FUNERAL Games. It was customary for persons of rank among the ancient Greeks and Romans to institute games, with all sorts of exercises, to do honour to the manes of their deceased friends. Patroclus's funeral games occupy the greater part of Book xxiii. of the Iliad; and Homer introduces Agamemnon's ghost, telling the ghost of Achilles that he had been a spectator at a great number of such solemnities.
The funeral games of the Greeks consisted chiefly of horse-races. The prizes were of different kinds and value, according to the rank and magnificence of the person who instituted them. The garlands given to victors on the occasion usually consisted of parsley, which was thought to have some relation to the dead.
These games, among the Romans, consisted chiefly of processions, and sometimes of mortal combats of gladiators and Gauls around the funeral pile. In very early times they, as well
Funeral Oration
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Fur Trade.
as the Greeks, were accustomed to slay a number of captives and slaves before the pile, as victims to appease the manes of the deceased. Cæsar relates that the Gauls also observed this sanguinary custom.