10 EARLY GREEK GAMES AND PRIZES. 
gods.!. Thus the Isthmian were instituted in honor of the dead Meli- 
kertes,? the Nemean in honor of Opheltes or Archermoros,* the Pythian 
in honor of the slain Python,‘the Olympian in honor of the hero Pelops.° 
To both Pindar and Bacchylides the Olympian games were associated 
with the tomb of Pelops; Pausanias, on the other hand, records that the 
ancient Elean writers ascribed their origin to the Idzan Herakles of 
Crete. It was a common tradition that Herakles founded the games, 
some writers saying that it was the Cretan, others that it was the 
Greek hero, the son of Zeus and Alkmena.’ 
Despite the variation in legends relative to the institution of the 
four national games, we should not doubt the universal tradition that 
all were funerary in origin. ‘The tradition is confirmed by many lines 
of argument: by the survival of funeral customs in their later rituals, 
by the later custom of instituting funeral games in honor of dead 
warriors both in antiquity and in modern times, and by the testi- 
mony of early athletic art in Greece.* We shall now briefly consider 
these arguments. 


'The scholiast on Pindar, Nem., Argum., Boeckh, p. 424 B, and Jsthm., Argum., p. 514, calls 
the Nemean and Isthmian games funerary; Clem. Alex., Protrept., Ch. II, 34, 29 P. (quoted by 
Eusebios, Praep. evang., II, 6, 72 b. c.) says that all four great games were funerary in origin. 
2P., I., 44.8; Clem. Alex., Strom., I, Ch. 21, 137, 401 P. 
8P., II, 15.2-3; Apollod., III, 6, 4; Hyginus, Fab., 74; schol. on Pindar’s Nem., Argum. Here 
the umpires wore mourning garments because of the origin of the games: see Gardiner, p. 225. 
4Aristotle, Peplos, frag.=F. H. G., II; p. 189, no. 282; Clem: Alex.,; Protr., Choi, 2), 2) .and 
Ch. II, 34,29 P.; Hyg., Fab., 140. For a different story of the founding (to appease Apollo for 
not protecting the temple when Delphi was invaded by Danaos), see Augustine, de Civ. Dei, 
XVIII, 12; cf. schol. on Pind., Pyth., Argum.; Ovid, Met., I, 445f. The Pythia were reorganized 
by the Amphictyons as a funeral contest in honor of the soldiers who fell in the first Sacred War. 
5Cf. P., V, 13,1-2;/Clem. Alex., J. ¢. 6V, 7.6-9. 
7See Strabo, VIII, 3.30 (C.354-5); Pindar, Ol., II, 3 f.; VI, 67 f.; X, 25 f.; Diod., IV, 14 and 
V, 64. According to Pindar, //. cc. and the scholiast on Ol., II, 2, 5, and 7, Boeckh, pp. 58-9, 
Herakles, the son of Zeus, instituted the games in honor of Zeus; but Statius, Thed., VI, 5 f., 
Solinus, I, 28 (ed. Mommsen), Hyg., Fab., 273, Clem. Alex., Strom., I, Ch. 21, 137, say it was in 
honor of Pelops. On the traditional connection of Herakles with Olympia, see E. Curtius, 40h. 
d. k. preuss. Akad. d. Wiss. zu Berlin, philos.-histor. Kl., 1894, pp. 1098 f.; Busolt, Griech. Gesch.?, 
1893, I, pp. 240 f. On legends of the early history of Olympia, see Krause, Olympia, oder 
Darstellung der grossen olympischen Spielen, 1838, pp. 26 f. 
8Cf. Frazer, II, pp. 549-50; Krause, p. 9, n. 3;. from these two many of the following eeiatte 
are taken. Cf. also Rouse, pp. 4 and 10; Roane Die Entstehung der Olympionikenliste, Hermes, 
XXXIX, 1904, pp. 224 f.; Krause, Die Pythien, Nemeen und Isthmien, 1841, pp. 9 f. (Pythian), 
112 f. (Nemean), 170 f. (Isthmian); Gardiner, pp. 27 f.; see also Ridgeway, Origin of Tragedy, 
1910, pp. 36, 38, and cf. J. H. S., XXXI, 1911, p. xtvir. Since the simple theory of the 
origin of the Olympic Festival in the funeral games in honor of Pelops does not explain all the 
legends of the games nor all the peculiar customs of the festival, and because of the inadequate 
character of the literary evidence (the earliest mention of it being a Delphic oracle quoted by 
Phlegon, F. H. G., p. 604; cf. Clem. Alex., Protrept, II, 34, p. 29), it has been attacked by F. M. 
Cornford (in Miss Harrison’s Themis, pp. 212 f.) and others. These scholars have tried to find the 
origin of the Olympic games rather in a ritual contest of succession to the throne, the honors extended 
toa victor being held to prove his kingly or divine character. Thetheory was first proposed by A. B- 
Cook, The European Sky God, Folk Lore, 1904, and has recently been elaborated by Frazer in his 
Golden Bough,’ III, pp. 89 f., who has attempted to harmonize it with his earlier funeral theory. 
The inadequacy of the newer theory has been shown by E. N. Gardiner, The Alleged Kingship 
of the Olympic Victor, B. S. 4., XXII, 1916-18, pp. 85 f. For a review of his paper, see also 
J. H.S., XXXVIII, 1918, pp. xivit. 
