A History of Greece. For the use of colleges and schools

Front matter

BAI.AMJS. A HISTORY OF GREECE fm tht citsc of Colleges anir Schools. EY THE REV. FREDERICK ARNOLD, B.A., LATE OF CHRIST CHURCH, OXFORD. LONDON: THE RELIGIOUS TRACT SOCIETY, 56, Paternoster Row ; 65, St. Paul's Churchyard ; and 164, Piccadilly. LONDON: rRINTED UT WILLTAM CLOWES AND SONS, STAMTORD STREET AND CUARING CROSS. PREFACE, A few words may best here he said concerning the plan and scope of the present his tory. The objection is commonly brought, and only too truly, that abridged histories are little more than dry abstracts or bare lists of proper names. It appeared to the author that it might not be impossible to avoid this re proach. The School History, which loads the memory with incessant details, is too great a burden for the young reader, and, from its repellent character, must defeat its own purpose of in structing him and of eliciting a taste for this kind of study.

At the same time the author fully recognized the fact that it would -not be worth while to write a new History of Greece which would not give with fulness and accuracy the main results of recent scholarship, and satisfy the high •educational standard of schools and colleges. He has attempted, therefore, to write the chapters in a popular and clear way, which might really interest the young student or tho general reader, and might be helpful to the candidate for honours in breaking up the ground VI

Preface

. for him before studying the original authorities, seriatim, for himself. He has taken care not to encumber such chapters with more than a fair share of their proper names. But he has added supplementary chapters and notes, in which he has given the exact information which ought to be accurately possessed by the young student who will have to face examination papers. He would recommend that these sections of the book should be omitted on a first perusal, but they should be fully mastered afterwards. The fact that Mr. Grote's great work has appeared since the publication of a previous History of Greece issued by the Religious Tract Society, would alone be sufficient to explain the appearance of the present volume. The author must express bis deep sense of that universal debt which is owing to the late Mr. Grote ; but great as Mr. Grote's success has been, particularly in what may be called the Constitutional History of Athens, there are parts of Bishop Thirlwall's History which certainly have not been superseded ; and on the question of the Sophists, and some other subjects, he has been led to adopt the conclusions of scholars who have seen reason to dissent from those of Mr. Grote.

He has almost discarded, except in a very general waj-, and where absolutely necessary, any treatment of the Greek mythology. This he has done, certainly not as denying the interest and importance of the mythology, but because he had no space for disquisition on the subject, and he did not think it worth while to present the body of legends in narrative forms. He felt also the force of Bishop Thirlwall's remark, that it would be " difficult to convey the knowledge of the Greek mythology without danger of polluting the youthful imagination." He has virtually closed his history at the death of Alexander, limiting it to the period covered by the classical authors, and which necessarily receives almost exclusive attention in our great places of education. PEEFACE. He has added a chapter on Greece at the time of St. Paul, which connects the subject with sacred history.

He has in his Notes cited various passages from con tinental and English writers, which appeared strikingly to illustrate the matters referred to, and which might serve as an introduction to the large literature of tho subject. There never was a time when the providential place of Greece in the order and government of the world was more strongly felt by our deepest thinkers. It is felt that there is no real line between Ancient and Modern history, and that the lessons of Ancient history are, in truth, most modern in their application. The his tory and literature of Greece have been always esteemed among the choicest instruments of intellectual culture, and, studied within the necessary limitations, and with the caution that such records of heathen society demand, will always retain a utility of their own in Christian education.

They adumbrate the truth of God's moral government of the world, and show how " righteousness exalteth a nation, but sin is a reproach to any people." In the present day the domains of ancient history have been explored with peculiar energy and research, and the result of such investigation has been more and more to bring secular and sacred history into agreement, to furnish fresh illustrations to Holy Writ, and fresh con firmations of the truth and minute accuracy of the Divine Revelation. In this great argument, Greek history, though not to the same extent as that of Egypt and the East, has its proper share and position, and special care has been taken in these pages to illustrate matters of biblical interest. Moreover, it may be said that Greek history and literature, mirroring the brilliant dawn of the human mind, are, in a sense, a prœjparatio evangelica of good things to come. For they shew us both the greatness and littleness of man, the vastness of the in tellectual powers with which God has endowed his

PREFACE.

. creatures, and their utter powerlessness, when unas sisted by Divine grace, to confer real purity, peace, and happiness. That great thinker Coleridge expressed his judgment, which must receive concurrence from all thoughtful/and religious minds, that the Greeks were educated under a distinct providential though not miraculous dispensation, and were manifestly employed as a co-agent in the mightiest revolution of the moral world, the propagation of the Gospel. It is impossible to read without interest the story of the marvellous people who were the appointed instruments for preparing a language in which, at the crisis of the world's history, the glad tidings of Jesus Christ spread through out the civilized world, and, beyond that, to other nations and countries, waiting for the light of their morning.

The author has to thank the Rev. Dr. Jacob, late Head Master of Christ's Hospital, the Rev. R. Blackmore, Head Master of Probus School, and other friends, for their kind assistance in passing these sheets through the press, and also the Bishop of St. David's, for permis sion to make use of his work. F. A. PROCESSION OF HORSEMEN : FROM FRIEZE OF THE PARTHENON, CONTENTS. CHAP. PACE i. The Geography and Ethnology 1 n. The Homeric Age 10 Supplementary Notes : On the Poems of Homer 17 Hesiocl 20 in. The Dawn of Greek History 21 iv. The Dorians and the Peloponnesus 30 v. The Legislation op Lycurgus 33 vi. Sfaktan Wars and Conquests 42 vii. Attica* and its early Hisror.Y 50 Tin. The Era before Solon 50 Supplementary Note : On the Ancient Constitution of Athens CO ix. The Life and Laws of Solon C2 Supplementary Notes: a. The Constitution nf Solon 68 B. The Seven Wise Men Of) x. Athens during the Rule of Pisisteatus and his Sons 71 xi.

The Era of Cleisthenes 77 Supplementary Note : On the Constitution of Cleisthcnes 83 xn. The Greek Colonies SI Supplementary Note : On Greek Lyric Poetry ... ... ... ... 93 xm. The Ionian Greeks 97 xiv. Cyrus and his Successors 104 xv. The Story of the Ionian Eevolt 109 xvi. From the Subjugation of Ionia to the Battle of Marathon 117 xvii. From the Battle of Marathon to the Battle of Salamis 129 xviii. The March of Xerxes and Battles of Thermopylæ and Artemisium 135 xix. Salamis 14C xx. Plat.ea and Mycale 157 Supplementary Note : Was Xeixes Ahasuerus ? CONTENTS. X TAGF. CHAr- 1-1 xxi. The Eise of Athenian Power— Pausani as ... i-'Jxxn. Themistocles 1'J Supplementary Chapter : Early History of Greek Philosophy 1 83 xxm. The Growth of the Athenian Suprejiacy ... 1SS xxrv. Sudden Decline of Athenian Power 19S Supplementary Chapter : On the Changes in the Athenian Constitution made by Pericles "" - xxv.

The Administration of Pericles 205 Notes and Illustrations: a. View from the Parthenon 219 e. Athens before the Peloponnesian War ... 220 xxvi. The Commencement of the Peloponnesian War . . . 220 Notes and Illustrations : a. Contrasts of the War 230 B. The Lacedæmonians began the War ... 230 0, Allies of Sparta and Athens ... .. ... 231 D. Platæa 231 xxvii. From the Breaking out of the War to the Death of Pericles 232 xxviii. Feom the Death of Pericles to the Fall of Platæa % 240 xxix. From the Destruction of Plat.fa to the Dissensions ik Coecyra 240 xxx. From the Troubles in Corcyea to the Catastrophe at Idomene 251 xxxi. Sphacteeia 256 xxxn. The Eighth Yeae of the War 265 xxxiii. From the Ninth Yeae of the War to the Peace of Nicias 272 Supplementary Note : On the Character of Biasiilas 277 Supplementary Chapter .- The Greek Drama 27S Notes : a. On the Greek Language ... ... ... 2S4 B. View of the Three Tragedians 285 c. The Moral Aspect of the Tragedians ... 287 xxxiv.

From the Peace of Nicias to the Conquest of Melos 290 xxxv. Expedition to Sicily 299 xxxvi. Siege of Syracuse till the Arrival of GYLirrus 30S CONTENTS. XI •SUP. PAGE xxxvn. From the Arrival of Gylippcs to the Close of the Sicilian Expedition 3)9 Supplementary Notes : a. On the Siege of Syracuse 336 B. The Greek Bond of Pace as contrasted with Christianity 33S xxxviii. From the Close of the Sicilian Expedition to the Eeturn of Alcieiades 339 xxxix. From the Eeturn of Alcibiades to the Fall or Athens 347 Supplementary Chapter : On the Greek Historians 356 xl. The Thirty Tyrants ".. 363 xli. Socrates and the Sophists 36S Supplementary Notes : a. Socrates 384 B. On the Sophists 386 xlii. The Expedition of the Ten Thousand 387 xllti. The Supremacy of Sparta 395 xi.iv. The Supremacy of Thebes 411 xlv.

The Supremacy of Macedon 418 xlvi. Alexander the Great 435 xlvii. Alexander and his Successors 450 xlviii. Greece at the Time of St. Paul 463 Chronological Table of Contents 479 Index 490 MODEKX ATHENS! THE ACHOrOLIS. MAPS AND ILLUSTRATIONS. PAGE Salamis Frontispiece MiNEBYA v Processionof Horsemenviii Modern Athens— the Acropolis x* General Map 'Jo/ace I Mount Parnassus * Argos, from Mycenæ ls> View of Delphi 21 Plains of Sparta Temple of Minerva, Sunium .50 Plan of Athens ' . . .55 The Parthenon .61 Athenian Coin 64 Colonies of Asia Minor 85 Colonies in Italy 83 Colonies in Sicily 00 Plan of Marathon .* .124 Plains of Marathon . 12T Plan of Thermopylæ i4i Thermopylæ ■ . .143 Map of Salamis 150 Platæa . . . . p .163 Ruins of the Propyleuh ......... 209 Ruins of the Parthenon ......... 213 Coin of Ægina . 22» The AcPlOpolis restored ....... . 237 Map of Sphacteria and Bay of Pylus 257 Greek Costume.

Military Costume o7tJ 293 Plan of a Greek Theatre ..... 281 Plan of Athenian Operations before Syracuse . . . 311 Galley .-. '_ .' 336 Temple of Jupiter Oltmi-us . ,,- •SO I Macedonian Coins . . 434 Corinthian Coin THE HISTORY OF GREECE. MOINT PARNASSUS.

Chapter I. The Geography And Ethnology

In studying the history of any country it is absolutely necessary that we should possess an adequate knowledge of its geography. The atlas should be the companion to which we first resort, and from which we should never be long absent. It will be sufficient, at the commence- B ment, to acquaint ourselves with the mere outlines of the subject, if we resolve to complete our knowledge of the map leisurely, from time to time, as occasion may arise. Greece, we perceive at a glance, is a peninsula, and its wave-washed boundaries — east, west, and south — are easily discerned and described. But its northern boundary has always been wavering and ill-defined, and as we enlarge those northern limits, the geography becomes more complicated. There is a long range of moun tains called Olympus and the Cambunian Hills, near the fortieth degree of north latitude, extending pretty nearly from sea to sea, which may be conveniently taken as the northern boundary.

This, however, would embrace several districts which would not properly be included in ancient Hellas, and we are really reduced to much narrower limits in accurate^7 defining the extent of Greece Proper. And yet this country, so small, was the scene of mighty events. A tract of country even smaller — Palestine — has been the scene of events in finitely mightier. The whole area of Greece Proper is, indeed, rather less than the little kingdom of Portugal. We may learn to understand niuch of the history of Greece from its geography. It has a long coast-line indented with many bays and abounding with ample harbours. Bold headlands project into the sea, and creeks run up among the hills. Through the interior of the country run long ridges of lofty mountains, with woody slopes and craggy peaks.

The earth was rich with the durable limestone-rock from which huge masonry was constructed, and with varied and exhaustless veins of marble whence the great works of her sculptors were hewn. The sky of Greece is cloudless, the air pure and bracing, the land rich with rivers and forests, the smiling sea studded with countless islands. The position of Greece was in itself a matchless advantage to her, being in close neighbourhood to the high and ancient civilization of the seaboard countries of Asia and Africa, and whatever flourished on the European shores of the Mediterranean, thus affording quick intercommunication and an easy interchange of the choicest results of civil ization and art. The peninsula of Greece, breaking from the mass of "continental land, is justly said to become more and more finely articulated, as it tapers southward, termi nating in the Peninsula of the Peloponnesus.

The modern name of the Peloponnesus, Morea, is derived from its resemblance to the outspread mulberry leaf. The narrow Isthmus of Corinth unites the Peloponnese to the rest of Greece. Peloponnese means Island of Pelops, the mythical hero of the region. It is important to remember the easy divisions of the Peloponnese. Its mountainous central region was Arcadia, and the simple pastoral character of the people has given us the word " Arcadian." The long narrow strip of country bordering ■on the Corinthian Gulf, and north of Arcadia, was called Achaia. When the Eomans made Greece a province of their empire, they gave the whole country this name of Achaia. Elis was on the west of Arcadia, famous for those Olympic Games which took place on the plain of Olympia. Here was the river Alpheus, and the town Pisa, of which we hear so much in connection with these games.

On the east was Argolis, which contained several states, of which Argos was the chief. The southern •divisions were Laconia and Messenia. The capital of Laconia was the widely-known Sparta on the plain of the Eurotas. Messenia had a plain watered by the Pamisus, larger and more fertile than the plain of Sparta, but not equally famous. Messenia and Laconia were separated by Mount Taygetus, which terminates at the promontory of Tænarum (Cape Matapan), the most southern point of Europe. Messenia possessed Pylus, the only complete harbour in the Peloponnese, whose modern name of Navarino has been rendered famous in recent history. The Isthmus of Corinth, so called from the famous city on its western edge, is four or five miles broad ; it is level, but closed in by high mountain ranges. The small mountain district of Megaris was interposed be tween Attica and the Isthmus.

It would have been a good thing for Attica if this Megaris had belonged to it, but its attachments were with the Peloponnese ; and it proved itself a most formidable foe to Attica by the facilities it afforded to invaders. Attica is a " foreland," triangular in shape, stretching sixty miles southwards, b HISTORY OF GREECE. and is four and twenty miles only at its greatest breadth. Its southernmost point was the "marbled steep" of Sunium, not far from the hills of Laurium, famous for silver mines. Athens stood slightly inland, four or five miles from its port, Piræus. The air was pure, and the soil light; fruit flourished better than corn, and pre eminent among fruits was the olive of Athene, whence the city derived its name. The country was rich in marble, and one of its mountains, Hymettus, was as famous for its honey as for its minerals.

North of Attica was Bœotia, whose atmosphere was as thick and heavy as that of Attica was light and pure. The heavy atmosphere is caused by the nature of the country, which is shut in on all sides by mountains affording no outlet to the waters. The Athenians used to say that the thick air made the Bœotians an exceedingly stupid people. The country was full of lakes and marshes ; but though it extended from sea to sea, it was effectually severed from the sea on either side by chains of mountains. Looking at the map we see that in the thirty-ninth degree of latitude the land contracts between the Malian and Ambracian Gulfs. An imaginary line drawn here will give us, between this line and the Isthmus of Corinth, the great division of Central Greece. We have already mentioned the diminutive region of Me garis and the important divisions of Attica and Bœotia.

Several other regions must be mentioned which make up part of Central Greece. There was Locris, the country of the Locrians. These people, from Mount Cnemis and from the town of Opus, were respectively called the Epicnemidian and Opuntian Locrians. In another part of Greece, north of the Gulf of Corinth, there is a wild mountainous country also called Locris ; but to distinguish it from the others it is called Ozolian Locris. North of this, between the mountains of Œta and Parnassus, is the plain of Doris. These three names have the deepest interest. Parnassus is the noble mountain, eight thousand feet high, which was the fabled haunt of the Muses. Œta is the mountain which served as the northern barrier of Central Greece ; there was only one entrance, an opening between the mountains and the sea, called Thermopylæ, of which all the world has heard.

Doris was the district from which it is said that the Dorians issued forth to conquer the Pelopon nesus and spread their colonies abroad. There was one other division in this western portion of Central Greece, namely, Phocis, the greater part of which was taken up by Mount Parnassus. ; In the western half of Central Greece we have already mentioned Locris. Besides this there are Ætolia and Acarnania. These two are divided by the river Achelous, which is the largest river in Greece. There are broad and fruitful plains in this region, and more forests than are found elsewhere in Greece, which were frequented by hordes of robbers. Northern Greece included Thessaly on the east, and Epirus on the west. The boundary between the two was made by the long and lofty range of Mount Pindus, called the Greek Apennines.

Two mighty arms from Mount Pindus enclose the fair and fertile plain of Thessaly, the largest plain in Greece. It is watered b}7 the Eiver Peneus, which flows into the sea through the beautiful Glen of Tempe. The Peneus is often shallow, but at times is greatly swollen by the melting of the mountain snows. It is only through the Vale of Tempe that an army could invade Thessaly from the north. Epirus was regarded very much as a foreign land. The islands of Greece are very numerous, beautiful and important. The largest of all is Eubœa. This stretched for ninety miles opposite the coasts of Attica and Bœotia. The channel which separates it from the mainland is called the Euripus, noted for its impetuous and irregular current. The Ægean Sea, fondly called by the Greeks their own, is thickly sown with islands which have become famous in history and song.

A chain of islands, beginning off Cape Sunium, appears to eircle the sacred Isle of Delos with an irregular belt, thence called the Cyclades, and then in a waving line links itself to a scattered cluster off the Asiatic <;oast, called hence the Sporades. Just off the south ernmost promontory of Laconia is the little Island of Cythera, from whence the snowy summits of the mountains of Crete, lying to the south-west, are visible ; HISTORY OF GREECE. and near this is the Isle of Ehodes. The sea between Attica and Argolis is called the Saronic Gulf, and here are two islands, Salamis and Ægina, of which we shall read much in Athenian history. On the west of Greece, in the Ionian Sea, is Corcyra, opposite Epirus, and Leucadia, opposite Acarnania. Off the same coast is Cephalonia, and near it Ulysses' Island of Ithaca.

Lower down still is the.lsland of Zacynthus, opposite Elis. This will serve for the present as a rough outline of Greek geography. We must afterwards trace out the mountain ranges, the courses of rivers, the designa tions of different spaces of water, and the sites of famous localities. A few words should, however, be added on the physical geography of Greece. In many respects the country may be compared to Switzerland. It is one of the most mountainous countries in the world. There are so many peaks and mountain chains that level ground of any extent is rare. At present the mountain regions are barren of woodland and pasture, but there is reason to believe that this was not the case, in ancient times, to the same extent. The natural barriers of enclosing hills effectually served to debar the inhabitants of different districts from much inter communication.

The populations of Greece were, bej7ond all example, disunited, through the geographical impediments which nature on every side interposed.. Some intercourse would, however, take place in the hot season, when the shepherds drove their cattle from the low plains to the upland pastures of the hills. The coast line afforded great compensation for the in ternal configuration of the country. It equals in extent the entire coast line of Spain and Portugal put together. There were so many creeks and arms of the sea, so many promontories and indentations, that a ready access was afforded between islands and continental colonies and the shores of Greece. Arcadia was the solitary region of the Peloponnese that did not possess a seaboard. We have derived the names of Greece and Greek through the Latin language, which has also given us the popular forms of most Greek proper names.

The people called themselves Hellenes, and the territory inhabited by the Hellenes was called Hellas, but not defined with any geographical exactitude. There seems to have been a time when the whole country was called Pelasgia, and the people Pelasgians. This Pelasgian race to some extent overspread both Italy and Greece. The Pelasgians were afterwards spoken of by the Hel lenes very much as the Anglo-Saxons are by ourselves, and certain tribes prided themselves on their pure Pelas gian descent. The Hellenes, or later inhabitants of the country, were substantially of the same stock as the Pelasgians. Both belonged to that family of nations which is called the Indo-Teutonic. The Greeks said that the Hellenic name was derived from a hero called Hellen, who was the brother or son of Deucalion ; that this Deucalion with his wife Pyrrha escaped a mighty flood which desolated all the world ; that a new race miraculously arose, and then the people who descended from Hellen came into Greece.

It is interesting to notice this venerable tradition, one of many, in many countries and languages, which point back to the destruction of the world by the deluge, of which we read in the pages of unerring truth. The different Greek races — Dorian, Ionian, Æolic, Achæan — were popu larly derived from descendants of Hellen. Probably, also, there were certain foreign elements in the Hel lenic populations. There are traditions which point to colonies planted by Egyptians, Phœnicians, and races of Asia Minor. There can be no doubt of the fact that the Greek alphabet was derived from the Phœnician alphabet. But these foreign elements do not appear to have had any extensive admixture with the Hellenic race, and were probably completely merged in the course of time. Two considerations must always be present with us in studying Greek history.

We must remember the self-government or autonomy which existed, not only in large geographical districts but even in towns and villages. Our modern tendency is towards unity and centralization ; small and weak states agglomerate into large and powerful kingdoms. Now in ancient Greece the tendency was always towards infinite divisions and subdivisions, and this tendency caused the ultimate down fall of the country. It is exceedingly difficult for us to realize the political condition of ancient Greece. The smallest township claimed its independence, and even a very little island would contain two or three independent communities. One result of this is, that we have nothing like an exhaustive or even moderately complete account of Greek history as a whole. Another result is that, unlike the history of the Eoman empire and the modern kingdoms that have issued from the Eoman empire, the history of Greece has no regular beginning, middle, and end ; we have no main narrative, but must turn now to one and now to another of the cluster of Hellenic states.

It is only at the time of the Macedonian supremacy that we have anything like unity in Greek history. Still, we must remember, that though there were so many points of difference, there were also many points of agreement among the Hellenes. They always remembered that they belonged to the same blood and spoke the same language, worshipped with the same sacrifices and in the same temples, had the same manners and same modes of thought and action. We must also, secondly, remember, that there is a sense in which Greece was only a small part of Greece. Besides Greece Proper there were vast regions, more or less peopled by Hellenes, and so, in a large sense, belonging to Hellas. The Greeks penetrated to the west as far as Marseilles, and to the east so far as Trebizonde. They colonized numerous islands in the Mediterranean or Great Sea.

They had colonies on the shores of the Euxine and the Adriatic, on the coasts of Africa and Asia Minor. In the time of Alexander, Græcia formed one of the great empires of the world. When it afterwards fell beneath the Eoman domination it was acknowledged by the Eomans that there was a sense in which captive Greece had taken her captor captive. Such was the marvellous race which, in the youth of the world, settled in Greece, not, we may feel sure, without the superintending providence of God. " If," says a great authority,1 "in the great scheme of Providence for the moral advancement of the creation, to every people. as to every individual, a distinct part has been allotted in the drama of temporal existence, the Greek nation may 1 Mure's ' Critical History of Greek Literature.' be assumed, long before its subjection to any secondary influences, to have been pre-ordained the special instru ment of protecting those delightful arts, which, while in themselves the most effectual means of softening the ruder element of our nature, affect the general sources of mental enjoyment.

The same Providence which formed the design adopted also the most efficacious means of carrying it into effect, by placing this favoured people under a bright but temperate heaven, in a fertile and salubrious land, offering in its interior every variety of scenery, from the softest amenity to the extreme of grand and terrible, and intersected by gulfs and arms of the sea, opening up a continued succession of inspiring prospects, with a boundless sphere of activity for the intellectual faculties." But we go even further than this. In this land so singularly placed and blest a language arose which in its strength, flexibility, and beauty, seemed faithfully to reflect the nature of the country and its children. In that language many of the greatest of the marvels of the human mind are treasured up, which even to this day possess the highest utility as means of instruction and instruments of education.

In the providence of God that language was destined for a still higher and more hallowed agency. When Alexander extended the Macedonian empire far and wide, the Greek tongue became the common language spoken throughout the whole civilized world. In that language the Scriptures of the New Testament were written, and thus the gospel of the grace of God was brought at once within the reach of the civilized world. The whole antecedent history of Greece was, in its way, a preparation for the time when He, the Desire of all nations, should come. argos, from mtcenæ. CHAPTEE II. THE HOMERIC AGE. It is not too much to say that any authentic knowledge of Greek history commences with the poems of Homer. These are the earliest documents which directly or indi rectly can supply us with any real information on the subject.

These immortal poems, which maintain an absolute supremacy in Greek literature, afford us the earliest glances of Hellenic history and manners. The Homeric narrative, indeed, may be mainly considered as pure invention, or indistinct legend ; but there is no sufficient reason to doubt that the groundwork of the poem is historical, and that there was, really and truly, a siege of Troy. No reliance can be placed upon the details, which are of course presented only in a poetic THE HOMERIC AGE. and traditional way. An examination of these poems furnishes us with a series of simple, vivid pictures, which tell us a great deal about the state of the Greeks in what is called the Heroic Age. We obtain distinct, information on the subjects of manners, religion, knowledge, and the arts, and, in however imperfect a form, possess an initial chapter of Greek history.