Page:History of Art in Primitive Greece - Mycenian Art Vol 1.djvu/113

 92 Primitive Greece : Mycenian Art. later form of Hellenes.^ The first literary mention of these Selli or Helli is found in the Iliad, Achilles prays to the god of Dodona, and reminds him that the interpreters of his will, the Selli, dwelling around his sanctuary, never wash their feet, and sleep on the bare ground.^ Even in after ages, when manners had softened, they persistently adhered to the coarse and uncouth habits of the founders of this local worship ; it was their way of reminding the faithful of and impressing upon them the hoary antiquity of the shrine. After them the surrounding country was called Hellopia or Hellas.^ Then, with tribes that crossed Pindus carrying with them the rites of their national religion into the eastern districts, along with the fame of its infallible oracle, the name extended to Southern Thessaly. In the Iliady Hellas appears almost as synonymous with Phthiotis ; and Achylles so calls the land inhabited by his Myrmidons.* In the enumeration of the chiefs before Troy, the inhabitants of that country are once called Hellenes.^ From the Iliad to the Odyssey^ the appellation becomes more comprehensive still. Speaking of Ulysses, the formula which oftener occurs to the poet is the following: The hero whose glory has spread afar into Hellas and the centre of Argos as well.^ Hellas, writes the Scoliast, lies in Thessaly. And so it does ; but it is probable that the thoughts of those who heard the songs in which the two names are thus brought together did not travel to Thessaly and Argolis alone, but that on the one hand the formula called ^ Aristarchus, in a note upon the Homeric line cited below, adds his testimony to the co-existence of the twin forms *Eoi and ScXXoil 2 liiad^ xvi. — .... a/Lf0( ^€ ^2iiKm 3 On Hellapia, or the canton having Dodona as head-centre, see Hesiod's description (Fragment LI. ed. Lehrs). of the poem, the word IXavcAXijicc is found. Of Ajax, son of Oilaeus, it is said that he excelled IlaWXXi^i'cfc K-ai 'Ax««oi)c, in his skill in whirling the spear. Aristarchus, however, remarked long ago that for Homer the Hellenes were only a Thessalian population, and that the line in question bore the impress of a later time and usage. With the Alexandrian critic, we must fain consider this verse as one among the interpolations which abound in the poem, notably in the ships' list, where facility for insertion was too strong to be resisted. ^ Odyssey : dydpof, toG kXIoc ivpv i«0' 'EXXnSa *:ai fAiaoi^ "Apyoc.
 * Iliad, ii.
 * Iliad : Mvp/ii^oVfc 8c K-aXcun-o ical "EXXiyi'fc *:"* 'Ax^'ot. In that section