[574] Apollodôr. i. 9, 25. Apollôn. Rhod. iv. 1700-1725.

[575] Some called Talôs a remnant of the brazen race of men (Schol. Apoll. Rhod. iv. 1641).

[576] Apollodôr. i. 9, 26. Apollôn. Rhod. iv. 1638.

[577] Diodôr. iv. 53. Eratosth. Catasterism. c. 35.

[578] Strabo. xi. p. 526-531.

[579] Apollôn. Rhod. i. 955-960, and the Scholia.

There was in Kyzikus a temple of Apollo under different ἐπικλήσεις; some called it the temple of the Jasonian Apollo.

Another anchor however was preserved in the temple of Rhea on the banks of the Phasis, which was affirmed to be the anchor of the ship Argô. Arrian saw it there, but seems to have doubted its authenticity (Periplus, Euxin. Pont. p. 9. Geogr. Min. v. 1).

[580] Neanthês ap. Strabo. i. p. 45. Apollôn. Rhod. i. 1125, and Schol. Steph. Byz. v. Φρίξος.

Apollônius mentions the fountain called Jasoneæ, on the hill of Dindymon. Apollôn. Rhod. ii. 532, and the citations from Timosthenês and Herodôrus in the Scholia. See also Appian. Syriac. c. 63.

[581] See the historians of Hêrakleia, Nymphis and Promathidas, Fragm. Orelli, pp. 99, 100-104. Schol. ad Apollôn. Rhod. iv. 247. Strabo, xii. p. 546. Autolykus, whom he calls companion of Jasôn, was, according to another legend, comrade of Hêraklês in his expedition against the Amazons.

[582] Stephan. Byz. v. Παντικαπαῖον, Eustath. ad Dionys. Periêgêt. 311.

[583] Xenophôn, Anabas. vi. 2, 1; v. 7, 37.

[584] Strabo, xi. p. 499.

[585] Appian, Mithridatic. c. 101.

[586] Strabo, xi. p. 499, 503, 526, 531; i. p. 45-48. Justin, xlii. 3, whose statements illustrate the way in which men found a present home and application for the old fables,—“Jason, primus humanorum post Herculem et Liberum, qui reges Orientis fuisse traduntur, eam cœli plagam domuisse dicitur. Cum Albanis fœdus percussit, qui Herculem ex Italiâ ab Albano monte, cum, Geryone extincto, armenta ejus per Italiam duceret, secuti dicuntur; quique, memores Italicæ originis, exercitum Cn. Pompeii bello Mithridatico fratres consalutavêre. Itaque Jasoni totus fere Oriens, ut conditori, divinos honores templaque constituit; quæ Parmenio, dux Alexandri Magni, post multos annos dirui jussit, ne cujusquam nomen in Oriente venerabilius quam Alexandri esset.”

The Thessalian companions of Alexander the Great, placed by his victories in possession of rich acquisitions in these regions, pleased themselves by vivifying and multiplying all these old fables, proving an ancient kindred between the Medes and Thessalians. See Strabo, xi. p. 530. The temples of Jasôn were τιμώμενα σφόδρα ὑπὸ τῶν βαρβάρων (ib. p. 526).

The able and inquisitive geographer Eratosthenês was among those who fully believed that Jasôn had left his ships in the Phasis, and had undertaken a land expedition into the interior country, in which he had conquered Media and Armenia (Strabo, i. p. 48).

[587] Appian, Mithridatic. 103: τοὺς Κόλχους ἐπήει, καθ᾽ ἰστορίαν τῆς Ἀργοναυτῶν καὶ Διοσκούρων καὶ Ἡρακλέους ἐπιδημίας, καὶ μάλιστα τὸ πάθος ἰδεῖν ἐθέλων, ὃ Προμηθεῖ φασὶ γενέσθαι περὶ τὸ Καύκασον ὄρος. The lofty crag of Caucasus called Strobilus, to which Promêtheus had been attached, was pointed out to Arrian himself in his Periplus (p. 12. Geogr. Minor vol. i.).

[588] Strabo, i. pp. 21, 45, 46; v. 224-252. Pompon. Mel. ii. 3. Diodôr. iv. 56. Apollôn. Rhod. iv. 656. Lycophron, 1273.—

[589] Heyne, Observ. ad Apollodôr. i. 9, 16. p. 72. “Mirum in modum fallitur, qui in his commentis certum fundum historicum vel geographicum aut exquirere studet, aut se reperisse, atque historicam vel geographicam aliquam doctrinam, systema nos dicimus, inde procudi posse, putat,” etc.

See also the observations interspersed in Burmann’s Catalogus Argonautarum, prefixed to his edition of Valerius Flaccus.

The Persian antiquarians whom Herodotus cites at the beginning of his history (i. 2-4—it is much to be regretted that Herodotus did not inform us who they were, and whether they were the same as those who said that Perseus was an Assyrian by birth and had become a Greek, vi. 54), joined together the abductions of Iô and of Eurôpê, of Mêdea and of Helen, as pairs of connected proceedings, the second injury being a retaliation for the first,—they drew up a debtor and creditor account of abductions between Asia and Europe. The Kolchian king (they said) had sent a herald to Greece to ask for his satisfaction for the wrong done to him by Jasôn and to re-demand his daughter Mêdea; but he was told in reply that the Greeks had received no satisfaction for the previous rape of Iô.

There was some ingenuity in thus binding together the old fables, so as to represent the invasions of Greece by Darius and Xerxês as retaliations for the unexpiated destruction wrought by Agamemnôn.

[590] Sophokl. ap. Strabo. vii. p. 295.—

[591] Odyss. iv. 562. The Islands of the Blessed, in Hesiod, are near the ocean (Opp. Di. 169).

[592] Hesiod, Theogon. 275-290. Homer, Iliad, i. 423. Odyss. i. 23; ix 86-206; x 4-83; xii. 135. Mimnerm. Fragm. 13, Schneidewin.

[593] Pindar, Pyth. x. 29.—

Hesiod, and the old epic poem called the Epigoni, both mentioned the Hyperboreans (Herod. iv. 32-34).

[594] This idea is well stated and sustained by Völcker (Mythische Geographie der Griechen und Römer, cap. i. p. 11), and by Nitzsch in his Comments on the Odyssey—Introduct. Remarks to b. ix. p. xii.-xxxiii. The twelfth and thirteenth chapters of the History of Orchomenos, by O. Müller, are also full of good remarks on the geography of the Argonautic voyage (pp. 274-299).

The most striking evidence of this disposition of the Greeks is to be found in the legendary discoveries of Alexander and his companions, when they marched over the untrodden regions in the east of the Persian empire (see Arrian, Hist. Al. v. 3: compare Lucian. Dialog. Mortuor. xiv. vol. i. p. 212. Tauch) because these ideas were first broached at a time when geographical science was sufficiently advanced to canvass and criticize them. The early settlers in Italy, Sicily and the Euxine, indulged their fanciful vision without the fear of any such monitor: there was no such thing as a map before the days of Anaximander, the disciple of Thalês.

[595] See Mr. Payne Knight, Prolegg. ad Homer. c. 49. Compare Spohn—“de extremâ Odysseæ parte”—p. 97.

[596] Strabo. xvii. p. 834. An altar of Odysseus was shown upon this island, as well as some other evidences (σύμβολα) of his visit to the place.

Apollônius Rhodius copies the Odyssey in speaking of the island of Thrinakia and the cattle of Helios (iv. 965, with Schol.). He conceives Sicily as Thrinakia, a name afterwards exchanged for Trinakria. The Scholiast ad Apoll. (1. c.) speaks of Trinax king of Sicily. Compare iv. 291 with the Scholia.

[597] Thucyd. i. 25-vi. 2. These local legends appear in the eyes of Strabo convincing evidence (i. p. 23-26),—the tomb of the siren Parthenopê at Naples, the stories at Cumæ and Dikæarchia about the νεκυομαντεῖον of Avernus, and the existence of places named after Baius and Misênus, the companions of Odysseus, etc.

[598] Strabo, iii. p. 150-157. Οὐ γὰρ μόνον οἱ κατὰ τὴν Ἰταλίαν καὶ Σικελίαν τόποι καὶ ἄλλοι τινὲς τῶν τοιούτων σημεῖα ὑπογράφουσιν, ἀλλὰ καὶ ἐν τῇ Ἰβηρίᾳ Ὀδύσσεια πόλις δείκνυται, καὶ Ἀθηνᾶς ἱερὸν, καὶ ἄλλα μύρια ἴχνη τῆς τε ἐκείνου πλάνης, καὶ ἄλλων τῶν ἐκ τοῦ Τρωϊκοῦ πολέμου περιγενομένων (I adopt Grosskurd’s correction of the text from γενομένων to περιγενομένων, in the note to his German translation of Strabo).

Asklepiadês (of Myrlea in Bithynia, about 170 B. C.) resided some time in Turditania, the south-western region of Spain along the Guadalquivir, as a teacher of Greek literature (παιδεύσας τὰ γραμματικὰ), and composed a periegesis of the Iberian tribes, which unfortunately has not been preserved. He made various discoveries in archæology, and successfully connected his old legends with several portions of the territory before him. His discoveries were,—1. In the temple of Athênê, at this Iberian town of Odysseia, there were shields and beaks of ships affixed to the walls, monuments of the visit of Odysseus himself. 2. Among the Kallæki, in the northern part of Portugal, several of the companions of Teukros had settled and left descendants: there were in that region two Grecian cities, one called Hellenês, the other called Amphilochi; for Amphilochus also, the son of Amphiaraus, had died in Iberia, and many of his soldiers had taken up their permanent residence in the interior. 3. Many new inhabitants had come into Iberia with the expedition of Hêraklês; some also after the conquest of Messênê by the Lacedæmonians. 4. In Cantabria, on the north. coast of Spain, there was a town and region of Lacedæmonian colonists. 5. In the same portion of the country there was the town of Opsikella, founded by Opsikellas, one of the companions of Antenôr in his emigration from Troy (Strabo, iii. p. 157).

This is a specimen of the manner in which the seeds of Grecian mythus came to be distributed over so large a surface. To an ordinary Greek reader, these legendary discoveries of Asklepiadês would probably be more interesting than the positive facts which he communicated respecting the Iberian tribes; and his Turditanian auditors would be delighted to hear—while he was reciting and explaining to them the animated passage of the Iliad, in which Agamemnôn extols the inestimable value of the bow of Teukros (viii. 281)—that the heroic archer and his companions had actually set foot in the Iberian peninsula.

[599] This was the opinion of Kratês of Mallus, one of the most distinguished of the critics on Homer: it was the subject of an animated controversy between him and Aristarchus (Aulus Gellius, N. A. xiv. 6; Strabo, iii. p. 157). See the instructive treatise of Lehrs, De Aristarchi Studiis, c. v. § 4. p. 251. Much controversy also took place among the critics respecting the ground which Menelaus went over in his wanderings (Odyss. iv.). Kratês affirmed that he had circumnavigated the southern extremity of Africa and gone to India: the critic Aristonikus, Strabo’s contemporary, enumerated all the different opinions (Strabo, i. p. 38).

[600] Strabo, iii. p. 157.

[601] Strabo, i. p. 22-44; vii. p. 299.

[602] Stesichori Fragm. ed. Kleine; Geryonis, Fr. 5. p. 60; ap. Strabo. iii. p. 148; Herodot. iv. 8. It seems very doubtful whether Stesichorus meant to indicate any neighboring island as Erytheia, if we compare Fragm. 10. p. 67 of the Geryonis, and the passages of Athenæus and Eustathius there cited. He seems to have adhered to the old fable, placing Erytheia on the opposite side of the ocean-stream, for Hêraklês crosses the ocean to get to it.

Hekatæus, ap. Arrian. Histor. Alex. ii. 16. Skylax places Erytheia, “whither Geryôn is said to have come to feed his oxen,” in the Kastid territory near the Greek city of Apollônia on the Ionic Gulf, northward of the Keraunian mountains. There were splendid cattle consecrated to Hêlios near Apollônia, watched by the citizens of the place with great care (Herodot. ix. 93; Skylax, c. 26).

About Erytheia, Cellerius observes (Geogr. Ant. ii. 1, 227), “Insula Erytheia, quam veteres adjungunt Gadibus, vel demersa est, vel in scopulis quærenda, vel pars est ipsarum Gadium, neque hodie ejus formæ aliqua, uti descripta est, fertur superesse.” To make the disjunctive catalogue complete, he ought to have added, “or it never really existed,”—not the least probable supposition of all.

[603] Hesiod, Theogon. 956-992; Homer, Odyss. xii. 3-69.—

[604] Mimnerm. Fragm. 10-11, Schneidewin; Athenæ. vii. p. 277.—

[605] Strabo, i. p. 45-46. Δημήτριος ὁ Σκήψιος ... πρὸς Νεάνθη τὸν Κυζικηνὸν φιλοτιμοτέρως ἀντιλέγων, εἰπόντα, ὅτι οἱ Ἀργοναῦται πλέοντες εἰς Φᾶσιν τὸν ὑφ᾽ Ὁμήρου καὶ τῶν ἄλλων ὁμολογούμενον πλοῦν, ἱδρύσαντο τὰ τῆς Ἰδαίας μητρὸς ἱερὰ ἐπὶ Κύζικον ... ἀρχήν φησὶ μηδ᾽ εἰδέναι τὴν εἰς Φᾶσιν ἀποδημίαν τοῦ Ἰάσονος Ὅμηρον. Again, p. 46, παραλαβὼν μάρτυρα Μίμνερμον, ὃς ἐν τῷ Ὠκεανῷ ποιήσας οἴκησιν Αἰήτου, etc.

The adverb φιλοτιμοτέρως reveals to us the municipal rivalry and contention between the small town Skêpsis and its powerful neighbor Kyzikus, respecting points of comparative archæology.

[606] Eumêlus, Fragm. Εὐρωπία 7, Κορινθιακὰ 2-5. pp. 63-68, Düntzer.

[607] Arrian, Periplus Pont. Euxin. p. 12; ap. Geogr. Minor. vol. i. He saw the Caucasus from Dioskurias.

[608] Herodot i. 2; vii. 193-197. Eurip. Mêd. 2. Valer. Flacc. v. 51.

[609] Strabo, i. p. 23. Völcker (Ueber Homerische Geographie, v. 66) is instructive upon this point, as upon the geography of the Greek poets generally. He recognizes the purely mythical character of Æa in Homer and Hesiod, but he tries to prove—unsuccessfully, in my judgment—that Homer places Æêtês in the east, while Circê is in the west, and that Homer refers the Argonautic voyage to the Euxine Sea.

[610] Strabo (or Polybius, whom he has just been citing) contends that Homer knew the existence of Æêtês in Kolchis, and of Circê at Circeium, as historical persons, as well as the voyage of Jasôn to Æa as an historical fact. Upon this he (Homer) built a superstructure of fiction (προσμύθευμα): he invented the brotherhood between them, and he placed both the one and the other in the exterior ocean (συγγενείας τε ἔπλασε τῶν οὕτω διῳκισμένων, καὶ ἐξωκεανισμὸν ἀμφοῖν, i. p. 20); perhaps also Jasôn might have wandered as far as Italy, as evidences (σημεῖά τινα) are shown that he did (ib.).

But the idea that Homer conceived Æêtês in the extreme east and Circê in the extreme west, is not reconcilable with the Odyssey. The supposition of Strabo is alike violent and unsatisfactory.

Circê was worshipped as a goddess at Circeii (Cicero, Nat. Deor. iii. 19). Hesiod, in the Theogony, represents the two sons of Circê by Odysseus as reigning over all the warlike Tyrrhenians (Theog. 1012), an undefined western sovereignty. The great Mamilian gens at Tusculum traced their descent to Odysseus and Circê (Dionys. Hal. iv. 45).

[611] See above, p. 239. There is an opinion cited from Hekatæus in Schol. Apoll. Rhod. iv. 284. contrary to this, which is given by the same scholiast on iv. 259. But, in spite of the remarks of Klausen (ad. Fragment. Hekatæi, 187. p. 98), I think that the Schol. ad. iv. 284 has made a mistake in citing Hekatæus; the more so as the scholiast, as printed from the Codex Parisinus, cites the same opinion without mentioning Hekatæus. According to the old Homeric idea, the ocean stream flowed all round the earth, and was the source of all the principal rivers which flowed into the great internal sea, or Mediterranean (see Hekatæus, Fr. 349; Klausen, ap. Arrian. ii. 16, where he speaks of the Mediterranean as the μεγάλη θάλασσα). Retaining this old idea of the ocean-stream, Hekatæus would naturally believe that the Phasis joined it: nor can I agree with Klausen (ad Fr. 187) that this implies a degree of ignorance too gross to impute to him.

[612] Apollôn. Rhod. iv. 287; Schol. ad iv. 284; Pindar, Pyth. iv. 447, with Schol.; Strabo, i. p. 46-57; Aristot. Mirabil. Auscult. c. 105. Altars were shown in the Adriatic, which had been erected both by Jasôn and by Mêdea (ib.).

Aristotle believed in the forked course of the Ister, with one embouchure in the Euxine and another in the Adriatic: he notices certain fishes called τρίχιαι, who entered the river (like the Argonauts) from the Euxine, went up it as far as the point of bifurcation and descended into the Adriatic (Histor. Animal. viii. 15). Compare Ukert, Geographie der Griech. und Römer, vol. iii. p. 145-147, about the supposed course of the Ister.

[613] Diodôr. iv. 56; Timæus, Fragm. 53. Göller. Skymnus the geographer also adopted this opinion (Schol. Apoll. Rhod. 284-287). The pseudo-Orpheus in the poem called Argonautica seems to give a jumble of all the different stories.

[614] Diodôr. iv. 49. This was the tale both of Sophoklês and of Kallimachus (Schol. Apoll. Rhod. iv. 284).

See the Dissertation of Ukert, Beylage iv. vol. i. part 2, p. 320 of his Geographie der Griechen und Römer, which treats of the Argonautic voyage at some length; also J. H. Voss, Alte Weltkunde über die Gestalt der Erde, published in the second volume of the Kritische Blätter, pp. 162, 314-326; and Forbiger, Handbuch der Alten Geographie-Einleitung, p. 8.

[615] Strabo, i. p. 45. He speaks here of the voyage of Phryxus, as well as that of Jasôn, as having been a military undertaking (στρατεία): so again, iii. p. 149, he speaks of the military expedition of Odysseus—ἡ τοῦ Ὀδυσσέως στρατία, and ἡ Ἡρακλέους στρατία (ib.). Again xi. p. 498. Οἱ μῦθοι, αἰνιττόμενοι τὴν Ἰάσονος στρατείαν προελθόντος μέχρι καὶ Μηδίας· ἔτι δὲ πρότερον τὴν Φρίξου. Compare also Justin, xlii. 2-3; Tacit. Annal. vi. 34.

Strabo cannot speak of the old fables with literal fidelity: he unconsciously transforms them into quasi-historical incidents of his own imagination. Diodôrus gives a narrative of the same kind, with decent substitutes for the fabulous elements (iv. 40-47-56).

[616] Strabo, i. p. 48. The far-extending expeditions undertaken in the eastern regions by Dionysus and Hêraklês were constantly present to the mind of Alexander the Great as subjects of comparison with himself: he imposed upon his followers perilous and trying marches, from anxiety to equal or surpass the alleged exploits of Semiramis, Cyrus, Perseus, and Hêraklês. (Arrian, v. 2, 3; vi. 24, 3; vii. 10, 12. Strabo, iii. p. 171; xv. p. 686; xvii. p. 81).

[617] The eponym Bœôtus is son of Poseidôn and Arnê (Euphorion ap. Eustath. ad Iliad. ii. 507). It was from Arnê in Thessaly that the Bœôtians were said to have come, when they invaded and occupied Bœôtia. Euripidês made him son of Poseidôn and Melanippê. Another legend recited Bœôtus and Hellên as sons of Poseidôn and Antiopê (Hygin. f. 157-186).

The Tanagræan poetess Korinna (the rival of Pindar, whose compositions in the Bœôtian dialect are unfortunately lost) appears to have dwelt upon this native Bœôtian genealogy: she derived the Ogygian gates of Thêbes from Ogygus, son of Bœôtus (Schol. Apollôn. Rhod. iii. 1178), also the Fragments of Korinna in Schneidewin’s edition, fr. 2. p. 432.

[618] Homer, Odyss. xi. 262, and Eustath. ad loc. Compare Schol. ad Iliad. xiii. 301.

[619] Iliad, xiv. 321. Iô is κερόεσσα προμάτωρ of the Thêbans. Eurip. Phœniss. 247-676.

[620] Apollodôr. ii. 1, 3; iii. 1, 8. In the Hesiodic poems (ap. Schol. Apoll. Rhod. ii. 178), Phœnix was recognized as son of Agenôr. Pherekydês also described both Phœnix and Kadmus as sons of Agenôr (Pherekyd. Fragm. 40, Didot). Compare Servius ad. Virgil. Æneid. 1. 338. Pherekydês expressly mentioned Kilix (Apollod. ib.). Besides the Εὐρώπεια of Stesichorus (see Stesichor. Fragm. xv. p. 73, ed. Kleine), there were several other ancient poems on the adventures of Europa; one in particular by Eumêlus (Schol. ad Iliad. vi. 138), which however can hardly be the same as the τὰ ἔπη τὰ εἰς Εὐρώπην alluded to by Pausanias (ix. 5, 4). See Wüllner de Cyclo Epico, p. 57 (Münster 1825).

[621] Conôn, Narrat. 37. Perhaps the most remarkable thing of all is the tone of unbounded self-confidence with which Conôn winds up this tissue of uncertified suppositions—περὶ μὲν Κάδμου καὶ Θηβῶν οἰκίσεως οὗτος ὁ ἀληθὴς λόγος· τὸ δὲ ἄλλο μῦθος καὶ γοητεία ἀκοῆς.

[622] Stesichor. (Fragm. 16; Kleine) ap. Schol. Eurip. Phœniss. 680. The place where the heifer had lain down was still shown in the time of Pausanias (ix. 12, 1).

Lysimachus, a lost author who wrote Thebaïca, mentioned Eurôpa as having come with Kadmus to Thêbes, and told the story in many other respects very differently (Schol. Apoll. Rhod. iii. 1179).

[623] Apollodôr. iii. 4, 1-3. Pherekydês gave this account of the necklace, which seems to imply that Kadmus must have found his sister Eurôpa. The narrative here given is from Hellanikus; that of Pherekydês differed from it in some respects: compare Hellanik. Fragm. 8 and 9, and Pherekyd. Frag. 44. The resemblance of this story with that of Jasôn and Æêtês (see above, chap. xiii. p. 237) will strike everyone. It is curious to observe how the old logographer Pherekydês explained this analogy in his narrative; he said that Athênê had given half the dragon’s teeth to Kadmus and half to Æêtês (see Schol. Pindar. Isthm. vi. 13).

[624] Hesiod, Theogon. 976. Leukothea, the sea-goddess, daughter of Kadmus, is mentioned in the Odyssey, v. 334; Diodôr. iv. 2.

[625] Eurip. Phœniss. 680, with the Scholia; Pherekydês, Fragm. 44; Androtiôn, ap. Schol. Pindar. Isthm. vi. 13. Dionysius (?) called the Sparti an ἔθνος Βοιωτίας (Schol. Phœniss. 1. c).

Even in the days of Plutarch, there were persons living who traced their descent to the Sparti of Thêbes (Plutarch, Ser. Num. Vindict. p. 563).

[626] Apollodôr. iii. 4, 2-9; Diodôr. iv. 2.

[627] See Apollodôr. iii. 4, 3; Stesichor. Fragm. xvii. Kleine; Pausan. ix. 2, 3; Eurip. Bacch. 337; Diodôr. iv. 81. The old logographer Akusilaus copied Stesichorus.

Upon this well-known story it is unnecessary to multiply references. I shall however briefly notice the remarks made upon it by Diodôrus and by Pausanias, as an illustration of the manner in which the literary Greeks of a later day dealt with their old national legends.

Both of them appear implicitly to believe the fact, that Aktæôn was devoured by his own dogs, but they differ materially in the explanation of it.

Diodôrus accepts and vindicates the miraculous interposition of the displeased goddess to punish Aktæôn, who, according to one story, had boasted of his superiority in the chase to Artemis,—according to another story, had presumed to solicit the goddess in marriage, emboldened by the great numbers of the feet of animals slain in the chase which he had hung up as offerings in her temple. “It is not improbable (observes Diodôrus) that the goddess was angry on both these accounts. For whether Aktæôn abused these hunting presents so far as to make them the means of gratifying his own desires towards one unapproachable in wedlock, or whether he presumed to call himself an abler hunter than her with whom the gods themselves will not compete in this department,—in either case the wrath of the goddess against him was just and legitimate (ὁμολογουμένην καὶ δικαίαν ὀργὴν ἔσχε πρὸς αὐτὸν ἡ θεός). With perfect propriety therefore (Καθόλου δὲ πιθανῶς) was he transformed into an animal such as those he had hunted, and torn to pieces by the very dogs who had killed them.” (Didot. iv. 80.)

Pausanias, a man of exemplary piety, and generally less inclined to scepticism than Diodôrus, thinks the occasion unsuitable for a miracle or special interference. Having alluded to the two causes assigned for the displeasure of Artemis (they are the two first-mentioned in my text, and distinct from the two noticed by Diodôrus), he proceeds to say, “But I believe that the dogs of Aktæôn went mad, without the interference of the goddess: in this state of madness they would have torn in pieces without distinction any one whom they met (Paus. ix. 2, 3. ἐγὼ δὲ ἄνευ θεοῦ πείθομαι νόσον λύσσαν ἐπιβαλεῖν τοῦ Ἀκταίωνος τοὺς κύνας).” He retains the truth of the final catastrophe, but rationalizes it, excluding the special intervention of Artemis.

[628] Apollod. iii. 5, 3-4; Theocrit. Idyll. xxvi. Eurip. Bacch. passim. Such is the tragical plot of this memorable drama. It is a striking proof of the deep-seated reverence of the people of Athens for the sanctity of the Bacchic ceremonies, that they could have borne the spectacle of Agavê on the stage with her dead son’s head, and the expressions of triumphant sympathy in her action on the part of the Chorus (1168), Μάκαιρ᾽ Ἀγαύη! This drama, written near the close of the life of Euripidês, and exhibited by his son after his death (Schol. Aristoph. Ran. 67,), contains passages strongly inculcating the necessity of implicit deference to ancestorial authority in matters of religion, and favorably contrasting the uninquiring faith of the vulgar with the dissenting and inquisitive tendencies of superior minds: see v. 196; compare vv. 389 and 422.—

Such reproofs “insanientis sapientiæ” certainly do not fall in with the plot of the drama itself, in which Pentheus appears as a Conservative, resisting the introduction of the new religious rites. Taken in conjunction with the emphatic and submissive piety which reigns through the drama, they countenance the supposition of Tyrwhitt, that Euripidês was anxious to repel the imputations, so often made against him, of commerce with the philosophers and participation in sundry heretical opinions.

Pacuvius in his Pentheus seems to have closely copied Euripidês; see Servius ad Virg. Æneid. iv. 469.

The old Thespis had composed a tragedy on the subject of Pentheus: Suidas, Θέσπις; also Æschylus; compare his Eumenidês, 25.

According to Apollodôrus (iii. 5, 5), Labdakus also perished in a similar way to Pentheus, and from the like impiety,—ἐκείνῳ φρονῶν παραπλήσια.

[629] Pausan. i. 38, 9.

[630] For the adventures of Antiopê and her sons, see Apollodôr. iii. 5; Pausan. ii. 6, 2; ix. 5, 2.

The narrative given respecting Epôpeus in the ancient Cyprian verses seems to have been very different from this, as far as we can judge from the brief notice in Proclus’s Argument,—ὡς Ἐπωπεὺς φθείρας τὴν Λυκούργου (Λύκου) γυναῖκα ἐξεπορθήθη: it approaches more nearly to the story given in the seventh fable of Hyginus, and followed by Propertius (iii. 15); the eighth fable of Hyginus contains the tale of Antiopê as given by Euripidês and Ennius. The story of Pausanias differs from both.

The Scholiast ad Apollôn. Rhod. i. 735. says that there were two persons named Antiopê; one, daughter of Asôpus, the other, daughter of Nykteus. Pausanias is content with supposing one only, really the daughter of Nykteus, but there was a φήμη that she was daughter of Asôpus (ii. 6, 2). Asius made Antiopê daughter of Asôpus, and mother (both by Zeus and by Epôpeus: such a junction of divine and human paternity is of common occurrence in the Greek legends) of Zêthus and Amphiôn (ap. Paus. 1. c).

The contradictory versions of the story are brought together, though not very perfectly, in Sterk’s Essay De Labdacidarum Historiâ, p. 38-43 (Leyden, 1829).

[631] This story about the lyre of Amphiôn is not noticed in Homer, but it was narrated in the ancient ἔπη ἐς Εὐρώπην which Pausanias had read: the wild beasts as well as the stones were obedient to his strains (Paus. ix. 5, 4). Pherekydês also recounted it (Pherekyd. Fragm. 102, Didot). The tablet of inscription (Ἀναγραφὴ) at Sikyôn recognized Amphiôn as the first composer of poetry and harp-music (Plutarch, de Musicâ, c. 3. p. 1132).

[632] The tale of the wife and son of Zêthus is as old as the Odyssey (xix. 525). Pausanias adds the statement that Zêthus died of grief (ix. 5, 5; Pherekydês, Fragm. 102, Did.). Pausanias, however, as well as Apollodôrus, tells us that Zêthus married Thêbê, from whom the name Thêbes was given to the city. To reconcile the conflicting pretensions of Zêthus and Amphiôn with those of Kadmus, as founders of Thêbes, Pausanias supposes that the latter was the original settler of the hill of the Kadmeia, while the two former extended the settlement to the lower city (ix. 5, 1-3).

[633] See Valckenaer. Diatribe in Eurip. Reliq. cap. 7, p. 58; Welcker, Griechisch. Tragöd. ii. p. 811. There is a striking resemblance between the Antiopê of Euripidês and the Tyrô of Sophoklês in many points.

Plato in his Gorgias has preserved a few fragments, and a tolerably clear general idea of the characters of Zêthus and Amphiôn (Gorg. 90-92); see also Horat. Epist. i. 18, 42.

Both Livius and Pacuvius had tragedies on the scheme of this of Euripidês, the former seemingly a translation.

[634] See the description of the locality in K. O. Müller (Orchomenos, c. i. p. 37).

The tombs of Laius and his attendant were still seen there in the days of Pausanias (x. 5, 2).

[635] Apollodôr. iii. 5, 8. An author named Lykus, in his work entitled Thêbaïca, ascribed this visitation to the anger of Dionysus (Schol. Hesiod, Theogon. 326). The Sphinx (or Phix, from the Bœôtian Mount Phikium) is as old as the Hesiodic Theogony,—Φῖκ᾽ ὀλόην τέκε, Καδμείοισιν ὄλεθρον (Theog. 326).

[636] Odyss. xi. 270. Odysseus, describing what he saw in the under-world, says,—

[637] Iliad, xxiii. 680, with the scholiast who cites Hesiod. Proclus, Argum. ad Cypria, ap. Düntzer, Fragm. Epic. Græc. p. 10. Νέστωρ δὲ ἐν παρεκβάσει διηγεῖται ... καὶ τὰ περὶ Οἰδίπουν, etc.

[638] Pausan. ix. 5, 5. Compare the narrative from Peisander in Schol. ad Eurip. Phœniss. 1773; where, however, the blindness of Œdipus seems to be unconsciously interpolated out of the tragedians. In the old narrative of the Cyclic Thêbaïs, Œdipus does not seem to be represented as blind (Leutsch, Thebaidis Cyclici Reliquiæ, Götting. 1830, p. 42).

Pherekydês (ap. Schol. Eurip. Phœniss. 52) tells us that Œdipus had three children by Jokasta, who were all killed by Erginus and the Minyæ (this must refer to incidents in the old poems which we cannot now recover); then the four celebrated children by Euryganeia; lastly, that he married a third wife, Astymedusa. Apollodôrus follows the narrative of the tragedians, but alludes to the different version about Euryganeia,—εἰσὶ δ᾽ οἵ φασιν, etc. (iii. 5, 8).

Hellanikus (ap. Schol. Eur. Phœniss. 59) mentioned the self-inflicted blindness of Œdipus; but it seems doubtful whether this circumstance was included in the narrative of Pherekydês.

[639] Pausan. ix. 9. 3. Ἐποιήθη δὲ ἐς τὸν πόλεμον τοῦτον καὶ ἔπη, Θηβαΐς· τὰ δὲ ἔπη ταῦτα Καλλῖνος, ἀφικόμενος αὐτῶν ἐς μνήμην, ἔφησεν Ὅμηρον τὸν ποιήσαντα εἶναι. Καλλίνῳ δὲ πολλοί τε καὶ ἄξιοι λόγου κατὰ ταῦτα ἔγνωσαν· ἐγὼ δὲ τὴν ποίησιν ταύτην μετά γε Ἰλιάδα καὶ τὰ ἔπη τὰ ἐς Ὀδυσσέα ἐπαινῶ μάλιστα. The name in the text of Pausanias stands Καλαῖνος, an unknown person: most of the critics recognize the propriety of substituting Καλλῖνος, and Leutsch and Welcker have given very sufficient reasons for doing so.

The Ἀμφιάρεω ἐξελασία ἐς Θέβας, alluded to in the pseudo-Herodotean life of Homer, seems to be the description of a special passage in this Thêbaïs.