Mosaics of Grecian History by Marcius Willson and Robert Pierpont Willson

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14. At the south-eastern extremity of the Peloponnesus was Laconia,
the fertile portions of which consisted mostly of a long, narrow
valley, shut in on three sides by the mountain ranges of Ta-yg'etus
on the west and Parnon on the north and east, and open only on
the south to the sea. Through this valley flows the river Euro'tas,
on whose banks, about twenty miles from the sea, stood the capital
city, Lacedae'mon, or Sparta, which was unwalled and unfortified
during its most flourishing period, as the Spartans held that the
real defence of a town consists solely in the valor of its citizens.
The sea-coast of Laconia was lined with towns, and furnished with
numerous ports and commodious harbors. While Sparta was equaled
by few other Greek cities in the magnificence of its temples and
statues, the private houses, and even the palace of the king,
were always simple and unadorned.

15. West of Laconia was Messe'nia, the south-western division of
Greece, a mountainous country, but with many fertile intervening
valleys, the whole renowned for the mildness and salubrity of
its climate. Its principal river, the Pami'sus, rising in the
mountains of Arcadia, flows southward to the Messenian Gulf through
a beautiful plain, the lower portion of which was so celebrated
for its fertility that it was called Maca'ria, or "the blessed;"
and even to this day it is covered with plantations of the vine,
the fig, and the mulberry, and is "as rich in cultivation as can
be well imagined."

16. One district more--that of E'lis, north of Messenia and west
of Arcadia, and embracing the western slopes of the Achaian and
Arcadian mountains--makes up the complement of the ancient
Peloponnesian states. Though hilly and mountainous, like Messenia,
it had many valleys and hill-sides of great fertility. The river
Alphe'us, which the poets have made the most celebrated of the
rivers of Greece, flows westward through Elis to the Ionian Sea,
and on its banks was Olympia, the renowned seat of the Olympian
games. Here, also, was the sacred grove of olive and plane trees,
within which were temples, monuments, and statues, erected in
honor of gods, heroes, and conquerors. In the very midst stood
the great temple of Jupiter, which contained the colossal gold
and ivory statue of the god, the masterpiece of the sculptor
Phidias. Hence, by the common law of Greece Elis was deemed a
sacred territory, and its cities were unwalled, as they were
thought to be sufficiently protected by the sanctity of the
country; and it was only when the ancient faith began to give
way that the sacred character of Elis was disregarded.

17. The Isles of Greece.--

The Isles of Greece! the Isles of Greece!
Where burning Sappho loved and sung--
Where grew the arts of war and peace,
Where Delos rose and Phoebus sprung!
Eternal summer gilds them yet,
But all except their sun is set.
--BYRON.

The main-land of Greece was deeply indented by gulfs and almost
land-locked bays, and the shores were lined with numerous islands,
which were occupied by the Grecian race. Beginning our survey of
these in the northern AEge'an, we find, off the coast of Thessaly,
the Island of Lemnos, which is fabled as the spot on which the
fire-god Vulcan--the Lucifer of heathen mythology--fell, after
being hurled down from Olympus. Under a volcano of the island be
established his workshop, and there forged the thunder-bolts of
Jupiter and the arms of the gods and of godlike heroes.

Of the Grecian islands proper, the largest is Euboe'a, a long
and narrow island lying east of Central Greece, from which it
is separated by the narrow channel of the Euri'pus, or Euboe'an
Sea. South-east of Euboea are the Cyc'la-des, [Footnote: From
the Greek word kuklos, a circle.] a large group that kept guard
around the sacred Island of Delos, which is said to have risen
unexpectedly out of the sea. The Spor'a-des [Footnote: From the
Greek word speiro, to sow; scattered, like seed, so numerous were
they. Hence our word spore.] were another group, scattered over
the sea farther east, toward the coast of Asia Minor. The large
islands of Crete and Rhodes were south-east of these groups. In
the Saron'ic Gulf, between Attica and Ar'golis, were the islands
of Sal'amis and AEgi'na, the former the scene of the great naval
conflict between the Greeks on the one side and the Persians,
under Xerxes, on the other, and the latter long the maritime rival
of Athens.

Cyth'era, now Cer'igo, an island of great importance to the
Spartans, was separated by a narrow channel from the southern
extremity of Laconia. It was on the coast of this island that
the goddess Venus is fabled to have first appeared to mortals
as she arose out of the foam of the sea, having a beautifully
enameled shell for her chariot, drawn by dolphins, as some paintings
represent; but others picture her as borne on a shining seahorse.
She was first called Cyth-er-e'a, from the name of the island.
The nymphs of ocean, of the land, and the streams, the fishes
and monsters of the deep, and the birds of heaven, with rapturous
delight greeted her coming, and did homage to the beauty of the
Queen of Love. The following fine description of the scene, truly
Grecian in spirit, is by a modern poet:

Uprisen from the sea when Cytherea,
Shining in primal beauty, paled the day,
The wondering waters hushed, They yearned in sighs
That shook the world--tumultuously heaved
To a great throne of azure laced with light
And canopied in foam to grace their queen.
Shrieking for joy came O-ce-an'i-des,
And swift Ner-e'i-des rushed from afar,
Or clove the waters by. Came eager-eyed
Even shy Na-i'a-des from inland streams,
With wild cries headlong darting through the waves;
And Dryads from the shore stretched their long arms,
While, hoarsely sounding, heard was Triton's shell;
Shoutings uncouth, bewildered sounds,
And innumerable splashing feet
Of monsters gambolling around their god,
Forth shining on a sea-horse, fierce and finned.
Some bestrode fishes glinting dusky gold,
Or angry crimson, or chill silver bright;
Others jerked fast on their own scanty tails;
And sea-birds, screaming upward either side,
Wove a vast arch above the Queen of Love,
Who, gazing on this multitudinous
Homaging to her beauty, laughed. She laughed
The soft, delicious laughter that makes mad;
Low warblings in the throat, that clinch man's life
Tighter than prison bars.
--THOMAS WOOLNER.

Off the coast of Elis were the two small islands called the
Stroph'a-des, noted as the place of habitation of those fabled
winged monsters, the Harpies. Here AEne'as landed in his flight
from the ruins of Troy, but no pleasant greetings met him there.

"At length I land upon the Strophades,
Safe from the dangers of the stormy seas.
Those isles are compassed by th' Ionian main,
The dire abode where the foul Harpies reign:
Monsters more fierce offended Heaven ne'er sent
From hell's abyss for human punishment.
We spread the tables on the greensward ground;
We feed with hunger, and the bowls go round;
When from the mountain-tops, with hideous cry
And clattering wings, the hungry Harpies fly:
They snatch the meat, defiling all they find,
And, parting, leave a loathsome stench behind."
--VIRGIL'S AEneid, B. III.

North of the Strophades, along the western coast of Greece, were
the six Ionian islands known in Grecian history as Paxos,
Zacyn'thus, Cephalo'nia, Ith'aca (the native island of Ulysses),
Leu'cas (or Leuca'dia), and Corcy'ra (now Corfu), which latter
island Homer calls Phaea'cia, and where he places the fabled gardens
of Alcin'o-us. It was King Alcinous who kindly entertained Ulysses
in his island home when the latter was shipwrecked on his coast.
He is highly praised in Grecian legends for his love of agriculture;
and his gardens, so beautifully described by Homer, have afforded
a favorite theme for poets of succeeding ages. HOMER'S description
is as follows:

Close to the gates a spacious garden lies,
From storms defended and inclement skies;
Four acres was the allotted space of ground,
Fenced with a green enclosure all around;
Tall thriving trees confessed the fruitful mould,
And reddening apples ripen here to gold.
Here the blue fig with luscious juice o'erflows;
With deeper red the full pomegranate glows;
The branch here bends beneath the weighty pear,
And verdant olives flourish round the year.
The balmy spirit of the western gale
Eternal breathes on fruits untaught to fail;
Each dropping pear a following pear supplies;
On apples apples, figs on figs arise:
The same mild season gives the blooms to blow,
The buds to harden, and the fruits to grow.

Here ordered vines in equal ranks appear,
With all the united labors of the year;
Some to unload the fertile branches run,
Some dry the blackening clusters in the sun,
Others to tread the liquid harvest join,
The groaning presses foam with floods of wine.
Here are the vines in early flower descried,
Here grapes discolored on the sunny side,
And there in Autumn's richest purple dyed.
Beds of all various herbs, forever green,
In beauteous order terminate the scene.

Two plenteous fountains the whole prospect crowned:
This through the garden leads its streams around,
Visits each plant, and waters all the ground;
While that in pipes beneath the palace flows,
And thence its current on the town bestows.
To various use their various streams they bring;
The people one, and one supplies the king.
--Odyssey, B. VII. POPE'S Trans.

CHAPTER II.

THE FABULOUS AND LEGENDARY PERIOD OF GRECIAN HISTORY.

I. GRECIAN MYTHOLOGY.

As the Greeks, in common with the Egyptians and other Eastern
nations, placed the reign of the gods anterior to the race of
mortals, Grecian mythology--which is a system of myths, or fabulous
opinions and doctrines respecting the universe and the deities
who were supposed to preside over it--forms the most natural and
appropriate introduction to Grecian history.

Our principal knowledge of this system is derived from the works
of Homer, He'si-od, and other ancient writers, who have gathered
the floating legends of which it consists into tales and epic
poems, many of them of great power and beauty. Some of these legends
are exceedingly natural and pleasing, while others shock and disgust
us by the gross impossibilities and hideous deformities which they
reveal. Yet these legends are the spontaneous and the earliest
growth of the Grecian mind, and were long accepted by the people
as serious realities. They are, therefore, to be viewed as exponents
of early Grecian philosophy,--of all that the early Greeks believed,
and felt, and conjectured, respecting the universe and its government,
and respecting the social relations, duties, and destiny of
mankind,--and their influence upon national character was great.
As a Scotch poet and scholar of our own day well remarks,

Old fables these, and fancies old!
But not with hasty pride
Let logic cold and reason bold
Cast these old dreams aside.
Dreams are not false in all their scope:
Oft from the sleepy lair
Start giant shapes of fear and hope
That, aptly read, declare
Our deepest nature. God in dreams
Hath spoken to the wise;
And in a people's mythic themes
A people's wisdom lies.
--J. STUART BLACKIE.

According to Grecian philosophy, first in the order of time came
Cha'os, a heterogeneous mass, containing all the seeds of nature.
This was formed by the hand of an unknown god, into "broad-breasted
Earth" (the mother of the gods), who produced U'ranus, or Heaven.
Then Earth married Uranus, or Heaven; and from this union came a
numerous and powerful brood--the Ti'tans, and the Cyclo'pes, and
the gods of the wintry season Kot'-tos, Bria're-us, and Gy'ges,
who had each a hundred hands), supposed to be personifications
of the hail, the rain, and the snow.

The Titans made war upon their father, Uranus, who was wounded
by Chro'nos, or Saturn, the youngest and bravest of his sons.
From the drops of blood which flowed from the wound and fell upon
the earth sprung the Furies, the Giants, and the Me'lian nymphs;
and from those which fell into the sea sprang Venus, the goddess
of love and beauty. Uranus being dethroned, Saturn was permitted
by his brethren to reign, on condition that he would destroy all
his male children. But Rhe'a (his wife), unwilling to see her
children perish, concealed from him the birth of Zeus' (or Jupiter),
Pos-ei'don (or Neptune), and Pluto.

THE BATTLE OF THE GIANTS.

The Titans, informed that Saturn had saved his children, made war
upon him and dethroned him; but he was soon restored by his son
Jupiter. Yet Jupiter soon afterward conspired against his father,
and after a long war with him and his giant progeny, that lasted
full ten years, he drove Saturn from the kingdom, which he held
against the repeated assaults of all the gods, who were finally
destroyed or imprisoned by his overmastering power. This contest
is termed "the Battle of the Giants," and is very celebrated in
Grecian mythology. The description of it which HESIOD has given
in his Theogony is considered "one of the most sublime passages
in classical poetry, conceived with great boldness, and executed
with a power and force which show a masterly though rugged genius.
It will bear a favorable comparison with Milton's 'Battle of the
Angels,' in Paradise Lost." We subjoin the following extracts from
it:

The immeasurable sea tremendous dashed
With roaring, earth resounded, the broad heaven
Groaned, shattering; huge Olympus reeled throughout,
Down to its rooted base, beneath the rush
Of those immortals. The dark chasm of hell
Was shaken with the trembling, with the tramp
Of hollow footsteps and strong battle-strokes,
And measureless uproar of wild pursuit.
So they against each other through the air
Hurled intermixed their weapons, scattering groans
Where'er they fell.

The voice of armies rose
With rallying shout through the starred firmament,
And with a mighty war-cry both the hosts
Encountering closed. Nor longer then did Jove
Curb down his force, but sudden in his soul
There grew dilated strength, and it was filled
With his omnipotence; his whole of might
Broke from him, and the godhead rushed abroad.
The vaulted sky, the Mount Olympus, flashed
With his continual presence, for he passed
Incessant forth, and lightened where he trod.

Thrown from his nervous grasp the lightnings flew,
Reiterated swift; the whirling flash,
Cast sacred splendor, and the thunder-bolt
Fell. Then on every side the foodful earth
Roared in the burning flame, and far and near
The trackless depth of forests crashed with fire;
Yea, the broad earth burned red, the floods of Nile
Glowed, and the desert waters of the sea.

Round and round the Titans' earthy forms
Rolled the hot vapor, and on fiery surge
Streamed upward, swathing in one boundless blaze
The purer air of heaven. Keen rushed the light
In quivering splendor from the writhen flash;
Strong though they were, intolerable smote
Their orbs of sight, and with bedimming glare
Scorched up their blasted vision. Through the gulf
Of yawning chaos the supernal flame
Spread, mingling fire with darkness.

The whirlwinds were abroad, and hollow aroused
A shaking and a gathering dark of dust,
Crushing the thunders from the clouds of air,
Hot thunder-bolts and flames, the fiery darts
Of Jove; and in the midst of either host
They bore upon their blast the cry confused
Of battle, and the shouting. For the din
Tumultuous of that sight-appalling strife
Rose without bound. Stern strength of hardy proof
Wreaked there its deeds, till weary sank the war.
--Trans. by ELTON.

Thus Jupiter, or Jove, became the head of the universe; and to
him is ascribed the creation of the subsequent gods, of man, and
of all animal life, and the supreme control and government of
all. His supremacy is beautifully sung in the following hymn by
the Greek philosopher CLE-AN'THES, said to be the only one of
his numerous writings that has been preserved. Like many others
of the ancient hymns of adoration, it presents us with high
spiritual conceptions of the unity and attributes of Deity; and
had it been addressed to Jehovah it would have been deemed a grand
tribute to his majesty and a noble specimen of deep devotional
feeling.

Hymn to Jupiter.

Most glorious of th' immortal powers above--
O thou of many names--mysterious Jove!
For evermore almighty! Nature's source,
That govern'st all things in their ordered course,
All hail to thee! Since, innocent of blame,
E'en mortal creatures may address thy name--
For all that breathe and creep the lowly earth
Echo thy being with reflected birth--
Thee will I sing, thy strength for aye resound!
The universe that rolls this globe around
Moves wheresoe'er thy plastic influence guides,
And, ductile, owns the god whose arm presides.

The lightnings are thy ministers of ire,
The double-forked and ever-living fire;
In thy unconquerable hand they glow,
And at the flash all nature quakes below.
Thus, thunder-armed, thou dost creation draw
To one immense, inevitable law;
And with the various mass of breathing souls
Thy power is mingled and thy spirit rolls.
Dread genius of creation! all things bow
To thee! the universal monarch thou!
Nor aught is done without thy wise control
On earth, or sea, or round the ethereal pole,
Save when the wicked, in their frenzy blind,
Act o'er the follies of a senseless mind.

Thou curb'st th' excess; confusion to thy sight
Moves regular; th' unlovely scene is bright.
Thy hand, educing good from evil, brings
To one apt harmony the strife of things.
One ever-during law still binds the whole,
Though shunned, resisted, by the sinner's soul.
Wretches! while still they course the glittering prize,
The law of God eludes their ears and eyes.
Life then were virtue, did they this obey;
But wide from life's chief good they headlong stray.

Now glory's arduous toils the breast inflame;
Now avarice thirsts, insensible of shame;
Now sloth unnerves them in voluptuous ease,
And the sweet pleasures of the body please.
With eager haste they rush the gulf within,
And their whole souls are centred in their sin.
But oh, great Jove! by whom all good is given--
Dweller with lightnings and the clouds of heaven--
Save from their dreadful error lost mankind!
Father, disperse these shadows of the mind!
Give them thy pure and righteous law to know,
Wherewith thy justice governs all below.
Thus honored by the knowledge of thy way,
Shall men that honor to thyself repay,
And bid thy mighty works in praises ring,
As well befits a mortal's lips to sing;
More blest nor men nor heavenly powers can be
Than when their songs are of thy law and thee.
--Trans, by ELTON.

Jupiter is said to have divided the dominion of the universe
between himself and his two brothers, Neptune and Pluto, taking
heaven as his own portion, and having his throne and holding his
court on Mount Olympus, in Thessaly, while he assigned the dominion
of the sea to Neptune, and to Pluto the lower regions--the abodes
of the dead. Jupiter had several wives, both goddesses and mortals;
but last of all he married his sister Juno, who maintained
permanently the dignity of queen of the gods. The offspring of
Jupiter were numerous, comprising both celestial and terrestrial
divinities. The most noted of the former were Mars, the god of
war; Vulcan, the god of fire (the Olympian artist who forged the
thunder-bolts of Jupiter and the arms of all the gods); and Apollo,
the god of archery, prophecy, music, and medicine.

"Mine is the invention of the charming lyre;
Sweet notes, and heavenly numbers I inspire.
Med'cine is mine: what herbs and simples grow
In fields and forests, all their powers I know,
And am the great physician called below."
--Apollo to Daphne, in OVID'S Metam. PRYDEN'S Trans.

Then come Mercury, the winged messenger, interpreter and ambassador
of the gods; Diana, queen of the woods and goddess of hunting,
and hence the counterpart of her brother Apollo; and finally,
Minerva, the goddess of wisdom and skill, who is said to have
Sprung full-armed from the brain of Jupiter.

Besides these divinities there were many others--as Ceres, the
goddess of grain and harvests; and Vesta, the goddess of home
joys and comforts, who presided over the sanctity of the domestic
hearth. There were also inferior gods and goddesses innumerable--such
as deities of the woods and the mountains, the meadows and the
rivers--some terrestrial, others celestial, according to the places
over which they were supposed to preside, and rising in importance
in proportion to the powers they manifested. Even the Muses, the
Fates, and the Graces were numbered among Grecian deities.

But while, undoubtedly, the great mass of the Grecian people
believed that their divinities were real persons, who presided
over the affairs of men, their philosophers, while encouraging
this belief as the best adapted to the understanding of the people,
took quite a different view of them, and explained the mythological
legends as allegorical representations of general physical and
moral truths. Thus, while Jupiter, to the vulgar mind, was the
god or the upper regions, "who dwelt on the Summits of the highest
mountains, gathered the clouds about him, shook the air with his
thunder, and wielded the lightning as the instrument of his wrath,"
yet in all this he was but the symbol of the ether or atmosphere
which surrounds the earth; and hence, the numerous fables of this
monarch of the gods may be considered merely as "allegories which
typify the great generative power of the universe, displaying itself
in a variety of ways, and under the greatest diversity of forms."
So, also, Apollo was, in all likelihood, originally the sun-god
of the Asiatic nations; displaying all the attributes of that
luminary; and because fire is "the great agent in reducing and
working the metals, Vulcan, the fire-god, naturally became an
artist, and is represented as working with hammer and tongs at
his anvil. Thus the Greeks, instead of worshipping Nature,
worshipped the Powers of Nature, as personified in the almost
infinite number of their deities.

The process by which the beings of Grecian mythology came into
existence, among an ardent and superstitious people, is beautifully
described by the poet WORDSWORTH as very naturally arising out
of the

Teeming Fancies of the Greek Mind.

The lively Grecian, in a land of hills,
Rivers, and fertile plains, and sounding shores,
Under a copse of variegated sky,
Could find commodious place for every god.
In that fair clime the lonely herdsman, stretched
On the soft grass through half a summer's day,
With music lulled his indolent repose;
And in some fit of weariness, if he,
When his own breath was silent, chanced to hear
A distant strain, far sweeter than the sounds
Which his poor skill could make, his fancy fetch'd
Even from the blazing chariot of the sun
A beardless youth, who touched a golden lute,
And filled the illumined groves with ravishment.

The night hunter, lifting a bright eye
Up toward the crescent moon, with grateful heart
Called on the lovely wanderer who bestow'd
That timely light to share his joyous sport.
And hence a beaming goddess, with her nymphs,
Across the lawn, and through the darksome grove
(Not unaccompanied with tuneful notes,
By echo multiplied from rock or cave),
Swept in the storm of chase, as moon and stars
Glance rapidly along the clouded heaven
When winds are blowing strong. The traveller slacked
His thirst from rill or gushing fount, and thank'd
The Naiad. Sunbeams, upon distant hills
Gliding apace, with shadows in their train,
Might, with small help from fancy, be transformed
Into fleet Oreads sporting visibly.

The Zephyrs fanning, as they passed, their wings,
Lacked not for love fair objects, whom they wooed
With gentle whisper. Withered boughs grotesque,
Stripped of their leaves and twigs by hoary age,
From depth of shaggy covert peeping forth
In the low vale, or on steep mountain side--
And sometimes intermixed with stirring horns
Of the live deer, or goat's depending beard--
These were the lurking Satyrs, a wild brood
Of gamesome deities; or Pan himself,
The simple shepherd's awe-inspiring god.

Similar ideas are expressed in an article on the Nature of Early
History, by a celebrated English scholar, [Footnote: Henry George
Liddell, D. D., Dean of Christchurch College, Oxford.] who says:
"The legends, or mythic fables, of the Greeks are chiefly connected
with religious ideas, and may mostly be traced to that sort of
awe or wonder with which simple and uneducated minds regard the
changes and movements of the natural world. The direct and easy
way in which the imagination of such persons accounts for marvelous
phenomena, is to refer them to the operation of Persons. When the
attention is excited by the regular movements of sun, and moon,
and stars, by the alternations of day and night, by the recurrence
of the seasons, by the rising and falling of the seas, by the
ceaseless flow of rivers, by the gathering of clouds, the rolling
of thunder, and the flashing of lightning, by the operations of
life in the vegetable and animal worlds--in short, by any exhibition
of an active and motive power--it is natural for uninstructed
minds to consider such changes and movements as the work of divine
Persons. In this manner the early Greek legends associate themselves
with personifications of the powers of Nature. All attempts to
account for the marvels which surround us are foregone; everything
is referred to the immediate operation of a god. 'Cloud-compelling
Zeus' is the author of the phenomenon of the air; 'Earth-shaking
Pos-ei'don,' of all that happens in the water under the earth;
Nymphs are attached to every spring or tree; De-me'ter, or Mother
Earth, for six months rejoices in the presence of Proserpine,
[Footnote: In some legends Proserpine is regarded as the daughter
of Mother Earth, or Ceres, and a personification of the growing
corn.] the green herb, her daughter, and for six months regrets
her absence in dark abodes beneath the earth.

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