454 DR DONALDSON ON THE EXPIATORY AND SUBSTITUTIONARY 
inhabitants must expose at the entrance of the cave a young man who was one 
of the citizens. A young man was selected by lot, the sacrificial fillet was put 
round his head, and he was led forth. Happily he is met by another young .. 
man, of powerful build, who, falling deeply in love with the victim, tears the | 
fillet from his head and places it on his own. He is led to the cave, rushes 
into it, drags the animal from its lair, and hurls it down the rocks. The 
animal disappeared, but from the spot which its body struck gushed forth a 
fountain. 
Such stories as these throw no real light on human sacrifice. 
We get a good deal more light from Pausanias. Some of the tales which he 
relates, though belonging to a mythical age, show how human sacrifices might 
have been offered to deities with some show of reason. In mentioning the 
temple of Artemis Triclaria, he tells us that a virgin acted as priestess till she 
was married. Once upon a time an exceedingly beautiful virgin of the name of 
Comaetho discharged this duty. An exceedingly handsome young man, 
Melanippus, fell in love with her, and she soon came to return the passion with 
equal ardour. But the course of true love did not run smooth. The parents of 
both the young people objected to the marriage. But the lovers were not to 
be baffled in this way, and accordingly they met regularly in the temple of 
Artemis, and ‘‘ were going to use the temple as a bedchamber.” Whereupon 
the anger of the goddess became manifest. The crops failed, diseases began to 
rage, and many died. In distress, the people applied to the Delphic oracle, and 
the Pythia accused Melanippus and Comaetho, ordered them to be offered up as 
a sacrifice to Artemis, and enjoined the annual sacrifice of the most beautiful 
young man and young woman. Pausanias bewails the fate of the young men 
and women who suffered from no fault of their own; but he thinks that the 
lovers are not to be pitied: “for,” says the old traveller, ‘to man alone success 
in love is a full equivalent for life.” Pausanias then goes on to relate how the 
human sacrifice came to an end—a part of the story which we need not relate, 
but which is of value to us, as it states that the sacrifices took place while Troy 
still stood. Pausanias, in this latter part of the story, makes the Delphic oracle 
describe human sacrifice as a foreign sacrifice (@vcia €é). (Paus. lib. vii. cap. 
xix. 2.) Pausanias tells another story of a similar nature. He mentions the 
existence of a temple of Dionysus Aigobolos in Potniz in Boeotia. The inhabi- 
tants sacrificing to this god proceeded under the influence of drink to such a pitch 
of insolence as to kill the priest of the god. The god took vengeance immediately 
and sent a plague, and the plague did not cease until, instructed by the oracle 
of Delphi, a beautiful boy was sacrificed to Dionysus. Soon after, the god 
changed the sacrifice, and took a goat instead of a boy (Paus. /2b. ix. cap. viii. 1). 
In both of these mythical cases a real and serious offence was committed against 
an individual god; and the sacrifice is a direct punishment of the offence. The 



























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