DOI Page / Citation link:
https://doi.org/10.11588/diglit.1755#0144
THE OLYMPIAN GAMES. 103
softer power. While the other provinces then were so many Theatres of
War, that which surrounded the city of Elis was consecrated hy the united
voices of the peninsular population, as a Temple of Peace. The land itself
was considered holy and inviolable. The sound of arms was not permitted
to cross its frontier. It was the Delos of the Peloponnesus. Here was a
perpetual armistice; and not only was the influence of this asylum felt within
its own limits, hut at stated periods it extended itself to the other parts of
the Peninsula.
The full Moon which gave the signal for the commencement of the cele-
bration of the Olympian Games,—which were under the special direction and
control of the citizens of Elis, who regarded them as the glory and ornament
of their own soil,—was like a natural Herald, which proclaimed peace to the
inhabitants of the neighbouring provinces of Greece, who, however bitter their
enmity at other times might be, and within the frontiers of other provinces,
resorted with feelings of a different kind to the hallowed limits of Elis, and
stood as friends and brothers, at that season, on the banks of the Alpheus,
and beneath the shade of the olive grove of Olympia.
We have endeavoured to show how the political state of the Peloponnesus
received its tone and character from the physical form and features of the soil
itself; and it would not be an uninteresting speculation to examine how the
religious faith, the mythological traditions, and the social manners of its in-
habitants, were affected bv influences arisinof from the same source.
There is no country, of the same dimensions, in Europe, which has been
the scene of so many and such varying natural revolutions, as that which we
fire now describing. It has been the arena of conflicts, not merely between
man and man, but of even fiercer struggles, in which the elements of nature
have been the combatants. The loss of the Rhone, which dives into a sub-
terranean channel beneath the rocks of the Ecluse, has attracted the notice
and excited the wonder of the Swiss traveller; and in Italy, the stupen-
dous works by which the waters of the Alban and Fucine lakes have been
reduced from their ancient level, and conducted through the centre of high
lulls, by means of long, deep, and broad emissaries, serve as proofs of the
power and ingenuity of man to rival the operations of nature. The Copaic
Jake, in the continent of Greece, presents examples of a similar kind. But
le single province of Arcadia, in the Peloponnesus, exhibits more wonders
of this description than all these combined together. From the sides
^5
softer power. While the other provinces then were so many Theatres of
War, that which surrounded the city of Elis was consecrated hy the united
voices of the peninsular population, as a Temple of Peace. The land itself
was considered holy and inviolable. The sound of arms was not permitted
to cross its frontier. It was the Delos of the Peloponnesus. Here was a
perpetual armistice; and not only was the influence of this asylum felt within
its own limits, hut at stated periods it extended itself to the other parts of
the Peninsula.
The full Moon which gave the signal for the commencement of the cele-
bration of the Olympian Games,—which were under the special direction and
control of the citizens of Elis, who regarded them as the glory and ornament
of their own soil,—was like a natural Herald, which proclaimed peace to the
inhabitants of the neighbouring provinces of Greece, who, however bitter their
enmity at other times might be, and within the frontiers of other provinces,
resorted with feelings of a different kind to the hallowed limits of Elis, and
stood as friends and brothers, at that season, on the banks of the Alpheus,
and beneath the shade of the olive grove of Olympia.
We have endeavoured to show how the political state of the Peloponnesus
received its tone and character from the physical form and features of the soil
itself; and it would not be an uninteresting speculation to examine how the
religious faith, the mythological traditions, and the social manners of its in-
habitants, were affected bv influences arisinof from the same source.
There is no country, of the same dimensions, in Europe, which has been
the scene of so many and such varying natural revolutions, as that which we
fire now describing. It has been the arena of conflicts, not merely between
man and man, but of even fiercer struggles, in which the elements of nature
have been the combatants. The loss of the Rhone, which dives into a sub-
terranean channel beneath the rocks of the Ecluse, has attracted the notice
and excited the wonder of the Swiss traveller; and in Italy, the stupen-
dous works by which the waters of the Alban and Fucine lakes have been
reduced from their ancient level, and conducted through the centre of high
lulls, by means of long, deep, and broad emissaries, serve as proofs of the
power and ingenuity of man to rival the operations of nature. The Copaic
Jake, in the continent of Greece, presents examples of a similar kind. But
le single province of Arcadia, in the Peloponnesus, exhibits more wonders
of this description than all these combined together. From the sides
^5