Note 1009 — Chapter XVI · GRECIAN MYTHES, AS UNDERSTOOD, FELT AND INTERPRETED BY THE GREEKS THEMSELVES. (continued 2)
Reading edition
Pausan. i. 3, 3. Λέγεται μὲν δὴ καὶ ἄλλα οὐκ ἀληθῆ παρὰ τοῖς πολλοῖς, οἷα ἱστορίας ἀνηκόοις οὖσι, καὶ ὅποσα ἤκουον εὐθὺς ἐκ παιδῶν ἔν τε χόροις καὶ τραγῳδίαις πιστὰ ἡγουμένοις, etc. The treatise of Lucian, De Saltatione, is a curious proof how much these mythes were in every one’s memory, and how large the range of knowledge of them was which a good dancer possessed (see particularly c. 76-79. t. ii. p. 308-310, Hemst).
Antiphanês ap. Athenæ. vi. p. 223:—
Μακάριόν ἐστιν ἡ τραγῳδία ποίημα κατὰ πάντ᾽, εἴ γε πρῶτον οἱ λόγοι ὑπὸ τῶν θεατῶν εἰσιν ἐγνωρίσμενοι πρὶν καί τιν᾽ εἰπεῖν· ὡς ὑπομνῆσαι μόνον δεῖ τὸν ποιητήν. Οἰδίπουν γὰρ ἂν γε φῶ, τὰ δ᾽ ἄλλα πάντ᾽ ἴσασιν· ὁ πατὴρ Λάϊος, μήτηρ Ἰοκάστη, θυγατέρες, παῖδες τίνες· τί πείσεθ᾽ οὗτος, τί πεποίηκεν. Ἂν πάλιν εἴπῃ τις Ἀλκμαίωνα, καὶ τὰ παιδία πάντ᾽ εὐθὺς εἴρηχ᾽, ὅτι μανεὶς ἀπέκτονε τὴν μήτερ᾽· ἀγανακτῶν δ᾽ Ἄδραστος εὐθέως ἥξει, πάλιν δ᾽ ἄπεισιν, etc.
The first pages of the eleventh Oration of Dio Chrysostom contain some striking passages both as to the universal acquaintance with the mythes, and as to their extreme popularity (Or. xi. p. 307-312, Reisk). See also the commencement of Heraklidês, De Allegoriâ Homericâ (ap. Scriptt. Myth. ed. Gale, p. 408), about the familiarity with Homer.
The Lydê of the poet Antimachus was composed for his own consolation under sorrow, by enumerating the ἡρωϊκὰς συμφοράς (Plutarch, Consolat. ad Apollôn. c. 9. p. 106: compare Æschines cont. Ktesiph. c. 48): a sepulchral inscription in Thêra, on the untimely death of Admêtus, a youth of the heroic gens Ægidae, makes a touching allusion to his ancestors Pêleus and Pherês (Boeckh, C. I. t. ii. p. 1087).
A curious passage of Aristotle is preserved by Dêmêtrius Phalereus (Περὶ Ἑρμηνείας, c. 144),—Ὅσῳ γὰρ αὐτίτης καὶ μονώτης εἰμὶ, φιλομυθότερος γέγονα (compare the passage in the Nikomachean Ethics, i. 9, μονώτης καὶ ἄτεκνος). Stahr refers this to a letter of Aristotle written in his old age, the mythes being the consolation of his solitude (Aristotelia, i. p. 201).
For the employment of the mythical names and incidents as topics of pleasing and familiar comparison, see Menander, Περὶ Ἐπιδεικτῖκ. § iv. capp. 9 and 11, ap. Walz. Coll. Rhett. t. ix. pp. 283-294. The degree in which they passed into the ordinary songs of women is illustrated by a touching epigram contained among the Chian Inscriptions published in Boeckh’s Collection (No. 2236):—
Βιττὼ καὶ Φαινὶς, φίλη ἡμέρη (?), αἱ συνέριθοι, Αἱ πενιχραὶ, γραῖαι, τῆδ᾽ ἐκλίθημεν ὁμοῦ. Ἀμφότεραι Κώαι, πρῶται γένος—ὦ γλυκὺς ὄρθρος, Πρὸς λύχνον ᾧ μύθους ᾔδομεν ἡμιθέων.
These two poor women were not afraid to boast of their family descent. They probably belonged to some noble gens which traced its origin to a god or a hero. About the songs of women, see also Agathias, i. 7. p. 29, ed. Bonn.
In the family of the wealthy Athenian Dêmocratês was a legend, that his primitive ancestor (son of Zeus by the daughter of the Archêgetês of the dême Aixôneis, to which he belonged) had received Hêraklês at his table: this legend was so rife that the old women sung it,—ἅπερ αἱ γραῖαι ᾄδουσι (Plato, Lysis, p. 205). Compare also a legend of the dême Ἀναγυροῦς, mentioned in Suidas ad voc.
“Who is this virgin?” asks Orestês from Pyladês in the Iphigeneia in Tauris of Euripidês (662), respecting his sister Iphigeneia, whom he does not know as priestess of Artemis in a foreign land:—
Τίς ἐστιν ἡ νεᾶνις; ὡς Ἑλληνικῶς Ἀνήρεθ᾽ ἡμᾶς τούς τ᾽ ἐν Ἰλίῳ πόνους Νόστον τ᾽ Ἀχαιῶν τόν τ᾽ ἐν οἰωνοῖς σοφὸν Κάλχαντ᾽, Ἀχιλλέως τ᾽ οὔνομ᾽, etc. ... ἐστὶν ἡ ξένη γένος Ἐκεῖθεν. Ἀργεία τις, etc.