Better attested, at least, is the similar clemency of Alexander the Great, when he sacked Thebes one hundred and eight years after the traditional date of Pindar's death (335 B.c.). He spared only (I) the Cadmeia, or citadel, of Thebes (thenceforth to be occupied by a Macedonian garrison) ; (2) the temples and holy places ; and (3) Pindar's house. While the inhabitants were sold into slavery, exception was made only of (I) priests and priest esses; (2) persons who had been connected by private evi,a with Philip or Alexander, or by public EePia with the Macedonians; (3) Pindar's descendants. It is probable enough, as Dio Chry sostom suggests (ii. 33), that Alexander was partly moved by personal gratitude to a poet who had celebrated his ancestor Alexander I. of Macedon. But he must have been also, or chiefly, influenced by the sacredness which in the eyes of all Hellenes surrounded Pindar's memory, not only as that of a great national poet, but also as that of a man who had stood in a specially close relation to the gods, and, above all, to the Delphian Apollo.
During the second half of Pindar's life, Athens was rising to that supremacy in literature and art which was to prove more lasting than her political primacy. Pindar did not live to see the Parthenon, or to witness the mature triumphs of Sophocles; but he knew the sculpture of Calamis, and he may have known the masterpieces of Aeschylus. It is interesting to note the feeling of this great Theban poet, who stands midway between Homeric epos and Athenian drama, towards the Athens of which Thebes was so often the bitterest foe, but with which he himself had so large a measure of spiritual kinship. A few words remain from a dithyramb in which he paid a glowing tribute to those "sons of Athens" who "laid the shining foundations of free dom" (rancs 'AOavalcov 011Xovro Ocavvetv Kpwrio' i7cv6epias, fr. 55,
77), while Athens itself is thus invoked: cw ral Xorapal /cal loarickavot Kai Itolkuot., 'EXXeuos gpfurp,a, KXEtral'A0Eivat, oacp.6vcov irroXteepov (fr. 54,
76). Isocra tes, writing in 353 B.c., states that the phrase `EXXIcbos gpetaga, "stay of Hellas," so greatly gratified the Athenians that they conferred on Pindar the high distinction of rpqevia (i.e., ap pointed him honorary consul, as it were—for Athens at Thebes), besides presenting him with a sum of money (Antidosis, 166).
One of the letters of the pseudo-Aeschines (Ep. iv.) gives an improbable turn to the story by saying that the Thebans had fined Pindar for his praise of Athens, and that the Athenians repaid him twice the sumo. The notice preserved by Isocrates less than one hundred years after Pindar's death—is good warrant for the belief that Pindar had received some exceptional honours from Athens. Pausanias saw a statue of Pindar at Athens, near
the temple of Ares (i. 8, 4). Besides the fragment just mentioned, several passages in Pindar's extant odes bespeak his love for Athens. Its name is almost always joined by him with some epithet of praise or reverence. In alluding to the great battles of the Persian wars, while he gives the glory of Plataea to the Spar tans, he assigns that of Salamis to the Athenians (Pyth. i. 76). In celebrating (Pyth. vii.) the Pythian victory of the Athenian Megacles, he begins thus : "Fairest of preludes is the renown of Athens for the mighty race of the Alcmaeonidae. What home, or what house, could I call mine by a name that should sound more glorious for Hellas to hear?" (Cf. also Nem. v. 49.) Pindar's versatility as a lyric poet is one of the characteristics remarked by Horace (Odes, iv. 2), and is proved by the fragments, though the poems which have come down entire represent only one class of compositions—the Epinicia, or odes of victory, com memorating successes in the great games. The lyric types to which the fragments belong, though it cannot be assumed that the list is complete, are at least numerous and varied.
( I) "Tyvoc, Hymns to deities—as to Zeus Am mon, to Persephone, to Fortune. The fragmentary iSAvos entitled eni3aloc5 seems to have celebrated the deities of Thebes. (2) IIcccavEs, paeans, expressing prayer or praise for the help of a protecting god, especially Apollo, Artemis or Zeus. (3)LicObpapOoc, Dithyrambs, odes of a lofty and impassioned strain, sung by choruses in honour of Dionysus. (4)
Processional Songs, choral chants for worshippers approaching a shrine. (5) IlapNvca, Choral Songs for Maidens.
"DiroPX71,uara, Choral Dance-Songs, adapted to a lively movement, used from an early date in the cult of Apollo, and afterwards in that of other gods, especially Dionysus. To this class belongs one of the finest fragments (84,
107), written for the Thebans in connection with propitiatory rites after an eclipse of the sun, probably that of the 3oth of April 463 B.C. (7)T7K(..44ta, Songs of Praise (for men, while rylvoc were for gods), to be sung by a festal company. (8) 1K6Xca, Festal Songs. The usual sense of o-K6Xcov is a drinking-song, taken up by one guest after another at a banquet. But Pindar's
were choral and antistrophic. One was to be sung at Corinth by a chorus of the lepobovXot attached to the temple of Aphrodite Ourania, when a certain Xenophon offered sacrifice before going to compete at Olympia. Another brilliant fragment, for Theoxenus of Tenedos, has an erotic character.