_The dogmas which underlie these different burial rites cannot, we think, be fused. They can only combine by the evolution of an eclectic doctrine._ Had such a doctrine evolved in Homer? The only passage in the Homeric poems which can help us to decide is the _Nekuia_[53] of the _Odyssey_. THE NEKUIA OF THE _ODYSSEY_. Ridgeway’s theory[54] of the difference between the Pelasgian and the Achaean cults of the dead is now well known. The former, he maintains, buried their dead, honoured them with periodical offerings of food and drink, and believed that the dead lived in a subconscious state in the tomb; the latter, however, cremated their dead, practised no regular tomb offerings (χοαί), and believed that the souls of the dead flitted away through the air to a place called Hades in the west. The curious thing about the _Nekuia_ is that the souls of the dead in Hades are represented as anxious for food and drink, and when Odysseus sacrifices there, the ghosts come forth to lick up the blood of the victim. Further, it is only when they have drunk the blood that they regain their memory and recognise their friends again.[55] Odysseus thus describes the scene at the entrance to Hades to which he has been miraculously permitted to descend: ‘There (_i.e._ at the entrance to Hades) Perimedes and Eurylochus held the victims and I drew my sharp sword ... and dug a pit ... and about it poured a drink-offering to all the dead ... mead and sweet wine and water ... and I took the sheep and cut their throats over the trench and the dark blood flowed forth and lo! the spirits of the dead came out of Erebus ... and they flocked together from every side about the trench.[56] First came Elpenor that had not yet been buried ...[57] (who said) “Leave me not unwept and unburied ... burn me and pile me a barrow on the shore....”[58] Anon came the soul of the Theban Teiresias ...[59] (who said) “Whomsoever of the dead thou shalt suffer to approach the blood, he shall prophesy truthfully ...”[60]: my mother too drew nigh and drank the dark blood and at once she knew me.’[61]