supremely happy and glorious (τὸ δ' ἔσχατον κορυφοῦται βασιλεῦσι, Ol. i. 113), this does not involve approval of the τυραννίς as a form of government. He is speaking with reference to victory in the great festivals; the four-horse-chariot race, the contest which contributed most to the splendour of such festivals, was possible only for very rich men; and τύραννοι, such as Hiero, commanded the amplest means of achieving such victories with impressive magnificence. Pindar's picture of the estimable τύραννοσ is one who is "gentle to the folk, not envious of the noble, and to strangers a father wondrous kind":—a character which, if realised, would have gone far to strip the Greek τύραννισ of its distinctive vices[1].
On the other hand, there is only one touch in Pindar's extant work which can be said to reflect unfavourably on democracy,—his remark that the man of honest tongue has the advantage under every form of rule,—παρὰ τυραννίδι, χὡπόταν ὁ λάβος στρατός, χὤταν πόλιν οἱ σοφοὶ τηρέωντι[2]. By οἱ σοφοί are meant "the few"—the houses in whom the ancient sacred rituals are hereditary,—the depositaries of ancient civil wisdom and law. Now it is worthy of notice that this occurs in an ode written for Hiero of Syracuse, and that in Pindar's time (if he died, as seems likely, about 441 B.C.) neither Greece Proper nor the Hellenic East yet presented
