It is evident that Æschylus must have found some of his material among these local legends since no antecedent poet furnishes him with the legend complete as it appears in his great drama. Several interesting examples of the influencing of the Hesiodic account by a local legend may be traced. For example, in Hesiod, Prometheus is said to be the son of Iäpetus, one of the twelve Titans and Klymene, a daughter of Okeanos. Eschylus makes him simply a son of Gaia, the Earth, which was also identified with Themis. Gaia and Themis are distinct goddesses in Hesiod, but they were worshipped at Athens as one deity, GeThemis. In this departure from Hesiod, Eschylus was therefore supported by local tradition. If any justification were needed for this variation from the authority of Hesiod, the gain poetically would be a sufficient one. How much more fitting it is that Prometheus, the embodiment of all wisdom, should have as his sole parent the earthgoddess; she who has ever typified the wise, universal mother! How the ideas of the earth-goddess and Themis, the goddess of Justice, came to coalesce has been interestingly explained by Ed

wyn R. Bevan.1 Themis was not primarily the goddess of Justice but an oracular power. At Delphi, the local myth knew of a time, when the oracle was that of Themis not of Apollo, and of a still earlier time when it belonged to Gaia. Themis and Gaia were not identified at Delphi as they were at Athens, but they were closely associated as oracular powers. Themis is the daughter and successor of Gaia. According to a common Greek idea it was out of the earth that prophetic inspiration and dreams mainly came. Not only Gaia, herself, but other earth deities, gave men good counsel in oracle and vision. Even the Pythoness at Delphi was inspired by a vapor arising out of the ground. In Hesiod, Gaia, as the giver of good advice, plays an important part. She seems to have been the moving spirit in all important actions. She prompted Kronos in the deed by means of which he accomplished the overthrow of his father Uranos. She and Uranos foretold Kronos of his own doom, and revealed to Rhea how the infant Zeus was to be preserved from the progeny-devouring jaws of his father.

1 Introduction to Translation of "Prometheus Bound."

Through her "sage instructions" Kronos was compelled to disgorge his children. Her admonishings helped Zeus to win his final victory, for she told the gods everything from beginning to end. Finally she and Uranos saved Zeus from doing that which would bring about his own overthrow.

There is a poetic link, however, between Hesiod and Eschylus in Pindar, which gives one more step toward the unfolding of the idea as it finally appears in Eschylus. In one of Pindar's Isthmian Odes, Themis plays the part given in Hesiod to Gaia. According to this version Zeus is restrained from doing the fatal thing by Themis, who is called the expounder of oracles. A last touch of symbolism is added by Eschylus when he makes the oracular mother, Themis, unable to speak except through the mouth of her son, Prometheus. He alone can tell Zeus the peril which hangs over his head and how it may be removed.

The notion that Zeus is one day to be overthrown as his father and grandfather had been before him appears in Hesiod, though in a very different form from the story as told in Eschylus,

メ

and not connected in any way with the Prometheus

story. In Hesiod it is Metis, the first wife of Zeus, who is to give birth to the future ruler. Being warned in time by Gaia and Uranos, Zeus swallows Metis. For thus they persuaded him, lest other of the everliving gods should possess sovereign honor in the room of Jove. For of her it was fated that wise children should be born: first, the glancing-eyed Tritonian maiden, having equal might and prudent counsel with her sire; and then, I ween, she was going to give birth to a son, as king of gods and men, with an overbearing spirit. This little tragedy ends, as Apollodorus relates, with the birth of a daughter Athênê, who sprang fully armed from her father's head, symbolic, as some mythologists say, of the sudden flash of the dawn in the morning sky. Pindar relates that it is Thetis the Nereid who is destined to bear a royal son better than his father. Zeus and Poseidon contend for her, not knowing how the matter stands, and again it is Themis who declares the peril, and Thetis is married to Peleus.

The friendliness of Hephaistos for Prometheus is natural. They were both fire-gods and in the

Attic worship were closely associated, having many things in common and being worshipped together. On the other hand, the brother and sister, Force and Strength, the children of the river Styx, came to the aid of Zeus against the Titans, as related in Hesiod, and ever after remained by his side.

Mr. Bevan is of the opinion that Okeanos is brought into the play for two main reasons. "In the first place he marks the scene of the actionat the extreme verge of the earth, round which revolves the circular, all-encompassing river, whose name he bears. And the same purpose is served by making the Chorus consist of his daughters. Their visible presence in itself brings home to the spectator how very far away the place is. But, secondly, Okeanos is morally the foil to Prometheus. Both belong to the old race of gods and just because they do, the personal contrast of the two is exhibited in sharper relief. There were two main elements in the traditional idea of Okeanos. One was his immense age. According to Homer, he was the beginning of all things. In Hesiod he does not hold quite so primal a position,