the god say ‘‘I reign over all Arcadia’’ (Dialogues of the Gods22.3). Besides, it was in
his role as an Arcadian god that the Athenians installed him on the slopes of the
Acropolis after the battle of Marathon. He had appeared on Mount Parthenion near
Tegea to Philippides, the runner the Athenians had sent to ask the Spartans for help,
and he had offered his help the Athenians (Herodotus 6.105).
Although he could intervene in war (Borgeaud 1979:137–56), the god was above
all the protector of shepherds and their animals, and so too of hunters, and his
appearance symbolized the symbiosis between man and animal. He was half-man
and half-goat. From the animal, he took his head, legs, genitals, his little tail, and his
hair. From man he borrowed his upright stance, his chest, and his hands. On many
votive statuettes the animal elements are accentuated. In addition to these represen-
tations there was, from the fifth century onwards, a ‘‘humanized’’ type in which his
animality was manifest only in the form of two little horns, and the coinage of the
Arcadian League in the fourth century offered the most idealized image of the god.
However, it was not until the Roman era that the god abandoned his connection
with the animal world (Jost 1987–8:219–24 and plates 28–30, figures 1–12). His
animality was considered normal. Rare and late are the authors who, like Lucian
(Dialogues of the Gods22.2), feel the need to justify this appearance (Hermes had
approached Penelope in the form of a goat). No locallogoswas felt to be necessary to
explain this, as was the case for Poseidon Hippios. Thus Pan presented the hybrid
form typical of Arcadia. His attributes were thelago ̄bolon(a stick for killing hares), a
shepherd’s crook, and the syrinx, made from reeds glued together with wax, which he
had invented in Arcadia (it was in the Melpeian mountains, as it was told, that ‘‘Pan
invented the melody of the syrinx’’: Pausanias 8.38.11).
The god was omnipresent in Arcadia. Instead of living on Olympus, he was present
in the places frequented by the shepherds and their flocks, and he moved with them.
In the Phigalianlogosof Demeter Melaina, when the goddess retired into a cave in her
anger, Pan took on the role of mediator with Zeus: ‘‘Pan, who traversed Arcadia and
who hunted now on one mountain and then on another, arrived in due course, we are
told, on Mount Elaion. He saw Demeter’s condition... ’’ (Pausanias 8.42.3). As a
shepherd himself, he was skopie ̄tas, ‘‘he who watches from the mountain-tops’’
(Palatine Anthology 6.109 line 9) and prokathe ̄gete ̄s, ‘‘Conductor [of flocks]’’
(IGv.2, 93). He accompanied shepherds in their transhumance.
The locations of Pan’s cult in Arcadia were often diffuse, reflecting the mobile
character of the god. In addition to his delimited and humble sanctuaries in town and
country, entire mountains were sacred to him: thus Mount Lampeia (Pausanias
8.24.4) and Mount Maenalus (Pausanias 8.36.8), where ‘‘the locals claim actually
to hear Pan playing the syrinx.’’ The Nomian mountains, derived their name, accord-
ing to Pausanias (8.38.11) ‘‘from the pasturages [nomoi] of Pan.’’ The frequent
occurrence of the god is to be explained by the preponderance in Arcadia of the
pastoral economy (Roy 1999:328–36). A series of bronze ex-votos from a sanctuary
of Pan near Berekla on the slopes of Lykaion demonstrate that the god’s clientele was
recruited chiefly from the world of breeders and minor shepherds. Particularly
noteworthy are the figurines of shepherds wearing the pilos and dressed in
heavy cloaks, into which they huddle against the cold (Hu ̈binger 1992, 1993). Pan
was not merely a symbol of pastoral life in Arcadia, and tutelary deity of the Arcadian
League: he was also considered to be the supreme god of Arcadia, if we may believe
The Religious System in Arcadia 265