James Frazer - The Golden Bough - A Study in Magic and Religion (Third Edition, Vol. 07 of 12)

As to the Plataean games see Plutarch, Aristides , 21; Pausanias, ix. 2. 6.

Strabo, vii. 7. 6, p. 325; Suetonius, Augustus , 18; Dio Cassius, li. 1; Daremberg et Saglio, Dictionnaire des Antiquités Grecques et Romaines , s. v. “Actia.”

Pausanias, viii. 9. 8.

Scholiast on Pindar, Pyth. , Argument, p. 298, ed. Aug. Boeckh; Censorinus, De die natali , xviii. 6. According to the scholiast on Pindar ( l. c. ) the change from the octennial to the quadriennial period was occasioned by the nymphs of Parnassus bringing ripe fruits in their hands to Apollo, after he had slain the dragon at Delphi.

Scholiast on Pindar, Olymp. iii. 35 (20), p. 98, ed. Aug. Boeckh. Compare Boeckh's commentary on Pindar (vol. iii. p. 138 of his edition); L. Ideler, Handbuch der mathematischen und technischen Chronologie , i. 366 sq. , ii. 605 sqq.

See The Dying God , chapter ii. § 4, “Octennial Tenure of the Kingship,” especially pp. 68 sq. , 80, 89 sq.

Geminus, Elementa Astronomiae , viii. 25 sqq. , pp. 110 sqq. , ed. C. Manitius (Leipsic, 1898); Censorinus, De die natali , xviii. 2-6.

Geminus, l. c.

Geminus, Elementa Astronomiae , viii. 36-41.

Censorinus, De die natali , xviii. 5. As Eudoxus flourished in the fourth century b. c., some sixty or seventy years after Meton, who introduced the nineteen years' cycle to remedy the defects of the octennial cycle, the claim of Eudoxus to have instituted the latter cycle may at once be put out of court. The claim of Cleostratus, who seems to have lived in the sixth or fifth century b. c., cannot be dismissed so summarily; but for the reasons given in the text he can hardly have done more than suggest corrections or improvements of the ancient octennial cycle.

Geminus, Elementa Astronomiae , viii. 27. With far less probability Censorinus ( De die natali , xviii. 2-4) supposes that the octennial cycle was produced by the successive duplication of biennial and quadriennial cycles. See below, pp. 86 sq.

L. Ideler, Handbuch der mathematischen und technischen Chronologie , ii. 605.

The Dying God , pp. 58 sqq. Speaking of the octennial cycle Censorinus observes that “ Ob hoc in Graecia multae religiones hoc intervallo temporis summa caerimonia coluntur ” ( De die natali , xviii. 6). Compare L. Ideler, op. cit. ii. 605 sq. ; G. F. Unger, “Zeitrechnung der Griechen und Römer,” in Iwan Müller's Handbuch der classischen Altertumswissenschaft , i. 2732 sq. The great age and the wide diffusion of the octennial cycle in Greece are rightly maintained by A. Schmidt ( Handbuch der griechischen Chronologie , Jena, 1888, pp. 61 sqq. ), who suggests that the cycle may have owed something to the astronomy of the Egyptians, with whom the inhabitants of Greece are known to have had relations from a very early time.

Aratus, Phaenomena , 733 sqq. ; L. Ideler, Handbuch der mathematischen und technischen Chronologie , i. 255 sq.

Geminus, Elementa Astronomiae , viii. 15-45.

Macrobius, Saturnalia , i. 15. 9 sqq. ; Livy, ix. 46. 5; Valerius Maximus, ii. 5. 2; Cicero, Pro Muraena , xi. 25; id. , De legibus , ii. 12. 29; Suetonius, Divus Iulius , 40; Plutarch, Caesar , 59.

See The Dying God , pp. 92 sqq.

Plato, Meno , p. 81 a-c; Pindar, ed. Aug. Boeckh, vol. iii. pp. 623 sq. , Frag. 98. See further The Dying God , pp. 69 sq.

Plutarch, Aristides , 21; Pausanias, ix. 2. 6.

See above, p. 80.

Pausanias, iv. 5. 10; compare Aristotle, Constitution of Athens , iii. 1; G. Gilbert, Handbuch der griechischen Staatsalterthumer , i. 2(Leipsic, 1893) pp. 122 sq.

See The Dying God , pp. 89-92.

L. Ideler, Handbuch der mathematischen und technischen Chronologie , ii. 606 sq.

Censorinus, De die natali , xviii. 2-4.

Censorinus, De die natali , xviii. 2.

L. Ideler, Handbuch der mathematischen und technischen Chronologie , i. 270.

Augustine, De civitate Dei , vii. 20. “ In Cereris autem sacris praedicantur illa Eleusinia, quae apud Athenienses nobilissima fuerunt. De quibus iste [Varro] nihil interpretatur, nisi quod attinet ad frumentum, quod Ceres invenit, et ad Proserpinam, quam rapiente Orco perdidit. Et hanc ipsam dicit significare foecunditatem seminum… Dicit deinde multa in mysteriis ejus tradi, quae nisi ad frugum inventionem non pertineant. ”

A. Baumeister, Denkmäler des classischen Altertums , i. 577 sq. ; Drexler, s. v. "Gaia," in W. H. Roscher's Lexikon der griech. und röm. Mythologie , i. 1574 sqq. ; L. R. Farnell, The Cults of the Greek States , iii. (Oxford, 1907) p. 27.

Pausanias, vii. 21. 11. At Athens there was a sanctuary of Earth the Nursing-Mother and of Green Demeter (Pausanias, i. 22. 3), but we do not know how the goddesses were represented.

L. R. Farnell, The Cults of the Greek States , iii. 256 with plate xxi. b.

The distinction between Demeter (Ceres) and the Earth Goddess is clearly marked by Ovid, Fasti , iv. 673 sq. :

“ Officium commune Ceres et Terra tuentur;Haec praebet causam frugibus, illa locum. ”

Dittenberger, Sylloge Inscriptionum Graecarum , 2Nos. 20, 408, 411, 587, 646, 647, 652, 720, 789. Compare the expression διώνυμοι θέαι applied to them by Euripides, Phoenissae , 683, with the Scholiast's note.

The substantial identity of Demeter and Persephone has been recognised by some modern scholars, though their interpretations of the myth do not altogether agree with the one adopted in the text. See F. G. Welcker, Griechische Götterlehre (Göttingen, 1857-1862), ii. 532; L. Preller, in Pauly's Realencyclopädie der classischen Altertumswissenschaft , vi. 106 sq. ; F. Lenormant, in Daremberg et Saglio, Dictionnaire des Antiquités Grecques et Romaines , i. 2. pp. 1047 sqq.

Homeric Hymn to Demeter , 480 sqq. ; Pindar, quoted by Clement of Alexandria, Strom. iii. 3. 17, p. 518, ed. Potter; Sophocles, quoted by Plutarch, De audiendis poetis , 4; Isocrates, Panegyricus , 6; Cicero, De legibus , ii. 14. 36; Aristides, Eleusin. vol. i. p. 421, ed. G. Dindorf.