3. The _peace-offerings_ (ἱλασμοὶ), by which Apollo was first appeased, and his wrath averted, should, as it appears, be distinguished from the _purifications_ (καθαρμοὶ), by which he was supposed to restore the mind to purity and tranquillity. At Sicyon (where the religion of Apollo flourished at a very early period) it was related, that Apollo and Artemis had, after the destruction of the Python, wished to be there purified, but that, being driven away by a phantom (whence in after-times a certain spot in the town was called φόβος), they proceeded to some other place. Upon this the inhabitants were attacked by a pestilence; and the seers ordered them to appease the deities. Seven boys and the same number of girls were ordered to go to the river Sythas and bathe in its waters, then to carry the statues of the two deities into the temple of Peitho, and from thence back to that of Apollo.(1355) The Attic festival of Delphinia (on the sixth of Munychion) had evidently the same meaning; in this seven boys and girls reverently conveyed the ἱκετηρία, an olive-branch bound with white fillets of wool, into the Delphinium.(1356) This took place exactly one month before the Thargelia; and in all probability the peace-offerings and purifications (ἱλασμοὶ and καθαρμοὶ) were celebrated at the same period throughout the whole of Greece.
4. By comparing and arranging the scattered fragments of information respecting the time of the festivals belonging to these two classes, we shall obtain the following clear and simple account.(1357)
In the commencement of the Apollinian year, in the first month of spring, called Bysius (_i.e._ Πύθιος) at Delphi, Munychion at Athens, Apollo was supposed to come through the defile of Parnassus to Delphi, and begin the battle with the Delphinè. He next assumes the character of the wrathful god, whom it was necessary to appease; and hence, on the sixth day of the month, the expiatory festival of Delphinia took place at Athens, and probably also at Miletus and Massalia; we may likewise suppose that it was the same month which in Ægina and Thera went under the name of Delphinius:(1358) on the seventh Apollo destroyed the Python.(1359) The pæan was now sung. This too was the day on which, according to immemorial custom, the oracle first broke silence; at a late period it was also esteemed at Delphi as the birthday of Apollo.(1360) Immediately after, the Delphian procession moved on to Tempe; and at the same time the tithes of men were once despatched to Apollo in Crete.(1361)