But whatever uncertainties may obscure the various stages in the history of comedy, fortunately there is little doubt as to the source from which it came. Aristotle states that “comedy also sprang from improvisations, originating with the leaders of the phallic ceremonies,[88] which still survive as institutions in many of our cities.”[89] Mr. Cornford (_op. cit._, pp. 37 ff.) finds the best illustration of these ceremonies in the well-known passage in Aristophanes’ _Acharnians_, vss. 237 ff. Dicaeopolis has just concluded a private peace with Sparta and prepares to celebrate a festival of Dionysus on his country estate. He marshals his meager procession as if it contained a multitude, his daughter carries upon her head a sacred basket with the implements of sacrifice, two slaves hold aloft a pole which is surmounted by the phallic symbol, and Dicaeopolis himself brings up the rear with a large pot in his arms, while the wife and mother constitutes the watching throng. At vss. 246 ff. a sacrifice is offered to the accompaniment of an invocation to Dionysus. Finally Dicaeopolis re-forms his procession with various coarse remarks and starts up a phallic ballad of an obscene nature in honor of Phales, “mate of Dionysus and fellow-reveller” (ξύγκωμε). The proceedings thus consist of a procession to the place of sacrifice, the sacrifice itself, and the phallic song or _comus_ (κῶμος). The last is important for our present purpose because comedy (κωμῳδία) etymologically means “comus-song” (κῶμος + ᾠδή). Κῶμος denotes both a revel and the band of masqueraders participating therein. The comus was the particular type of phallic ceremony from which comedy developed. The comus in Aristophanes’ _Acharnians_ is sung by Dicaeopolis alone for the reason that the lack of suitable helpers compelled him to act as both priest and congregation. But Cornford is right (_op. cit._, pp. 38 ff.) in recognizing this song as belonging to a widely spread type in which the improvisations of one or more leaders (ἐξάρχοντες) are interrupted at more or less regular intervals by a recurrent chantey on the part of the chorus. In this instance the song is not continued to a length natural to the type, but is cut short by the real chorus of the play which has been hiding but now bursts forth and stops proceedings with a shower of stones. From the standpoint of contents Cornford detects two elements in the comus: an invocation to the god to attend his worshipers in their rites, and an improvisational “iambic” element of obscene ribaldry, which often took the form of satire directed against individuals by name (_ibid._, p. 41). These two elements exactly correspond to the double object of all phallic ceremonies, which were both a “positive agent of fertilization” and a “negative charm against evil spirits.” The former result was obtained by the invocation of friendly powers; as to the latter,