PINDAR OLYMPIAN 3: MAPPING ACRAGAS ON THE PERIPHERY OF THE EARTH

摘要

Olympian 3 celebrates the victory of Theron of Acragas in the four-horse chariot nrace in 476 B.C.n2n The inscription to Ol. 3 and the ancient scholia place its per-nformance within the festival of the Theoxenia held annually at Acragas in honour nof the Dioscuri, whom the poet invokes in the ode’s opening lines, and many nscholars accept this as a possible and plausible scenario.n3n The mythical narrative, nwhich occupies almost two thirds of the poem, dwells on the transport of the olive ntree – the leaves of which were used for the wreaths awarded to Olympic victors n– from the Istrian land to Greece by Heracles. As the story goes, after founding nthe Olympic games Heracles realized that the Olympian field lacked trees. This nbareness of the landscape awoke in him the desire to plant at Olympia some of nthe olive trees he saw in the land of the Hyperboreans, when he was pursuing the nhind of Artemis, which Taygeta had in the past dedicated as sacred to the goddess.n4n nThe post-mythical section begins with the praise of the Emmenidae (Theron’s clan), nextolling their piety and virtue, and the ode closes with an encomium of Theron, in nwhich the tyrant is proclaimed to have reached from home the Pillars of Heracles:εἰ δ᾽ ἀριστεύει μὲν ὕδωρ, κτεάνων δὲn χρυσὸς αἰδοιέστατος,nνῦν δὲ πρὸς ἐσχατιὰνn Θήρων ἀρεταῖσιν ἱκάνων ἅπτεταιnοἴκοθεν Ἡρακλέοςn σταλᾶν. (Ol. 3.42–4)nIf water is best, while gold isn the most revered of possessions,nthen truly has Theron now reached the furthest pointn with his achievements andnfrom his home grasps the pillarsn of Heracles.n5