The Helena independent. [volume] (Helena, Mont.) 1875-1943, 1892-03-07
SOME GREEK RIDDLES.
The Mania Of Cracking Enigmatical
Nuts One of Very Ancient
Origin.
King Solomon and the Queen of
Sheba Met for Trial of Their
Wits.
Contest Between Homer and Heriod-Los
Ing Ones Head Literally and Flgura-
tively-Anagrams and Acrostics.

Written for THE HELENA r~NoEpENpENr.l
TT is NOT NECESSARY no PROvl
as to any 4 who reads his Bible o
i the newspaper that there ia nothing
Older, nothing newer than the riddle.
Perhaps the Greeks spoiled their repast:
more frequently than we do by cracking
enipmatical mats; but the mania is by nc
means dead, and an abhorsence of conun-
drums indicates a lack of true sympathy
with the life of The people. Too great al
indulgence in them, on the other hand, is
apt to make u man an ineutferable one.
TIL history of the riddle. like the history
of proverbs, forms Il large part of folklore.
Chapter upon chapter might be written on
the animals alone that figure in riddles as
they figure in proverbs, which are often
nothing but abridged fables. But the goat
and the dog in Greek proverbs are not our
goat and our dog. and the swine itself has
q subtle differentiation from our hog, as
the razorback differs from the Berkshire.
And apart from the moral and physical
characters of the animals that play so CON
spicuous a part in this realm of study, we
encounter mysterious powers disguised in
the form of beasts. "%."@@M@@ #%."4
Let us study some of the points in which
the riddle Of our race resembles the riddle
of the Greeks. -
In the first place, in both cases. the rid
die has a tendency to sing itself, to fall
into some kind of rude verse, now a%llitera-
tive, now quantitive, now rhyming. The
riddles of the nursery are almost all
chants. and the earliest Greek riddles are
in verse. And the earliest makers of rid
dies are women, ''spae- wives to use
the homely Scotch word for sibyls. The
sphinx at one end, Mother Goose at the
other.
The great riddle-maker among the Greeks
was one Cleobuline, also called Eumetis.
after her, 1.-The Cleobulinas." doubtless a
repertory of Joe Millsr's. Her riddle about
the %"cupping glass;" or rather the cup
ping brass" one of the oldest of surgical
instruments, is among the earliest and
most famous on record:
II cav a man glue brass with fire upon anot Their
man
So close the two
Together grew s
That you would say
One blood were they.
Now read my riddle if YOU can" .@..""..#.
OF very ancient date are contests in rid
dies. King Solomon and the queen of
Sheba met for such a trial of wits, and
J%osephus tolls us that solomon was too
much for Hiram, of Tyre, as we'll as for the
queen Of Sheba, until Hiram got help from
one of his subjects.
It may be not without interest that in one
of the Oldest contests of this kind, the one
between the seer Glaucus and the seer
Polyldus, the inevitable blackberry riddle
figures.
First red, then white, then black"
And as blackberries have been proverbi-
ally plentiful ever since. it is no wonder
that this riddle has held its own to the
present day. Only in a German popular
riddle the cherry has taken its place. The
rude verse. initiated, not translated. runs
thus:
'White as snow
/ let it 60:
Green as grass,
l let il pass:
Red as blood,
Not vet good.