Themis, a study of the social origins of Greek ... - Warburg Institute

516 Themis [ch.
The sentiment is strangely like the Hymn of the Kouretes.
Apollo takes the place, as well he might 1 ,
of the Greatest Kouros.
The Dike then of the Hymn is one of the Horai and is the
daughter of Themis. To us she seems like a slightly more
abstracted Themis. In her other form she is Justice, that is,
she is Convention, public usage, the social conscience, Themis
regarded as an abstraction. But to regard Dike thus is to lose
sight of her aspect as one of the Seasons, and indeed to mis-
conceive her origin and very essence.
Dike in her origin is very like Themis, only always a little
more alive, less stationary. In common Greek parlance, preserved
chiefly in the normal use of the accusative, she is the 'way of life,'
normal habit.
/3p£/xei 8'
apaxerov Sitcav v8ams opoKTvirov.
' The clatter of horse's hooves roars in the way of, after the fashion of, an
unconquerable mountain-beating toiTent.'
KOfirjs Se irivBos \ay^ava> 7ro>Xov 8iktjv 3 .
My hair dishevelled like a colt's wild mane.
Again, Pindar 4 says he will have no share in the loud boast of
the guileful citizen
:
cptXov e'ir] (pikelv •
ttoti 6° e^dpbv ar €%dpos iwv Xvkoio 8i