A Plea for the Christians 17

In making a defense I must give more precise arguments both about the names of the gods, to show that they are recent, and about their images, to show that they came into being yesterday or the day before, so to speak. You yourselves know these things better, since you are in every respect conversant with the ancient writers, more than anyone else. I say, then, that Orpheus, Homer, and Hesiod are the ones who gave genealogies and names to those they call gods. Herodotus too bears witness: “I think that Hesiod and Homer lived four hundred years before my time, and not more; and it was they who made a theogony for the Greeks, gave the gods their titles, distributed their honors and skills, and described their forms.” As for images, they were not even thought of as long as there was no modeling, painting, or sculpture, until Saurias of Samos, Craton of Sicyon, Cleanthes of Corinth, and the Corinthian girl came along. Shadow-drawing was invented by Saurias, who traced the outline of a horse in the sunlight; painting by Craton, who painted the shadows of a man and a woman on a whitened tablet; and modeling in relief was invented by the girl. She was in love with someone, and traced the outline of his shadow on the wall while he slept; then her father, delighted with the exact likeness (he was a potter), cut out the outline and filled it in with clay; the figure is preserved at Corinth to this day. After these came Daedalus and Theodorus of Miletus, who further invented sculpture and modeling. So short is the time since images and the making of idols began that we can name the craftsman of each god. The Artemis at Ephesus, the Athena (or rather Athela, as those who speak more mystically call her, for such was the ancient statue made from the olive), and the seated Athena were made by Endoeus, a pupil of Daedalus; the Pythian Apollo is the work of Theodorus and Telecles; the Delian Apollo and Artemis are the art of Tectaeus and Angelion; the Hera at Samos and the one at Argos are by the hands of Smilis; the other idols are by Phidias; the Aphrodite at Cnidus is another work of Praxiteles's art; the Asclepius at Epidaurus is the work of Phidias. In short, not one of them escapes having been made by a human being. If, then, they are gods, why did they not exist from the beginning? Why are they younger than those who made them? Why did they need human beings and art in order to come into being? They are earth and stones and matter and elaborate art.