Such was the earliest phase of Greek literature, so far as any remains of it exist. It took on a different form when Athens rose to political supremacy and became a capital of art and the chief centre of Hellenic thought, its productions being received with admiration throughout Greece, while the ripened judgment and taste of its citizens became the arbiters of literary excellence for many centuries to follow. The earliest notable literature, however, came from the Ionians of Asia Minor and the adjacent islands. In the soft and mild climate and productive valleys of this region and under the warm suns and beside the limpid seas of the smiling islands, the mobile Ionic spirit found inspiration and blossomed into song while yet the rocky Attic soil was barren of literary growth. But with the conquering inroads of the Persians literature fled from this field to find a new home among "those busy Athenians, who are never at rest themselves nor are willing to let any one else be." [Illustration: ALONG THE COAST OF GREECE.] The day of the epic poet had now passed and the lyric took its place, making its first appearance, like the epic, in Ionia and the AEgean islands, but finding its most appreciative audience and enthusiastic support in Athens, the coming home of the muse. Song became the prevailing literary demand, and was supplied abundantly by such choice singers as Sappho, Alcaeus, Anacreon, Simonides, and others of the soft and cheerful vein, the biting satires of Archilochus, the noble odes of Pindar, the war anthems of Tyrtaeus, and the productions of many of lesser fame. This flourishing period of song sank away when a new form of literature, that of the drama, suddenly came into being and attained immediate popularity. For a century earlier it had been slowly taking form in the rural districts of Attica, beginning in the odes addressed to Dionysus, the god of wine, the Bacchus of Roman mythology. These odes were sung at the public festivals of the vintage season, were accompanied by gesture and action and in time by dialogue, and the day came when groups of amateur actors travelled in carts from place to place to present their rude dramatic scenes, then mainly composed of song and dance, rude jests, and dialogues. In this way the drama slowly came into being, comedy from the jovial by-play of the rustic actors, tragedy from their crude efforts to reproduce the serious side of mythologic story. A great tragic artist and poet, the far-famed AEschylus, lifted these primitive attempts into the field of the true drama. He was quickly followed by two other great artists in the same field, Sophocles and Euripides, while the efforts of the earlier comedians were succeeded by the fun-distilling productions of Aristophanes, the greatest of ancient artists in this field.