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Praise and persuasion in Greek hymns*

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  23 February 2012

William D. Furley
William D. Furley
Affiliation:
Heidelberg University
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Extract

Largely because the processes of transmission have been unkind, the religious hymns sung by the Greeks during worship of a god on a public or private occasion have received less than their due attention from modern scholars. Our sources frequently mention in passing that hymns were sung on the way to Eleusis, for example, or at the well Kallichoron on arrival at Eleusis, or by the deputations to Delos for the Delia, but they usually fail to record the texts or contents of these hymns. Until the fourth century BC temple authorities did not normally have the texts of cult songs inscribed; and the works themselves were by a diversity of authors, some well-known, some obscure, making the collection of their ‘hymns’ a difficult task for the Alexandrian compilers. Some such hymns were traditional—Olen's at Delos, for example — handed down orally from generation to generation; others were taught to a chorus for a specific occasion and then forgotten. Nor do the surviving corpora of ‘hymns’ — I refer to the Homeric Hymns, Callimachus' six hymns, and the Orphic Hymns—go very far to satisfy our curiosity as to the nature of this ubiquitous hieratic poetry. The Homeric Hymns would seem to have been preludes (προοίμια) to the recitation of epic poetry; they are in the same metre and style as epic, and the singer usually announces that he is about to commence another poem on finishing the hymn. Their content may give us authentic material about a god and his attendant myths, but the context of their performance seems distinct from worship proper. The Homeric Hymns provided the basic model for Callimachus' hymns although it is clear that he adapted the model to permit innovations such as the mimetic mode of hymns 2, 5 and 6, which present an eye-witness account of religious ritual. Some find Callimachus' hymns lacking in true religious feeling; few seriously maintain that they were intended, or could have been used, for performance in cult.

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Articles
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The Journal of Hellenic Studies , Volume 115 , November 1995 , pp. 29 - 46
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Copyright © The Society for the Promotion of Hellenic Studies 1995

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References

1 Cf. Callimachus, Hymn iv (to Delos) 304 ff.

2 E.g. 5. 293 to Aphrodite: Or 6.21, to Aphrodite: Cf. Allen, T.W., Halliday, W.R., Sikes, E.E. (ed.), The Homeric Hymns (Oxford 1936)Google Scholar, introduction, but (xciv ff.) they question whether the longer hymns should be considered as mere preludes to epic recitation. Aloni, A., ‘Prooimia, Hymnoi, Elio Aristide e i cugini bastardi’, QUCC n.s. iv–vi (1980) 23–40Google Scholar, emphasizes that the hexameter prooimion (of which the Homeric hymns are examples) was a type of hymn, that used by an epic singer or rhapsode prior to epic recitation at festival games

3 Clay, J.S., The politics of Olympus: form and meaning in the major Homeric Hymns (Princeton 1989)Google Scholar in her introduction goes so far as to suggest that these hymns may have been intended for recital at banquets, like Demodokos' song of Aphrodite's adultery with Ares in Od. viii.

4 Cf. Hopkinson, N., A Hellenistic anthology (Cambridge 1989) 111–12.Google Scholar

5 Cf. Powell, J.U., Barber, E.A., New chapters in the history of Greek literature (Oxford 1921) 41Google Scholar: ‘…and the strange “Hymns” of Callimachus, laboriously compiled, it would seem, out of a handbook of mythology and a Dialect Dictionary, and containing not enough religion (to borrow the expression of a celebrated Bishop) “to save a tomtit’”. This view, however, is extreme. It is true that Callimachus' main purpose is literary rather than hieratic, but there is nothing bogus or trivial about the myths he relates. Bulloch, A.W., ‘The future of a Hellenistic illusion: some observations on Callimachus and religion’, MH xli (1984) 209–230Google Scholar, argues for greater depth of religious feeling, especially in the sixth hymn. On the mimetic hymns see Albert, W., Das mimetische Gedicht in der Antike. Geschichte und Typologie von den Anfängen bis in die augusteische Zeit (Frankfurt-am-Main 1988) 55 ff.Google Scholar

6 Cf. e.g. Hopkinson, N., Callimachus: Hymn to Demeter (Cambridge 1984) 37Google Scholar; Bulloch, A.W., Callimachus' Fifth Hymn (Cambridge 1985) 4 ff.Google Scholar Some defend the possibility that Callimachus' hymns were sung in conjunction with religious rites: Cahen, E., Les hymnes de Callimaque (Paris 1930) 281Google Scholar: Fraser, P.M., Ptolemaic Alexandria (Oxford 1984) ii.b 916 f.Google Scholar with nn. 298–92.

7 Cf. Quandt, W., Orphei Hymni (Berlin 1962).Google Scholar

8 Cf. Preisendanz, K., Heitsch, E., Henrichs, A., Papyri Graecae Magicae. Die griechischen Zauberpapyri ii (Stuttgart 1974), 237 ff.Google Scholar (= PGM) Heitsch, E., ‘Zu den Zauberhymnen’, Philologus ciii (1959) 215–36Google Scholar; Riesenfeld, H., ‘Remarques sur les hymnes magiques’, Eranos xlvi (1946) 153–60.Google ScholarGraf, F., ‘Prayer in magic and religious ritual’, in: Faraone, C.A., Obbink, D. (edd.), Magica hiera: ancient Greek magic and religion (New York/Oxford 1991) 188–213.Google Scholar

9 Bremer, J.M., ‘Greek hymns’ in: Versnel, H.S., van Straten, F.T. (edd.), Faith, hope and worship (Leiden 1981) 193–215.CrossRefGoogle Scholar

10 Maas, P., Epidaurische Hymnen (Halle 1933).Google Scholar

11 Reprint Chicago 1981, originally Oxford 1925.

12 Lattke, M., Hymnus: Materialien zu einer Geschichte der antiken Hymnologie (Fribourg 1991)CrossRefGoogle Scholar, contains a lot of rather undigested material.

13 I am thinking, of course, primarily of the Meuli-Burkert school exemplified by such works by Burkert, W. as Homo necans (Berlin/New York 1972)Google Scholar, Griechische Religion der archaischen und klassischen Epochen (Stuttgart 1977) as well as a whole series of articles (five of which are conveniently collected in Most, G.W. (ed.), Wilder Ursprung (Berlin 1990)Google Scholar), which have deservedly become canonical in their field. Burkert's recent article, ‘Griechische Hymnen’, in: Burkert, W., Stolz, F. (edd.), Hymnen der alten Welt im Kulturvergleich (Göttingen 1994) 9–18Google Scholar, does little to rectify the imbalance.

14 E.g. P. Cartledge on p. 98 of Easterling, P.E. and Muir, J.V. (ed.), Greek Religion and Society (Cambridge 1985)Google Scholar: ‘One thing, though, is pretty clear. Classical Greek religion was at bottom a question of doing not of believing, of behaviour rather than faith. Or, as Finley puts it in his introduction to the Legacy of Greece, “Greek piety, Greek religion…appear to be a matter of rituals, festivals, processions, games, oracles, sacrifices - actions, in sum - and of stories, myths, about concrete instances in the working of the deities, not of abstract dogmas”’. Note how the actions listed under ritual do not include hymn-singing, and how myths are added later as a separate feature. In fact myths were the expression of personal and community faith in the Greek gods and formed a vital ingredient of hymns, as we shall see.

15 Cf. Wünsch, RE ix1 s.v. ‘Hymnos’ 141–2.

16 CQ n.s. v (1955) 157–75.

17 Käppel, L., Paian. Studien zur Geschichte einer Gattung (Berlin/New York 1992)CrossRefGoogle Scholar e.g. 64: ‘Gerade diese auf Ansprache und Dialog hin organisierte Struktur des Paians ist es, die ihn… zum Beispiel vom Hymnos, der von der Sprechhaltung der “Anbetung” geprägt ist, unterscheidet’. Käppel wishes to distinguish between paeans and hymns by the attitude of the worshipper. The former are characterized by an attitude of supplication (‘gebetshafte Sprechhaltung’), the latter by one of worship (‘Anbetung’: p. 83). It is true that paeans tended to be sung prayers to Apollo (e.g.) for delivery from peril (cf. Proclus ap. Phot. Bibl. 320a: ), but that does not, in my opinion, stop them being a type of hymn.

18

19

20

21 Cf schol. Bacchylides 23, p. 128 Snell-Maehler (= POxy. 2368 B col. i 9–20) with Käppels discussion (n. 17) 38 ff. On the dithyramb cf. Zimmermann, B., Dithyrambus. Geschichte einer Gattung (Göttingen 1992).CrossRefGoogle Scholar

22 The surviving fragments of Pindar's hymns are addressed to Zeus, (Zeus) Ammon, Persephone, Tyche, Apollo Ptoion; Menander Rhetor attributes an ‘apopemptic’ hymn to Apollo to Bacchylides ( 2, = Snell-Maehler 1A); and we hear of a hymn by Bacchylides to Hekate (ibid. 1B).

23 Race, W.H., ‘Aspects of rhetoric and form in Greek hymns’, GRBS xxiii (1982) 5–14Google Scholar, esp. 8 ff. Examples: Makedonikos' paean to Apollo and Asklepios (cf. Pordomingo Pardo, F., ‘El pean de Macedonico…,’, Corolla Londiniensis iv [1984] 101–129)Google Scholar, 1. 17 ‘Grant that we may…flourish as we hymn your wisdom…’; Aristonoos' paean to Apollo (CA 164) 11. 45–8: ‘delighted by our hymns…look after and protect us!’

24 Ibid. p. 8. On p. 10 he writes: ‘The rhetorical of a hymn is, then, to secure the god's pleasure by a ‘pleasing’ choice of names and titles… and by the ‘proper’ narration of his powers and exploits. And after finding a fitting and giving a ‘pleasing’ account of the god's powers, the hymnist is prepared to make his petition.’

25 This is Pritchett's, W.K. preferred date: The Greek state at war iii (Berkeley/London 1979) 331.Google Scholar Further discussion: Hornblower, S., A commentary on Thucydides vol. I (Oxford 1991) 517 ff.Google Scholar The episode certainly happened after the Athenian re-organization of the Delian festival in 426/5 BC (Thuc. iii 104).

26 Plutarch says that the ceremony had been conducted before Nikias He describes Nikias' pontoon bridge as and the procession across it The display was both lavish and orderly.

27 Menander Rhetor II, 17 (ed. by D.A. Russell and N.G. Wilson Oxford 1981) p. 441, says that the splendour of a festival in its various aspects (hymns, athletic competitions, sacrifice) is intended as an expression of thanks to the deity addressed for benefits received: Hymns are sung to please the god through a display of intellectual and musical excellence, athletic competitions by one of physical prowess: The rhetorician's speech is a model prose-hymn or eulogy of Apollo Sminthiakos designed to show imitators the best choice and order of subjects when called upon to compose such a public show-piece.

28 E.g. Pindar, Paean v. 37 ff. (Delian Apollo, Delos, Leto, Apollo and Artemis); Euripides, IT 1097 ff. (Artemis, Delos, Leto); Agathon's hymn in Aristophanes, Thesm. 101 ff. (Apollo, Artemis, Leto); Limenios' Delphic paean 11. 36 ff. (Powell, CA p. 150): Artemis and Leto round out prayer to Apollo.

29 First published: Weil, H., Reinach, Th., BCH xvii (1893) 569–583, 584–610CrossRefGoogle Scholar; xviii (1894) 345–362, 363–389; among subsequent editions see: Reinach, Th., ‘Hymnes avec notes musicales’, Fouilles de Delphes ii.2 (1909–1913) 147–69Google Scholar and 332 n. 1 (A. Colin); Fairbanks, A., A study of the Greek paean (Ithaca 1900) 119–39Google Scholar; Powell, CA 141 ff.; Pöhlmann, E., Denkmäler altgriechischer Musik (Nürnberg 1970) 58–67Google Scholar (= Erlanger Beiträge zur Sprach- und Kunstwissenschaft, vol. xxxi); the recent volume by Bélis, Annie, Corpus des Inscriptions de Delphes, vol. iii, Les hymnes à Apollon (Paris 1992)Google Scholar, is based on fresh examination of all the fragments of stone: Bélis suggests that in the title is the poet's proper name, not his ethnic. For a modern ‘recording’ of the hymn see ‘Musique de la Grèce antique’, by Gregorio Paniagua, Harmonia Mundi no. 1015 (1978) no. 3. The metre is creticpaeonic—possibly arranged in pentameters—up to 1. 27, where, by analogy with Limenios' paean, there is likely to have been a change of metre.

30 In Powell's text (CA p. 150): Cf. Pindar, OI 2. 12, (interjected prayer to Zeus). Limenios' piece is entitled a ‘Paean and P(roso)dion’ to Apollo, and the change of metre from paeonic to glyconic at this point (1. 36) may mark the commencement of the prosodion. Alternatively, the whole piece is a combined ‘paean and prosodion’.

31 Ausfeld, K., ‘De Graecorum precationibus quaestiones’, Jahrbuch für classische Philologie xxviii (1903) 505ff.Google Scholar; Danielewicz, G., ‘De elementis hymnicis in Sapphus Alcaei Anacreontis carminibus’, Eos lii (1974) 23–33Google Scholar, citing Zieliński, , Religia starzytnej Grecji (Warsaw 1921)Google Scholar, prefers ‘invocatio - sanctio - precatio’; Bremer (n. 9) 196, suggests that the central portion of hymns and prayers might better be termed ‘argument’, as ‘pars epica’ is misleading in many cases (there is no ‘epic’ recitation in any hymns except the Homeric Hymns).

32 Menander Rhetor, Sminthiakos p. 438, advises the hymnist to invoke the Muses' help in invoking Apollo, since one is uncertain how most effectively and politely to address him. The Muses provide a bridge between the human poet and the gods' world: Hesiod's proem to the Theogony is addressed to the Muses as they, archetypically, sing of the gods' birth—the topic to which Hesiod has addressed himself. Pindar, , Pa. vii b 15–20Google Scholar Snell-Maehler, invokes the Muses' help in hymning Apollo as ‘the minds of men are blind when one tries to fathom the path of deep wisdom without the aid of the daughters of Helikon'.

33 Cf. Nachtergael, G., Les Galates en Grèce et les Sotéria de Delphes, Acad. Roy. de Belgique, Mém. de la classe de Lettres, 2nd series, vol. IXIII/I (Brussels 1977) 15–205.Google Scholar

34 Plutarch, Aristeides 20. 4–8: Apollodorus ap. Strab. 9, 2, 11; SIG 296 f.; 696–9; 728: On the Pythais festival see: Colin, G., Le culte d’ Apollon Pythien à Athènes (Paris 1905)Google Scholar; Boethius, A., Die Pythais (Diss. Uppsala 1918)Google Scholar; Deubner, L., Attische Feste (Berlin 1932) 203–4Google Scholar; Tracy, S.V., ‘Notes on the Pythais inscriptions’, BCH xcix (1975) 185–218.CrossRefGoogle Scholar The Pythais consisted of a deputation to Delphi to offer sacrifice and worship on behalf of Athens; the hymn-singing choristers in 128/7 were professional musicians (Paean Delphicus ii 19–20: ) a tripod with new fire was brought back to Athens (SIG3 711 D 22; 728 I 4). The festival was irregular: Athenian officials called Pythaistai convened it when lightning was observed over Mt. Parnes from the eschara of Zeus Astrapaios.

35 Callimachus, Hymn to Delos 171 ff., includes reference to the same thwarted attack on Delphi by the Gauls in order to glorify Ptolemy Philadelphos' role in defeating their army. The event is given mythical stature by comparing the Gauls with latter-day Titans (1. 174: )

36 Recognized by Plato, Crat. 400e: (sc. the gods) cf. Norden, E., Agnostos Theos. Untersuchungen zur Formengeschichte religiöser Rede (Leipzig/Berlin 1913) 143 ff.Google Scholar; Keyssner, K., Studien zum griechischen Hymnus (Diss. Würzburg 1931) 9 ff.Google Scholar; Bremer (n. 9) 194–5.

37 Compare the Iacchos hymn sung by the Eleusinian initiates in Aristophanes' Frogs, 324 ff. The invocation to Iacchos to ‘come dancing through this meadow to your holy revellers' (325–6) is paralleled by the procession of mystai along the Sacred Way to Eleusis. Images of the gods were frequently carried in processions, or a priest or priestess dressed up as the deity; these elements underline the point that a religious procession was intended to ‘usher in’ the god by persuasive action and word. Callimachus' second hymn to Apollo (I ff.) describes the excited anticipation of the god's arrival to listen to a hymn sung in his honour: the laurel-bush shakes, a tremor runs through the temple, the doors resound to the god's footfall, the Delian palm-tree nods, the swan sings on high- all visible or audible signs of the god's advent.

38 Menander Rhetor, Sminthiakos p. 441, likewise advises the hymnist to draw attention to the pleasing spectacle of cult as ritual framework for the hymn's performance. The god, he says, will be pleased by the spectacle of human efforts to display their excellence in various activities.

39 Powell (n. 5) 45.

40 Bélis (n. 29) 140 f. suggests a different reason for the emphasis on the excellence of the hymnodists' performance: in 134 BC, she says, there is evidence of lack of favour in the Amphictiony for the Athenian Technitai, whereas in 125 the Athenian singers seem to be preferred to the competition from the Isthmus and Nemea. She suggests that the 128 Pythais (to which she dates both paeans) served to promote the cause of the Athenian Technitai of Dionysos. But hymns' tendency to praise themselves (and hence the object of their worship, the god) is a more general phenomenon: e.g. Palaikastro hymn of the Curetes (CA 160–1) 11. 6–10; Limenios' paean (CA 149), 11. 15 ff.; Makedonikos' paean to Apollo and Asklepios (Pordomingo Pardo n. 23 ) 11. 1 ff. (1. 5).

41 Menander Rhetor, Sminthiakos 441, recommends including such stories as illustrations of the god's In Apollo's case he cites the slaying of Python and Tityos as illustrations of Apollo's command of Thus the myth defines permanent qualities. On the dragon-slaying motif in Apolline myth see Fontenrose, J., Python: A study of Delphic myth and its origins (Los Angeles 1959).Google Scholar

42 Pfeiffer, R., Callimachus ii 3 (Oxford 1987) 70.Google Scholar On the divine epiphany of Apollo in the battle against Brennus see Auffarth, C., ‘Gott mit uns!’ Eine gallische Niederlage durch Eingreifen der Götter in der augusteischen Geschichtsschreibung (Pompeius Trogus 24, 6–8)’, Altspr. Unterricht xxxiii.5 (1990) 14–38.Google Scholar

43 Compare Proclus' definition of the paean (Bibi. 320a21ff.)— ‘a type of song now sung to all gods but originally particular to Apollo and Artemis, sung for deliverance from plague and illnesses’—with Käppel's (n. 17) 28: ‘In allen Fällen dient der Paian der gebetshaft-dialogischen Kommunikation mit einer als Heilsbringer gedachten Gottheit: diese Kommunikation ist geprägt von der Heilserwartung (Bitte) bzw. Heilserfahrung (Dank) des Paian-Ichs’.

44 Cf. Adami, F., ‘De poetis scaenicis graecis hymnorum sacrorum imitatoribus’, Jb. f. class. Philologie xxvi (1901) 215–62Google Scholar (mainly on Dionysos); Ax, W., ‘Die Parados des Oidipus Tyrannos’, Hermes lxvii (1932) 413–37Google Scholar; Dorsch, K.D., Götterhymnen in Chorliedern der griechischen Tragödie (Diss. Münster 1983)Google Scholar; Mantziou, M., Hymns and hymnal prayers in fifth-century Greek tragedy with special reference to Euripides (Diss. London 1981).Google Scholar

45 Cf. Owen, A.S. (ed.), Euripides: Ion 2 (Oxford 1957) 78Google Scholar: ‘These lines of molossi may be a Delphic hymn, known to Athenian visitors, a touch of local colour.’

46 On this hymn cf. Harrison, J., Themis (London 1977Google Scholar; reprint of 1912 Cambridge edition) 393 ff.; Fontenrose (n. 41) 395 ff.; M. Platnauer (ed.), (Oxford 1956); H. Strohm (ed.) (München 1949) 177–8: ‘Ein Preislied auf Apollon in der Form einer Legendenerzählung, dessen vorherrschendes Mass das Prosodiakon der alten Prozessionslieder…’.

47 I.e. the ‘er-Stil’ of address changes to the ‘du-Stil’, in Norden's terminology (Agnostos Theos 163 ff.).

48 Cf. HH to Apollo 60; Callimachus, Hymn to Delos 268: and ibid. 11 ff. generally.

49 The motif of expounded upon by Norden, Agnostos Theos 149 ff. Note Ion's wish to praise his saviour Apollo: Eur. Ion 137:

50 Powell CA 149 ff. and 162 ff. respectively. Limenios' paean describes Apollo's birth on Delos and then traces his first coming to Athens amid musical celebrations, before calling on the god to come to Delphi, where the present hymn is being sung. Thus Apollo ‘accompanies’ the Athenians, as it were, from Athens to Delphi. Aristonoos' hymn (17 ff.) traces Apollo's movements from his ritual purification at Tempe back to Delphi escorted by Athena, whereupon he ‘persuades’ Gaia and Themis to let him take over the oracle. The god's departure to, and return from, Tempe had its ritual counterpart in the S(t)epteria festival.

51 is Diggle's proposal for in the mss.

52 Cf. Aristonoos' paean to Apollo 37 (CA p. 163) on the gifts of other gods to Apollo:

53 P. 245, hymn no. 11. The lines quoted are followed in the papyrus by further hexameters invoking Apollo-Helios; the cletic message continues loud and clear, but the character of Apollo changes from that of Delphic prophet to astrological divinity typical of the later conception of Apollo (and Artemis = Selene).

54 This is the main point made by Graf (n. 8).

55 Cf. McCown, C.C., ‘The Ephesia Grammata in popular belief’, TAPA liv (1923) 128–40.Google Scholar

56 This aspect of myth is a significant omission in Bremmer's, J. otherwise useful collection of papers on myth, Interpretations of Greek mythology (London and Sydney 1987).Google Scholar

57 Clay (n. 3).

58 Nowhere more forcefully than in Eur. Her. 1340ff. Yunis, H., A new creed: fundamental religious beliefs in the Athenian polis and Euripidean drama (Göttingen 1988) esp. 155 ff.CrossRefGoogle Scholar, seems to me, however, to go too far when he takes such passages as evidence of Euripides' adherence to a new ‘moral’ theology (p. 159: ‘Heracles…is concerned with…a philosophical understanding of divinity’).

59 For a formal analysis of the parados as a paean-hymn, see Ax, W., ‘Die Parados des Oidipus Tyrannos’, Hermes lxvii (1932) 413–37Google Scholar; see further: Mikalson, J.D., Honour thy gods: popular religion in Greek tragedy (Chapel Hill NC 1991) 58Google Scholar; R.D. Dawe (ed.) (Oxford 1982); Burton, R.W.B., The chorus in Sophocles' tragedies (Oxford 1990) 138–48.Google Scholar

60 Note similar apotropaic epithets in magical texts: Zeus in an incantation to ward off physical affliction: Guarducci, M., IC ii 19. 7 line 3 (Rome 1939).Google Scholar

61 Cf. Mikalson (n. 59) 58. Dawe ad loc. suggests that the plague had become so closely associated with war in the minds of Athenians during the early years of the Archidamian War, that Ares might be thought to be responsible for war and plague.

62 As is the case, for example, in the Epidaurian hymn to Telesphoros, lines 23ff. (Maas [n. 10] 152 ff.):

63 Cf. Maas, P., ‘The Philinna papyrus’, JHS lxii (1942) 33–8CrossRefGoogle Scholar; Maas, P., Koenen, L., ‘Der brennende Horusknabe: zu einem Zauberspruch des Philinna-Papyrus’, Chron. d'Égypte xxxvii (1962) 167–174Google Scholar; Henrichs, A., ‘Zum Text einiger Zauberpapyri’, ZPE vi (1970) 193–212Google Scholar; Betz, H.D. (ed.), The Greek magical papyri in translation, including the demotic spells (Chicago 1986) 258 f.Google Scholar (with bibliography).

64 Kotansky, R., ‘Incantations and prayers for salvation on inscribed Greek amulets’, Magika Hiera 107–37Google Scholar, p. 112 with notes. Cf. my paper ‘Besprechung und Behandlung: Zur Form und Funktion von ΕΠΩΙΔΑΙ in der griechischen Zaubermedizin’ in: Festschrift A. Dihle (Göttingen 1993) 80–104.

65 Cf. Bremer (n. 9) 196.

66 Maas (n. 10) 134 ff. Cf. PMG 935; West, M.L., ‘The Epidaurian Hymn to the Mother of the Gods’, CQ n.s. xx (1970) 212–15Google Scholar (I have omitted some of West's more drastic emendations and supplements). Page and West concur in dating the hymn to the 4th or 3rd c. BC, whilst Maas believed it might have been by Telesilla herself. Page believes it is composed basically of stichic telesilleans (with anomalies), whilst West following Maas detects sequences of three telesilleans followed by a reizianum (being, ace. to Maas, a ‘catalectic’ version of the telesillean).

67 As West ad loc. says, not ‘a third of the sea’.

68 Our hymn picks up many of the points in the Euripidean stasimon: the woody mountainous scenery (1303), the castanets or cymbals (1308 and 1347), Zeus looking down from heaven (1317 ff.), Zeus' instructions that the Great Mother should desist from her anger (1339 f.). On the syncretism of the Great Mother with Demeter from the 5th. c. on, see Nilsson, , GGR i 725–8.Google Scholar

69 This, of course, is the essential theme of Hesiod's Theogony. Theogonies play a major role in hymn-writing. Makedonikos' paean to Apollo and Asklepios (CA 138–9) or the anonymous Hellenistic theogonic hymn to Demeter (Supplementum Hellenisticum p. 990), are good examples. Part of the purpose is undoubtedly to ‘map out’ divine territory accurately, the more effectively to invoke a god; but there is an incantatory element as well. Herodotus i 132, says that Persian magi recite their theogony at sacrifice as an that is, incantation to summon up the deity addressed. Herodotus reports this as a foreign custom, but many Greek hymns have similar elements.

70 Equally clear in the Helena stasimon, where the Mother's displeasure results in agricultural sterility, famine and an end of Olympian worship. Zeus' position is reconciliatory: rather than blasting earth in anger at the Mother's wilful behaviour, he seeks to appease her using music-playing go-betweens (the Graces and Muses).

71 Thus my argument is analogous to Bundy's, E.L. in Studia Pindarica (Berkeley/Los Angeles 1962)Google Scholar where he analyses the elements and structure of a sample of Pindar's epinicians (OI. 11 and 1. 1 ) as coherent in terms of the overriding encomiastic purpose.

72 See above n. 13.

73 Generally, in Perikles' words (Thuc. ii 38), sacrifices and festivals offer spiritual relaxation from labours