R. M. Meyer, Altgermanische Religionsgeschichte, 1910.
Sir John Rhys, Oxford Proceedings, p. 201, sqq.
CHAPTER XVI
GREECE
The history of Europe begins in Greece. It is there that the Aryans in Europe first feel the touch of the arts and civilisation of the East, and are stirred up to new activities; and the life thus quickened in Greece transmitted its spark to Italy, and so to the whole of Europe.
People and Land.—There is no direct evidence that the Greeks came to their country from elsewhere; and the theory of a Græco-Italic period, in which the future inhabitants of Greece and Italy lived together somewhere to the north of both these countries and made common advances in civilisation, is now abandoned. There are, however, faint indications that the Greeks spread over their country from the north southwards. What people dwelt in it before them it is impossible to say; the Pelasgi and Leleges, whom they themselves conceived to have preceded them, left behind them no other trace than that belief. When first we descry this land in the faint dawn of history, it is tenanted by the people whose name it bears, touched only by the Thracians to the north, and the Illyrians to the west, these also being Aryan races. Though the Greeks are on both sides of the Egean, which seems from the earliest times to have connected rather than divided them, their centre of gravity is in the mainland of Hellas, including the Peloponnesus. In this country many a migration no doubt took place before the people was finally arranged in it; and some of these migrations are faintly known to history. When once the settlement had been accomplished, the nature of the country did much to fix the institutions of the people and the mutual relations of their various communities. Large tribes coming into the narrow valleys and sequestered coasts of Greece necessarily broke up into small cantons, each of which, though not cut off from intercourse with its neighbours, was free to develop by itself. The country is said by travellers to be the most beautiful in the world. The branch of the Aryans which settled in it may have brought scanty acquirements with them, but they brought great capacities. The Greeks had an unrivalled talent for doing what they saw others do, in a much better way, and so making it their own. They had an inborn disposition to what is reasonable. That they had a deep-seated inclination to what is harmonious and beautiful is proved by their first great work of art, their language. Of that language there were several dialects in the earliest times; the principal ones being the broad Doric of the peninsula and the colonies, and the softer Ionic of which the classical language is a branch. But the Greeks of all dialects could understand each other, and regarded as barbarians those without who spoke other tongues. Thus from the first this people was much divided, but was also held together by strong bonds.
Earliest Religion—Functional Deities.—The religion the Greeks brought with them to their country was undoubtedly that which we have discussed in our chapter on the Aryans. The primitive elements of Aryan religion all reappear in Greece; the combination of many small household worships with the supra-family worship of a great god or gods, the few great gods who are surrounded by a multitude of spirits, some of these also growing into gods, the recognition of spiritual presences in many a natural object, living or dead. All this we find in early Greece. The whole nation believes in Zeus; to all he is the Lord of heaven, the giver of rain, the fertiliser of mother earth, the supreme ruler in earth as well as in heaven, the father of the gods as well as of men. This is the first bond of unity in Greek religion. But every family, every village, every town has its own peculiar worship which is to be found nowhere else. That worship may be addressed to Zeus with a local title; each circle of men has its own particular Zeus, who is their protector and ruler; and thus Zeus has many forms and names. In each community there is also the worship of the goddess of the hearth (Hestia); each household has its own Hestia, and carries on the worship which in other Aryan peoples is connected with the memory of departed ancestors. But the family or the township has also other objects of worship. There are other gods besides Zeus who are connected with heaven, such as Apollo and Heracles. There are gods connected with each activity of the people. Artemis is goddess of hunting, Aphrodite of the peaceful life of nature and of gardens, and also of love. Poseidon, the sea-god, was also worshipped inland, and was perhaps originally a god of horses and oxen; Hephæstus was the god of workers in metal, Ares the god of battle. These are in their origin what are called functional deities, that is to say, gods who are present in the function with which they are associated, and of which they constitute the ideal or sacred side, and who have no existence apart from it.
The gods of Greece in fact had their origin in that view of nature as animated in every part, which the Greeks shared with other branches of the Aryans, and with early man generally. Like the Latins, the Greeks at first saw a mystery, a spirit, in every part of life; each fountain had its nymph, each forest glade its dryad; and they felt the gods to be returning to fresh life when spring came with its flowers. Each of their own activities also had its unseen genius. Each enclosure for flocks had its Apollo, "him of the sheepfold," who protected the flock and the shepherd; and each boundary stone its Hermes, "him of the boundary," who also watched over flocks and took charge of marches and of paths.