OF THE RELIGION OF GREECE,

o4S

means reasonable so to dispose of the women without their consent, they
summoned them to the public assembly ; where, being met in a full bo-
dy, the proposal was no sooner olfered to them, than, with unanimous
consent, they gave their approbation of it, applauding Daiphanlus. and
decreeing him a crown, in reward of so generous and noble a contrivance ;
the boys also are said to have met and consented to it. Things being in
this posture, they went to meet their enemies, whom they engaged with
such fury and resolution, that t ose by whom they had just been before
reduced to pxtreme despair, were entirely defeated by them (1). In
memory of which victory this festival was instituted, and observed with
more solemnity, and frequently by greater numbers of worshippers, than
any other in that country. Here you may take notice of the pioverb,
Quitsm uirwoict', i. e. Phocensian despair, which is applied to persons lost
beyond all hopes of recovery, and is said to have taken its original f, om
this story.

'Eaenia, a festival instituted by the Laconians, in memory of Hele-
na (2), to whom they gave the honour of a temple and divine worship.
It was celebrated by virgins riding upon mules, or in certain chariots
composed of reeds or bulrushes, and called Koua^ai.

EAET0EPiA) at Plataea(3), to Jupiter Eleutherius, or the assertor of li-
berty, by delegates from almost all the cities of Greece It was institut-
ed upon this account: Mardonius, the Persian general, being defeated in
the territories of Plataea by the Grecians, under the conduct of Pausanias
the Spartan, the Plataeans erected an altar, and a statue of white marble,
to Jupiter Eleutherius, by whose assistance they supposed the Grecians
had asserted the liberties of Greece against the force of the barbarians :
and a general assembly being summoned from all parts of Greece, Aris-
tides, the Athenian, proposed that deputies might be sent every fifth year
from the cities of Greece, to celebrate EXevQegia, i. e. the games of liber-
ty; which was agreed upon, and great prizes appointed to be contended
for.

The Platasans also kept an anniversary solemnity, in memory of those
that had valiantly lost their lives in defence of their country'* liberty, of
which the manner was thus : on the sixteenth of the month Maemacte-
rian, which with the Boeotians is Alalcomenius, a procession was made,
beginning about break of day. It was led by a trumpeter, sounding a
point of war ; then followed certain chariots, laden with myrrh, gai lands,
and a black bull; after these came young men, free-born, it not being per-
mitted any person of servile condition to assist at any part of the solem-
nity, because the men in whose memory it was instituted died in defence
of the liberty of Greece ; these carried libations of wine and milk, in large
two-eared vessels, and jars of oil, and precious ointments : last of all came
the chief magistrate, for whom, though it was unlawful at other times to
touch any thing of iron, or wear garments of any colour but white, yet
he was then clad in a purple robe, and taking a water-pot out of the city-
chamber, proceeded with a sword in his hand through the middle of the
town to the sepulchres : then he drew water out of a neighbouring spring,
and washed and anointed the monuments ; then sacrificed the bull upon
a pile of wood, making supplication to infernal Mercury, and Jupiter, and
invited the souls of those valiant heroes that lost their lives in defence of

(l) Plut de Virtue Mulierura.

e2) Hesychius, (3) Pausan, Boot. Plut AristWe