§ 1. Diffusion of the worship of Apollo in Peloponnesus by the
Dorians. § 2. His Introduction by the Dorians at the Olympic
festival. § 3. Influence of the Delphian oracle of Apollo.
Subjects of the oracle. § 4. Migrations caused by the oracle. § 5.
Connexion of the temple of Delphi with the Amphictyons of
Thermopylæ. § 6. Worship of Apollo in Asia Minor and the islands.
§ 7. In Italy and Sicily, in Apollonia and Cyrene.
1. We now come to the _third_ epoch of the propagation of the worship of
Apollo. The first embraced the earliest migrations of the Doric nation,
when the great temples at Delphi, Cnosus, and Delos were founded from
Tempe. The second period is that of the maritime supremacy of Minos, when
the coasts of Asia and Greece were covered with groves and expiatory
altars of this god. The third comprehends the chief migration of the
Dorians, and others occasioned by it. Through these means Apollo became
the principal deity in Peloponnesus, where, in early times, we find few
traces of his existence. That the Carnean Apollo of the Lacedæmonians, and
the Apollo Nomius of the Arcadians, form no exceptions to our assertion,
will be proved in a subsequent inquiry into the nature and origin of these
worships.(1065)
After the Doric conquest of Peloponnesus, the chief temples were every
where consecrated to Apollo. We have already spoken of the sanctuary of
Apollo Pythaëus, in which the Argive confederacy held their
meetings;(1066) nor was the temple of Apollo Lyceus in the market-place
less celebrated.(1067) The Spartans also worshipped this deity under the
former name,(1068) and the inhabitants of Sicyon under the latter.(1069)
Hecatus, it is pretended, was a soothsayer, who came with the sons of
Aristodemus to Sparta; and his descendant, in the second Messenian war,
held the same office:(1070) the name of this family refers to the worship
of Apollo Hecatus (the far-darting god). At Sparta Apollo was the national
deity; the kings sacrificed to him on the first and seventh days of every
month;(1071) the influence of the capital city had also caused its general
extension throughout the country.(1072) Corinth,(1073) Epidaurus,(1074)
Ægina,(1075) and Trœzen(1076) followed the same example.
The name of the Delphian god had now attained throughout Peloponnesus the
universal respect which it so long enjoyed: it had even led the way to the
settlement and conquest of that peninsula, and hence Apollo was called by
the Dorians their _leader_ and _founder_.(1077) It was not till a later
period that the kings of Messenia (who upon the whole adhered less
strictly to the Doric customs than the Spartans) entered into a connexion
with the sanctuary at Delos, which had then already fallen into the power
of the Ionians. About the fifth Olympiad (760 B.C.) Eumelus, the
Corinthian poet, composed an ode for a Messenian chorus to that holy
island.(1078) On the other hand, it was owing to the Dorians (particularly
to the Spartans) that the Pythian sanctuary remained independent, in the
hands of the Delphians; to preserve it in this state was one of the duties
which they inherited from their fathers;(1079) and they protected it more
than once, particularly against the Athenians.
2. The political power of the Dorians over the whole of Peloponnesus
necessarily ensured the preponderance of their religious institutions;
nevertheless we find that the Achæans and Arcadians possessed few temples
of Apollo, and those not the principal ones in their cities.(1080) The
worship of Apollo was however, through Spartan influence, held in great
respect at Tegea (the customs of which town had indeed become almost
entirely Doric), where there was also a tribe called Apolloneatis.(1081)
The country moreover being intersected in every direction by roads to
Olympia and Delphi (to which place Peloponnesus despatched her hecatombs
in the beginning of the spring),(1082) must have been by this very
circumstance induced to establish temples in honour of Apollo, an instance
of which appears in that at Onceum.
The principal deity of the Doric name soon obtained a conspicuous place in
the national festival, held equally sacred by all Peloponnesians; I mean
that of Olympia. The establishment of this festival is probably of early
date; perhaps it took place during the time when the dominion of the
Pelopidæ spread from Pisa and Olympia over most parts of the peninsula.
Hence the Elean Ætolians, when they seized upon the presidency of these
games, were, by the command of the oracle, at the same time obliged to
take one of the Pelopidæ from the Achæan town of Helice for their
prince.(1083) Moreover, the ancient rivalry between the Olympian and
Isthmian worship, which occasioned the prohibition against any Elean
contending at the Isthmus,(1084) can hardly have arisen at any other time
than when (previously to the Doric usurpation) the Olympian Zeus was the
chief god of the Achæans,(1085) the Isthmian Poseidon of the Ionians.
But it was not till the Dorians, for the purpose of assembling all the
Peloponnesians, at least every four years, under the protection of their
god, had taken possession of the temple at Olympia; nor till Iphitus the
Ætolian, and Lycurgus the Dorian, had renewed these contests, or given
them a greater degree of importance, that Apollo and Zeus are found in
connexion with each other, and even contending in the course at Olympia.
And as a further instance of change, the sacred armistice of Olympia went
by the local name of Therma;(1086) and hence Apollo, as the patron and
guardian deity of the institution, was called Thermius, and worshipped
under that title in the grove of Altis.(1087) At this time Hercules (whose
worship, once entirely unknown in Elis, was introduced by Iphitus)(1088)
is also reported to have brought the wild olive-tree from the Hyperboreans
to the Alpheus, and planted the sacred grove of Altis with it.(1089) The
important influence of the Delphian oracle on the Olympian games also
occasioned the time of their celebration to be regulated by the Pythian
cycle of eight years.(1090) For whereas the whole cycle of eight years
consisted of ninety-nine lunar months, at the expiration of which time the
revolutions of the moon and sun again nearly coincided; this period was at
Olympia divided into two unequal parts of fifty and forty-nine months, so
that the festival took place sometimes in the month of Apollonius,
sometimes in Parthenius.
The introduction of the worship of Apollo must have had no less influence
on the families of the soothsayers, who ministered at the altars of the
Olympic deities. These were the Clytiadæ, Iamidæ, and Telliadæ;(1091) of
which the Clytiadæ considered themselves as belonging to a clan, which
produced very many soothsayers, viz., the Melampodidæ.(1092) This explains
the fable that Melampus received the gift of prophecy from Apollo on the
banks of the Alpheus,(1093) in the place where it was exercised by his
descendants the Clytiadæ.
3. The Doric migration gave rise to many others, which spread the worship
of Apollo in various directions; no longer, however, as a peculiar deity
of the Dorians and Cretans, but, in a more extended sense, as the national
god of the Greeks. This was chiefly occasioned by the influence of Delphi,
which seems to have given the chief stimulus to that great migration. In
fact, it became from this time invested with a power which hardly belonged
to any subsequent institution. Apollo is represented as governing nations
with an arbitrary power, compelling them, however unwilling, to undertake
distant expeditions, and pointing out the settlements which they are to
occupy. In order to convey a more distinct idea of this singular
phenomenon, it is necessary that the condition of the immediate subjects
of the Pythian temple should be more closely examined.
When the district of the Cirrhæans had, by the Amphictyonic war, become
forfeited to the temple of Delphi, the sacred lands belonging to it formed
a very considerable territory. Two inscriptions contain surveys of the
Hieromnemons respecting its boundaries: one relating to those towards
Anticirrha in the east, the other to those in the direction of Amphissa to
the west.(1094) Now it certainly appears that in ancient times, when
Cirrha was in existence, none of these lands belonged to the temple, which
must therefore have possessed little or no territory. But in spite of the
generally received accounts of the Amphictyonic war, it can be
satisfactorily proved, that in earlier times Cirrha and the temple, with
its appendages, formed one state.(1095) Their territory indeed consisted
for the most part of rock, mountain, and narrow glens;(1096) yet towards
the south it embraced the spacious plain of Crissa, and in the north at
least the luxuriant vineyards of Parnassus. By whom then was this
territory cultivated? certainly neither by the Doric nobles nor the Cretan
colonists, who in the Homeric hymn are derided by the god for thinking of
the labours of agriculture, and commanded to employ themselves merely in
sacrificing victims.(1097) Thus it is evident, that there were subjects of
the temple, who, besides the humble employment of cultivating the soil,
were also obliged to tend the herds belonging to the temple. These were
the servants of the temple whom we so frequently find mentioned.(1098) The
same class also existed in Crete, as we have before proved from the
tribute sent by Athens; and Crete, in its turn, as well as Eretria and
Magnesia,(1099) sent such “human firstlings” to the temple of Pytho.
Mention is also made of a town in Crete composed of a thousand men, all
sacred slaves.(1100) Now these slaves of Delphi may have been procured in
different ways, either as tribute (and that either of a city or of
individuals), as voluntary bondsmen, or by purchase:(1101) the latter mode
was probably of rare occurrence in early times. There still remain a
considerable number of Delphian monuments, in which private individuals
present or sell to the god those slaves whom they wish to favour.(1102)
The condition of these vassals corresponds to that of the Doric
bondsmen;(1103) but their servitude was probably of a milder nature; for
we find it frequently stated that the sacred slaves lived inviolate under
the protection of the god, although (at least in early times) they were
entirely dependent on the sacred council of the temple. Originally, a
great part consisted of prisoners taken in war. We collect from ancient
epic poems that Manto the daughter of Tiresias was, after the war of the
Epigoni, sent to the Pythian god as a share of the spoil(1104)
(ἀκροθίνιον): one individual, as is usual in the language of mythology,
standing for many. The Gephyræans also are said to have been at that time
decimated, sent from Thebes to Delphi, and thus to have arrived at
Athens.(1105) After the Persian war, an idea was actually entertained of
reviving this punishment against the Thebans, whose enemies considered
them, at a still later period, as in the eye of justice decimated, and
given as slaves to Apollo.(1106)
4. When the Pythian god was either unwilling or unable to retain within
his territory the crowds who had been collected in this manner, he sent
them out as colonists; without, however, entirely giving up all claim to
their obedience. The early Grecian history affords several examples of
this proceeding: the earliest is a Doric tradition respecting the Dryopes,
which differs in some respect from their own account. Hercules, here
represented as a Doric hero, had subjugated the Dryopes, and brought them
to Delphi as an offering to Apollo, by whom he was commanded to settle
them on the southern coast of Argolis.(1107) That this nation, probably of
Pelasgic origin, did not in early times worship the Doric god, is evident
from the tradition that Leogoras the Dryopian violated the temple of
Apollo.(1108) But it is equally certain that they were henceforth
compelled to serve Apollo as their chief deity, especially in his
character of Apollo Pythaëus at Argos.(1109) A part of this nation however
remained at Delphi, where it is frequently mentioned in later times under
the name of Craugallidæ, who, together with the Cirrhæans, appear as
enemies to the temple;(1110) from which circumstance it may be inferred
that most of these Cirrhæans were revolted subjects of the temple.
The migration of the Magnesians approaches rather nearer to the historical
age. This race, dwelling under mount Pelion, felt itself, about the time
of the Thessalian migration, so pressed for want of territory, that it had
recourse to the Delphian oracle, by whose advice it decimated its numbers;
that is, it sent off a tenth part of the young male population, who (like
a _ver sacrum_ in Italy)(1111) renounced their native land.(1112) These
young colonists were mostly despatched to the worshippers of Apollo in
Crete, where they founded the town of Magnesia, which Plato speaks of as a
place that had been destroyed, and considers as a prototype of his ideal
state, Apollo having been its only legislator.(1113) The intercourse of
Crete with the coast of Asia Minor soon carried over these sojourners to
the banks of the Mæander and the Lethæus, at the confluence of which
rivers they had been settled some time before the Ionic migration;(1114)
being, as was afterwards declared by a Panhellenic decree, the first
Greeks who settled in Asia Minor.(1115) Still, although thus separated
from their mother country, they maintained, as sacred colonists (ἱεροὶ
ἄποικοι), a perpetual connexion with Delphi, and were bound, in ancient
times, to provide all travellers with food and lodging.(1116) The
Delphians could expect a similar reception at Delos:(1117) and indeed an
extended exercise of the duties of hospitality formed one of the principal
objects of this worship. Pausanias(1118) gives an account of this very
important worship of Apollo in Magnesia as follows:(1119) “At Hylæ, a
place in the territory of the Magnesians,(1120) is a cavern consecrated to
Apollo; not, indeed, remarkable for its size; but it contains a statue of
Apollo of great antiquity, and which confers strength for every kind of
work. Certain devotees throw themselves, by the assistance of this image,
from steep and lofty precipices; or tearing large trees up by the roots,
walk with their burden down the steepest paths.” We would attempt to trace
more minutely the connexion of Magnesia with Crete and Delphi, had not all
clue to history been necessarily broken off by the conquest of this proud
and prosperous city by the Ephesians, and its complete destruction by the
Treres, a Cimmerian tribe, in the time of the Lydian monarch Ardys.(1121)
We have only time to notice some few other events of a similar nature.
Thus the Ænianes came to the oracle about the same time, and on a similar
emergency as the Magnesians; dwelt for some years in the territory of
Cirrha, and were afterwards sent to the banks of the Inachus in southern
Thessaly.(1122) An example of historical authority is furnished by the
Chalcideans in Eubœa, the youthful part of whose population was despatched
by Apollo to Rhegium in Italy;(1123) hence this town also celebrated the
worship of the god with expiatory rites and festivals,(1124) to which the
Messenians of Sicily sent choruses of thirty-five boys across the
straits.(1125)
5. These events, which from their connected form cannot be poetical
fictions, give some idea of the extensive influence of the temple of
Delphi, the power of which was probably at its highest pitch in the time
immediately succeeding the Doric migrations. Hence also this was the epoch
of the greatest influence of the Amphictyons of Thermopylæ;(1126) which
confederation of Thessalian tribes, and of tribes derived from Thessaly,
united the worship of the Doric temple of Apollo with that of Demeter at
Thermopylæ, and thus an Hellenic and ancient Pelasgic worship were
combined together,(1127) probably not without a view of forming a more
intimate union between the different races of Greece. The assembling in
the spring of the year at Delphi was probably copied from the meeting of
the neighbouring towns, in the spring festival, at Tempe, at which
business of a political kind was sometimes transacted.(1128) The power,
however, of the Amphictyons of Thermopylæ was at no time actually
political, and, with a very few exceptions, all their regulations and
undertakings concerned the protection of the two temples in their rights
and possessions, the rights of other temples in Greece, and the
maintenance of some principles of international law (νόμοι Ἀμφικτυονικοὶ),
founded upon religious notions.
6. The Dorian colonies introduced Apollo into Asia Minor as the principal
deity of their national and federal festival on the promontory of
Triopium,(1129) where they probably first planted his worship, without,
however, excluding the more ancient Pelasgic rites of Demeter and the
infernal gods, which, although of a different nature, were united in the
ceremonies at Triopium with those of Apollo.(1130) In the same manner the
twelve towns of the Æolians, with whom Apollo was by no means so nearly
connected, celebrated in his honour, as it seems, their federal festival
in the grove of Gryneum near Myrina.(1131) And though when the Ionians
crossed over from Athens to Asia Minor they remained so constant to the
worship of Poseidon that they consecrated to him their national festival
at Mycale, and also built in the island of Tenos a splendid temple of
Poseidon and Amphitrite, honoured with festivals and sacred
embassies;(1132) yet the Cretan worship was so prevalent at Delos, when
first overrun by the Ionians, that this island was itself the religious
metropolis of the Cyclades,(1133) at whose festivals and contests the
higher classes of the islanders attended with their families, even in
ancient times; which naturally gave rise to the establishment of temples
to Apollo, the principal deity, in the rest of the Cyclades; as
Cythnus,(1134) Siphnus,(1135) Ceos,(1136) Naxos,(1137) &c.
7. The principal places to be mentioned in Italy besides Rhegium are
Croton and Metapontum. The former was an Achæan and Lacedæmonian colony;
in the founding of which, according to tradition, the oracle had an
important share;(1138) the memory of which is preserved by temples of
Apollo Pythius, Hyperboreus,(1139) and Alæus,(1140) within, and close to
the town. Croton was peculiarly subject to the influence of Apollo, whose
worship operated to an unusual extent on the character and customs of its
inhabitants. On the founding of Metapontum our information is scanty. The
inhabitants generally supposed themselves to be of Achæan origin; yet
Ephorus has preserved a remarkable, though confused tradition, that
Daulius the tyrant of Crissa was the founder of that town.(1141) It seems,
then, that inhabitants of Daulis, in the narrow valley of Parnassus, and
Crissæans, from the coast, had passed over to Italy in very early times.
The inhabitants of Metapontum, as ancient subjects of Apollo, sent him
golden ears of corn (χρυσοῦν θέρος) as a tithe of their harvest; we find
on their coins the full ears of barley, which were paid as tribute, and on
the reverse the god himself, armed with his helmet, arrow and bow, as a
conqueror, and holding a branch of laurel; exactly coinciding with the
symbols used in the temple of Delphi.(1142) Thus historical tradition and
religious symbols both point to the same conclusion.(1143)
During the period of which we are treating, the regulation of colonies by
the Delphian oracle was the chief instrument which extended the worship of
Apollo on the coast of the Mediterranean. In honour of this deity the
Chalcideans who founded Naxos, the first Greek colony in Sicily (Olymp. 5.
2. 759 B.C.), erected on the coast an altar of Apollo Archegetas, upon
which the Sicilian Theori always sacrificed when they sailed to the temple
of Apollo in their mother-country.(1144)
Apollonia, the Corinthian settlement on the Ionian sea, was also supposed
to have been founded by Apollo;(1145) hence the above-mentioned custom of
sending “_the golden summer_” to Delphi prevailed in this town.(1146) We
have in a former work(1147) shown that the worship at Thera and Cyrene was
paid to the deity of the Theban Ægidæ, viz., the Carnean Apollo; who,
however, at the founding of the colony (Olymp. 37), was already considered
as the same with the Dorian god; hence the fountain of Apollo at Cyrene,
its colony of Apollonia, &c. Mythology, which often first clothes the
events of history in a fabulous garb, and then refers them to an early and
unknown time, expressed the founding of Cyrene, under the guidance of the
temple of Apollo, in the following elegant personification—That Cyrene, a
Thessalian nymph, the favourite of Apollo, was carried by her divine lover
to Africa, in his chariot drawn by swans.(1148)
We shall abstain from bringing down the colonization of this religion to a
later period, since in after-times the lively principle which at first
actuated the worshippers of Apollo was lost; and, instead of considering
their actions as the effect of supernatural compulsion, men were rather
disposed to regulate their conduct according to the dictates of reason and
free-will.