ave seen,
closely associated with the state; the Athena Parthenos and the Olympian
Zeus appealed to their worshippers as citizens of Athens and as members
of the privileged Hellenic race. It would be easy to trace a similar
character in almost all the great statues of gods that are recorded as
belonging to this period. Thus the Dionysus of Alcamenes is not the
dreamy god of wine and pleasure that we find at a later age, but an
august figure, bearded and enthroned, the giver of the riches of the
earth and the wine, the god in whose honour all the great Dionysian
festivals were held; the same sculptor's Hermes is the guardian of ways
and gates, the giver of increase to flocks, not the youthful and
athletic messenger of the gods. Hephaestus, too, especially when
associated with Athena, is the patron and teacher of all handicrafts,
himself the ideal artisan, practical and genial, but with none of his
godhead lost in a too human individuality; even his
lameness--characteristic of the smith in all folk-lore--is lightly
indicated, not dwelt on as an interesting motive. Various statues of
particular gods may, of course, emphasise one side or another of their
functions. Athena may be worshipped and represented as goddess of
Victory or of Health; but here, too, it is usually some recognised state
cult that underlies the representation. Outside Athens we find the same
conditions. To take only one instance, the colossal gold and ivory Hera
of Argos, made by the chief Argive master Polyclitus, is the great
goddess of the city, just as Athena is of Athens. She was represented as
the bride of Zeus, who annually renewed her maidenhood at the great
Argive festival of the divine marriage; and we cannot doubt that
Polyclitus expressed in this statue, which was hardly less famous than
the masterpieces of Phidias, all the essential features of the great
religious ideals that underlay this primitive rite. His Hera had neither
the warlike nor the intellectual and spiritual characteristics of the
Attic Athena; but she was the goddess of womanly grace and beauty in the
bride, and embodied that perfection of physical form which Argive art
sought also in its athletic figures, and which was in a sense a part of
the religion that found expression in the great athletic games. Some
gods--Apollo, for example--seem in fifth-century statues to have a more
individual character. Just as in earlier times the name Apollo serves to
cover a multitude of statue