The History and Antiquities of the Doric Race, Vol. 1 of 2

In the first place, then, we shall remind the reader of a position sufficiently established by the foregoing inquiries; that the Apollo of Tempe, Delphi, Delos, [pg 295] Crete, Lycia, Troy, Athens, and Peloponnesus, is the same god, and not, as was very frequently the case in the religions of Greece, a combination of several deities under one name. This conclusion we supported as well by historical accounts respecting the foundation of his numerous temples, as by the evidence derived from a recurrence of the same names, rites, and symbols; such, for example, as the titles of Lycius and Lycia, Delphinius and Pythius; the oracles and sibyls; the purifications and expiations; the custom of leaping from rocks; decimations; the golden summer, and bloodless oblations; the laurel-berries; the legend of the Hyperboreans, and the cycle of eight years. Hence the theologians mentioned by Cicero1188 were wrong in endeavouring without any authority to distinguish between the Athenian, Cretan, and Hyperborean Apollo.

2. It appears, however, that they were warranted in distinguishing from the rest the Apollo Nomius of Arcadia; although in their etymology of the name,1189 which made him a divine lawgiver, they by no means followed the most authentic sources of religious history. The correct account is without doubt that given by Pindar,1190 who calls Aristæus, conjointly with Zeus and Apollo, a protector of flocks, and guardian of huntsmen. In fact, Aristæus and his son Actæon were ancient deities of the early Pelasgic inhabitants of Greece.1191 That god also protected agriculture and pasturing, warded off the scorching heat of summer, charmed by incantations the mild Etesian winds, and [pg 296] loved hunting and the care of bees. His chief haunts were the plains under mount Pelion and Iolcus—from which place his worship was introduced into Cyrene—the fertile valley of Thebes, Parrhasia in Arcadia,1192 and the Parrhasian island of Ceos;1193 at Cyrene, Apollo and Cyrene were called his parents.1194 The genealogy attributed to Aristæus varied considerably in different places; through the prevalence of Greek worship in Arcadia he was considered identical with Apollo. It was remembered that the Delphian god had also tended the herds of Admetus; and perhaps the national worship of Aristæus at Pheræ had partly contributed to the formation of this fable.1195 Deities, whose worship at an early period fell into disuse, were adapted and modified in various ways to suit the ruling powers: and even if a complete and consistent system of mythology was eradicated and destroyed as a whole, yet particular portions of it would combine themselves with the prevailing religion, and thus obtain a new existence. Thus also the ancient elementary deity, which had received the name of Apollo Nomius, was called the son of the ancient Silenus,1196 because his attributes seemed to resemble those of the attendants of Bacchus.1197 I shall take occasion hereafter to explain [pg 297] the connexion between the Carnean Apollo and this deity.1198

3. It should also be observed that Apollo and Æsculapius were connected in fable and mythology; and this at an early period, for Hesiod called Æsculapius the son of Apollo;1199 but, as it appears, only in mythology, and not in any religious worship. Thus neither at Tricca, Lebadea, Epidaurus, nor Cos, were Apollo Pæan and Æsculapius intimately connected; nor do we ever find that they had altars, festivals, or sacrifices in common, except perhaps in a temple at the modern town of Megalopolis.1200 This practical difference may be accounted for by the national origin of the two worships. For Phlegyas, the ancestor of Æsculapius, and the sons of Æsculapius mentioned in the Homeric Catalogue, belonged to races which were hostile both to the Dorians and the temple of Delphi; and the dispersion of the schools of the Asclepiadæ through Greece had nothing in common with the foundation of the temples of Apollo.

4. Having made these distinctions, we now return to the principal position established by the preceding inquiries; viz., that it was the Dorians among whom the religion of Apollo was the most ancient, important, and truly national worship.

5. In the first place, then, the accounts above given of Apollo returning from the Hyperboreans with the ripe ears of corn, and the tribute of the golden ears, certainly suggest the idea of a guardian of agriculture.1201 On the coins of Metapontum we frequently see these ears of corn, with the grasshopper, or mouse both in the act of creeping, upon the reverse. The same explanation is applicable to both symbols. The mouse and grasshopper are animals hurtful to the corn, which the god was supplicated to protect from their attacks. In like manner the Cretan Apollo Σμίνθειος was doubtless a destroyer of field mice (σμίνθοι);1202 and his statue was represented with one foot upon a mouse.1203

Again, in Rhodes he was called ἐρυθίβιος, “the averter of mildew;”1204 which attribute was peculiarly suitable to him, as being one of the Triopian deities, one of whom was Demeter, the destroyer of Erysichthon. These are probably the chief reasons which can be adduced in favour of the position that Apollo was an elementary deity; reasons which are founded on the symbols and ceremonies of the real worship, and not on the opinions of later philosophers. But, first, the argument that Apollo was an elementary god, because he was a patron and protector of agriculture, is inconclusive; for he performs this office in his character of guardian and averter of misfortune generally. The case indeed would be otherwise, had Apollo been supposed either to call forth the seed from the earth or bring it to maturity; no trace however of these functions being attributed to him ever occurs. It is therefore unnecessary on this account to identify him with the sun. And it may be remarked likewise, that the chief festivals of Apollo were not connected with any remarkable epochs of the sun's course, but rather with the rising of the stars, particularly of the pleiads, and with the phases of the moon. Thus the new moon was sacred to Apollo, who hence received the name of Νεομήνιος;1205 and so likewise the first quarter, or the seventh day; and, finally, the full moon (διχομηνία), particularly in the island of Zacynthus.1206 From these circumstances, however, no one will infer that Apollo was a god of the moon.

We do not, however, deny that Apollo and the god of the sun admitted in particular points of a comparison [pg 300] and parallel with each other; the source of external light might be a symbol of the “bright and pure” god; and indeed the Platonists favoured this supposition,1207 which is not, however, supported by any historical authority. The worship of the sun was practised in the Acropolis of Corinth, at Rhodes, Athens, and in earlier times also at Calauria and Tænarum; but in none of these places was it connected with the rites of Apollo.1208

6. This naturally leads us to inquire how any ideal connexion between Apollo and the sun, if it really existed, should have been entirely overlooked for so many centuries; how was it that these deities were not identified till the Grecian mythology had ceased to have any influence upon the ideas and feelings of mankind? Even when the Egyptian interpreters identified Horus with Apollo, they were in all probability guided only by the resemblance between the destroyer of the Python and the vanquisher of Baby (Typhon in Greek).1209 The Persian magi, however, in discovering a connexion between the worship of Apollo and their religion (on which account Xerxes preserved from injury the island where Apollo and Artemis were born),1210 were influenced by a well-grounded comparison, which we shall find occasion to confirm in a subsequent chapter;1211 yet, in all probability, it was not the sun, but Ormuzd, whom they supposed to be Apollo. It was [pg 301] not until the philosophers of the Ionic school identified the deities of the popular creed partly with material powers and objects, and partly with the attributes of the universal intellect (νοῦς), that the doctrine was advanced of Apollo being the sun. From them Euripides, who called Zeus the air, and Vesta the earth, was naturally among the first to receive it. In the tragedy of Phaethon, the mother of the unfortunate youth complained against his father Helius as follows; “Rightly does he who knows the secret names of the gods call thee Apollo” (the destroyer);1212 referring, without doubt, not to any doctrine connected with, or revealed in the mysteries, but to a philosophical interpretation. This opinion, thus adopted by Euripides, became still more general at Alexandria; and Callimachus blames those “who separate Apollo from the sun, and Artemis from the moon.”1213 Soon afterwards it was said to have originated in very early times; and the author of the astronomical treatise attributed to Eratosthenes1214 relates, that Orpheus the Thracian had from the top of a mountain, at break of day, prayed to the sun, whom he also called Apollo, as the greatest of all the deities.1215 Nevertheless, this statement does not authorize us to infer, that in the ancient Orphic Hymns, previous to Herodotus, Apollo and the sun were identified. For this system of religious [pg 302] speculation was chiefly concerned about Bacchus; and in all the Orphic fragments of any antiquity Apollo is hardly ever noticed.1216

7. It seems, therefore, that whatever might have been the poetical attributes of Apollo in late times, in his religious character he was never an elementary deity, the essence of whose godhead is a personification of the creative powers of nature. None of the characteristic marks of such a religion are discoverable in his worship. So far from being a god of generation1217 and production, he remains unmarried and youthful; for it is easy to see that his poetical amour with the nymph Daphne, and his sons, mentioned in poetry and prophecy, have no connexion with his worship. In his sacred rites and symbols there is no trace of the adoration of the generative powers, like those occurring in the ancient Arcadian worship of Hermes, the Argive fables of Here, or the Attic legends of Hephæstus and Athene. The worship of Apollo is even still more widely removed from the boisterous and frantic orgies so conspicuous in the Thracian rites of Dionysus. And although this latter worship flourished by the side of Helicon and Parnassus, near the Pythian temple, and both kinds of religious worship were practised in the immediate neighbourhood of each [pg 303] other,1218 yet the religious feelings and rites which distinguished the services of the two gods always remained dissimilar.

In the subsequent discussion we shall accordingly take for granted the original diversity of Apollo and the sun; and though the rites of the worship of Apollo, as preserved and recorded in later times, are doubtless of greater antiquity than any written documents which either we or the Greeks possessed, it will be convenient first to state the clearer and more intelligible accounts of Homer on the subject of Apollo, his divine character and worship.

1. Homer, as we have already seen, had, both from hearsay and personal observation, acquired a very accurate knowledge of the Cretan worship of Apollo in the Smintheum, in the citadel of Troy, in Lycia near mounts Ida and Cragus, as well as of Pytho and the Delian palm-tree. His picture of Apollo is, however, considerably changed by the circumstance of the god acting as a friend to the Trojans and an enemy to the Greeks, although both equally honour him with sacrifices and pæans. Yet he generally appears to the [pg 304] Greeks in a darker and more unfavourable view. “Dread the son of Zeus,” says the priest of Chryse to the Greeks, “he walks dark as night; the sure and deadly arrows rattle on his shoulders.” His punishments are sudden sickness, rapid pestilence, and death, the cause and occasion of which is generally unseen; yet sometimes he grants death as a blessing.1219 His arrows are said to wound from afar, because they are unforeseen and unexpected. He is called the far-darting god;1220 his divine vengeance never misses its aim. He appears in the terror of his might when from the heights of the citadel he stimulates the Trojans with a loud war-cry to the combat;1221 and leads them on, a cloud around his shoulders, and the ægis in his hand, into the thick of the battle,1222 like Ares himself,1223 though far from showing the boisterous confidence of that deity. Achilles, to whom he is indeed particularly hostile, calls him the most pernicious of all the gods. Even when he appears amongst the gods, “all tremble before him in the palace of Zeus, and rise from their seats; while Latona alone rejoices that she has produced so strong a son and so powerful an archer.”1224

It is remarkable how seriously Homer (who otherwise speaks of the gods, and particularly of those friendly to Troy, with some levity of expression)1225 describes [pg 305] the character of Apollo. He is never represented as hurried on by blind fury. He never opposes the Greeks without reason, or through caprice, but only when they disregard the sacred rights of priests and suppliants, or assume an unusual degree of arrogance. But when the gods separate into two bodies, and descend to the contest, he, unmoved by passion, shuns the combat, and speaks of the quick succession of the race of man in a manner which betokens the oracular deity of Pytho.1226 A similar spirit is perceivable in his address to the daring Diomed: “The race of the immortal gods resembles not that of mortals.” Thus Apollo appears as the minister of vengeance, the chastiser of arrogance. Consistently with this character he destroys the proud Niobe,1227 the unruly Aloidæ,1228 Tityus and the Python, the enemies of the gods. His contests with Eurytus of Œchalia, and with Phorbas the Phlegyan, were grounded on historical facts; the former alluded to the enmity between the Dorians and Œchalians, the latter to that between the Pythian sanctuary and the Phlegyans.1229

2. We will now examine the notions of other poets on the character of Apollo as a revenging and punishing deity, in which light he is introduced by Homer. [pg 306] Archilochus calls upon Apollo to “punish and destroy the guilty as he is wont to destroy them.”1230 Hipponax, the successor of Archilochus in vituperative satiric poetry, prays that “Artemis and Apollo may destroy thee;”1231 and Æschylus, with manifest allusion to the name, says, Ἀπόλλων ἀπώλεσας;1232 which, however, can hardly entitle us to infer that the name of Apollo was really derived from ἀπολεῖν;1233 for we should lose sight of one main point, viz., the object against which his destructive powers were directed, or be reduced to consider him an universal destroyer, a character which is ill adapted to mark the nature of a divine being of any kind whatsoever. Apollo slays, indeed, but only to inflict deserved punishment. At Megara was exhibited the tomb of Corœbus, who had slain the Fury sent by Apollo against that town, to punish the crimes of the fathers by destroying their children.1234 After this action, Corœbus was ordered to carry in his arms a tripod from Pytho, and erect on the spot where he should fall down from exhaustion, a town (Tripodiscus) and a temple to the god. This explains why many sacred fines were at Corinth, Patara, and Amphipolis,1235 paid into the temple of Apollo, who thus appears, in some measure, as enforcing his own judgments. [pg 307] Æschylus refers to his office of avenging murder, where he speaks of Apollo, Pan, and Zeus, as the gods who send the Furies;1236 Zeus as ruler of the world, Pan as the dæmon that disorders the intellect, Apollo as the god of punishment. Hence it was not without reason that the Romans believed Apollo to be represented in a statue of the god Vejovis, a terrible god, equipped with arrows.1237 At least there is some connexion between him and Apollo καταιβάσιος, “who darts down in the lightning;” to whom the Thessalians vowed every year a hecatomb of men.1238 At Argos it was the custom immediately after death for the relations to sacrifice to Apollo as a god of death; the priest of Apollo (the amphipolus) offered up the victim, and for consuming the fragments of the sacrifice a new fire was always kindled. On the thirtieth day afterwards a sacrifice was offered to Hermes as the conductor of souls.1239

3. Although we have thus dwelt upon the gloomy side of Apollo's character, it must not be supposed that he was considered in the light of a malevolent and destroying power. Thus Pindar declares that of all the gods “he is the most friendly to men.”1240 His titles, also, as connected with different temples, serve to remove that impression. Thus he was called the Healer at Elis,1241 the Assister at Phigaleia,1242 the Defender, the Averter of Evil,1243 at Athens, and in many [pg 308] oracles.1244 Although some of these names were perhaps not introduced until the Peloponnesian war, and the restriction of his avenging power to physical evil is first perceptible in Pindar and the tragedians,1245 yet the idea of the healing and protecting power of Apollo must have been of remote antiquity. Under all these names Apollo does not so much appear bestowing positive good as assuaging and warding off evil; and in this character he was invoked (according to an oracle) to send health and good fortune.1246

4. The preceding arguments may perhaps receive confirmation from a description of the god Pæan (Παιήων) in Homer. The name clearly betokens a healing deity, and though the poet indeed speaks of him as a separate individual, and the physician of Olympus,1247 yet this division appears to have been merely poetical, without any reference to actual worship; since from very early times the pæan had, in the Pythian temple,1248 been appointed to be sung in honour of [pg 309] Apollo.1249 The song, like other hymns, derived its name from that of the god to whom it was sung. The god was first called pæan, then the hymn, and lastly the singers themselves.1250 Now we know that the pæan was originally sung at the cessation of a plague, and after a victory, and generally, when any evil was averted, it was performed as a purification from the pollution.1251 The chant was loud and joyous, as celebrating the victory of the preserving and healing deity.1252 Besides the pæans of victory,1253 however, there were others which were sung at the beginning of battle;1254 and there was a tradition that the chorus of Delphian virgins had chanted “Io Pæan” at the contest of Apollo with the Python.1255 The pæan of victory varied according to the different tribes; all Dorians, viz., Spartans, Argives, Corinthians, and Syracusans, had the same.1256 This use of the pæan, as a song of rejoicing [pg 310] for victory, sufficiently explains its double meaning; it bore a mournful sense in reference to the battle, and a joyous sense in reference to the victory. Apollo, under this name, was therefore either considered as a destroying (from παίω), or as a protecting and healing deity, who frees the mind from care and sorrow;1257 and accordingly the tragedians, by an analogical application of the word, also called Death, to whom both these attributes belonged, by the title of Pæan.1258 And thus this double character of Apollo, by virtue of which he was equally formidable as a foe, and welcome as an ally,1259 was authorized by the ambiguity of his name.

5. On the other hand, the title Agyieus had a single signification.1260 This appellation of Apollo was peculiar to the Dorians,1261 and consequently of great antiquity at Delphi;1262 from which place, however, it was brought over to Athens at a very early period, and indeed partly at the command of an oracle.1263 His statue was erected in court-yards, and before the doors of houses; that is, at the boundary of private and public property, in order to admit the god as a tutelary deity, and to avert evil. The symbol or image of the god [pg 311] was most simple, being a conical block of stone. The ancients knew not whether to consider it as an altar or statue.1264 The worship consisted of a constant succession of trifling services and marks of adoration.1265 Frankincense was burnt before the pillar;1266 it was bedecked with wreaths of myrtle, garlands, &c. This was sufficient to remind, and at the same time to assure, the ancient Dorians of the protecting presence of their deity. The Athenians represented their Hermes in a similar manner. This god, although fundamentally distinct from Apollo, was invested by them with the same offices: thus the statues of both gods were placed, as protecting powers, in front of the houses: both gods were supposed to confer blessings on those who either entered or left the house: both were represented by simple columnar statues. With Apollo, however, this protection was rather of a spiritual and inward nature: while the phallic form, which always distinguished the Hermæ of Athens, shows that this god was considered to afford, by increasing the fruitfulness of the fields and cattle, and generally all the products of nature, a more external and physical assistance.

6. To these titles may perhaps be added the name of Apollo itself. That we must search for its etymology in the Greek language alone, and that it could have been derived from no other source, is evident [pg 312] from the preceding investigations. In the first place, then, we cannot derive it from the sun, ΑϜΕΛΙΟΣ,1267 since the digamma is never changed into Π. The derivation from ΟΛΩ we have already rejected, as being founded on a partial and occasional attribute of the god.1268 On the other hand, we may observe that the ancient Doric Æolian form of the name was not Ἀπόλλων but Ἀπέλλων,1269 which also obtained amongst the ancient Latins,1270 and from which the Macedonian and Delphian month Apellæus evidently derived its name. Now if this is admitted to be the original form, Ἀπέλλων simply means the averter or defender,1271 and belongs to the same class as Ἀλεξίκακος, Ἀποτροπαῖος, and other names mentioned above.

7. All these names, however, only indicate the attributes and actions of the deity; but the name Phœbus expresses more nearly his peculiar nature. From its original sense of “bright,” “clear,” its secondary sense of “pure,” “unstained,” is easily derived;1272 and hence the term φοιβάζειν (which perhaps [pg 313] is connected with the Latin februare), “to expiate.” Phoebus therefore is the clear and spotless god, often emphatically called the “pure and holy” (ἁγνὸς θεός).1273 This name is particularly applied to him when he returns purified from Tempe.1274 The same meaning is implied in the epithet ξανθὸς, which also signifies “pure,” and “clear;”1275 hence the streams near the temples of Apollo in Troy and Lycia were called Xanthus,1276 and amongst the Macedonians the expiatory festival of the army bore the title of Xanthica.1277 In allusion to Apollo as a god of joy and gladness, Aeschylus frequently forbids that he should be invoked in sorrow.1278 Several other passages from poets and grammarians might be adduced to support this idea.1279

8. We now come to the most enigmatical of all the titles of Apollo, viz., “Lyceus.” It was shown above, that Apollo Lycius was worshipped at Lycorea on mount Parnassus, in Lycia at the foot of mount Cragus, in Lycia under mount Ida, at Athens, Argos, Sparta, and Sicyon. This religion must have been of greater antiquity than the Greek colonies in Asia Minor, having been carried over thither at the time of [pg 314] their establishment. Homer was also acquainted with this title of Apollo.

In explanation of this epithet we every where find traditions concerning wolves. The descendants of Deucalion, who survived the deluge, following a wolf's roar, founded Lycorea on a ridge of mount Parnassus. Latona came as a she-wolf from the Hyperboreans to Delos: she was conducted by wolves to the river Xanthus. Wolves protected the treasures of Apollo; and near the great altar at Delphi there stood an iron wolf with ancient inscriptions.1280 The attack of a wolf upon a herd of cattle occasioned the worship of Apollo Lyceus at Argos, where a brazen group of figures, commemorating the circumstance, was erected in the market-place.1281 The Sicyonian tradition of Apollo “the destroyer of wolves” is certainly of less antiquity, as also the epithet Λυκοκτόνος (Lupercus), which occurs in Sophocles and other authors.1282

Now in inquiring into the meaning of the symbol of the wolf in this signification, it may be first remarked that it is a beast of prey. In this point of view it cannot but appear a remarkable coincidence that Apollo should in the Iliad assume the form of a hawk,1283 and a species of falcon should be called his swift messenger.1284 Thus also the tragedians frequently [pg 315] represented Apollo, in his character of a destroyer, under the title of Lyceus.1285 We are not, however, to suppose that it was this character of Apollo as a destroying power which gave a name, not only to innumerable temples, but even to whole countries; such a supposition would, contrary to history and analogy, make the early state of this religion to have been one of the grossest barbarism and superstition. It is far more probable that the name Lyceus is connected with the ancient primitive word lux (whence λευκός). The Greek word λύκη is preserved most distinctly in λυκάβας, i.e. course of the light;1286 and by the epithet Λυκηγένης, applied to Apollo by Homer,1287 and probably taken from some ancient hymns, we should (from the idiom of the Greek language) rather understand one born of light, than the Lycian god. That light and splendour are frequently employed, both in the symbols of worship and language of the poets, to express the attributes of Apollo, cannot be denied;1288 and we only remind the reader of the belief that the fire which burnt on the altar of Apollo Lyceus at Argos had originally fallen from heaven:1289 and thus the epithet Lyceus would seem to belong to the same class as Ægletes, Phœbus, and Xanthus.1290

It is not to be supposed that the wolf was made use of as a symbol of Apollo merely from an accidental similarity of name; but it is difficult to discover what analogy even the lively imagination of the Greeks could have found between the wolf and light. At a later period it was attempted to explain this symbol by the circumstance that all wolves produced their young within twelve days in the year, the precise time during which Latona was wandering as a she-wolf from the Hyperboreans to Delos.1291 This physical interpretation was, however, grounded on the fable, and not the fable on it. Perhaps the sharp sight of the wolf1292 (if we can trust the accounts of the ancients), or even the bright colour of the animal, may afford a better explanation.1293

In the ancient Grecian worship, however, there is another example, and one in the highest degree remarkable, of the connexion between light and the wolf. On the lofty peak of Lycæum, a mountain of Arcadia, above the ancient Lycosura, there stood (as Pindar says) a lofty and splendid altar of Zeus Lycæus, with which were in some way connected all the traditions concerning Lycaon, who sacrificed his child to Zeus, and was in consequence transformed into a wolf. Now not only does the symbol of the wolf occur in this place,1294 but there is also a reference to [pg 317] light. There stood here a sacred shrine or adytum, supposed to be inaccessible; and the popular belief was, that whoever entered it cast no shadow; and in order to escape being sacrificed, the aggressor was obliged to escape as a deer: hence the pursuing god naturally appeared to the imagination as a wolf.1295 We perceive that light was supposed to dwell within the sanctuary. Thus in this very ancient worship of the Parrhasians, which in other respects has little in common with the Doric worship of Apollo, we discover the same combination of ideas and symbols that exists in the latter, and cannot but consider it a vestige of some very ancient symbolical idea peculiar and general among the Greeks.

9. Having proceeded so far, we shall endeavour to unite and harmonize the different facts already collected. Apollo, as he is represented by Homer, exhibits the character of a destroying and avenging, as well as a delivering and protecting power. But he is the avenger of impiety and arrogance, and the punisher of injustice and sin, and not the author of evil to mankind for evil's sake. He was therefore always considered as attended with certain beings whose nature was contrary to his own; his character could only be shown in opposition with a system of hostile attributes and powers. As the warring and victorious god, he required enemies to combat and conquer: as the pure and bright god, he implies the existence of a dark and impure side of nature. In this manner the worship of Apollo resembled those religions, such as the ancient Persian, which were [pg 318] founded on the doctrine of two principles, one of good, the other of evil. At the same time he is no deified personification of the creative or generative powers of nature, nor of any natural object or phenomenon; and he has therefore nothing in common with the deities of the elementary religions.