poems. I am not aware of any evidence for announcing this as positively known,—except, indeed, an admission of Wolf, which is, doubtless, good as an argumentum ad hominem, but is not to be received as proof (Wolf, Proleg. p. 50). The evidences mentioned by Mr. Clinton (p. 368) certainly cannot be regarded as proving anything to the point.

Giese (Ueber den Æolischen Dialekt, p. 172) places the first writing of the separate rhapsodies composing the Iliad in the seventh century B.C.

[259] The songs of the Icelandic Skalds were preserved orally for a period longer than two centuries,—P. A. MÜller thinks very much longer,—before they were collected, or embodied in written story by Snorro and SÆmund (Lange, Untersuchungen Über die Gesch. der NÖrdischen Heldensage. p. 98; also, Introduct. pp. xx-xxviii). He confounds, however, often, the preservation of the songs from old time,—with the question, whether they have or have not an historical basis.

And there were, doubtless, many old bards and rhapsodes in ancient Greece, of whom the same might be said which Saxo Grammaticus affirms of an Englishman named Lucas, that he was “literis quidem tenuiter instructus, sed historiarum scienti apprime eruditus.” (Dahlmann, Historische Forschungen, vol. ii. p. 176.)

[260] “Homer wrote a sequel of songs and rhapsodies, to be sung by himself for small earnings and good cheer, at festivals and other days of merriment; the Iliad he made for the men, the Odysseus for the other sex. These loose songs were not collected together into the form of an epic poem until 500 years after.”

Such is the naked language in which Wolf’s main hypothesis had been previously set forth by Bentley, in his “Remarks on a late Discourse of Freethinking, by Phileleutherus Lipsiensis,” published in 1713: the passage remained unaltered in the seventh edition of that treatise published in 1737. See Wolf’s Proleg. xxvii. p. 115.

The same hypothesis may be seen more amply developed, partly in the work of Wolfs pupil and admirer, William MÜller, Homerische Vorschule (the second edition of which was published at Leipsic, 1836, with an excellent introduction and notes by Baumgarten-Crusius, adding greatly to the value of the original work by its dispassionate review of the whole controversy), partly in two valuable Dissertations of Lachmann, published in the Philological Transactions of the Berlin Academy for 1837 and 1841.

[261] Joseph, cont. Apion. i. 2; Cicero de Orator, iii. 34; Pausan. vii. 26, 6: compare the Scholion on Plautus in Ritschl, Die Alexandrin. Bibliothek, p. 4. Ælian (V. II. xiii. 14), who mentions both the introduction of the Homeric poems into Peloponnesus by Lykurgus, and the compilation by Peisistratus, can hardly be considered as adding to the value of the testimony: still less, Libanius and Suidas. What we learn is, that some literary and critical men of the Alexandrine age (more or fewer, as the case may be; but Wolf exaggerates when he talks of an unanimous conviction) spoke of Peisistratus as having first put together the fractional parts of the Iliad and Odyssey into entire poems.

[262] Plato, Hipparch. p. 228.

[263] “Doch ich komme mir bald lÄcherlich vor, wenn ich noch immer die MÖglichkeit gelten lasse, dass unsere Ilias in dem gegenwÄrtigen Zusammenhange der bedeutenden Theile, und nicht blos der wenigen bedeutendsten, jemals vor der Arbeit des Pisistratus gedacht worden sey.” (Lachmann, Fernere Betrachtungen Über die Ilias, sect. xxviii. p. 32; Abhandlungen Berlin. Academ. 1841.) How far this admission—that for the few most important portions of the Iliad, there did exist an established order of succession prior to Peisistratus—is intended to reach, I do not know; but the language of Lachmann goes farther than either Wolf or William MÜller. (See Wolf, Prolegomen. pp. cxli-cxlii, and W. MÜller, Homerische Vorschule, Abschnitt vii. pp. 96, 98, 100, 102.) The latter admits that neither Peisistratus nor the Diaskeuasts could have made any considerable changes in the Iliad and Odyssey, either in the way of addition or of transposition; the poems as aggregates being too well known, and the Homeric vein of invention too completely extinct, to admit of such novelties.

I confess, I do not see how these last-mentioned admissions can be reconciled with the main doctrine of Wolf, in so far as regards Peisistratus.

[264] Diogen. LaËrt. i. 57.—?? te ????? ?? ?p????? ????afe (S????) ?a??de?s?a?, ???? ?p?? ? p??t?? ????e?, ??e??e? ???es?a? t?? ????e???, ?? f?s? ??e???da? ?? t??? ?e?a??????.

Respecting Hipparchus, son of Peisistratus, the Pseudo-Plato tells us (in the dialogue so called, p. 228),—?a? t? ????? ?p? p??t?? ????se? e?? t?? ??? ta?t???, ?a? ?????ase t??? ?a??d??? ?a?a???a???? ?? ?p????e?? ?fe??? a?t? d????a?, ?spe? ??? ?t? ??de p????s?.

These words have provoked multiplied criticisms from all the learned men who have touched upon the theory of the Homeric poems,—to determine what was the practice which Solon found existing, and what was the change which he introduced. Our information is too scanty to pretend to certainty, but I think the explanation of Hermann the most satisfactory (“Quid sit ?p???? et ?p???de?.”—Opuscula, tom. v. p. 300, tom. vii. p. 162).

?p???e?? is the technical term for the prompter at a theatrical representation (Plutarch, PrÆcept. gerend. Reip. p. 813); ?p???? and ?p????e?? have corresponding meanings, of aiding the memory of a speaker and keeping him in accordance with a certain standard, in possession of the prompter: see the words ?? ?p?????, Xenophon. CyropÆd. iii. 3, 37. ?p????, therefore, has no necessary connection with a series of rhapsodes, but would apply just as much to one alone; although it happens in this case to be brought to bear upon several in succession. ?p??????, again, means “the taking up in succession of one rhapsode by another:” though the two words, therefore, have not the same meaning, yet the proceeding described in the two passages, in reference both to SolÔn and Hipparchus, appears to be in substance the same,—i. e. to insure, by compulsory supervision, a correct and orderly recitation by the successive rhapsodes who went through the different parts of the poem.

There is good reason to conclude from this passage that the rhapsodes before SolÔn were guilty both of negligence and of omission in their recital of Homer, but no reason to imagine either that they transposed the books, or that the legitimate order was not previously recognized.

The appointment of a systematic ?p???e??, or prompter, plainly indicates the existence of complete manuscripts.

The direction of SolÔn, that Homer should be rhapsodized under the security of a prompter with his manuscript, appears just the same as that of the orator Lykurgus in reference to Æschylus, SophoklÊs, and EuripidÊs (Pseudo-Plutarch. Vit. x. Rhetor. Lycurgi Vit.)—e?s??e??e d? ?a? ?????—?? ?a???? e????a? ??a?e??a? t?? p???t?? ??s?????, S?f???????, ????p?d??, ?a? t?? t?a??d?a? a?t?? ?? ????? ??a?a????? f???tte??, ?a? t?? t?? p??e?? ??aat?a pa?a?a?????s?e?? t??? ?p???????????? ?? ??? ???? a?t?? (?????) ?p?????es?a?. The word ?????, which occurs last but one, is introduced by the conjecture of Grysar, who has cited and explained the above passage of the Pseudo-Plutarch in a valuable dissertation—De GrÆcorum TragoediÂ, qualis fuit circa tempora Demosthenis (Cologne, 1830). All the critics admit the text as it now stands to be unintelligible, and various corrections have been proposed, among which that of Grysar seems the best. From his Dissertation, I transcribe the following passage, which illustrates the rhapsodizing of Homer ?? ?p?????:—

“Quum histriones fabulis interpolandis Ægre abstinerent, Lycurgus legem supra indicatam eo tulit consilio, ut recitationes histrionum cum publico illo exemplo omnino congruas redderet. Quod ut assequeretur, constituit, ut dum fabulÆ in scen recitarentur, scriba publicus simul exemplum civitatis inspiceret, juxta sive in theatro sive in postscenio sedens. HÆc enim verbi pa?a?a?????s?e?? est significatio, posita prÆcipue in prÆpositione pa??, ut idem sit, quod contra sive juxta legere; id quod faciunt ii, qui lecta ab altero vel recitata cum suis conferre cupiunt.” (Grysar, p. 7.)

[265] That the Iliad or Odyssey were ever recited with all the parts entire, at any time anterior to SolÔn, is a point which Ritschl denies (Die Alexandrin. Bibliothek, pp. 67-70). He thinks that before SolÔn, they were always recited in parts, and without any fixed order among the parts. Nor did SolÔn determine (as he thinks) the order of the parts: he only checked the license of the rhapsodes as to the recitation of the separate books: it was Pesistratus, who, with the help of Onomakritus and others, first settled the order of the parts and bound each poem into a whole, with some corrections and interpolations. Nevertheless, he admits that the parts were originally composed by the same poet, and adapted to form a whole amongst each other: but this primitive entireness (he asserts) was only maintained as a sort of traditional belief, never realized in recitation, and never reduced to an obvious, unequivocal, and permanent fact,—until the time of Peisistratus.

There is no sufficient ground, I think, for denying all entire recitation previous to SolÔn, and we only interpose a new difficulty, both grave and gratuitous, by doing so.

[266] The Æthiopis of Arktinus contained nine thousand one hundred verses, as we learn from the Tabula Iliaca: yet Proklus assigns to it only four books. The Ilias Minor had four books, the Cyprian Verses eleven, though we do not know the number of lines in either.

Nitzsch states it as a certain matter of fact, that Arktinus recited his own poem alone, though it was too long to admit of his doing so without interruption. (See his Vorrede to the second vol. of the Odyssey, p. xxiv.) There is no evidence for this assertion, and it appears to me highly improbable.

In reference to the Romances of the Middle Ages, belonging to the Cycle of the Round Table, M. Fauriel tells us that the German Perceval has nearly twenty-five thousand verses (more than half as long again as the Iliad); the Perceval of Christian of Troyes, probably more; the German Tristan, of Godfrey of Strasburg, has more than twenty-three thousand; sometimes, the poem is begun by one author, and continued by another. (Fauriel, Romans de Chevalerie, Revue des Deux Mondes, t. xiii. pp. 695-697.)

The ancient unwritten poems of the Icelandic Skalds are as much lyric as epic: the longest of them does not exceed eight hundred lines, and they are for the most part much shorter (Untersuchungen Über die Geschichte der NÖrdischen Heldensage, aus P. A. MÜller’s Sagabibliothek von G. Lange, Frankf. 1832, Introduct. p. xlii.).

[267] Plutarch, SolÔn, 10.

[268] The Homeric Scholiast refers to Quintus Calaber ?? t? ?a????a???, which was only one portion of his long poem (Schol. ad Iliad. ii. 220).

[269] Knight, Prolegg. Homer, xxxii. xxxvi. xxxvii. That Peisistratus caused a corrected MS. of the Iliad to be prepared, there seems good reason to believe, and the Scholion on Plautus edited by Ritschl (see Die Alexandrinische Bibliothek, p. 4) specifies the four persons (Onomakritus was one) employed on the task. Ritschl fancies that it served as a sort of Vulgate for the text of the Alexandrine critics, who named specially other MSS. (of Chios, SinÔpÊ, Massalia, etc.) only when they diverged from this Vulgate: he thinks, also, that it formed the original from whence those other MSS. were first drawn, which are called in the Homeric Scholia a? ????a?, ?????te?a? (pp. 59-60).

Welcker supposes the Peisistratic MS. to have been either lost or carried away when XerxÊs took Athens (Der Epische Kyklus, pp. 382-388).

Compare Nitzsch, Histor. Homer. Fasc. i. pp. 165-167; also his commentary on Odyss. xi. 604, the alleged interpolation of Onomakritus; and Ulrici, Geschichte der Hellen. Poes. Part i. s. vii. pp. 252-255.

The main facts respecting the Peisistratic recension are collected and discussed by GrÄfenhan, Geschichte der Philologie, sect. 54-64, vol. i. pp. 266-311. Unfortunately, we cannot get beyond mere conjecture and possibility.

[270] Wolf allows both the uniformity of coloring, and the antiquity of coloring, which pervade the Homeric poems; also, the strong line by which they stand distinguished from the other Greek poets: “Immo congruunt in iis omnia ferme in idem ingenium, in eosdem mores, in eandem formam sentiendi et loquendi.” (Prolegom. p. cclxv; compare p. cxxxviii.)

He thinks, indeed, that this harmony was restored by the ability and care of Aristarchus, (“mirificum illum concentum revocatum Aristarcho imprimis debemus.”) This is a very exaggerated estimate of the interference of Aristarchus: but at any rate the concentus itself was ancient and original, and Aristarchus only restored it, when it had been spoiled by intervening accidents; at least, if we are to construe revocatum strictly, which, perhaps, is hardly consistent with Wolf’s main theory.

[271] See Wolf, Prolegg. c. xii. p. xliii. “Nondum enim prorsus ejecta et explosa est eorum ratio, qui Homerum et Callimachum et Virgilium et Nonnum et Miltonum eodem animo legunt, nec quid uniuscujusque Ætas ferat, expendere legendo et computare laborant,” etc.

A similar and earlier attempt to construe the Homeric poems with reference to their age, is to be seen in the treatise called Il Vero Omero of Vico,—marked with a good deal of original thought, but not strong in erudition (Opere di Vico, ed. Milan, vol. v. pp. 437-497).

[272] In the forty-sixth volume of his collected works, in the little treatise “Homer, noch einmal:” compare G. Lange, Ueber die Kyklischen Dichter (Mainz, 1837), Preface, p. vi.

[273] “Non esse totam Iliadem aut Odysseam unius poetÆ opus, ita extra dubitationem positam puto, ut qui secus sentiat, eum non satis lectitasse illa carmina contendam.” (Godf. Hermann, PrÆfat. ad Odysseam, Lips. 1825, p. iv.) See the language of the same eminent critic in his treatise “Ueber Homer und Sappho,” Opuscula, vol. v. p. 74.

Lachmann, after having dissected the two thousand two hundred lines in the Iliad, between the beginning of the eleventh book, and line five hundred and ninety of the fifteenth, into four songs, “in the highest degree different in their spirit,” (“ihrem Geiste nach hÖchst verschiedene Lieder,”) tells us that whosoever thinks this difference of spirit inconsiderable,—whosoever does not feel it at once when pointed out,—whosoever can believe that the parts as they stand now belong to one artistically constructed Epos,—“will do well not to trouble himself any more either with my criticisms or with epic poetry, because he is too weak to understand anything about it,” (“weil er zu schwach ist etwas darin zu verstehen:”) Fernere Betrachtungen Ueber die Ilias: Abhandl. Berlin. Acad. 1841, p. 18, § xxiii.

On the contrary, Ulrici, after having shown (or tried to show) that the composition of Homer satisfies perfectly, in the main, all the exigencies of an artistic epic,—adds, that this will make itself at once evident to all those who have any sense of artistical symmetry; but that, for those to whom that sense is wanting, no conclusive demonstration can be given. He warns the latter, however, that they are not to deny the existence of that which their shortsighted vision cannot distinguish, for everything cannot be made clear to children, which the mature man sees through at a glance (Ulrici, Geschichte des Griechischen Epos, Part i. ch. vii. pp. 260-261). Read also Payne Knight, Proleg. c. xxvii, about the insanity of the Wolfian school, obvious even to the “homunculus e trivio.”

I have the misfortune to dissent from both Lachmann and Ulrici; for it appears to me a mistake to put the Iliad and Odyssey on the same footing, as Ulrici does, and as is too frequently done by others.

[274] Plato, Aristotle, and their contemporaries generally, read the most suspicious portions of the Homeric poems as genuine (Nitzsch, Plan und Gang der Odyssee, in the Preface to his second vol. of Comments on the Odyssey, pp. lx-lxiv).

ThucydidÊs accepts the Hymn to Apollo as a composition by the author of the Iliad.

[275] Bernhard Thiersch, Ueber das Zeitalter und Vaterland des Homer (Halberstadt, 1832), Einleitung, pp. 4-18.

[276] Compare i, 295; ii. 145 (??p????? ?e? ?pe?ta d??? ??t?s?e? ????s?e); xi. 118; xiii. 395; xv. 178; also xiv. 162.

[277] Nitzsch, Plan und Gang der Odyssee, p. xliii, prefixed to the second vol. of his Commentary on the Odysseis.

“At carminum primi auditores non adeo curiosi erant (observes Mr. Payne Knight, Proleg. c. xxiii.), ut ejusmodi rerum rationes aut exquirerent aut expenderent; neque eorum fides e subtilioribus congruentiis omnino pendebat. Monendi enim sunt etiam atque etiam Homericorum studiosi, veteres illos ???d??? non lingu professori inter viros criticos et grammaticos, aut alios quoscunque argutiarum captatores, carmina cantitasse, sed inter eos qui sensibus animorum libere, incaute, et effuse indulgerent,” etc. Chap. xxii-xxvii. of Mr. Knight’s Prolegomena, are valuable to the same purpose, showing the “homines rudes et agrestes,” of that day, as excellent judges of what fell under their senses and observation, but careless, credulous, and unobservant of contradiction, in matters which came only under the mind’s eye.

[278] W. MÜller is not correct in saying that, in the first assembly of the gods, Zeus promises something which he does not perform: Zeus does not promise to send Hermes as messenger to KalypsÔ, in the first book, though AthÊnÊ urges him to do so. Zeus, indeed, requires to be urged twice before he dictates to KalypsÔ the release of Odysseus, but he had already intimated, in the first book, that he felt great difficulty in protecting the hero, because of the wrath manifested against him by PoseidÔn.

[279] Odyss. ix. 534.—

[280] Wolf admits, in most unequivocal language, the compact and artful structure of the Odyssey. Against this positive internal evidence, he sets the general presumption, that no such constructive art can possibly have belonged to a poet of the age of Homer: “De Odysse maxime, cujus admirabilis summa et compages pro prÆclarissimo monumento GrÆci ingenii habenda est.... Unde fit ut Odysseam nemo, cui omnino priscus vates placeat, nisi perlectam e manu deponere queat. At illa ars id ipsum est, quod vix ac ne vix quidem cadere videtur in vatem, singulas tantum rhapsodias decantantem,” etc. (Prolegomen. pp. cxviii-cxx; compare cxii.)

[281] Lachmann seems to admit one case in which the composer of one song manifests cognizance of another song, and a disposition to give what will form a sequel to it. His fifteenth song (the Patrokleia) lasts from xv. 592 down to the end of the 17th book: the sixteenth song (including the four next books, from eighteen to twenty-two inclusive) is a continuation of the fifteenth, but by a different poet. (Fernere Betrachtungen Über die Ilias, Abhandl. Berlin. Acad. 1841, sect. xxvi. xxviii. xxix. pp. 24, 34, 42.)

This admission of premeditated adaptation to a certain extent breaks up the integrity of the Wolfian hypothesis.

[282] The advocates of the Wolfian theory, appear to feel the difficulties which beset it; for their language is wavering in respect to these supposed primary constituent atoms. Sometimes Lachmann tells us, that the original pieces were much finer poetry than the Iliad as we now read it; at another time, that it cannot be now discovered what they originally were: nay, he farther admits, (as remarked in the preceding note,) that the poet of the sixteenth song had cognizance of the fifteenth.

But if it be granted that the original constituent songs were so composed, though by different poets, as that the more recent were adapted to the earlier with more or less dexterity and success, this brings us into totally different conditions of the problem. It is a virtual surrender of the Wolfian hypothesis, which, however, Lachmann both means to defend, and does defend with ability; though his vindication of it has, to my mind, only the effect of exposing its inherent weakness by carrying it out into something detailed and positive. I will add, in respect to his Dissertations, so instructive as a microscopic examination of the poem,—1. That I find myself constantly dissenting from that critical feeling, on the strength of which he cuts out parts as interpolations, and discovers traces of the hand of distinct poets; 2. That his objections against the continuity of the narrative are often founded upon lines which the ancient scholiasts and Mr. Payne Knight had already pronounced to be interpolations; 3. That such of his objections as are founded upon lines undisputed, admit in many cases of a complete and satisfactory reply.

[283] Lange, in his Letter to Goethe, Ueber die Einheit der Iliade, p. 33 (1826); Nitzsch, Historia Homeri, Fasciculus 2, PrÆfat. p. x.

[284] Even Aristotle, the great builder-up of the celebrity of Homer as to epical aggregation, found some occasions (it appears) on which he was obliged to be content with simply excusing, without admiring, the poet (Poet. 44 t??? ?????? ??a???? ? p???t?? ?d???? ?fa???e? t? ?t?p??.)

And Hermann observes justly, in his acute treatise De Interpolationibus Homeri (Opuscula, tom. v. p. 53),—“Nisi admirabilis illa Homericorum carminum suavitas lectorum animos quasi incantationibus quibusdam captos teneret, non tam facile delitescerent, quÆ accuratius considerata, et multo minus apte quam quis jure postulet composita esse apparere necesse est.”

This treatise contains many criticisms on the structure of the Iliad, some of them very well founded, though there are many from which I dissent.

[285] In reference to the books from the second to the seventh, inclusive, I agree with the observations of William MÜller, Homerische Vorschule, Abschnitt viii. pp. 116-118.

[286] Lachmann, Fernere Betrachtungen Über die Ilias, Abhandlungen Berlin. Acad. 1841, p. 4.

After having pointed out certain discrepancies which he maintains to prove different composing hands, he adds: “Nevertheless, we must be careful not to regard the single constituent songs in this part of the poem as being distinct and separable in a degree equal to those in the first half; for they all with one accord harmonize in one particular circumstance, which, with reference to the story of the Iliad, is not less important even than the anger of Achilles, viz. that the three most distinguished heroes, AgamemnÔn, Odysseus, and DiomÊdÊs, all become disabled throughout the whole duration of the battles.”

Important for the story of the AchillÊis, I should say, not for that of the Iliad. This remark of Lachmann is highly illustrative for the distinction between the original and the enlarged poem.

[287] I confess my astonishment that a man of so much genius and power of thought as M. Benjamin Constant, should have imagined the original Iliad to have concluded with the death of Patroclus, on the ground that Achilles then becomes reconciled with AgamemnÔn. See the review of B. Constant’s work, De la Religion, etc., by O. MÜller, in the Kleine Schriften of the latter, vol. ii. p. 74.

[288] He appears as the mediator between the insulted Achilles and the Greeks, manifesting kindly sympathies for the latter without renouncing his fidelity to the former. The wounded Machaon, an object of interest to the whole camp, being carried off the field by Nestor,—Achilles, looking on from his distant ship, sends Patroclus to inquire whether it be really Machaon; which enables Nestor to lay before Patroclus the deplorable state of the Grecian host, as a motive to induce him and Achilles again to take arms. The compassionate feelings of Patroclus being powerfully touched, he is hastening to enforce upon Achilles the urgent necessity of giving help, when he meets Eurypylus crawling out of the field, helpless with a severe wound, and imploring his succor. He supports the wounded warrior to his tent, and ministers to his suffering; but before this operation is fully completed, the Grecian host has been totally driven back, and the Trojans are on the point of setting fire to the ships: Patroclus then hurries to Achilles to proclaim the desperate peril which hangs over them all, and succeeds in obtaining his permission to take the field at the head of the Myrmidons. The way in which Patroclus is kept present to the hearer, as a prelude to his brilliant but short-lived display, when he comes forth in arms,—the contrast between his characteristic gentleness and the ferocity of Achilles,—and the natural train of circumstances whereby he is made the vehicle of reconciliation on the part of his offended friend, and rescue to his imperiled countrymen,—all these exhibit a degree of epical skill, in the author of the primitive AchillÊis, to which nothing is found parallel in the added books of the Iliad.

[289] Observe, for example, the following passages:—

1. Achilles, standing on the prow of his ship, sees the general army of Greeks undergoing defeat by the Trojans, and also sees Nestor conveying in his chariot a wounded warrior from the field. He sends Patroclus to find out who the wounded man is: in calling forth Patroclus, he says (xi. 607),—

Heyne, in his comment, asks the question, not unnaturally, “Poenituerat igitur asperitatis erga priorem legationem, an homo arrogans expectaverat alteram ad se missam iri?” I answer, neither one nor the other: the words imply that he had received no embassy at all. He is still the same Achilles who in the first book paced alone by the seashore, devouring his own soul under a sense of bitter affront, and praying to Thetis to aid his revenge: this revenge is now about to be realized, and he hails its approach with delight. But if we admit the embassy of the ninth book to intervene, the passage becomes a glaring inconsistency for that which Achilles anticipates as future, and even yet as contingent, had actually occurred on the previous evening; the Greeks had supplicated at his feet,—they had proclaimed their intolerable need,—and he had spurned them. The Scholiast, in his explanation of these lines, after giving the plain meaning, that “Achilles shows what he has long been desiring, to see the Greeks in a state of supplication to him,”—seems to recollect that this is in contradiction to the ninth book, and tries to remove the contradiction, by saying “that he had been previously mollified by conversation with Phoenix,”—?d? d? p??a?a??e?? ?? ?? t?? F??????? ?????,—a supposition neither countenanced by anything in the poet, nor sufficient to remove the difficulty.

2. The speech of PoseidÔn (xiii. 115) to encourage the dispirited Grecian heroes, in which, after having admitted the injury done to Achilles by AgamemnÔn, he recommends an effort to heal the sore, and intimates “that the minds of good men admit of this healing process,” (???? ??e?e?a ??ss??? ??esta? te f???e? ?s????,) is certainly not very consistent with the supposition that this attempt to heal had been made in the best possible way, and that Achilles had manifested a mind implacable in the extreme on the evening before,—while the mind of AgamemnÔn was already brought to proclaimed humiliation, and needed no farther healing.

3. And what shall we say to the language of Achilles and Patroclus, at the beginning of the sixteenth book, just at the moment when the danger has reached its maximum, and when Achilles is about to send forth his friend?

Neither Nestor, when he invokes and instructs Patroclus as intercessor with Achilles (xi. 654-790), nor Patroclus himself, though in the extreme of anxiety to work upon the mind of Achilles, and reproaching him with hardness of heart,—ever bring to remembrance the ample atonement which had been tendered to him; while Achilles himself repeats the original ground of quarrel, the wrong offered to him in taking away BrisÊis, continuing the language of the first book; then, without the least allusion to the atonement and restitution since tendered, he yields to his friend’s proposition, just like a man whose wrong remained unredressed, but who was, nevertheless, forced to take arms by necessity (xvi. 60-63):—

I agree with the Scholiast and Heyne in interpreting ?f?? ?e as equivalent to d?e??????,—not as referring to any express antecedent declaration.

Again, farther on in the same speech, “The Trojans (Achilles says) now press boldly forward upon the ships, for they no longer see the blaze of my helmet: but if AgamemnÔn were favorably disposed towards me, they would presently run away and fill the ditches with their dead bodies” (71):—

Now here again, if we take our start from the first book, omitting the ninth, the sentiment is perfectly just. But assume the ninth book, and it becomes false and misplaced; for AgamemnÔn is then a prostrate and repentant man, not merely “favorably disposed” towards Achilles, but offering to pay any price for the purpose of appeasing him.

4. Again, a few lines farther, in the same speech, Achilles permits Patroclus to go forth, in consideration of the extreme peril of the fleet, but restricts him simply to avert this peril and do nothing more: “Obey my words, so that you may procure for me honor and glory from the body of Greeks, and that they may send back to me the damsel, giving me ample presents besides: when you have driven the Trojans from the ships, come back again”:—

How are we to reconcile this with the ninth book, where Achilles declares that he does not care for being honored by the Greeks, ix. 604? In the mouth of the affronted Achilles, of the first book, such words are apt enough: he will grant succor, but only to the extent necessary for the emergency, and in such a way as to insure redress for his own wrong,—which redress he has no reason as yet to conclude that AgamemnÔn is willing to grant. But the ninth book has actually tendered to him everything which he here demands, and even more (the daughter of AgamemnÔn in marriage, without the price usually paid for a bride, etc.): BrisÊis, whom now he is so anxious to repossess, was then offered in restitution, and he disdained the offer. Mr. Knight, in fact, strikes out these lines as spurious; partly, because they contradict the ninth book, where Achilles has actually rejected what he here thirsts for (“Dona cum puell jam antea oblata aspernatus erat,”)—partly because he thinks that they express a sentiment unworthy of Achilles; in which latter criticism I do not concur.

5. We proceed a little farther to the address of Patroclus to the Myrmidons, as he is conducting them forth to the battle: “Fight bravely, Myrmidons, that we may bring honor to Achilles; and that the wide-ruling AgamemnÔn may know the mad folly which he committed, when he dishonored the bravest of the Greeks.”

To impress this knowledge upon AgamemnÔn was no longer necessary. The ninth book records his humiliating confession of it, accompanied by atonement and reparation. To teach him the lesson a second time, is to break the bruised reed,—to slay the slain. But leave out the ninth book, and the motive is the natural one,—both for Patroclus to offer, and for the Myrmidons to obey: Achilles still remains a dishonored man, and to humble the rival who has dishonored him is the first of all objects, as well with his friends as with himself.

6. Lastly, the time comes when Achilles, in deep anguish for the death of Patroclus, looks back with aversion and repentance to the past. To what point should we expect that his repentance would naturally turn? Not to his primary quarrel with AgamemnÔn, in which he had been undeniably wronged,—but to the scene in the ninth book, where the maximum of atonement for the previous wrong is tendered to him and scornfully rejected. Yet when we turn to xviii. 108, and xix. 55, 68, 270, we find him reverting to the primitive quarrel in the first book, just as if it had been the last incident in his relations with AgamemnÔn: moreover, AgamemnÔn (xix. 86), in his speech of reconciliation, treats the past just in the same way,—deplores his original insanity in wronging Achilles.

7. When we look to the prayers of Achilles and Thetis, addressed to Zeus in the first book, we find that the consummation prayed for is,—honor to Achilles,—redress for the wrong offered to him,—victory to the Trojans until AgamemnÔn and the Greeks shall be made bitterly sensible of the wrong which they have done to their bravest warrior (i. 409-509). Now this consummation is brought about in the ninth book. Achilles can get no more, nor does he ultimately get more, either in the way of redress to himself or remorseful humiliation of AgamemnÔn, than what is here tendered. The defeat which the Greeks suffer in the battle of the eighth book (????? ????) has brought about the consummation. The subsequent and much more destructive defeats which they undergo are thus causeless: yet Zeus is represented as inflicting them reluctantly, and only because they are necessary to honor Achilles (xiii. 350; xv. 75, 235, 598; compare also viii. 372 and 475).

If we reflect upon the constitution of the poem, we shall see that the fundamental sequence of ideas in it is, a series of misfortunes to the Greeks, brought on by Zeus for the special purpose of procuring atonement to Achilles and bringing humiliation on AgamemnÔn: the introduction of Patroclus superadds new motives of the utmost interest, but it is most harmoniously worked into the fundamental sequence. Now the intrusion of the ninth book breaks up the scheme of the poem by disuniting the sequence: AgamemnÔn is on his knees before Achilles, entreating pardon and proffering reparation, yet the calamities of the Greeks become more and more dreadful. The atonement of the ninth book comes at the wrong time and in the wrong manner.

There are four passages (and only four, so far as I am aware) in which the embassy of the ninth book is alluded to in the subsequent books: one in xviii. 444-456, which was expunged as spurious by Aristarchus (see the Scholia and Knight’s commentary, ad loc.); and three others in the following book, wherein the gifts previously tendered by Odysseus as the envoy of AgamemnÔn are noticed as identical with the gifts actually given in the nineteenth book. I feel persuaded that these passages (vv. 140-141, 192-195, and 243) are specially inserted for the purpose of establishing a connection between the ninth book and the nineteenth. The four lines (192-195) are decidedly better away: the first two lines (140-141) are noway necessary; while the word ?????? (which occurs in both passages) is only rendered admissible by being stretched to mean nudius tertius (Heyne, ad loc.).

I will only farther remark with respect to the ninth book, that the speech of AgamemnÔn (17-28), the theme for the rebuke of DiomÊdÊs and the obscure commonplace of Nestor, is taken verbatim from his speech in the second book, in which place the proposition, of leaving the place and flying, is made, not seriously, but as a stratagem (ii. 110, 118, 140).

The length of this note can only be excused by its direct bearing upon the structure of the Iliad. To show that the books from the eleventh downwards are composed by a poet who has no knowledge of the ninth book, is, in my judgment, a very important point of evidence in aiding us to understand what the original AchillÊis was. The books from the second to the seventh inclusive are insertions into the AchillÊis, and lie apart from its plot, but do not violently contradict it, except in regard to the agora of the gods at the beginning of the fourth book, and the almost mortal wound of SarpÊdon in his battle with Tlepolemus. But the ninth book overthrows the fundamental scheme of the poem.

[291] Iliad, xi. 659; xiv. 128; xvi. 25.

[292] The intervention of Oneirus ought rather to come as an immediate preliminary to book viii. than to book ii. The first forty-seven lines of book ii would fit on and read consistently at the beginning of book viii, the events of which book form a proper sequel to the mission of Oneirus.

[293] O. MÜller, (History of Greek Literature, ch. v. § 8,) doubts whether the beginning of the second book was written “by the ancient Homer, or by one of the later Homerids:” he thinks the speech of AgamemnÔn, wherein he plays off the deceit upon his army, is “a copious parody (of the same words used in the ninth book) composed by a later Homerid, and inserted in the room of an originally shorter account of the arming of the Greeks.” He treats the scene in the Grecian agora as “an entire mythical comedy, full of fine irony and with an amusing plot, in which the deceiving and deceived AgamemnÔn is the chief character.”

The comic or ironical character which is here ascribed to the second book appears to me fanciful and incorrect; but MÜller evidently felt the awkwardness of the opening incident, though his way of accounting for it is not successful. The second book seems to my judgment just as serious as any part of the poem.

I think also that the words alluded to by O. MÜller in the ninth book are a transcript of those in the second, instead of the reverse, as he believes,—because it seems probable that the ninth book is an addition made to the poem after the books between the first and the eighth had been already inserted,—it is certainly introduced after the account of the fortification, contained in the seventh book, had become a part of the poem: see ix. 349. The author of the Embassy to Achilles fancied that that hero had been too long out of sight, and out of mind,—a supposition for which there was no room in the original AchillÊis, when the eighth and eleventh books followed in immediate succession to the first, but which offers itself naturally to any one on reading our present Iliad.

[294] Iliad, vii. 327.

[295] Heyne treats the eighth book as decidedly a separate song, or epic; a supposition which the language of Zeus and the agora of the gods at the beginning are alone sufficient to refute, in my judgment (Excursus 1, ad lib. xi. vol. vi. p. 269). This Excursus, in describing the sequence of events in the Iliad, passes at once and naturally from book eighth to book eleventh.

And Mr. Payne Knight, when he defends book eleventh against Heyne, says, “QuÆ in undecim rhapsodi Iliadis narrata sunt, haud minus ex ante narratis pendent: neque rationem pugnÆ commissÆ, neque rerum in e gestarum nexum atque ordinem, quisquam intelligere posset, nisi iram et secessum Achillis, et victoriam quam Trojani inde consecuti erant, antea cognosset.” (Prolegom. c. xxix.)

Perfectly true: to understand the eleventh book, we must have before us the first and the eighth (which are those that describe the anger and withdrawal of Achilles, and the defeat which the Greeks experience in consequence of it); we may dispense with the rest.

[296] O. MÜller (Hist. Greek Literat. ch. v. § 6) says, about this wall: “Nor is it until the Greeks are taught by the experience of the first day’s fighting, that the Trojans can resist them in open battle, that the Greeks build the wall round their ships.... This appeared to ThucydidÊs so little conformable to historical probability, that, without regard to the authority of Homer, he placed the building of these walls immediately after the landing.”

It is to be lamented, I think, that ThucydidÊs took upon him to determine the point at all as a matter of history; but when he once undertook this, the account in the Iliad was not of a nature to give him much satisfaction, nor does the reason assigned by MÜller make it better. It is implied in MÜller’s reason that, before the first day’s battle, the Greeks did not believe that the Trojans could resist them in open battle: the Trojans (according to him) never had maintained the field, so long as Achilles was up and fighting on the Grecian side, and therefore the Greeks were quite astonished to find now, for the first time, that they could do so.

Now nothing can be more at variance with the tenor of the second and following books than this supposition. The Trojans come forth readily and fight gallantly; neither AgamemnÔn, nor Nestor, nor Odysseus consider them as enemies who cannot hold front; and the circuit of exhortation by AgamemnÔn (EpipÔlÊsis), so strikingly described in the fourth book, proves that he does not anticipate a very easy victory. Nor does Nestor, in proposing the construction of the wall, give the smallest hint that the power of the Trojans to resist in the open field was to the Greeks an unexpected discovery.

The reason assigned by MÜller, then, is a fancy of his own, proceeding from the same source of mistake as others among his remarks; because he tries to find, in the books between the first and eighth, a governing reference to Achilles (the point of view of the AchillÊis), which those books distinctly refuse. The AchillÊis was a poem of Grecian disasters up to the time when Achilles sent forth Patroclus; and during those disasters, it might suit the poet to refer by contrast to the past time when Achilles was active, and to say that then the Trojans did not dare even to present themselves in battle-array in the field, whereas now they were assailing the ships. But the author of books ii. to vii. has no wish to glorify Achilles: he gives us a picture of the Trojan war generally, and describes the Trojans, not only as brave and equal enemies, but well known by the Greeks themselves to be so.

The building of the Grecian wall, as it now stands described, is an unexplained proceeding, which MÜller’s ingenuity does not render consistent.

[297] Schol. ad Iliad. x. 1.

[298] AgamemnÔn, after deploring the misguiding influence of AtÊ, which induced him to do the original wrong to Achilles, says (xix. 88-137),—

[299] The supposition of a smaller original Iliad, enlarged by successive additions to the present dimensions, and more or less interpolated (we must distinguish enlargement from interpolation,—the insertion of a new rhapsody from that of a new line), seems to be a sort of intermediate compromise, towards which the opposing views of Wolf, J. H. Voss, Nitzsch, Hermann, and Boeckh, all converge. Baumgarten-Crusius calls this smaller poem an AchillÊis.

Wolf, Preface to the GÖschen edit. of the Iliad, pp. xii-xxiii; Voss, Anti-Symbolik, part ii. p. 234; Nitzsch, Histor. Homeri, Fasciculus i. p. 112; and Vorrede to the second volume of his Comments on the Odyssey, p. xxvi: “In the Iliad (he there says) many single portions may very easily be imagined as parts of another whole, or as having been once separately sung.” (See Baumgarten-Crusius, Preface to his edition of W. MÜller’s Homerische Vorschule, pp. xlv-xlix.)

Nitzsch distinguishes the Odyssey from the Iliad, and I think justly, in respect to this supposed enlargement. The reasons which warrant us in applying this theory to the Iliad have no bearing upon the Odyssey. If there ever was an Ur-Odyssee, we have no means of determining what it contained.

[300] The remarks of O. MÜller on the Iliad (in his History of Greek Literature) are highly deserving of perusal: with much of them I agree, but there is also much which seems to me unfounded. The range of combination, and the far-fetched narrative stratagem which he ascribes to the primitive author, are in my view inadmissible (chap. v. § 5-11):—

“The internal connection of the Iliad (he observes, § 6) rests upon the union of certain parts; and neither the interesting introduction, describing the defeat of the Greeks up to the burning of the ship of Protesilaus, nor the turn of affairs brought about by the death of Patroclus, nor the final pacification of the anger of Achilles, could be spared from the Iliad, when the fruitful seed of such a poem had once been sown in the soul of Homer, and had begun to develop its growth. But the plan of the Iliad is certainly very much extended beyond what was actually necessary; and in particular, the preparatory part, consisting of the attempts on the part of the other heroes to compensate for the absence of Achilles, has, it must be owned, been drawn out to a disproportionate length, so that the suspicion that there were later insertions of importance applies with greater probability to the first than to the last books.... A design manifested itself at an early period to make this poem complete in itself, so that all the subjects, descriptions, and actions, which could alone give interest to a poem on the entire war, might find a place within the limits of its composition. For this purpose, it is not improbable that many lays of earlier bards, who had sung single adventures of the Trojan war, were laid under contribution, and the finest parts of them incorporated in the new poem.”

These remarks of O. MÜller intimate what is (in my judgment) the right view, inasmuch as they recognize an extension of the plan of the poem beyond its original limit, manifested by insertions in the first half; and it is to be observed that, in his enumeration of those parts, the union of which is necessary to the internal connection of the Iliad, nothing is mentioned except what is comprised in books i. viii. xi. to xxii. or xxiv. But his description of “the preparatory part,” as “the attempts of the other heroes to compensate for the absence of Achilles,” is noway borne out by the poet himself. From the second to the seventh book, Achilles is scarcely alluded to; moreover, the Greeks do perfectly well without him. This portion of the poem displays, not “the insufficiency of all the other heroes without Achilles,” as MÜller had observed in the preceding section, but the perfect sufficiency of the Greeks under DiomÊdÊs, AgamemnÔn, etc. to make head against Troy; it is only in the eighth book that their insufficiency begins to be manifested, and only in the eleventh book that it is consummated by the wounds of the three great heroes. DiomÊdÊs is, in fact, exalted to a pitch of glory in regard to contests with the gods, which even Achilles himself never obtains afterwards, and Helenus the Trojan puts him above Achilles (vi. 99) in terrific prowess. Achilles is mentioned two or three times as absent, and AgamemnÔn, in his speech to the Grecian agora, regrets the quarrel (ii. 377), but we never hear any such exhortation as, “Let us do our best to make up for the absence of Achilles,”—not even in the EpipÔlÊsis of AgamemnÔn, where it would most naturally be found. “Attempts to compensate for the absence of Achilles” must, therefore, be treated as the idea of the critic, not of the poet.

Though O. MÜller has glanced at the distinction between the two parts of the poem (an original part, having chief reference to Achilles and the Greeks; and a superinduced part, having reference to the entire war), he has not conceived it clearly, nor carried it out consistently. If we are to distinguish these two points of view at all, we ought to draw the lines at the end of the first book and at the beginning of the eighth, thus regarding the intermediate six books as belonging to the picture of the entire war (or the Iliad as distinguished from the AchillÊis): the point of view of the AchillÊis, dropped at the end of the first book, is resumed at the beginning of the eighth. The natural fitting together of these two parts is noticed in the comment of Heyne, ad viii. 1: “CÆterum nunc Jupiter aperte solvit Thetidi promissa, dum reddit causam Trojanorum bello superiorem, ut Achillis desiderium Achivos, et poenitentia injuriÆ ei illatÆ Agamemnonem incessat (cf. i. 5). Nam quÆ adhuc narrata sunt, partim continebantur in fortun belli utrinque tentat ... partim valebant ad narrationem variandam,” etc. The first and the eighth books belong to one and the same point of view, while all the intermediate books belong to the other. But O. MÜller seeks to prove that a portion of these intermediate books belongs to one common point of view with the first and eighth, though he admits that they have been enlarged by insertions. Here I think he is mistaken. Strike out anything which can be reasonably allowed for enlargement in the books between the first and eighth, and the same difficulty will still remain in respect to the remainder; for all the incidents between those two points are brought out in a spirit altogether indifferent to Achilles or his anger. The Zeus of the fourth book, as contrasted with Zeus in the first or eighth, marks the difference; and this description of Zeus is absolutely indispensable as the connecting link between book iii. on the one side and books iv. and v. on the other. Moreover, the attempt of O. MÜller, to force upon the larger portion of what is between the first and eighth books the point of view of the AchillÊis, is never successful: the poet does not exhibit in those books “insufficient efforts of other heroes to compensate for the absence of Achilles,” but a general and highly interesting picture of the Trojan war, with prominent reference to the original ground of quarrel. In this picture, the duel between Paris and Menelaus forms naturally the foremost item,—but how far-fetched is the reasoning whereby O. MÜller brings that striking recital within the scheme of the AchillÊis! “The Greeks and Trojans are for the first time struck by an idea, which might have occurred in the previous nine years, if the Greeks, when assisted by Achilles, had not, from confidence in their superior strength, considered every compromise as unworthy of them,—namely, to decide the war by a single combat between the authors of it.” Here the causality of Achilles is dragged in by main force, and unsupported either by any actual statement in the poem or by any reasonable presumption; for it is the Trojans who propose the single combat, and we are not told that they had ever proposed it before, though they would have had stronger reasons for proposing it during the presence of Achilles than during his absence.

O. MÜller himself remarks (§ 7), “that from the second to the seventh book Zeus appears as it were to have forgotten his resolution and his promise to Thetis.” In other words, the poet, during this part of the poem, drops the point of view of the AchillÊis to take up that of the more comprehensive Iliad: the AchillÊis reappears in book viii,—again disappears in book x,—and is resumed from book xi. to the end of the poem.

[301] This tendency to insert new homogeneous matter by new poets into poems already existing, is noticed by M. Fauriel, in reference to the Romans of the Middle Ages:—

“C’est un phÉnomÈne remarquable dans l’histoire de la poÉsie Épique, que cette disposition, cette tendance constante du goÛt populaire À amalgamer, À lier en une seule et mÊme composition le plus possible des compositions diverses,—cette disposition persiste chez un peuple, tant que la poÉsie conserve un reste de vie; tant qu’elle s’y transmet par la tradition et qu’elle y circule À l’aide du chant ou des rÉcitations publiques. Elle cesse partout oÙ la poÉsie est une fois fixÉe dans les livres, et n’agit plus que par la lecture,—cette derniÈre Époque est pour ainsi dire, celle de la propriÉtÉ poÉtique—celle oÙ chaque poËte prÉtend À une existence, À une gloire, personnelles; et oÙ la poÉsie cesse d’Être une espÈce de trÉsor commun dont le peuple jouit et dispose À sa maniÈre, sans s’inquiÉter des individus qui le lui ont fait.” (Fauriel, Sur les Romans Chevaleresques, leÇon 5^me, Revue des Deux Mondes, vol. xiii. p. 707.)

M. Fauriel thinks that the Shah Nameh of Ferdusi was an amalgamation of epic poems originally separate, and that probably the Mahabharat was so also (ib. 708).

[302] The remarks of Boeckh, upon the possibility of such coÖperation of poets towards one and the same scheme are perfectly just:—

“Atqui quomodo componi a variis auctoribus successu temporum rhapsodiÆ potuerint, quÆ post prima initia directÆ jam ad idem consilium et quam vocant unitatem carminis sint ... missis istorum declamationibus qui populi universi opus Homerum esse jactant ... tum potissimum intelligetur, ubi gentis civilis Homeridarum propriam et peculiarem Homericam poesin fuisse, veteribus ipsis si non testibus, at certe ducibus, concedetur.... QuÆ quum ita sint, non erit adeo difficile ad intelligendum, quomodo, post prima initia ab egregio vate facta, in gente sacrorum et artis communione sociatÂ, multÆ rhapsodiÆ ad unum potuerint consilium dirigi.” (Index Lection. 1834, p. 12.)

I transcribe this passage from Giese (Ueber den Æolischen Dialekt, p. 157), not having been able to see the essay of which it forms a part.

[303] Wolf, Prolegom. p. cxxxviii. “Quippe in universum idem sonus est omnibus libris; idem habitus sententiarum, orationis, numerorum,” etc.

[304] Wolf, Prolegomen. p. cxxxvii. “Equidem certe quoties in continenti lectione ad istas partes (i. e. the last six books) deveni, nunquam non in iis talia quÆdam sensi, quÆ nisi illÆ tam mature cum ceteris coaluissent, quovis pignore contendam, dudum ab eruditis detecta et animadversa fuisse, immo multa ejus generis, ut cum nunc ??????tata habeantur, si tantummodo in Hymnis legerentur, ipsa sola eos suspicionibus ???e?a? adspersura essent.” Compare the sequel, p. cxxxviii, “ubi nervi deficiant et spiritus Homericus,—jejunum et frigidum in locis multis,” etc.

[305] Iliad, xx. 25. Zeus addresses the agora of the gods,—

The formal restriction put upon the gods by Zeus at the beginning of the eighth book, and the removal of that restriction at the beginning of the twentieth, are evidently parts of one preconceived scheme.

It is difficult to determine whether the battle of the gods and goddesses in book xxi. (385-520) is to be expunged as spurious, or only to be blamed as of inferior merit (“improbanda tantum, non resecanda—hoc enim est illud, quo plerumque summa criseÔs HomericÆ redit,” as Heyne observes in another place, Obss. Iliad. xviii. 444). The objections on the score of non-Homeric locution are not forcible (see P. Knight, ad loc.), and the scene belongs to that vein of conception which animates the poet in the closing act of his AchillÊis.

[306] While admitting that these last books of the Iliad are not equal in interest with those between the eleventh and eighteenth, we may add that they exhibit many striking beauties, both of plan and execution, and one in particular may be noticed as an example of happy epical adaptation. The Trojans are on the point of ravishing from the Greeks the dead body of Patroclus, when Achilles (by the inspiration of HÊrÊ and Iris) shows himself unarmed on the Grecian mound, and by his mere figure and voice strikes such terror into the Trojans that they relinquish the dead body. As soon as night arrives, Polydamas proposes, in the Trojan agora, that the Trojans shall retire without farther delay from the ships to the town, and shelter themselves within the walls, without awaiting the assault of Achilles armed on the next morning. Hector repels this counsel of Polydamas with expressions,—not merely of overweening confidence in his own force, even against Achilles,—but also of extreme contempt and harshness towards the giver; whose wisdom, however, is proved by the utter discomfiture of the Trojans the next day. Now this angry deportment and mistake on the part of Hector is made to tell strikingly in the twenty-second book, just before his death. There yet remains a moment for him to retire within the walls, and thus obtain shelter against the near approach of his irresistible enemy, but he is struck with the recollection of that fatal moment when he repelled the counsel which would have saved his countrymen: “If I enter the town, Polydamas will be the first to reproach me, as having brought destruction upon Troy on that fatal night when Achilles came forth, and when I resisted his better counsel.” (Compare xviii. 250-315; xxii. 100-110; and Aristot. Ethic. iii. 8.)

In a discussion respecting the structure of the Iliad, and in reference to arguments which deny all designed concatenation of parts, it is not out of place to notice this affecting touch of poetry, belonging to those books which are reproached as the feeblest.

[307] The latter portion of the seventh book is spoiled by the very unsatisfactory addition introduced to explain the construction of the wall and ditch: all the other incidents (the agora and embassy of the Trojans, the truce for burial, the arrival of wine-ships from Lemnos, etc.) suit perfectly with the scheme of the poet of these books, to depict the Trojan war generally.

[308] Unless, indeed, we are to imagine the combat between Tlepolemus and SarpÊdon, and that between Glaukus and DiomÊdÊs, to be separate songs; and they are among the very few passages in the Iliad which are completely separable, implying no special antecedents.

[309] Compare also Heyne, Excursus ii. sect. ii. ad Iliad. xxiv. vol. viii. p. 783.

[310] Subsequent poets, seemingly thinking that the naked story, (of DiomÊdÊs slaughtering RhÊsus and his companions in their sleep,) as it now stands in the Iliad, was too displeasing, adopted different ways of dressing it up. Thus, according to Pindar (ap. Schol. Iliad. x. 435), RhÊsus fought one day as the ally of Troy, and did such terrific damage, that the Greeks had no other means of averting total destruction from his hand on the next day, except by killing him during the night. And the Euripidean drama, called RhÊsus, though representing the latter as a new-comer, yet puts into the mouth of AthÊnÊ the like overwhelming predictions of what he would do on the coming day, if suffered to live; so that to kill him in the night is the only way of saving the Greeks (Eurip. RhÊs. 602): moreover, RhÊsus himself is there brought forward as talking with such overweening insolence, that the sympathies of man, and the envy of the gods, are turned against him (ib. 458).

But the story is best known in the form and with the addition (equally unknown to the Iliad) which Virgil has adopted. It was decreed by fate that, if the splendid horses of RhÊsus were permitted once either to taste the Trojan provender, or to drink of the river Xanthus, nothing could preserve the Greeks from ruin (Æneid, i. 468, with Servius, ad loc.):—

All these versions are certainly improvements upon the story as it stands in the Iliad.

[311] Mr. Knight places the Iliad about two centuries, and the Odyssey one century, anterior to Hesiod: a century between the two poems (Prolegg. c. lxi.)

[312] Hermann, PrÆfat. ad Odyss. p. vii.

[313] Knight, Prolegg. 1, c. Odyss. xxii. 465-478.

[314] The arguments, upon the faith of which Payne Knight and other critics have maintained the Odyssey to be younger than the Iliad, are well stated and examined in Bernard Thiersch,—QuÆstio de Divers Iliadis et OdysseÆ Ætate,—in the Anhang (p. 306) to his work Ueber das Zeitalter und Vaterland des Homer.

He shows all such arguments to be very inconclusive; though the grounds upon which he himself maintains identity of age between the two appear to me not at all more satisfactory (p. 327): we can infer nothing to the point from the mention of Telemachus in the Iliad.

Welcker thinks that there is a great difference of age, and an evident difference of authorship, between the two poems (Der Episch. Cyclus, p. 295).

O. MÜller admits the more recent date of the Odyssey, but considers it “difficult and hazardous to raise upon this foundation any definite conclusions as to the person and age of the poet.” (History of the Literature of Ancient Greece, ch. v. s. 13.)

[315] Dr. Thirlwall has added to the second edition of his History of Greece a valuable Appendix, on the early history of the Homeric poems (vol. i. pp. 500-516); which contains copious information respecting the discrepant opinions of German critics, with a brief comparative examination of their reasons. I could have wished that so excellent a judge had superadded, to his enumeration of the views of others, an ampler exposition of his own. Dr. Thirlwall seems decidedly convinced upon that which appears to me the most important point in the Homeric controversy: “That before the appearance of the earliest of the poems of the Epic Cycle, the Iliad and Odyssey, even if they did not exist precisely in their present form, had at least reached their present compass, and were regarded each as a complete and well-defined whole, not as a fluctuating aggregate of fugitive pieces.” (p. 509.)

This marks out the Homeric poems as ancient both in the items and in the total, and includes negation of the theory of Wolf and Lachmann, who contend that, as a total, they only date from the age of Peisistratus. It is then safe to treat the poems as unquestionable evidences of Grecian antiquity (meaning thereby 776 B.C.), which we could not do if we regarded all congruity of parts in the poems as brought about through alterations of Peisistratus and his friends.

There is also a very just admonition of Dr. Thirlwall (p. 516) as to the difficulty of measuring what degree of discrepancy or inaccuracy might or might not have escaped the poet’s attention, in an age so imperfectly known to us.

[316] There are just remarks on this point in Heyne’s Excursus, ii. sect. 2 and 4, ad Il. xxiv. vol. viii. pp. 771-800.

[317] “Wenig Deutsche, und vielleicht nur wenige Menschen aller neuern Nationen, haben GefÜhl fÜr ein Æsthetisches Ganzes: sie loben und tadeln nur stellenweise, sie entzÜcken sich nur stellenweise.” (Goethe, Wilhelm Meister: I transcribe this from Welcker’s Æschyl. Trilogie, p. 306.)

What ground there is for restricting this proposition to modern as contrasted with ancient nations, I am unable to conceive.

[318] The ?????e?a ???ata of Homer were extolled by Aristotle; see Schol. ad Iliad. i. 481; compare Dionys. Halicarn. De Compos. Verbor. c. 20. ?ste ?d?? ??? d?af??e?? ????e?a t? p???ata ? ?e??e?a ????. Respecting the undisguised bursts of feeling by the heroes, the Scholiast ad Iliad, i. 349 tells us,—?t???? t? ?p????? p??? d????a,—compare Euripid. Helen. 959, and the severe censures of Plato, Republ. ii. p. 388.

The Homeric poems were the best understood, and the most widely popular of all Grecian composition, even among the least instructed persons, such (for example) as the semibarbarians who had acquired the Greek language in addition to their own mother tongue. (Dio Chrysost. Or. xviii. vol. i. p. 478; Or. liii. vol. ii. p. 277, Reisk.) Respecting the simplicity and perspicuity of the narrative style, implied in this extensive popularity, Porphyry made a singular remark: he said, that the sentences of Homer really presented much difficulty and obscurity, but that ordinary readers fancied they understood him, “because of the general clearness which appeared to run through the poems.” (See the Prolegomena of Villoison’s edition of the Iliad, p. xli.) This remark affords the key to a good deal of the Homeric criticism. There doubtless were real obscurities in the poems, arising from altered associations, customs, religion, language, etc., as well as from corrupt text; but while the critics did good service in elucidating these difficulties, they also introduced artificially many others, altogether of their own creating. Refusing to be satisfied with the plain and obvious meaning, they sought in Homer hidden purposes, elaborate innuendo, recondite motives even with regard to petty details, deep-laid rhetorical artifices (see a specimen in Dionys. Hal. Ars Rhetor. c. 15, p. 316, Reiske; nor is even Aristotle exempt from similar tendencies, Schol. ad Iliad. iii. 441, x. 198), or a substratum of philosophy allegorized. No wonder that passages, quite perspicuous to the vulgar reader, seemed difficult to them.

There could not be so sure a way of missing the real Homer as by searching for him in these devious recesses. He is essentially the poet of the broad highway and the market-place, touching the common sympathies and satisfying the mental appetencies of his countrymen with unrivalled effect; but exempt from ulterior views, either selfish or didactic, and immersed in the same medium of practical life and experience, religiously construed, as his auditors. No nation has ever yet had so perfect and touching an exposition of its early social mind as the Iliad and Odyssey exhibit.

In the verbal criticism of Homer, the Alexandrine literati seem to have made a very great advance, as compared with the glossographers who preceded them. (See Lehrs, De Studiis Aristarchi, Dissert. ii. p. 42.)

[319] Horat. Epist. i. 2, v. 1-26:—

Horace contrasts the folly and greediness of the companions of Ulysses, in accepting the refreshments tendered to them by Circe, with the self-command of Ulysses himself in refusing them. But in the incident as described in the original poem, neither the praise nor the blame, here implied, finds any countenance. The companions of Ulysses follow the universal practice in accepting hospitality tendered to strangers, the fatal consequences of which, in their particular case, they could have no ground for suspecting; while Ulysses is preserved from a similar fate, not by any self-command of his own, but by a previous divine warning and a special antidote, which had not been vouchsafed to the rest (see Odyss. x. 285). And the incident of the Sirens, if it is to be taken as evidence of anything, indicates rather the absence, than the presence, of self-command on the part of Ulysses.

Of the violent mutations of text, whereby the Grammatici or critics tried to efface from Homer bad ethical tendencies (we must remember that many of these men were lecturers to youth), a remarkable specimen is afforded by Venet. Schol. ad Iliad. ix. 453; compare Plutarch, de Audiendis Poetis, p. 95. Phoenix describes the calamitous family tragedy in which he himself had been partly the agent, partly the victim. Now that an Homeric hero should confess guilty proceedings, and still more guilty designs, without any expression of shame or contrition, was insupportable to the feelings of the critics. One of them, Aristodemus, thrust two negative particles into one of the lines; and though he thereby ruined not only the sense but the metre, his emendation procured for him universal applause, because he had maintained the innocence of the hero (?a? ?? ???? ??d????se?, ???? ?a? ?t????, ?? e?se? t???sa? t?? ???a). And Aristarchus thought the case so alarming, that he struck out from the text four lines, which have only been preserved to us by Plutarch (? ?? ???sta???? ??e??e t? ?p? ta?ta, f???e??). See the Fragment of Dioscorides (pe?? t?? pa?? ???? ????) in Didot’s Fragmenta Historicor. GrÆcor. vol. ii. p. 193.

[320] “C’est un tableau idÉal, À coup sÛr, que celui de la sociÉtÉ Grecque dans les chants qui portent le nom d’HomÈre: et pourtant cette sociÉtÉ y est toute entiÈre reproduite, avec la rusticitÉ, la fÉrocitÉ de ses moeurs, ses bonnes et ses mauvaises passions, sans dessein de faire particuliÈrement ressortir, de cÉlÉbrer tel ou tel de ses mÉrites, de ses avantages, ou de laisser dans l’ombre ses vices et ses maux. Ce mÉlange du bien et du mal, du fort et du faible,—cette simultanÉitÉ d’idÉes et de sentimens en apparence contraires,—cette variÉtÉ, cette incohÉrence, ce dÉveloppement inÉgal de la nature et de la destinÉe humaine,—c’est prÉcisÉment lÀ ce qu’il y a de plus poÉtique, car c’est le fond mÊme des choses, c’est la vÉritÉ sur l’homme et le monde: et dans les peintures idÉales qu’en veulent faire la poÉsie, le roman et mÊme l’histoire, cet ensemble, si divers et pourtant si harmonieux, doit se retrouver: sans quoi l’idÉal vÉritable y manque aussi bien que la rÉalitÉ.” (Guizot, Cours d’Histoire Moderne; LeÇon 7^me, vol. i. p. 285.)

[321] Compare Strong, Statistics of the Kingdom of Greece, p. 2; and Kruse, Hellas, vol. i. ch. 3, p. 196.

[322] DikÆarch, 31, p. 460, ed. Fuhr:—

Skylax, c. 35.—??a??a—??te??e? ???eta? ? ????? s??e??? e??a? ???? ???e??? p?t???, ?a? ?????? ?a???t???? p??e??, ? ?st? pa?? t?? p?ta??.

[323] Herod. i. 146: ii. 56. The Molossian AlkÔn passes for a Hellen (Herod. vi. 127).

[324] The mountain systems in the ancient Macedonia and Illyricum, north of Olympus, have been yet but imperfectly examined: see Dr. Griesebach, Reise durch Rumelien und nach Brussa im Jahre 1839, vol. ii. ch. 13, p. 112, seqq. (GÖtting. 1841), which contains much instruction respecting the real relations of these mountains as compared with the different ideas and representations of them. The words of Strabo (lib. vii. Excerpt. 3, ed. Tzschucke), that Scardus, OrbÊlus, RhodopÊ, and HÆmus extend in a straight line from the Adriatic to the Euxine, are incorrect.

See Leake’s Travels in Northern Greece, vol. i. p. 335: the pass of Tschangon, near Castoria (through which the river Devol passes from the eastward to fall into the Adriatic on the westward), is the only cleft in this long chain from the river Drin in the north down to the centre of Greece.

[325] For the general sketch of the mountain system of Hellas, see Kruse, Hellas, vol. i. ch. 4, pp. 280-290; Dr. Cramer, Geog. of An. Greece, vol. i. pp. 3-8.

Respecting the northern regions, Epirus, Illyria, and Macedonia, O. MÜller, in his short but valuable treatise Ueber die Makedoner, p. 7 (Berlin, 1825), may be consulted with advantage. This treatise is annexed to the English translation of his History of the Dorians by Mr. G. C. Lewis.

[326] Out of the 47,600,000 stremas (= 12,000,000 English acres) included in the present kingdom of Greece, 26,500,000 go to mountains, rocks, rivers, lakes, and forests,—and 21,000,000 to arable land, vineyards, olive and currant grounds, etc. By arable land is meant, land fit for cultivation; for a comparatively small portion of it is actually cultivated at present (Strong, Statistics of Greece, p. 2, London, 1842).

The modern kingdom of Greece does not include Thessaly. The epithet ?????? (hollow) is applied to several of the chief Grecian states,—????? ????, ????? ?a?eda???, ?????? ?????, etc.

???????? ?f??? te ?a? ????a??eta?, Strabo, viii. p. 381.

The fertility of Boeotia is noticed in Strabo, ix. p. 400, and in the valuable fragment of DikÆarchus, ???? ????d??, p. 140, ed. Fuhr.

[327] For the geological and mineralogical character of Greece, see the survey undertaken by Dr. Fiedler, by orders of the present government of Greece, in 1834 and the following years (Reise durch alle Theile des KÖnigreichs Griechenland in Auftrag der K. G. Regierung in den Jahren 1834 bis 1837, especially vol. ii. pp. 512-530).

Professor Ross remarks upon the character of the Greek limestone,—hard and intractable to the mason,—jagged and irregular in its fracture,—as having first determined in early times the polygonal style of architecture, which has been denominated (he observes) Cyclopian and Pelasgic, without the least reason for either denomination (Reise auf den Griech. Inseln, vol. i. p. 15).

[328] Griesebach, Reisen durch Rumelien, vol. ii. ch. 13, p. 124.

[329] In passing through the valley between Œta and Parnassus, going towards Elateia, Fiedler observes the striking change in the character of the country. “Romelia (i. e. Akarnania, Ætolia, Ozolian Lokris, etc.), woody, well-watered, and covered with a good soil, ceases at once and precipitously: while craggy limestone mountains, of a white-grey color, exhibit the cold character of Attica and the Morea.” (Fiedler, Reise, i. p. 213.)

The Homeric Hymn to Apollo conceives even the ped??? p???f???? of Thebes as having in its primitive state been covered with wood (v. 227).

The best timber used by the ancient Greeks came from Macedonia, the Euxine, and the Propontis: the timber of Mount Parnassus and of Euboea was reckoned very bad; that of Arcadia better (Theophrast. v. 2, 1; iii. 9).

[330] See Fiedler, Reise, etc. vol. i. pp. 84, 219, 362, etc.

Both Fiedler and Strong (Statistics of Greece, p. 169) dwell with great reason upon the inestimable value of Artesian wells for the country.

[331] Ross, Reise auf den Griechischen Inseln, vol. i. letter 2, p. 12.

[333] Thucydid. ii. 102.

[334] Strabo, ix. p. 407.

[335] Colonel Leake observes (Travels in Morea, vol. iii. pp. 45, 153-155), “The plain of Tripolitza (anciently that of Tegea and Mantineia) is by far the greatest of that cluster of valleys in the centre of Peloponnesus, each of which is so closely shut in by the intersecting mountains, that no outlet is afforded to the waters except through the mountains themselves,” etc. Respecting the Arcadian Orchomenus, and its inclosed lake with Katabothra, see the same work, p. 103; and the mountain plains near Corinth, p. 263.

This temporary disappearance of the rivers was familiar to the ancient observers—?? ?atap???e??? t?? p?ta??. (Aristot. Meteorolog. i. 13. Diodor. xv. 49. Strabo, vi. p. 271; viii. p. 389, etc.)

Their familiarity with this phenomenon was in part the source of some geographical suppositions, which now appear to us extravagant, respecting the long subterranean and submarine course of certain rivers, and their reappearance at very distant points. Sophokles said that the Inachus of Akarnania joined the Inachus of Argolis: Ibykus the poet affirmed that the AsÔpus, near Sikyon, had its source in Phrygia; the river InÔpus of the little island of Delos was alleged by others to be an effluent from the mighty Nile; and the rhetor ZÔilus, in a panegyrical oration to the inhabitants of Tenedos, went the length of assuring them that the Alpheius in Elis had its source in their island (Strabo, vi. p. 271). Not only Pindar and other poets (Antigon. Caryst. c. 155), but also the historian TimÆus (TimÆi Frag. 127, ed. GÖller), and Pausanias, also, with the greatest confidence (v. 7, 2), believed that the fountain Arethusa, at Syracuse, was nothing else but the reappearance of the river Alpheius from Peloponnesus: this was attested by the actual fact that a goblet or cup (f????), thrown into the Alpheius, had come up at the Syracusan fountain, which TimÆus professed to have verified,—but even the arguments by which Strabo justifies his disbelief of this tale, show how powerfully the phenomena of the Grecian rivers acted upon his mind. “If (says he, l. c.) the Alpheius, instead of flowing into the sea, fell into some chasm in the earth, there would be some plausibility in supposing that it continued its subterranean course as far as Sicily without mixing with the sea: but since its junction with the sea is matter of observation, and since there is no aperture visible near the shore to absorb the water of the river (st?a t? ?atap???? t? ?e?a t?? p?ta??), so it is plain that the water cannot maintain its separation and its sweetness, whereas the spring Arethusa is perfectly good to drink.” I have translated here the sense rather than the words of Strabo; but the phenomena of “rivers falling into chasms and being drunk up,” for a time, is exactly what happens in Greece. It did not appear to Strabo impossible that the Alpheius might traverse this great distance underground; nor do we wonder at this, when we learn that a more able geographer than he (EratosthenÊs) supposed that the marshes of Rhinokolura, between the Mediterranean and the Red sea, were formed by the Euphrates and Tigris, which flowed underground for the length of 6000 stadia or furlongs (Strabo, xvi. p. 741: Seidel; Fragm. Eratosth. p. 194): compare the story about the Euphrates passing underground, and reappearing in Ethiopia as the river Nile (Pausan. ii. 5, 3). This disappearance and reappearance of rivers connected itself, in the minds of ancient physical philosophers, with the supposition of vast reservoirs of water in the interior of the earth, which were protruded upwards to the surface by some gaseous force (see Seneca, Nat. QuÆst. vi. 8). Pomponius Mela mentions an idea of some writers, that the source of the Nile was to be found, not in our (????????) habitable section of the globe, but in the Antichthon, or southern continent, and that it flowed under the ocean to rise up in Ethiopia (Mela, i. 9, 55).

These views of the ancients, evidently based upon the analogy of Grecian rivers, are well set forth by M. Letronne, in a paper on the situation of the Terrestrial Paradise, as represented by the Fathers of the Church; cited in A. von Humboldt, Examen Critique de l’Histoire de la GÉographie, etc., vol. iii. pp. 118-130.

[336] “Upon the arrival of the king and regency in 1833 (observes Mr. Strong), no carriage-roads existed in Greece; nor were they, indeed, much wanted previously, as down to that period not a carriage, waggon, or cart, or any other description of vehicles, was to be found in the whole country. The traffic in general was carried on by means of boats, to which the long indented line of the Grecian coast and its numerous islands afforded every facility. Between the seaports and the interior of the kingdom, the communication was effected by means of beasts of burden, such as mules, horses, and camels.” (Statistics of Greece, p. 33.)

This exhibits a retrograde march to a point lower than the description of the Odyssey, where Telemachus and Peisistratus drive their chariot from Pylus to Sparta. The remains of the ancient roads are still seen in many parts of Greece (Strong, p. 34).

[337] Dr. Clarke’s description deserves to be noticed, though his warm eulogies on the fertility of the soil, taken generally, are not borne out by later observers: “The physical phenomena of Greece, differing from those of any other country, present a series of beautiful plains, successively surrounded by mountains of limestone; resembling, although upon a larger scale, and rarely accompanied by volcanic products, the craters of the PhlegrÆan fields. Everywhere, their level surfaces seems to have been deposited by water, gradually retired or evaporated; they consist for the most part of the richest soil, and their produce is yet proverbially abundant. In this manner, stood the cities of Argos, Sikyon, Corinth, Megara, Eleusis, Athens, Thebes, Amphissa, Orchomenus, ChÆronea, Lebadea, Larissa, Pella, and many others.” (Dr. Clarke’s Travels, vol. ii. ch. 4, p. 74.)

[338] Sir W. Gell found, in the month of March, summer in the low plains of Messenia, spring in Laconia, winter in Arcadia (Journey in Greece, pp. 355-359).

[339] The cold central region (or mountain plain,—???p?d???) of Tripolitza, differs in climate from the maritime regions of Peloponnesus, as much as the south of England from the south of France.... No appearance of spring on the trees near Tegea, though not more than twenty-four miles from Argos.... Cattle are sent from thence every winter to the maritime plains of Elos in Laconia (Leake, Trav. in Morea, vol. i. pp. 88, 98, 197). The pasture on Mount Olono (boundary of Elis, Arcadia, and Achaia) is not healthy until June (Leake, vol. ii. p. 119); compare p. 348, and Fiedler, Reise, i. p. 314.

See also the Instructive Inscription of Orchomenus, in Boeckh, Staatshaushaltung der Athener, t. ii. p. 380.

The transference of cattle, belonging to proprietors in one state, for temporary pasturage in another, is as old as the Odyssey, and is marked by various illustrative incidents: see the cause of the first Messenian war (Diodor. Fragm. viii. vol. iv. p. 23, ed. Wess; Pausan. iv. 4, 2).

[340] “Universa autem (Peloponnesus), velut pensante Æquorum incursus naturÂ, in montes 76 extollitur.” (Plin. H. N. iv. 6.)

Strabo touches, in a striking passage (ii. pp. 121-122), on the influence of the sea in determining the shape and boundaries of the land: his observations upon the great superiority of Europe over Asia and Africa, in respect of intersection and interpenetration of land by the sea-water are remarkable: ? ?? ??? ????p? p???s????est?t? pas?? ?st?, etc. He does not especially name the coast of Greece, though his remarks have a more exact bearing upon Greece than upon any other country. And we may copy a passage out of Tacitus (Agricol. c. 10), written in reference to Britain, which applies far more precisely to Greece: “nusquam latius dominari mare ... nec litore tenus accrescere aut resorberi, sed influere penitus et ambire, et jugis etiam atque montibus inseri velut in suo.”

[341] Xenophon, De Vectigal. c. 1; Ephor. Frag. 67, ed. Marx; Stephan. Byz. ????t?a.

[342] Pliny, H. N. iv. 5, about the Isthmus of Corinth: “LechÆÆ hinc, CenchreÆ illinc, angustiarum termini, longo et ancipiti navium ambitu (i. e. round Cape Malea), quas magnitudo plaustris transvehi prohibet: quam ob causam perfodere navigabili alveo angustias eas tentavere Demetrius rex, dictator CÆsar, Caius princeps, Domitius Nero,—infausto (ut omnium exitu patuit) incepto.”

The d??????, less than four miles across, where ships were drawn across, if their size permitted, stretched from LechÆum on the Corinthian gulf, to Schoenus, a little eastward of CenchreÆ, on the Saronic gulf (Strabo, viii. p. 330). Strabo (viii. p. 335) reckons the breadth of the d?????? at forty stadia (about 4¾ English miles); the reality, according to Leake, is 3½ English miles (Travels in Morea, vol. iii. ch. xxix. p. 297).

[343] The north wind, the Etesian wind of the ancients, blows strong in the Ægean nearly the whole summer, and with especially dangerous violence at three points,—under Karystos, the southern cape of Euboea, near Cape Malea, and in the narrow strait between the islands of Tenos, Mykonos, and DÊlos (Ross, Reisen auf den Griechischen Inseln, vol. i. p. 20). See also Colonel Leake’s account of the terror of the Greek boatman, from the gales and currents round Mount Athos: the canal cut by Xerxes through the isthmus was justified by sound reasons (Travels in Northern Greece, vol. iii. c. 24, p. 145).

[344] The Periplus of Skylax enumerates every section of the Greek name, with the insignificant exceptions noticed in the text, as partaking of the line of coast; it even mentions Arcadia (c. 45), because at that time Lepreum had shaken off the supremacy of Elis, and was confederated with the Arcadians (about 360 B.C.): Lepreum possessed about twelve miles of coast, which therefore count as Arcadian.

[345] Cicero (De RepublicÂ, ii. 2-4, in the Fragments of that lost treatise, ed. Maii) notices emphatically both the general maritime accessibility of Grecian towns, and the effects of that circumstance on Grecian character: “Quod de Corintho dixi, id haud scio an liceat de cunct GrÆci verissime dicere. Nam et ipsa Peloponnesus fere tota in mari est: nec prÆtor Phliuntios ulli sunt, quorum agri non contingant mare: et extra Peloponnesum Ænianes et Dores et Dolopes soli absunt a mari. Quid dicam insulas GrÆciÆ, quÆ fluctibus cinctÆ natant pÆne ipsÆ simul cum civitatium institutis et moribus? Atque hÆc quidem, ut supra dixi, veteris sunt GrÆciÆ. Coloniarum vero quÆ est deducta a Graiis in Asiam, Thraciam, Italiam, Siciliam, Africam, prÆter unam Magnesiam, quam unda non alluat? Ita barbarorum agris quasi adtexta quÆdam videtur ora esse GrÆciÆ.”

Compare Cicero, Epistol. ad Attic. vi. 2, with the reference to DikÆarchus, who agreed to a great extent in Plato’s objections against a maritime site (De Legg. iv. p. 705; also, Aristot. Politic. vii. 5-6). The sea (says Plato) is indeed a salt and bitter neighbor (??a ?e ?? ??t?? ?????? ?a? p????? ?e?t???a), though convenient for purposes of daily use.

[346] HekatÆus, Fragm. ???ad???? de?p??? ... ??a? ?a? ?e?a ???a. Herodot. i. 66. ?a?a??f???? ??d?e?. Theocrit. Id. vii. 106.—

The alteration of ????, which is obviously out of place, in the scholia on this passage, to ?????, appears unquestionable.

[347] Skylax, Peripl. 59.

[348] Cicero, de Orator. i. 44. “Ithacam illam in asperrimis saxulis, sicut nidulum, affixam.”

[349] Herodot. i. 52; iii. 57; vi. 46-125. Boeckh, Public Economy of Athens, b. i. ch. 3.

The gold and silver offerings sent to the Delphian temple, even from the Homeric times (Il. ix. 405) downwards, were numerous and valuable; especially those dedicated by Croesus, who (Herodot. i. 17-52) seems to have surpassed all predecessors.

[350] Strabo, x. p. 447; xiv. pp. 680-684. Stephan. Byz. v. ??d????, ?a?eda???. Kruse, Hellas, ch. iv. vol. i. p. 328. Fiedler, Reisen in Griechenland, vol. ii. pp. 118-559.

[351] Note to second edition.—In my first edition, I had asserted that cotton grew in Greece in the time of Pausanias,—following, though with some doubt, the judgment of some critics, that ?ss?? meant cotton. I now believe that this was a mistake, and have expunged the passage.

[352] At the repast provided at the public cost for those who dined in the Prytaneium of Athens, SolÔn directed barley-cakes for ordinary days, wheaten bread for festivals (AthenÆus, iv. p. 137).

The milk of ewes and goats was in ancient Greece preferred to that of cows (Aristot. Hist. Animal. iii. 15, 5-7); at present, also, cow’s-milk and butter is considered unwholesome in Greece, and is seldom or never eaten (Kruse, Hellas, vol. i. ch. 4, p. 368).

[353] Theophrast. Caus. Pl. ix. 2; Demosthen. adv. Leptin. c. 9. That salt-fish from the Propontis and from Gades was sold in the markets of Athens during the Peloponnesian war, appears from a fragment of the Marikas of Eupolis (Fr. 23, ed. Meineke; Stephan. Byz. v. G?de??a):—

The Phoenician merchants who brought the salt-fish from Gades took back with them Attic pottery for sale among the African tribes of the coast of Morocco (Skylax, Peripl. c. 109).

[354] SimonidÊs, Fragm. 109, Gaisford.—

The Odyssey mentions certain inland people, who knew nothing either of the sea, or of ships, or the taste of salt: Pausanias looks for them in Epirus (Odyss. xi. 121; Pausan. i. 12, 3).

[355] ??t?????? te ??? e?s? ?e??p????s??? (says Perikles, in his speech to the Athenians, at the commencement of the Peloponnesian war, Thucyd. i. 141) ?a? ??te ?d?? ??te ?? ????? ???at? ?st?? a?t???, etc.,—??d?e? ?e????? ?a? ?? ?a??ss???, etc. (ib. c. 142.)

[356] In Egypt, the men sat at home and wove, while the women did out-door business: both the one and the other excite the surprise of Herodotus and SophoklÊs (Herod. ii. 35; Soph. Œd. Col. 340).

For the spinning and weaving of the modern Greek peasant women, see Leake, Trav. Morea, vol. i. pp. 13, 18, 223, etc.; Strong, Stat. p. 185.

[357] Herodot. i. 142; Hippocrat. De AËre, Loc. et Aq. c. 12-13; Aristot. Polit. vii. 6, 1.

[358] The mountaineers of Ætolia are, at this time, unable to come down into the marshy plain of Wrachori, without being taken ill after a few days (Fiedler, Reise in Griech. i. p. 184).

[359] DikÆarch. Fragm. p. 145, ed. Fuhr—???? ????d??. ?st????s? d? ?? ????t?? t? ?at? a?t??? ?p?????ta ?d?a ??????ata ?????te? ta?ta—??? ?? a?s??????de?a? ?at???e?? ?? ???p?, t?? d? f????? ?? ?a????, t?? f????e???a? ?? Tesp?a??, t?? ???? ?? T?a??, t?? p?e??e??a? ?? ????d???, t?? pe??e???a? ?? ?????e??, ?? ??ata?a?? t?? ??a???e?a?, t?? p??et?? ?? ????st?, t?? ??a?s??s?a? ?? ?????t?.

About the distinction between ????a??? and ?tt????, see the same work, p. 141.

[360] Strabo, vii. pp. 322, 324, 326; Thucydid. ii. 68. Theopompus (ap. Strab. l. c.) reckoned 14 Epirotic ????.

[361] Herodot. i. 140, ii. 56, vi. 127.

[362] Strabo, vii. p. 327.

Several of the Epirotic tribes were d????ss??,—spoke Greek in addition to their native tongue.

See, on all the inhabitants of these regions, the excellent dissertation of O. MÜller above quoted, Ueber die Makedoner; appended to the first volume of the English translation of his History of the Dorians.

[363] Herodot. i. 143-150.

[364] See the protest of EratosthenÊs against the continuance of the classification into Greek and Barbarian, after the latter word had come to imply rudeness (ap. Strabo. ii. p. 66; Eratosth. Fragm. Seidel. p. 85).

[365] Cato, Fragment. ed. Lion. p. 46; ap. Plin. H. N. xxii. 1. A remarkable extract from Cato’s letter to his son, intimating his strong antipathy to the Greeks; he proscribes their medicine altogether, and admits only a slight taste of their literature: “Quod bonum sit eorum literas inspicere, non per discere.... Jurarunt inter se, Barbaros necare omnes medicinÂ, sed hoc ipsum mercede faciunt, ut fides iis sit et facile disperdant. Nos quoque dictitant Barbaros et spurios, nosque magis quam alios, Opicos appellatione foedant.”

[366] ?a??? ???sat? a?a??f????, Homer, Iliad, ii. 867. Homer does not use the word ??a???, or any words signifying either a Hellen generally or a non-Hellen generally (Thucyd. i. 3). Compare Strabo, viii. p. 370; and xiv. p. 662.

Ovid reproduces the primitive sense of the word ??a???, when he speaks of himself as an exile at Tomi (Trist. v. 10-37):—

The Egyptians had a word in their language, the exact equivalent of ??a??? in this sense (Herod. ii. 158).

[367] Herod. viii. 144. ...t? ????????? ??? ?a??? te ?a? ?????ss??, ?a? ?e?? ?d??at? te ????? ?a? ??s?a?, ??ea te ??t??pa? t?? p??d?ta? ?e??s?a? ????a???? ??? ?? e? ????. (Ib. x. 7.) ?e?? d?, ??a te ???????? a?des???te?, ?a? t?? ????da de???? p??e?e??? p??d???a?, etc.

Compare DikÆarch. Fragm. p. 147, ed. Fuhr; and Thucyd. iii. 59,—t? ????? t?? ??????? ???a... ?e??? t??? ??????? ?a? ??????? t?? ???????: also, the provision about the ????? ?e?? in the treaty between Sparta and Athens (Thuc. v. 18; Strabo, ix. p. 419).

It was a part of the proclamation solemnly made by the EumolpidÆ, prior to the celebration of the Eleusinian mysteries, “All non-Hellens to keep away,”—e???es?a? t?? ?e??? (Isocrates, Orat. iv. Panegyr. p. 74).

[368] HekatÆ. Fragm. 356, ed. Klausen: compare Strabo, vii. p. 321; Herod. i. 57; Thucyd. i. 3,—?at? p??e?? te, ?s?? ??????? s???esa?, etc.

[369] “Antiqui grammatici eas tantum dialectos spectabant, quibus scriptores usi essent: ceteras, quÆ non vigebant nisi in ore populi, non notabant.” (Ahrens, De Dialecto ÆolicÂ, p. 2.) The same has been the case, to a great degree, even in the linguistic researches of modern times, though printing now affords such increased facility for the registration of popular dialects.

[370] Herod. i. 142.

[371] Respecting the three varieties of the Æolic dialect, differing considerably from each other, see the valuable work of Ahrens, De Dial. Æol. sect. 2, 32, 50.

[372] The work of Albert Giese, Ueber den Æolischen Dialekt (unhappily not finished, on account of the early death of the author,) presents an ingenious specimen of such analysis.

[373] See the interesting remarks of Dio Chrysostom on the attachment of the inhabitants of Olbia (or Borysthenes) to the Homeric poems: most of them, he says, could repeat the Iliad by heart, though their dialect was partially barbarized, and the city in a sad state of ruin (Dio Chrysost. Orat. xxxvi. p. 78, Reisk).

[374] Plato, Legg. ii. 1, p. 653; Kratylus, p. 406; and Dionys. Hal. Ars Rhetoric. c. 1-2, p. 226,—Te?? ?? ?? p?? p??t?? p?s?? ?st???s??? pa?????e?? ??e?? ?a? ?p?????? ???? ???p??? ??, ???p??? ?e??? t?? d? ?? ?????, ?p?????.

Apollo, the Muses, and Dionysus are ???e??tasta? ?a? ??????e?ta? (Homer, Hymn to Apoll. 146). The same view of the sacred games is given by Livy, in reference to the Romans and the Volsci (ii. 36-37): “Se, ut consceleratos contaminatosque, ab ludis, festis diebus, coetu quodammodo hominum Deorumque, abactos esse ... ideo nos ab sede piorum, coetu, concilioque abigi.” It is curious to contrast this with the dislike and repugnance of Tertullian: “Idololatria omnium ludorum mater est,—quod enim spectaculum sine idolo, quis ludus sine sacrificio?” (De Spectaculis, p. 369.)

[375] Iliad, xxiii. 630-679. The games celebrated by Akastus, in honor of Pelias, were famed in the old epic (Pausan. v. 17, 4; ApollodÔr. i. 9, 28).

[376] Strabo, ix. p. 421; Pausan. x. 7, 3. The first Pythian games celebrated by the Amphiktyons, after the Sacred War, carried with them a substantial reward to the victor (an ???? ???at?t??); but in the next, or second Pythian games, nothing was given but an honorary reward, or wreath of laurel leaves (???? stefa??t??): the first coincide with Olympiad 48, 3; the second with Olympiad 49, 3.

Compare Schol. ad Pindar. Pyth. Argument.: Pausan. x. 37, 4-5; Krause, Die Pythien, Nemeen, und Isthmien, sect. 3, 4, 5.

The Homeric Hymn to Apollo is composed at a time earlier than the Sacred War, when Krissa is flourishing; earlier than the Pythian games, as celebrated by the Amphiktyons.

[377] Plutarch, SolÔn, 23. The Isthmian Agon was to a certain extent a festival of old Athenian origin; for among the many legends respecting its first institution, one of the most notorious represented it as having been founded by Theseus after his victory over Sinis at the Isthmus (see Schol. ad Pindar. Isth. Argument.; Pausan. ii. 1, 4), or over SkeirÔn (Plutarch, Theseus, c. 25). Plutarch says that they were first established by Theseus as funeral games for SkeirÔn, and Pliny gives the same story (H. N. vii. 57). According to Hellanikus, the Athenian TheÔrs at the Isthmian games had a privileged place, (Plutarch, l. c.).

There is, therefore, good reason why SolÔn should single out the IsthmionikÆ as persons to be specially rewarded, not mentioning the PythionikÆ and NemeonikÆ,—the Nemean and Pythian games not having then acquired Hellenic importance. Diogenes LaËrt. (i. 55) says that SolÔn provided rewards, not only for victories at the Olympic and Isthmian, but also ???????? ?p? t?? ?????, which Krause (Pythien, Nemeen und Isthmien, sect. 3, p. 13) supposes to be the truth: I think, very improbably. The sharp invective of Timokreon against Themistocles, charging him among other things with providing nothing but cold meat at the Isthmian games (?s??? d? ?pa?d??e?e ?e????? ????? ???a pa?????, Plutarch. Themistoc. c. 21), seems to imply that the Athenian visitors, whom the TheÔrs were called upon to take care of at those games, were numerous.

[378] In many Grecian states (as at Ægina, Mantineia, Troezen, Thasos, etc.) these TheÔrs formed a permanent college, and seem to have been invested with extensive functions in reference to religious ceremonies: at Athens, they were chosen for the special occasion (see Thucyd. v. 47; Aristotel. Polit. v. 8, 3; O. MÜller, Æginetica, p. 135; Demosthen. de Fals. Leg. p. 380).

[379] About the sacred truce, Olympian, Isthmian, etc., formally announced by two heralds crowned with garlands sent from the administering city, and with respect to which many tricks were played, see Thucyd. v. 49; Xenophon, Hellen. iv. 7, 1-7; Plutarch, Lycurg. 23; Pindar, Isthm. ii. 35,—sp??d?f????—?????e? ????—Thucyd. viii. 9-10, is also peculiarly instructive in regard to the practice and the feeling.

[380] Pindar, Isthm. iii. 26 (iv. 14); Nem. vi. 40.

[381] Strabo, viii. p. 374.

[382] Strabo, viii. p. 343; Pausan v. 6, 1.

[383] At Iolkos, on the north coast of the Gulf of PagasÆ, and at the borders of the MagnÊtes, Thessalians, and AchÆans of PhthiÔtis, was celebrated a periodical religious festival, or panegyris, the title of which we are prevented from making out by the imperfection of Strabo’s text (Strabo, ix. 436). It stands in the text as printed in Tzschucke’s edition, ??ta??a d? ?a? t?? ???a???? pa???????, s??et?????. The mention of ???a??? pa???????, which conducts us only to the Amphiktyonic convocations of ThermopylÆ and Delphi is here unsuitable; and the best or Parisian MS. of Strabo presents a gap (one among the many which embarrass the ninth book) in the place of the word ???a????. Dutneil conjectures t?? ?e??a??? pa???????, deriving the name from the celebrated funeral games of the old epic celebrated by Akastus in honor of his father Pelias. Grosskurd (in his note on the passage) approves the conjecture, but it seems to me not probable that a Grecian panegyris would be named after Pelias. ????a???, in reference to the neighboring mountain and town of Pelion, might perhaps be less objectionable (see DikÆarch. Fragm. pp. 407-409, ed. Fuhr.), but we cannot determine with certainty.

[384] Herod, i.; Dionys. Hal. iv. 25.

[385] Strabo, ix. p. 412; Homer. Hymn. Apoll. 232.

[386] Strabo, ix. p. 411.

[387] Thucyd. iii. 104; v. 55. Pausan. vii. 7, 1; 24, 3. Polyb. v. 8; ii. 54. Homer. Hymn. Apoll. 146.

According to what seems to have been the ancient and sacred tradition, the whole of the month Karneius was a time of peace among the Dorians; though this was often neglected in practice at the time of the Peloponnesian war (Thuc. v. 54). But it may be doubted whether there was any festival of Karneia common to all the Dorians: the Karneia at Sparta seems to have been a LacedÆmonian festival.

[388] The list of the Amphiktyonic constituency is differently given by Æschines, by Harpokration, and by Pausanias. Tittmann (Ueber den Amphiktyonischen Bund, sect. 3, 4, 5) analyzes and compares their various statements, and elicits the catalogue given in the text.

[389] Æschines, De Fals. Legat. p. 280, c. 36.—?at?????s??? d? ???? d?de?a, t? et????ta t?? ?e??? ... ?a? t??t?? ?de??a ??ast?? ?????, ?s???f?? ?e??e???, t? ???st?? t? ???tt???, etc.

[390] Æschin. Fals. Legat. p. 279, c. 35: ?a d? ?? ????? d?e?????? t?? ?t?s?? t?? ?e???, ?a? t?? p??t?? s???d?? ?e?????? t?? ?f??t?????, ?a? t??? ?????? a?t?? ???????, ?? ??? ??????? ?? t??? ???a???? ?de?a? p???? t?? ?f??t????d?? ???stat?? p???se?? ?d? ?d?t?? ?aat?a??? e???e??, etc.

[391] Homer, Iliad, vi. 457. Homer, Hymn to DÊmÊtÊr, 100, 107, 170. Herodot. vi. 137. Thucyd. ii. 15.

[392] Herodot. vii. 200; Livy, xxxi. 32.

[393] The festival of the Amarynthia in Euboea, held at the temple of Artemis of Amarynthus, was frequented by the Ionic Chalcis and Eretria as well as by the Dryopic Karystus. In a combat proclaimed between Chalcis and Eretria, to settle the question about the possession of the plain of Lelantum, it was stipulated that no missile weapons should be used by either party; this agreement was inscribed and recorded in the temple of Artemis (Strabo x. p. 448; Livy, xxxv. 38).

[394] Æschin. De Fals. Legat. c. 35, p. 279: compare adv. Ktesiphont. c. 36, p. 406.

[395] See the charge which Æschines alleges to have been brought by the Lokrians of Amphissa against Athens in the Amphiktyonic Council (adv. Ktesiphont. c. 38, p. 409). Demosthenes contradicts his rival as to the fact of the charge having been brought, saying that the Amphisseans had not given the notice, customary and required, of their intention to bring it: a reply which admits that the charge might be brought (Demosth. de CoronÂ, c. 43, p. 277).

The Amphiktyons offer a reward for the life of Ephialtes, the betrayer of the Greeks at ThermopylÆ; they also erect columns to the memory of the fallen Greeks in that memorable strait, the place of their half-yearly meeting (Herod. vii. 213-228).

[396] Æschin. adv. Ktesiph. 1, c. Plutarch, SolÔn, c. xi, who refers to Aristotle ?? t? t?? ?????????? ??a??af?—Pausan. x. 37, 4; Schol. ad Pindar, Nem. ix. 2. ??? ?f??t??????? d??a?, ?sa? p??es? p??? p??e?? e?s?? (Strabo, ix. p. 420). These Amphiktyonic arbitrations, however are of rare occurrence in history, and very commonly abused.

[397] Herodot. ii. 180, v. 62.

[398] Thucyd. i. 112, iv. 118, v. 18. The Phokians in the Sacred War (B.C. 354) pretended that they had an ancient and prescriptive right to the administration of the Delphian temple, under accountability to the general body of Greeks for the proper employment of its possessions,—thus setting aside the Amphiktyons altogether (Diodor. xvi. 27).

[399] Æschin. de Fals. Legat. p. 280, c. 36. The party intrigues which moved the council in regard to the Sacred War against the Phokians (B.C. 355) may be seen in Diodorus, xvi. 23-28, seq.

[400] Cicero, De Invention. ii. 23. The representation of Dionysius of Halikarnassus (Ant. Rom. iv. 25) overshoots the reality still more.

About the common festivals and Amphiktyones of the Hellenic world generally, see Wachsmuth, Hellenische Alterthumskunde, vol. i. sect. 22, 24, 25; also, C. F. Hermann, Lehrbuch der Griech. StaatsalterthÜmer, sect. 11-13.

[401] Plutarch, Sympos. vii. 5, 1.

[402] In this early phase of the Pythian festival, it is said to have been celebrated every eight years, marking what we should call an OctaetÊris, and what the early Greeks called an EnnaetÊris (Censorinus, De Die Natali, c. 18). This period is one of considerable importance in reference to the principle of the Grecian calendar, for ninety-nine lunar months coincide very nearly with eight solar years. The discovery of this coincidence is ascribed by Censorinus to Kleostratus of Tenedos, whose age is not directly known: he must be anterior to Meton, who discovered the cycle of nineteen solar years, but (I imagine) not much anterior. In spite of the authority of Ideler, it seems to me not proved, nor can I believe, that this octennial period with its solar and lunar coincidence was known to the Greeks in the earliest times of their mythical antiquity, or before the year 600 B.C. See Ideler, Handbuch der Chronologie, vol. i. p. 366; vol. ii. p. 607. The practice of the Eleians to celebrate the Olympic games alternately after forty-nine and fifty lunar months, though attested for a later time by the Scholiast on Pindar, is not proved to be old. The fact that there were ancient octennial recurring festivals, does not establish a knowledge of the properties of the octaeteric or ennaeteric period: nor does it seem to me that the details of the Boeotian daf??f??Ía, described in Proclus ap. Photium, sect. 239, are very ancient. See, on the old mythical OctaetÊris, O. MÜller, Orchomenos 218, seqq., and Krause, Die Pythien, Nemeen, und Isthmien, sect. 4, p. 22.

[404] Xenophon, Anabas. vii. 8, 20: ? d? ?s?d?t?? ????sa?, ?t? p???? ?p? a?t?? te?????? e?? ? ?e??f??, ??a????eta?, etc. Xenoph. Hellen. iii. 2, 22: ? ???st?????es?a? t??? ?????a? ?f? ??????? p????,—compare Iliad, vii. 450.

[405] Callimach. Hymn. Apoll. 55, with Spanheim’s note; Cicero, De Divinat. i. 1.

[406] See this point strikingly illustrated by Plato, Repub. v. pp. 470-471 (c. 16), and Isocrates, Panegyr. p. 102.

[407] Respecting the Arcadian KynÆtha, see the remarkable observations of Polybius iv. 17-23.

[408] See above, vol. i. ch. vi. p. 126 of this History.

[409] For examples and evidences of these practices, see Herodot. ii. 162; the amputation of the nose and cars of PatarbÊmis, by Apries, king of Egypt (Xenophon, Anab. i. 9-13). There were a large number of men deprived of hands, feet, or eyesight, in the satrapy of Cyrus the younger, who had inflicted all these severe punishments for the prevention of crime,—he did not (says Xenophon) suffer criminals to scoff at him (e?a ?ata?e???). The ??t?? was carried on at Sardis (Herodot. iii. 49),—500 pa?de? ??t??a? formed a portion of the yearly tribute paid by the Babylonians to the court of Susa (Herod. iii. 92). Selling of children for exportation by the Thracians (Herod. v. 6); there is some trace of this at Athens, prior to the Solonian legislation (Plutarch, SolÔn, 23), arising probably out of the cruel state of the law between debtor and creditor. For the sacrifice of children to Kronus by the Carthaginians, in troubled times, (according to the language of Ennius, “Poeni soliti suos sacrificare puellos,”) Diodor. xx. 14; xiii. 86. Porphyr. de Abstinent. ii. 56: the practice is abundantly illustrated in MÖver’s Die Religion der PhÖnizier, pp. 298-304.

Arrian blames Alexander for cutting off the nose and ears of the Satrap BÊssus, saying that it was an act altogether barbaric, (i. e. non-Hellenic,) (Exp. Al. iv. 7, 6.) About the seas?? ?e?p?ep?? pe?? t?? as???a in Asia, see Strabo, xi. p. 526.

[410] Thucyd. i. 6: Herodot. i. 10.

[411] Aristot. Polit. iii. 6, 12. It is unnecessary to refer to the many inscriptions which confer upon some individual non-freeman the right of ?p??a?a and ???t?s??.

[412] Skylax, Peripl. c. 28-33; Thucyd. ii. 80. See Dio Chrysostom, Or. xlvii. p. 225, vol. ii. ed. Reisk,—????? ?????t? d????es?s?a? ?at? ??a?, t??? a?????? ??????, ? s??a p??e?? ?a? ???a ??e??.

[413] Strabo, viii. pp. 337, 342, 386; Pausan. viii. 45, 1; Plutarch, QuÆst. GrÆc. c. 17-37.

[414] Pausan. viii. 27, 2-5; Diod. xv. 72: compare Arist. Polit. ii. 1, 5.

The description of the d?????s?? of Mantineia is in Xenophon, Hellen. v. 2, 6-8: it is a flagrant example of his philo-Laconian bias. We see by the case of the Phokians after the Sacred War, (Diodor. xvi. 60; Pausan. x. 3, 2,) how heavy a punishment this d?????s?? was. Compare, also, the instructive speech of the Akanthian envoy KleigenÊs, at Sparta, when he invoked the LacedÆmonian interference for the purpose of crushing the incipient federation, or junction of towns into a common political aggregate, which was growing up round Olynthus (Xen. Hellen. v. 2, 11-2). The wise and admirable conduct of Olynthus, and the reluctance of the neighboring cities to merge themselves in this union, are forcibly set forth; also, the interest of Sparta in keeping all the Greek towns disunited. Compare the description of the treatment of Capua by the Romans (Livy, xxvi. 16).

[415] Thucyd. i. 5; iii. 94. Xenoph. Hellen. iv. 6, 5.

[416] Pausanias, x. 4, 1: his remarks on the Phokian p???? Panopeus indicate what he included in the idea of a p????: e??e ????sa? t?? p???? ?a? t??t???, ??? ?e ??? ???e?a, ?? ????s??? ?st??? ?? ??at???, ??? ?????? ????s??, ??? ?d?? ?ate???e??? ?? ??????? ???? ?? st??a?? ????a?? ?at? t?? ?a??a? ???sta t?? ?? t??? ??es??, ??ta??a ?????s?? ?p? ?a??d??. ??? d? ???? ?e t?? ???a? e?s?? a?t??? ?? t??? ??????, ?a? ?? t?? s??????? s???d???? ?a? ??t?? p?p??s? t?? F??????.

The ???? p???sata of the Pelasgians on the peninsula of Mount AthÔs (Thucyd. iv. 109) seem to have been something between villages and cities. When the Phokians, after the Sacred War, were deprived of their cities and forced into villages by the Amphiktyons, the order was that no village should contain more than fifty houses, and that no village should be within the distance of a furlong of any other (Diodor. xvi. 60).

[417] Aristot. Polit. i. 1, 8. ? d? ?? p?e????? ???? ???????a t??e??? p???? ? d? p?s?? ????sa p??a? t?? a?ta??e?a?. Compare also iii. 6, 14; and Plato, Legg. viii. p. 848.

[418] Thucyd. i. 10. ??te ???????s?e?s?? p??e??, ??te ?e???? ?a? ?atas?e?a?? p???te??s? ???sa????, ?at? ??a? d? t? pa?a?? t?? ????d?? t??p? ????s?e?s??, fa????t? ?? ?p?deest??a.

[419] Xenophon, Hellen. iii. 2, 31.

[420] Larcher, Chronologie d’HÉrodote, ch. viii. pp. 215, 274; Raoul Rochette, Histoire des Colonies Grecques, book i. ch. 5; Niebuhr, RÖmische Geschichte, vol. i. pp. 26-64, 2d ed. (the section entitled Die Oenotrer und Pelasger); O. MÜller, Die Etrusker, vol. i. (Einleitung, ch. ii. pp. 75-100); Dr. Thirlwall, History of Greece, vol. i. ch. ii. pp. 36-64. The dissentient opinions of Kruse and Mannert may be found in Kruse, Hellas, vol. i. pp. 398-425; Mannert, Geographie der Griechen und RÖmer, part viii. Introduct. p. 4, seqq.

Niebuhr puts together all the mythical and genealogical traces, many of them in the highest degree vague and equivocal, of the existence of Pelasgi in various localities; and then, summing up their cumulative effect, asserts (“not as an hypothesis, but with full historical conviction,” p. 54) “that there was a time when the Pelasgians, perhaps the most extended people in all Europe, were spread from the Po and the Arno to the Rhyndakus,” (near Kyzikus,) with only an interruption in Thrace. What is perhaps the most remarkable of all, is the contrast between his feeling of disgust, despair, and aversion to the subject, when he begins the inquiry (“the name Pelasgi,” he says, “is odious to the historian, who hates the spurious philology out of which the pretences to knowledge on the subject of such extinct people arise,” p. 28), and the full confidence and satisfaction with which he concludes it.

[421] Herodot. ii. 23: ? d? pe?? t?? ??e???? e?pa?, ?? ?fa??? t?? ???? ??e?e??a?, ??? ??e? ??e????.

[422] That KrÊstÔn is the proper reading in Herodotus, there seems every reason to believe—not KrotÔn, as Dionys. Hal. represents it (Ant. Rom. i. 26)—in spite of the authority of Niebuhr in favor of the latter.

[423] Thucyd. iv. 109. Compare the new Fragmenta of Strabo, lib. vii. edited from the Vatican MS. by Kramer, and since by Tafel (TÜbingen, 1844), sect. 34, p. 26,—???sa? d? t?? ?e?????s?? ta?t?? t?? ?? ????? ?e?as??? t??e?, e?? p??te d????e??? p???sata? ??e????, ???f????, ?????????, ????, T?ss??.

[424] Herod. i. 57. p??s?e??????t?? a?t? ?a? ????? ?????? a????? s?????.

[425] AthenÆ. vi. p. 271. F???pp?? ?? t? pe?? ?a??? ?a? ?e????? s?????at?, ?ata???a? t??? ?a?eda?????? ????ta? ?a? t??? Tetta?????? pe??sta?, ?a? ????? f?s? t??? ???e??? ?? ????ta?? ???sas?a? p??a? te ?a? ???.

[426] Herod, i. 57. ??t??a d? ???ssa? ?esa? ?? ?e?as???, ??? ??? ?t?e???? e?pa?. e? d? ??e?? ?st? te?a???e???? ???e?? t??s? ??? ?t? ???s? ?e?as???, t?? ?p?? ???s???? ???st??a p???? ???e??t?? ... ?a? t?? ??a???? te ?a? S??????? ?e?as??? ????s??t?? ?? ????sp??t? ... ?a? ?sa ???a ?e?as???? ???ta p???sata t? ????a et?a?e? e? t??t??s? de? ???e??, ?sa? ?? ?e?as??? ??a??? ???ssa? ???te?. ?? t????? ?? ?a? p?? t????t? t? ?e?as?????, t? ?tt???? ?????, ??? ?e?as????? ?a t? eta??? t? ?? ?????a? ?a? t?? ???ssa? et?a?e? ?a? ??? d? ??te ?? ???st????ta? ??d???s? t?? ??? sf?a? pe?????e??t?? e?s? ?????ss??, ??te ?? ??a??????? sf?s? d?, ?????ss??. d????s? d?, ?t? t?? ??e??a?t? ???ss?? ?a?a?t??a etaa????te? ?? ta?ta t? ????a, t??t?? ????s? ?? f??a??.

In the next chapter, Herodotus again calls the Pelasgian nation ??a???.

Respecting this language, heard by Herodotus at KrÊstÔn and Plakia, Dr. Thirlwall observes (chap. ii. p. 60), “This language Herodotus describes as barbarous, and it is on this fact he grounds his general conclusion as to the ancient Pelasgian tongue. But he has not entered into any details that might have served to ascertain the manner or degree in which it differed from the Greek. Still, the expressions he uses would have appeared to imply that it was essentially foreign, had he not spoken quite as strongly in another passage, where it is impossible to ascribe a similar meaning to his words. When he is enumerating the dialects that prevailed among the Ionian Greeks, he observes that the Ionian cities in Lydia agree not at all in their tongue with those of Karia; and he applies the very same term to these dialects, which he had before used in speaking of the remains of the Pelasgian language. This passage affords a measure by which we may estimate the force of the word barbarian in the former. Nothing more can be safely inferred from it, than that the Pelasgian language which Herodotus heard on the Hellespont, and elsewhere, sounded to him a strange jargon: as did the dialect of Ephesus to a Milesian, and as the Bolognese does to a Florentine. This fact leaves its real nature and relation to the Greek quite uncertain; and we are the less justified in building on it, as the history of Pelasgian settlements is extremely obscure, and the traditions which Herodotus reports on that subject have by no means equal weight with statements made from his personal observation.” (Thirlwall, History of Greece, ch. ii. p. 60, 2d edit.)

In the statement delivered by Herodotus (to which Dr. Thirlwall here refers) about the language spoken in the Ionic Greek cities, the historian had said (i. 142),—G??ssa? d? ?? t?? a?t?? ??t?? ?e????as?, ???? t??p??? t?sse?a? pa?a??????. Miletus, Myus, and PriÊne,—?? t? ?a??? ?at?????ta? ?at? ta?t? d?a?e??e?a? sf?. Ephesus, Kolophon, etc.,—a?ta? a? p???e? t?s? p??te??? ?e??e?s?s? ????????s? ?at? ???ssa? ??d??, sf? d? ??f?????s?. The Chians and ErythrÆans,—?at? t??t? d?a?????ta?, S???? d? ?p? ???t?? ?????. ??t?? ?a?a?t??e? ???ss?? t?sse?e? ??????ta?.

The words ???ss?? ?a?a?t?? (“distinctive mode of speech”) are common to both these passages, but their meaning in the one and in the other is to be measured by reference to the subject-matter of which the author is speaking, as well as to the words which accompany them,—especially the word ??a??? in the first passage. Nor can I think (with Dr. Thirlwall) that the meaning of ??a??? is to be determined by reference to the other two words: the reverse is, in my judgment, correct. ???a??? is a term definite and unequivocal, but ???ss?? ?a?a?t?? varies according to the comparison which you happen at the moment to be making, and its meaning is here determined by its conjunction with ??a???.

When Herodotus was speaking of the twelve Ionic cities in Asia, he might properly point out the differences of speech among them as so many different ?a?a?t??e? ???ss??: the limits of difference were fixed by the knowledge which his hearers possessed of the persons about whom he was speaking; the Ionians being all notoriously Hellens. So an author, describing Italy, might say that Bolognese, Romans, Neapolitans, Genoese, etc. had different ?a?a?t??e? ???ss??; it being understood that the difference was such as might subsist among persons all Italians.

But there is also a ?a?a?t?? ???ss?? of Greek generally (abstraction made of its various dialects and diversities), as contrasted with Persian, Phoenician, or Latin,—and of Italian generally, as contrasted with German or English. It is this comparison which Herodotus is taking, when he describes the language spoken by the people of KrÊstÔn and Plakia, and which he notes by the word ??a??? as opposed to ?????????: it is with reference to this comparison that ?a?a?t?? ???ss??, in the fifty-seventh chapter, is to be construed. The word ??a??? is the usual and recognized antithesis of ?????, or ?????????.

It is not the least remarkable part of the statement of Herodotus, that the language spoken at KrÊstÔn and at Plakia was the same, though the places were so far apart from each other. This identity of itself shows that he meant to speak of a substantive language, not of a “strange jargon.”

I think it, therefore, certain that Herodotus pronounces the Pelasgians of his day to speak a substantive language different from Greek; but whether differing from it in a greater or less degree (e. g. in the degree of Latin or of Phoenician), we have no means of deciding.

[427] Aristotel. Meteorol. i. 14.

[428] Homer, Iliad, xvi. 234; Hesiod, Fragm. 149, ed. Marktscheffel; Sophokl. Trachin. 1174; Strabo, vii. p. 328.

[429] Stephan. Byz. v. G?a????.—G?a??e? d? pa?? t? ?????? a? t?? ??????? ?t??e?, ?a? pa?? S?f???e? ?? ???es??. ?st? d? etap?as??, ? t?? G?a?? e??e?a? ???s?? ?st??.

The word G?a??e?, in Alkman, meaning “the mothers of the Hellenes,” may well be only a dialectic variety of ???e?, analogous to ???? and ?????, for ??e??, ?????, etc. (Ahrens, De Dialecto DoricÂ, sect. 11, p. 91; and sect. 31, p. 242), perhaps declined like ???a??e?.

The term used by SophoklÊs, if we may believe Photius, was not G?a????, but ?a???? (Photius, p. 480, 15; Dindorf, Fragment. Soph. 933: compare 455). Eustathius (p. 890) seems undecided between the two.

[430] Xenophon, Hellen. vii. 5, 27; Demosthenes, De Coron. c. 7, p. 231—???? t?? ?? ????t?? ?a? pa?? t??t??? ?a? pa?? t??? ?????? ????s?? ???? ?a? tapa??.

[431] Demosthen. de Coron. c. 21, p. 247.

[432] Xenophon, Anabas. iii. 2, 25-26.

[433] Xenophon, Hellen. vi. 1, 12; Isocrates, Orat. ad Philipp., Orat. v. p. 107. This discourse of IsokratÊs is composed expressly for the purpose of calling on Philip to put himself at the head of united Greece against the Persians: the Oratio iv, called Panegyrica, recommends a combination of all Greeks for the same purpose, but under the hegemony of Athens, putting aside all intestine differences: see Orat. iv. pp. 45-68.

[434] Thucyd. iii. 93. ?? Tessa??? ?? d???e? ??te? t?? ta?t? ??????, ?a? ?? ?p? t? ?? ??t??et? (Herakleia), etc.

[435] Herodot. vii. 173; Strabo, ix. pp. 440-441. Herodotus notices the pass over the chain of Olympus or the Cambunian mountains by which Xerxes and his army passed out of Macedonia into PerrhÆbia; see the description of the pass and the neighboring country in Leake, Travels in Northern Greece, ch. xxviii. vol. iii. pp. 338-348; compare Livy, xlii. 53.

[436] Skylax, Periplus, c. 66; Herodot. vii. 183-188.

[437] Skylax, Peripl. c. 64; Strabo, ix. pp. 433-434. SophoklÊs included the territory of Trachin in the limits of PhthiÔtis (Strabo, l. c.). Herodotus considers PhthiÔtis as terminating a little north of the river Spercheius (vii. 198).

[438] See the description of Thaumaki in Livy, xxxii. 4, and in Dr. Holland’s Travels, ch. xvii. vol. ii. p. 112,—now Thomoko.

[439] Skylax, Peripl. c. 65. Hesychius (v. ?a?as?t?? ?p?????) seems to reckon PagasÆ as AchÆan.

About the towns in Thessaly, and their various positions, see Mannert, Geograph. der Gr. und RÖmer, part vii. book iii. ch. 8 and 9.

There was an ancient religious ceremony, celebrated by the Delphians every ninth year (EnnaËtÊris): a procession was sent from Delphi to the pass of TempÊ, consisting of well-born youths under an archi-theÔr, who represented the proceeding ascribed by an old legend to Apollo; that god was believed to have gone thither to receive expiation after the slaughter of the serpent Pytho: at least, this was one among several discrepant legends. The chief youth plucked and brought back a branch from the sacred laurel at TempÊ, as a token that he had fulfilled his mission: he returned by “the sacred road,” and broke his fast at a place called ?e?p????, near Larissa. A solemn festival, frequented by a large concourse of people from the surrounding regions, was celebrated on this occasion at TempÊ, in honor of Apollo TempeitÊs (?p????? ?epe?t?, in the Æolic dialect of Thessaly: see Inscript. in Boeckh, Corp. Ins. No. 1767). The procession was accompanied by a flute-player.

See Plutarch, QuÆst. GrÆc. ch. xi. p. 292; De MusicÂ, ch. xiv. p. 1136, Ælian, V. II. iii. 1: Stephan. Byz. v. ?e?p????.

It is important to notice these religious processions as establishing intercourse and sympathies between the distant members of Hellas: but the inferences which O. MÜller (Dorians, b. ii. 1, p. 222) would build upon them, as to the original seat of the Dorians and the worship of Apollo, are not to be trusted.

[440] Plato, Krito, c. 15, p. 53. ??e? ??? d? p?e?st? ?ta??a ?a? ????as?a (compare the beginning of the MenÔn)—a remark the more striking, since he had just before described the Boeotian Thebes as a well-regulated city, though both DikÆarchus and Polybius represent it in their times as so much the contrary.

See also Demosthen. Olynth. i. c. 9, p. 16, cont. Aristokrat. c. 29, p. 657; Schol. Eurip. Phoeniss. 1466; Theopomp. Fragment. 34-178, ed. Didot; AristophanÊs, Plut. 521.

The march of political affairs in Thessaly is understood from Xenoph. Hellen. vi. 1: compare Anabas. i. 1, 10, and Thucyd. iv. 78.

[441] See Cicero, Orat. in Pison. c. 11; De Leg. Agrar. cont. Rullum, c. 34-35.

[442] Compare the Thessalian cavalry as described by Polybius. iv. 8, with the Macedonian as described by ThucydidÊs, ii. 100.

[443] Herodot. vii. 176; Thucyd. i. 12.

[444] Pindar, Pyth. x. init. with the Scholia, and the valuable comment of Boeckh, in reference to the AleuadÆ; Schneider ad Aristot. Polit. v. 5, 9; and the Essay of Buttmann, Von dem Geschlecht der Aleuaden, art. xxii. vol. ii. p. 254, of the collection called “Mythologus.”

[445] Ahrens, De Dialect. ÆolicÂ, c. 1, 2.

[446] See Aristot. Polit. ii. 6, 3; Thucyd. ii. 99-100.

[447] The words ascribed by Xenophon (Hellen. vi. 1, 11) to Jason of PherÆ, as well as to Theocritus (xvi. 34), attest the numbers and vigor of the Thessalian PenestÆ, and the great wealth of the AleuadÆ and SkopadÆ. Both these families acquired celebrity from the verses of Simonides: he was patronized and his muse invoked by both of them; see Ælian, V. H. xii. 1; Ovid, Ibis, 512; Quintilian, xi. 2, 15. Pindar also boasts of his friendship with Thorax the Aleuad (Pyth. x. 99).

The Thessalian ??d?ap?d?sta?, alluded to in Aristophanes (Plutus, 521), must have sold men out of the country for slaves,—either refractory PenestÆ, or PerrhÆbian, Magnetic, and AchÆan freemen, seized by violence: the Athenian comic poet MnÊsimachus, in jesting on the voracity of the Pharsalians, exclaims, ap. AthenÆ. x. p. 418—

PagasÆ was celebrated as a place of export for slaves (Hermippus ap. AthenÆ, i. 49).

MenÔn of Pharsalus assisted the Athenians against Amphipolis with 200, or 300 “PenestÆ, on horseback, of his own”—(?e??sta?? ?d????) Demosthen. pe?? S??ta?. c. 9, p. 173, cont. Aristokrat. c. 51, p. 687.

[448] Archemachus ap. AthenÆ. vi. p. 264; Plato, Legg. vi. p. 777; Aristot. Polit. ii. 6, 3; vii. 9, 9; Dionys. Halic. A. R. ii. 84.

Both Plato and Aristotle insist on the extreme danger of having numerous slaves, fellow-countrymen and of one language—(??f????, ??f????, pat???ta? ???????).

[449] Aristot. Polit. vii. 11, 2.

[450] Theopompus and Archemachus ap. AthenÆ. vi. pp. 264-266: compare Thucyd. ii. 12; Steph. Byz. v. ????—the converse of this story in Strabo, ix. pp. 401-411, of the Thessalian ArnÊ being settled from Boeotia. That the villains or PenestÆ were completely distinct from the circumjacent dependents,—AchÆans, MagnÊtes, PerrhÆbians, we see by Aristot. Polit. ii. 6, 3. They had their eponymous hero PenestÊs, whose descent was traced to Thessalus son of HÊraklÊs; they were thus connected with the mythical father of the nation (Schol. Aristoph. Vesp. 1271).

[451] Herodot. i. 57: compare vii. 176.

[452] Hellanikus, Fragm. 28, ed. Didot; Harpocration, v. ?et?a???a: the quadruple division was older than HekatÆus (Steph. Byz. v. ???????).

HekatÆus connected the PerrhÆbians with the genealogy of Æolus through TyrÔ, the daughter of SalmÔneus: they passed as ????e?? (HekatÆus, Frag. 334, ed. Didot; Stephan. Byz. v. F??a??a and G?????).

The territory of the city of HistiÆa (in the north part of the island of Euboea) was also called HistiÆÔtis. The double occurrence of this name (no uncommon thing in ancient Greece) seems to have given rise to the statement, that the PerrhÆbi had subdued the northern parts of Euboea, and carried over the inhabitants of the Euboean HistiÆa captive into the north-west of Thessaly (Strabo, ix. p. 437, x. p. 446).

[453] Pliny, H. N. iv. 1; Strabo, ix. p. 440.

[454] Strabo, ix. p. 443.

[455] Diodor. xviii. 11; Thucyd. ii. 22.

[456] The Inscription No. 1770 in Boeckh’s Corpus Inscript. contains a letter of the Roman consul, Titus Quinctius Flamininus, addressed to the city of KyretiÆ (north of Atrax in PerrhÆbia). The letter is addressed, ???et???? t??? ta???? ?a? t? p??e?,—the title of Tagi seems thus to have been given to the magistrates of separate Thessalian cities. The Inscriptions of Thaumaki (No. 1773-1774) have the title ?????te?, not ta???. The title ta??? was peculiar to Thessaly (Pollux, i. 128).

[457] Xenophon, Hellen. vi. 1, 9; Diodor. xiv. 82; Thucyd. i. 3. Herod. vii. 6, calls the AleuadÆ Tessa???? as???e?.

[458] Xenophon, Memorab. i. 2, 24; Hellenic. ii. 3, 37. The loss of the comedy called ???e?? of Eupolis (see Meineke, Fragm. Comicor. GrÆc. p. 513) probably prevents us from understanding the sarcasm of Aristophanes (Vesp. 1263) about the pa?ap??se?a of Amynias among the PenestÆ of Pharsalus; but the incident there alluded to can have nothing to do with the proceedings of Kritias, touched upon by Xenophon.

[459] Xenophon, Hellen. vi. 1, 9-12.

[460] Demosthen. Olynth. i. c. 3, p. 15; ii. c. 5. p. 21. The orator had occasion to denounce Philip, as having got possession of the public authority of the Thessalian confederation, partly by intrigue, partly by force; and we thus hear of the ????e? and the ????a?, which formed the revenue of the confederacy.

[461] Xenophon (Hellen. vi. 1, 7) numbers the ?a?a??? among these tributaries along with the Dolopes: the Maraces are named by Pliny (H. N. iv. 3), also, along with the Dolopes, but we do not know where they dwelt.

[462] Xenophon, Hellen. vi. 1, 9; Pindar, Pyth. iv. 80.

[463] Herodot. vii. 176; viii. 27-28.

[464] The story of invading Thessalians at KerÊssus, near Leuktra in Boeotia, (Pausan. ix. 13, 1,) is not at all probable.

[465] One story was, that these AchÆans of Phthia went into Peloponnesus with Pelops, and settled in Laconia (Strabo, viii. p. 365).

[466] Aristoteles ap. AthenÆ iv. p. 173 Conon, Narrat. 29; Strabo. xiv. p. 647.

Hoeck (Kreta, b. iii. vol. ii. p. 409) attempts (unsuccessfully, in my judgment) to reduce these stories into the form of substantial history.

[467] Thucyd. iii. 92. The distinction made by Skylax (c. 61) and Diodorus (xviii. 11) between ????e?? and ?a??e??—the latter adjoining the former on the north—appears inadmissible, though Letronne still defends it (PÉriple de Marcien d’HÉraclÉe, etc., Paris, 1839, p. 212).

Instead of ?a??e??, we ought to read ?a?e??, as O. MÜller observes (Dorians, i. 6, p. 48).

It is remarkable that the important town of Lamia (the modern Zeitun) is not noticed either by Herodotus, ThucydidÊs, or Xenophon; Skylax is the first who mentions it. The route of Xerxes towards ThermopylÆ lay along the coast from Alos.

The Lamieis (assuming that to be the correct reading) occupied the northern coast of the Maliac gulf, from the north bank of the Spercheius to the town of Echinus: in which position Dr. Cramer places the ????e?? ?a??????—an error, I think (Geography of Greece, vol. i. p. 436).

It is not improbable that Lamia first acquired importance during the course of those events towards the close of the Peloponnesian war, when the LacedÆmonians, in defence of Herakleia, attacked the AchÆans of PhthiÔtis, and even expelled the ŒtÆans for a time from their seats (see Thucyd. viii. 3; Diodor. xiv. 38).

[468] Aristot. Polit. iv. 10, 10.

[469] Plutarch, QuÆstion. GrÆc. p. 294.

[470] Thucyd. iii. 92-97; viii. 3. Xenoph. Hellen. i. 2, 18; in another passage Xenophon expressly distinguishes the ŒtÆi and the Ænianes (Hellen. iii. 5. 6). Diodor. xiv. 38. Æschines, De Fals. Leg. c. 44, p. 290.

[471] About the fertility as well as the beauty of this valley, see Dr. Holland’s Travels, ch. xvii. vol. ii. p. 108, and Forchhammer (Hellenika, Griechenland, im Neuen das Alte, Berlin, 1837). I do not concur with the latter in his attempts to resolve the mythes of HÊraklÊs, Achilles, and others, into physical phenomena: but his descriptions of local scenery and attributes are most vivid and masterly.

[472] Strabo, ix. p. 425; Forchhammer, Hellenika, pp. 11-12. Kynus is sometimes spoken of as the harbor of Opus, but it was a city of itself as old as the Homeric Catalogue, and of some moment in the later wars of Greece, when military position came to be more valued than legendary celebrity (Livy, xxviii. 6; Pausan. x. 1, 1; Skylax. c. 61-62); the latter counts Thronium and KnÊmis or KnÊmides as being Phokian, not Lokrian; which they were for a short time, during the prosperity of the Phokians, at the beginning of the Sacred War, though not permanently (Æschin. Fals. Legat. c. 42, p. 46). This serves as one presumption about the age of the Periplus of Skylax (see the notes of Klausen ad Skyl. p. 269). These Lokrian towns lay along the important road from ThermopylÆ to Elateia and Boeotia (Pausan. vii. 15, 2; Livy, xxxiii. 3).

[473] Pausan. x. 33, 4.

[474] Pausan. x. 5, 1; Demosth. Fals. Leg. c. 22-28; Diodor. xvi. 60, with the note of Wesseling.

The tenth book of Pausanias, though the larger half of it is devoted to Delphi, tells us all that we know respecting the less important towns of Phokis. Compare also Dr. Cramer’s Geography of Greece, vol. ii. sect. 10; and Leake’s Travels in Northern Greece, vol. ii. ch. 13.

Two funeral monuments of the Phokian hero Schedius (who commands the Phokian troops before Troy, and is slain in the Iliad) marked the two extremities of Phokis,—one at Daphnus on the Euboean sea, the other at Antikyra on the Corinthian gulf (Strabo, ix. p. 425; Pausan. x. 36, 4).

[475] Herodot. viii. 31, 43, 46; Diodor. iv. 57; Aristot. ap. Strabo, viii. p. 373.

O. MÜller (History of the Dorians, book i. ch. ii.) has given all that can be known about Doris and Dryopis, together with some matters which appear to me very inadequately authenticated.

[476] ???e?? ???a? ?a? ??p???????, Strabo, ix. p. 427.

[477] Herod, vii. 126; Thucyd. ii. 102.

[478] See the difficult journey of Fiedler from Wrachori northward by Karpenitz, and then across the north-western portion of the mountains of the ancient Eurytanes (the southern continuation of Mount TymphrÊstus and Œta), into the upper valley of the Spercheius (Fiedler’s Reise in Griechenland, vol. i. pp. 177-191), a part of the longer journey from Missolonghi to Zeitun.

Skylax (c. 35) reckons Ætolia as extending inland as far as the boundaries of the Ænianes on the Spercheius—which is quite correct—Ætolia EpiktÊtus—???? t?? ??ta?a?, Strabo, x. p. 450.

[480] Ephorus, Fragm. 29, Marx. ap. Strabo, p. 463. The situation of Thermus, “the acropolis as it were of all Ætolia,” and placed on a spot almost unapproachable by an army, is to a certain extent, though not wholly, capable of being determined by the description which Polybius gives of the rapid march of Philip and the Macedonian army to surprise it. The maps, both of Kruse and Kiepert, place it too much on the north of the lake TrichÔnis: the map of Fiedler notes it, more correctly, to the east of that lake (Polyb. v. 7-8; compare BrandstÄter, Geschichte des Ætol. Landes, p. 133).

[481] Thucyd. iii. 102.—????st?tat?? d? ???ss?? e?s?, ?a? ??fa??? ?? ?????ta?. It seems that ThucydidÊs had not himself seen or conversed with them, but he does not call them ??a???.

[482] Ephorus, Fragment. 29, ed. Marx.; Skymn. Chius, v. 471; Strabo, x. p. 450.

[483] Thucyd. i. 6; iii. 94. Aristotle, however, included, in his large collection of ????te?a?, an ??a?????? ????te?a as well as an ??t???? ????te?a (Aristotelis Rerum Publicarum ReliquiÆ, ed. Neumann, p. 102; Strabo, vii. p. 321).

[484] TimÆus, Fragm. xvii. ed. GÖller; Polyb. xii. 6-7; AthenÆus, vi. p. 264.

[485] This brief fragment of the ?a??e?e?a of Alkman is preserved by Stephan. Byz. (???s???), and alluded to by Strabo, x. p. 460: see Welcker Alkm. Fragm. xi. and Bergk, Alk. Fr. xii.

[486] Herodot. vi. 127.

[487] See an admirable topographical description of the north part of Boeotia,—the lake KÔpaÏs and its environs, in Forchhammer’s Hellenika, pp. 159-186, with an explanatory map. The two long and laborious tunnels constructed by the old Orchomenians for the drainage of the lake, as an aid to the insufficiency of the natural Katabothra, are there very clearly laid down: one goes to the sea, the other into the neighboring lake Hylika, which is surrounded by high rocky banks and can take more water without overflowing. The lake KÔpaÏs is an inclosed basin, receiving all the water from Doris and Phokis through the KÊphisus. A copy of Forchhammer’s map will be found at the end of the present volume.

Forchhammer thinks that it was nothing but the similarity of the name ItÔnea (derived from ?t?a, a willow-tree) which gave rise to the tale of an emigration of people from the Thessalian to the Boeotian ItÔnÊ (p. 148).

The Homeric Catalogue presents KÔpÆ, on the north of the lake, as Boeotian, but not Orchomenus nor AsplÊdÔn (Iliad, ii. 502).

[488] See O. MÜller, Orchomenos, cap. xx. p. 418, seq.

[489] See Demosthen. De Fals. Legat. c. 43-45. Another portion of this narrow road is probably meant by the pass of KorÔneia—t? pe?? ?????e?a? ste?? (Diodor. xv. 52; Xenoph. Hellen. iv. 3, 15)—which Epameinondas occupied to prevent the invasion of Kleombrotus from Phokis.

[490] Thucyd. ii. 2—?at? t? p?t??a t?? p??t?? ????t??: compare the speech of the Thebans to the LacedÆmonians after the capture of PlatÆa, iii. 61, 65, 66.

[491] Thucyd. iv. 91; C. F. Hermann, Griechische Staats AlterthÜmer, sect. 179; Herodot. v. 79; Boeckh, Commentat. ad. Inscript. Boeotic. ap. Corp. Ins. Gr. part v. p. 726.

[492] Herodot. viii. 135; ix. 15-43. Pausan ix. 13, 1; ix. 23, 3; ix. 24, 3; ix. 32, 1-4. Xenophon, Hellen. vi. 4, 3-4: compare O. MÜller, Orchomenos, cap. xx. p. 403.

[493] Aristot. Polit. ii. 9, 6-7. ?????t?? d? a?t??? (to the Thebans) ????et? F????a?? pe?? t? ????? t???? ?a? pe?? t?? pa?d?p???a?, ??? ?a???s?? ??e???? ????? ?et?????? ?a? t??t? ?st?? ?d??? ?p? ??e???? ?e????et?????, ?p?? ? ?????? s???ta? t?? ??????. A perplexing passage follows within three lines of this,—F??????? d? ?d??? ?st?? ? t?? ??s??? ??????s??,—which raises two questions: first, whether Philolaus can really be meant in the second passage, which talks of what is ?d??? to Philolaus, while the first passage had already spoken of something ?d??? ?e????et????? by the same person. Accordingly, GÖttling and M. BarthÉlemy St. Hilaire follow one of the MSS. by writing Fa???? in place of F???????. Next, what is the meaning of ??????s??? O. MÜller (Dorians, ch. x. 5, p. 209) considers it to mean a “fresh equalization, just as ??adas?? means a fresh division,” adopting the translation of Victorius and SchlÖsser.

The point can hardly be decisively settled; but if this translation of ??????s?? be correct, there is good ground for preferring the word Fa???? to F???????; since the proceeding described would harmonize better with the ideas of Phaleas (Aristot. Pol. ii. 4, 3).

[494] Ælian, V. H. ii. 7.

[495] Aristot. Polit. ii. 3, 7. This PheidÔn seems different from PheidÔn of Argos, as far as we are enabled to judge.

[496] Herodot. vi. 74; Pausan. viii. 18, 2. See the description and print of the river Styx, and the neighboring rocks, in Fiedler’s Reise durch Griechenland, vol. i. p. 400.

He describes a scene amidst these rocks, in 1826, when the troops of Ibrahim Pasha were in the Morea, which realizes the fearful pictures of war after the manner of the ancient Gauls, or Thracians. A crowd of five thousand Greeks, of every age and sex, had found shelter in a grassy and bushy spot embosomed amidst these crags,—few of them armed. They were pursued by five thousand Egyptians and Arabians: a very small resistance, in such ground, would have kept the troops at bay, but the poor men either could not or would not offer it. They were forced to surrender: the youngest and most energetic cast themselves headlong from the rocks and perished: three thousand prisoners were carried away captive, and sold for slaves at Corinth, Patras, and Modon: all those who were unfit for sale were massacred on the spot by the Egyptian troops.

[497] This is the only way of reconciling Herodotus (viii. 73) with ThucydidÊs (iv. 56, and v. 41). The original extent of the Kynurian territory is a point on which neither of them had any means of very correct information, but there is no occasion to reject the one in favor of the other.

[498] Herod. viii. 73. ?? d? ?????????, a?t?????e? ???te?, d?????s? ????? e??a? ???e?? ??ded???e??ta? d?, ?p? te ???e??? ????e??? ?a? t?? ??????, ???te? ???e?ta? ?a? pe???????.

[499] Herodot. iv. 145-146.

[500] Herodotus omits SÖus between ProklÊs and EurypÔn, and inserts PolydektÊs between Prytanis and Eunomus: moreover, the accounts of the LacedÆmonians, as he states them, represented Lykurgus, the lawgiver, as uncle and guardian of LabÔtas, of the Eurysthenid house,—while SimonidÊs made him son of Prytanis, and others made him son of Eunomus, of the Proklid line: compare Herod. i. 65; viii. 131. Plutarch, Lycurg. c. 2.

Some excellent remarks on this early series of Spartan kings will be found in Mr. G. C. Lewis’s article in the Philological Museum, vol. ii. pp. 42-48, in a review of Dr. Arnold on the Spartan Constitution.

Compare also Larcher, Chronologie d’HÉrodote, ch. 13, pp. 484-514. He lengthens many of the reigns considerably, in order to suit the earlier epoch which he assigns to the capture of Troy and the Return of the Herakleids.

[501] History of the Dorians, vol. ii. Append. p. 442.

[502] This story—that the heroic ancestor of the great Corinthian BacchiadÆ had slain the holy man Karnus, and had been punished for it by long banishment and privation—leads to the conjecture, that the Corinthians did not celebrate the festival of the Karneia, common to the Dorians generally.

Herodotus tells us, with regard to the Ionic cities, that all of them celebrated the festival of Apaturia, except Ephesus and Kolophon; and that these two cities did not celebrate it, “because of a certain reason of murder committed,”—??t?? ??? ????? ????? ??? ????s?? ?pat????a? ?a? ??t?? ?at? f???? t??? s????? (Herod. i. 147).

The murder of Karnus by HippotÊs was probably the f???? s????? which forbade the Corinthians from celebrating the Karneia; at least, this supposition gives to the legend a special pertinence which is otherwise wanting to it. Respecting the Karneia and Hyacinthia, see Schoell De Origine GrÆci Dramatis, pp. 70-78. TÜbingen, 1828.

There were various singular customs connected with the Grecian festivals, which it was usual to account for by some legendary tale. Thus, no native of Elis ever entered himself as a competitor, or contended for the prize, at the Isthmian games. The legendary reason given for this was, that HÊraklÊs had waylaid and slain (at KleÔnÆ) the two Molionid brothers, when they were proceeding to the Isthmian games as TheÔrs or sacred envoys from the Eleian king Augeas. Redress was in vain demanded for this outrage, and MolionÊ, mother of the slain envoys, imprecated a curse upon the Eleians generally if they should ever visit the Isthmian festival. This legend is the f???? s?????, explaining why no Eleian runner or wrestler was ever known to contend there (Pausan. ii. 15, 1; v. 2, 1-4. Ister, Fragment. 46, ed. Didot).

[503] Diodor. Fragm. lib. vii. p. 14, with the note of Wesseling. Strabo (viii. p. 378) states the Bacchiad oligarchy to have lasted nearly two hundred years.

[504] Herodot. i. 82. The historian adds, besides CythÊra, ?a? a? ???pa? t?? ??s??. What other islands are meant, I do not distinctly understand.

[505] So Plato (Legg. iii. p. 692), whose mind is full of the old mythe and the tripartite distribution of Peloponnesus among the Herakleids,—? d? a?, p??te???sa ?? t??? t?te ??????? t??? pe?? t?? d?a????, ? pe?? t? ?????, etc.

[506] Pausan. ii. 38, 1; Strabo, viii. p. 368. Professor Ross observes, respecting the line of coast near Argos, “The sea-side is thoroughly flat, and for the most part marshy; only at the single point where Argos comes nearest to the coast,—between the mouth, now choked by sand, of the united Inachus and Charadrus, and the efflux of the Erasinus, overgrown with weeds and bulrushes,—stands an eminence of some elevation and composed of firmer earth, upon which the ancient Temenion was placed.” (Reisen im Peloponnes, vol. i. sect. 5, p. 149, Berlin, 1841.)

[507] Thucyd. iv. 42.

[508] Thucyd. i. 122; iii. 85, vii. 18-27; viii. 38-40.

[509] Thucyd. iv. 42.

[510] Aristot. ap. Prov. Vatican, iv. 4, ????a??? p?????,—also Prov. Suidas, x. 2.

[511] Hist. of Dorians, ch. i. 9. AndrÔn positively affirms that the Dorians came from HistiÆÔtis to KrÊte; but his affirmation does not seem to me to constitute any additional evidence of the fact: it is a conjecture adapted to the passage in the Odyssey (xix. 174), as the mention of AchÆans and Pelasgians evidently shows.

Aristotle (ap. Strab. viii. p. 374) appears to have believed that the Herakleids returned to Argos out of the Attic Tetrapolis (where, according to the Athenian legend, they had obtained shelter when persecuted by Eurystheus), accompanying a body of Ionians who then settled at Epidaurus. He cannot, therefore, have connected the Dorian occupation of Argos with the expedition from Naupaktus.

[512] Herod. viii. 43-46; Diodor. iv. 37; Pausan. iv. 34, 6.

[513] Strabo, viii. p. 373; ix. p. 434. Herodot. viii. 43. PherekydÊs, Fr. 23 and 38, ed. Didot. Steph. Byz. v. ????p?. Apollodor. ii. 7, 7. Schol. Apollon. Rhod. i. 1213.

[514] Herodot. i. 56.—???e?te? d? a?t?? ?? t?? ????p?da et??, ?a? ?? t?? ????p?d?? ??t? ?? ?e??p????s?? ?????, ??????? ??????,—to the same purpose, viii. 31-43.

[515] See Herodot. vii. 148. The Argeians say to the LacedÆmonians, in reference to the chief command of the Greeks—?a?t?? ?at? ?e t? d??a??? ???es?a? t?? ??e????? ???t??, etc. SchweighÄuser and others explain the point by reference to the command of AgamemnÔn; but this is at best only a part of the foundation of their claim: they had a more recent historical reality to plead also: compare Strabo, viii. p. 376.

[516] ??? ?t?s??t?? (so runs the accusation of the Theban orators against the captive PlatÆans, before their LacedÆmonian judges, Thucyd. iii. 61.) ???ta?a? ?ste??? t?? ????? ????t?a?—??? ?????? a?t??, ?spe? ?t???? t? p??t??, ??e??e?es?a? ?f? ???, ??? d? t?? ????? ????t?? pa?aa????te? t? p?t??a, ?pe?d? p??s??a??????t?, p??se????sa? p??? ????a???? ?a? et? a?t?? p???? ??? ??apt??.

[517] Respecting PheidÔn, king of Argos, Ephorus said,—t?? ????? ???? ????ae t?? ?????? d?espas???? e?? p?e?? ??? (ap. Strabo. viii. p. 358).

[518] The worship of Apollo PythaËus, adopted from Argos both at HermionÊ and AsinÊ, shows the connection between them and Argos (Pausan. ii. 35, 2; ii. 36, 5): but Pausanias can hardly be justified in saying that the Argeians actually Dorized HermionÊ: it was Dryopian in the time of Herodotus, and seemingly for a long time afterwards (Herodot. viii. 43). The Hermionian Inscription, No. 1193, in Boeckh’s Collection, recognizes their old Dryopian connection with AsinÊ in Laconia: that town had once been neighbor of HermionÊ, but was destroyed by the Argeians, and the inhabitants received a new home from the Spartans. The dialect of the Hermionians (probably that of the Dryopians generally) was Doric. See Ahrens, De Dialecto DoricÂ, pp. 2-12.

[519] Thucyd. v. 53. ?????tat?? t?? ?e??? ?sa? ?? ???e???. The word e?sp?a???, which the historian uses in regard to the claim of Argos against Epidaurus, seems to imply a money-payment withheld: compare the offerings exacted by Athens from Epidaurus (Herod. v. 82).

The peculiar and intimate connection between the Argeians, and Apollo, with his surname of PythaËus, was dwelt upon by the Argeian poetess Telesilla (Pausan. ii. 36, 2).

[520] Herodot. vi. 92. See O. MÜller, History of the Dorians, ch. 7, 13.

[521] Ephor. Fragm. 15, ed. Marx; ap. Strabo, viii. p. 358; Theopompus, Fragm. 30, ed. Didot; ap. Diodor. Fragm. lib. iv.

The Parian Marble makes PheidÔn the eleventh from HÊraklÊs, and places him B.C. 895; Herodotus, on the contrary (in a passage which affords considerable grounds for discussion), places him at a period which cannot be much higher than 600 B.C. (vi. 127.) Some authors suspect the text of Herodotus to be incorrect: at any rate, the real epoch of PheidÔn is determined by the 8th Olympiad. Several critics suppose two PheidÔns, each king of Argos,—among others, O. MÜller (Dorians, iii. 6, 10); but there is nothing to countenance this, except the impossibility of reconciling Herodotus with the other authorities. And Weissenborn, in a dissertation of some length, vindicates the emendation of Pausanias proposed by some former critics,—altering the 8th Olympiad, which now stands in the text of Pausanias, into the twenty-eighth, as the date of PheidÔn’s usurpation at the Olympic games. Weissenborn endeavors to show that PheidÔn cannot have flourished earlier than 660 B.C.; but his arguments do not appear to me very forcible, and certainly not sufficient to justify so grave an alteration in the number of Pausanias (BeitrÄge zur Griechischen Alterthumskunde, p. 18, Jena, 1844). Mr. Clinton (Fasti Hellenici, vol. i. App. 1, p. 249) places PheidÔn between 783 and 744 B.C.; also, Boeckh. ad Corp. Inscript. No. 2374, p. 335, and MÜller, Æginetica, p. 63.

[522] Pausan. ii. 36, 5; iv. 35, 2.

[523] Pausan. ii. 19, 1. ???e??? d?, ?te ?s?????a? ?a? t? a?t????? ??ap??te? ?? pa?a??t?t??, t? t?? ????s?a? t?? as????? ?? ?????st?? p????a???, ?? ??d??? t? ?e?s?? ?a? t??? ?p??????? t? ???a ?e?f???a? t?? as????? ????. This passage has all the air of transferring back to the early government of Argos, feelings which were only true of the later. It is curious that, in this chapter, though devoted to the Argeian regal line and government, Pausanias takes no notice of PheidÔn: he mentions him only with reference to the disputed Olympic ceremony.

[524] Ephorus, ut suprÀ. Fe?d??a t?? ???e???, d??at?? ??ta ?p? ??????, d???e? d? ?pe?e?????? t??? ?at? a?t??, ?f? ?? t?? te ????? ???? ????ae t?? ?????? d?espas???? e?? p?e?? ???, etc. What is meant by the lot of TÊmenus has been already explained.

[525] Plutarch, Narrat. Amator. p. 772; Schol. Apollon. Rhod. iv. 1212; compare Didymus, ap. Schol. Pindar. Olymp. xiii. 27.

I cannot, however, believe that PheidÔn, the ancient Corinthian law giver mentioned by Aristotle, is the same person as PheidÔn the king of Argos (Polit. ii. 6, 4).

[526] Ephor. ut suprÀ.???? t??t???, ?p???s?a? ?a? ta?? ?f? ??a?????? a??e?e?sa?? p??es?, ?a? t??? ????a? ?????? t????a? a?t??, ??? ??e???? ????e? t??t?? d? e??a? ?a? t?? ???p?a???, etc.

[527] Herodot. v. 43.

[528] Xenoph. Hellen. vii. 4, 28; Diodor. xv. 78.

[529] Strabo, viii. p. 354.

[530] Thucyd. iv. 98.

[531] Pausan. v. 22, 2; Strabo, viii. pp. 354-358; Herodot. vi. 127. The name of the victor (AntiklÊs the Messenian), however, belonging to the 8th Olympiad, appears duly in the lists; it must have been supplied afterwards.

[532] Herodot. vi. 127; Ephor. ap. Strab. viii. pp. 358-376.

[533] Metrologische Untersuchungen Über Gewichte, MÜnzfusse, und MÄsse des Alterthums in ihrem Zusammenhange dargestellt, von Aug. Boeckh; Berlin, 1838.

See chap. 7, 1-3. But I cannot agree with M. Boeckh, in thinking that PheidÔn, in celebrating the Olympic games, deduced from the Olympic stadium, and formally adopted, the measure of the foot, or that he at all settled measures of length. In general, I do not think that M. Boeckh’s conclusions are well made out, in respect to the Grecian measures of length and capacity. In an examination of this eminently learned treatise (inserted in the Classical Museum, 1844, vol. i.), I endeavored to set forth both the new and interesting points established by the author, and the various others in which he appeared to me to have failed.

[534] I have modified this sentence as it stood in my first edition. It is not correct to speak of the Egyptian money scale: the Egyptians had no coined money. See a valuable article, in review of my History, in the Christian Reformer, by Mr. Kenrick, who pointed out this inaccuracy.

[535] Thucyd. v. 31.

[536] Plutarch, Apophthegm. Laconic. p. 226; DikÆarchus ap. AthenÆ. iv. p. 141.

The ÆginÆan mina, drachma, and obolus were the denominations employed in stipulations among the Peloponnesian states (Thucyd. v. 47).

[537] Herodot. vi. 127. Fe?d???? t?? ???e??? t???????—t?? ???sa?t?? ???sta d? ??????? ?p??t??. Pausanias (vi. 22, 2) copies the expression.

Aristotle cites PheidÔn as a person who, being a as??e??, made himself a t??a???? (Politic. viii. 8, 5).

[538] Herodot. vii. 149.

[539] Pausan. iii. 22, 9; iii. 23, 4.

[540] Herodot. v. 83; Strabo, viii. p. 375.

[541] Rhodes, KÔs, Knidus, and Halikarnassus are all treated by Strabo (xiv. p. 653) as colonies of Argos: Rhodes is so described by ThucydidÊs (vii. 57), and KÔs by Tacitus (xii. 61). KÔs, Kalydna, and Nisyrus are described by Herodotus as colonies of Epidaurus (vii. 99): Halikarnassus passes sometimes for a colony of TroezÊn, sometimes of TroezÊn and Argos conjointly: “Cum Melas et Areuanius ab Argis et Troezene coloniam communem eo loco induxerunt, barbaros Caras et Leleges ejecerunt (Vitruv. ii. 8, 12: Steph. Byz. v. ???????ass??).” Compare Strabo, x. p. 479; Conon, Narr. 47; Diodor. v. 80.

Raoul Rochette (Histoire des Colonies Grecques, t. iii. ch. 9) and O. MÜller (History of the Dorians, ch. 6) have collected the facts about these Asiatic Dorians.

The little town of BoeÆ had its counterpart of the same name in KrÊte (Steph. Byz. v. ?????).

[542] Strabo, p. 374.

[543] Ephorus ap. Strabo, viii. p. 376; Boeckh, Metrologie, Abschn. 7, 1: see also the Marmor Parium, Epoch 30.

[544] Etymologicon Magn. ??????? ???sa.

[545] Pollux, Onomastic. x. 179. ??? d? ?? ?a? Fe?d?? t? ???e??? ??a?????, ?p? t?? Fe?d????? ?t??? ???as????, ?p?? ?? ?? ???e??? p???te?? ???st?t???? ???e?.

Also Ephorus ap. Strab. viii. p. 358. ?a? ?t?a ??e??e t? Fe?d??e?a ?a???e?a ?a? sta????, ?a? ???sa ?e?a???e???, etc.

[546] This differs from Boeckh’s opinion: see the note in page 315.

[547] Theophrast. Character. c. 13; Pollux, x. 179.

[548] Odyss. xv. 297.

[549] Strabo, x. p. 479.

[550] Leake, Travels in Morea, vol. iii. ch. 23, p. 29; compare Diodor. xv. 66.

The distance from Olympia to Sparta, as marked on a pillar which Pausanias saw at Olympia, was 660 stadia,—about 77 English miles (Pausan. vi. 16, 6).

[551] Strabo, viii. pp. 364, 365; Pausan. iii. 2, 5: compare the story of Krius, Pausan. iii. 13, 3.

[552] Pausan. iv. 3, 3; viii. 29, 4.

[553] Strabo (viii. p. 366) blames EuripidÊs for calling MessÊnÊ an inland country; but the poet seems to have been quite correct in doing so.

[554] Pausan. iv. 2, 2. ete???? d? a?t?? ???? ????e?? ?? te ?ess????? ?a? ?a?eda??????.

[555] Pausan. iv. 3, 5-6.

[556] Homer, Iliad, ii. 604.—

Schol. ad loc. ? d? ??p?t?? ???a??tat?? ????, ????? t? ?????.

[557] Compare the two citations from Ephorus, Strabo, viii. pp. 361-365. Unfortunately, a portion of the latter citation is incurably mutilated in the text: O. MÜller (History of the Dorians, book i. ch. v. 13) has proposed an ingenious conjecture, which, however, cannot be considered as trustworthy. Grosskurd, the German translator, usually skilful in these restorations, leaves the passage untouched.

For a new coloring of the death of KresphontÊs, adjusted by IsokratÊs so as to suit the purpose of the address which he puts into the mouth of Archidamus king of Sparta, see the discourse in his works which passes under that name (Or. iv. pp. 120-122). IsokratÊs says that the Messenian Dorians slew KresphontÊs, whose children fled as suppliants to Sparta, imploring revenge for the death of their father, and surrendering the territory to the Spartans. The Delphian god advised the latter to accept the tender, and they accordingly attacked the Messenians, avenged KresphontÊs, and appropriated the territory.

IsokratÊs always starts from the basis of the old legend,—the triple Dorian conquest made all at once: compare Panathenaic. Or. xii. pp. 270-287.

[558] Ephorus ap. Strabo, viii. p. 361. Dr. Thirlwall observes (History of Greece, ch. vii. p. 300, 2d edit.), “The Messenian Pylus seems long to have retained its independence, and to have been occupied for several centuries by one branch of the family of Neleus; for descendants of Nestor are mentioned as allies of the Messenians in their struggle with Sparta in the latter half of the seventh century B.C.”

For this assertion, Dr. Thirlwall cites Strabo (viii. p. 355). I agree with him as to the matter of fact: I see no proof that the Dorians of StenyklÊrus ever ruled over what is called the Messenian Pylus; for, of course, if they did not rule over it before the second Messenian war, they never acquired it at all. But on reference to the passage in Strabo, it will not be found to prove anything to the point; for Strabo is speaking, not of the Messenian Pylus, but of the Triphylian Pylus: he takes pains to show that Nestor had nothing to do with the Messenian Pylus,—??st???? ?p?????? means the inhabitants of Triphylia, near Lepreum: compare p. 350.

[559] Strabo, viii. p. 360. Concerning the situation of KorÔnÊ, in the Messenian gulf, see Pausanias, iv. 34, 2; Strabo, viii. p. 361; and the observations of Colonel Leake, Travels in Morea, ch. x. vol. i. pp. 439-448. He places it near the modern Petalidhi, seemingly on good grounds.

[560] See Mr. Clinton’s Chronological Tables for the year 732 B.C.; O. MÜller (in the Chronological Table subjoined to his History of the Dorians) calls this victor, Oxythemis of KorÔneia, in Boeotia. But this is inadmissible, on two grounds: 1. The occurrence of a Boeotian competitor in that early day at the Olympic games. The first eleven victors (I put aside Oxythemis, because he is the subject of the argument) are all from western and southern Peloponnesus; then come victors from Corinth, Megara, and Epidaurus; then from Athens; there is one from Thebes in the 41st Olympiad. I infer from hence that the celebrity and frequentation of the Olympic games increased only by degrees, and had not got beyond Peloponnesus in the eighth century B.C. 2. The name CoronÆus, ?????a???, is the proper and formal title for a citizen of KorÔnÊ, not for a citizen of KorÔneia: the latter styles himself ?????e??. The ethnical name ?????e??, as belonging to KorÔneia in Boeotia, is placed beyond doubt by several inscriptions in Boeckh’s collection; especially No. 1583, in which a citizen of that town is proclaimed as victorious at the festival of the Charitesia at Orchomenus: compare Nos. 1587-1593, in which the same ethnical name occurs. The Boeotian Inscriptions attest in like manner the prevalence of the same etymological law in forming ethnical names, for the towns near KorÔneia: thus, ChÆrÔneia makes ?a????e??; Lebadeia, ?eade??; Elateia, ??ate??, or ??ate?e??.

The Inscriptions afford evidence perfectly decisive as to the ethnical title under which a citizen of KorÔneia in Boeotia would have caused himself to be entered and proclaimed at the Olympic games; better than the evidence of Herodotus and ThucydidÊs, who both call them ?????a??? (Herodot. v. 79; Thucyd. iv. 93): Polybius agrees with the Inscription, and speaks of the ?????e??, ?eade??, ?a????e?? (xxvii. 1). O. MÜller himself admits, in another place (Orchomenos, p. 480), that the proper ethnical name is ?????e??. The reading of Strabo (ix. p. 411) is not trustworthy: see Grosskurd, ad loc.; compare Steph. Byz. ?????e?a and ??????.

In regard to the formation of ethnical names, it seems the general rule, that a town ending in ? or a?, preceded by a consonant, had its ethnical derivative in a???; such as S?????, ??????, ???, T?a?, ????a?; while names ending in e?a had their ethnicon in e??, as ??e???d?e?a, ??se?a, Se?e??e?a, ??s???e?a (the recent cities thus founded by the successors of Alexander are perhaps the best evidences that can be taken of the analogies of the language), ?e??pe?a, ?e??te?a, in addition to the Boeotian names of towns above quoted. There is, however, great irregularity in particular cases, and the number of towns called by the same name created an anxiety to vary the ethnicon for each: see Stephan. Byz. v. ?????e?a.

[561] The entire nakedness of the competitors at Olympia was adopted from the Spartan practice, seemingly in the 14th Olympiad, as is testified by the epigram on Orsippus the Megarian. Previous to that period, the Olympic competitors had d?a??ata pe?? t? a?d??a (Thucyd. i. 6).

[562] Thucyd. iii. 112: iv. 41: compare vii. 44, about the sameness of sound of the war-shout, or pÆan, as delivered by all the different Dorians.

[563] Corpus Inscript. Boeckh, Nos. 1771, 1772, 1773; Ahrens, De Dialecto DoricÂ, sect. i-ii. 48.

[565] See the valuable work of Ahrens, De Dialecto ÆolicÂ. sect. 51. He observes, in reference to the Lesbian, Thessalian, and Boeotian dialects: “Tres illas dialectos, quÆ optimo jure ÆolicÆ vocari videntur—quia, qui illis usi sunt, Æoles erant—comparantem mirum habere oportet, quod Asianorum Æolum et Boeotorum dialecti tantum inter se distant, quantum vix ab ali quÂvis GrÆcÆ linguÆ dialecto.” He then enumerates many points of difference: “Contra tot tantasque differentias pauca reperiuntur eaque fere levia, quÆ utrique dialecto, neque simul DoricÆ, communia sint.... Vides his comparatis tantum interesse inter utramque dialectum, ut dubitare liceat, an Æoles Boeoti non magis cum Æolibus Asianis conjuncti fuerint, quam qui hodie miro quodam casu Saxones vocantur cum antiquis Saxonibus. Nihilominus Thessalic dialecto in comparationem vocata, diversissima quÆ videntur aliquo vinculo conjungere licet. Quamvis enim pauca de e comperta habeamus, hoc tamen certum est, alia Thessalis cum Lesbiis, alia cum solis Boeotis communia esse.” (P. 222-223.)

[566] About the Æolic dialect of the PerrhÆbians, see Stephanus Byz. v. G?????, and ap. Eustath. ad Iliad, p. 335.

The Attic judgment, in comparing these different varieties of Greek speech, is expressed in the story of a man being asked—Whether the Boeotians or the Thessalians were most of barbarians? He answered—The Eleians (Eustath. ad Iliad. p. 304).

[567] See Heeren, Dissertatio de Fontibus Plutarchi, pp. 19-25.

[568] Herodot. i. 65. Moreover, Herodotus gives this as the statement of the LacedÆmonians themselves.

[569] Plutarch, Lykurg. c. 1. According to Dionys. Halik. (Ant. Rom. ii. 49) Lykurgus was uncle, not son, of Eunomus.

Aristotle considers Lykurgus as guardian of Charilaus (Politic. ii. 7, 1): compare v. 10, 3. See O. MÜller (Hist. of Dorians, i. 7, 3).

[570] PhlegÔn also adds KleosthenÊs of Pisa (De Olympiis ap. Meursii Opp. vii. p. 128). It appears that there existed a quoit at Olympia, upon which the formula of the Olympic truce was inscribed, together with the names of Iphitus and Lykurgus as the joint authors and proclaimers of it. Aristotle believed this to be genuine, and accepted it as an evidence of the fact which it professed to certify: and O. MÜller is also disposed to admit it as genuine,—that is, as contemporary with the times to which it professes to relate. I come to a different conclusion: that the quoit existed, I do not doubt; but that the inscription upon it was actually set down in writing, in or near B.C. 880, would be at variance with the reasonable probabilities resulting from Grecian palÆography. Had this ancient and memorable instrument existed at Olympia in the days of Herodotus, he could hardly have assigned to Lykurgus the epoch which we now read in his writings.

The assertions in MÜller’s History of the Dorians (i. 7, 7), about Lykurgus, Iphitus, and KleosthenÊs “drawing up the fundamental law of the Olympic armistice,” are unsupported by any sufficient evidence. In the later times of established majesty of the Olympic festival, the Eleians did undoubtedly exercise the power which he describes; but to connect this with any deliberate regulation of Iphitus and Lykurgus, is in my judgment incorrect. See the mention of a similar truce proclaimed throughout Triphylia by the Makistians as presidents of the common festival at the temple of the Samian Poseidon (Strabo, viii. p. 343).

[571] Thucyd. i. 18.

[572] Mr. Clinton fixes the legislation of Lykurgus, “in conformity with ThucydidÊs,” at about 817 B.C., and his regency at 852 B.C., about thirty-five years previous (Fasti Hellen. v. i. c. 7, p. 141): he also places the Olympiad of Iphitus B.C. 828 (F. H. vol. ii. p. 410; App. c. 22).

In that chapter, Mr. Clinton collects and discusses the various statements respecting the date of Lykurgus: compare, also, Larcher ad Herodot. i. 67, and Chronologie, pp. 486-492.

The differences in these statements must, after all, be taken as they stand, for they cannot be reconciled except by the help of arbitrary suppositions, which only mislead us by producing a show of agreement where there is none in reality. I agree with Mr. Clinton, in thinking that the assertion of ThucydidÊs is here to be taken as the best authority. But I altogether dissent from the proceeding which he (in common with Larcher, Wesseling, Sir John Marsham, and others) employs with regard to the passage of Herodotus, where that author calls Lykurgus the guardian and uncle of LabÔtas (of the Eurystheneid line). Mr. Clinton says: “From the notoriety of the fact that Lycurgus was ascribed to the other house (the Prokleids), it is manifest that the passage must be corrupted” (p. 144); and he then goes on to correct the text of Herodotus, agreeably to the proposition of Sir J. Marsham.

This proceeding seems to me inadmissible. The text of Herodotus reads perfectly well, and is not contradicted by anything to be found elsewhere in Herodotus himself: moreover, we have here a positive guarantee of its accuracy, for Mr. Clinton himself admits that it stood in the days of Pausanias just as we now read it (Pausan. iii. 2, 3). By what right, then, do we alter it? or what do we gain by doing so? Our only right to do so, is, the assumption that there must have been uniformity of belief and means of satisfactory ascertainment, (respecting facts and persons of the ninth and tenth centuries before the Christian era,) existing among Greeks of the fifth and succeeding centuries; an assumption which I hold to be incorrect. And all we gain is, an illusory unanimity produced by gratuitously putting words into the mouth of one of our witnesses.

If we can prove Herodotus to have been erroneously informed, it is right to do so; but we have no ground for altering his deposition. It affords a clear proof that there were very different stories as to the mere question, to which of the two lines of Herakleids the Spartan lawgiver belonged,—and that there was an enormous difference as to the time in which he lived.

[573] History of the Dorians, i. 7, 6.

[574] History of the Dorians, iii. 1, 8. Alf. Kopstadt recognizes this as an error in MÜller’s work: see his recent valuable Dissertation “De Rerum Laconicarum Constitutionis LycurgeÆ Origine et Indole,” GryphiÆ, 1849, sect. 3, p. 18.

[575] Among the many other evidences to this point, see Aristotle, Ethic. x. 9; Xenophon, Republ. Laced. 10, 8.

[576] Herodot. i. 65-66; Thucyd. i. 18.

[577] Strabo, viii. p. 363.

[578] Plutarch, Lykurg. 3, 4, 5.

[579] For an instructive review of the text as well as the meaning of this ancient Rhetra, see Urlichs, Ueber die Lycurgischen Rhetren, published since the first edition of this History. His refutation of the rash charges of GÖttling seems to me complete: but his own conjectures are not all equally plausible; nor can I subscribe to his explanation of ?f?st?s?a?.

[580] Plutarch, Lykurg. c. 5-6. Hermippus, the scholar of Aristotle, professed to give the names of twenty out of these thirty devoted partisans.

There was, however, a different story, which represented that Lykurgus, on his return from his travels, found Charilaus governing like a despot (Heraclid. Pontic. c. 2).

[581] The words of the old Rhetra—???? ???a???? ?a? ?????? ???a??a? ?e??? ?d??s?e???, f???? f????a?ta, ?a? ??? ???a?ta, t??????ta, ?e???s?a? s?? ???a??ta??, ?atast?sa?ta, ??a? ?? ??a? ?pe????e?? eta?? ?a??a? ?a? ??a??????, ??t?? e?sf??e?? te ?a? ?f?stas?a?? d?? d? ?????? e?e? ?a? ???t??. (Plutarch, ib.)

The reading ?????? (last word but three) is that of Coray’s edition: other readings proposed are ????a?, ??????, ?????a?, etc. The MSS., however, are incurably corrupt, and none of the conjectures can be pronounced certain.

The Rhetra contains various remarkable archaisms,—?pe????e??—?f?stas?a?,—the latter word in the sense of putting the question for decision, corresponding to the function of the ?fest?? at Knidus, (Plutarch, QuÆst. GrÆc. c. 4; see Schneider, Lexicon, ad voc.)

O. MÜller connects t??????ta with ???, and lays it down that there were thirty Obes at Sparta: I rather agree with those critics who place the comma after ???a?ta, and refer the number thirty to the senate. Urlichs, in his Dissertation Ueber Die Lykurgisch. Rhetren (published in the Rheinisches Museum for 1847, p. 204), introduces the word p?es??e??a? after t??????ta; which seems a just conjecture, when we look to the addition afterwards made by Theopompus. The statements of MÜller about the Obes seem to me to rest on no authority.

The word Rhetra means a solemn compact, either originally emanating from, or subsequently sanctioned by, the gods, who are always parties to such agreements: see the old Treaty between the Eleians and HerÆans,—? ???t?a, between the two,—commemorated in the valuable inscription still preserved,—as ancient, according to Boeckh, as Olymp. 40-60, (Boeckh, Corp. Inscript. No. 2, p. 26, part i.) The words of TyrtÆus imply such a compact between contracting parties: first the kings, then the senate, lastly the people—e??e?a?? ??t?a?? ??tapae???????—where the participle last occurring applies not to the people alone, but to all the three. The Rhetra of Lykurgus emanated from the Delphian god; but the kings, senate, and people all bound themselves, both to each other and to the gods, to obey it. The explanations given of the phrase by Nitzsch and SchÖmann (in Dr. Thirlwall’s note, ch. viii. p. 334) seem to me less satisfactory than what appears in C. F. Hermann (Lehrbuch der Griech. StaatsalterthÜmer, s. 23).

Nitzsch (Histor. Homer. sect. xiv. pp. 50-55) does not take sufficient account of the distinction between the meaning of ??t?a in the early and in the later times. In the time of the Ephor Epitadeus, or of Agis the Third, he is right in saying that ??t?a is equivalent to scitum,—still, however, with an idea of greater solemnity and unchangeability than is implied in the word ????, analogous to what is understood by a fundamental or organic enactment in modern ideas. The old ideas, of a mandate from the Delphian god, and a compact between the kings and the citizens, which had once been connected with the word, gradually dropped away from it. There is no contradiction in Plutarch, therefore, such as that to which Nitzsch alludes (p. 54).

Kopstadt’s Dissertation (pp. 22, 30) touches on the same subject. I agree with Kopstadt (Dissert. pp. 28-30), in thinking it probable that Plutarch copied the words of the old Lykurgean constitutional Rhetra, from the account given by Aristotle of the Spartan polity.

King Theopompus probably brought from the Delphian oracle the important rider which he tacked to the mandate as originally brought by Lykurgus—?? as??e?? Te?p?p?? ?a? ????d???? t?de t? ??t?? pa?e????a?a?. The authority of the oracle, together with their own influence, would enable them to get these words accepted by the people.

[582] ?? d? s?????? ? d??? ????t?, t??? p?es??e??a? ?a? ???a??ta? ?p?stat??a? e?e?. (Plutarch, ib.)

Plutarch tells us that the primitive Rhetra, anterior to this addition, specially enjoined the assembled citizens either to adopt or reject, without change, the Rhetra proposed by the kings and senate, and that the rider was introduced because the assembly had disobeyed this injunction, and adopted amendments of its own. It is this latter sense which he puts on the word s??????. Urlichs (Ueber Lyc. Rhetr. p. 232) and Nitzsch (Hist. Homer. p. 54) follow him, and the latter even construes the epithet ???e?a?? ??t?a?? ??tapae??????? of TyrtÆus in a corresponding sense: he says, “Populus iis (rhetris) e??e?a??, i. e. nihil inflexis, suffragari jubetur: nam lex cujus TyrtÆus admonet, ita sanxerat—si populus rogationem inflexam (i. e. non nisi ad suum arbitrium immutatam) accipere voluerit, senatores et auctores abolento totam.”

Now, in the first place, it seems highly improbable that the primitive Rhetra, with its antique simplicity, would contain any such preconceived speciality of restriction upon the competence of the assembly. That restriction received its formal commencement only from the rider annexed by king Theopompus, which evidently betokens a previous dispute and refractory behavior on the part of the assembly.

In the second place, the explanation which these authors give of the words s?????? and e??e?a??, is not conformable to the ancient Greek, as we find it in Homer and Hesiod: and these early analogies are the proper test, seeing that we are dealing with a very ancient document. In Hesiod, ???? and s?????? are used in a sense which almost exactly corresponds to right and wrong (which words, indeed, in their primitive etymology, maybe traced back to the meaning of straight and crooked). See Hesiod. Opp. Di. 36, 192, 218, 221, 226, 230, 250, 262, 264; also Theogon. 97, and Fragm. 217, ed. GÖttling; where the phrases are constantly repeated, ??e?a? d??a?, s????a? d??a?, s?????? ????. There is also the remarkable expression, Opp. Di. 9. ?e?a d? t? ????e? s??????: compare v. 263. ????ete ?????: also Homer, Iliad, xvi. 387. ?? ?? e?? ????? s?????? ?????s? ???sta?; and xxiii. 580. ??e?a; xviii. 508. ?? et? t??s? d???? ????tata e?p?, etc.

If we judge by these analogies, we shall see that the words of TyrtÆus, e??e?a?? ??t?a??, mean “straightforward, honest, statutes or conventions”—not propositions adopted without change, as Nitzsch supposes. And so the words s?????? ????t?, mean, “adopt a wrong or dishonest determination,”—not a determination different from what was proposed to them.

These words gave to the kings and senate power to cancel any decision of the public assembly which they disapproved. It retained only the power of refusing assent to some substantive propositions of the authorities, first of the kings and senate, afterwards of the ephors. And this limited power it seems always to have preserved.

Kopstadt explains well the expression s??????, as the antithesis to the epithet of TyrtÆus, e??e?a?? ??t?a?? (Dissertat. sect. 15, p. 124).

[583] Herod. i. 65: compare Plutarch, Lycurg. c. 7; Aristot. Polit. v. 9, 1 (where he gives the answer of king Theopompus).

Aristotle tells us that the ephors were chosen, but not how they were chosen; only, that it was in some manner excessively puerile,—pa?da???d?? ??? ?st? ??a? (ii. 6, 16).

M. BarthÉlemy St. Hilaire, in his note to the passage of Aristotle, presumes that they were of course chosen in the same manner as the senators; but there seems no sufficient ground in Aristotle to countenance this. Nor is it easy to reconcile the words of Aristotle respecting the election of the senators, where he assimilates it to an a??es?? d??aste?t??? (Polit. v. 5, 8; ii. 6, 18), with the description which Plutarch (Lycurg. 26) gives of that election.

[584] Kopstadt agrees in this supposition, that the number of the senate was probably not peremptorily fixed before the Lykurgean reform (Dissertat. ut sup. sect. 13, p. 109).

[585] Plato, Legg. iii. p. 691; Plato Epist. viii. p. 354, B.

[586] Plato, Legg. iii. p. 691; Aristot. Polit. ii. 6, 20.

[587] The conspiracy of Pausanias, after the repulse of Xerxes, was against the liberty of combined Hellas, to constitute himself satrap of Hellas under the Persian monarch, rather than against the established LacedÆmonian government; though undoubtedly one portion of his project was to excite the Helots to revolt, and Aristotle treats him as specially aiming to put down the power of the ephors (Polit. v. 5, 6: compare Thucyd. i. 128-134; Herodot. v. 32).

[588] Xenophon, Republic. Laced, c. 14.

[589] Plutarch, Agis, c. 12. ???t? ??? t? ???e??? (the ephors) ?s??e?? ?? d?af???? t?? as?????, etc.

[590] Plutarch, KleomenÊs, c. 10. s?e??? d? t??t??, t? ???? ???, etapep????? t?? as???a t?? ?f????, etc.

[591] Xenophon, Republic. LacedÆmon. c. 15. ?a? ?????? ?? ???????? ?at? ??a p?????ta?? ?f???? ?? ?p?? t?? p??e??, as??e?? d? ?p?? ?a?t??. ? d? ????? ?st?, t? ?? as??e?, ?at? t??? t?? p??e?? ?e?????? ????? as??e?se??? t? d? p??e?, ?ped??????t?? ??e????, ?st?f????t?? t?? as??e?a? pa???e??.

[592] Herodot. vi. 57.

[593] Plato, Legg. iii. p. 692; Aristot. Polit. v. 11, 1; Cicero de Republic. Fragm. ii. 33, ed. Maii—“Ut contra consulare imperium tribuni plebis, sic illi (ephori) contra vim regiam constituti;”—also, De Legg. iii. 7. and Valer. Max. iv. 1.

Compare Plutarch, Lycurg. c. 7: Tittmann, Griechisch. Staatsverfassung, p. 108, seqq.

[594] Polyb. xxiv. 8.

[595] Aristot. Polit. ii. 6, 14-16; ?st? d? ?a? ? d?a?ta t?? ?f???? ??? ?????????? t? ????at? t?? p??e??? a?t? ?? ??? ??e???? ??a? ?st?? ?? d? t??? ?????? ????? ?pe????e? ?p? t? s??????, etc.

[596] Herodot. vi. 56.

[597] Aristot. ii. 7, 4; Xenoph. Republ. Laced. c. 13. ?a?sa?Ía?, pe?sa? t?? ?f???? t?e??, ????e? f??????, Xenoph. Hellen. ii. 4, 29; f?????? ?f??a? ?? ?f????, iii. 2, 23.

A special restriction was put on the functions of the king, as military commander-in-chief, in 417 B.C., after the ill-conducted expedition of Agis, son of Archidamus, against Argos. It was then provided that ten Spartan counsellors should always accompany the king in every expedition (Thucyd. v. 63).

[598] The hide-money (de?at????) arising from the numerous victims offered at public sacrifices at Athens, is accounted for as a special item of the public revenue in the careful economy of that city: see Boeckh, Public Econ. of Athens, iii. 7, p. 333; Eng. Trans. Corpus Inscription. No. 157.

[599] TyrtÆus, Fragm. 1, ed. Bergk; Strabo, xviii. p. 362:—

Compare Thucyd. v. 16; Herodot. v. 39; Xenoph. Hellen. iii. 3, 3; Plutarch, Lysand. c. 22.

[600] Herod, v. 72. See the account in Plutarch, of the abortive stratagem of Lysander, to make the kingly dignity elective, by putting forward a youth who passed for the son of Apollo (Plutarch, Lysand. c. 25-26).

[601] Xenoph. Hellen. iii. 3, 1. ????—?t??e se??t??a? ? ?at? ?????p?? taf??.

[602] For the privileges of the Spartan kings, see Herodot. vi. 56-57; Xenophon, Republ. Laced. c. 15; Plato, Alcib. i. p. 123.

[603] Herodot. vi. 66, and Thucyd. v. 16, furnish examples of this.

[604] Xenophon, Republ. Laced. c. 8, 2, and Agesilaus, cap. 7, 2.

[605] Xenoph. Rep. Laced. 8, 4; Thucydid. i. 131; Aristot. Polit. ii. 6,14—????? ??a? e????? ?a? ?s?t??a????. Plutarch, Lycurg. c. 13.—? ???s?a? ????? ?????f???.

Plato, in his Republic, in like manner disapproves of any general enactments, tying up beforehand the discretion of perfectly educated men, like his guardians, who will always do what is best on each special occasion (Republic, iv. p. 425).

[606] Besides the primitive constitutional Rhetra mentioned above, page 345, various other RhetrÆ are also attributed to Lykurgus: and Plutarch singles out three under the title of “The Three RhetrÆ,” as if they were either the only genuine Lykurgean RhetrÆ, or at least stood distinguished by some peculiar sanctity from all others (Plutarch, QuÆst. Roman. c. 87. Agesilaus, c. 26).

These three were (Plutarch, Lycurg. c. 13; comp. Apophth. Lacon. p. 227): 1. Not to resort to written laws. 2. Not to employ in house-building any other tools than the axe and the saw. 3. Not to undertake military expeditions often against the same enemies.

I agree with Nitzsch (Histor. Homer. pp. 61-65) that these RhetrÆ, though doubtless not actually Lykurgean, are, nevertheless, ancient (that is, probably dating somewhere between 650-550 B.C.) and not the mere fictions of recent writers, as SchÖmann (Ant. Jur. Pub. iv. 1; xiv. p. 132) and Urlichs (p. 241) seem to believe. And though Plutarch specifies the number three, yet there seems to have been still more, as the language of TyrtÆus must be held to indicate: out of which, from causes which we do not now understand, the three which Plutarch distinguishes excited particular notice.

These maxims or precepts of state were probably preserved along with the dicta of the Delphian oracle, from which authority, doubtless, many of them may have emanated,—such as the famous ancient prophecy ? f??????at?a Sp??ta? ??e?, ???? d? ??d?? (Krebs, Lectiones DiodoreÆ, p. 140. Aristotel. ?e?? ????te???, ap. Schol. ad Eurip. Andromach. 446. SchÖmann, Comm. ad Plutarch. Ag. et Cleomen. p. 123).

Nitzsch has good remarks in explanation of the prohibition against “using written laws.” This prohibition was probably called forth by the circumstance that other Grecian states were employing lawgivers like Zaleukus, Drako, Charondas, or Solon,—to present them, at once, with a series of written enactments, or provisions. Some Spartans may have proposed that an analogous lawgiver should be nominated for Sparta: upon which proposition a negative was put in the most solemn manner possible, by a formal Rhetra, perhaps passed after advice from Delphi. There is no such contradiction, therefore, (when we thus conceive the event,) as some authors represent, in forbidding the use of written laws by a Rhetra itself, put into writing. To employ a phrase in greater analogy with modern controversies—“The Spartans, on the direction of the oracle, resolve to retain their unwritten common law, and not to codify.”

[607] ?d??e t??? ?f????? ?a? t? ?????s?? (Xen. Hellen. iii. 2, 23).

[608] The case of Leotychides, Herod. vi. 72; of Pleistoanax, Thucyd. ii. 21-v. 16; Agis the Second, Thucyd. v. 63; Agis the Third, Plutarch, Agis, c. 19: see Plutarch, Agesilaus, c. 5.

Respecting the ephors generally, see Wachsmuth, Hellen. Alterthumskunde, v. 4, 42, vol. i. p. 223; Cragius, Rep. Lac. ii. 4, p. 121.

Aristotle distinctly marks the ephors as ???pe??????: so that the story alluded to briefly in the Rhetoric (iii. 18) is not easy to be understood.

[609] Thucyd. i. 67, 80, 87. ???????? sf?? a?t?? t?? e????ta.

[610] Thucyd. iv. 68. t?? p???te?a? t? ???pt??: compare iv. 74; also, his remarkable expression about so distinguished a man as Brasidas, ?? d? ??? ad??at??, ?? ?a?eda??????, e?pe??, and iv. 24, about the LacedÆmonian envoys to Athens. Compare SchÖmann, Antiq. Jur. Pub. GrÆc. iv. 1, 10, p. 122. Aristotel. Polit. ii. 8, 3.

[611] ??? ????? ?a??????? ?????s?a? (Xenoph. Hellen. iii. 3, 8), which means the ?????te?, or senate, and none besides, except the ephors, who convoked it. (See Lachmann, Spart. Verfass. sect. 12, p. 216.) What is still more to be noted, is the expression ?? ?????t?? as the equivalent of ? ?????s?a (compare Hellen. v. 2, 11; vi. 3, 3), evidently showing a special and limited number of persons convened: see, also, ii. 4, 38; iv. 6, 3; v. 2, 33; Thucyd. v. 77.

The expression ?? ?????t?? could never have got into use as an equivalent for the Athenian ecclesia.

[612] Xenoph. Republ. Laced. 10; Aristot. Polit. ii. 6, 17; iii. 1, 7; Demosthen. cont. Leptin. c. 23, p. 489; IsokratÊs, Or. xii. (Panathenaic.) p. 266. The language of DemosthenÊs seems particularly inaccurate.

Plutarch (Agesilaus, c. 32), on occasion of some suspected conspirators, who were put to death by Agesilaus and the ephors, when Sparta was in imminent danger from the attack of Epameinondas, asserts, that this was the first time that any Spartan had ever been put to death without trial.

[613] Aristot. Polit. ii. 6, 18. Compare, also, Thucydid. i. 131, about the guilty Pausanias,—p?ste??? ???as? d?a??se?? t?? d?a????; Herodot. v. 72; Thucyd. v. 16,—about the kings Leotychides and Pleistoanax; the brave and able Gylippus,—Plutarch, Lysand. c. 16.

[614] The ephors are sometimes considered as a democratical element, because every Spartan citizen had a chance of becoming ephor; sometimes as a despotical element, because in the exercise of their power they were subject to little restraint and no responsibility: see Plato, Legg. iv. p. 712; Aristot. Polit. ii. 3, 10; iv. 7, 4, 5.

[615] A specimen of the way in which this antiquity was lauded, may be seen in IsokratÊs, Or. xii. (Panathenaic.) p. 288.

[616] Herodot. v. 68; Stephan. Byz. ????e? and ????; O. MÜller, Dorians, iii. 5, 2; Boeckh ad Corp. Inscrip. No. 1123.

Thucyd. i. 24, about Phalius, the Herakleid, at Corinth.

[617] See TyrtÆus, Fragm. 8, 1, ed. Schneidewin, and Pindar, Pyth. i. 61. v. 71, where the expressions “descendants of HÊraklÊs” plainly comprehend more than the two kingly families. Plutarch, Lysand. c. 22; Diodor. xi. 58.

[618] Herodot. iv. 149; Pindar, Pyth. v. 67; Aristot. ?a???. ????t. p. 127, Fragm. ed. Neuman. The TalthybiadÆ, or heralds, at Sparta, formed a family or caste apart (Herod. vii. 134).

O. MÜller supposes, without any proof, that the Ægeids must have been adopted into one of the three Dorian tribes; this is one of the corollaries from his fundamental supposition, that Sparta is the type of pure Dorism (vol. ii. p. 78). Kopstadt thinks (Dissertat. p. 67) that I have done injustice to O. MÜller, in not assenting to his proof: but, on studying the point over again, I can see no reason for modifying what is here stated in the text. The Section of SchÖmann’s work (Antiq. Jur. Publ. GrÆc. iv. 1, 6, p. 115) on this subject asserts a great deal more than can be proved.

[619] Herod. v. 68-92; Boeckh, Corp. Inscrip. Nos. 1130, 1131; Stephan. Byz. v. ????????; Pausan. ii. 28, 3.

[620] Photius ???ta ??t?; also. Proverb. Vatic. Suidas, xi. 64; compare Hesychius, v. ????fa???.

[621] MÜller, Dorians, iii. 5, 3-7; Boeckh ad Corp. Inscription. part iv. sect. 3, p. 609.

[622] Pausan. iii. 16, 6; Herodot. iii. 55; Boeckh, Corp. Inscript. Nos. 1241, 1338, 1347, 1425; Steph. Byz. v. ?es?a; Strabo, viii. p. 364; Hesych. v. ??t???.

There is much confusion and discrepancy of opinion about the Spartan tribes. Cragius admits six (De Republ. Lacon. i. 6); Meursius, eight (Rep. Lacon. i. 7): BarthÉlemy (Voyage du Jeune Anacharsis, iv. p. 185) makes them five. Manso has discussed the subject at large, but I think not very satisfactorily, in the eighth Beilage to the first book of his History of Sparta (vol. ii. p. 125); and Dr. Thirwall’s second Appendix (vol. i. p. 517) both notices all the different modern opinions on this obscure topic, and adds several useful criticisms. Our scanty stock of original evidence leaves much room for divergent hypotheses, and little chance of any certain conclusion.

[623] Thucyd. i. 10.

[624] One or two Perioekic officers appear in military command towards the end of the Peloponnesian war (Thucyd. viii. 6, 22), but these seem rare exceptions, even as to foreign service by sea or land, while a Perioekus, as magistrate at Sparta, was unheard of.

[625] One half was paid by the enslaved Messenians (TyrtÆus, Frag. 4, Bergk): ??s? p??, ?ss?? ???p?? ????sa f??e?.

[626] Strabo, viii. p. 362. Stephanus Byz. alludes to this total of one hundred townships in his notice of several different items among them,—?????a—p???? ?a?????? ?a t?? ??at??; also, v. ?f??d?s???, ???a?, ?????????, etc: but he probably copied Strabo, and, therefore, cannot pass for a distinct authority. The total of one hundred townships belongs to the maximum of Spartan power, after the conquest and before the severance of Messenia; for AulÔn, BoiÆ, and MethÔnÊ (the extreme places) are included among them.

Mr. Clinton (Fast. Hellen. ii. p. 401) has collected the names of above sixty out of the one hundred.

[627] Thucyd. iv. 53.

[628] Xenophon, Hellen. iv. 5, 11; Herod. ix. 7; Thucyd. v. 18-23. The AmyklÆan festival of the Hyacinthia, and the AmyklÆan temple of Apollo, seem to stand foremost in the mind of the Spartan authorities. ??t?? ?a? ?? ????tata t?? pe??????? (Thucyd. iv. 8), who are ready before the rest, and march against the Athenians at Pylus, probably include the AmyklÆans.

Laconia generally is called by ThucydidÊs (iii. 16) as the pe??????? of Sparta.

[629] The word pe??????? is sometimes used to signify simply “surrounding neighbor states,” in its natural geographical sense: see Thucyd. i. 17, and Aristot. Polit. ii. 7, 1.

But the more usual employment of it is, to mean, the unprivileged or less privileged members of the same political aggregate living without the city, in contrast with the full-privileged burghers who lived within it. Aristotle uses it to signify, in KrÊte, the class corresponding to the LacedÆmonian Helots (Pol. ii. 7, 3): there did not exist in KrÊte any class corresponding to the LacedÆmonian Perioeki. In KrÊte, there were not two stages of inferiority,—there was only one, and that one is marked by the word pe???????; while the LacedÆmonian Perioekus had the Helot below him. To an Athenian the word conveyed the idea of undefined degradation.

To understand better the status of the Perioekus, we may contrast him with the Metoekus, or Metic. The latter resides in the city, but he is an alien resident on sufferance, not a native: he pays a special tax, stands excluded from all political functions, and cannot even approach the magistrate except through a friendly citizen, or ProstatÊs (ep? p??st?t?? ???e??—Lycurgus cont. Leocrat. c. 21-53): he bears arms for the defence of the state. The situation of a Metic was, however, very different in different cities of Greece. At Athens, that class were well-protected in person and property, numerous and domiciliated: at Sparta, there were at first none,—the XenÊlasy excluded them; but this must have been relaxed long before the days of Agis the Third.

The Perioekus differs from the Metic, in being a native of the soil, subject by birth to the city law.

M. Kopstadt (in his Dissertation above cited, on LacedÆmonian affairs, sect. 7, p. 60) expresses much surprise at that which I advance in this note respecting KrÊte and LacedÆmon,—that in KrÊte there was no class of men analogous to the LacedÆmonian Perioeki, but only two classes,—i. e. free citizens and Helots. He thinks that this position is “prorsus falsum.”

But I advance nothing more here than what is distinctly stated by Aristotle, as Kopstadt himself admits (pp. 60, 71). Aristotle calls the subject class in KrÊte by the name of ?e???????. And in this case, the general presumptions go far to sustain the authority of Aristotle. For Sparta was a dominant or capital city, including in its dependence not only a considerable territory, but a considerable number of inferior, distinct, organized townships. In KrÊte, on the contrary, each autonomous state included only a town with its circumjacent territory, but without any annexed townships. There was, therefore, no basis for the intermediate class called, in Laconia, Perioeki: just as Kopstadt himself remarks (p. 78) about the Dorian city of Megara. There were only the two classes of free KrÊtan citizens, and serf-cultivators in various modifications and subdivisions.

Kopstadt (following Hoeck, KrÊta, b. iii. vol. iii. p. 23) says that the authority of Aristotle on this point is overborne by that of Dosiadas and SosikratÊs,—authors who wrote specially on KrÊtan affairs. Now if we were driven to make a choice, I confess that I should prefer the testimony of Aristotle,—considering that we know little or nothing respecting the other two. But in this case I do not think that we are driven to make a choice: Dosiadas (ap. AthenÆ. xiv. p. 143) is not cited in terms, so that we cannot affirm him to contradict Aristotle: and SosikratÊs (upon whom Hoeck and Kopstadt rely) says something which does not necessarily contradict him, but admits of being explained so as to place the two witnesses in harmony with each other.

SosikratÊs says (ap. AthenÆ. vi. p. 263), ??? ?? ?????? d???e?a? ?? ???te? ?a???s? ???a?, t?? d? ?d?a? ?fa??ta?, t??? d? pe???????? ?p??????. Now the word pe???????? seems to be here used just as Aristotle would have used it, to comprehend the KrÊtan serfs universally: it is not distinguished from ???ta? and ?fa??ta?, but comprehends both of them as different species under a generic term. The authority of Aristotle affords a reason for preferring to construe the passage in this manner, and the words appear to me to admit of it fairly.

[631] Herod. viii. 73-135; Xenoph. Hellen. vi. 1, 8; Thucyd. iv. 76-94.

[632] Xenoph. Hellen. vi. 3, 5, 9, 19. IsokratÊs, writing in the days of Theban power, after the battle of Leuktra, characterizes the Boeotian towns as pe??????? of Thebes (Or. viii. De Pace, p. 182); compare Orat. xiv. Plataic. pp. 299-303. Xenophon holds the same language, Hellen. v. 4, 46: compare Plutarch, Agesilaus, 28.

[633] Aristot. Polit. ii. 6, 23.

[634] Thucyd. i. 77-95; vi. 105. IsokratÊs (Panathenaic. Or. xii. p. 283), Spa?t??ta? d? ?pe??pt????? ?a? p??e????? ?a? p?e????ta?, ????? pe? a?t??? e??a? p??te? ?pe???fas?. Compare his Oratio de Pace (Or. viii. pp. 180-181); Oratio Panegyr. (Or. iv. pp. 64-67).

[635] IsokratÊs, Panathenaic. Or. xii. p. 280. ?ste ??de?? ?? a?t??? d?? ?e t?? ?????a? d??a??? ?pa???se?e?, ??de? ????? ? t??? ?atap??t?st?? ?a? ??sta? ?a? t??? pe?? t?? ???a? ?d???a? ??ta?? ?a? ??? ??e???? sf?s?? a?t??? ???????te? t??? ?????? ?p??????s?.

[636] IsokratÊs, Orat. xii. (Panathenaic.) pp. 270-271. The statement in the same oration (p. 246), that the LacedÆmonians “had put to death without trial more Greeks (p?e???? t?? ???????) than had ever been tried at Athens since Athens was a city,” refers to their allies or dependents out of Laconia.

[637] Ephorus, Fragm. 18, ed. Marx; ap. Strabo, viii. p. 365.

[638] Dr. Arnold (in his Dissertation on the Spartan Constitution, appended to the first volume of his ThucydidÊs, p. 643) places greater confidence in the historical value of this narrative of IsokratÊs than I am inclined to do. On the other hand, Mr. G. C. Lewis, in his Review of Dr. Arnold’s Dissertation (Philological Museum, vol. ii. p. 45), considers the “account of IsokratÊs as completely inconsistent with that of Ephorus;” which is saying rather more, perhaps, than the tenor of the two strictly warrants. In Mr. Lewis’s excellent article, most of the difficult points respecting the Spartan constitution will be found raised and discussed in a manner highly instructive.

Another point in the statement of IsokratÊs is, that the Dorians, at the time of the original conquest of Laconia, were only two thousand in number (Or. xii. Panath. p. 286). Mr. Clinton rejects this estimate as too small, and observes, “I suspect that IsokratÊs, in describing the numbers of the Dorians at the original conquest, has adapted to the description the actual numbers of the Spartans in his own time.” (Fast. Hellen. ii. p. 408.)

This seems to me a probable conjecture, and it illustrates as well the absence of data under which IsokratÊs or his informants labored, as the method which they took to supply the deficiency.

[639] SchÖmann, Antiq. Jurisp. GrÆcorum, iv. 1, 5, p. 112.

[640] Pausan. iii. 2, 6; iii. 22, 5. The statement of MÜller is to be found (History of the Dorians, iii. 2, 1): he quotes a passage of Pausanias, which is noway to the point.

Mr. G. C. Lewis (Philolog. Mus. ut. sup. p. 41) is of the same opinion as MÜller.

[641] M. Kopstadt (in the learned Dissertation which I have before alluded to, De Rerum Laconicarum Constitutionis LycurgeÆ Origine et Indole, cap. ii. p. 31) controverts this position respecting the Perioeki. He appears to understand it in a sense which my words hardly present,—at least, a sense which I did not intend them to present: as if the majority of inhabitants in each of the hundred Perioekic towns were Dorians,—“ut per centum LaconiÆ oppida distributi ubique majorem incolarum numerum efficerent,” (p. 32.) I meant only to affirm that some of the Perioekic towns, such as AmyklÆ, were wholly, or almost wholly, Dorian; many others of them partially Dorian. But what may have been the comparative numbers (probably different in each town) of Dorian and non-Dorian inhabitants,—there are no means of determining. M. Kopstadt (p. 35) admits that AmyklÆ, Pharis, and GeronthrÆ, were Perioekic towns peopled by Dorians; and if this be true, it negatives the general maxim on the faith of which he contradicts what I affirm: his maxim is—“nunquam Dorienses À Doriensibus nisi bello victi erant, civitate Æquoque jure privati sunt,” (p. 31.) It is very unsafe to lay down such large positions respecting a supposed uniformity of Dorian rules and practice. The high authority of O. MÜller has been extremely misleading in this respect.

It is plain that Herodotus (compare his expression, viii. 73 and i. 145) conceived all the free inhabitants of Laconia not as AchÆans, but as Dorians. He believes in the story of the legend, that the AchÆans, driven out of Laconia by the invading Dorians and HerakleidÆ, occupied the territory in the north-west of Peloponnesus which was afterwards called AchÆa,—expelling from it the Ionians. Whatever may be the truth about this legendary statement,—and whatever may have been the original proportions of Dorians and AchÆans in Laconia,—these two races had (in the fifth century B.C.) become confounded in one undistinguishable ethnical and political aggregate called Laconian, or LacedÆmonian,—comprising both Spartans and Perioeki, though with very unequal political franchises, and very material differences in individual training and habits. The case was different in Thessaly, where the Thessalians held in dependence MagnÊtes, PerrhÆbi, and AchÆans: the separate nationality of these latter was never lost.

[642] Herod. vii. 234.

[643] Thucyd. viii. 6-22. They did not, however, partake in the Lykurgean discipline; but they seem to be named ?? ?? t?? ???a? pa?de?, as contrasted with ?? ?? t?? ?????? (Sosibius ap. AthenÆ. xv. p. 674).

[644] Aristot. Polit. ii. 6, 23. d?? ??? t? t?? Spa?t?at?? e??a? t?? p?e?st?? ???, ??? ??et????s?? ??????? t?? e?sf????.

Mr. G. C. Lewis, in the article above alluded to (Philolog. Mus. ii. p. 54), says, about the Perioeki: “They lived in the country or in small towns of the Laconian territory, and cultivated the land, which they did not hold of any individual citizen, but paid for it a tribute or rent to the state; being exactly in the same condition as the possessores of the Roman domain, or the Ryots, in Hindostan, before the introduction of the Permanent Settlement.” It may be doubted, I think, whether the Perioeki paid any such rent or tribute as that which Mr. Lewis here supposes. The passage just cited from Aristotle seems to show that they paid direct taxation individually, and just upon the same principle as the Spartan citizens, who are distinguished only by being larger landed-proprietors. But though the principle of taxation be the same, there was practical injustice (according to Aristotle) in the mode of assessing it. “The Spartan citizens (he observes) being the largest landed-proprietors, take care not to canvass strictly each other’s payment of property-tax”—i. e. they wink mutually at each other’s evasions. If the Spartans had been the only persons who paid e?sf???, or property-tax, this observation of Aristotle would have had no meaning. In principle, the tax was assessed, both on their larger properties and on the smaller properties of the Perioeki: in practice, the Spartans helped each other to evade the due proportion.

[645] The village-character of the Helots is distinctly marked by Livy, xxxiv. 27, in describing the inflictions of the despot Nabis: “Ilotarum quidam (hi sunt jam inde antiquitus castellani, agreste genus) transfugere voluisse insimulati, per omnes vicos sub verberibus acti necantur.”

[646] Herodot. i. 66. ????st???????t? ?? ???f??s? ?p? p?s? t? ????d?? ????.

[647] See O. MÜller, Dorians, iii. 3, 1; Ephorus ap. Strabo, viii. p. 365: Harpocration, v. ????te?.

[648] Kleomenes the Third, offered manumission to every Helot, who could pay down five Attic minÆ: he was in great immediate want of money, and he raised, by this means, five hundred talents. Six thousand Helots must thus have been in a condition to find five minÆ each, which was a very considerable sum (Plutarch, Kleomenes, c. 23).

[649] Such is the statement, that Helots were compelled to appear in a state of drunkenness, in order to excite in the youths a sentiment of repugnance against intoxication (Plutarch, Lycurg. c. 28; also, Adversus Stoicos de Commun. Notit. c. 19, p. 1067).

[650] Herod. ix. 29. The Spartans, at ThermopylÆ, seem to have been attended each by only one Helot (vii. 229).

O. MÜller seems to consider that the light-armed, who attended the Perioekic hoplites at PlatÆa, were not Helots (Dor. iii. 3, 6). Herodotus does not distinctly say that they were so, but I see no reason for admitting two different classes of light-armed in the Spartan military force.

The calculation which MÜller gives of the number of Perioeki and Helots altogether, proceeds upon very untrustworthy data. Among them is to be noticed his supposition that p???t??? ???a means the district of Sparta as distinguished from Laconia, which is contrary to the passage in Polybius (vi. 45): p???t??? ???a, in Polybius, means the territory of the state generally.

[651] Xenophon, Rep. Lac. c. 12, 4; Kritias, De LacedÆm. Repub. ap. Libanium, Orat. de Servitute, t. ii. p. 85, Reisk. ?? ?p?st?a? e??e?a t?? p??? t??? ????ta? ??a??e? ?? Spa?t?at?? ????? t?? ?sp?d?? t?? p??pa?a, etc.

[652] Thucyd. i. 101; iv. 80; v. 14-23.

[653] Thucyd. iv. 80. ?? d? ?? p???? ?ste??? ?f???s?? te a?t???, ?a? ??de?? ?s?et? ?t? t??p? ??ast?? d?ef????.

[654] Plutarch, Lycurg. c. 28; Heraclides Pontic. p. 504, ed. Crag.

[655] Plato, Legg. i. p. 633: the words of the LacedÆmonian Megillus designate an existing Spartan custom. Compare the same treatise, vi. p. 763, where Ast suspects, without reason, the genuineness of the word ???pt??.

[656] Myron, ap. AthenÆ. xiv. p. 657. ?p???pte?? t??? ?d???????? does not strictly mean “to put to death.”

[657] Thucyd. v. 34.

[658] Xenophon, Rep. Lac. c. 7.

[659] Plutarch, Lykurg. c. 15; substantially confirmed by Xenophon, Rep. Lac. c. 1, 5.

[660] See the authors quoted in AthenÆus, iv. p. 141.

[661] Xenoph. Rep. Lac. 2-3, 3-5, 4-6. The extreme pains taken to enforce ?a?te??a (fortitude and endurance) in the Spartan system is especially dwelt upon by Aristotle (Politica, ii. 6, 5-16); compare Plato, De Legibus, i. p. 633; Xenophon, De Laced. Repub. ii. 9, with the references in Schneider’s note,—likewise Cragius, De Republica Laced. iii. 8, p. 325.

[662] It is remarkable that these violent contentions of the youth, wherein kicking, biting, gouging out each other’s eyes, was resorted to,—as well as the d?aast???s??, or scourging-match, before the altar of Artemis,—lasted down to the closing days of Sparta, and were actually seen by Cicero, Plutarch, and even Pausanias. Plutarch had seen several persons die under the suffering (Plutarch, Lykurg. c. 16, 18-30; and Instituta Laconica, p. 239; Pausan. iii. 14, 9, 16, 7; Cicero, Tuscul. Disp. ii. 15).

The voluntary tortures, undergone by the young men among the Mandan tribe of Indians, at their annual religious festival, in the presence of the elders of the tribe,—afford a striking illustration of the same principles and tendencies as this Spartan d?aast???s??. They are endured partly under the influence of religious feelings, as an acceptable offering to the Great Spirit,—partly as a point of emulation and glory on the part of the young men, to show themselves worthy and unconquerable in the eyes of their seniors. The intensity of these tortures is, indeed, frightful to read, and far surpasses in that respect anything ever witnessed at Sparta. It would be incredible, were it not attested by a trustworthy eye-witness.

See Mr. Catlin’s Letters on the North American Indians, Letter 22, vol. i. p. 157, seq.

“These religious ceremonies are held, in part, for the purpose of conducting all the young men of the tribe, as they annually arrive at manhood, through an ordeal of privation and torture; which, while it is supposed to harden their muscles and prepare them for extreme endurance,—enables the chiefs who are spectators of the scene, to decide upon their comparative bodily strength and ability, to endure the extreme privations and sufferings that often fall to the lot of Indian warriors; and that they may decide who is the most hardy and best able to lead a war-party in case of emergency.”—Again, p. 173, etc.

The ?a?te??a or power of endurance (Aristot. Pol. ii. 6, 5-16) which formed one of the prominent objects of the Lycurgean training, dwindles into nothing compared to that of the Mandan Indians.

[663] Xenophon, Anab. iv. 6, 14; and De Repub. Lac. c. 2, 6; IsokratÊs, Or. xii. (Panath.) p. 277. It is these licensed expeditions for thieving, I presume, to which IsokratÊs alludes, when he speaks of t?? pa?d?? a?t????a? at Sparta, which, in its natural sense, would be the reverse of the truth (p. 277).

[664] Aristot. Polit. viii. 3, 3,—the remark is curious,—??? ?? ??? a? ???sta d????sa? t?? p??e?? ?p?e?e?s?a? t?? pa?d?? a? ?? ????t???? ???? ?p????s?, ???e?a? t? t? e?d? ?a? t?? a???s?? t?? s??t??? ?? d? ?????e? ta?t?? ?? ??? ?a?t?? t?? ?a?t?a?, etc. Compare the remark in Plato, Protagor. p. 342.

[665] Aristot. Polit. ii. 6, 5; Plutarch, Agesilaus, c. 31. Aristotle alludes to the conduct of the Spartan women on the occasion of the invasion of Laconia by the Thebans, as an evidence of his opinion respecting their want of courage. His judgment in this respect seems hard upon them, and he probably had formed to himself exaggerated notions of what their courage under such circumstances ought to have been, as the result of their peculiar training. We may add that their violent demonstrations on that trying occasion may well have arisen quite as much from the agony of wounded honor as from fear, when we consider what an event the appearance of a conquering army in Sparta was.

[666] Aristot. Polit. ii. 6, 5, 8, 11.

[667] Xenoph. Rep. Lac. i. 3-4; Plutarch, Lycurg. c. 13-14.

[668] Eurip. Androm. 598; Cicero, Tuscul. QuÆst. ii. 15. The epithet fa??????de?, as old as the poet Ibykus, shows that the Spartan women were not uncovered (see Julius Pollux, vii. 55).

It is scarcely worth while to notice the poetical allusions of Ovid and Propertius.

How completely the practice of gymnastic and military training for young women, analogous to that of the other sex, was approved by Plato, may be seen from the injunctions in his Republic.

[669] Aristot. Polit. vii. 14, 4.

[670] “It is certain (observes Dr. Thirlwall, speaking of the Spartan unmarried women) that in this respect the Spartan morals were as pure as those of any ancient, perhaps of any modern, people.” (History of Greece, ch. viii. vol. i. p. 371.)

[671] Plutarch, Lycurg. c. 15; Xenoph. Rep. Lac. i. 5. Xenophon does not make any allusion to the abduction as a general custom. There occurred cases in which it was real and violent: see Herod. v. 65. Demaratus carried off and married the betrothed bride of Leotychides.

[672] Xenoph. Rep. Lac. i. 9. ?? d? t?? a? ???a??? ?? s?????e?? ? ?????t?, t????? d? ????????? ?p??????, ?a? t??t? ???? ?p???se?, ??t??a ?? e?te???? ?a? ?e??a?a? ????, pe?sa?ta t?? ????ta, ?? ta?t?? te???p??e?s?a?. ?a? p???? ?? t??a?ta s??e???e?. ?? te ??? ???a??e? d?tt??? ?????? ?????ta? ?at??e??, ?? te ??d?e? ?de?f??? t??? pa?s? p??s?a??e??, ?? t?? ?? ?????? ?a? t?? d???e?? ????????s?, t?? d? ????t?? ??? ??t?p?????ta?.

[673] Herodot. v. 39-40. ?et? d? ta?ta, ???a??a? ???? d??, d???? ?st?a? ???ee, p????? ??da? Spa?t??t???.

[674] MÜller, Hist. of Dorians, iv. 4, 1. The stories recounted by Plutarch, (Agis, c. 20; KleomenÊs, c. 37-38,) of the conduct of Agesistrata and Kratesikleia, the wives of Agis and KleomenÊs, and of the wife of Panteus (whom he does not name) on occasion of the deaths of their respective husbands, illustrate powerfully the strong conjugal affection of a Spartan woman, and her devoted adherence and fortitude in sharing with her husband the last extremities of suffering.

[675] See the Oration of Lysias, De CÆde Eratosthenis, Orat. i. p. 94, seq.

[676] Plutarch, Agis, c. 4.

[677] Aristot. Polit. ii. 6, 6; Plutarch, Agis, c. 4. t??? ?a?eda??????? ?at?????? ??ta? ?e? t?? ???a????, ?a? p?e??? ??e??a?? t?? d??s???, ? t?? ?d??? a?t???, p???p?a???e?? d?d??ta?.

[678] Aristophan. Lysistr. 80.

[679] See the remarkable account in Xenophon, Hellen. iv. 16; Plutarch, Agesilaus, c. 29; one of the most striking incidents in Grecian history. Compare, also, the string of sayings ascribed to LacedÆmonian women, in Plutarch, Lac. Apophth. p. 241, seq.

[680] How offensive the LacedÆmonian xenÊlasy or expulsion of strangers appeared in Greece, we may see from the speeches of PeriklÊs in ThucydidÊs (i. 144; ii. 39). Compare Xenophon, Rep. Lac. xiv. 4; Plutarch, Agis, c. 10; Lykurgus, c. 27; Plato, Protagoras, p. 348.

No Spartan left the country without permission: IsokratÊs, Orat. xi. (Busiris), p. 225; Xenoph. ut sup.

Both these regulations became much relaxed after the close of the Peloponnesian war.

[681] Plutarch, Lykurg. c. 25.

[682] Plutarch observes justly about Sparta, under the discipline of Lykurgus, that it was “not the polity of a city, but the life of a trained and skilful man,”—?? p??e?? ? Sp??t? p???te?a?, ???? ??d??? ?s??t?? ?a? s?f?? ??? ????sa (Plutarch, Lyk. c. 30).

About the perfect habit of obedience at Sparta, see Xenophon, Memorab. iii. 5, 9, 15-iv. 4, 15, the grand attributes of Sparta in the eyes of its admirers (IsokratÊs, Panathen. Or. xii. pp. 256-278), pe??a???a—s?f??s???—ta ????s?a t??e? ?a?est?ta ?a? p??? t?? ?s??s?? t?? ??d??a? ?a? p??? t?? ?????a? ?a? s?????? t?? pe?? t?? p??e?? ?pe???a?.

[683] Aristot. Polit. viii. 3, 3. ?? ?????e? ... ?????de?? ?pe??????ta? t??? p?????.

That the Spartans were absolutely ignorant of letters, and could not read, is expressly stated by IsokratÊs (Panathen. Or. xii. p. 277). ??t?? d? t?s??t?? ?p??e?e????? t?? ?????? pa?de?a? ?a? f???s?f?a? e?s??, ?st? ??d? ???ata a??????s??, etc.

The preference of rhetoric to accuracy, is so manifest in IsokratÊs, that we ought to understand his expressions with some reserve; but in this case it is evident that he means literally what he says, for in another part of the same discourse, there is an expression dropped, almost unconsciously, which confirms it. “The most rational Spartans (he says) will appreciate this discourse, if they find any one to read it to them,”—?? ???s? t?? ??a???s?e??? (p. 285).

[684] Aristot. Polit. ii. 6, 22; vii. 13, 11; viii. 1, 3; viii. 3, 3. Plato, Legg. i. pp. 626-629. Plutarch, SolÔn, c. 22.

[685] Thucyd. iv. 126. ?? ?e ?d? ?p? p???te??? t????t?? ??ete, ?? a?? ?? p????? ?????? ?????s?, ???? p?e????? ????? ???ss???? ??? ???? t??? ?t?s?e??? t?? d??aste?a? ? t? a??e??? ??ate??.

The most remarkable circumstance is, that these words are addressed by Brasidas to an army composed, in large proportion, of manumitted Helots (Thucyd. iv. 81).

[686] Plato treats of the system of Lykurgus, as emanating from the Delphian Apollo and Lykurgus as his missionary (Legg. i. p. 632).

[687] AlcÆi Fragment. 41, p. 279, ed. Schneidewin:—

Compare the Schol. ad Pindar. Isthm. ii. 17, and Diogen. LaËrt. i. 31.

[688] Thucydid. i. 6. et??? d? a? ?s??t? ?a? ?? t?? ??? t??p?? p??t?? ?a?eda?????? ????sa?t?, ?a? ?? t? ???a p??? t??? p?????? ?? t? e??? ?e?t????? ?s?d?a?t?? ???sta ?at?st?sa?. See, also, Plutarch, Apophthegm. Lacon. p. 210. A.-F.

[689] Xenoph. Republ. Laced. c. 7.

[690] Plato, Legg. iii. p. 684.

[691] Aristotel. Politic. ii. 2, 10. ?spe? t? pe?? t?? ?t?se?? ?? ?a?eda???? ?a? ???t? t??? s?ss?t???? ? ?????t?? ??????se.

[692] Aristot. Politic. ii. 4, 1, about Phaleas; and about Sparta and Krete, generally, the whole sixth and seventh chapters of the second book; also, v. 6, 2-7.

Theophrastus (apud Plutarch, Lycurg. c. 10) makes a similar observation, that the public mess, and the general simplicity of habits, tended to render wealth of little service to the possessor: t?? p???t?? ?p???t?? ?pe???sas?a? t? ?????t?t? t?? de?p???, ?a? t? pe?? t?? d?a?ta? e?te?e??. Compare Plutarch. Apophthegm. Lacon. p. 226 E. The wealth, therefore, was not formally done away with in the opinion of Theophrastus: there was no positive equality of possessions.

Both the Spartan kings dined at the public mess at the same pheidition (Plutarch, Agesilaus, c. 30).

HerakleidÊs Ponticus mentions nothing, either about equality of Spartan lots or fresh partition of lands, by Lykurgus (ad calcem Cragii, De Spartanorum Repub. p. 504), though he speaks about the Spartan lots and law of succession as well as about Lykurgus.

[693] IsokratÊs, Panathen. Or. xii. pp. 266, 270, 278: ??d? ??e?? ?p???p?? ??d? ??? ??adas?? ??d? ???? ??d?? t?? ?????st?? ?a???.

[694] Plutarch, Agis, c. iv.

[695] Aristot. Polit. ii. 6, 21. ?a?? d? t??? ?a??s?? ??ast?? de? f??e??, ?a? sf?d?a pe??t?? ????? ??t??, ?a? t??t? t? ?????a ?? d??a???? dapa???.... ???? d? t?? p???te?a? ??t?? ?st?? ? p?t????, t?? ? d???e??? t??t? t? t???? f??e?? ? et??e?? a?t??. So also Xenophon, Rep. Lac. c. vii. ?sa ?? f??e?? e?? t? ?p?t?de?a, ????? d? d?a?t?s?a? t??a?.

The existence of this rate-paying qualification, is the capital fact in the history of the Spartan constitution; especially when we couple it with the other fact, that no Spartan acquired anything by any kind of industry.

[696] HerakleidÊs Ponticus, ad calcem Cragii De Repub. Laced. p. 504. Compare Cragius, iii. 2, p. 196.

Aristotle (ii. 6, 10) states that it was discreditable to buy or sell a lot of land, but that the lot might be either given or bequeathed at pleasure. He mentions nothing about the prohibition to divide, and even states what contradicts it,—that it was the practice to give a large dowry when a rich man’s daughter married (ii. 6, 11). The sister of Agesilaus, Kyniska, was a person of large property, which apparently implies the division of his father’s estate (Plutarch, Agesilaus, 30).

Whether there was ever any law prohibiting a father from dividing his lot among his children, may well be doubted. The Rhetra of the ephor Epitadeus (Plutarch, Agis, 5), granted unlimited power of testamentary disposition to the possessor, so that he might give away or bequeathe his land to a stranger if he chose. To this law great effects are ascribed: but it is evident that the tendency to accumulate property in few hands, and the tendency to diminution in the number of qualified citizens, were powerfully manifested before the time of Epitadeus, who came after Lysander. Plutarch, in another place, notices Hesiod, Xenokrates, and Lykurgus, as having concurred with Plato, in thinking that it was proper to leave only one single heir (??a ???? ????????? ?ata??pe??) (?p???ata e?? ?s??d??, Fragm. vol. v. p. 777, Wyttenb.). But Hesiod does not lay down this as a necessity or as a universal rule; he only says, that a man is better off who has only one son (Opp. Di. 374). And if Plato had been able to cite Lykurgus as an authority for that system of an invariable number of separate ??????, or lots, which he sets forth in his treatise De Legibus (p. 740), it is highly probable that he would have done so. Still less can Aristotle have supposed that Lykurgus or the Spartan system either insured, or intended to insure, the maintenance of an unalterable number of distinct proprietary lots; for he expressly notices that scheme as a peculiarity of Philolaus the Corinthian, in his laws for the Thebans (Polit. ii. 9, 7).

[697] Polybius, Fragm. ap. Maii. Collect. Vett. Scrip. vol. ii. p. 384.

Perhaps, as O. MÜller remarks, this may mean only, that none except the eldest brother could afford to marry; but the feelings of the Spartans in respect to marriage were, in many other points, so different from ours, that we are hardly authorized to reject the literal statement (History of the Dorians, iii. 10, 2),—which, indeed, is both illustrated and rendered credible by the permission granted in the laws of SolÔn to an ?p??????? who had been claimed in marriage by a relative in his old age,—?? ? ??at?? ?a? ?????? ?e????? ?at? t?? ???? a?t?? ? d??at?? ? p??s???e?? ?p? t?? ????sta t?? ??d??? ?p??es?a? (Plutarch, SolÔn, c. 20).

I may observe that of O. MÜller’s statements, respecting the lots of land at Sparta, several are unsupported and some incorrect.

[698] Plutarch, KleomenÊs, cap. 2-11, with the note of SchÖmann, p. 175; also, Lycurg. cap. 8; AthenÆ. iv. p. 141.

Phylarchus, also, described the proceedings of KleomenÊs, seemingly with favor (AthenÆ. ib.); compare Plutarch, Agis, c. 9.

Polybius believed, that Lykurgus had introduced equality of landed possession, both in the district of Sparta, and throughout Laconia: his opinion is, probably, borrowed from these same authors, of the third century before the Christian era. For he expresses his great surprise, how the best-informed ancient authors (?? ?????tat?? t?? ???a??? s????af???), Plato, Xenophon, Ephorus, KallisthenÊs, can compare the Kretan polity to the old LacedÆmonian, the main features of the two being (as he says) so different,—equality of property at Sparta, great inequality of property in Krete, among other differences (Polyb. vi. 45-48).

This remark of Polybius, exhibits the difference of opinion of the earlier writers, as compared with those during the third century before the Christian era. The former compared Spartan and Kretan institutions, because they did not conceive equality of landed property as a feature in old Sparta.

[699] Respecting SphÆrus, see Plutarch, Lycurg. c. 8; Kleomen. c. 2; AthenÆ. v. p. 141; Diogen. LaËrt. vii. sect. 137.

[700] Hist. of Greece, ch. viii. vol. i. pp. 344-347.

C. F. Hermann, on the contrary, considers the equal partition of Laconia into lots indivisible and inalienable, as “an essential condition” (eine wesentliche Bedingung) of the whole Lykurgean system (Lehrbuch der Griechischen StaatsalterthÜmer, sect. 28).

Tittmann (Griechische Staatsverfassungen, pp. 588-596) states and seems to admit the equal partition as a fact, without any commentary.

Wachsmuth (Hellenisch. Alterthumskunde, v. 4, 42, p. 217) supposes “that the best land was already parcelled, before the time of Lykurgus, into lots of equal magnitude, corresponding to the number of Spartans, which number afterwards increased to nine thousand.” For this assertion, I know no evidence: it departs from Plutarch, without substituting anything better authenticated or more plausible. Wachsmuth notices the partition of Laconia among the Perioeki in thirty thousand equal lots, without any comment, and seemingly as if there were no doubt of it (p. 218).

Manso, also, supposes that there had once been an equal division of land prior to Lykurgus,—that it had degenerated into abuse,—and that Lykurgus corrected it, restoring, not absolute equality, but something near to equality (Manso, Sparta, vol. i. pp. 110-121). This is the same gratuitous supposition as that of Wachsmuth.

O. MÜller admits the division as stated by Plutarch, though he says that the whole number of nine thousand lots cannot have been set out before the Messenian war; and he adheres to the idea of equality as contained in Plutarch; but he says that the equality consisted in “equal estimate of average produce,”—not in equal acreable dimensions. He goes so far as to tell us that “the lots of the Spartans, which supported twice as many men as the lots of the Perioeki, must, upon the whole, have been twice as extensive (i. e. in the aggregate): each lot must, therefore, have been seven times greater,” (compare History of the Dorians, iii. 3, 6; iii. 10, 2.) He also supposes, that “similar partitions of land had been made from the time of the first occupation of Laconia by the Dorians.” Whoever compares his various positions with the evidence brought to support them, will find a painful disproportion between the basis and the superstructure.

The views of SchÖmann, as far as I collect from expressions somewhat vague, seem to coincide with those of Dr. Thirlwall. He admits, however that the alleged Lykurgean equalization is at variance with the representations of Plato (SchÖmann, Antiq. Jur. Pub. iv. 1, 7, note 4, p. 116).

[701] Plutarch, Lykurg. c. 8. s???pe?se t?? ???a? ?pasa? e?? ?s?? ???ta?, ?? ????? ??ad?sas?a?, ?a? ??? et? ??????? ?pa?ta?, ?a?e?? ?a? ?s???????? t??? ???? ?e???????, t? d? p??te??? ??et? et???ta?? ?? ????? ?t??? p??? ?te??? ??? ??s?? d?af????, ??d? ???s?t?t??, p??? ?s?? a?s???? ????? ????e? ?a? ?a??? ?pa????. ?p???? d? t? ???? t? ?????, d???e?e, etc.

[702] Plutarch, Agis, c. 19-20.

[704] Aristotle (Polit. ii. 6, 11) remarks that the territory of the Spartans would maintain fifteen hundred horsemen and thirty thousand hoplites, while the number of citizens was, in point of fact, less than one thousand. Dr. Thirlwall seems to prefer the reading of GÖttling,—three thousand instead of thirty thousand; but the latter seems better supported by MSS, and most suitable.

[705] Plutarch, Agis, c. 5.

[706] Herod. vi. 61. ??a ?????p?? te ????? ???at??a, etc; vii. 134.

[707] Herod. vi. 70-103; Thucyd. v. 50.

[708] Xenoph. Hellen. vi. 4, 11; Xenoph. de Rep. Lac. v. 3; Molpis ap. AthenÆ. iv. p. 141; Aristot. Polit. ii. 2, 5.

[709] Thucyd. i. 6; Aristot. Polit. iv. 7, 4, 5; viii. 1, 3.

[710] Aristot. Polit. ii. 6, 10-13; v. 6, 7.

[711] The panegyrist Xenophon acknowledges much the same respecting the Sparta which he witnessed; but he maintains that it had been better in former times (Repub. Lac. c. 14).

[712] The view of Dr. Thirlwall agrees, in the main, with that of Manso and O. MÜller (Manso, Sparta, vol. i. pp. 118-128; and vol. ii. Beilage, 9, p. 129; and MÜller, History of the Dorians, vol. ii. b. iii. c. 10, sect. 2, 3).

Both these authors maintain the proposition stated by Plutarch (Agis c. 5, in his reference to the ephor Epitadeus, and the new law carried by that ephor), that the number of Spartan lots, nearly equal and rigorously indivisible, remained with little or no change from the time of the original division, down to the return of Lysander, after his victorious close of the Peloponnesian war. Both acknowledge that they cannot understand by what regulations this long unalterability, so improbable in itself, was maintained: but both affirm the fact positively. The period will be more than four hundred years if the original division be referred to Lykurgus: more than three hundred years, if the nine thousand lots are understood to date from the Messenian war.

If this alleged fact be really a fact, it is something almost without a parallel in the history of mankind: and before we consent to believe it, we ought at least to be satisfied that there is considerable show of positive evidence in its favor, and not much against it. But on examining Manso and MÜller, it will be seen that not only is there very slender evidence in its favor,—there is a decided balance of evidence against it.

The evidence produced to prove the indivisibility of the Spartan lot, is a passage of HerakleidÊs Ponticus, c. 2 (ad. calc. Cragii, p. 504), p??e?? d? ??? ?a?eda??????? a?s???? ?e???sta?,—t?? ???a?a? ???a? ??a??es?a? (or ?e?e?s?a?) ??d?? ??est?. The first portion of this assertion is confirmed by, and probably borrowed from, Aristotle, who says the same thing, nearly in the same words: the second portion of the sentence ought, according to all reasonable rules of construction, to be understood with reference to the first part; that is, to the sale of the original lot. “To sell land, is held disgraceful among the LacedÆmonians, nor is it permitted to sever off any portion of the original lot,” i. e. for sale. HerakleidÊs is not here speaking of the law of succession to property at LacedÆmon, nor can we infer from his words that the whole lot was transmitted entire to one son. No evidence except this very irrelevant sentence is produced by MÜller and Manso to justify their positive assertion, that the Spartan lot of land was indivisible in respect to inheritance.

Having thus determined the indivisible transmission of lots to one son of a family, Manso and MÜller presume, without any proof, that that son must be the eldest: and MÜller proceeds to state something equally unsupported by proof: “The extent of his rights, however, was perhaps no farther than that he was considered master of the house and property; while the other members of the family had an equal right to the enjoyment of it.... The master of the family was, therefore, obliged to contribute for all these to the syssitia, without which contribution no one was admitted.”—pp. 199, 200.

All this is completely gratuitous, and will be found to produce as many difficulties in one way as it removes in another.

The next law as to the transmission of property, which Manso states to have prevailed, is, that all daughters were to marry without receiving any dowry,—the case of a sole daughter is here excepted. For this proposition he cites Plutarch, Apophtheg. Laconic. p. 227; Justin, iii. 3; Ælian. V. H. vi. 6. These authors do certainly affirm, that there was such a regulation, and both Plutarch and Justin assign reasons for it, real or supposed. “Lykurgus, being asked why he directed that maidens should be married without dowry, answered,—In order that maidens of poor families might not remain unmarried, and that character and virtue might be exclusively attended to in the choice of a wife.” The same general reason is given by Justin. Now the reason here given for the prohibition of dowry, goes, indirectly, to prove that there existed no such law of general succession, as that which had been before stated, namely, the sacred indivisibility of the primitive lot. For had this latter been recognized, the reason would have been obvious why daughters could receive no dowry; the father’s whole landed property (and a Spartan could have little of any other property, since he never acquired anything by industry) was under the strictest entail to his eldest son. Plutarch and Justin, therefore, while in their statement as to the matter of fact, they warrant Manso in affirming the prohibition of dowry (about this matter of fact, more presently), do, by the reason which they give, discountenance his former supposition as to the indivisibility of the primitive family lots.

Thirdly, Manso understands Aristotle (Polit. ii. 6, 11), by the use of the adverb ???, to affirm something respecting his own time specially, and to imply at the same time that the ancient custom had been the reverse. I cannot think that the adverb, as Aristotle uses it in that passage, bears out such a construction: ??? d?, there, does not signify present time as opposed to past, but the antithesis between the actual custom and that which Aristotle pronounces to be expedient. Aristotle gives no indication of being aware that any material change had taken place in the laws of succession at Sparta: this is one circumstance, for which both Manso and MÜller, who both believe in the extraordinary revolution caused by the permissive law of the ephor Epitadeus, censure him.

Three other positions are laid down by Manso about the laws of property at Sparta. 1. A man might give away or bequeathe his land to whomsoever he pleased. 2. But none except childless persons could do this. 3. They could only give or bequeathe it to citizens who had no land of their own. Of these three regulations, the first is distinctly affirmed by Aristotle, and may be relied upon: the second is a restriction not noticed by Aristotle, and supported by no proof except that which arises out of the story of the ephor Epitadeus, who is said to have been unable to disinherit his son without causing a new law to be passed: the third is a pure fancy.

So much for the positive evidence, on the faith of which Manso and MÜller affirm the startling fact, that the lots of land in Sparta remained distinct, indivisible, and unchanged in number, down to the close of the Peloponnesian war. I venture to say that such positive evidence is far too weak to sustain an affirmation in itself so improbable, even if there were no evidence on the other side for contradiction. But in this case there is powerful contradictory evidence.

First, the assertions of these authors are distinctly in the teeth of Aristotle, whose authority they try to invalidate, by saying that he spoke altogether with reference to his own time at Sparta, and that he misconceived the primitive Lykurgean constitution. Now this might form a reasonable ground of presumption against the competency of Aristotle, if the witnesses produced on the other side were older than he. But it so happens, that every one of the witnesses produced by Manso and MÜller, are younger than Aristotle: HerakleidÊs Ponticus, Plutarch, Justin, Ælian, etc. Nor is it shown that these authors copied from any source earlier than Aristotle,—for his testimony cannot be contradicted by any inferences drawn from Herodotus, ThucydidÊs, Xenophon, Plato, IsokratÊs, or Ephorus. None of these writers, anterior to, or contemporary with, Aristotle, countenance the fancy of equal, indivisible, perpetual lots, or prohibition of dowry.

The fact is, that Aristotle is not only our best witness, but also our oldest witness, respecting the laws of property in the Spartan commonwealth. I could have wished, indeed, that earlier testimonies had existed, and I admit that even the most sagacious observer of 340-330 B.C. is liable to mistake when he speaks of one or two centuries before. But if Aristotle is to be discredited on the ground of late date, what are we to say to Plutarch? To insist on the intellectual eminence of Aristotle would be superfluous: and on this subject he is a witness the more valuable, as he had made careful, laborious, and personal inquiries into the Grecian governments generally, and that of Sparta among them,—the great point de mire for ancient speculative politicians.

Now the statements of Aristotle, distinctly exclude the idea of equal, indivisible, inalienable, perpetual lots,—and prohibition of dowry. He particularly notices the habit of giving very large dowries, and the constant tendency of the lots of land to become consolidated in fewer and fewer hands. He tells us nothing upon the subject which is not perfectly consistent, intelligible, and uncontradicted by any known statements belonging to his own, or to earlier times. But the reason why men refuse to believe him, and either set aside or explain away his evidence, is, that they sit down to the study with their minds full of the division of landed property ascribed to Lykurgus by Plutarch. I willingly concede that, on this occasion, we have to choose between Plutarch and Aristotle. We cannot reconcile them except by arbitrary suppositions, every one of which breaks up the simplicity, beauty, and symmetry of Plutarch’s agrarian idea,—and every one of which still leaves the perpetuity of the original lots unexplained. And I have no hesitation in preferring the authority of Aristotle (which is in perfect consonance with what we indirectly gather from other authors, his contemporaries and predecessors) as a better witness on every ground; rejecting the statement of Plutarch, and rejecting it altogether, with all its consequences.

But the authority of Aristotle is not the only argument which may be urged to refute this supposition that the distinct Spartan lots remained unaltered in number down to the time of Lysander. For if the number of distinct lots remained undiminished, the number of citizens cannot have greatly diminished. Now the conspiracy of KinadÔn falls during the life of Lysander, within the first ten years after the close of the Peloponnesian war: and in the account which Xenophon gives of that conspiracy, the paucity of the number of citizens is brought out in the clearest and most emphatic manner. And this must be before the time when the new law of Epitadeus is said to have passed, at least before that law can have had room to produce any sensible effects. If, then, the ancient nine thousand lots still remained all separate, without either consolidation or subdivision, how are we to account for the small number of citizens at the time of the conspiracy of KinadÔn?

This examination of the evidence, for the purpose of which I have been compelled to prolong the present note, shows—1. That the hypothesis of indivisible, inalienable lots, maintained for a long period in undiminished number at Sparta, is not only sustained by the very minimum of affirmative evidence, but is contradicted by very good negative evidence. 2. That the hypothesis which represents dowries to daughters as being prohibited by law, is, indeed, affirmed by Plutarch, Ælian, and Justin, but is contradicted by the better authority of Aristotle.

The recent edition of HerakleidÊs Ponticus, published by Schneidewin, in 1847, since my first edition, presents an amended text, which completely bears out my interpretation. His text, derived from a fuller comparison of existing MSS., as well as from better critical judgment (see his Prolegg. c. iii. p. liv.), stands—???e?? d? ??? ?a?eda??????? a?s???? ?e???sta?? t?? d? ???a?a? ???a? ??d? ??est?? (p. 7). It is plain that all this passage relates to sale of land, and not to testation, or succession, or division. Thus much negatively is certain, and Schneidewin remarks in his note (p. 53) that it contradicts MÜller, Hermann, and SchÖmann,—adding, that the distinction drawn is, between land inherited from the original family lots, and land otherwise acquired, by donation, bequest, etc. Sale of the former was absolutely illegal: sale of the latter was discreditable, yet not absolutely illegal. Aristotle in the Politics (ii. 6, 10) takes no notice of any such distinction, between land inherited from the primitive lots, and land otherwise acquired. Nor was there, perhaps, any well-defined line of distinction, in a country of unwritten customs, like Sparta, between what was simply disgraceful and what was positively illegal. Schneidewin, in his note, however, assumes the original equality of the lots as certain in itself, and as being the cause of the prohibition: neither of which appears to me true.

I speak of this confused compilation still under the name of HerakleidÊs Ponticus, by which it is commonly known: though Schneidewin, in the second chapter of his Prolegomena, has shown sufficient reason for believing that there is no authority for connecting it with the name of HerakleidÊs. He tries to establish the work as consisting of Excerpta from the lost treatise of Aristotle’s pe?? ????te???: which is well made out with regard to some parts, but not enough to justify his inference as to the whole. The article, wherein Welcker vindicates the ascribing of the work to an Excerptor of HerakleidÊs, is unsatisfactory (Kleine Schriften, p. 451).

Beyond this irrelevant passage of HerakleidÊs Ponticus, no farther evidence is produced by MÜller and Manso to justify their positive assertion, that the Spartan lot of land was indivisible in respect to inheritance.

[713] Herod. vi. 57, in enumerating the privileges and perquisites of the kings—d????e?? d? ?????? t??? as???a? t?sade ???a? pat?????? te pa?????? p???, ?? t?? ????eta? ??e??, ?? ? pe? ? pat?? a?t?? ?????s?? ?a? ?d?? d??s???? p???? ?a? ?? t?? ?et?? pa?da p???es?a? ?????, as????? ????t??? p???es?a?.

It seems curious that pat?????? p???e??? should mean a damsel who has no father (literally, lucus a non lucendo): but I suppose that we must accept this upon the authority of Julius Pollux and TimÆus. Proceeding on this interpretation, Valckenaer gives the meaning of the passage very justly: “OrbÆ nuptias, necdum a patre desponsatÆ, si plures sibi vindicarent, fieretque ? ?p???????, ut Athenis loquebantur, ?p?d????, SpartÆ lis ista dirimebatur a regibus solis.”

Now the judicial function here described, is something very different from the language of Dr. Thirlwall, that “the kings had the disposal of the hand of orphan heiresses in cases where the father had not signified his will.” Such disposal would approach somewhat to that omnipotence which AristophanÊs (Vesp. 585) makes old Philokleon claim for the Athenian dikasts (an exaggeration well calculated to serve the poet’s purpose of making the dikasts appear monsters of caprice and injustice), and would be analogous to the power which English kings enjoyed three centuries ago as feudal guardians over wards. But the language of Herodotus is inconsistent with the idea that the kings chose a husband for the orphan heiress. She was claimed, as of right, by persons in certain degrees of relationship to her. Whether the law about ????ste?a, affinity carrying legal rights, was the same as at Athens, we cannot tell; but the question submitted for adjudication at Sparta, to the kings, and at Athens to the dikasteries, was certainly the same, agreeably to the above note of Valckenaer,—namely, to whom, among the various claimants for the marriage, the best legal title really belonged. It is, indeed, probable enough, that the two royal descendants of HÊraklÊs might abuse their judicial function, as there are various instances known in which they take bribes; but they were not likely to abuse it in favor of an unprovided youth.

Next, as to adoption: Herodotus tells us that the ceremony of adoption was performed before the kings: probably enough, there was some fee paid with it. But this affords no ground for presuming that they had any hand in determining whom the childless father was to adopt. According to the Attic law about adoption, there were conditions to be fulfilled, consents to be obtained, the absence of disqualifying circumstances verified, etc; and some authority before which this was to be done was indispensable (see Meier und SchÖmann, Attisch. Prozess, b. iii. ch. ii. p. 436). At Sparta, such authority was vested by ancient custom in the king: but we are not told, nor is it probable, “that he could interpose, in opposition to the wishes of individuals, to relieve poverty,” as Dr. Thirlwall supposes.

[714] Sp??ta daas???t??, SimonidÊs, apud Plutarch. Agesilaus, c. 1.

[715] Aristotel. Polit. ii. 6, 9, 19, 23. t? f???t???—t? f??????at??.

[716] Aristot. Polit. ii. 6, 12.

[717] Aristot. Polit. ii. 6, 22. ????a???? ?s????t? ?? p??e???te?, ?p????t? d? ???a?te?, etc. Compare also vii. 13, 15.

[718] Plutarch, Kleomen. c. 8; Phylarch. ap. AthenÆ. vi. p. 271.

The strangers called ???f???, and the illegitimate sons of Spartans, whom Xenophon mentions with eulogy, as “having partaken in the honorable training of the city,” must probably have been introduced in this same way, by private support from the rich (Xenoph. Hellen. v. 3, 9). The xenÊlasy must have then become practically much relaxed, if not extinct.

[719] Strabo, viii. p. 362; Steph. Byz. ???e?a.

Construing the word p??e?? extensively, so as to include townships small as well as considerable, this estimate is probably inferior to the truth; since, even during the depressed times of modern Greece, a fraction of the ancient Laconia (including in that term Messenia) exhibited much more than one hundred bourgs.

In reference merely to the territory called La Magne, between Calamata in the Messenian gulf and Capo di Magna, the lower part of the peninsula of TÆnarus, see a curious letter, addressed to the Duc de Nevers, in 1618, (on occasion of a projected movement to liberate the Morea from the Turks, and to insure to him the sovereignty of it, as descendant of the PalÆologi,) by a confidential agent whom he despatched thither,—M. Chateaurenaud,—who sends to him “une sorte de tableau statistique du Magne, ou sont ÉnumerÉs 125 bourgs ou villages renfermans 4,913 feux, et pouvans fournir 10,000 combattans, dont 4,000 armÉs, et 6,000 sans armes (between Calamata and Capo di Magna).” (MÉmoires de l’AcadÉmie des Inscriptions, tom. xv. 1842, p. 329. MÉmoire de M. Berger Xivrey.)

This estimate is not far removed from that of Colonel Leake, towards the beginning of the present century, who considers that there were then in Mani (the same territory) one hundred and thirty towns and villages; and this too in a state of society exceedingly disturbed and insecure,—where private feuds and private towers, or pyrghi, for defence, were universal, and in parts of which, Colonel Leake says, “I see men preparing the ground for cotton, with a dagger and pistols at their girdles. This, it seems, is the ordinary armor of the cultivator when there is no particular suspicion of danger: the shepherd is almost always armed with a musket.” ... “The Maniotes reckon their population at thirty thousand, and their muskets at ten thousand.” (Leake, Travels in Morea, vol. i. ch. vii. pp. 243, 263-266.)

Now, under the dominion of Sparta, all Laconia doubtless enjoyed complete internal security, so that the idea of the cultivator tilling his land in arms would be unheard of. Reasoning upon the basis of what has just been stated about the Maniote population and number of townships, one hundred p??e??, for all Laconia, is a very moderate computation.

[720] Aristot. ?a???. ????te?a, ap. Schol. Pindar. Isthm. vii. 18.

I agree with M. Boeckh, that Pindar himself identifies this march of the Ægeids to AmyklÆ with the original Herakleid conquest of Peloponnesus. (NotÆ CriticÆ ad Pindar. Pyth. v. 74, p. 479.)

[721] Pausan. iii. 2, 6; iii. 12, 7.

[722] Pausan. iii. 22, 5.

[723] Pausan. iii. 19, 5.

[724] Xenoph. Hellen. iv. 5, 11.

[725] Pausan. iii. 2, 7; iii. 20, 6. Strabo, viii. p. 363.

If it be true, as Pausanias states, that the Argeians aided Helus to resist, their assistance must probably have been given by sea; perhaps from Epidaurus LimÊra, or PrasiÆ, when they formed part of the Argeian federation.

[726] History of the Dorians, i. 7, 10 (note). It seems that Diodorus had given a history of the Messenian wars in considerable detail, if we may judge from a fragment of the last seventh book, containing the debate between Kleonnis and AristomenÊs. Very probably it was taken from Ephorus,—though this we do not know.

For the statements of Pausanias respecting MyrÔn and Rhianus, see iv. 6. Besides MyrÔn and Rhianus, however, he seems to have received oral statements from contemporary Messenians and LacedÆmonians; at least on some occasions he states and contrasts the two contradictory stories (iv. 4, 4; iv. 5, 1).

[727] Pausan. iv. 27, 2-3: Diodor. xv. 77.

[728] See Diodor. Fragm. lib. viii. vol. iv. p. 30: in his brief summary of Messenian events (xv. 66), he represents it as a matter on which authors differed, whether Aristomenes belonged to the first or second war. Clemens Alexand. (Prot. p. 36) places him in the first, the same as MyrÔn, by mentioning him as having killed Theopompus.

Wesseling observes (ad Diod. l. c.), “Duo fuerunt Aristomenes, uterque in Messeniorum contra Spartanos bello illustrissimus, alter posteriore, priore alter bello.”

Unless this duplication of homonymous persons can be shown to be probable, by some collateral evidence, I consider it only as tantamount to a confession, that the difficulty is insoluble.

Pausanias is reserved in his manner of giving judgment,—? ??t?? ???st????? d??? ?e ?? ?????e? ?p? t?? p????? t?? ?st???? (iv. 6). MÜller (Dorians, i. 7, 9) goes much too far when he affirms that the statement of MyrÔn was “in the teeth of all tradition.” MÜller states incorrectly the citation from Plutarch, Agis, c. 21 (see his Note h). Plutarch there says nothing about TyrtÆus: he says that the Messenians affirmed that their hero AristomenÊs had killed the Spartan king Theopompus, whereas the LacedÆmonians said, that he had only wounded the king. According to both accounts, then, it would appear that AristomenÊs belonged to the first Messenian war, not to the second.

[729] TyrtÆus, Fragm. 6, Gaisford. But TyrtÆus ought not to be understood to affirm distinctly (as Pausanias, Mr. Clinton, and MÜller, all think) that Theopompus survived and put a close to the war: his language might consist with the supposition that Theopompus had been slain in the war,—?? d?a (Theopompus), ?ess???? e???e? e????????.

For we surely might be authorized in saying—“It was through Epameinondas that the Spartans were conquered and humbled; or it was through Lord Nelson that the French fleet was destroyed in the last war,” though both of them perished in the accomplishment.

TyrtÆus, therefore, does not contradict the assertion, that Theopompus was slain by AristomenÊs, nor can he be cited as a witness to prove that AristomenÊs did not live during the first Messenian war; which is the purpose for which Pausanias quotes him (iv. 6).

[730] IsokratÊs (Archidamus), Or. vi. pp. 121-122.

[731] Strabo (vi. p. 257) gives a similar account of the sacrilege and murderous conduct of the Messenian youth at the temple of Artemis Limnatis. His version, substantially agreeing with that of the LacedÆmonians, seems to be borrowed from Antiochus, the contemporary of ThucydidÊs, and is therefore earlier than the foundation of MessÊnÊ by Epameinondas, from which event the philo-Messenian statements take their rise. Antiochus, writing during the plenitude of LacedÆmonian power, would naturally look upon the Messenians as irretrievably prostrate, and the impiety here narrated would in his mind be the natural cause why the divine judgments overtook them. Ephorus gives a similar account (ap. Strabo. vi. p. 280).

Compare HerakleidÊs Ponticus (ad calcem Cragii De Rep. Laced. p. 528) and Justin, iii. 4.

The possession of this temple of Artemis Limnatis,—and of the Ager Dentheliates, the district in which it was situated,—was a subject of constant dispute between the LacedÆmonians and Messenians after the foundation of the city of MessÊnÊ, even down to the time of the Roman emperor Tiberius (Tacit. Annal. iv. 43). See Stephan. Byz. v. ?e???????; Pausan. iii. 2, 6; iv. 4, 2; iv. 31, 3. Strabo, viii. p. 362.

From the situation of the temple of Artemis Limnatis, and the description of the Ager Dentheliates, see Professor Ross, Reisen im Peloponnes, i. pp. 5-11. He discovered two boundary-stones with inscriptions, dating from the time of the early Roman emperors, marking the confines of LacedÆmon and MessÊnÊ; both on the line of the highest ridge of Taygetus, where the waters separate east and west, and considerably to the eastward of the temple of Artemis Limnatis, so that at that time the Ager Dentheliates was considered a part of Messenia.

I now find that Colonel Leake (Peloponnesiaca, p. 181) regards these Inscriptions, discovered by Professor Ross, as not proving that the temple of Artemis Limnatis was situated near the spot where they were found. His authority weighs much with me on such a point, though the arguments which he here employs do not seem to me conclusive.

[732] It is, perhaps, to this occasion that the story of the Epeunakti, in Theopompus, referred (ap. AthenÆ. vi. p. 271),—Helots adopted into the sleeping-place of their masters, who had been slain in the war, and who were subsequently enfranchised.

The story of the PartheniÆ, obscure and unintelligible as it is, belongs to the foundation of the colony of Taras, or Tarentum (Strabo, vi. p. 279).

[733] See Plutarch, De Superstitione, p. 168.

[734] See Pausan. iv. 6-14.

An elaborate discussion is to be seen in Manso’s Sparta, on the authorities whom Pausanias has followed in his History of the Messenian Wars, 18^te Beilage, tom. ii. p. 264.

“It would evidently be folly (he observes, p. 270), to suppose that in the history of the Messenian wars, as Pausanias lays them before us, we possess the true history of these events.”

[735] TyrtÆus, Fragm. 5, 6 (Schneidewin).

C. F. Hermann conceives the treatment of the Messenians after the first war, as mild, in comparison with what it became after the second (Lehrbuch der Griech. StaatsalterthÜmer, sect. 31), a supposition which the emphatic words of TyrtÆus render inadmissible.

[736] This is the express comparison introduced by Pausanias, iv. 5, 2.

[737] Plutarch, Sept. Sapient. Convivium, p. 159.

[738] Pausan. iv. 18, 4. ???st????? d? ?? te t? ???a ?e?? t??, ?a? d? ?a? t?te ?f??asse?.

Plutarch (De Herodot. Malignitat. p. 856) states that Herodotus had mentioned AristomenÊs as having been made prisoner by the LacedÆmonians, but Plutarch must here have been deceived by his memory, for Herodotus does not mention AristomenÊs.

[739] The narrative in Pausanias, iv. 15-24.

According to an incidental notice in Herodotus, the Samians affirmed that they had aided LacedÆmon in war against MessÊnÊ,—at what period we do not know (Herodot. iii. 56).

[740] ???? d? ?ess?????? ??da a?t?? ?p? ta?? sp??da?? ???st????? ?????d??? ?a????ta? (Pausan. ii. 14, 5). The practice still continued in his time.

Compare, also, Pausan. iv. 27, 3; iv. 32, 3-4.

[741] Pausanias heard the song himself (iv. 16, 4)—?p??e??? ?sa t? ?a? ?? ??? ?t? ?d?e???:—

According to one story, the LacedÆmonians were said to have got possession of the person of AristomenÊs, and killed him: they found in him a hairy heart (Steph. Byz. v. ??da??a).

[742] Pausan. iv. 15, 1.

Perhaps Leotychides was king during the last revolt of the Helots, or Messenians, in 464 B.C., which is called the third Messenian war. He seems to have been then in exile, in consequence of his venality during the Thessalian expedition,—but not yet dead (Herodot. vi. 72). Of the reality of what Mr. Clinton calls the third Messenian war, in 490 B.C., I see no adequate proof (see Fast. Hell. vol. i. p. 257).

The poem of Rhianus was entitled ?ess???a??. He also composed Tessa????, ???a??, ??a???. See the Fragments,—they are very few,—in DÜntzer’s Collection, pp. 67-77.

He seems to have mentioned Nikoteleia, the mother of AristomenÊs (Fr. ii. p. 73): compare Pausan. iv. 14, 5.

I may remark, that Pausanias, throughout his account of the second Messenian war, names king Anaxander as leading the LacedÆmonian troops; but he has no authority for so doing, as we see by iv. 15, 1. It is a pure calculation of his own, from the pat???? pat??e? of TyrtÆus.

[743] Pausan. iv. 15, 3; Justin. iii, 5, 4. Compare Plato, Legg. ii. p. 630, Diodor. xv. 66; Lycurg. cont. Leokrat. p. 162. Philochorus and KallisthenÊs also represented him as a native of AphidnÆ in Attica, which Strabo controverts upon slender grounds (viii. p. 362); Philochor. Fr. 56 (Didot).

[744] Plutarch, Theseus, c. 33; Pausan. i. 41, 5; Welcker, Alkman. Fragm. p. 20.

[745] Plutarch, Kleomen. c. 2. ??a??? ???? ????? a?????e??.

[746] Philochorus, Frag. 56, ed. Didot; Lycurgus cont. Leokrat. p. 163.

[747] See Plutarch, De MusicÂ, pp. 1134, 1142, 1146.

[748] Thucyd. v. 69; Xenoph. Rep. Laced. c. 13.

[749] See the treatise of Plutarch, De MusicÂ, passim, especially c. 17, p. 1136, etc.; 33, p. 1143. Plato, Republ. iii. p. 399; Aristot. Polit. viii. 6, 5-8.

The excellent treatise De Metris Pindari, prefixed by M. Boeckh to his edition of Pindar, is full of instruction upon this as well as upon all other points connected with the Grecian music (see lib. iii. c. 8, p. 238).

[750] Aristot. Polit. v. 7, 1; Pausan. iv. 18, 2.

[751] Pausan. vi. 12, 2; Strabo viii. p. 355, where the ??st???? ?p?????? mean the Pylians of Tryphylia.

[752] Respecting the position of the Eleians and PisatÆ during the second Messenian war, there is confusion in the different statements: as they cannot all be reconciled, we are compelled to make a choice.

That the Eleians were allies of Sparta, and the Pisatans of Messenia, and that the contests of Sparta and Messenia were mixed up with those of Elis and Pisa about the agonothesia of the Olympic games, is conformable to one distinct statement of Strabo (viii. pp. 355, 358), and to the passage in Phavorinus v. ???e?a?, and is, moreover, indirectly sustained by the view given in Pausanias respecting the relations between Elis and Pisa (vi. 22, 2), whereby it clearly appears that the agonothesia was a matter of standing dispute between the two, until the Pisatans were finally crushed by the Eleians in the time of Pyrrhus, son of PantaleÔn. Farther, this same view is really conformable to another passage in Strabo, which, as now printed, appears to contradict it, but which is recognized by MÜller and others as needing correction, though the correction which they propose seems to me not the best. The passage (viii. p. 362) stands thus: ??e?????? d? ?p????sa? (Messenians and LacedÆmonians) d?? t?? ?p?st?se?? t?? ?ess?????. ??? ?? ??? p??t?? ?at??t?s?? a?t?? f?s? ???ta??? ?? t??? p???as? ?at? t??? t?? pat???? pat??a? ?e??s?a?? t?? d? de?t??a?, ?a?? ?? ???e??? s?????? ??e???? ?a? ???e???? ?a? ??sat?? ?p?st?sa?, ????d?? ?? ???st????t?? t?? ???????? as???a pa?e?????? st?at????, ??sat?? d? ?a?ta?e??ta t?? ?fa??????? ????a f?s?? a?t?? st?at???sa? t?? p??e?? t??? ?a?eda???????, etc. Here it is obvious that, in the enumeration of allies, the Arcadians ought to have been included; accordingly, both O. MÜller and Mr. Clinton (ad annum 672 B.C.) agree in altering the passage thus: they insert the words ?a? ???ada? after the word ??e????, so that both Eleians and Pisatans appear as allies of Messenia at once. I submit that this is improbable in itself, and inconsistent with the passage of Strabo previously noticed: the proper way of altering the passage is, in my judgment, to substitute the word ???ada? in place of the word ??e????, which makes the two passages of Strabo consistent with each other, and hardly does greater violence to the text.

As opposed to the view here adopted, there is, undoubtedly, the passage of Pausanias (iv. 15, 4) which numbers the Eleians among the allies of Messenia, and takes no notice of the PisatÆ. The affirmation of Julius Africanus (ap. Eusebium Chronic. i. p. 145, that the PisatÆ revolted from Elis in the 30th Olympiad, and celebrated the Olympic games themselves until Ol. 52, for twenty-two successive ceremonies) is in contradiction,—first, with Pausanias (vi. 22, 2), which appears to me a clear and valuable statement, from its particular reference to the three non-Olympiads,—secondly, with Pausanias (v. 9, 4), when the Eleians in the 50th Olympiad determine the number of HellanodikÆ. I agree with Corsini (Fasti Attici, t. iii. p. 47) in setting aside the passage of Julius Africanus: Mr. Clinton (F. H. p. 253) is displeased with Corsini for this suspicion, but he himself virtually does the same thing; for, in order to reconcile Jul. Africanus with Pansanias, he introduces a supposition quite different from what is asserted by either of them; i. e. a joint agonothesia by Eleians and Pisatans together. This hypothesis of Mr. Clinton appears to me gratuitous and inadmissible: Africanus himself meant to state something quite different, and I imagine him to have been misled by an erroneous authority. See Mr. Clinton, F. H. ad. ann. 660 B.C. to 580 B.C.

[754] Diodor. xv. 66; Polyb. iv. 33, who quotes KallisthenÊs; Paus. viii. 5, 8. Neither the Inscription, as cited by Polybius, nor the allusion in Plutarch (De Ser Numin. VindictÂ, p. 548), appear to fit the narrative of Pausanias, for both of them imply secret and long-concealed treason, tardily brought to light by the interposition of the gods; whereas, Pausanias describes the treason of AristokratÊs, at the battle of the Trench, as palpable and flagrant.

[755] Herakleid. Pontic. ap. Diog. LaËrt. i. 94.

[756] Pausan. iv. 24, 2; iv. 34, 6; iv. 35, 2.

[757] Thucyd. i. 101.

[758] Pausanias says, t?? ?? ????? ?ess???a?, p??? t?? ?s??a???, a?t?? d?e????a???, etc. (iv. 24, 2.)

In an apophthegm ascribed to king Polydorus, leader of the Spartans during the first Messenian war, he is asked, whether he is really taking arms against his brethren, to which he replies, “No; I am only marching to the unallotted portion of the territory.” (Plutarch, Apophthegm. Lakonic. p. 231.)—?p? t?? ??????t?? ???a?.

[759] Pausan. vi. 22, 2; v. 6, 3; v. 10, 2; Strabo, viii. pp. 355-357.

The temple in honor of Zeus at Olympia, was first erected by the Eleians, out of the spoils of this expedition (Pausan. v. 10, 2).

[760] Thucyd. v. 31. Even Lepreum is characterized as Eleian, however (Aristoph. Aves, 149): compare also Steph. Byz. v. ???f???a, ? ????.

Even in the 6th Olympiad, an inhabitant of Dyspontium is proclaimed as victor at the stadium, under the denomination of “an Eleian from Dyspontium;” proclaimed by the Eleians of course,—the like in the 27th Olympiad: see Stephan. Byz. v. ??sp??t??? which shows that the inhabitants of the Pisatid cannot have rendered themselves independent of Elis in the 26th Olympiad, as Strabo alleges (viii. p. 355).

[761] Herodot. iv. 149; Strabo, viii. p. 343.

[762] Diodor. xiv. 17; xv. 77; Xenoph. Hellen. iii. 2, 23, 26.

It was about this period, probably, that the idea of the local eponymous, Triphylus, son of Arkas, was first introduced (Polyb. iv. 77).

[763] Hermippus ap. AthenÆ. i. p. 27. ??d??p?d? ?? F????a?, ap? d? ???ad?a? ?p????????. Also, Xenoph. Hellen. vii. 1, 23. p?e?st?? d? f???? t?? ????????? t? ???ad???? e??, etc.

[764] Pausan. viii. 6, 7; viii. 37, 6; viii. 38, 2. Xenias, one of the generals of Greek mercenaries in the service of Cyrus the younger, a native of the Parrhasian district in Arcadia, celebrates with great solemnity, during the march upward, the festival and games of the LykÆa (Xenoph. Anabas. i. 2 10; compare Pindar, Olymp. ix. 142).

Many of the forests in Arcadia contained not only wild boars, but bears, in the days of Pausanias (viii. 23, 4).

[765] Pausan. viii. 26, 5; Strabo, viii. p. 388.

Some geographers distributed the Arcadians into three subdivisions, Azanes, Parrhasii, and Trapezuntii. Azan passed for the son of Arcas, and his lot in the division of the paternal inheritance was said to have contained seventeen towns (?? ??a?e? ????). Stephan. Byz. v. ??a??a—?a??as?a. KleitÔr seems the chief place in Azania, as far as we can infer from genealogy (Pausan. viii. 4, 2, 3). PÆus, or PÄos, from whence the Azanian suitor of the daughter of KleisthenÊs presented himself, was between KleitÔr and PsÔphis (Herod. vi. 127; Paus. viii. 23, 6). A Delphian oracle, however, reckons the inhabitants of Phigaleia, in the south-western corner of Arcadia, among the Azanes (Paus. viii. 42, 3).

The burial-place of Areas was supposed to be on Mount MÆnalus (Paus. viii. 9, 2).

[766] Thucyd. v. 65. Compare the description of the ground in Professor Ross (Reisen im Peloponnes. iv. 7).

[767] Strabo. viii. p. 337.

[768] Herodot. ix. 27.

[769] Strabo, 1. c. Mantineia is reckoned among the oldest cities of Arcadia (Polyb. ii. 54). Both Mantineia and Orchomenus had originally occupied very lofty hill-sites, and had been rebuilt on a larger scale, lower down, nearer to the plain (Pausan. viii. 8, 3; 12, 4; 13, 2).

In regard to the relations, during the early historical period, between Sparta, Argos, and Arcadia, there is a new fragment of Diodorus (among those recently published by Didot out of the Excerpta in the Escurial library, Fragment. Historic. GrÆcor. vol. ii. p. viii.). The Argeians had espoused the cause of the Arcadians against Sparta; and at the expense of considerable loss and suffering, had regained such portions of Arcadia as she had conquered. The king of Argos restored this recovered territory to the Arcadians: but the Argeians generally were angry that he did not retain it and distribute it among them as a reward for their losses in the contest. They rose in insurrection against the king, who was forced to flee, and take refuge at Tegea.

We have nothing to illustrate this fragment, nor do we know to what king, date, or events, it relates.

[770] ?a??a??? d?s?e?e??? (Delphian Oracle, ap. Paus. viii. 9, 2).

[771] Xenophon, in describing the ardor with which Epameinondas inspired his soldiers before this final battle, says (vii. 5, 20), p?????? ?? ??e?????t? ?? ?ppe?? t? ?????, ?e?e???t?? ??e????? ?pe???f??t? d? ?a? t?? ????d?? ?p??ta?, ??pa?a ????te?, ?? T?a??? ??te?? p??te? d? ??????t? ?a? ????a? ?a? a?a??a?, ?a? ??ap?????t? t?? ?sp?da?.

It is hardly conceivable that these Arcadian clubmen should have possessed a shield and a full panoply. The language of Xenophon in calling them hoplites, and the term ?pe???f??t?, properly referring to the inscription on the shield, appear to be conceived in a spirit of contemptuous sneering, proceeding from Xenophon’s miso-Theban tendencies: “The Arcadian hoplites, with their clubs, put themselves forward to be as good as the Thebans.” That these tendencies of Xenophon show themselves in expressions very unbecoming to the dignity of history (though curious as evidences of the time), may be seen by vii. 5, 12, where he says of the Thebans,—??ta??a d? ?? p?? p????te?, ?? ?e??????te? t??? ?a?eda???????, ?? t? pa?t? p????e?, etc.

[772] Thucyd. v. 33, 47, 81.

[773] Thucyd. 1. c. Compare the instructive speech of KleigenÊs, the envoy from Akanthus, addressed to the LacedÆmonians, B.C. 382 (Xen. Hellen. v. 2, 15-16).

[774] Xenoph. Hellen. v. 2, 1-6; Diodor. xv. 19.

[775] Xenoph. Hellen. vi. 5, 10-11; vii. 1, 23-25.

[776] Pausan. viii. 27, 5. No oekist is mentioned from Orchomenus, though three of the petty townships contributing (s??te????ta) to Orchomenus were embodied in the new city. The feud between the neighboring cities of Orchomenus and Mantineia was bitter (Xen. Hellen. vi. 5, 11-22). Orchomenus and HÊrÆa both opposed the political confederation of Arcadia.

The oration of DemosthenÊs, ?p?? ?e?a??p???t??, strongly attests the importance of this city, especially c. 10,—??? ?? ??a??e??s? ?a? d?????s??s??, ?s?????? ?a?eda??????? e???? ?st?? e??a?, etc.

[777] Pausan. iii. 2, 6; iii. 7, 3; viii. 48, 3.

[778] Pausan. viii. 39, 2.

[779] Alkman, Fr. 15, Welcker; Strabo, x. p. 446.

[780] That the SkiritÆ were Arcadians is well known (Thuc. v. 47; Steph. Byz. v. S?????); the possession of Belemina was disputed with Sparta, in the days of her comparative humiliation, by the Arcadians: see Plutarch, KleomenÊs, 4; Pausan. viii. 35, 4.

Respecting KaryÆ (the border town of Sparta, where the d?aat???a were sacrificed, Thuc. v. 55), see Photius ?a???te?a—???t? ??t??d??? t?? d? ?a??a? ????d?? ??sa? ?pet???t? ?a?eda??????.

The readiness with which KaryÆ and the Maleates revolted against Sparta after the battle of Leuktra, even before the invasion of Laconia by the Thebans, exhibits them apparently as conquered foreign dependencies of Sparta, without any kindred of race (Xenoph. Hellen. vi. 5, 24-26; vii. 1, 28). Leuktron, in the Maleatis, seems to have formed a part of the territory of Megalopolis in the days of KleomenÊs the Third (Plutarch, KleomenÊs, 6); in the Peloponnesian war it was the frontier town of Sparta towards Mount LykÆum (Thuc. v. 53).

[781] Herod. i. 66. ?ataf????sa?te? ????d?? ???ss??e? e??a?, ????st???????t? ?? ???f??s? ?p? p?s? t? ????d?? ????.

[782] Herod. i. 67; Pausan. iii. 3, 5; vii. 45, 2.

Herodotus saw the identical chains suspended in the temple of AthÊnÊ Alea at Tegea.

[783] Herod. i. 69-70.

[784] Herod. ix. 26.

[785] Xenoph. Hellen. v. 2, 19. ?spe? ????de?, ?ta? e?? ??? ??s?, t? te a?t?? s????s? ?a? t? ????t??a ??p????s?, etc.

This was said to the LacedÆmonians about ten years before the battle of Leuktra.

[786] Herod. i. 82.

[787] Pausan. ii. 25, 1.

[788] Pausan. iii. 7, 5.

[789] Herod. i. 82; Strabo, viii. p. 376.

[790] The Argeians showed at Argos a statue of Perilaus, son of AlkÊnÔr, killing OthryadÊs (Pausan. ii. 20, 6; ii. 38, 5: compare x. 9, 6, and the references in Larcher ad Herodot. i. 82). The narrative of Chrysermus, ?? t??t? ?e??p????s?a??? (as given in Plutarch, Parallel. Hellenic. p. 306), is different in many respects.

Pausanias found the Thyreatis in possession of the Argeians (ii. 38, 5). They told him that they had recovered it by adjudication; when or by whom we do not know: it seems to have passed back to Argos before the close of the reign of KleomenÊs the Third, at Sparta (220 B.C.), Polyb. iv. 36.

Strabo even reckons PrasiÆ as Argeian, to the south of Kynuria (viii. p. 368), though in his other passage (p. 374) seemingly cited from Ephorus, it is treated as LacedÆmonian. Compare Manso, Sparta, vol. ii. Beilage i. p. 48.

Eusebius, placing this duel at a much earlier period (Ol. 27, 3, 678 B.C.), ascribes the first foundation of the GymnopÆdia at Sparta to the desire of commemorating the event. Pausanias (iii. 7, 3) places it still farther back in the reign of Theopompus.

[791] Thucyd. v. 41. ???? d? ?a?eda??????? t? ?? p??t?? ?d??e? ???a e??a? ta?ta, ?pe?ta (?pe????? ??? p??t?? t? ????? f????? ??e??) ???e????sa? ?f? ??? ??????, ?a? ???e????a?t?.

[792] Herodot. vii. 9. Compare the challenge which Herodotus alleges to have been proclaimed to the Spartans by Mardonius, through a herald, just before the battle of PlatÆa (ix. 48).

[793] AthenÆ. xv. p. 678.

[794] Herod. viii. 73; Pausan. iii. 2, 2; viii. 27, 3.

[795] Pausan. ii. 25, 5. Mannert (Geographie der Griechen und RÖmer Griechenland, book ii. ch. xix. p. 618) connects the Kynurians of Arcadia and Argolis, though Herodotus tells us that the latter were Ionians: he gives to this name much greater importance and extension than the evidence bears out.

[796] Strabo, viii. p. 370—? ??a??? ???? t?? p???? ?? ????e??? t?? ?at? ???????a? ????? t?? ???ad?a?. Coray and Grosskurd gain nothing here by the conjectural reading of ???e?a? in place of ???ad?a?, for the ridge of Lyrkeium ran between the two, and might, therefore be connected with either without impropriety.

[797] Thucyd. vi. 95.

[798] Xenophon, Hellen. iv. 8, 7: f???e??? t?? ???e??t?ta t?? ???a?.

[799] Xenoph. Hellen. v. 5. 10; Eurip. ap. Strabo, viii. p. 366; Leake, Travels in Morea, vol. iii. c. xxii. p. 25.

“It is to the strength of the frontiers, and the comparatively large extent of country inclosed within them, that we must trace the primary cause of the LacedÆmonian power. These enabled the people, when strengthened by a rigid military discipline, and put in motion by an ambitious spirit, first to triumph over their weaker neighbors of Messenia, by this additional strength to overawe the disunited republics of Arcadia, and at length for centuries to hold an acknowledged military superiority over every other state in Greece.

“It is remarkable that all the principal passes into Laconia lead to one point: this point is Sparta; a fact which shows at once how well the position of that city was chosen for the defence of the province, and how well it was adapted, especially as long as it continued to be unwalled, to maintain a perpetual vigilance and readiness for defence, which are the surest means of offensive success.

“The natural openings into the plain of Sparta are only two; one by the upper Eurotas, as the course of that river above Sparta may be termed; the other by its only large branch Œnus, now the Kelefina, which, as I have already stated, joins the Eurotas opposite to the north-eastern extremity of Sparta. All the natural approaches to Sparta from the northward lead to one or the other of these two valleys. On the side of Messenia, the northerly prolongation of Mount Taygetum, which joins Mount Lyceum at the pass of Andania, now the pass of MakryplÁi, furnishes a continued barrier of the loftiest kind, admitting only of routes easily defensible; and which,—whether from the Cromitis of Arcadia to the south-westward of the modern LondÁri, from the Stenykleric plain, from the plain of the Pamisus, or from PherÆ, now KalamÁta,—all descend into the valley of the upper Eurotas, and conduct to Sparta by Pellana. There was, indeed, a branch of the last-mentioned route, which descended into the Spartan plain at the modern Mistra, and which must have been a very frequent communication between Sparta and the lower part of Messenia; but, like the other direct passes over Taygetum, it was much more difficult and defensible than those which I have called the natural entrances of the province.”

[800] Aristot. Polit. viii. 3, 4. ?t? d? a?t??? t??? ?????a? ?se?, ??? ?? a?t?? p??s?d?e??? ta?? f???p???a??, ?pe?????ta? t?? ?????? ??? d?, ?a? t??? ???as???? ?a? t??? p??e????? ???s?, ?e?p?????? ?t????: ?? ??? t? t??? ????? ?????e?? t?? t??p?? t??t?? d??fe???, ???? t? ???? ? p??? ?s????ta? ?s?e??.... ??ta????st?? ??? t?? pa?de?a? ??? ????s?? p??te??? d? ??? e????.

[801] Herodot. i. 68. ?d? d? sf? ?a? ? p???? t?? ?e??p????s?? ?? ?atest?a???.

[802] Herodot. i. 67; compare Larcher’s note.

Concerning the obscure and difficult subject of the military arrangements of Sparta, see Cragius, Repub. Laced. iv. 4; Manso, Sparta, ii. Beilage 18, p. 224; O. MÜller, Hist. Dorians, iii. 12; Dr. Arnold’s note on ThucydidÊs, v. 68; and Dr. Thirlwall, History of Greece, vol. i. Appendix 3, p. 520.

[803] Pollux, i. 10, 129. ?d??? ??t?? t?? ?a?eda??????, ????t?a, ?a? ??a: compare Suidas and Hesych. v. ????t?a; Xenoph. Rep. Lacon. c. 11; Thucyd. v. 67-68; Xenoph. Hellen. vi. 4, 12.

Suidas states the enÔmoty at twenty-five men: in the LacedÆmonian army which fought at the first battle of Mantineia (418 B.C.), it seems to have consisted of about thirty-two men (Thuc. l. c.): at the battle of Leuktra of thirty-six men (Xen. Hellen. l. c.). But the language of Xenophon and ThucydidÊs does not imply that the number of each enÔmoty was equal.

[804] O. MÜller states that the enomotarch, after a pa?a????, or deployment into phalanx, stood on the right hand, which is contrary to Xenoph. Rep. Lac. 11, 9.—?te d? ? ????? e?????? ????eta?, ??d? ?? t??t? e???e?te?? ?????ta?, ???? ?st?? ?te ?a? p?e??e?te??,—the ????? was the first enomotarch of the lochus, the p??t?st?t?? (as appears from 11, 5), when the enÔmoty marched in single file. To put the ??e?? on the right flank, was done occasionally for special reason,—?? d? p?te ??e?? t???? d??? ??f??e??, t?? ??e??a d????? ???a? ??e??, etc. I understand Xenophon’s description of the pa?a????, or deployment, differently from MÜller,—it rather seems that the enÔmoties which stood first made a side-movement to the left, so that the first enomotarch still maintained his place on the left, at the same time that the opportunity was created for the enÔmoties in the rear to come up and form equal front, t? ????t???? pa?e????ta? e?? ?t?p?? pa?? ?sp?da ?a??stas?a?,—the words pa?? ?sp?da have reference, as I imagine, to the proceeding of the first enomotarch, who set the example of side-movement to the left-hand, as it is shown by the words which follow,—?a? d?? pa?t?? ??t?? ?st? ?? ? f??a?? ??a?t?a ?atast?. The phalanx was constituted when all the lochi formed an equal and continuous front, whether the sixteen enÔmoties, of which each lochus was composed, might be each in one file, in three files, or in six files.

[805] See Xenoph. Anab. iv. 8, 10, upon the advantage of attacking the enemy with ?????? ?????, in which case the strongest and best soldiers all came first into conflict. It is to be recollected, however, that the practice of the Cyreian troops cannot be safely quoted as authority for the practice at Sparta. Xenophon and his colleagues established lochi, pentekosties, and enÔmoties in the Cyreian army: the lochus consisted of one hundred men, but the numbers of the other two divisions are not stated (Anab. iii. 4, 21; iv. 3, 26: compare Arrian, Tactic. cap. 6).

[806] The words of Thucydides indicate the peculiar marshalling of the LacedÆmonians, as distinguished both from their enemies and from their allies at the battle of Mantineia,—?a? e???? ?p? sp??d?? ?a??sta?t? ?? ??s?? t?? ?a?t??, ???d?? t?? as????? ??asta ?????????? ?at? ????: again, c. 68.

About the music of the flute or fife, Thucyd. v. 69; Xen. Rep. Lac. 13, 9; Plutarch, Lycurg. c. 22.

[807] Meursius, Dr. Arnold, and Rachetti (Della Milizia dei Grechi Antichi, Milan, 1807, p. 166) all think that lochus and mora were different names for the same division; but if this is to be reconciled with the statement of Xenophon in Repub. Lac. c. 11, we must suppose an actual change of nomenclature after the Peloponnesian war, which appears to be Dr. Arnold’s opinion,—yet it is not easy to account for.

There is one point in Dr. Thirlwall’s Appendix which is of some importance, and in which I cannot but dissent from his opinion. He says, after stating the nomenclature and classification of the Spartan military force as given by Xenophon, “Xenophon speaks only of Spartans, as appears by the epithet p???t????,” p. 521: the words of Xenophon are, ???st? d? t?? p???t???? ???? ??e? p???a???? ??a, etc. (Rep. Lac. 11.)

It appears to me that Xenophon is here speaking of the aggregate LacedÆmonian heavy-armed force, including both Spartans and Perioeki,—not of Spartans alone. The word p???t???? does not mean Spartans as distinguished from Perioeki, but LacedÆmonians as distinguished from allies. Thus, when Agesilaus returns home from the blockade of Phlius, Xenophon tells us that ta?ta p???sa? t??? ?? s?????? ?f??e, t? d? p???t???? ???ade ?p??a?e (Hellen. v. 3, 25).

O. MÜller, also, thinks that the whole number of five thousand seven hundred and forty men, who fought at the first battle of Mantineia, in the thirteenth year of the Peloponnesian war, were furnished by the city of Sparta itself (Hist. of Dorians, iii. 12, 2): and to prove this, he refers to the very passage just cited from the Hellenica of Xenophon, which, as far as it proves anything, proves the contrary of his position. He gives no other evidence to support it, and I think it in the highest degree improbable. I have already remarked that he understands the expression p???t??? ???a (in Polybius, vi. 45) to mean the district of Sparta itself as contradistinguished from Laconia,—a construction which seems to me not warranted by the passage in Polybius.

[808] Aristotle, ?a????? ????te?a, Fragm. 5-6, ed. Neumann: Photius v. ?????. Harpokration, ???a. Etymologic. Mag. ???a. The statement of Aristotle is transmitted so imperfectly that we cannot make out clearly what it was. Xenophon says that there were six morÆ in all, comprehending all the citizens of military age (Rep. Lac. 11, 3). But Ephorus stated the mora at five hundred men, Kallisthenes at seven hundred, and Polybius at nine hundred (Plutarch, Pelopid. 17; Diodor. xv. 32). If all the citizens competent to bear arms were comprised in six morÆ, the numbers of each mora must of course have varied. At the battle of Mantineia, there were seven LacedÆmonian lochi, each lochus containing four pentekosties, and each pentekosty containing four enÔmoties: ThucydidÊs seems, as I before remarked, to make each enÔmoty thirty-two men. But Xenophon tells us that each mora had four lochi, each lochus two pentekosties, and each pentekosty two enÔmoties (Rep. Lac. 11, 4). The names of these divisions remained the same, but the numbers varied.

[809] This is implied in the fact, that the men under thirty or under thirty-five years of age, were often detached in a battle to pursue the light troops of the enemy (Xen. Hellen. iv. 5, 15-16).

[810] Xenoph. Hellen. vi. 4, 12.

[811] Herodot. vi. 111; Thucyd. vi. 98; Xenoph. Hellen. iv. 2, 19.

The same marshalling of hoplites, according to the civil tribes to which they belonged, is seen in the inhabitants of MessÊnÊ in Sicily as well as of Syrakuse (Thucyd. iii. 90; vi. 100).

At Argos, there was a body of one thousand hoplites, who, during the Peloponnesian war, received training in military manoeuvres at the cost of the city (Thucyd. v. 67), but there is reason to believe that this arrangement was not introduced until about the period of the peace of Nikias in the tenth or eleventh year of the Peloponnesian war, when the truce between Argos and Sparta was just expiring, and when the former began to entertain schemes of ambition. The Epariti in Arcadia began at a much later time, after the battle of Leuktra (Xenoph. Hellen. vii. 4, 33).

About the Athenian taxiarchs, one to each tribe, see Æschines de Fals. Leg. c. 53, p. 300 R.; Lysias, pro Mantitheo, Or. xvi. p. 147; Demosth. adv. Boeotum pro nomine, p. 999 R. Philippic, i. p. 47.

See the advice given by Xenophon (in his Treatise De Officio Magistri Equitum) for the remodelling of the Athenian cavalry, and for the introduction of small divisions, each with its special commander. The division into tribes is all that he finds recognized (Off. M. E. C. ii. 2-iv. 9); he strongly recommends giving orders,—d?? pa?a????se??, and not ?p? ???????.

[812] Plutarch, Pelopid. c. 23. ???t?? ????? te???ta? ?a? s?f?sta? t?? p??e???? ??te? ?? Spa?t??ta?, etc. (Xenoph. Rep. Lac. c. 14) ???sa?? ??, t??? ?? ?????? a?t?s?ed?ast?? e??a? t?? st?at??t????, ?a?eda??????? d? ????? t? ??t? te???ta? t?? p??e????.... ?ste t?? de????? ????es?a? ??d?? ?p??e?ta?? ??d?? ??? ?p??s?ept?? ?st??.

[813] ??a? ??? p??????a? p??est??a? t?? ????d?? (Herodot. i. 69): compare i. 152; v. 49; vi, 84, about Spartan hegemony.

[814] Xenoph. Repub. Lac. 10, 8. ?pa????s? ?? p??te? t? t??a?ta ?p?t?de?ata, ?e?s?a? d? a?t? ??de?a p???? ????e?.

The magnificent funeral discourse, pronounced by PeriklÊs in the early part of the Peloponnesian war over the deceased Athenian warriors, includes a remarkable contrast of the unconstrained patriotism and bravery of the Athenians, with the austere, repulsive, and ostentatious drilling to which the Spartans were subject from their earliest youth; at the same time, it attests the powerful effect which that drilling produced upon the mind of Greece (Thucyd. ii. 37-39). p?ste???te? ?? ta?? pa?as?e?a?? t? p???? ?a? ?p?ta??, ? t? ?f? ??? a?t?? ?? t? ???a e?????? ?a? ?? ta?? pa?de?a?? ?? ?? (the Spartans) ?p?p??? ?s??se? e???? ???? ??te? t? ??d?e??? et?????ta?, etc.

The impression of the light troops, when they first began to attack the LacedÆmonian hoplites in the island of Sphakteria, is strongly expressed by ThucydidÊs (iv. 34),—t? ???? ded???????? ?? ?p? ?a?eda???????, etc.

[815] Xenoph. Hellen. v. 4, 52: compare iii. 5, 20.

[816] Xenoph. Hellen. iii. 4, 19.

[817] Pausan. iv. 24, 2; iv. 35, 2.

[818] Pausan. ii. 19, 2; Plutarch (Cur Pythia nunc non reddat oracula, etc. c. 5, p. 396; De Fortun Alexandri, c. 8, p. 340). LakidÊs, king of Argos, is also named by Plutarch as luxurious and effeminate (De capiend ab hostibus utilitate, c. 6, p. 89).

O. MÜller (Hist. of Dorians, iii. 6, 10) identifies LakidÊs, son of Meltas, named by Pausanias, with LeÔkÊdÊs son of PheidÔn, named by Herodotus as one of the suitors for the daughter of KleisthenÊs the Sikyonian (vi. 127); and he thus infers that Meltas must have been deposed and succeeded by Ægon, about 560 B.C. This conjecture seems to me not much to be trusted.

[819] Herodot. vii. 149.

[820] Herodot. viii. 73.

Strabo distinguishes two places called OrneÆ; one a village in the Argeian territory, the other a town between Corinth and SikyÔn: but I doubt whether there ever were two places so called: the town or village dependent on Argos seems the only place (Strabo. viii. p. 376).

[821] Thucyd. v. 67-vi. 95.

The KleÔnÆans are also said to have aided the Argeians in the destruction of MykenÆ, conjointly with the Tegeatans: from hence, however, we cannot infer anything as to their dependence at that time (Strabo, viii. p. 377).

[822] Pindar, Nem. x. 42. ??e??a??? p??? ??d??? tet????? (compare Nem. iv. 17). ??e??a??? t? ?p? ??????, etc.

[823] See Corsini Dissertation. AgonisticÆ, iii. 2.

The tenth Nemean Ode of Pindar is on this point peculiarly good evidence, inasmuch as it is composed for, and supposed to be sung by TheiÆus, a native of Argos. Had there been any jealousy then subsisting between Argos and KleÔnÆ on the subject of the presidency of this festival, Pindar would never, on such an occasion, have mentioned expressly the KleÔnÆans as presidents.

The statements of the Scholia on Pindar, that the Corinthians at one time celebrated the Nemean games, or that they were of old celebrated at SikyÔn, seem unfounded (Schol. Pind. Arg. Nem., and Nem. x. 49).

[824] Polyb. ii. 41.

[825] Herodot. i. 145; Strabo, viii. p. 385.

[826] Pausan. iv. 15, 1; Strabo, viii. p. 383; Homer, Iliad, ii. 573. Pausanias seems to have forgotten this statement, when he tells us that the name of HyperÊsia was exchanged for that of Ægeira, during the time of the Ionian occupation of the country (vii. 26, 1; Steph. Byz. copies him, v. ???e??a). It is doubtful whether the two names designate the same place, nor does Strabo conceive that they did.

[827] Strabo, viii. pp. 337, 342, 386.

[828] Polyb. ii. 41.

[829] See Leake’s Travels in Morea, c. xxvii. and xxxi.