haps, especially in the scholia on the Iliad and
Odyssey, they furnish us with a precious myth or popular marchen not
otherwise recorded. The regular professional mythographi, again, of whom
Apollodorus (150 B.C.) is the type, compiled manuals explanatory of the
myths which were alluded to by the poets. The scholiasts and mythographi
often retain myths from lost poems and lost plays. Finally, from the
travellers and historians we occasionally glean examples of the tales
("holy chapters," as Mr. Grote calls them) which were narrated by
priests and temple officials to the pilgrims who visited the sacred
shrines.

These "chapters" are almost invariably puerile, savage and obscene.
They bear the stamp of extreme antiquity, because they never, as a rule,
passed through the purifying medium of literature. There were many myths
too crude and archaic for the purposes of poetry and of the drama.
These were handed down from local priest to local priest, with the
inviolability of sacred and immutable tradition. We have already given a
reason for assigning a high antiquity to the local temple myths. Just as
Greeks lived in villages before they gathered into towns, so their gods
were gods of villages or tribes before they were national deities. The
local myths are those of the archaic village state of "culture," more
ancient, more savage, than literary narrative. Very frequently the local
legends were subjected to the process of allegorical interpretation, as
men became alive to the monstrosity of their unsophisticated meaning.
Often they proved too savage for our authorities, who merely remark,
"Concerning this a certain holy chapter is told," but decline to record
the legend. In the same way missionaries, with mistaken delicacy, often
refuse to repeat some savage legend with which they are acquainted.

The latest sort of testimony as to Greek myths must be sought in
the writings of the heathen apologists or learned Pagan defenders of
Paganism in the first centuries during Christianity, and in the works of
their opponents, the fathers of the Church. Though the fathers certainly
do not understate the abominations of Paganism, and though the
heathen apologists make free use of allegorical (and impossible)
interpretations, the evidence of both is often useful and important. The
testimony of ancient art, vases, statues, pictures and the descriptions
of these where they no longer survive, are also of service and interest.

After this