Plinys from classical antiquity, but it is quite impossible to re- 

 count them here.' What they all have in common is the friendli- 

 ness of the dolphin for human beings, their rescue of them when 

 they were thrown into the sea, their playfulness, especially with 

 children, and their interest in almost any sort of sound. All these 

 traits came to be regarded as mythical by later and more sophis- 

 ticated ages, and Usener {Die Sintfiuthsagen) comments on the 

 effect that the prevalence of these tales had even upon the scien- 

 tific thought of antiquity, making it difficult for such thinkers 

 as Aristotle to get away from the behef in the dolphin's ability 

 to carry a rider, and in its capacity for human feeling (Aristotle, 

 History of Animals, 631a). But Aristotle was right and Herr 

 Usener wrong. The delightful thing about most of these myths 

 is that they all appear to be based on solid fact, and not on the 

 fancies attributed to the original narrators. Another typical mod- 

 ern gloss by a highly sophisticated writer, biologically not un- 

 knowledgeable, Norman Douglas, is the following: Comment- 

 ing on the delphic mythology, he writes, "From these and many 

 other sources, we may gather that there was supposed to exist 

 an obscure but powerful bond of affection between this animal 

 and humanity, and that it was endowed with a certain kind- 

 heartedness and man-loving propensity. This is obviously not 

 the case ; the dolphin cares no more about us than cares the had- 

 dock. What is the origin of this beHef ? I conjecture that the 

 beast was credited with these social sentiments out of what may 

 be called poetic reciprocation. Mankind, loving the merry gam- 

 bols and o ther endearing characteristics of the dolphin, which 



^ Among the many well-known figures of classical mythology said to have been 

 saved by dolphins from the sea are Eikadios, Enalos, Koiranos, Phalanthos, Taras, etc. 

 In many other cases the corpses were brought ashore by a dolphin, which then expired 

 on reaching land (similarly, with minor variations, was this so with Palaimon or 

 Melikertes, Dionysios and Hermias of lasos, Hesiod, and the boys already referred 

 to from Baiae and Naupaktos). Similar incidents reappear in the writings of the hagi- 

 ographers. Saints Martinianos of Kaisareia, Kallistratos of Carthage, Basileios the 

 younger of Constantinople, were each saved from a watery grave by a couple of dol- 

 phins. The corpse of Saint Loukianos of Antioch was brought ashore by a large 

 dolphin, which then expired on the sand. See Klement, Avion, 1-64, and Usener, Die 

 Sintfiuthsagen, 138-180. 



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