‘Es ist das schoene Vorrecht der historischen Forschung, die Verstorbenen in der Erinnerung der Nachwelt wieder aufleben zu lassen. Erscheint es billig, dass die Namen derer, welche sich hohe Verdienste um ihr Volk erworben, der Vergessenheit nicht anheimfallen, so ist es menschlich, denen überhaupt nachzuforschen, welche einst in weiten Kreisen von der Mit- und Nachwelt genannt und gefeiert worden sind.’

With these words, used by Dr. Koehler in regard to the once famous ‘condottiere,’ Diogenes, in the third century B.C., I beg to introduce to the reader a personage who, although perhaps of limited interest, was once celebrated and powerful and had the honour of calling himself the friend of Julius Caesar. His son moreover did his best to prevent a deed, the failure of which would probably have changed the direction of the history of the world,—the murder of Caesar.

The passages in ancient writers which relate to the man of whom I speak are well known, but they have not hitherto been rightly connected with one another, or thoroughly understood.

In this article it is proposed to examine the available numismatic evidence relating to the settlement of Samians at Zancle, and the change of the name of the city to Messana, and to suggest possible lines along which a reconstruction of the events might proceed.

It will be well first to review such literary evidence as we possess. The earliest such evidence is found in Herodotus. He gives at length the story of the Samian settlement. After the battle of Lade, which ruined the cause of the revolted Ionians, the Samian oligarchs (οἵ τι ἔχοντες) decided to abandon their city and sail away to found a colony elsewhere, rather than stay and endure the oppression of Aeaces, their old tyrant, restored under Persian influence (ἐς ἀποικίην ἐκπλέειν μηδὲ μένοντας Μήδοισί τε καὶ Αἰάκεῖδουλεύειν). Now the men of Zancle in Sicily had sent a general invitation to the Ionians to come to the West and settle at the Fair Shore (Καλὴν ᾿ Ακτὴν ἐᾶν χαίρειν), a Sicel possession on the north coast of Sicily. The Samians accordingly decided to accept the invitation.

The following inscriptions were discovered in Thasos in the winter of 1886, by Mr. J. Theodore Bent. Owing to the opposition of the Turkish authorities he was prevented from conveying to England the original marbles and monuments, and had to be content, for the present, with his memoranda of the sites explored and impressions of the inscriptions. One of these paper impressions has supplied the text of the Thasian Decree discussed in the preceding pages. The other Thasian impressions were placed by Mr. Bent in the hands of Mr. A. H. Smith of the British Museum, to be prepared for publication in this Journal. Mr. A. H. Smith however found the task he had undertaken in preparing an Index to the Hellenic Journal was making such demands upon his time, that he invited me to relieve him by editing the whole of Mr. Bent's Thasian impressions. Mr. Smith had already made transcriptions of a number of the texts, which he kindly placed at my disposal. I am however myself responsible for the arrangement and restoration of the texts as here given. Their interest and value will be considerably enhanced by the memoranda which Mr. Bent himself has furnished respecting the sites and buildings wherein the various inscriptions were discovered. None of them, so far as I know, have been published before.

1. At Robert College, Bebek, Constantinople, small stele 0·36 × 0·69 (letters 0·15) with relief of sacrifice to Apollo Citharoedus by a number of worshippers arranged in rows above each other: the inscription is much worn:

The epithet may be connected with the river name Macestus, Mecistus, with which again we may compare the Lesbian mountain Macistum, and the name Macestis in Le Bas 1127. The Macestus valley is possibly the provenance of both the Bebek stelai. A long series of votives dedicated to Apollo Crateanus (Arch. Zeit. 1875, 162), is said to come from a spot three hours from Manyas and nine from Balukiser. I was told also by Mr. Bunning of Susurlu that many of the Van Branteghem antiquities were found at a spot near Omarkeui.

At the start of the section entitled ‘structure’ in his commentary on Callimachus' Hymn to Artemis, Fritz Bornmann notes that the third Hymn has enjoyed less success among critics than any other. ‘They lament’, he says, ‘the lack of unity'. And indeed, beginning with Wilamowitz, this has been not only the dominant, but the only view of the hymn. The latter part of the poem, said Wilamowitz, ‘macht trotz allen Künsten den Eindruck eines gelehrten Nachtrages' und es ist das auch’, he adds. Some forty years later K.J. McKay put it this way: ‘If there is a stronger unifying principle in this straggling composition than the idea of weaving together a number of disparate strands into a ‘historic day’ in the life of Artemis (with vv. 183–268 as a possibly unfortunate addition), it still eludes us'. And recently, Michael Hasiam has remarked on the poem's ‘disjointed tail section’. The hymn, to his mind, ‘progressively disintegrates, as the clear structural framework with which it started fades totally from view’. Even Herter, in his famous and influential essay on the hymn, ‘Kallimachos und Homer‘, echoes this opinion of the final third of the poem. The commentator Bornmann concludes: ‘this estimation is essentially correct’.

Ten years ago an article in these pages stressed the importance of detailed analysis of the traditions involving the Carians, and archaeological evidence was used to check the assertions of the literary record. In that instance the extremer version of the tradition in question was shown to be largely inexact, while the less extreme preserved the probable truth of the Carians' habitual use of certain military devices. That the ghost of pan-Carianism should be well and truly laid is all to the good; yet I hope to show here that the literary record, such as it is, of the presence of Carians in the Lydian capital is reasonably substantiated by the archaeological and epigraphic material.

Herodotos' Carian source pointed to an old relationship between the Lydians and Carians, symbolised by the temple of Carian Zeus at Mylasa and by the kinship of the eponymous heroes Car and Lydus. According to this source linguistic affinities existed between Lydians and Carians. In Strabo's time Lydians and Carians together inhabited the plain of the Maeander, though the Carians evidently exercised sole possession of the land to the south of the river. In the late seventh and sixth centuries, however, Lydians and Carians lived cheek by jowl in Aphrodisias, and there is good archaeological and epigraphic evidence for a Lydian community in the city. Whether this means that we must attempt to redraw the boundary between Lydian- and Carian-speakers (if such a boundary is logically acceptable) or whether the Lydians represented a trading community in a foreign (if friendly) city, remains to be seen. There is some evidence to suggest that Carians were present in archaic Smyrna, and epigraphic documentation for their presence, if not in Ephesos, at any rate at Belevi. They had a natural interest in their northern neighbours.

Two years ago Hauser published a remarkable bell-krater then in private possession and now in the Boston Museum of Fine Arts. (FRH. Pl. 115). On the one side we see a picture of Artemis shooting Actaeon, on the other a young shepherd is hotly pursued by a goat-headed Pan, while a small god-stick, or phallic herm, views the scene from a neighbouring eminence. The drawing is a marvel of elaborate elegance, the subjects uncommon, the forms and attitudes strangely and finely stylized. Who is the author of this fascinating work? In the text which accompanies the plate Hauser mentioned and reproduced a small pelike in Vienna, which he saw was closely related to the Boston krater, though he did not feel certain it was by the same artist: on the front of this vase, a man squats on a rock fishing with a rod and a youth with a basket stands beside him; on the reverse, a second youth carrying two baskets on a pole across his shoulder is speeding past a phallic herm (ibid. 2 pp. 293 and 295). In the opinion of the present writer, krater and pelike are undoubtedly by one master; and forty other vases are to be attributed to the same ingenious hand. A list of these vases will first be given, arranged according to shape; and a description of the master's style will follow. Cunning composition; rapid motion; quick deft draughtsmanship; strong and peculiar stylization; a deliberate archaism, retaining old forms, but refining, refreshing, and galvanizing them; nothing noble or majestic, but grace, humour, vivacity, originality, and dramatic force: these are the qualities which mark the Boston krater, and which characterize the anonymous artist who, for the sake of convenience, may be called ‘the master of the Boston Pan-vase,’ or, more briefly,‘the Pan-master.’

In 1957 Mr Lobel published, in the twenty-fourth volume of the Oxyrhynchus Papyri, a large fragment of a commentary on the Spartan poet Alcman. It is the second column of this papyrus which I propose to discuss; lines 13 to 22 give us some information about the Spartan royal family, and lines 22 to 25 seem to be saying something about the Spartan tribal organisation. Unfortunately, however, much of the left-hand side of the column is missing at this point; and when, from line 22, we do at last have a few letters from the left-hand side, we are faced with a gap running up the right-hand side as well. Because of this, it will be necessary to spend some time in an attempt to discover what the papyrus said, what it might have said, and what it could not possibly have said. Until this is done, no historical conclusions can safely be drawn.

Before starting on an examination of the text, however, it would be as well to state what can be known about the author of the commentary. We can be certain that he had the work of previous scholars before him. In line 4 he refers to Theon, the Augustan grammarian, and in line 5 to Tyrannion; there were two grammarians of that name, and we cannot tell which he means (Lobel 54). Furthermore, in line 28, τῶν λοιπῶν is best taken as meaning ‘the other commentators’ (see p. 70). Whether or not he was an intelligent man is a question on which it is better not to dogmatise. He is capable of interpretative remarks of dubious value (lines 9–13, with Lobel ad loc.). There is certainly a muddle in the third column, which may indicate stupidity on the part of the commentator, or carelessness on the part of the scribe. We should not assume too readily that what he says is the gospel truth about early Sparta. On the other hand, we should remember that he might be working from a reliable source.

The chorus' depiction of Ares as a ‘gold-changer of bodies’ and trader in precious metals underscores the increased intersection of finances and war in fifth-century Athens. The metaphor's details point to three contemporary developments (in addition to the patrios nomos allusion noted by Fraenkel): the increased conscription of citizens, the institution of pay for military service, and the payment of financial support for war orphans. And as leader of the Delian League, Athens itself resembled the war-god, establishing equivalents between men and money, and profiting from its acceptance of tribute payments in a variety of currencies. Taken together, the metaphor's contemporary dimensions probably had an unsettling effect on the Athenian audience.

In his Handbook of Greek Mythology Professor H. J. Rose several times draws attention to the legendary theme of the floating chest, which occurs so frequently as to suggest that ‘some kind of ritual lies behind all these tales’. The theme is recognised by Dr. A. B. Cook (Zeus II, 671 sqq.) as one of the perennials of folk-lore, and parallels are cited from modern Europe, Siberia, and India. A study by M. E. Cosquin (‘Le Lait de la Mère et le Coffre Flottant’ in Revue des Questions Historiques, 1908), based on material drawn from North Africa, India, and Java as well as the Classical world, links the floating chest to the miraculous suckling of children.

The preservation of a child or a mother and child in a floating chest was obviously a good story, and Euripides, by choosing this version of the Telephus legend in preference to that which left the child exposed on land, no doubt contributed to its popularity. Moreover, in legends of the introduction of a new cult the story teller often required a miraculous means of transport. The chest may have served a similar purpose to the floating rock of Celtic saints. But these explanations are not sufficient to account for the recurrence of the chest in a large number of stories which have important common elements.

The institution of sunthusiâ, ‘joint sacrifice’, appears in many forms in Graeco-Roman antiquity, but takes a special shape in the period of the Roman empire. After a brief outline of the practice, I address particular problems in inscriptions of Iasus in Caria and Side in Pamphylia.

In the Hellenistic period, the verb sunthûein and its related nouns, sunthutês, sunthusiâ, are mainly used in two senses. In the private sphere, devotees of particular gods or groups of gods may form standing associations of ‘joint sacrificers’, sometimes with common ownership of property.

Hearing of extensive and unidentified ruins on the banks of the river Jeihan (the ancient Pyramus) at a spot now called Bodroum to the east of the Cilician plain, just as the river enters the plain from the gorges of the Anti-Taurus, we determined to visit the site. The result of our explorations, made in the early months of this year, are as follows.

Our route took us past the rock of Anazarba and Kars Bazaar, at which places we decided to spend a few days, and though the spots have both been previously described we were able to add a few points to the information concerning them, both epigraphical and topographical.

Anazarba.—Caesarea penes Anazarbum, as Ptolemy calls it, was second only in importance to Tarsus of the cities of Cilicia during the days of imperial Rome, and was the metropolis of the eastern portion of the great plain. The town was built at the foot of a long rocky mountain, rising like an island out of the plain for the extent of three miles and attaining an altitude of 2,000 feet. The walls as they at present stand are of Armenian and Saracenic construction, enclosing a parallelogram, one side of which is protected by the mountain; but they contain many portions of Roman work, notably the great southern gate formed by a triumphal arch erected in the time of Justinian, when that emperor restored the town after it had been ruined by an earthquake.

The chief authority for the life of this saint is the biography by Symeon Metaphrastes, written about 900–50 A.D. It quotes the epitaph on the saint's tomb, and the question whether this epitaph is an original document of the second century A.D., or a later forgery, is one of the utmost importance for the early history of the Christian church, and of many literary points connected with it. The document is not very easily accessible, so that it may be well to quote it as it is given in the Life by Metaphrastes; the criticism of the text has been to a certain extent advanced by the metrical restorations proposed by Pitra and others.

The story of the sources of the Nile which Herodotus says the Scribe of the Sacred Treasures of Athene told him at Sais has been discussed many times, and nearly everything which can be said about it has been said. But the following points do not seem to have been made as yet.

The story that the sources or springs of the Nile are at Elephantine is absurd as it stands, as indeed Herodotus himself realised. Many suggestions have been put forward in explanation, primarily that the story is something theological or that it represents a very ancient tradition dating from the earliest times when the First Cataract was the Ultima Thule of Egypt. The flaw in such an explanation is that ‘from the earliest times’ the Nile's course south of the Cataract had been well known to the Egyptians. Cemeteries have been found in Nubia of the Egyptian predynastic and early dynastic times, and certainly from the Old Kingdom onwards armies and trading expeditions were commonly accustomed to go far up to the south. It was, therefore, well known to the Egyptians throughout history that the Nile did not rise at the First Cataract, but came from much farther south.

The Onchestos passage in the Homeric Hymn to Apollo (229-38) has been discussed extensively, most usefully by A. Schachter (BICS 23 (1976) 102-14) and G. Roux (REG 77 (1964) 1-22). Further consideration of the disputed verbal forms in lines 235 and 236 and the plurals of 233-6 suggests that the plurals do indeed indicate a two-horse chariot team but that the presence of a team is not incompatible with the test of a single colt, and that if a chariot is wrecked by the unguided horses, it is righted and left in situ (with the horses removed) while prayers of supplication are made to Poseidon. The events referred to are interpreted as elements of a religious ritual with explicit military implications, dating from the Mycenaean period. It is, however, noted that a Babylonian ritual parallel might suggest a Near Eastern (and possibly non-military) origin.

I lately enriched a village library with some volumes of Dickens; but, to my disappointment, the country-folk did not care for them. And the reason was not only that all those amusing vulgarities seem neither vulgar nor amusing to rustic readers; but far more because their way of life is so entirely removed from that life of the office, the back-parlour, and the street, with which the great humourist has to do, that they cannot imagine it. My failure made me reflect how imperfect is our acquaintance with the scenery and associations of classical life, and how much of the wit and fun of ancient humourists may be lost upon us, who live in such a different world from theirs. This misgiving must strike the reader of the Characters: he feels that they are sketched from life, but he craves for a completer familiarity with the Athens of the 4th century, without which many of the minuter touches may be missed. The very quality in Theophrastus which some have called ‘superficial,’ makes a fresh demand upon the reader. The author indicates only the external symptoms of character, not concerning himself with a deeper analysis.

By the generosity of Mr. S. Pepys Cockerell the British Museum has recently come into possession of three volumes of sketches, plans, etc., made by his father, C. R. Cockerell, R.A., during the seven years (1810–1817) in which he was travelling in S. Europe and the Levant.

The Collection contains about 500 sketches, a few in water-colour, sepia, and Indian-ink, the rest in pencil, and is of great interest both artistically and archaeologically. On its artistic interest I do not propose to dwell; Cockerell's merits as an artist have always been recognised, and these delicate water-colour and pencil notes, in which there is not an unnecessary or an unmeaning line, are quite up to the level of his finished work.

We possess few contemporary records of the Ionian expansion, even in its later stages, and the gradual hellenization of the coast-lands of southern Asia Minor is a process that, in the absence of historical documents, has largely to be inferred from later developments and by archaeological research. At least as early as the eighth century the sea-faring Greeks were known to the Assyrians, under the generic name of Ionians, as pirates and freebooters who troubled the coasts of their maritime provinces. That they should occasionally come into armed conflict with the Assyrian power was to be expected, but it has not hitherto been realized that at the beginning of the seventh century they were sufficiently numerous and powerful within the area of Assyrian control to join other adventurous and discontented elements in conducting a land campaign of some magnitude, and in defying, for a time successfully, the Assyrian forces. That they were capable of doing so may be taken as evidence of a considerable Ionian expansion eastwards at the close of the eighth and the beginning of the seventh centuries, and, though the Assyrians had little difficulty in checking the movement, it is probable that fresh conflicts of a like nature would have been recorded in the later Assyrian annals, were it not that a few years afterwards the centre of Ionian power in Western Asia Minor began to be held in check by Lydia, and later, in company with Lydia, was shaken to its foundation by the Cimmerian invaders. In fact those Ionians, whom Sennacherib met and defeated, achieved little political success, and that of a temporary character. It is possible that the effects of their cultural relations with their conquerors were more lasting.

This article argues that Pindar refers to cyclic Trojan epics as fixed poems known to his audiences and discusses why this matters for our understanding of his poetry. Section I claims that Isthmian 4 alludes to the Aethiopis as the work of Homer. Section II examines how Nemean 10 closely engages with the Cypria. Section III argues that Nemean 6 and Isthmian 8 signal an intertextual engagement with the Aethiopis and the Cypria. A conclusion assesses how far we can extrapolate from the preceding arguments to generalize about Pindar's relationship to Trojan epic and then suggests one particular way in which recognizing allusions to lost epic can enrich our understanding of his preserved lyric.