Laudator Temporis Acti

Homer, Odyssey 19.107-114 (tr. Richmond Lattimore):

Lady, no mortal man on the endless earth could have cause
to find fault with you; your fame goes up into the wide heaven,
as of some king who, as a blameless man and god-fearing,
and ruling as lord over many powerful people,
upholds the way of good government, and the black earth yields him
barley and wheat, his trees are heavy with fruit, his sheepflocks
continue to bear young, the sea gives him fish, because of
his good leadership, and his people prosper under him.

ὦ γύναι, οὐκ ἄν τίς σε βροτῶν ἐπ᾽ ἀπείρονα γαῖαν
νεικέοι: ἦ γάρ σευ κλέος οὐρανὸν εὐρὺν ἱκάνει,
ὥς τέ τευ ἢ βασιλῆος ἀμύμονος, ὅς τε θεουδὴς
ἀνδράσιν ἐν πολλοῖσι καὶ ἰφθίμοισιν ἀνάσσων        110
εὐδικίας ἀνέχῃσι, φέρῃσι δὲ γαῖα μέλαινα
πυροὺς καὶ κριθάς, βρίθῃσι δὲ δένδρεα καρπῷ,
τίκτῃ δ᾽ ἔμπεδα μῆλα, θάλασσα δὲ παρέχῃ ἰχθῦς
ἐξ εὐηγεσίης, ἀρετῶσι δὲ λαοὶ ὑπ᾽ αὐτοῦ.

Martin P. Nilsson, Homer and Mycenae (1933; rpt. Philadelphia: University of Pennsylvania Press, 1972), pp. 219-220:

A close resemblance exists between the old Teutonic and the Homeric kingship which is explained partly by the similarity of life and of historical circumstances, but is partly due to the common origin of the Greek and the Teutonic races. The kings of the Swedes and of the Burgundians were held responsible for the luck of their people whether in the matter of victory, weather, or good crops. It is related that the Swedes sacrificed their king if the crops failed, and the Burgundian kings were deposed if the luck of the war or the crops failed.¹ Even among the Anglo-Saxons and other peoples kings were deposed, though the reasons are not specified. There is a faint trace of this very primitive conception in a passage in Homer,² in which it is said of a king, who, fearing the gods, rules over many and mighty men, maintaining right, that the black earth bears crops of wheat and barley, the trees are laden with fruit, and the sheep bring forth and fail not, the sea gives fishes, and the people prosper under him. The old idea has been deflected and modernized by the reference to the righteousness of the king as the cause of the abundant supply, but at the bottom there is the old primitive conception of the power of the king to influence the course of Nature and the luck of his people³ which has been so brilliantly exposed by Frazer.

¹ Ammianus Marc., xxviii, 5.14.
² Od. xix, vv. 109.
³ H. Meltzer, "Ein Nachklang des Königsfetischismus bei Homer," Philologus, lxii, 1903, pp. 481.