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Published online by Cambridge University Press: 23 December 2013
Thus far I have tried to show that the fully developed legend of Cadmus the Phoenician does not appear before the fifth century. This of course leads to no certain conclusion. Apart from the possibility (which I think an unlikely one) that the fragmentary state of our knowledge of the earlier writers forbids our coming to any conclusion, however tentative, on a subject like the present, it is still possible that the fifth century writers represent an older and better tradition than the poets before them. There is no more unproductive idea than that which assumes that every story bears the date of the writer who preserves it. We find Pausanias especially citing legends which are manifestly older and truer than many told by earlier writers, and Asius the Samian—to take a parallel case—giving a better version of a Boeotian myth than the local Pindar. But if it can be shown that writers of the fifth century, Herodotus and the logographi, were less interested in local tradition than in learned theory, especially when the latter was based on researches in foreign countries, we do then get some probability for the view that a statement found in them, but in no earlier writer, may be theory and not tradition. To do this we must get some idea of their methods.
1 A very likely contingency unless the logographi were especially given to theory, as I maintain; yet one overlooked by Crusius, who supposes them always to be drawing from old epic sources. Indeed when he says at the conclusion of his article (p. 880), ‘durch die oben gegebene Entwickelung des Materials ist diesen Hypothesen (the Eastern origin of Kadmos) von vornherein der Boden entzogen. Die ältesten Zeugnisse kennen Kadmos nur in Boiotien und wissen nichts von seinem Verhältnis zur Europe und zum Phoinix, oder gar von seinem Phoinikertume,” we may remark with Macan on a passage in Herodotus (iv. 189) that ‘clearly the statement is an inference not a tradition: but it may be a sound inference, even though he was hardly entitled to make it.”
2 If the Boeoti are really new-comers into Boeotia as is probable, the best instances of early and local writers giving what is presumably only a pragmatic form of a story are Hesiod (Fr. 41 ed. Rzach, 1902) saying that Onchestus, and Corinna (Fr. 31) that Ogygus, was a son of Boeotus.
3 Busolt, , Gr. Gesch. i.2 p. 147Google Scholar.
4 Id. p. 149, n. 3. As to the genuineness of the fragments of Acusilaus (whose book was used by Plato, (Symp. 178 D)Google Scholar, the Aristotelian Eudemus, and perhaps by Demetrius, of Scepsis, ap. Strabo, x. p. 472)Google Scholar, see Busolt's remarks here.
5 This Eumelus seems to have been the same as the epic poet, though in ancient times it was doubted whether the prose history was his: Paus. ii. 1. 1.
6 Clem. Alex., Strom. vi. 3. 26, pp. 751–2Google Scholar p. A knowledge of Herodotus or of Hecataeus of Abdera was clearly not a strong point with Clement: yet he admits that Herodotus and Ephorus said the alphabet came from Phoenicia, (‘barbarians invented nearly everything,” Strom. i. 75. p. 362 p)Google Scholar.
7 c. Apion. i. 6–18.
8 Busolt (p. 149) speaks of ‘die “Genealogien” des Akusilaos, in denen er hesiodische Genealogien in Prosa bearbeitete und “verbesserte”’: which is a plausible view of this one author.
9 de Thuc. iudic. 5 (of. 23 for the genuineness of writings attributed to still earlier authors).
10 Antiq. Rom. i. 13.
11 i. 2. 6, p. 18. One might add another passage from Strabo (vii. p. 341), where he blames Hecataeus for distinguishing the Epeans from the Eleans (Fr. 348): πολλἀ μὲν οὖν καὶ μὴ ὄντα λέγουσιν οἱ ἀρχαῖοι συγγραφεῖς συντε θραμμένοι τῷ ψεύδει διὰ τὰς μυθογραφίας διὰ δὲ τοῦτο καὶ σὺχ ὁμολογοῦσι πρὸς ἀλληλούς περὶ τῶν αὐτῶν
12 Hdt. iv. 191; cf. iv. 13, 32 (when he says ὠς δὴ λέγονταὶ γε ὐπὸ Λιβύων he is surely throwing additional doubt on the statement of some predecessor, Hecataeus or Scylax may be, that the Libyans did tell such tales. There is no reason to suppose that he himself ever questioned the Libyans on such matters. See Macan ad lac). Cf. too Diod. i. 37 for the mythical tendencies of the logogiaphi.
13 Antiq. Ind. i. 107–8.
14 Fr. 332; Demetr., de dornt. § 2 and § 12Google Scholar.
15 This is not of course a new view with regard to Hecataeus: see Diels, , Hermes, xxii. 1887, pp. 411 ff.Google Scholar; Wells, , J.H.S. xxix. p. 41Google Scholar: ‘It is Hecataeus whom we must credit with the first attempt to test Greek tradition by native sources of information. Herodotus has only borrowed this practice from his predecessor.’
16 Hdt. ii. 143; above, pp. 61–2.
17 Aelian, Nut. An. ix. 23Google Scholar: fr. 347.
18 Fr. 346. Cf. Pherec. fr. 32, Hellan. fr. 61, for early rationalism. ‘The Greeks were Euhemerists before Euhemeros, at least in regard to this particular case (Salmoxis and his underground chamber). The “historicizing” method had been introduced presumably by the first logographoi, Genealogists, Historians, perhaps partly as an adaptation of the wisdom of the Egyptians (Hdt. ii. 43, 143), and is illustrated by Herodotus himself (ii. 44 et al) as well as by Thucydides (i. 3, 4; ii. 15, sq.; ii. 29)’—Macan on Hdt. iv. 95. A little later, Herodotus seems to have been the chief representative of the rationalist school of mythographers: frr. 16, 18, 23–4.
19 Schol. Soph., O.C. 1320Google Scholar (F.H.G. iv. 627).
20 Fr. 357 (F.H.G. i. p. 28 and iv. p. 627): see Schol. Eur., Orest. 872Google Scholar ed. Schwartz.
21 Fr. 356: Strabo, vii. 321. The words following, however, given to Hecataeus by Muller, are probably not his, σχεδὸν δέ τι καὶ ἡ σύμπασα ῾Ελλὰς κατοικία βαρβάρων ὐπῆρξε τὸ παλαιόν ἀπ᾿ αὐτῶν λογιζομένοις τῶν μνμονευο μένων for they are only the beginning of a sentence, which gives a list of some of the barbarian inhabitants of the Peloponnese, Phrygians under Pelops, Egyptians under Danaus, Dryopes, Caucones, Pelasgians, Leleges and the like; and outside the Isthmus, Thracians in Attica and Phocis, Phoenicians under Cadmus in Thebes, Aones, Temmikes, Hyantes in Boeotia, etc.; and some of the heroic names are foreign, such as Cecrops, Codras and others. The Thracians, Illyrians and Epirots καὶ μεχρὶ νῦν ἐν πλευραῖς εἰσὶν κ.τ.λ The whole of this sentence must be Strabo's. (If it were Hecataeus this would be the first known reference to the Phoenician theory; above, p. 61.)
22 Fr. 362: Hdt. vi. 137.
23 Fr. 254; F.H.G. i. p. 17, iv. p. 627. The reference may be to Heeataeus of Abdera, not to the logographer, in which case it would still be instructive as to the methods of a later scholar. Cf. Fr. 358, which should come at the beginning of fr. 254, from Herodian.
24 Cf. perhaps, the presence of Hypachaei in Cilicia (Hdt. vii. 91, where see Macan), which may have helped the argument.
25 v. 57–8. Crusius is never so unfortunate, as when commenting on Herodotus. He says on. this passage (p. 862): ‘die Gephyräer wissen, dass sie nach Euboia gehören und zählen sich zu den Kadmeern: das ist Thatsache; sie stammen nicht aus Euboia, sondern mit Kadmos aus Phönizien, das ist Sage oder Hypothese, die nie hätte geglaubt werden sollen.” Not only is there nothing in the Greek to imply that the Gephyraei called themselves Cadmeans, but anybody acquainted with Herodotus would see, that had they done so, the historian would have had no need ‘to find out by enquiry’ that they were Phoenicians who came over with Cadmus; he would have assumed it as he does elsewhere. What he found out was that they were Cadmeans from Tanagra, instead of, as they said, Greeks from Eretria; and hence they were Phoenicians.
26 We have, perhaps, another instance of this method in the story of the bribery of Themistocles: εἰ δὲ δὴ τινες καὶ ἄλλοι ἔδοσαν νησιωτέων οὐκ ἔχω εἰπεῖν δοκέω δέ τινας καὶ ἄλλους δοῦναι καὶ οὐ τούτους μοὺνους . . . Θεμι στοκλέης μέν νυν ἐξ ᾿´Ανδρον ὁρμώμενος παρὰ νησιωτέων ἐκτᾶτο λάθρῃ τῶν ἄλλων στρατηγῶν viii. 112): ‘the conjecture of four lines back becomes a precise matter of fact, by repetition: a frequent fallacy in historiography—and criticism.” (Macan); though I am not clear that Herodotus is here referring back to his conjecture, but to his statement of fact, that Carystus and Paros did bribe Themistocles.
27 ‘The terminology ἐπὶ ῥητοῖσι ἐδέξαντο κ.τ.λ. is suspiciously recent, and the statement seems to imply the synoikism of Attica, and a graded franchise. The partial taboo, or excommunication, looks like the most genuine element in the tradition’—Macan: especially when you call it taboo.
28 See Töpffer, , Attische Genealogie, p. 293 foll.Google Scholar; who denies the Phoenician origin, and suggests that the theory was due to a confusion between Phoenicians and the Greek hero Phoenix, who as son of Amyntor king of Eleon, is a Boeotian. One of his arguments is singularly unsound. Eleon was quite close to Tanagra: ‘gerade hier sassen aber nach der ältesten Ueberlieferung auch die Gephyräer (Hdt. v. 57) bevor sie von den andringenden Boiotern aus ihren alten Sitzen vertrieben und in dem fremdenfreundlichen Attika aufgenommen wurden.” It is as clear as can be that the statement (which may go back to Hecataeus, fr. 89) that this clan of the Gephyraei came from Tanagra is as much inference on Herodotus' part as his assertion of their Phoenician origin. Töpffer also asserts that the Boeotian river Phoenix was near Eleon, whereas it really flowed by Tegyra (not Tanagra) near Orchomenus.
29 v. 66.
30 v. 62. ‘H. appears to be expressly combating and denying the view that they were foreigners’—Macan.
31 v. 22. They were Temenids from Argos, viii. 137–9.
32 vi. 35. Pherec. fr. 20; as also did Hellanicus in his Asopis, Fr. 14 (Aegina, mother of Aeacus being a daughter of the river Asopus). The names Agenor and Laius occur in this genealogy: one could suggest perhaps that this was the kind of fact that might have led an ancient author interested in such theories to suggest a foreign origin of a family, though it did not in this case.
33 i. 105.
34 ii. 50.
35 ii. 52, 53.
36 vii. 166; cf. iii. 135 (Persian enquiry) and ix. 85 where both πυνθάνομαι and ἀκούω occur. In ii. 54, he gives an Egyptian inference as a result of their ‘enquiry.” Cf. iv. 95, where he does not quite believe what he learnt, and v. 9.
37 E.g. ii, 118; iii. 49, 50, 77; vii. 195.
38 iv. 192, Macan ad loc.
39 ii. 34.
40 ii. 19.
41 ii. 28–9; cf. 148.
42 ii. 99. It is interesting that ἰστορίη here means the results of his enquiry (in this case only asking questions about what he did not see), not the enquiry itself: ὔψις eigene Anschauung u. das dadurch erworbene Wissen: γνώμη eigenes Urteil u. auf Ueberlegung gegründete Einsicht; ἰστορίη durch Umhören u. Nachfrage erlangte Wissenschaft’ Stein. In another passage (vii. 96) ἰστορίη means the telling or writing down of the resulta of enquiry (see Macan's note ad loc., and Stein on i. 1), and gets very near to the later meaning.
43 vii. 184. Another instance of the word being used arithmetically is the famous one of Ariston, the Spartan king, and his son, ἐπὶ σακτύλων συμβαλλόμενος τοὺς μῆνας εἶπε ἀπο μόσας οὐκ ἄν ἐμὸς εἴη (vi. 63).
44 viii. 30; and immediately below ὠς ἐμοὶ δοκέειν as to the value of which inference, with a note on Herodotus' method, Macan says: ‘Hdt. accepts, nay invites, fall responsibility for the very unfavourable verdict on the Phokians at this crisis … He wholly discounts, in fact, and discredits the spirited and patriotic reply of the Phokians, which he faithfully proceeds to report.’
45 This would include knowledge of the story in Stesichorus, as well as hearing it confirmed by priests on the spot.
46 ii. 112. On another occasion he is unable to draw an inference (iv. 45).
47 i. 172.
48 ii. 23.
49 ii. 120.
50 iv. 53. cf. ii. 120 ad fin. ὠς μὲν ἐγὼ γνώμην ἀποφαίνομαι) and ii. 43 (early Greek voyages, ὡς ἔλπομαὶ γε καὶ ἐμὴ γνώμη αἰρέει).
51 i. 171.
52 ii. 24; cf. vi. 84, viii. 133 for Herodotus giving an opinion in an uncertain case οὐκ ἔχω φράσαι οὐ γὰρ ὦν λέγεται δοκέμ δ᾿ ἔγωγε κ.τ.λ. For his sense of ‘accurate knowledge’ (τῶν γὰρ ἠμεῖς ἴδμεν τῶν καὶ πέρι ἀτρεκές τι λέγεται etc.), see vi. 14, vii. 148, ix. 84, iii. 98, 115 (these especially instructive), iv. 17–20, 81, 183–4, 187 (where see Macan), v. 9.
53 ii. 150, iii. 12 (αἴτιον δὲ τούτου τόδε ἔλεγον καὶ ἐμέ γ᾿ εὐπετέως ἔπειθον of the different natures of Persian and Egyptian skulls).
54 iv. 42, v. 86.
55 iv. 5 (Targitaus, the first Scythian, son of Zeus and the river Borysthenes' daughter); cf. iii. 3, vii. 214. A good instance in iv. 105: according to both Scythians and Greeks who live in Scythia, once each year every man of the Neuri becomes a wolf for a few days; ἐμὲ μέν νυν ταῦτα λέγοντες οὐ πείθουσι λέγουσι δὲ ἔλεγον οἰ ἰρέεσ οὐδὲν λέγοντεσ
56 iii. 9; cf. iv. 173, 179, 195, etc.
57 iii. 120, v. 44–5; cf. iv. 95.
58 vii. 148–152. Macan, of course, says that we have here an argument for the priority of Bks vii–ix, that Herodotus introduces his defence here. But it could be as easily a reply to criticism of earlier books. Cf. ii. 123.
59 Macan on viii. 46.
60 ii. 99–142; from Men, the first king, to Setho, the priests are his only authority. After Setho he writes down what Egyptians and others say in agreement (cf. 147). The phrase ἔλεγον οἰ ἰρέεσ is constantly recurring in Chap. 99 foll.; on one occasion at least, the story of Sesostris, c. 107, to express his own doubts. Most of the early kings named by Herodotus are connected in some way with the building of the Ptah-temple at Memphis, and the priests here cited are probably those of Memphis (cf. ii. 3–4); see Stein on cc. 99, 100.
61 ii. 3.
62 ii. 5, 10, 12, 15, etc. The priests expressed the opinion that Egypt was an ἐπίκτητος γῆ So did Hecataeus, Fr. 279. Arrian, , Exped. Alex. v. 6Google Scholar: ‘Both Herodotus and Hecataeus called Egypt “a gift of the Nile,” if the books of the latter on Egypt are really genuine.” In modern times too the Γῆς περίοδος has been rejected as spurious, on no good grounds me indice. See Wells, , J.H.S. xxix. p. 41 ff.Google Scholar; Caspari, ibid. xxx. pp. 236 ff.; Busolt i2. 150.
63 ii. 145.
64 ii. 43–4.
65 ii. 48–9.
66 Above, p. 67 cf. ii. 45 for the ‘Greek’ story of Heracles in Egypt, a foolish story in Herodotus' eyes.
67 ii. 79, 91. Very noticeable is the first passage, about Linus: ‘the Egyptians know the Linus-song, which is sung in Phoenicia, Cyprus and elsewhere (under different names in different countries, but it is always the same as the Greek Linus); ὤστε πολλὰ μὲν καὶ ἄλλα ἀποθωυμάζειν με τῶν περὶ Αἴγυπτον ἐόντων ἐν δὲ δὴ καὶ τὸν Λίνον ὀκόθεν ἔλαβον φαίνονται δὲ ἀδὲ μεμαθήκασι δ᾿ ὦν τοῦτο πάντες οἰ Herodotus seems not quite to have made up his mind that the other nations borrowed the song from Egypt.
68 ii. 4.
69 ii. 58.
70 A result, of course, obtained, once the Phoenician origin of Cadmus was established, by comparing his date with that of Amphitryon at Thebes.
71 ii. 43–5.
72 ii. 145–6; cf. 52.
73 ii. 4.
74 ii. 50–1. What exactly Herodotus means by the ‘names’ of the goda it is difficult to discover: see Stein ad loc. In ii. 79 (Linus-Maneros) he uses the same word to say that this hero was called by different names in different countries. Nor does he mean that the Greeks borrowed simply the system of giving individual names (as is shown by the statement that they learnt the names of Heracles, Dionysus—cf. c. 52—and Pan later than the others). Herodotus gives us many of these pairs (Zeus-Amûn, Dionysius-Osiris, Demeter-Isis, etc.), and seems to assume others (Athena-Sais, for example): see ii. 42, 46, 59, (79), 144, 175, iii. 27, 37. Perhaps some of the details had been worked out before him: cf. Hellanicus Fr. 150 (Babys = Typhon). Similar is Zeus = Belus (i. 181). It is interesting to note how these equations between Greek and Oriental gods are worked out by Eastern writers, e.g. Berossus the Chaldean, priest of Belus (temp. Alexander, the Great), fr. 2, F.H.G. ii. 498Google Scholar; or Philo Byblius (temp. Hadrian, , fr. 2, 21) F.H.G. iii. 568Google Scholar, or by Alexander, Polyhistor, , a Milesian, (temp. Sulla) fr. 3, F.H.G. iii. 212Google Scholar.
75 ii. 52–3.
76 ii. 54–7.
77 ii. 58.
78 ii. 64.
79 ii. 82
80 ii. 109.
81 ii. 123; cf. c. 81.
82 ii. 156.
83 ii. 166–7. This is instructive: ‘I cannot say for certain whether the Greeks learnt this from Egypt, for Thracians, Lydians, Scythians, Persians and nearly all barbarians have the same custom; μεμαθήκασι δ᾿ ὦν τοῦτο πάντες οἰ ῾´Ελληνες καὶ μάλιστα Λακεδαιλμόνιοι
84 ii. 171.
85 ii. 177.
86 iv. 180.
87 In his Aegyptiaca, fr. 155, in opposition to Heoataeus, who said the vine was first found in Aetolia, fr. 341. We may note again the growtli of a theory, as geographical knowledge gets wider.
88 ii. 104.
89 This last sentence must have been appreciated by Herodotus' hearers in Athens. (Heuses a very similar phrase to describe Themistocles' appropriating the ideas of Mnesiphilus about fighting at Salamis, viii. 58; a passage about which Plutarch, gets so angry, De Malign. Herod. 37, p. 869 E.Google Scholar)
90 ii. 80.
91 vi. 60.
92 vi. 58–9.
93 vi. 53–5.
94 ii. 118
95 ii. 50; cf. iv. 180, 188.
96 iv. 189. It is strange that in this last case Herodotus should have selected an almost certainly Semitic word, and derived it from the Libyans, not the Phoenicians. Or did he hear in Sicily that it had been borrowed from Carthage?
97 iv. 173.
98 iv. 178.
99 iv. 179.
100 iv. 191.
101 iv. 180.
102 ii. 112.
103 i. 105, vii. 90.
104 i. 170.
105 De Malign. Her. 13, p. 857 D; cf. ii. 142, Stein, ad loc., for a probable correction of Hesiod and other Greek poets by Herodotus.
106 ii. 91; cf. 98, where Herodotus points out that the name of ‘the city of Archandros’ is non-Egyptian.
107 i. 135; cf. Plutarch op. cit. 857 B.
108 Cf. especially ii. 53: καὶ τὰ μὲν πρῶτα αἰ Δωδωνιδες ἰρεῖαι λέγονται τὰ δὲ ὐστερα τὰ ἐσ ῾Ησίοδόν τε καὶ ῾´Ομηρον ἔχοντα ἐγώ λέγω
109 ii. 73.
110 ii. 131.
111 ii. 122–3.
112 ii. 156.
113 iii. 16.
114 iii. 2.
115 iii. 139.
116 The influence of Delphi, apparent when he is dealing with the history of the Greek cities, is not obvious in his treatment of Greek religion. If the legend of the Gephyraei preserved by Pausanias Atticista and Suidas (quoted by Crusius, p. 863; cf. Töpffer, pp. 297 f.), which is almost exactly parallel to the story of the foundation of Thebes by Cadmus (Delphic Oracle, following cattle till they tire), is at all ancient, it may have been told Herodotus by the priests of Delphi, and led him to infer the kinsmanship between the Gephyraei and the Cadmeans.
117 ii. 160.
118 v. 97.
119 vii. 23. For other general expressions of admiration, see ii. 4, 64, 77, iii. 129 (cf. ii. 84), el al.
120 Op. cit. 12, p. 857 A–B. Cf. Stein's note on ii. 119. According to Diodorus (i. 37), the theory of the Nile which was held by Hecataeus (fr. 278), and so scornfully rejected by Herodotus (ii. 20, 23), was held by the priests too. If Herodotus knew this, and yet did not put it on record, it would indeed be a case of prejudiced suppression; but he was hardly so ingenuous; and Diodorus may he wrong.
The tract De Malignitate Herodoti is an interesting work, and Plutarch, in his pedantic way, does touch on some of the crucial points in the case against Herodotus as a pariial historian, as his prejudice against the Thebans, the Phocians, the Corinthians, and Themistocles (864 H, 868 B–D, 870 C, 869 E–F), and indeed his fondness for barbarian origins (cf. 856 E, 857 A–F, 860 E). But he is sometimes astonishingly futile (e.g. 855 C, 858 C–D); and he quite misunderstands the Herodotean maxim of λέγειν τὰ λεγόμενα (863 D). Yet he has a good analysis of the persuasiveness of Herodotus' malignity (854 F-855 A, 874 A–B).
121 14, p. 857 E–F.
122 It is perhaps an argument in favour of Maoan's theory of the prior composition of Bks. vii–ix, that there Herodotus is apparently unconscious of any idea that the Greek gods are not Greek in origin, though with regard to Heracles at least he had a good opportunity—his shrines at Thermopylae, with a river Phoenix close by (vii. 176); an opportunity taken by Macan.
123 Frr. 24–5.
124 The poem called Danais, of which but little is known.
125 Hecat. fr. 357; Hdt. ii. 91. 171, 182; vi. 54.
126 ii. 182. It is noteworthy that Diodorus (v. 58) and Apollodorus (ii. 13) are more certain than Herodotus, and leave out ‘it is said.’ (According to them it was Danaus, not his daughters, who founded the shrine.)
127 vi. 54.
128 Frr. 187–9; Acusil. fr. 18. Acusilaus knew of Inaclus as the first king of Argos, fr. 13. (If the author of the Aegimius was Cercops of Miletus, as some ancient scholars thought, Io may have wandered as far as the limits of Milesian knowledge of geography. In the same way Arctinus of Miletus conveyed Achilles to Leuce in the Aethiopis, probably for the first time: Proclus quoted by Kinkel, Fragm. Epic. Gr.).
129 Medus: Hecat. fr. 171; Hdt. vii. 62; Ctesias fr. 13 (see Gilmore's note on fr. 15, p. 79); Diod. Epit. Bk. X. (letter of Datis to Athena). Perseus: Hdt. vi. 53–4, vii. 61, 150; cf. ii. 91 (Perseus at Chemmis in Egypt); Hellan. fr. 159; Ctesias fr. 13. Herodotus is inconsistent; see Macan on vii. 150. (I do not know why Mr. Macan says, on vii. 61, ‘Hellanicus differed from Herodotus on this point; Steph. Byz. s.v. Ιόπη There is no mention of Hellanicus in this article of Stephanas, and fr. 159. also from Steph. s.v. ᾿Αρταία shows that he agreed; and see fr. 30, F.H.G. iv. p. 636 and 168. Pherecydes, perhaps, did differ: Perses is not mentioned in the long extracts about Perseus and his adventures given by Schol. Ap. Rh. 1090–1, 1515 = Fr. 26.)
130 ‘A truly incredible assertion, bearing the impress of Hellenic fabrication, and irreconcilable with the fact that the real name of the Medes was Mada. [Does this follow?] A Hellenized Mede or Persian, now and then may have been persuaded to accept such Greek fictions; but this confident assertion of Herodotus' is a good illustration of the illusory character of his Quellen-Angabe.’ Macan, pp. 10–4. I suspect (here is something more behind Herodotus' statement than this.
131 On vi. 54; and see his remarks in App. x. § 26 ad fin. Io was probably earlier in Argos than in Egypt, where she became almost identified with Isis (Hdt. ii. 41).
132 Note on v. 58. The various localizations of the Perseus-Andromeda myth are interesting as a parallel; especially the placing of Andromeda at Joppa (first made popular by Theopompus), with which Io was later connected. Steph. Byz. (s.v. Iope) definitely rejects the Greek version: see Roscher.
133 Hdt. i. 7, 80, Acusil. fr. 27.
134 Hdt. iv. 8.
135 Hdt. i. 95. It is noteworthy that Xanthus the Lydian knew nothing of this story, fr. 1 (Dionys., Halic., Antiq. Rom. i. 28Google Scholar).
136 Hellan. fr. 1.
137 Pherec. fr. 85 (Dionys., Halic., Antiq. Rom. i. 13Google Scholar).
138 Strabo ix. 405.
139 Dion., Halic., de Thuc. § 23Google Scholar.
140 See Busolt, i. p. 148, n. 2. Crusius is one of those that reject him (p. 874): ‘Seit Müller, C. (F.H.G. ii. p. 2Google Scholar) gilt der “Logograph” Kadmos mit recht als mythische Person; schon die Zusammenstellung mit Aristeas lehrt, dass wir uns hier nicht auf historischem Boden befinden; u. die Ueberlieferung selbst sagt es, wenn sie den Mann mit Orpheus in Verbindung setzt. [On this argument, once Cadmus is mythical, we must reject Hecataeus too, who is joined with him frequently; and so on in a never-ending chain.] Im Grunde ist er wohl mit dem epischen Helden identisch.” For Suidas calls him the inventor of letters, and he is often ‘the first prosewriter.” I think it possible that it may be the other way about: Cadmus the Phoenician as inventor of letters is identical with the logographer. If Suidas is preserving an old tradition, as is conceivable, and not merely confusing the man and the hero (as is probable), it may be that there was at Miletus in the fifth century a tradition (true or false) that Cadmus the Milesian was the first writer, or the inventor or introducer of letters; and that Herodotus may have inferred (‘found out by enquiry’) that this was wrong, and the invention really belonged to the Phoenician. It may have helped Herodotus to his theory. Prof.Murray, confuses both ancient tradition and modern theory when he writes (Gk. Lit. p. 121)Google Scholar. ‘The names of the earliest chroniclers have a mythical ring. … The chronicle of Miletus, commonly acknowledged to be the oldest of all, was the« first thing written by Cadmus, when he had invented letters.”
141 Fr. 19 (Hesiod, fr. 27), where the latter would appear to give a more pragmatic account; fr. 12. 16 (Hesiod, fr. 40, 143). In frr. 5, 7 (Hesiod, frr. 150, 3) he differs on general matters of mythology.
142 Frr. 1, 3, 8, 10, 18.
143 Professor Murray (pp. 121—2) says he is ‘a half-mythical “Bring Renown,” parallel to “Hearken-people” (Acusilaus) of Argos. The first real chroniclers come from Ionia and the islands … Bion of Proconnesus, Dionysius of Miletus,” etc. Does he mean that the evidence for the work of Bion, Dionysius and the others is more plentiful and of better quality, less myth-made and more respectable than that for Pherecydes, or even Acusilaus? They are far vaguer figures to us. And is ‘Pherecydes’ a more ‘mythical’ name than Pericles or Demosthenes?
144 Fr. 26, from Schol. Ap. Rh. iv. 1090, 1515.
145 Fr. 24.
146 Fr. 27.
147 Fr. 33.
148 Fr. 102a. Pausanias (ix. 5, 7) tells us that Homer did not know the story; and proceeds to relate what other poets said of him. But Palaephatus (c. 42) says that Hesiod and others told the story (Hes. fr. 133).
149 Phoen. 818 ff. Is this too ‘direkt aus epischen Quellen?’
150 Fr. 49 (Hell. fr. 12), ap. Schol., Phoen. 71Google Scholar.
151 Certainty on such matters can never be obtained until we know how trustworthy are the quotations even in the good Scholia; that is, not is the Scholiast correct in saying Pherecydes said this or that, but is he right to quote Pherecydes at all, implying that he is an original authority, not an epitomator of the Epic? This is a matter that has not so far as I know been properly worked out. But even if a Scholiast generally quotes the Epic and the logographi at secondhand from some such book as Lysimachus' Collection of Paradoxa Thebaica, he may be still as trustworthy if Lysimachus was a careful writer. It is perhaps noteworthy how seldom handbooks like Lysimachus', or Asclepiades' Tragedumena, are quoted.
152 Hes. fr. 34; Pherecyd. fr. 102 b; Hell. fr. 54; Xanthus, fr. 13 and Schol. Eur. Phoen. 159 (om. F.H.G.); Bacch. fr. 46.
153 Pherecyd. fr. 52.
154 Antiq. Rom. i. 28.
155 Above p. 225. Yet he told the story of Hermes and Argos fr. 9 (perhaps in connection with wanderings of Io in Lydia?) To him Philottus the Lydian was the husband of Niobe, who remains apparently in Lydia; fr. 13 and Schol. Eur., Phoen. 159Google Scholar.
156 See Vossius quoted by Müller on Fr. 19.
157 Yet few would suppose that when Prof. Murray writes (p. 131) ‘Strabohimself “would sooner believe Homer, Hesiod and the tragedians”’ than Hellanicus, what Strabo really says (xi. 508 by the way, not ‘xiii. 612’) is ‘I would sooner believe the stories of Homer, Hesiod and the tragedians about heroes, than Ctesias and Herodotus and Hellanicus and similar writers, when they are speaking of what they never saw, nor heard of (at least, not from those who had seen them), merely to give pleasure to their hearers.’
158 i. 97. I cannot agree with those scholars (e.g., Busolt ii2. p. 5, Murray, loc. cit.), who think that ‘Thucydides means that the system of putting the events down in a lump against an archon's name, was inexact compared with his own division of succeeding summers and winters’; for he does not himself use this method when recording the events of the Pentecontaëtia, the treatment of which he criticises in Hellanicus. Quite obviously he means that Hellanicus got his events in the wrong order.
159 Fr. 143.
160 A well-known instance of the adoption of a learned theory by the tragedians, is their taking over Anaxagoras' idea concerning the rise of the Nile (Hdt. ii. 22; Diod. i. 38; Athen. ii. 87). All three accepted it: Aesch. fr. 293 where see Nauck); Soph. fr. 797; Eur., Helen. ad init.; fr. 230Google Scholar.
