224 KANSAS UNIVKRSITN' QUAR'IKRL^ . 



or hired mourners), participated in by the female relatives and a 

 chorus of women. The imperfect tense, Oprjveov, in the passage of 

 Homer cited above, seems to warrant the conclusion that the aoiSr] 

 consisted of strophes, and that at each pause some mourner broke 

 in with some passionate lament. The antistrophe is easily provided 

 for by the chorus of women. Such an explanation at least utilizes 

 all the material and accords well with the previous and subsequent 

 history of the chorus. Thus we have here again an illustration of 

 the /xei/ and 8c principle entering into the Greek life as well as into 

 the Greek language. The threnos without doubt contained many 

 allusions to the valor and virtue of the dead, and this fact gave to 

 the threnos a personal and aristocratic character which was in exact 

 keeping with the times in which it flourished. It was then that the 

 government of Greece most nearly approached the patriarchal 

 form. It was then that the family was a unit for both political and 

 religious purposes. Later, when the tyrants came in, the threnos 

 was changed to meet the new political and social conditions. In 

 the 13'ric odes to the dead, of Pindar and Simonides, we see the 

 next step in this development. The ode of Simonides on the 

 heroes of Thermopylae is especially significant in this connection as 

 forming the connecting link between the personal and aristrocratic 

 threnos and the impersonal and democratic epitaphios. It would 

 be interesting to trace the line of resemblance between the growth 

 of the Epitaphios Logos and that of the tragic drama, did it not 

 carry us beyond the limits of our present purpose. Suffice it to say 

 that in the dithyramb from which the tragic drama was developed 

 we have the same three classes of jierformers: the minstrels, the 

 leaders of the chorus, and the chorus itself — as we had in the early 

 threnos. The prose of the Epitaphios may be said to correspond 

 to the collotpiial iambics (Arist. Poet., c. 4) of the tragedy, the 

 orator to the mourner and the bard. The incorporation of legends 

 is common not only to the threnos and the dithyramb, but is a very 

 marked feature of the Epitaphios. In fact, the presence of t}'^?; is 

 to be looked for as much in the Epitaphios as in the tragedy. 



The transformation of the threnos into the epitaphios was due to 

 the reforms introduced into the society of Athens by the establish- 

 ment of the Athenian democracy near the close of the sixth centur\-. 

 The exact time at which public funerals began is not known. But, 

 without discussing the weight of inferences to be drawn from the 

 statements of L}sias (Epit. 3-20), of Thucydides (2, 35), and of 

 Herodotus (5, 78), we can say with safety, at least, that the custom 

 did not exist before the time of Cleisthenes. 



