Page:Folk-lore - A Quarterly Review. Volume 15, 1904.djvu/431

 The European Sky -god. 401

fellow-countrymen.^''^ Another trace of the same conception may be found in the rule that athletes who cheated in the games at Olympia were fined, and that from the fines thus levied bronze statues of Zeus called Zanes were made and set up in the sacred precinct.^"^ When we recall Macro- bius' statement ^^° that "the souls of consecrated men, whom the Greeks call Zanes, they regarded as owed to the gods," it is tempting to suppose that we have here the final commutation of what was originally a death-penalty imposed on the would-be king who could not beat his opponent in fair fight.^^^ Lastly, the belief that the Olympic victor was an incarnation of Zeus will serve to explain two myths, which I append without further comment. Pausanias,^^- when discussing the origin of the games at Olympia, makes the singular statement : " Some say that Zeus here wrestled with Cronus himself for the kingdom ; others that he held the games in honour of his victory over Cronus." Tzetzes^^'^ preserves a yet more singular legend bearing on the same subject: "Heracles vanquished in battle Augeas king of Elis, the son of Helios and Iphiboe, because he had not received the reward due to him for the cleansing of the byre ; and, having sacked Elis, he formed of the spoils thereof a contest in honour of Olympian Zeus and called it the Olympian contest. It was held every four years or, to speak with more precision, every fifty months. The athletes contended in the pentathlon (boxing,

"^ Philippus of Crotona heroified (Hdt. 5. 47) ; Cleomedes of Astypalsea heroified (Paus., 6. 9. 8) ; Polydamas of Scotussa invoked as healer (Luc. deor. concil., 12); Euthymus of Locri in Italy deified during his life-time (Plin. nat, hist., 7. 152, Paus., 6. 6. 10) ; Theagenes of Thasos worshipped as a god in Thasos and elsewhere (Paus., 6. 11. 8 f., Luc. deor. concil., 12). See Class. Rev., xvii., 275.

•'* Paus., 5. 21. 2.

"*» Supra, p. 384.

'8' Supra, p. 382 f.

'*^ Paus., 5. 7. 10.

"* Tzetz. in Lye. Alex., 41.

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