DISCOVERY 



99 



it up from the ground, since in the former case the ba]l 

 can be thrown back as soon as received. The main 

 function of the " full-back," then, is to be able to 

 catch and to throw. 



In the team that is retiring the same division of 

 duties can be detected. The " forward " is retiring 

 cautiousl}', ready to advance again. The " three- 

 quarter " is alert, ready to move in any direction, and 

 the " full-back " is waiting to catch the ball and throw 

 it back. In addition, the " full-back " seems to be 

 the captain : his left arm is extended as though he 

 were signalling to the " forward " to fall back. It is, 

 I think, no mere coincidence that his gesture corre- 

 sponds to the modern Greek equivalent of our own 

 gesture of beckoning. The hand is turned down and 

 makes a sweeping downward motion. i 



The general correspondence of the sculptured scene 



much evidence as to the contests of teams of ball- 

 players,2 but unfortunately there is little to enable us 

 to tell the nature of these Spartan games. 



It is, of course, possible that Athens derived many 

 of her non-Olympian games from Sparta itself. The 

 games of the everyday life of the palaestra, called by the 

 Greeks iratyn'ai, were said by the Lydians to have 

 been learnt by the Greeks from Lydia.^ Lydia, we 

 know, was in the closest possible touch with Sparta 

 in the seventh and early sixth centuries B.C., and it 

 seems probable that Sparta was the home of the 

 ordinary athletic game. The game of Episkyros 

 certainly falls into the category of a Traiyvia. It was 

 also called Ephebike or Epikoinos, Pollux tells us — 

 the first because it was a game rather for young men 

 than for children, the second because a moderately 

 large number of players took part in it. 



VllltMAN liyUIVALENT UF RUGBY. 



with the game described by Pollux thus seems evident. 

 No element of the game as described by Pollux con- 

 tradicts what we have in the relief. On the other 

 hand, we learn from the relief much that seems to 

 supplement what is in Pollux. Thus the division of 

 functions of the players, the counter-throw of the team 

 that has received the ball, and the important position 

 of the " full-back," who acts both as captain and 

 principal defender, arc points which are not indicated 

 by Pollux but which yet agree with his account. 



Other Greek Ball Games 



A few general considerations need attention. Of 

 ball games in general we know little outside what 

 Pollux tells us. The second of the newly discovered 

 bases shows us a ball-game hitherto unknown, resemb- 

 ling hockey. From inscriptions in Sparta comes 



' I am indebted to Professor J. L. Myres for this suggestion. 



That the game should have originated in Asia Minor 

 seems still more probable in view of the fact that the 

 date on grounds of style of this relief is shortly before 

 the year 510 B.C., when the Ionian artistic and other 

 influences originally imported to Attica by Peisistratus 

 were the ruling fashion. This Ionian predominance in 

 fashion would have sanctioned the adoption of a game 

 from Sparta which was already known to the Ionian 

 elements of the population who had come over to 

 Athens as artists, students, and athletes. 



As a work of art this relief is one of the most remark- 

 able and beautiful of the archaic period ever found 

 in Greece. The darkness of the background that is 

 evident in the photograph is due to the fact that the 

 original crimson colouring is admirably preserved. The 

 elegance, perhaps at times slightly exaggerated, of the 



- See M. N. Tod in the Annual of the British School at Athens, 

 vol. X, pp. 43 ff. 



3 See Hercdotus, i. 94. 



