CHAPTER II—Priestly Kings
[157] J. Marquardt, Römische Staatsverwaltung, iii.² 321 sqq. Kings of the Sacred Rites are known from inscriptions to have existed at Lanuvium, Bovillae, and Tusculum. See Corpus Inscriptionum Latinarum, xiv., Nos. 2089, 2413, 2634. At Rome the Sacrificial King held office for life (Dionysius Halicarn. Antiquit. Rom. iv. 74. 4).
[158] Plato, Politicus, p. 290 E; Aristotle, Constitution of Athens, 57; Lysias, Or. vi. 4; G. Gilbert, Handbuch der griechischen Staatsalterthümer,² i. 281 sqq.
[159] Aristotle, Politics, viii. (vi.) 8. 20, p. 1322 b 26 sqq.; G. Gilbert, op. cit. ii. 323 sq.; G. F. Schömann, Griechische Alterthümer,⁴ i. 145 sq., ii. 423 sq.
[160] Dittenberger, Sylloge Inscriptionum Graecarum,² No. 616; Ch. Michel, Recueil d’Inscriptions grecques, No. 716.
[161] P. Cauer, Delectus Inscriptionum Graecarum,² No. 431, lines 46 sqq. Another inscription in the same collection (No. 428) also refers to the kings of Mytilene. Both inscriptions are printed in Ch. Michel’s Recueil, Nos. 356, 357.
[162] Dittenberger, Sylloge Inscriptionum Graecarum,² No. 570; Ch. Michel, Recueil, No. 707.
[163] P. Cauer, Delectus Inscriptionum Graecarum,² No. 496; Ch. Michel, Recueil, No. 1383.
[164] G. F. Schömann, Handbuch der griech. Alterthümer,⁴ ii. 270 sqq.; E. Ziebarth, “Der Fluch im griechischen Recht,” Hermes, xxx. (1895) pp. 57–70; Miss J. E. Harrison, Prolegomena to the Study of Greek Religion² (Cambridge, 1908), pp. 138–145; and my note on Pausanias, iii. 2. 7. For example, the people of Teos cursed poisoners and all persons who hindered the importation of corn (Cauer, op. cit. No. 480; Ch. Michel, op. cit. No. 1318). On the other hand, at Athens in the time of Solon public curses were levelled at all who exported anything but olive oil (Plutarch, Solon, 24). These particular curses may interest students of the history of free trade.
[165] Plutarch, Quaest. Graec. 12. Aug. Mommsen (Delphika, pp. 250 sq.) is probably right in comparing this ceremony with the swinging-festival (Aiora) at Athens, as to which see The Golden Bough, Second Edition, ii. 453 sqq.
[166] Corpus Inscriptionum Graecarum Graeciae Septentrionalis, i. Nos. 1, 2, 3, 10, 11, 12, 13, 14, 188, 223; G. F. Schömann, op. cit. i. 146; G. Gilbert, op. cit. ii. 323 sq.
[167] Strabo, viii. 7. 2, p. 384. In this passage the word βασιλέα is omitted in some editions, but has the authority of several MSS. (Strabo ed. C. Müller, p. 998), and is probably right.
[168] This was the case at Elis (H. Roehl, Inscriptiones Graecae antiquissimae, No. 112; P. Cauer, op. cit. No. 253; E. S. Roberts, Introduction to Greek Epigraphy, i. No. 292), in Cos (Dittenberger, op. cit. No. 616), in Chios (ib. No. 570), at Mytilene (Cauer, op. cit. Nos. 428, 431), at Cyme (Plutarch, Quaest. Graec. 2), and perhaps in Siphnos (Isocrates, Or. xix. 36). The Kings of Elis may have been the officials called Basilai who sacrificed on the top of Mount Cronius at Olympia at the spring equinox (Pausanias, vi. 20. 1).
[169] Livy, ii. 2. 1; Dionysius Halicarn., Antiquit. Rom. iv. 74. 4.
[170] Aristotle, Politics, iii. 14. 13, p. 1285 b 14 sqq.; Demosthenes, Contra Neaer. § 74 sqq. p. 1370; Plutarch, Quaest. Rom. 63.
[171] Xenophon, Repub. Lacedaem. 15, compare id. 13; Aristotle, Politics, iii. 14. 3, p. 1285 a 3 sqq. Argos was governed, at least nominally, by a king as late as the time of the great Persian war (Herodotus, vii. 149); and at Orchomenus, in the secluded highlands of Northern Arcadia, the kingly form of government persisted till towards the end of the fifth century B.C. (Plutarch, Parallela, 32). As to the kings of Thessaly in the sixth and fifth centuries B.C., see F. Hiller von Gaertringen in Aus der Anomia (Berlin, 1890), pp. 1–16.
[172] Herodotus, vi. 56.
[173] Strabo, xiv. 1. 3, pp. 632 sq. These Ephesian kings, who probably held office for life, are not to be confounded with the purely priestly functionaries called Essenes or King Bees, whose tenure of office was annual. See below, vol. ii. p. 135.
[174] Herodotus, iv. 162.
[175] Strabo, xii. 3. 37, 5. 3; compare xi. 4. 7, xii. 2. 3, 2. 6, 3. 31 sq., 3. 34, 8. 9, 8. 14. But see Encyclopaedia Britannica, 9th ed. art. “Priest,” xix. 729.
[176] J. Grimm, Deutsche Rechtsalterthümer, p. 243.
[177] See the Lî-Kî (Legge’s translation), passim (Sacred Books of the East, vols. xxvii., xxviii.).
[178] W. Ellis, History of Madagascar (London, N.D.), i. 359 sq.
[179] Ph. Paulitschke, Ethnographie Nordost-Afrikas: die geistige Cultur der Danâkil, Galla und Somâl (Berlin, 1896), p. 129.
[180] Brasseur de Bourbourg, Histoire des nations civilisées du Mexique et de l’Amérique-Centrale, i. 94. As to the ruins of Palenque, see H. H. Bancroft, Native Races of the Pacific States, iv. 288 sqq.; T. Maler, “Mémoire sur l’état de Chiapa (Mexique),” Revue d’Ethnographie, iii. (1885) pp. 327 sqq.
[181] Father Croonenberghs, “La Mission du Zambèze,” Missions Catholiques, xiv. (1882) p. 453.
[182] Herodotus, v. 75.
[183] Pausanias, iii. 1. 5.
[184] J. Rendel Harris, The Dioscuri in the Christian Legends (London, 1903); id., The Cult of the Heavenly Twins (Cambridge, 1906). See also below, pp. [262] sqq. With the Spartan custom we may compare the use which the Zulus made of twins in war. See Dudley Kidd, Savage Childhood, a Study of Kafir Children (London, 1906), p. 47 sq.: “In war time a twin used to be hunted out and made to go right in front of the attacking army, some few paces in front of the others. He was supposed to be fearless and wild. His twin, if a sister, and if surviving, was compelled to tie a cord very tightly round her loins during the fight, and had to starve herself; she was also expected to place the twin brother’s sleeping-mat in that part of the hut which the itongo [ancestral spirits] loved to haunt. This brought success in war. But the great chief Tshaka stopped this practice, for he said that the wild twin did foolhardy things and brought the army into needless danger.”
[185] Pliny, Nat. Hist. ii. 101; Diodorus Siculus, iv. 43; Seneca, Natur. Quaest. i. 1. 13; Lucian, Dial. deorum, xxvi. 2; Ovid, Fasti, v. 720; Plutarch, De defect. oraculorum, 30; Lactantius Placidus, Comment. in Statii Theb. viii. 792; Th. Henri Martin, in Revue Archéologique, N.S. xiii. (1866) pp. 168–174; P. Sébillot, Légendes, Croyances et Superstitions de la Mer (Paris, 1886), ii. 87–109. Seafaring men in different parts of the world still see and draw omens from these weird lights on the masts. See Edward FitzGerald, quoted in County Folk-lore, Suffolk (London, 1893), pp. 121 sq.; W. W. Skeat, Malay Magic (London, 1900), p. 279.
[186] Pliny, Nat. Hist. ii. 101. Compare Seneca, Natur. Quaest. i. 1. 14.
[187] Potocki, Voyages dans les Steps d’Astrakhan et du Caucase, i. 143.
[188] Dionysius Halicarn. Antiquit. Roman. vi. 13; Cicero, De natura deorum, ii. 2. 6.