turn back without searching whether the Greek calendar does not offer something to match the other two great feasts of the ancient Celts at the beginning of the months of August and May; for I have never been able to find that they held any remarkable feast in winter, a lacuna which, if not more apparent than real, must have had a meaning. But however that may be, it follows from the coincidence between the Goidelic Samhain and the Greek Chalceia, that the Panathenæa, with its great variety of games and contests in honour of the goddess Athene,[1] who used to be then presented with a splendid peplos, must have taken place at the same time as the Lugnassad, said to have been established by Lug in honour of Tailltiu or Taillne his foster-mother. The parallel in other respects between the great festival of the Greeks and the feasts held at the same date in all Celtic lands (pp. 409—424) would take up too much time to discuss here; but having proved two-thirds of my case, so to say, I must now continue my digression to the remaining third. At this point, however, I must confess to somewhat less success, as the Greek calendar shows nothing occurring just three months before the Panathenæa. So one has to be content with an approximation in the Athenian Thargelia, centring on the sixth day of the month of Thargelion.[2] This is at least six days later than one could wish for a feast to match the Goidelic Beltaine, or the first of May; but it was also about the time of the Delia in the island of Delos. Both were held in honour of the Sun-god Apollo; and further the Thargelia commemorated
