DEDICATION OF ATHLETE PRIZES. 21 
spot near the so-called Pantheion,! which was probably a grove behind 
the temple of Zeus.* The laurel prize at the Pythian games replaced 
the older articles of value or money in 582 B.C.’ It came from Tempe 
and was plucked by a boy whose parents must be living.* The wreath is 
seen on late Delphian coins of the imperial age.*. Lucian also states that 
apples were given as prizes at Delphi.® Wild celery was the prize at 
the Isthmus in the time of Pindar.’ It was dried or withered to 
differentiate it from the fresh celery used at Nemea.® Later writers say 
that the wreath was of the leaves of the pine,® which was the tree sacred 
to Poseidon. Probably pine leaves composed the older wreath, a prac- 
tice certainly revived again in later Roman imperial days;!° for while 
on coins of Augustus and Nero celery 1s represented, those of Anto- 
ninus Pius and Lucius Verus show pine.!! A row of pine trees lined 
the approach to Poseidon’s sanctuary.’? The prize at Nemea was celery 
and not parsley, as many wrongly intérpret the wreath appearing on 
Selinuntian coins. | Pausanias al&6 states that at most Greek games a 
alm wreath was placed in the victor’s right hand.1* The palm as a 
symbol of victory occurs first toward the end of the fifth century B.C.” 
DEDICATION OF ATHLETE PRIZES. 
ust as soldiers on returning from successful campaigns might dedi- 
cate their spoils of victory, victors in athletic contests might consecrate. 
to the gods their prizes. ) In the Homeric poems we have no certain 
evidence of such a custom. A Delphic tripod was ascribed to Dio- 
medes and possibly this was a prize won at the funeral games in honor 
of Patroklos.’® ‘The first literary example of such a dedication of which 
we are certain is the prize tripod dedicated to the Helikonian Muses by 


oo. A 
1Pseudo-Aristot.,/.c.; schol. on Pindar, Ol., III, 60, and VIII, 12, Boeckh, pp. 102 and 189 
*Weniger, Der ine Ocelbaum in Olympia, 1895. 
3 pe apy fan facia Parium, 53 f. On the reason why the laurel was the prize for a Pythian 
victory, see P., X, 7.8; cf. VIII, 48.2 (as above); schol. on Pindar, Pyth., Argum., Boeckh, p. 298. 
On the Delphian laurel, see also Pliny, H.N., XV, 127; Dio Cass., LXIII, 9. Virgil crowns his 
victors with laurel: 4en., V, 246 and 539. 
4Aelian, Var. Hist., III, 1; schol. on Pindar, Pyth., Argum., Boeckh, p. 298. 
5See Gardiner, p. 208, fig. 27, a coin in the British Museum: B. M. Coins, Delphi, 38. 
6 Anacharsis, 9; see also C. J. A., III, 116; Kaibel, Epigrammata graeca, 1878, no. 931. 
7Nem., IV, 88; Ol., XIII, 32 f.; Isthm., II, 16, VIII, 64. 
8Schol. on Pindar, Nem., Argum., Boeckh, p. 426. 
°F. g., P., VIII, 48.2; cf. Plut., Qaest. conviv., V, 3.3; Timoleon, 26. 
Krause, Die Pythien, Nemeen und Isthmien, pp. 197f.; schol.-on Isthm., Argum., Boeckh, p. 514. 
uSee B. M. Coins, Corinth, 509-12; 564; 602-3 (603 = Gardiner, p. 214, fig. 28); 624; cf. J. G., II, 
1320, and Gardiner, p. 222, n. 2. 
2P.,1I,1.7. Curtius, Peloponnesos, I, p. 543, believes that the pine was not a fir, but the Pinus 
maritima; Philippson, in the Zeitschr. d. Gesellsch. fuer Erdkunde zu Berlin, XXV, 1890, pp. 74 f., 
believes that it was the Pinus halepensis Mill. 
13See Droysen, Hermes, XIV, 1879, p. 3; Head, Historia Nummorum, pp. 146 f.; Imhoof-Blumer 
and O. Keller, Tier- und Pflanzenbilder auf Muenzen und Gemmen, Pl. VI, 8; VII, 2; LX, 9-12; 
XXV, 19. MVITI, 48.2. 
15See Tarbell, Class. Phil., II], pp. 264 f.; he traces its origin to Delos and its popularity to the 
restoration of the Delian festival by the Athenians in 426 B. C. 
Mentioned by Phanias, ap. Athen., VI, 21 (232 c.) 
