Page:Folk-lore - A Quarterly Review. Volume 14, 1903.djvu/303

 Greek Votive Offerings. 277

verb {avariOevai} appropriate to the former (p. 167). Per- haps we should be least open to criticism if we made the distinction depend on the question of locality, regarding as " votive " all statues erected in the sacred precinct/ as " honorific " those put up elsewhere. But it might be wiser to drop the distinction altogether.

Of two other principles Dr. Rouse avails himself on occasion, though he does not explicitly formulate them or give them the prominence that they deserve. One is the great canon laid down by Servius in his commentary on Aen. 2. 116 (cp. id. 4. 512) : "in sacris simulata pro veris accipi." It may for brevity's sake be called the principle of similarity. No form of votive offering is commoner than the dedication of a model in place of the real thing. Dr. Rouse recognises models of diseased members (p.2ioff.), of the sacrifice whether animal (pp. 18, 296 IT.) or vegetable (p. 296), of the tithe or firstfruit (p. 66 ff.), of shrines and parts of shrines (p. 70), of tripods (pp. 145 f., 160), shields (p. 115), &c. But he ought also to have grasped the fact that the dedication of statues and statuettes involves precisely the same principle. As we have seen, to multiply figures of the god is to multiply the god himself ; and to erect a votive portrait is to add to the god's retainers.

The other principle to which I allude would be described

by a grammarian as synecdoche. It is that principle by

which we allow a part to stand for the whole. Dr. Rouse

is rather chary of admitting its influence. He describes it

as an " idea which is found late " (p. 211 n. i ) and instances

a passage of Aristeides (48. 27. 472) who tells us that the god

bade him cut off a portion of his body for the salvation of

the whole. " This being hard to perform he waived the

matter and ordered me to draw off the ring that I was

wearing and dedicate it to the god of Fulfilment. That,

' So Reisch, Griechische IVeihgeschenke, p. 36, "Was im heiligen Bezirke aufgestellt ist, wird dadurch von selbst als Anath m gekennzeichnet," &c,