eive lucrative orders, the former for a statue or an ode, the
latter for the sale of their merchandise. Tents stood in rows upon the
plain, and everywhere were scenes of busy traffic or of social
entertainment.

We are not concerned here with the various exercises that constituted
the festival, nor with the games which were celebrated in the stadium,
nor with the horse and chariot races in the hippodrome, except in so far
as women were participants; and their part was but slight. When the
games were held, a priestess of Demeter was present, seated on an altar
of white marble opposite the umpires' seats, but she was the only woman
to whom this privilege was granted. While their loved ones were
contending in the stadium, mothers and wives and sisters had to remain
on the southern bank of the Alpheus. Only one instance is recounted
where this rule was broken. "Pherenice, daughter of a celebrated
Rhodian wrestler, whose family boasted that they were descended from
Hercules, could not bear to leave her son while the contest was going
on, and disguising herself as a man, and pretending to be a teacher of
gymnastics, she mingled with the groups of gymnasts. When her son was
proclaimed victor, however, her feelings carried her away, and forgetful
of prudence she rushed to embrace her child. In her haste her robes
became disordered, and her sex was revealed. The law was explicit: every
woman found within the sacred precinct was condemned to death.
Nevertheless, the judges acquitted her, in recognition of the fame her
family had won; but to prevent any repetition of the occurrence, the
masters, as well as their pupils, had thenceforth to present themselves
naked."

Women could, however, run their horses in the hippodrome and thus win a
prize, as was done by Cynisca, daughter of Archidamnus, King of Sparta,
who was the first woman that bred horses and gained a chariot victory at
Olympia. After her, other women, chiefly Spartans, won Olympic
victories, but none of them attained such fame as did Cynisca. So
honored was she by her people that a shrine was erected to her at her
death; there was also erected at Sparta a statue of the maiden Euryleon,
who won an Olympic victory with a two-horse chariot.

Though excluded from the games at the great festival of Zeus, there were
yet some games at Olympia in which women took part. These were a feature
of the festival of Hera, whose temple was also in the Altis. At this
festival, sixteen