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351
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351

On the Early Kings of Attica. 351 of Mercury and Daira, others the son of Ogygus. Now though Ogygus may have been of recent introduction into Attic history, he appears really to have belonged to the old legends of Boeotia (Pans. ix. 5. 1.) and the epithet of Ogygian Thebes and the name of the Ogygian gate were derived from his sup- posed rule. Boeotia was the country from which the Eleusinian religion proximately came- There was on the borders of the lake Copais an Eleusis, which the advance of its waters over- whelmed (Paus. IX. 24. Strab. i. 591. Oxf.). Ceres and Pro- serpine were said to have founded or occupied Thebes (Eur. Phoen. 694.)5 and when Eumolpus is called a Thracian, the Thracians of Boeotia are to be understood^. It was from this connexion of Ogyges with the Eleusinian rites that he was represented as the father of Upa^cSiKrj (Steph. Byz. Kpayo^) an Orphic name of Proserpine (Orph. H. 28. 5. Arg. 31 '.) To the connexion of Ogyges with these rites I should also refer Pind. Nem. 6. 73. clctkiols ^Xlovpto^ vtt wyvyioi^ bpecn. Ce- leae, which was close to Phlius, (Paus. 2. 14) was a great seat of the Eleusinian worship. Heyne's interpretation of wyv yioL9 opeat "jam olim nota'* is very tame and impoetic. The propriety of connecting the establishment of the worship of the Oeol ')(06vloi with a personage whose name when examined means only dark^ is obvious. Their rites were celebrated in the night. " Frumenti satio apud Eleu- sina a Triptolemo reperta est; in cujus muneris honorem nodes initiormn sacratae Just. 2. 6. and whether we con- sider their physical import, as denoting the burial of the seed, or their moral association with the unseen world, the idea of darkness is inseparable from them. It may confirm the interpretation now given, to point out some other in- stances in which mythological fictions have been influenced by the same association. Whether *Op(p€v^ be derived from 'OpcpiKci or vice versa, ^ Eumolpus is said ApoUod. 3, 15, 3. 4 to have come with his son Ismarus to Tegyrius king of the Thracians. Tegyra was a town in Boeotia, Steph. Byz. ■7 The name is explained (Hes. s. voc.) wcrTrep n-eXo's eir 1^^66X0- a toT? re Xeyofxeuoi's Kal TrpaTTOfieuoL^ hut it more probably means " exactress of justice," an epithet which well suits the office of Proserpine, as a goddess of the unseen world. The name seems to have been given to the Furies (Paus. 9. 32) but they also were goddesses of the earth (see TEsch. Eum. 1039 quoted above). Hence Ceres was called 'EpLwv^ (Paus. 8. 25.) Vol. II. No. 5. Yy