Page:The Ancient City- A Study on the Religion, Laws, and Institutions of Greece and Rome.djvu/192

 186 THE CITY. BOOK IH. by rites and formulns they could attach tliese sacred beings to the soil which they themselves were going to occupy, and could shut them up within the enclosure which themselves were about to trace, and they said to them, "Come with us, O divine kings, and dwell with us in this city." The first day was occupied with these sacrifices and these prayers. The next day the boundaries were traced, whilst the people sang religious hymns. We are surprised, at first, when we see in the an- cient authors that there was no city, however ancient it might be, which did not pretend to know the name of its founder and the date of its foundation. Tliis is because a city could not lose the recollection of the sacred ceremony which had marked its birth. For every year it celebrated the anniversary of tliis birth- day with a sacrifice. Athens, as well as Rome, cele- brated its birthday. It often happened that colonists or conquerors estab- lished themselves in a city already built. They had not to build houses, for nothing opposed their occupy- ing those of the vanquished ; but they had to perform the ceremony of foundation — that is, to establish their sacred fires, and to fix their national gods in their new home. This explains the statements of Thucydides and Herodotus that the Dorians founded Lacedremon, and the lonians Miletus, though these two tribes found Lace* dffimon and Miletus built and already very ancient. These usnges show clearly what a city was in the opinion of the ancients. Surrounded by a sacred en- closure, and extending around an altar, it was the reli- gious abode of gorls and citizens. Livy said of Rome, "There is not a place in this city which is not impreg- nated with religion, and which is not occupied by some