The histories of Herodotus;

106 HERODOTUS—BOOK II, EUTERPE [55-60
agreed with them. My opinion of these things is this : If the
Phoenicians did really carry off the women employed in the
temple, and sold the one of them into Libya and the other
into Greece, this last woman, as I think, was sold to some
Thesprotians, in that part which is now called Hellas, but
was formerly called Pelasgia: then, being reduced to slavery,
she erected a temple to Jupiter, under an oak that grew there
nothing being more natural than that she, who had been an
attendant in the Temple of Jupiter at Thebes, should retain
the memory of it wherever she came. And afterward, when
she had learned the Greek language, she instituted an oracle
and she said that her sister in Libya had been sold by the
same Phoenicians by whom she herself was sold. The women,
I conjecture, were called doves by the Dodonaeans, because
they were barbarians, and they seemed to them to chatter like
birds ; but after a time, when the woman spoke intelligibly
to them, they presently reported that the dove had spoken
with a human voice ; for as long as she used a barbarous language,
she appeared to them to chatter like a bird : for how
could a dove speak with a human voice? But in saying that
the dove was black, they show that the woman was an Egyptian.
The manner in which oracles are delivered at Thebes
in Egypt, and at Dodona, is very similar ; and the art of divination
from victims came likewise from Egypt.
The Egyptians were also the first who introduced public
festivals, processions, and solemn supplications ; and the
Greeks learned them from them : for these rites appear to have
been established for a very long time, but those in Greece
have been lately introduced. The Egyptians hold public fes-
tivals not only once in a year, but several times : that which is
best and most rigidly observed is in the city of Bubastis, in
honour of Diana ; the second, in the city of Busiris, is in honour
of Isis ; for in this city is the largest Temple of Isis, and
it is situated in the middle of the Egyptian Delta. Isis is in
the Grecian language called Demeter. The third festival is
held at Sais, in honour of Minerva ; the fourth, at Heliopolis,
in honour of the sun ; the fifth, at the city of Buto, in honour
of Latona; the sixth, at the city of Papremis, in honour of
Mars. Now, when they are being conveyed to the city Bubastis,
they act as follows : for men and women embark together,
and great numbers of both sexes in every barge : some
of the women have castanets on which they play, and the men
play on the flute during the whole voyage; the rest of the
women and men sing and clap their hands together at the
same time. When in the course of their passage they come
;