Page:Modern Greek folklore and ancient Greek religion - a study in survivals.djvu/489

 could the deed also be punished as the murder of close kinsfolk was wont to be punished? Could the children, albeit slain by their own father's hand, desire revenge upon him who loved them and was loved of them? 'No,' he answers boldly, 'pollution ([Greek: miasma]) there is, but no Alastor, no Avenger of blood, can come from them that love against them that love.' How then does Theseus picture the Alastor who, but for the bond of love between the father and his dead children, would seek vengeance for their death? The phrase which he uses is ambiguous—perhaps deliberately ambiguous—[Greek: oudeis ek tôn philôn]. It may mean equally well 'no one of those who love' or 'no one coming from those who love.' But when the close correspondence of [Greek: miasma], 'pollution,' and [Greek: alastôr] 'avenger,' is noted in this passage, and when it is also remembered that the dead children of Medea are elsewhere plainly named Miastores, it is hard to suppose that an audience familiar with the belief that the dead themselves avenged their own wrongs would not have interpreted the ambiguous phrase to mean 'none of these children shall rise up from the grave as an Alastor, for love is stronger than vengeance.'

But such doubt as still remains is set at rest when we turn from the usage of the word Alastor to its origin and enquire how it obtained the sense of 'Avenger.' What is its derivation?

Two conjectures seem to have been made by the ancients and are recorded by early commentators and lexicographers. The one connects the word with the root of [Greek: lanthanô], 'I escape notice,' and extracts a meaning in a variety of ways, leaving it open to choice, for example, whether it shall mean a god whose notice nothing escapes or a man who commits acts which cannot escape some god's notice. The other conjecture refers the word to the root of [Greek: alaomai], 'I wander.' It is between these two proposed derivations that our choice lies; nor can we obtain much help from the greatest modern authorities. Curtius unhesitatingly adopts the latter, Brugmann the former, nor does either of them so much as mention the possibility of the alternative. I must therefore discuss the question without reference to these authorities, knowing that, if I run counter to the one, I have the countenance of the other.