Page:Modern Greek folklore and ancient Greek religion - a study in survivals.djvu/548

 providing 'all that it beseemeth that a man should have when he goeth beneath the murky gloom .' Indeed I question whether Homer had any clear conception of their utility; they seem rather to have been vaguely honorific; and since the custom of making such gifts is neither usual in Homer nor in harmony with his idea of future existence, I hold it likely that once again he was drawing upon the Pelasgian religion in order to give to the last rites of Patroclus the maximum of splendour.

The Dipylon-period puts an end to all uncertainty; thenceforward down to the present day the Greek custom of providing the dead with the necessaries of bodily life will be found to have been uniform and continuous. There has been no interruption of the simple practice of providing the dead with food both at the time of the funeral and at stated intervals thereafter. For the Dipylon-period this has been proved by the contents of the graves and by the strata of burnt soil observed at Eleusis above them. The same phenomena continue to present themselves also in the case of later graves at Athens, certainly down to the third century, and, though any detailed description of graves of a still later date is hard to find, the custom unquestionably still prevailed; for literary evidence, overlapping that of archaeology at the start, carries on our knowledge of the custom into the Christian era.

The Choephori of Aeschylus takes its very name from the practice of pouring wine or other beverages on the graves of the dead for them to consume; and the word [Greek: choai] was specially applied to this kind of libation as opposed to the [Greek: loibai] or [Greek: spondai] wherewith gods were propitiated. Similarly the Greek language possessed a special word for gifts of food (or other perishable gifts such as flowers) brought to the graves of the dead; these were called [Greek: enagismata] in strict contrast with the sacrifices ([Greek: thysiai], etc.) by which gods were appeased. These presents of food were regularly made on two occasions at least after the funeral; there were the [Greek: trita] brought, according to modern computation, on the second, in [Greek: Ephêmeris Archaiol.] 1889, p. 183. Possibly also at Athens, cf. Brückner and Pernice, in ''Athen. Mittheil.'' 1893, pp. 89-90.]were also made to Chthonian deities (cf. Pausan. 34. 3), but there was a distinction in character even between these [Greek: enagismata] and those made to the dead. Wine, for example, was excluded from the former and included in the latter. Possibly in origin [Greek: enagizein] was the Pelasgian rite, [Greek: thyein] the Achaean.]