hymn describes how Leto, in travail with Apollo, sought out
a place in which to bear her son, and how Apollo, born in Delos, at once
claimed for himself the lyre, the bow, and prophecy. This part of the
existing hymn ends with an encomium of the Delian festival of Apollo and
of the Delian choirs. The second part celebrates the founding of Pytho
(Delphi) as the oracular seat of Apollo. After various wanderings the
god comes to Telphus, near Haliartus, but is dissuaded by the nymph of
the place from settling there and urged to go on to Pytho where, after
slaying the she-dragon who nursed Typhaon, he builds his temple. After
the punishment of Telphusa for her deceit in giving him no warning of
the dragoness at Pytho, Apollo, in the form of a dolphin, brings certain
Cretan shipmen to Delphi to be his priests; and the hymn ends with a
charge to these men to behave orderly and righteously.

The Delian part is exclusively Ionian and insular both in style and
sympathy; Delos and no other is Apollo's chosen seat: but the second
part is as definitely continental; Delos is ignored and Delphi alone is
the important centre of Apollo's worship. From this it is clear that
the two parts need not be of one date--The first, indeed, is ascribed
(Scholiast on Pindar "Nem". ii, 2) to Cynaethus of Chios (fl. 504 B.C.),
a date which is obviously far too low; general considerations point
rather to the eighth century. The second part is not later than 600
B.C.; for 1) the chariot-races at Pytho, which commenced in 586 B.C.,
are unknown to the writer of the hymn, 2) the temple built by Trophonius
and Agamedes for Apollo (ll. 294-299) seems to have been still standing
when the hymn was written, and this temple was burned in 548. We may at
least be sure that the first part is a Chian work, and that the second
was composed by a continental poet familiar with Delphi.

The "Hymn to Hermes" differs from others in its burlesque, quasi-comic
character, and it is also the best-known of the Hymns to English readers
in consequence of Shelley's translation.

After a brief narrative of the birth of Hermes, the author goes on to
show how he won a place among the gods. First the new-born child found a
tortoise and from its shell contrived the lyre; next, with much cunning
circumstance, he stole Apollo's cattle and, when charged with the theft
by Apollo, forced that god to appear in undignified guise before the
tribunal of Zeus. Zeus seeks to reconcile the pai