Early European History. Hutton Webster
The Greeks as described in the Homeric epics were in a transitional stage between the life of shepherds and that of farmers. Wealth consisted chiefly of flocks and herds, though nearly every freeman owned a little plot of land on which he cultivated grain and cared for his orchard and vineyard. There were few skilled workmen, for almost everything was made at home. A separate class of traders had not yet arisen. Commerce was little followed. The Greeks depended on Phoenician sailors to bring to their shores the commodities which they could not produce themselves. Iron was known and used, for instance, in the manufacture of farm tools. During Homeric times, however, that metal had not yet displaced copper and bronze. [8]
SOCIAL LIFE
Social life was very simple. Princes tended flocks and built houses; princesses carried water and washed clothes. Agamemnon, Odysseus, and other heroes were not ashamed to be their own butchers and cooks. The Homeric knights did not ride on horseback, but fought from chariots. They sat at table instead of reclining at meals, as did the later Greeks. Coined money was unknown. Trade was by barter, values being reckoned in oxen or in lumps of gold and silver. Men bought their wives by making gifts of cattle to the parents. The art of writing is mentioned only once in the Homeric poems, and doubtless was little used.
[Illustration: A CRETAN CUPBEARER (Museum of Candia, Crete) A fresco painting from the palace of Gnossus. The youth carries a silver cup ornamented with gold. His waist is tightly drawn in by a girdle, his hair is dark and curly, his profile is almost classically Greek.]
LAW AND MORALITY
The times were rude. Wars, though petty, were numerous and cruel. The vanquished suffered death or slavery. Piracy, flourishing upon the unprotected seas, ranked as an honorable occupation. It was no insult to inquire of a seafaring stranger whether he was pirate or merchant. Murders were frequent. The murderer had to dread, not a public trial and punishment, but rather the personal vengeance of the kinsmen of his victim. The Homeric Greeks, in fact, exhibited the usual defects and vices of barbarous peoples.
HOMERIC GEOGRAPHY
The Iliad and Odyssey disclose a considerable acquaintance with peninsular Greece and the coasts of Asia Minor. Cyprus, Egypt, and Sicily are also known in part. The poet imagines the earth as a sort of flat shield, with Greece lying in the center. [9] The Mediterranean, "The Sea," as it is called by Homer, and its continuation, the Euxine, [10] divided the world into two equal parts. Surrounding the earth was "the great strength of the Stream of Ocean," [11] a river, broad and deep, beyond which lay the dark and misty realm of the mythical Cimmerians. The underworld of Hades, home of the dead, was beneath the surface of the earth.
[Illustration: Map, THE WORLD according to HOMER (900 B.C.)]
[Illustration: Map, GREEK CONQUESTS AND MIGRATIONS]
24. EARLY GREEK RELIGION
THE OLYMPIAN COUNCIL
We may learn from the Homeric poems what were the religious ideas held by the early Greeks. The greater gods and goddesses were not numerous. Less than a score everywhere received worship under the same names and in all the temples. Twelve of the chief deities formed a select council, which was supposed to meet on the top of snow-crowned Olympus. The Greeks, however, did not agree as to what gods and goddesses should be included in this august assemblage.
ATTRIBUTES OF THE DEITIES
Many of the Olympian deities appear to have been simply personifications of natural phenomena. Zeus, "father of gods and men," as Homer calls him, was a heaven god, who gathered the clouds in storms and hurled the lightning bolt. Apollo, a mighty god of light, who warded off darkness and evil, became the ideal of manly beauty and the patron of music, poetry, and healing. Dionysus was worshiped as the god of sprouting and budding vegetation. Poseidon, brother of Zeus, ruled the sea. Hera, the wife of Zeus, represented the female principle in nature. Hence she presided over the life of women and especially over the sacred rites of marriage. Athena, who sprang full-grown from the forehead of Zeus, embodied the idea of wisdom and all womanly virtues. Aphrodite, who arose from the foam of the sea, was the goddess of love and beauty. Demeter, the great earth- mother, watched over seed-time and harvest. Each deity thus had a kingdom and a function of its own.
[Illustration: GREEK GODS AND GODDESSES
ZEUS OTRICOLI, Vatican Gallery, Rome
HERA, Ludovisi Villa, Rome
APOLLO OF THE BELVEDERE, Vatican Gallery, Rome
APHRODITE OF CNIDUS, Glyptothek, Munich]
[Illustration: THE APHRODITE OF MELOS (Louvre, Paris) More commonly known as the "Venus of Milo." The statue was discovered in 1820 A.D. on the island of Melos. It consists of two principal pieces joined together across the folds of the drapery. Most art critics date this work about 100 B.C. The strong serene figure of the goddess sets forth the Greek ideal of female loveliness.]
CONCEPTIONS OF THE DEITIES
The Greeks made their gods and goddesses after themselves. The Olympian divinities are really magnified men and women, subject to all human passions and appetites, but possessed of more than human power and endowed with immortality. They enjoy the banquet, where they feast on nectar and ambrosia; they take part in the struggles of the battle field; they marry and are given in marriage. The gods, morally, were no better than their worshipers. They might be represented as deceitful, dissolute, and cruel, but they could also be regarded as upholders of truth and virtue. Even Homer could say, "Verily the blessed gods love not evil deeds, but they reverence justice and the righteous acts of men." [12]
[Illustration: THE FRANÇOIS VASE (Archaeological Museum, Florence) Found in an Etruscan grave in 1844 A.D. A black-figured terra cotta vase of about 600 B.C. It is nearly three feet in height and two an one half feet in diameter. The figures on the vase depict scenes from Greek mythology.
Calydonian boar hunt
Games at the funeral of Patroclus
Peleus Thetis and the gods
Pursuit of Troilus by Achilles
Animal scenes, sphinxes, etc.]
IDEAS OF THE OTHER WORLD
Greek ideas of the other world were dismal to an extreme. The after-life in Hades was believed to be a shadowy, joyless copy of the earthly existence. In Hades the shade of great Achilles exclaims sorrowfully, "Nay, speak not comfortably to me of death. Rather would I live on earth as the hireling of another, even with a landless man who had no great livelihood, than bear sway among all the dead." [13] It was not until several centuries after Homer that happier notions of the future life were taught, or at least suggested, in the Eleusinian mysteries. [14]
25. RELIGIOUS INSTITUTIONS: ORACLES AND GAMES
ORACLE OF APOLLO AT DELPHI
The Greeks believed that communications from the gods were received from certain inspired persons at places called oracles. The oracle of Apollo at Delphi in Phocis enjoyed the utmost veneration. It lay within a deep cave on the rocky side of Mount Parnassus. Out of a chasm rose a volcanic vapor which had a certain intoxicating power. The Pythia, or prophetess of Apollo, sat on a tripod over the steaming cleft and inhaled the gas. The words she uttered in delirium were supposed to come from the god. They were taken down by the attendant priests, written out in verse, and delivered to the suppliants.
INQUIRIES AT THE ORACLE
The fame of Apollo as the patron of inspiration and prophecy spread throughout Greece and penetrated to foreign lands. Every year thousands of visitors made their way to Apollo's shrine. Sick men prayed for health, childless men prayed for offspring. Statesmen wished to learn the fate of their political