XII

"Who sit deck'd out with flowers, and bearing robesOf saffron hue, and richly border'd o'erWith loose Cimmerian vests and circling sandals."

"Who sit deck'd out with flowers, and bearing robes

Of saffron hue, and richly border'd o'er

With loose Cimmerian vests and circling sandals."

Furthermore, they are fond of drink, and this vice is mercilessly satirized. The inexorable oath administered by Lysistrata to her comrades, in entering upon their crusade to bring about peace, is one which no Athenian woman would incur the penalty of breaking: "If I violate my pledge, may the cup be filled with water!"

Occasionally a man found he had married a wife who set aside his conjugal authority and ruled the household. Thus Strepsiades, the country gentleman of Aristophanes'sClouds, quarrelled with his luxurious, city-bred wife, of the aristocratic house of Megacles, over the naming of their son, which was the father's right, and, woman-like, she carried her point; and this son she brought up to despise his father's country ways and to squander his father's substance in horse racing.

Aristophanes was not the only comic poet who indulged in gibes at the female sex, for the object of comedy was to amuse, and the Athenian audience of men ever found delight in the portrayal of the weaknesses and foibles of the opposite sex. Even his predecessor Susarion, who was the first to compose comedy in verse, and is usually called the inventor of comedy, gave expression to the current abuse: "Hear, O ye people! Susarion says this, the son of Philinus, the Megarian, of Tripodiscus: women are an evil; and yet, my countrymen, one cannot set up house without evil; for to be married or not to be married is alike bad." It is unfortunate for our purpose that so little survives of the numberless plays of the Middle and New Comedy, especially the latter, for this comedy of manners presented a close and faithful picture of domestic life and would have been an almost inexhaustible mine of information on Attic life in general, full as it was of illustrations of the manners, feelings, prejudices, and ways of thinking of the Ancient Greeks.

The fragments preserved to us are sufficient, however, to give us glimpses of the manner in which woman was treated on the stage; and, while there was much harsh criticism, it is gratifying to note that her good qualities were at times recognized. Says the poet Antiphanes:

"What! when you court concealment, will you tellThe matter to a woman? Just as wellTell all the criers in the public squares I'Tis hard to say which of them louder blares."

"What! when you court concealment, will you tell

The matter to a woman? Just as well

Tell all the criers in the public squares I

'Tis hard to say which of them louder blares."

"Great Zeus," says another poet, "may I perish, if I ever spoke against woman, the most precious of all acquisitions. For if Medea was an objectionable person, surely Penelope was an excellent creature. Does anyone abuse Clytemnestra? I oppose the admirable Alcestis. But perhaps someone may abuse Phaedra; then I say, by Zeus! what a capital person was.... Oh, dear! the catalogue of good women is already exhausted, while there remains a crowd of bad ones that might be mentioned." "Woman's a necessary and undying evil," says Philemon; and in another fragment:

"A good wife's duty 'tis, Nicostratus,Not to command, but to obey her spouse;Most mischievous a wife who rules her husband."

"A good wife's duty 'tis, Nicostratus,

Not to command, but to obey her spouse;

Most mischievous a wife who rules her husband."

Menander, the greatest representative of the New Comedy, has been compared to a mirror, so clear were the images he presented of human life. His epigrammatic sayings are justly famous, and many of them refer to woman. "Manner, not money, makes a woman's charm," says he in one passage; and in another:

"When thou fair woman seest, marvel not;Great beauty's oft to countless faults allied."

"When thou fair woman seest, marvel not;

Great beauty's oft to countless faults allied."

"Where women are, there every ill is found," is still another disparaging sentiment, as is his repetition of the frequent gibe at marriage:

"Marriage, if truth be told (of this be sure),An evil is--but one we must endure."

"Marriage, if truth be told (of this be sure),

An evil is--but one we must endure."

Yet the poet was also appreciative of the good qualities in woman, as is seen in the sentiment: "A good woman is the rudder of her household;" with which we may compare the words of another poet:

"A sympathetic wife is man's chiefest treasure;"

and at times Menander notes how even a woman of serious faults may prove to be the greatest blessing:

"How burdensome a wife extravagant;Not as he would may he who's ta'en her live.Yet this of good she has: she bears him children;She watches o'er his couch, if he be sick,With tender care; she's ever by his sideWhen fortune frowns; and should he chance to die,The last sad rites with honor due she pays."

"How burdensome a wife extravagant;

Not as he would may he who's ta'en her live.

Yet this of good she has: she bears him children;

She watches o'er his couch, if he be sick,

With tender care; she's ever by his side

When fortune frowns; and should he chance to die,

The last sad rites with honor due she pays."

Surely a touching portraiture of woman's gentle ministry, and worthy to be compared with Scott's famous lines! In spite of the numerous complaints against woman, the plays of the New Comedy usually ended in a happy marriage--the wild youth falls in love with the penniless maiden, reforms, discovers her to be wellborn, and wins over the angry parent; then follow joyous wedding festivities, and happiness ever afterward. Such is the usual course of the plot. Satirical reflections on woman, especially when made in poetry, must not be taken too seriously; and where romantic love is also the theme for song, we may be sure that woman, though much abused, is yet tenderly regarded and highly esteemed among men.

A social movement for the emancipation of woman, which had occupied the attention of thinking men and women of Athens in the latter half of the fifth century before Christ, which had been started by Aspasia in her salon, which had been discussed by Socrates and the Socratics, especially Æschines, and which had brought about a battle royal between the dramatists Euripides and Aristophanes, naturally called for scientific treatment at the hands of the philosophers. The works of Plato, Aristotle, and Xenophon accordingly devote much space to the consideration of the Woman Question. The female sex, hitherto "accustomed to live cowed and in obscurity,"--as Plato puts it,--justly claimed more favorable conditions; and the philosophers who endeavored to bring about a better social status asserted that woman deserved proper recognition at the hands of men.

Plato had taken seriously to heart the lessons of the Peloponnesian War. He was keenly sensitive to the evils of democracy as then existent, and recognized the need of governmental and social reform. He felt that in the disregard of women at least half the citizen population had been neglected, and we have in his works the strongest assertion of the equality of the sexes.

"And so," he says, in one of his dialogues, "in the administration of a State, neither a woman as a woman nor a man as a man has any special function, but the gifts of nature are equally diffused in both sexes; all the pursuits of men are the pursuits of women also, and in all of these woman is only a lesser man." "Very true." "Then are we to impose all our enactments on men and none on women?" "That will never do." "One woman has a gift of healing, another not; one is a musician, another is not." "Very true." "And one woman has a turn for gymnastic and military exercises, while another is unwarlike and hates gymnastics." "Beyond question." "And one woman is a philosopher, and another is an enemy of philosophy; one has spirit, and another is without spirit." "This is also true."

From these premises, recognizing the diversity of gifts among women and the correspondence of their talents with those of men, though less in degree, Plato affirms that women should receive a training similar to that accorded to men; to them should be given the same education and assigned the same duties, though the lighter tasks should fall to them as being less strong physically.

"There shall be compulsory education," says Plato, in his Laws, "for females as well as males; they shall both go through the same exercises. I assert, without fear of contradiction, that gymnastic exercises and horsemanship are as suitable to women as to men. I further affirm that nothing can be more absurd than the practice which prevails in our country, of men and women not following the same pursuits with all their strength and with one mind, for thus the State, instead of being a whole, is reduced to a half."

The view of Plato, as stated in hisRepublic, which aroused the most hostile criticism was his theory of the community of women as well as of property. But this grew out of the fundamental thesis in his theory of government: that the State must be developed into a perfect unity. The family as a private possession disturbed this unity, and must therefore be dispensed with.

This theory, however, proved too extreme, even for Plato himself, and in his Laws he returns to the idea of marriage, but he follows the Spartan system by putting marriage under the constant surveillance of legislation. He wishes every man to contract that marriage which is most beneficial to the State, not that which is most pleasing to himself. He urges that people of opposing temperaments and of different conditions in life should wed,--the stronger with the weaker, the richer with the poorer,--"perceiving that the city ought to be well mingled, like a cup in which the maddening wine is hot and fiery, but, when chastened by a soberer god, receives a fair associate and becomes an excellent and temperate drink." By such arguments he endeavors to beguile the spirits of men into believing that the equability of their children's disposition is of more importance than equality when they marry.

The philosopher does not seem to see the humor in his proposal to bring together contrary natures, nor the pain he would inflict on the parties most concerned. With him the interest of the State is supreme, and to that everything must yield.

However, even amid such extreme doctrines we find wise counsel, inspired by a more practical and humane spirit. Plato finds fault with the prevailing custom of not giving young people an opportunity to become acquainted with each other before marriage; and he recognizes, from the excellent influence of the wife's activity in the home, how much she might contribute to the well-being of the State if she were taken out of seclusion and intimately associated with the life of her husband.

The woman's rights movement reached its high-water mark in the works of Plato. Thenceforth there were a gradual decline in the conception of woman's capacities and a lessening of the demands for her emancipation.

Aristotle is less generous than Plato in his concessions to woman. "The male is by nature superior, and the female inferior; the one rules, the other is ruled; this principle of necessity is extended to all mankind." Thus he asserts woman's inferiority to man and he insists upon her silent and passive obedience. The difference of functions and duties he bases upon difference of nature. "The temperance and courage of a man are other than those of a woman. For a man who is courageous only as a woman is will seem timid, and a woman will seem impudent if she has merely the reserve and modesty of an honest man. Thus, in a family, a woman's duties differ from a man's--his it is to acquire, hers to preserve." Each woman, however, has her part in the State, and should be prepared for it. "In women the qualities of the body are beauty and height; those of the soul are temperance and love of work, without baseness. An individual and a State should desire each of these qualities in both men and women." Yet, while asserting woman's inferiority, Aristotle recognizes the sanctity of marriage and of the family, and preaches to men faithfulness and regard and appreciation in their attitude toward women. In hisEthicshe dwells with delicacy on the affectionate regard husband and wife should each have for the other. They should bear with and encourage each other in all the events of life. And while he insists upon the limitations of woman's intelligence and reasoning powers, he yet recognizes her superiority to man in qualities of the heart; and when he wishes to give an example of disinterested and ideal affection, it is woman who serves as his model. On the whole, Aristotle draws a more pleasing picture of woman's character and position than Plato, in spite of the greater equality granted by the latter. Plato's philosophy was primarily the product of imagination, Aristotle's of experience; Plato was essentially theoretical, Aristotle practical. Hence the teachings of the Stagirite were doubtless based on examples of conjugal unity and felicity which he saw about him, and he extended to the Athenian people in general the views of marital relations that prevailed in his own circle.

Xenophon's treatise onDomestic Economywas probably intended to be a contribution to the current discussion of the Woman Question; in it he sought to prove the falsity of the views of Plato and Aristotle, who advocated greater freedom for woman, and at the same time endeavored to reform existing conditions without materially changing them. In hisRecollections of Socrates, he expresses, as the views of that philosopher, opinions of the high value of the sex, but only in purely domestic relations. Socrates insists upon reverence for and obedience to the mother, who watches over her children with tender affection and unwearied solicitude; who, when they are capable of receiving instruction, endeavors to instil into their minds the knowledge which will best conduce to their future welfare. "For the man who is wanting in respect to parents," he adds, "public punishments are appointed; the laws yield him no longer their protection, neither is he permitted any share in the administration; since they think no sacrifice offered by a hand so impious can be acceptable to the gods or beneficial to man." These and other passages show that the Socrates of Xenophon entertained very delicate sentiments regarding the domestic life. He saw in woman the diligent mother and industrious housekeeper, watchful of her house and its management. He leaves her in her seclusion, occupied with her quiet domestic duties, but at the same time he recognizes the charm as well as the usefulness of her presence in the home. Her economy, vigilance, and care are of inestimable value to her husband. He regards marriage as a union in which husband and wife have each his or her own duties as well as authority. His views are a contrast to those of his time, when the rights were all on one side, while on the other were only duty and submission.

TheDomestic Economyof Xenophon is but an exposition and illustration of the views which the author here attributes to Socrates. The most remarkable feature in Xenophon's system of woman training is the utter absence of any intellectual discipline. Manifestly, he did not believe in the mental equality of the sexes. His was a purely industrial system of education, one merely designed to fit woman for the duties of the home.

It is not improbable that in this work is embodied the view which pleased the majority of the Athenian public regarding the aspirations of women. Thus, after more than half a century of discussion, the agitation for the emancipation of woman seems not to have accomplished any demonstrable change in her social life, but to have resolved itself merely into a plea for better equipment for her domestic duties. Yet even this was something gained; and if all the husbands of Athens were as conscientious as Ischomachus in training their wives for the duties of home, and gave them the companionship which such an education involved, there must have been marked improvement in the social status of woman.

Perhaps it was impossible for women to be accorded greater liberty of action while the ancient conception of the city-state obtained. Woman's harmonious development regularly keeps pace with her freedom, and the intellectual possibilities of the sex are only limited by the opportunities afforded. The men who were responsible for the system could hurl their shafts of satire at the uncultivated women confined to their apartments and their domestic cares; but whenever the least liberty of action was granted those women, they proved themselves fully equal to the men in intellectual capacity, and the Greek woman always exceeded her brothers in moral sublimity and unselfishness. The root of the evil was the system of government. Soon Philip and Alexander were to put an end with their legions to the exclusiveness of the city-state, and the Greek woman of the Hellenistic period was destined to enjoy greater freedom and greater influence.

More spiritual by nature, more inclined to mysticism, with keener intuitions, woman has ever taken a more prominent part in religious matters than man. Hence, even in such a country as Hellas, where woman was excluded from so many lines of human activity, we find that in religious observance she had equal freedom with man, and far exceeded him in devoutness and religious fervor. The Greeks, though they had only the light of nature to guide them, were essentially a spiritual people. They saw the hand of the Unseen everywhere manifesting itself in natural phenomena: they recognized divinities in the fertility of the soil, in the stars of the heavens, in the crystal waters of the spring, in the rain and in the storm cloud, in the winds of the forest. They even personified abstractions, and deified emotions and virtues. Nor were they merely content with inward piety, but endeavored in every way by outward observance to worship the deities which were the creations of their own myth-making faculties; and in all the religious ceremonials of the Greeks woman played a prominent role.

All the Greek peoples gloried in being of the same blood and language and religion. Though widely separated politically and engaged in endless wars among themselves, the chief bond of union known to them was the common cult of some divinity and participation in the same religious festivals. The oracles, the temples, the games, the processions in honor of their gods, tended to maintain the unity of Greece and were the promoters of national sentiment. Woman's part in these bonds of union made her influential in the welfare of the common country, and religious ceremonies were to her occasions in which she could feel herself an essential factor in Greek life.

In the childhood of the world, man, who reached conclusions by a long process of reasoning, stood in awe of the intuitive faculty in woman that enabled her to arrive at a truth without apparent effort. Hence the spirit of divination was thought to be inherent in the sex, and women were prophetesses from remote ages. Among pagan peoples, the earliest manifestations of the prophetic instinct in woman were recognized in the persons of certain seers to whom was given the name of Sibyls. The word in its etymology signifies the "will of God," and was applied to the inspired prophetesses of some deity, chiefly of Apollo. The Sibyls were generally represented as maidens, dwelling in lonely caverns or by sacred springs, who were possessed of the spirit of divination and gave forth prophetic utterances while under the influence of enthusiastic frenzy. Their number, their names, their countries, their times, are matters about which we have no certain knowledge; but twelve are mentioned by ancient writers, of whom three were certainly Greek--the Delphian, the Erythrean, and the Samian. Herophila, the Erythrean Sibyl, was the most celebrated of them all, and she is represented as wandering from her Ionian home, by manifold journeyings, to Cumæ, in Magna Græcia, whence she became known as the Cumæan Sibyl. She it was whom Æneas consulted before his descent into Hades, and who later sold to the last Tarquin the prophetic books. It was believed that her age reached a thousand years.

Women also were priestesses at the oracles of Hellas, which were seats of the worship of certain divinities, where prophecies were imparted to inquiring souls through the instrumentality of the attendants of the deity. The oldest and most venerated of the oracles was that of Zeus at Dodona, mentioned by Homer. Here, among the prophetic oaks, priestesses read the future in the rustling of the leaves and in the creaking of the branches, in the bubbling of a spring and in the sounds made by brazen cymbals hung near the sacred shrine. Herodotus visited this oracle, and gives the names of the three priestesses who officiated in his time. These priestesses--Promenia, Timarete, Nicandra--related to him a very interesting story concerning the origin of the oracle. They traced its sacred legends back to the worship in the famous temple of Thebes in Egypt. Two doves, they said, flew away one day from the city of Thebes and took their flight into distant lands. One alighted in Libya, on the spot where the oracle of Jupiter Ammon was later established; while the other, crossing the sea, flew as far as Dodona, where, perching on an oak, in human voice she commanded those that heard her to establish there an oracle of Zeus. For this reason the priestesses were known as Peliades, or doves. When, however, Herodotus inquired of the priests in Thebes about the tradition, they told a different story: that two priestesses of their temple had once been carried off from Egypt by the Phoenicians and sold into slavery, and that one of these priestesses finally established herself at Dodona. So, whether dove or priestess, the tradition of the Egyptian origin of the oracle seemed confirmed.

Apollo, however, rather than Zeus, was the god of prophecy, and it was generally in connection with his shrines that oracles were spoken. Usually, fountains whose water was supposed to influence the workings of the mind, or caverns whence escaped a gas producing delirium or hallucination, were regarded as places where the divinity was present. Hence there existed numerous oracles of Apollo in Greece proper and in Asia Minor. The most celebrated of the latter was the oracle of the Didymæan Apollo at Branchidæ, near Miletus, where a priestess uttered prophecies, seated on a wheel-shaped disk, after she had bathed the hem of her robe and her feet in the sacred spring and had breathed the vapors arising from it.

The most illustrious of all the oracles of ancient Hellas was at Delphi, which is situated, like a vast amphitheatre, above the beautiful plain of Cirrha in Phocis, with the double summits of Parnassus forming the background. Delphi became the centre of the Hellenic religion, and the fame of its oracle extended as far as to Lydia in the east, and to Rome and the Etruscans in the west. At first, a young maiden took the part of the priestess of Apollo who gave the responses; but the authorities realizing the dangers to which the beauty of the priestess might lead, a woman of at least fifty years of age was later selected for the honor, and finally, as one prophetess was not sufficient to answer the questions of the vast crowd of pilgrims that assembled to consult the oracle, three were chosen. The name given to the inspired priestess was always the same, that of Pythia.

To prepare the priestess for the ordeal which was to make known the will of the god, she was kept fasting for a number of days--a condition favorable to hallucinations, and then was given laurel leaves to chew because of their narcotic virtue. Then the Pythia was seated on a tripod, placed in the middle of the sanctuary, over an opening in the ground whence mephitic vapors were escaping. Her head was crowned with a garland made from the tree of Apollo, and about the tripod coiled a snake, the emblem of the art of divination. The exhalations from the abyss were deemed to be the very breath of the god, with which he inspired his priestess. Soon she grew pale and trembled with convulsive movements; her only utterances at first were groans and sighs; and now, with eyes aflame, with hair dishevelled, and with foam on her lips, amid shrieks of anguish she gave forth a few incoherent, disconnected words. The god had at last spoken through his priestess. The words were carefully written down by the attendant priest, who gave a rhythmic form to the response, and thus a revelation of the future was made known to the anxious inquirer.

The Pythia was consulted by all the peoples of Greece, as well as by kings and strangers from foreign lands. Colonies to Italy, to Africa, to the regions about the Black Sea, were sent at her command; she sanctioned laws; she taught Lycurgus that the best laws were those which obliged rulers to rule well and subjects to obey well. To the conquered, she counselled resignation and hope. Peoples lusting for conquest, she bade revive their piety toward the gods and seek the mercy of heaven by showing themselves merciful. She was also the guardian of individual morality. To a king desiring peace of mind, she declared that his unhappiness was due to his and his predecessors' wrong-doings, and recommended the exercise of clemency when he returned home. Being asked: "Who is the happiest of men?" she replied: "Phædrus, who has died for his country," A man named Glaucus wished to withhold a treasure which had been confided to him, but decided first to get the sanction of the oracle; the Pythia revealed to him the woes reserved for the perjured. To the lot of Gyges, the wealthy and powerful king, she preferred that of a poor Arcadian farmer who cultivated his plot of ground in peace of mind. By pure and elevated moral teachings, the Pythia instructed the bands of pilgrims who assembled at Delphi. Such was the power in the hands of a woman. Frail and nervous, she yet represented a religious institution the most influential in the pagan world; she largely determined the destiny of Greeks and barbarians alike. The wisdom of this oracular centre is generally ascribed in modern times to the college of priests assembled at Delphi, who interpreted the responses of the Pythia; but, whatever the nature of the mechanism by which this oracle retained its influence for centuries, the people in general had, for ages, perfect faith that the responses came directly from the god of prophecy through his inspired priestess. It is undoubtedly true that the Greeks, as well as the Hindoos, Gauls, and Germans, attributed to woman the gift of second-sight; and the immaculate life which the Pythia was required to lead attests the fact that to receive the inspiration of the god of light there were needed a purity of heart and a devoutness of spirit which could only be found in a woman. Strange to say, it was the law that no woman could consult this oracle of Apollo, whose divine will was revealed through a woman; women could, however, indirectly receive a response through the mediation of a man.

The Greeks were fond of the pomp and splendor of religious festivals. They celebrated such festivals whenever occasion offered, and during their continuance all regular occupations ceased. Plato saw in the prevailing custom other advantages besides the purely religious effect. "The gods," he says, "touched with compassion for the human race, which nature condemns to labor, have provided for intervals of repose in the regular succession of festivals instituted in their own honor." These festivities were not only a feature of the national religion; they were the schools of patriotism, of poetry, and of art. Each city had its own special festivals, and there were also those national celebrations in which all people joined. Zeus was the national deity of the Greeks; Olympia was his most sacred seat; and the Olympian festival was the greatest event in Greece.

In the district of Elis, on the western side of the Peloponnesus, the river Alpheus, after dashing and splashing down the mountains of Arcadia, slackens its speed and meanders westwardly through the valley in fantastic curves and windings. Soon it meets the quiet waters of the Cladeus coming from the north. Between the two, and not far from their confluence, lie the wooded slopes of Mount Cronion. In the triangular space thus formed by the rivers and the mountain is situated the sacred grove known as the Altis, the hallowed precinct of Olympian Zeus. Here was his temple, and not far from it the shrine of his consort Hera; and just outside the sacred precinct lay the racecourse, where were celebrated the Olympic games which have made the name of Olympia famous throughout the world. This was the national centre of Greece, where citizens from all parts of the Greek world assembled to join in friendly contests of physical prowess and poetry and song. The situation was indeed a beautiful one. Northward and westward were the mountain peaks of Achæa and the high tablelands of Arcadia; southward, the rugged mountain chain of Messene; westward, the Ionian sea. The well-watered valley, bounded by undulating hills, was covered with luxuriant vegetation. The pine woods of Mount Cronion, the dense grove of plane trees within and about the sacred precinct, the vine, the olive and the myrtle of the valley, and the quiet waters of the sacred streams, were elements that constituted a landscape of indescribable beauty, renowned in ancient times and the delight of modern travellers.

The festival in honor of Olympian Zeus recurred every four years, at the time of the full moon following the summer solstice. Sacred heralds carried to all parts of the Greek world the official message announcing the festival, and a sacred truce was declared for a sufficient length of time to allow all desirous of doing so to attend the gathering and to return home. As the great day approached, men and youths, matrons and maidens, set out to take part in or to witness the various features of the festival. Cities sent sacred embassies, ortheoriæ, resplendent in purple and gold, bearing offerings to the god. Artists and poets, merchants and manufacturers, found in this gathering of the Greeks a great mart in which they could make known their talents or their wares and receive lucrative orders, the former for a statue or an ode, the latter for the sale of their merchandise. Tents stood in rows upon the plain, and everywhere were scenes of busy traffic or of social entertainment.

We are not concerned here with the various exercises that constituted the festival, nor with the games which were celebrated in the stadium, nor with the horse and chariot races in the hippodrome, except in so far as women were participants; and their part was but slight. When the games were held, a priestess of Demeter was present, seated on an altar of white marble opposite the umpires' seats, but she was the only woman to whom this privilege was granted. While their loved ones were contending in the stadium, mothers and wives and sisters had to remain on the southern bank of the Alpheus. Only one instance is recounted where this rule was broken. "Pherenice, daughter of a celebrated Rhodian wrestler, whose family boasted that they were descended from Hercules, could not bear to leave her son while the contest was going on, and disguising herself as a man, and pretending to be a teacher of gymnastics, she mingled with the groups of gymnasts. When her son was proclaimed victor, however, her feelings carried her away, and forgetful of prudence she rushed to embrace her child. In her haste her robes became disordered, and her sex was revealed. The law was explicit: every woman found within the sacred precinct was condemned to death. Nevertheless, the judges acquitted her, in recognition of the fame her family had won; but to prevent any repetition of the occurrence, the masters, as well as their pupils, had thenceforth to present themselves naked."

Women could, however, run their horses in the hippodrome and thus win a prize, as was done by Cynisca, daughter of Archidamnus, King of Sparta, who was the first woman that bred horses and gained a chariot victory at Olympia. After her, other women, chiefly Spartans, won Olympic victories, but none of them attained such fame as did Cynisca. So honored was she by her people that a shrine was erected to her at her death; there was also erected at Sparta a statue of the maiden Euryleon, who won an Olympic victory with a two-horse chariot.

Though excluded from the games at the great festival of Zeus, there were yet some games at Olympia in which women took part. These were a feature of the festival of Hera, whose temple was also in the Altis. At this festival, sixteen women, duly appointed, wove a robe for the goddess and conducted games called the Heræa, participated in by the maidens of Elis and surrounding districts. Pausanias thus describes the spectacle: "The games consist of a race between virgins. The virgins are not all of the same age; but the youngest run first, the next in age run next, and the eldest virgins run last of all. They run thus: their hair hangs down, they wear a shirt that reaches to a little above the knee, the right shoulder is bare to the breast. The course assigned to them for the contest is the Olympic stadium; but the course is shortened by about one-sixth of the stadium. The winners receive crowns of olive and a share of the cow which is sacrificed to Hera; moreover, they are allowed to dedicate statues of themselves, with their names engraved on them."

From a consideration of woman's part in the religious ceremonials at the national centres of Greece,--Delphi and Olympia,--we must now turn to Athens, with whose festive calendar we are much better acquainted. The Athenians were rightly characterized by the Apostle Paul as being very religious. In all parts of the city were temples and statues; according to one writer, it was easier to find there a god than a man. More than eighty days out of each year were given up to religious festivities. Pallas Athena, daughter of Zeus, was the patron goddess of Athens, and the Acropolis was her sacred precinct; but other deities were worshipped, even on the Acropolis, and throughout the city there were shrines to numberless gods and goddesses.

From earliest times, women were intimately associated with the worship of Athena. Varro preserves a tradition which records that it was women's votes that determined the choice of Athena over Poseidon as patron deity of Athens. Originally, women took part in the public councils with men and had a voice therein, and when the weighty question of the rivalry of the two divinities came up they outvoted the men by a majority of one in favor of the goddess. Poseidon was angered, and submerged the land of Attica. To appease the god, the citizens deprived the women of the right to vote and forbade them in future to transmit their names to their children and to be called Athenians. But though their political rights were thus sadly infringed and they were relegated to ignorance and obscurity, they retained their part in the exercises of religion, especially in the worship of their patron goddess. Little is known of the various priestesses of Athena, who figured so prominently in the art of Athens and who presided at the goddess's temples on the Acropolis. It was an important office and was always held by a woman of great wisdom, high moral character, and mature years. Under her direction were the maidens of the city who were chosen from time to time from the noblest families to take part in the festivals of the goddess. Pausanias gives us a glimpse of the duties of certain of these maidens, and we could wish that he had cleared up the mystery that surrounded their office. "Two maidens," said he, "dwell not far from the temple of the Polias; the Athenians call them Arrephoræ. They are lodged for a time with the goddess; but when the festival comes around, they perform the following ceremony by night. They put on their heads the things which the priestess of Athena gives them to carry, but what it is she gives is known neither to her who gives nor to them who carry. Now, there is in the city an enclosure, not far from the sanctuary of Aphrodite, called Aphrodite in the Gardens, and there is a natural underground descent through it. Down this way the maidens go. Below, they leave their burdens; and getting something else which is wrapped up, they bring it back. These maidens are then discharged and others are brought to the Acropolis in their stead." Other maidens resided for a time on the Acropolis, engaged in weaving the saffron-colored peplus which was to be presented to the goddess at the Great Panathenæa--the most brilliant festival of the Athenians. This was the highest honor that could be conferred on Athenian maidens, and while engaged in this work they shared in the deference shown the goddess. They dwelt with the great priestess, and were under her immediate direction when they appeared in public; they were clad in tunics of white, with cloaks of gold, and were universally recognized as votaries of Athena. It has been conjectured that the mysterious bundles which the Arrephoræ carried down from the Acropolis contained the remnants of the wool which had served to make the peplus of the preceding year, and that they brought back the material destined for the future peplus; but of this there is no positive evidence. Certain it is, however, that the garment intended for the goddess was a masterpiece of the textile art, woven of the finest fabrics and embroidered in gold with scenes of Athena battling with the gods against the giants, and of such other incidents as the State had judged worthy to figure beside her exploits. Athena was, among her many functions, also the goddess of weaving and other feminine arts, and as such had a shrine on the Acropolis, where she was worshipped under the title of Athena Ergane. Within this precinct were statues to Lysippe, Timostrata, and Aristomache, maidens thus honored because of their skill in womanly occupations.

For the origin of the Panathenæa--the greatest of Athenian festivals--we must go back to the heroic days of Athens when King Erechtheus dedicated on the Acropolis the archaic wooden statue of Athena, reputed to have fallen from heaven, and established the custom of offering to the image once a year a new mantle, embroidered by noble maidens of the city. Later, Theseus united the various tribes under one rule, with the Acropolis as its centre, A festival to celebrate this event was united with the festival to Athena, and the enlarged festival was known as the Panathenæa, symbolizing the union and political power of Athens and the sovereignty of the goddess. Pisistratus increased the splendor of this festival, and, in the golden days of Athens after the Persian War, Pericles added to its pomp and magnificence. He erected on the Acropolis an imposing temple to the goddess, the Parthenon, and placed within it her image of gold and ivory. The worship of Athena and the political supremacy of Athens now became synonymous. Her festival was the highest expression of the ideals of Athens in its greatest epoch. The greater Panathenaæ was Athens in its glory, possessed of an overflowing treasury, supreme among the States of Greece, the exponent of poetry and art and beauty.

There was great rejoicing when the sacred peplus was at length completed by the maidens, and there arrived the season of the festival, which was to culminate on Athena's birthday, the twenty-seventh of the month Boëdromion, which corresponded nearly to our September. The earlier days were spent in gymnastic games, horse and chariot races, and contests in music and poetry. On the fifth and last day occurred the most brilliant feature of the entire festival, the solemn procession which attended the delivery of the sacred peplus to the priestess of Athena that she might place it around the wooden image of the goddess. So important was this procession that Phidias selected it as the theme to be portrayed on the frieze of the Parthenon. The procession formed in the Outer Ceramicus, just outside the principal gate of the city, and the peplus was placed on a miniature ship (for which it served as a sail), which was set on wheels and drawn by sailors. Through the market place, round the western slope of the Areopagus, along its southern side, the procession wended its way till it reached the western approach to the Acropolis. Then the peplus was removed from the ship, and, borne by those chosen for this service, it was carried at the head of the procession up the western slope, through the Propylæa, and delivered to the magistrate appointed to receive it before the temple of Athena. The frieze of the Parthenon presents the most important details of the procession. Its western end shows the stage of preparation--the flower of Athenian youth and nobility preparing to mount or just mounting their steeds to join in the cavalcade. As we turn to the northern and southern sides, we observe that the procession has formed and is now in motion. The cavalcade is composed of youthful horsemen, who move forward in compact array, with all the dash and spirit of youth. Just ahead of the horsemen are the chariots, driven by their charioteers, with the warriors either standing by the driver or just stepping into the moving chariot. As the eastern end of the temple is approached, restlessness of movement gives place to solemnity, and impatient riders and charioteers are succeeded by more stately figures. Elderly men, bearers of olive branches; representatives of the foreign residents, carrying trays filled with offerings of cakes; attendants, bearing on their shoulders vessels filled with the sacred wine; musicians, playing on flutes or lyres-march in slow, measured steps. In advance of them are the cows and sheep led to sacrifice, conducted by a number of attendants.

The frieze on the eastern end of the temple represents the culmination of the festival. The crowning act is about to be performed, and the solemnity becomes absolute. Figures at one end are balanced by corresponding figures at the other, all advancing toward a common point. First come slowly moving maidens, who are carrying the sacrificial utensils--their noble birth manifesting itself in their dignity of demeanor. The five maidens in the rear bear the ewers used in the libations; those forming the central group carry, in pairs, large objects resembling candlesticks, whose uses are not definitely known; while in the lead, on each side, are two maidens, bearing nothing in their hands--probably the Arrephoræ, whose duties have been already performed. Both in costume and in coiffure these maidens represent what was characteristic of their age and sex in Athens during the supremacy of Pericles. Next comes a group of men, probably the magistrates appointed to await the arrival of the procession on the Acropolis. They border the seated divinities who have assembled to do honor to Athens at its greatest festival--seven figures on each side of the central slab, directly over the door of the temple, whereon is represented the climax of the solemn occasion,--the delivery of the new peplus to the priest or magistrate, whose office it was to receive it; while at his side stands the priestess of Athena, receiving from two attendants certain objects of unknown significance.

Other pieces of sculpture on the Acropolis magnify the office of woman in the religious ceremonials in honor of the patron goddess. One of the porticoes of the Erectheum represents maidens of dignified mien and great beauty holding up the entablature with perfect ease and stately grace. These figures are usually called Caryatides, a name applied by the architect Vitruvius to designate figures of this kind; he ascribes its origin to the destruction of the town of Carya, in the Peloponnesus, by the Athenians, because it espoused the Persian side, the women of the town being sold into slavery; but surely the Athenians would not have so honored the disgraced women of a hostile city. Could they not portray, in marble, the Arrephoric maidens, and could not the basket-like burdens on their heads represent the burdens which they carried down from the Acropolis, and those which they received instead? The Athenians, indeed, called the figures merelyKorai, or "the maidens."

Furthermore, excavations at Athens made in 1886 brought to light a number of statues of maidens, which now adorn one of the rooms of the Acropolis Museum. They are all of one type,--life-size figures of young women, all standing in the same attitude, with one arm extended from the elbow, while the other hand holds the long and elegant drapery close about the figure; their hair is elaborately arranged, and ringlets fall over their necks and shoulders. These statues are relics of days before the Persian War. The Persians sacked Athens in B.C. 480, and wrought general havoc on the Acropolis, burning temples, throwing down columns, demolishing statues. When the Athenians, flushed with victory, returned to their ruined homes, they regarded as unhallowed all that had been touched by the hands of the barbarian, and therefore, in building up anew the Acropolis as the sacred precinct of Athena, they extended and levelled its surface and filled in the hollows thus made with the debris of the Acropolis--architectural blocks, statues, and vessels; and these relics of pre-Persian art lay thus securely buried for ages, to be revealed to modern eyes by the pickaxe of the archæologist. Now, who are these maidens, standing in conventional pose, with regular and finely moulded features, and with richly adorned drapery and elaborate headdress? They cannot represent priestesses of Athena, for the priestess was always an elderly lady, who, after being chosen, held office for the rest of her life. Nor can they represent the goddess herself, for all her usual attributes--the ægis, the spear, the helmet, the snake--are absent. Hence we probably have in these statues portraits of votaries of Athena, young women of the aristocratic families of Athens, who placed statues of themselves in the sacred precinct of the goddess to serve as symbols of perpetual homage.

Finally, certain maidens of Athens of the Heroic Age were later deified and themselves given sacred precincts on the Acropolis. King Cecrops had three daughters--- Aglauros, Herse, and Pandrosus. When Erectheus, the son of Earth by Hephæstus, was born, half of his form being like that of a snake,--a sign of his origin,--the child was put into a chest by Athena, who then gave it to the daughters of Cecrops to take care of, at the same time forbidding them to open it. Aglauros and Herse disobeyed, and, in terror at the serpent-shaped child, went mad and threw themselves from the rock of the Acropolis. Pandrosus, the faithful maiden, was rewarded by being made the first priestess of Athena, and was later honored by having a sanctuary of her own, next to that of the goddess; while Aglauros had to rest content with a cavern on the northern slope of the Acropolis, near where she had thrown herself down.

The celebrations in honor of Dionysus, the god of luxuriant fertility and especially of the grape, were exceedingly simple at first, according to Plutarch, being merely "a rustic procession carrying a vine-wreathed jar and a basket of figs"; but later there was a festival at every stage in the growth of the grape and in the making of the wine, and especially at the approach of vintage time, and when the vintage was put into the press. There were processions and rustic dances, and all the usual features of the carnival, as the revellers became more and more under the influence of the god. In these revels, women consecrated to this divinity, and called Bacchantes or Mænads, formed a special group. The symbol of their worship was a thyrsus--a pole ending with a bunch of vine or ivy leaves, or with a pine cone and a fillet. At intervals the procession would stop, and one of the revellers would mount a wagon or a platform and recount to those below, disguised as Pans and Satyrs, the adventures of the god of wine and joy. From these rustic masquerades emerged in time both Tragedy and Comedy.

Of the festivals in the city, the Anthesteria, or Feast of Flowers, was of most interest to the fair sex. This festival occurred in the spring--when the preceding year's wine was tasted for the first time--and lasted three days. Its principal feature was the Feast of Beakers, which began at sunset with a great procession. Those who took part in it appeared, wearing wreaths of ivy and bearing torches, in the Outer Ceramicus. This festival was in the especial charge of the king-archon, and the wife of that magistrate played the chief role in the ceremonies. Maidens and matrons appeared, disguised as Horæ, Nymphs, or Bacchantes, and crowded round the triumphant car on which the ancient image of Dionysus, was conveyed to the town. At a certain stage in the procession, the king-archon's wife, known as the Basilissa, was given a seat in the car, beside the image of Dionysus, for on this day she was the symbolical bride of the god. Thus, on this joyous wedding day, the nuptial procession conducted the car to the temple of the god in Limnai.

In the inmost shrine of the temple a mystic sacrifice for the welfare of the State was offered by the Basilissa and the fourteen ladies of honor expressly appointed by the archon for this purpose. After the sacrifice, with which numerous secret ceremonies were connected, the mystic union of Dionysus, and the Basilissa was celebrated, symbolizing the sacred marriage of the god with his much-loved city. On the following day, among other ceremonies, the ladies of honor offered sacrifices to Dionysus, on various specially erected altars.

These were joyous occasions; there were, however, sombre Dionysia, which were celebrated by night, in the winter season, when the god was thought to be absent or dead; because the vine was then withered and lifeless. Such celebrations commemorated only grief and regret. At this season, women of Athens left their homes and sought the slopes of Mount Parnassus, to join the women of Delphi in savage rites celebrating the sufferings of Dionysus. In these Bacchantes, religious fervor was transformed into the wildest delirium. "With dishevelled hair and torn garments they ran through the woods, bearing torches and beating cymbals, with savage screams and violent gestures. A nervous excitement brought distraction to the senses and to the mind, and showed itself in wild language and gestures, and the coarsest excesses were acts of devotion. When the Mænads danced madly through the woods, with serpents wreathed about their arms, or a dagger in their hands, with which they struck at those whom they met; when intoxication and the sight of blood drove the excited throng to frenzy--it was the god acting in them, and consecrating them as his priestesses. Woe to the man who should come upon these mysteries! he was torn to pieces; even animals were thus killed, and the Mænads devoured their quivering flesh and drank their warm blood." In the ardor inspired by their mad orgies, these votaries did not distinguish between man and beast, and a mother once tore to pieces her son, whom she mistook for a young lion, and proudly placed on the end of her thyrsus the bleeding head of her offspring. Euripides, in hisBacchanals, has drawn a sombre picture of the excesses into which the wine god led his inspired followers. Similar orgies, which took their rise in Lydia, were held on the summits of Taÿgetus and in the plains of Macedon and Thrace.

Though certain Attic women, under the frenzy of religious enthusiasm, would join the Delphian women in their wild rites of Dionysus, this orgiastic worship was never popular at Athens. The Athenian ladies much preferred the worship of Demeter, the goddess of agriculture and of domestic life.

The Thesmophoria, the festival in honor of Demeter and her daughter, Persephone, contrasted greatly with the Panathenæa. The latter was public and was participated in by all; the former was secret, and only married women could take part in it. The Panathenæa celebrated the political and intellectual supremacy of the State, as symbolized in its patron goddess; the Thesmophoria was the festival of domestic life, held in honor of the goddess of virtuous marriage and the author of the earth's fertility.

This festival was celebrated in October, at the period of the autumnal sowing. Every citizen of Athens who possessed property to the amount of three talents was compelled to furnish his wife with sufficient money to enable her to celebrate the Thesmophoria; this was the extent of male participation. For many days, the women had to prepare themselves for the solemn rites by fasting, abstinence, and purifications; two of their number were chosen from each tribe by their companions to prepare and preside over the various features of the celebration. On the first day of the Thesmophoria, the women went to the primitive seat of the celebration at Halimus, near the promontory of Colias, not in a formal procession, but in small groups, and at the hour of nightfall. The comic side of the Demeter festivals exhibited itself on the way, as the participants recognized each other with jests and raillery, recalling by this the pleasantries with which the maiden lambé caused Demeter to smile, when the latter was afflicted with melancholy over the loss of her daughter; and woe to the man who met these women! for he became the victim of the most scornful mockery and sarcasm. At Halimus, in the sanctuary of Demeter, the mysteries were celebrated by night; the following day was spent in taking purifying baths in the sea and in playing and dancing on the shore. After enjoying their freedom here for a day or more, the women set out in a long procession for Athens, while priestesses bore in caskets on their heads theThesmai, or the laws of Demeter, whence the festival took its name.

The remainder of the celebration took place in the city, either in the sanctuary of Demeter or on the Pnyx, which was on this occasion exclusively turned over to the women for the celebration. The first day after their return was called the "day of fasting," for during the whole day the women sat in deep mourning on the ground and took no food whatsoever, while they sang dirges and observed other customs common in case of death; they also sacrificed swine to the infernal deities. The rites of the next day were of a more general character. The name given the day was "Calligenia," signifying "bearer of a fair offspring," and on this day they offered a sacrifice to Demeter and prayed her to give to women the blessing of fair children. We know but little of the sacrifices, dances, and merry games which occupied this final day of the festival. This worship of Demeter was one of the most elevating influences in the social life of Athens; and the Thesmophoria was but a prelude to the celebration of the Eleusinian mysteries, into which women as well as men were initiated.

The ceremonies at Eleusis seem to have consisted primarily in a dramatic representation of the beautiful legend of Demeter and Persephone, from which many moral lessons could be drawn. Homer has preserved to us this legend in the Homeric hymn beginning:

"I begin to sing fair-haired Demeter, a hallowed goddess,--herself and her slim-ankled daughter whom Hades snatched away from golden-sworded Demeter, renowned for fruits, as the maiden sported with the deep-bosomed daughters of Oceanus, culling flowers through the soft meadow--roses and crocuses and beautiful violets, hyacinths, the iris and the narcissus, which Earth, at the command of Zeus, favoring the All-Receiver [Hades], brought forth as a snare to the maiden. From its root an hundred heads sprung forth, and the whole wide heaven above was scented with its fragrance, and the whole earth laughed, and the briny wave of the sea. And the girl stretched out both her hands to seize the pretty plaything, when the wide-winged earth yawned in the Mysian plain where the all-receiving king, the many-named son of Cronus, leaped forth with his immortal steeds and snatched her away, unwilling, in his golden chariot, weeping and shrieking aloud, calling upon her father, the son of Cronus."

The hymn then recounts how the goddess-mother roamed for nine days over the earth, seeking her lost daughter, till on the tenth she learned the truth from the all-seeing Sun. Angered at Zeus for permitting the violence, she wandered about among men in the form of an old woman, till at length, at Eleusis, in Attica, she was kindly received at the house of King Celeus, and acted as nurse for his newborn son, Demophon. She would have made the lad immortal by giving him a bath of fire; but being surprised and prevented by the mother, she revealed her deity, and caused to be erected in her honor a temple, in which she gave herself up to her sorrow. In anger, she made the earth barren, and would not allow the crops to spring up again until her daughter was allowed to spend two-thirds of the year with her mother among the Immortals, devoting the remaining third to her gloomy spouse in the realms of Hades. Upon her return to Olympus, Demeter left the gift of corn, of agriculture, and of her holy mysteries, with her host, and sent Triptolemus the Eleusinian about the earth to make known to men the knowledge of agriculture, of civil order, and of holy wedlock. Thus the worship of Demeter, as the founder of law and order and marriage, became prevalent, and exerted a most helpful influence throughout Hellas.

The mysteries of Eleusis inculcated the moral lessons which would promote right living among the people. They were in charge of a priesthood consisting of both men and women. The chief priest, the hierophant, was a man of irreproachable character, and held the office for life on condition of celibacy. The priestesses had in charge especially the initiation of the women, but their duties were not restricted to this.

The candidates for initiation, the Mystai, had to spend a year in preparation. Homicides, courtesans, barbarians, all who had any stain upon their lives, were excluded from these rites; only Hellenes "of pure soul and pure hands" were eligible for initiation. On the days preceding the festival, expiatory ceremonies were performed, of which the most notable was one in which a girl or boy, styled "the child of the hearth," performed certain rites of purification for those who were desirous of being admitted into the mysteries. Finally, on the twentieth day of the month Boëdromion, corresponding nearly to our September, the great procession set forth from Athens for Eleusis, along the Sacred Way. In this procession the women took part in great numbers, and it afforded excellent opportunities for the display of beautiful toilettes. Aristocratic ladies were usually driven in chariots. As the crowd of pilgrims passed over the Cephissus Bridge, there was, as in the Thesmophoria, much banter and raillery in memory of the manner in which the goddess was once diverted from her grief; and all along the road there were stations for sacrifices and oblations, where the maidens engaged in singing and graceful dances. Eleusis was finally reached at night by torchlight, and the following days were spent by the initiated in their religious duties and by the candidates in further preparation.

We have unfortunately but meagre glimpses into the Eleusinian mysteries, and cannot follow the order of ceremonies. Suffice it to say that, besides promoting good living and happiness in this life, they gave hope for the life to come. "The man purified by initiation," says Pindar, "has understood before his death the beginning and end of life, and after death dwells with the gods."

In Polygnotus's famous painting of the infernal regions, in the Lesché at Delphi, two women were represented trying to carry water in jars that have no bottoms; an inscription states that they were never initiated, and the moral was "that without initiation life is altogether wasted and lost." In the worship of Demeter and in the Eleusinian mysteries there was everything to appeal to woman--the sanctity of marriage, deified motherhood, exaltation of the home and of domestic duties--and the zeal manifested by Athenian women in these religious rites doubtless promoted a feminine piety and a natural devoutness which ennobled the Athenian home and softened parental discipline.

The Thesmophoria was the festival of the married women; but young girls and even children had their festivals in the Brauronia and the Artemisia, celebrated in honor of Artemis, the special patron of virgins. The Brauronia was celebrated every fifth year, in the little town of Brauron. Chosen Athenian maidens between the ages of five and ten years, dressed in saffron-colored garments, went in solemn procession to the sanctuary of the goddess, where they performed a propitiatory rite, in which they imitated bears, an animal sacred to Artemis. Every maiden of Athens, before she could marry, must have once taken part in this festival and consecrated herself to the goddess. There was also a precinct of Artemis Brauronia on the Acropolis, and doubtless this ceremony was also performed there. Almost everywhere this virgin goddess was revered by young girls as the guardian of their maiden years, and before marriage it was the custom that the bride should dedicate to Artemis a lock of her hair, her girdle, and her maiden tunic.

Maidens also took part in the worship of the twin brother of Artemis, Apollo, in the island of Delos, which was the birthplace of the god and goddess. The celebration was a festival of youth and beauty, of poetry and art. Aristocratic maidens of Athens joined with those of the seat of the Delphian confederacy over which Athens presided in making the occasion emphasize the power and splendor of Athens in the height of its greatness.

"Once every five years, in the spring, a solemn festival recalled the anniversary of the birth of the god. The maidens of Delos, wearing their richest attire, and crowned with flowers, united in joyous chorus around the altar, and represented in sacred dances the story of the birth of Apollo. Others, with garlands of flowers in their hands, went to hang them on the ancient statue of the goddess, which Theseus had, according to tradition, brought from Crete to Delos. From all parts of Greece, from the islands, and from Asia, solemn embassies, sacredtheoriæ, landed in the harbor. The most brilliant was that of the Athenians, who were long the suzerains of the island. Each year, a State vessel, the Paralian galley, conveyed the sacred embassy to Delos; the crew was composed of free men, the vessel decked with flowers. At the moment of its departure, the whole town was purified; the priests of Apollo bestowed on the galley a solemn benediction, and the law forbade that the purified town should be defiled by any sentence of death until the return of the vessel. The members of the embassy were chosen from the chief families of the city, and they were accompanied by a chorus of young men and maidens, who were to chant the sacred hymns in honor of Apollo and perform around the altar of the Horns, one of the marvels of Delos and of the world, an ancient and solemn dance--thegeranos. The day of the arrival of these theoriæ was a festival in Delos. Amid the acclamations of an enthusiastic crowd, the embassy disembarked in the harbor; and such was the joy and impatience of the people, that sometimes its members had not even time to don their robes of ceremony and to crown themselves with flowers. Over the bridge wound the sacred procession of the Athenians, with its splendidly dressed musicians, its chorus chanting the sacred hymns, its rich offerings destined for the god; received at the end of the bridge by the official charged with the reception of these pious embassies, it pursued its way to the temple, there to present its offerings and prayers, and to pour out on the altar the blood of its hecatombs. During the rest of the day, feasts were provided for the people, and games and contests filled the island with the sounds of rejoicing."

After the celebration, the Paralia returned to Athens, bearing homeward the beautiful maidens who had done honor to the god and had added to the glory of their native city.

Aphrodite, the goddess of beauty and of pleasure, also had her festivals in which women took part. Certain of these were of a lascivious character and were celebrated chiefly by the demi-monde; they were held especially at the temple of Aphrodite Pandemus on the promontory of Colias. But the ladies of Athens took part in the Adonia, in honor of Adonis, beloved of Aphrodite. The ceremonies of the first day were of a mournful character, as they commemorated the death of Adonis; but the second day was one of rejoicing and entertainment, as Adonis was conceived of as returning to life to spend six months with Aphrodite. In his death and resurrection the changes of the seasons were poetically symbolized. Women of the leading families were expected to participate in the magnificent solemnities, which took place at the summer solstice. A long procession of priests and of maidens acting as canephorse, bearing vases for libations, baskets, perfumes, and flowers, approached a colossal catafalque, over which were spread beautiful purple coverlets. On these lay a statue of Adonis, pale in death, but still beautifull Over this mournful figure a beautiful woman gave expression in every way to the most bitter grief and sang a hymn to Adonis, telling his sad story. The women round about were clad in mourning and celebrated the plaintive funeral dance; while on all sides was heard the mournful cry: "Alas! alas! Adonis is dead!"

The hymn or psalm to Adonis was a distinguished and most popular feature of the celebration of the Adonia; Theocritus, in Idyl XV., gives its rendering on the occasion when Arsinoe, queen of Ptolemy Philadelphus, decorated the image of Adonis. In a later chapter of the present volume,--that on The Alexandrian Woman,--an English version of this psalm is given, into which the spirit of the original is most aptly infused; and in connection therewith is a lively and forceful picture of the attitude and manners of the ladies of the day.

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