Smith, William: A smaller dictionary of Greek and Roman antiquities (London, 1871)

OLYMPIAS.

6

ORACTJLTJM.

as could be obtained, was one of the easiest
and surest modes of publishing them ; and
this was a favourite practice of the Greeks
and Romans. Accordingly we find many
instances of literary works thus published at
the Olympic festival. Herodotus is said to
have read his history at this festival ; but
though there are some reasons for doubting
the correctness of this statement, there are
numerous other writers who thus published
their works, as the sophist Hippias, Prodicus
of Ceos, Anaximenes, the orator Lysias, Dion
Cbrysostom, &c. It must be borne in mind
that these recitations were not contests, and
that they formed properly no part of the
festival. In the same way painters and other
artists exhibited their works at Olympia.

OI.YMPIAS (6Au/u.7ria9), an Olympiad, the
most celebrated chronological aera among
the Greeks, was the period of four years
which elapsed between each celebration of
the Olympic Games. The Olympiads began
to be reckoned from the victory of Coroebus
in the foot-race, which happened in the year
u.c. 776. Timaeus of Sicily, however, who
flourished n.c. 264, was the first writer who
regularly arranged events according to the
conquerors in each Olympiad. His practice
of recording events by Olympiads was fol-
lowed by Polybius, Diodorus Siculus, Diony-
sius of Haliearnassus, &c. The writers who
make use of the aera of the Olympiads,
usually give the number of the Olympiad
(the first corresponding to b.c. 7 76), and then
the name of the conqueror in the foot-race.
Some writers also speak of events as happen-
ing in the first, second, third, or fourth year,
as the case may be, of a certain Olympiad ;
but others do not give the separate years of
each Olympiad. The rules for converting
Olympiads into the year b.c., and vice versa,
are given under Chroxoi.ogia ; but as this
is troublesome, the student will find at the
end of the book a list of the Olympiads, with
the years of the Christian aera corresponding
to them from the beginning of the Olympiads
to 4..d. 301. To save space, the separate
years of each Olympiad, with the correspond-
ing years b.c, are only given from the 47th
to the 126th Olympiad, as this is the most
important period of Grecian history; in the
other Olympiads the first year only is
given. In consulting the table it must be
borne in mind that the Olympic Games were
celebrated about midsummer, and that the
Attic year commenced at about the same
time. If, therefore, an event happened in
the second half of the Attic year, the year
b.c. must be reduced by 1. Thus Socrates
was put to death in the 1st year of the
95 th Olympiad, which corresponds in the

table to b.c. 400 ; but as his death happened
in Thargelion, the 11th month of the Attic
year, the year b.c. must be reduced by 1,
which gives us b.c. 399, the true date of his
death.

O PALI A, a Roman festival in honour of
Opis, celebrated on the 19th of December,
being the third day of the Saturnalia. It was
believed that Opis was the wife of Saturnus,
and for this reason the festivals were cele-
brated at the same time.

OPSONITJM, or OBSONIUM {b^ov, dim.
bipapiov; bxjjrifxa.), denoted everything which
was eaten with bread, the principal substance
of every meal. Those numerous articles of
diet called opsonia or pulmentaria were de-
signed to give nutriment, but still more to
add a relish to food. Some of these articles
were taken from the vegetable kingdom, but
were much more pungent and savoury than
bread, such as olives, either fresh or pickled,
radishes, and sesamum. Of animal food by
much the most common kind was fish, whence
the terms under explanation were in the
course of time used in a confined and special
sense to denote fish only, but fish variously
prepared, and more especially salt fish, which
was most extensively employed to give a
relish to the vegetable diet. The Athenians
were in the habit of going to markets («s
Toui/zoi') themselves in order to purchase their
opsonia (b^uivelv, opsonare). Pmt the opulent
Romans had a slave, called opsonator (otyti>vr\<;),
whose office it was to purchase for his master.

OPTIO._ [Cen-turio.]

OPTIMATES. [Nobiles.]

ORACULUM [fuurreUnr, xPVa"rnPLOV) was
used by the ancients to designate both the
revelations made by the deity to man, as well
as the place in which such revelations were
made. The deity was in none of these places
believed to appear in person to man, and to
communicate to him his will or knowledge
of the future, but all oracular revelations
were made through some kind of medium,
which was different in the different places
where oracles existed. It ma}-, at first sight,
seem strange that there were, comparatively
speaking, so few oracles of Zeus, the father
and ruler of gods and men. But although,
according to the belief of the ancients, Zeus
himself was the first source of all oracular
revelations, yet he was too far above men to
enter with them into any close relation ;
other gods therefore, especially Apollo, and
even heroes, acted as mediators between Zeus
and men, and were, as it were, the organs
through which he communicated his will.
The ancients consulted the will of the gods
on all important occasions of public and pri-
vate life, since they were unwilling to under-