The musical competitions certainly date back to the time of Peisistratus, who reorganized the earlier yearly festival as a pentaeteris, increased the programme, and gave to the festival a wider and more popular scope. It was either Peisistratus himself or his son, Hipparchus, who organized recitations by rhapsodists of the Homeric poems, which had perhaps taken place at a yet earlier date at Brauron. These recitations were confined to Homer, and it is recorded as a special mark of honour that an exception was made in favour of the _Perseis_ of Choerilus, which described the triumph of Athens over Xerxes.[391] There seem also to have been competitions in lyric and elegiac poetry. According to Plutarch[392] Pericles was the first to introduce contests in singing and playing on the lyre and on the flute. The competitions were held in the newly built Odeum, and Pericles himself presided as judge. In the first part of his statement Plutarch is mistaken. Midas of Agrigentum, whose Pythian victory on the flute is celebrated in one of Pindar’s earliest odes, is also credited with a victory in the Panathenaea.[393] The existence of musical competitions at a yet earlier date is proved by two small sixth-century Panathenaic amphorae in the British Museum.[394] One represents a citharist playing on the chelys, the other a player on the double flute, standing on a platform before a bearded man, clothed in a long chiton and striped himation, while at the side of the platform is seated a judge similarly clothed and holding a wand. The vase from which our illustration is taken belongs to the class of vase described as imitations of Panathenaic amphorae (Fig. 32). The musical competition is represented on both sides. At a later date the musical prizes consisted in a sum of silver and crowns of gold. In any case, the small amphorae cannot have been used to hold oil, and may be regarded as commemorative prizes bestowed on musicians, perhaps in addition to some more substantial prize, on the analogy of the larger amphorae bestowed on victors in athletics or chariot-races. [Illustration: Fig. 32. Small Panathenaic(?) amphora, in British Museum, B. 188. Sixth century.] An early black-figured kylix in the British Museum points to the existence of choral and dramatic competitions at the Panathenaea (Fig. 33). The central group represents a sacrifice to Athene, who stands beside her altar armed with shield and spear, much as she is depicted on Panathenaic vases. Advancing towards the altar is a procession formed of a tragic chorus, a comic chorus, and a dithyrambic chorus. Diogenes Laertius[395] states that dramatic competitions existed at the Panathenaea, but we have no further information concerning them. [Illustration: Fig. 33. B.-f. kylix, in British Museum, B. 80.]