Page:The Ancient City- A Study on the Religion, Laws, and Institutions of Greece and Rome.djvu/233

 CHAP. VIII. THE RITUALS AND THE ANNALS. 227 existence of the national gods ; for the events which it contained were the visible form under which these gods had revealed themselves from age to ago. Even among these facts there were many that gave rise to festivals and annual sacrifices. The history of the city told the citizen what he must believe and what he must adore. Then, too, this history was written by priests. Rome had its annals of the pontiffs; the Sabine priests, the Saranite priests, and the Etruscan priests had similar ones.' Among the Greeks there has been pre- served to us the recollection of the books or secret annals of Athens, Sparta, Delphi, Naxos, and Taren- tum.* When Pausanias travelled in Greece, in the time of Hadrian, the priests of every city related to hinii the old local histories. They did not invent them, but. had learned them in their annals. This sort of history was entirely local. It commenced at the foundation^ because what had happened before this date was of no- interest to the city ; and this explains why the an- cients have so completely ignored their earliest history.. Their records related only to affiiirs in which the city had been engaged, and gave no heed to the rest of the world. Every city had its special history, as it had its ^•eligion and its calendar. We can easily believe that these city annals were exceedingly dry, and very whimsical, both in substance and in form. They were not a work of art, but a re- ligious work. Later came the writers, the narrators,^. • ' Dionysius, II. 49. Livy, X. S3. Cicero, DeDivin., II. 41 ; 1.33; II. 23. Censorinus, 12, 17. Suetonius, Claudius, 42. Macrobius, I. 12; V. 10. Solin., II. 9. Servius, VII. 678; ^'I^. 398. Letters of Marc. Aurel., IV. 4. ' Plutarch, Cont. Colot., 17; Solon, 11; Moral., 8C9. Athe- feus, Xr. 49. Tac, Ann., IV. 43.