The first was known as the Cretic foot, being in a way the model
or type from which the others were made; but the others were
called paeons. The "Hymn to Apollo" was called a paeon or paean,
for the singers danced in Cretic rhythms as they chanted it.

There were many other dances in Greece, each having its
characteristic rhythm. For instance, the Molossian dance
consisted of three long steps, [- - -] ([3/2]); that of the
Laconians was the dactyl, [- ' '] ([4/4]), which was sometimes
reversed [' ' -] ([4/4]). In the latter form it was also the
chief dance of the Locrians, the step being called anapaest.
From Ionia came the two long and two short steps, [- - ' '],
([3/4: 4 4 8 8]), or [' ' - -] ([3/4: 8 8 4 4]), which were
called Ionic feet. The Doric steps consisted primarily of a
trochee and a spondee, [- ' - -] or [7/8] time. These values,
however, were arranged in three other different orders, namely,
[' - - - | - - ' - | - - - '] and were called the first,
second, third, or fourth epitrite, according to the positions
of the short step. The second epitrite was considered the most
distinctly Doric.

The advent of the Dionysian[06] festivals in Greece threatened
to destroy art, for those wild Bacchic dances, which are to
be traced back to that frenzied worship of Bel and Astarte
in Babylon, wild dances amenable only to the impulse of the
moment, seemed to carry everything before them. Instead of that,
however, the hymns to Bacchus, who was called in Phoenicia
the flute god, from which the characteristics of his worship
are indicated, were the germs from which tragedy and comedy
developed, and the mad bacchanalian dances were tamed into