Note 962 — Chapter XCVII · SICILIAN AND ITALIAN GREEKS. — AGATHOKLES.

Diodor. xx. 14. ᾐτιῶντο δὲ καὶ τὸν Κρόνον αὑτοῖς ἐναντιοῦσθαι, καθόσον ἐν τοῖς ἔμπροσθεν χρόνοις θύοντες τούτῳ τῷ θεῷ τῶν υἱῶν τοὺς κρατίστους, ὕστερον ὠνούμενοι λάθρα παῖδας καὶ θρέψαντες ἔπεμπον ἐπὶ τὴν θυσίαν· καὶ ζητήσεως γενομένης, εὑρέθησάν τινες τῶν καθιερουργημένων ὑποβολιμαῖοι γεγονότες· τούτων δὲ λαβόντες ἔννοιαν, καὶ τοὺς πολεμίους πρὸς τοῖς τείχεσιν ὁρῶντες στρατοπεδεύοντας, ἐδεισιδαιμόνουν ὡς καταλελυκότες τὰς πατρίους τῶν θεῶν τιμάς· διορθώσασθαι δὲ τὰς ἀγνοίας σπεύδοντες, διακοσίους μὲν τῶν ἐπιφανεστάτων παίδων προκρίναντες ἔθυσαν δημοσίᾳ· ἄλλοι δ᾽ ἐν διαβολαῖς ὄντες, ἑκουσίως ἑαυτοὺς ἔδοσαν, οὐκ ἐλάττους ὄντες τριακοσίων· ἦν δὲ παρ᾽ αὐτοῖς ἀνδριὰς Κρόνου χαλκοῦς, ἐκτετακὼς τὰς χεῖρας ὑπτίας ἐγκεκλιμένας ἐπὶ τὴν γῆν, ὥστε τὸν ἐπιτεθέντα τῶν παίδων ἀποκυλίεσθαι καὶ πίπτειν εἴς τι χάσμα πλῆρες πυρός. Compare Festus ap. Lactantium, Inst. Div. i. 21; Justin, xviii. 6, 12.

In this remarkable passage (the more remarkable because so little information concerning Carthaginian antiquity has reached us), one clause is not perfectly clear, respecting the three hundred who are said to have voluntarily given themselves up. Diodorus means (I apprehend) as Eusebius understood it, that these were fathers who gave up their children (not themselves) to be sacrificed. The victims here mentioned as sacrificed to Kronus were children, not adults (compare Diodor. xiii. 86): nothing is here said about adult victims. Wesseling in his note adheres to the literal meaning of the words, dissenting from Eusebius: but I think that the literal meaning is less in harmony with the general tenor of the paragraph. Instances of self-devotion, by persons torn with remorse, are indeed mentioned: see the case of Imilkon, Diodor. xiv. 76; Justin, xix. 3.

We read in the Fragment of Ennius—“Pœni sunt soliti suos sacrificare puellos:” see the chapter iv. of Münter’s work, Religion der Karthager, on this subject.