The best edition of the works of Athanasius is the so-called Maurine edition of Bernard de Montfaucon in 3 vols. (Paris, 1698); this was enlarged in the 3rd edition by Giustiniani (4 vols., Padua, 1777), and is printed in this form in Migne’sPatrologia, vols. xxv.-xxviii. An English translation of selections, with excellent introductions to the several writings, was published by Archibald Robertson in theLibrary of the Nicene and Post-Nicene Fathers, second series, vol. 4 (Oxford and New York, 1892). There is no biography satisfactory from the modern point of view. Studies preliminary to such a biography began to be published by E. Schwartz in his essays, “Zur Geschichte des Athanasius” (in theNachrichten der koniglichen Gesellschaft der Wissenschaften zu Göttingen, 1904, &c.). The life of Athanasius, however, is so completely intertwined with the history of his time that it is permissible to refer, for a knowledge of him, to the general descriptions which will be found at the close of the articleArius. Of the older literature, Tillemont’sMémoires pour servir à l’histoire ecclésiastique des six premiers siècles, vols. vi. and viii., are still a mine of material for the historian. Of the newer literature the following deserve to be read:—Johann Adam Möhler,Athanasius der Grosse und die Kirche seiner Zeit, 2 vols. (2nd ed., Mainz, 1844); and Fr. Boehringer, “Arius und Athanasius,”Die Kirche Christi und ihre Zeugen, vol. i. part 2 (2nd ed., Stuttgart, 1874).
The best edition of the works of Athanasius is the so-called Maurine edition of Bernard de Montfaucon in 3 vols. (Paris, 1698); this was enlarged in the 3rd edition by Giustiniani (4 vols., Padua, 1777), and is printed in this form in Migne’sPatrologia, vols. xxv.-xxviii. An English translation of selections, with excellent introductions to the several writings, was published by Archibald Robertson in theLibrary of the Nicene and Post-Nicene Fathers, second series, vol. 4 (Oxford and New York, 1892). There is no biography satisfactory from the modern point of view. Studies preliminary to such a biography began to be published by E. Schwartz in his essays, “Zur Geschichte des Athanasius” (in theNachrichten der koniglichen Gesellschaft der Wissenschaften zu Göttingen, 1904, &c.). The life of Athanasius, however, is so completely intertwined with the history of his time that it is permissible to refer, for a knowledge of him, to the general descriptions which will be found at the close of the articleArius. Of the older literature, Tillemont’sMémoires pour servir à l’histoire ecclésiastique des six premiers siècles, vols. vi. and viii., are still a mine of material for the historian. Of the newer literature the following deserve to be read:—Johann Adam Möhler,Athanasius der Grosse und die Kirche seiner Zeit, 2 vols. (2nd ed., Mainz, 1844); and Fr. Boehringer, “Arius und Athanasius,”Die Kirche Christi und ihre Zeugen, vol. i. part 2 (2nd ed., Stuttgart, 1874).
(G. K.)
ATHAPASCAN,a widely distributed linguistic stock of North American Indians, the chief tribes included being the Chippewyan, Navajo, Apache, Jicarilla, Lipan, Hupa and Wailaki. The Athapascan family is geographically divided into Northern, Pacific and Southern. The Northern division (Tinneh or Déné) is about Alaska, and the Yukon and Mackenzie rivers,—the eponymous “Athabasca” tribe living round Lake Athabasca, in the province of Alberta in Canada. The Pacific division covers a strip of territory, some 400 m. in length, from Oregon southwards into California. The Southern division includes Arizona and New Mexico, parts of Utah, Colorado, Kansas and Texas, and the northern part of Mexico. The typical tribes are those of the Northern division.
SeeHandbook of American Indians(Washington, 1907).
SeeHandbook of American Indians(Washington, 1907).
ATHARVA VEDA,the fourth book of the Vedas, the ancient scriptures of the Brahman religion. Like the other Vedas it is divided into Samhita, Brahmanas and Upanishads, representing the spiritual element and its magical and nationalistic development. The mantras or sayings composing the Samhita of the Atharva Veda differ from those of the other Vedas by being in the form of spells rather than prayers or hymns, and seem to indicate a stage of religion lower than that of the Rig Veda.
ATHEISM(from Gr.ἀ-, privative, andθεός, God), literally a system of belief which denies the existence of God. The term as generally used, however, is highly ambiguous. Its meaning varies (a) according to the various definitions of deity, and especially (b) according as it is (i.) deliberately adopted by a thinker as a description of his own theological standpoint, or (ii.) applied by one set of thinkers to their opponents. As to (a), it is obvious that atheism from the standpoint of the Christian is a very different conception as compared with atheism as understood by a Deist, a Positivist, a follower of Euhemerus or Herbert Spencer, or a Buddhist. But the ambiguities arising from the points of view described in (b) are much more difficult both intellectually and in their practical social issues. Thus history shows how readily the term has been used in the most haphazard manner to describe even the most trivial divergence of opinion concerning points of dogma. In other words, “atheism” has been used generally by the orthodox adherents of one religion, or even of a single sect, for all beliefs which are different or even differently expressed. It is in fact in these cases, like “heterodoxy,” a term of purely negative significance, and its intellectual value is of the slightest. The distinction between the terms “religion” and “magic” is, in a similar way, often due merely to rivalry between the adherents of two or more mutually exclusive religions brought together in the same community. When the psalmist declares that “the fool hath said in his heart, there is no God,” he probably does not refer to theoretical denial, but to a practical disbelief in God’s government of human affairs, shown in disobedience to moral laws. Socrates was charged with “not believing in the gods the city believes in.” The cry of the heathen populace in the Roman empire against the Christians was “Away with the atheists! To the lions with the Christians!” The ground for the charge was probably the lack of idolatry in all Christian worship. Spinoza, for whom God alone existed, was persecuted as an atheist. A common designation of Knox was “the atheist,” although it was to him “matter of satisfaction that our most holy religion is founded on faith, not on reason.”
In its most scientific and serious usage the term is applied to that state of mind which does not find deity (i.e.either one or many gods) in or above the physical universe. Thus it has been applied to certain primitive savages, who have been thought (e.g.by Lord Avebury in hisPrehistoric Times) to have no religious belief; it is, however, the better opinion that there are no peoples who are entirely destitute of some rudimentary religious belief. In the second place, and most usually, it is applied to a purely intellectual, metaphysical disbelief in the existence of any god, or of anything supernatural. In this connexion it is usual to distinguish three types of atheism:—thedogmatic, which denies the existence of God positively; thesceptical, which distrusts the capacity of the human mind to discover the existence of God; and thecritical, which doubts the validity of the theistic argument, the proofs for the existence of God. That the first type of atheism exists, in spite of the denials of those who favour the second or the third, may be proved by the utterances of men like Feuerbach, Flourens or Bradlaugh. “There is no God,” says Feuerbach, “it is clear as the sun and as evident as the day that there is no God, and still more that there can be none.” With greater passionFlourens declares “Our enemy is God. Hatred of God is the beginning of wisdom. If mankind would make true progress, it must be on the basis of atheism.” Bradlaugh maintained against Holyoake that he would fight until men respected the name “atheist.” The answer to dogmatic atheism, that it implies infinite knowledge, has been well stated in John Foster’sEssays, and restated by Chalmers in hisNatural Theology, and its force is recognized in Holyoake’s careful qualification of the sense in which secularism accepts atheism, “always explaining the term atheist to mean ‘not seeing God’ visually or inferentially, never suffering it to be taken for anti-theism, that is, hating God, denying God—ashatingimplies personal knowledge as the ground of dislike, anddenyingimplies infinite knowledge as the ground of disproof.” But dogmatic atheism is rare compared with the sceptical type, which is identical with agnosticism (q.v.) in so far as it denies the capacity of the mind of man to form any conception of God, but is different from it in so far as the agnostic merely holds his judgment in suspense, though, in practice, agnosticism is apt to result in an attitude towards religion which is hardly distinguishable from a passive and unaggressive atheism. The third or critical type may be illustrated byA Candid Examination of Theismby “Physicus” (G.J. Romanes), in which the writer endeavours to establish the weakness of the proofs for the existence of God, and to substitute for theism Spencer’s physical explanation of the universe, and yet admits how unsatisfying to himself the new position is. “When at times I think, as think at times I must, of the appalling contrast between the hallowed glory of that creed which once was mine, and the lonely mystery of existence as now I find it—at such times I shall ever feel it impossible to avoid the sharpest pang of which my nature is susceptible.”
Atheism has to meet the protest of the heart as well as the argument of the mind of mankind. It must be judged not only by theoretical but by practical arguments, in its relations either to the individual or to a society. Voltaire himself, speaking as a practical man rather than as a metaphysician, declared that if there were no God it would be necessary to invent one; and if the analysis is only carried far enough it will be found that those who deny the existence of God (in a conventional sense) are all the time setting up something in the nature of deity by way of an ideal of their own, while fighting over the meaning of a word or its conventional misapplication.
ATHELM(d. 923), English churchman, is said to have been a monk of Glastonbury before his elevation in 909 to the see of Wells, of which he was the first occupant. In 914 he became archbishop of Canterbury.
ATHELNEY,a slight eminence of small extent in the low level tract about the junction of the rivers Tone and Parrett in Somersetshire, England. It was formerly isolated by marshes and accessible only by boat or artificial causeway, and under these conditions it gained its historical fame as the retreat of King Alfred in 878-879 when he was unable to withstand the incursions of the Danes. After regaining his throne he founded a monastery here in gratitude for the retreat afforded him by the island; no traces of it exist above ground, but remains have been excavated. There was also found here, in 1693, the celebrated Alfred jewel, bearing his name, and preserved in the Ashmolean Museum at Oxford. An inscribed pillar commemorating the king was set up in 1801. The name of Athelney signifies the Isle of Princes (A.S.Æthelingaea). Athelney is a railway station on a branch of the Great Western line.
ATHENA(the Attic form of the Homeric Athene, also called Athenaia, Pallas Athene, Pallas), one of the most important goddesses in Greek mythology. With Zeus and Apollo, she forms a triad which represents the embodiment of all divine power. No satisfactory derivation of the name Athena has been given1; Pallas, at first an epithet, but after Pindar used by itself, may possibly be connected withπαλλακή(“maiden”). Athena has been variously described as the pure aether, the storm-cloud, the dawn, the twilight; but there is little evidence that she was regarded as representing any of the physical powers of nature, and it is better to endeavour to form an idea of her character and attributes from a consideration of her cult-epithets and ritual. According to the legend, her father Zeus swallowed his wife Metis (“counsel”), when pregnant with Athena, since he had been warned that his children by her might prove stronger than himself and dethrone him. Hephaestus (or Prometheus) subsequently split open his head with a hatchet, and Athena sprang forth fully armed, uttering a loud shout of victory (Hesiod,Theogony, 886; Pindar,Olympia, vii. 35). In Crete she was said to have issued from a cloud burst asunder by Zeus. According to Roscher, the manner of her birth represents the storm-cloud split by lightning; Farnell (Cults of the Greek States, i. p. 285) sees in it an indication that, as the daughter of Metis, Athena was already invested with a mental and moral character, and explains the swallowing of Metis (for which compare the story of Cronus and his children) by the desire to attribute an extraordinary birth to one in whom masculine traits predominated. In another account (asΤριτογένεια) she is the daughter of the river Triton, to which various localities were assigned, and wherever there was a river (or lake) of that name, the inhabitants claimed that she was born there. It is probable that the name originated in Boeotia (C.O. Müller,Geschichten hellenischer Stamme, i. pp. 351-357; but see Macan on Herodotus, iv. 180), whence it was conveyed by colonists to Cyrene and thence to Libya, where there was a river Triton. Here some local divinity, a daughter of Poseidon, connected with the water and also of a warlike character, was identified by the colonists with their own Athena. In any case, it is fairly certain that Tritogeneia means “water-born,” although an old interpretation derived it fromτριτώ, a supposed Boeotian word meaning “head,” which further points to the name having originated in Boeotia. Roscher suggests that the localization of her birthplace in the extreme west points to the western sea, the home of cloud and storm.
In Homer Athena already appears as the goddess of counsel, of war, of female arts and industries, and the protectress of Greek cities, this last aspect of her character being the most important and pronounced. Hence she is calledπολιάς,πολιοῦχος, in many Greek states, and is frequently associated withΖεὺς πολιεύς. The most celebrated festival of the city-goddess was the Panathenaea at Athens and other places. Other titles of kindred meaning areἀρχηγέτις(“founder”) andπαναχαἶς, the protectress of the Achaean league. At Athens she presided over the phratries or clans, and was known asἀπατουρίαandφρατρία, and sacrifice was offered to her at the festival Apaturia. The titleμήτηρ, given her by the inhabitants of Elis, whose women, according to the legend, she had blessed with abundance of children, seems at variance with the generally-recognized conception of her asπαρθένος; butμήτηρmay bear the same meaning asκουροτρόφος, the fosterer of the young, in harmony with her aspect as protectress of civic and family life. At Alalcomenae, near the Tritonian lake in Boeotia, she wasἀλαλκομενηἶς(“defender”). Her temple, which was pillaged by Sulla, contained an ivory image, which was said to have fallen from heaven. The inhabitants claimed that the goddess was born there and brought up by a local hero Alalcomeneus. Her images, called Palladia, which guarded the heights (cf. her epithetsἀκρία, κραναία), represented her with shield uplifted, brandishing her spear to keep off the foe. The cult of Athena Itonia, whose earliest seat appears to have, been amongst the Thessalians, who used her name as a battle-cry, made its way to Coronea in Boeotia, where her sanctuary was the seat of the Pamboeotian confederacy. The meaning of Itonia is obscure: Dümmler connects it withἰτεῶνες, the “willow-beds” on the banks of the river Coralios (the riverof the maiden,i.e.Athena); Jebb (on Bacchylides,fr.xi. 2) suggests a derivation fromίέναι, the goddess of the “onset.” At Thebes she was worshipped as Athena Onka or Onga, of equally uncertain derivation (possibly fromὄγκος, “a height”). Peculiar to Arcadia is the title Athena Alea, probably = “warder off of evil,” although others explain it as = “warmth,” and see in it an allusion to her physical nature as one of the powers of light. Farnell (Cults, p. 275) points out that at the same time she is certainly looked upon as in some way connected with the health-divinities, since in her temple she is grouped with Asclepius and Hygieia (seeHygieia).
She already appears as the goddess of counsel (πολύβουλος) in theIliadand in Hesiod. The Attic bouleutae took the oath by Athena Boulaia; at Sparta she wasἀγοραία, presiding over the popular assemblies in the market-place; in Arcadiaμηχανῖτιςthe discoverer of devices. The epithetπρονοία(“forethought”) is due, according to Farnell, to a confusion withπροναία, referring to a statue of the goddess standing “before a shrine,” and arose later (probably spreading from Delphi), some time after the Persian wars, in which she repelled a Persian attack on the temples “by divine forethought”; another legend attributes the name to her skill in assisting Leto at the birth of Apollo and Artemis. With this aspect of her character may be compared the Hesiodic legend, according to which she was the daughter of Metis. Her connexion with the trial of Orestes, the introduction of a milder form of punishment for justifiable homicide, and the institution of the courtτὸ ἐπὶ Παλλαδίῴ, show the important part played by her in the development of legal ideas.
The protectress of cities was naturally also a goddess of war. As such she appears in Homer and Hesiod and in post-Homeric legend as the slayer of the Gorgon and taking part in the battle of the giants. On numerous monuments she is represented asἀρεία, “the warlike,”νικηφόρος, “bringer of victory,” holding an image of Nike (q.v.) in her outstretched hand (for other similar epithets see Roscher’sLexikon). She was also the goddess of the arts of war in general;στοιχεία, she who draws up the ranks for battle,ζωστηρία, she who girds herself for the fray. Martial music (cp.Ἀθήνη σάλπιγξ, “trumpet”) and the Pyrrhic dance, in which she herself is said to have taken part to commemorate the victory over the giants, and the building of war-ships were attributed to her. She instructed certain of her favourites in gymnastics and athletics, as a useful training for war. The epithetsἱππία,χαλινῖτις,δαμάσιππος, usually referred to her as goddess of war-horses, may perhaps be reminiscences of an older religion in which the horse was sacred to her. As a war-goddess, she is the embodiment of prudent and intelligent tactics, entirely different from Ares, the personification of brute force and rashness, who is fitly represented as suffering defeat at her hands. She is the patroness and protectress of those heroes who are distinguished for their prudence and caution, and in the Trojan War she sides with the more civilized Greeks.
The goddess of war develops into the goddess of peace and the pursuits connected with it. She is prominent as the promoter of agriculture in Attic legend. The Athenian hero Erechtheus (Erichthonius), originally an earth-god, is her foster-son, with whom she was honoured in the Erechtheum on the Acropolis. Her oldest priestesses, the dew-sisters—Aglauros, Herse, Pandrosos—signify the fertilization of the earth by the dew, and were probably at one time identified with Athena, as surnames of whom both Aglauros and Pandrosos are found. The story of the voluntary sacrifice of the Attic maiden Aglauros on behalf of her country in time of war (commemorated by the ephebi taking the oath of loyalty to their country in her temple), and of the leap of the three sisters over the Acropolis rock (seeErechtheus), probably points to an old human sacrifice. Athena also gave the Athenians the olive-tree, which was supposed to have sprung from the bare soil of the Acropolis, when smitten by her spear, close to the horse (or spring of water) produced by the trident of Poseidon, to which he appealed in support of his claim to the lordship of Athens. She is also connected with Poseidon in the legend of Erechtheus, not as being in any way akin to the former in nature or character, but as indicating the contest between an old and a new religion. This god, whose worship was introduced into Athens at a later date by the Ionian immigrants, was identified with Erechtheus-Erichthonius (for whose birth Athena was in a certain sense responsible), and thus was brought into connexion with the goddess, in order to effect a reconciliation of the two cults. Athena was said to have invented the plough, and to have taught men to tame horses and yoke oxen. Various arts were attributed to her—shipbuilding, the goldsmith’s craft, fulling, shoemaking and other branches of industry. As early as Homer she takes especial interest in the occupations of women; she makes Hera’s robe and her own peplus, and spinning and weaving are often called “the works of Athena.” The custom of offering a beautifully woven peplus at the Panathenaic festival is connected with her character as Ergane the goddess of industry.2As patroness of the arts, she is associated with Hephaestus (one of her titles isἩφαιστία) and Prometheus, and in Boeotia she was regarded as the inventress of the flute. According to Pindar, she imitated on the flute the dismal wail of the two surviving Gorgons after the death of Medusa. The legend that Athena, observing in the water the distortion of her features caused by playing that instrument, flung it away, probably indicates that the Boeotians whom the Athenians regarded with contempt, used the flute in their worship of the Boeotian Athena. The story of the slaying of Medusa by Athena, in which there is no certain evidence that she played a direct part, explained by Roscher as the scattering of the storm-cloud, probably arose from the fact that she is represented as wearing the Gorgon’s head as a badge.
As in the case of Aphrodite and Apollo, Roscher in hisLexikondeduces all the characteristics of Athena from a single conception—that of the goddess of the storm or the thunder-cloud (for a discussion of such attempts see Farnell,Cults, i. pp. 3, 263). There seems little reason for regarding her as a nature-goddess at all, but rather as the presiding divinity of states and cities, of the arts and industries—in short, as the goddess of the whole intellectual side of human life.
Except at Athens, little is known of the ceremonies or festivals which attended her worship. There we have the following. (1) The ceremony of theThree Sacred Ploughs, by which the signal for seed-time was given, apparently dating from a period when agriculture was one of the chief occupations of her worshippers. (2) TheProcharisteriaat the end of winter, at which thanks were offered for the germination of the seed. (3) TheScirophoria, with a procession from the Acropolis to the village of Skiron, in the height of summer, the priests who were to entreat her to keep off the summer heat walking under the shade of parasols (σκίρον) held over them; others, however, connect the name withσκῖρος(“gypsum”), perhaps used for smearing the image of the goddess. (4) TheOschophoria, at the vintage season, with races among boys, and a procession, with songs in praise of Dionysus and Ariadne. (5) TheChalkeia(feast of smiths), at which the birth of Erechtheus and the invention of the plough were celebrated. (6) ThePlynteriaandCallynteria, at which her ancient image and peplus in the Erechtheum and the temple itself were cleaned, with a procession in which bunches of figs (frequently used in lustrations) were carried. (7) TheArrhephoriaorErrephoria(perhaps =Ersephoria, “dew-bearing”), at which four girls, between seven and eleven years of age, selected from noble families, carried certain unknown sacred objects to and from the temple of Aphrodite “in the gardens” (see J.E. Harrison,Classical Review, April 1889). (8) ThePanathenaea, at which the new robes for the image of he goddess were carried through the city, spread like a sail on a mast. The reliefs of the frieze of the cella of the Parthenon enable us to form an idea of the procession. Athletic games, open to all who traced their nationality to Athens, were part of this festival. Mention should also be made of the Argiveceremony, at which thexoanon(ancient wooden statue) of Athena was washed in the river Inachus, a symbol of her purification after the Gigantomachia.
The usual attributes of Athena were the helmet, the aegis, the round shield with the head of Medusa in the centre, the lance, an olive branch, the owl, the cock and the snake. Of these the aegis, usually explained as a storm-cloud, is probably intended as a battle-charm, like the Gorgon’s head on the shield and the faces on the shields of Chinese soldiers; the owl probably represents the form under which she was worshipped in primitive times, and subsequently became her favourite bird (the epithetγλαυκῶπις, meaning “keen-eyed” in Homer, may have originally signified “owl-faced”); the snake, a common companion of the earth deities, probably refers to her connexion with Erechtheus-Erichthonius.
As to artistic representations of the goddess, we have first the rude figure which seems to be a copy of the Palladium; secondly, the still rude, but otherwise more interesting, figures of her, ase.g.when accompanying heroes, on the early painted vases; and thirdly, the type of her as produced by Pheidias, from which little variation appears to have been made. Of his numerous statues of her, the three most celebrated were set up on the Acropolis. (1) AthenaParthenos, in the Parthenon. It was in ivory and gold, and 30 ft. high. She was represented standing, in a long tunic; on her head was a helmet, ornamented with sphinxes and griffins; on her breast was the aegis, fringed with serpents and the Gorgon’s head in centre. In her right hand was a Nike or winged victory, while her left held a spear, which rested on a shield on which were represented the battles of the Amazons with the giants. (2) A colossal statue said to have been formed from the spoils taken at Marathon, the so-called AthenaPromachos. (3) AthenaLemnia, so called because it had been dedicated by the Athenian cleruchies in Lemnos. In this she was represented without arms, as a brilliant type of virgin beauty. The two last statues were of bronze. From the time of Pheidias calm earnestness, self-conscious might, and clearness of intellect were the main characteristics of the goddess. The eyes, slightly cast down, betoken an attitude of thoughtfulness; the forehead is clear and open; the mouth indicates firmness and resolution. The whole suggests a masculine rather than a feminine form.
From Greece the worship of Athena extended to Magna Graecia, where a number of temples were erected to her in various places. In Italy proper she was identified with Minerva (q.v.).
See articles in Pauly-Wissowa’sRealencyclopädie; W.H. Roscher’sLexikon der Mythologie; Daremberg and Saglio’sDictionnaire des antiquités(s.v. “Minerva”); L. Preller,Griechische Mythologie; W.H. Roscher, “Die Grundbedeutung der Athene,” inNektar und Ambrosia(1883); F.A. Voigt, “Beiträge zur Mythologie des Ares und Athena,” inLeipziger Studien, iv. (1881); L.R. Farnell,The Cults of the Greek States, i. (1896); J.E. Harrison,Prolegomena to the Study of Greek Religion(1903), for the festivals especially; O. Gruppe,Griechische Mythologie, ii. (1907). In the articleGreek Art, fig. 21 represents Athena in the act of striking a prostrate giant; fig. 38 a statuette of Athena Parthenos, a replica of the work of Pheidias.
See articles in Pauly-Wissowa’sRealencyclopädie; W.H. Roscher’sLexikon der Mythologie; Daremberg and Saglio’sDictionnaire des antiquités(s.v. “Minerva”); L. Preller,Griechische Mythologie; W.H. Roscher, “Die Grundbedeutung der Athene,” inNektar und Ambrosia(1883); F.A. Voigt, “Beiträge zur Mythologie des Ares und Athena,” inLeipziger Studien, iv. (1881); L.R. Farnell,The Cults of the Greek States, i. (1896); J.E. Harrison,Prolegomena to the Study of Greek Religion(1903), for the festivals especially; O. Gruppe,Griechische Mythologie, ii. (1907). In the articleGreek Art, fig. 21 represents Athena in the act of striking a prostrate giant; fig. 38 a statuette of Athena Parthenos, a replica of the work of Pheidias.
(J. H. F.)
1O. Gruppe (Griechische Mythologie, ii. p. 1194) thinks that it probably means “without mother’s milk,” either in an active or in a passive sense “not giving suck,” or “unsuckled,” in her character as the virgin goddess, or as springing from the head of Zeus. In support of this view he refers to Hesychiusθήνιον γάλαand a passage in Athenagoras (Legatio pro Christianis, 17), where it is stated that Athena was sometimes calledἈθηλᾶorἈθήλη. For Pallas, he prefers the old etymology fromπάλλω(to “shake”), rather in the sense of “earth-shaker” than “lance-brandisher.”2According to J.E. Harrison in Classical Review (June 1894), Athena Ergane is the goddess of the fruits of the field and the procreation of children.
1O. Gruppe (Griechische Mythologie, ii. p. 1194) thinks that it probably means “without mother’s milk,” either in an active or in a passive sense “not giving suck,” or “unsuckled,” in her character as the virgin goddess, or as springing from the head of Zeus. In support of this view he refers to Hesychiusθήνιον γάλαand a passage in Athenagoras (Legatio pro Christianis, 17), where it is stated that Athena was sometimes calledἈθηλᾶorἈθήλη. For Pallas, he prefers the old etymology fromπάλλω(to “shake”), rather in the sense of “earth-shaker” than “lance-brandisher.”
2According to J.E. Harrison in Classical Review (June 1894), Athena Ergane is the goddess of the fruits of the field and the procreation of children.
ATHENAEUM,a name originally applied in ancient Greece (Ἀθήναιον) to buildings dedicated to Athena, and specially used as the designation of a temple in Athens, where poets and men of learning were accustomed to meet and read their productions. The academy for the promotion of learning which the emperor Hadrian built (aboutA.D.135) at Rome, near the Forum, was also called the Athenaeum. Poets and orators still met and discussed there, but regular courses of instruction were given by a staff of professors in rhetoric, jurisprudence, grammar and philosophy. The institution, later called Schola Romana, continued in high repute till the 5th century. Similar academies were also founded in the provinces and at Constantinople by the emperor Theodosius II. In modern times the name has been applied to various academies, as those of Lyons and Marseilles, and the Dutch high schools; and it has become a very general designation for literary clubs. It is also familiar as the title of several literary periodicals, notably of the London literary weekly founded in 1828.
ATHENAEUS,of Naucratis in Egypt, Greek rhetorician and grammarian, flourished about the end of the 2nd and the beginning of the 3rd centuryA.D.Suidas only tells us that he lived “in the times of Marcus”; but the contempt with which he speaks of Commodus (died 192) shows that he survived that emperor. Athenaeus himself states that he was the author of a treatise on thethratta—a kind of fish mentioned by Archippus and other comic poets—and of a history of the Syrian kings, both of which works are lost. We still possess theDeipnosophistae, which may mean dinner-table philosophers or authorities on banquets, in fifteen books. The first two books, and parts of the third, eleventh and fifteenth, are only extant in epitome, but otherwise we seem to possess the work entire. It is an immense storehouse of miscellaneous information, chiefly on matters connected with the table, but also containing remarks on music, songs, dances, games, courtesans. It is full of quotations from writers whose works have not come down to us; nearly 800 writers and 2500 separate writings are referred to by Athenaeus; and he boasts of having read 800 plays of the Middle Comedy alone. The plan of theDeipnosophistaeis exceedingly cumbrous, and is badly carried out. It professes to be an account given by the author to his friend Timocrates of a banquet held at the house of Laurentius (or Larentius), a scholar and wealthy patron of art. It is thus a dialogue within a dialogue, after the manner of Plato, but a conversation of sufficient length to occupy several days (though represented as taking place in one) could not be conveyed in a style similar to the short conversations of Socrates. Among the twenty-nine guests are Galen and Ulpian, but they are all probably fictitious personages, and the majority take no part in the conversation. If Ulpian is identical with the famous jurist, theDeipnosophistaemust have been written after his death (228); but the jurist was murdered by the praetorian guards, whereas Ulpian in Athenaeus dies a natural death. The conversation ranges from the dishes before the guests to literary matters of every description, including points of grammar and criticism; and they are expected to bring with them extracts from the poets, which are read aloud and discussed at table. The whole is but a clumsy apparatus for displaying the varied and extensive reading of the author. As a work of art it can take but a low rank, but as a repertory of fragments and morsels of information it is invaluable.
Editio princeps, Aldine, 1524; Casaubon, 1597-1600; Schweighäuser, 1801-1807; Dindorf, 1827; Meineke, 1859-1867; Kaibel, 1887-1890; English translation by Yonge in Bohn’sClassical Library.
Editio princeps, Aldine, 1524; Casaubon, 1597-1600; Schweighäuser, 1801-1807; Dindorf, 1827; Meineke, 1859-1867; Kaibel, 1887-1890; English translation by Yonge in Bohn’sClassical Library.
ATHENAGORAS,a Christian apologist of the 2nd centuryA.D., was, according to an emendator of the Paris Codex 451 of the 11th century, a native of Athens. The only sources of information regarding him are a short notice by Philip of Side, in Pamphylia (c.A.D.420), and the inscription on his principal work. Philip—or rather the compiler who made excerpts from him—says that he was at the head of an Alexandrian school (the catechetical), that he lived in the time of Hadrian and Antoninus, to whom he addressed hisApology, and that Clement of Alexandria was his pupil; but these statements are more than doubtful. The inscription on the work describes it as the “Embassy of Athenagoras, the Athenian, a philosopher and a Christian concerning the Christians, to the Emperors Marcus Aurelius Antoninus and Lucius Aurelius Commodus, &c.” This statement has given rise to considerable discussion, but from it and internal evidence the date of theApology(Πρεσβεία περὶ Χρίστιανῶν) may be fixed at aboutA.D.177. Athenagoras is also the author of a discourse on the resurrection of the body, which is not authenticated otherwise than by the titles on the various manuscripts. In theApology, after contrasting the judicial treatment of Christians with that of other accused persons, he refutes the accusations brought against the Christians of atheism, eating human flesh and licentiousness, and in doing so takes occasion to make a vigorous and skilful attack on pagan polytheism and mythology. The discourse on the resurrection answers objections to the doctrine, and attempts to prove its truth from considerations of God’s purpose in the creation of man, His justice and the nature of man himself. Athenagoras is a powerful and clear writer, who strives to comprehend his opponents’ views and isacquainted with the classical writers. He used theApologyof Justin, but hardly the works of Aristides or Tatian. His theology is strongly tinged with Platonism, and this may account for his falling into desuetude. His discussion of the Trinity has some points of speculative interest, but it is not sufficiently worked out; he regards the Son as the Reason or Wisdom of the Father, and the Spirit as a divine effluence. On some other points, as the nature of matter, the immortality of the soul and the principle of sin, his views are interesting.
Editions.—J.C. Th. Eg. de Otto,Corpus Apol. Christ. Saec.II. vol. vii. (Jena, 1857); E. Schwartz inTexte und Untersuchungen, iv. 2 (Leipzig, 1891).Translations.—Humphreys (London, 1714); B.P. Pratten (Ante-Nic. Fathers, Edinburgh, 1867).Literature.—A. Harnack,Gesch. der altchr. Litt.pp. 526-558, and similar works by O. Bardenhewer and A. Ehrhard; Herzog-Hauck,Realencyk.; G. Krüger,Early Chr. Lit.p. 130 (where additional literature is cited). In 1559 and 1612 appeared in French a work onTrue and Perfect Love, purporting to be a translation from the Greek of Athenagoras; it is a palpable forgery.
Editions.—J.C. Th. Eg. de Otto,Corpus Apol. Christ. Saec.II. vol. vii. (Jena, 1857); E. Schwartz inTexte und Untersuchungen, iv. 2 (Leipzig, 1891).
Translations.—Humphreys (London, 1714); B.P. Pratten (Ante-Nic. Fathers, Edinburgh, 1867).
Literature.—A. Harnack,Gesch. der altchr. Litt.pp. 526-558, and similar works by O. Bardenhewer and A. Ehrhard; Herzog-Hauck,Realencyk.; G. Krüger,Early Chr. Lit.p. 130 (where additional literature is cited). In 1559 and 1612 appeared in French a work onTrue and Perfect Love, purporting to be a translation from the Greek of Athenagoras; it is a palpable forgery.
ATHENODORUS,the name of two Stoic philosophers of the 1st centuryB.C., who have frequently been confounded.
1.Athenodorus Cananites(c.74B.C.-A.D.7), so called from his birthplace Canana near Tarsus (not Cana in Cilicia nor Canna in Lycaonia), was the son of one Sandon, whose name indicates Tarsian descent, not Jewish as many have held. He was a personal friend of Strabo, from whom we derive our knowledge of his life. He taught the young Octavian (afterwards Augustus) at Apollonia, and was a pupil of Posidonius at Rhodes. Subsequently he appears to have travelled in the East (Petra and Egypt) and to have made himself famous by lecturing in the great cities of the Mediterranean. Writing in 50B.C., Cicero speaks of him with the highest respect (cf.Ep. ad. Att., xvi. 11. 4, 14. 4), a fact which enables us to fix the date of his birth as not later than about 74. His influence over Augustus was strong and lasting. He followed him to Rome in 44, and is said to have criticized him with the utmost candour, bidding him repeat the letters of the alphabet before acting on an angry impulse. In later years he was allowed by Augustus to return to Tarsus in order to remodel the constitution of the city after the degenerate democracy which had misgoverned it under Boethus. He succeeded (c.15-10B.C.) in setting up a timocratic oligarchy in the imperial interest (seeTarsus). Sir W.M. Ramsay is inclined to attribute to the influence of Athenodorus the striking resemblances which can be established between Seneca and Paul, the latter of whom must certainly have been acquainted with his teachings. According to Eusebius and Strabo he was a learned scientist for his day, and some attribute to him a history of Tarsus. He helped Cicero in the composition of theDe Officiis. His works are not certainly known, and none are extant. (See Sir W.M. Ramsay in theExpositor, September 1906, pp. 268 ff.)
2.Athenodorus Cordylion, also of Tarsus, was keeper of the library at Pergamum, and was an old man in 47B.C.In his enthusiasm for Stoicism he used to cut out from Stoic writings passages which seemed to him unsatisfactory. He also settled in Rome, where he died in the house of the younger Cato.
Among others of the name may be mentioned (3)Athenodorus of Teos, who played the cithara at the wedding of Alexander the Great and Statira at Susa (324B.C.); (4) a Greek physician of the 1st centuryA.D., who wrote on epidemic diseases; and two sculptors, of whom (5) one executed the statues of Apollo and Zeus which the Spartans dedicated at Delphi after Aegospotami; and (6) the other was a son of Alexander of Rhodes, whom he helped in the Laocoon group.
Among others of the name may be mentioned (3)Athenodorus of Teos, who played the cithara at the wedding of Alexander the Great and Statira at Susa (324B.C.); (4) a Greek physician of the 1st centuryA.D., who wrote on epidemic diseases; and two sculptors, of whom (5) one executed the statues of Apollo and Zeus which the Spartans dedicated at Delphi after Aegospotami; and (6) the other was a son of Alexander of Rhodes, whom he helped in the Laocoon group.
ATHENRY,a market town of county Galway, Ireland, 14 m. inland (E.) from Galway on the Midland Great Western main line. Pop. (1901) 853. Its name is derived fromAth-na-riogh, the ford of kings; and it grew to importance after the Anglo-Norman invasion as the first town of the Burgs and Berminghams. The walls were erected in 1211 and the castle in 1238, and the remains of both are noteworthy. A Dominican monastery was founded with great magnificence by Myler de Bermingham in 1241, and was repaired by the Board of Works in 1893. Of the Franciscan monastery of 1464 little is left. The town returned two members to the Irish parliament from the time of Richard II. to the Union; but it never recovered from the wars of the Tudor period, culminating in a successful siege by Red Hugh O’Donnell in 1596.
ATHENS[Ἀθῆναι,Athenae, modern colloquial GreekἉθήνα], the capital of the kingdom of Greece, situated in 23° 44′ E. and 37° 58′ N., towards the southern end of the central and principal plain of Attica. The various theories with regard to the origin of the name are all somewhat unconvincing; it is conceivable that, with the other homonymous Greek towns, such as Athenae Diades in Euboea,Ἀθῆναιmay be connected etymologically withἄνθος, a flower (cf.Firenze, Florence); the patron goddess, Athena, was probably called after the place of her cult.
I. Topography and Antiquities
The Attic plain,τὸ πεδίον, slopes gently towards the coast of the Saronic Gulf on the south-west; on the east it is overlooked by Mount Hymettus (3369 ft.); on the north-east by Pentelicus or Brilessus (3635 ft.) from which, in ancient and modern times, an immense quantity of the finest marble has been quarried; on the north-west by Parnes (4636 ft.), a continuation of the Boeotian Cithaeron, and on the west by Aegaleus (1532 ft.), which descends abruptly to the bay of Salamis. In the centre of the plain extends from north-east to south-west a series of low heights, now known as Turcovuni, culminating towards the south in the sharply pointed Lycabettus (1112 ft.), now called Hagios Georgios from the monastery which crowns its summit. Lycabettus, the most prominent feature in the Athenian landscape, directly overhung the ancient city, but was not included in its walls; its peculiar shape rendered it unsuitable for fortification. The Turcovuni ridge, probably the ancient Anchesmus, separates the valley of the Cephisus on the north-west from that of its confluent, the Ilissus, which skirted the ancient city on the south-west. The Cephisus, rising in Pentelicus, enters the sea at New Phalerum; in summer it dwindles to an insignificant stream, while the Ilissus, descending from Hymettus, is totally dry, probably owing to the destruction of the ancient forests on both mountains, and the consequent denudation of the soil. Separated from Lycabettus by a depression to the south-west, through which flows a brook, now a covered drain (probably to be identified with the Eridanus), stands the remarkable oblong rocky mass of the Acropolis (512 ft.), rising precipitously on all sides except the western; its summit was partially levelled in prehistoric times, and the flat area was subsequently enlarged by further cutting and by means of retaining walls. Close to the Acropolis on the west is the lower rocky eminence of the Areopagus,Ἄρειος πάγος(377 ft.), the seat of the famous council; the name (see alsoAreopagus) has been connected with Ares, whose temple stood on the northern side of the hill, but is more probably derived from theἉραίor Eumenides, whose sanctuary was formed by a cleft in its north-eastern declivity. Farther west of the Acropolis are three elevations; to the north-west the so-called “Hill of the Nymphs” (341 ft.), on which the modern Observatory stands; to the west the Pnyx, the meeting-place of the Athenian democracy (351 ft.), and to the south-west the loftier Museum Hill (482 ft.), still crowned with the remains of the monument of Philópappus. A cavity, a little to the west of the Observatory Hill, is generally supposed to be the ancient Barathron or place of execution. To the south-east of the Acropolis, beyond the narrow valley of the Ilissus, is the hill Ardettus (436 ft.). The distance from the Acropolis to the nearest point of the sea coast at Phalerum is a little over 3 m.
The natural situation of Athens was such as to favour the growth of a powerful community. For the first requisites of a primitive settlement—food supply and defence—it afforded every advantage. The Attic plain, notwithstandingInfluence of the geographical position.the lightness of the soil, furnished an adequate supply of cereals; olive and fig groves and vineyards were cultivated from the earliest times in the valley of the Cephisus, and pasturage for sheep and goats was abundant. The surrounding rampart of mountains was broken towards thenorth-east by an open tract stretching between Hymettus and Pentelicus towards Marathon, and was traversed by the passes of Decelea, Phylé and Daphné on the north and north-west, but the distance between these natural passages and the city was sufficient to obviate the danger of surprise by an invading land force. On the other hand Athens, like Corinth, Megara and Argos, was sufficiently far from the sea to enjoy security against the sudden descent of a hostile fleet. At the same time the relative proximity of three natural harbours, Peiraeus, Zea and Munychia, favoured the development of maritime commerce and of the sea power which formed the basis of Athenian hegemony. The climate is temperate, but liable to sudden changes; the mean temperature is 63°.1 F., the maximum (in July) 99°.01, the minimum (in January) 31°.55. The summer heat is moderated by the sea-breeze or by cool northerly winds from the mountains (especially in July and August). The clear, bracing air, according to ancient writers, fostered the intellectual and aesthetic character of the people and endowed them with mental and physical energy. For the architectural embellishment of the city the finest building material was procurable without difficulty and in abundance; Pentelicus forms a mass of white, transparent, blue-veined marble; another variety, somewhat similar in appearance, but generally of a bluer hue, was obtained from Hymettus. For ordinary purposes grey limestone was furnished by Lycabettus and the adjoining hills; limestone from the promontory of Acté (the so-called “poros” stone), and conglomerate, were also largely employed. For the ceramic art admirable material was at hand in the district north-west of the Acropolis. For sculpture and various architectural purposes white, fine-grained marble was brought from Paros and Naxos. The main drawback to the situation of the city lay in the insufficiency of its water-supply, which was supplemented by an aqueduct constructed in the time of the Peisistratids and by later water-courses dating from the Roman period. A great number of wells were also sunk and rain-water was stored in cisterns.