Zeus : a study in ancient religion - Warburg Institute

2 1 The Pythia and the
story was told at greater length and with other variations by
Ephoros the historian {c. 350 B.C.), whose account is preserved to us
in primis by Strabon^
'Ephoros states that the Thracians after making a treaty with the Boeotians
attacked them one night, when their camp was off its guard in the enjoyment of
peace. The Boeotians flung them back, and at once reproached them for
breaking the treaty. " No," said the Thracians, "we agreed to a truce by day ;
we attacked you by night." Hence the common proverb— "a Thracian shuffle^."
While the war was still being waged, the Pelasgians and the Boeotians too went
to consult the oracle. He cannot tell, he says, what answer was given to the
Pelasgians ;
but the prophetess replied to the Boeotians that they would prosper,
if they committed impiety. The sacred envoys, suspecting the prophetess of
showing favour to the Pelasgians in her reply on account of their kinship (for the
sanctuary had originally been Pelasgian), caught up the woman and cast her on
to a pyre. They thought that, whether she had done amiss or not, in either case
their action was justified : if she had uttered a lying oracle, she was duly
punished ; if she had done no wrong, they had but carried out her bidding. Those
in charge of the sanctuary did not like to put the perpetrators to death, in a
sanctuary too, without a formal judgment, so brought them to trial and summoned
them before the priestesses, that is the prophetesses, three in number to
begin with and now reduced to two. The Boeotians protested that nowhere was
it customary for women to act as judges. An equal number of men was therefore
chosen. The men acquitted ; the women condemned. As the votes were equal,
those for acquittal prevailed. Ever since then at Dodona oracles have been de-
livered to the Boeotians, and to the Boeotians only, by men^. The prophetesses,
however, put a different interpretation upon the oracle, to wit, that the god enjoined
upon the Boeotians to steal the tripods in Boiotia and send one year by
year to Dodona. And this in point of fact they do. They always take down by
night one of their dedicated tripods, wrap it in cloaks, and have a clandestine
tripod-carrying to Dodonal'
' Ephoros y;'a^. 30 (Frag. hist. Gr. i. 241 f. Miiller) ap. Strab. 401 f.
^ QpaKla wapetLipeffis, cp. Zenob. 4. 37, append, prov. 3. i\, Souid. s.v. Qpg.Kia,
irapevpecTis, Polyain. 7. 43.
^ Quoted by Eustath. lu Od. p. 1760, 4 f.
* Cp. Prokl. chi-estoi)i. (after Ephoros?) ap. Phot. bibl. p. 321b 32 ff. Bekker ro Se
Tpiwodrj^opLKOv /xAo? (Poll. 4. 53
Tpnro8r)