Section 19 of The Great Events, Volume 1. This is a LibriVox recording. All LibriVox recordings are in the public domain. For more information or to volunteer, please visit LibriVox.org. The Great Events by Famous Historians, Volume 1, edited by Charles F. Horn, Rossiter Johnson, and John Roode. The Foundation of Buddhism, B.C. 623. Thomas William Reese-Davids. When the Blessed One died, there arose at the moment of his passing out of existence, a mighty earthquake, terrible and awe-inspiring, and the thunders of heaven burst forth. When the Blessed One died, Brahma Sahampati at the moment of his passing away from existence uttered this stanza. They all, all beings that have life, shall lay aside their complex form, that aggregation of mental and material qualities that gives them, or in heaven or on earth, their fleeting individuality. In as the teacher being such a one, unequaled among all the men that are, successor of the prophets of old time, mighty by wisdom and in insight clear, hath died. When the Blessed One died, Saka, the King of the Gods, at the moment of his passing away from existence uttered this stanza. They are transient all, each being's parts and powers, growth is their nature and decay. They are produced, they are dissolved again, and then is best when they have sunk to rest. When the Blessed One died, the venerable Anuruda at the moment of his passing away from existence uttered these stanzas. When he who from all craving want was free, who to Nirvana's tranquil state had reached, when the great sage finished his span of life, no gasping struggle vexed that steadfast heart, all resolute and with unshaken mind. He calmly triumphed, or the pain of death, as a bright flame dies away, so was his last deliverance from the bonds of life. When the Blessed One died, the venerable Ananda at the moment of his passing away from existence uttered this stanza. Then was their terror, then stood the hair on end, when he endowed with every grace the Supreme Buddha died. When the Blessed One died, of those of the brethren who were not free from the passions, some stretched out their arms and wept, and some fell headlong to the ground, rolling to and fro in anguish at the thought. Too soon has the Blessed One died, too soon has the happy one passed away from existence, too soon has the light gone out in the world. But those of the brethren who were free from the passions, the arahats bore their grief collected and composed at the thought. Impermanent are all component things. How is it possible that they should not be dissolved? Then the venerable Anuruda exhorted the brethren and said, Enough, my brethren, weep not, neither lament. Has not the Blessed One formerly declared this to us, that it is in the very nature of all things near and dear unto us, that we must divide ourselves from them, leave them, sever ourselves from them? How then, brethren, can this be possible, that whereas anything whatever born, brought into being and organized, contains within itself the inherent necessity of dissolution? How then can this be possible, that such a being should not be dissolved? No such condition can exist. Even the spirits, brethren, will reproach us. But of what kind of spirits is the Lord the venerable Anuruda thinking? There are spirits, brother Ananda, in the sky, but of worldly mind, who dishevel their hair and weep and stretch forth their arms and weep, fall prostrate on the ground and roll to and fro in anguish at the thought. Too soon has the Blessed One died, too soon has the happy one passed away, too soon has the light gone out in the world. There are spirits, too, Ananda, on the earth and of worldly mind, who tear their hair and weep and stretch forth their arms and weep, fall prostrate on the ground and roll to and fro in anguish at the thought. Too soon has the Blessed One died, too soon has the happy one passed away, too soon has the light gone out in the world. But the spirits who are free from passion hear it, calm and self-possessed, mindful of the saying which begins, impermanent indeed are all component things. How then is it possible that such a being should not be dissolved? Now the venerable Anuruddha and the venerable Ananda spend the rest of that night in religious discourse. Then the venerable Anuruddha said to the venerable Ananda, Go now, brother Ananda, into Kusinara and inform the malas of Kusinara, saying, The Blessed One, O Vasetas, is dead. Do then whatever Seameth to you fit. Even so, Lord, said the venerable Ananda in ascent to the venerable Anuruddha, and having robed himself early in the morning he took his bowl and went into Kusinara with one of the brethren as an attendant. Now at that time the malas of Kusinara were assembled in the council hall concerning that very matter. And the venerable Ananda went to the council hall of the malas of Kusinara, and when he had arrived there he informed them saying, The Blessed One, O Vasetas, is dead. Do then whatever Seameth to you fit. And when they had heard this saying of the venerable Ananda, the malas with their young men and their maidens and their wives were grieved and sad and afflicted at heart, and some of them wept, disheveling their hair, and some stretched forth their arms and wept, and some fell prostrate on the ground, and some reeled to and fro in anguish at the thought, too soon has the Blessed One died, too soon has the happy one passed away, too soon has the light gone out in the world. Then the malas of Kusinara gave orders to their attendants saying, Gather together perfumes and garlands and all the music in Kusinara. And the malas of Kusinara took the perfumes and garlands and all the musical instruments and five hundred suits of apparel, and went to the upavatana, to the salagrove of the malas, where the body of the Blessed One lay. There they passed the day in paying honor, reverence, respect, and homage to the remains of the Blessed One with dancing and hymns and music, and with garlands and perfumes, and in making canopies of their garments and preparing decoration wreaths to hang thereon. Then the malas of Kusinara thought, it is much too late to burn the body of the Blessed One today, let us now perform the cremation tomorrow. And in paying honor, reverence, respect, and homage to the remains of the Blessed One with dancing and hymns and music, and with garlands and perfumes, and in making canopies of their garments and preparing decoration wreaths to hang thereon. They passed the second day too, and then the third day, and the fourth, and the fifth, and the sixth day also. Then, on the seventh day, the malas of Kusinara thought, let us carry the body of the Blessed One by the south and outside to a spot on the south and outside of the city, paying it honor and reverence and respect and homage with dance and song and music with garlands and perfumes, and there to the south of the city let us perform the cremation ceremony. And thereupon eight chieftains among the malas bathed their heads and clad themselves in new garments with the intention of bearing the body of the Blessed One. But behold, they could not lift it up. Then the malas of Kusinara said to the venerable Anurudha, What, Lord, can be the reason? What can be the cause that eight chieftains of the malas who have bathed their heads and clad themselves in new garments with the intention of bearing the body of the Blessed One are unable to lift it up? It is because you, O Vasetha's, have one purpose and the spirits have another purpose. But what, Lord, is the purpose of the spirit? Your purpose, O Vasetha's, is this. Let us carry the body of the Blessed One by the south and outside to a spot on the south and outside of the city, paying it honor and reverence and respect and homage with dance and song and music with garlands and perfumes. And there, to the south of the city, let us perform the cremation ceremony. But the purpose of the spirits, Vasetha's, is this. Let us carry the body of the Blessed One by the north to the north of the city and entering the city by the north gate let us bring it through the midst of the city into the midst thereof and going out again by the eastern gate, paying honor and reverence and respect and homage to the body of the Blessed One with heavenly dance and song and music and garlands and perfumes. Let us carry it to the shrine of the Malas called Makuta Bantana to the east of the city and there let us perform the cremation ceremony. Even according to the purpose of the spirits, so, Lord, let it be. Then immediately all Kusunara, down even to the dustbins and rubbish heaps, became strewn knee-deep with Mandarava flowers from heaven and while both the spirits from the skies and the Malas of Kusunara upon earth paid honor and reverence and respect and homage to the body of the Blessed One with dance and song and music with garlands and with perfumes. They carried the body by the north to the north of the city and entering the city by the north gate they carried it through the midst of the city into the midst thereof and going out again by the eastern gate they carried it to the shrine of the Malas called Makuta Bantana and there to the east of the city they laid down the body of the Blessed One. Then the Malas of Kusunara said to the venerable Ananda what should be done, Lord, with the remains of the Tathagata? As men treat the remains of a king of kings so, Vasethas, should they treat the remains of a Tathagata? And how, Lord, do they treat the remains of a king of kings? They wrapped the body of a king of kings, Vasethas, in a new cloth. When that is done they wrap it in cotton wool. When that is done they wrap it in a new cloth and so on till they have wrapped the body in 500 successive layers of both kinds. Then they place the body in an oil vessel of iron and cover that close up with another oil vessel of iron. They then build a funeral pile of all kinds of perfumes and burn the body of the king of kings. And then at the four crossroads they erect a Dagabah to the king of kings. This, Vasethas, is the way in which they treat the remains of a king of kings and as they treat the remains of a king of kings so, Vasethas, should they treat the remains of the Tathagata? At the four crossroads a Dagabah should be erected to the Tathagata and whosoever shall there place garlands or perfumes or paint or make salutation there or become in its presence calm in heart that shall long be to them for a profit and a joy. Therefore the Malas gave orders to their attendants saying gather together all the carted cotton wool of the Malas. Then the Malas of Kusunara wrapped the body of the Blessed One in a new cloth and when that was done they wrapped it in cotton wool and when that was done they wrapped it in a new cloth and so on till they had wrapped the body of the Blessed One in five hundred layers of both kinds and then they placed the body in an oil vessel of iron and covered that close up with another vessel of iron and then they built a funeral pile of all kinds of perfumes and upon it they placed the body of the Blessed One. Now at that time the Venerable Maha Kasapa was journeying along the high road from Pava to Kusunara with a great company of the Brethren with about five hundred of the Brethren and the Venerable Maha Kasapa left the high road and sat himself down at the foot of a certain tree. Just at that time a certain naked ascetic who had picked up a Mandarava flower in Kusunara was coming along the high road to Pava and the Venerable Maha Kasapa saw the naked ascetic coming in the distance and when he had seen him he said to the naked ascetic Oh friend! Surely you knowest our master Yay friend! I know him! This day the Samana Gotama has been dead a week that is how I obtained this Mandarava flower and immediately of those of the Brethren who were not yet free from the passions some stretched out their arms and wept and some fell headlong on the ground and some reeled to and fro in anguish at the thought too soon has the blessed one died too soon has the happy one passed away from existence too soon has the light gone out in the world but those of the Brethren who were free from the passions the Arahats bore their grief collected and composed at the thought impermanent are all component things how is it possible that they should not be dissolved now at that time a brother named Subhada who had been received into the order in his old age was seated there in their company and Subhada the old addressed the Brethren and said enough Brethren weep not, neither lament we are well rid of the great Samana we used to be annoyed being told this be seems you this be seems you not but now we shall be able to do whatever we like and what we do not like that we shall not have to do but the venerable Mahakasapa addressed the Brethren and said enough my Brethren weep not, neither lament has not the blessed one formerly declared this to us is in the very nature of all things near and dear unto us that we must divide ourselves from them leave them sever ourselves from them how then Brethren can this be possible that whereas anything whatever born brought into being and organized contains within itself the inherent necessity of dissolution how then can this be possible that such a being should not be dissolved no such condition can exist now just at that time four chieftains of the Malas had bathed their heads and clad themselves in new garments with the intention of setting on fire the funeral pile of the blessed one but behold they were unable to set it alight then the Malas of Kusunara said to the venerable Anuruda what Lord can be the reason and what the cause that four chieftains of the Malas who have bathed their heads and clad themselves in new garments with the intention of setting on fire the funeral pile of the blessed one are unable to set it on fire it is because you Ovasitas have one purpose and the spirits have another purpose but what Lord is the purpose of the spirits the purpose of the spirits Ovasitas is this that venerable brother Mahakasapa is now journeying along the high road from Pava to Kusunara with a great company of the brethren with five hundred of the brethren the funeral pile of the blessed one shall not catch fire until the venerable Mahakasapa shall have been able reverently to salute the sacred feet of the blessed one even according to the purpose of the spirits so Lord let it be then the venerable Mahakasapa went on to Makuta Bandana of Kusunara to the shrine of the Malas to the place where the funeral pile of the blessed one was and when he had come up to it he arranged his robe on one shoulder and bowing down with clasp hands he thrice walked reverently round the pile and then uncovering the feet he bowed down in reverence at the feet of the blessed one and those five hundred brethren arranged their robes on one shoulder and bowing down with clasp hands they thrice walked reverently round the pile and bowed down in reverence at the feet of the blessed one and when the homage of the venerable Mahakasapa and of those five hundred brethren was ended the funeral pile of the blessed one caught fire of itself now as the body of the blessed one burned itself away from the skin and the integument and the flesh and the nerves and the fluid of the joints neither soot nor ash was seen and only the bones remained behind just as one sees no soot nor ash when glue or oil is burned so as the body of the blessed one burned itself away from the skin and the integument and the flesh and the nerves and the fluid of the joints neither soot nor ash was seen and only the bones remained behind and of those five hundred pieces of raiment the very innermost and outermost were both consumed and when the body of the blessed one had been burned up there came down streams of water from the sky and extinguished the funeral pile of the blessed one and there burst forth streams of water from the storehouse of the waters beneath the earth and extinguished the funeral pile of the blessed one the malas of Cucinara also brought water scented with all kinds of perfumes and extinguished the funeral pile of the blessed one then the malas of Cucinara surrounded the bones of the blessed one in their council hall with a latticework of spears and with a rampart of bows and there seven days they paid honor and reverence and respect and homage to them with dance and song and music and with garlands and perfumes now the king of Magada Agata Satu the son of the queen of the Videa clan heard the news that the blessed one had died at Cucinara then the king of Magada Agata Satu the son of the queen of the Videa clan sent a messenger to the malas saying the blessed one belonged to the soldier cast and I too am of the soldier cast I am worthy to receive a portion of the relics of the blessed one over the remains of the blessed one will I put up a sacred cairn and in honor thereof will I celebrate a feast and the likavis of Vesali heard the news that the blessed one had died at Cucinara and the likavis of Vesali sent a messenger to the malas saying the blessed one belonged to the soldier cast and we too are of the soldier cast we are worthy to receive a portion of the relics of the blessed one over the remains of the blessed one will we put up a sacred cairn and in honor thereof will I celebrate a feast and the Sakias of Kapila Vatu heard the news that the blessed one had died at Cucinara and the Sakias of Kapila Vatu sent a messenger to the malas saying the blessed one was the pride of our race we are worthy to receive a portion of the relics of the blessed one over the remains of the blessed one will we put up a sacred cairn and in honor thereof will we celebrate a feast and the bullies of Alacapa heard the news that the blessed one had died at Cucinara and the bullies of Alacapa sent a messenger to the malas saying the blessed one belonged to the soldier cast and we too are of the soldier cast we are worthy to receive a portion of the relics of the blessed one over the remains of the blessed one will we put up a sacred cairn and in honor thereof will we celebrate a feast and the Brahmin of Vethadipa heard the news that the blessed one had died at Cucinara and the Brahmin of Vethadipa sent a messenger to the malas saying the blessed one belonged to the soldier cast and I am a Brahmin I am worthy to receive a portion of the relics of the blessed one over the remains of the blessed one will I put up a sacred cairn and in honor thereof will I celebrate a feast and the malas of Paava heard the news that the blessed one had died at Cucinara then the malas of Paava sent a messenger to the malas saying the blessed one belonged to the soldier cast and we too are of the soldier cast we are worthy to receive a portion of the relics of the blessed one over the remains of the blessed one will we put up a sacred cairn and in honor thereof will we celebrate a feast when they heard these things the malas of Cucinara spoke to the assembled brethren saying the blessed one died in our village domain we will not give away any part of the remains of the blessed one when they had thus spoken Dona the Brahmin addressed the assembled brethren and said here reverend sir one single word from me for barrence was our Buddha want to teach unseemly is it that over the division of the remains of him who was the best of beings life should rise and wounds and war let us all sirs with one accord unite in friendly harmony to make eight portions widespread let thupas rise in every land that in the enlightened one mankind may trust do thou then O Brahmin, thyself divide the remains of the blessed one equally into eight parts be it so sir said Dona in ascent to the assembled brethren and he divided the remains of the blessed one equally into eight parts with their division and he said to them give me sirs this vessel and I will set up over it a sacred cairn and in its honor will I establish a feast and they gave the vessel to Dona the Brahmin and the Moriaz of Pifalevana heard the news that the blessed one had died at Cusinara then the Moriaz of Pifalevana sent a messenger to the Malas saying the blessed one belonged to the soldier cast and we too are of the soldier cast we are worthy to receive a portion of the relics of the blessed one over the remains of the blessed one will we put up a sacred cairn and in honor thereof will we celebrate a feast and when they heard the answer saying there is no portion of the remains of the blessed one left over the remains of the blessed one are all distributed then they took away the embers then the king of Magadha Agatasatu the son of the queen of the Videa clan and omega Agah and the leap of Vesaly made a mound in Vesaly over the remains of the blessed one and held the feast and the bullies of ala kapa made a mound in ala kapa over the remains of the blessed one and held a feast and the Kolias of Ramaghama made a mound in Ramaghama over the remains of the blessed one And Vethadipaka, the Brahmin, made a mound in Vethadipa over the remains of the Blessed One and held a feast. And the Mallas of Pava made a mound in Pava over the remains of the Blessed One and held a feast. And the Mallas of Kusinara made a mound in Kusinara over the remains of the Blessed One and held a feast. And Dona, the Brahmin, made a mound over the vessel in which the body had been burned and held a feast. And the Morias of Pifalevana made a mound over the embers and held a feast. Thus were there eight mounds, tupas for the remains, and one for the vessel, and one for the embers. This was how it used to be. Eight measures of relics there were of him, of the far-seeing eye, of the best of the best of men. In India, seven are worshipped, and one measure in Ramagama by the kings of the serpent race. One tooth, two, is honoured in heaven, and one in Gandhara's city, one in the Kalinga realm, and one more by the Naga race. Through their glory the bountiful earth is made bright with offerings painless. For with such are the great teachers' relics best honoured by those who are honoured, by gods and by Nagas and kings, yea, thus by the noblest of monarchs, bowed down with clasped hands. Hard. Hard is a Buddha to meet with through hundreds of ages. End of Section 19, Recording by Linda Johnson. Among the leading features of Greek life, especially those belonging to its religious customs and observances, none are more characteristic and none possess a more attractive interest for the modern reader and student than the peculiar festivals which it was their practice to hold. The four great national festivals or games were the Olympic, held every four years in honour of Zeus, on the banks of the Alpheus and Elis, the Pythian, celebrated once in four years in honour of Apollo at Delphi, the Isthmian, held every two years at the Isthmian Sanctuary in the Isthmus of Corinth, in honour of Poseidon, Neptune, and the Nemean, celebrated at Nemea in the second and fourth year of each Olympiad in honour of the Nemean Juno. With regard to the influence of these games or festivals upon the political and social life of Greece, much has been written by historians and special students of the Grecian States. While the celebrations do not appear to have accomplished much for the political union of Greece, they are to be credited with marked beneficial effects in the promotion of a Pan-Hellenic spirit which, if it failed to produce such a union of the Greek race, nevertheless quickened and strengthened the common feeling of family relationship. Thus a sense of their identical origin and racial traits was kept alive and the tendencies of Greek development and culture preserved their essential character and distinction. By means of these periodical gatherings, representing all parts of the Greek world, not only was friendly competition in every field of talent and performance secured, but even trade and commerce found through them new channels of activity. So in various ways, the national games proved a source of fresh energy and broader enterprise among the various branches of the Grecian people. The particular character and significance of the Pythian games at Delphi and their relation to the other national festivals form an interesting subject for study and connection with the general history of Greece. What are called the Olympic, Pythian, Nemean and Isthmian games, the four most conspicuous amid many others analogous, were in reality great religious festivals. For the gods then gave their special sanction, name and presence to recreative meetings. The closest association then prevailed between the feelings of common worship and the sympathy and common amusement. Though this association is now no longer recognized, it is nevertheless essential that we should keep it fully before us if we desire to understand the life and proceedings of the Greek. To Herodotus and his contemporaries, these great festivals, then frequented by crowds from every part of Greece, were of overwhelming importance and interest, yet they had once been purely local, attracting no visitors except from a very narrow neighborhood. In the Homeric poems much is said about the common gods, and about special places consecrated to and occupied by several of them. The chiefs celebrate funeral games in honor of a deceased father, which are visited by competitors from different parts of Greece, but nothing appears to manifest public or town festivals open to grecian visitors generally. And though the rocky pytho with its temple stands out in the Iliad as a place both venerated and rich, the Pythian games under the superintendents of the Amphicteans, with continuous enrollment of victors and a panhellenic reputation, do not begin until after the sacred war in the 48th Olympiad, or BC 586. The Olympic games, more conspicuous than the Pythian as well as considerably older, are also remarkable on another ground, in as much as they supplied historical computers with the oldest backward record of continuous time. It was in the year BC 776 that the Ilians inscribed the name of their countrymen Corobus as victor in the competition of runners, and that they began the practice of inscribing in like manner in each Olympic or fifth recurring year, the name of the runner who won the prize. Even for a long time after this, however, the Olympic games seemed to have remained a local festival, the prize being uniformly carried off at the first 12 Olympiads by some competitor either of Ilis or its immediate neighborhood. The Nemean and Isthmian games did not become notorious or frequented until later even than the Pythian. Solon and his legislation proclaimed the large reward of 500 drams for every Athenian who gained an Olympic prize, and the lower sum of 100 drams for an Isthmian prize. He counts the former as Panhellenic rank and renown, an ornament even to the city of which the victor was a member, the latter as partial and confined to the neighborhood. Of the beginnings of these great solemnities we cannot presume to speak except in mythical language. We know them only in their comparative maturity, but the habit of common sacrifice on a small scale and between near neighbors is a part of the earliest habits of Greece. The sentiment of fraternity between two tribes or villages first manifested itself by sending a sacred legation or theoria to offer sacrifices to each other's festivals, and to partake in the recreations which followed, thus establishing a truce with solemn guarantee and bringing themselves into direct connection each with the god of the other under his appropriate local surname. The Pacific Communion so fostered, and the increased assurance of intercourse as Greece gradually emerged from the turbulence and pugnacity of the heroic age, operated especially in extending the range of this ancient habit. The village festivals became town festivals, largely frequented by the citizens of other towns and sometimes with special invitations sent round to attract theors from every Hellenic community, and thus these once humble assemblages gradually swelled into the pomp and immense confluence of the Olympic and Pythian games. The city administering such holy ceremonies enjoyed inviolability of territory during the month of their occurrence, being itself under obligation at that time to refrain from all aggression, as well as to notify by heralds the commencement of the truce to all other cities not in avowed hostility with it. This imposed heavy fines upon other towns, even on the powerful Lacka demon, for violation of the Olympic truce on pain of exclusion from the festival in case of non-payment. Sometimes this tendency to religious fraternity took a form called an amphiktioni, different from the common festival. A certain number of towns entered into an exclusive religious partnership for the celebration of sacrifices periodically to the god of a particular temple, which was supposed to be the common property and under the common protection of all, though one of the number was often named as permanent administrator, while all other Greeks were excluded. That there were many religious partnerships of this sort, which have never acquired a place in history among the early Grecian villages, we may perhaps gather from the etymology of the word amphiktions, designating residents around or neighbors considered in the point of view of fellow religionists, as well as from the indications preserved to us in reference to various parts of the country. Thus there was an amphiktioni of seven cities at the holy island of Caloria, close to the harbor of Trozen, Hermione, Epidaurus, Aegina, Athens, Prasie, Nauklia, and Orcomenus, jointly maintained the temple and sanctuary of Poseidon in that island, with which it would seem that the city of Trozen, though close at hand, had no connection, meeting there at stated periods to offer formal sacrifices. These seven cities, indeed, were not immediate neighbors, but the specialty and exclusiveness of their interest in the temple is seen from the fact that when the Argeans took Nauklia, they adopted and fulfilled these religious obligations on behalf of the prior inhabitants. So also did the Lacedaemonians, when they had captured Prasie. Again in trifilia, situated between the Pisces and Messenia in the western part of Peloponnesus, there was a similar religious meeting and partnership of the Trophylians on Cape Samakan at the temple of the Simeon Poseidon. Here the inhabitants of McKiston were entrusted with the details of superintendents, as well as with a duty of notifying beforehand the exact time of meeting, a precaution essential amidst the diversities and irregularities of the Greek calendar, and also of proclaiming what was called the Simeon truce, a temporary abstinence from hostilities which bound all Trophylians during the Holy Period. This latter custom discloses the salutary influence of such institutions in presenting to men's minds a common object of reverence, common duties and common enjoyments, thus generating sympathies and feelings of mutual obligation amid petty communities not less fierce and suspicious. So, too, the 12 chief Ionic cities in and near Asia Minor had their Pan-Ionic Amphictyoni peculiar to themselves. The six Doric cities in and near the southern corner of that peninsula combined for the like purpose at the temple of the Triopian Apollo, and the feeling of special partnership is here particularly illustrated by the fact that Helacarnassus, one of the six, was formally extruded by the remaining five in consequence of a violation of the rules. There was also an Amphictyonic union at Ancestus in Boetia in the venerated grove and temple at Poseidon, of whom it consisted we are not informed. There are some specimens of the sort of special religious conventions and assemblies which seem to have been frequent throughout Greece. Nor ought we omit those religious meetings and sacrifices which were common to all members of one Hellenic subdivision, such as the Pan-Boetia to all Boetians, celebrated at the temple of the Ionian Athena near Carnea. The common observances rendered to the temple of Apollo Pythias at Argos by all those neighboring towns which had once been attached by this religious thread to the Argean. The similar periodical ceremonies frequented by all who bore the Achaean or Aetolian name, and the splendid and exhilarating festivals so favorable to the diffusion of the early Grecian poetry which brought all Ionians at stated intervals to the sacred island of Delos. This latter class of festivals agreed with the Amphictyoni in being of a special and exclusive character not open to all Greeks. But there was one among these many Amphictyonis, which, though starting from the smallest beginnings, gradually expanded into so comprehensive a character, had acquired so market of predominance over the rest, as to be called the Amphictyonic assembly, and even to have been mistaken by some authors for a sort of federal Hellenic diet. 12 subraces out of the number which made up entire Hellas, belonged to this ancient Amphictyoni, the meetings of which were held twice and every year, in spring at the temple of Apollo at Delphi, in autumn at Thermopylae, in the sacred precinct of Demeter Amphictyonis. Sacred deputies, including a chief called the Hiram-Naman, and subordinates called the Pelagoro, attended these meetings from each of the twelve races. A crowd of volunteers seemed to have accompanied them for purposes of sacrifice, trade, or enjoyment. Their special and most important function consisted in watching over the Delphian temple, in which all the twelve subraces had a joint interest, and it was the immense wealth and national ascendancy of this temple which enhanced to so great a pitch the dignity of its acknowledged administrators. The twelve constituent members were as follows, the Thessalians, Boetians, Dorians, Ionians, Perhabians, Magnedes, Locrians, Oteans, Achaeans, Vossians, Dallippes, and Malleans. All are counted as races. If we treat the Hellenes as a race, we must call them subraces. No mention being made of cities. All count equally in respect to voting. Two votes being given by the deputies from each of the twelve. Moreover, we are told that in determining the deputies to be sent, or the manner in which the votes of each race should be given, the powerful Athens, Sparta, and Thebes had no more influence than the humblest Ionian, Dorian, or Boetian city. This latter fact is distinctly stated by Asciniis, himself a Pylegor sent to Delphi by Athens. And so, doubtless, the theory of the case stood. The votes of the Ionic races counted for neither more nor less than two. Whether given by deputies from Athens, or from the small towns of Erythrae and Prien. And in like manner, the Dorian votes were as good in the division when given by deputies from Boeon and Centineon in the little territory of Doris, as if the men delivering them had been Spartans. But there can be as little question that in practice, the little Ionic cities and the little Doric cities pretended to no share in the Amphitheonic deliberations. As the Ionic vote came to be substantially the vote of Athens. So, if Sparta was ever obstructed in the management of the Doric vote, it must have been by powerful Doric cities like Argos or Corinth, not by the insignificant towns of Doris. But the theory of Amphitheonic suffrage, as laid down by Asciniis, however little realized in practice during his day, is important in as much as it shows in full evidence the primitive and original constitution. The first establishment of the Amphitheonic convocation dates from a time when all the twelve members were on a footing of equal independence, and when there were no overwhelming cities such as Sparta and Athens decast in the shade the humbler members. When Sparta was only one Doric city and Athens only one Ionic city among various others of consideration, not much inferior. There are also other proofs which show the high antiquity of this Amphitheonic convocation. Asciniis gives us an extract from the oath which had been taken by the sacred deputies who attended on behalf of their respective races ever since its first establishment, and which still apparently continued to be taken in his day. The antique simplicity of this oath and of the conditions to which the members bind themselves betrays the early age in which it originated, as well as the humble resources of those towns to which it was applied. We will not destroy any Amphitheonic town, we will not cut off any Amphitheonic town from running water. Such are the two prominent obligations which Asciniis specifies out of the old oath. The second of the two carries us back to the simplest state of society, and to towns of the smallest size when the maidens went out with their basins to fetch water from the spring, like the daughters of Cilios et Eleusis, or those of Athens from the Fountain Calero. We may even conceive that the special mention of this detail in the covenant between the twelve races is borrowed literally from agreements still earlier among the villages or little towns in which the members of each race were distributed. At any rate, it proves satisfactorily the very ancient date to which the commencement of the Amphitheonic convocations must be referred. The belief of Asciniis, perhaps also the belief general in this time, was that it commenced simultaneously with the first foundation of the Delphian Temple, an event of which we have no historical knowledge, but there seems reason to suppose that its original establishment is connected with Thermopylae and Demeter Amphithionia rather than with Delphi and Apollo. The special surname by which Demeter and her temple at Thermopylae was known, the temple of the hero Amphithion, which stood at its side, the word Piloa, which obtained footing in the language to designate the half-yearly meeting of the deputies both at Thermopylae and at Delphi, these indications point to Thermopylae, the real central point for all the twelve, as the primary place of meeting, and to the Delphian half-year as something secondary and super-added. On such a matter, however, we cannot go beyond a conjecture. The hero Amphithion, whose temple stood at Thermopylae, passed in mythical genealogy for the brother of Helen, and it may be affirmed with truth that the habit of forming Amphithionic unions and of frequenting each other's religious festivals was the great means of creating and fostering the primitive feeling of brotherhood among the children of Helen in those early times when rudeness, insecurity, and pugnacity did so much to isolate them. A certain number of salutary habits and sentiments, such as that which the Amphithionic oath embodies in regard to abstinence from injury as well as to mutual protection, gradually found their way into men's minds. The obligations thus brought into play acquired a substantive efficacy of their own, and the religious feeling which always remained connected with them, came afterward to be only one out of many complex agencies by which the later historical Greek was moved. Athens and Sparta in the days of their might, and the inferior cities in relation to them, played each their own political game in which religious considerations will be found to bear only a subordinate part. The special function of the Amphithionic council, so far as we know it, consisted in watching over the safety, the interests, and the treasures of the Delphian temple. If anyone shall plunder the property of the god, or shall be cognizant thereof, or shall take treacherous counsel against the things in the temple, we will punish him with foot and hand and voice, and by every means in our power. So ran the old Amphithionic oath with an energetic implication attached to it. And there are some examples in which the council constitutes its functions, so largely as to receive and adjudicate upon complaints against entire cities, for offenses against the religious and patriotic sentiment of the Greeks generally, but for the most part its interference relates directly to the Delphian temple. The earliest case in which it is brought to our view is the sacred war against Sira in the 46th Olympiad or BC 595, conducted by Eurylaikus the Thessalion and Chlisthenes of Sychion, and proposed by Solene of Athens. We find the Amphithions also about half a century afterward undertaking the duty of collecting subscriptions throughout the Hellenic world and making the contract with the Akmeanids for rebuilding the temple after a conflagration. But the influence of this council is essentially of a fluctuating and intermittent character. Sometimes it appears forward to decide and its decisions command respect, but such occasions are rare, taking the general course of known Greek in history. While there are other occasions, and those too especially affecting the Delphian temple, on which we are surprised to find nothing said about it. In the long and perturbed period which Thucydides describes, he never once mentions the Amphithions, though the temple and the safety of its treasures form the repeated subject as well of dispute as of expressed stipulation between Athens and Sparta. Moreover, among the twelve constituent members of the council we find three, the Perhabians, the Magneses, and the Achaeans of Thea, who were not even independent, but subject to the Thessalians, so that its meetings, when they were not matters of mere form, probably expressed only the feelings of the three or four leading members. When one or more of these great powers had a party purpose to accomplish against others, when Philip of Macedon wished to extrude one of the members in order to procure admission for himself, it became convenient to turn this ancient form into a serious reality, and we shall see the Athenian Eskinis providing a pretext for Philip to meddle in favor of the minor Boetian cities against Thebes, by alleging that these cities were under the protection of the old Amphithionic oath. It is thus that we have to consider the council as an element in Grecian affairs, an ancient institution, one among many instances of the primitive habit of religious fraternization, but wider and more comprehensive than the rest, at first purely religious, then religious and political at once, lastly more the latter than the former, highly valuable in the infancy, but unsuited to the maturity of Greece, and called into real working only on rare occasions, when its efficiency happened to fall in with the views of Athens, Thebes, or the King of Macedon. In such special moments it shines with a transient light, which affords a partial pretense for the imposing title bestowed on it by Cicero, Commune, Greciae, Consilium, but we should completely misinterpret Grecian history if we regarded it as a federal council habitually directed or habitually obeyed. Had there existed any such Commune Consilium of tolerable wisdom and patriotism, and had the tendencies of the Hellenic mind being capable of adapting themselves to it, the whole course of later Grecian history would probably have been altered. The Macedonian kings would have remained only as respectable neighbors, borrowing civilization from Greece and expending their military energies upon Thracians and Illyrians, while United Hellas might even have maintained her own territory against the conquering legions of Rome. The twelve constituent and fictionic races remained unchanged until the sacred war against the Phocians, BC 355, after which, though the number twelve was continued, the Phocians were disfranchised and their votes transferred to Philip of Macedon. It has been already mentioned that these twelve did not exhaust the whole of Hellas. Arcadians, Illyrians, Piscins, Minier, Dryopes, Aetolians, all genuine Hellenes are not comprehended in it, but all of them had a right to make use of the Temple of Delphi and to contend in the Pythian and Olympic games. The Pythian games, celebrated near Delphi, were under the superintendents of the Amphic deans or of some acting magistrate chosen by and presumed to represent them. Like the Olympic games, they came around every four years, the interval between one celebration and another being four complete years, which the Greeks called a pentoteris. The Isthmian and the Mian games recurred every two years. In its first humble form, a competition among bards to sing a hymn in praise of Apollo. This festival was doubtless of immemorial antiquity, but the first extension of it into pan-Hellenic notoriety, as I've already remarked, the first multiplication of the subjects of competition, and the first introduction of a continuous record of the conquerors, date only from the time when it came under the presidency of the Amphic deans at the close of the sacred war against Sira. What is called the first Pythian contest coincides with the third year of the 48th Olympiad or B.C. 585. From that period forward, the games become crowded and celebrated, but the date just named, nearly two centuries after the first Olympiad, is a proof that the habit of periodical frequentation of festivals by numbers and from distant parts grew up but slowly in the Grecian world. The foundation of the Temple of Delphi itself reaches far beyond all historical knowledge, forming one of the Aboriginal institutions of Hellas. It is a sanctified and wealthy place even in the Iliad. The legislation of Lycurgus at Sparta is introduced under its auspices, and the earliest Grecian colonies, those of Sicily and Italy in the 8th century B.C., are established in consonants with its mandate. Delphi and Dodona appear in the most ancient circumstances of Greece as universally venerated oracles and sanctuaries, and Delphi not only receives honors and donations but also answers questions from Lydians, Phrygians, Etruscans, Romans, etc. It is not exclusively Hellenic. One of the valuable services which a Greek looked for from this and other great religious establishments was that it should resolve his doubts in cases of perplexity, that it should advise him whether to begin a new or to persist in an old project, that it should foretell what would be his fate under given circumstances, and inform him, if suffering under distress, on what conditions the gods will grant him relief. The three priestesses of Dodona with their venerable oak and the priestess of Delphi sitting on her tripod under the influence of a certain gas or vapor exhaling from the rock were alike competent to determine these difficult points, and we shall have consternation to notice in this history with what complete faith both the question was put and the answer treasured up, what serious influence it often exercised upon both public and private proceeding. The hexameter verses in which the Pythian priestess delivered herself were indeed often so equivocal or unintelligible that the most serious believer with all anxiety to interpret and obey them often found himself ruined by the result. Yet the general faith in the oracle was in no way shaken by such painful experience. For as the unfortunate issue always admitted of being explained by two hypotheses, either that the god had spoken falsely or that his meaning had not been correctly understood, no man of genuine piety ever hesitated to adopt the letter. There were many other oracles throughout Greece besides Delphi and Dodona. Apollo was open to the inquiries of the faithful at Toan in Boetia, at a bay in Focus, at Brankide near Miletus, at Petara in Lesia, and other places. In like manner Zeus gave answers at Olympia, Poseidon at Tenerus, Amphiarus at Thebes, Amphilochus at Malus, etc. And this habit of consulting the oracle formed part of the still more general tendency of the Greek mind to undertake no enterprise without having first ascertained how the gods viewed it and what measures they were likely to take. Sacrifices were offered and the interior of the victim carefully examined with the same intent, omens, prodigies, unlooked for coincidences, casual expressions, etc. were all construed as significant of the divine will. To sacrifice with a view to this or that undertaking, or to consult the oracle with the same view, are familiar expressions embodied in the language. Nor could any man set about a scheme with comfort until he'd satisfied himself in some manner or other that the gods were favorable to it. The Disposition here, adverted to, is one of these mental analogies pervading the whole Hellenic nation, which Herodotus indicates. And the common habit among all Greeks of respectfully listening to the oracle of Delphi will be found on many occasions useful in maintaining unanimity among men not accustomed to obey the same political superior. In the numerous colonies especially, founded by mixed multitudes from distant parts of Greece, the minds of the emigrants were greatly determined toward cordial cooperation, by their knowledge that the expedition had been directed, the oocyst indicated, and the spot either chosen or approved by Apollo of Delphi. Such in most cases was the fact that God, according to the conception of the Greeks, takes delight always in the foundation of new cities and himself in person lays the first stone. These are the elements of union with which the historical Hellenes take their start. Community of blood, language, religious point of view, legends, sacrifices, festivals, and also with certain allowances of manners and character. The analogy of manners and character between the rude inhabitants of the Arcadian Sinaita and the polite Athens was indeed accompanied with wide differences. Yet if we compare the two with foreign contemporaries we shall find certain negative characteristics of much importance common to both. In no city of historical Greece did there prevail either human sacrifices or deliberate mutilation, such as cutting off the nose, ears, hands, feet, etc., or castration, or selling of children into slavery or polygamy, or the feeling of unlimited obedience toward one man. All customs, which might be pointed out, is existing among the contemporary Carthaginians, Egyptians, Persians, Thracians, etc. The habit of running, wrestling, boxing, etc., in gymnastic contests, with the body perfectly naked, was common to all Greeks, having been first adopted as a Lassidemonian fashion in the 14th Olympiad. Thucydides and Herodotus remark that it was not only not practiced but even regarded as unseemly among non-Helenes. Of such customs, indeed, at once common to all the Greeks, and peculiar to them as distinguished from others, we cannot specify a great number, but we may see enough to convince ourselves that there did really exist, in spite of local differences, a general Hellenic sentiment and character which counted among the cementing causes of a union apparently so little assured. During the two centuries succeeding B.C. 1776, the festival of the Olympic Zeus in the Piscited gradually passed from a local to a national character, and acquired an attractive force capable of bringing together into temporary union the dispersed fragments of Helles from Marseille to Trebizond. In this important function it did not long stand alone. During the 6th century B.C., three other festivals, at first local, became successively nationalized, the Pythia near Delphi, the Isthmia near Corinth, the Nimea near Cleone, between Sisyon and Argos. In regard to the Pythian festival, we find a short notice of the particular incidents and individuals by whom its reconstitution and enlargement were brought about. A notice the more interesting in as much as these very incidents are themselves a manifestation of something like Pan-Hellenic patriotism, standing almost alone in an age which presents little else in operation except distinct city interests. At the time when the Homeric hymn to the Delphinian Apollo was composed, probably in the 7th century B.C., the Pythian festival had as yet acquired little eminence. The rich and holy temple of Apollo was then purely irracular, established for the purpose of communicating to pious inquirers the councils of the immortals. Multitudes of visitors came to consult it, as well as to sacrifice victims and to deposit costly offerings. But while the god delighted in the sound of the harp as an accompaniment to the singing of pains, he was by no means anxious to encourage horse races and chariot races in the neighborhood. Nay, this psalmist considers that the noise of horses would be a nuisance, the drinking of mules a desecration to the sacred fountains, and the ostentation of fine-built chariots objectionable, as tending to divert the attention of spectators away from the great temple and its wealth. From such inconveniences the god was protected by placing his sanctuary in the rocky pytho, a rugged and uneven recess of no great dimensions embosomed in the southern declivity of Parnassus, and about two thousand feet above the level of the sea, while the topmost Parnassian summits reached a height of near eight thousand feet. The situation was extremely imposing, but unsuited by nature for the congregation of any considerable number of spectators, altogether impracticable for chariot races, and only rendered practicable by later art and outlay for the theater as well as for the stadium. Such a sight furnished little means of subsistence, but the sacrifices and presence of visitors enabled the ministers of the temple to live in abundance, and gathered together by degrees a village around it. Near the sanctuary of pytho, and about the same altitude, was situated the ancient Faustian town of Crissa, on a projecting spur of Parnassus, overhung above by the line of rocky precipice called the Fadriades, and itself overhanging below the deep ravine through which flows the river Pystis. On the other side of this river rises the steep mountain surface, which projects southward into the Corinthian Gulf, the river reaching that gulf through the broad Crissoean plain, which stretches westward nearly to the Locrian town of Amphisa, a plain for the most part fertile and productive, though least so in its eastern part immediately under the surface, where the Seaport Syrah was placed. The temple, the oracle, and the wealth of pytho belonged to the very earliest periods of Grecian antiquity, but the octenial solemnity in honor of the god included at first no other competition, except that of Barts, who sang each a pain with the harp. The Amphictianic assembly held one of its half yearly meetings near the temple of pytho, the other at Thermopylae. In those early times when the Homeric hymn to Apollo was composed, the town of Crissoe appears to have been great and powerful, possessing all the broad plain between Parnassus, Serphus, and the Gulf, to which latter it gave its name, and possessing also what was a property not less valuable, the adjoining sanctuary of pytho itself, which the hymn identifies with Crissoe, not indicating Delphi as a separate place. The Crisseans, doubtless derived great prophets from the number of visitors who came to visit Delphi, both by land and by sea, and Serra was originally only the name for their seaport. Gradually, however, the port appears to have grown in importance at the expense of the town, just as Apollonia and Ptolemaus came to equal Cyrene and Barca, and his Plymouth dock has swelled into Devonport, while at the same time the sanctuary of Pytho, with its administrators expanded into the town of Delphi, and came to claim an independent existence of its own. The original relations between Crissoe, Serra, and Delphi, were in this manner at length subverted, the first declining and the two latter rising. The Crisseans found themselves dispossessed of the management of the temple, which passed to the Delphians, as well as of the prophets arising from the visitors, whose disbursements went to enrich the inhabitants of Serra. Crissoe was a primitive city of the Phocian name, and could boast of a place as such in the Homeric catalog, so that her loss of importance was not likely to be quietly endured. Moreover, in addition to the above facts already sufficient in themselves as seeds of a quarrel, we are told that the Serraeans abused their position as masters of the avenue to the temple by sea, and levied exorbitant tolls on the visitors who landed there, a number constantly increasing from the multiplication of the Transmarine colonies, and from the prosperity of those in Italy and Sicily. Besides such a fence against the general Grecian public, they had also incurred the enmity of their Phocian neighbors by outrages upon women, Phocian as well as Argean, who were returning from the temple. Thus stood the case, apparently, about B.C. 595, when the Amphicteonic meeting interfered, either prompted by the Phocians, or perhaps on their own spontaneous impulse, out of regard to the temple, to punish the Serraeans. After a war of ten years, the first sacred war in Greece, this object was completely accomplished by a joint force of the Sallians under Eurylaicus, Sisyonians under Chlisthenes, and Athenians under Alcmaeon, the Athenian Solon being the person who originated and enforced in the Amphicteonic Council the proposition of interference. Serrae appears to have made a strenuous resistance until its supplies from the sea were intercepted by the naval force of the Sicionian Chlisthenes. Even after the town was taken, its inhabitants defended themselves for some time on the heights of surface. At length, however, they were thoroughly subdued. Their town was destroyed or left to subsist merely as a landing-place, while the whole adjoining plain was consecrated to the Delphian god, whose domains thus touched the sea. Under this sentence, pronounced by the religious feeling of Greece and sanctified by a solemn oath publicly sworn and inscribed at Delphi, the land was condemned to remain untilled and unplanted without any species of human care and serving only for the pastureage of cattle. The latter circumstance was convenient to the temple in as much as it furnished abundance of victims for the pilgrims who landed and came to sacrifice. For without preliminary sacrifice no man could consult the oracle. While the entire prohibition of tillage was the only means of obviating the growth of another troublesome neighbor on the seaboard, the ruin of Sira in this war is certain, though the necessity of a harbor for visitors arriving by sea led to the gradual revival of the town upon a humbler scale of pretension. But the fate of Chrissa is not so clear, nor do we know whether it was destroyed or left subsisting in a position of inferiority with regard to Delphi. From this time forward, however, the Delphian community appear as substantive and autonomous exercising in their own right the management of the temple, though we shall find, on more than one occasion, that the Phocians contest this right and lay claim to the management of it for themselves, a remnant of that early period when the oracle stood in the domain of the Phocian Chrissa. There seems, moreover, to have been a standing in typathy between the Delphians and the Phocians. The sacred war emanating from a solemn and fictionic decree carried on jointly by troops of different states whom we do not know to have ever before cooperated and directed exclusively toward an object of common interest is in itself a fact of high importance, as manifesting a decided growth of panhellenic feeling. Sparta is not named as interfering, a circumstance which seems remarkable when we consider both her power, even as it then stood, and her intimate connection with the Delphian oracle, while the Athenians appear as the chief movers, through the greatest and best of their citizens. The credit of a large-minded patriotism rests prominently upon them. But if this sacred war itself is a proof that the panhellenic spirit was growing stronger, the positive result in which it ended reinforced that spirit still farther. The spoils of Sira were employed by the victorious allies in founding the Pythian Games. The octenial festival hitherto celebrated at Delphi in honor of the God, including no other competition except in the harp and the pain, was expanded into comprehensive games on the model of the Olympic, with matches not only of music, but also of gymnastics and chariots, celebrated not at Delphi itself, but on the maritime plane near the ruined Sira, and under the direct superintendents of the Amphic deans themselves. I've already mentioned that Solon provided large rewards for such Athenians as gained victories in the Olympic and Isthmian Games, thereby indicating his sense of the great value of the national games as a means of promoting Hellenic intercommunion. It was the same feeling which instigated the foundation of the new games on the Sereian plane in commemoration of the vindicated honor of Apollo and in the territory newly made over to him. They were celebrated in the autumn or first half of every third Olympic year, the Amphic deans being the ostensible agonithets or administrators and appointing persons to discharge the duty in their names. At the first Pythian ceremony in BC 586, valuable rewards were given to the different victors. At the second BC 582, nothing was conferred but wreaths of laurel. The rapidly attained celebrity of the games being such as to render any further recompense superfluous. The Scyonian despot, Chlisthenes himself, once the leader in the conquest of Sera, gained the prize at the chariot race of the Second Pythia. We find other great personages in Greece frequently mentioned as competitors and the games long maintained a dignity second only to the Olympic, over which indeed they had some advantage. First, that they were not abused for the purpose of promoting petty jealousies and antipathies of any administering state as the Olympic games were perverted by the aliens on more than one occasion. Next, that they comprised music and poetry as well as bodily display. From the circumstances attending their foundation, the Pythian games deserved even more than the Olympic, the title bestowed on them by Demosthenes, the common agon of the Greeks. The Olympic and Pythian games continued always to be the most venerated celebrities in Greece. Yet the Namia and Isthmia acquired a celebrity not much inferior, the Olympic prize counting for the highest of all. Both the Namia and Isthmia were distinguished from the other two festivals by occurring not once in four years but once in two years. The former in the second and fourth years of each Olympiad, the latter in the first and third years. To both is assigned according to Greek custom an origin connected with the interesting persons and circumstances of legendary antiquity. But our historical knowledge of both begins with the 6th century BC. The first historical Namiad is presented as belonging to Olympiad, BC 52 or 53, 572 to 568, a few years subsequent to the sacred war above mentioned and to the origin of the Pythia. The festival was celebrated in honor of the Namian Zeus in the Valley of Namia between Phyllis and Cleonae. The Cleonaeans themselves were originally its presidents until some period after BC 460, the Argeans deprived them of that honor and assumed the honors of administration to themselves. The Namian games had their Helana Disei to superintend to keep order and to distribute the prizes as well as the Olympic. Respecting the Isthmian festival, our first historical information is a little earlier for it has already been stated that Solon conferred a premium upon every Athenian citizen who gained a prize at that festival as well as at the Olympian in or after BC 594. It was celebrated by the Corinthians at their Isthmus in honor of Poseidon, and if we may draw any inference from the legends respecting its foundation, which is ascribed sometimes to Theseus, the Athenians appear to have identified it with the antiquities of their own state. We thus perceive that the interval between BC 600 and 560 exhibits the first historical manifestation of the Pythia, Isthmia, and Namia, the first expansion of all the three from local and to Panhellenic festivals. To the Olympic games, for some time the only great center of union among all the widely dispersed Greeks are now added three other sacred agonies of the like public open national character, constituting visible marks as well as tutillary bonds of collective Hellenism and ensuring to every Greek who went to compete in the matches a safe and inviolate transit even through hostile Hellenic states. These four, all in or near Peloponnesus and one of which occurred in each year, formed the period or cycle of sacred games and those who had gained prizes at all before received the enviable designation of Periodonises. The honors paid to Olympic victors on their return to their native city were prodigious even in the sixth century BC and became even more extravagant afterward. We may remark that in the Olympic games alone the oldest as well as the most illustrious of the four the musical and intellectual element was wanting. All the three more recent agonies included crowns for exercises of music and poetry along with gymnastics, chariots, and horses. It was not only in the distinguishing national stamp set upon these four great festivals that the gradual increase of Hellenic family feeling exhibited itself during the course of this earliest period of Grecian history. Pursuant to the same tendencies religious festivals in all the considerable towns gradually became more and more open and accessible attracting guests as well as competitors from beyond the border. The comparative dignity of the city as well as the honor rendered to the presiding god were measured by the numbers, admiration, and envy of the frequenting visitors. There is no positive evidence indeed of such expansion in the Attic festivals earlier than the reign of Pisistratus who first added the quadrennial or greater panathenae to the ancient annual or lesser panathenae. Nor can we trace the steps of progress in regards to Thebes Orcaminas, Thespiae, Megara, Scyon, Pelene, Aegean, Argos, etc. But we find full reason for believing that such was the general reality. Of the Olympic or Isthmian victors whom Pindar and Simonides celebrated, many derived a portion of their renown from previous victories acquired at several of these local contests. Victories sometimes so numerous as to prove how widespread the habit of reciprocal frequentation had become. Though we find even in the third century BC treaties of alliance between different cities in which it is thought necessary to confer such mutual right by express stipulation. Temptation was offered to the distinguished gymnastic or musical competitors by prizes of great value. Timaeus even asserted as proof of the overwinning pride of Croton and Sbaris that these cities tried to supplant the preeminence of the Olympic Games by instituting games of their own with the richest prizes to be celebrated at the same time. A statement in itself not worthy of credit yet nevertheless illustrating the animated rivalry known to prevail among the Grecian cities in procuring for themselves splendid and crowded games. At the time when the Homeric hymn to Demeter was composed the worship of that goddess seems to have been purely local at Eleusis. But before the Persian War the festival celebrated by the Athenians every year in honour of the Eleusinian Demeter admitted Greeks of all cities to be initiated and was attended by vast crowds of them. It was thus that the simplicity and strict local application of the primitive religious festival among the greater states in Greece gradually expanded on certain great occasions periodically recurring into an elaborate and regulated series of exhibitions not merely admitting but soliciting the fraternal presence of all Hellenic spectators. In this respect Sparta seems to have formed an exception to the remaining states. Her festivals were for herself alone and her general rudeness toward other Greeks was not materially softened even at the Carnea and Hyatsyntia or Gymnopidae. On the other hand the Attic Dionysia was gradually exalted from their original rude spontaneous outburst of village feeling in thankfulness to the god followed by song, dance, and revelry of various kinds into costly and diversified performances first by trained chorus next by actors super added to it and the dramatic compositions thus produced as they embodied the perfection of Grecian art so they were eminently calculated to invite a pan-Hellenic audience and to encourage the sentiment of Hellenic unity. The dramatic literature of Athens however belongs properly to a later period. Previous to the year BC 560 we see only those commencements of innovation which drew upon Thespis the rebuke of Solon who however himself contributed to impart to the Pan-Athenic Festival a more solemn and attractive character by checking the license of the rhapsodies and ensuring to those present a full orderly recital of the Iliad. The sacred games and festivals took hold of the Greek mind by so great a variety of feelings as to counterbalance in a high degree the political de-severance and to keep alive among their widespread cities in the midst of constant jealousy and frequent quarrel a feeling of brotherhood and congenial sentiment such as must otherwise have died away. The Theors or sacred envoys who came to Olympia or Delphi from so many different points all sacrificed to the same God and at the same altar witnessed the same sports and contributed by their donatives to enrich or adorn one respective scene. Moreover the festival afforded opportunity for a sort of fair including much traffic amid so large a mass of spectators and besides the exhibitions of the games themselves there were recitations and lectures in a spacious council room for those who chose to listen to them by poets, rhapsodies, philosophers and historians among which last the history of Herodotus is said to have been publicly read by its author. Of the wealthy and great men in the various cities many contended simply for the chariot victories and horse victories but there were others whose ambition was of a character more strictly personal and who stripped naked as runners, wrestlers, boxers or pancreateists having gone through the extreme fatigue of a complete previous training. Cylon whose unfortunate attempt to usurp the sceptre at Athens has been recounted had gained the prize in the Olympic Stadium. Alexander's son of Amintus the Prince of Macedon had run for it. The great family of the Diagoridae at Rhodes who furnished magistrates in generals to their native city supplied a still greater number of successful boxers and pancreateists at Olympia while other instances also occur of generals named by various cities from the list of successful Olympic gymnasts and the Odes of Pindar always dearly purchased attest how many of the great and wealthy were found in that list. The perfect popularity and equality of persons at these great games is a feature not less remarkable than the exact adherence to predetermined rule and the self-imposed submission of the immense crowd to a handful of servants armed with sticks who executed the orders of the Elian Helena Dice the ground upon which the ceremony took place and even the territory of the administering state was protected by a truce of God during the month of the festival the commencement of which was formally announced by heralds sent round to the various states. Treaties of peace between different cities were often formally commemorated by pillars there erected and the general impression of the scene suggested nothing but ideas of peace and brotherhood among Greeks. And I may remark that the impression of the games as belonging to all Greeks and to none but Greeks was stronger and clearer during the interval between B.C. 600 to 300 than it came to be afterward. For the Macedonian conquest had the effect of diluting and corrupting Hellenism by spreading an exterior varnish of Hellenic tastes and manners over a wide area of incongruous foreigners who were incapable of the real elevation of the Hellenic character so that although in later times the games continued undiminished both in attraction and in number of visitors the spirit of pan-Hellenic communion which had once animated the scene was gone forever. For more information or to volunteer please visit LibriVox.org The Great Events by Famous Historians Volume 1 edited by Charles F. Horn Rositer Johnson and John Rudd Section 22 Solon's Early Greek Legislation B.C. 594 by George Grote Part 1 Likorgos The reputed Spartan lawgiver is credited with the construction about B.C. 800 of the earliest Grecian common wells founded upon a specific code of laws. These laws had mainly a military basis and through obedience to them the Spartans became a people of great hardiness accustomed to self-discipline famous for their prowess and endurance in war and for sternness of individual and social virtues. In Athens there were no written laws until the time of Draco B.C. 621 the government before that period having been long in the hands of an oligarchy. In the year above named Draco was Archon and to him was entrusted the work of framing a legal code conditions under the oligarchy rule having become intolerable to the people at large. The chief features of Draco's legislation had reference to the punishment of crime and so extreme were the severities of the system and so cruel the penalties it prescribed that in later times it was declared to have been written in blood. The draconian laws remained in force until superseded by the great system of Solon whose advent as the new lawgiver was brought about mainly through the conspiracy of Cylon 12 years after the legislation of Draco affairs in Athens were in a deplorable state of confusion and violence the revolt of the poor against the power and privilege of the rich leading to dangerous dissensions and collisions. Solon who enjoyed a universal reputation for wisdom and uprightness was called upon by the oligarchy which again held rule to assume what was in fact almost absolute power. The character of his legislation and its influence upon the course of Greek history have been set forth by many authors and the following account is perhaps the best that has appeared in modern literature. Solon, son of Exis Cestides was an opotreed of middling fortune but of the purest heroic blood belonging to the gents or family of the Codrids and Nelaides and tracing his origin to the god Poseidon. His father is said to have diminished his substance by prodigality which compelled Solon in his earlier years to have recourse to trade and in this pursuit he visited many parts of Greece and Asia. He was thus enabled to enlarge the sphere of his observation and to provide material for thought as well as for composition. His poetical talents displayed themselves at a very early age first on light, afterward on serious subjects. It will be recollected that there was at that time no Greek prose writing and that the acquisitions as well as the effusions of an intellectual man even in their simplest form adjusted themselves not to the limitations of the period and the semicolon but to those of the hexameter and pentameter. Nor in point of fact do the verses of Solon aspire to any higher effect than we are accustomed to associate with an earnest touching and admonitory prose composition. The advice and appeals which he frequently addressed to his countrymen were delivered in this easy meter dopless far less difficult than the elaborate prose of subsequent writers or speakers such as Thakadaides, Isochrites or Demostines. His poetry and his reputation became known throughout many parts of Greece so that he was classed along with tales of Miletus, bias of Breen, Pythagoras of Mytilene, Periander of Corinth, Cleobolus of Lindos, Calon of Lachadiman all together forming the constellation aftervards renowned as the Seven Wise Men. The first particular event in respect to which Solon appears as an active politician is the possession of the island of Salamis then disputed between Megara and Athens. Megara was at that time able to contest with Athens and for some time to contest with success the occupation of this important island a remarkable fact which perhaps may be explained by supposing that the inhabitants of Athens and its neighborhood carried on the struggle with only partial aid from the rest of Attica. However this may be it appears that the Megarians had actually established themselves in Salamis at the time when Solon began his political career and that the Athenians had experienced so much loss in the struggle as to have formally prohibited any citizen from ever submitting a proposition for its reconquest. Stung with this dishonorable abnegation Solon counter-fated a state of ecstactic excitement rushed into the Agora and there on the stone usually occupied by the official Herald pronounced to the surrounding crowd a short, elegiac poem which he had previously composed on the subject of Salamis. Enforcing upon them the disgrace of abandoning the island he wrought so powerfully upon their feelings that they rescinded their prohibitory law. Rather he exclaimed would I forfeit my native city and become a citizen of Folligandrus than be still named an Athenian branded with the shame of surrendered Salamis. The Athenians again entered into the war and conferred upon him the command of it partly as we are told at the instigation of Pisestratus though the latter must have been at this time BC 600 to 594 a very young man or rather boy. The stories in Plutarch as to the way in which Salamis was recovered are contradictory as well as apocryphal ascribing to Solon various stratagems to deceive the Megarian occupiers. Unfortunately no authority is given for any of them. According to that which seems the most plausible he was directed by the Delphian god first to propitiate the local heroes of the island and he accordingly crossed over to it by night for the purpose of sacrificing to the heroes Perifemus and Siharus on the Salamanian shore. 500 Athenian volunteers were then levied for the attack of the island and there's the stipulation that if they were victorious they should hold it in property and citizenship. They were safely landed on an outlying promontory while Solon having been fortunate enough to seize a ship which the Megarians had sent to watch the proceedings manned it with Athenians and sailed straight toward the city of Salamis to which the Athenians who had landed also directed their march. The Megarians marched out from the city to repel the latter and during the heat of the engagement Solon with his Megarian ship an Athenian crew sailed directly to the city. The Megarians interpreting this as the return of their own crew permitted the ship to approach without resistance and the city was thus taken by surprise. Permission having been given to the Megarians to quit the island Solon took possession of it for the Athenians erecting a temple to Enialius the god of war on Cape Skiradium near the city of Salamis. The citizens of Megaro however made various efforts for the recovery of so valuable a possession so that a war ensued long as well as disastrous to both parties. At last it was agreed between them to refer the dispute to the arbitration of Sparta and five Spartans were appointed to decide it Cretolidus Amompharetus Hipsichidus Anaxilus and Cleomines The verdict in favor of Athenians was founded on evidence which it is somewhat curious to trace. Both parties attempted to show that the dead bodies buried in the island conformed to their own peculiar mode of internment and both parties are said to have cited verses from the catalog of the Iliad each accusing the other of error or interpolation. But the Athenians had the advantage on two points. First, there were oracles from Delphi wherein Salamis was mentioned with the Epithet Ionian. Next, Filaios and Erysekis sons of the Telemonian Ajax the great hero of the island had accepted the citizenship of Athenians made over Salamis to the Athenians and transferred their own residences to Broron and Melit in Attica where the demon or Gens Filidae still worshipped Filaios as its eponymous ancestor. Such a title was held sufficient and Salamis was abjudged by the fire Spartans to Attica with which it ever afterward remained incorporated until the days of Macedonian supremacy. Two centuries and a half later when the orator Ajaskins argued the Athenian right to Amphifolis against Philip of Machgedon the legendary elements of the title were indeed put forward but more in the way of preface or introduction to the substantial political grounds. But in the year 600 BC the authority of the legend was more deep-seated and operative and adequate by itself to determine a favorable verdict. In addition to the conquest of Salamis Solon increased his reputation by espousing the cause of the Delphian temple against the extortinate proceedings of the inhabitants of Kira and the favor of the Oracle was probably not without its effect in procuring for him that encouraging prophecy with which his legislative career opened. It is on the occasion of Solon's legislation that we obtain our first glimpse unfortunately but a glimpse of the actual state of Attica and its inhabitants. It is a sad and repulsive picture presenting to us political discord and private suffering combined. Violent dissensions prevailed among the inhabitants of Attica who were separated into three factions the Padillas or men of the plain comprising Athens, Aloyses and the neighboring territory among whom the greatest number of rich families were included the mountaineers in the east and north of Attica called Diacri who were on the whole the poorest party and the Parli in the southern portion of Attica from sea to sea whose means and social position were intermediate between the two. Upon what particular points these intestine disputes turned we are not distinctly informed they were not however peculiar to the period immediately preceding the archonship of Solon they had prevailed before and they reappear afterward prior to the despotism of Pisistratus the latter standing forward as the leader of the Diacri and as champion real or pretended of the poorer population but in the time of Solon these intestine quarrels were aggravated by something much more difficult to deal with a general mutiny of the poorer population against the rich resulting from misery combined with oppression the Theeds whose condition we have already contemplated in the poems of Homer and Hesiod are now presented to us as forming the bulk of the population of Attica the cultivating tenants meteors and small proprietors of the country they are exhibited as weighed down by depths and dependence and driven in large numbers out of state of freedom into slavery the whole mass of them were told being in depth to the rich who are proprietors of the greater part of the soil they had either borrowed money for their own necessities or they tilled the lands of the rich as dependent tenants paying a stipulated portion of the produced and in this capacity they were largely in arrear all the calamitous effects were her scene of the old harsh law of debtor and creditor once prevalent in Greece, Italy, Asia and a large portion of the world combined with the recognition of slavery as legitimate status and of the right of one man to sell himself as well as that of another man to buy him every debtor unable to fulfill his contract was liable to be up judged as the slave of his creditor until he could find means either of paying it or working it out and not only he himself but his minor sons and unmarried daughters and sisters also whom the law gave him the power of selling the poor man thus borrowed upon the security of his body to translate literally the Greek phrase and upon that of the persons in his family so severely had these oppressive contracts been enforced that many debtors had been reduced from freedom to slavery in Attica itself many others had been sold for exportation and some had only hitherto preserved their own freedom by selling their children moreover a great number of the smaller properties in Attica were under mortgage signified according to the formality usual in the Attic law and continued down throughout the historical times by a stone pillar erected on the land inscribed with the name of the lender and the amount of the loan the proprietors of these mortgage lands in case of an unfavorable turn of events had no other prospect except that of irremediable slavery for themselves and their families either in their own native country robbed of all its delights or in some barbarian region where the Attic accent would never meet their ears some had fled the country to escape legal adjudication of their persons and earned a miserable subsistence in foreign parts by degrading occupations upon several too this deplorable lot had fallen by unjust condemnation and corrupt judges the conduct of the rich in regard to money sacred and profane in regard to matters public as well as private being thoroughly unprincipled and rapacious the manifold and long-continued suffering of the poor under this system plunged into a state of debasement not more tolerable than that of a gallic plebs and the injustices of the rich in whom all political power was then vested are facts well attested by the poems of Solon himself even in the short fragments preserved to us it appears that immediately preceding the time of his archonship the evils had ripened to such a point and the determination of the mass of sufferers to extort for themselves some mode of relief had become so pronounced that the existing laws could no longer be enforced according to the profound remark of Aristotle that seditions are generated by great causes but out of small incidents we may conceive that some recent events had occurred as immediate stimulants to the outbreak of the debtors like those which lend so striking an interest to the early Roman annals as the inflaming sparks of violent popular movements for which the train had long before been laid condemnations by the archons of insolvent debtors may have been unusually numerous or the maltreatment of some particular debtor once a respected free man in his condition of slavery may have been brought to act vividly upon the public sympathies like the case of the old plebeian centurion at Rome first impoverished by the plunder of the enemy then reduced to borrow and lastly up judged to his creditor as an insolvent who claims a protection of the people in the forum rousing their feelings to the highest pitch by the marks of the slave whip visible on his person some such incidents had probably happened though we have no historians to recount them moreover it is not unreasonable to imagine that that public mental affliction which the purifier epimenides had been invoked to appease as it sprung in part from pestilence so it had its cause partly in years of sterility which must of course have aggravated the distress of the small cultivators however this may be such was the condition of things in bc 594 through mutiny of the poor free men and seats and uneasiness of the middling citizens that the governing oligarchy unable either to enforce their private depths or to maintain their political power were obliged to invoke the well-known wisdom and integrity of salon though his vigorous protest which doubtless rendered him acceptable to the mass of the people against the iniquity of the existing system had already been proclaimed in his poems they still hoped that he would serve as an auxiliary to help them over their difficulties they therefore choose him nominally as arcane along with philom brutus but with power in substance dictatorial it had happened in several grecian states that the governing oligarchies either by quarrels among their own members or by the general bad condition of the people under their government were deprived of that hold upon the public mind which was essential to their power sometimes as in the case of pitacus of metilene anterior to the archonship of salon and often in the factions of the italian republics in the middle ages the collision of opposing forces had rendered society intolerable and driven all parties to acquiesce in the choice of some reforming dictator usually however in the early greek oligarchies this ultimate crisis was anticipated by some ambitious individual who availed himself of the public discontent to overthrow the oligarchy and usurp the powers of a despot and so probably it might have happened in athenes had not the recent failure of salon with all its miserable consequences operated as a deterring motive it is curious to read in the words of salon himself the temper in which his appointment was construed by a large portion of the community but more especially by his own friends bearing in mind that at this early day so far as our knowledge goes democratical government was a thing unknown in Greece all greekian governments were either oligarchical or despotic the mass of the freemen having not yet tasted of constitutional privilege his own friends and supporters were the first to urge him while redressing the prevalent discontents to multiply partisans for himself personally and seize the supreme power they even chid him as a madman for declining to haul up the net when the fish were already enmeshed the mass of the people in despair with their lot would gladly have seconded him in such an attempt while many even amongst the oligarchy might have acquiesced in his personal government from the mere apprehension of something worse if they resisted it that salon might easily have made himself despot admits of little doubt and though the position of a greek despot was always perilous he would have had greater facility for maintaining himself in it than pieces stratus possessed after him though that nothing but the combination of prudence and virtue which marks his lofty character restricted him within the trust specially confided to him to the surprise of everyone to the dissatisfaction of his own friends under the complaints alike as he says of warriors extreme and dissentient parties who required him to adopt measures fatal to the peace of society he said himself honestly to solve the very difficult and critical problem submitted to him of all grievances the most urgent was the condition of the poorer class of deptors to their relief salon's first measure the memorable say said ktaya or shaking off of burdens was directed the relief which it afforded was complete and immediate it canceled at once all those contracts in which the deptor had borrowed on the security either of his person or of his land it forbade all future loans or contracts in which the person of the deptor was pledged as security it deprived the creditor in future of all power to imprison or enslave or extort work from his deptor and confined him to an effective judgment at law authorizing the seizure of the property of the letter it swept off all the numerous mortgage pillars from the landed properties in attica leaving the land free from all past claims it liberated and restored to their full rights all deptors actually in slavery under previous legal adjudication and it even provided the means we do not know what how of repurchasing in foreign lands and bringing back to the renewed life of liberty in attica many insolvent who had been sold for exportation and while solon forbade every Athenian to pledge or sell his own person into slavery he took a step further in the same direction by forbidding him to pledge or sell his son his daughter or an unmarried sister under his tutelage accepting only the case in which either of the letter might be detected in Anciestity whether this last ordinance was contemporaneous with the say sectea or followed as one of his subsequent reforms seems doubtful by this extensive measure the poor deptors the seeds small tenants and proprietors together with their families were rescued from suffering and peril but these were not the only deptors in the state the creditors and landlords of the exonerated seeds were doubtless in their turn deptors to others and were less able to discharge their obligations and consequence of the loss inflicted upon them by the say sectea it was to assist these wealthier deptors whose bodies were in no danger yet without exonerating them entirely that solon resorted to the additional expedient of debasing the money standard he lowered the standard of the drachma in a proportion of something more than 25 percent so that hundred drachmas of the new standard contained no more silver than 73 of the old or hundred of the old were equivalent to 138 of the new by this change the creditors of these more substantial deptors were obliged to submit to a loss while the deptors acquired an exemption to the extent of about 27 percent lastly solon decreed that all those who had been condemned by the archons to atemi civil disfranchisement should be restored to their full privileges of citizens accepting however from this indulgence those who had been condemned by the evitae or by the areopagus or by the philobacillase the four kings of the tribes after trial in the britannium on charges either of murder or treason so wholesale a measure of amnesty affords strong grounds for believing that the previous judgments of the archons hadn't been intolerably harsh and it is to be recollected that the draconian ordinances were then enforced end of section 22