ζηλῶ δὲ σοῦ μὲν Ἑλλάδ’, Ἑλλάδος δὲ σέ.
(l. 1405.)
But this utterance, made under such exceptional circumstances, cannot counteract the effect of what has gone before; and, anyhow, it is a curiously isolated expression, and rather a qualified one.
[117] Worthy of notice is the excellent touch which makes this man, though poor, yet a member of a good family. (l. 37.) As Euripides knew well enough, a son of the soil would have been incapable of even this much refinement of feeling. We may observe, by the way, that Orestes expresses himself as very sceptical of the whole story—anyhow as far as motives go. (l. 253 seqq.)
[118] Hel. 566 seqq. Still more offensive, of course, are the suggestions of Ion to his mother (Ion 1523 seqq.); but there the offence is against decency, not against romance.
[119] Except occasionally, as already noticed, in the case of close blood-relations.
[120] Such erotic legends as he does introduce are treated with strangely little sympathy. The best (in the extant odes) is that of Pelops and Hippodameia (Olymp. 1), where the writer has, perhaps, been roused to a little warmth by the story of Pelops and Poseidon that has immediately preceded. The legend of Peleus and Hippolyte (Nem. 5) is noticeable as being, strangely enough, the only one in which the woman is represented as taking the initiative; but this is doubtless to be explained by the fact that nearly all these stories are descriptive of the amours of gods. The story of Jason and Medea is utterly spoiled in Pyth. 4. In that of Apollo and Coronis (Pyth. 3) only the unfaithfulness of the nymph and her punishment are dwelt upon. The other erotic stories told—i.e. those of Apollo and Euadne (Olymp. 6), Apollo and Cyrene (Pyth. 9), Zeus and the daughter of Opoeis (Olymp. 9), Ixion and Hera (Pyth. 2), are merely concerned with seductions of the most commonplace kind. The story of Rhoecus and the Hamadryad (Fr. 165) is the only one of importance alluded to in the fragments; but here it is uncertain how far Pindar told the story, and how far he merely alluded to it.
[121] [On the position occupied by women in the Old Comedy compare Women in Greek Comedy, § 3, 4.]
[122] Cp. Theocr. vii. 39.
[123] One or two points are perhaps worth noticing in this connection. It is usual to assume that the Battis of Philetas was an Hetaera; but the evidence seems rather to suggest that she was his wife. The way in which she is spoken of in Ovid, Trist. i. 6, 2, Pont. iii. 1, 57, (in the former place coupled with the Lyde of Antimachus,) seems to support this view; and, at any rate, there does not appear to be any evidence to the contrary. The personal character of Philetas, as we learn it from various notices of him, seems also rather to point in the same direction; though this is not, of course, an argument that can be pressed. (It would be interesting to know whether the fact that Philetas is apparently never alluded to under a nickname, like so many others of the Alexandrian writers, was due to this austerity of character.)