[112] Apollon., Mirab. 3 (prob. from Thpomp.); Plin., NH. vii, 174; Plu., Gen. Soc. 22, p. 592 C (Ἑρμόδωρος—the same copyist’s error occurs in Procl. in Rp. ii, 113, 24 Kroll); Luc., Enc. Musc. 7; Tert., An. 2; 44 (from Soranos; cf. Cael. Aur., Tard. 1, 3, 5); Or., Cels. iii, 3; 32. The same Hermotimos of Klazomenai is undoubtedly the person meant when a Ἑρμότιμος is mentioned among the earlier incarnations of the soul of Pythagoras, even when the country of the person in question is not named (as in D.L. viii, 5 f.; Porph., VP. 45; Tert., An. 28) or is incorrectly called a Milesian (e.g. in Hipp., RH. 1, 2, p. 12 D.-S.). A quite untenable theory about this Hermot. is given by Göttling, Opusc. Ac. 211.—Acc. to Plin. the enemies who finally burnt the body of Hermot. (with the connivance of his wife) were the Cantharidae—probably the name of a γένος hostile to Hermot.—There is a remarkably similar story in Indian tradition: see Rh. Mus. 26, 559 n. But I no longer suspect any historical connexion between this story and that of Hermot.; the same preconceptions have led in India as in Greece to the invention of the same tale. Similar conceptions in German beliefs: Grimm, 1803, n. 650.
[113] Hence the legend that Apollo after the murder of Python was purified not at Tempe, as the story generally went, but in Krete at Tarrha by Karmanor: Paus. 2, 7, 7; 2, 30, 3; 10, 6, 7 (the hexameters of Phemonoë); 10, 16, 5. The καθάρσια for Zeus were brought from Krete: Orph. fr. 183 Ab.; cf. the oracle ap. Oinom. Eus., PE. 5, 31, 2: K. O. Müller, Introd. Scient. Myth. 98.—Krete an ancient seat of mantikê: the Lokrian Onomakritos, teacher of Thaletas, lived in Krete κατὰ τέχνην μαντικήν, Arist., Pol. 1274a, 25.
[114] See above ([pp. 96] f). As one who had been initiated into the orgiastic cult of Zeus in Krete (Str. 468), Epimenides is called νέος Κούρης: Plu., Sol. 12; D.L. i, 115. He is called ἱερεὺς Διὸς καὶ Ῥέας in Sch. Clem. Al. iv, p. 103 Klotz.
[115] Legend of the ἄλιμον of E.: H. Smyrn. 18. D.L. i, 114. Plu. 7 Sap. 14. He was prepared for it by living on ἀσφόδελος, μαλάχη and the edible root of a kind of σκίλλα (Thphr., HP. 7, 12, 1). All these are sacred to the χθόνιοι (on ἀσφόδελος, see partic. AB. 457, 5 ff., which goes back to Aristarchos; and Hsch. s.v.), and were only eaten occasionally by the poor: Hes., Op. 41.
[116] οὗ (Ἐπιμενίδου) λόγος ὡς ἐξίοι ἡ ψυχὴ ὅποσον ἤθελε χρόνον καὶ πάλιν εἰσῄει ἐν τῷ σώματι, Suid. Ἐπιμεν. This is possibly the meaning of προσποιηθῆναι (λέγεται) πολλάκις ἀναβεβιωκέναι, D.L. i, 114. Epimenides like others μετὰ θάνατον ἐν τοῖς ζῶσι γενόμενος, Procl. in Rp. ii, 113, 24 Kr. The story of his prolonged sleep in the cave is an example of a widespread fairy-tale motif; see Rh. Mus. 33, 209, n. 2; 35, 160. In the case of Epimenides it has been exaggerated beyond all bounds and attached to him as a sort of popular mode of expressing his long ἐκστάσεις. This cave-sleep is interpreted as a state of ekstasis by Max. Tyr. 16, 1: ἐν τοῦ Διὸς τοῦ Δικταίου (see above, chap. iii, [n. 23]) τῷ ἄντρῳ κείμενος ὕπνῳ βαθεῖ ἔτη συχνά (cf. the ψυχή of Hermot. which ἀπὸ τοῦ σώματος πλαζομένη ἀποδημεῖ ἐπὶ πολλὰ ἔτη, Apollon., Mir. 3) ὄναρ ἔφη ἐντυχεῖν αὐτὸς θεοῖς κτλ. Thus his ὄνειρος became διδάσκαλος to him, Max. Tyr. 38, 3; cf. Sch. Luc., Tim. 6, 110 Rb.
[117] σοφὸς περὶ τὰ θεῖα (δεινὸς τὰ θεῖα, Max. Tyr. 38, 3) τὴν ἐνθουσιαστικὴν σοφίαν, Plu., Sol. 12. Epimen. is put among the ἔνθεοι μάντεις, Bakis and the Sibyl, by Cic., Div. 1, 34.—Prolonged solitude is a preparation for the business of the ecstatic seer (cf. Plu.’s story of a sort of counterpart to Epimenides, Def. Or. 21, p. 421 B). There [332] is still another fragment remaining from the story of Epim. on this head in the account given by Theopompos (though he makes too rationalistic a use of it): Epim. did not sleep all that time ἀλλὰ χρόνον τινὰ ἐκπατῆσαι, ἀσχολούμενον περὶ ῥιζοτομίαν (which he needed as an ἰατρόμαντις); D.L. i, 112. We cannot help being reminded of the way in which the Angekok of Greenland, after prolonged and profound solitude, severe fasting and concentration of thought, makes himself into a magician (Cranz, Hist. of Greenland, p. 194). In the same way the North American Indian stays for weeks in a solitary wood and consciously prepares himself for his visions. At last the real world falls away from him, the imagined world of his visions becomes the real one and seems almost palpable; till finally in complete ecstasy he rushes out of his hiding place. Nor would it be hard to find analogies in the religion of civilized peoples.
[118] Epim. is credited with prophecies of coming events: Pl., Lg. 642 D; D.L. i, 114, and also Cic., Div. i, 34. On the other hand, Arist., Rh. 3, 17, 10, has περὶ τῶν ἐσομένων οὐκ ἐμαντεύετο, ἀλλὰ περὶ τῶν γεγονότων μὲν ἀδήλων δέ which at least means discovering the grounds of an event—grounds known only to the god and the seer; e.g. the interpretation of a pestilence as the vengeance of the daimones for an ancient crime, etc. If only rational explanation were meant there would be no need for a μάντις.
[119] Delos: Plu., Sept. Sap. 14, p. 158 A. (There is no need to suppose that there has been any confusion between this μέγας καθαρμός by Epimenides and any other purification of Delos that happens to be better known to us—the Pisistratean or that of the year 426.) Epimenides πόλεις ἐκάθηρεν ἄλλας τε καὶ τὴν Ἀθηναίων, Paus. 1, 14, 4.
[120] The purification of Athens from the Kylonian ἄγος by Epimenides is now further confirmed by the Aristotelian Ἀθ. πολ. 1 fin. This admittedly is not a very strong guarantee of its historical truth; but no strong guarantee is required to dispose of the doubts recently raised as to the historical truth of the story that Athens was purified by Epimenides, and even of Epimenides’ very existence. There is no reason at all for such a doubt. The fact that the historical figure of Epimenides has been almost entirely obscured behind the veil of fable and romance gives us of course no right to doubt his existence (or what would be the fate of Pythagoras, Pherekydes of Syros, and of many others?); and further, because some parts of the story of Epim. and his life are fabulous, to doubt the truth of his entirely non-fabulous purification of the Athenians from murder is a monstrous inversion of true historical method.—No exact dating for the purification of Athens is to be derived from the Aristotelian account of the event, as the English ed. (Kenyon) of the Ἀθ. πολ. rightly observes. It certainly does not follow (as e.g. Bauer takes for granted in his Forsch. zu Arist. Ἀθ. πολ. 41) that the purification took place before the archonship of Drakon (Ol. 39). Furthermore, it is probable that in Plu., Sol. 12, everything that comes before τοὺς ὅρους (p. 165, 19, Sint. ed. min.) is taken from Aristotle (though perhaps not directly). In this case Aristotle, too, would be shown to have attributed to Solon the first suggestion that led to the condemnation of the ἐναγεῖς. In Plu., however, Solon is still far from having thoughts of his νομοθεσία, he is still only ἤδη δόξαν ἔχων c. 12 (not till c. 14 does his archonship begin). Solon’s archonship is put by Ἀθ. πολ. in the year 591/0 (c. 14, 1, where we should be careful to avoid arbitrary alteration of the figures); Suid. Σόλων, Eus., Chron. also date it in Ol. 47, and the same period is implied by Plu., Sol. 14, p. 168, 12. (Ἀθ. πολ. [333] 13, 2, also brings the first archonship of Damasias to 582/1 = Ol. 49, 3: a date to which all other reliable tradition also points). The condemnation of the ἐναγεῖς and the purification of Athens by Epimenides thus took place some considerable time before 591. It is possible that Suid. gives the right date. s.v. Ἐπιμενίδης· ἐκάθηρε τὰς Ἀθήνας τοῦ Κυλωνείου ἄγους κατὰ τὴν μδ Ὀλυμπιάδα (604/1)—that in the Kirrhaian war there was an Ἀλκμαίων general of the Athenians offers no objection: Plu., Sol. 11. Suidas’ statement has not (as I once thought myself, with Bernhardy) been taken from D.L., nor is it to be corrected acc. to his text. D.L. i, 100, only brings forward the connexion between the purification and the Κυλώνειον ἄγος as the opinion of “some” (which in spite of the vagueness of expression must mean Neanthes ap. Ath. 602 C), while the real reason is said to be a λοιμός, and the purification (as in Eus. Chr.) is placed in Ol. 46; i.e. probably 46, 3, the traditional date of Solon’s legislation.—Plato, Lg. 642 DE, does not conflict with the story of the expiation of the Κυλ. ἄγος by Epimenides: his story that Epimen. was present in Athens in the year 500 and retarded the threatened Persian invasion for ten years is not intended to contest the truth of the tradition of the much earlier purification of Athens by Epimen. (“retarded”: so Clem. Al., Str. vi, 13, p. 755 P., understood Plato and prob. rightly; we often hear in legendary stories of the gods or their prophets retarding coming events which have been determined by fate; cf. Pl., Smp. 201 D; Hdt. i, 91; Ath. 602 B; Eus., PE. 5, 35, p. 233 BC; Vg., A. vii, 313 ff.; viii, 398 f.; and what Serv. ad loc. reports from the libri Acheruntici). How the same man could be living both at the end of the seventh and of the sixth centuries would have troubled Plato not at all—tradition attributed a miraculously long life to Ep. At any rate, it is quite impossible to base the chronology of Ep.’s life on the story in Plato. (It may have been suggested by a forged oracle made ex eventu after 490 and fathered on Epim., as Schultess suggests, De Epim. Crete, p. 47, 1877.)
[121] Details of the expiation ceremonies: D.L. i, 111–12; Neanthes ap. Ath. 602 C. It is not the human sacrifice but the sentimental interpretation of Neanth. that Polemon (Ath. 602 F.) declares to be fictitious. They are invariably sacrifices to the χθόνια that Epim. institutes. Thus (as Abaris founded a temple at Sparta for Κόρη σώτειρα) he founded at Athens, evidently as the concluding part of the purification, τὰ ἱερὰ τῶν σεμνῶν θεῶν, i.e. of the Erinyes: D.L. i, 112.