Cook, Arthur B.: Zeus: a study in ancient religion (Band 2,1): Zeus god of the dark sky (thunder and lightning): Text and notes (Cambridge, 1925)

2\2 Dionysos at Delphoi

Daphnephoria1, a festival likewise held every eighth year. Yet, if
Apollon settled at Delphoi in days when the octennial cycle was
in vogue, we must not therefore jump to the conclusion that he had
staked out his claim before the arrival of Dionysos. For, though
the Stepterion included a mimetic representation of Apollon's fight
with Python, the Heroi's and the Charila were distinctly Dionysiac :
the former resembled the ascent of Semele and was explained by
a mystic tale known to the Thyiads ; the latter assigned important
duties to the principal Thyiad2. The fact is that the oktaeteris was
an ancient rectification of the calendar, which left its mark on a
variety of customs and myths11. It was never the exclusive property
of any one god or goddess, and at Delphoi it was common to the
rites of Apollon and Dionysos. Fortunately for our solution of the
problem we can appeal from the early oktaeteris to the still earlier
trieterist. Delphoi was in classical times the centre of certain far-
famed trieteric rites5; and these were notoriously the rites, not of
Apollon, but of Dionysos6. Unless, therefore, we hold—in defiance
of the Greek and Roman chronologists7—that the trietcris was no

1 I have dealt in detail with the Daphnephoria in Folk-Lore 1904 xv. 409 ff. See also
Boetticher Baumkultus p. 3853"., P. Paris in Daremberg—Saglio Diet. Ant. ii. 24 ft".,
P. Stengel in Pauly—Wissowa Rcal-Enc. iv. 2140, O. Jessen ib. iv. 2 140 f., Nilsson Gr.
Feste p. 164 f., Famell Cults of Gk. Slates iv. 284 ff., Frazer Pauscmias v. 4iff., id.
Golden Bough?: The Magic Art ii. 63 n. 2, The Dying God pp. 78f., 88f., Adonis Attis
Osiris3 ii. 241. Sir J. G. Frazer (The Dying God p. 79) contends that at Thebes 'in his-
torical times Apollo appears to have ousted Cadmus from the festival,' and thinks it 'not
impossible that at Delphi also...Apollo may have displaced an old local hero in the
honourable office of dragon-slayer.'

2 Plout. quaestt. Gr. 12. Cp. L. Weniger Uber das Collegium der Thyiaden v. Delphi
Eisenach 1876.

3 Supra i. 692. See further A. Schmidt Handbuch der griechischen Chronologic Jena
1888 p. 56 ff. (with the caveat of W. H. Roscher Die enneadischen und hebdomadischen
Frist en und VVochen der altesten Griechen {Abk. d. sacks. Gesellsch. d. Wiss. Phil.-hist.
Classe 1903 xxi. 4) Leipzig 1903 p. 73 n. 204b), F. K. Ginzel Handbuch der mathema-
tischen und technischen Chronologic Leipzig 1911 ii. 3650., Gruppe Gr. Myth. Rel.
p. 957 n. r.

4 Supra i. 690. The historical priority of the trietcris is accepted also by A. Schmidt
Handbuch der griechischen Chronologie Jena 1888 p. 31 ff., G. F. Unger Zeitrechnung der
Griechen und Ro?ner~ (in I. von Miiller Handbuch der klassischen Altertums-wissenschaft
i2) Miinchen 1892 p. 731 f., G. F. Schoemann Griechische Alferihumer* Berlin 1902 ii.
460 n. 2, Gruppe Gr. Myth. Rel. p. 955 f. It is too summarily rejected by M. P. Nilsson
Primitive Time-reckoning Lund 1920 p. 1.

5 Gruppe Gr. Myth. Rel. p. 956 n. 2.

6 The myth and the rites in question are well put together by L. Weniger in the
Archiv f. Rel. 1906 ix. 231 ff. Cp. M. Ross De Baccho Delphico Bonnae 1865 p. 2 ff.

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