The Golden Bough: A Study in Magic and Religion (Third Edition, Vol.

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Title: The Golden Bough: A Study in Magic and Religion (Third Edition, Vol. - 5 of 12)
Author: Frazer, James George, 1854-1941
Language: English
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The Golden Bough

Studies in the History of Oriental Religion

James George Frazer, D.C.L., LL.D., Litt.D.

Fellow of Trinity College, Cambridge

Professor of Social Anthropology in the University of Liverpool

Vol. V. of XII.

Part IV: Adonis Attis Osiris.

Vol. 1 of 2.

New York and London

MacMillan and Co.

1914

CONTENTS

Preface to the First Edition.
Preface to the Second Edition.
Preface to the Third Edition.
Book First. Adonis.
Chapter I. The Myth of Adonis.
Chapter II. Adonis in Syria.
Chapter III. Adonis in Cyprus.
Chapter IV. Sacred Men and Women.
§ 1. An Alternative Theory.
§ 2. Sacred Women in India.
§ 3. Sacred Men and Women in West Africa.
§ 4. Sacred Women in Western Asia.
§ 5. Sacred Men in Western Asia.
§ 6. Sons of God.
§ 7. Reincarnation of the Dead.
§ 8. Sacred Stocks and Stones among the Semites.
Chapter V. The Burning of Melcarth.
Chapter VI. The Burning of Sandan.
§ 1. The Baal of Tarsus.
§ 2. The God of Ibreez.
§ 3. Sandan of Tarsus.
§ 4. The Gods of Boghaz-Keui.
§ 5. Sandan and Baal at Tarsus.
§ 6. Priestly Kings of Olba.
§ 7. The God of the Corycian Cave.
§ 8. Cilician Goddesses.
§ 9. The Burning of Cilician Gods.
Chapter VII. Sardanapalus and Hercules.
§ 1. The Burning of Sardanapalus.
§ 2. The Burning of Croesus.
§ 3. Purification by Fire.
§ 4. The Divinity of Lydian Kings.
§ 5. Hittite Gods at Tarsus and Sardes.
§ 6. The Resurrection of Tylon.
Chapter VIII. Volcanic Religion.
§ 1. The Burning of a God.
§ 2. The Volcanic Region of Cappadocia.
§ 3. Fire-Worship in Cappadocia.
§ 4. The Burnt Land of Lydia.
§ 5. The Earthquake God.
§ 6. The Worship of Mephitic Vapours.
§ 7. The Worship of Hot Springs.
§ 8. The Worship of Volcanoes in other Lands.
Chapter IX. The Ritual of Adonis.
Chapter X. The Gardens of Adonis.
Book Second. Attis.
Chapter I. The Myth and Ritual of Attis.
Chapter II. Attis As a God of Vegetation.
Chapter III. Attis As The Father God.
Chapter IV. Human Representatives of Attis.
Chapter V. The Hanged God.
Chapter VI. Oriental Religions in the West.
Chapter VII. Hyacinth.
Footnotes

[Cover Art]

PREFACE TO THE FIRST EDITION.

These studies are an expansion of the corresponding sections in my book
_The Golden Bough_, and they will form part of the third edition of that
work, on the preparation of which I have been engaged for some time. By
far the greater portion of them is new, and they make by themselves a
fairly complete and, I hope, intelligible whole. I shall be glad if
criticisms passed on the essays in their present shape should enable me to
correct and improve them when I come to incorporate them in my larger
work.

In studying afresh these three Oriental worships, akin to each other in
character, I have paid more attention than formerly to the natural
features of the countries in which they arose, because I am more than ever
persuaded that religion, like all other institutions, has been profoundly
influenced by physical environment, and cannot be understood without some
appreciation of those aspects of external nature which stamp themselves
indelibly on the thoughts, the habits, the whole life of a people. It is a
matter of great regret to me that I have never visited the East, and so
cannot describe from personal knowledge the native lands of Adonis, Attis,
and Osiris. But I have sought to remedy the defect by comparing the
descriptions of eye-witnesses, and painting from them what may be called
composite pictures of some of the scenes on which I have been led to touch
in the course of this volume. I shall not have wholly failed if I have
caught from my authorities and conveyed to my readers some notion, however
dim, of the scenery, the atmosphere, the gorgeous colouring of the East.

J. G. Frazer.

TRINITY COLLEGE, CAMBRIDGE,
_22nd July 1906_.

PREFACE TO THE SECOND EDITION.

In this second edition some minor corrections have been made and some
fresh matter added. Where my views appear to have been misunderstood, I
have endeavoured to state them more clearly; where they have been
disputed, I have carefully reconsidered the evidence and given my reasons
for adhering to my former opinions. Most of the additions thus made to the
volume are comprised in a new chapter (“Sacred Men and Women”), a new
section (“Influence of Mother-kin on Religion”), and three new appendices
(“Moloch the King,” “The Widowed Flamen,” and “Some Customs of the Pelew
Islanders”). Among the friends and correspondents who have kindly helped
me with information and criticisms of various sorts I wish to thank
particularly Mr. W. Crooke, Professor W. M. Flinders Petrie, Mr. G. F.
Hill of the British Museum, the Reverend J. Roscoe of the Church
Missionary Society, and Mr. W. Wyse. Above all I owe much to my teacher
the Reverend Professor R. H. Kennett, who, besides initiating me into the
charms of the Hebrew language and giving me a clearer insight into the
course of Hebrew history, has contributed several valuable suggestions to
the book and enhanced the kindness by reading and criticizing some of the
proofs.

J. G. Frazer.

TRINITY COLLEGE, CAMBRIDGE,
_22nd September 1907_.

PREFACE TO THE THIRD EDITION.

In revising the book for this third edition I have made use of several
important works which have appeared since the last edition was published.
Among these I would name particularly the learned treatises of Count
Baudissin on Adonis, of Dr. E. A. Wallis Budge on Osiris, and of my
colleague Professor J. Garstang on the civilization of the Hittites, that
still mysterious people, who begin to loom a little more distinctly from
the mists of the past. Following the example of Dr. Wallis Budge, I have
indicated certain analogies which may be traced between the worship of
Osiris and the worship of the dead, especially of dead kings, among the
modern tribes of Africa. The conclusion to which these analogies appear to
point is that under the mythical pall of the glorified Osiris, the god who
died and rose again from the dead, there once lay the body of a dead man.
Whether that was so or not, I will not venture to say. The longer I occupy
myself with questions of ancient mythology the more diffident I become of
success in dealing with them, and I am apt to think that we who spend our
years in searching for solutions of these insoluble problems are like
Sisyphus perpetually rolling his stone up hill only to see it revolve
again into the valley, or like the daughters of Danaus doomed for ever to
pour water into broken jars that can hold no water. If we are taxed with
wasting life in seeking to know what can never be known, and what, if it
could be discovered, would not be worth knowing, what can we plead in our
defence? I fear, very little. Such pursuits can hardly be defended on the
ground of pure reason. We can only say that something, we know not what,
drives us to attack the great enemy Ignorance wherever we see him, and
that if we fail, as we probably shall, in our attack on his entrenchments,
it may be useless but it is not inglorious to fall in leading a Forlorn
Hope.

J. G. Frazer

CAMBRIDGE,
_16th January 1914_.

BOOK FIRST. ADONIS.

Chapter I. The Myth of Adonis.

(M1) The spectacle of the great changes which annually pass over the face
of the earth has powerfully impressed the minds of men in all ages, and
stirred them to meditate on the causes of transformations so vast and
wonderful. Their curiosity has not been purely disinterested; for even the
savage cannot fail to perceive how intimately his own life is bound up
with the life of nature, and how the same processes which freeze the
stream and strip the earth of vegetation menace him with extinction. At a
certain stage of development men seem to have imagined that the means of
averting the threatened calamity were in their own hands, and that they
could hasten or retard the flight of the seasons by magic art. Accordingly
they performed ceremonies and recited spells to make the rain to fall, the
sun to shine, animals to multiply, and the fruits of the earth to grow. In
course of time the slow advance of knowledge, which has dispelled so many
cherished illusions, convinced at least the more thoughtful portion of
mankind that the alternations of summer and winter, of spring and autumn,
were not merely the result of their own magical rites, but that some
deeper cause, some mightier power, was at work behind the shifting scenes
of nature. They now pictured to themselves the growth and decay of
vegetation, the birth and death of living creatures, as effects of the
waxing or waning strength of divine beings, of gods and goddesses, who
were born and died, who married and begot children, on the pattern of
human life.

(M2) Thus the old magical theory of the seasons was displaced, or rather
supplemented, by a religious theory. For although men now attributed the
annual cycle of change primarily to corresponding changes in their
deities, they still thought that by performing certain magical rites they
could aid the god, who was the principle of life, in his struggle with the
opposing principle of death. They imagined that they could recruit his
failing energies and even raise him from the dead. The ceremonies which
they observed for this purpose were in substance a dramatic representation
of the natural processes which they wished to facilitate; for it is a
familiar tenet of magic that you can produce any desired effect by merely
imitating it. And as they now explained the fluctuations of growth and
decay, of reproduction and dissolution, by the marriage, the death, and
the rebirth or revival of the gods, their religious or rather magical
dramas turned in great measure on these themes. They set forth the
fruitful union of the powers of fertility, the sad death of one at least
of the divine partners, and his joyful resurrection. Thus a religious
theory was blended with a magical practice. The combination is familiar in
history. Indeed, few religions have ever succeeded in wholly extricating
themselves from the old trammels of magic. The inconsistency of acting on
two opposite principles, however it may vex the soul of the philosopher,
rarely troubles the common man; indeed he is seldom even aware of it. His
affair is to act, not to analyse the motives of his action. If mankind had
always been logical and wise, history would not be a long chronicle of
folly and crime.(1)

(M3) Of the changes which the seasons bring with them, the most striking
within the temperate zone are those which affect vegetation. The influence
of the seasons on animals, though great, is not nearly so manifest. Hence
it is natural that in the magical dramas designed to dispel winter and
bring back spring the emphasis should be laid on vegetation, and that
trees and plants should in them more prominently than beasts and birds.
Yet the two sides of life, the vegetable and the animal, were not
dissociated in the minds of those who observed the ceremonies. Indeed they
commonly believed that the tie between the animal and the vegetable world
was even closer than it really is; hence they often combined the dramatic
representation of reviving plants with a real or a dramatic union of the
sexes for the purpose of furthering at the same time and by the same act
the multiplication of fruits, of animals, and of men. To them the
principle of life and fertility, whether animal or vegetable, was one and
indivisible. To live and to cause to live, to eat food and to beget
children, these were the primary wants of men in the past, and they will
be the primary wants of men in the future so long as the world lasts.
Other things may be added to enrich and beautify human life, but unless
these wants are first satisfied, humanity itself must cease to exist.
These two things, therefore, food and children, were what men chiefly
sought to procure by the performance of magical rites for the regulation
of the seasons.

(M4) Nowhere, apparently, have these rites been more widely and solemnly
celebrated than in the lands which border the Eastern Mediterranean. Under
the names of Osiris, Tammuz, Adonis, and Attis, the peoples of Egypt and
Western Asia represented the yearly decay and revival of life, especially
of vegetable life, which they personified as a god who annually died and
rose again from the dead. In name and detail the rites varied from place
to place: in substance they were the same. The supposed death and
resurrection of this oriental deity, a god of many names but of
essentially one nature, is the subject of the present inquiry. We begin
with Tammuz or Adonis.(2)

(M5) The worship of Adonis was practised by the Semitic peoples of
Babylonia and Syria, and the Greeks borrowed it from them as early as the
seventh century before Christ.(3) The true name of the deity was Tammuz:
the appellation of Adonis is merely the Semitic _Adon_, “lord,” a title of
honour by which his worshippers addressed him.(4) In the Hebrew text of
the Old Testament the same name Adonai, originally perhaps Adoni, “my
lord,” is often applied to Jehovah.(5) But the Greeks through a
misunderstanding converted the title of honour into a proper name. While
Tammuz or his equivalent Adonis enjoyed a wide and lasting popularity
among peoples of the Semitic stock, there are grounds for thinking that
his worship originated with a race of other blood and other speech, the
Sumerians, who in the dawn of history inhabited the flat alluvial plain at
the head of the Persian Gulf and created the civilization which was
afterwards called Babylonian. The origin and affinities of this people are
unknown; in physical type and language they differed from all their
neighbours, and their isolated position, wedged in between alien races,
presents to the student of mankind problems of the same sort as the
isolation of the Basques and Etruscans among the Aryan peoples of Europe.
An ingenious, but unproved, hypothesis would represent them as immigrants
driven from central Asia by that gradual desiccation which for ages seems
to have been converting once fruitful lands into a waste and burying the
seats of ancient civilization under a sea of shifting sand. Whatever their
place of origin may have been, it is certain that in Southern Babylonia
the Sumerians attained at a very early period to a considerable pitch of
civilization; for they tilled the soil, reared cattle, built cities, dug
canals, and even invented a system of writing, which their Semitic
neighbours in time borrowed from them.(6) In the pantheon of this ancient
people Tammuz appears to have been one of the oldest, though certainly not
one of the most important figures.(7) His name consists of a Sumerian
phrase meaning “true son” or, in a fuller form, “true son of the deep
water,”(8) and among the inscribed Sumerian texts which have survived the
wreck of empires are a number of hymns in his honour, which were written
down not later than about two thousand years before our era but were
almost certainly composed at a much earlier time.(9)

(M6) In the religious literature of Babylonia Tammuz appears as the
youthful spouse or lover of Ishtar, the great mother goddess, the
embodiment of the reproductive energies of nature. The references to their
connexion with each other in myth and ritual are both fragmentary and
obscure, but we gather from them that every year Tammuz was believed to
die, passing away from the cheerful earth to the gloomy subterranean
world, and that every year his divine mistress journeyed in quest of him
“to the land from which there is no returning, to the house of darkness,
where dust lies on door and bolt.” During her absence the passion of love
ceased to operate: men and beasts alike forgot to reproduce their kinds:
all life was threatened with extinction. So intimately bound up with the
goddess were the sexual functions of the whole animal kingdom that without
her presence they could not be discharged. A messenger of the great god Ea
was accordingly despatched to rescue the goddess on whom so much depended.
The stern queen of the infernal regions, Allatu or Eresh-Kigal by name,
reluctantly allowed Ishtar to be sprinkled with the Water of Life and to
depart, in company probably with her lover Tammuz, that the two might
return together to the upper world, and that with their return all nature
might revive.

(M7) Laments for the departed Tammuz are contained in several Babylonian
hymns, which liken him to plants that quickly fade. He is

“_A tamarisk that in the garden has drunk no water,_
_Whose crown in the field has brought forth no blossom._
_A willow that rejoiced not by the watercourse,_
_A willow whose roots were torn up._
_A herb that in the garden had drunk no water._”

His death appears to have been annually mourned, to the shrill music of
flutes, by men and women about midsummer in the month named after him, the
month of Tammuz. The dirges were seemingly chanted over an effigy of the
dead god, which was washed with pure water, anointed with oil, and clad in
a red robe, while the fumes of incense rose into the air, as if to stir
his dormant senses by their pungent fragrance and wake him from the sleep
of death. In one of these dirges, inscribed _Lament of the Flutes for
Tammuz_, we seem still to hear the voices of the singers chanting the sad
refrain and to catch, like far-away music, the wailing notes of the
flutes:—

“_At his vanishing away she lifts up a lament,_
_‘__Oh my child!__’__ at his vanishing away she lifts up a
lament;_
_‘__My Damu!__’__ at his vanishing away she lifts up a lament._
_‘__My enchanter and priest!__’__ at his vanishing away she
lifts up a lament,_
_At the shining cedar, rooted in a spacious place,_
_In Eanna, above and below, she lifts up a lament._
_Like the lament that a house lifts up for its master, lifts she
up a lament,_
_Like the lament that a city lifts up for its lord, lifts she up
a lament._
_Her lament is the lament for a herb that grows not in the bed,_
_Her lament is the lament for the corn that grows not in the
ear._
_Her chamber is a possession that brings not forth a possession,_
_A weary woman, a weary child, forspent._
_Her lament is for a great river, where no willows grow,_
_Her lament is for a field, where corn and herbs grow not._
_Her lament is for a pool, where fishes grow not._
_Her lament is for a thicket of reeds, where no reeds grow._
_Her lament is for woods, where tamarisks grow not._
_Her lament is for a wilderness where no cypresses (?) grow._
_Her lament is for the depth of a garden of trees, where honey and
wine grow not._
_Her lament is for meadows, where no plants grow._
_Her lament is for a palace, where length of life grows not._”(10)

(M8) The tragical story and the melancholy rites of Adonis are better
known to us from the descriptions of Greek writers than from the fragments
of Babylonian literature or the brief reference of the prophet Ezekiel,
who saw the women of Jerusalem weeping for Tammuz at the north gate of the
temple.(11) Mirrored in the glass of Greek mythology, the oriental deity
appears as a comely youth beloved by Aphrodite. In his infancy the goddess
hid him in a chest, which she gave in charge to Persephone, queen of the
nether world. But when Persephone opened the chest and beheld the beauty
of the babe, she refused to give him back to Aphrodite, though the goddess
of love went down herself to hell to ransom her dear one from the power of
the grave. The dispute between the two goddesses of love and death was
settled by Zeus, who decreed that Adonis should abide with Persephone in
the under world for one part of the year, and with Aphrodite in the upper
world for another part. At last the fair youth was killed in hunting by a
wild boar, or by the jealous Ares, who turned himself into the likeness of
a boar in order to compass the death of his rival. Bitterly did Aphrodite
lament her loved and lost Adonis.(12) The strife between the divine rivals
for the possession of Adonis appears to be depicted on an Etruscan mirror.
The two goddesses, identified by inscriptions, are stationed on either
side of Jupiter, who occupies the seat of judgment and lifts an admonitory
finger as he looks sternly towards Persephone. Overcome with grief the
goddess of love buries her face in her mantle, while her pertinacious
rival, grasping a branch in one hand, points with the other at a closed
coffer, which probably contains the youthful Adonis.(13) In this form of
the myth, the contest between Aphrodite and Persephone for the possession
of Adonis clearly reflects the struggle between Ishtar and Allatu in the
land of the dead, while the decision of Zeus that Adonis is to spend one
part of the year under ground and another part above ground is merely a
Greek version of the annual disappearance and reappearance of Tammuz.

Chapter II. Adonis in Syria.

(M9) The myth of Adonis was localized and his rites celebrated with much
solemnity at two places in Western Asia. One of these was Byblus on the
coast of Syria, the other was Paphos in Cyprus. Both were great seats of
the worship of Aphrodite, or rather of her Semitic counterpart,
Astarte;(14) and of both, if we accept the legends, Cinyras, the father of
Adonis, was king.(15) Of the two cities Byblus was the more ancient;
indeed it claimed to be the oldest city in Phoenicia, and to have been
founded in the early ages of the world by the great god El, whom Greeks
and Romans identified with Cronus and Saturn respectively.(16) However
that may have been, in historical times it ranked as a holy place, the
religious capital of the country, the Mecca or Jerusalem of the
Phoenicians.(17) The city stood on a height beside the sea,(18) and
contained a great sanctuary of Astarte,(19) where in the midst of a
spacious open court, surrounded by cloisters and approached from below by
staircases, rose a tall cone or obelisk, the holy image of the
goddess.(20) In this sanctuary the rites of Adonis were celebrated.(21)
Indeed the whole city was sacred to him,(22) and the river Nahr Ibrahim,
which falls into the sea a little to the south of Byblus, bore in
antiquity the name of Adonis.(23) This was the kingdom of Cinyras.(24)
From the earliest to the latest times the city appears to have been ruled
by kings, assisted perhaps by a senate or council of elders.(25) The first
of the kings of whom we have historical evidence was a certain Zekar-baal.
He reigned about a century before Solomon; yet from that dim past his
figure stands out strangely fresh and lifelike in the journal of an
Egyptian merchant or official named Wen-Ammon, which has fortunately been
preserved in a papyrus. This man spent some time with the king at Byblus,
and received from him, in return for rich presents, a supply of timber
felled in the forests of Lebanon.(26) Another king of Byblus, who bore the
name of Sibitti-baal, paid tribute to Tiglath-pileser III., king of
Assyria, about the year 739 B.C.(27) Further, from an inscription of the
fifth or fourth century before our era we learn that a king of Byblus, by
name Yehaw-melech, son of Yehar-baal, and grandson of Adom-melech or
Uri-melech, dedicated a pillared portico with a carved work of gold and a
bronze altar to the goddess, whom he worshipped under the name of Baalath
Gebal, that is, the female Baal of Byblus.(28)

(M10) The names of these kings suggest that they claimed affinity with
their god Baal or Moloch, for Moloch is only a corruption of _melech_,
that is, “king.” Such a claim at all events appears to have been put
forward by many other Semitic kings.(29) The early monarchs of Babylon
were worshipped as gods in their lifetime.(30) Mesha, king of Moab,
perhaps called himself the son of his god Kemosh.(31) Among the Aramean
sovereigns of Damascus, mentioned in the Bible, we find more than one
Ben-hadad, that is, “son of the god Hadad,” the chief male deity of the
Syrians;(32) and Josephus tells us that down to his own time, in the first
century of our era, Ben-hadad I., whom he calls simply Adad, and his
successor, Hazael, continued to be worshipped as gods by the people of
Damascus, who held processions daily in their honour.(33) Some of the
kings of Edom seem to have gone a step farther and identified themselves
with the god in their lifetime; at all events they bore his name Hadad
without any qualification.(34) King Bar-rekub, who reigned over Samal in
North-Western Syria in the time of Tiglath-pileser (745-727 B.C.) appears
from his name to have reckoned himself a son of Rekub-el, the god to whose
favour he deemed himself indebted for the kingdom.(35) The kings of Tyre
traced their descent from Baal,(36) and apparently professed to be gods in
their own person.(37) Several of them bore names which are partly composed
of the names of Baal and Astarte; one of them bore the name of Baal pure
and simple.(38) The Baal whom they personated was no doubt Melcarth, “the
king of the city,” as his name signifies, the great god whom the Greeks
identified with Hercules; for the equivalence of the Baal of Tyre both to
Melcarth and to Hercules is placed beyond the reach of doubt by a
bilingual inscription, in Phoenician and Greek, which was found in
Malta.(39)

(M11) In like manner the kings of Byblus may have assumed the style of
Adonis; for Adonis was simply the divine Adon or “lord” of the city, a
title which hardly differs in sense from Baal (“master”) and Melech
(“king”). This conjecture would be confirmed if one of the kings of Byblus
actually bore, as Renan believed, the name of Adom-melech, that is, Adonis
Melech, the Lord King. But, unfortunately, the reading of the inscription
in which the name occurs is doubtful.(40) Some of the old Canaanite kings
of Jerusalem appear to have played the part of Adonis in their lifetime,
if we may judge from their names, Adoni-bezek and Adoni-zedek,(41) which
are divine rather than human titles. Adoni-zedek means “lord of
righteousness,” and is therefore equivalent to Melchizedek, that is, “king
of righteousness,” the title of that mysterious king of Salem and priest
of God Most High, who seems to have been neither more nor less than one of
these same Canaanitish kings of Jerusalem.(42) Thus if the old priestly
kings of Jerusalem regularly played the part of Adonis, we need not wonder
that in later times the women of Jerusalem used to weep for Tammuz, that
is, for Adonis, at the north gate of the temple.(43) In doing so they may
only have been continuing a custom which had been observed in the same
place by the Canaanites long before the Hebrews invaded the land. Perhaps
the “sacred men,” as they were called, who lodged within the walls of the
temple at Jerusalem down almost to the end of the Jewish kingdom,(44) may
have acted the part of the living Adonis to the living Astarte of the
women. At all events we know that in the cells of these strange clergy
women wove garments for the _asherim_,(45) the sacred poles which stood
beside the altar and which appear to have been by some regarded as
embodiments of Astarte.(46) Certainly these “sacred men” must have
discharged some function which was deemed religious in the temple at
Jerusalem; and we can hardly doubt that the prohibition to bring the wages
of prostitution into the house of God, which was published at the very
same time that the men were expelled from the temple,(47) was directed
against an existing practice. In Palestine as in other Semitic lands the
hire of sacred prostitutes was probably dedicated to the deity as one of
his regular dues: he took tribute of men and women as of flocks and herds,
of fields and vineyards and oliveyards.

(M12) But if Jerusalem had been from of old the seat of a dynasty of
spiritual potentates or Grand Lamas, who held the keys of heaven and were
revered far and wide as kings and gods in one, we can easily understand
why the upstart David chose it for the capital of the new kingdom which he
had won for himself at the point of the sword. The central position and
the natural strength of the virgin fortress need not have been the only or
the principal inducements which decided the politic monarch to transfer
his throne from Hebron to Jerusalem.(48) By serving himself heir to the
ancient kings of the city he might reasonably hope to inherit their
ghostly repute along with their broad acres, to wear their nimbus as well
as their crown.(49) So at a later time when he had conquered Ammon and
captured the royal city of Rabbah, he took the heavy gold crown of the
Ammonite god Milcom and placed it on his own brows, thus posing as the
deity in person.(50) It can hardly, therefore, be unreasonable to suppose
that he pursued precisely the same policy at the conquest of Jerusalem.
And on the other side the calm confidence with which the Jebusite
inhabitants of that city awaited his attack, jeering at the besiegers from
the battlements,(51) may well have been born of a firm trust in the local
deity rather than in the height and thickness of their grim old walls.
Certainly the obstinacy with which in after ages the Jews defended the
same place against the armies of Assyria and Rome sprang in large measure
from a similar faith in the God of Zion.

(M13) Be that as it may, the history of the Hebrew kings presents some
features which may perhaps, without straining them too far, be interpreted
as traces or relics of a time when they or their predecessors played the
part of a divinity, and particularly of Adonis, the divine lord of the
land. In life the Hebrew king was regularly addressed as
_Adoni-ham-melech_, “My Lord the King,”(52) and after death he was
lamented with cries of _Hoi ahi! Hoi Adon!_ “Alas my brother! alas
Lord!”(53) These exclamations of grief uttered for the death of a king of
Judah were, we can hardly doubt, the very same cries which the weeping
women of Jerusalem uttered in the north porch of the temple for the dead
Tammuz.(54) However, little stress can be laid on such forms of address,
since _Adon_ in Hebrew, like “lord” in English, was a secular as well as a
religious title. But whether identified with Adonis or not, the Hebrew
kings certainly seem to have been regarded as in a sense divine, as
representing and to some extent embodying Jehovah on earth. For the king’s
throne was called the throne of Jehovah;(55) and the application of the
holy oil to his head was believed to impart to him directly a portion of
the divine spirit.(56) Hence he bore the title of Messiah, which with its
Greek equivalent Christ means no more than “the Anointed One.” Thus when
David had cut off the skirt of Saul’s robe in the darkness of a cave where
he was in hiding, his heart smote him for having laid sacrilegious hands
upon _Adoni Messiah Jehovah_, “my Lord the Anointed of Jehovah.”(57)

(M14) Like other divine or semi-divine rulers the Hebrew kings were
apparently held answerable for famine and pestilence. When a dearth,
caused perhaps by a failure of the winter rains, had visited the land for
three years, King David inquired of the oracle, which discreetly laid the
blame not on him but on his predecessor Saul. The dead king was indeed
beyond the reach of punishment, but his sons were not. So David had seven
of them sought out, and they were hanged before the Lord at the beginning
of barley harvest in spring: and all the long summer the mother of two of
the dead men sat under the gallows-tree, keeping off the jackals by night
and the vultures by day, till with the autumn the blessed rain came at
last to wet their dangling bodies and fertilize the barren earth once
more. Then the bones of the dead were taken down from the gibbet and
buried in the sepulchre of their fathers.(58) The season when these
princes were put to death, at the beginning of barley harvest, and the
length of time they hung on the gallows, seem to show that their execution
was not a mere punishment, but that it partook of the nature of a
rain-charm. For it is a common belief that rain can be procured by magical
ceremonies performed with dead men’s bones,(59) and it would be natural to
ascribe a special virtue in this respect to the bones of princes, who are
often expected to give rain in their life. When the Israelites demanded of
Samuel that he should give them a king, the indignant prophet, loth to be
superseded by the upstart Saul, called on the Lord to send thunder and
rain, and the Lord did so at once, though the season was early summer and
the reapers were at work in the wheat-fields, a time when in common years
no rain falls from the cloudless Syrian sky.(60) The pious historian who
records the miracle seems to have regarded it as a mere token of the wrath
of the deity, whose voice was heard in the roll of thunder; but we may
surmise that in giving this impressive proof of his control of the weather
Samuel meant to hint gently at the naughtiness of asking for a king to do
for the fertility of the land what could be done quite as well and far
more cheaply by a prophet.

(M15) In Israel the excess as well as the deficiency of rain seems to have
been set down to the wrath of the deity.(61) When the Jews returned to
Jerusalem from the great captivity and assembled for the first time in the
square before the ruined temple, it happened that the weather was very
wet, and as the people sat shelterless and drenched in the piazza they
trembled at their sin and at the rain.(62) In all ages it has been the
strength or the weakness of Israel to read the hand of God in the changing
aspects of nature, and we need not wonder that at such a time and in so
dismal a scene, with a lowering sky overhead, the blackened ruins of the
temple before their eyes, and the steady drip of the rain over all, the
returned exiles should have been oppressed with a double sense of their
own guilt and of the divine anger. Perhaps, though they hardly knew it,
memories of the bright sun, fat fields, and broad willow-fringed rivers of
Babylon,(63) which had been so long their home, lent a deeper shade of
sadness to the austerity of the Judean landscape, with its gaunt grey
hills stretching away, range beyond range, to the horizon, or dipping
eastward to the far line of sombre blue which marks the sullen waters of
the Dead Sea.(64)

(M16) In the days of the Hebrew monarchy the king was apparently credited
with the power of making sick and making whole. Thus the king of Syria
sent a leper to the king of Israel to be healed by him, just as scrofulous
patients used to fancy that they could be cured by the touch of a French
or English king. However, the Hebrew monarch, with more sense than has
been shown by his royal brothers in modern times, professed himself unable
to work any such miracle. “Am I God,” he asked, “to kill and to make
alive, that this man doth send unto me to recover a man of his
leprosy?”(65) On another occasion, when pestilence ravaged the country and
the excited fancy of the plague-stricken people saw in the clouds the
figure of the Destroying Angel with his sword stretched out over
Jerusalem, they laid the blame on King David, who had offended the touchy
and irascible deity by taking a census. The prudent monarch bowed to the
popular storm, acknowledged his guilt, and appeased the angry god by
offering burnt sacrifices on the threshing-floor of Araunah, one of the
old Jebusite inhabitants of Jerusalem. Then the angel sheathed his
flashing sword, and the shrieks of the dying and the lamentations for the
dead no longer resounded in the streets.(66)

(M17) To this theory of the sanctity, nay the divinity of the Hebrew kings
it may be objected that few traces of it survive in the historical books
of the Bible. But the force of the objection is weakened by a
consideration of the time and the circumstances in which these books
assumed their final shape. The great prophets of the eighth and the
seventh centuries by the spiritual ideals and the ethical fervour of their
teaching had wrought a religious and moral reform perhaps unparalleled in
history. Under their influence an austere monotheism had replaced the old
sensuous worship of the natural powers: a stern Puritanical spirit, an
unbending rigour of mind, had succeeded to the old easy supple temper with
its weak compliances, its wax-like impressionability, its proclivities to
the sins of the flesh. And the moral lessons which the prophets inculcated
were driven home by the political events of the time, above all by the
ever-growing pressure of the great Assyrian empire on the petty states of
Palestine. The long agony of the siege of Samaria(67) must have been
followed with trembling anxiety by the inhabitants of Judea, for the
danger was at their door. They had only to lift up their eyes and look
north to see the blue hills of Ephraim, at whose foot lay the beleaguered
city. Its final fall and the destruction of the northern kingdom could not
fail to fill every thoughtful mind in the sister realm with sad
forebodings. It was as if the sky had lowered and thunder muttered over
Jerusalem. Thenceforth to the close of the Jewish monarchy, about a
century and a half later, the cloud never passed away, though once for a
little it seemed to lift, when Sennacherib raised the siege of
Jerusalem(68) and the watchers on the walls beheld the last of the long
line of spears and standards disappearing, the last squadron of the
blue-coated Assyrian cavalry sweeping, in a cloud of dust, out of
sight.(69)

(M18) It was in this period of national gloom and despondency that the two
great reformations of Israel’s religion were accomplished, the first by
king Hezekiah, the second a century later by king Josiah.(70) We need not
wonder then that the reformers who in that and subsequent ages composed or
edited the annals of their nation should have looked as sourly on the old
unreformed paganism of their forefathers as the fierce zealots of the
Commonwealth looked on the far more innocent pastimes of Merry England;
and that in their zeal for the glory of God they should have blotted many
pages of history lest they should perpetuate the memory of practices to
which they traced the calamities of their country. All the historical
books passed through the office of the Puritan censor,(71) and we can
hardly doubt that they emerged from it stript of many gay feathers which
they had flaunted when they went in. Among the shed plumage may well have
been the passages which invested human beings, whether kings or commoners,
with the attributes of deity. Certainly no pages could seem to the censor
more rankly blasphemous; on none, therefore, was he likely to press more
firmly the official sponge.

(M19) But if Semitic kings in general and the kings of Byblus in
particular often assumed the style of Baal or Adonis, it follows that they
may have mated with the goddess, the Baalath or Astarte of the city.
Certainly we hear of kings of Tyre and Sidon who were priests of
Astarte.(72) Now to the agricultural Semites the Baal or god of a land was
the author of all its fertility; he it was who produced the corn, the
wine, the figs, the oil, and the flax, by means of his quickening waters,
which in the arid parts of the Semitic world are oftener springs, streams,
and underground flow than the rains of heaven.(73) Further, “the
life-giving power of the god was not limited to vegetative nature, but to
him also was ascribed the increase of animal life, the multiplication of
flocks and herds, and, not least, of the human inhabitants of the land.
For the increase of animate nature is obviously conditioned, in the last
resort, by the fertility of the soil, and primitive races, which have not
learned to differentiate the various kinds of life with precision, think
of animate as well as vegetable life as rooted in the earth and sprung
from it. The earth is the great mother of all things in most mythological
philosophies, and the comparison of the life of mankind, or of a stock of
men, with the life of a tree, which is so common in Semitic as in other
primitive poetry, is not in its origin a mere figure. Thus where the
growth of vegetation is ascribed to a particular divine power, the same
power receives the thanks and homage of his worshippers for the increase
of cattle and of men. Firstlings as well as first-fruits were offered at
the shrines of the Baalim, and one of the commonest classes of personal
names given by parents to their sons or daughters designates the child as
the gift of the god.” In short, “the Baal was conceived as the male
principle of reproduction, the husband of the land which he
fertilised.”(74) So far, therefore, as the Semite personified the
reproductive energies of nature as male and female, as a Baal and a
Baalath, he appears to have identified the male power especially with
water and the female especially with earth. On this view plants and trees,
animals and men, are the offspring or children of the Baal and Baalath.

(M20) If, then, at Byblus and elsewhere, the Semitic king was allowed, or
rather required, to personate the god and marry the goddess, the intention
of the custom can only have been to ensure the fertility of the land and
the increase of men and cattle by means of homoeopathic magic. There is
reason to think that a similar custom was observed from a similar motive
in other parts of the ancient world, and particularly at Nemi, where both
the male and the female powers, the Dianus and Diana, were in one aspect
of their nature personifications of the life-giving waters.(75)

(M21) The last king of Byblus bore the ancient name of Cinyras, and was
beheaded by Pompey the Great for his tyrannous excesses.(76) His legendary
namesake Cinyras is said to have founded a sanctuary of Aphrodite, that
is, of Astarte, at a place on Mount Lebanon, distant a day’s journey from
the capital.(77) The spot was probably Aphaca, at the source of the river
Adonis, half-way between Byblus and Baalbec; for at Aphaca there was a
famous grove and sanctuary of Astarte which Constantine destroyed on
account of the flagitious character of the worship.(78) The site of the
temple has been discovered by modern travellers near the miserable village
which still bears the name of Afka at the head of the wild, romantic,
wooded gorge of the Adonis. The hamlet stands among groves of noble
walnut-trees on the brink of the lyn. A little way off the river rushes
from a cavern at the foot of a mighty amphitheatre of towering cliffs to
plunge in a series of cascades into the awful depths of the glen. The
deeper it descends, the ranker and denser grows the vegetation, which,
sprouting from the crannies and fissures of the rocks, spreads a green
veil over the roaring or murmuring stream in the tremendous chasm below.
There is something delicious, almost intoxicating, in the freshness of
these tumbling waters, in the sweetness and purity of the mountain air, in
the vivid green of the vegetation. The temple, of which some massive hewn
blocks and a fine column of Syenite granite still mark the site, occupied
a terrace facing the source of the river and commanding a magnificent
prospect. Across the foam and the roar of the waterfalls you look up to
the cavern and away to the top of the sublime precipices above. So lofty
is the cliff that the goats which creep along its ledges to browse on the
bushes appear like ants to the spectator hundreds of feet below. Seaward
the view is especially impressive when the sun floods the profound gorge
with golden light, revealing all the fantastic buttresses and rounded
towers of its mountain rampart, and falling softly on the varied green of
the woods which clothe its depths.(79) It was here that, according to the
legend, Adonis met Aphrodite for the first or the last time,(80) and here
his mangled body was buried.(81) A fairer scene could hardly be imagined
for a story of tragic love and death. Yet, sequestered as the valley is
and must always have been, it is not wholly deserted. A convent or a
village may be observed here and there standing out against the sky on the
top of some beetling crag, or clinging to the face of a nearly
perpendicular cliff high above the foam and the din of the river; and at
evening the lights that twinkle through the gloom betray the presence of
human habitations on slopes which might seem inaccessible to man. In
antiquity the whole of the lovely vale appears have been dedicated to
Adonis, and to this day it is haunted by his memory; for the heights which
shut it in are crested at various points by ruined monuments of his
worship, some of them overhanging dreadful abysses, down which it turns
the head dizzy to look and see the eagles wheeling about their nests far
below. One such monument exists at Ghineh. The face of a great rock, above
a roughly hewn recess, is here carved with figures of Adonis and
Aphrodite. He is portrayed with spear in rest, awaiting the attack of a
bear, while she is seated in an attitude of sorrow.(82) Her grief-stricken
figure may well be the mourning Aphrodite of the Lebanon described by
Macrobius,(83) and the recess in the rock is perhaps her lover’s tomb.
Every year, in the belief of his worshippers, Adonis was wounded to death
on the mountains, and every year the face of nature itself was dyed with
his sacred blood. So year by year the Syrian damsels lamented his untimely
fate,(84) while the red anemone, his flower, bloomed among the cedars of
Lebanon, and the river ran red to the sea, fringing the winding shores of
the blue Mediterranean, whenever the wind set inshore, with a sinuous,
band of crimson.

Chapter III. Adonis in Cyprus.

(M22) The island of Cyprus lies but one day’s sail from the coast of
Syria. Indeed, on fine summer evenings its mountains may be descried
looming low and dark against the red fires of sunset.(85) With its rich
mines of copper and its forests of firs and stately cedars, the island
naturally attracted a commercial and maritime people like the Phoenicians;
while the abundance of its corn, its wine, and its oil must have rendered
it in their eyes a Land of Promise by comparison with the niggardly nature
of their own rugged coast, hemmed in between the mountains and the
sea.(86) Accordingly they settled in Cyprus at a very early date and
remained there long after the Greeks had also established themselves on
its shores; for we know from inscriptions and coins that Phoenician kings
reigned at Citium, the Chittim of the Hebrews, down to the time of
Alexander the Great.(87) Naturally the Semitic colonists brought their
gods with them from the mother-land. They worshipped Baal of the
Lebanon,(88) who may well have been Adonis, and at Amathus on the south
coast they instituted the rites of Adonis and Aphrodite, or rather
Astarte.(89) Here, as at Byblus, these rites resembled the Egyptian
worship of Osiris so closely that some people even identified the Adonis
of Amathus with Osiris.(90) The Tyrian Melcarth or Moloch was also
worshipped at Amathus,(91) and the tombs discovered in the neighbourhood
prove that the city remained Phoenician to a late period.(92)

(M23) But the great seat of the worship of Aphrodite and Adonis in Cyprus
was Paphos on the south-western side of the island. Among the petty
kingdoms into which Cyprus was divided from the earliest times until the
end of the fourth century before our era Paphos must have ranked with the
best. It is a land of hills and billowy ridges, diversified by fields and
vineyards and intersected by rivers, which in the course of ages have
carved for themselves beds of such tremendous depth that travelling in the
interior is difficult and tedious. The lofty range of Mount Olympus (the
modern Troodos), capped with snow the greater part of the year, screens
Paphos from the northerly and easterly winds and cuts it off from the rest
of the island. On the slopes of the range the last pine-woods of Cyprus
linger, sheltering here and there monasteries in scenery not unworthy of
the Apennines. The old city of Paphos occupied the summit of a hill about
a mile from the sea; the newer city sprang up at the harbour some ten
miles off.(93) The sanctuary of Aphrodite at Old Paphos (the modern
Kuklia) was one of the most celebrated shrines in the ancient world. From
the earliest to the latest times it would seem to have preserved its
essential features unchanged. For the sanctuary is represented on coins of
the Imperial age,(94) and these representations agree closely with little
golden models of a shrine which were found in two of the royal graves at
Mycenae.(95) Both on the coins and in the models we see a façade
surmounted by a pair of doves and divided into three compartments or
chapels, of which the central one is crowned by a lofty superstructure. In
the golden models each chapel contains a pillar standing in a pair of
horns: the central superstructure is crowned by two pairs of horns, one
within the other; and the two side chapels are in like manner crowned each
with a pair of horns and a single dove perched on the outer horn of each
pair. On the coins each of the side chapels contains a pillar or
candelabra-like object: the central chapel contains a cone and is flanked
by two high columns, each terminating in a pair of ball-topped pinnacles,
with a star and crescent appearing between the tops of the columns. The
doves are doubtless the sacred doves of Aphrodite or Astarte,(96) and the
horns and pillars remind us of the similar religious emblems which have
been found in the great prehistoric palace of Cnossus in Crete, as well as
on many monuments of the Mycenaean or Minoan age of Greece.(97) If
antiquaries are right in regarding the golden models as copies of the
Paphian shrine, that shrine must have suffered little outward change for
more than a thousand years; for the royal graves at Mycenae, in which the
models were found, can hardly be of later date than the twelfth century
before our era.

(M24) Thus the sanctuary of Aphrodite at Paphos was apparently of great
antiquity.(98) According to Herodotus, it was founded by Phoenician
colonists from Ascalon;(99) but it is possible that a native goddess of
fertility was worshipped on the spot before the arrival of the
Phoenicians, and that the newcomers identified her with their own Baalath
or Astarte, whom she may have closely resembled. If two deities were thus
fused in one, we may suppose that they were both varieties of that great
goddess of motherhood and fertility whose worship appears to have been
spread all over Western Asia from a very early time. The supposition is
confirmed as well by the archaic shape of her image as by the licentious
character of her rites; for both that shape and those rites were shared by
her with other Asiatic deities. Her image was simply a white cone or
pyramid.(100) In like manner, a cone was the emblem of Astarte at
Byblus,(101) of the native goddess whom the Greeks called Artemis at Perga
in Pamphylia,(102) and of the sun-god Heliogabalus at Emesa in Syria.(103)
Conical stones, which apparently served as idols, have also been found at
Golgi in Cyprus, and in the Phoenician temples of Malta;(104) and cones of
sandstone came to light at the shrine of the “Mistress of Torquoise” among
the barren hills and frowning precipices of Sinai.(105) The precise
significance of such an emblem remains as obscure as it was in the time of
Tacitus.(106) It appears to have been customary to anoint the sacred cone
with olive oil at a solemn festival, in which people from Lycia and Caria
participated.(107) The custom of anointing a holy stone has been observed
in many parts of the world; for example, in the sanctuary of Apollo at
Delphi.(108) To this day the old custom appears to survive at Paphos, for
“in honour of the Maid of Bethlehem the peasants of Kuklia anointed
lately, and probably still anoint each year, the great corner-stones of
the ruined Temple of the Paphian Goddess. As Aphrodite was supplicated
once with cryptic rites, so is Mary entreated still by Moslems as well as
Christians, with incantations and passings through perforated stones, to
remove the curse of barrenness from Cypriote women, or increase the
manhood of Cypriote men.”(109) Thus the ancient worship of the goddess of
fertility is continued under a different name. Even the name of the old
goddess is retained in some parts of the island; for in more than one
chapel the Cypriote peasants adore the mother of Christ under the title
Panaghia Aphroditessa.(110)

(M25) In Cyprus it appears that before marriage all women were formerly
obliged by custom to prostitute themselves to strangers at the sanctuary
of the goddess, whether she went by the name of Aphrodite, Astarte, or
what not.(111) Similar customs prevailed in many parts of Western Asia.
Whatever its motive, the practice was clearly regarded, not as an orgy of
lust, but as a solemn religious duty performed in the service of that
great Mother Goddess of Western Asia whose name varied, while her type
remained constant, from place to place. Thus at Babylon every woman,
whether rich or poor, had once in her life to submit to the embraces of a
stranger at the temple of Mylitta, that is, of Ishtar or Astarte, and to
dedicate to the goddess the wages earned by this sanctified harlotry. The
sacred precinct was crowded with women waiting to observe the custom. Some
of them had to wait there for years.(112) At Heliopolis or Baalbec in
Syria, famous for the imposing grandeur of its ruined temples, the custom
of the country required that every maiden should prostitute herself to a
stranger at the temple of Astarte, and matrons as well as maids testified
their devotion to the goddess in the same manner. The emperor Constantine
abolished the custom, destroyed the temple, and built a church in its
stead.(113) In Phoenician temples women prostituted themselves for hire in
the service of religion, believing that by this conduct they propitiated
the goddess and won her favour.(114) “It was a law of the Amorites, that
she who was about to marry should sit in fornication seven days by the
gate.”(115) At Byblus the people shaved their heads in the annual mourning
for Adonis. Women who refused to sacrifice their hair had to give
themselves up to strangers on a certain day of the festival, and the money
which they thus earned was devoted to the goddess.(116) This custom may
have been a mitigation of an older rule which at Byblus as elsewhere
formerly compelled every woman without exception to sacrifice her virtue
in the service of religion. I have already suggested a reason why the
offering of a woman’s hair was accepted as an equivalent for the surrender
of her person.(117) We are told that in Lydia all girls were obliged to
prostitute themselves in order to earn a dowry;(118) but we may suspect
that the real motive of the custom was devotion rather than economy. The
suspicion is confirmed by a Greek inscription found at Tralles in Lydia,
which proves that the practice of religious prostitution survived in that
country as late as the second century of our era. It records of a certain
woman, Aurelia Aemilia by name, not only that she herself served the god
in the capacity of a harlot at his express command, but that her mother
and other female ancestors had done the same before her; and the publicity
of the record, engraved on a marble column which supported a votive
offering, shows that no stain attached to such a life and such a
parentage.(119) In Armenia the noblest families dedicated their daughters
to the service of the goddess Anaitis in her temple at Acilisena, where
the damsels acted as prostitutes for a long time before they were given in
marriage. Nobody scrupled to take one of these girls to wife when her
period of service was over.(120) Again, the goddess Ma was served by a
multitude of sacred harlots at Comana in Pontus, and crowds of men and
women flocked to her sanctuary from the neighbouring cities and country to
attend the biennial festivals or to pay their vows to the goddess.(121)

(M26) If we survey the whole of the evidence on this subject, some of
which has still to be laid before the reader, we may conclude that a great
Mother Goddess, the personification of all the reproductive energies of
nature, was worshipped under different names but with a substantial
similarity of myth and ritual by many peoples of Western Asia; that
associated with her was a lover, or rather series of lovers, divine yet
mortal, with whom she mated year by year, their commerce being deemed
essential to the propagation of animals and plants, each in their several
kind;(122) and further, that the fabulous union of the divine pair was
simulated and, as it were, multiplied on earth by the real, though
temporary, union of the human sexes at the sanctuary of the goddess for
the sake of thereby ensuring the fruitfulness of the ground and the
increase of man and beast.(123) And if the conception of such a Mother
Goddess dates, as seems probable, from a time when the institution of
marriage was either unknown or at most barely tolerated as an immoral
infringement of old communal rights, we can understand both why the
goddess herself was regularly supposed to be at once unmarried and
unchaste, and why her worshippers were obliged to imitate her more or less
completely in these respects. For had she been a divine wife united to a
divine husband, the natural counterpart of their union would have been the
lawful marriage of men and women, and there would have been no need to
resort to a system of prostitution or promiscuity in order to effect those
purposes which, on the principles of homoeopathic magic, might in that
case have been as well or better attained by the legitimate intercourse of
the sexes in matrimony. Formerly, perhaps, every woman was obliged to
submit at least once in her life to the exercise of those marital rights
which at a still earlier period had theoretically belonged in permanence
to all the males of the tribe. But in course of time, as the institution
of individual marriage grew in favour, and the old communism fell more and
more into discredit, the revival of the ancient practice even for a single
occasion in a woman’s life became ever more repugnant to the moral sense
of the people, and accordingly they resorted to various expedients for
evading in practice the obligation which they still acknowledged in
theory. One of these evasions was to let the woman offer her hair instead
of her person; another apparently was to substitute an obscene symbol for
the obscene act.(124) But while the majority of women thus contrived to
observe the forms of religion without sacrificing their virtue, it was
still thought necessary to the general welfare that a certain number of
them should discharge the old obligation in the old way. These became
prostitutes either for life or for a term of years at one of the temples:
dedicated to the service of religion, they were invested with a sacred
character,(125) and their vocation, far from being deemed infamous, was
probably long regarded by the laity as an exercise of more than common
virtue, and rewarded with a tribute of mixed wonder, reverence, and pity,
not unlike that which in some parts of the world is still paid to women
who seek to honour their Creator in a different way by renouncing the
natural functions of their sex and the tenderest relations of humanity. It
is thus that the folly of mankind finds vent in opposite extremes alike
harmful and deplorable.

(M27) At Paphos the custom of religious prostitution is said to have been
instituted by King Cinyras,(126) and to have been practised by his
daughters, the sisters of Adonis, who, having incurred the wrath of
Aphrodite, mated with strangers and ended their days in Egypt.(127) In
this form of the tradition the wrath of Aphrodite is probably a feature
added by a later authority, who could only regard conduct which shocked
his own moral sense as a punishment inflicted by the goddess instead of as
a sacrifice regularly enjoined by her on all her devotees. At all events
the story indicates that the princesses of Paphos had to conform to the
custom as well as women of humble birth.

(M28) The legendary history of the royal and priestly family of the
Cinyrads is instructive. We are told that a Syrian man, by name Sandacus,
migrated to Cilicia, married Pharnace, daughter of Megassares, king of
Hyria, and founded the city of Celenderis. His wife bore him a son,
Cinyras, who in time crossed the sea with a company of people to Cyprus,
wedded Metharme, daughter of Pygmalion, king of the island, and founded
Paphos.(128) These legends seem to contain reminiscences of kingdoms in
Cilicia and Cyprus which passed in the female line, and were held by men,
sometimes foreigners, who married the hereditary princesses. There are
some indications that Cinyras was not in fact the founder of the temple at
Paphos. An older tradition ascribed the foundation to a certain Aerias,
whom some regarded as a king, and others as the goddess herself.(129)
Moreover, Cinyras or his descendants at Paphos had to reckon with rivals.
These were the Tamirads, a family of diviners who traced their descent
from Tamiras, a Cilician augur. At first it was arranged that both
families should preside at the ceremonies, but afterwards the Tamirads
gave way to the Cinyrads.(130) Many tales were told of Cinyras, the
founder of the dynasty. He was a priest of Aphrodite as well as a
king,(131) and his riches passed into a proverb.(132) To his descendants,
the Cinyrads, he appears to have bequeathed his wealth and his dignities;
at all events, they reigned as kings of Paphos and served the goddess as
priests. Their dead bodies, with that of Cinyras himself, were buried in
the sanctuary.(133) But by the fourth century before our era the family
had declined and become nearly extinct. When Alexander the Great expelled
a king of Paphos for injustice and wickedness, his envoys made search for
a member of the ancient house to set on the throne of his fathers. At last
they found one of them living in obscurity and earning his bread as a
market gardener. He was in the very act of watering his beds when the
king’s messengers carried him off, much to his astonishment, to receive
the crown at the hands of their master.(134) Yet if the dynasty decayed,
the shrine of the goddess, enriched by the offerings of kings and private
persons, maintained its reputation for wealth down to Roman times.(135)
When Ptolemy Auletes, king of Egypt, was expelled by his people in 57
B.C., Cato offered him the priesthood of Paphos as a sufficient
consolation in money and dignity for the loss of a throne.(136)

(M29) Among the stories which were told of Cinyras, the ancestor of these
priestly kings and the father of Adonis, there are some that deserve our
attention. In the first place, he is said to have begotten his son Adonis
in incestuous intercourse with his daughter Myrrha at a festival of the
corn-goddess, at which women robed in white were wont to offer
corn-wreaths as first-fruits of the harvest and to observe strict chastity
for nine days.(137) Similar cases of incest with a daughter are reported
of many ancient kings.(138) It seems unlikely that such reports are
without foundation, and perhaps equally improbable that they refer to mere
fortuitous outbursts of unnatural lust. We may suspect that they are based
on a practice actually observed for a definite reason in certain special
circumstances. Now in countries where the royal blood was traced through
women only, and where consequently the king held office merely in virtue
of his marriage with an hereditary princess, who was the real sovereign,
it appears to have often happened that a prince married his own sister,
the princess royal, in order to obtain with her hand the crown which
otherwise would have gone to another man, perhaps to a stranger.(139) May
not the same rule of descent have furnished a motive for incest with a
daughter? For it seems a natural corollary from such a rule that the king
was bound to vacate the throne on the death of his wife, the queen, since
he occupied it only by virtue of his marriage with her. When that marriage
terminated, his right to the throne terminated with it and passed at once
to his daughter’s husband. Hence if the king desired to reign after his
wife’s death, the only way in which he could legitimately continue to do
so was by marrying his daughter, and thus prolonging through her the title
which had formerly been his through her mother.

(M30) In this connexion it is worth while to remember that at Rome the
Flamen Dialis was bound to vacate his priesthood on the death of his wife,
the Flaminica.(140) The rule would be intelligible if the Flaminica had
originally been the more important functionary of the two, and if the
Flamen held office only by virtue of his marriage with her.(141) Elsewhere
I have shown reason to suppose that he and his wife represented an old
line of priestly kings and queens, who played the parts of Jupiter and
Juno, or perhaps rather Dianus and Diana, respectively.(142) If the
supposition is correct, the custom which obliged him to resign his
priesthood on the death of his wife seems to prove that of the two deities
whom they personated, the goddess, whether named Juno or Diana, was indeed
the better half. But at Rome the goddess Juno always played an
insignificant part; whereas at Nemi her old double, Diana, was
all-powerful, casting her mate, Dianus or Virbius, into deep shadow. Thus
a rule which points to the superiority of the Flaminica over the Flamen,
appears to indicate that the divine originals of the two were Dianus and
Diana rather than Jupiter and Juno; and further, that if Jupiter and Juno
at Rome stood for the principle of father-kin, or the predominance of the
husband over the wife, Dianus and Diana at Nemi stood for the older
principle of mother-kin, or the predominance of the wife in matters of
inheritance over the husband. If, then, I am right in holding that the
kingship at Rome was originally a plebeian institution and descended
through women,(143) we must conclude that the people who founded the
sanctuary of Diana at Nemi were of the same plebeian stock as the Roman
kings, that they traced descent in the female line, and that they
worshipped a great Mother Goddess, not a great Father God. That goddess
was Diana; her maternal functions are abundantly proved by the votive
offerings found at her ancient shrine among the wooded hills.(144) On the
other hand, the patricians, who afterwards invaded the country, brought
with them father-kin in its strictest form, and consistently enough paid
their devotions rather to Father Jove than to Mother Juno.

(M31) A parallel to what I conjecture to have been the original relation
of the Flaminica to her husband the Flamen may to a certain extent be
found among the Khasis of Assam, who preserve to this day the ancient
system of mother-kin in matters of inheritance and religion. For among
these people the propitiation of deceased ancestors is deemed essential to
the welfare of the community, and of all their ancestors they revere most
the primaeval ancestress of the clan. Accordingly in every sacrifice a
priest must be assisted by a priestess; indeed, we are told that he merely
acts as her deputy, and that she “is without doubt a survival of the time
when, under the matriarchate, the priestess was the agent for the
performance of all religious ceremonies.” It does not appear that the
priest need be the husband of the priestess; but in the Khyrim State,
where each division has its own goddess to whom sacrifices are offered,
the priestess is the mother, sister, niece, or other maternal relation of
the priest. It is her duty to prepare all the sacrificial articles, and
without her assistance the sacrifice cannot take place.(145) Here, then,
as among the ancient Romans on my hypothesis, we have the superiority of
the priestess over the priest based on a corresponding superiority of the
goddess or divine ancestress over the god or divine ancestor; and here, as
at Rome, a priest would clearly have to vacate office if he had no woman
of the proper relationship to assist him in the performance of his sacred
duties.

(M32) Further, I have conjectured that as representatives of Jupiter and
Juno respectively the Flamen and Flaminica at Rome may have annually
celebrated a Sacred Marriage for the purpose of ensuring the fertility of
the powers of nature.(146) This conjecture also may be supported by an
analogous custom which is still observed in India. We have seen how among
the Oraons, a primitive hill-tribe of Bengal, the marriage of the Sun and
the Earth is annually celebrated by a priest and priestess who personate
respectively the god of the Sun and the goddess of the Earth.(147) The
ceremony of the Sacred Marriage has been described more fully by a Jesuit
missionary, who was intimately acquainted with the people and their native
religion. The rite is celebrated in the month of May, when the _sal_ tree
is in bloom, and the festival takes its native name (_khaddi_) from the
flower of the tree. It is the greatest festival of the year. “The object
of this feast is to celebrate the mystical marriage of the Sun-god
(_Bhagawan_) with the Goddess-earth (_Dharti-mai_), to induce them to be
fruitful and give good crops.” At the same time all the minor deities or
demons of the village are propitiated, in order that they may not hinder
the beneficent activity of the Sun God and the Earth Goddess. On the eve
of the appointed day no man may plough his fields, and the priest,
accompanied by some of the villagers, repairs to the sacred grove, where
he beats a drum and invites all the invisible guests to the great feast
that will await them on the morrow. Next morning very early, before
cock-crow, an acolyte steals out as quietly as possible to the sacred
spring to fetch water in a new earthen pot. This holy water is full of all
kinds of blessings for the crops. The priest has prepared a place for it
in the middle of his house surrounded by cotton threads of diverse
colours. So sacred is the water that it would be defiled and lose all its
virtue, were any profane eye to fall on it before it entered the priest’s
house. During the morning the acolyte and the priest’s deputy go round
from house to house collecting victims for the sacrifice. In the afternoon
the people all gather at the sacred grove, and the priest proceeds to
consummate the sacrifice. The first victims to be immolated are a white
cock for the Sun God and a black hen for the Earth Goddess; and as the
feast is the marriage of these great deities the marriage service is
performed over the two fowls before they are hurried into eternity.
Amongst other things both birds are marked with vermilion just as a bride
and bridegroom are marked at a human marriage; and the earth is also
smeared with vermilion, as if it were a real bride, on the spot where the
sacrifice is offered. Sacrifices of fowls or goats to the minor deities or
demons follow. The bodies of the victims are collected by the village
boys, who cook them on the spot; all the heads go to the sacrificers. The
gods take what they can get and are more or less thankful. Meantime the
acolyte has collected flowers of the _sal_ tree and set them round the
place of sacrifice, and he has also fetched the holy water from the
priest’s house. A procession is now formed and the priest is carried in
triumph to his own abode. There his wife has been watching for him, and on
his arrival the two go through the marriage ceremony, applying vermilion
to each other in the usual way “to symbolise the mystical marriage of the
Sun-god with the Earth-goddess.” Meantime all the women of the village are
standing on the thresholds of their houses each with a winnowing-fan in
her hand. In the fan are two cups, one empty to receive the holy water,
and the other full of rice-beer for the consumption of the holy man. As he
arrives at each house, he distributes flowers and holy water to the happy
women, and enriches them with a shower of blessings, saying, “May your
rooms and granary be filled with rice, that the priest’s name may be
great.” The holy water which he leaves at each house is sprinkled on the
seeds that have been kept to sow next year’s crop. Having thus imparted
his benediction to the household the priest swigs the beer; and as he
repeats his benediction and his potation at every house he is naturally
dead-drunk by the time he gets to the end of the village. “By that time
every one has taken copious libations of rice-beer, and all the devils of
the village seem to be let loose, and there follows a scene of debauchery
baffling description—all these to induce the Sun and the Earth to be
fruitful.”(148)

Thus the people of Cyprus and Western Asia in antiquity were by no means
singular in their belief that the profligacy of the human sexes served to
quicken the fruits of the earth.(149)

(M33) Cinyras is said to have been famed for his exquisite beauty(150) and
to have been wooed by Aphrodite herself.(151) Thus it would appear, as
scholars have already observed,(152) that Cinyras was in a sense a
duplicate of his handsome son Adonis, to whom the inflammable goddess also
lost her heart. Further, these stories of the love of Aphrodite for two
members of the royal house of Paphos can hardly be dissociated from the
corresponding legend told of Pygmalion, the Phoenician king of Cyprus, who
is said to have fallen in love with an image of Aphrodite and taken it to
his bed.(153) When we consider that Pygmalion was the father-in-law of
Cinyras, that the son of Cinyras was Adonis, and that all three, in
successive generations, are said to have been concerned in a love-intrigue
with Aphrodite, we can hardly help concluding that the early Phoenician
kings of Paphos, or their sons, regularly claimed to be not merely the
priests of the goddess(154) but also her lovers, in other words, that in
their official capacity they personated Adonis. At all events Adonis is
said to have reigned in Cyprus,(155) and it appears to be certain that the
title of Adonis was regularly borne by the sons of all the Phoenician
kings of the island.(156) It is true that the title strictly signified no
more than “lord”; yet the legends which connect these Cyprian princes with
the goddess of love make it probable that they claimed the divine nature
as well as the human dignity of Adonis. The story of Pygmalion points to a
ceremony of a sacred marriage in which the king wedded the image of
Aphrodite, or rather of Astarte. If that was so, the tale was in a sense
true, not of a single man only, but of a whole series of men, and it would
be all the more likely to be told of Pygmalion, if that was a common name
of Semitic kings in general, and of Cyprian kings in particular.
Pygmalion, at all events, is known as the name of the famous king of Tyre
from whom his sister Dido fled;(157) and a king of Citium and Idalium in
Cyprus, who reigned in the time of Alexander the Great, was also called
Pygmalion, or rather Pumiyathon, the Phoenician name which the Greeks
corrupted into Pygmalion.(158) Further, it deserves to be noted that the
names Pygmalion and Astarte occur together in a Punic inscription on a
gold medallion which was found in a grave at Carthage; the characters of
the inscription are of the earliest type.(159) As the custom of religious
prostitution at Paphos is said to have been founded by King Cinyras and
observed by his daughters,(160) we may surmise that the kings of Paphos
played the part of the divine bridegroom in a less innocent rite than the
form of marriage with a statue; in fact, that at certain festivals each of
them had to mate with one or more of the sacred harlots of the temple, who
played Astarte to his Adonis. If that was so, there is more truth than has
commonly been supposed in the reproach cast by the Christian fathers that
the Aphrodite worshipped by Cinyras was a common whore.(161) The fruit of
their union would rank as sons and daughters of the deity, and would in
time become the parents of gods and goddesses, like their fathers and
mothers before them. In this manner Paphos, and perhaps all sanctuaries of
the great Asiatic goddess where sacred prostitution was practised, might
be well stocked with human deities, the offspring of the divine king by
his wives, concubines, and temple harlots. Any one of these might probably
succeed his father on the throne(162) or be sacrificed in his stead
whenever stress of war or other grave junctures called, as they sometimes
did,(163) for the death of a royal victim. Such a tax, levied occasionally
on the king’s numerous progeny for the good of the country, would neither
extinguish the divine stock nor break the father’s heart, who divided his
paternal affection among so many. At all events, if, as there seems reason
to believe, Semitic kings were often regarded at the same time as
hereditary deities, it is easy to understand the frequency of Semitic
personal names which imply that the bearers of them were the sons or
daughters, the brothers or sisters, the fathers or mothers of a god, and
we need not resort to the shifts employed by some scholars to evade the
plain sense of the words.(164) This interpretation is confirmed by a
parallel Egyptian usage; for in Egypt, where the kings were worshipped as
divine,(165) the queen was called “the wife of the god” or “the mother of
the god,”(166) and the title “father of the god” was borne not only by the
king’s real father but also by his father-in-law.(167) Similarly, perhaps,
among the Semites any man who sent his daughter to swell the royal harem
may have been allowed to call himself “the father of the god.”

(M34) If we may judge by his name, the Semitic king who bore the name of
Cinyras was, like King David, a harper; for the name of Cinyras is clearly
connected with the Greek _cinyra_, “a lyre,” which in its turn comes from
the Semitic _kinnor_, “a lyre,” the very word applied to the instrument on
which David played before Saul.(168) We shall probably not err in assuming
that at Paphos as at Jerusalem the music of the lyre or harp was not a
mere pastime designed to while away an idle hour, but formed part of the
service of religion, the moving influence of its melodies being perhaps
set down, like the effect of wine, to the direct inspiration of a deity.
Certainly at Jerusalem the regular clergy of the temple prophesied to the
music of harps, of psalteries, and of cymbals;(169) and it appears that
the irregular clergy also, as we may call the prophets, depended on some
such stimulus for inducing the ecstatic state which they took for
immediate converse with the divinity.(170) Thus we read of a band of
prophets coming down from a high place with a psaltery, a timbrel, a pipe,
and a harp before them, and prophesying as they went.(171) Again, when the
united forces of Judah and Ephraim were traversing the wilderness of Moab
in pursuit of the enemy, they could find no water for three days, and were
like to die of thirst, they and the beasts of burden. In this emergency
the prophet Elisha, who was with the army, called for a minstrel and bade
him play. Under the influence of the music he ordered the soldiers to dig
trenches in the sandy bed of the waterless waddy through which lay the
line of march. They did so, and next morning the trenches were full of the
water that had drained down into them underground from the desolate,
forbidding mountains on either hand. The prophet’s success in striking
water in the wilderness resembles the reported success of modern dowsers,
though his mode of procedure was different. Incidentally he rendered
another service to his countrymen. For the skulking Moabites from their
lairs among the rocks saw the red sun of the desert reflected in the
water, and taking it for the blood, or perhaps rather for an omen of the
blood, of their enemies, they plucked up heart to attack the camp and were
defeated with great slaughter.(172)

(M35) Again, just as the cloud of melancholy which from time to time
darkened the moody mind of Saul was viewed as an evil spirit from the Lord
vexing him, so on the other hand the solemn strains of the harp, which
soothed and composed his troubled thoughts,(173) may well have seemed to
the hag-ridden king the very voice of God or of his good angel whispering
peace. Even in our own day a great religious writer, himself deeply
sensitive to the witchery of music, has said that musical notes, with all
their power to fire the blood and melt the heart, cannot be mere empty
sounds and nothing more; no, they have escaped from some higher sphere,
they are outpourings of eternal harmony, the voice of angels, the
Magnificat of saints.(174) It is thus that the rude imaginings of
primitive man are transfigured and his feeble lispings echoed with a
rolling reverberation in the musical prose of Newman. Indeed the influence
of music on the development of religion is a subject which would repay a
sympathetic study. For we cannot doubt that this, the most intimate and
affecting of all the arts, has done much to create as well as to express
the religious emotions, thus modifying more or less deeply the fabric of
belief to which at first sight it seems only to minister. The musician has
done his part as well as the prophet and the thinker in the making of
religion. Every faith has its appropriate music, and the difference
between the creeds might almost be expressed in musical notation. The
interval, for example, which divides the wild revels of Cybele from the
stately ritual of the Catholic Church is measured by the gulf which severs
the dissonant clash of cymbals and tambourines from the grave harmonies of
Palestrina and Handel. A different spirit breathes in the difference of
the music.(175)

(M36) The legend which made Apollo the friend of Cinyras(176) may be based
on a belief in their common devotion to the lyre. But what function, we
may ask, did string music perform in the Greek and the Semitic ritual? Did
it serve to rouse the human mouthpiece of the god to prophetic ecstasy? or
did it merely ban goblins and demons from the holy places and the holy
service, drawing as it were around the worshippers a magic circle within
which no evil thing might intrude? In short, did it aim at summoning good
or banishing evil spirits? was its object inspiration or exorcism? The
examples drawn from the lives or legends of Elisha and David prove that
with the Hebrews the music of the lyre might be used for either purpose;
for while Elisha employed it to tune himself to the prophetic pitch, David
resorted to it for the sake of exorcising the foul fiend from Saul. With
the Greeks, on the other hand, in historical times, it does not appear
that string music served as a means of inducing the condition of trance or
ecstasy in the human mouthpieces of Apollo and the other oracular gods; on
the contrary, its sobering and composing influence, as contrasted with the
exciting influence of flute music, is the aspect which chiefly impressed
the Greek mind.(177) The religious or, at all events, the superstitious
man might naturally ascribe the mental composure wrought by grave, sweet
music to a riddance of evil spirits, in short to exorcism; and in harmony
with this view, Pindar, speaking of the lyre, says that all things hateful
to Zeus in earth and sea tremble at the sound of music.(178) Yet the
association of the lyre with the legendary prophet Orpheus as well as with
the oracular god Apollo seems to hint that in early days its strains may
have been employed by the Greeks, as they certainly were by the Hebrews,
to bring on that state of mental exaltation in which the thick-coming
fancies of the visionary are regarded as divine communications.(179) Which
of these two functions of music, the positive or the negative, the
inspiring or the protective, predominated in the religion of Adonis we
cannot say; perhaps the two were not clearly distinguished in the minds of
his worshippers.

(M37) A constant feature in the myth of Adonis was his premature and
violent death. If, then, the kings of Paphos regularly personated Adonis,
we must ask whether they imitated their divine prototype in death as in
life. Tradition varied as to the end of Cinyras. Some thought that he slew
himself on discovering his incest with his daughter;(180) others alleged
that, like Marsyas, he was defeated by Apollo in a musical contest and put
to death by the victor.(181) Yet he cannot strictly be said to have
perished in the flower of his youth if he lived, as Anacreon averred, to
the ripe age of one hundred and sixty.(182) If we must choose between the
two stories, it is perhaps more likely that he died a violent death than
that he survived to an age which surpassed that of Thomas Parr by eight
years,(183) though it fell far short of the antediluvian standard. The
life of eminent men in remote ages is exceedingly elastic and may be
lengthened or shortened, in the interests of history, at the taste and
fancy of the historian.

Chapter IV. Sacred Men and Women.

§ 1. An Alternative Theory.

(M38) In the preceding chapter we saw that a system of sacred prostitution
was regularly carried on all over Western Asia, and that both in Phoenicia
and in Cyprus the practice was specially associated with the worship of
Adonis. As the explanation which I have adopted of the custom has been
rejected in favour of another by writers whose opinions are entitled to be
treated with respect, I shall devote the present chapter to a further
consideration of the subject, and shall attempt to gather, from a closer
scrutiny and a wider survey of the field, such evidence as may set the
custom and with it the worship of Adonis in a clearer light. At the outset
it will be well to examine the alternative theory which has been put
forward to explain the facts.

(M39) It has been proposed to derive the religious prostitution of Western
Asia from a purely secular and precautionary practice of destroying a
bride’s virginity before handing her over to her husband in order that
“the bridegroom’s intercourse should be safe from a peril that is much
dreaded by men in a certain stage of culture.”(184) Among the objections
which may be taken to this view are the following:—

(M40) (1) The theory fails to account for the deeply religious character
of the customs as practised in antiquity all over Western Asia. That
religious character appears from the observance of the custom at the
sanctuaries of a great goddess, the dedication of the wages of
prostitution to her, the belief of the women that they earned her favour
by prostituting themselves,(185) and the command of a male deity to serve
him in this manner.(186)

(M41) (2) The theory fails to account for the prostitution of married
women at Heliopolis(187) and apparently also at Babylon and Byblus; for in
describing the practice at the two latter places our authorities,
Herodotus and Lucian, speak only of women, not of virgins.(188) In Israel
also we know from Hosea that young married women prostituted themselves at
the sanctuaries on the hilltops under the shadow of the sacred oaks,
poplars, and terebinths.(189) The prophet makes no mention of virgins
participating in these orgies. They may have done so, but his language
does not imply it: he speaks only of “your daughters” and “your
daughters-in-law.” The prostitution of married women is wholly
inexplicable on the hypothesis here criticized. Yet it can hardly be
separated from the prostitution of virgins, which in some places at least
was carried on side by side with it.

(M42) (3) The theory fails to account for the repeated and professional
prostitution of women in Lydia, Pontus, Armenia, and apparently all over
Palestine.(190) Yet this habitual prostitution can in its turn hardly be
separated from the first prostitution in a woman’s life. Or are we to
suppose that the first act of unchastity is to be explained in one way and
all the subsequent acts in quite another? that the first act was purely
secular and all the subsequent acts purely religious?

(M43) (4) The theory fails to account for the _Ḳedeshim_ (“sacred men”)
side by side with the _Ḳedeshoth_ (“sacred women”) at the
sanctuaries;(191) for whatever the religious functions of these “sacred
men” may have been, it is highly probable that they were analogous to
those of the “sacred women” and are to be explained in the same way.

(M44) (5) On the hypothesis which I am considering we should expect to
find the man who deflowers the maid remunerated for rendering a dangerous
service; and so in fact we commonly find him remunerated in places where
the supposed custom is really practised.(192) But in Western Asia it was
just the contrary. It was the woman who was paid, not the man; indeed, so
well was she paid that in Lydia and Cyprus the girls earned dowries for
themselves in this fashion.(193) This clearly shows that it was the woman,
and not the man, who was believed to render the service. Or are we to
suppose that the man had to pay for rendering a dangerous service?(194)

These considerations seem to prove conclusively that whatever the remote
origin of these Western Asiatic customs may have been, they cannot have
been observed in historical times from any such motive as is assumed by
the hypothesis under discussion. At the period when we have to do with
them the customs were to all appearance purely religious in character, and
a religious motive must accordingly be found for them. Such a motive is
supplied by the theory I have adopted, which, so far as I can judge,
adequately explains all the known facts.

(M45) At the same time, in justice to the writers whose views I have
criticized, I wish to point out that the practice from which they propose
to derive the sacred prostitution of Western Asia has not always been
purely secular in character. For, in the first place, the agent employed
is sometimes reported to be a priest;(195) and, in the second place, the
sacrifice of virginity has in some places, for example at Rome and in
parts of India, been made directly to the image of a male deity.(196) The
meaning of these practices is very obscure, and in the present state of
our ignorance on the subject it is unsafe to build conclusions on them. It
is possible that what seems to be a purely secular precaution may be only
a degenerate form of a religious rite; and on the other hand it is
possible that the religious rite may go back to a purely physical
preparation for marriage, such as is still observed among the aborigines
of Australia.(197) But even if such an historical origin could be
established, it would not explain the motives from which the customs
described in this volume were practised by the people of Western Asia in
historical times. The true parallel to these customs is the sacred
prostitution which is carried on to this day by dedicated women in India
and Africa. An examination of these modern practices may throw light on
the ancient customs.

§ 2. Sacred Women in India.

(M46) In India the dancing-girls dedicated to the service of the Tamil
temples take the name of _deva-dasis_, “servants or slaves of the gods,”
but in common parlance they are spoken of simply as harlots. Every Tamil
temple of note in Southern India has its troop of these sacred women.
Their official duties are to dance twice a day, morning and evening, in
the temple, to fan the idol with Tibetan ox-tails, to dance and sing
before it when it is borne in procession, and to carry the holy light
called _Kúmbarti_. Inscriptions show that in A.D. 1004 the great temple of
the Chola king Rajaraja at Tanjore had attached to it four hundred “women
of the temple,” who lived at free quarters in the streets round about it
and were allowed land free of taxes out of its endowment. From infancy
they are trained to dance and sing. In order to obtain a safe delivery
expectant mothers will often vow to dedicate their child, if she should
prove to be a girl, to the service of God. Among the weavers of
Tiru-kalli-kundram, a little town in the Madras Presidency, the eldest
daughter of every family is devoted to the temple. Girls thus made over to
the deity are formally married, sometimes to the idol, sometimes to a
sword, before they enter on their duties; from which it appears that they
are often, if not regularly, regarded as the wives of the god.(198) Among
the Kaikolans, a large caste of Tamil weavers who are spread all over
Southern India, at least one girl in every family should be dedicated to
the temple service. The ritual, as it is observed at the initiation of one
of these girls in Coimbatore, includes “a form of nuptial ceremony. The
relations are invited for an auspicious day, and the maternal uncle, or
his representative, ties a gold band on the girl’s forehead, and, carrying
her, places her on a plank before the assembled guests. A Brahman priest
recites the _mantrams_, and prepares the sacred fire (_hōmam_). The uncle
is presented with new cloths by the girl’s mother. For the actual nuptials
a rich Brahman, if possible, and, if not, a Brahman of more lowly status
is invited. A Brahman is called in, as he is next in importance to, and
the representative of the idol. It is said that, when the man who is to
receive her first favours, joins the girl, a sword must be placed, at
least for a few minutes, by her side.” When one of these dancing-girls
dies, her body is covered with a new cloth which has been taken for the
purpose from the idol, and flowers are supplied from the temple to which
she belonged. No worship is performed in the temple until the last rites
have been performed over her body, because the idol, being deemed her
husband, is held to be in that state of ceremonial pollution common to
human mourners which debars him from the offices of religion.(199) In
Mahratta such a female devotee is called Murli. Common folk believe that
from time to time the shadow of the god falls on her and possesses her
person. At such times the possessed woman rocks herself to and fro, and
the people occasionally consult her as a soothsayer, laying money at her
feet and accepting as an oracle the words of wisdom or folly that drop
from her lips.(200) Nor is the profession of a temple prostitute adopted
only by girls. In Tulava, a district of Southern India, any woman of the
four highest castes who wearies of her husband or, as a widow and
therefore incapable of marriage, grows tired of celibacy, may go to a
temple and eat of the rice offered to the idol. Thereupon, if she is a
Brahman, she has the right to live either in the temple or outside of its
precincts, as she pleases. If she decides to live in it, she gets a daily
allowance of rice, and must sweep the temple, fan the idol, and confine
her amours to the Brahmans. The male children of these women form a
special class called Moylar, but are fond of assuming the title of
Stanikas. As many of them as can find employment hang about the temple,
sweeping the areas, sprinkling them with cow-dung, carrying torches before
the gods, and doing other odd jobs. Some of them, debarred from these holy
offices, are reduced to the painful necessity of earning their bread by
honest work. The daughters are either brought up to live like their
mothers or are given in marriage to the Stanikas. Brahman women who do not
choose to live in the temples, and all the women of the three lower
castes, cohabit with any man of pure descent, but they have to pay a fixed
sum annually to the temple.(201)

(M47) In Travancore a dancing-girl attached to a temple is known as a
_Dâsî_, or _Dêvadâsî_, or _Dêvaratiâl_, “a servant of God.” The following
account of her dedication and way of life deserves to be quoted because,
while it ignores the baser side of her vocation, it brings clearly out the
idea of her marriage to the deity. “Marriage in the case of a _Dêvaratiâl_
in its original import is a renunciation of ordinary family life and a
consecration to the service of God. With a lady-nurse at a Hospital, or a
sister at a Convent, a _Dêvadâsî_ at a Hindu shrine, such as she probably
was in the early ages of Hindu spirituality, would have claimed favourable
comparison. In the ceremonial of the dedication-marriage of the _Dâsî_,
elements are not wanting which indicate a past quite the reverse of
disreputable. The girl to be married is generally from six to eight years
in age. The bridegroom is the presiding deity of the local temple. The
ceremony is done at his house. The expenses of the celebration are
supposed to be partly paid from his funds. To instance the practice at the
Suchîndram temple, a _Yôga_ or meeting of the chief functionaries of the
temple arranges the preliminaries. The girl to be wedded bathes and goes
to the temple with two pieces of cloth, a _tâli_, betel, areca-nut, etc.
These are placed by the priest at the feet of the image. The girl sits
with the face towards the deity. The priest kindles the sacred fire and
goes through all the rituals of the _Tirukkalyânam_ festival. He then
initiates the bride into the _Panchâkshara mantra_, if in a Saiva temple,
and the _Ashtâkshara_, if in a Vaishnava temple. On behalf of the divine
bridegroom, he presents one of the two cloths she has brought as offering
and ties the _Tâli_ around her neck. The practice, how old it is not
possible to say, is then to take her to her house where the usual marriage
festivities are celebrated for four days. As in Brahminical marriages, the
_Nalunku_ ceremony, _i.e._ the rolling of a cocoanut by the bride to the
bridegroom and _vice versa_ a number of times to the accompaniment of
music, is gone through, the temple priest playing the bridegroom’s part.
Thenceforth she becomes the wife of the deity in the sense that she
formally and solemnly dedicates the rest of her life to his service with
the same constancy and devotion that a faithful wife united in holy
matrimony shows to her wedded lord. The life of a _Dêvadâsî_ bedecked with
all the accomplishments that the muses could give was one of spotless
purity. Even now she is maintained by the temple. She undertakes fasts in
connection with the temple festivals, such as the seven days’ fast for the
_Apamârgam_ ceremony. During the period of this fast, strict continence is
enjoined; she is required to take only one meal, and that within the
temple—in fact to live and behave at least for a term, in the manner
ordained for her throughout life. Some of the details of her daily work
seem interesting; she attends the _Dîpâradhana_, the waving of lighted
lamps in front of the deity at sunset every day; sings hymns in his
praise, dances before his presence, goes round with him in his processions
with lights in hand. After the procession, she sings a song or two from
Jayadêva’s _Gîtagôvinda_ and with a few lullaby hymns, her work for the
night is over. When she grows physically unfit for these duties, she is
formally invalided by a special ceremony, _i.e._ _Tôtuvaikkuka_, or the
laying down of the ear-pendants. It is gone through at the Maha Raja’s
palace, whereafter she becomes a _Tâikkizhavi_ (old mother), entitled only
to a subsistence-allowance. When she dies, the temple contributes to the
funeral expenses. On her death-bed, the priest attends and after a few
ceremonies immediately after death, gets her bathed with
saffron-powder.”(202)

§ 3. Sacred Men and Women in West Africa.

(M48) Still more instructive for our present purpose are the West African
customs. Among the Ewe-speaking peoples of the Slave Coast “recruits for
the priesthood are obtained in two ways, viz. by the affiliation of young
persons, and by the direct consecration of adults. Young people of either
sex dedicated or affiliated to a god are termed _kosio_, from _kono_,
‘unfruitful,’ because a child dedicated to a god passes into his service
and is practically lost to his parents, and _si_, ‘to run away.’ As the
females become the ‘wives’ of the god to whom they are dedicated, the
termination _si_ in _võdu-si_ [another name for these dedicated women],
has been translated ‘wife’ by some Europeans; but it is never used in the
general acceptation of that term, being entirely restricted to persons
consecrated to the gods. The chief business of the female _kosi_ is
prostitution, and in every town there is at least one institution in which
the best-looking girls, between ten and twelve years of age, are received.
Here they remain for three years, learning the chants and dances peculiar
to the worship of the gods, and prostituting themselves to the priests and
the inmates of the male seminaries; and at the termination of their
novitiate they become public prostitutes. This condition, however, is not
regarded as one for reproach; they are considered to be married to the
god, and their excesses are supposed to be caused and directed by him.
Properly speaking, their libertinage should be confined to the male
worshippers at the temple of the god, but practically it is
indiscriminate. Children who are born from such unions belong to the
god.”(203) These women are not allowed to marry since they are deemed the
wives of a god.(204)

(M49) Again, in this part of Africa “the female _Kosio_ of Dañh-gbi, or
_Dañh-sio_, that is, the wives, priestesses, and temple prostitutes of
Dañh-gbi, the python-god, have their own organization. Generally they live
together in a group of houses or huts inclosed by a fence, and in these
inclosures the novices undergo their three years of initiation. Most new
members are obtained by the affiliation of young girls; but any woman
whatever, married or single, slave or free, by publicly simulating
possession, and uttering the conventional cries recognized as indicative
of possession by the god, can at once join the body, and be admitted to
the habitations of the order. The person of a woman who has joined in this
manner is inviolable, and during the period of her novitiate she is
forbidden, if single, to enter the house of her parents, and, if married,
that of her husband. This inviolability, while it gives women
opportunities of gratifying an illicit passion, at the same time serves
occasionally to save the persecuted slave, or neglected wife, from the
ill-treatment of the lord and master; for she has only to go through the
conventional form of possession and an asylum is assured.”(205) The
python-god marries these women secretly in his temple, and they father
their offspring on him; but it is the priests who consummate the
union.(206)

(M50) For our purpose it is important to note that a close connexion is
apparently supposed to exist between the fertility of the soil and the
marriage of these women to the serpent. For the time when new brides are
sought for the reptile-god is the season when the millet is beginning to
sprout. Then the old priestesses, armed with clubs, run frantically
through the streets shrieking like mad women and carrying off to be brides
of the serpent any little girls between the ages of eight and twelve whom
they may find outside of the houses. Pious people at such times will
sometimes leave their daughters at their doors on purpose that they may
have the honour of being dedicated to the god.(207) The marriage of wives
to the serpent-god is probably deemed necessary to enable him to discharge
the important function of making the crops to grow and the cattle to
multiply; for we read that these people “invoke the snake in excessively
wet, dry, or barren seasons; on all occasions relating to their government
and the preservation of their cattle; or rather, in one word, in all
necessities and difficulties, in which they do not apply to their new
batch of gods.”(208) Once in a bad season the Dutch factor Bosman found
the King of Whydah in a great rage. His Majesty explained the reason of
his discomposure by saying “that that year he had sent much larger
offerings to the snake-house than usual, in order to obtain a good crop;
and that one of his vice-roys (whom he shewed me) had desired him afresh,
in the name of the priests, who threatened a barren year, to send yet
more. To which he answered that he did not intend to make any further
offerings this year; and if the snake would not bestow a plentiful harvest
on them, he might let it alone; for (said he) I cannot be more damaged
thereby, the greatest part of my corn being already rotten in the
field.”(209)

(M51) The Akikuyu of British East Africa “have a custom which reminds one
of the West African python-god and his wives. At intervals of, I believe,
several years the medicine-men order huts to be built for the purpose of
worshipping a river snake. The snake-god requires wives, and women or more
especially girls go to the huts. Here the union is consummated by the
medicine-men. If the number of females who go to the huts voluntarily is
not sufficient, girls are seized and dragged there. I believe the
offspring of such a union is said to be fathered by God (Ngai): at any
rate there are children in Kikuyu who are regarded as the children of
God.”(210)

(M52) Among the negroes of the Slave Coast there are, as we have seen,
male _kosio_ as well as female _kosio_; that is, there are dedicated men
as well as dedicated women, priests as well as priestesses, and the ideas
and customs in regard to them seem to be similar. Like the women, the men
undergo a three years’ novitiate, at the end of which each candidate has
to prove that the god accepts him and finds him worthy of inspiration.
Escorted by a party of priests he goes to a shrine and seats himself on a
stool that belongs to the deity. The priests then anoint his head with a
mystic decoction and invoke the god in a long and wild chorus. During the
singing the youth, if he is acceptable to the deity, trembles violently,
simulates convulsions, foams at the mouth, and dances in a frenzied style,
sometimes for more than an hour. This is the proof that the god has taken
possession of him. After that he has to remain in a temple without
speaking for seven days and nights. At the end of that time, he is brought
out, a priest opens his mouth to show that he may now use his tongue, a
new name is given him, and he is fully ordained.(211) Henceforth he is
regarded as the priest and medium of the deity whom he serves, and the
words which he utters in that morbid state of mental excitement which
passes for divine inspiration, are accepted by the hearers as the very
words of the god spoken by the mouth of the man.(212) Any crime which a
priest committed in a state of frenzy used to remain unpunished, no doubt
because the act was thought to be the act of the god. But this benefit of
clergy was so much abused that under King Gezo the law had to be altered;
and although, while he is still possessed by the god, the inspired
criminal is safe, he is now liable to punishment as soon as the divine
spirit leaves him. Nevertheless on the whole among these people “the
person of a priest or priestess is sacred. Not only must a layman not lay
hands on or insult one; he must be careful not even to knock one by
accident, or jostle against one in the street. The Abbé Bouche
relates(213) that once when he was paying a visit to the chief of Agweh,
one of the wives of the chief was brought into the house by four
priestesses, her face bloody, and her body covered with stripes. She had
been savagely flogged for having accidentally trodden upon the foot of one
of them; and the chief not only dared not give vent to his anger, but had
to give them a bottle of rum as a peace-offering.”(214)

(M53) Among the Tshi-speaking peoples of the Gold Coast, who border on the
Ewe-speaking peoples of the Slave Coast to the west, the customs and
beliefs in regard to the dedicated men and dedicated women, the priests
and priestesses, are very similar. These persons are believed to be from
time to time possessed or inspired by the deity whom they serve; and in
that state they are consulted as oracles. They work themselves up to the
necessary pitch of excitement by dancing to the music of drums; each god
has his special hymn, sung to a special beat of the drum, and accompanied
by a special dance. It is while thus dancing to the drums that the priest
or priestess lets fall the oracular words in a croaking or guttural voice
which the hearers take to be the voice of the god. Hence dancing has an
important place in the education of priests and priestesses; they are
trained in it for months before they may perform in public. These
mouthpieces of the deity are consulted in almost every concern of life and
are handsomely paid for their services.(215) “Priests marry like any other
members of the community, and purchase wives; but priestesses are never
married, nor can any ‘head money’ be paid for a priestess. The reason
appears to be that a priestess belongs to the god she serves, and
therefore cannot become the property of a man, as would be the case if she
married one. This prohibition extends to marriage only, and a priestess is
not debarred from sexual commerce. The children of a priest or priestess
are not ordinarily educated for the priestly profession, one generation
being usually passed over, and the grandchildren selected. Priestesses are
ordinarily most licentious, and custom allows them to gratify their
passions with any man who may chance to take their fancy.”(216) The ranks
of the hereditary priesthood are constantly recruited by persons who
devote themselves or who are devoted by their relations or masters to the
profession. Men, women, and even children can thus become members of the
priesthood. If a mother has lost several of her children by death, she
will not uncommonly vow to devote the next born to the service of the
gods; for in this way she hopes to save the child’s life. So when the
child is born it is set apart for the priesthood, and on arriving at
maturity generally fulfils the vow made by the mother and becomes a priest
or priestess. At the ceremony of ordination the votary has to prove his or
her vocation for the sacred life in the usual way by falling into or
simulating convulsions, dancing frantically to the beat of drums, and
speaking in a hoarse unnatural voice words which are deemed to be the
utterance of the deity temporarily lodged in the body of the man or
woman.(217)

§ 4. Sacred Women in Western Asia.

(M54) Thus in Africa, and sometimes if not regularly in India, the sacred
prostitutes attached to temples are regarded as the wives of the god, and
their excesses are excused on the ground that the women are not
themselves, but that they act under the influence of divine inspiration.
This is in substance the explanation which I have given of the custom of
sacred prostitution as it was practised in antiquity by the peoples of
Western Asia. In their licentious intercourse at the temples the women,
whether maidens or matrons or professional harlots, imitated the
licentious conduct of a great goddess of fertility for the purpose of
ensuring the fruitfulness of fields and trees, of man and beast; and in
discharging this sacred and important function the women were probably
supposed, like their West African sisters, to be actually possessed by the
goddess. The hypothesis at least explains all the facts in a simple and
natural manner; and in assuming that women could be married to gods it
assumes a principle which we know to have been recognized in Babylon,
Assyria, and Egypt.(218) At Babylon a woman regularly slept in the great
bed of Bel or Marduk, which stood in his temple on the summit of a lofty
pyramid; and it was believed that the god chose her from all the women of
Babylon and slept with her in the bed. However, unlike the Indian and West
African wives of gods, this spouse of the Babylonian deity is reported by
Herodotus to have been chaste.(219) Yet we may doubt whether she was so;
for these wives or perhaps paramours of Bel are probably to be identified
with the wives or votaries of Marduk mentioned in the code of Hammurabi,
and we know from the code that female votaries of the gods might be
mothers and married to men.(220) At Babylon the sun-god Shamash as well as
Marduk had human wives formerly dedicated to his service, and they like
the votaries of Marduk might have children.(221) It is significant that a
name for these Babylonian votaries was _ḳadishtu_, which is the same word
as _ḳedesha_, “consecrated woman,” the regular Hebrew word for a temple
harlot.(222) It is true that the law severely punished any disrespect
shown to these sacred women;(223) but the example of West Africa warns us
that a formal respect shown to such persons, even when it is enforced by
severe penalties, need be no proof at all of their virtuous
character.(224) In Egypt a woman used to sleep in the temple of Ammon at
Thebes, and the god was believed to visit her.(225) Egyptian texts often
mention her as “the divine consort,” and in old days she seems to have
usually been the Queen of Egypt herself.(226) But in the time of Strabo,
at the beginning of our era, these consorts or concubines of Ammon, as
they were called, were beautiful young girls of noble birth, who held
office only till puberty. During their term of office they prostituted
themselves freely to any man who took their fancy. After puberty they were
given in marriage, and a ceremony of mourning was performed for them as if
they were dead.(227) When they died in good earnest, their bodies were
laid in special graves.(228)

§ 5. Sacred Men in Western Asia.

(M55) As in West Africa the dedicated women have their counterpart in the
dedicated men, so it was in Western Asia; for there the sacred men
(_ḳedeshim_) clearly corresponded to the sacred women (_ḳedeshoth_), in
other words, the sacred male slaves(229) of the temples were the
complement of the sacred female slaves. And as the characteristic feature
of the dedicated men in West Africa is their supposed possession or
inspiration by the deity, so we may conjecture was it with the sacred male
slaves (the _ḳedeshim_) of Western Asia; they, too, may have been regarded
as temporary or permanent embodiments of the deity, possessed from time to
time by his divine spirit, acting in his name, and speaking with his
voice.(230) At all events we know that this was so at the sanctuary of the
Moon among the Albanians of the Caucasus. The sanctuary owned church lands
of great extent peopled by sacred slaves, and it was ruled by a
high-priest, who ranked next after the king. Many of these slaves were
inspired by the deity and prophesied; and when one of them had been for
some time in this state of divine frenzy, wandering alone in the forest,
the high-priest had him caught, bound with a sacred chain, and maintained
in luxury for a year. Then the poor wretch was led out, anointed with
unguents, and sacrificed with other victims to the Moon. The mode of
sacrifice was this. A man took a sacred spear, and thrust it through the
victim’s side to the heart. As he staggered and fell, the rest observed
him closely and drew omens from the manner of his fall. Then the body was
dragged or carried away to a certain place, where all his fellows stood
upon it by way of purification.(231) In this custom the prophet, or rather
the maniac, was plainly supposed to be moon-struck in the most literal
sense, that is, possessed or inspired by the deity of the Moon, who was
perhaps thought by the Albanians, as by the Phrygians,(232) to be a male
god, since his chosen minister and mouthpiece was a man, not a woman.(233)
It can hardly therefore be deemed improbable that at other sanctuaries of
Western Asia, where sacred men were kept, these ministers of religion
should have discharged a similar prophetic function, even though they did
not share the tragic fate of the moon-struck Albanian prophet. Nor was the
influence of these Asiatic prophets confined to Asia. In Sicily the spark
which kindled the devastating Servile War was struck by a Syrian slave,
who simulated the prophetic ecstasy in order to rouse his fellow-slaves to
arms in the name of the Syrian goddess. To inflame still more his
inflammatory words this ancient Mahdi ingeniously interlarded them with
real fire and smoke, which by a common conjurer’s trick he breathed from
his lips.(234)

(M56) In like manner the Hebrew prophets were believed to be temporarily
possessed and inspired by a divine spirit who spoke through them, just as
a divine spirit is supposed by West African negroes to speak through the
mouth of the dedicated men his priests. Indeed the points of resemblance
between the prophets of Israel and West Africa are close and curious. Like
their black brothers, the Hebrew prophets employed music in order to bring
on the prophetic trance;(235) like them, they received the divine spirit
through the application of a magic oil to their heads;(236) like them,
they were apparently distinguished from common people by certain marks on
the face;(237) and like them they were consulted not merely in great
national emergencies but in the ordinary affairs of everyday life, in
which they were expected to give information and advice for a small fee.
For example, Samuel was consulted about lost asses,(238) just as a Zulu
diviner is consulted about lost cows;(239) and we have seen Elisha acting
as a dowser when water ran short.(240) Indeed, we learn that the old name
for a prophet was a seer,(241) a word which may be understood to imply
that his special function was divination rather than prophecy in the sense
of prediction. Be that as it may, prophecy of the Hebrew type has not been
limited to Israel; it is indeed a phenomenon of almost world-wide
occurrence; in many lands and in many ages the wild, whirling words of
frenzied men and women have been accepted as the utterances of an
indwelling deity.(242) What does distinguish Hebrew prophecy from all
others is that the genius of a few members of the profession wrested this
vulgar but powerful instrument from baser uses, and by wielding it in the
interest of a high morality rendered a service of incalculable value to
humanity. That is indeed the glory of Israel, but it is not the side of
prophecy with which we are here concerned.

(M57) More to our purpose is to note that prophecy of the ordinary sort
appears to have been in vogue at Byblus, the sacred city of Adonis,
centuries before the life-time of the earliest Hebrew prophet whose
writings have come down to us. When the Egyptian traveller, Wen-Ammon, was
lingering in the port of Byblus, under the King’s orders to quit the
place, the spirit of God came on one of the royal pages or henchmen, and
in a prophetic frenzy he announced that the King should receive the
Egyptian stranger as a messenger sent from the god Ammon.(243) The god who
thus took possession of the page and spoke through him was probably
Adonis, the god of the city. With regard to the office of these royal
pages we have no information; but as ministers of a sacred king and liable
to be inspired by the deity, they would naturally be themselves sacred; in
fact they may have belonged to the class of sacred slaves or _ḳedeshim_.
If that was so it would confirm the conclusion to which the foregoing
investigation points, namely, that originally no sharp line of distinction
existed between the prophets and the _ḳedeshim_; both were “men of God,”
as the prophets were constantly called;(244) in other words, they were
inspired mediums, men in whom the god manifested himself from time to time
by word and deed, in short temporary incarnations of the deity. But while
the prophets roved freely about the country, the _ḳedeshim_ appear to have
been regularly attached to a sanctuary; and among the duties which they
performed at the shrines there were clearly some which revolted the
conscience of men imbued with a purer morality. What these duties were, we
may surmise partly from the behaviour of the sons of Eli to the women who
came to the tabernacle,(245) partly from the beliefs and practices as to
“holy men” which survive to this day among the Syrian peasantry.

(M58) Of these “holy men” we are told that “so far as they are not
impostors, they are men whom we would call insane, known among the Syrians
as _mejnûn_, possessed by a _jinn_ or spirit. They often go in filthy
garments, or without clothing. Since they are regarded as intoxicated by
deity, the most dignified men, and of the highest standing among the
Moslems, submit to utter indecent language at their bidding without
rebuke, and ignorant Moslem women do not shrink from their approach,
because in their superstitious belief they attribute to them, as men
possessed by God, a divine authority which they dare not resist. Such an
attitude of compliance may be exceptional, but there are more than rumours
of its existence. These ‘holy men’ differ from the ordinary derwishes whom
travellers so often see in Cairo, and from the ordinary madmen who are
kept in fetters, so that they may not do injury to themselves and others.
But their appearance, and the expressions regarding them, afford some
illustrations of the popular estimate of ancient seers, or prophets, in
the time of Hosea: ‘The prophet is a fool, the man that hath the spirit is
mad’;(246) and in the time of Jeremiah,(247) the man who made himself a
prophet was considered as good as a madman.”(248) To complete the parallel
these vagabonds “are also believed to be possessed of prophetic power, so
that they are able to foretell the future, and warn the people among whom
they live of impending danger.”(249)

(M59) We may conjecture that with women a powerful motive for submitting
to the embraces of the “holy men” is a hope of obtaining offspring by
them. For in Syria it is still believed that even dead saints can beget
children on barren women, who accordingly resort to their shrines in order
to obtain the wish of their hearts. For example, at the Baths of Solomon
in Northern Palestine, blasts of hot air escape from the ground; and one
of them, named Abu Rabah, is a famous resort of childless wives who wish
to satisfy their maternal longings. They let the hot air stream up over
their bodies and really believe that children born to them after such a
visit are begotten by the saint of the shrine.(250) But the saint who
enjoys the highest reputation in this respect is St. George. He reveals
himself at his shrines which are scattered all over the country; at each
of them there is a tomb or the likeness of a tomb. The most celebrated of
these sanctuaries is at Kalat el Hosn in Northern Syria. Barren women of
all sects, including Moslems, resort to it. “There are many natives who
shrug their shoulders when this shrine is mentioned in connection with
women. But it is doubtless true that many do not know what seems to be its
true character, and who think that the most puissant saint, as they
believe, in the world can give them sons.” “But the true character of the
place is beginning to be recognized, so that many Moslems have forbidden
their wives to visit it.”(251)

§ 6. Sons of God.

(M60) Customs like the foregoing may serve to explain the belief, which is
not confined to Syria, that men and women may be in fact and not merely in
metaphor the sons and daughters of a god; for these modern saints, whether
Christian or Moslem, who father the children of Syrian mothers, are
nothing but the old gods under a thin disguise. If in antiquity as at the
present day Semitic women often repaired to shrines in order to have the
reproach of barrenness removed from them—and the prayer of Hannah is a
familiar example of the practice,(252) we could easily understand not only
the tradition of the sons of God who begat children on the daughters of
men,(253) but also the exceedingly common occurrence of the divine titles
in Hebrew names of human beings.(254) Multitudes of men and women, in
fact, whose mothers had resorted to holy places in order to procure
offspring, would be regarded as the actual children of the god and would
be named accordingly. Hence Hannah called her infant Samuel, which means
“name of God” or “his name is God”;(255) and probably she sincerely
believed that the child was actually begotten in her womb by the
deity.(256) The dedication of such children to the service of God at the
sanctuary was merely giving back the divine son to the divine father.
Similarly in West Africa, when a woman has got a child at the shrine of
Agbasia, the god who alone bestows offspring on women, she dedicates him
or her as a sacred slave to the deity.(257)

(M61) Thus in the Syrian beliefs and customs of to-day we probably have
the clue to the religious prostitution practised in the very same regions
in antiquity. Then as now women looked to the local god, the Baal or
Adonis of old, the Abu Rabah or St. George of to-day, to satisfy the
natural craving of a woman’s heart; and then as now, apparently, the part
of the local god was played by sacred men, who in personating him may
often have sincerely believed that they were acting under divine
inspiration, and that the functions which they discharged were necessary
for the fertility of the land as well as for the propagation of the human
species. The purifying influence of Christianity and Mohammedanism has
restricted such customs within narrow limits; even under Turkish rule they
are now only carried on in holes and corners. Yet if the practice has
dwindled, the principle which it embodies appears to be fundamentally the
same; it is a desire for the continuance of the species, and a belief that
an object so natural and legitimate can be accomplished by divine power
manifesting itself in the bodies of men and women.

(M62) The belief in the physical fatherhood of God has not been confined
to Syria in ancient and modern times. Elsewhere many men have been counted
the sons of God in the most literal sense of the word, being supposed to
have been begotten by his holy spirit in the wombs of mortal women. Here I
shall merely illustrate the creed by a few examples drawn from classical
antiquity.(258) Thus in order to obtain offspring women used to resort to
the great sanctuary of Aesculapius, situated in a beautiful upland valley,
to which a path, winding through a long wooded gorge, leads from the bay
of Epidaurus. Here the women slept in the holy place and were visited in
dreams by a serpent; and the children to whom they afterwards gave birth
were believed to have been begotten by the reptile.(259) That the serpent
was supposed to be the god himself seems certain; for Aesculapius
repeatedly appeared in the form of a serpent,(260) and live serpents were
kept and fed in his sanctuaries for the healing of the sick, being no
doubt regarded as his incarnations.(261) Hence the children born to women
who had thus visited a sanctuary of Aesculapius were probably fathered on
the serpent-god. Many celebrated men in classical antiquity were thus
promoted to the heavenly hierarchy by similar legends of a miraculous
birth. The famous Aratus of Sicyon was certainly believed by his
countrymen to be a son of Aesculapius; his mother is said to have got him
in intercourse with a serpent.(262) Probably she slept either in the
shrine of Aesculapius at Sicyon, where a figurine of her was shown seated
on a serpent,(263) or perhaps in the more secluded sanctuary of the god at
Titane, not many miles off, where the sacred serpents crawled among
ancient cypresses on the hill-top which overlooks the narrow green valley
of the Asopus with the white turbid river rushing in its depths.(264)
There, under the shadow of the cypresses, with the murmur of the Asopus in
her ears, the mother of Aratus may have conceived, or fancied she
conceived, the future deliverer of his country. Again, the mother of
Augustus is said to have got him by intercourse with a serpent in a temple
of Apollo; hence the emperor was reputed to be the son of that god.(265)
Similar tales were told of the Messenian hero Aristomenes, Alexander the
Great, and the elder Scipio: all of them were reported to have been
begotten by snakes.(266) In the time of Herod a serpent, according to
Aelian, in like manner made love to a Judean maid.(267) Can the story be a
distorted rumour of the parentage of Christ?

(M63) In India even stone serpents are credited with a power of bestowing
offspring on women. Thus the Komatis of Mysore “worship _Nága_ or the
serpent god. This worship is generally confined to women and is carried on
on a large scale once a year on the fifth day of the bright fortnight of
Srávana (July and August). The representations of serpents are cut in
stone slabs and are set up round an _Asvattha_ tree on a platform, on
which is also generally planted a margosa tree. These snakes in stones are
set up in performance of vows and are said to be specially efficacious in
curing bad sores and other skin diseases and in giving children. The women
go to such places for worship with milk, fruits, and flowers on the
prescribed day which is observed as a feast day.” They wash the stones,
smear them with turmeric, and offer them curds and fruits. Sometimes they
search out the dens of serpents and pour milk into the holes for the live
reptiles.(268)

§ 7. Reincarnation of the Dead.

(M64) The reason why snakes were so often supposed to be the fathers of
human beings is probably to be found in the common belief that the dead
come to life and revisit their old homes in the shape of serpents.

This notion is widely spread in Africa, especially among tribes of the
Bantu stock. It is held, for example, by the Zulus, the Thonga, and other
Caffre tribes of South Africa;(269) by the Ngoni of British Central
Africa;(270) by the Wabondei,(271) the Masai,(272) the Suk,(273) the
Nandi,(274) and the Akikuyu of German and British East Africa;(275) and by
the Dinkas of the Upper Nile.(276) It prevails also among the Betsileo and
other tribes of Madagascar.(277) Among the Iban or Sea Dyaks of Borneo a
man’s guardian spirit (_Tua_) “has its external manifestation in a snake,
a leopard or some other denizen of the forest. It is supposed to be the
spirit of some ancestor renowned for bravery or some other virtue who at
death has taken an animal form. It is a custom among the Iban when a
person of note in the tribe dies, not to bury the body but to place it on
a neighbouring hill or in some solitary spot above ground. A quantity of
food is taken to the place every day, and if after a few days the body
disappears, the deceased is said to have become a _Tua_ or guardian
spirit. People who have been suffering from some chronic complaint often
go to such a tomb, taking with them an offering to the soul of the
deceased to obtain his help. To such it is revealed in a dream what animal
form the honoured dead has taken. The most frequent form is that of a
snake. Thus when a snake is found in a Dyak house it is seldom killed or
driven away; food is offered to it, for it is a guardian spirit who has
come to inquire after the welfare of its clients and bring them good luck.
Anything that may be found in the mouth of such a snake is taken and kept
as a charm.”(278) Similarly in Kiriwina, an island of the Trobriands
Group, to the east of New Guinea, “the natives regarded the snake as one
of their ancestral chiefs, or rather as the abode of his spirit, and when
one was seen in a house it was believed that the chief was paying a visit
to his old home. The natives considered this as an ill omen and so always
tried to persuade the animal to depart as soon as possible. The honours of
a chief were paid to the snake: the natives passed it in a crouching
posture, and as they did so, saluted it as a chief of high rank. Native
property was presented to it as an appeasing gift, accompanied by prayers
that it would not do them any harm, but would go away quickly. They dared
not kill the snake, for its death would bring disease and death upon those
who did so.”(279)

(M65) Where serpents are thus viewed as ancestors come to life, the people
naturally treat them with great respect and often feed them with milk,
perhaps because milk is the food of human babes and the reptiles are
treated as human beings in embryo, who can be born again from women. Thus
“the Zulu-Caffres imagine that their ancestors generally visit them under
the form of serpents. As soon, therefore, as one of these reptiles appears
near their dwellings, they hasten to salute it by the name of _father_,
place bowls of milk in its way, and turn it back gently, and with the
greatest respect.”(280) Among the Masai of East Africa, “when a
medicine-man or a rich person dies and is buried, his soul turns into a
snake as soon as his body rots; and the snake goes to his children’s kraal
to look after them. The Masai in consequence do not kill their sacred
snakes, and if a woman sees one in her hut, she pours some milk on the
ground for it to lick, after which it will go away.”(281) Among the Nandi
of British East Africa, “if a snake goes on to the woman’s bed, it may not
be killed, as it is believed that it personifies the spirit of a deceased
ancestor or relation, and that it has been sent to intimate to the woman
that her next child will be born safely. Milk is put on the ground for it
to drink, and the man or his wife says: ‘... If thou wantest the call,
come, thou art being called.’ It is then allowed to leave the house. If a
snake enters the houses of old people they give it milk, and say: ‘If thou
wantest the call, go to the huts of the children,’ and they drive it
away.”(282) This association of the serpent, regarded as an incarnation of
the dead, both with the marriage bed and with the huts of young people,
points to a belief that the deceased person who is incarnate in the snake
may be born again as a human child into the world. Again, among the Suk of
British East Africa “it seems to be generally believed that a man’s spirit
passes into a snake at death. If a snake enters a house, the spirit of the
dead man is believed to be very hungry. Milk is poured on to its tracks,
and a little meat and tobacco placed on the ground for it to eat. It is
believed that if no food is given to the snake one or all of the members
of the household will die. It, however, may none the less be killed if
encountered outside the house, and if at the time of its death it is
inhabited by the spirit of a dead man, ‘that spirit dies also.’ ”(283) The
Akikuyu of British East Africa, who similarly believe that snakes are
_ngoma_ or spirits of the departed, “do not kill a snake but pour out
honey and milk for it to drink, which they say it licks up and then goes
its way. If a man causes the death of a snake he must without delay summon
the senior Elders in the village and slaughter a sheep, which they eat and
cut a _rukwaru_ from the skin of its right shoulder for the offender to
wear on his right wrist; if this ceremony is neglected he, his wife and
his children will die.”(284) Among the Baganda the python god Selwanga had
his temple on the shore of the lake Victoria Nyanza, where he dwelt in the
form of a live python. The temple was a hut of the ordinary conical shape
with a round hole in the wall, through which the sinuous deity crawled out
and in at his pleasure. A woman lived in the temple, and it was her duty
to feed the python daily with fresh milk from a wooden bowl, which she
held out to the divine reptile while he drained it. The serpent was
thought to be the giver of children; hence young couples living in the
neighbourhood always came to the shrine to ensure the blessing of the god
on their union, and childless women repaired from long distances to be
relieved by him from the curse of barrenness.(285) It is not said that
this python god embodied the soul of a dead ancestor, but it may have been
so; his power of bestowing offspring on women suggests it.

(M66) The Romans and Greeks appear to have also believed that the souls of
the dead were incarnate in the bodies of serpents. Among the Romans the
regular symbol of the _genius_ or guardian spirit of every man was a
serpent,(286) and in Roman houses serpents were lodged and fed in such
numbers that if their swarms had not been sometimes reduced by
conflagrations there would have been no living for them.(287) In Greek
legend Cadmus and his wife Harmonia were turned at death into snakes.(288)
When the Spartan king Cleomenes was slain and crucified in Egypt, a great
serpent coiled round his head on the cross and kept off the vultures from
his face. The people regarded the prodigy as a proof that Cleomenes was a
son of the gods.(289) Again, when Plotinus lay dying, a snake crawled from
under his bed and disappeared into a hole in the wall, and at the same
moment the philosopher expired.(290) Apparently superstition saw in these
serpents the souls of the dead men. In Greek religion the serpent was
indeed the regular symbol or attribute of the worshipful dead,(291) and we
can hardly doubt that the early Greeks, like the Zulus and other African
tribes at the present day, really believed the soul of the departed to be
lodged in the reptile. The sacred serpent which lived in the Erechtheum at
Athens, and was fed with honey-cakes once a month, may have been supposed
to house the soul of the dead king Erechtheus, who had reigned in his
lifetime on the same spot.(292) Perhaps the libations of milk which the
Greeks poured upon graves(293) were intended to be drunk by serpents as
the embodiments of the deceased; on two tombstones found at Tegea a man
and a woman are respectively represented holding out to a serpent a cup
which may be supposed to contain milk.(294) We have seen that various
African tribes feed serpents with milk because they imagine the reptiles
to be incarnations of their dead kinsfolk;(295) and the Dinkas, who
practise the custom, also pour milk on the graves of their friends for
some time after the burial.(296) It is possible that a common type in
Greek art, which exhibits a woman feeding a serpent out of a saucer, may
have been borrowed from a practice of thus ministering to the souls of the
departed.(297)

(M67) Further, at the sowing festival of the Thesmophoria, held by Greek
women in October, it was customary to throw cakes and pigs to serpents,
which lived in caverns or vaults sacred to the corn-goddess Demeter.(298)
We may guess that the serpents thus propitiated were deemed to be
incarnations of dead men and women, who might easily be incommoded in
their earthy beds by the operations of husbandry. What indeed could be
more disturbing than to have the roof of the narrow house shaken and rent
over their heads by clumsy oxen dragging a plough up and down on the top
of it? No wonder that at such times it was thought desirable to appease
them with offerings. Sometimes, however, it is not the dead but the Earth
Goddess herself who is disturbed by the husbandman. An Indian prophet at
Priest Rapids, on the Middle Columbia River, dissuaded his many followers
from tilling the ground because “it is a sin to wound or cut, tear up or
scratch our common mother by agricultural pursuits.”(299) “You ask me,”
said this Indian sage, “to plough the ground. Shall I take a knife and
tear my mother’s bosom? You ask me to dig for stone. Shall I dig under her
skin for her bones? You ask me to cut grass and hay and sell it and be
rich like white men. But how dare I cut off my mother’s hair?”(300) The
Baigas, a primitive Dravidian tribe of the Central Provinces in India,
used to practise a fitful and migratory agriculture, burning down patches
of jungle and sowing seed in the soil fertilized by the ashes after the
breaking of the rains. “One explanation of their refusal to till the
ground is that they consider it a sin to lacerate the breast of their
mother earth with a ploughshare.”(301) In China the disturbance caused to
the earth-spirits by the operations of digging and ploughing was so very
serious that Chinese philosophy appears to have contemplated a plan for
allowing the perturbed spirits a close time by forbidding the farmer to
put his spade or his plough into the ground except on certain days, when
the earth-spirits were either not at home or kindly consented to put up
with some temporary inconvenience for the good of man. This we may infer
from a passage in a Chinese author who wrote in the first century of our
era. “If it is true,” he says, “that the spirits who inhabit the soil
object to it being disturbed and dug up, then it is proper for us to
select special good days for digging ditches and ploughing our fields.
(But this is never done); it therefore follows that the spirits of the
soil, even though really annoyed when it is disturbed, pass over such an
offence if man commits it without evil intent. As he commits it merely to
ensure his rest and comfort, the act cannot possibly excite any anger
against him in the perfect heart of those spirits; and this being the
case, they will not visit him with misfortune even if he do not choose
auspicious days for it. But if we believe that the earth-spirits cannot
excuse man on account of the object he pursues, and detest him for
annoying them by disturbing the ground, what advantage then can he derive
from selecting proper days for doing so?”(302) What advantage indeed? In
that case the only logical conclusion is, with the Indian prophet, to
forbid agriculture altogether, as an impious encroachment on the spiritual
world. Few peoples, however, who have once contracted the habit of
agriculture are willing to renounce it out of a regard for the higher
powers; the utmost concession which they are willing to make to religion
in the matter is to prohibit agricultural operations at certain times and
seasons, when the exercise of them would be more than usually painful to
the earth-spirits. Thus in Bengal the chief festival in honour of Mother
Earth is held at the end of the hot season, when she is supposed to suffer
from the impurity common to women, and during that time all ploughing,
sowing, and other work cease.(303) On a certain day of the year, when
offerings are made to the Earth, the Ewe farmer of West Africa will not
hoe the ground, and the Ewe weaver will not drive a sharp stake into it,
“because the hoe and the stake would wound the Earth and cause her
pain.”(304) When Ratumaimbulu, the god who made fruit-trees to blossom and
bear fruit, came once a year to Fiji, the people had to live very quietly
for a month lest they should disturb him at his important work. During
this time they might not plant nor build nor sail about nor go to war;
indeed most kinds of work were forbidden. The priests announced the time
of the god’s arrival and departure.(305) These periods of rest and quiet
would seem to be the Indian and Fijian Lent.

(M68) Thus behind the Greek notion that women may conceive by a
serpent-god(306) seems to lie the belief that they can conceive by the
dead in the form of serpents. If such a belief was ever held, it would be
natural that barren women should resort to graves in order to have their
wombs quickened, and this may explain why they visited the shrine of the
serpent-god Aesculapius for that purpose; the shrine was perhaps at first
a grave. It is significant that in Syria the shrines of St. George, to
which childless women go to get offspring, always include a tomb or the
likeness of one;(307) and further, that in the opinion of Syrian peasants
at the present day women may, without intercourse with a living man, bear
children to a dead husband, a dead saint, or a jinnee.(308) In the East
Indies also it is still commonly believed that spirits can consort with
women and beget children on them. The Olo Ngadjoe of Borneo imagine that
albinoes are the offspring of the spirit of the moon by mortal women, the
pallid hue of the human children naturally reflecting the pallor of their
heavenly father.(309)

(M69) Such beliefs are closely akin to the idea, entertained by many
peoples, that the souls of the dead may pass directly into the wombs of
women and be born again as infants. Thus the Hurons used to bury little
children beside the paths in the hope that their souls might enter the
passing squaws and be born again;(310) and similarly some negroes of West
Africa throw the bodies of infants into the bush in order that their souls
may choose a new mother from the women who pass by.(311) Among the tribes
of the Lower Congo “a baby is always buried near the house of its mother,
never in the bush. They think that, if the child is not buried near its
mother’s house, she will be unlucky and never have any more children.” The
notion probably is that the dead child, buried near its mother’s house,
will enter into her womb and be born again, for these people believe in
the reincarnation of the dead. They think that “the only new thing about a
child is its body. The spirit is old and formerly belonged to some
deceased person, or it may have the spirit of some living person.” For
example, if a child is like its mother, father, or uncle, they imagine
that it must have the spirit of the relative whom it resembles, and that
therefore the person whose soul has thus been abstracted by the infant
will soon die.(312) Among the Bangalas, a tribe of cannibals in Equatorial
Africa, to the north of the Congo, a woman was one day seen digging a hole
in the public road. Her husband entreated a Belgian officer to let her
alone, promising to mend the road afterwards, and explaining that his wife
wished to become a mother. The good-natured officer complied with his
request and watched the woman. She continued to dig till she had uncovered
a little skeleton, the remains of her first-born, which she tenderly
embraced, humbly entreating the dead child to enter into her and give her
again a mother’s joy. The officer rightly did not smile.(313) The Bagishu,
a Bantu tribe of Mount Elgon, in the Uganda Protectorate, practise the
custom of throwing out their dead “except in the case of the youngest
child or the old grandfather or grandmother, for whom, like the child, a
prolonged life on earth is desired.... When it is desired to perpetuate on
the earth the life of some old man or woman, or that of some young baby,
the corpse is buried inside the house or just under the eaves, until
another child is born to the nearest relation of the corpse. This child,
male or female, takes the name of the corpse, and the Bagishu firmly
believe that the spirit of the dead has passed into this new child and
lives again on earth. The remains are then dug up and thrown out into the
open.”(314)

(M70) Again, just as measures are adopted to facilitate the rebirth of
good ghosts, so on the other hand precautions are taken to prevent the
rebirth of bad ones. Thus, with regard to the Baganda of Central Africa we
read that, “while the present generation know the cause of pregnancy, the
people in the earlier times were uncertain as to its real cause, and
thought that it was possible to conceive without any intercourse with the
male sex. Hence their precautions in passing places where either a suicide
had been burnt, or a child born feet first had been buried. Women were
careful to throw grass or sticks on such a spot, for by so doing they
thought that they could prevent the ghost of the dead from entering into
them, and being reborn.”(315) The fear of being got with child by such
ghosts was not confined to married women, it was shared by all women
alike, whether young or old, whether married or single; and all of them
sought to avert the danger in the same way.(316) And Baganda women
imagined that without the help of the other sex they could be impregnated
not only by these unpleasant ghosts but also by the flower of the banana.
If while a woman was busy in her garden under the shadow of the banana
trees, a great purple bloom chanced to fall from one of the trees on her
back or shoulders, it was quite enough, in the opinion of the Baganda, to
get her with child; and were a wife accused of adultery because she gave
birth to a child who could not possibly have been begotten by her husband,
she had only to father the infant on a banana flower to be honourably
acquitted of the charge. The reason why this remarkable property was
ascribed to the bloom of the banana would seem to be that ghosts of
ancestors were thought to haunt banana groves, and that the afterbirths of
children, which the Baganda regarded as twins of the children, were
commonly buried at the root of the trees.(317) What more natural than that
a ghost should lurk in each flower, and dropping adroitly in the likeness
of a blossom on a woman’s back effect a lodgment in her womb?

(M71) Again, when a child dies in Northern India it is usually buried
under the threshold of the house, “in the belief that as the parents tread
daily over its grave, its soul will be reborn in the family. Here, as Mr.
Rose suggests, we reach an explanation of the rule that children of Hindus
are buried, not cremated. Their souls do not pass into the ether with the
smoke of the pyre, but remain on earth to be reincarnated in the
household.”(318) In the Punjaub this belief in the reincarnation of dead
infants gives rise to some quaint or pathetic customs. Thus, “in the
Hissar District, Bishnois bury dead infants at the threshold, in the
belief that it would facilitate the return of the soul to the mother. The
practice is also in vogue in the Kangra District, where the body is buried
in front of the back door. In some places it is believed that, if the
child dies in infancy and the mother drops her milk for two or three days
on the ground, the soul of the child comes back to be born again. For this
purpose milk diluted with water is placed in a small earthen pot and
offered to the dead child’s spirit for three consecutive evenings. There
is also a belief in the Ambala and Gujrat Districts that if jackals and
dogs dig out the dead body of the child and bring it towards the town or
village, it means that the child will return to its mother, but if they
take it to some other side, the soul will reincarnate in some other
family. For this purpose, the second day after the infant’s death, the
mother goes out early in the morning to see whether the dogs have brought
the body towards the village. When the child is being taken away for
burial the mother cuts off and preserves a piece of its garment with a
view to persuade the soul to return to her. Barren women or those who have
lost children in infancy tear a piece off the clothing of a dead child and
stitch it to their wearing apparel, believing that the soul of the child
will return to them instead of its own mother. On this account, people
take great care not to lose the clothes of dead children, and some bury
them in the house.”(319) In Bilaspore “a still-born child, or one who has
passed away before the _Chhatti_ (the sixth day, the day of purification)
is not taken out of the house for burial, but is placed in an earthen
vessel and is buried in the doorway or in the yard of the house. Some say
that this is done in order that the mother may bear another child.”(320)
Here in Bilaspore the people have devised a very simple way of identifying
a dead person when he or she is born again as an infant. When anybody
dies, they mark the body with soot or oil, and the next baby born in the
family with a similar mark is hailed as the departed come to life
again.(321) Among the Kois of the Godavari district, in Southern India,
the dead are usually burnt, but the bodies of children and of young men
and women are buried. If a child dies within a month of its birth, it is
generally buried close to the house “so that the rain, dripping from the
eaves, may fall upon the grave, and thereby cause the parents to be
blessed with another child.”(322) Apparently it is supposed that the soul
of the dead child, refreshed and revived by the rain, will pass again into
the mother’s womb. Indian criminal records contain many cases in which
“the ceremonial killing of a male child has been performed as a cure for
barrenness, the theory being that the soul of the murdered boy becomes
reincarnated in the woman, who performs the rite with a desire to secure
offspring. Usually she effects union with the spirit of the child by
bathing over its body or in the water in which the corpse has been washed.
Cases have recently occurred in which the woman actually bathed in the
blood of the child.”(323)

(M72) On the fifth day after a death the Gonds perform the ceremony of
bringing back the soul. They go to the bank of a river, call aloud the
name of the deceased, and entering the water catch a fish or an insect.
This creature they then take home and place among the sainted dead of the
family, supposing that in this manner the spirit of the departed has been
brought back to the house. Sometimes the fish or insect is eaten in the
belief that it will be thus reborn as a child.(324) This last custom
explains the widely diffused story of virgins who have conceived by eating
of a plant or an animal or merely by taking it to their bosom.(325) In all
such cases we may surmise that the plant or animal was thought to contain
the soul of a dead person, which thus passed into the virgin’s womb and
was born again as an infant. Among the South Slavs childless women often
resort to a grave in which a pregnant woman is buried. There they bite
some grass from the grave, invoke the deceased by name, and beg her to
give them the fruit of her womb. After that they take a little of the
mould from the grave and carry it about with them thenceforth under their
girdle.(326) Apparently they imagine that the soul of the unborn infant is
in the grass or the mould and will pass from it into their body.

(M73) Among the Kai of German New Guinea, “impossible as it may be
thought, it is yet a fact that women here and there deny in all
seriousness the connexion between sexual intercourse and pregnancy. Of
course most people are clear as to the process. The ignorance of some
individuals is perhaps based on the consideration that not uncommonly
married women remain childless for years or for life. Finally, the
animistic faith contributes its share to support the ignorance.”(327) In
some islands of Southern Melanesia the natives appear similarly to believe
that sexual intercourse is not necessary to impregnation, and that a woman
can conceive through the simple passage into her womb of a spirit-animal
or a spirit-fruit without the help of a man. In the island of Mota, one of
the Banks’ group, “the course of events is usually as follows: a woman
sitting down in her garden or in the bush or on the shore finds an animal
or fruit in her loincloth. She takes it up and carries it to the village,
where she asks the meaning of the appearance. The people say that she will
give birth to a child who will have the characters of this animal or even,
it appeared, would be himself or herself the animal. The woman then takes
the creature back to the place where she had found it and places it in its
proper home; if it is a land animal on the land; if a water animal in the
pool or stream from which it had probably come. She builds up a wall round
it and goes to feed and visit it every day. After a time the animal will
disappear, and it is believed that that is because the animal has at the
time of its disappearance entered into the woman. It seemed quite clear
that there was no belief in physical impregnation on the part of the
animal, nor of the entry of a material object in the form of the animal
into her womb, but so far as I could gather, an animal found in this way
was regarded as more or less supernatural, a spirit animal and not one
material, from the beginning. It has happened in the memory of an old man
now living in Mota that a woman who has found an animal in her loincloth
has carried it carefully in her closed hands to the village, but that when
she opened her hands to show it to the people, the animal has gone, and in
this case it was believed that the entry had taken place while the woman
was on her way from the bush to the village.... When the child is born it
is regarded as being in some sense the animal or fruit which had been
found and tended by the mother. The child may not eat the animal during
the whole of its life, and if it does so, will suffer serious illness, if
not death. If it is a fruit which has been found, the child may not eat
this fruit or touch the tree on which it grows, the latter restriction
remaining in those cases in which the fruit is inedible.... I inquired
into the idea at the bottom of the prohibition of the animal as food, and
it appeared to be that the person would be eating himself. It seemed that
the act would be regarded as a kind of cannibalism. It was evident that
there is a belief in the most intimate relation between the person and all
individuals of the species with which he is identified.

“A further aspect of the belief in the animal nature of a child is that it
partakes of the physical and mental characters of the animal with which it
is identified. Thus, if the animal found has been a sea-snake, and this is
a frequent occurrence, the child would be weak, indolent and slow; if an
eel, there will be a similar disposition; if a hermit crab, the child will
be hot-tempered; if a flying fox, it will also be hot-tempered and the
body will be dark; if a brush turkey, the disposition will be good; if a
lizard, the child will be soft and gentle; if a rat, thoughtless, hasty
and intemperate. If the object found has been a fruit, here also the child
will partake of its nature. In the case of a wild Malay apple
(_malmalagaviga_) the child will have a big belly, and a person with this
condition will be asked, ‘Do you come from the _malmalagaviga_?’ Again, if
the fruit is one called _womarakaraqat_, the child will have a good
disposition.

(M74) “In the island of Motlav not far from Mota they have the same belief
that if a mother has found an animal in her dress, the child will be
identified with that animal and will not be allowed to eat it. Here again
the child is believed to have the characters of the animal, and two
instances given were that a child identified with a yellow crab will have
a good disposition and be of a light colour, while if a hermit crab has
been found, the child will be angry and disagreeable. In this island a
woman who desires her child to have certain characters will frequent a
place where she will be likely to encounter the animal which causes the
appearance of these characters. Thus, if she wants to have a light
coloured child, she will go to a place where there are light coloured
crabs.”(328)

(M75) Throughout a large part of Australia, particularly in the Centre,
the North, and the West, the aborigines hold that the commerce of the
human sexes is not necessary to the production of children; indeed many of
them go further and deny that sexual intercourse is the real cause of the
propagation of the species. Among the Arunta, Kaitish, Luritcha, Ilpirra
and other tribes, who roam the barren steppes of Central Australia, it
appears to be a universal article of belief that every person is the
reincarnation of a deceased ancestor, and that the souls of the dead pass
directly into the wombs of women, who give them birth without the need of
commerce with the other sex. They think that the spirits of the departed
gather and dwell at particular spots, marked by a natural feature such as
a rock or a tree, and that from these lurking-places they dart out and
enter the bodies of passing women or girls. When a woman feels her womb
quickened, she knows that a spirit has made its way into her from the
nearest abode of the dead. This is their regular explanation of conception
and childbirth. “The natives, one and all in these tribes, believe that
the child is the direct result of the entrance into the mother of an
ancestral spirit individual. They have no idea of procreation as being
associated with sexual intercourse, and firmly believe that children can
be born without this taking place.”(329) The spots where the souls thus
congregate waiting to be born again are usually the places where the
remote ancestors of the dream-time are said to have passed into the
ground; that is, they are the places where the forefathers of the tribe
are supposed to have died or to have been buried. For example, in the
Warramunga tribe the ancestor of the Black-snake clan is said to have left
many spirits of Black-snake children in the rocks and trees which border a
certain creek. Hence no woman at the present day dares to strike one of
these trees with an axe, being quite convinced that the blow would release
one of the spirit-children, who would at once enter her body. They imagine
that the spirit is no larger than a grain of sand, and that it enters the
woman through her navel and grows into a child in her womb.(330) Again, at
several places in the wide territory of the Arunta tribe there are certain
stones which are in like manner thought to be the abode of souls awaiting
rebirth. Hence the stones are called “child-stones.” In one of them there
is a hole through which the spirit-children look out for passing women,
and it is firmly believed that a visit to the stone would result in
conception. If a young woman is obliged to pass near the stone and does
not wish to have a child, she will carefully disguise her youth, pulling a
wry face and hobbling along on a stick. She will bend herself double like
a very old woman, and imitating the cracked voice of age she will say,
“Don’t come to me, I am an old woman.” Nay, it is thought that women may
conceive by the stone without visiting it. If a man and his wife both wish
for a child, the husband will tie his hair-girdle round the stone, rub it,
and mutter a direction to the spirits to give heed to his wife. And it is
believed that by performing a similar ceremony a malicious man can cause
women and even children at a distance to be pregnant.(331)

(M76) Such beliefs are not confined to the tribes of Central Australia but
prevail among all the tribes from Lake Eyre northwards to the sea and the
Gulf of Carpentaria.(332) Thus the Mungarai say that in the far past time
their old ancestors walked about the country, making all the natural
features of the landscape and leaving spirit-children behind them where
they stopped. These children emanated from the bodies of the ancestors,
and they still wait at various spots looking out for women into whom they
may go and be born. For example, near McMinn’s bar on the Roper River
there is a large gum tree full of spirit-children, who all belong to one
particular totem and are always agog to enter into women of that totem.
Again, at Crescent Lagoon an ancestor, who belonged to the thunder totem,
deposited numbers of spirit-children; and if a woman of the Gnaritjbellan
subclass so much as dips her foot in the water, one of the spirit-children
passes up her leg and into her body and in due time is born as a child,
who has thunder for its totem. Or if the woman stoops and drinks water,
one of the sprites will enter her through the mouth. Again, there are
lagoons along the Roper River where red lilies grow; and the water is full
of spirit-children which were deposited there by a kangaroo man. So when
women of the Gnaritjbellan subclass wade into the water to gather lilies,
little sprites swarm up their legs and are born as kangaroo children.
Again, in the territory of the Nullakun tribe there is a certain spring
where a man once deposited spirit-children of the rainbow totem; and to
this day when a woman of the right totem comes to drink at the spring, the
spirit of a rainbow child will dart into her and be born. Once more, in
the territory of the Yungman tribe the trees and stones near Elsey Creek
are full of spirit-children who belong to the sugar-bag (honeycomb) totem;
and these sugar-bag children are constantly entering into the right women
and being born into the world.(333)

(M77) The natives of the Tully River in Queensland do not recognize sexual
intercourse as a cause of conception in women, though curiously enough
they do recognize it as the cause of conception in all animals, and pride
themselves on their superiority to the brutes in that they are not
indebted for the continuance of their species to such low and vulgar
means. The true causes of conception in a woman, according to them, are
four in number. First, she may have received a particular species of black
bream from a man whom the European in his ignorance would call the father;
this she may have roasted and sat over the fire inhaling the savoury smell
of the roast fish. That is quite sufficient to get her with child. Or,
secondly, she may have gone out on purpose to catch a certain kind of
bull-frog, and if she succeeds in capturing it, that again is a full and
satisfactory explanation of her pregnancy. Thirdly, some man may have told
her to conceive a child, and the mere command produces the desired effect.
Or, fourth and lastly, she may have simply dreamed that the child was put
into her, and the dream necessarily works its own fulfilment. Whatever
white men may think about the matter, these are the real causes why babies
are born among the blacks on the Tully River.(334) About Cape Bedford in
Queensland the natives believe that babies are sent by certain long-haired
spirits, with two sets of eyes in the front and back of their heads, who
live in the dense scrub and underwood. The children are made in the far
west where the sun goes down, and they are made not in the form of infants
but full grown; but on their passage from the sunset land to the wombs
they are changed into the shape of spur-winged plovers, if they are girls,
or of pretty snakes, if they are boys. So when the cry of a plover is
heard by night, the blacks prick up their ears and say, “Hallo! there is a
baby somewhere about.” And if a woman is out in the bush searching for
food and sees one of the pretty snakes, which are really baby boys on the
look out for mothers, she will call out to her mates, and they will come
running and turn over stones, and leaves, and logs in the search for the
snake; and if they cannot find it they know that it has gone into the
woman and that she will soon give birth to a baby boy.(335) On the
Pennefather River in Queensland the being who puts babies into women is
called Anje-a. He takes a lump of mud out of one of the mangrove swamps,
moulds it into the shape of an infant, and insinuates it into a woman’s
womb. You can never see him, for he lives in the depths of the woods,
among the rocks, and along the mangrove swamps; but sometimes you can hear
him laughing there to himself, and when you hear him you may know that he
has got a baby ready for somebody.(336) Among the tribes of the Cairns
district in North Queensland “the acceptance of food from a man by a woman
was not merely regarded as a marriage ceremony, but as the actual cause of
conception.”(337)

(M78) Similarly among the Australian tribes of the Northern Territory,
about Port Darwin and the Daly River, especially among the Larrekiya and
Wogait, “conception is not regarded as a direct result of cohabitation.”
The old men of the Wogait say that there is an evil spirit who takes
babies from a big fire and puts them in the wombs of women, who must give
birth to them. In the ordinary course of events, when a man is out hunting
and kills game or collects other food, he gives it to his wife and she
eats it, believing that the game or other food will cause her to conceive
and bring forth a child. When the child is born, it may on no account
partake of the food which caused conception in the mother until it has got
its first teeth.(338) A similar belief that conception is caused by the
food which a woman eats is held by some tribes of Western Australia. On
this subject Mr. A. R. Brown reports as follows: “In the Ingarda tribe at
the mouth of the Gascoyne River, I found a belief that a child is the
product of some food of which the mother has partaken just before her
first sickness in pregnancy. My principal informant on this subject told
me that his father had speared a small animal called _bandaru_, probably a
bandicoot, but now extinct in this neighbourhood. His mother ate the
animal, with the result that she gave birth to my informant. He showed me
the mark in his side where, as he said, he had been speared by his father
before being eaten by his mother. A little girl was pointed out to me as
being the result of her mother eating a domestic cat, and her brother was
said to have been produced from a bustard.... The bustard was one of the
totems of the father of these two children and, therefore, of the children
themselves. This, however, seems to have been purely accidental. In most
cases the animal to which conception is due is not one of the father’s
totems. The species that is thus connected with an individual by birth is
not in any way sacred to him. He may kill or eat it; he may marry a woman
whose conceptional animal is of the same species, and he is not by the
accident of his birth entitled to take part in the totemic ceremonies
connected with it.

“I found traces of this same belief in a number of tribes north of the
Ingarda, but everywhere the belief seemed to be sporadic; that is to say,
some persons believed in it and others did not. Some individuals could
tell the animal or plant from which they or others were descended, while
others did not know or in some cases denied that conception was so caused.
There were to be met with, however, some beliefs of the same character. A
woman of the Buduna tribe said that native women nowadays bear half-caste
children because they eat bread made of white flour. Many of the men
believed that conception is due to sexual intercourse, but as these
natives have been for many years in contact with the whites this cannot be
regarded as satisfactory evidence of the nature of their original beliefs.

(M79) “In some tribes further to the north I found a more interesting and
better organised system of beliefs. In the Kariera, Ñamal, and Injibandi
tribes the conception of a child is believed to be due to the agency of a
particular man, who is not the father. This man is the _wororu_ of the
child when it is born. There were three different accounts of how the
_wororu_ produces conception, each of them given to me on several
different occasions. According to the first, the man gives some food,
either animal or vegetable, to the woman, and she eats this and becomes
pregnant. According to the second, the man when he is out hunting kills an
animal, preferably a kangaroo or an emu, and as it is dying he tells its
spirit or ghost to go to a particular woman. The spirit of the dead animal
goes into the woman and is born as a child. The third account is very
similar to the last. A hunter, when he has killed a kangaroo or an emu,
takes a portion of the fat of the dead animal which he places on one side.
This fat turns into what we may speak of as a spirit-baby, and follows the
man to his camp. When the man is asleep at night the spirit-baby comes to
him and he directs it to enter a certain woman who thus becomes pregnant.
When the child is born the man acknowledges that he sent it, and becomes
its _wororu_. In practically every case that I examined, some forty in
all, the _wororu_ of a man or woman was a person standing to him or her in
the relation of father’s brother own or tribal. In one case a man had a
_wororu_ who was his father’s sister. The duties of a man to his _wororu_
are very vaguely defined. I was told that a man ‘looks after’ his
_wororu_, that is, performs small services for him, and, perhaps, gives
him food. The conceptional animal or plant is not the totem of either the
child or the _wororu_. The child has no particular magical connection with
the animal from which he is derived. In a very large number of cases that
animal is either the kangaroo or the emu.”(339)

(M80) Thus it appears that a childlike ignorance as to the physical
process of procreation still prevails to some extent among certain rude
races of mankind, who are accordingly driven to account for it in various
fanciful ways such as might content the curiosity of children. We may
safely assume that formerly a like ignorance was far more widely spread
than it is now; indeed in the long ages which elapsed before any portion
of mankind emerged from savagery, it is probable that the true cause of
childbirth was universally unknown, and that people made shift to explain
the mystery by some such theories as are still current among the savage or
barbarous races of Central Africa, Melanesia, and Australia. A little
reflection on the conditions of savage life may satisfy us that the
ignorance is by no means so surprising as it may seem at first sight to a
civilized observer, or, to put it otherwise, that the true cause of the
birth of children is not nearly so obvious as we are apt to think. Among
low savages, such as all men were originally, it is customary for boys and
girls to cohabit freely with each other under the age of puberty, so that
they are familiar with a commerce of the sexes which is not and cannot be
attended with the birth of children. It is, therefore, not very wonderful
that they should confidently deny the connexion of sexual intercourse with
the production of offspring. Again, the long interval of time which
divides the act of conception from the first manifest symptoms of
pregnancy might easily disguise from the heedless savage the vital
relation between the two. These considerations may remove or lessen the
hesitation which civilized man naturally feels at admitting that a
considerable part or even the whole of his species should ever have
doubted or denied what seems to him one of the most obvious and elementary
truths of nature.(340)

(M81) In the light of the foregoing evidence, stories of the miraculous
birth of gods and heroes from virgin mothers lose much of the glamour that
encircled them in days of old, and we view them simply as relics of
superstition surviving like fossils to tell us of a bygone age of
childlike ignorance and credulity.

§ 8. Sacred Stocks and Stones among the Semites.

(M82) Traces of beliefs and customs like the foregoing may perhaps be
detected among the ancient Semites. When the prophet Jeremiah speaks of
the Israelites who said to a stock or to a tree (for in Hebrew the words
are the same), “Thou art my father,” and to a stone, “Thou hast brought me
forth,”(341) it is probable that he was not using vague rhetorical
language, but denouncing real beliefs current among his contemporaries.
Now we know that at all the old Canaanite sanctuaries, including the
sanctuaries of Jehovah down to the reformations of Hezekiah and Josiah,
the two regular objects of worship were a sacred stock and a sacred
stone,(342) and that these sanctuaries were the seats of profligate rites
performed by sacred men (_ḳedeshim_) and sacred women (_ḳedeshoth_). Is it
not natural to suppose that the stock and stone which the superstitious
Israelites regarded as their father and mother were the sacred stock
(_asherah_) and the sacred stone (_massebah_) of the sanctuary, and that
the children born of the loose intercourse of the sexes at these places
were believed to be the offspring or emanations of these uncouth but
worshipful idols in which, as in the sacred trees and stones of Central
Australia, the souls of the dead may have been supposed to await rebirth?
On this view the sacred men and women who actually begot or bore the
children were deemed the human embodiments of the two divinities, the men
perhaps personating the sacred stock, which appears to have been a tree
stripped of its branches, and the women personating the sacred stone,
which seems to have been in the shape of a cone, an obelisk, or a
pillar.(343)

(M83) These conclusions are confirmed by the result of recent researches
at Gezer, an ancient Canaanitish city, which occupied a high, isolated
point on the southern border of Ephraim, between Jerusalem and the sea.
Here the English excavations have laid bare the remains of a sanctuary
with the sacred stone pillars or obelisks (_masseboth_) still standing in
a row, while between two of them is set a large socketed stone,
beautifully squared, which perhaps contained the sacred stock or pole
(_asherah_). In the soil which had accumulated over the floor of the
temple were found vast numbers of male emblems rudely carved out of soft
limestone; and tablets of terra-cotta, representing in low relief the
mother-goddess, were discovered throughout the strata. These objects were
no doubt votive-offerings presented by the worshippers to the male and
female deities who were represented by the sacred stock and the sacred
stones; and their occurrence in large quantities raises a strong
presumption that the divinities of the sanctuary were a god and goddess
regarded as above all sources of fertility. The supposition is further
strengthened by a very remarkable discovery. Under the floor of the temple
were found the bones of many new-born children, none more than a week old,
buried in large jars. None of these little bodies showed any trace of
mutilation or violence; and in the light of the customs practised in many
other lands(344) we seem to be justified in conjecturing that the infants
were still-born or died soon after birth, and that they were buried by
their parents in the sanctuary in the hope that, quickened by the divine
power, they might enter again into the mother’s womb and again be born
into the world.(345) If the souls of these buried babes were supposed to
pass into the sacred stocks and stones and to dart from them into the
bodies of would-be mothers who resorted to the sanctuary, the analogy with
Central Australia would be complete. That the analogy is real and not
fanciful is strongly suggested by the modern practice of Syrian women who
still repair to the shrines of saints to procure offspring, and who still
look on “holy men” as human embodiments of divinity. In this, as in many
other dark places of superstition, the present is the best guide to the
interpretation of the past; for while the higher forms of religious faith
pass away like clouds, the lower stand firm and indestructible like rocks.
The “sacred men” of one age are the dervishes of the next, the Adonis of
yesterday is the St. George of to-day.

Chapter V. The Burning of Melcarth.

(M84) If a custom of putting a king or his son to death in the character
of a god has left small traces of itself in Cyprus, an island where the
fierce zeal of Semitic religion was early tempered by Greek humanity, the
vestiges of that gloomy rite are clearer in Phoenicia itself and in the
Phoenician colonies, which lay more remote from the highways of Grecian
commerce. We know that the Semites were in the habit of sacrificing some
of their children, generally the first-born, either as a tribute regularly
due to the deity or to appease his anger in seasons of public danger and
calamity.(346) If commoners did so, is it likely that kings, with all
their heavy responsibilities, could exempt themselves from this dreadful
sacrifice for the fatherland? In point of fact, history informs us that
kings steeled themselves to do as others did.(347) It deserves to be
noticed that if Mesha, king of Moab, who sacrificed his eldest son by
fire, claimed to be a son of his god,(348) he would no doubt transmit his
divinity to his offspring; and further, that the same sacrifice is said to
have been performed in the same way by the divine founder of Byblus, the
great seat of the worship of Adonis.(349) This suggests that the human
representatives of Adonis formerly perished in the flames. At all events,
a custom of periodically burning the chief god of the city in effigy
appears to have prevailed at Tyre and in the Tyrian colonies down to a
late time, and the effigy may well have been a later substitute for a man.
For Melcarth, the great god of Tyre, was identified by the Greeks with
Hercules,(350) who is said to have burned himself to death on a great
pyre, ascending up to heaven in a cloud and a peal of thunder.(351) The
common Greek legend, immortalized by Sophocles, laid the scene of the
fiery tragedy on the top of Mount Oeta, but another version transferred it
significantly to Tyre itself.(352) Combined with the other evidence which
I shall adduce, this latter tradition raises a strong presumption that an
effigy of Hercules, or rather of Melcarth, was regularly burned at a great
festival in Tyre. That festival may have been the one known as “the
awakening of Hercules,” which was held in the month of Peritius, answering
nearly to January.(353) The name of the festival suggests that the
dramatic representation of the death of the god on the pyre was followed
by a semblance of his resurrection. The mode in which the resurrection was
supposed to be effected is perhaps indicated by the statement of a Greek
writer that the Phoenicians used to sacrifice quails to Hercules, because
Hercules on his journey to Libya had been slain by Typhon and brought to
life again by Iolaus, who held a quail under his nose: the dead god
snuffed at the bird and revived.(354) According to another account Iolaus
burnt a quail alive, and the dead hero, who loved quails, came to life
again through the savoury smell of the roasted bird.(355) This latter
tradition seems to point to a custom of burning the quails alive in the
Phoenician sacrifices to Melcarth.(356) A festival of the god’s
resurrection might appropriately be held in spring, when the quails
migrate northwards across the Mediterranean in great bands, and immense
numbers of them are netted for the market.(357) In the month of March the
birds return to Palestine by myriads in a single night, and remain to
breed in all the open plains, marshes, and cornfields.(358) Certainly a
close connexion seems to have subsisted between quails and Melcarth; for
legend ran that Asteria, the mother of the Tyrian Hercules, that is, of
Melcarth, was transformed into a quail.(359) It was probably to this
annual festival of the death and resurrection of Melcarth that the
Carthaginians were wont to send ambassadors every year to Tyre, their
mother-city.(360)

(M85) In Gades, the modern Cadiz, an early colony of Tyre on the Atlantic
coast of Spain,(361) there was an ancient, famous, and wealthy sanctuary
of Hercules, the Tyrian Melcarth. Indeed the god was said to be buried on
the spot. No image stood in his temple, but a perpetual fire burned on the
altar, and incense was offered by white-robed priests, with bare feet and
shorn heads, who were bound to chastity. Neither women nor pigs might
pollute the holy place by their presence. In later times many
distinguished Romans went on pilgrimage to this remote shrine on the
Atlantic shore when they were about to embark on some perilous enterprise,
and they returned to it to pay their vows when their petitions had been
granted.(362) One of the last things Hannibal himself did before he
marched on Italy was to repair to Gades and offer up to Melcarth prayers
which were never to be answered. Soon after he dreamed an ominous
dream.(363) Now it would appear that at Gades, as at Tyre, though no image
of Melcarth stood in the temple, an effigy of him was made up and burned
at a yearly festival. For a certain Cleon of Magnesia related how,
visiting Gades, he was obliged to sail away from the island with the rest
of the multitude in obedience to the command of Hercules, that is, of
Melcarth, and how on their return they found a monstrous man of the sea
stranded on the beach and burning; for the god, they were told, had struck
him with a thunderbolt.(364) We may conjecture that at the annual festival
of Melcarth strangers were obliged to quit the city, and that in their
absence the mystery of burning the god was consummated. What Cleon and the
rest saw on their return to Gades would, on this hypothesis, be the
smouldering remains of a gigantic effigy of Melcarth in the likeness of a
man riding on a sea-horse, just as he is represented on coins of
Tyre.(365) In like manner the Greeks portrayed the sea-god Melicertes,
whose name is only a slightly altered form of Melcarth, riding on a
dolphin or stretched on the beast’s back.(366)

(M86) At Carthage, the greatest of the Tyrian colonies, a reminiscence of
the custom of burning a deity in effigy seems to linger in the story that
Dido or Elissa, the foundress and queen of the city, stabbed herself to
death upon a pyre, or leaped from her palace into the blazing pile, to
escape the fond importunities of one lover or in despair at the cruel
desertion of another.(367) We are told that Dido was worshipped as a
goddess at Carthage so long as the country maintained its
independence.(368) Her temple stood in the centre of the city shaded by a
grove of solemn yews and firs.(369) The two apparently contradictory views
of her character as a queen and a goddess may be reconciled if we suppose
that she was both the one and the other; that in fact the queen of
Carthage in early days, like the queen of Egypt down to historical times,
was regarded as divine, and had, like human deities elsewhere, to die a
violent death either at the end of a fixed period or whenever her bodily
and mental powers began to fail. In later ages the stern old custom might
be softened down into a pretence by substituting an effigy for the queen
or by allowing her to pass through the fire unscathed. A similar
modification of the ancient rule appears to have been allowed at Tyre
itself, the mother-city of Carthage. We have seen reason to think that the
kings of Tyre, from whom Dido was descended, claimed to personate the god
Melcarth, and that the deity was burned either in effigy or in the person
of a man at an annual festival.(370) Now in the same chapter in which
Ezekiel charges the king of Tyre with claiming to be a god, the prophet
describes him as walking “up and down amidst the stones of fire.”(371) The
description becomes at once intelligible if we suppose that in later times
the king of Tyre compounded for being burnt in the fire by walking up and
down on hot stones, thereby saving his life at the expense perhaps of a
few blisters on his feet. It is possible that when all went well with the
commonwealth, children whom strict law doomed to the furnace of Moloch may
also have been mercifully allowed to escape on condition of running the
fiery gauntlet. At all events, a religious rite of this sort has been and
is still practised in many parts of the world: the performers solemnly
pace through a furnace of heated stones or glowing wood-ashes in the
presence of a multitude of spectators. Examples of the custom have been
adduced in another part of this work.(372) Here I will cite only one. At
Castabala, in Southern Cappadocia, there was worshipped an Asiatic goddess
whom the Greeks called the Perasian Artemis. Her priestesses used to walk
barefoot over a fire of charcoal without sustaining any injury. That this
rite was a substitute for burning human beings alive or dead is suggested
by the tradition which placed the adventure of Orestes and the Tauric
Artemis at Castabala;(373) for the men or women sacrificed to the Tauric
Artemis were first put to the sword and then burned in a pit of sacred
fire.(374) Among the Carthaginians another trace of such a practice may
perhaps be detected in the story that at the desperate battle of Himera,
fought from dawn of day till late in the evening, the Carthaginian king
Hamilcar remained in the camp and kept sacrificing holocausts of victims
on a huge pyre; but when he saw his army giving way before the Greeks, he
flung himself into the flames and was burned to death. Afterwards his
countrymen sacrificed to him and erected a great monument in his honour at
Carthage, while lesser monuments were reared to his memory in all the
Punic colonies.(375) In public emergencies which called for extraordinary
measures a king of Carthage may well have felt bound in honour to
sacrifice himself in the old way for the good of his country. That the
Carthaginians regarded the death of Hamilcar as an act of heroism and not
as a mere suicide of despair, is proved by the posthumous honours they
paid him.

(M87) The foregoing evidence, taken altogether, raises a strong
presumption, though it cannot be said to amount to a proof, that a
practice of burning a deity, and especially Melcarth, in effigy or in the
person of a human representative, was observed at an annual festival in
Tyre and its colonies. We can thus understand how Hercules, in so far as
he represented the Tyrian god, was believed to have perished by a
voluntary death on a pyre. For on many a beach and headland of the Aegean,
where the Phoenicians had their trading factories, the Greeks may have
watched the bale-fires of Melcarth blazing in the darkness of night, and
have learned with wonder that the strange foreign folk were burning their
god. In this way the legend of the voyages of Hercules and his death in
the flames may be supposed to have originated. Yet with the legend the
Greeks borrowed the custom of burning the god; for at the festivals of
Hercules a pyre used to be kindled in memory of the hero’s fiery death on
Mount Oeta.(376) We may surmise, though we are not expressly told, that an
effigy of Hercules was regularly burned on the pyre.

Chapter VI. The Burning of Sandan.

§ 1. The Baal of Tarsus.

(M88) In Cyprus the Tyrian Melcarth was worshipped side by side with
Adonis at Amathus,(377) and Phoenician inscriptions prove that he was
revered also at Idalium and Larnax Lapethus. At the last of these places
he seems to have been regarded by the Greeks as a marine deity and
identified with Poseidon.(378) A remarkable statue found at Amathus may
represent Melcarth in the character of the lion-slayer, a character which
the Greeks bestowed on Hercules. The statue in question is of colossal
size, and exhibits a thick-set, muscular, hirsute deity of almost bestial
aspect, with goggle eyes, huge ears, and a pair of stumpy horns on the top
of his head. His beard is square and curly: his hair falls in three
pigtails on his shoulders: his brawny arms appear to be tattooed. A lion’s
skin, clasped by a buckle, is knotted round his loins; and he holds the
skin of a lioness in front of him, grasping a hind paw with each hand,
while the head of the beast, which is missing, hung down between his legs.
A fountain must have issued from the jaws of the lioness, for a
rectangular hole, where the beast’s head should be, communicates by a
channel with another hole in the back of the statue. Greek artists working
on this or a similar barbarous model produced the refined type of the
Grecian Hercules with the lion’s scalp thrown like a cowl over his head.
Statues of him have been found in Cyprus, which represent intermediate
stages in this artistic evolution.(379) But there is no proof that in
Cyprus the Tyrian Melcarth was burned either in effigy or in the person of
a human representative.(380)

(M89) On the other hand, there is clear evidence of the observance of such
a custom in Cilicia, the country which lies across the sea from Cyprus,
and from which the worship of Adonis, according to tradition, was
derived.(381) Whether the Phoenicians ever colonized Cilicia or not is
doubtful,(382) but at all events the natives of the country, down to late
times, worshipped a male deity who, in spite of a superficial assimilation
to a fashionable Greek god, appears to have been an Oriental by birth and
character. He had his principal seat at Tarsus, in a plain of luxuriant
fertility and almost tropical climate, tempered by breezes from the snowy
range of Tarsus on the north and from the sea on the south.(383) Though
Tarsus boasted of a school of Greek philosophy which at the beginning of
our era surpassed those of Athens and Alexandria,(384) the city apparently
remained in manners and spirit essentially Oriental. The women went about
the streets muffled up to the eyes in Eastern fashion, and Dio Chrysostom
reproaches the natives with resembling the most dissolute of the
Phoenicians rather than the Greeks whose civilization they aped.(385) On
the coins of the city they assimilated their native deity to Zeus by
representing him seated on a throne, the upper part of his body bare, the
lower limbs draped in a flowing robe, while in one hand he holds a
sceptre, which is topped sometimes with an eagle but often with a lotus
flower. Yet his foreign nature is indicated both by his name and his
attributes; for in Aramaic inscriptions on the coins he bears the name of
the Baal of Tarsus, and in one hand he grasps an ear of corn and a bunch
of grapes.(386) These attributes clearly mark him out as a god of
fertility in general, who conferred on his worshippers the two things
which they prized above all other gifts of nature, the corn and the wine.
He was probably therefore a Semitic, or at all events an Oriental, rather
than a Greek deity. For while the Semite cast all his gods more or less in
the same mould, and expected them all to render him nearly the same
services, the Greek, with his keener intelligence and more pictorial
imagination, invested his deities with individual characteristics,
allotting to each of them his or her separate function in the divine
economy of the world. Thus he assigned the production of the corn to
Demeter, and that of the grapes to Dionysus; he was not so unreasonable as
to demand both from the same hard-worked deity.

§ 2. The God of Ibreez.

(M90) Now the suspicion that the Baal of Tarsus, for all his posing in the
attitude of Zeus, was really an Oriental is confirmed by a remarkable
rock-hewn monument which is to be seen at Ibreez in Southern Cappadocia.
Though the place is distant little more than fifty miles from Tarsus as
the crow flies, yet the journey on horseback occupies five days; for the
great barrier of the Taurus mountains rises like a wall between. The road
runs through the famous pass of the Cilician Gates, and the scenery
throughout is of the grandest Alpine character. On all sides the mountains
tower skyward, their peaks sheeted in a dazzling pall of snow, their lower
slopes veiled in the almost inky blackness of dense pine-forests, torn
here and there by impassable ravines, or broken into prodigious precipices
of red and grey rock which border the narrow valley for miles. The
magnificence of the landscape is enhanced by the exhilarating influence of
the brisk mountain air, all the more by contrast with the sultry heat of
the plain of Tarsus which the traveller has left behind. When he emerges
from the defile on the wide open tableland of Anatolia he feels that in a
sense he has passed out of Asia, and that the highroad to Europe lies
straight before him. The great mountains on which he now looks back formed
for centuries the boundary between the Christian West and the Mohammedan
East; on the southern side lay the domain of the Caliphs, on the northern
side the Byzantine Empire. The Taurus was the dam that long repelled the
tide of Arab invasion; and though year by year the waves broke through the
pass of the Cilician Gates and carried havoc and devastation through the
tableland, the refluent waters always retired to the lower level of the
Cilician plains. A line of beacon lights stretching from the Taurus to
Constantinople flashed to the Byzantine capital tidings of the approach of
the Moslem invaders.(387)

(M91) The village of Ibreez is charmingly situated at the northern foot of
the Taurus, some six or seven miles south of the town of Eregli, the
ancient Cybistra, From the town to the village the path goes through a
richly cultivated district of wheat and vines along green lanes more
lovely than those of Devonshire, lined by thick hedges and rows of willow,
poplar, hazel, hawthorn, and huge old walnut-trees, where in early summer
the nightingales warble on every side. Ibreez itself is embowered in the
verdure of orchards, walnuts, and vines. It stands at the mouth of a deep
ravine enclosed by great precipices of red rock. From the western of these
precipices a river clear as crystal, but of a deep blue tint, bursts in a
powerful jet, and being reinforced by a multitude of springs becomes at
once a raging impassable torrent foaming and leaping with a roar of waters
over the rocks in its bed. A little way from the source a branch of the
main stream flows in a deep narrow channel along the foot of a reddish
weather-stained rock which rises sheer from the water. On its face, which
has been smoothed to receive them, are the sculptures. They consist of two
colossal figures, representing a god adored by his worshipper. The deity,
some fourteen feet high, is a bearded male figure, wearing on his head a
high pointed cap adorned with several pairs of horns, and plainly clad in
a short tunic, which does not reach his knees and is drawn in at the waist
by a belt. His legs and arms are bare; the wrists are encircled by bangles
or bracelets. His feet are shod in high boots with turned-up toes. In his
right hand he holds a vine-branch laden with clusters of grapes, and in
his raised left hand he grasps a bunch of bearded wheat, such as is still
grown in Cappadocia; the ears of corn project above his fingers, while the
long stalks hang down to his feet. In front of him stands the lesser
figure, some eight feet high. He is clearly a priest or king, more
probably perhaps both in one. His rich vestments contrast with the simple
costume of the god. On his head he wears a round but not pointed cap,
encircled by flat bands and ornamented in front with a rosette or bunch of
jewels, such as is still worn by Eastern princes. He is draped from the
neck to the ankles in a long robe heavily fringed at the bottom, over
which is thrown a shawl or mantle secured at the breast by a clasp of
precious stones. Both robe and shawl are elaborately carved with patterns
in imitation of embroidery. A heavy necklace of rings or beads encircles
the neck; a bracelet or bangle clasps the one wrist that is visible; the
feet are shod in boots like those of the god. One or perhaps both hands
are raised in the act of adoration. The large aquiline nose, like the beak
of a hawk, is a conspicuous feature in the face both of the god and of his
worshipper; the hair and beard of both are thick and curly.(388)

(M92) The situation of this remarkable monument resembles that of Aphaca
on the Lebanon;(389) for in both places we see a noble river issuing
abruptly from the rock to spread fertility through the rich vale below.
Nowhere, perhaps, could man more appropriately revere those great powers
of nature to whose favour he ascribes the fruitfulness of the earth, and
through it the life of animate creation. With its cool bracing air, its
mass of verdure, its magnificent stream of pure ice-cold water—so grateful
in the burning heat of summer—and its wide stretch of fertile land, the
valley may well have been the residence of an ancient prince or
high-priest, who desired to testify by this monument his devotion and
gratitude to the god. The seat of this royal or priestly potentate may
have been at Cybistra,(390) the modern Eregli, now a decayed and miserable
place straggling amid orchards and gardens full of luxuriant groves of
walnut, poplar, willow, mulberry, and oak. The place is a paradise of
birds. Here the thrush and the nightingale sing full-throated, the hoopoe
waves his crested top-knot, the bright-hued woodpeckers flit from bough to
bough, and the swifts dart screaming by hundreds through the air. Yet a
little way off, beyond the beneficent influence of the springs and
streams, all is desolation—in summer an arid waste broken by great marshes
and wide patches of salt, in winter a broad sheet of stagnant water, which
as it dries up with the growing heat of the sun exhales a poisonous
malaria. To the west, as far as the eye can see, stretches the endless
expanse of the dreary Lycaonian plain, barren, treeless, and solitary,
till it fades into the blue distance, or is bounded afar off by abrupt
ranges of jagged volcanic mountains, on which in sunshiny weather the
shadows of the clouds rest, purple and soft as velvet.(391) No wonder that
the smiling luxuriance of the one landscape, sharply contrasting with the
bleak sterility of the other, should have rendered it in the eyes of
primitive man a veritable garden of God.

(M93) Among the attributes which mark out the deity of Ibreez as a power
of fertility the horns on his high cap should not be overlooked. They are
probably the horns of a bull; for to primitive cattle-breeders the bull is
the most natural emblem of generative force. At Carchemish, the great
Hittite capital on the Euphrates, a relief has been discovered which
represents a god or a priest clad in a rich robe, and wearing on his head
a tall horned cap surmounted by a disc.(392) Sculptures found at the
palace of Euyuk in North-Western Cappadocia prove that the Hittites
worshipped the bull and sacrificed rams to it.(393) Similarly the Greeks
conceived the vine-god Dionysus in the form of a bull.(394)

§ 3. Sandan of Tarsus.

(M94) That the god of Ibreez, with the grapes and corn in his hands, is
identical with the Baal of Tarsus, who bears the same emblems, may be
taken as certain.(395) But what was his name? and who were his
worshippers? The Greeks apparently called him Hercules; at least in
Byzantine times the neighbouring town of Cybistra adopted the name of
Heraclea, which seems to show that Hercules was deemed the principal deity
of the place.(396) Yet the style and costume of the figures at Ibreez
prove unquestionably that the god was an Oriental. If any confirmation of
this view were needed, it is furnished by the inscriptions carved on the
rock beside the sculptures, for these inscriptions are composed in the
peculiar system of hieroglyphics now known as Hittite. It follows,
therefore, that the deity worshipped at Tarsus and Ibreez was a god of the
Hittites, that ancient and little-known people who occupied the centre of
Asia Minor, invented a system of writing, and extended their influence, if
not their dominion, at one time from the Euphrates to the Aegean. From the
lofty and arid tablelands of the interior, a prolongation of the great
plateau of Central Asia, with a climate ranging from the most burning heat
in summer to the most piercing cold in winter,(397) these hardy
highlanders seem to have swept down through the mountain-passes and
established themselves at a very early date in the rich southern lowlands
of Syria and Cilicia.(398) Their language and race are still under
discussion, but a great preponderance of opinion appears to declare that
neither the one nor the other was Semitic.(399)

(M95) In the inscription attached to the colossal figure of the god at
Ibreez two scholars have professed to read the name of Sandan or
Sanda.(400) Be that as it may, there are independent grounds for thinking
that Sandan, Sandon, or Sandes may have been the name of the Cappadocian
and Cilician god of fertility. For the god of Ibreez in Cappadocia
appears, as we saw, to have been identified by the Greeks with Hercules,
and we are told that a Cappadocian and Cilician name of Hercules was
Sandan or Sandes.(401) Now this Sandan or Hercules is said to have founded
Tarsus, and the people of the city commemorated him at an annual or, at
all events, periodical festival by erecting a fine pyre in his
honour.(402) Apparently at this festival, as at the festival of Melcarth,
the god was burned in effigy on his own pyre. For coins of Tarsus often
exhibit the pyre as a conical structure resting on a garlanded altar or
basis, with the figure of Sandan himself in the midst of it, while an
eagle with spread wings perches on the top of the pyre, as if about to
bear the soul of the burning god in the pillar of smoke and fire to
heaven.(403) In like manner when a Roman emperor died leaving a son to
succeed him on the throne, a waxen effigy was made in the likeness of the
deceased and burned on a huge pyramidal pyre, which was reared upon a
square basis of wood; and from the summit of the blazing pile an eagle was
released for the purpose of carrying to heaven the soul of the dead and
deified emperor.(404) The Romans may have borrowed from the East a
grandiose custom which savours of Oriental adulation rather than of Roman
simplicity.(405)

(M96) The type of Sandan or Hercules, as he is portrayed on the coins of
Tarsus, is that of an Asiatic deity standing on a lion. It is thus that he
is represented on the pyre, and it is thus that he appears as a separate
figure without the pyre. From these representations we can form a fairly
accurate conception of the form and attributes of the god. They exhibit
him as a bearded man standing on a horned and often winged lion. Upon his
head he wears a high pointed cap or mitre, and he is clad sometimes in a
long robe, sometimes in a short tunic. On at least one coin his feet are
shod in high boots with flaps. At his side or over his shoulder are slung
a sword, a bow-case, and a quiver, sometimes only one or two of them. His
right hand is raised and sometimes holds a flower. His left hand grasps a
double-headed axe, and sometimes a wreath either in addition to the axe or
instead of it; but the double-headed axe is one of Sandan’s most constant
attributes.(406)

§ 4. The Gods of Boghaz-Keui.

(M97) Now a deity of almost precisely the same type figures prominently in
the celebrated group of Hittite sculptures which is carved on the rocks at
Boghaz-Keui in North-Western Cappadocia. The village of Boghaz-Keui, that
is, “the village of the defile,” stands at the mouth of a deep, narrow,
and picturesque gorge in a wild upland valley, shut in by rugged mountains
of grey limestone. The houses are built on the lower slopes of the hills,
and a stream issuing from the gorge flows past them to join the Halys,
which is distant about ten hours’ journey to the west. Immediately above
the modern village a great ancient city, enclosed by massive fortification
walls, rose on the rough broken ground of the mountainside, culminating in
two citadels perched on the tops of precipitous crags. The walls are still
standing in many places to a height of twelve feet or more. They are about
fourteen feet thick and consist of an outer and inner facing built of
large blocks with a core of rubble between them. On the outer side they
are strengthened at intervals of about a hundred feet by projecting towers
or buttresses, which seem designed rather as architectural supports than
as military defences. The masonry, composed of large stones laid in
roughly parallel courses, resembles in style that of the walls of Mycenae,
with which it may be contemporary; and the celebrated Lion-gate at Mycenae
has its counterpart in the southern gate of Boghaz-Keui, which is flanked
by a pair of colossal stone lions executed in the best style of Hittite
art. The eastern gate is adorned on its inner side with the figure of a
Hittite warrior or Amazon carved in high relief. A dense undergrowth of
stunted oak coppice now covers much of the site. The ruins of a large
palace or temple, built of enormous blocks of stone, occupy a terrace in a
commanding situation within the circuit of the walls. This vast city, some
four or five miles in circumference, appears to have been the ancient
Pteria, which Croesus, king of Lydia, captured in his war with Cyrus. It
was probably the capital of a powerful Hittite empire before the Phrygians
made their way from Europe into the interior of Asia Minor and established
a rival state to the west of the Halys.(407)

(M98) From the village of Boghaz-Keui a steep and rugged path leads up
hill to a sanctuary, distant about a mile and a half to the east. Here
among the grey limestone cliffs there is a spacious natural chamber or
hall of roughly oblong shape, roofed only by the sky, and enclosed on
three sides by high rocks. One of the short sides is open, and through it
you look out on the broken slopes beyond and the more distant mountains,
which make a graceful picture set in a massy frame. The length of the
chamber is about a hundred feet; its breadth varies from twenty-five to
fifty feet. A nearly level sward forms the floor. On the right-hand side,
as you face inward, a narrow opening in the rock leads into another but
much smaller chamber, or rather corridor, which would seem to have been
the inner sanctuary or Holy of Holies. It is a romantic spot, where the
deep shadows of the rocks are relieved by the bright foliage of
walnut-trees and by the sight of the sky and clouds overhead. On the
rock-walls of both chamber are carved the famous bas-reliefs. In the outer
sanctuary these reliefs represent two great processions which defile along
the two long sides of the chamber and meet face to face on the short wall
at the inner end. The figures on the left-hand wall are for the most part
men clad in the characteristic Hittite costume, which consists of a high
pointed cap, shoes with turned-up toes, and a tunic drawn in at the waist
and falling short of the knees.(408) The figures on the right-hand wall
are women wearing tall, square, flat-topped bonnets with ribbed sides;
their long dresses fall in perpendicular folds to their feet, which are
shod in shoes like those of the men. On the short wall, where the
processions meet, the greater size of the central figures, as well as
their postures and attributes, mark them out as divine. At the head of the
male procession marches or is carried a bearded deity clad in the ordinary
Hittite costume of tall pointed cap, short tunic, and turned-up shoes; but
his feet rest on the bowed heads of two men, in his right hand he holds on
his shoulder a mace or truncheon topped with a knob, while his extended
left hand grasps a symbol, which apparently consists of a trident
surmounted by an oval with a cross-bar. Behind him follows a similar,
though somewhat smaller, figure of a man, or perhaps rather of a god,
carrying a mace or truncheon over his shoulder in his right hand, while
with his left he holds aloft a long sword with a flat hilt; his feet rest
not on two men but on two flat-topped pinnacles, which perhaps represent
mountains. At the head of the female procession and facing the great god
who is borne on the two men, stands a goddess on a lioness or panther. Her
costume does not differ from that of the women: her hair hangs down in a
long plait behind: in her extended right hand she holds out an emblem to
touch that of the god. The shape and meaning of her emblem are obscure. It
consists of a stem with two pairs of protuberances, perhaps leaves or
branches, one above the other, the whole being surmounted, like the emblem
of the god, by an oval with a cross-bar. Under the outstretched arms of
the two deities appear the front parts of two animals, which have been
usually interpreted as bulls but are rather goats; each of them wears on
its head the high conical Hittite cap, and its body is concealed by that
of the deity. Immediately behind the goddess marches a smaller and
apparently youthful male figure, standing like her upon a lioness or
panther. He is beardless and wears the Hittite dress of high pointed cap,
short tunic, and shoes with turned-up toes. A crescent-hilted sword is
girt at his side; in his left hand he holds a double-headed axe, and in
his right a staff topped by an armless doll with the symbol of the
cross-barred oval instead of a head. Behind him follow two women, or
rather perhaps goddesses, resembling the goddess at the head of the
procession, but with different emblems and standing not on a lioness but
on a single two-headed eagle with outspread wings.

(M99) The entrance to the smaller chamber is guarded on either side by the
figure of a winged monster carved on the rock; the bodies of both figures
are human, but one of them has the head of a dog, the other the head of a
lion. In the inner sanctuary, to which this monster-guarded passage leads,
the walls are also carved in relief. On one side we see a procession of
twelve men in Hittite costume marching with curved swords in their right
hands. On the opposite wall is a colossal erect figure of a deity with a
human head and a body curiously composed of four lions, two above and two
below, the latter standing on their heads. The god wears the high conical
Hittite hat: his face is youthful and beardless like that of the male
figure standing on the lioness in the large chamber; and the ear turned to
the spectator is pierced with a ring. From the knees downwards the legs,
curiously enough, are replaced by a device which has been interpreted as
the tapering point of a great dagger or dirk with a midrib. To the right
of this deity a square panel cut in the face of the rock exhibits a group
of two figures in relief. The larger of the two figures closely resembles
the youth on the lioness in the outer sanctuary. His chin is beardless; he
wears the same high pointed cap, the same short tunic, the same turned-up
shoes, the same crescent-hilted sword, and he carries a similar armless
doll in his right hand. But his left arm encircles the neck of the smaller
figure, whom he seems to clasp to his side in an attitude of protection.
The smaller figure thus embraced by the god is clearly a priest or
priestly king. His face is beardless; he wears a skull-cap and a long
mantle reaching to his feet with a sort of chasuble thrown over it. The
crescent-shaped hilt of a sword projects from under his mantle. The wrist
of his right arm is clasped by the god’s left hand; in his left hand the
priest holds a crook or pastoral staff which ends below in a curl. Both
the priest and his protector are facing towards the lion-god. In an upper
corner of the panel behind them is a divine emblem composed of a winged
disc resting on what look like two Ionic columns, while between them
appear three symbols of doubtful significance. The figure of the priest or
king in this costume, though not in this attitude, is a familiar one; for
it occurs twice in the outer sanctuary and is repeated twice at the great
Hittite palace of Euyuk, distant about four and a half hours’ ride to the
north-east of Boghaz-Keui. In the outer sanctuary at Boghaz-Keui we see
the priest marching in the procession of the men, and holding in one hand
his curled staff, or _lituus_, and in the other a symbol like that of the
goddess on the lioness: above his head appears the winged disc without the
other attributes. Moreover he occupies a conspicuous place by himself on
the right-hand wall of the outer sanctuary, quite apart from the two
processions, and carved on a larger scale than any of the other figures in
them. Here he stands on two heaps, perhaps intended to represent
mountains, and he carries in his right hand the emblem of the winged disc
supported on two Ionic columns with the other symbols between them, except
that the central symbol is replaced by a masculine figure wearing a
pointed cap and a long robe decorated with a dog-tooth pattern. On one of
the reliefs at the palace of Euyuk we see the priest with his
characteristic dress and staff followed by a priestess, each of them with
a hand raised as if in adoration: they are approaching the image of a bull
which stands on a high pedestal with an altar before it. Behind them a
priest leads a flock of rams to the sacrifice. On another relief at Euyuk
the priest, similarly attired and followed by a priestess, is approaching
a seated goddess and apparently pouring a libation at her feet. Both these
scenes doubtless represent acts of worship paid in the one case to a
goddess, in the other to a bull.(409)

(M100) We have still to inquire into the meaning of the rock-carvings at
Boghaz-Keui. What are these processions which are meeting? Who are the
personages represented? and what are they doing? Some have thought that
the scene is historical and commemorates a great event, such as a treaty
of peace between two peoples or the marriage of a king’s son to a king’s
daughter.(410) But to this view it has been rightly objected that the
attributes of the principal figures prove them to be divine or priestly,
and that the scene is therefore religious or mythical rather than
historical. With regard to the two personages who head the processions and
hold out their symbols to each other, the most probable opinion appears to
be that they stand for the great Asiatic goddess of fertility and her
consort, by whatever names these deities were known; for under diverse
names a similar divine couple appears to have been worshipped with similar
rites all over Western Asia.(411) The bearded god who, grasping a trident
in his extended left hand, heads the procession of male figures is
probably the Father deity, the great Hittite god of the thundering sky,
whose emblems were the thunderbolt and the bull; for the trident which he
carries may reasonably be interpreted as a thunderbolt. The deity is
represented in similar form on two stone monuments of Hittite art which
were found at Zenjirli in Northern Syria and at Babylon respectively. On
both we see a bearded male god wearing the usual Hittite costume of tall
cap, short tunic, and shoes turned up at the toes: a crescent-hilted sword
is girt at his side: his hands are raised: in the right he holds a
single-headed axe or hammer, in the left a trident of wavy lines, which is
thought to stand for forked lightning or a bundle of thunderbolts. On the
Babylonian slab, which bears a long Hittite inscription, the god’s cap is
ornamented with a pair of horns.(412) The horns on the cap are probably
those of a bull; for on another Hittite monument, found at Malatia on the
Euphrates, there is carved a deity in the usual Hittite costume standing
on a bull and grasping a trident or thunderbolt in his left hand, while
facing him stands a priest clad in a long robe, holding a crook or curled
staff in one hand and pouring a libation with the other.(413) The Hittite
thunder-god is also known to us from a treaty of alliance which about the
year 1290 B.C. was contracted between Hattusil, King of the Hittites, and
Rameses II., King of Egypt. By a singular piece of good fortune we possess
copies of this treaty both in the Hittite and in the Egyptian language.
The Hittite copy was found some years ago inscribed in cuneiform
characters on a clay tablet at Boghaz-Keui; two copies of the treaty in
the Egyptian language are engraved on the walls of temples at Thebes. From
the Egyptian copies, which have been read and translated, we gather that
the thunder-god was the principal deity of the Hittites, and that the two
Hittite seals which were appended to the treaty exhibited the King
embraced by the thunder-god and the Queen embraced by the sun-goddess of
Arenna.(414) This Hittite divinity of the thundering sky appears to have
long survived at Doliche in Commagene, for in later Roman art he reappears
under the title of Jupiter Dolichenus, wearing a Phrygian cap, standing on
a bull, and wielding a double axe in one hand and a thunderbolt in the
other. In this form his worship was transported from his native Syrian
home by soldiers and slaves, till it had spread over a large part of the
Roman empire, especially on the frontiers, where it flourished in the
camps of the legions.(415) The combination of the bull with the
thunderbolt as emblems of the deity suggests that the animal may have been
chosen to represent the sky-god for the sake not merely of its virility
but of its voice; for in the peal of thunder primitive man may well have
heard the bellowing of a celestial bull.

(M101) The goddess who at the head of the procession of women confronts
the great sky-god in the sanctuary at Boghaz-Keui is generally recognized
as the divine Mother, the great Asiatic goddess of life and fertility. The
tall flat-topped hat with perpendicular grooves which she wears, and the
lioness or panther on which she stands, remind us of the turreted crown
and lion-drawn car of Cybele, who was worshipped in the neighbouring land
of Phrygia across the Halys.(416) So Atargatis, the great Syrian goddess
of Hierapolis-Bambyce, was portrayed sitting on lions and wearing a tower
on her head.(417) At Babylon an image of a goddess whom the Greeks called
Rhea had the figures of two lions standing on her knees.(418)

(M102) But in the rock-hewn sculptures of Boghaz-Keui, who is the youth
with the tall pointed cap and double axe who stands on a lioness or
panther immediately behind the great goddess? His figure is all the more
remarkable because he is the only male who interrupts the long procession
of women. Probably he is at once the divine son and the divine lover of
the goddess; for we shall find later on that in Phrygian mythology Attis
united in himself both these characters.(419) The lioness or panther on
which he stands marks his affinity with the goddess, who is supported by a
similar animal. It is natural that the lion-goddess should have a lion-son
and a lion-lover. For we may take it as probable that the Oriental deities
who are represented standing or sitting in human form on the backs of
lions and other animals were originally indistinguishable from the beasts,
and that the complete separation of the bestial from the human or divine
shape was a consequence of that growth of knowledge and of power which led
man in time to respect himself more and the brutes less. The hybrid gods
of Egypt with their human bodies and animal heads form an intermediate
stage in this evolution of anthropomorphic deities out of beasts.

(M103) We may now perhaps hazard a conjecture as to the meaning of that
strange colossal figure in the inner shrine at Boghaz-Keui with its human
head and its body composed of lions. For it is to be observed that the
head of the figure is youthful and beardless, and that it wears a tall
pointed cap, thus resembling in both respects the youth with the
double-headed axe who stands on a lion in the outer sanctuary. We may
suppose that the leonine figure in the inner shrine sets forth the true
mystic, that is, the old savage nature of the god who in the outer shrine
presented himself to his worshippers in the decent semblance of a man. To
the chosen few who were allowed to pass the monster-guarded portal into
the Holy of Holies, the awful secret may have been revealed that their god
was a lion, or rather a lion-man, a being in whom the bestial and human
natures mysteriously co-existed.(420) The reader may remember that on the
rock beside this leonine divinity is carved a group which represents a god
with his arm twined round the neck of his priest in an attitude of
protection, holding one of the priest’s hands in his own. Both figures are
looking and stepping towards the lion-monster, and the god is holding out
his right hand as if pointing to it. The scene may represent the deity
revealing the mystery to the priest, or preparing him to act his part in
some solemn rite for which all his strength and courage will be needed. He
seems to be leading his minister onward, comforting him with an assurance
that no harm can come near him while the divine arm is around him and the
divine hand clasps his. Whither is he leading him? Perhaps to death. The
deep shadows of the rocks which fall on the two figures in the gloomy
chasm may be an emblem of darker shadows soon to fall on the priest. Yet
still he grasps his pastoral staff and goes forward, as though he said,
“Yea, though I walk through the valley of the shadow of death, I will fear
no evil; for thou art with me: thy rod and thy staff they comfort me.”

(M104) If there is any truth in these guesses—for they are little more—the
three principal figures in the processional scene at Boghaz-Keui represent
the divine Father, the divine Mother, and the divine Son. But we have
still to ask, What are they doing? That they are engaged in the
performance of some religious rite seems certain. But what is it? We may
conjecture that it is the rite of the Sacred Marriage, and that the scene
is copied from a ceremony which was periodically performed in this very
place by human representatives of the deities.(421) Indeed, the solemn
meeting of the male and female figures at the head of their respective
processions obviously suggests a marriage, and has been so interpreted by
scholars, who, however, regarded it as the historical wedding of a prince
and princess instead of the mystic union of a god and goddess, overlooking
or explaining away the symbols of divinity which accompany the principal
personages.(422) We may suppose that at Boghaz-Keui, as at many other
places in the interior of Asia Minor, the government was in the hands of a
family who combined royal with priestly functions and personated the gods
whose names they bore. Thus at Pessinus in Phrygia, as we shall see later
on, the priests of Cybele bore the name of her consort Attis, and
doubtless represented him in the ritual.(423) If this was so at
Boghaz-Keui, we may surmise that the chief pontiff and his family annually
celebrated the marriage of the divine powers of fertility, the Father God
and the Mother Goddess, for the purpose of ensuring the fruitfulness of
the earth and the multiplication of men and beasts. The principal parts in
the ceremony would naturally be played by the pontiff himself and his
wife, unless indeed they preferred for good reasons to delegate the
onerous duty to others. That such a delegation took place is perhaps
suggested by the appearance of the pontiff himself in a subordinate place
in the procession, as well as by his separate representation in another
place, as if he were in the act of surveying the ceremony from a
distance.(424) The part of the divine Son at the rite would fitly devolve
upon one of the high-priest’s own offspring, who may well have been
numerous. For it is probable that here, as elsewhere in Asia Minor, the
Mother Goddess was personated by a crowd of sacred harlots,(425) with whom
the spiritual ruler may have been required to consort in his character of
incarnate deity. But if the personation of the Son of God at the rites
laid a heavy burden of suffering on the shoulders of the actor, it is
possible that the representative of the deity may have been drawn, perhaps
by lot, from among the numerous progeny of the consecrated courtesans; for
these women, as incarnations of the Mother Goddess, were probably supposed
to transmit to their offspring some portion of their own divinity. Be that
as it may, if the three principal personages in the processional scene at
Boghaz-Keui are indeed the Father, the Mother, and the Son, the remarkable
position assigned to the third of them in the procession, where he walks
behind his Mother alone in the procession of women, appears to indicate
that he was supposed to be more closely akin to her than to his Father.
From this again we may conjecturally infer that mother-kin rather than
father-kin was the rule which regulated descent among the Hittites. The
conjecture derives some support from Hittite archives, for the names of
the Great Queen and the Queen Mother are mentioned along with that of the
King in state documents.(426) The other personages who figure in the
procession may represent human beings masquerading in the costumes and
with the attributes of deities. Such, for example, are the two female
figures who stand on a double-headed eagle; the two male figures stepping
on what seem to be two mountains; and the two winged beings in the
procession of men, one of whom may be the Moon-god, for he wears a
crescent on his head.(427)

§ 5. Sandan and Baal at Tarsus.

(M105) Whatever may be thought of these speculations, one thing seems
fairly clear and certain. The figure which I have called the divine Son at
Boghaz-Keui is identical with the god Sandan, who appears on the pyre at
Tarsus. In both personages the costume, the attributes, the attitude are
the same. Both represent a man clad in a short tunic with a tall pointed
cap on his head, a sword at his side, a double-headed axe in his hand, and
a lion or panther under his feet.(428) Accordingly, if we are right in
identifying him as the divine Son at Boghaz-Keui, we may conjecture that
under the name of Sandan he bore the same character at Tarsus. The
conjecture squares perfectly with the title of Hercules, which the Greeks
bestowed on Sandan; for Hercules was the son of Zeus, the great
father-god. Moreover, we have seen that the Baal of Tarsus, with the
grapes and the corn in his hand, was assimilated to Zeus.(429) Thus it
would appear that at Tarsus as at Boghaz-Keui there was a pair of deities,
a divine Father and a divine Son, whom the Greeks identified with Zeus and
Hercules respectively. If the Baal of Tarsus was a god of fertility, as
his attributes clearly imply, his identification with Zeus would be
natural, since it was Zeus who, in the belief of the Greeks, sent the
fertilizing rain from heaven.(430) And the identification of Sandan with
Hercules would be equally natural, since the lion and the death on the
pyre were features common to both. Our conclusion then is that it was the
divine Son, the lion-god, who was burned in effigy or in the person of a
human representative at Tarsus, and perhaps at Boghaz-Keui. Semitic
parallels suggest that the victim who played the part of the Son of God in
the fiery furnace ought in strictness to be the king’s son.(431) But no
doubt in later times an effigy would be substituted for the man.

§ 6. Priestly Kings of Olba.

(M106) Unfortunately we know next to nothing of the kings and priests of
Tarsus. In Greek times we hear of an Epicurean philosopher of the city,
Lysias by name, who was elected by his fellow-citizens to the office of
Crown-wearer, that is, to the priesthood of Hercules. Once raised to that
dignity, he would not lay it down again, but played the part of tyrant,
wearing a white robe edged with purple, a costly cloak, white shoes, and a
golden wreath of laurel. He truckled to the mob by distributing among them
the property of the wealthy, while he put to death such as refused to open
their money-bags to him.(432) Though we cannot distinguish in this account
between the legal and the illegal exercise of authority, yet we may safely
infer that the priesthood of Hercules, that is of Sandan, at Tarsus
continued down to late times to be an office of great dignity and power,
not unworthy to be held in earlier times by the kings themselves. Scanty
as is our information as to the kings of Cilicia, we hear of two whose
names appear to indicate that they stood in some special relation to the
divine Sandan. One of them was Sandu’arri, lord of Kundi and Sizu, which
have been identified with Anchiale and Sis in Cilicia.(433) The other was
Sanda-sarme, who gave his daughter in marriage to Ashurbanipal, king of
Assyria.(434) It would be in accordance with analogy if the kings of
Tarsus formerly held the priesthood of Sandan and claimed to represent him
in their own person.

(M107) We know that the whole of Western or Mountainous Cilicia was ruled
by kings who combined the regal office with the priesthood of Zeus, or
rather of a native deity whom, like the Baal of Tarsus, the Greeks
assimilated to their own Zeus. These priestly potentates had their seat at
Olba, and most of them bore the name either of Teucer or of Ajax,(435) but
we may suspect that these appellations are merely Greek distortions of
native Cilician names. Teucer (_Teukros_) may be a corruption of Tark,
Trok, Tarku, or Troko, all of which occur in the names of Cilician priests
and kings. At all events, it is worthy of notice that one, if not two, of
these priestly Teucers had a father called Tarkuaris,(436) and that in a
long list of priests who served Zeus at the Corycian cave, not many miles
from Olba, the names Tarkuaris, Tarkumbios, Tarkimos, Trokoarbasis, and
Trokombigremis, besides many other obviously native names, occur side by
side with Teucer and other purely Greek appellations.(437) In like manner
the Teucrids, who traced their descent from Zeus and reigned at Salamis in
Cyprus,(438) may well have been a native dynasty, who concocted a Greek
pedigree for themselves in the days when Greek civilization was
fashionable. The legend which attributed the foundation of the Cyprian
Salamis to Teucer, son of Telamon, appears to be late and unknown to
Homer.(439) Moreover, a cruel form of human sacrifice which was practised
in the city down to historical times savours rather of Oriental barbarity
than of Greek humanity. Led or driven by the youths, a man ran thrice
round the altar; then the priest stabbed him in the throat with a spear
and burned his body whole on a heaped-up pyre. The sacrifice was offered
in the month of Aphrodite to Diomede, who along with Agraulus, daughter of
Cecrops, had a temple at Salamis. A temple of Athena stood within the same
sacred enclosure. It is said that in olden times the sacrifice was offered
to Agraulus, and not to Diomede. According to another account it was
instituted by Teucer in honour of Zeus. However that may have been, the
barbarous custom lasted down to the reign of Hadrian, when Diphilus, king
of Cyprus, abolished or rather mitigated it by substituting the sacrifice
of an ox for that of a man.(440) On the hypothesis here suggested we must
suppose that these Greek names of divine or heroic figures at the Cyprian
Salamis covered more or less similar figures of the Asiatic pantheon. And
in the Salaminian burnt-sacrifice of a man we may perhaps detect the
original form of the ceremony which in historical times appears to have
been performed upon an image of Sandan or Hercules at Tarsus. When an ox
was sacrificed instead of a man, the old sacrificial rites would naturally
continue to be observed in all other respects exactly as before: the
animal would be led thrice round the altar, stabbed with a spear, and
burned on a pyre. Now at the Syrian Hierapolis the greatest festival of
the year bore the name of the Pyre or the Torch. It was held at the
beginning of spring. Great trees were then cut down and planted in the
court of the temple: sheep, goats, birds, and other creatures were hung
upon them: sacrificial victims were led round: then fire was set to the
whole, and everything was consumed in the flames.(441) Perhaps here also
the burning of animals was a substitute for the burning of men. When the
practice of human sacrifice becomes too revolting to humanity to be
tolerated, its abolition is commonly effected by substituting either
animals or images for living men or women. At Salamis certainly, and
perhaps at Hierapolis, the substitutes were animals: at Tarsus, if I am
right, they were images. In this connexion the statement of a Greek writer
as to the worship of Adonis in Cyprus deserves attention. He says that as
Adonis had been honoured by Aphrodite, the Cyprians after his death cast
live doves on a pyre to him, and that the birds, flying away from the
flames, fell into another pyre and were consumed.(442) The statement seems
to be a description of an actual custom of burning doves in sacrifice to
Adonis. Such a mode of honouring him would be very remarkable, since doves
were commonly sacred to his divine mistress Aphrodite or Astarte. For
example, at the Syrian Hierapolis, one of the chief seats of her worship,
these birds were so holy that they might not even be touched. If a man
inadvertently touched a dove, he was unclean or tabooed for the rest of
the day. Hence the birds, never being molested, were so tame that they
lived with the people in their houses, and commonly picked up their food
fearlessly on the ground.(443) Can the burning of the sacred bird of
Aphrodite in the Cyprian worship of Adonis have been a substitute for the
burning of a sacred man who personated the lover of the goddess?

(M108) If, as many scholars think, Tark or Tarku was the name, or part of
the name, of a great Hittite deity, sometimes identified as the god of the
sky and the lightning,(444) we may conjecture that Tark or Tarku was the
native name of the god of Olba, whom the Greeks called Zeus, and that the
priestly kings who bore the name of Teucer represented the god Tark or
Tarku in their own persons. This conjecture is confirmed by the
observation that Olba, the ancient name of the city, is itself merely a
Grecized form of Oura, the name which the place retains to this day.(445)
The situation of the town, moreover, speaks strongly in favour of the view
that it was from the beginning an aboriginal settlement, though in after
days, like so many other Asiatic cities, it took on a varnish of Greek
culture. For it stood remote from the sea on a lofty and barren tableland,
with a rigorous winter climate, in the highlands of Cilicia.

(M109) Great indeed is the contrast between the bleak windy uplands of
Western or Rugged Cilicia, as the ancients called it, and the soft
luxuriant lowlands of Eastern Cilicia, where winter is almost unknown and
summer annually drives the population to seek in the cool air of the
mountains a refuge from the intolerable heat and deadly fevers of the
plains. In Western Cilicia, on the other hand, a lofty tableland, ending
in a high sharp edge on the coast, rises steadily inland till it passes
gradually into the chain of heights which divide it from the interior.
Looked at from the sea it resembles a great blue wave swelling in one
uniform sweep till its crest breaks into foam in the distant snows of the
Taurus. The surface of the tableland is almost everywhere rocky and
overgrown, in the intervals of the rocks, with dense, thorny, almost
impenetrable scrub. Only here and there in a hollow or glen the niggardly
soil allows of a patch of cultivation; and here and there fine oaks and
planes, towering over the brushwood, clothe with a richer foliage the
depth of the valleys. None but wandering herdsmen with their flocks now
maintain a precarious existence in this rocky wilderness. Yet the ruined
towns which stud the country prove that a dense population lived and
throve here in antiquity, while numerous remains of wine-presses and
wine-vats bear witness to the successful cultivation of the grape. The
chief cause of the present desolation is lack of water; for wells are few
and brackish, perennial streams hardly exist, and the ancient aqueducts,
which once brought life and fertility to the land, have long been suffered
to fall into disrepair.

(M110) But for ages together the ancient inhabitants of these uplands
earned their bread by less reputable means than the toil of the husbandman
and the vinedresser. They were buccaneers and slavers, scouring the high
seas with their galleys and retiring with their booty to the inaccessible
fastnesses of their mountains. In the decline of Greek power all over the
East the pirate communities of Cilicia grew into a formidable state,
recruited by gangs of desperadoes and broken men who flocked to it from
all sides. The holds of these robbers may still be seen perched on the
brink of the profound ravines which cleave the tableland at frequent
intervals. With their walls of massive masonry, their towers and
battlements, overhanging dizzy depths, they are admirably adapted to bid
defiance to the pursuit of justice. In antiquity the dark forests of
cedar, which clothed much of the country and supplied the pirates with
timber for their ships, must have rendered access to these fastnesses
still more difficult. The great gorge of the Lamas River, which eats its
way like a sheet of forked lightning into the heart of the mountains, is
dotted every few miles with fortified towns, some of them still
magnificent in their ruins, dominating sheer cliffs high above the stream.
They are now the haunt only of the ibex and the bear. Each of these
communities had its own crest or badge, which may still be seen carved on
the corners of the mouldering towers. No doubt, too, it blazoned the same
crest on the hull, the sails, or the streamers of the galley which, manned
with a crew of ruffians, it sent out to prey upon the rich merchantmen in
the Golden Sea, as the corsairs called the highway of commerce between
Crete and Africa.

(M111) A staircase cut in the rock connects one of these ruined castles
with the river in the glen, a thousand feet below. But the steps are worn
and dangerous, indeed impassable. You may go for miles along the edge of
these stupendous cliffs before you find a way down. The paths keep on the
heights, for in many of its reaches the gully affords no foothold even to
the agile nomads who alone roam these solitudes. At evening the winding
course of the river may be traced for a long distance by a mist which, as
the heat of the day declines, rises like steam from the deep gorge and
hangs suspended in a wavy line of fleecy cloud above it. But even more
imposing than the ravine of the Lamas is the terrific gorge known as the
_Sheitan dere_ or Devil’s Glen near the Corycian cave. Prodigious walls of
rock, glowing in the intense sunlight, black in the shadow, and spanned by
a summer sky of the deepest blue, hem in the dry bed of a winter torrent,
choked with rocks and tangled with thickets of evergreens, among which the
oleanders with their slim stalks, delicate taper leaves, and bunches of
crimson blossom stand out conspicuous.(446)

(M112) The ruins of Olba, among the most extensive and remarkable in Asia
Minor, were discovered in 1890 by Mr. J. Theodore Bent. But three years
before another English traveller had caught a distant view of its
battlements and towers outlined against the sky like a city of enchantment
or dreams.(447) Standing at a height of nearly six thousand feet above the
sea, the upper town commands a free, though somewhat uniform, prospect for
immense distances in all directions. The sea is just visible far away to
the south. On these heights the winter is long and severe. Snow lies on
the ground for months. No Greek would have chosen such a site for a city,
so bleak and chill, so far from blue water; but it served well for a
fastness of brigands. Deep gorges, one of them filled for miles with
tombs, surround it on all sides, rendering fortification walls
superfluous. But a great square tower, four stories high, rises
conspicuous on the hill, forming a landmark and earning for this upper
town the native name of _Jebel Hissar_, or the Mountain of the Castle. A
Greek inscription cut on the tower proves that it was built by Teucer, son
of Tarkuaris, one of the priestly potentates of Olba. Among other remains
of public buildings the most notable are forty tall Corinthian columns of
the great temple of Olbian Zeus. Though coarse in style and corroded by
long exposure to frost and snow, these massive pillars, towering above the
ruins, produce an imposing effect. That the temple of which they formed
part belonged indeed to Olbian Zeus is shown by a Greek inscription found
within the sacred area, which records that the pent-houses on the inner
side of the boundary wall were built by King Seleucus Nicator and repaired
for Olbian Zeus by “the great high-priest Teucer, son of Zenophanes.”
About two hundred yards from this great temple are standing five elegant
granite columns of a small temple dedicated to the goddess Fortune.
Further, the remains of two theatres and many other public buildings
attest the former splendour of this mountain city. An arched colonnade, of
which some Corinthian columns are standing with their architraves, ran
through the town; and an ancient paved road, lined with tombs and ruins,
leads down hill to a lower and smaller city two or three miles distant. It
is this lower town which retains the ancient name of Oura. Here the
principal ruins occupy an isolated fir-clad height bounded by two narrow
ravines full of rock-cut tombs. Below the town the ravines unite and form
a fine gorge, down which the old road passed seaward.(448)

§ 7. The God of the Corycian Cave.

(M113) Nothing yet found at Olba throws light on the nature of the god who
was worshipped there under the Greek name of Zeus. But at two places near
the coast, distant only some fourteen or fifteen miles from Olba, a deity
also called Zeus by the Greeks was revered in natural surroundings of a
remarkable kind, which must have stood in close relation with the worship,
and are therefore fitted to illustrate it. In both places the features of
the landscape are of the same general cast, and at one of them the god was
definitely identified with the Zeus of Olba. The country here consists of
a tableland of calcareous rock rent at intervals by those great chasms
which are characteristic of a limestone formation. Similar fissures, with
the accompaniment of streams or rivers which pour into them and vanish
under ground, are frequent in Greece, and may be observed in our own
country near Ingleborough in Yorkshire. Fossil bones of extinct animals
are often found embedded in the stalagmite or breccia of limestone caves.
For example, the famous Kent’s Hole near Torquay contained bones of the
mammoth, rhinoceros, lion, hyaena, and bear; and red osseous breccias,
charged with the bones of quadrupeds which have long disappeared from
Europe, are common in almost all the countries bordering on the
Mediterranean.(449) Western Cilicia is richer in Miocene deposits than any
other part of Anatolia, and the limestone gorges of the coast near Olba
are crowded with fossil oysters, corals, and other shells.(450) Here, too,
within the space of five miles the limestone plateau is rent by three
great chasms, which Greek religion associated with Zeus and Typhon. One of
these fissures is the celebrated Corycian cave.

(M114) To visit this spot, invested with the double charm of natural
beauty and legendary renown, you start from the dead Cilician city of
Corycus on the sea, with its ruined walls, towers, and churches, its
rock-hewn houses and cisterns, its shattered mole, its island-fortress,
still imposing in decay. Viewed from the sea, this part of the Cilician
coast, with its long succession of white ruins, relieved by the dark
wooded hills behind, presents an appearance of populousness and splendour.
But a nearer approach reveals the nakedness and desolation of the once
prosperous land.(451) Following the shore westward from Corycus for about
an hour you come to a pretty cove enclosed by wooded heights, where a
spring of pure cold water bubbles up close to the sea, giving to the spot
its name of _Tatlu-su_, or the Sweet Water. From this bay a steep ascent
of about a mile along an ancient paved road leads inland to a plateau.
Here, threading your way through a labyrinth or petrified sea of jagged
calcareous rocks, you suddenly find yourself on the brink of a vast chasm
which yawns at your feet. This is the Corycian cave. In reality it is not
a cave but an immense hollow or trough in the plateau, of oval shape and
perhaps half a mile in circumference. The cliffs which enclose it vary
from one hundred to over two hundred feet in depth. Its uneven bottom
slopes throughout its whole length from north to south, and is covered by
a thick jungle of trees and shrubs—myrtles, pomegranates, carobs, and many
more, kept always fresh and green by rivulets, underground water, and the
shadow of the great cliffs. A single narrow path leads down into its
depths. The way is long and rough, but the deeper you descend the denser
grows the vegetation, and it is under the dappled shade of whispering
leaves and with the purling of brooks in your ears that you at last reach
the bottom. The saffron which of old grew here among the bushes is no
longer to be found, though it still flourishes in the surrounding
district. This luxuriant bottom, with its rich verdure, its refreshing
moisture, its grateful shade, is called Paradise by the wandering
herdsmen. They tether their camels and pasture their goats in it and come
hither in the late summer to gather the ripe pomegranates. At the southern
and deepest end of this great cliff-encircled hollow you come to the
cavern proper. The ruins of a Byzantine church, which replaced a heathen
temple, partly block the entrance. Inwards the cave descends with a gentle
slope into the bowels of the earth. The old path paved with polygonal
masonry still runs through it, but soon disappears under sand. At about
two hundred feet from its mouth the cave comes to an end, and a tremendous
roar of subterranean water is heard. By crawling on all fours you may
reach a small pool arched by a dripping stalactite-hung roof, but the
stream which makes the deafening din is invisible. It was otherwise in
antiquity. A river of clear water burst from the rock, but only to vanish
again into a chasm. Such changes in the course of streams are common in
countries subject to earthquakes and to the disruption caused by volcanic
agency. The ancients believed that this mysterious cavern was haunted
ground. In the rumble and roar of the waters they seemed to hear the clash
of cymbals touched by hands divine.(452)

(M115) If now, quitting the cavern, we return by the same path to the
summit of the cliffs, we shall find on the plateau the ruins of a town and
of a temple at the western edge of the great Corycian chasm. The wall of
the holy precinct was built within a few feet of the precipices, and the
sanctuary must have stood right over the actual cave and its subterranean
waters. In later times the temple was converted into a Christian church.
By pulling down a portion of the sacred edifice Mr. Bent had the good
fortune to discover a Greek inscription containing a long list of names,
probably those of the priests who superintended the worship. One name
which meets us frequently in the list is Zas, and it is tempting to regard
this as merely a dialectical form of Zeus. If that were so, the priests
who bore the name might be supposed to personate the god.(453) But many
strange and barbarous-looking names, evidently foreign, occur in the list,
and Zas may be one of them. However, it is certain that Zeus was
worshipped at the Corycian cave; for about half a mile from it, on the
summit of a hill, are the ruins of a larger temple, which an inscription
proves to have been dedicated to Corycian Zeus.(454)

(M116) But Zeus, or whatever native deity masqueraded under his name, did
not reign alone in the deep dell. A more dreadful being haunted a still
more awful abyss which opens in the ground only a hundred yards to the
east of the great Corycian chasm. It is a circular cauldron, about a
quarter of a mile in circumference, resembling the Corycian chasm in its
general character, but smaller, deeper, and far more terrific in
appearance. Its sides overhang and stalactites droop from them. There is
no way down into it. The only mode of reaching the bottom, which is
covered with vegetation, would be to be lowered at the end of a long rope.
The nomads call this chasm Purgatory, to distinguish it from the other
which they name Paradise. They say that there is a subterranean passage
between the two, and that the smoke of a fire kindled in the Corycian cave
may be seen curling out of the other. The one ancient writer who expressly
mentions this second and more grisly cavern is Mela, who says that it was
the lair of the giant Typhon, and that no animal let down into it could
live.(455) Aeschylus puts into the mouth of Prometheus an account of “the
earth-born Typhon, dweller in Cilician caves, dread monster,
hundred-headed,” who in his pride rose up against the gods, hissing
destruction from his dreadful jaws, while from his Gorgon eyes the
lightning flashed. But him a flaming levin bolt, crashing from heaven,
smote to the very heart, and now he lies, shrivelled and scorched, under
the weight of Etna by the narrow sea. Yet one day he will belch a fiery
hail, a boiling angry flood, rivers of flame, to devastate the fat
Sicilian fields.(456) This poetical description of the monster, confirmed
by a similar passage of Pindar,(457) clearly proves that Typhon was
conceived as a personification of those active volcanoes which spout fire
and smoke to heaven as if they would assail the celestial gods. The
Corycian caverns are not volcanic, but the ancients apparently regarded
them as such, else they would hardly have made them the den of Typhon.

(M117) According to one legend Typhon was a monster, half man and half
brute, begotten in Cilicia by Tartarus upon the goddess Earth. The upper
part of him was human, but from the loins downward he was an enormous
snake. In the battle of the gods and giants, which was fought out in
Egypt, Typhon hugged Zeus in his snaky coils, wrested from him his crooked
sword, and with the blade cut the sinews of the god’s hands and feet. Then
taking him on his back he conveyed the mutilated deity across the sea to
Cilicia, and deposited him in the Corycian cave. Here, too, he hid the
severed sinews, wrapt in a bear’s skin. But Hermes and Aegipan contrived
to steal the missing thews and restore them to their divine owner. Thus
made whole and strong again, Zeus pelted his beaten adversary with
thunderbolts, drove him from place to place, and at last overwhelmed him
under Mount Etna. And the spots where the hissing bolts fell are still
marked by jets of flame.(458)

(M118) It is possible that the discovery of fossil bones of large extinct
animals may have helped to localize the story of the giant at the Corycian
cave. Such bones, as we have seen, are often found in limestone caverns,
and the limestone gorges of Cilicia are in fact rich in fossils. The
Arcadians laid the scene of the battle of the gods and the giants in the
plain of Megalopolis, where many bones of mammoths have come to light, and
where, moreover, flames have been seen to burst from the earth and even to
burn for years.(459) These natural conditions would easily suggest a fable
of giants who had fought the gods and had been slain by thunderbolts; the
smouldering earth or jets of flame would be regarded as the spots where
the divine lightnings had struck the ground. Hence the Arcadians
sacrificed to thunder and lightning.(460) In Sicily, too, great quantities
of bones of mammoths, elephants, hippopotamuses, and other animals long
extinct in the island have been found, and have been appealed to with
confidence by patriotic Sicilians as conclusive evidence of the gigantic
stature of their ancestors or predecessors.(461) These remains of huge
unwieldy creatures which once trampled through the jungle or splashed in
the rivers of Sicily may have contributed with the fires of Etna to build
up the story of giants imprisoned under the volcano and vomiting smoke and
flame from its crater. “Tales of giants and monsters, which stand in
direct connexion with the finding of great fossil bones, are scattered
broadcast over the mythology of the world. Huge bones, found at Punto
Santa Elena, in the north of Guayaquil, have served as a foundation for
the story of a colony of giants who dwelt there. The whole area of the
Pampas is a great sepulchre of enormous extinct animals; no wonder that
one great plain should be called the ‘Field of the giants,’ and that such
names as ‘the hill of the giant,’ ‘the stream of the animal,’ should be
guides to the geologist in his search for fossil bones.”(462)

(M119) About five miles to the north-east of the Corycian caverns, but
divided from them by many deep gorges and impassable rocks, is another and
very similar chasm. It may be reached in about an hour and a quarter from
the sea by an ancient paved road, which ascends at first very steeply and
then gently through bush-clad and wooded hills. Thus you come to a stretch
of level ground covered with the well-preserved ruins of an ancient town.
Remains of fortresses constructed of polygonal masonry, stately churches,
and many houses, together with numerous tombs and reliefs, finely
chiselled in the calcareous limestone of the neighbourhood, bear witness
to the extent and importance of the place. Yet it is mentioned by no
ancient writer. Inscriptions prove that its name was Kanyteldeis or
Kanytelideis, which still survives in the modern form of Kanidiwan. The
great chasm opens in the very heart of the city. So crowded are the ruins
that you do not perceive the abyss till you are within a few yards of it.
It is almost a complete circle, about a quarter of a mile wide,
three-quarters of a mile in circumference, and uniformly two hundred feet
or more in depth. The cliffs go sheer down and remind the traveller of the
great quarries at Syracuse. But like the Corycian caves, the larger of
which it closely resembles, the huge fissure is natural; and its bottom,
like theirs, is overgrown with trees and vegetation. Two ways led down
into it in antiquity, both cut through the rock. One of them was a tunnel,
which is now obstructed; the other is still open. Remains of columns and
hewn stones in the bottom of the chasm seem to show that a temple once
stood there. But there is no cave at the foot of the cliffs, and no stream
flows in the deep hollow or can be heard to rumble underground. A ruined
tower of polygonal masonry, which stands on the southern edge of the
chasm, bears a Greek inscription stating that it was dedicated to Olbian
Zeus by the priest Teucer, son of Tarkuaris. The letters are beautifully
cut in the style of the third century before Christ. We may infer that at
the time of the dedication the town belonged to the priestly kings of
Olba, and that the great chasm was sacred to Olbian Zeus.(463)

(M120) What, then, was the character of the god who was worshipped under
the name of Zeus at these two great natural chasms? The depth of the
fissures, opening suddenly and as it were without warning in the midst of
a plateau, was well fitted to impress and awe the spectator; and the sight
of the rank evergreen vegetation at their bottom, fed by rivulets or
underground water, must have presented a striking contrast to the grey,
barren, rocky wilderness of the surrounding tableland. Such a spot must
have seemed to simple folk a paradise, a garden of God, the abode of
higher powers who caused the wilderness to blossom, if not with roses, at
least with myrtles and pomegranates for man, and with grass and underwood
for his flocks. So to the Semite, as we saw, the Baal of the land is he
who fertilizes it by subterranean water rather than by rain from the sky,
and who therefore dwells in the depths of earth rather than in the height
of heaven.(464) In rainless countries the sky-god is deprived of one of
the principal functions which he discharges in cool cloudy climates like
that of Europe. He has, in fact, little or nothing to do with the
water-supply, and has therefore small excuse for levying a water-rate on
his worshippers. Not, indeed, that Cilicia is rainless; but in countries
bordering on the Mediterranean the drought is almost unbroken through the
long months of summer. Vegetation then withers: the face of nature is
scorched and brown: most of the rivers dry up; and only their white stony
beds, hot to the foot and dazzling to the eye, remain to tell where they
flowed. It is at such seasons that a green hollow, a shady rock, a
murmuring stream, are welcomed by the wanderer in the South with a joy and
wonder which the untravelled Northerner can hardly imagine. Never do the
broad slow rivers of England, with their winding reaches, their grassy
banks, their grey willows mirrored with the soft English sky in the placid
stream, appear so beautiful as when the traveller views them for the first
time after leaving behind him the aridity, the heat, the blinding glare of
the white southern landscape, set in seas and skies of caerulean blue.

(M121) We may take it, then, as probable that the god of the Corycian and
Olbian caverns was worshipped as a source of fertility. In antiquity, when
the river, which now roars underground, still burst from the rock in the
Corycian cave, the scene must have resembled Ibreez, where the god of the
corn and the vine was adored at the source of the stream; and we may
compare the vale of Adonis in the Lebanon, where the divinity who gave his
name to the river was revered at its foaming cascades. The three
landscapes had in common the elements of luxuriant vegetation and copious
streams leaping full-born from the rock. We shall hardly err in supposing
that these features shaped the conception of the deities who were supposed
to haunt the favoured spots. At the Corycian cave the existence of a
second chasm, of a frowning and awful aspect, might well suggest the
presence of an evil being who lurked in it and sought to undo the
beneficent work of the good god. Thus we should have a fable of a conflict
between the two, a battle of Zeus and Typhon.

(M122) On the whole we conclude that the Olbian Zeus, worshipped at one of
these great limestone chasms, and clearly identical in nature with the
Corycian Zeus, was also identical with the Baal of Tarsus, the god of the
corn and the vine, who in his turn can hardly be separated from the god of
Ibreez. If my conjecture is right the native name of the Olbian Zeus was
Tark or Trok, and the priestly Teucers of Olba represented him in their
own persons. On that hypothesis the Olbian priests who bore the name of
Ajax embodied another native deity of unknown name, perhaps the father or
the son of Tark. A comparison of the coin-types of Tarsus with the Hittite
monuments of Ibreez and Boghaz-Keui led us to the conclusion that the
people of Tarsus worshipped at least two distinct gods, a father and a
son, the father-god being known to the Semites as Baal and to the Greeks
as Zeus, while the son was called Sandan by the natives, but Hercules by
the Greeks. We may surmise that at Olba the names of Teucer and Ajax
designated two gods who corresponded in type to the two gods of Tarsus;
and if the lesser figure at Ibreez, who appears in an attitude of
adoration before the deity of the corn and the vine, could be interpreted
as the divine Son in presence of the divine Father, we should have in all
three places the same pair of deities, represented probably in the flesh
by successive generations of priestly kings. But the evidence is far too
slender to justify us in advancing this hypothesis as anything more than a
bare conjecture.

§ 8. Cilician Goddesses.

(M123) So far, the Cilician deities discussed have been males; we have as
yet found no trace of the great Mother Goddess who plays so important a
part in the religion of Cappadocia and Phrygia, beyond the great dividing
range of the Taurus. Yet we may suspect that she was not unknown in
Cilicia, though her worship certainly seems to have been far less
prominent there than in the centre of Asia Minor. The difference may
perhaps be interpreted as evidence that mother-kin and hence the
predominance of Mother Goddesses survived, in the bleak highlands of the
interior, long after a genial climate and teeming soil had fostered the
growth of a higher civilization, and with it the advance from female to
male kinship, in the rich lowlands of Cilicia. Be that as it may, Cilician
goddesses with or without a male partner are known to have been revered in
various parts of the country.

(M124) Thus at Tarsus itself the goddess ’Atheh was worshipped along with
Baal; their effigies are engraved on the same coins of the city. She is
represented wearing a veil and seated upon a lion, with her name in
Aramaic letters engraved beside her.(465) Hence it would seem that at
Tarsus, as at Boghaz-Keui, the Father God mated with a lion-goddess like
the Phrygian Cybele or the Syrian Atargatis. Now the name Atargatis is a
Greek rendering of the Aramaic ’Athar-’atheh, a compound word which
includes the name of the goddess of Tarsus.(466) Thus in name as well as
in attributes the female partner of the Baal of Tarsus appears to
correspond to Atargatis, the Syrian Mother Goddess whose image, seated on
a lion or lions, was worshipped with great pomp and splendour at
Hierapolis-Bambyce near the Euphrates.(467) May we go a step farther and
find a correspondence between the Baal of Tarsus and the husband-god of
Atargatis at Hierapolis-Bambyce? That husband-god, like the Baal of
Tarsus, was identified by the Greeks with Zeus, and Lucian tells us that
the resemblance of his image to the images of Zeus was in all respects
unmistakable. But his image, unlike those of Zeus, was seated upon
bulls.(468) In point of fact he was probably Hadad, the chief male god of
the Syrians, who appears to have been a god of thunder and fertility; for
at Baalbec in the Lebanon, where the ruined temple of the Sun is the most
imposing monument bequeathed to the modern world by Greek art in its
decline, his image grasped in his left hand a thunderbolt and ears of
corn,(469) and a colossal statue of the deity, found near Zenjirli in
Northern Syria, represents him with a bearded human head and horns, the
emblem of strength and fertility.(470) A similar god of thunder and
lightning was worshipped from early times by the Babylonians and
Assyrians; he bore the similar name of Adad and his emblems appear to have
been a thunderbolt and a bull. On an Assyrian relief his image is
represented as that of a bearded man clad in a short tunic, wearing a cap
with two pairs of horns, and grasping an axe in his right hand and a
thunderbolt in his left. His resemblance to the Hittite god of the
thundering sky was therefore very close. An alternative name for this
Babylonian and Assyrian deity was Ramman, an appropriate term, derived
from a verb _ramâmu_ to “scream” or “roar.”(471) Now we have seen that the
god of Ibreez, whose attributes tally with those of the Baal of Tarsus,
wears a cap adorned with bull’s horns;(472) that the Father God at
Boghaz-Keui, meeting the Mother Goddess on her lioness, is attended by an
animal which according to the usual interpretation is a bull;(473) and
that the bull itself was worshipped, apparently as an emblem of fertility,
at Euyuk near Boghaz-Keui.(474) Thus at Tarsus and Boghaz-Keui, as at
Hierapolis-Bambyce, the Father God and the Mother Goddess would seem to
have had as their sacred animals or emblems the bull and the lion
respectively. In later times, under Greek influence, the goddess was
apparently exchanged for, or converted into, the Fortune of the City, who
appears on coins of Tarsus as a seated woman with veiled and turreted
head, grasping ears of corn and a poppy in her hand. Her lion is gone, but
a trace of him perhaps remains on a coin which exhibits the throne of the
goddess adorned with a lion’s leg.(475) In general it would seem that the
goddess Fortune, who figures commonly as the guardian of cities in the
Greek East, especially in Syria, was nothing but a disguised form of Gad,
the Semitic god of fortune or luck, who, though the exigencies of grammar
required him to be masculine, is supposed to have been often merely a
special aspect of the great goddess Astarte or Atargatis conceived as the
patroness and protector of towns.(476) In Oriental religion such
permutations or combinations need not surprise us. To the gods all things
are possible. In Cyprus the goddess of love wore a beard,(477) and
Alexander the Great sometimes disported himself in the costume of Artemis,
while at other times he ransacked the divine wardrobe to figure in the
garb of Hercules, of Hermes, and of Ammon.(478) The change of the goddess
’Atheh of Tarsus into Gad or Fortune would be easy if we suppose that she
was known as Gad-’Atheh, “Luck of ’Atheh,” which occurs as a Semitic
personal name.(479) In like manner the goddess of Fortune at Olba, who had
her small temple beside the great temple of Zeus,(480) may have been
originally the consort of the native god Tark or Tarku.

(M125) Another town in Cilicia where an Oriental god and goddess appear to
have been worshipped together was Mallus. The city was built on a height
in the great Cilician plain near the mouth of the river Pyramus.(481) Its
coins exhibit two winged deities, a male and a female, in a kneeling or
running attitude. On some of the coins the male deity is represented, like
Janus, with two heads facing opposite ways, and with two pairs of wings,
while beneath him is the forepart of a bull with a human head. The obverse
of the coins which bear the female deity displays a conical stone,
sometimes flanked by two bunches of grapes.(482) This conical stone, like
those of other Asiatic cities,(483) was probably the emblem of a Mother
Goddess, and the bunches of grapes indicate her fertilizing powers. The
god with the two heads and four wings can hardly be any other than the
Phoenician El, whom the Greeks called Cronus; for El was characterized by
four eyes, two in front and two behind, and by three pairs of wings.(484)
A discrepancy in the number of wings can scarcely be deemed fatal to the
identification. The god may easily have moulted some superfluous feathers
on the road from Phoenicia to Mallus. On later coins of Mallus these
quaint Oriental deities disappear, and are replaced by corresponding Greek
deities, particularly by a head of Cronus on one side and a figure of
Demeter, grasping ears of corn, on the other.(485) The change doubtless
sprang from a wish to assimilate the ancient native divinities to the new
and fashionable divinities of the Greek pantheon. If Cronus and Demeter,
the harvest god and goddess, were chosen to supplant El and his female
consort, the ground of the choice must certainly have been a supposed
resemblance between the two pairs of deities. We may assume, therefore,
that the discarded couple, El and his wife, had also been worshipped by
the husbandman as sources of fertility, the givers of corn and wine. One
of these later coins of Mallus exhibits Dionysus sitting on a vine laden
with ripe clusters, while on the obverse is seen a male figure guiding a
yoke of oxen as if in the act of ploughing.(486) These types of the
vine-god and the ploughman probably represent another attempt to adapt the
native religion to changed conditions, to pour the old Asiatic wine into
new Greek bottles. The barbarous monster with the multiplicity of heads
and wings has been reduced to a perfectly human Dionysus. The sacred but
deplorable old conical stone no longer flaunts proudly on the coins; it
has retired to a decent obscurity in favour of a natural and graceful
vine. It is thus that a truly progressive theology keeps pace with the
march of intellect. But if these things were done by the apostles of
culture at Mallus, we cannot suppose that the clergy of Tarsus, the
capital, lagged behind their provincial brethren in their efforts to place
the ancient faith upon a sound modern basis. The fruit of their labours
seems to have been the more or less nominal substitution of Zeus, Fortune,
and Hercules for Baal, ’Atheh, and Sandan.(487)

(M126) We may suspect that in like manner the Sarpedonian Artemis, who had
a sanctuary in South-Eastern Cilicia, near the Syrian border, was really a
native goddess parading in borrowed plumes. She gave oracular responses by
the mouth of inspired men, or more probably of women, who in their moments
of divine ecstasy may have been deemed incarnations of her divinity.(488)
Another even more transparently Asiatic goddess was Perasia, or Artemis
Perasia, who was worshipped at Hieropolis-Castabala in Eastern Cilicia.
The extensive ruins of the ancient city, now known as Bodroum, cover the
slope of a hill about three-quarters of a mile to the north of the river
Pyramus. Above them towers the acropolis, built on the summit of dark grey
precipices, and divided from the neighbouring mountain by a deep cutting
in the rock. A mediaeval castle, built of hewn blocks of reddish-yellow
limestone, has replaced the ancient citadel. The city possessed a large
theatre, and was traversed by two handsome colonnades, of which some
columns are still standing among the ruins. A thick growth of brushwood
and grass now covers most of the site, and the place is wild and solitary.
Only the wandering herdsmen encamp near the deserted city in winter and
spring. The neighbourhood is treeless; yet in May magnificent fields of
wheat and barley gladden the eye, and in the valleys the clover grows as
high as the horses’ knees.(489) The ambiguous nature of the goddess who
presided over this City of the Sanctuary (_Hieropolis_)(490) was confessed
by a puzzled worshipper, a physician named Lucius Minius Claudianus, who
confided his doubts to the deity herself in some very indifferent Greek
verses. He wisely left it to the goddess to say whether she was Artemis,
or the Moon, or Hecate, or Aphrodite, or Demeter.(491) All that we know
about her is that her true name was Perasia, and that she was in the
enjoyment of certain revenues.(492) Further, we may reasonably conjecture
that at the Cilician Castabala she was worshipped with rites like those
which were held in honour of her namesake Artemis Perasia at another city
of the same name, Castabala in Cappadocia. There, as we saw, the
priestesses of the goddess walked over fire with bare feet unscathed.(493)
Probably the same impressive ceremony was performed before a crowd of
worshippers in the Cilician Castabala also. Whatever the exact meaning of
the rite may have been, the goddess was in all probability one of those
Asiatic Mother Goddesses to whom the Greeks often applied the name of
Artemis.(494) The immunity enjoyed by the priestess in the furnace was
attributed to her inspiration by the deity. In discussing the nature of
inspiration or possession by a deity, the Syrian philosopher Jamblichus
notes as one of its symptoms a total insensibility to pain. Many inspired
persons, he tells us, “are not burned by fire, the fire not taking hold of
them by reason of the divine inspiration; and many, though they are
burned, perceive it not, because at the time they do not live an animal
life. They pierce themselves with skewers and feel nothing. They gash
their backs with hatchets, they slash their arms with daggers, and know
not what they do, because their acts are not those of mere men. For
impassable places become passable to those who are filled with the spirit.
They rush into fire, they pass through fire, they cross rivers, like the
priestess at Castabala. These things prove that under the influence of
inspiration men are beside themselves, that their senses, their will,
their life are those neither of man nor of beast, but that they lead
another and a diviner life instead, whereby they are inspired and wholly
possessed.”(495) Thus in traversing the fiery furnace the priestesses of
Perasia were believed to be beside themselves, to be filled with the
goddess, to be in a real sense incarnations of her divinity.(496)

A similar touchstone of inspiration is still applied by some villagers in
the Himalayan districts of North-Western India. Once a year they worship
Airi, a local deity, who is represented by a trident and has his temples
on lonely hills and desolate tracts. At his festival the people seat
themselves in a circle about a bonfire. A kettle-drum is beaten, and one
by one his worshippers become possessed by the god and leap with shouts
round the flames. Some brand themselves with heated iron spoons and sit
down in the fire. Such as escape unhurt are believed to be truly inspired,
while those who burn themselves are despised as mere pretenders to the
divine frenzy. Persons thus possessed by the spirit are called Airi’s
horses or his slaves. During the revels, which commonly last about ten
days, they wear red scarves round their heads and receive alms from the
faithful. These men deem themselves so holy that they will let nobody
touch them, and they alone may touch the sacred trident, the emblem of
their god.(497) In Western Asia itself modern fanatics still practise the
same austerities which were practised by their brethren in the days of
Jamblichus. “Asia Minor abounds in dervishes of different orders, who lap
red-hot iron, calling it their ‘rose,’ chew coals of living fire, strike
their heads against solid walls, stab themselves in the cheek, the scalp,
the temple, with sharp spikes set in heavy weights, shouting ‘Allah,
Allah,’ and always consistently avowing that during such frenzy they are
entirely insensible to pain.”(498)

§ 9. The Burning of Cilician Gods.

(M127) On the whole, then, we seem to be justified in concluding that
under a thin veneer of Greek humanity the barbarous native gods of Cilicia
continued long to survive, and that among them the great Asiatic goddess
retained a place, though not the prominent place which she held in the
highlands of the interior down at least to the beginning of our era. The
principle that the inspired priest or priestess represents the deity in
person appears, if I am right, to have been recognized at Castabala and at
Olba, as well as at the sanctuary of Sarpedonian Artemis. There can be no
intrinsic improbability, therefore, in the view that at Tarsus also the
divine triad of Baal, ’Atheh, and Sandan may also have been personated by
priests and priestesses, who, on the analogy of Olba and of the great
sanctuaries in the interior of Asia Minor, would originally be at the same
time kings and queens, princes and princesses. Further, the burning of
Sandan in effigy at Tarsus would, on this hypothesis, answer to the walk
of the priestess of Perasia through the furnace at Castabala. Both were
perhaps mitigations of a custom of putting the priestly king or queen, or
another member of the royal family, to death by fire.

Chapter VII. Sardanapalus and Hercules.

§ 1. The Burning of Sardanapalus.

(M128) The theory that kings or princes were formerly burned to death at
Tarsus in the character of gods is singularly confirmed by another and
wholly independent line of argument. For, according to one account, the
city of Tarsus was founded not by Sandan but by Sardanapalus, the famous
Assyrian monarch whose death on a great pyre was one of the most famous
incidents in Oriental legend. Near the sea, within a day’s march of
Tarsus, might be seen in antiquity the ruins of a great ancient city named
Anchiale, and outside its walls stood a monument called the monument of
Sardanapalus, on which was carved in stone the figure of the monarch. He
was represented snapping the fingers of his right hand, and the gesture
was explained by an accompanying inscription, engraved in Assyrian
characters, to the following effect:—“Sardanapalus, son of Anacyndaraxes,
built Anchiale and Tarsus in one day. Eat, drink, and play, for everything
else is not worth that,” by which was implied that all other human affairs
were not worth a snap of the fingers.(499) The gesture may have been
misinterpreted and the inscription mistranslated,(500) but there is no
reason to doubt the existence of such a monument, though we may conjecture
that it was of Hittite rather than Assyrian origin; for, not to speak of
the traces of Hittite art and religion which we have found at Tarsus, a
group of Hittite monuments has been discovered at Marash, in the upper
valley of the Pyramus.(501) The Assyrians may have ruled over Cilicia for
a time, but Hittite influence was probably much deeper and more
lasting.(502) The story that Tarsus was founded by Sardanapalus may well
be apocryphal,(503) but there must have been some reason for his
association with the city. On the present hypothesis that reason is to be
found in the traditional manner of his death. To avoid falling into the
hands of the rebels, who laid siege to Nineveh, he built a huge pyre in
his palace, heaped it up with gold and silver and purple raiment, and then
burnt himself, his wife, his concubines, and his eunuchs in the fire.(504)
The story is false of the historical Sardanapalus, that is, of the great
Assyrian king Ashurbanipal, but it is true of his brother Shamashshumukin.
Being appointed king of Babylon by Ashurbanipal, he revolted against his
suzerain and benefactor, and was besieged by him in his capital. The siege
was long and the resistance desperate, for the Babylonians knew that they
had no mercy to expect from the ruthless Assyrians. But they were
decimated by famine and pestilence, and when the city could hold out no
more, King Shamashshumukin, determined not to fall alive into the hands of
his offended brother, shut himself up in his palace, and there burned
himself to death, along with his wives, his children, his slaves, and his
treasures, at the very moment when the conquerors were breaking in the
gates.(505) Not many years afterwards the same tragedy was repeated at
Nineveh itself by Saracus or Sinsharishkun, the last king of Assyria.
Besieged by the rebel Nabopolassar, king of Babylon, and by Cyaxares, king
of the Medes, he burned himself in his palace. That was the end of Nineveh
and of the Assyrian empire.(506) Thus Greek history preserved the memory
of the catastrophe, but transferred it from the real victims to the far
more famous Ashurbanipal, whose figure in after ages loomed vast and dim
against the setting sun of Assyrian glory.

§ 2. The Burning of Croesus.

(M129) Another Oriental monarch who prepared at least to die in the flames
was Croesus, king of Lydia. Herodotus tells how the Persians under Cyrus
captured Sardes, the Lydian capital, and took Croesus alive, and how Cyrus
caused a great pyre to be erected, on which he placed the captive monarch
in fetters, and with him twice seven Lydian youths. Fire was then applied
to the pile, but at the last moment Cyrus relented, a sudden shower
extinguished the flames, and Croesus was spared.(507) But it is most
improbable that the Persians, with their profound reverence for the
sanctity of fire, should have thought of defiling the sacred element with
the worst of all pollutions, the contact of dead bodies.(508) Such an act
would have seemed to them sacrilege of the deepest dye. For to them fire
was the earthly form of the heavenly light, the eternal, the infinite, the
divine; death, on the other hand, was in their opinion the main source of
corruption and uncleanness. Hence they took the most stringent precautions
to guard the purity of fire from the defilement of death.(509) If a man or
a dog died in a house where the holy fire burned, the fire had to be
removed from the house and kept away for nine nights in winter or a month
in summer before it might be brought back; and if any man broke the rule
by bringing back the fire within the appointed time, he might be punished
with two hundred stripes.(510) As for burning a corpse in the fire, it was
the most heinous of all sins, an invention of Ahriman, the devil; there
was no atonement for it, and it was punished with death.(511) Nor did the
law remain a dead letter. Down to the beginning of our era the death
penalty was inflicted on all who threw a corpse or cow-dung on the fire,
nay, even on such as blew on the fire with their breath.(512) It is hard,
therefore, to believe that a Persian king should have commanded his
subjects to perpetrate a deed which he and they viewed with horror as the
most flagitious sacrilege conceivable.

(M130) Another and in some respects truer version of the story of Croesus
and Cyrus has been preserved by two older witnesses—namely, by the Greek
poet Bacchylides, who was born some forty years after the event,(513) and
by a Greek artist who painted the scene on a red-figured vase about, or
soon after, the time of the poet’s birth. Bacchylides tells us that when
the Persians captured Sardes, Croesus, unable to brook the thought of
slavery, caused a pyre to be erected in front of his courtyard, mounted it
with his wife and daughters, and bade a page apply a light to the wood. A
bright blaze shot up, but Zeus extinguished it with rain from heaven, and
Apollo of the Golden Sword wafted the pious king and his daughters to the
happy land beyond the North Wind.(514) In like manner the vase-painter
clearly represents the burning of Croesus as a voluntary act, not as a
punishment inflicted on him by the conqueror. He lets us see the king
enthroned upon the pyre with a wreath of laurel on his head and a sceptre
in one hand, while with the other he is pouring a libation. An attendant
is in the act of applying to the pile two objects which have been
variously interpreted as torches to kindle the wood or whisks to sprinkle
holy water. The demeanour of the king is solemn and composed: he seems to
be performing a religious rite, not suffering an ignominious death.(515)

Thus we may fairly conclude with some eminent modern scholars(516) that in
the extremity of his fortunes Croesus prepared to meet death like a king
or a god in the flames. It was thus that Hercules, from whom the old kings
of Lydia claimed to be sprung,(517) ascended from earth to heaven: it was
thus that Zimri, king of Israel, passed beyond the reach of his enemies:
it was thus that Shamashshumukin, king of Babylon, escaped a brother’s
vengeance: it was thus that the last king of Assyria expired in the ruins
of his capital; and it was thus that, sixty-six years after the capture of
Sardes, the Carthaginian king Hamilcar sought to retrieve a lost battle by
a hero’s death.(518)

(M131) Semiramis herself, the legendary queen of Assyria, is said to have
burnt herself on a pyre out of grief at the death of a favourite
horse.(519) Since there are strong grounds for regarding the queen in her
mythical aspect as a form of Ishtar or Astarte,(520) the legend that
Semiramis died for love in the flames furnishes a remarkable parallel to
the traditionary death of the love-lorn Dido, who herself appears to be
simply an Avatar of the same great Asiatic goddess.(521) When we compare
these stories of the burning of Semiramis and Dido with each other and
with the historical cases of the burning of Oriental monarchs, we may
perhaps conclude that there was a time when queens as well as kings were
expected under certain circumstances, perhaps on the death of their
consort, to perish in the fire. The conclusion can hardly be deemed
extravagant when we remember that the practice of burning widows to death
survived in India under English rule down to a time within living
memory.(522)

(M132) At Jerusalem itself a reminiscence of the practice of burning
kings, alive or dead, appears to have lingered as late as the time of
Isaiah, who says: “For Tophet is prepared of old; yea, for the king it is
made ready; he hath made it deep and large: the pile thereof is fire and
much wood; the breath of the Lord, like a stream of brimstone, doth kindle
it.”(523) We know that “great burnings” were regularly made for dead kings
of Judah,(524) and it can hardly be accidental that the place assigned by
Isaiah to the king’s pyre is the very spot in the Valley of Hinnom where
the first-born children were actually burned by their parents in honour of
Moloch “the King.” The exact site of the Valley of Hinnom is disputed, but
all are agreed in identifying it with one of the ravines which encircle or
intersect Jerusalem; and according to some eminent authorities it was the
one called by Josephus the Tyropoeon.(525) If this last identification is
correct, the valley where the children were burned on a pyre lay
immediately beneath the royal palace and the temple. Perhaps the young
victims died for God and the king.(526)

(M133) With the “great burnings” for dead Jewish kings it seems worth
while to compare the great burnings still annually made for dead Jewish
Rabbis at the lofty village of Meiron in Galilee, the most famous and
venerated place of pilgrimage for Jews in modern Palestine. Here the tombs
of the Rabbis are hewn out of the rock, and here on the thirtieth of
April, the eve of May Day, multitudes of pilgrims, both men and women,
assemble and burn their offerings, which consist of shawls, scarfs,
handkerchiefs, books, and the like. These are placed in two stone basins
on the top of two low pillars, and being drenched with oil and ignited
they are consumed to ashes amid the loud applause, shouts, and cries of
the spectators. A man has been known to pay as much as two thousand
piastres for the privilege of being allowed to open the ceremony by
burning a costly shawl. On such occasions the solemn unmoved serenity of
the Turkish officials, who keep order, presents a striking contrast to the
intense excitement of the Jews.(527) This curious ceremony may be
explained by the widespread practice of burning property for the use and
benefit of the dead. So, to take a single instance, the tyrant Periander
collected the finest raiment of all the women in Corinth and burned it in
a pit for his dead wife, who had sent him word by necromancy that she was
cold and naked in the other world, because the clothes he buried with her
had not been burnt.(528) In like manner, perhaps, garments and other
valuables may have been consumed on the pyre for the use of the dead kings
of Judah. In Siam, the corpse of a king or queen is burned in a huge
structure resembling a permanent palace, which with its many-gabled and
high-pitched roofs and multitudinous tinselled spires, soaring to a height
of over two hundred feet, sometimes occupies an area of about an
acre.(529) The blaze of such an enormous catafalque may resemble, even if
it far surpasses, the “great burnings” for the Jewish kings.

§ 3. Purification by Fire.

(M134) These events and these traditions seem to prove that under certain
circumstances Oriental monarchs deliberately chose to burn themselves to
death. What were these circumstances? and what were the consequences of
the act? If the intention had merely been to escape from the hands of a
conqueror, an easier mode of death would naturally have been chosen. There
must have been a special reason for electing to die by fire. The legendary
death of Hercules, the historical death of Hamilcar, and the picture of
Croesus enthroned in state on the pyre and pouring a libation, all combine
to indicate that to be burnt alive was regarded as a solemn sacrifice,
nay, more than that, as an apotheosis which raised the victim to the rank
of a god.(530) For it is to be remembered that Hamilcar as well as
Hercules was worshipped after death. Fire, moreover, was regarded by the
ancients as a purgative so powerful that properly applied it could burn
away all that was mortal of a man, leaving only the divine and immortal
spirit behind. Hence we read of goddesses who essayed to confer
immortality on the infant sons of kings by burning them in the fire by
night; but their beneficent purpose was always frustrated by the ignorant
interposition of the mother or father, who peeping into the room saw the
child in the flames and raised a cry of horror, thus disconcerting the
goddess at her magic rites. This story is told of Isis in the house of the
king of Byblus, of Demeter in the house of the king of Eleusis, and of
Thetis in the house of her mortal husband Peleus.(531) In a slightly
different way the witch Medea professed to give back to the old their lost
youth by boiling them with a hell-broth in her magic cauldron;(532) and
when Pelops had been butchered and served up at a banquet of the gods by
his cruel father Tantalus, the divine beings, touched with pity, plunged
his mangled remains in a kettle, from which after decoction he emerged
alive and young.(533) “Fire,” says Jamblichus, “destroys the material part
of sacrifices, it purifies all things that are brought near it, releasing
them from the bonds of matter and, in virtue of the purity of its nature,
making them meet for communion with the gods. So, too, it releases us from
the bondage of corruption, it likens us to the gods, it makes us meet for
their friendship, and it converts our material nature into an
immaterial.”(534) Thus we can understand why kings and commoners who
claimed or aspired to divinity should choose death by fire. It opened to
them the gates of heaven. The quack Peregrinus, who ended his disreputable
career in the flames at Olympia, gave out that after death he would be
turned into a spirit who would guard men from the perils of the night;
and, as Lucian remarked, no doubt there were plenty of fools to believe
him.(535) According to one account, the Sicilian philosopher Empedocles,
who set up for being a god in his lifetime, leaped into the crater of Etna
in order to establish his claim to godhead.(536) There is nothing
incredible in the tradition. The crack-brained philosopher, with his itch
for notoriety, may well have done what Indian fakirs(537) and the
brazen-faced mountebank Peregrinus did in antiquity, and what Russian
peasants and Chinese Buddhists have done in modern times.(538) There is no
extremity to which fanaticism or vanity, or a mixture of the two, will not
impel its victims.

§ 4. The Divinity of Lydian Kings.

(M135) But apart from any general notions of the purificatory virtues of
fire, the kings of Lydia seem to have had a special reason for regarding
death in the flames as their appropriate end. For the ancient dynasty of
the Heraclids which preceded the house of Croesus on the throne traced
their descent from a god or hero whom the Greeks called Hercules;(539) and
this Lydian Hercules appears to have been identical in name and in
substance with the Cilician Hercules, whose effigy was regularly burned on
a great pyre at Tarsus. The Lydian Hercules bore the name of Sandon;(540)
the Cilician Hercules bore the name of Sandan, or perhaps rather of
Sandon, since Sandon is known from inscriptions and other evidence to have
been a Cilician name.(541) The characteristic emblems of the Cilician
Hercules were the lion and the double-headed axe; and both these emblems
meet us at Sardes in connexion with the dynasty of the Heraclids. For the
double-headed axe was carried as part of the sacred regalia by Lydian
kings from the time of the legendary queen Omphale down to the reign of
Candaules, the last of the Heraclid kings. It is said to have been given
to Omphale by Hercules himself, and it was apparently regarded as a
palladium of the Heraclid sovereignty; for after the dotard Candaules
ceased to carry the axe himself, and had handed it over to the keeping of
a courtier, a rebellion broke out, and the ancient dynasty of the
Heraclids came to an end. The new king Gyges did not attempt to carry the
old emblem of sovereignty; he dedicated it with other spoils to Zeus in
Caria. Hence the image of the Carian Zeus bore an axe in his hand and
received the epithet of Labrandeus, from _labrys_, the Lydian word for
“axe.”(542) Such is Plutarch’s account; but we may suspect that Zeus, or
rather the native god whom the Greeks identified with Zeus, carried the
axe long before the time of Candaules. If, as is commonly supposed, the
axe was the symbol of the Asiatic thunder-god,(543) it would be an
appropriate emblem in the hand of kings, who are so often expected to make
rain, thunder, and lightning for the good of their people. Whether the
kings of Lydia were bound to make thunder and rain we do not know; but at
all events, like many early monarchs, they seem to have been held
responsible for the weather and the crops. In the reign of Meles the
country suffered severely from dearth, so the people consulted an oracle,
and the deity laid the blame on the kings, one of whom had in former years
incurred the guilt of murder. The soothsayers accordingly declared that
King Meles, though his own hands were clean, must be banished for three
years in order that the taint of bloodshed should be purged away. The king
obeyed and retired to Babylon, where he lived three years. In his absence
the kingdom was administered by a deputy, a certain Sadyattes, son of
Cadys, who traced his descent from Tylon.(544) As to this Tylon we shall
hear more presently. Again, we read that the Lydians rejoiced greatly at
the assassination of Spermus, another of their kings, “for he was very
wicked, and the land suffered from drought in his reign.”(545) Apparently,
like the ancient Irish and many modern Africans, they laid the drought at
the king’s door, and thought that he only got what he deserved under the
knife of the assassin.

(M136) With regard to the lion, the other emblem of the Cilician Hercules,
we are told that the same king Meles, who was banished because of a
dearth, sought to make the acropolis of Sardes impregnable by carrying
round it a lion which a concubine had borne to him. Unfortunately at a
single point, where the precipices were such that it seemed as if no human
foot could scale them, he omitted to carry the beast, and sure enough at
that very point the Persians afterwards clambered up into the
citadel.(546) Now Meles was one of the old Heraclid dynasty(547) who
boasted their descent from the lion-hero Hercules; hence the carrying of a
lion round the acropolis was probably a form of consecration intended to
place the stronghold under the guardianship of the lion-god, the
hereditary deity of the royal family. And the story that the king’s
concubine gave birth to a lion’s whelp suggests that the Lydian kings not
only claimed kinship with the beast, but posed as lions in their own
persons and passed off their sons as lion-cubs. Croesus dedicated at
Delphi a lion of pure gold, perhaps as a badge of Lydia,(548) and Hercules
with his lion’s skin is a common type on coins of Sardes.(549)

(M137) Thus the death, or the attempted death, of Croesus on the pyre
completes the analogy between the Cilician and the Lydian Hercules. At
Tarsus and at Sardes we find the worship of a god whose symbols were the
lion and the double-headed axe, and who was burned on a great pyre, either
in effigy or in the person of a human representative. The Greeks called
him Hercules, but his native name was Sandan or Sandon. At Sardes he seems
to have been personated by the kings, who carried the double-axe and
perhaps wore, like their ancestor Hercules, the lion’s skin. We may
conjecture that at Tarsus also the royal family aped the lion-god. At all
events we know that Sandan, the name of the god, entered into the names of
Cilician kings, and that in later times the priests of Sandan at Tarsus
wore the royal purple.(550)

§ 5. Hittite Gods at Tarsus and Sardes.

(M138) Now we have traced the religion of Tarsus back by a double thread
to the Hittite religion of Cappadocia. One thread joins the Baal of
Tarsus, with his grapes and his corn, to the god of Ibreez. The other
thread unites the Sandan of Tarsus, with his lion and his double axe, to
the similar figure at Boghaz-Keui. Without being unduly fanciful,
therefore, we may surmise that the Sandon-Hercules of Lydia was also a
Hittite god, and that the Heraclid dynasty of Lydia were of Hittite blood.
Certainly the influence, if not the rule, of the Hittites extended to
Lydia; for at least two rock-carvings accompanied by Hittite inscriptions
are still to be seen in the country. Both of them attracted the attention
of the ancient Greeks. One of them represents a god or warrior in Hittite
costume armed with a spear and bow. It is carved on the face of a grey
rock, which stands out conspicuous on a bushy hillside, where an old road
runs through a glen from the valley of the Hermus to the valley of the
Cayster. The place is now called Kara-Bel. Herodotus thought that the
figure represented the Egyptian king and conqueror Sesostris.(551) The
other monument is a colossal seated figure of the Mother of the Gods,
locally known in antiquity as Mother Plastene. It is hewn out of the solid
rock and occupies a large niche in the face of a cliff at the steep
northern foot of Mount Sipylus.(552) Thus it would seem that at some time
or other the Hittites carried their arms to the shores of the Aegean.
There is no improbability, therefore, in the view that a Hittite dynasty
may have reigned at Sardes.(553)

§ 6. The Resurrection of Tylon.

(M139) The burning of Sandan, like that of Melcarth,(554) was probably
followed by a ceremony of his resurrection or awakening, to indicate that
the divine life was not extinct, but had only assumed a fresher and purer
form. Of that resurrection we have, so far as I am aware, no direct
evidence. In default of it, however, there is a tale of a local Lydian
hero called Tylon or Tylus, who was killed and brought to life again. The
story runs thus. Tylon or Tylus was a son of Earth.(555) One day as he was
walking on the banks of the Hermus a serpent stung and killed him. His
distressed sister Moire had recourse to a giant named Damasen, who
attacked and slew the serpent. But the serpent’s mate culled a herb, “the
flower of Zeus” in the woods, and bringing it in her mouth put it to the
lips of the dead serpent, which immediately revived. In her turn Moire
took the hint and restored her brother Tylon to life by touching him with
the same plant.(556) A similar incident occurs in many folk-tales.
Serpents are often credited with a knowledge of life-giving plants.(557)
But Tylon seems to have been more than a mere hero of fairy-tales. He was
closely associated with Sardes, for he figures on the coins of the city
along with his champion Damasen or Masnes, the dead serpent, and the
life-giving branch.(558) And he was related in various ways to the royal
family of Lydia; for his daughter married Cotys, one of the earliest kings
of the country,(559) and a descendant of his acted as regent during the
banishment of King Meles.(560) It has been suggested that the story of his
death and resurrection was acted as a pageant to symbolize the revival of
plant life in spring.(561) At all events, a festival called the Feast of
the Golden Flower was celebrated in honour of Persephone at Sardes,(562)
probably in one of the vernal months, and the revival of the hero and of
the goddess may well have been represented together. The Golden Flower of
the Festival would then be the “flower of Zeus” of the legend, perhaps the
yellow crocus of nature or rather her more gorgeous sister, the Oriental
saffron. For saffron grew in great abundance at the Corycian cave of
Zeus;(563) and it is an elegant conjecture, if it is nothing more, that
the very name of the place meant “the Crocus Cave.”(564) However, on the
coins of Sardes the magical plant seems to be a branch rather than a
blossom, a Golden Bough rather than a Golden Flower.

Chapter VIII. Volcanic Religion.

§ 1. The Burning of a God.

(M140) Thus it appears that a custom of burning a god in effigy or in the
person of a human representative was practised by at least two peoples of
Western Asia, the Phoenicians and the Hittites. Whether they both
developed the custom independently, or whether one of them adopted it from
the other, we cannot say. And their reasons for celebrating a rite which
to us seems strange and monstrous are also obscure. In the preceding
inquiry some grounds have been adduced for thinking that the practice was
based on a conception of the purifying virtue of fire, which, by
destroying the corruptible and perishable elements of man, was supposed to
fit him for union with the imperishable and the divine. Now to people who
created their gods in their own likeness, and imagined them subject to the
same law of decadence and death, the idea would naturally occur that fire
might do for the gods what it was believed to do for men, that it could
purge them of the taint of corruption and decay, could sift the mortal
from the immortal in their composition, and so endow them with eternal
youth. Hence a custom might arise of subjecting the deities themselves, or
the more important of them, to an ordeal of fire for the purpose of
refreshing and renovating those creative energies on the maintenance of
which so much depended. To the coarse apprehension of the uninstructed and
unsympathetic observer the solemn rite might easily wear a very different
aspect. According as he was of a pious or of a sceptical turn of mind, he
might denounce it as a sacrilege or deride it as an absurdity. “To burn
the god whom you worship,” he might say, “is the height of impiety and of
folly. If you succeed in the attempt, you kill him and deprive yourselves
of his valuable services. If you fail, you have mortally offended him, and
sooner or later he will visit you with his severe displeasure.” To this
the worshipper, if he was patient and polite, might listen with a smile of
indulgent pity for the ignorance and obtuseness of the critic. “You are
much mistaken,” he might observe, “in imagining that we expect or attempt
to kill the god whom we adore. The idea of such a thing is as repugnant to
us as to you. Our intention is precisely the opposite of that which you
attribute to us. Far from wishing to destroy the deity, we desire to make
him live for ever, to place him beyond the reach of that process of
degeneration and final dissolution to which all things here below appear
by their nature to be subject. He does not die in the fire. Oh no! Only
the corruptible and mortal part of him perishes in the flames: all that is
incorruptible and immortal of him will survive the purer and stronger for
being freed from the contagion of baser elements. That little heap of
ashes which you see there is not our god. It is only the skin which he has
sloughed, the husk which he has cast. He himself is far away, in the
clouds of heaven, in the depths of earth, in the running waters, in the
tree and the flower, in the corn and the vine. We do not see him face to
face, but every year he manifests his divine life afresh in the blossoms
of spring and the fruits of autumn. We eat of his broken body in bread. We
drink of his shed blood in the juice of the grape.”

§ 2. The Volcanic Region of Cappadocia.

(M141) Some such train of reasoning may suffice to explain, though
naturally not to justify, the custom which we bluntly call the burning of
a god. Yet it is worth while to ask whether in the development of the
practice these general considerations may not have been reinforced or
modified by special circumstances; for example, by the natural features of
the country where the custom grew up. For the history of religion, like
that of all other human institutions, has been profoundly affected by
local conditions, and cannot be fully understood apart from them. Now Asia
Minor, the region where the practice in question appears to have been
widely diffused, has from time immemorial been subjected to the action of
volcanic forces on a great scale. It is true that, so far as the memory of
man goes back, the craters of its volcanoes have been extinct, but the
vestiges of their dead or slumbering fires are to be seen in many places,
and the country has been shaken and rent at intervals by tremendous
earthquakes. These phenomena cannot fail to have impressed the imagination
of the inhabitants, and thereby to have left some mark on their religion.

(M142) Among the extinct volcanoes of Anatolia the greatest is Mount
Argaeus, in the centre of Cappadocia, the heart of the old Hittite
country. It is indeed the highest point of Asia Minor, and one of the
loftiest mountains known to the ancients; for in height it falls not very
far short of Mount Blanc. Towering abruptly in a huge pyramid from the
plain, it is a conspicuous object for miles on miles. Its top is white
with eternal snow, and in antiquity its lower slopes were clothed with
dense forests, from which the inhabitants of the treeless Cappadocian
plains drew their supply of timber. In these woods, and in the low grounds
at the foot of the mountain, the languishing fires of the volcano
manifested themselves as late as the beginning of our era. The ground was
treacherous. Under a grassy surface there lurked pits of fire, into which
stray cattle and unwary travellers often fell. Experienced woodmen used
great caution when they went to fell trees in the forest. Elsewhere the
soil was marshy, and flames were seen to play over it at night.(565)
Superstitious fancies no doubt gathered thick around these perilous spots,
but what shape they took we cannot say. Nor do we know whether sacrifices
were offered on the top of the mountain, though a curious discovery may
perhaps be thought to indicate that they were. Sharp and lofty pinnacles
of red porphyry, inaccessible to the climber, rise in imposing grandeur
from the eternal snow of the summit, and here Mr. Tozer found that the
rock had been perforated in various places with human habitations. One
such rock-hewn dwelling winds inward for a considerable distance; rude
niches are hollowed in its sides, and on its roof and walls may be seen
the marks of tools.(566) The ancients certainly did not climb mountains
for pleasure or health, and it is difficult to imagine that any motive but
superstition should have led them to provide dwellings in such a place.
These rock-cut chambers may have been shelters for priests charged with
the performance of religious or magical rites on the summit.

§ 3. Fire-Worship in Cappadocia.

(M143) Under the Persian rule Cappadocia became, and long continued to be,
a great seat of the Zoroastrian fire-worship. In the time of Strabo, about
the beginning of our era, the votaries of that faith and their temples
were still numerous in the country. The perpetual fire burned on an altar,
surrounded by a heap of ashes, in the middle of the temple; and the
priests daily chanted their liturgy before it, holding in their hands a
bundle of myrtle rods and wearing on their heads tall felt caps with
cheek-pieces which covered their lips, lest they should defile the sacred
flame with their breath.(567) It is reasonable to suppose that the natural
fires which burned perpetually on the outskirts of Mount Argaeus attracted
the devotion of the disciples of Zoroaster, for elsewhere similar fires
have been the object of religious reverence down to modern times. Thus at
Jualamukhi, on the lower slopes of the Himalayas, jets of combustible gas
issue from the earth; and a great Hindoo temple, the resort of many
pilgrims, is built over them. The perpetual flame, which is of a reddish
hue and emits an aromatic perfume, rises from a pit in the fore-court of
the sanctuary. The worshippers deliver their gifts, consisting usually of
flowers, to the attendant fakirs, who first hold them over the flame and
then cast them into the body of the temple.(568) Again, Hindoo pilgrims
make their way with great difficulty to Baku on the Caspian, in order to
worship the everlasting fires which there issue from the beds of
petroleum. The sacred spot is about ten miles to the north-east of the
city. An English traveller, who visited Baku in the middle of the
eighteenth century, has thus described the place and the worship. “There
are several ancient temples built with stone, supposed to have been all
dedicated to fire; most of them are arched vaults, not above ten to
fifteen feet high. Amongst others there is a little temple, in which the
Indians now worship; near the altar, about three feet high, is a large
hollow cane, from the end of which issues a blue flame, in colour and
gentleness not unlike a lamp that burns with spirits, but seemingly more
pure. These Indians affirm that this flame has continued ever since the
flood, and they believe it will last to the end of the world; that if it
was resisted or suppressed in that place, it would rise in some other.
Here are generally forty or fifty of these poor devotees, who come on a
pilgrimage from their own country, and subsist upon wild sallary, and a
kind of Jerusalem artichoke, which are very good food, with other herbs
and roots, found a little to the northward. Their business is to make
expiation, not for their own sins only, but for those of others; and they
continue the longer time, in proportion to the number of persons for whom
they have engaged to pray. They mark their foreheads with saffron, and
have a great veneration for a red cow.”(569) Thus it would seem that a
purifying virtue is attributed to the sacred flame, since pilgrims come to
it from far to expiate sin.

§ 4. The Burnt Land of Lydia.

(M144) Another volcanic region of Asia Minor is the district of Lydia, to
which, on account of its remarkable appearance, the Greeks gave the name
of the Burnt Land. It lies to the east of Sardes in the upper valley of
the Hermus, and covers an area of about fifty miles by forty. As described
by Strabo, the country was wholly treeless except for the vines, which
produced a wine inferior to none of the most famous vintages of antiquity.
The surface of the plains was like ashes; the hills were composed of black
stone, as if they had been scorched by fire. Some people laid the scene of
Typhon’s battle with the gods in this Black Country, and supposed that it
had been burnt by the thunderbolts hurled from heaven at the impious
monster. The philosophic Strabo, however, held that the fires which had
wrought this havoc were subterranean, not celestial, and he pointed to
three craters, at intervals of about four miles, each in a hill of scoriae
which he supposed to have been once molten matter ejected by the
volcanoes.(570) His observation and his theory have both been confirmed by
modern science. The three extinct volcanoes to which he referred are still
conspicuous features of the landscape. Each is a black cone of loose
cinders, scoriae, and ashes, with steep sides and a deep crater. From each
a flood of rugged black lava has flowed forth, bursting out at the foot of
the cone, and then rushing down the dale to the bed of the Hermus. The
dark streams follow all the sinuosities of the valleys, their sombre hue
contrasting with the rich verdure of the surrounding landscape. Their
surface, broken into a thousand fantastic forms, resembles a sea lashed
into fury by a gale, and then suddenly hardened into stone. Regarded from
the geological point of view, these black cones of cinders and these black
rivers of lava are of comparatively recent formation. Exposure to the
weather for thousands of years has not yet softened their asperities and
decomposed them into vegetable mould; they are as hard and ungenial as if
the volcanic stream had ceased to flow but yesterday. But in the same
district there are upwards of thirty other volcanic cones, whose greater
age is proved by their softened forms, their smoother sides, and their
mantle of vegetation. Some of them are planted with vineyards to their
summits.(571) Thus the volcanic soil is still as favourable to the
cultivation of the vine as it was in antiquity. The relation between the
two was noted by the ancients. Strabo compares the vines of the Burnt Land
with the vineyards of Catania fertilized by the ashes of Mount Etna; and
he tells us that some ingenious persons explained the fire-born Dionysus
as a myth of the grapes fostered by volcanic agency.(572)

§ 5. The Earthquake God.

(M145) But the inhabitants of these regions were reminded of the
slumbering fires by other and less agreeable tokens than the generous
juice of their grapes. For not the Burnt Land only but the country to the
south, including the whole valley of the Maeander, was subject to frequent
and violent shocks of earthquake. The soil was loose, friable, and full of
salts, the ground hollow, undermined by fire and water. In particular the
city of Philadelphia was a great centre of disturbance. The shocks there,
we are told, were continuous. The houses rocked, the walls cracked and
gaped; the few inhabitants were kept busy repairing the breaches or
buttressing and propping the edifices which threatened to tumble about
their ears. Most of the citizens, indeed, had the prudence to dwell
dispersed on their farms. It was a marvel, says Strabo, that such a city
should have any inhabitants at all, and a still greater marvel that it
should ever have been built.(573) However, by a wise dispensation of
Providence, the earthquakes which shook the foundations of their houses
only strengthened those of their faith. The people of Apameia, whose town
was repeatedly devastated, paid their devotions with great fervour to
Poseidon, the earthquake god.(574) Again, the island of Santorin, in the
Greek Archipelago, has been for thousands of years a great theatre of
volcanic activity. On one occasion the waters of the bay boiled and flamed
for four days, and an island composed of red-hot matter rose gradually, as
if hoisted by machinery, above the waves. It happened that the sovereignty
of the seas was then with the Rhodians, those merchant-princes whose
prudent policy, strict but benevolent oligarchy, and beautiful
island-city, rich with accumulated treasures of native art, rendered them
in a sense the Venetians of the ancient world. So when the ebullition and
heat of the eruption had subsided, their sea-captains landed in the new
island, and founded a sanctuary of Poseidon the Establisher or
Securer,(575) a complimentary epithet often bestowed on him as a hint not
to shake the earth more than he could conveniently help.(576) In many
places people sacrificed to Poseidon the Establisher, in the hope that he
would be as good as his name and not bring down their houses on their
heads.(577)

(M146) Another instance of a Greek attempt to quiet the perturbed spirit
underground is instructive, because similar efforts are still made by
savages in similar circumstances. Once when a Spartan army under King
Agesipolis had taken the field, it chanced that the ground under their
feet was shaken by an earthquake. It was evening, and the king was at mess
with the officers of his staff. No sooner did they feel the shock than,
with great presence of mind, they rose from their dinner and struck up a
popular hymn in honour of Poseidon. The soldiers outside the tent took up
the strain, and soon the whole army joined in the sacred melody.(578) It
is not said whether the flute-band, which always played the Spartan
redcoats into action,(579) accompanied the deep voices of the men with its
shrill music. At all events, the intention of this service of praise,
addressed to the earth-shaking god, can only have been to prevail on him
to stop. I have spoken of the Spartan redcoats because the uniform of
Spartan soldiers was red.(580) As they fought in an extended, not a deep,
formation, a Spartan line of battle must always have been, what the
British used to be, a thin red line. It was in this order, and no doubt
with the music playing and the sun flashing on their arms, that they
advanced to meet the Persians at Thermopylae. Like Cromwell’s Ironsides,
these men could fight as well as sing psalms.(581)

(M147) If the Spartans imagined that they could stop an earthquake by a
soldiers’ chorus, their theory and practice resembled those of many other
barbarians. Thus the people of Timor, in the East Indies, think that the
earth rests on the shoulder of a mighty giant, and that when he is weary
of bearing it on one shoulder he shifts it to the other, and so causes the
ground to quake. At such times, accordingly, they all shout at the top of
their voices to let him know that there are still people on the earth; for
otherwise they fear lest, impatient of his burden, he might tip it into
the sea.(582) The Manichaeans held a precisely similar theory of
earthquakes, except that according to them the weary giant transferred his
burden from one shoulder to the other at the end of every thirty
years,(583) a view which, at all events, points to the observation of a
cycle in the recurrence of earthquake shocks. But we are not told that
these heretics reduced an absurd theory to an absurd practice by raising a
shout in order to remind the earth-shaker of the inconvenience he was
putting them to. However, both the theory and the practice are to be found
in full force in various parts of the East Indies. When the Balinese and
the Sundanese feel an earthquake they cry out, “Still alive,” or “We still
live,” to acquaint the earth-shaking god or giant with their
existence.(584) The natives of Leti, Moa, and Lakor, islands of the Indian
Archipelago, imagine that earthquakes are caused by Grandmother Earth in
order to ascertain whether her descendants are still to the fore. So they
make loud noises for the purpose of satisfying her grandmotherly
solicitude.(585) The Tami of German New Guinea ascribe earthquakes to a
certain old Panku who sits under a great rock; when he stirs, the earth
quakes. If the shock lasts a long time they beat on the ground with
palm-branches, saying, “You down there! easy a little! We men are still
here.”(586) The Shans of Burma are taught by Buddhist monks that under the
world there sleeps a great fish with his tail in his mouth, but sometimes
he wakes, bites his tail, and quivering with pain causes the ground to
quiver and shake likewise. That is the cause of great earthquakes. But the
cause of little earthquakes is different. These are produced by little men
who live underground and sometimes feeling lonely knock on the roof of the
world over their heads; these knockings we perceive as slight shocks of
earthquakes. When Shans feel such a shock, they run out of their houses,
kneel down, and answer the little men saying, “We are here! We are
here!”(587) Earthquakes are common in the Pampa del Sacramento of Eastern
Peru. The Conibos, a tribe of Indians on the left bank of the great
Ucayali River, attribute these disturbances to the creator, who usually
resides in heaven, but comes down from time to time to see whether the
work of his hands still exists. The result of his descent is an
earthquake. So when one happens, these Indians rush out of their huts with
extravagant gestures shouting, as if in answer to a question, “A moment, a
moment, here I am, father, here I am!” Their intention is, no doubt, to
assure their heavenly father that they are still alive, and that he may
return to his mansion on high with an easy mind. They never remember the
creator nor pay him any heed except at an earthquake.(588) In Africa the
Atonga tribe of Lake Nyassa used to believe that an earthquake was the
voice of God calling to inquire whether his people were all there. So when
the rumble was heard underground they all shouted in answer, “_Ye, ye_,”
and some of them went to the mortars used for pounding corn and beat on
them with pestles. They thought that if any one of them did not thus
answer to the divine call he would die.(589) In Ourwira the people think
that an earthquake is caused by a dead sultan marching past underground;
so they stand up to do him honour, and some raise their hands to the
salute. Were they to omit these marks of respect to the deceased, they
would run the risk of being swallowed up alive.(590) The Baganda of
Central Africa used to attribute earthquakes to a certain god named
Musisi, who lived underground and set the earth in a tremor when he moved
about. At such times persons who had fetishes to hand patted them and
begged the god to be still; women who were with child patted their bellies
to keep the god from taking either their own life or that of their unborn
babes; others raised a shrill cry to induce him to remain quiet.(591)

(M148) When the Bataks of Sumatra feel an earthquake they shout “The
handle! The handle!” The meaning of the cry is variously explained. Some
say that it contains a delicate allusion to the sword which is thrust up
to the hilt into the body of the demon or serpent who shakes the earth.
Thus explained the words are a jeer or taunt levelled at that mischievous
being.(592) Others say that when Batara-guru, the creator, was about to
fashion the earth he began by building a raft, which he commanded a
certain Naga-padoha to support. While he was hard at work his chisel
broke, and at the same moment Naga-padoha budged under his burden.
Therefore Batara-guru said, “Hold hard a moment! The handle of the chisel
is broken off.” And that is why the Bataks call out “The handle of the
chisel” during an earthquake. They believe that the deluded Naga-padoha
will take the words for the voice of the creator, and that he will hold
hard accordingly.(593)

(M149) When the earth quakes in some parts of Celebes, it is said that all
the inhabitants of a village will rush out of their houses and grub up
grass by handfuls in order to attract the attention of the earth-spirit,
who, feeling his hair thus torn out by the roots, will be painfully
conscious that there are still people above ground.(594) So in Samoa,
during shocks of earthquake, the natives sometimes ran and threw
themselves on the ground, gnawed the earth, and shouted frantically to the
earthquake god Mafuie to desist lest he should shake the earth to
pieces.(595) They consoled themselves with the thought that Mafuie has
only one arm, saying, “If he had two, what a shake he would give!”(596)
The Bagobos of the Philippine Islands believe that the earth rests on a
great post, which a large serpent is trying to remove. When the serpent
shakes the post, the earth quakes. At such times the Bagobos beat their
dogs to make them howl, for the howling of the animals frightens the
serpent, and he stops shaking the post. Hence so long as an earthquake
lasts the howls of dogs may be heard to proceed from every house in a
Bagobo village.(597) The Tongans think that the earth is supported on the
prostrate form of the god Móooi. When he is tired of lying in one posture,
he tries to turn himself about, and that causes an earthquake. Then the
people shout and beat the ground with sticks to make him lie still.(598)
During an earthquake the Burmese make a great uproar, beating the walls of
their houses and shouting, to frighten away the evil genius who is shaking
the earth.(599) On a like occasion and for a like purpose some natives of
the Gazelle Peninsula in New Britain beat drums and blow on shells.(600)
The Dorasques, an Indian tribe of Panama, believed that the volcano of
Chiriqui was inhabited by a powerful spirit, who, in his anger, caused an
earthquake. At such times the Indians shot volleys of arrows in the
direction of the volcano to terrify him and make him desist.(601) Some of
the Peruvian Indians regarded an earthquake as a sign that the gods were
thirsty, so they poured water on the ground.(602) In Ashantee several
persons used to be put to death after an earthquake; they were slain as a
sacrifice to Sasabonsun, the earthquake god, in the hope of satiating his
cruelty for a time. Houses which had been thrown down or damaged by an
earthquake were sprinkled with human blood before they were rebuilt. When
part of the wall of the king’s house at Coomassie was knocked down by an
earthquake, fifty young girls were slaughtered, and the mud to be used in
the repairs was kneaded with their blood.(603)

(M150) An English resident in Fiji attributed a sudden access of piety in
Kantavu, one of the islands, to a tremendous earthquake which destroyed
many of the natives. The Fijians think that their islands rest on a god,
who causes earthquakes by turning over in his sleep. So they sacrifice to
him things of great value in order that he may turn as gently as
possible.(604) In Nias a violent earthquake has a salutary effect on the
morals of the natives. They suppose that it is brought about by a certain
Batoo Bedano, who intends to destroy the earth because of the iniquity of
mankind. So they assemble and fashion a great image out of the trunk of a
tree. They make offerings, they confess their sins, they correct the
fraudulent weights and measures, they vow to do better in the future, they
implore mercy, and if the earth has gaped, they throw a little gold into
the fissure. But when the danger is over, all their fine vows and promises
are soon forgotten.(605)

(M151) We may surmise that in those Greek lands which have suffered
severely from earthquakes, such as Achaia and the western coasts of Asia
Minor, Poseidon was worshipped not less as an earthquake god than as a
sea-god.(606) It is to be remembered that an earthquake is often
accompanied by a tremendous wave which comes rolling in like a mountain
from the sea, swamping the country far and wide; indeed on the coasts of
Chili and Peru, which have often been devastated by both, the wave is said
to be even more dreaded than the earthquake.(607) The Greeks often
experienced this combination of catastrophes, this conspiracy, as it were,
of earth and sea against the life and works of man.(608) It was thus that
Helice, on the coast of Achaia, perished with all its inhabitants on a
winter night, overwhelmed by the billows; and its destruction was set down
to the wrath of Poseidon.(609) Nothing could be more natural than that to
people familiar with the twofold calamity the dreadful god of the
earthquake and of the sea should appear to be one and the same. The
historian Diodorus Siculus observes that Peloponnese was deemed to have
been in ancient days the abode of Poseidon, that the whole country was in
a manner sacred to him, and that every city in it worshipped him above all
the gods. The devotion to Poseidon he explains partly by the earthquakes
and floods by which the land has been visited, partly by the remarkable
chasms and subterranean rivers which are a conspicuous feature of its
limestone mountains.(610)

§ 6. The Worship of Mephitic Vapours.

(M152) But eruptions and earthquakes, though the most tremendous, are not
the only phenomena of volcanic regions which have affected the religion of
the inhabitants. Poisonous mephitic vapours and hot springs, which abound
especially in volcanic regions,(611) have also had their devotees, and
both are, or were formerly, to be found in those western districts of Asia
Minor with which we are here concerned. To begin with vapours, we may take
as an illustration of their deadly effect the Guevo Upas, or Valley of
Poison, near Batur in Java. It is the crater of an extinct volcano, about
half a mile in circumference, and from thirty to thirty-five feet deep.
Neither man nor beast can descend to the bottom and live. The ground is
covered with the carcases of tigers, deer, birds, and even the bones of
men, all killed by the abundant emanations of carbonic acid gas which
exhale from the soil. Animals let down into it die in a few minutes. The
whole range of hills is volcanic. Two neighbouring craters constantly emit
smoke.(612) In another crater of Java, near the volcano Talaga Bodas, the
sulphureous exhalations have proved fatal to tigers, birds, and countless
insects; and the soft parts of these creatures, such as fibres, muscles,
hair, and skin, are well preserved, while the bones are corroded or
destroyed.(613)

(M153) The ancients were acquainted with such noxious vapours in their own
country, and they regarded the vents from which they were discharged as
entrances to the infernal regions.(614) The Greeks called them places of
Pluto (_Plutonia_) or places of Charon (_Charonia_).(615) In Italy the
vapours were personified as a goddess, who bore the name of Mefitis and
was worshipped in various parts of the peninsula.(616) She had a temple in
the famous valley of Amsanctus in the land of the Hirpini, where the
exhalations, supposed to be the breath of Pluto himself, were of so deadly
a character that all who set foot on the spot died.(617) The place is a
glen, partly wooded with chestnut trees, among limestone hills, distant
about four miles from the town of Frigento. Here, under a steep shelving
bank of decomposed limestone, there is a pool of dark ash-coloured water,
which continually bubbles up with an explosion like distant thunder. A
rapid stream of the same blackish water rushes into the pool from under
the barren rocky hill, but the fall is not more than a few feet. A little
higher up are apertures in the ground, through which warm blasts of
sulphuretted hydrogen are constantly issuing with more or less noise,
according to the size of the holes. These blasts are no doubt what the
ancients deemed the breath of Pluto. The pool is now called _Mefite_ and
the holes _Mefitinelle_. On the other side of the pool is a smaller pond
called the _Coccaio_, or Cauldron, because it appears to be perpetually
boiling. Thick masses of mephitic vapour, visible a hundred yards off,
float in rapid undulations on its surface. The exhalations given off by
these waters are sometimes fatal, especially when they are borne on a high
wind. But as the carbonic acid gas does not naturally rise more than two
or three feet from the ground, it is possible in calm weather to walk
round the pools, though to stoop is difficult and to fall would be
dangerous. The ancient temple of Mefitis has been replaced by a shrine of
the martyred Santa Felicita.(618)

(M154) Similar discharges of poisonous vapours took place at various
points in the volcanic district of Caria, and were the object of
superstitious veneration in antiquity. Thus at the village of Thymbria
there was a sacred cave which gave out deadly emanations, and the place
was deemed a sanctuary of Charon.(619) A similar cave might be seen at the
village of Acharaca near Nysa, in the valley of the Maeander. Here, below
the cave, there was a fine grove with a temple dedicated to Pluto and
Persephone. The place was sacred to Pluto, yet sick people resorted to it
for the restoration of their health. They lived in the neighbouring
village, and the priests prescribed for them according to the revelations
which they received from the two deities in dreams. Often the priests
would take the patients to the cave and leave them there for days without
food. Sometimes the sufferers themselves were favoured with revelations in
dreams, but they always acted under the spiritual direction of the
priests. To all but the sick the place was unapproachable and fatal. Once
a year a festival was held in the village, and then afflicted folk came in
crowds to be rid of their ailments. About the hour of noon on that day a
number of athletic young men, their naked bodies greased with oil, used to
carry a bull up to the cave and there let it go. But the beast had not
taken a few steps into the cavern before it fell to the ground and
expired: so deadly was the vapour.(620)

(M155) Another Plutonian sanctuary of the same sort existed at Hierapolis,
in the upper valley of the Maeander, on the borders of Lydia and
Phrygia.(621) Here under a brow of the hill there was a deep cave with a
narrow mouth just large enough to admit the body of a man. A square space
in front of the cave was railed off, and within the railing there hung so
thick a cloudy vapour that it was hardly possible to see the ground. In
calm weather people could step up to the railing with safety, but to pass
within it was instant death. Bulls driven into the enclosure fell to the
earth and were dragged out lifeless; and sparrows, which spectators by way
of experiment allowed to fly into the mist, dropped dead at once. Yet the
eunuch priests of the Great Mother Goddess could enter the railed-off area
with impunity; nay more, they used to go up to the very mouth of the cave,
stoop, and creep into it for a certain distance, holding their breath; but
there was a look on their faces as if they were being choked. Some people
ascribed the immunity of the priests to the divine protection, others to
the use of antidotes.(622)

§ 7. The Worship of Hot Springs.

(M156) The mysterious chasm of Hierapolis, with its deadly mist, has not
been discovered in modern times; indeed it would seem to have vanished
even in antiquity.(623) It may have been destroyed by an earthquake. But
another marvel of the Sacred City remains to this day. The hot springs
with their calcareous deposit, which, like a wizard’s wand, turns all that
it touches to stone, excited the wonder of the ancients, and the course of
ages has only enhanced the fantastic splendour of the great transformation
scene. The stately ruins of Hierapolis occupy a broad shelf or terrace on
the mountain-side commanding distant views of extraordinary beauty and
grandeur, from the dark precipices and dazzling snows of Mount Cadmus away
to the burnt summits of Phrygia, fading in rosy tints into the blue of the
sky. Hills, broken by wooded ravines, rise behind the city. In front the
terrace falls away in cliffs three hundred feet high into the desolate
treeless valley of the Lycus. Over the face of these cliffs the hot
streams have poured or trickled for thousands of years, encrusting them
with a pearly white substance like salt or driven snow. The appearance of
the whole is as if a mighty river, some two miles broad, had been suddenly
arrested in the act of falling over a great cliff and transformed into
white marble. It is a petrified Niagara. The illusion is strongest in
winter or in cool summer mornings when the mist from the hot springs hangs
in the air, like a veil of spray resting on the foam of the waterfall. A
closer inspection of the white cliff, which attracts the traveller’s
attention at a distance of twenty miles, only adds to its beauty and
changes one illusion for another. For now it seems to be a glacier, its
long pendent stalactites looking like icicles, and the snowy whiteness of
its smooth expanse being tinged here and there with delicate hues of blue,
rose and green, all the colours of the rainbow. These petrified cascades
of Hierapolis are among the wonders of the world. Indeed they have
probably been without a rival in their kind ever since the famous white
and pink terraces or staircases of Rotomahana in New Zealand were
destroyed by a volcanic eruption.

(M157) The hot springs which have wrought these miracles at Hierapolis
rise in a large deep pool among the vast and imposing ruins of the ancient
city. The water is of a greenish-blue tint, but clear and transparent. At
the bottom may be seen the white marble columns of a beautiful Corinthian
colonnade, which must formerly have encircled the sacred pool. Shimmering
through the green-blue water they look like the ruins of a Naiad’s palace.
Clumps of oleanders and pomegranate-trees overhang the little lake and add
to its charm. Yet the enchanted spot has its dangers. Bubbles of carbonic
acid gas rise incessantly from the bottom and mount like flickering
particles of silver to the surface. Birds and beasts which come to drink
of the water are sometimes found dead on the bank, stifled by the noxious
vapour; and the villagers tell of bathers who have been overpowered by it
and drowned, or dragged down, as they say, to death by the water-spirit.

(M158) The streams of hot water, no longer regulated by the care of a
religious population, have for centuries been allowed to overflow their
channels and to spread unchecked over the tableland. By the deposit which
they leave behind they have raised the surface of the ground many feet,
their white ridges concealing the ruins and impeding the footstep, except
where the old channels, filled up solidly to the brim, now form hard level
footpaths, from which the traveller may survey the strange scene without
quitting the saddle. In antiquity the husbandmen used purposely to lead
the water in rills round their lands, and thus in a few years their fields
and vineyards were enclosed with walls of solid stone. The water was also
peculiarly adapted for the dyeing of woollen stuffs. Tinged with dyes
extracted from certain roots, it imparted to cloths dipped in it the
finest shades of purple and scarlet.(624)

(M159) We cannot doubt that Hierapolis owed its reputation as a holy city
in great part to its hot springs and mephitic vapours. The curative virtue
of mineral and thermal springs was well known to the ancients, and it
would be interesting, if it were possible, to trace the causes which have
gradually eliminated the superstitious element from the use of such
waters, and so converted many old seats of volcanic religion into the
medicinal baths of modern times. It was an article of Greek faith that all
hot springs were sacred to Hercules.(625) “Who ever heard of cold baths
that were sacred to Hercules?” asks Injustice in Aristophanes; and Justice
admits that the brawny hero’s patronage of hot baths was the excuse
alleged by young men for sprawling all day in the steaming water when they
ought to have been sweating in the gymnasium.(626) Hot springs were said
to have been first produced for the refreshment of Hercules after his
labours; some ascribed the kindly thought and deed to Athena, others to
Hephaestus, and others to the nymphs.(627) The warm water of these sources
appears to have been used especially to heal diseases of the skin; for a
Greek proverb, “the itch of Hercules,” was applied to persons in need of
hot baths for the scab.(628) On the strength of his connexion with
medicinal springs Hercules set up as a patron of the healing art. In
heaven, if we can trust Lucian, he even refused to give place to
Aesculapius himself, and the difference between the two deities led to a
very unseemly brawl. “Do you mean to say,” demanded Hercules of his father
Zeus, in a burst of indignation, “that this apothecary is to sit down to
table before me?” To this the apothecary replied with much acrimony,
recalling certain painful episodes in the private life of the burly hero.
Finally the dispute was settled by Zeus, who decided in favour of
Aesculapius on the ground that he died before Hercules, and was therefore
entitled to rank as senior god.(629)

(M160) Among the hot springs sacred to Hercules the most famous were those
which rose in the pass of Thermopylae, and gave to the defile its name of
the Hot Gates.(630) The warm baths, called by the natives “the Pots,” were
enlarged and improved for the use of invalids by the wealthy sophist
Herodes Atticus in the second century of our era. An altar of Hercules
stood beside them.(631) According to one story, the hot springs were here
produced for his refreshment by the goddess Athena.(632) They exist to
this day apparently unchanged, although the recession of the sea has
converted what used to be a narrow pass into a wide, swampy flat, through
which the broad but shallow, turbid stream of the Sperchius creeps
sluggishly seaward. On the other side the rugged mountains descend in
crags and precipices to the pass, their grey rocky sides tufted with low
wood or bushes wherever vegetation can find a foothold, and their summits
fringed along the sky-line with pines. They remind a Scotchman of the
“crags, knolls, and mounds confusedly hurled” in which Ben Venue comes
down to the Silver Strand of Loch Katrine. The principal spring bursts
from the rocks just at the foot of the steepest and loftiest part of the
range. After forming a small pool it flows in a rapid stream eastward,
skirting the foot of the mountains. The water is so hot that it is almost
painful to hold the hands in it, at least near the source, and steam rises
thickly from its surface along the course of the brook. Indeed the clouds
of white steam and the strong sulphurous smell acquaint the traveller with
his approach to the famous spot before he comes in sight of the springs.
The water is clear, but has the appearance of being of a deep sea-blue or
sea-green colour. This appearance it takes from the thick, slimy deposits
of blue-green sulphur which line the bed of the stream. From its source
the blue, steaming, sulphur-reeking brook rushes eastward for a few
hundred yards at the foot of the mountain, and is then joined by the water
of another spring, which rises much more tranquilly in a sort of natural
bath among the rocks. The sides of this bath are not so thickly coated
with sulphur as the banks of the stream; hence its water, about two feet
deep, is not so blue. Just beyond it there is a second and larger bath,
which, from its square shape and smooth sides, would seem to be in part
artificial. These two baths are probably the Pots mentioned by ancient
writers. They are still used by bathers, and a few wooden dressing-rooms
are provided for the accommodation of visitors. Some of the water is
conducted in an artificial channel to turn a mill about half a mile off at
the eastern end of the pass. The rest crosses the flat to find its way to
the sea. In its passage it has coated the swampy ground with a white
crust, which sounds hollow under the tread.(633)

(M161) We may conjecture that these remarkable springs furnished the
principal reason for associating Hercules with this district, and for
laying the scene of his fiery death on the top of the neighbouring Mount
Oeta. The district is volcanic, and has often been shaken by
earthquakes.(634) Across the strait the island of Euboea has suffered from
the same cause and at the same time; and on its southern shore sulphureous
springs, like those of Thermopylae, but much hotter and more powerful,
were in like manner dedicated to Hercules.(635) The strong medicinal
qualities of the waters, which are especially adapted for the cure of skin
diseases and gout, have attracted patients in ancient and modern times.
Sulla took the waters here for his gout;(636) and in the days of Plutarch
the neighbouring town of Aedepsus, situated in a green valley about two
miles from the springs, was one of the most fashionable resorts of Greece.
Elegant and commodious buildings, an agreeable country, and abundance of
fish and game united with the health-giving properties of the baths to
draw crowds of idlers to the place, especially in the prime of the
glorious Greek spring, the height of the season at Aedepsus. While some
watched the dancers dancing or listened to the strains of the harp, others
passed the time in discourse, lounging in the shade of cloisters or pacing
the shore of the beautiful strait with its prospect of mountains beyond
mountains immortalized in story across the water.(637) Of all this Greek
elegance and luxury hardly a vestige remains. Yet the healing springs flow
now as freely as of old. In the course of time the white and yellow
calcareous deposit which the water leaves behind it, has formed a hillock
at the foot of the mountains, and the stream now falls in a steaming
cascade from the face of the rock into the sea.(638) Once, after an
earthquake, the springs ceased to flow for three days, and at the same
time the hot springs of Thermopylae dried up.(639) The incident proves the
relation of these Baths of Hercules on both sides of the strait to each
other and to volcanic agency. On another occasion a cold spring suddenly
burst out beside the hot springs of Aedepsus, and as its water was
supposed to be peculiarly beneficial to health, patients hastened from far
and near to drink of it. But the generals of King Antigonus, anxious to
raise a revenue, imposed a tax on the use of the water; and the spring, as
if in disgust at being turned to so base a use, disappeared as suddenly as
it had come.(640)

(M162) The association of Hercules with hot springs was not confined to
Greece itself. Greek influence extended it to Sicily,(641) Italy,(642) and
even to Dacia.(643) Why the hero should have been chosen as the patron of
thermal waters, it is hard to say. Yet it is worth while, perhaps, to
remember that such springs combine in a manner the twofold and seemingly
discordant principles of water and fire,(644) of fertility and
destruction, and that the death of Hercules in the flames seems to connect
him with the fiery element. Further, the apparent conflict of the two
principles is by no means as absolute as at first sight we might be
tempted to suppose; for heat is as necessary as moisture to the support of
animal and vegetable life. Even volcanic fires have their beneficent
aspect, since their products lend a more generous flavour to the juice of
the grape. The ancients themselves, as we have seen, perceived the
connexion between good wine and volcanic soil, and proposed more or less
seriously to interpret the vine-god Dionysus as a child of the fire.(645)
As a patron of hot springs Hercules combined the genial elements of heat
and moisture, and may therefore have stood, in one of his many aspects,
for the principle of fertility.

(M163) In Syria childless women still resort to hot springs in order to
procure offspring from the saint or the jinnee of the waters.(646) This,
for example, they do at the famous hot springs in the land of Moab which
flow through a wild gorge into the Dead Sea. In antiquity the springs went
by the Greek name of Callirrhoe, the Fair-flowing. It was to them that the
dying Herod, weighed down by a complication of disorders which the pious
Jews traced to God’s vengeance, repaired in the vain hope of arresting or
mitigating the fatal progress of disease. The healing waters brought no
alleviation of his sufferings, and he retired to Jericho to die.(647) The
hot springs burst in various places from the sides of a deep romantic
ravine to form a large and rapid stream of lukewarm water, which rushes
down the depths of the lynn, dashing and foaming over boulders, under the
dense shade of tamarisk-trees and cane-brakes, the rocks on either bank
draped with an emerald fringe of maidenhair fern. One of the springs falls
from a high rocky shelf over the face of a cliff which is tinted bright
yellow by the sulphurous water. The lofty crags which shut in the narrow
chasm are bold and imposing in outline and varied in colour, for they
range from red sandstone through white and yellow limestone to black
basalt. The waters issue from the line where the sandstone and limestone
meet. Their temperature is high, and from great clefts in the
mountain-sides you may see clouds of steam rising and hear the rumbling of
the running waters. The bottom of the glen is clothed and half choked with
rank vegetation; for, situated far below the level of the sea, the hot
ravine is almost African in climate and flora. Here grow dense thickets of
canes with their feathery tufts that shake and nod in every passing breath
of wind: here the oleander flourishes with its dark-green glossy foliage
and its beautiful pink blossoms: here tall date-palms rear their stately
heads wherever the hot springs flow. Gorgeous flowers, too, carpet the
ground. Splendid orobanches, some pinkish purple, some bright yellow, grow
in large tufts, each flower-stalk more than three feet high, and covered
with blossoms from the ground upwards. An exquisite rose-coloured geranium
abounds among the stones; and where the soil is a little richer than usual
it is a mass of the night-scented stock, while the crannies of the rocks
are gay with scarlet ranunculus and masses of sorrel and cyclamen. Over
all this luxuriant vegetation flit great butterflies of brilliant hues.
Looking down the far-stretching gorge to its mouth you see in the distance
the purple hills of Judah framed between walls of black basaltic columns
on the one side and of bright red sandstone on the other.(648)

(M164) Every year in the months of April and May the Arabs resort in
crowds to the glen to benefit by the waters. They take up their quarters
in huts made of the reeds which they cut in the thickets. They bathe in
the steaming water, or allow it to splash on their bodies as it gushes in
a powerful jet from a crevice in the rocks. But before they indulge in
these ablutions, the visitors, both Moslem and Christian, propitiate the
spirit or genius of the place by sacrificing a sheep or goat at the spring
and allowing its red blood to tinge the water. Then they bathe in what
they call the Baths of Solomon. Legend runs that Solomon the Wise made his
bathing-place here, and in order to keep the water always warm he
commanded the jinn never to let the fire die down. The jinn obey his
orders to this day, but sometimes they slacken their efforts, and then the
water runs low and cool. When the bathers perceive that, they say, “O
Solomon, bring green wood, dry wood,” and no sooner have they said so than
the water begins to gurgle and steam as before. Sick people tell the saint
or sheikh, who lives invisible in the springs, all about their ailments;
they point out to him the precise spot that is the seat of the malady, it
may be the back, or the head, or the legs; and if the heat of the water
diminishes, they call out, “Thy bath is cold, O sheikh, thy bath is cold!”
whereupon the obliging sheikh stokes up the fire, and out comes the water
boiling. But if in spite of their remonstrances the temperature of the
spring continues low, they say that the sheikh has gone on pilgrimage, and
they shout to him to hasten his return. Barren Moslem women also visit
these hot springs to obtain children, and they do the same at the similar
baths near Kerak. At the latter place a childless woman has been known to
address the spirit of the waters saying, “O sheikh Solomon, I am not yet
an old woman; give me children.”(649) The respect thus paid by Arab men
and women to the sheikh Solomon at his hot springs may help us to
understand the worship which at similar spots Greek men and women used to
render to the hero Hercules. As the ideal of manly strength he may have
been deemed the father of many of his worshippers, and Greek wives may
have gone on pilgrimage to his steaming waters in order to obtain the wish
of their hearts.

§ 8. The Worship of Volcanoes in other Lands.

(M165) How far these considerations may serve to explain the custom of
burning Hercules, or gods identified with him, in effigy or in the person
of a human being, is a question which deserves to be considered. It might
be more easily answered if we were better acquainted with analogous
customs in other parts of the world, but our information with regard to
the worship of volcanic phenomena in general appears to be very scanty.
However, a few facts may be noted.

(M166) The largest active crater in the world is Kirauea in Hawaii. It is
a huge cauldron, several miles in circumference and hundreds of feet deep,
the bottom of which is filled with boiling lava in a state of terrific
ebullition; from the red surge rise many black cones or insulated craters
belching columns of grey smoke or pyramids of brilliant flame from their
roaring mouths, while torrents of blazing lava roll down their sides to
flow into the molten, tossing sea of fire below. The scene is especially
impressive by night, when flames of sulphurous blue or metallic red sweep
across the heaving billows of the infernal lake, casting a broad glare on
the jagged sides of the insulated craters, which shoot up eddying streams
of fire with a continuous roar, varied at frequent intervals by loud
detonations, as spherical masses of fusing lava or bright ignited stones
are hurled into the air.(650) It is no wonder that so appalling a
spectacle should have impressed the imagination of the natives and filled
it with ideas of the dreadful beings who inhabit the fiery abyss. They
considered the great crater, we are told, as the primaeval abode of their
volcanic deities: the black cones that rise like islands from the burning
lake appeared to them the houses where the gods often amused themselves by
playing at draughts: the roaring of the furnaces and the crackling of the
flames were the music of their dance; and the red flaming surge was the
surf wherein they played, sportively swimming on the rolling wave.(651)

(M167) For these fearful divinities they had appropriate names; one was
the King of Steam or Vapour, another the Rain of Night, another the
Husband of Thunder, another the Child of War with a Spear of Fire, another
the Fiery-eyed Canoe-breaker, another the Red-hot Mountain holding or
lifting Clouds, and so on. But above them all was the great goddess Pélé.
All were dreaded: they never journeyed on errands of mercy but only to
receive offerings or to execute vengeance; and their arrival in any place
was announced by the convulsive trembling of the earth, by the lurid light
of volcanic eruption, by the flash of lightning, and the clap of thunder.
The whole island was bound to pay them tribute or support their temples
and devotees; and whenever the chiefs or people failed to send the proper
offerings, or incurred their displeasure by insulting them or their
priests or breaking the taboos which should be observed round about the
craters, they filled the huge cauldron on the top of Kirauea with molten
lava, and spouted the fiery liquid on the surrounding country; or they
would march to some of their other houses, which mortals call craters, in
the neighbourhood of the sinners, and rushing forth in a river or column
of fire overwhelm the guilty. If fishermen did not bring them enough fish
from the sea, they would go down, kill all the fish, fill the shoals with
lava, and so destroy the fishing-grounds. Hence, when the volcano was in
active eruption or threatened to break out, the people used to cast vast
numbers of hogs, alive or dead, into the craters or into the rolling
torrent of lava in order to appease the gods and arrest the progress of
the fiery stream.(652) To pluck certain sacred berries, which grow on the
mountain, to dig sand on its slopes, or to throw stones into the crater
were acts particularly offensive to the deities, who would instantly rise
in volumes of smoke, crush the offender under a shower of stones, or so
involve him in thick darkness and rain that he could never find his way
home. However, it was lawful to pluck and eat of the sacred berries, if
only a portion of them were first offered to the goddess Pélé. The offerer
would take a branch laden with clusters of the beautiful red and yellow
berries, and standing on the edge of the abyss and looking towards the
place where the smoke rose in densest volumes, he would say, “Pélé, here
are your berries: I offer some to you, some I also eat.” With that he
would throw some of the berries into the crater and eat the rest.(653) A
kind of brittle volcanic glass, of a dark-olive colour and
semi-transparent, is found on the mountain in the shape of filaments as
fine as human hair; the natives call it the hair of the goddess Pélé.(654)
Worshippers used to cast locks of their own hair into the crater of
Kirauea as an offering to the dreadful goddess who dwelt in it. She had
also a temple at the bottom of a valley, where stood a number of rude
stone idols wrapt in white and yellow cloth. Once a year the priests and
devotees of Pélé assembled there to perform certain rites and to feast on
hogs, dogs, and fruit, which the pious inhabitants of Hamakua brought to
the holy place in great abundance. This annual festival was intended to
propitiate the volcanic goddess and thereby to secure the country from
earthquakes and floods of molten lava.(655) The goddess of the volcano was
supposed to inspire people, though to the carnal eye the inspiration
resembled intoxication. One of these inspired priestesses solemnly
affirmed to an English missionary that she was the goddess Pélé herself
and as such immortal. Assuming a haughty air, she said, “I am Pélé; I
shall never die; and those who follow me, when they die, if part of their
bones be taken to Kirauea (the name of the volcano), will live with me in
the bright fires there.”(656) For “the worshippers of Pélé threw a part of
bones of their dead into the volcano, under the impression that the
spirits of the deceased would then be admitted to the society of the
volcanic deities, and that their influence would preserve the survivors
from the ravages of volcanic fire.”(657)

(M168) This last belief may help to explain a custom, which some peoples
have observed, of throwing human victims into volcanoes. The intention of
such a practice need not be simply to appease the dreadful volcanic
spirits by ministering to their fiendish lust of cruelty; it may be a
notion that the souls of the men or women who have been burnt to death in
the crater will join the host of demons in the fiery furnace, mitigate
their fury, and induce them to spare the works and the life of man. But,
however we may explain the custom, it has been usual in various parts of
the world to throw human beings as well as less precious offerings into
the craters of active volcanoes. Thus the Indians of Nicaragua used to
sacrifice men, women, and children to the active volcano Massaya, flinging
them into the craters: we are told that the victims went willingly to
their fate.(658) In the island of Siao, to the north of Celebes, a child
was formerly sacrificed every year in order to keep the volcano Goowoong
Awoo quiet. The poor wretch was tortured to death at a festival which
lasted nine days. In later times the place of the child has been taken by
a wooden puppet, which is hacked to pieces in the same way. The
Galelareese of Halmahera say that the Sultan of Ternate used annually to
require some human victims, who were cast into the crater of the volcano
to save the island from its ravages.(659) In Java the volcano Bromo or
Bromok is annually worshipped by people who throw offerings of coco-nuts,
plantains, mangoes, rice, chickens, cakes, cloth, money, and so forth into
the crater.(660) To the Tenggereese, an aboriginal heathen tribe
inhabiting the mountains of which Bromo is the central crater, the
festival of making offerings to the volcano is the greatest of the year.
It is held at full moon in the twelfth month, the day being fixed by the
high priest. Each household prepares its offerings the night before. Very
early in the morning the people set out by moonlight for Mount Bromo, men,
women, and children all arrayed in their best. Before they reach the
mountain they must cross a wide sandy plain, where the spirits of the dead
are supposed to dwell until by means of the Festival of the Dead they
obtain admittance to the volcano. It is a remarkable sight to see
thousands of people streaming across the level sands from three different
directions. They have to descend into it from the neighbouring heights,
and the horses break into a gallop when, after the steep descent, they
reach the level. The gay and varied colours of the dresses, the fantastic
costumes of the priests, the offerings borne along, the whole lit up by
the warm beams of the rising sun, lend to the spectacle a peculiar charm.
All assemble at the foot of the crater, where a market is held for
offerings and refreshments. The scene is a lively one, for hundreds of
people must now pay the vows which they made during the year. The priests
sit in a long row on mats, and when the high priest appears the people
pray, saying, “Bromo, we thank thee for all thy gifts and benefits with
which thou ever blessest us, and for which we offer thee our
thank-offerings to-day. Bless us, our children, and our children’s
children.” The prayers over, the high priest gives a signal, and the whole
multitude arises and climbs the mountain. On reaching the edge of the
crater, the pontiff again blesses the offerings of food, clothes, and
money, which are then thrown into the crater. Yet few of them reach the
spirits for whom they are intended; for a swarm of urchins now scrambles
down into the crater, and at more or less risk to life and limb succeeds
in appropriating the greater part of the offerings. The spirits, defrauded
of their dues, must take the will for the deed.(661) Tradition says that
once in a time of dearth a chief vowed to sacrifice one of his children to
the volcano, if the mountain would bless the people with plenty of food.
His prayer was answered, and he paid his vow by casting his youngest son
as a thank-offering into the crater.(662)

(M169) On the slope of Mount Smeroe, another active volcano in Java, there
are two small idols, which the natives worship and pray to when they
ascend the mountain. They lay food before the images to obtain the favour
of the god of the volcano.(663) In antiquity people cast into the craters
of Etna vessels of gold and silver and all kinds of victims. If the fire
swallowed up the offerings, the omen was good; but if it rejected them,
some evil was sure to befall the offerer.(664)

(M170) These examples suggest that a custom of burning men or images may
possibly be derived from a practice of throwing them into the craters of
active volcanoes in order to appease the dreaded spirits or gods who dwell
there. But unless we reckon the fires of Mount Argaeus in Cappadocia(665)
and of Mount Chimaera in Lycia,(666) there is apparently no record of any
mountain in Western Asia which has been in eruption within historical
times. On the whole, then, we conclude that the Asiatic custom of burning
kings or gods was probably in no way connected with volcanic phenomena.
Yet it was perhaps worth while to raise the question of the connexion,
even though it has received only a negative answer. The whole subject of
the influence which physical environment has exercised on the history of
religion deserves to be studied with more attention than it has yet
received.(667)

Chapter IX. The Ritual of Adonis.

(M171) Thus far we have dealt with the myth of Adonis and the legends
which associated him with Byblus and Paphos. A discussion of these legends
led us to the conclusion that among Semitic peoples in early times,
Adonis, the divine lord of the city, was often personated by priestly
kings or other members of the royal family, and that these his human
representatives were of old put to death, whether periodically or
occasionally, in their divine character. Further, we found that certain
traditions and monuments of Asia Minor seem to preserve traces of a
similar practice. As time went on, the cruel custom was apparently
mitigated in various ways; for example, by substituting an effigy or an
animal for the man, or by allowing the destined victim to escape with a
merely make-believe sacrifice. The evidence of all this is drawn from a
variety of scattered and often ambiguous indications: it is fragmentary,
it is uncertain, and the conclusions built upon it inevitably partake of
the weakness of the foundation. Where the records are so imperfect, as
they happen to be in this branch of our subject, the element of hypothesis
must enter largely into any attempt to piece together and interpret the
disjointed facts. How far the interpretations here proposed are sound, I
leave to future inquiries to determine.

(M172) From dim regions of the past, where we have had to grope our way
with small help from the lamp of history, it is a relief to pass to those
later periods of classical antiquity on which contemporary Greek writers
have shed the light of their clear intelligence. To them we owe almost all
that we know for certain about the rites of Adonis. The Semites who
practised the worship have said little about it; at all events little that
they said has come down to us. Accordingly, the following account of the
ritual is derived mainly from Greek authors who saw what they describe;
and it applies to ages in which the growth of humane feeling had softened
some of the harsher features of the worship.

(M173) At the festivals of Adonis, which were held in Western Asia and in
Greek lands, the death of the god was annually mourned, with a bitter
wailing, chiefly by women; images of him, dressed to resemble corpses,
were carried out as to burial and then thrown into the sea or into
springs;(668) and in some places his revival was celebrated on the
following day.(669) But at different places the ceremonies varied somewhat
in the manner and apparently also in the season of their celebration. At
Alexandria images of Aphrodite and Adonis were displayed on two couches;
beside them were set ripe fruits of all kinds, cakes, plants growing in
flower-pots, and green bowers twined with anise. The marriage of the
lovers was celebrated one day, and on the morrow women attired as
mourners, with streaming hair and bared breasts, bore the image of the
dead Adonis to the sea-shore and committed it to the waves. Yet they
sorrowed not without hope, for they sang that the lost one would come back
again.(670) The date at which this Alexandrian ceremony was observed is
not expressly stated; but from the mention of the ripe fruits it has been
inferred that it took place in late summer.(671) In the great Phoenician
sanctuary of Astarte at Byblus the death of Adonis was annually mourned,
to the shrill wailing notes of the flute, with weeping, lamentation, and
beating of the breast; but next day he was believed to come to life again
and ascend up to heaven in the presence of his worshippers. The
disconsolate believers, left behind on earth, shaved their heads as the
Egyptians did on the death of the divine bull Apis; women who could not
bring themselves to sacrifice their beautiful tresses had to give
themselves up to strangers on a certain day of the festival, and to
dedicate to Astarte the wages of their shame.(672)

(M174) This Phoenician festival appears to have been a vernal one, for its
date was determined by the discoloration of the river Adonis, and this has
been observed by modern travellers to occur in spring. At that season the
red earth washed down from the mountains by the rain tinges the water of
the river, and even the sea, for a great way with a blood-red hue, and the
crimson stain was believed to be the blood of Adonis, annually wounded to
death by the boar on Mount Lebanon.(673) Again, the scarlet anemone is
said to have sprung from the blood of Adonis, or to have been stained by
it;(674) and as the anemone blooms in Syria about Easter, this may be
thought to show that the festival of Adonis, or at least one of his
festivals, was held in spring. The name of the flower is probably derived
from Naaman (“darling”), which seems to have been an epithet of Adonis.
The Arabs still call the anemone “wounds of the Naaman.”(675) The red rose
also was said to owe its hue to the same sad occasion; for Aphrodite,
hastening to her wounded lover, trod on a bush of white roses; the cruel
thorns tore her tender flesh, and her sacred blood dyed the white roses
for ever red.(676) It would be idle, perhaps, to lay much weight on
evidence drawn from the calendar of flowers, and in particular to press an
argument so fragile as the bloom of the rose. Yet so far as it counts at
all, the tale which links the damask rose with the death of Adonis points
to a summer rather than to a spring celebration of his passion. In Attica,
certainly, the festival fell at the height of summer. For the fleet which
Athens fitted out against Syracuse, and by the destruction of which her
power was permanently crippled, sailed at midsummer, and by an ominous
coincidence the sombre rites of Adonis were being celebrated at the very
time. As the troops marched down to the harbour to embark, the streets
through which they passed were lined with coffins and corpse-like
effigies, and the air was rent with the noise of women wailing for the
dead Adonis. The circumstance cast a gloom over the sailing of the most
splendid armament that Athens ever sent to sea.(677) Many ages afterwards,
when the Emperor Julian made his first entry into Antioch, he found in
like manner the gay, the luxurious capital of the East plunged in mimic
grief for the annual death of Adonis: and if he had any presentiment of
coming evil, the voices of lamentation which struck upon his ear must have
seemed to sound his knell.(678)

(M175) The resemblance of these ceremonies to the Indian and European
ceremonies which I have described elsewhere is obvious. In particular,
apart from the somewhat doubtful date of its celebration, the Alexandrian
ceremony is almost identical with the Indian.(679) In both of them the
marriage of two divine beings, whose affinity with vegetation seems
indicated by the fresh plants with which they are surrounded, is
celebrated in effigy, and the effigies are afterwards mourned over and
thrown into the water.(680) From the similarity of these customs to each
other and to the spring and midsummer customs of modern Europe we should
naturally expect that they all admit of a common explanation. Hence, if
the explanation which I have adopted of the latter is correct, the
ceremony of the death and resurrection of Adonis must also have been a
dramatic representation of the decay and revival of plant life. The
inference thus based on the resemblance of the customs is confirmed by the
following features in the legend and ritual of Adonis. His affinity with
vegetation comes out at once in the common story of his birth. He was said
to have been born from a myrrh-tree, the bark of which bursting, after a
ten month’ gestation, allowed the lovely infant to come forth. According
to some, a boar rent the bark with his tusk and so opened a passage for
the babe. A faint rationalistic colour was given to the legend by saying
that his mother was a woman named Myrrh, who had been turned into a
myrrh-tree soon after she had conceived the child.(681) The use of myrrh
as incense at the festival of Adonis may have given rise to the
fable.(682) We have seen that incense was burnt at the corresponding
Babylonian rites,(683) just as it was burnt by the idolatrous Hebrews in
honour of the Queen of Heaven,(684) who was no other than Astarte. Again,
the story that Adonis spent half, or according to others a third, of the
year in the lower world and the rest of it in the upper world,(685) is
explained most simply and naturally by supposing that he represented
vegetation, especially the corn, which lies buried in earth half the year
and reappears above ground the other half. Certainly of the annual
phenomena of nature there is none which suggests so obviously the idea of
death and resurrection as the disappearance and reappearance of vegetation
in autumn and spring. Adonis has been taken for the sun; but there is
nothing in the sun’s annual course within the temperate and tropical zones
to suggest that he is dead for half or a third of the year and alive for
the other half or two-thirds. He might, indeed, be conceived as weakened
in winter, but dead he could not be thought to be; his daily reappearance
contradicts the supposition.(686) Within the Arctic Circle, where the sun
annually disappears for a continuous period which varies from twenty-four
hours to six months according to the latitude, his yearly death and
resurrection would certainly be an obvious idea; but no one except the
unfortunate astronomer Bailly(687) has maintained that the Adonis worship
came from the Arctic regions. On the other hand, the annual death and
revival of vegetation is a conception which readily presents itself to men
in every stage of savagery and civilization; and the vastness of the scale
on which this ever-recurring decay and regeneration takes place, together
with man’s intimate dependence on it for subsistence, combine to render it
the most impressive annual occurrence in nature, at least within the
temperate zones. It is no wonder that a phenomenon so important, so
striking, and so universal should, by suggesting similar ideas, have given
rise to similar rites in many lands. We may, therefore, accept as probable
an explanation of the Adonis worship which accords so well with the facts
of nature and with the analogy of similar rites in other lands. Moreover,
the explanation is countenanced by a considerable body of opinion amongst
the ancients themselves, who again and again interpreted the dying and
reviving god as the reaped and sprouting grain.(688)

(M176) The character of Tammuz or Adonis as a corn-spirit comes out
plainly in an account of his festival given by an Arabic writer of the
tenth century. In describing the rites and sacrifices observed at the
different seasons of the year by the heathen Syrians of Harran, he says:
“Tammuz (July). In the middle of this month is the festival of el-Bûgât,
that is, of the weeping women, and this is the Tâ-uz festival, which is
celebrated in honour of the god Tâ-uz. The women bewail him, because his
lord slew him so cruelly, ground his bones in a mill, and then scattered
them to the wind. The women (during this festival) eat nothing which has
been ground in a mill, but limit their diet to steeped wheat, sweet
vetches, dates, raisins, and the like.”(689) Tâ-uz, who is no other than
Tammuz, is here like Burns’s John Barleycorn—

“_They wasted o’er a scorching flame_
_The marrow of his bones;_
_But a miller us’d him worst of all—_
_For he crush’d him between two stones._”

This concentration, so to say, of the nature of Adonis upon the cereal
crops is characteristic of the stage of culture reached by his worshippers
in historical times. They had left the nomadic life of the wandering
hunter and herdsman far behind them; for ages they had been settled on the
land, and had depended for their subsistence mainly on the products of
tillage. The berries and roots of the wilderness, the grass of the
pastures, which had been matters of vital importance to their ruder
forefathers, were now of little moment to them: more and more their
thoughts and energies were engrossed by the staple of their life, the
corn; more and more accordingly the propitiation of the deities of
fertility in general and of the corn-spirit in particular tended to become
the central feature of their religion. The aim they set before themselves
in celebrating the rites was thoroughly practical. It was no vague
poetical sentiment which prompted them to hail with joy the rebirth of
vegetation and to mourn its decline. Hunger, felt or feared, was the
mainspring of the worship of Adonis.

(M177) It has been suggested by Father Lagrange that the mourning for
Adonis was essentially a harvest rite designed to propitiate the corn-god,
who was then either perishing under the sickles of the reapers, or being
trodden to death under the hoofs of the oxen on the threshing-floor. While
the men slew him, the women wept crocodile tears at home to appease his
natural indignation by a show of grief for his death.(690) The theory fits
in well with the dates of the festivals, which fell in spring or summer;
for spring and summer, not autumn, are the seasons of the barley and wheat
harvests in the lands which, worshipped Adonis.(691) Further, the
hypothesis is confirmed by the practice of the Egyptian reapers, who
lamented, calling upon Isis, when they cut the first corn;(692) and it is
recommended by the analogous customs of many hunting tribes, who testify
great respect for the animals which they kill and eat.(693)

(M178) Thus interpreted the death of Adonis is not the natural decay of
vegetation in general under the summer heat or the winter cold; it is the
violent destruction of the corn by man, who cuts it down on the field,
stamps it to pieces on the threshing-floor, and grinds it to powder in the
mill. That this was indeed the principal aspect in which Adonis presented
himself in later times to the agricultural peoples of the Levant, may be
admitted; but whether from the beginning he had been the corn and nothing
but the corn, may be doubted. At an earlier period he may have been to the
herdsman, above all, the tender herbage which sprouts after rain, offering
rich pasture to the lean and hungry cattle. Earlier still he may have
embodied the spirit of the nuts and berries which the autumn woods yield
to the savage hunter and his squaw. And just as the husbandman must
propitiate the spirit of the corn which he consumes, so the herdsman must
appease the spirit of the grass and leaves which his cattle munch, and the
hunter must soothe the spirit of the roots which he digs, and of the
fruits which he gathers from the bough. In all cases the propitiation of
the injured and angry sprite would naturally comprise elaborate excuses
and apologies, accompanied by loud lamentations at his decease whenever,
through some deplorable accident or necessity, he happened to be murdered
as well as robbed. Only we must bear in mind that the savage hunter and
herdsman of those early days had probably not yet attained to the abstract
idea of vegetation in general; and that accordingly, so far as Adonis
existed for them at all, he must have been the _Adon_ or lord of each
individual tree and plant rather than a personification of vegetable life
as a whole. Thus there would be as many Adonises as there were trees and
shrubs, and each of them might expect to receive satisfaction for any
damage done to his person or property. And year by year, when the trees
were deciduous, every Adonis would seem to bleed to death with the red
leaves of autumn and to come to life again with the fresh green of spring.

(M179) We have seen reason to think that in early times Adonis was
sometimes personated by a living man who died a violent death in the
character of the god. Further, there is evidence which goes to show that
among the agricultural peoples of the Eastern Mediterranean, the
corn-spirit, by whatever name he was known, was often represented, year by
year, by human victims slain on the harvest-field.(694) If that was so, it
seems likely that the propitiation of the corn-spirit would tend to fuse
to some extent with the worship of the dead. For the spirits of these
victims might be thought to return to life in the ears which they had
fattened with their blood, and to die a second death at the reaping of the
corn. Now the ghosts of those who have perished by violence are surly and
apt to wreak their vengeance on their slayers whenever an opportunity
offers. Hence the attempt to appease the souls of the slaughtered victims
would naturally blend, at least in the popular conception, with the
attempt to pacify the slain corn-spirit. And as the dead came back in the
sprouting corn, so they might be thought to return in the spring flowers,
waked from their long sleep by the soft vernal airs. They had been laid to
their rest under the sod. What more natural than to imagine that the
violets and the hyacinths, the roses and the anemones, sprang from their
dust, were empurpled or incarnadined by their blood, and contained some
portion of their spirit?

“_I sometimes think that never blows so red_
_The Rose as where some buried Caesar bled;_
_That every Hyacinth the Garden wears_
_Dropt in her Lap from some once lovely Head._

“_And this reviving Herb whose tender Green_
_Fledges the River-Lip on which we lean—_
_Ah, lean upon it lightly, for who knows_
_From what once lovely Lip it springs unseen?_”

(M180) In the summer after the battle of Landen, the most sanguinary
battle of the seventeenth century in Europe, the earth, saturated with the
blood of twenty thousand slain, broke forth into millions of poppies, and
the traveller who passed that vast sheet of scarlet might well fancy that
the earth had indeed given up her dead.(695) At Athens the great
Commemoration of the Dead fell in spring about the middle of March, when
the early flowers are in bloom. Then the dead were believed to rise from
their graves and go about the streets, vainly endeavoring to enter the
temples and the dwellings, which were barred against these perturbed
spirits with ropes, buckthorn, and pitch. The name of the festival,
according to the most obvious and natural interpretation, means the
Festival of Flowers, and the title would fit well with the substance of
the ceremonies if at that season the poor ghosts were indeed thought to
creep from the narrow house with the opening flowers.(696) There may
therefore be a measure of truth in the theory of Renan, who saw in the
Adonis worship a dreamy voluptuous cult of death, conceived not as the
King of Terrors, but as an insidious enchanter who lures his victims to
himself and lulls them into an eternal sleep. The infinite charm of nature
in the Lebanon, he thought, lends itself to religious emotions of this
sensuous, visionary sort, hovering vaguely between pain and pleasure,
between slumber and tears.(697) It would doubtless be a mistake to
attribute to Syrian peasants the worship of a conception so purely
abstract as that of death in general. Yet it may be true that in their
simple minds the thought of the reviving spirit of vegetation was blent
with the very concrete notion of the ghosts of the dead, who come to life
again in spring days with the early flowers, with the tender green of the
corn and the many-tinted blossoms of the trees. Thus their views of the
death and resurrection of nature would be coloured by their views of the
death and resurrection of man, by their personal sorrows and hopes and
fears. In like manner we cannot doubt that Renan’s theory of Adonis was
itself deeply tinged by passionate memories, memories of the slumber akin
to death which sealed his own eyes on the slopes of the Lebanon, memories
of the sister who sleeps in the land of Adonis never again to wake with
the anemones and the roses.

Chapter X. The Gardens of Adonis.

(M181) Perhaps the best proof that Adonis was a deity of vegetation, and
especially of the corn, is furnished by the gardens of Adonis, as they
were called. These were baskets or pots filled with earth, in which wheat,
barley, lettuces, fennel, and various kinds of flowers were sown and
tended for eight days, chiefly or exclusively by women. Fostered by the
sun’s heat, the plants shot up rapidly, but having no root they withered
as rapidly away, and at the end of eight days were carried out with the
images of the dead Adonis, and flung with them into the sea or into
springs.(698)

(M182) These gardens of Adonis are most naturally interpreted as
representatives of Adonis or manifestations of his power; they represented
him, true to his original nature, in vegetable form, while the images of
him, with which they were carried out and cast into the water, portrayed
him in his later human shape. All these Adonis ceremonies, if I am right,
were originally intended as charms to promote the growth or revival of
vegetation; and the principle by which they were supposed to produce this
effect was homoeopathic or imitative magic. For ignorant people suppose
that by mimicking the effect which they desire to produce they actually
help to produce it; thus by sprinkling water they make rain, by lighting a
fire they make sunshine, and so on. Similarly, by mimicking the growth of
crops they hope to ensure a good harvest. The rapid growth of the wheat
and barley in the gardens of Adonis was intended to make the corn shoot
up; and the throwing of the gardens and of the images into the water was a
charm to secure a due supply of fertilizing rain.(699) The same, I take
it, was the object of throwing the effigies of Death and the Carnival into
water in the corresponding ceremonies of modern Europe.(700) Certainly the
custom of drenching with water a leaf-clad person, who undoubtedly
personifies vegetation, is still resorted to in Europe for the express
purpose of producing rain.(701) Similarly the custom of throwing water on
the last corn cut at harvest, or on the person who brings it home (a
custom observed in Germany and France, and till quite lately in England
and Scotland), is in some places practised with the avowed intent to
procure rain for the next year’s crops. Thus in Wallachia and amongst the
Roumanians in Transylvania, when a girl is bringing home a crown made of
the last ears of corn cut at harvest, all who meet her hasten to throw
water on her, and two farm-servants are placed at the door for the
purpose; for they believe that if this were not done, the crops next year
would perish from drought.(702) So amongst the Saxons of Transylvania, the
person who wears the wreath made of the last corn cut is drenched with
water to the skin; for the wetter he is, the better will be next year’s
harvest, and the more grain there will be threashed out. Sometimes the
wearer of the wreath is the reaper who cut the last corn.(703) In Northern
Euboea, when the corn-sheaves have been piled in a stack, the farmer’s
wife brings a pitcher of water and offers it to each of the labourers that
he may wash his hands. Every man, after he has washed his hands, sprinkles
water on the corn and on the threshing-floor, expressing at the same time
a wish that the corn may last long. Lastly, the farmer’s wife holds the
pitcher slantingly and runs at full speed round the stack without spilling
a drop, while she utters a wish that the stack may endure as long as the
circle she has just described.(704) At the spring ploughing in Prussia,
when the ploughmen and sowers returned in the evening from their work in
the fields, the farmer’s wife and the servants used to splash water over
them. The ploughmen and sowers retorted by seizing every one, throwing
them into the pond, and ducking them under the water. The farmer’s wife
might claim exemption on payment of a forfeit, but every one else had to
be ducked. By observing this custom they hoped to ensure a due supply of
rain for the seed.(705) Also after harvest in Prussia, the person who wore
a wreath made of the last corn cut was drenched with water, while a prayer
was uttered that “as the corn had sprung up and multiplied through the
water, so it might spring up and multiply in the barn and granary.”(706)
At Schlanow, in Brandenburg, when the sowers return home from the first
sowing they are drenched with water “in order that the corn may
grow.”(707) In Anhalt on the same occasion the farmer is still often
sprinkled with water by his family; and his men and horses, and even the
plough, receive the same treatment. The object of the custom, as people at
Arensdorf explained it, is “to wish fertility to the fields for the whole
year.”(708) So in Hesse, when the ploughmen return with the plough from
the field for the first time, the women and girls lie in wait for them and
slyly drench them with water.(709) Near Naaburg, in Bavaria, the man who
first comes back from sowing or ploughing has a vessel of water thrown
over him by some one in hiding.(710) At Hettingen in Baden the farmer who
is about to begin the sowing of oats is sprinkled with water, in order
that the oats may not shrivel up.(711) Before the Tusayan Indians of North
America go out to plant their fields, the women sometimes pour water on
them; the reason for doing so is that “as the water is poured on the men,
so may water fall on the planted fields.”(712) The Indians of Santiago
Tepehuacan steep the seed of the maize in water before they sow it, in
order that the god of the waters may bestow on the fields the needed
moisture.(713)

(M183) The opinion that the gardens of Adonis are essentially charms to
promote the growth of vegetation, especially of the crops, and that they
belong to the same class of customs as those spring and midsummer
folk-customs of modern Europe which I have described elsewhere,(714) does
not rest for its evidence merely on the intrinsic probability of the case.
Fortunately we are able to show that gardens of Adonis (if we may use the
expression in a general sense) are still planted, first, by a primitive
race at their sowing season, and, second, by European peasants at
midsummer. Amongst the Oraons and Mundas of Bengal, when the time comes
for planting out the rice which has been grown in seed-beds, a party of
young people of both sexes go to the forest and cut a young Karma-tree, or
the branch of one. Bearing it in triumph they return dancing, singing, and
beating drums, and plant it in the middle of the village dancing-ground. A
sacrifice is offered to the tree; and next morning the youth of both
sexes, linked arm-in-arm, dance in a great circle round the Karma-tree,
which is decked with strips of coloured cloth and sham bracelets and
necklets of plaited straw. As a preparation for the festival, the
daughters of the headman of the village cultivate blades of barley in a
peculiar way. The seed is sown in moist, sandy soil, mixed with turmeric,
and the blades sprout and unfold of a pale-yellow or primrose colour. On
the day of the festival the girls take up these blades and carry them in
baskets to the dancing-ground, where, prostrating themselves
reverentially, they place some of the plants before the Karma-tree.
Finally, the Karma-tree is taken away and thrown into a stream or
tank.(715) The meaning of planting these barley blades and then presenting
them to the Karma-tree is hardly open to question. Trees are supposed to
exercise a quickening influence upon the growth of crops, and amongst the
very people in question—the Mundas or Mundaris—“the grove deities are held
responsible for the crops.”(716) Therefore, when at the season for
planting out the rice the Mundas bring in a tree and treat it with so much
respect, their object can only be to foster thereby the growth of the rice
which is about to be planted out; and the custom of causing barley blades
to sprout rapidly and then presenting them to the tree must be intended to
subserve the same purpose, perhaps by reminding the tree-spirit of his
duty towards the crops, and stimulating his activity by this visible
example of rapid vegetable growth. The throwing of the Karma-tree into the
water is to be interpreted as a rain-charm. Whether the barley blades are
also thrown into the water is not said; but if my interpretation of the
custom is right, probably they are so. A distinction between this Bengal
custom and the Greek rites of Adonis is that in the former the tree-spirit
appears in his original form as a tree; whereas in the Adonis worship he
appears in human form, represented as a dead man, though his vegetable
nature is indicated by the gardens of Adonis, which are, so to say, a
secondary manifestation of his original power as a tree-spirit.

(M184) Gardens of Adonis are cultivated also by the Hindoos, with the
intention apparently of ensuring the fertility both of the earth and of
mankind. Thus at Oodeypoor in Rajputana a festival is held “in honour of
Gouri, or Isani, the goddess of abundance, the Isis of Egypt, the Ceres of
Greece. Like the Rajpoot Saturnalia, which it follows, it belongs to the
vernal equinox, when nature in these regions proximate to the tropic is in
the full expanse of her charms, and the matronly Gouri casts her golden
mantle over the verdant Vassanti, personification of spring. Then the
fruits exhibit their promise to the eye; the kohil fills the ear with
melody; the air is impregnated with aroma, and the crimson poppy contrasts
with the spikes of golden grain to form a wreath for the beneficent Gouri.
Gouri is one of the names of Isa or Parvati, wife of the greatest of the
gods, Mahadeva or Iswara, who is conjoined with her in these rites, which
almost exclusively appertain to the women. The meaning of _gouri_ is
‘yellow,’ emblematic of the ripened harvest, when the votaries of the
goddess adore her effigies, which are those of a matron painted the colour
of ripe corn.” The rites begin when the sun enters the sign of the Ram,
the opening of the Hindoo year. An image of the goddess Gouri is made of
earth, and a smaller one of her husband Iswara, and the two are placed
together. A small trench is next dug, barley is sown in it, and the ground
watered and heated artificially till the grain sprouts, when the women
dance round it hand in hand, invoking the blessing of Gouri on their
husbands. After that the young corn is taken up and distributed by the
women to the men, who wear it in their turbans. Every wealthy family, or
at least every subdivision of the city, has its own image. These and other
rites, known only to the initiated, occupy several days, and are performed
within doors. Then the images of the goddess and her husband are decorated
and borne in procession to a beautiful lake, whose deep blue waters mirror
the cloudless Indian sky, marble palaces, and orange groves. Here the
women, their hair decked with roses and jessamine carry the image of Gouri
down a marble staircase to the water’s edge, and dance round it singing
hymns and love-songs. Meantime the goddess is supposed to bathe in the
water. No men take part in the ceremony; even the image of Iswara, the
husband-god, attracts little attention.(717) In these rites the
distribution of the barley shoots to the men, and the invocation of a
blessing on their husbands by the wives, point clearly to the desire of
offspring as one motive for observing the custom. The same motive probably
explains the use of gardens of Adonis at the marriage of Brahmans in the
Madras Presidency. Seeds of five or nine sorts are mixed and sown in
earthen pots, which are made specially for the purpose and are filled with
earth. Bride and bridegroom water the seeds both morning and evening for
four days; and on the fifth day the seedlings are thrown, like the real
gardens of Adonis, into a tank or river.(718)

(M185) In the Himalayan districts of North-Western India the cultivators
sow barley, maize, pulse, or mustard in a basket of earth on the
twenty-fourth day of the fourth month (_Asárh_), which falls about the
middle of July. Then on the last day of the month they place amidst the
new sprouts small clay images of Mahadeo and Parvati and worship them in
remembrance of the marriage of those deities. Next day they cut down the
green stalks and wear them in their head-dress.(719) Similar is the barley
feast known as Jâyî or Jawâra in Upper India and as Bhujariya in the
Central Provinces. On the seventh day of the light half of the month Sâwan
grains of barley are sown in a pot of manure, and spring up so quickly
that by the end of the month the vessel is full of long, yellowish-green
stalks. On the first day of the next month, Bhâdon, the women and girls
take the stalks out, throw the earth and manure into water, and distribute
the plants among their male friends, who bind them in their turbans and
about their dress.(720) At Sargal in the Central Provinces of India this
ceremony is observed about the middle of September. None but women may
take part in it, though crowds of men come to look on. Some little time
before the festival wheat or other grain has been sown in pots ingeniously
constructed of large leaves, which are held together by the thorns of a
species of acacia. Having grown up in the dark, the stalks are of a pale
colour. On the day appointed these gardens of Adonis, as we may call them,
are carried towards a lake which abuts on the native city. The women of
every family or circle of friends bring their own pots, and having laid
them on the ground they dance round them. Then taking the pots of
sprouting corn they descend to the edge of the water, wash the soil away
from the pots, and distribute the young plants among their friends.(721)
At the temple of the goddess Padmavati, near Pandharpur in the Bombay
Presidency, a Nine Nights’ festival is held in the bright half of the
month Ashvin (September-October). At this time a bamboo frame is hung in
front of the image, and from it depend garlands of flowers and strings of
wheaten cakes. Under the frame the floor in front of the pedestal is
strewn with a layer of earth in which wheat is sown and allowed to
sprout.(722) A similar rite is observed in the same month before the
images of two other goddesses, Ambabai and Lakhubai, who also have temples
at Pandharpur.(723)

(M186) In some parts of Bavaria it is customary to sow flax in a pot on
the last three days of the Carnival; from the seed which grows best an
omen is drawn as to whether the early, the middle, or the late sowing will
produce the best crop.(724) In Sardinia the gardens of Adonis are still
planted in connexion with the great Midsummer festival which bears the
name of St. John. At the end of March or on the first of April a young man
of the village presents himself to a girl, and asks her to be his _comare_
(gossip or sweetheart), offering to be her _compare_. The invitation is
considered as an honour by the girl’s family, and is gladly accepted. At
the end of May the girl makes a pot of the bark of the cork-tree, fills it
with earth, and sows a handful of wheat and barley in it. The pot being
placed in the sun and often watered, the corn sprouts rapidly and has a
good head by Midsummer Eve (St. John’s Eve, the twenty-third of June). The
pot is then called _Erme_ or _Nenneri_. On St. John’s Day the young man
and the girl, dressed in their best, accompanied by a long retinue and
preceded by children gambolling and frolicking, move in procession to a
church outside the village. Here they break the pot by throwing it against
the door of the church. Then they sit down in a ring on the grass and eat
eggs and herbs to the music of flutes. Wine is mixed in a cup and passed
round, each one drinking as it passes. Then they join hands and sing
“Sweethearts of St. John” (_Compare e comare di San Giovanni_) over and
over again, the flutes playing the while. When they tire of singing they
stand up and dance gaily in a ring till evening. This is the general
Sardinian custom. As practised at Ozieri it has some special features. In
May the pots are made of cork-bark and planted with corn, as already
described. Then on the Eve of St. John the window-sills are draped with
rich cloths, on which the pots are placed, adorned with crimson and blue
silk and ribbons of various colours. On each of the pots they used
formerly to place a statuette or cloth doll dressed as a woman, or a
Priapus-like figure made of paste; but this custom, rigorously forbidden
by the Church, has fallen into disuse. The village swains go about in a
troop to look at the pots and their decorations and to wait for the girls,
who assemble on the public square to celebrate the festival. Here a great
bonfire is kindled, round which they dance and make merry. Those who wish
to be “Sweethearts of St. John” act as follows. The young man stands on
one side of the bonfire and the girl on the other, and they, in a manner,
join hands by each grasping one end of a long stick, which they pass three
times backwards and forwards across the fire, thus thrusting their hands
thrice rapidly into the flames. This seals their relationship to each
other. Dancing and music go on till late at night.(725) The correspondence
of these Sardinian pots of grain to the gardens of Adonis seems complete,
and the images formerly placed in them answer to the images of Adonis
which accompanied his gardens.

(M187) Customs of the same sort are observed at the same season in Sicily.
Pairs of boys and girls become gossips of St. John on St. John’s Day by
drawing each a hair from his or her head and performing various ceremonies
over them. Thus they tie the hairs together and throw them up in the air,
or exchange them over a potsherd, which they afterwards break in two,
preserving each a fragment with pious care. The tie formed in the latter
way is supposed to last for life. In some parts of Sicily the gossips of
St. John present each other with plates of sprouting corn, lentils, and
canary seed, which have been planted forty days before the festival. The
one who receives the plate pulls a stalk of the young plants, binds it
with a ribbon, and preserves it among his or her greatest treasures,
restoring the platter to the giver. At Catania the gossips exchange pots
of basil and great cucumbers; the girls tend the basil, and the thicker it
grows the more it is prized.(726)

(M188) In these midsummer customs of Sardinia and Sicily it is possible
that, as Mr. R. Wünsch supposes,(727) St. John has replaced Adonis. We
have seen that the rites of Tammuz or Adonis were commonly celebrated
about midsummer; according to Jerome, their date was June.(728) And
besides their date and their similarity in respect of the pots of herbs
and corn, there is another point of affinity between the two festivals,
the heathen and the Christian. In both of them water plays a prominent
part. At his midsummer festival in Babylon the image of Tammuz, whose name
is said to mean “true son of the deep water,” was bathed with pure water:
at his summer festival in Alexandria the image of Adonis, with that of his
divine mistress Aphrodite, was committed to the waves; and at the
midsummer celebration in Greece the gardens of Adonis were thrown into the
sea or into springs. Now a great feature of the midsummer festival
associated with the name of St. John is, or used to be, the custom of
bathing in the sea, springs, rivers, or the dew on Midsummer Eve or the
morning of Midsummer Day. Thus, for example, at Naples there is a church
dedicated to St. John the Baptist under the name of St. John of the Sea
(_S. Giovan a mare_); and it was an old practice for men and women to
bathe in the sea on St. John’s Eve, that is, on Midsummer Eve, believing
that thus all their sins were washed away.(729) In the Abruzzi water is
still supposed to acquire certain marvellous and beneficent properties on
St. John’s Night. They say that on that night the sun and moon bathe in
the water. Hence many people take a bath in the sea or in a river at that
season, especially at the moment of sunrise. At Castiglione a Casauria
they go before sunrise to the Pescara River or to springs, wash their
faces and hands, then gird themselves with twigs of bryony (_vitalba_) and
twine the plant round their brows, in order that they may be free from
pains. At Pescina boys and girls wash each other’s faces in a river or a
spring, then exchange kisses, and become gossips. The dew, also, that
falls on St. John’s Night is supposed in the Abruzzi to benefit whatever
it touches, whether it be water, flowers, or the human body. For that
reason people put out vessels of water on the window-sills or the
terraces, and wash themselves with the water in the morning in order to
purify themselves and escape headaches and colds. A still more efficacious
mode of accomplishing the same end is to rise at the peep of dawn, to wet
the hands in the dewy grass, and then to rub the moisture on the eyelids,
the brow, and the temples, because the dew is believed to cure maladies of
the head and eyes. It is also a remedy for diseases of the skin. Persons
who are thus afflicted should roll on the dewy grass. When patients are
prevented by their infirmity or any other cause from quitting the house,
their friends will gather the dew in sheets or tablecloths and so apply it
to the suffering part.(730) At Marsala in Sicily there is a spring of
water in a subterranean grotto called the Grotto of the Sibyl. Beside it
stands a church of St. John, which has been supposed to occupy the site of
a temple of Apollo. On St. John’s Eve, the twenty-third of June, women and
girls visit the grotto, and by drinking of the prophetic water learn
whether their husbands have been faithful to them in the year that is
past, or whether they themselves will wed in the year that is to come.
Sick people, too, imagine that by bathing in the water, drinking of it, or
ducking thrice in it in the name of the Trinity, they will be made
whole.(731) At Chiaramonte in Sicily the following custom is observed on
St. John’s Eve. The men repair to one fountain and the women to another,
and dip their heads thrice in the water, repeating at each ablution
certain verses in honour of St. John. They believe that this is a cure or
preventive of the scald.(732) When Petrarch visited Cologne, he chanced to
arrive in the town on St. John’s Eve. The sun was nearly setting, and his
host at once led him to the Rhine. A strange sight there met his eyes, for
the banks of the river were covered with pretty women. The crowd was great
but good-humoured. From a rising ground on which he stood the poet saw
many of the women, girt with fragrant herbs, kneel down on the water’s
edge, roll their sleeves up above their elbows, and wash their white arms
and hands in the river, murmuring softly some words which the Italian did
not understand. He was told that the custom was a very old one, much
honoured in the observance; for the common folk, especially the women,
believed that to wash in the river on St. John’s Eve would avert every
misfortune in the coming year.(733) On St. John’s Eve the people of
Copenhagen used to go on pilgrimage to a neighbouring spring, there to
heal and strengthen themselves in the water.(734) In Spain people still
bathe in the sea or roll naked in the dew of the meadows on St. John’s
Eve, believing that this is a sovereign preservative against diseases of
the skin.(735) To roll in the dew on the morning of St. John’s Day is also
esteemed a cure for diseases of the skin in Normandy and Perigord. In
Perigord a field of hemp is especially recommended for the purpose, and
the patient should rub himself with the plants on which he has
rolled.(736) At Ciotat in Provence, while the midsummer bonfire blazed,
young people used to plunge into the sea and splash each other vigorously.
At Vitrolles they bathed in a pond in order that they might not suffer
from fever during the year, and at Saint-Maries they watered the horses to
protect them from the itch.(737) A custom of drenching people on this
occasion with water formerly prevailed in Toulon, Marseilles, and other
towns of the south of France. The water was squirted from syringes, poured
on the heads of passers-by from windows, and so forth.(738) From Europe
the practice of bathing in rivers and springs on St. John’s Day appears to
have passed with the Spaniards to the New World.(739)

(M189) It may perhaps be suggested that this wide-spread custom of bathing
in water or dew on Midsummer Eve or Midsummer Day is purely Christian in
origin, having been adopted as an appropriate mode of celebrating the day
dedicated to the Baptist. But in point of fact the custom is older than
Christianity, for it was denounced and forbidden as a heathen practice by
Augustine,(740) and to this day it is practised at midsummer by the
Mohammedan peoples of North Africa.(741) We may conjecture that the
Church, unable to put down this relic of paganism, followed its usual
policy of accommodation by bestowing on the rite of a Christian name and
acquiescing, with a sigh, in its observance. And casting about for a saint
to supplant a heathen patron of bathing, the Christian doctors could
hardly have hit upon a more appropriate successor than St. John the
Baptist.

(M190) But into whose shoes did the Baptist step? Was the displaced deity
really Adonis, as the foregoing evidence seems to suggest? In Sardinia and
Sicily it may have been so, for in these islands Semitic influence was
certainly deep and probably lasting. The midsummer pastimes of Sardinian
and Sicilian children may therefore be a direct continuation of the
Carthaginian rites of Tammuz. Yet the midsummer festival seems too widely
spread and too deeply rooted in Central and Northern Europe to allow us to
trace it everywhere to an Oriental origin in general and to the cult of
Adonis in particular. It has the air of a native of the soil rather than
of an exotic imported from the East. We shall do better, therefore, to
suppose that at a remote period similar modes of thought, based on similar
needs, led men independently in many distant lands, from the North Sea to
the Euphrates, to celebrate the summer solstice with rites which, while
they differed in some things, yet agreed closely in others; that in
historical times a wave of Oriental influence, starting perhaps from
Babylonia, carried the Tammuz or Adonis form of the festival westward till
it met with native forms of a similar festival; and that under pressure of
the Roman civilization these different yet kindred festivals fused with
each other and crystallized into a variety of shapes, which subsisted more
or less separately side by side, till the Church, unable to suppress them
altogether, stripped them so far as it could of their grosser features,
and dexterously changing the names allowed them to pass muster as
Christian. And what has just been said of the midsummer festivals probably
applies, with the necessary modifications, to the spring festivals also.
They, too, seem to have originated independently in Europe and the East,
and after ages of separation to have amalgamated under the sway of the
Roman Empire and the Christian Church. In Syria, as we have seen, there
appears to have been a vernal celebration of Adonis; and we shall
presently meet with an undoubted instance of an Oriental festival of
spring in the rites of Attis. Meantime we must return for a little to the
midsummer festival which goes by the name of St. John.

(M191) The Sardinian practice of making merry round a great bonfire on St.
John’s Eve is an instance of a custom which has been practised at the
midsummer festival from time immemorial in many parts of Europe. That
custom has been more fully dealt with by me elsewhere.(742) The instances
which I have cited in other parts of this work seem to indicate a
connexion of the midsummer bonfire with vegetation. For example, both in
Sweden and Bohemia an essential part of the festival is the raising of a
May-pole or Midsummer-tree, which in Bohemia is burned in the
bonfire.(743) Again, in a Russian midsummer ceremony a straw figure of
Kupalo, the representative of vegetation, is placed beside a May-pole or
Midsummer-tree and then carried to and fro across a bonfire.(744) Kupalo
is here represented in duplicate, in tree-form by the Midsummer-tree, and
in human form by the straw effigy, just as Adonis was represented both by
an image and a garden of Adonis; and the duplicate representatives of
Kupalo, like those of Adonis, are finally cast into water. In the
Sardinian and Sicilian customs the Gossips or Sweethearts of St. John
probably answer, on the one hand to Adonis and Astarte, on the other to
the King and Queen of May. In the Swedish province of Blekinge part of the
midsummer festival is the election of a Midsummer Bride, who chooses her
bridegroom; a collection is made for the pair, who for the time being are
looked upon as man and wife.(745) Such Midsummer pairs may be supposed,
like the May pairs, to stand for the powers of vegetation or of fertility
in general: they represent in flesh and blood what the images of Siva or
Mahadeo and Parvati in the Indian ceremonies, and the images of Adonis and
Aphrodite in the Alexandrian ceremony, set forth in effigy.

(M192) The reason why ceremonies whose aim is to foster the growth of
vegetation should thus be associated with bonfires; why in particular the
representative of vegetation should be burned in the likeness of a tree,
or passed across the fire in effigy or in the form of a living couple, has
been discussed by me elsewhere.(746) Here it is enough to have adduced
evidence of such association, and therefore to have obviated the objection
which might have been raised to my theory of the Sardinian custom, on the
ground that the bonfires have nothing to do with vegetation. One more
piece of evidence may here be given to prove the contrary. In some parts
of Germany and Austria young men and girls leap over midsummer bonfires
for the express purpose of making the hemp or flax grow tall.(747) We may,
therefore, assume that in the Sardinian custom the blades of wheat and
barley which are forced on in pots for the midsummer festival, and which
correspond so closely to the gardens of Adonis, form one of those
widely-spread midsummer ceremonies, the original object of which was to
promote the growth of vegetation, and especially of the crops. But as, by
an easy extension of ideas, the spirit of vegetation was believed to
exercise a beneficent and fertilizing influence on human as well as animal
life, the gardens of Adonis would be supposed, like the May-trees or
May-boughs, to bring good luck, and more particularly perhaps
offspring,(748) to the family or to the person who planted them; and even
after the idea had been abandoned that they operated actively to confer
prosperity, they might still be used to furnish omens of good or evil. It
is thus that magic dwindles into divination. Accordingly we find modes of
divination practised at midsummer which resemble more or less closely the
gardens of Adonis. Thus an anonymous Italian writer of the sixteenth
century has recorded that it was customary to sow barley and wheat a few
days before the festival of St. John (Midsummer Day) and also before that
of St. Vitus; and it was believed that the person for whom they were sown
would be fortunate, and get a good husband or a good wife, if the grain
sprouted well; but if it sprouted ill, he or she would be unlucky.(749) In
various parts of Italy and all over Sicily it is still customary to put
plants in water or in earth on the Eve of St. John, and from the manner in
which they are found to be blooming or fading on St. John’s Day omens are
drawn, especially as to fortune in love. Amongst the plants used for this
purpose are _Ciuri di S. Giuvanni_ (St. John’s wort?) and nettles.(750) In
Prussia two hundred years ago the farmers used to send out their servants,
especially their maids, to gather St. John’s wort on Midsummer Eve or
Midsummer Day (St. John’s Day). When they had fetched it, the farmer took
as many plants as there were persons and stuck them in the wall or between
the beams; and it was thought that he or she whose plant did not bloom
would soon fall sick or die. The rest of the plants were tied in a bundle,
fastened to the end of a pole, and set up at the gate or wherever the corn
would be brought in at the next harvest. The bundle was called _Kupole_:
the ceremony was known as Kupole’s festival; and at it the farmer prayed
for a good crop of hay, and so forth.(751) This Prussian custom is
particularly notable, inasmuch as it strongly confirms the opinion that
Kupalo (doubtless identical with Kupole) was originally a deity of
vegetation.(752) For here Kupalo is represented by a bundle of plants
specially associated with midsummer in folk-custom; and her influence over
vegetation is plainly signified by placing her vegetable emblem over the
place where the harvest is brought in, as well as by the prayers for a
good crop which are uttered on the occasion. This furnishes a fresh
argument in support of the view that the Death, whose analogy to Kupalo,
Yarilo, and the rest I have shown elsewhere, originally personified
vegetation, more especially the dying or dead vegetation of winter.(753)
Further, my interpretation of the gardens of Adonis is confirmed by
finding that in this Prussian custom the very same kind of plants is used
to form the gardens of Adonis (as we may call them) and the image of the
deity. Nothing could set in a stronger light the truth of the theory that
the gardens of Adonis are merely another manifestation of the god himself.

(M193) In Sicily gardens of Adonis are still sown in spring as well as in
summer, from which we may perhaps infer that Sicily as well as Syria
celebrated of old a vernal festival of the dead and risen god. At the
approach of Easter, Sicilian women sow wheat, lentils, and canary-seed in
plates, which they keep in the dark and water every two days. The plants
soon shoot up; the stalks are tied together with red ribbons, and the
plates containing them are placed on the sepulchres which, with the
effigies of the dead Christ, are made up in Catholic and Greek churches on
Good Friday,(754) just as the gardens of Adonis were placed on the grave
of the dead Adonis.(755) The practice is not confined to Sicily, for it is
observed also at Cosenza in Calabria,(756) and perhaps in other places.
The whole custom—sepulchres as well as plates of sprouting grain—may be
nothing but a continuation, under a different name, of the worship of
Adonis.

(M194) Nor are these Sicilian and Calabrian customs the only Easter
ceremonies which resemble the rites of Adonis. “During the whole of Good
Friday a waxen effigy of the dead Christ is exposed to view in the middle
of the Greek churches and is covered with fervent kisses by the thronging
crowd, while the whole church rings with melancholy, monotonous dirges.
Late in the evening, when it has grown quite dark, this waxen image is
carried by the priests into the street on a bier adorned with lemons,
roses, jessamine, and other flowers, and there begins a grand procession
of the multitude, who move in serried ranks, with slow and solemn step,
through the whole town. Every man carries his taper and breaks out into
doleful lamentation. At all the houses which the procession passes there
are seated women with censers to fumigate the marching host. Thus the
community solemnly buries its Christ as if he had just died. At last the
waxen image is again deposited in the church, and the same lugubrious
chants echo anew. These lamentations, accompanied by a strict fast,
continue till midnight on Saturday. As the clock strikes twelve, the
bishop appears and announces the glad tidings that ‘Christ is risen,’ to
which the crowd replies, ‘He is risen indeed,’ and at once the whole city
bursts into an uproar of joy, which finds vent in shrieks and shouts, in
the endless discharge of carronades and muskets, and the explosion of
fire-works of every sort. In the very same hour people plunge from the
extremity of the fast into the enjoyment of the Easter lamb and neat
wine.”(757)

(M195) In like manner the Catholic Church has been accustomed to bring
before its followers in a visible form the death and resurrection of the
Redeemer. Such sacred dramas are well fitted to impress the lively
imagination and to stir the warm feelings of a susceptible southern race,
to whom the pomp and pageantry of Catholicism are more congenial than to
the colder temperament of the Teutonic peoples. The solemnities observed
in Sicily on Good Friday, the official anniversary of the Crucifixion, are
thus described by a native Sicilian writer. “A truly moving ceremony is
the procession which always takes place in the evening in every commune of
Sicily, and further the Deposition from the Cross. The brotherhoods took
part in the procession, and the rear was brought up by a great many boys
and girls representing saints, both male and female, and carrying the
emblems of Christ’s Passion. The Deposition from the Cross was managed by
the priests. The coffin with the dead Christ in it was flanked by Jews
armed with swords, an object of horror and aversion in the midst of the
profound pity excited by the sight not only of Christ but of the Mater
Dolorosa, who followed behind him. Now and then the ‘mysteries’ or symbols
of the Crucifixion went in front. Sometimes the procession followed the
‘three hours of agony’ and the ‘Deposition from the Cross.’ The ‘three
hours’ commemorated those which Jesus Christ passed upon the Cross.
Beginning at the eighteenth and ending at the twenty-first hour of Italian
time two priests preached alternately on the Passion. Anciently the
sermons were delivered in the open air on the place called the Calvary: at
last, when the third hour was about to strike, at the words _emisit
spiritum_ Christ died, bowing his head amid the sobs and tears of the
bystanders. Immediately afterwards in some places, three hours afterwards
in others, the sacred body was unnailed and deposited in the coffin. In
Castronuovo, at the Ave Maria, two priests clad as Jews, representing
Joseph of Arimathea and Nicodemus, with their servants in costume,
repaired to the Calvary, preceded by the Company of the Whites. There,
with doleful verses and chants appropriate to the occasion, they performed
the various operations of the Deposition, after which the procession took
its way to the larger church.... In Salaparuta the Calvary is erected in
the church. At the preaching of the death, the Crucified is made to bow
his head by means of machinery, while guns are fired, trumpets sound, and
amid the silence of the people, impressed by the death of the Redeemer,
the strains of a melancholy funeral march are heard. Christ is removed
from the Cross and deposited in the coffin by three priests. After the
procession of the dead Christ the burial is performed, that is, two
priests lay Christ in a fictitious sepulchre, from which at the mass of
Easter Saturday the image of the risen Christ issues and is elevated upon
the altar by means of machinery.”(758) Scenic representations of the same
sort, with variations of detail, are exhibited at Easter in the
Abruzzi,(759) and probably in many other parts of the Catholic world.(760)

(M196) When we reflect how often the Church has skilfully contrived to
plant the seeds of the new faith on the old stock of paganism, we may
surmise that the Easter celebration of the dead and risen Christ was
grafted upon a similar celebration of the dead and risen Adonis, which, as
we have seen reason to believe, was celebrated in Syria at the same
season. The type, created by Greek artists, of the sorrowful goddess with
her dying lover in her arms, resembles and may have been the model of the
_Pietà_ of Christian art, the Virgin with the dead body of her divine Son
in her lap, of which the most celebrated example is the one by Michael
Angelo in St. Peter’s. That noble group, in which the living sorrow of the
mother contrasts so wonderfully with the languor of death in the son, is
one of the finest compositions in marble. Ancient Greek art has bequeathed
to us few works so beautiful, and none so pathetic.(761)

(M197) In this connexion a well-known statement of Jerome may not be
without significance. He tells us that Bethlehem, the traditionary
birthplace of the Lord, was shaded by a grove of that still older Syrian
Lord, Adonis, and that where the infant Jesus had wept, the lover of Venus
was bewailed.(762) Though he does not expressly say so, Jerome seems to
have thought that the grove of Adonis had been planted by the heathen
after the birth of Christ for the purpose of defiling the sacred spot. In
this he may have been mistaken. If Adonis was indeed, as I have argued,
the spirit of the corn, a more suitable name for his dwelling-place could
hardly be found than Bethlehem, “the House of Bread,”(763) and he may well
have been worshipped there at his House of Bread long ages before the
birth of Him who said, “I am the bread of life.”(764) Even on the
hypothesis that Adonis followed rather than preceded Christ at Bethlehem,
the choice of his sad figure to divert the allegiance of Christians from
their Lord cannot but strike us as eminently appropriate when we remember
the similarity of the rites which commemorated the death and resurrection
of the two. One of the earliest seats of the worship of the new god was
Antioch, and at Antioch, as we have seen,(765) the death of the old god
was annually celebrated with great solemnity. A circumstance which
attended the entrance of Julian into the city at the time of the Adonis
festival may perhaps throw some light on the date of its celebration. When
the emperor drew near to the city he was received with public prayers as
if he had been a god, and he marvelled at the voices of a great multitude
who cried that the Star of Salvation had dawned upon them in the
East.(766) This may doubtless have been no more than a fulsome compliment
paid by an obsequious Oriental crowd to the Roman emperor. But it is also
possible that the rising of a bright star regularly gave the signal for
the festival, and that as chance would have it the star emerged above the
rim of the eastern horizon at the very moment of the emperor’s approach.
The coincidence, if it happened, could hardly fail to strike the
imagination of a superstitious and excited multitude, who might thereupon
hail the great man as the deity whose coming was announced by the sign in
the heavens. Or the emperor may have mistaken for a greeting to himself
the shouts which were addressed to the star. Now Astarte, the divine
mistress of Adonis, was identified with the planet Venus, and her changes
from a morning to an evening star were carefully noted by the Babylonian
astronomers, who drew omens from her alternate appearance and
disappearance.(767) Hence we may conjecture that the festival of Adonis
was regularly timed to coincide with the appearance of Venus as the
Morning or Evening Star. But the star which the people of Antioch saluted
at the festival was seen in the East; therefore, if it was indeed Venus,
it can only have been the Morning Star. At Aphaca in Syria, where there
was a famous temple of Astarte, the signal for the celebration of the
rites was apparently given by the flashing of a meteor, which on a certain
day fell like a star from the top of Mount Lebanon into the river Adonis.
The meteor was thought to be Astarte herself,(768) and its flight through
the air might naturally be interpreted as the descent of the amorous
goddess to the arms of her lover. At Antioch and elsewhere the appearance
of the Morning Star on the day of the festival may in like manner have
been hailed as the coming of the goddess of love to wake her dead leman
from his earthy bed. If that were so, we may surmise that it was the
Morning Star which guided the wise men of the East to Bethlehem,(769) the
hallowed spot which heard, in the language of Jerome, the weeping of the
infant Christ and the lament for Adonis.

BOOK SECOND. ATTIS.

Chapter I. The Myth and Ritual of Attis.

(M198) Another of those gods whose supposed death and resurrection struck
such deep roots into the faith and ritual of Western Asia is Attis. He was
to Phrygia what Adonis was to Syria. Like Adonis, he appears to have been
a god of vegetation, and his death and resurrection were annually mourned
and rejoiced over at a festival in spring.(770) The legends and rites of
the two gods were so much alike that the ancients themselves sometimes
identified them.(771) Attis was said to have been a fair young shepherd or
herdsman beloved by Cybele, the Mother of the Gods, a great Asiatic
goddess of fertility, who had her chief home in Phrygia.(772) Some held
that Attis was her son.(773) His birth, like that of many other heroes, is
said to have been miraculous. His mother, Nana, was a virgin, who
conceived by putting a ripe almond or a pomegranate in her bosom. Indeed
in the Phrygian cosmogony an almond figured as the father of all
things,(774) perhaps because its delicate lilac blossom is one of the
first heralds of the spring, appearing on the bare boughs before the
leaves have opened. Such tales of virgin mothers are relics of an age of
childish ignorance when men had not yet recognized the intercourse of the
sexes as the true cause of offspring. That ignorance, still shared by the
lowest of existing savages, the aboriginal tribes of central
Australia,(775) was doubtless at one time universal among mankind. Even in
later times, when people are better acquainted with the laws of nature,
they sometimes imagine that these laws may be subject to exceptions, and
that miraculous beings may be born in miraculous ways by women who have
never known a man. In Palestine to this day it is believed that a woman
may conceive by a jinnee or by the spirit of her dead husband. There is,
or was lately, a man at Nebk who is currently supposed to be the offspring
of such a union, and the simple folk have never suspected his mother’s
virtue.(776) Two different accounts of the death of Attis were current.
According to the one he was killed by a boar, like Adonis. According to
the other he unmanned himself under a pine-tree, and bled to death on the
spot. The latter is said to have been the local story told by the people
of Pessinus, a great seat of the worship of Cybele, and the whole legend
of which the story forms a part is stamped with a character of rudeness
and savagery that speaks strongly for its antiquity.(777) Both tales might
claim the support of custom, or rather both were probably invented to
explain certain customs observed by the worshippers. The story of the
self-mutilation of Attis is clearly an attempt to account for the
self-mutilation of his priests, who regularly castrated themselves on
entering the service of the goddess. The story of his death by the boar
may have been told to explain why his worshippers, especially the people
of Pessinus, abstained from eating swine.(778) In like manner the
worshippers of Adonis abstained from pork, because a boar had killed their
god.(779) After his death Attis is said to have been changed into a
pine-tree.(780)

(M199) The worship of the Phrygian Mother of the Gods was adopted by the
Romans in 204 B.C. towards the close of their long struggle with Hannibal.
For their drooping spirits had been opportunely cheered by a prophecy,
alleged to be drawn from that convenient farrago of nonsense, the
Sibylline Books, that the foreign invader would be driven from Italy if
the great Oriental goddess were brought to Rome. Accordingly ambassadors
were despatched to her sacred city Pessinus in Phrygia. The small black
stone which embodied the mighty divinity was entrusted to them and
conveyed to Rome, where it was received with great respect and installed
in the temple of Victory on the Palatine Hill. It was the middle of April
when the goddess arrived,(781) and she went to work at once. For the
harvest that year was such as had not been seen for many a long day,(782)
and in the very next year Hannibal and his veterans embarked for Africa.
As he looked his last on the coast of Italy, fading behind him in the
distance, he could not foresee that Europe, which had repelled the arms,
would yet yield to the gods, of the Orient. The vanguard of the conquerors
had already encamped in the heart of Italy before the rearguard of the
beaten army fell sullenly back from its shores.

(M200) We may conjecture, though we are not told, that the Mother of the
Gods brought with her the worship of her youthful lover or son to her new
home in the West. Certainly the Romans were familiar with the Galli, the
emasculated priests of Attis, before the close of the Republic. These
unsexed beings, in their Oriental costume, with little images suspended on
their breasts, appear to have been a familiar sight in the streets of
Rome, which they traversed in procession, carrying the image of the
goddess and chanting their hymns to the music of cymbals and tambourines,
flutes and horns, while the people, impressed by the fantastic show and
moved by the wild strains, flung alms to them in abundance, and buried the
image and its bearers under showers of roses.(783) A further step was
taken by the Emperor Claudius when he incorporated the Phrygian worship of
the sacred tree, and with it probably the orgiastic rites of Attis, in the
established religion of Rome.(784) The great spring festival of Cybele and
Attis is best known to us in the form in which it was celebrated at Rome;
but as we are informed that the Roman ceremonies were also Phrygian,(785)
we may assume that they differed hardly, if at all, from their Asiatic
original. The order of the festival seems to have been as follows.(786)

(M201) On the twenty-second day of March, a pine-tree was cut in the woods
and brought into the sanctuary of Cybele, where it was treated as a great,
divinity. The duty of carrying the sacred tree was entrusted to a guild of
Tree-bearers. The trunk was swathed like a corpse with woollen bands and
decked with wreaths, of violets, for violets were said to have sprung from
the blood of Attis, as roses and anemones from the blood of Adonis; and
the effigy of a young man, doubtless Attis himself, was tied to the middle
of the stem.(787) On the second day of the festival, the twenty-third of
March, the chief ceremony seems to have been a blowing of trumpets.(788)
The third day, the twenty-fourth of March, was known as the Day of Blood:
the Archigallus or high-priest drew blood from his arms and presented it
as an offering.(789) Nor was he alone in making this bloody sacrifice.
Stirred by the wild barbaric music of clashing cymbals, rumbling drums,
droning horns, and screaming flutes, the inferior clergy whirled about in
the dance with waggling heads and streaming hair, until, rapt into a
frenzy of excitement and insensible to pain, they gashed their bodies with
potsherds or slashed them with knives in order to bespatter the altar and
the sacred tree with their flowing blood.(790) The ghastly rite probably
formed part of the mourning for Attis and may have been intended to
strengthen him for the resurrection. The Australian aborigines cut
themselves in like manner over the graves of their friends for the
purpose, perhaps, of enabling them to be born again.(791) Further, we may
conjecture, though we are not expressly told, that it was on the same Day
of Blood and for the same purpose that the novices sacrificed their
virility. Wrought up to the highest pitch of religious excitement they
dashed the severed portions of themselves against the image of the cruel
goddess. These broken instruments of fertility were afterwards reverently
wrapt up and buried in the earth or in subterranean chambers sacred to
Cybele,(792) where, like the offering of blood, they may have been deemed
instrumental in recalling Attis to life and hastening the general
resurrection of nature, which was then bursting into leaf and blossom in
the vernal sunshine. Some confirmation of this conjecture is furnished by
the savage story that the mother of Attis conceived by putting in her
bosom a pomegranate sprung from the severed genitals of a man-monster
named Agdestis, a sort of double of Attis.(793)

(M202) If there is any truth in this conjectural explanation of the
custom, we can readily understand why other Asiatic goddesses of fertility
were served in like manner by eunuch priests. These feminine deities
required to receive from their male ministers, who personated the divine
lovers, the means of discharging their beneficent functions: they had
themselves to be impregnated by the life-giving energy before they could
transmit it to the world. Goddesses thus ministered to by eunuch priests
were the great Artemis of Ephesus(794) and the great Syrian Astarte of
Hierapolis,(795) whose sanctuary, frequented by swarms of pilgrims and
enriched by the offerings of Assyria and Babylonia, of Arabia and
Phoenicia, was perhaps in the days of its glory the most popular in the
East.(796) Now the unsexed priests of this Syrian goddess resembled those
of Cybele so closely that some people took them to be the same.(797) And
the mode in which they dedicated themselves to the religious life was
similar. The greatest festival of the year at Hierapolis fell at the
beginning of spring, when multitudes thronged to the sanctuary from Syria
and the regions round about. While the flutes played, the drums beat, and
the eunuch priests slashed themselves with knives, the religious
excitement gradually spread like a wave among the crowd of onlookers, and
many a one did that which he little thought to do when he came as a
holiday spectator to the festival. For man after man, his veins throbbing
with the music, his eyes fascinated by the sight of the streaming blood,
flung his garments from him, leaped forth with a shout, and seizing one of
the swords which stood ready for the purpose, castrated himself on the
spot. Then he ran through the city, holding the bloody pieces in his hand,
till he threw them into one of the houses which he passed in his mad
career. The household thus honoured had to furnish him with a suit of
female attire and female ornaments, which he wore for the rest of his
life.(798) When the tumult of emotion had subsided, and the man had come
to himself again, the irrevocable sacrifice must often have been followed
by passionate sorrow and lifelong regret. This revulsion of natural human
feeling after the frenzies of a fanatical religion is powerfully depicted
by Catullus in a celebrated poem.(799)

(M203) The parallel of these Syrian devotees confirms the view that in the
similar worship of Cybele the sacrifice of virility took place on the Day
of Blood at the vernal rites of the goddess, when the violets, supposed to
spring from the red drops of her wounded lover, were in bloom among the
pines. Indeed the story that Attis unmanned himself under a pine-tree(800)
was clearly devised to explain why his priests did the same beside the
sacred violet-wreathed tree at his festival. At all events, we can hardly
doubt that the Day of Blood witnessed the mourning for Attis over an
effigy of him which was afterwards buried.(801) The image thus laid in the
sepulchre was probably the same which had hung upon the tree.(802)
Throughout the period of mourning the worshippers fasted from bread,
nominally because Cybele had done so in her grief for the death of
Attis,(803) but really perhaps for the same reason which induced the women
of Harran to abstain from eating anything ground in a mill while they wept
for Tammuz.(804) To partake of bread or flour at such a season might have
been deemed a wanton profanation of the bruised and broken body of the
god. Or the fast may possibly have been a preparation for a sacramental
meal.(805)

(M204) But when night had fallen, the sorrow of the worshippers was turned
to joy. For suddenly a light shone in the darkness: the tomb was opened:
the god had risen from the dead; and as the priest touched the lips of the
weeping mourners with balm, he softly whispered in their ears the glad
tidings of salvation. The resurrection of the god was hailed by his
disciples as a promise that they too would issue triumphant from the
corruption of the grave.(806) On the morrow, the twenty-fifth day of
March, which was reckoned the vernal equinox, the divine resurrection was
celebrated with a wild outburst of glee. At Rome, and probably elsewhere,
the celebration took the form of a carnival. It was the Festival of Joy
(_Hilaria_). A universal licence prevailed. Every man might say and do
what he pleased. People went about the streets in disguise. No dignity was
too high or too sacred for the humblest citizen to assume with impunity.
In the reign of Commodus a band of conspirators thought to take advantage
of the masquerade by dressing in the uniform of the Imperial Guard, and
so, mingling with the crowd of merrymakers, to get within stabbing
distance of the emperor. But the plot miscarried.(807) Even the stern
Alexander Severus used to relax so far on the joyous day as to admit a
pheasant to his frugal board.(808) The next day, the twenty-sixth of
March, was given to repose, which must have been much needed after the
varied excitements and fatigues of the preceding days.(809) Finally, the
Roman festival closed on the twenty-seventh of March with a procession to
the brook Almo. The silver image of the goddess, with its face of jagged
black stone, sat in a wagon drawn by oxen. Preceded by the nobles walking
barefoot, it moved slowly, to the loud music of pipes and tambourines, out
by the Porta Capena, and so down to the banks of the Almo, which flows
into the Tiber just below the walls of Rome. There the high-priest, robed
in purple, washed the wagon, the image, and the other sacred objects in
the water of the stream. On returning from their bath, the wain and the
oxen were strewn with fresh spring flowers. All was mirth and gaiety. No
one thought of the blood that had flowed so lately. Even the eunuch
priests forgot their wounds.(810)

(M205) Such, then, appears to have been the annual solemnization of the
death and resurrection of Attis in spring. But besides these public rites,
his worship is known to have comprised certain secret or mystic
ceremonies, which probably aimed at bringing the worshipper, and
especially the novice, into closer communication with his god. Our
information as to the nature of these mysteries and the date of their
celebration is unfortunately very scanty, but they seem to have included a
sacramental meal and a baptism of blood. In the sacrament the novice
became a partaker of the mysteries by eating out of a drum and drinking
out of a cymbal, two instruments of music which figured prominently in the
thrilling orchestra of Attis.(811) The fast which accompanied the mourning
for the dead god(812) may perhaps have been designed to prepare the body
of the communicant for the reception of the blessed sacrament by purging
it of all that could defile by contact the sacred elements.(813) In the
baptism the devotee, crowned with gold and wreathed with fillets,
descended into a pit, the mouth of which was covered with a wooden
grating. A bull, adorned with garlands of flowers, its forehead glittering
with gold leaf, was then driven on to the grating and there stabbed to
death with a consecrated spear. Its hot reeking blood poured in torrents
through the apertures, and was received with devout eagerness by the
worshipper on every part of his person and garments, till he emerged from
the pit, drenched, dripping, and scarlet from head to foot, to receive the
homage, nay the adoration, of his fellows as one who had been born again
to eternal life and had washed away his sins in the blood of the
bull.(814) For some time afterwards the fiction of a new birth was kept up
by dieting him on milk like a new-born babe.(815) The regeneration of the
worshipper took place at the same time as the regeneration of his god,
namely at the vernal equinox.(816) At Rome the new birth and the remission
of sins by the shedding of bull’s blood appear to have been carried out
above all at the sanctuary of the Phrygian goddess on the Vatican Hill, at
or near the spot where the great basilica of St. Peter’s now stands; for
many inscriptions relating to the rites were found when the church was
being enlarged in 1608 or 1609.(817) From the Vatican as a centre this
barbarous system of superstition seems to have spread to other parts of
the Roman empire. Inscriptions found in Gaul and Germany prove that
provincial sanctuaries modelled their ritual on that of the Vatican.(818)
From the same source we learn that the testicles as well as the blood of
the bull played an important part in the ceremonies.(819) Probably they
were regarded as a powerful charm to promote fertility and hasten the new
birth.

Chapter II. Attis As a God of Vegetation.

(M206) The original character of Attis as a tree-spirit is brought out
plainly by the part which the pine-tree plays in his legend, his ritual,
and his monuments.(820) The story that he was a human being transformed
into a pine-tree is only one of those transparent attempts at
rationalizing old beliefs which meet us so frequently in mythology. The
bringing in of the pine-tree from the woods, decked with violets and
woollen bands, is like bringing in the May-tree or Summer-tree in modern
folk-custom; and the effigy which was attached to the pine-tree was only a
duplicate representative of the tree-spirit Attis. After being fastened to
the tree, the effigy was kept for a year and then burned.(821) The same
thing appears to have been sometimes done with the May-pole; and in like
manner the effigy of the corn-spirit, made at harvest, is often preserved
till it is replaced by a new effigy at next year’s harvest.(822) The
original intention of such customs was no doubt to maintain the spirit of
vegetation in life throughout the year. Why the Phrygians should have
worshipped the pine above other trees we can only guess. Perhaps the sight
of its changeless, though sombre, green cresting the ridges of the high
hills above the fading splendour of the autumn woods in the valleys may
have seemed to their eyes to mark it out as the seat of a diviner life, of
something exempt from the sad vicissitudes of the seasons, constant and
eternal as the sky which stooped to meet it. For the same reason, perhaps,
ivy was sacred to Attis; at all events, we read that his eunuch priests
were tattooed with a pattern of ivy leaves.(823) Another reason for the
sanctity of the pine may have been its usefulness. The cones of the
stone-pine contain edible nut-like seeds, which have been used as food
since antiquity, and are still eaten, for example, by the poorer classes
in Rome.(824) Moreover, a wine was brewed from these seeds,(825) and this
may partly account for the orgiastic nature of the rites of Cybele, which
the ancients compared to those of Dionysus.(826) Further, pine-cones were
regarded as symbols or rather instruments of fertility. Hence at the
festival of the Thesmophoria they were thrown, along with pigs and other
agents or emblems of fecundity, into the sacred vaults of Demeter for the
purpose of quickening the ground and the wombs of women.(827)

(M207) Like tree-spirits in general, Attis was apparently thought to wield
power over the fruits of the earth or even to be identical with the corn.
One of his epithets was “very fruitful”: he was addressed as the “reaped
green (or yellow) ear of corn”; and the story of his sufferings, death,
and resurrection was interpreted as the ripe grain wounded by the reaper,
buried in the granary, and coming to life again when it is sown in the
ground.(828) A statue of him in the Lateran Museum at Rome clearly
indicates his relation to the fruits of the earth, and particularly to the
corn; for it represents him with a bunch of ears of corn and fruit in his
hand, and a wreath of pine-cones, pomegranates, and other fruits on his
head, while from the top of his Phrygian cap ears of corn are
sprouting.(829) On a stone urn, which contained the ashes of an
Archigallus or high-priest of Attis, the same idea is expressed in a
slightly different way. The top of the urn is adorned with ears of corn
carved in relief, and it is surmounted by the figure of a cock, whose tail
consists of ears of corn.(830) Cybele in like manner was conceived as a
goddess of fertility who could make or mar the fruits of the earth; for
the people of Augustodunum (Autun) in Gaul used to cart her image about in
a wagon for the good of the fields and vineyards, while they danced and
sang before it,(831) and we have seen that in Italy an unusually fine
harvest was attributed to the recent arrival of the Great Mother.(832) The
bathing of the image of the goddess in a river may well have been a
rain-charm to ensure an abundant supply of moisture for the crops. Or
perhaps, as Mr. Hepding has suggested, the union of Cybele and Attis, like
that of Aphrodite and Adonis, was dramatically represented at the
festival, and the subsequent bath of the goddess was a ceremonial
purification of the bride, such as is often observed at human
marriages.(833) In like manner Aphrodite is said to have bathed after her
union with Adonis,(834) and so did Demeter after her intercourse with
Poseidon.(835) Hera washed in the springs of the river Burrha after her
marriage with Zeus;(836) and every year she recovered her virginity by
bathing in the spring of Canathus.(837) However that may be, the rules of
diet observed by the worshippers of Cybele and Attis at their solemn fasts
are clearly dictated by a belief that the divine life of these deities
manifested itself in the fruits of the earth, and especially in such of
them as are actually hidden by the soil. For while the devotees were
allowed to partake of flesh, though not of pork or fish, they were
forbidden to eat seeds and the roots of vegetables, but they might eat the
stalks and upper parts of the plants.(838)

Chapter III. Attis As The Father God.

(M208) The name Attis appears to mean simply “father.”(839) This
explanation, suggested by etymology, is confirmed by the observation that
another name for Attis was Papas;(840) for Papas has all the appearance of
being a common form of that word for “father” which occurs independently
in many distinct families of speech all the world over. Similarly the
mother of Attis was named Nana,(841) which is itself a form of the
world-wide word for “mother.” “The immense list of such words collected by
Buschmann shows that the types _pa_ and _ta_, with the similar forms _ap_
and _at_, preponderate in the world as names for ‘father,’ while _ma_ and
_na_, _am_ and _an_, preponderate as names for ‘mother.’ ”(842)

(M209) Thus the mother of Attis is only another form of his divine
mistress the great Mother Goddess,(843) and we are brought back to the
myth that the lovers were mother and son. The story that Nana conceived
miraculously without commerce with the other sex shows that the Mother
Goddess of Phrygia herself was viewed, like other goddesses of the same
primitive type, as a Virgin Mother.(844) That view of her character does
not rest on a perverse and mischievous theory that virginity is more
honourable than matrimony. It is derived, as I have already indicated,
from a state of savagery in which the mere fact of paternity was unknown.
That explains why in later times, long after the true nature of paternity
had been ascertained, the Father God was often a much less important
personage in mythology than his divine partner the Mother Goddess. With
regard to Attis in his paternal character it deserves to be noticed that
the Bithynians used to ascend to the tops of the mountains and there call
upon him under the name of Papas. The custom is attested by Arrian,(845)
who as a native of Bithynia must have had good opportunities of observing
it. We may perhaps infer from it that the Bithynians conceived Attis as a
sky-god or heavenly father, like Zeus, with whom indeed Arrian identifies
him. If that were so, the story of the loves of Attis and Cybele, the
Father God and the Mother Goddess, might be in one of its aspects a
particular version of the widespread myth which represents Mother Earth
fertilized by Father Sky;(846) and, further, the story of the emasculation
of Attis would be parallel to the Greek legend that Cronus castrated his
father, the old sky-god Uranus,(847) and was himself in turn castrated by
his own son, the younger sky-god Zeus.(848) The tale of the mutilation of
the sky-god by his son has been plausibly explained as a myth of the
violent separation of the earth and sky, which some races, for example the
Polynesians, suppose to have originally clasped each other in a close
embrace.(849) Yet it seems unlikely that an order of eunuch priests like
the Galli should have been based on a purely cosmogonic myth: why should
they continue for all time to be mutilated because the sky-god was so in
the beginning? The custom of castration must surely have been designed to
meet a constantly recurring need, not merely to reflect a mythical event
which happened at the creation of the world. Such a need is the
maintenance of the fruitfulness of the earth, annually imperilled by the
changes of the seasons. Yet the theory that the mutilation of the priests
of Attis and the burial of the severed parts were designed to fertilize
the ground may perhaps be reconciled with the cosmogonic myth if we
remember the old opinion, held apparently by many peoples, that the
creation of the world is year by year repeated in that great
transformation which depends ultimately on the annual increase of the
sun’s heat.(850) However, the evidence for the celestial aspect of Attis
is too slight to allow us to speak with any confidence on this subject. A
trace of that aspect appears to survive in the star-spangled cap which he
is said to have received from Cybele,(851) and which is figured on some
monuments supposed to represent him.(852) His identification with the
Phrygian moon-god Men Tyrannus(853) points in the same direction, but is
probably due rather to the religious speculation of a later age than to
genuine popular tradition.(854)

Chapter IV. Human Representatives of Attis.

(M210) From inscriptions it appears that both at Pessinus and Rome the
high-priest of Cybele regularly bore the name of Attis.(855) It is
therefore a reasonable conjecture that he played the part of his namesake,
the legendary Attis, at the annual festival.(856) We have seen that on the
Day of Blood he drew blood from his arms, and this may have been an
imitation of the self-inflicted death of Attis under the pine-tree. It is
not inconsistent with this supposition that Attis was also represented at
these ceremonies by an effigy; for instances can be shown in which the
divine being is first represented by a living person and afterwards by an
effigy, which is then burned or otherwise destroyed.(857) Perhaps we may
go a step farther and conjecture that this mimic killing of the priest,
accompanied by a real effusion of his blood, was in Phrygia, as it has
been elsewhere, a substitute for a human sacrifice which in earlier times
was actually offered. Sir W. M. Ramsay, whose authority on all questions
relating to Phrygia no one will dispute, is of opinion that at these
Phrygian ceremonies “the representative of the god was probably slain each
year by a cruel death, just as the god himself died.”(858) We know from
Strabo(859) that the priests of Pessinus were at one time potentates as
well as priests; they may, therefore, have belonged to that class of
divine kings or popes whose duty it was to die each year for their people
and the world. The name of Attis, it is true, does not occur among the
names of the old kings of Phrygia, who seem to have borne the names of
Midas and Gordias in alternate generations; but a very ancient inscription
carved in the rock above a famous Phrygian monument, which is known as the
Tomb of Midas, records that the monument was made for, or dedicated to,
King Midas by a certain Ates, whose name is doubtless identical with
Attis, and who, if not a king himself, may have been one of the royal
family.(860) It is worthy of note also that the name Atys, which, again,
appears to be only another form of Attis, is recorded as that of an early
king of Lydia;(861) and that a son of Croesus, king of Lydia, not only
bore the name Atys but was said to have been killed, while he was hunting
a boar, by a member of the royal Phrygian family, who traced his lineage
to King Midas and had fled to the court of Croesus because he had
unwittingly slain his own brother.(862) Scholars have recognized in this
story of the death of Atys, son of Croesus, a mere double of the myth of
Attis;(863) and in view of the facts which have come before us in the
present inquiry(864) it is a remarkable circumstance that the myth of a
slain god should be told of a king’s son. May we conjecture that the
Phrygian priests who bore the name of Attis and represented the god of
that name were themselves members, perhaps the eldest sons, of the royal
house, to whom their fathers, uncles, brothers, or other kinsmen deputed
the honour of dying a violent death in the character of gods, while they
reserved to themselves the duty of living, as long as nature allowed them,
in the humbler character of kings? If this were so, the Phrygian dynasty
of Midas may have presented a close parallel to the Greek dynasty of
Athamas, in which the eldest sons seem to have been regularly destined to
the altar.(865) But it is also possible that the divine priests who bore
the name of Attis may have belonged to that indigenous race which the
Phrygians, on their irruption into Asia from Europe, appear to have found
and conquered in the land afterwards known as Phrygia.(866) On the latter
hypothesis the priests may have represented an older and higher
civilization than that of their barbarous conquerors. Be that as it may,
the god they personated was a deity of vegetation whose divine life
manifested itself especially in the pine-tree and the violets of spring;
and if they died in the character of that divinity, they corresponded to
the mummers who are still slain in mimicry by European peasants in spring,
and to the priest who was slain long ago in grim earnest on the wooded
shore of the Lake of Nemi.

Chapter V. The Hanged God.

(M211) A reminiscence of the manner in which these old representatives of
the deity were put to death is perhaps preserved in the famous story of
Marsyas. He was said to be a Phrygian satyr or Silenus, according to
others a shepherd or herdsman, who played sweetly on the flute. A friend
of Cybele, he roamed the country with the disconsolate goddess to soothe
her grief for the death of Attis.(867) The composition of the Mother’s
Air, a tune played on the flute in honour of the Great Mother Goddess, was
attributed to him by the people of Celaenae in Phrygia.(868) Vain of his
skill, he challenged Apollo to a musical contest, he to play on the flute
and Apollo on the lyre. Being vanquished, Marsyas was tied up to a
pine-tree and flayed or cut limb from limb either by the victorious Apollo
or by a Scythian slave.(869) His skin was shown at Celaenae in historical
times. It hung at the foot of the citadel in a cave from which the river
Marsyas rushed with an impetuous and noisy tide to join the Maeander.(870)
So the Adonis bursts full-born from the precipices of the Lebanon; so the
blue river of Ibreez leaps in a crystal jet from the red rocks of the
Taurus; so the stream, which now rumbles deep underground, used to gleam
for a moment on its passage from darkness to darkness in the dim light of
the Corycian cave. In all these copious fountains, with their glad promise
of fertility and life, men of old saw the hand of God and worshipped him
beside the rushing river with the music of its tumbling waters in their
ears. At Celaenae, if we can trust tradition, the piper Marsyas, hanging
in his cave, had a soul for harmony even in death; for it is said that at
the sound of his native Phrygian melodies the skin of the dead satyr used
to thrill, but that if the musician struck up an air in praise of Apollo
it remained deaf and motionless.(871)

(M212) In this Phrygian satyr, shepherd, or herdsman who enjoyed the
friendship of Cybele, practised the music so characteristic of her
rites,(872) and died a violent death on her sacred tree, the pine, may we
not detect a close resemblance to Attis, the favourite shepherd or
herdsman of the goddess, who is himself described as a piper,(873) is said
to have perished under a pine-tree, and was annually represented by an
effigy hung, like Marsyas, upon a pine? We may conjecture that in old days
the priest who bore the name and played the part of Attis at the spring
festival of Cybele was regularly hanged or otherwise slain upon the sacred
tree, and that this barbarous custom was afterwards mitigated into the
form in which it is known to us in later times, when the priest merely
drew blood from his body under the tree and attached an effigy instead of
himself to its trunk. In the holy grove at Upsala men and animals were
sacrificed by being hanged upon the sacred trees.(874) The human victims
dedicated to Odin were regularly put to death by hanging or by a
combination of hanging and stabbing, the man being strung up to a tree or
a gallows and then wounded with a spear. Hence Odin was called the Lord of
the Gallows or the God of the Hanged, and he is represented sitting under
a gallows tree.(875) Indeed he is said to have been sacrificed to himself
in the ordinary way, as we learn from the weird verses of the _Havamal_,
in which the god describes how he acquired his divine power by learning
the magic runes:

“_I know that I hung on the windy tree_
_For nine whole nights,_
_Wounded with the spear, dedicated to Odin,_
_Myself to myself._”(876)

The Bagobos of Mindanao, one of the Philippine Islands, used annually to
sacrifice human victims for the good of the crops in a similar way. Early
in December, when the constellation Orion appeared at seven o’clock in the
evening, the people knew that the time had come to clear their fields for
sowing and to sacrifice a slave. The sacrifice was presented to certain
powerful spirits as payment for the good year which the people had
enjoyed, and to ensure the favour of the spirits for the coming season.
The victim was led to a great tree in the forest; there he was tied with
his back to the tree and his arms stretched high above his head, in the
attitude in which ancient artists portrayed Marsyas hanging on the fatal
tree. While he thus hung by the arms, he was slain by a spear thrust
through his body at the level of the armpits. Afterwards the body was cut
clean through the middle at the waist, and the upper part was apparently
allowed to dangle for a little from the tree, while the under part
wallowed in blood on the ground. The two portions were finally cast into a
shallow trench beside the tree. Before this was done, anybody who wished
might cut off a piece of flesh or a lock of hair from the corpse and carry
it to the grave of some relation whose body was being consumed by a ghoul.
Attracted by the fresh corpse, the ghoul would leave the mouldering old
body in peace. These sacrifices have been offered by men now living.(877)

(M213) In Greece the great goddess Artemis herself appears to have been
annually hanged in effigy in her sacred grove of Condylea among the
Arcadian hills, and there accordingly she went by the name of the Hanged
One.(878) Indeed a trace of a similar rite may perhaps be detected even at
Ephesus, the most famous of her sanctuaries, in the legend of a woman who
hanged herself and was thereupon dressed by the compassionate goddess in
her own divine garb and called by the name of Hecate.(879) Similarly, at
Melite in Phthia, a story was told of a girl named Aspalis who hanged
herself, but who appears to have been merely a form of Artemis. For after
her death her body could not be found, but an image of her was discovered
standing beside the image of Artemis, and the people bestowed on it the
title of Hecaerge or Far-shooter, one of the regular epithets of the
goddess. Every year the virgins sacrificed a young goat to the image by
hanging it, because Astypalis was said to have hanged herself.(880) The
sacrifice may have been a substitute for hanging an image or a human
representative of Artemis. Again, in Rhodes the fair Helen was worshipped
under the title of Helen of the Tree, because the queen of the island had
caused her handmaids, disguised as Furies, to string her up to a
bough.(881) That the Asiatic Greeks sacrificed animals in this fashion is
proved by coins of Ilium, which represent an ox or cow hanging on a tree
and stabbed with a knife by a man, who sits among the branches or on the
animal’s back.(882) At Hierapolis also the victims were hung on trees
before they were burnt.(883) With these Greek and Scandinavian parallels
before us we can hardly dismiss as wholly improbable the conjecture that
in Phrygia a man-god may have hung year by year on the sacred but fatal
tree.

(M214) The tradition that Marsyas was flayed and that his skin was
exhibited at Celaenae down to historical times may well reflect a ritual
practice of flaying the dead god and hanging his skin upon the pine as a
means of effecting his resurrection, and with it the revival of vegetation
in spring. Similarly, in ancient Mexico the human victims who personated
gods were often flayed and their bloody skins worn by men who appear to
have represented the dead deities come to life again.(884) When a Scythian
king died, he was buried in a grave along with one of his concubines, his
cup-bearer, cook, groom, lacquey, and messenger, who were all killed for
the purpose, and a great barrow was heaped up over the grave. A year
afterwards fifty of his servants and fifty of his best horses were
strangled; and their bodies, having been disembowelled and cleaned out,
were stuffed with chaff, sewn up, and set on scaffolds round about the
barrow, every dead man bestriding a dead horse, which was bitted and
bridled as in life.(885) These strange horsemen were no doubt supposed to
mount guard over the king. The setting up of their stuffed skins might be
thought to ensure their ghostly resurrection.

(M215) That some such notion was entertained by the Scythians is made
probable by the account which the mediaeval traveller de Plano Carpini
gives of the funeral customs of the Mongols. The traveller tells us that
when a noble Mongol died, the custom was to bury him seated in the middle
of a tent, along with a horse saddled and bridled, and a mare and her
foal. Also they used to eat another horse, stuff the carcase with straw,
and set it up on poles. All this they did in order that in the other world
the dead man might have a tent to live in, a mare to yield milk, and a
steed to ride, and that he might be able to breed horses. Moreover, the
bones of the horse which they ate were burned for the good of his
soul.(886) When the Arab traveller Ibn Batuta visited Peking in the
fourteenth century, he witnessed the funeral of an emperor of China who
had been killed in battle. The dead sovereign was buried along with four
young female slaves and six guards in a vault, and an immense mound like a
hill was piled over him. Four horses were then made to run round the
hillock till they could run no longer, after which they were killed,
impaled, and set up beside the tomb.(887) When an Indian of Patagonia
dies, he is buried in a pit along with some of his property. Afterwards
his favourite horse, having been killed, skinned, and stuffed, is propped
up on sticks with its head turned towards the grave. At the funeral of a
chief four horses are sacrificed, and one is set up at each corner of the
burial-place. The clothes and other effects of the deceased are burned;
and to conclude all, a feast is made of the horses’ flesh.(888) The
Scythians certainly believed in the existence of the soul after death and
in the possibility of turning it to account. This is proved by the
practice of one of their tribes, the Taurians of the Crimea, who used to
cut off the heads of their prisoners and set them on poles over their
houses, especially over the chimneys, in order that the spirits of the
slain men might guard the dwellings.(889) Some of the savages of Borneo
allege a similar reason for their favourite custom of taking human heads.
“The custom,” said a Kayan chief, “is not horrible. It is an ancient
custom, a good, beneficent custom, bequeathed to us by our fathers and our
fathers’ fathers; it brings us blessings, plentiful harvests, and keeps
off sickness and pains. Those who were once our enemies, hereby become our
guardians, our friends, our benefactors.”(890) Thus to convert dead foes
into friends and allies all that is necessary is to feed and otherwise
propitiate their skulls at a festival when they are brought into the
village. “An offering of food is made to the heads, and their spirits,
being thus appeased, cease to entertain malice against, or to seek to
inflict injury upon, those who have got possession of the skull which
formerly adorned the now forsaken body.”(891) When the Sea Dyaks of
Sarawak return home successful from a head-hunting expedition, they bring
the head ashore with much ceremony, wrapt in palm leaves. “On shore and in
the village, the head, for months after its arrival, is treated with the
greatest consideration, and all the names and terms of endearment of which
their language is capable are abundantly lavished on it; the most dainty
morsels, culled from their abundant though inelegant repast, are thrust
into its mouth, and it is instructed to hate its former friends, and that,
having been now adopted into the tribe of its captors, its spirit must be
always with them; sirih leaves and betel-nut are given to it, and finally
a cigar is frequently placed between its ghastly and pallid lips. None of
this disgusting mockery is performed with the intention of ridicule, but
all to propitiate the spirit by kindness, and to procure its good wishes
for the tribe, of whom it is now supposed to have become a member.”(892)
Amongst these Dyaks the “Head-Feast,” which has been just described, is
supposed to be the most beneficial in its influence of all their feasts
and ceremonies. “The object of them all is to make their rice grow well,
to cause the forest to abound with wild animals, to enable their dogs and
snares to be successful in securing game, to have the streams swarm with
fish, to give health and activity to the people themselves, and to ensure
fertility to their women. All these blessings, the possessing and feasting
of a fresh head are supposed to be the most efficient means of securing.
The very ground itself is believed to be benefited and rendered fertile,
more fertile even than when the water in which fragments of gold presented
by the Rajah have been washed, has been sprinkled over it.”(893)

(M216) In like manner, if my conjecture is right, the man who represented
the father-god of Phrygia used to be slain and his stuffed skin hung on
the sacred pine in order that his spirit might work for the growth of the
crops, the multiplication of animals, and the fertility of women. So at
Athens an ox, which appears to have embodied the corn-spirit, was killed
at an annual sacrifice, and its hide, stuffed with straw and sewn up, was
afterwards set on its feet and yoked to a plough as if it were ploughing,
apparently in order to represent, or rather to promote, the resurrection
of the slain corn-spirit at the end of the threshing.(894) This employment
of the skins of divine animals for the purpose of ensuring the revival of
the slaughtered divinity might be illustrated by other examples.(895)
Perhaps the hide of the bull which was killed to furnish the regenerating
bath of blood in the rites of Attis may have been put to a similar use.

Chapter VI. Oriental Religions in the West.

(M217) The worship of the Great Mother of the Gods and her lover or son
was very popular under the Roman Empire. Inscriptions prove that the two
received divine honours, separately or conjointly, not only in Italy, and
especially at Rome, but also in the provinces, particularly in Africa,
Spain, Portugal, France, Germany, and Bulgaria.(896) Their worship
survived the establishment of Christianity by Constantine; for Symmachus
records the recurrence of the festival of the Great Mother,(897) and in
the days of Augustine her effeminate priests still paraded the streets and
squares of Carthage with whitened faces, scented hair, and mincing gait,
while, like the mendicant friars of the Middle Ages, they begged alms from
the passers-by.(898) In Greece, on the other hand, the bloody orgies of
the Asiatic goddess and her consort appear to have found little
favour.(899) The barbarous and cruel character of the worship, with its
frantic excesses, was doubtless repugnant to the good taste and humanity
of the Greeks, who seem to have preferred the kindred but gentler rites of
Adonis. Yet the same features which shocked and repelled the Greeks may
have positively attracted the less refined Romans and barbarians of the
West. The ecstatic frenzies, which were mistaken for divine
inspiration,(900) the mangling of the body, the theory of a new birth and
the remission of sins through the shedding of blood, have all their origin
in savagery,(901) and they naturally appealed to peoples in whom the
savage instincts were still strong. Their true character was indeed often
disguised under a decent veil of allegorical or philosophical
interpretation,(902) which probably sufficed to impose upon the rapt and
enthusiastic worshippers, reconciling even the more cultivated of them to
things which otherwise must have filled them with horror and disgust.

(M218) The religion of the Great Mother, with its curious blending of
crude savagery with spiritual aspirations, was only one of a multitude of
similar Oriental faiths which in the later days of paganism spread over
the Roman Empire, and by saturating the European peoples with alien ideals
of life gradually undermined the whole fabric of ancient
civilization.(903) Greek and Roman society was built on the conception of
the subordination of the individual to the community, of the citizen to
the state; it set the safety of the commonwealth, as the supreme aim of
conduct, above the safety of the individual whether in this world or in a
world to come. Trained from infancy in this unselfish ideal, the citizens
devoted their lives to the public service and were ready to lay them down
for the common good; or if they shrank from the supreme sacrifice, it
never occurred to them that they acted otherwise than basely in preferring
their personal existence to the interests of their country. All this was
changed by the spread of Oriental religions which inculcated the communion
of the soul with God and its eternal salvation as the only objects worth
living for, objects in comparison with which the prosperity and even the
existence of the state sank into insignificance. The inevitable result of
this selfish and immoral doctrine was to withdraw the devotee more and
more from the public service, to concentrate his thoughts on his own
spiritual emotions, and to breed in him a contempt for the present life
which he regarded merely as a probation for a better and an eternal. The
saint and the recluse, disdainful of earth and rapt in ecstatic
contemplation of heaven, became in popular opinion the highest ideal of
humanity, displacing the old ideal of the patriot and hero who, forgetful
of self, lives and is ready to die for the good of his country. The
earthly city seemed poor and contemptible to men whose eyes beheld the
City of God coming in the clouds of heaven. Thus the centre of gravity, so
to say, was shifted from the present to a future life, and however much
the other world may have gained, there can be little doubt that this one
lost heavily by the change. A general disintegration of the body politic
set in. The ties of the state and the family were loosened: the structure
of society tended to resolve itself into its individual elements and
thereby to relapse into barbarism; for civilization is only possible
through the active co-operation of the citizens and their willingness to
subordinate their private interests to the common good. Men refused to
defend their country and even to continue their kind.(904) In their
anxiety to save their own souls and the souls of others, they were content
to leave the material world, which they identified with the principle of
evil, to perish around them. This obsession lasted for a thousand years.
The revival of Roman law, of the Aristotelian philosophy, of ancient art
and literature at the close of the Middle Ages, marked the return of
Europe to native ideals of life and conduct, to saner, manlier views of
the world. The long halt in the march of civilization was over. The tide
of Oriental invasion had turned at last. It is ebbing still.(905)

(M219) Among the gods of eastern origin who in the decline of the ancient
world competed against each other for the allegiance of the West was the
old Persian deity Mithra. The immense popularity of his worship is
attested by the monuments illustrative of it which have been found
scattered in profusion all over the Roman Empire.(906) In respect both of
doctrines and of rites the cult of Mithra appears to have presented many
points of resemblance not only to the religion of the Mother of the
Gods(907) but also to Christianity.(908) The similarity struck the
Christian doctors themselves and was explained by them as a work of the
devil, who sought to seduce the souls of men from the true faith by a
false and insidious imitation of it.(909) So to the Spanish conquerors of
Mexico and Peru many of the native heathen rites appeared to be diabolical
counterfeits of the Christian sacraments.(910) With more probability the
modern student of comparative religion traces such resemblances to the
similar and independent workings of the mind of man in his sincere, if
crude, attempts to fathom the secret of the universe, and to adjust his
little life to its awful mysteries. However that may be, there can be no
doubt that the Mithraic religion proved a formidable rival to
Christianity, combining as it did a solemn ritual with aspirations after
moral purity and a hope of immortality.(911) Indeed the issue of the
conflict between the two faiths appears for a time to have hung in the
balance.(912) An instructive relic of the long struggle is preserved in
our festival of Christmas, which the Church seems to have borrowed
directly from its heathen rival. In the Julian calendar the twenty-fifth
of December was reckoned the winter solstice,(913) and it was regarded as
the Nativity of the Sun, because the day begins to lengthen and the power
of the sun to increase from that turning-point of the year.(914) The
ritual of the nativity, as it appears to have been celebrated in Syria and
Egypt, was remarkable. The celebrants retired into certain inner shrines,
from which at midnight they issued with a loud cry, “The Virgin has
brought forth! The light is waxing!”(915) The Egyptians even represented
the new-born sun by the image of an infant which on his birthday, the
winter solstice, they brought forth and exhibited to his worshippers.(916)
No doubt the Virgin who thus conceived and bore a son on the twenty-fifth
of December was the great Oriental goddess whom the Semites called the
Heavenly Virgin or simply the Heavenly Goddess; in Semitic lands she was a
form of Astarte.(917) Now Mithra was regularly identified by his
worshippers with the Sun, the Unconquered Sun, as they called him;(918)
hence his nativity also fell on the twenty-fifth of December.(919) The
Gospels say nothing as to the day of Christ’s birth, and accordingly the
early Church did not celebrate it. In time, however, the Christians of
Egypt came to regard the sixth of January as the date of the Nativity, and
the custom of commemorating the birth of the Saviour on that day gradually
spread until by the fourth century it was universally established in the
East. But at the end of the third or the beginning of the fourth century
the Western Church, which had never recognized the sixth of January as the
day of the Nativity, adopted the twenty-fifth of December as the true
date, and in time its decision was accepted also by the Eastern Church. At
Antioch the change was not introduced till about the year 375 A.D.(920)

(M220) What considerations led the ecclesiastical authorities to institute
the festival of Christmas? The motives for the innovation are stated with
great frankness by a Syrian writer, himself a Christian. “The reason,” he
tells us, “why the fathers transferred the celebration of the sixth of
January to the twenty-fifth of December was this. It was a custom of the
heathen to celebrate on the same twenty-fifth of December the birthday of
the Sun, at which they kindled lights in token of festivity. In these
solemnities and festivities the Christians also took part. Accordingly
when the doctors of the Church perceived that the Christians had a leaning
to this festival, they took counsel and resolved that the true Nativity
should be solemnized on that day and the festival of the Epiphany on the
sixth of January. Accordingly, along with this custom, the practice has
prevailed of kindling fires till the sixth.”(921) The heathen origin of
Christmas is plainly hinted at, if not tacitly admitted, by Augustine when
he exhorts his Christian brethren not to celebrate that solemn day like
the heathen on account of the sun, but on account of him who made the
sun.(922) In like manner Leo the Great rebuked the pestilent belief that
Christmas was solemnized because of the birth of the new sun, as it was
called, and not because of the nativity of Christ.(923)

(M221) Thus it appears that the Christian Church chose to celebrate the
birthday of its Founder on the twenty-fifth of December in order to
transfer the devotion of the heathen from the Sun to him who was called
the Sun of Righteousness.(924) If that was so, there can be no intrinsic
improbability in the conjecture that motives of the same sort may have led
the ecclesiastical authorities to assimilate the Easter festival of the
death and resurrection of their Lord to the festival of the death and
resurrection of another Asiatic god which fell at the same season. Now the
Easter rites still observed in Greece, Sicily, and Southern Italy bear in
some respects a striking resemblance to the rites of Adonis, and I have
suggested that the Church may have consciously adapted the new festival to
its heathen predecessor for the sake of winning souls to Christ.(925) But
this adaptation probably took place in the Greek-speaking rather than in
the Latin-speaking parts of the ancient world; for the worship of Adonis,
while it flourished among the Greeks, appears to have made little
impression on Rome and the West.(926) Certainly it never formed part of
the official Roman religion. The place which it might have taken in the
affections of the vulgar was already occupied by the similar but more
barbarous worship of Attis and the Great Mother. Now the death and
resurrection of Attis were officially celebrated at Rome on the
twenty-fourth and twenty-fifth of March,(927) the latter being regarded as
the spring equinox,(928) and therefore as the most appropriate day for the
revival of a god of vegetation who had been dead or sleeping throughout
the winter. But according to an ancient and widespread tradition Christ
suffered on the twenty-fifth of March, and accordingly some Christians
regularly celebrated the Crucifixion on that day without any regard to the
state of the moon. This custom was certainly observed in Phrygia,
Cappadocia, and Gaul, and there seem to be grounds for thinking that at
one time it was followed also in Rome.(929) Thus the tradition which
placed the death of Christ on the twenty-fifth of March was ancient and
deeply rooted. It is all the more remarkable because astronomical
considerations prove that it can have had no historical foundation.(930)
The inference appears to be inevitable that the passion of Christ must
have been arbitrarily referred to that date in order to harmonize with an
older festival of the spring equinox. This is the view of the learned
ecclesiastical historian Mgr. Duchesne, who points out that the death of
the Saviour was thus made to fall upon the very day on which, according to
a widespread belief, the world had been created.(931) But the resurrection
of Attis, who combined in himself the characters of the divine Father and
the divine Son,(932) was officially celebrated at Rome on the same day.
When we remember that the festival of St. George in April has replaced the
ancient pagan festival of the Parilia;(933) that the festival of St. John
the Baptist in June has succeeded to a heathen Midsummer festival of
water;(934) that the festival of the Assumption of the Virgin in August
has ousted the festival of Diana;(935) that the feast of All Souls in
November is a continuation of an old heathen feast of the dead;(936) and
that the Nativity of Christ himself was assigned to the winter solstice in
December because that day was deemed the Nativity of the Sun;(937) we can
hardly be thought rash or unreasonable in conjecturing that the other
cardinal festival of the Christian church—the solemnization of Easter—may
have been in like manner, and from like motives of edification, adapted to
a similar celebration of the Phrygian god Attis at the vernal
equinox.(938)

(M222) At least it is a remarkable coincidence, if it is nothing more,
that the Christian and the heathen festivals of the divine death and
resurrection should have been solemnized at the same season and in the
same places. For the places which celebrated the death of Christ at the
spring equinox were Phrygia, Gaul, and apparently Rome, that is, the very
regions in which the worship of Attis either originated or struck deepest
root. It is difficult to regard the coincidence as purely accidental. If
the vernal equinox, the season at which in the temperate regions the whole
face of nature testifies to a fresh outburst of vital energy, had been
viewed from of old as the time when the world was annually created afresh
in the resurrection of a god, nothing could be more natural than to place
the resurrection of the new deity at the same cardinal point of the year.
Only it is to be observed that if the death of Christ was dated on the
twenty-fifth of March, his resurrection, according to Christian tradition,
must have happened on the twenty-seventh of March, which is just two days
later than the vernal equinox of the Julian calendar and the resurrection
of Attis. A similar displacement of two days in the adjustment of
Christian to heathen celebrations occurs in the festivals of St. George
and the Assumption of the Virgin. However, another Christian tradition,
followed by Lactantius and perhaps by the practice of the Church in Gaul,
placed the death of Christ on the twenty-third and his resurrection on the
twenty-fifth of March.(939) If that was so, his resurrection coincided
exactly with the resurrection of Attis.

(M223) In point of fact it appears from the testimony of an anonymous
Christian, who wrote in the fourth century of our era, that Christians and
pagans alike were struck by the remarkable coincidence between the death
and resurrection of their respective deities, and that the coincidence
formed a theme of bitter controversy between the adherents of the rival
religions, the pagans contending that the resurrection of Christ was a
spurious imitation of the resurrection of Attis, and the Christians
asserting with equal warmth that the resurrection of Attis was a
diabolical counterfeit of the resurrection of Christ. In these unseemly
bickerings the heathen took what to a superficial observer might seem
strong ground by arguing that their god was the older and therefore
presumably the original, not the counterfeit, since as a general rule an
original is older than its copy. This feeble argument the Christians
easily rebutted. They admitted, indeed, that in point of time Christ was
the junior deity, but they triumphantly demonstrated his real seniority by
falling back on the subtlety of Satan, who on so important an occasion had
surpassed himself by inverting the usual order of nature.(940)

(M224) Taken altogether, the coincidences of the Christian with the
heathen festivals are too close and too numerous to be accidental. They
mark the compromise which the Church in the hour of its triumph was
compelled to make with its vanquished yet still dangerous rivals. The
inflexible Protestantism of the primitive missionaries, with their fiery
denunciations of heathendom, had been exchanged for the supple policy, the
easy tolerance, the comprehensive charity of shrewd ecclesiastics, who
clearly perceived that if Christianity was to conquer the world it could
do so only by relaxing the too rigid principles of its Founder, by
widening a little the narrow gate which leads to salvation. In this
respect an instructive parallel might be drawn between the history of
Christianity and the history of Buddhism.(941) Both systems were in their
origin essentially ethical reforms born of the generous ardour, the lofty
aspirations, the tender compassion of their noble Founders, two of those
beautiful spirits who appear at rare intervals on earth like beings come
from a better world to support and guide our weak and erring nature.(942)
Both preached moral virtue as the means of accomplishing what they
regarded as the supreme object of life, the eternal salvation of the
individual soul, though by a curious antithesis the one sought that
salvation in a blissful eternity, the other in a final release from
suffering, in annihilation. But the austere ideals of sanctity which they
inculcated were too deeply opposed not only to the frailties but to the
natural instincts of humanity ever to be carried out in practice by more
than a small number of disciples, who consistently renounced the ties of
the family and the state in order to work out their own salvation in the
still seclusion of the cloister. If such faiths were to be nominally
accepted by whole nations or even by the world, it was essential that they
should first be modified or transformed so as to accord in some measure
with the prejudices, the passions, the superstitions of the vulgar. This
process of accommodation was carried out in after ages by followers who,
made of less ethereal stuff than their masters, were for that reason the
better fitted to mediate between them and the common herd. Thus as time
went on, the two religions, in exact proportion to their growing
popularity, absorbed more and more of those baser elements which they had
been instituted for the very purpose of suppressing. Such spiritual
decadences are inevitable. The world cannot live at the level of its great
men. Yet it would be unfair to the generality of our kind to ascribe
wholly to their intellectual and moral weakness the gradual divergence of
Buddhism and Christianity from their primitive patterns. For it should
never be forgotten that by their glorification of poverty and celibacy
both these religions struck straight at the root not merely of civil
society but of human existence. The blow was parried by the wisdom or the
folly of the vast majority of mankind, who refused to purchase a chance of
saving their souls with the certainty of extinguishing the species.

Chapter VII. Hyacinth.

(M225) Another mythical being who has been supposed to belong to the class
of gods here discussed is Hyacinth. He too has been interpreted as the
vegetation which blooms in spring and withers under the scorching heat of
the summer sun.(943) Though he belongs to Greek, not to Oriental
mythology, some account of him may not be out of place in the present
discussion. According to the legend, Hyacinth was the youngest and
handsomest son of the ancient king Amyclas, who had his capital at Amyclae
in the beautiful vale of Sparta. One day playing at quoits with Apollo, he
was accidentally killed by a blow of the god’s quoit. Bitterly the god
lamented the death of his friend. The hyacinth—“that sanguine flower
inscribed with woe”—sprang from the blood of the hapless youth, as
anemones and roses from the blood of Adonis, and violets from the blood of
Attis:(944) like these vernal flowers it heralded the advent of another
spring and gladdened the hearts of men with the promise of a joyful
resurrection. The flower is usually supposed to be not what we call a
hyacinth, but a little purple iris with the letters of lamentation (AI,
which in Greek means “alas”) clearly inscribed in black on its petals. In
Greece it blooms in spring after the early violets but before the
roses.(945) One spring, when the hyacinths were in bloom, it happened that
the red-coated Spartan regiments lay encamped under the walls of Corinth.
Their commander gave the Amyclean battalion leave to go home and celebrate
as usual the festival of Hyacinth in their native town. But the sad flower
was to be to these men an omen of death; for they had not gone far before
they were enveloped by clouds of light-armed foes and cut to pieces.(946)

(M226) The tomb of Hyacinth was at Amyclae under a massive altar-like
pedestal, which supported an archaic bronze image of Apollo. In the left
side of the pedestal was a bronze door, and through it offerings were
passed to Hyacinth, as to a hero or a dead man, not as to a god, before
sacrifices were offered to Apollo at the annual Hyacinthian festival.
Bas-reliefs carved on the pedestal represented Hyacinth and his maiden
sister Polyboea caught up to heaven by a company of goddesses.(947) The
annual festival of the Hyacinthia was held in the month of Hecatombeus,
which seems to have corresponded to May.(948) The ceremonies occupied
three days. On the first the people mourned for Hyacinth, wearing no
wreaths, singing no paeans, eating no bread, and behaving with great
gravity. It was on this day probably that the offerings were made at
Hyacinth’s tomb. Next day the scene was changed. All was joy and bustle.
The capital was emptied of its inhabitants, who poured out in their
thousands to witness and share the festivities at Amyclae. Boys in
high-girt tunics sang hymns in honour of the god to the accompaniment of
flutes and lyres. Others, splendidly attired, paraded on horseback in the
theatre: choirs of youths chanted their native ditties: dancers danced:
maidens rode in wicker carriages or went in procession to witness the
chariot races: sacrifices were offered in profusion: the citizens feasted
their friends and even their slaves.(949) This outburst of gaiety may be
supposed to have celebrated the resurrection of Hyacinth and perhaps also
his ascension to heaven, which, as we have seen, was represented on his
tomb. However, it may be that the ascension took place on the third day of
the festival; but as to that we know nothing. The sister who went to
heaven with him was by some identified with Artemis or Persephone.(950)

(M227) It is highly probable, as Erwin Rohde perceived,(951) that Hyacinth
was an old aboriginal deity of the underworld who had been worshipped at
Amyclae long before the Dorians invaded and conquered the country. If that
was so, the story of his relation to Apollo must have been a comparatively
late invention, an attempt of the newcomers to fit the ancient god of the
land into their own mythical system, in order that he might extend his
protection to them. On this theory it may not be without significance that
sacrifices at the festival were offered to Hyacinth, as to a hero, before
they were offered to Apollo.(952) Further, on the analogy of similar
deities elsewhere, we should expect to find Hyacinth coupled, not with a
male friend, but with a female consort. That consort may perhaps be
detected in his sister Polyboea, who ascended to heaven with him. The new
myth, if new it was, of the love of Apollo for Hyacinth would involve a
changed conception of the aboriginal god, which in its turn must have
affected that of his spouse. For when Hyacinth came to be thought of as
young and unmarried there was no longer room in his story for a wife, and
she would have to be disposed of in some other way. What was easier for
the myth-maker than to turn her into his unmarried sister? However we may
explain it, a change seems certainly to have come over the popular idea of
Hyacinth; for whereas on his tomb he was portrayed as a bearded man, later
art represented him as the pink of youthful beauty.(953) But it is perhaps
needless to suppose that the sisterly relation of Polyboea to him was a
late modification of the myth. The stories of Cronus and Rhea, of Zeus and
Hera, of Osiris and Isis, remind us that in old days gods, like kings,
often married their sisters, and probably for the same reason, namely, to
ensure their own title to the throne under a rule of female kinship which
treated women and not men as the channel in which the blood royal
flowed.(954) It is not impossible that Hyacinth may have been a divine
king who actually reigned in his lifetime at Amyclae and was afterwards
worshipped at his tomb. The representation of his triumphal ascent to
heaven in company with his sister suggests that, like Adonis and
Persephone, he may have been supposed to spend one part of the year in the
under-world of darkness and death, and another part in the upper-world of
light and life. And as the anemones and the sprouting corn marked the
return of Adonis and Persephone, so the flowers to which he gave his name
may have heralded the ascension of Hyacinth.

End Of Vol. 1.

FOOTNOTES

M1 The changes of the seasons explained by the life and death of gods.
M2 Magical ceremonies to revive the failing energies of the gods.

1 As in the present volume I am concerned with the beliefs and
practices of Orientals I may quote the following passage from one
who has lived long in the East and knows it well: “The Oriental mind
is free from the trammels of logic. It is a literal fact that the
Oriental mind can accept and believe two opposite things at the same
time. We find fully qualified and even learned Indian doctors
practising Greek medicine, as well as English medicine, and
enforcing sanitary restrictions to which their own houses and
families are entirely strangers. We find astronomers who can predict
eclipses, and yet who believe that eclipses are caused by a dragon
swallowing the sun. We find holy men who are credited with
miraculous powers and with close communion with the Deity, who live
in drunkenness and immorality, and who are capable of elaborate
frauds on others. To the Oriental mind, a thing must be incredible
to command a ready belief” (“Riots and Unrest in the Punjab, from a
correspondent,” _The Times Weekly Edition_, May 24, 1907, p. 326).
Again, speaking of the people of the Lower Congo, an experienced
missionary describes their religious ideas as “chaotic in the
extreme and impossible to reduce to any systematic order. The same
person will tell you at different times that the departed spirit
goes to the nether regions, or to a dark forest, or to the moon, or
to the sun. There is no coherence in their beliefs, and their ideas
about cosmogony and the future are very nebulous. Although they
believe in punishment after death their faith is so hazy that it has
lost all its deterrent force. If in the following pages a lack of
logical unity is observed, it must be put to the debit of the native
mind, as that lack of logical unity really represents the mistiness
of their views.” See Rev. John H. Weeks, “Notes on some Customs of
the Lower Congo People,” _Folk-lore_, xx. (1909) pp. 54 _sq._ Unless
we allow for this innate capacity of the human mind to entertain
contradictory beliefs at the same time, we shall in vain attempt to
understand the history of thought in general and of religion in
particular.

M3 The principles of animal and of vegetable life confused in these
ceremonies.
M4 Prevalence of these rites in Western Asia and Egypt.

2 The equivalence of Tammuz and Adonis has been doubted or denied by
some scholars, as by Renan (_Mission de Phénicie_, Paris, 1864, pp.
216, 235) and by Chwolsohn (_Die Ssabier und der Ssabismus_, St.
Petersburg, 1856, ii. 510). But the two gods are identified by
Origen (_Selecta in Ezechielem_, Migne’s _Patrologia Graeca_, xiii.
797), Jerome (_Epist._ lviii. 3 and _Commentar. in Ezechielem_,
viii. 13, 14, Migne’s _Patrologia Latina_, xxii. 581, xxv. 82),
Cyril of Alexandria (_In Isaiam_, lib. ii. tomus. iii., and
_Comment. on Hosea_, iv. 15, Migne’s _Patrologia Graeca_, lxx. 441,
lxxi. 136), Theodoretus (_In Ezechielis cap._ viii., Migne’s
_Patrologia Graeca_, lxxxi. 885), the author of the Paschal
Chronicle (Migne’s _Patrologia Graeca_, xcii. 329) and Melito (in W.
Cureton’s _Spicilegium Syriacum_, London, 1855, p. 44); and
accordingly we may fairly conclude that, whatever their remote
origin may have been, Tammuz and Adonis were in the later period of
antiquity practically equivalent to each other. Compare W. W. Graf
Baudissin, _Studien zur semitischen Religionsgeschichte_ (Leipsic,
1876-1878), i. 299; _id._, in _Realencyclopädie für protestantische
Theologie und Kirchengeschichte_,3 _s.v._ “Tammuz”; _id._, _Adonis
und Esmun_ (Leipsic, 1911), pp. 94 _sqq._; W. Mannhardt, _Antike
Wald- und Feldkulte_ (Berlin, 1877), pp. 273 _sqq._; Ch. Vellay, “Le
dieu Thammuz,” _Revue de l’Histoire des Religions_, xlix. (1904) pp.
154-162. Baudissin holds that Tammuz and Adonis were two different
gods sprung from a common root (_Adonis und Esmun_, p. 368). An
Assyrian origin of the cult of Adonis was long ago affirmed by
Macrobius (_Sat._ i. 21. 1). On Adonis and his worship in general
see also F. C. Movers, _Die Phoenizier_, i. (Bonn, 1841) pp. 191
_sqq._; W. H. Engel, _Kypros_ (Berlin, 1841), ii. 536 _sqq._; Ch.
Vellay, _Le culte et les fêtes d’ Adonis-Thammouz dans l’Orient
antique_ (Paris, 1904).

M5 Tammuz or Adonis in Babylonia. His worship seems to have originated
with the Sumerians.

3 The mourning for Adonis is mentioned by Sappho, who flourished about
600 B.C. See Th. Bergk’s _Poetae Lyrici Graeci_,3 iii. (Leipsic,
1867) p. 897; Pausanias, ix. 29. 8.

4 Ed. Meyer, _Geschichte des Altertums_,2 i. 2 (Berlin, 1909), pp. 394
_sq._; W. W. Graf Baudissin, _Adonis und Esmun_, pp. 65 _sqq._

_ 5 Encyclopaedia Biblica_, ed. T. K. Cheyne and J. S. Black, iii.
3327. In the Old Testament the title _Adoni_, “my lord,” is
frequently given to men. See, for example, Genesis xxxiii. 8, 13,
14, 15, xlii. 10, xliii. 20, xliv. 5, 7, 9, 16, 18, 19, 20, 22, 24.

6 C. P. Tiele, _Geschichte der Religion im Altertum_ (Gotha,
1896-1903), i. 134 _sqq._; G. Maspero, _Histoire Ancienne des
Peuples de l’Orient Classique, les Origines_ (Paris, 1895), pp. 550
_sq._; L. W. King, _Babylonian Religion and Mythology_ (London,
1899), pp. 1 _sqq._; _id._, _A History of Sumer and Akkad_ (London,
1910), pp. 1 _sqq._, 40 _sqq._; H. Winckler, in E. Schrader’s _Die
Keilinschriften und das alte Testament_3 (Berlin, 1902), pp. 10
_sq._, 349; Fr. Hommel, _Grundriss der Geographie und Geschichte des
alten Orients_ (Munich, 1904), pp. 18 _sqq._; Ed. Meyer, _Geschichte
des Altertums_,2 i. 2 (Berlin, 1909), pp. 401 _sqq._ As to the
hypothesis that the Sumerians were immigrants from Central Asia, see
L. W. King, _History of Sumer and Akkad_, pp. 351 _sqq._ The gradual
desiccation of Central Asia, which is conjectured to have caused the
Sumerian migration, has been similarly invoked to explain the
downfall of the Roman empire; for by rendering great regions
uninhabitable it is supposed to have driven hordes of fierce
barbarians to find new homes in Europe. See Professor J. W.
Gregory’s lecture “Is the earth drying up?” delivered before the
Royal Geographical Society and reported in _The Times_, December
9th, 1913. It is held by Prof. Hommel (_op. cit._ pp. 19 _sqq._)
that the Sumerian language belongs to the Ural-altaic family, but
the better opinion seems to be that its linguistic affinities are
unknown. The view, once ardently advocated, that Sumerian was not a
language but merely a cabalistic mode of writing Semitic, is now
generally exploded.

7 H. Zimmern, “Der babylonische Gott Tamüz,” _Abhandlungen der
philologisch-historischen Klasse der Königl. Sächsischen
Gesellschaft der Wissenschaften_, xxvii. No. xx. (Leipsic, 1909) pp.
701, 722.

_ 8 Dumu-zi_, or in fuller form _Dumuzi-abzu_. See P. Jensen,
_Assyrisch-Babylonische Mythen und Epen_ (Berlin, 1900), p. 560; H.
Zimmern, _op. cit._ pp. 703 _sqq._; _id._, in E. Schrader’s _Die
Keilinschriften und das Alte Testament_3 (Berlin, 1902), p. 397; P.
Dhorme, _La Religion Assyro-Babylonienne_ (Paris, 1910), p. 105; W.
W. Graf Baudissin, _Adonis und Esmun_ (Leipsic, 1911), p. 104.

9 H. Zimmern, “Der babylonische Gott Tamüz,” _Abhandl. d. Kön. Sächs.
Gesellschaft der Wissenschaften_, xxvii. No. xx. (Leipsic, 1909) p,
723. For the text and translation of the hymns, see H. Zimmern,
“Sumerisch-babylonische Tamüzlieder,” _Berichte über die
Verhandlungen der Königlich Sächsischen Gesellschaft der
Wissenschaften zu Leipzig, Philologisch-historische Klasse_, lix.
(1907) pp. 201-252. Compare H. Gressmann, _Altorientalische Texte
und Bilder_ (Tübingen, 1909), i. 93 _sqq._; W. W. Graf Baudissin,
_Adonis und Esmun_ (Leipsic, 1911), pp. 99 _sq._; R. W. Rogers,
_Cuneiform Parallels to the Old Testament_ (Oxford, N.D.), pp.
179-185.

M6 Tammuz the lover of Ishtar. Descent of Ishtar to the nether world to
recover Tammuz.
M7 Laments for Tammuz.

10 A. Jeremias, _Die babylonisch-assyrischen Vorstellungen vom Leben
nach dem Tode_ (Leipsic, 1887), pp. 4 _sqq._; _id._, in W. H.
Roscher’s _Lexikon der griech. und röm. Mythologie_, ii. 808, iii.
258 _sqq._; M. Jastrow, _The Religion of Babylonia and Assyria_
(Boston, 1898), pp. 565-576, 584, 682 _sq._; W. L. King, _Babylonian
Religion and Mythology_, pp. 178-183; P. Jensen,
_Assyrisch-babylonische Mythen und Epen_, pp. 81 _sqq._, 95 _sqq._,
169; R. F. Harper, _Assyrian and Babylonian Literature_ (New York,
1901), pp. 316 _sq._, 338, 408 _sqq._; H. Zimmern, in E. Schrader’s
_Die Keilinschriften und das Alte Testament_,3 pp. 397 _sqq._, 561
_sqq._; _id._, “Sumerisch-babylonische Tamūzlieder,” _Berichte über
die Verhandlungen der Königlich Sächsischen Gesellschaft der
Wissenschaften zu Leipzig, Philologisch-historische Klasse_, lix.
(1907) pp. 220, 232, 236 _sq._; _id._, “Der babylonische Gott
Tamūz,” _Abhandlungen der philologisch-historischen Klasse der
Königl. Sächsischen Gesellschaft der Wissenschaften_, xxvii. No. xx.
(Leipsic, 1909) pp. 725 _sq._, 729-735; H. Gressmann,
_Altorientalische Texte und Bilder zum Alten Testamente_ (Tübingen,
1909), i. 65-69; R. W. Rogers, _Cuneiform Parallels to the Old
Testament_ (Oxford, N.D.), pp. 121-131; W. W. Graf Baudissin,
_Adonis und Esmun_ (Leipsic, 1911), pp. 99 _sqq._, 353 _sqq._
According to Jerome (on Ezekiel viii. 14) the month of Tammuz was
June; but according to modern scholars it corresponded rather to
July, or to part of June and part of July. See F. C. Movers, _Die
Phoenizier_, i. 210; F. Lenormant, “Il mito di Adone-Tammuz nei
documenti cuneiformi,” _Atti del IV. Congresso Internazionale degli
Orientalisti_ (Florence, 1880), i. 144 _sq._; W. Mannhardt, _Antike
Wald- und Feldkulte, p. 275; Encyclopaedia Biblica_, _s.v._
“Months,” iii. 3194. My friend W. Robertson Smith informed me that
owing to the variations of the local Syrian calendars the month of
Tammuz fell in different places at different times, from midsummer
to autumn, or from June to September. According to Prof. M. Jastrow,
the festival of Tammuz was celebrated just before the summer
solstice (_The Religion of Babylonia and Assyria_, pp. 547, 682). He
observes that “the calendar of the Jewish Church still marks the
17th day of Tammuz as a fast, and Houtsma has shown that the
association of the day with the capture of Jerusalem by the Romans
represents merely the attempt to give an ancient festival a worthier
interpretation.”

M8 Adonis in Greek mythology merely a reflection of the Oriental
Tammuz.

11 Ezekiel viii. 14.

12 Apollodorus, _Bibliotheca_, iii. 14. 4; Bion, _Idyl_, i., J.
Tzetzes. _Schol. on Lycophron_, 831; Ovid, _Metam._ x. 503 _sqq._;
Aristides, _Apology_, edited by J. Rendel Harris (Cambridge, 1891),
pp. 44, 106 _sq._ In Babylonian texts relating to Tammuz no
reference has yet been found to death by a boar. See H. Zimmern,
“Sumerisch-babylonische Tamūzlieder,” p. 451; _id._, “Der
babylonische Gott Tamūz,” p. 731. Baudissin inclines to think that
the incident of the boar is a late importation into the myth of
Adonis. See his _Adonis und Esmun_, pp. 142 _sqq._ As to the
relation of the boar to the kindred gods Adonis, Attis, and Osiris
see _Spirits of the Corn and of the Wild_, ii. 22 _sqq._, where I
have suggested that the idea of the boar as the foe of the god may
be based on the terrible ravages which wild pigs notoriously commit
in fields of corn.

13 W. W. Graf Baudissin, _Adonis und Esmun_ (Leipsic, 1911), pp. 152
_sq._, with plate iv. As to the representation of the myth of Adonis
on Etruscan mirrors and late works of Roman art, especially
sarcophaguses and wall-paintings, see Otto Jahn, _Archäologische
Beiträge_ (Berlin, 1847), pp. 45-51.

M9 Worship of Adonis and Astarte at Byblus, the kingdom of Cinyras. The
kings of Byblus.

14 The ancients were aware that the Syrian and Cyprian Aphrodite, the
mistress of Adonis, was no other than Astarte. See Cicero, _De
natura deorum_, iii. 23. 59; Joannes Lydus, _De mensibus_, iv. 44.
On Adonis in Phoenicia see W. W. Graf Baudissin, _Adonis und Esmun_
(Leipsic, 1911), pp. 71 _sqq._

15 As to Cinyras, see F. C. Movers, _Die Phoenizier_, i. 238 _sqq._,
ii. 2. 226-231; W. H. Engel, _Kypros_ (Berlin, 1841), i. 168-173,
ii. 94-136; Stoll, _s.v._ “Kinyras,” in W. H. Roscher’s _Lexikon der
griech. und röm. Mythologie_, ii. 1189 _sqq._ Melito calls the
father of Adonis by the name of Cuthar, and represents him as king
of the Phoenicians with his capital at Gebal (Byblus). See Melito,
“Oration to Antoninus Caesar,” in W. Cureton’s _Spicilegium
Syriacum_ (London, 1855), p. 44.

16 Philo of Byblus, quoted by Eusebius, _Praeparatio Evangelii_, i. 10;
_Fragmenta Historicorum Graecorum_, ed. C. Müller, iii. 568;
Stephanus Byzantius, _s.v._ Βύβλος. Byblus is a Greek corruption of
the Semitic Gebal (גבל), the name which the place still retains. See
E. Renan, _Mission de Phénicie_ (Paris, 1864), p. 155.

17 R. Pietschmann, _Geschichte der Phoenizier_ (Berlin, 1889), p. 139.
On the coins it is designated “Holy Byblus.”

18 Strabo, xvi. 1. 18, p. 755.

19 Lucian, _De dea Syria_, 6.

20 The sanctuary and image are figured on coins of Byblus. See T. L.
Donaldson, _Architectura Numismatica_ (London, 1859), pp. 105 _sq._;
E. Renan, _Mission de Phénicie_, p. 177; G. Perrot et Ch. Chipiez,
_Histoire de l’Art dans l’Antiquité_, iii. (Paris, 1885) p. 60; R.
Pietschmann, _Geschichte der Phoenizier_, p. 202; G. Maspero,
_Histoire Ancienne des Peuples de l’Orient Classique_, ii. (Paris,
1897) p. 173. Renan excavated a massive square pedestal built of
colossal stones, which he thought may have supported the sacred
obelisk (_op. cit._ pp. 174-178).

21 Lucian, _De dea Syria_, 6.

22 Strabo, xvi. 1. 18, p. 755.

23 Lucian, _De dea Syria_, 8; Pliny, _Nat. Hist._ v. 78; E. Renan,
_Mission de Phénicie_, pp. 282 _sqq._

24 Eustathius, _Commentary on Dionysius Periegetes_, 912 (_Geographi
Graeci Minores_, ed. C. Müller, ii. 376); Melito, in W. Cureton’s
_Spicilegium Syriacum_, p. 44.

25 Ezekiel xxvii. 9. As to the name Gebal see above, p. 13, note 1.

26 L. B. Paton, _The Early History of Syria and Palestine_ (London,
1902), pp. 169-171. See below, pp. 75 _sq._

27 L. B. Paton, _op. cit._ p. 235; R. F. Harper, _Assyrian and
Babylonian Literature_, p. 57 (the Nimrud inscription of
Tiglath-pileser III.).

28 The inscription was discovered by Renan. See Ch. Vellay, _Le culte
et les fêtes d’Adonis-Thammouz dans l’Orient antique_ (Paris, 1904),
pp. 38 _sq._; G. A. Cooke, _Text-book of North-Semitic Inscriptions_
(Oxford 1903), No. 3, pp. 18 _sq._ In the time of Alexander the
Great the king of Byblus was a certain Enylus (Arrian, _Anabasis_,
ii. 20), whose name appears on a coin of the city (F. C. Movers,
_Die Phoenizier_, ii. 1, p. 103, note 81).

M10 Divinity of Semitic kings.

29 On the divinity of Semitic kings and the kingship of Semitic gods
see W. R. Smith, _Religion of the Semites_2 (London, 1894), pp. 44
_sq._, 66 _sqq._

30 H. Radau, _Early Babylonian History_ (New York and London, 1900),
pp. 307-317; P. Dhorme, _La Religion Assyro-Babylonienne_ (Paris,
1910), pp. 168 _sqq._

31 The evidence for this is the Moabite stone, but the reading of the
inscription is doubtful. See S. R. Driver, in _Encyclopaedia
Biblica_, _s.v._ “Mesha,” vol. iii. 3041 _sqq._; _id._, _Notes on
the Hebrew Text and the Topography of the Books of Samuel_, Second
Edition (Oxford, 1913), pp. lxxxv., lxxxvi., lxxxviii. _sq._; G. A.
Cooke, _Text-book of North-Semitic Inscriptions_, No. 1, pp. 1
_sq._, 6.

32 2 Kings viii. 7, 9, xiii. 24 _sq._; Jeremiah xlix. 27. As to the god
Hadad see Macrobius, _Saturn_, i. 23. 17-19 (where, as so often in
late writers, the Syrians are called Assyrians); Philo of Byblus, in
_Fragmenta Historicorum Graecorum_, ed. C. Müller, iii. 569; F.
Baethgen, _Beiträge zur semitischen Religionsgeschichte_ (Berlin,
1888), pp. 66-68; G. A. Cooke, _Text-book of North-Semitic
Inscriptions_, Nos. 61, 62, pp. 161 _sq._, 164, 173, 175; M. J.
Lagrange, _Études sur les Religions Sémitiques_2 (Paris, 1905), pp.
93, 493, 496 _sq._ The prophet Zechariah speaks (xii. 11) of a great
mourning of or for Hadadrimmon in the plain of Megiddon. This has
been taken to refer to a lament for Hadad-Rimmon, the Syrian god of
rain, storm, and thunder, like the lament for Adonis. See S. R.
Driver’s note on the passage (_The Minor Prophets_, pp. 266 _sq._,
_Century Bible_); W. W. Graf Baudissin, _Adonis und Esmun_, p. 92.

33 Josephus, _Antiquit. Jud._ ix. 4. 6.

34 Genesis xxxvi. 35 _sq._; 1 Kings xi. 14-22; 1 Chronicles i. 50 _sq._
Of the eight kings of Edom mentioned in Genesis (xxxvi. 31-39) and
in 1 Chronicles (i. 43-50) not one was the son of his predecessor.
This seems to indicate that in Edom, as elsewhere, the blood royal
was traced in the female line, and that the kings were men of other
families, or even foreigners, who succeeded to the throne by
marrying the hereditary princesses. See _The Magic Art and the
Evolution of Kings_, ii. 268 _sqq._ The Israelites were forbidden to
have a foreigner for a king (Deuteronomy xvii. 15 with S. R.
Driver’s note), which seems to imply that the custom was known among
their neighbours. It is significant that some of the names of the
kings of Edom seem to be those of divinities, as Prof. A. H. Sayce
observed long ago (_Lectures on the Religion of the Ancient
Babylonians_, London and Edinburgh, 1887, p. 54).

35 G. A. Cooke, _op. cit._ Nos. 62, 63, pp. 163, 165, 173 _sqq._, 181
_sqq._; M. J. Lagrange, _op. cit._ pp. 496 _sqq._ The god Rekub-el
is mentioned along with the gods Hadad, El, Reshef, and Shamash in
an inscription of King Bar-rekub’s mortal father, King Panammu (G.
A. Cooke, _op. cit._ No. 61, p. 161).

36 Virgil, _Aen._ i. 729 _sq._, with Servius’s note; Silius Italicus,
_Punica_, i. 86 _sqq._

37 Ezekiel xxviii. 2, 9.

38 Menander of Ephesus, quoted by Josephus, _Contra Apionem_, i. 18 and
21; _Fragmenta Historicorum Graecorum_, ed. C. Müller, iv. 446 _sq._
According to the text of Josephus, as edited by B. Niese, the names
of the kings in question were Abibal, Balbazer, Abdastart,
Methusastart, son of Leastart, Ithobal, Balezor, Baal, Balator,
Merbal. The passage of Menander is quoted also by Eusebius,
_Chronic._ i. pp. 118, 120, ed. A. Schoene.

39 G. A. Cooke, _Text-book of North-Semitic Inscriptions_, No. 36, p.
102. As to Melcarth, the Tyrian Hercules, see Ed. Meyer, _s.v._
“Melqart,” in W. H. Roscher’s _Lexikon d. griech. u. röm.
Mythologie_, ii. 2650 _sqq._ One of the Tyrian kings seems to have
been called Abi-milk (Abi-melech), that is, “father of a king” or
“father of Moloch,” that is, of Melcarth. A letter of his to the
king of Egypt is preserved in the Tel-el-Amarna correspondence. See
R. F. Harper, _Assyrian and Babylonian Literature_, p. 237. As to a
title which implies that the bearer of it was the father of a god,
see below, pp. 51 _sq._

M11 Divinity of the Phoenician kings of Byblus and the Canaanite kings
of Jerusalem. The “sacred men” at Jerusalem.

40 E. Renan, quoted by Ch. Vellay, _Le culte et les fêtes
d’Adonis-Thammouz_, p. 39. Mr. Cooke reads ארםלך (Uri-milk) instead
of אדםלך (Adon-milk) (G. A. Cooke, _Text-book of North-Semitic
Inscriptions_, No. 3, p. 18).

41 Judges i. 4-7; Joshua x. 1 _sqq._

42 Genesis xiv. 18-20, with Prof. S. R. Driver’s commentary;
_Encyclopaedia Biblica_, _s.vv._ “Adoni-bezek,” “Adoni-zedek,”
“Melchizedek.” It is to be observed that names compounded with
Adoni- were occasionally borne by private persons. Such names are
Adoni-kam (Ezra ii. 13) and Adoni-ram (1 Kings iv. 6), not to
mention Adoni-jah (1 Kings i. 5 _sqq._), who was a prince and
aspired to the throne of his father David. These names are commonly
interpreted as sentences expressive of the nature of the god whom
the bearer of the name worshipped. See Prof. Th. Nöldeke, in
_Encyclopaedia Biblica_, _s.v._ “Names,” iii. 3286. It is quite
possible that names which once implied divinity were afterwards
degraded by application to common men.

43 Ezekiel viii. 14.

44 They were banished from the temple by King Josiah, who came to the
throne in 637 B.C. Jerusalem fell just fifty-one years later. See 2
Kings xxiii. 7. As to these “sacred men” (_ḳedēshīm_), see below,
pp. 72 _sqq._

45 2 Kings xxiii. 7, where, following the Septuagint, we must
apparently read כתנים for the בתים of the Massoretic Text. So R.
Kittel and J. Skinner.

46 The _ashērah_ (singular of _ashērīm_) was certainly of wood (Judges
vi. 26): it seems to have been a tree stripped of its branches and
planted in the ground beside an altar, whether of Jehovah or of
other gods (Deuteronomy xvi. 21; Jeremiah xvii. 2). That the
_asherah_ was regarded as a goddess, the female partner of Baal,
appears from 1 Kings xviii. 19; 2 Kings xxi. 3, xxiii. 4; and that
this goddess was identified with Ashtoreth (Astarte) may be inferred
from a comparison of Judges ii. 13 with Judges iii. 7. Yet on the
other hand the pole or tree seems by others to have been viewed as a
male power (Jeremiah ii. 27; see below, pp. 107 _sqq._), and the
identification of the _asherah_ with Astarte has been doubted or
disputed by some eminent modern scholars. See on this subject W.
Robertson Smith, _Religion of the Semites_,2 pp. 187 _sqq._; S. R.
Driver, on Deuteronomy xvi. 21; J. Skinner, on 1 Kings xiv. 23; M.
J. Lagrange, _Études sur les religions Sémitiques_,2 pp. 173 _sqq._;
G. F. Moore, in _Encyclopaedia Biblica_, vol. i. 330 _sqq._, _s.v._
“Asherah.”

47 Deuteronomy xxiii. 17 _sq._ (in Hebrew 18 _sq._). The code of
Deuteronomy was published in 621 B.C. in the reign of King Josiah,
whose reforms, including the ejection of the _ḳedeshim_ from the
temple, were based upon it. See W. Robertson Smith, _The Old
Testament in the Jewish Church_2 (London and Edinburgh, 1892), pp.
256 _sqq._, 353 _sqq._; S. R. Driver, _Critical and Exegetical
Commentary on Deuteronomy_3 (Edinburgh, 1902), pp. xliv. _sqq._; K.
Budde, _Geschichte der althebräischen Litteratur_ (Leipsic, 1906),
pp. 105 _sqq._

M12 David as heir of the old sacred kings of Jerusalem.

48 He reigned seven years in Hebron and thirty-three in Jerusalem (2
Samuel v. 5; 1 Kings ii. 11; 1 Chronicles xxix. 27).

49 Professor A. H. Sayce has argued that David’s original name was
Elhanan (2 Samuel xxi. 19 compared with xxiii. 24), and that the
name David, which he took at a later time, should be written Dod or
Dodo, “the Beloved One,” which according to Prof. Sayce was a name
for Tammuz (Adonis) in Southern Canaan, and was in particular
bestowed by the Jebusites of Jerusalem on their supreme deity. See
A. H. Sayce, _Lectures on the Religion of the Ancient Babylonians_
(London and Edinburgh, 1887), pp. 52-57. If he is right, his
conclusions would accord perfectly with those which I had reached
independently, and it would become probable that David only assumed
the name of David (Dod, Dodo) after the conquest of Jerusalem, and
for the purpose of identifying himself with the god of the city, who
had borne the same title from time immemorial. But on the whole it
seems more likely, as Professor Kennett points out to me, that in
the original story Elhanah, a totally different person from David,
was the slayer of Goliath, and that the part of the giant-killer was
thrust on David at a later time when the brightness of his fame had
eclipsed that of many lesser heroes.

50 2 Samuel xii. 26-31; 1 Chronicles xx. 1-3. Critics seem generally to
agree that in these passages the word מלכם must be pointed _Milcom_,
not _malcham_ “their king,” as the Massoretic text, followed by the
English version, has it. The reading _Milcom_, which involves no
change of the original Hebrew text, is supported by the reading of
the Septuagint Μολχὸμ τοῦ βασιλέως αὐτῶν, where the three last words
are probably a gloss on Μολχὸμ. See S. R. Driver, _Notes on the
Hebrew Text and the Topography of the Books of Samuel_, Second
Edition (Oxford, 1913), p. 294; Dean Kirkpatrick, in his note on 2
Samuel xii. 30 (_Cambridge Bible for Schools and Colleges_);
_Encyclopaedia Biblica_, iii. 3085; R. Kittel, _Biblia Hebraica_, i.
433; Brown, Driver, and Briggs, _Hebrew and English Lexicon of the
Old Testament_ (Oxford, 1906), pp. 575 _sq._ David’s son and
successor adopted the worship of Milcom and made a high place for
him outside Jerusalem. See 1 Kings xi. 5; 2 Kings xxiii. 13.

51 2 Samuel v. 6-10; 1 Chronicles xi. 4-9.

M13 Traces of the divinity of Hebrew kings.

52 See for example 1 Samuel xxiv. 8; 2 Samuel xiv. 9, 12, 15, 17, 18,
19, 22, xv. 15, 21, xvi. 4, 9, xviii. 28, 31, 32; 1 Kings i. 2, 13,
18, 20, 21, 24, 27; 1 Chronicles xxi. 3, 23.

53 Jeremiah xxii. 18, xxxiv. 5. In the former passage, according to the
Massoretic text, the full formula of mourning was, “Alas my brother!
alas sister! alas lord! alas his glory!” Who was the lamented
sister? Professor T. K. Cheyne supposes that she was Astarte, and by
a very slight change (דדה for הדה) he would read “Dodah” for “his
glory,” thus restoring the balance between the clauses; for “Dodah”
would then answer to “Adon” (lord) as “sister” answers to “brother.”
I have to thank Professor Cheyne for kindly communicating this
conjecture to me by letter. He writes that Dodah “is a title of
Ishtar, just as Dôd is a title of Tamûz,” and for evidence he refers
me to the Dodah of the Moabite Stone, where, however, the reading
Dodah is not free from doubt. See G. A. Cooke, _Text-book of
North-Semitic Inscriptions_, No. 1, pp. 1, 3, 11; _Encyclopaedia
Biblica_, ii. 3045; S. R. Driver, _Notes on the Hebrew Text and the
Topography of the Books of Samuel_, Second Edition (Oxford, 1913),
pp. lxxxv., lxxxvi., xc.; F. Baethgen, _Beiträge zur semitischen
Religionsgeschichte_ (Berlin, 1888), p. 234; H. Winckler,
_Geschichte Israels_ (Leipsic, 1895-1900), ii. 258. As to Hebrew
names formed from the root _dôd_ in the sense of “beloved,” see
Brown, Driver, and Briggs, _Hebrew and English Lexicon of the Old
Testament_, pp. 187 _sq._; G. B. Gray, _Studies in Hebrew Proper
Names_ (London, 1896), pp. 60 _sqq._

54 This was perceived by Renan (_Histoire du peuple d’Israel_, iii.
273), and Prof. T. K. Cheyne writes to me: “The formulae of public
mourning were derived from the ceremonies of the Adonia; this
Lenormant saw long ago.”

55 1 Chronicles xxix. 23; 2 Chronicles ix. 8.

56 1 Samuel xvi. 13, 14, compare _id._, x. 1 and 20. The oil was poured
on the king’s head (1 Samuel x. 1; 2 Kings ix. 3, 6). For the
conveyance of the divine spirit by means of oil, see also Isaiah lx.
1. The kings of Egypt appear to have consecrated their vassal Syrian
kings by pouring oil on their heads. See the Tell-el-Amarna letters,
No. 37 (H. Winckler, _Die Thontafeln von Tell-el-Amarna_, p. 99).
Some West African priests are consecrated by a similar ceremony. See
below, p. 68. The natives of Buru, an East Indian island, imagine
that they can keep off demons by smearing their bodies with coco-nut
oil, but the oil must be prepared by young unmarried girls. See G.
A. Wilken, “Bijdrage tot de kennis der Alfoeren van het eiland
Boeroe,” _Verhandelingen van het Bataviaasch Genootschap van Kunsten
en Wetenschappen_, xxxviii. (Batavia, 1875) p. 30; _id._,
_Verspreide Geschriften_ (The Hague, 1912), i. 61. In some tribes of
North-West America hunters habitually anointed their hair with
decoctions of certain plants and deer’s brains before they set out
to hunt. The practice was probably a charm to secure success in the
hunt. See C. Hill-Tout, _The Home of the Salish and Déné_ (London,
1907), p. 72.

57 1 Samuel xxiv. 6. Messiah in Hebrew is _Mashiah_ (משיה). The English
form Messiah is derived from the Aramaic through the Greek. See T.
K. Cheyne, in _Encyclopaedia Biblica_, _s.v._ “Messiah,” vol. iii.
3057 _sqq._ Why hair oil should be considered a vehicle of
inspiration is by no means clear. It would have been intelligible if
the olive had been with the Hebrews, as it was with the Athenians, a
sacred tree under the immediate protection of a deity; for then a
portion of the divine essence might be thought to reside in the oil.
W. Robertson Smith supposed that the unction was originally
performed with the fat of a sacrificial victim, for which vegetable
oil was a later substitute (_Religion of the Semites_,2 pp. 383
_sq._). On the whole subject see J. Wellhausen, “Zwei Rechtsriten
bei den Hebräern,” _Archiv für Religionswissenschaft_, vii. (1904)
pp. 33-39; H. Weinel, “משה und seine Derivate,” _Zeitschrift für die
alttestamentliche Wissenschaft_, xviii. (1898) pp. 1-82.

M14 The Hebrew kings seem to have been held responsible for drought and
famine.

58 2 Samuel xxi. 1-14, with Dean Kirkpatrick’s notes on 1 and 10.

_ 59 The Magic Art and the Evolution of Kings_, i. 284 _sq._

60 1 Samuel xii. 17 _sq._ Similarly, Moses stretched forth his rod
toward heaven and the Lord sent thunder and rain (Exodus ix. 23).
The word for thunder in both these passages is “voices” (קלות). The
Hebrews heard in the clap of thunder the voice of Jehovah, just as
the Greeks heard in it the voice of Zeus and the Romans the voice of
Jupiter.

M15 Excessive rain set down to the wrath of the deity.

61 Ezekiel xiii. 11, 13, xxxviii. 22; Jeremiah iii. 2 _sq._ The Hebrews
looked to Jehovah for rain (Leviticus xxvi. 3-5; Jeremiah v. 24)
just as the Greeks looked to Zeus and the Romans to Jupiter.

62 Ezra x. 9-14. The special sin which they laid to heart on this
occasion was their marriage with Gentile women. It is implied,
though not expressly said, that they traced the inclemency of the
weather to these unfortunate alliances. Similarly, “during the rainy
season, when the sun is hidden behind great masses of dark clouds,
the Indians set up a wailing for their sins, believing that the sun
is angry and may never shine on them again.” See Francis C.
Nicholas, “The Aborigines of Santa Maria, Colombia,” _American
Anthropologist_, N.S., iii. (New York, 1901) p. 641. The Indians in
question are the Aurohuacas of Colombia, in South America.

63 Psalm cxxxvii. The willows beside the rivers of Babylon are
mentioned in the laments for Tammuz. See above, pp. 9, 10.

64 The line of the Dead Sea, lying in its deep trough, is visible from
the Mount of Olives; indeed, so clear is the atmosphere that the
blue water seems quite near the eye, though in fact it is more than
fifteen miles off and nearly four thousand feet below the spectator.
See K. Baedeker, _Palestine and Syria_4 (Leipsic, 1906), p. 77. When
the sun shines on it, the lake is of a brilliant blue (G. A. Smith,
_Historical Geography of the Holy Land_, London, 1894, pp. 501
_sq._); but its brilliancy is naturally dimmed under clouded skies.

M16 Hebrew kings apparently supposed to heal disease and stop epidemics.

65 2 Kings v. 5-7.

66 2 Samuel xxiv.; 1 Chronicles xxi. In this passage, contrary to his
usual practice, the Chronicler has enlivened the dull tenor of his
history with some picturesque touches which we miss in the
corresponding passage of Kings. It is to him that we owe the vision
of the Angel of the Plague first stretching out his sword over
Jerusalem and then returning it to the scabbard. From him Defoe
seems to have taken a hint in his account of the prodigies, real or
imaginary, which heralded the outbreak of the Great Plague in
London. “One time before the plague was begun, otherwise than as I
have said in St. Giles’s, I think it was in March, seeing a crowd of
people in the street, I joined with them to satisfy my curiosity,
and found them all staring up into the air to see what a woman told
them appeared plain to her, which was an angel clothed in white with
a fiery sword in his hand, waving it or brandishing it over his
head.... One saw one thing and one another. I looked as earnestly as
the rest, but, perhaps, not with so much willingness to be imposed
upon; and I said, indeed, that I could see nothing but a white
cloud, bright on one side, by the shining of the sun upon the other
part.” See Daniel Defoe, _History of the Plague in London_
(Edinburgh, 1810, pp. 33 _sq._). It is the more likely that Defoe
had here the Chronicler in mind, because a few pages earlier he
introduces the prophet Jonah and a man out of Josephus with very
good effect.

M17 The rarity of references to the divinity of Hebrew kings in the
historical books may be explained by the circumstances in which
these works were composed or edited.

67 2 Kings xvii. 5 _sq._, xviii. 9 _sq._

68 2 Kings xix. 32-36.

69 We owe to Ezekiel (xxiii. 5 _sq._, 12) the picture of the handsome
Assyrian cavalrymen in their blue uniforms and gorgeous trappings.
The prophet writes as if in his exile by the waters of Babylon he
had seen the blue regiments filing past, in all the pomp of war, on
their way to the front.

M18 The historical books were composed or edited under the influence of
the prophetic reformation.

70 Samaria fell in 722 B.C., during or just before the reign of
Hezekiah: the Book of Deuteronomy, the cornerstone of king Josiah’s
reformation, was produced in 621 B.C.; and Jerusalem fell in 586
B.C. The date of Hezekiah’s accession is a much-disputed point in
the chronology of Judah. See the Introduction to Kings and Isaiah
i.-xxxix. by J. Skinner and O. C. Whitehouse respectively, in _The
Century Bible_.

71 Or the Deuteronomic redactor, as the critics call him. See W.
Robertson Smith, _The Old Testament in the Jewish Church_2 (London
and Edinburgh, 1892), pp. 395 _sq._, 425; _Encyclopaedia Biblica_,
ii. 2078 _sqq._, 2633 _sqq._, iv. 4273 _sqq._; K. Budde, _Geschichte
der althebräischen Litteratur_ (Leipsic, 1906), pp. 99, 121 _sqq._,
127 _sqq._, 132; Principal J. Skinner, in his introduction to Kings
(in _The Century Bible_), pp. 10 _sqq._

M19 The Baal and his female Baalath the sources of all fertility.

72 Menander of Ephesus, quoted by Josephus, _Contra Apionem_, i. 18
(_Fragmenta Historicorum Graecorum_, ed. C. Müller, iv. 446); G. A.
Cooke, _Text-book of North-Semitic Inscriptions_, No. 4, p. 26.
According to Justin, however, the priest of Hercules, that is, of
Melcarth, at Tyre, was distinct from the king and second to him in
dignity. See Justin, xviii. 4, 5.

73 Hosea ii. 5 _sqq._; W. Robertson Smith, _Religion of the Semites_2
(London, 1894), pp. 95-107.

74 W. Robertson Smith, _Religion of the Semites_,2 pp. 107 _sq._

M20 Personation of the Baal by the king.

_ 75 The Magic Art and the Evolution of Kings_, ii. 120 _sqq._, 376
_sqq._

M21 Cinyras, king of Byblus. Aphaca and the vale of the Adonis.
Monuments of Adonis.

76 Strabo, xvi. 1. 18, p. 755.

77 Lucian, _De dea Syria_, 9.

78 Eusebius, _Vita Constantini_, iii. 55; Sozomenus, _Historia
Ecclesiastica_, ii. 5; Socrates, _Historia Ecclesiastica_, i. 18;
Zosimus, i. 58.

79 On the valley of the Nahr Ibrahim, its scenery and monuments, see
Edward Robinson, _Biblical Researches in Palestine_3 (London, 1867),
iii. 603-609; W. M. Thomson, _The Land and the Book, Lebanon,
Damascus, and beyond Jordan_ (London, 1886), pp. 239-246; E. Renan,
_Mission de Phénicie_, pp. 282 _sqq._; G. Maspero, _Histoire
Ancienne des Peuples de l’Orient Classique_, ii. (Paris, 1897) pp.
175-179; Sir Charles Wilson, _Picturesque Palestine_ (London, N.D.),
iii. 16, 17, 27. Among the trees which line the valley are oak,
sycamore, bay, plane, orange, and mulberry (W. M. Thomson, _op.
cit._ p. 245). Travellers are unanimous in testifying to the
extraordinary beauty of the vale of the Adonis. Thus Robinson
writes: “There is no spot in all my wanderings on which memory
lingers with greater delight than on the sequestered retreat and
exceeding loveliness of Afka.” Renan says that the landscape is one
of the most beautiful in the world. My friend the late Sir Francis
Galton wrote to me (20th September 1906): “I have no good map of
Palestine, but strongly suspect that my wanderings there, quite
sixty years ago, took me to the place you mention, above the gorge
of the river Adonis. Be that as it may, I have constantly asserted
that the view I then had of a deep ravine and blue sea seen through
the cliffs that bounded it, was the most beautiful I had ever set
eyes on.”

_ 80 Etymologicum Magnum_, _s.v._ Ἄφακα, p. 175.

81 Melito, “Oration to Antoninus Caesar,” in W. Cureton’s _Spicilegium
Syriacum_ (London, 1855), p. 44.

82 E. Renan, _Mission de Phénicie_, pp. 292-294. The writer seems to
have no doubt that the beast attacking Adonis is a bear, not a boar.
Views of the monument are given by A. Jeremias, _Das Alte Testament
im Lichte des Alten Orients_2 (Leipsic, 1906), p. 90, and by
Baudissin, _Adonis und Esmun_, plates i. and ii., with his
discussion, pp. 78 _sqq._

83 Macrobius, _Saturn_, i. 21. 5.

84 Lucian, _De dea Syria_, 8.

M22 Phoenician colonies in Cyprus.

85 F. C. Movers, _Die Phoenizier_, ii. 2, p. 224; G. Maspero, _Histoire
Ancienne des Peuples de l’Orient Classique_, ii. 199; G. A. Smith,
_Historical Geography of the Holy Land_ (London, 1894), p. 135.

86 On the natural wealth of Cyprus see Strabo, xiv. 6. 5; W. H. Engel,
_Kypros_, i. 40-71; F. C. Movers, _Die Phoenizier_, ii. 2, pp. 224
_sq._; G. Maspero, _Histoire Ancienne des Peuples de l’Orient
Classique_, ii. 200 _sq._; E. Oberhummer, _Die Insel Cypern_, i.
(Munich, 1903) pp. 175 _sqq._, 243 _sqq._ As to the firs and cedars
of Cyprus see Theophrastus, _Historia Plantarum_, v. 7. 1, v. 9. 1.
The Cyprians boasted that they could build and rig a ship complete,
from her keel to her topsails, with the native products of their
island (Ammianus Marcellinus, xiv. 8. 14).

87 G. A. Cooke, _Text-Book of North-Semitic Inscriptions_, Nos. 12-25,
pp. 55-76, 347-349; P. Gardner, _New Chapters in Greek History_
(London, 1892), pp. 179, 185. It has been held that the name of
Citium is etymologically identical with Hittite. If that was so, it
would seem that the town was built and inhabited by a non-Semitic
people before the arrival of the Phoenicians. See _Encyclopaedia
Biblica_, _s.v._ “Kittim.” Other traces of this older race, akin to
the primitive stock of Asia Minor, have been detected in Cyprus;
amongst them the most obvious is the Cyprian syllabary, the
characters of which are neither Phoenician nor Greek in origin. See
P. Gardner, _op. cit._ pp. 154, 173-175, 178 _sq._

88 G. A. Cooke, _Text-Book of North-Semitic Inscriptions_, No. 11, p.
52.

89 Stephanus Byzantius, _s.v._ Ἀμαθοῦς; Pausanias, ix. 41. 2 _sq._
According to Pausanias, there was a remarkable necklace of green
stones and gold in the sanctuary of Adonis and Aphrodite at Amathus.
The Greeks commonly identified it with the necklace of Harmonia or
Eriphyle. A terra-cotta statuette of Astarte, found at Amathus (?),
represents her wearing a necklace which she touches with one hand.
See L. P. di Cesnola, _Cyprus_ (London, 1877), p. 275. The scanty
ruins of Amathus occupy an isolated hill beside the sea. Among them
is an enormous stone jar, half buried in the earth, of which the
four handles are adorned with figures of bulls. It is probably of
Phoenician manufacture. See L. Ross, _Reisen nach Kos,
Halikarnassos, Rhodes und der Insel Cypern_ (Halle, 1852), pp. 168
_sqq._

90 Stephanus Byzantius, _s.v._ Ἀμαθοῦς. For the relation of Adonis to
Osiris at Byblus see below, vol. ii. pp. 9 _sq._, 22 _sq._, 127.

91 Hesychius, _s.v._ Μάλικα.

92 L. P. di Cesnola, _Cyprus_, pp. 254-283; G. Perrot et Ch. Chipiez,
_Histoire de l’Art dans l’Antiquité_, iii. (Paris, 1885) pp.
216-222.

M23 Kingdom of Paphos. Sanctuary of Aphrodite at Paphos.

93 D. G. Hogarth, _Devia Cypria_ (London, 1889), pp. 1-3;
_Encyclopaedia Britannica_,9 vi. 747; Élisée Reclus, _Nouvelle
Géographie Universelle_ (Paris, 1879-1894), ix. 668.

94 T. L. Donaldson, _Architectura Numismatica_ (London, 1859), pp.
107-109, with fig. 31; _Journal of Hellenic Studies_, ix. (1888) pp.
210-213; G. F. Hill, _Catalogue of the Greek Coins of Cyprus_
(London, 1904), pp. cxxvii-cxxxiv, with plates xiv. 2, 3, 6-8, xv.
1-4, 7, xvi. 2, 4, 6-9, xvii. 4-6, 8, 9, xxvi. 3, 6-16; George
Macdonald, _Catalogue of Greek Coins in the Hunterian Collection_
(Glasgow, 1899-1905), ii. 566, with pl. lxi. 19. As to the existing
remains of the temple, which were excavated by an English expedition
in 1887-1888, see “Excavations in Cyprus, 1887-1888,” _Journal of
Hellenic Studies_, ix. (1888) pp. 193 _sqq._ Previous accounts of
the temple are inaccurate and untrustworthy.

95 C. Schuchhardt, _Schliemann’s Ausgrabungen_2 (Leipsic, 1891), pp.
231-233; G. Perrot et Ch. Chipiez, _Histoire de l’Art dans
l’Antiquité_, vi. (Paris, 1894) pp. 336 _sq._, 652-654; _Journal of
Hellenic Studies_, ix. (1888) pp. 213 _sq._; P. Gardner, _New
Chapters in Greek History_, p. 181.

96 J. Selden, _De dis Syris_ (Leipsic, 1668), pp. 274 _sqq._; S.
Bochart, _Hierozoicon_, Editio Tertia (Leyden, 1692), ii. 4 _sqq._
Compare the statue of a priest with a dove in his hand, which was
found in Cyprus (Perrot et Chipiez, _Histoire de l’Art dans
l’Antiquité_, iii. Paris, 1885, p. 510), with fig. 349.

97 A. J. Evans, “Mycenaean Tree and Pillar Cult,” _Journal of Hellenic
Studies_, xxi. (1901) pp. 99 _sqq._

M24 The Aphrodite of Paphos a Phoenician or aboriginal deity. Her
conical image.

98 Tacitus, _Annals_, iii. 62.

99 Herodotus, i. 105; compare Pausanias, i. 14. 7. Herodotus only
speaks of the sanctuary of Aphrodite in Cyprus, but he must refer to
the great one at Paphos. At Ascalon a goddess was worshipped in
mermaid-shape under the name of Derceto, and fish and doves were
sacred to her (Diodorus Siculus, ii. 4; compare Lucian, _De dea
Syria_, 14). The name Derceto, like the much more correct Atargatis,
is a Greek corruption of _’Attâr_, the Aramaic form of _Astarte_,
but the two goddesses Atargatis and Astarte, in spite of the
affinity of their names, appear to have been historically distinct.
See Ed. Meyer, _Geschichte des Altertums_,2 i. 2 (Stuttgart and
Berlin, 1909), pp. 605, 650 _sq._; F. Baethgen, _Beiträge zur
Semitischen Religionsgeschichte_ (Berlin, 1888), pp. 68 _sqq._; F.
Cumont, _s.vv._ “Atargatis” and “Dea Syria,” in Pauly-Wissowa’s
_Real-Encyclopädie der classischen Altertumswissenschaft_; René
Dussaud, _Notes de Mythologie Syrienne_ (Paris, 1903), pp. 82
_sqq._; R. A. Stewart Macalister, _The Philistines, their History
and Civilization_ (London, 1913), pp. 94 _sqq._

100 It is described by ancient writers and figured on coins. See
Tacitus, _Hist._ ii. 3; Maximus Tyrius, _Dissert._ viii. 8; Servius
on Virgil, _Aen._ i. 720; T. L. Donaldson, _Architectura
Numismatica_, p. 107, with fig. 31; _Journal of Hellenic Studies_,
ix. (1888) pp. 210-212. According to Maximus Tyrius, the material of
the pyramid was unknown. Probably it was a stone. The English
archaeologists found several fragments of white cones on the site of
the temple at Paphos: one which still remains in its original
position in the central chamber was of limestone and of somewhat
larger size (_Journal of Hellenic Studies_, ix. (1888) p. 180).

101 See above, p. 14.

102 On coins of Perga the sacred cone is represented as richly decorated
and standing in a temple between sphinxes. See B. V. Head, _Historia
Numorum_ (Oxford, 1887), p. 585; P. Gardner, _Types of Greek Coins_
(Cambridge, 1883), pl. xv. No. 3; G. F. Hill, _Catalogue of the
Greek Coins of Lycia, Pamphylia, and Pisidia_ (London, 1897), pl.
xxiv. 12, 15, 16. However, Mr. G. F. Hill writes to me: “Is the
stone at Perga really a cone? I have always thought it was a cube or
something of that kind. On the coins the upper, sloping portion is
apparently an elaborate veil or head-dress. The head attached to the
stone is seen in the middle of this, surmounted by a tall
_kalathos_.” The sanctuary stood on a height, and a festival was
held there annually (Strabo, xiv. 4. 2, p. 667). The native title of
the goddess was _Anassa_, that is, “Queen.” See B. V. Head, _l.c._;
Wernicke, _s.v._ “Artemis,” in Pauly-Wissowa, _Real-Encyclopädie der
classischen Altertumswissenschaft_, ii. 1, col. 1397. Aphrodite at
Paphos bore the same title. See below, p. 42, note 6. The worship of
Pergaean Artemis at Halicarnassus was cared for by a priestess, who
held office for life and had to make intercession for the city at
every new moon. See G. Dittenberger, _Sylloge Inscriptionum
Graecarum_2 (Leipsic, 1898-1901), vol. ii. p. 373, No. 601.

103 Herodian, v. 3. 5. This cone was of black stone, with some small
knobs on it, like the stone of Cybele at Pessinus. It is figured on
coins of Emesa. See B. V. Head, _Historia Numorum_ (Oxford, 1887),
p. 659; P. Gardner, _Types of Greek Coins_, pl. xv. No. 1. The
sacred stone of Cybele, which the Romans brought from Pessinus to
Rome during the Second Punic War, was small, black, and rugged, but
we are not told that it was of conical shape. See Arnobius,
_Adversus Nationes_, vii. 49; Livy, xxix. 11. 7. According to one
reading, Servius (on Virgil, _Aen._ vii. 188) speaks of the stone of
Cybele as a needle (_acus_), which would point to a conical shape.
But the reading appears to be without manuscript authority, and
other emendations have been suggested.

104 G. Perrot et Ch. Chipiez, _Histoire de l’Art dans l’Antiquité_, iii.
273, 298 _sq._, 304 _sq._ The sanctuary of Aphrodite, or rather
Astarte, at Golgi is said to have been even more ancient than her
sanctuary at Paphos (Pausanias, viii. 5. 2).

105 W. M. Flinders Petrie, _Researches in Sinai_ (London, 1906), pp. 135
_sq._, 189. Votive cones made of clay have been found in large
numbers in Babylonia, particularly at Lagash and Nippur. See M.
Jastrow, _The Religion of Babylonia and Assyria_ (Boston, U.S.A.,
1898), pp. 672-674.

106 Tacitus, _Hist._ ii. 3.

107 We learn this from an inscription found at Paphos. See _Journal of
Hellenic Studies_, ix. (1888) pp. 188, 231.

108 Pausanias, x. 24. 6, with my note.

109 D. G. Hogarth, _A Wandering Scholar in the Levant_ (London, 1896),
pp. 179 _sq._ Women used to creep through a holed stone to obtain
children at a place on the Dee in Aberdeenshire. See _Balder the
Beautiful_, ii. 187.

110 G. Perrot et Ch. Chipiez, _Histoire de l’Art dans l’Antiquité_, iii.
628.

M25 Sacred prostitution in the worship of the Paphian Aphrodite and of
other Asiatic goddesses.

111 Herodotus, i. 199; Athenaeus, xii. 11, p. 516 A; Justin, xviii. 5.
4; Lactantius, _Divin. Inst._ i. 17; W. H. Engel, _Kypros_, ii. 142
_sqq._ Asiatic customs of this sort have been rightly explained by
W. Mannhardt (_Antike Wald- und Feldkulte_, pp. 283 _sqq._).

112 Herodotus, i. 199; Strabo, xvi. 1. 20, p. 745. As to the identity of
Mylitta with Astarte see H. Zimmern in E. Schrader’s _Die
Keilinschriften und das alte Testament_,3 pp. 423, note 7, 428, note
4. According to him, the name Mylitta comes from _Mu’allidtu_, “she
who helps women in travail.” In this character Ishtar would answer
to the Greek Artemis and the Latin Diana. As to sacred prostitution
in the worship of Ishtar see M. Jastrow, _The Religion of Babylonia
and Assyria_, pp. 475 _sq._, 484 _sq._; P. Dhorme, _La Religion
Assyro-Babylonienne_ (Paris, 1910), pp. 86, 300 _sq._

113 Eusebius, _Vita Constantini_, iii. 58; Socrates, _Historia
Ecclesiastica_, i. 18. 7-9; Sozomenus, Historia Ecclesiastica, v.
10. 7. Socrates says that at Heliopolis local custom obliged the
women to be held in common, so that paternity was unknown, “for
there was no distinction of parents and children, and the people
prostituted their daughters to the strangers who visited them” (τοῖς
παριοῦσι ξένοις). The prostitution of matrons as well as of maids is
mentioned by Eusebius. As he was born and spent his life in Syria,
and was a contemporary of the practices he describes, the bishop of
Caesarea had the best opportunity of informing himself as to them,
and we ought not, as Prof. M. P. Nilsson does (_Griechische Feste_,
Leipsic, 1906, p. 366 n.2), to allow his positive testimony on this
point to be outweighed by the silence of the later historian
Sozomenus, who wrote long after the custom had been abolished.
Eusebius had good reason to know the heathenish customs which were
kept up in his diocese; for he was sharply taken to task by
Constantine for allowing sacrifices to be offered on altars under
the sacred oak or terebinth at Mamre; and in obedience to the
imperial commands he caused the altars to be destroyed and an
oratory to be built instead under the tree. So in Ireland the
ancient heathen sanctuaries under the sacred oaks were converted by
Christian missionaries into churches and monasteries. See Socrates,
_Historia Ecclesiastica_, i. 18; _The Magic Art and the Evolution of
Kings_, ii. 242 _sq._

114 Athanasius, _Oratio contra Gentes_, 26 (Migne’s _Patrologia Graeca_,
xxv. 52), γυναῖκες γοῦν ἐν εἰδωλείοις τῆς Φοινικῆς πάλαι
προεκαθέζοντο, ἀπαρχόμεναι τοῖς ἐκεῖ θέοις ἑαυτῶν τὴν τοῦ σώματος
αὐτῶν μισθαρνίαν, νομίζουσαι τῇ πορνειᾳ τὴν θέον ἑαυτῶν ἰλάσκεσθαι
καὶ εἰς εὐμενείαν ἄγειν αὐτὴν διὰ τούτων. The account of the
Phoenician custom which is given by H. Ploss (_Das Weib_,2 i. 302)
and repeated after him by Fr. Schwally (_Semitische
Kriegsaltertümer_, Leipsic, 1901, pp. 76 _sq._) may rest only on a
misapprehension of this passage of Athanasius. But if it is correct,
we may conjecture that the slaves who deflowered the virgins were
the sacred slaves of the temples, the _ḳedeshim_, and that they
discharged this office as the living representatives of the god. As
to these _ḳedeshim_, or “sacred men,” see above, pp. 17 _sq._, and
below, pp. 72 _sqq._

_ 115 The Testaments of the Twelve Patriarchs_, translated and edited by
R. H. Charles (London, 1908), chapter xii. p. 81.

116 Lucian, _De dea Syria_, 6. The writer is careful to indicate that
none but strangers were allowed to enjoy the women (ἡ δὲ ἀγορὴ
μούνοισι ξείνοισι παρακέεται).

_ 117 The Magic Art and the Evolution of Kings_, i. 30 _sq._

118 Herodotus, i. 93 _sq._; Athenaeus, xii. 11, pp. 515 _sq._

119 W. M. Ramsay, “Unedited Inscriptions of Asia Minor,” _Bulletin de
Correspondance Hellénique_, vii. (1883) p. 276; _id._, _Cities and
Bishoprics of Phrygia_, i. (Oxford, 1895) pp. 94 _sq._, 115.

120 Strabo, xi. 14. 16, p. 532.

121 Strabo, xii. 3. 32, 34 and 36, pp. 557-559; compare xii. 2. 3, p.
535. Other sanctuaries in Pontus, Cappadocia, and Phrygia swarmed
with sacred slaves, and we may conjecture, though we are not told,
that many of these slaves were prostitutes. See Strabo, xi. 8. 4,
xii. 2. 3 and 6, xii. 3. 31 and 37, xii. 8. 14.

M26 The Asiatic Mother Goddess a personification of all the reproductive
energies of nature. Her worship perhaps reflects a period of sexual
communism.

122 On this great Asiatic goddess and her lovers see especially Sir W.
M. Ramsay, _Cities and Bishoprics of Phrygia_, i. 87 _sqq._

123 Compare W. Mannhardt, _Antike Wald- und Feldkulte_, pp. 284 _sq._;
W. Robertson Smith, _The Prophets of Israel_, New Edition (London,
1902), pp. 171-174. Similarly in Camul, formerly a province of the
Chinese Empire, the men used to place their wives at the disposal of
any foreigners who came to lodge with them, and deemed it an honour
if the guests made use of their opportunities. The emperor, hearing
of the custom, forbade the people to observe it. For three years
they obeyed, then, finding that their lands were no longer fruitful
and that many mishaps befell them, they prayed the emperor to allow
them to retain the custom, “for it was by reason of this usage that
their gods bestowed upon them all the good things that they
possessed, and without it they saw not how they could continue to
exist.” See _The Book of Ser Marco Polo_, translated and edited by
Colonel Henry Yule, Second Edition (London, 1875), i. 212 _sq._ Here
apparently the fertility of the soil was deemed to depend on the
intercourse of the women with strangers, not with their husbands.
Similarly, among the Oulad Abdi, an Arab tribe of Morocco, “the
women often seek a divorce and engage in prostitution in the
intervals between their marriages; during that time they continue to
dwell in their families, and their relations regard their conduct as
very natural. The administrative authority having bestirred itself
and attempted to regulate this prostitution, the whole population
opposed the attempt, alleging that such a measure would impair the
abundance of the crops.” See Edmond Doutté, _Magie et Religion dans
l’Afrique du Nord_ (Algiers, 1908), pp. 560 _sq._

124 Clement of Alexandria, _Protrept._ ii. 14, p. 13, ed. Potter;
Arnobius, _Adversus Nationes_, v. 19; compare Firmicus Maternus, _De
errore profanarum religionum_, 10.

125 In Hebrew a temple harlot was regularly called “a sacred woman”
(_kĕdēsha_). See _Encyclopaedia Biblica_, _s.v._ “Harlot”; S. R.
Driver, on Genesis xxxviii. 21. As to such “sacred women” see below,
pp. 70 _sqq._

M27 The daughters of Cinyras.

126 Clement of Alexandria, _Protrept._ ii. 13, p. 12, ed. Potter;
Arnobius, _Adversus Nationes_, v. 19; Firmicus Maternus, _De errore
profanarum religionum_, 10.

127 Apollodorus, _Bibliotheca_, iii. 14. 3.

M28 The Paphian dynasty of the Cinyrads.

128 Apollodorus, _Bibliotheca_, iii. 14. 3. I follow the text of R.
Wagner’s edition in reading Μεγασσάρου τοῦ Ὑριέων βασιλέως. As to
Hyria in Isauria see Stephanus Byzantius, _s.v._ Ὑρία. The city of
Celenderis, on the south coast of Cilicia, possessed a small harbour
protected by a fortified peninsula. Many ancient tombs survived till
recent times, but have now mostly disappeared. It was the port from
which the Turkish couriers from Constantinople used to embark for
Cyprus. As to the situation and remains see F. Beaufort, _Karmania_
(London, 1817), p. 201; W. M. Leake, _Journal of a Tour in Asia
Minor_ (London, 1824), pp. 114-118; R. Heberdey und A. Wilhelm,
“Reisen in Kilikien,” _Denkschriften der kais. Akademie der
Wissenschaften, Philosoph.-historische Classe_, xliv. (1896) No. vi.
p. 94. The statement that the sanctuary of Aphrodite at Paphos was
founded by the Arcadian Agapenor, who planted a colony in Cyprus
after the Trojan war (Pausanias, viii. 5. 2), may safely be
disregarded.

129 Tacitus, _Hist._ ii. 3; _Annals_, iii. 62.

130 Tacitus, _Hist._ ii. 3; Hesychius, _s.v._ Ταμιράδαι.

131 Pindar, _Pyth._ ii. 13-17.

132 Tyrtaeus, xii. 6 (_Poetae Lyrici Graeci_, ed. Th. Bergk,3 Leipsic,
1866-1867, ii. 404); Pindar, _Pyth._ viii. 18; Plato, _Laws_, ii. 6,
p. 660 E; Clement of Alexandria, _Paedag._ iii. 6, p. 274, ed.
Potter; Dio Chrysostom, _Orat._ viii. (vol. i. p. 149, ed. L.
Dindorf); Julian, _Epist._ lix. p. 574, ed. F. C. Hertlein;
Diogenianus, viii. 53; Suidas, _s.v._ Καταγηράσαις.

133 Schol. on Pindar, _Pyth._ ii. 15 (27); Hesychius, _s.v._ Κινυράδαι;
Clement of Alexandria, _Protrept._ iii. 45, p. 40, ed. Potter;
Arnobius, _Adversus Nationes_, vi. 6. That the kings of Paphos were
also priests of the goddess is proved, apart from the testimony of
ancient writers, by inscriptions found on the spot. See H. Collitz,
_Sammlung der griechischen Dialektinschriften_, i. (Göttingen, 1884)
p. 22, Nos. 38, 39, 40. The title of the goddess in these
inscriptions is Queen or Mistress (Ϝανασ(σ)ἀς). It is perhaps a
translation of the Semitic Baalath.

134 Plutarch, _De Alexandri Magni fortuna aut virtute_, ii. 8. The name
of the gardener-king was Alynomus. That the Cinyrads existed as a
family down to Macedonian times is further proved by a Greek
inscription found at Old Paphos, which records that a certain
Democrates, son of Ptolemy, head of the Cinyrads, and his wife
Eunice, dedicated a statue of their daughter to the Paphian
Aphrodite. See L. Ross, “Inschriften von Cypern,” _Rheinisches
Museum_, N.F. vii. (1850) pp. 520 _sq._ It seems to have been a
common practice of parents to dedicate statues of their sons or
daughters to the goddess at Paphos. The inscribed pedestals of many
such statues were found by the English archaeologists. See _Journal
of Hellenic Studies_, ix. (1888) pp. 228, 235, 236, 237, 241, 244,
246, 255.

135 Tacitus, _Hist._ ii. 4; Pausanias, viii. 24. 6.

136 Plutarch, _Cato the Younger_, 35.

M29 Incest of Cinyras with his daughter Myrrha, and birth of Adonis.
Legends of royal incest—a suggested explanation.

137 Ovid, _Metam._ x. 298 _sqq._; Hyginus, _Fab._ 58, 64; Fulgentius,
_Mytholog._ iii. 8; Lactantius Placidius, _Narrat. Fabul._ x. 9;
Servius on Virgil, _Ecl._ x. 18, and _Aen._ v. 72; Plutarch,
_Parallela_, 22; Schol. on Theocritus, i. 107. It is Ovid who
describes (_Metam._ x. 431 _sqq._) the festival of Ceres, at which
the incest was committed. His source was probably the
_Metamorphoses_ of the Greek writer Theodorus, which Plutarch
(_l.c._) refers to as his authority for the story. The festival in
question was perhaps the Thesmophoria, at which women were bound to
remain chaste (Schol. on Theocritus, iv. 25; Schol. on Nicander,
_Ther._ 70 _sq._; Pliny, _Nat. Hist._ xxiv. 59; Dioscorides, _De
Materia Medica_, i. 134 (135); compare Aelian, _De natura
animalium_, ix. 26). Compare E. Fehrle, _Die kultische Keuschheit im
Altertum_ (Giessen, 1910), pp. 103 _sqq._, 121 _sq._, 151 _sqq._ The
corn and bread of Cyprus were famous in antiquity. See Aeschylus,
_Suppliants_, 549 (555); Hipponax, cited by Strabo, viii. 3. 8, p.
340; Eubulus, cited by Athenaeus, iii. 78, p. 112 F; E. Oberhummer,
_Die Insel. Cypern_, i. (Munich, 1903) pp. 274 _sqq._ According to
another account, Adonis was the fruit of the incestuous intercourse
of Theias, a Syrian king, with his daughter Myrrha. See Apollodorus,
_Bibliotheca_, iii. 14. 4 (who cites Panyasis as his authority); J.
Tzetzes, _Schol. on Lycophron_, 829; Antoninus Liberalis,
_Transform._ 34 (who lays the scene of the story on Mount Lebanon).
With the corn-wreaths mentioned in the text we may compare the
wreaths which the Roman Arval Brethren wore at their sacred
functions, and with which they seem to have crowned the images of
the goddesses. See G. Henzen, _Acta Fratrum Arvalium_ (Berlin,
1874), pp. 24-27, 33 _sq._ Compare Pausanias, vii. 20. 1. _sq._

138 A list of these cases is given by Hyginus, _Fab._ 253. It includes
the incest of Clymenus, king of Arcadia, with his daughter Harpalyce
(compare Hyginus, _Fab._ 206); that of Oenomaus, king of Pisa, with
his daughter Hippodamia (compare J. Tzetzes, _Schol. on Lycophron_,
156; Lucian, _Charidemus_, 19); that of Erechtheus, king of Athens,
with his daughter Procris; and that of Epopeus, king of Lesbos, with
his daughter Nyctimene (compare Hyginus, _Fab._ 204).

139 The custom of brother and sister marriage seems to have been
especially common in royal families. See my note on Pausanias, i. 7.
1 (vol. ii. pp. 84 _sq._); as to the case of Egypt see below, vol.
ii. pp. 213 _sqq._ The true explanation of the custom was first, so
far as I know, indicated by J. F. McLennan (_The Patriarchal
Theory_, London, 1885, p. 95).

M30 The Flamen Dialis and his Flaminica at Rome.

140 Aulus Gellius, x. 15. 22; J. Marquardt, _Römische Staatsverwaltung_,
iii.2 (Leipsic, 1885) p. 328.

141 Priestesses are said to have preceded priests in some Egyptian
cities. See W. M. Flinders Petrie, _The Religion of Ancient Egypt_
(London, 1906), p. 74.

_ 142 The Magic Art and the Evolution of Kings_, ii. 179, 190 _sqq._

_ 143 The Magic Art and the Evolution of Kings_, ii. 268 _sqq._

_ 144 The Magic Art and the Evolution of Kings_, i. 12 note 1.

M31 Priestesses among the Khasis of Assam.

145 Major P. R. T. Gurdon, _The Khasis_ (London, 1907), pp. 109-112, 120
_sq._

M32 Sacred marriage of a priest and priestess as representatives of the
Sun-god and the Earth-goddess. Marriage of the Sun-god and
Earth-goddess acted by a priest and his wife.

_ 146 The Magic Art and the Evolution of Kings_, ii. 191 _sqq._

_ 147 The Magic Art and the Evolution of Kings_, ii. 148.

148 The late Rev. P. Dehon, S.J., “Religion and Customs of the Uraons,”
_Memoirs of the Asiatic Society of Bengal_, vol. i. No. 9 (Calcutta,
1906), pp. 144-146.

149 For more evidence see _The Magic Art and the Evolution of Kings_,
ii. 97 _sqq._

M33 Cinyras beloved by Aphrodite. Pygmalion and Aphrodite. The
Phoenician kings of Cyprus or their sons appear to have been
hereditary lovers of the goddess. Sacred marriage of the kings of
Paphos. Sons and daughters, fathers and mothers of a god.

150 Lucian, _Rhetorum praeceptor_, 11; Hyginus, _Fab._ 270.

151 Clement of Alexandria, _Protrept._ ii. 33, p. 29, ed. Potter.

152 W. H. Engel, _Kypros_, ii. 585, 612; A. Maury, _Histoire des
Religions de la Grèce Antique_ (Paris, 1857-1859), iii. 197, note 3.

153 Arnobius, _Adversus Nationes_, vi. 22; Clement of Alexandria,
_Protrept._ iv. 57, p. 51, ed. Potter; Ovid, _Metam._ x. 243-297.
The authority for the story is the Greek history of Cyprus by
Philostephanus, cited both by Arnobius and Clement. In Ovid’s
poetical version of the legend Pygmalion is a sculptor, and the
image with which he falls in love is that of a lovely woman, which
at his prayer Venus endows with life. That King Pygmalion was a
Phoenician is mentioned by Porphyry (_De abstinentia_, iv. 15) on
the authority of Asclepiades, a Cyprian.

154 See above, p. 42.

155 Probus, on Virgil, _Ecl._ x. 18. I owe this reference to my friend
Mr. A. B. Cook.

156 In his treatise on the political institutions of Cyprus, Aristotle
reported that the sons and brothers of the kings were called “lords”
(ἄνακτες), and their sisters and wives “ladies” (ἄνασσαι). See
Harpocration and Suidas, _s.v._ Ἄνακτες. Compare Isocrates, ix. 72;
Clearchus of Soli, quoted by Athenaeus, vi. 68, p. 256 A. Now in the
bilingual inscription of Idalium, which furnished the clue to the
Cypriote syllabary, the Greek version gives the title Ϝάναξ as the
equivalent of the Phoenician _Adon_ (אדן). See _Corpus Inscriptionum
Semiticarum_, i. No. 89; G. A. Cooke, _Text-book of North-Semitic
Inscriptions_, p. 74, note 1.

157 Josephus, _Contra Apionem_, i. 18, ed. B. Niese; Appian, _Punica_,
i; Virgil, _Aen._ i. 346 _sq._; Ovid, _Fasti_, iii. 574; Justin,
xviii. 4; Eustathius on Dionysius Periegetes, 195 (_Geographi Graeci
Minores_, ed. C. Müller Paris, 1882, ii. 250 _sq._).

158 Pumi-yathon, son of Milk-yathon, is known from Phoenician
inscriptions found at Idalium. See G. A. Cooke, _Text-book of
North-Semitic Inscriptions_, Nos. 12 and 13, pp. 55 _sq._, 57 _sq._
Coins inscribed with the name of King Pumi-yathon are also in
existence. See G. F. Hill, _Catalogue of the Greek Coins of Cyprus_
(London, 1904), pp. xl. _sq._, 21 _sq._, pl. iv. 20-24. He was
deposed by Ptolemy (Diodorus Siculus, xix. 79. 4). Most probably he
is the Pymaton of Citium who purchased the kingdom from a dissolute
monarch named Pasicyprus some time before the conquests of Alexander
(Athenaeus, iv. 63, p. 167). In this passage of Athenaeus the name
Pymaton, which is found in the MSS. and agrees closely with the
Phoenician Pumi-yathon, ought not to be changed into Pygmalion, as
the latest editor (G. Kaibel) has done.

159 G. A. Cooke, _op. cit._ p. 55, note 1. Mr. Cooke remarks that the
form of the name (פגמלין instead of פמייתן) must be due to Greek
influence.

160 See above, p. 41.

161 Clement of Alexandria, _Protrept._ ii. 13, p. 12; Arnobius,
_Adversus Nationes_, v. 9; Firmicus Maternus, _De errore profanarum
religionum_, 10.

162 That the king was not necessarily succeeded by his eldest son is
proved by the case of Solomon, who on his accession executed his
elder brother Adoni-jah (1 Kings ii. 22-24). Similarly, when
Abimelech became king of Shechem, he put his seventy brothers in
ruthless oriental fashion to death. See Judges viii. 29-31, ix. 5
_sq._, 18. So on his accession Jehoram, King of Judah, put all his
brothers to the sword (2 Chronicles xxi. 4). King Rehoboam had
eighty-eight children (2 Chronicles xi. 21) and King Abi-jah had
thirty-eight (2 Chronicles xiii. 21). These examples illustrate the
possible size of the family of a polygamous king.

_ 163 The Dying God_, pp. 160 _sqq._

164 The names which imply that a man was the father of a god have proved
particularly puzzling to some eminent Semitic scholars. See W.
Robertson Smith, _Religion of the Semites_,2 p. 45, note 2; Th.
Nöldeke, _s.v._ “Names,” _Encyclopaedia Biblica_, iii. 3287 _sqq._;
W. W. Graf Baudissin, _Adonis und Esmun_, pp. 39 _sq._, 43 _sqq._
Such names are Abi-baal (“father of Baal”), Abi-el (“father of El”),
Abi-jah (“father of Jehovah”), and Abi-melech (“father of a king” or
“father of Moloch”). On the hypothesis put forward in the text the
father of a god and the son of a god stood precisely on the same
footing, and the same person would often be both one and the other.
Where the common practice prevailed of naming a father after his son
(_Taboo and the Perils of the Soul_, pp. 331 _sqq._), a divine king
in later life might often be called “father of such-and-such a god.”

_ 165 The Magic Art and the Evolution of Kings_, i. 418 _sq._

166 A. Erman, _Aegypten und aegyptisches Leben im Altertum_ (Tübingen,
N.D.), p. 113.

167 L. Borchardt, “Der ägyptische Titel ‘Vater des Gottes’ als
Bezeichnung für ‘Vater oder Schwiegervater des Königs,’ ” _Berichte
über die Verhandlungen der Königlich Sächsischen Gesellschaft der
Wissenschaften zu Leipzig, Philolog.-histor. Klasse_, lvii. (1905)
pp. 254-270.

M34 Cinyras, like King David, a harper. The use of music as a means of
prophetic inspiration among the Hebrews.

168 F. C. Movers, _Die Phoenizier_, i. 243; Stoll, _s.v._ “Kinyras,” in
W. H. Roscher’s _Lexikon der griech. und röm. Mythologie_, ii. 1191;
1 Samuel xvi. 23.

169 1 Chronicles xxv. 1-3; compare 2 Samuel vi. 5.

170 W. Robertson Smith, _The Prophets of Israel_2 (London, 1902), pp.
391 _sq._; E. Renan, _Histoire du peuple d’Israel_ (Paris, 1893),
ii. 280.

171 1 Samuel x. 5.

172 2 Kings iii. 4-24. And for the explanation of the supposed miracle,
see W. Robertson Smith, _The Old Testament in the Jewish Church_2
(London and Edinburgh, 1892), pp. 146 _sq._ I have to thank
Professor Kennett for the suggestion that the Moabites took the
ruddy light on the water for an omen of blood rather than for actual
gore.

M35 The influence of music on religion.

173 1 Samuel xvi. 14-23.

174 J. H. Newman, _Sermons preached before the University of Oxford_,
No. xv. pp. 346 _sq._ (third edition).

175 It would be interesting to pursue a similar line of inquiry in
regard to the other arts. What was the influence of Phidias on Greek
religion? How much does Catholicism owe to Fra Angelico?

M36 The function of string music in Greek and Semitic ritual.

176 Pindar, _Pyth._ ii. 15 _sq._

177 On the lyre and the flute in Greek religion and Greek thought, see
L. R. Farnell, _The Cults of the Greek States_ (Oxford, 1896-1909),
iv. 243 _sqq._

178 Pindar, _Pyth._ i. 13 _sqq._

179 This seems to be the view also of Dr. Farnell, who rightly connects
the musical with the prophetic side of Apollo’s character (_op.
cit._ iv. 245).

M37 Traditions as to the death of Cinyras.

180 Hyginus, _Fab._ 242. So in the version of the story which made
Adonis the son of Theias, the father is said to have killed himself
when he learned what he had done (Antoninus Liberalis, _Transform._
34).

181 Scholiast and Eustathius on Homer, _Iliad_, xi. 20. Compare F. C.
Movers, _Die Phoenizier_, i. 243 _sq._; W. H. Engel, _Kypros_, ii.
109-116; Stoll, _s.v._ “Kinyras,” in W. H. Roscher’s _Lexikon der
griech. und röm. Mythologie_, ii. 1191.

182 Anacreon, cited by Pliny, _Nat. Hist._ vii. 154. Nonnus also refers
to the long life of Cinyras (_Dionys._ xxxii. 212 _sq._).

_ 183 Encyclopaedia Britannica_,9 xiv. 858.

M38 Sacred prostitution of Western Asia.
M39 Theory of its secular origin.

184 L. R. Farnell, “Sociological hypotheses concerning the position of
women in ancient religion,” _Archiv für Religionswissenschaft_, vii.
(1904) p. 88; M. P. Nilsson, _Griechische Feste_ (Leipsic, 1906),
pp. 366 _sq._; Fr. Cumont, _Les religions orientales dans le
paganisme Romain_2 (Paris, 1909), pp. 361 _sq._ A different and, in
my judgment, a truer view of these customs was formerly taken by
Prof. Nilsson. See his _Studia de Dionysiis Atticis_ (Lund, 1900),
pp. 119-121. For a large collection of facts bearing on this subject
and a judicious discussion of them, see W. Hertz, “Die Sage vom
Giftmädchen,” _Gesammelte Abhandlungen_ (Stuttgart and Berlin,
1905), pp. 195-219. My attention was drawn to this last work by
Prof. G. L. Hamilton of the University of Michigan after my
manuscript had been sent to the printer. With Hertz’s treatment of
the subject I am in general agreement, and I have derived from his
learned treatise several references to authorities which I had
overlooked.

M40 The theory does not account for the religious character of the
custom,

185 Above, p. 37.

186 Above, p. 38. Prof. Nilsson is mistaken in affirming (_op. cit._ p.
367) that the Lydian practice was purely secular: the inscription
which I have cited proves the contrary. Both he and Dr. Farnell
fully recognize the religious aspect of most of these customs in
antiquity, and Prof. Nilsson attempts, as it seems to me,
unsuccessfully, to indicate how a practice supposed to be purely
secular in origin should have come to contract a religious
character.

M41 Nor for the prostitution of married women.

187 Above, p. 37.

188 Above, pp. 36 _sq._, 38.

189 Hosea iv. 13 _sq._

M42 Nor for the repeated prostitution of the same women.

190 Above, pp. 37 _sqq._

M43 Nor for the “sacred men” beside the “sacred women”.

191 See above, pp. 17 _sq._

M44 And is irreconcilable with the payment of the women.

192 L. di Varthema, _Travels_ (Hakluyt Society, 1863), pp. 141, 202-204
(Malabar); J. A. de Mandlesloe, in J. Harris’s _Voyages and
Travels_, i. (London, 1744), p. 767 (Malabar); Richard, “History of
Tonquin,” in J. Pinkerton’s _Voyages and Travels_, ix. 760 _sq._
(Aracan); A. de Morga, _The Philippine Islands, Moluccas, Siam,
Cambodia, Japan, and China_ (Hakluyt Society, 1868), pp. 304 _sq._
(the Philippines); J. Mallat, _Les Philippines_ (Paris, 1846), i. 61
(the Philippines); L. Moncelon, in _Bulletins de la Société
d’Anthropologie de Paris_, 3me Série, ix. (1886) p. 368 (New
Caledonia); H. Crawford Angas, in _Verhandlungen der Berliner
Gesellschaft für Anthropologie, Ethnologie und Urgeschichte_, 1898,
p. 481 (Azimba, Central Africa); Sir H. H. Johnston, _British
Central Africa_ (London, 1897), p. 410 (the Wa-Yao of Central
Africa). See further, W. Hertz, “Die Sage vom Giftmädchen,”
_Gesammelte Abhandlungen_, pp. 198-204.

193 Herodotus, i. 93; Justin, xviii. 5. 4. Part of the wages thus earned
was probably paid into the local temple. See above, pp. 37, 38.
However, according to Strabo (xi. 14. 16, p. 532) the Armenian girls
of rich families often gave their lovers more than they received
from them.

194 This fatal objection to the theory under discussion has been clearly
stated by W. Hertz, _op. cit._ p. 217. I am glad to find myself in
agreement with so judicious and learned an inquirer.

M45 The practice of destroying virginity has sometimes had a religious
character.

195 L. di Varthema, _Travels_ (Hakluyt Society, 1863), p. 141; J. A. de
Mandlesloe, in J. Harris’s _Voyages and Travels_, i. (London, 1744)
p. 767; A. Hamilton, “New Account of the East Indies,” in J.
Pinkerton’s _Voyages and Travels_, viii. 374; Ch. Lassen, _Indische
Alterthumskunde_, iv. (Leipsic, 1861), p. 408; A. de Herrera, _The
General History of the Vast Continent and Islands of America_,
translated by Captain J. Stevens (London, 1725-1726), iii. 310, 340;
Fr. Coreal, _Voyages aux Indes Occidentales_ (Amsterdam, 1722), i.
10 _sq._, 139 _sq._; C. F. Ph. v. Martius, _Beiträge zur
Ethnographie und Sprachenkunde Amerika’s_, i. (Leipsic, 1867) pp.
113 _sq._ The first three of these authorities refer to Malabar; the
fourth refers to Cambodia; the last three refer to the Indians of
Central and South America. See further W. Hertz, “Die Sage vom
Giftmädchen,” _Gesammelte Abhandlungen_, pp. 204-207. For a
criticism of the Malabar evidence see K. Schmidt, _Jus primae
noctis_ (Freiburg im Breisgau, 1881), pp. 312-320.

196 Lactantius, _Divin. Institut._ i. 20; Arnobius, _Adversus Nationes_,
iv. 7; Augustine, _De civitate Dei_, vi. 9, vii. 24; D. Barbosa,
_Description of the Coasts of East Africa and Malabar_ (Hakluyt
Society, 1866), p. 96; Sonnerat, _Voyage aux Indes Orientales et à
la Chine_ (Paris, 1782), i. 68; F. Liebrecht, _Zur Volkskunde_
(Heilbronn, 1879), pp. 396 _sq._, 511; W. Hertz, “Die Sage vom
Giftmädchen,” _Gesammelte Abhandlungen_, pp. 270-272. According to
Arnobius, it was matrons, not maidens, who resorted to the image.
This suggests that the custom was a charm to procure offspring.

197 R. Schomburgk, in _Verhandlungen der Berliner Gesellschaft für
Anthropologie, Ethnologie und Urgeschichte_, 1879, pp. 235 _sq._;
Miklucho-Maclay, _ibid._ 1880, p. 89; W. E. Roth, _Studies among the
North-West-Central Queensland Aborigines_ (Brisbane and London,
1897), pp. 174 _sq._, 180; B. Spencer and F. J. Gillen, _Native
Tribes of Central Australia_ (London, 1899), pp. 92-95; _id._,
_Northern Tribes of Central Australia_ (London, 1904), pp. 133-136.
In Australia the observance of the custom is regularly followed by
the exercise of what seem to be old communal rights of the men over
the women.

M46 Sacred women in the Tamil temples of Southern India. Such women are
sometimes married to the god and possessed by him.

198 J. A. Dubois, _Mœurs, Institutions et Cérémonies des Peuples de
l’Inde_ (Paris, 1825), ii. 353 _sqq._; J. Shortt, “The Bayadère or
dancing-girls of Southern India,” _Memoirs of the Anthropological
Society of London_, iii. (1867-69) pp. 182-194; Edward Balfour,
_Cyclopaedia of India_3 (London, 1885), i. 922 _sqq._; W. Francis,
in _Census of India, 1901_, vol. xv., _Madras_, Part I. (Madras,
1902) pp. 151 _sq._; E. Thurston, _Ethnographic Notes in Southern
India_ (Madras, 1906), pp. 36 _sq._, 40 _sq._ The office of these
sacred women has in recent years been abolished, on the ground of
immorality, by the native Government of Mysore. See _Homeward Mail_,
6th June 1909 (extract kindly sent me by General Begbie).

199 Edgar Thurston, _Castes and Tribes of Southern India_ (Madras,
1909), iii. 37-39. Compare _id._, _Ethnographic Notes in Southern
India_ (Madras, 1906), pp. 29 _sq._ In Southern India the maternal
uncle often takes a prominent part in the marriage ceremony to the
exclusion of the girl’s father. See, for example, E. Thurston,
_Castes and Tribes of Southern India_, ii. 497, iv. 147. The custom
is derived from the old system of mother-kin, under which a man’s
heirs are not his own children but his sister’s children. As to this
system see below, Chapter XII., “Mother-kin and Mother Goddesses.”

200 E. Balfour, _op. cit._ ii. 1012.

201 Francis Buchanan, “A Journey from Madras through the countries of
Mysore, Canara, and Malabar,” in J. Pinkerton’s _Voyages and
Travels_, viii. (London, 1811), p. 749.

M47 In Travancore the dancing-girls are regularly married to the god.

202 N. Subramhanya Aiyar, in _Census of India, 1901_, vol. xxvi.,
_Travancore_, Part i. (Trivandrum, 1903), pp. 276 _sq._ I have to
thank my friend Mr. W. Crooke for referring me to this and other
passages on the sacred dancing-girls of India.

M48 Among the Ewe peoples of West Africa the sacred prostitutes are
regarded as the wives of the god.

203 A. B. Ellis, _The Ewe-speaking Peoples of the Slave Coast of West
Africa_ (London, 1890), pp. 140 _sq._

204 A. B. Ellis, _op. cit._ p. 142.

M49 The human wives of the python-god.

205 A. B. Ellis, _op. cit._ pp. 148 _sq._ Compare Des Marchais, _Voyage
en Guinée et à Cayenne_ (Amsterdam, 1731), ii. 144-151; P. Bouche,
_La Côte des Esclaves_ (Paris, 1885), p. 128. The Abbé Bouche calls
these women _danwés_.

206 A. B. Ellis, _op. cit._ p. 60; Des Marchais, _op. cit._ ii. 149
_sq._

M50 Supposed connexion between the fertility of the soil and the
marriage of women to the serpent.

207 Des Marchais, _Voyage en Guinée et à Cayenne_ (Amsterdam, 1731), ii.
146 _sq._

208 W. Bosman, “Description of the Coast of Guinea,” in J. Pinkerton’s
_Voyages and Travels_, xvi. (London, 1814), p. 494.

209 W. Bosman, _l.c._ The name of Whydah is spelt by Bosman as Fida, and
by Des Marchais as Juda.

M51 Human wives of a snake-god among the Akikuyu.

210 MS. notes, kindly sent to me by the author, Mr. A. C. Hollis, 21st
May, 1908.

M52 Sacred men as well as women in West Africa: they are thought to be
possessed by the deity.

211 A. B. Ellis, _The Ewe-speaking Peoples of the Slave Coast_, pp.
142-144; Le R. P. Baudin, “Féticheurs ou ministres religieux des
Nègres de la Guinée,” _Les Missions Catholiques_, No. 787 (4 juillet
1884), p. 322.

212 A. B. Ellis, _op. cit._ pp. 150 _sq._

_ 213 La Côte des Esclaves_, pp. 127 _sq._

214 A. B. Ellis, _op. cit._ p. 147.

M53 Similarly among the Tshi peoples of the Gold Coast there are sacred
men and women, who are supposed to be inspired by the deity.

215 A. B. Ellis, _The Tshi-speaking Peoples of the Gold Coast of West
Africa_ (London, 1887), pp. 120-138.

216 A. B. Ellis, _op. cit._ p. 121.

217 A. B. Ellis, _op. cit._ pp. 120 _sq._, 129-138. The slaves, male and
female, dedicated to a god from childhood are often mentioned by the
German missionary Mr. J. Spieth in his elaborate work on the Ewe
people (_Die Eẇe-Stämme: Material zur Kunde des Eẇe-Volkes in
Deutsch-Togo_, Berlin, 1906, pp. 228, 229, 309, 450, 474, 792, 797,
etc.). But his information does not illustrate the principal points
to which I have called attention in the text.

M54 In like manner the sacred prostitutes of Western Asia may have been
viewed as possessed by the deity and married to the god.

_ 218 The Magic Art and the Evolution of Kings_, ii. 129-135.

219 Herodotus, i. 181 _sq._ It is not clear whether the same or a
different woman slept every night in the temple.

220 H. Winckler, _Die Gesetze Hammurabi_2 (Leipsic, 1903), p. 31, § 182;
C. H. W. Johns, _Babylonian and Assyrian Laws, Contracts, and
Letters_ (Edinburgh, 1904), pp. 54, 55, 59, 60, 61 (§§ 137, 144,
145, 146, 178, 182, 187, 192, 193, of the Code of Hammurabi). As to
these female votaries see especially C. H. W. Johns, “Notes on the
Code of Hammurabi,” _American Journal of Semitic Languages and
Literatures_, xix. (January 1903) pp. 98-107. Compare S. A. Cook,
_The Laws of Moses and the Code of Hammurabi_ (London, 1903), pp.
147-150.

221 C. H. W. Johns, “Notes on the Code of Hammurabi,” _l.c._, where we
read (p. 104) of a female votary of Shamash who had a daughter.

_ 222 Code of Hammurabi_, § 181; C. H. W. Johns, “Notes on the Code of
Hammurabi,” _op. cit._ pp. 100 sq.; S. A. Cook, _op. cit._ p. 148.
Dr. Johns translates the name by “temple maid” (_Babylonian and
Assyrian Laws_, _Contracts, and Letters_, p. 61). He is scrupulously
polite to these ladies, but I gather from him that a far less
charitable view of their religious vocation is taken by Father
Scheil, the first editor and translator of the code.

223 Any man proved to have pointed the finger of scorn at a votary was
liable to be branded on the forehead (_Code of Hammurabi_, § 127).

224 See above, pp. 66, 69.

225 Herodotus, i. 182.

226 A. Wiedemann, _Herodots Zweites Buch_ (Leipsic, 1890), pp. 268 _sq._
See further _The Magic Art and the Evolution of Kings_, ii. 130
_sqq._

227 Strabo, xvii. 1. 46, p. 816. The title “concubines of Zeus (Ammon)”
is mentioned by Diodorus Siculus (i. 47).

228 Diodorus Siculus, i. 47.

M55 Similarly the sacred men (_ḳedeshim_) of Western Asia may have been
regarded as possessed by the deity and as acting and speaking in his
name.

229 The ἱερόδουλοι, as the Greeks called them.

230 I have to thank the Rev. Professor R. H. Kennett for this important
suggestion as to the true nature of the _ḳedeshim_. The passages of
the Bible in which mention is made of these men are Deuteronomy
xxiii. 17 (in Hebrew 18); 1 Kings xiv. 24, xv. 12, xxii. 46 (in
Hebrew 47); 2 Kings xxiii. 7; Job xxxvi. 14 (where _ḳedeshim_ is
translated “the unclean” in the English version). The usual
rendering of _ḳedeshim_ in the English Bible is not justified by any
of these passages; but it may perhaps derive support from a
reference which Eusebius makes to the profligate rites observed at
Aphaca (_Vita Constantini_, iii. 55; Migne’s _Patrologia Graeca_,
xx. 1120); Γύνιδες γοῦν τινες ἄνδρες οὐκ ἄνδρες, τὸ σέμνον τῆς
φύσεως ἀπαρνησάμενοι, θηλείᾳ νόσῳ τὴν δαίμονα ἱλεοῦντο. But probably
Eusebius is here speaking of the men who castrated themselves in
honour of the goddess, and thereafter wore female attire. See
Lucian, _De dea Syria_, 51; and below, pp. 269 _sq._

231 Strabo, xi. 4. 7, p. 503.

232 Drexler, in W. H. Roscher’s _Lexikon der griech. und röm.
Mythologie_, _s.v._ “Men,” ii. 2687 _sqq._

233 It is true that Strabo (_l.c._) speaks of the Albanian deity as a
goddess, but this may be only an accommodation to the usage of the
Greek language, in which the moon is feminine.

234 Florus, _Epitoma_, ii. 7; Diodorus Siculus, Frag. xxxiv. 2 (vol. v.
pp. 87 _sq._, ed. L. Dindorf, in the Teubner series).

M56 Resemblance of the Hebrew prophets to the sacred men of Western
Africa.

235 Above, pp. 52 _sq._

236 1 Kings xix. 16; Isaiah lx. 1.

237 1 Kings xx. 41. So in Africa “priests and priestesses are readily
distinguishable from the rest of the community. They wear their hair
long and unkempt, while other people, except the women in the towns
on the seaboard, have it cut close to the head.... Frequently both
appear with white circles painted round their eyes, or with various
white devices, marks, or lines painted on the face, neck, shoulders,
or arms” (A. B. Ellis, _The Tshi-speaking Peoples of the Gold
Coast_, p. 123). “Besides the ordinary tribal tattoo-marks borne by
all natives, the priesthood in Dahomi bear a variety of such marks,
some very elaborate, and an expert can tell by the marks on a priest
to what god he is vowed, and what rank he holds in the order. These
hierarchical marks consist of lines, scrolls, diamonds, and other
patterns, with sometimes a figure, such as that of the crocodile or
chameleon. The shoulders are frequently seen covered with an
infinite number of small marks like dots, set close together. All
these marks are considered sacred, and the laity are forbidden to
touch them” (A. B. Ellis, _The Ewe-speaking Peoples of the Slave
Coast_, p. 146). The reason why the prophet’s shoulders are
especially marked is perhaps given by the statement of a Zulu that
“the sensitive part with a doctor [medicine-man] is his shoulders.
Everything he feels is in the situation of his shoulders. That is
the place where black men feel the Amatongo” (ancestral spirits).
See H. Callaway, _The Religious System of the Amazulu_, part ii. p.
159. These African analogies suggest that the “wounds between the
arms” (literally, “between the hands”) which the prophet Zechariah
mentions (xiii. 6) as the badge of a Hebrew prophet were marks
tattooed on his shoulders in token of his holy office. The
suggestion is confirmed by the prophet’s own statement (_l.c._) that
he had received the wounds in the house of his lovers (בית מאהבי);
for the same word lovers is repeatedly applied by the prophet Hosea
to the Baalim (Hosea, ii. 5, 7, 10, 12, 13, verses 7, 9, 12, 14, 15
in Hebrew).

238 1 Samuel ix. 1-20.

239 H. Callaway, _The Religious System of the Amazulu_, part iii. pp.
300 _sqq._

240 See above, pp. 52 _sq._

241 1 Samuel ix. 9. In the Wiimbaio tribe of South-Eastern Australia a
medicine-man used to be called “_mekigar_, from _meki_, ‘eye’ or ‘to
see,’ otherwise ‘one who sees,’ that is, sees the causes of maladies
in people, and who could extract them from the sufferer, usually in
the form of quartz crystals” (A. W. Howitt, _The Native Tribes of
South-East Australia_, London, 1904, p. 380).

242 That the prophet’s office in Canaan was developed out of the
widespread respect for insanity is duly recognized by Ed. Meyer,
_Geschichte des Altertums_,2 i. 2. p. 383.

M57 Inspired prophets at Byblus.

243 W. Max Müller, in _Mitteilungen der Vorderasiatischen Gesellschaft_,
1900, No. 1, p. 17; A. Erman, “Eine Reise nach Phönizien im 11
Jahrhundert v. Chr.” _Zeitschrift für Āgyptische Sprache und
Altertumskunde_, xxxviii. (1900) pp. 6 _sq._; G. Maspero, _Les
contes populaires de l’Égypte Ancienne_,3 p. 192; A. Wiedemann,
_Altägyptische Sagen und Märchen_ (Leipsic, 1906), pp. 99 _sq._; H.
Gressmann, _Altorientalische Texte und Bilder zum Alten Testamente_
(Tübingen, 1909), p. 226. Scholars differ as to whether Wen-Ammon’s
narrative is to be regarded as history or romance; but even if it
were proved to be a fiction, we might safely assume that the
incident of the prophetic frenzy at Byblus was based upon familiar
facts. Prof. Wiedemann thinks that the god who inspired the page was
the Egyptian Ammon, not the Phoenician Adonis, but this view seems
to me less probable.

244 1 Samuel ix. 6-8, 10; 1 Kings xiii. 1, 4-8, 11, etc.

245 1 Samuel ii. 22. Totally different from their Asiatic namesakes were
the “sacred men” and “sacred women” who were charged with the
superintendence of the mysteries at Andania in Messenia. They were
chosen by lot and held office for a year. The sacred women might be
either married or single; the married women had to swear that they
had been true to their husbands. See G. Dittenberger, _Sylloge
Inscriptionum Graecarum_2 (Leipsic, 1898-1901), vol. ii. pp. 461
_sqq._, No. 653; Ch. Michel, _Recueil d’Inscriptions Grecques_
(Brussels, 1900), pp. 596 _sqq._, No. 694; _Leges Graecorum Sacrae_,
ed. J. de Prott, L. Ziehen, Pars Altera, Fasciculus i. (Leipsic,
1906), No. 58, pp. 166 _sqq._

M58 “Holy men” in modern Syria.

246 Hosea ix. 7.

247 Jeremiah xxix. 26.

248 S. I. Curtiss, _Primitive Semitic Religion To-day_ (Chicago, New
York, Toronto, 1902), pp. 150 _sq._

249 S. I. Curtiss, _op. cit._ p. 152. As to these “holy men,” see
further C. R. Conder, _Tent-work in Palestine_ (London, 1878), ii.
231 _sq._: “The most peculiar class of men in the country is that of
the Derwîshes, or sacred personages, who wander from village to
village, performing tricks, living on alms, and enjoying certain
social and domestic privileges, which very often lead to scandalous
scenes. Some of these men are mad, some are fanatics, but the
majority are, I imagine, rogues. They are reverenced not only by the
peasantry, but also sometimes by the governing class. I have seen
the Kady of Nazareth ostentatiously preparing food for a miserable
and filthy beggar, who sat in the justice-hall, and was consulted as
if he had been inspired. A Derwîsh of peculiar eminence is often
dressed in good clothes, with a spotless turban, and is preceded by
a banner-bearer, and followed by a band, with drum, cymbal, and
tambourine.... It is natural to reflect whether the social position
of the Prophets among the Jews may not have resembled that of the
Derwîshes.”

M59 The licence accorded to such “holy men” may be explained by the
desire of women for offspring.

250 S. I. Curtiss, _op. cit._ pp. 116 _sq._

251 S. I. Curtiss, _op. cit._ pp. 118, 119. In India also some
Mohammedan saints are noted as givers of children. Thus at
Fatepur-Sikri, near Agra, is the grave of Salim Chishti, and
childless women tie rags to the delicate tracery of the tomb, “thus
bringing them into direct communion with the spirit of the holy man”
(W. Crooke, _Natives of Northern India_, London, 1907, p. 203).

M60 Belief that men and women may be the offspring of a god.

252 1 Samuel i.

253 Genesis vi. 1-3. In this passage “the sons of God (or rather of the
gods)” probably means, in accordance with a common Hebrew idiom, no
more than “the gods,” just as the phrase “sons of the prophets”
means the prophets themselves. For more examples of this idiom, see
Brown, Driver, and Briggs, _Hebrew and English Lexicon_, p. 121.

254 For example, all Hebrew names ending in _-el_ or _-iah_ are
compounds of El or Yahwe, two names of the divinity. See G. B. Gray,
_Studies in Hebrew Proper Names_ (London, 1896), pp. 149 _sqq._

255 Brown, Driver, and Briggs, _Hebrew and English Lexicon_, p. 1028.
But compare _Encyclopaedia Biblica_, iii. 3285, iv. 4452.

256 A trace of a similar belief perhaps survives in the narratives of
Genesis xxxi. and Judges xiii., where barren women are represented
as conceiving children after the visit of God, or of an angel of
God, in the likeness of a man.

257 J. Spieth, _Die Ewe-Stämme_ (Berlin, 1906), pp. 446, 448-450.

M61 The saints in modern Syria are the equivalents of the ancient Baal
or Adonis.
M62 Belief in the physical fatherhood of God not confined to Syria. Sons
of the serpent-god.

258 For more instances see H. Usener, _Das Weihnachtsfest_2 (Bonn,
1911), i. 71 _sqq._

259 G. Dittenberger, _Sylloge Inscriptionum Graecarum_,2 vol. ii. pp.
662, 663, No. 803, lines 117 _sqq._, 129 _sqq._

260 Pausanias, ii. 10. 3 (with my note), iii. 23. 7; Livy, xi. Epitome;
Pliny, _Nat. Hist._ xxix. 72; Valerius Maximus, i. 8. 2; Ovid,
_Metam._ xv. 626-744; Aurelius Victor, _De viris illustr._ 22;
Plutarch, _Quaest. Rom._ 94.

261 Aristophanes, _Plutus_, 733; Pausanias, ii. 11. 8; Herodas,
_Mimiambi_, iv. 90 _sq._; G. Dittenberger, _Sylloge Inscriptionum
Graecarum_,2 vol. ii. p. 655, No. 802, lines 116 _sqq._; Ch. Michel,
_Recueil d’Inscriptions Grecques_, p. 826, No. 1069.

262 Pausanias, ii. 10. 3, iv. 14. 7 _sq._

263 Pausanias, ii. 10. 4.

264 Pausanias, ii. 11. 5-8.

265 Suetonius, _Divus Augustus_, 94; Dio Cassius, xlv. 1. 2. Tame
serpents were kept in a sacred grove of Apollo in Epirus. A virgin
priestess fed them, and omens of plenty and health or the opposites
were drawn from the way in which the reptiles took their food from
her. See Aelian, _Nat. Hist._ xi. 2.

266 Pausanias, iv. 14. 7; Livy, xxvi. 19; Aulus Gellius, vi. 1;
Plutarch, _Alexander_, 2. All these cases have been already cited in
this connexion by L. Deubner, _De incubatione_ (Leipsic, 1900), p.
33 note.

267 Aelian, _De natura animalium_, vi. 17.

M63 Women fertilized by stone serpents in India.

268 H. V. Nanjundayya, _The Ethnographical Survey of Mysore_, vi.
_Komati Caste_ (Bangalore, 1906), p. 29.

M64 Belief that the dead come to life in the form of serpents.

269 T. Arbousset et F. Daumas, _Voyage d’Exploration au Nord-Est de la
Colonie du Cap de Bonne-Espérance_ (Paris, 1842), p. 277; H.
Callaway, _Religious System of the Amazulu_, part ii. pp. 140-144,
196-200, 208-212; J. Shooter, _The Kafirs of Natal_ (London, 1857),
p. 162; E. Casalis, _The Basutos_ (London, 1861), p. 246; “Words
about Spirits,” (_South African_) _Folk-lore Journal_, ii. (1880)
pp. 101-103; A. Kranz, _Natur- und Kulturleben der Zulus_
(Wiesbaden, 1880), p. 112; F. Speckmann, _Die Hermannsburger Mission
in Afrika_ (Hermannsburg, 1876), pp. 165-167; Dudley Kidd, _The
Essential Kafir_ (London, 1904), pp. 85-87; Henri A. Junod, _The
Life of a South African Tribe_ (Neuchatel, 1912-1913), ii. 358 _sq._

270 W. A. Elmslie, _Among the Wild Ngoni_ (London, 1899), pp. 71 _sq._

271 O. Baumann, _Usambara und seine Nachbargebiete_ (Berlin, 1891), pp.
141 _sq._

272 S. L. Hinde and H. Hinde, _The Last of the Masai_ (London, 1901),
pp. 101 _sq._; A. C. Hollis, _The Masai_ (Oxford, 1905), pp. 307
_sq._; Sir H. Johnston, _The Uganda Protectorate_ (London, 1904),
ii. 832.

273 M. W. H. Beech, _The Suk_ (Oxford, 1911), p. 20.

274 A. C. Hollis, _The Nandi_ (Oxford, 1909), p. 90.

275 H. R. Tate, “The Native Law of the Southern Gikuyu of British East
Africa,” _Journal of the African Society_, No. xxxv. April 1910, p.
243.

276 E. de Pruyssenaere, _Reisen und Forschungen im Gebiete des Weissen
und Blauen Nil_ (Gotha, 1877), p. 27 (_Petermann’s Mittheilungen,
Ergänzungsheft_, No. 50). Compare G. Schweinfurth, _The Heart of
Africa_3 (London, 1878), i. 55. Among the Bahima of Ankole dead
chiefs turn into serpents, but dead kings into lions. See J. Roscoe,
“The Bahima, a Cow Tribe of Enkole in the Uganda Protectorate,”
_Journal of the Anthropological Institute_, xxxvii. (1907), pp. 101
_sq._; Major J. A. Meldon, “Notes on the Bahima of Ankole,” _Journal
of the African Society_, No. xxii. (January 1907), p. 151. Major
Leonard holds that the pythons worshipped in Southern Nigeria are
regarded as reincarnations of the dead; but this seems very
doubtful. See A. G. Leonard, _The Lower Niger and its Tribes_
(London, 1906), pp. 327 _sqq._ Pythons are worshipped by the
Ewe-speaking peoples of the Slave Coast, but apparently not from a
belief that the souls of the dead are lodged in them. See A. B.
Ellis, _The Ewe-speaking Peoples of the Slave Coast of West Africa_,
pp. 54 _sqq._

277 G. A. Shaw, “The Betsileo,” _The Antananarivo Annual and Madagascar
Magazine, Reprint of the First Four Numbers_ (Antananarivo, 1885),
p. 411; H. W. Little, _Madagascar, its History and People_ (London,
1884), pp. 86 _sq._; A. van Gennep, _Tabou et Totémisme à
Madagascar_ (Paris, 1904), pp. 272 _sqq._

278 “Religious Rites and Customs of the Iban or Dyaks of Sarawak,” by
Leo Nyuak, translated from the Dyak by the Very Rev. Edm. Dunn,
_Anthropos_, i. (1906) p. 182. As to the Sea Dyak reverence for
snakes and their belief that spirits (_antus_) are incarnate in the
reptiles, see further J. Perham, “Sea Dyak Religion,” _Journal of
the Straits Branch of the Royal Asiatic Society_, No. 10 (December,
1882), pp. 222-224; H. Ling Roth, _The Natives of Sarawak and
British North Borneo_ (London, 1896), i. 187 _sq._ But from this
latter account it does not appear that the spirits (_antus_) which
possess the snakes are supposed to be those of human ancestors.

279 George Brown, D.D., _Melanesians and Polynesians_ (London, 1910),
pp. 238 _sq._

M65 Serpents which are viewed as ancestors come to life are treated with
respect and often fed with milk.

280 Rev. E. Casalis, _The Basutos_ (London, 1861), p. 246. Compare A.
Kranz, _Natur- und Kulturleben der Zulus_ (Wiesbaden, 1880), p. 112.

281 A. C. Hollis, _The Masai_ (Oxford, 1905), p. 307.

282 A. C. Hollis, _The Nandi_ (Oxford, 1909), p. 90.

283 Mervyn W. H. Beech, _The Suk, their Language and Folklore_ (Oxford,
1911), p. 20.

284 H. R. Tate (District Commissioner, East Africa Protectorate), “The
Native Law of the Southern Gikuyu of British East Africa,” _Journal
of the African Society_, No. xxxv., April 1910, p. 243. See further
C. W. Hobley, “Further Researches into Kikuyu and Kamba Religious
Beliefs and Customs,” _Journal of the Royal Anthropological
Institute_, xli. (1911) p. 408. According to Mr. Hobley it is only
one particular sort of snake, called _nyamuyathi_, which is thought
to be the abode of a spirit and is treated with ceremonious respect
by the Akikuyu. Compare P. Cayzac, “La Religion des Kikuyu,”
_Anthropos_, v. (1910) p. 312; and for more evidence of milk offered
to serpents as embodiments of the dead see E. de Pruyssenaere and H.
W. Little, cited above, p. 83, notes 1 and 2.

285 Rev. J. Roscoe, _The Baganda_ (London, 1911), pp. 320 _sq._ My
friend Mr. Roscoe tells me that serpents are revered and fed with
milk by the Banyoro to the north of Uganda; but he cannot say
whether the creatures are supposed to be incarnations of the dead.
Some of the Gallas also regard serpents as sacred and offer milk to
them, but it is not said that they believe the reptiles to embody
the souls of the departed. See Rev. J. L. Krapf, _Travels,
Researches and Missionary Labours in Eastern Africa_ (London, 1860),
pp. 77 _sq._ The negroes of Whydah in Guinea likewise feed with milk
the serpents which they worship. See Thomas Astley’s _New General
Collection of Voyages and Travels_, iii. (London, 1746) p. 29.

M66 The Greeks and Romans seem to have shared the belief that the souls
of the dead can be reincarnated in serpents.

286 L. Preller, _Römische Mythologie_3 (Berlin, 1881-1883), ii. 196
_sq._; G. Wissowa, _Religion und Kultus der Römer_2 (Munich, 1912),
pp. 176 _sq._ The worship of the _genius_ was very popular in the
Roman Empire. See J. Toutain, _Les Cultes Païens dans l’Empire
Romain_, Première Partie, i. (Paris, 1907) pp. 439 _sqq._

287 Pliny, _Nat. Hist._ xxix. 72. Compare Seneca, _De Ira_, iv. 31. 6.

288 Apollodorus, _Bibliotheca_, iii. 5. 4; Hyginus, _Fab._ 6; Ovid,
_Metam._ iv. 563-603.

289 Plutarch, _Cleomenes_, 39.

290 Porphyry, _De vita Plotini_, p. 103, Didot edition (appended to the
lives of Diogenes Laertius).

291 Plutarch, _Cleomenes_, 39; Scholiast on Aristophanes, _Plutus_, 733.

292 Herodotus, viii. 41; Plutarch, _Themistocles_, 10; Aristophanes,
_Lysistra_, 758 _sq._, with the Scholium; Philostratus, _Imag._ ii.
17. 6. See further my note on Pausanias, i, 18, 2 (vol. ii. pp. 168
_sqq._).

293 Sophocles, _Electra_, 893 _sqq._; Euripides, _Orestes_, 112 _sqq._

_ 294 Mittheilungen des Deutsch. Archäo log. Institutes in Athen_, iv.
(1879) pl. viii. Compare _ib._ pp. 135 _sq._, 162 _sq._

295 Above, pp. 84 _sq._

296 E. de Pruyssenaere, _l.c._ (above, p. 83, note 1).

297 See C. O. Müller, _Denkmäler der alten Kunst_2 (Göttingen, 1854),
pl. lxi. with the corresponding text in vol. i. (where the eccentric
system of paging adopted renders references to it practically
useless). In these groups the female figure is commonly, and perhaps
correctly, interpreted as the Goddess of Health (Hygieia). It is to
be remembered that Hygieia was deemed a daughter of the serpent-god
Aesculapius (Pausanias i. 23. 4), and was constantly associated with
him in ritual and art. See, for example, Pausanias, i. 40. 6, ii. 4.
5, ii. 11. 6, ii. 23. 4, ii. 27. 6, iii. 22. 13, v. 20. 3, v. 26. 2,
vii. 23. 7, viii. 28. 1, viii. 31. 1, viii. 32. 4, viii. 47. 1. The
snake-entwined goddess whose image was found in a prehistoric shrine
at Gournia in Crete may have been a predecessor of the
serpent-feeding Hygieia. See R. M. Burrows, _The Discoveries in
Crete_ (London, 1907), pp. 137 _sq._ The snakes, which were the
regular symbol of the Furies, may have been originally nothing but
the emblems or rather embodiments of the dead; and the Furies
themselves may, like Aesculapius, have been developed out of the
reptiles, sloughing off their serpent skins through the
anthropomorphic tendency of Greek thought.

M67 The serpents fed at the Thesmophoria may have been deemed
incarnations of the dead. Reluctance to disturb the Earth Goddess or
the spirits of the earth by the operations of digging and ploughing.
Hence agricultural operations are sometimes forbidden.

298 Scholia on Lucian, _Dial. Meretr._ ii. (_Scholia in Lucianum_, ed.
H. Rabe, Leipsic, 1906, pp. 275 _sq._). As to the Thesmophoria, see
my article, “Thesmophoria,” _Encyclopaedia Britannica_,9 xxiii. 295
_sqq._; _Spirits of the Corn and of the Wild_, ii. 17 _sqq._

299 A. S. Gatschet, _The Klamath Indians of South-Western Oregon_
(Washington, 1890), p. xcii.

300 Washington Matthews, “Myths of Gestation and Parturition,” _American
Anthropologist_, New Series, iv. (New York, 1902) p. 738.

_ 301 Central Provinces, Ethnographic Survey_, iii. _Draft Articles on
Forest Tribes_ (Allahabad, 1907), p. 23.

302 J. J. M. de Groot, _The Religious System of China_, v. (Leyden,
1907) pp. 536 _sq._

303 W. Crooke, _Natives of Northern India_ (London, 1907), p. 232.

304 J. Spieth, _Die Ewe-Stämme_ (Berlin, 1906), p. 796.

305 J. E. Erskine, _Journal of a Cruise among the Islands of the Western
Pacific_ (London, 1853), pp. 245 _sq._

M68 Graves as places of conception for women.

306 Persons initiated into the mysteries of Sabazius had a serpent drawn
through the bosom of their robes, and the reptile was identified
with the god (ὁ διὰ κόλπου θέος, Clement of Alexandria, _Protrept._
ii. 16, p. 14, ed. Potter). This may be a trace of the belief that
women can be impregnated by serpents, though it does not appear that
the ceremony was performed only on women.

307 See above, p. 78. Among the South Slavs women go to graves to get
children. See below, p. 96.

308 S. I. Curtiss, _Primitive Semitic Religion To-day_, pp. 115 _sqq._

309 A. C. Kruijt, _Het Animisme in den Indischen Archipel_ (The Hague,
1906), P. 398.

M69 Reincarnation of the dead in America and Africa.

_ 310 Relations des Jésuites_, 1636, p. 130 (Canadian reprint, Quebec,
1858). A similar custom was practised for a similar reason by the
Musquakie Indians. See Miss Mary Alicia Owen, _Folk-lore of the
Musquakie Indians of North America_ (London, 1904), pp. 22 _sq._,
86. Some of the instances here given have been already cited by Mr.
J. E. King, who suggests, with much probability, that the special
modes of burial adopted for infants in various parts of the world
may often have been intended to ensure their rebirth. See J. E.
King, “Infant Burial,” _Classical Review_, xvii. (1903) pp. 83 _sq._
For a large collection of evidence as to the belief in the
reincarnation of the dead, see E. S. Hartland, _Primitive Paternity_
(London, 1909-1910), i. 156 _sqq._

311 Mary H. Kingsley, _Travels in West Africa_ (London, 1897), p. 478.

312 Rev. John H. Weeks, “Notes on some Customs of the Lower Congo
People,” _Folk-lore_, xix. (1908) p. 422.

313 Th. Masui, _Guide de la Section de l’État Indépendant du Congo à
l’Exposition de Bruxelles-Tervueren en 1897_ (Brussels, 1897), pp.
113 _sq._

314 J. B. Purvis, _Through Uganda to Mount Elgon_ (London, 1909), pp.
302 _sq._ As to the Bagishu or Bageshu and their practice of
throwing out the dead, see Rev. J. Roscoe, “Notes on the Bageshu,”
_Journal of the Royal Anthropological Institute_, xxxix. (1909) pp.
181 _sqq._

M70 Measures taken to prevent the rebirth of undesirable spirits. Belief
of the Baganda that a woman can be impregnated by the flower of the
banana.

315 Rev. J. Roscoe, _The Baganda_ (London, 1911), pp. 46 _sq._ Women
adopted a like precaution at the grave of twins to prevent the
ghosts of the twins from entering into them and being born again
(_id._, pp. 124 _sq._). The Baganda always strangled children that
were born feet first and buried their bodies at cross-roads. The
heaps of sticks or grass thrown on these graves by passing women and
girls rose in time into mounds large enough to deflect the path and
to attract the notice of travellers. See J. Roscoe, _op. cit._ pp.
126 _sq._, 289.

316 Rev. J. Roscoe, _op. cit._ pp. 126 _sq._ In the Senegal and Niger
region of Western Africa it is said to be commonly believed by women
that they can conceive without any carnal knowledge of a man. See
Maurice Delafosse, _Haut-Sénégal-Niger, Le Pays, les Peuples, les
Langues, l’Histoire, les Civilisations_ (Paris, 1912), iii. 171.

317 Rev. J. Roscoe, _The Baganda_, pp. 47 _sq._; _Totemism and Exogamy_,
ii. 506 _sq._ As to the custom of depositing the afterbirths of
children at the foot of banana (plantain) trees, see J. Roscoe, _op.
cit._ pp. 52, 54 _sq._

M71 Reincarnation of the dead in India. Means taken to facilitate the
rebirth of dead children.

318 W. Crooke, _Natives of Northern India_ (London, 1907), p. 202. As to
the Hindoo custom of burying infants but burning older persons, see
_The Belief in Immortality and the Worship of the Dead_, i. 162
_sq._

_ 319 Census of India, 1911_, vol. xiv. _Punjab_, Part i., Report, by
Pandit Harikishan Kaul (Lahore, 1912), p. 299.

320 E. M. Gordon, _Indian Folk Tales_ (London, 1908), p. 49. Other
explanations of the custom are reported by the writer, but the
original motive was probably a desire to secure the reincarnation of
the dead child in the mother.

321 E. M. Gordon, _op. cit._ pp. 50 _sq._

322 E. Thurston, _Ethnographic Notes in Southern India_ (Madras, 1906),
p. 155; _id._, _Castes and Tribes of Southern India_ (Madras, 1909),
iv. 52.

323 W. Crooke, _Natives of Northern India_, p. 202; _Census of India,
1901_, vol. xvii. _Punjab_, Part i., Report, by H. A. Rose (Simla,
1902), pp. 213 _sq._

M72 Bringing back the soul of the dead in a fish or insect. Stories of
the Virgin Birth. Reincarnation of the dead among the South Slavs.

_ 324 Census of India, 1901_, vol. xiii. _Central Provinces_, Part i.,
Report, by R. V. Russell (Nagpur, 1902), p. 93.

325 For stories of such virgin births see Comte H. de Charency, _Le
folklore dans les deux Mondes_ (Paris, 1894), pp. 121-256; E. S.
Hartland, _The Legend of Perseus_, vol. i. (London, 1894) pp. 71
_sqq._; and my note on Pausanias vii. 17. 11 (vol. iv. pp. 138-140).
To the instances there cited by me add: A. Thevet, _Cosmographie
Universelle_ (Paris, 1575), ii. 918 [wrongly numbered 952]; K. von
den Steinen, _Unter den Naturvölkern Zentral-Brasiliens_ (Berlin,
1884), pp. 370, 373; H. A. Coudreau, _La France Equinoxiale_, ii.
(Paris, 1887) pp. 184 _sq._; _Relations des Jésuites_, 1637, pp. 123
_sq._ (Canadian reprint, Quebec, 1858); Franz Boas, _Indianische
Sagen von der Nord-Pacifischen Küste Amerikas_ (Berlin, 1895), pp.
311 _sq._; A. G. Morice, _Au pays de l’Ours Noir_ (Paris and Lyons,
1897), p. 153; A. Raffray, “Voyage à la côte nord de la Nouvelle
Guinée,” _Bulletin de la Société de Géographie_ (Paris), VIe Série,
xv. (1878) pp. 392 _sq._; J. L. van der Toorn, “Het animisme bij den
Minangkabauer der Padangsche Bovenlanden,” _Bijdragen tot de Taal-
Land- en Volkenkunde van Nederlandsch-Indië_, xxxix. (1890) p. 78;
E. Aymonier, “Les Tchames et leurs religions,” _Revue de l’Histoire
des Religions_, xxiv. (1901) pp. 215 _sq._; Major P. R. T. Gurdon,
_The Khasis_ (London, 1907), p. 195. In some stories the conception
is brought about not by eating food but by drinking water. But the
principle is the same.

326 F. S. Krauss, _Sitte und Brauch der Süd-Slaven_ (Vienna, 1885), p.
531.

M73 Belief of the Kai that women may be impregnated without sexual
intercourse. Belief in the island of Mota that a woman can conceive
through the entrance into her of a spirit animal or fruit.

327 Ch. Keysser, “Aus dem Leben der Kaileute,” in R. Neuhauss’s _Deutsch
Neu-Guinea_, iii. (Berlin, 1911) p. 26.

M74 Similar belief in the island of Motlav.

328 W. H. R. Rivers, “Totemism in Polynesia and Melanesia,” _Journal of
the Royal Anthropological Institute_, xxxix. (1909) pp. 173-175.
Compare _Totemism and Exogamy_, ii. 89 _sqq._ As to this Melanesian
belief that animals can enter into women and be born from them as
human children with animal characteristics, Dr. Rivers observes (p.
174): “It was clear that this belief was not accompanied by any
ignorance of the physical _rôle_ of the human father, and that the
father played the same part in conception as in cases of birth
unaccompanied by an animal appearance. We found it impossible to get
definitely the belief as to the nature of the influence exerted by
the animal on the woman, but it must be remembered that any belief
of this kind can hardly have escaped the many years of European
influence and Christian teaching which the people of this group have
received. It is doubtful whether even a prolonged investigation of
this point could now elicit the original belief of the people about
the nature of the influence.” To me it seems that the belief
described by Dr. Rivers in the text is incompatible with the
recognition of human fatherhood as a necessary condition for the
birth of children, and that though the people may now recognize that
necessity, perhaps as a result of intercourse with Europeans, they
certainly cannot have recognized it at the time when the belief in
question originated.

M75 Australian beliefs as to the birth of children. Reincarnation of the
dead in Central Australia.

329 Baldwin Spencer and F. J. Gillen, _Northern Tribes of Central
Australia_ (London, 1904), p. 330, compare _id._ _ibid._ pp. xi,
145, 147-151, 155 _sq._, 161 _sq._, 169 _sq._, 173 _sq._, 174-176,
606; _id._, _Native Tribes of Central Australia_ (London, 1899), pp.
52, 123-125, 126, 132 _sq._, 265, 335-338.

330 B. Spencer and F. J. Gillen, _Northern Tribes of Central Australia_,
pp. 162, 330 _sq._

331 B. Spencer and F. J. Gillen, _Native Tribes of Central Australia_,
pp. 337 _sq._

M76 Reincarnation of the dead in Northern Australia.

332 W. Baldwin Spencer, _An Introduction to the Study of Certain Native
Tribes of the Northern Territory_ (Melbourne, 1912), p. 6: “The two
fundamental beliefs of reincarnation and of children not being of
necessity the result of sexual intercourse, are firmly held by the
tribes in their normal wild state. There is no doubt whatever of
this, and we now know that these two beliefs extend through all the
tribes northwards to Katherine Creek and eastwards to the Gulf of
Carpentaria.” In a letter (dated Melbourne, July 27th, 1913)
Professor Baldwin Spencer writes to me that the natives on the
Alligator River in the Northern Territory “have detailed
traditions—as also have all the tribes—of how great ancestors
wandered over the country leaving numbers of spirit children behind
them who have been reincarnated time after time. They know who
everyone is a reincarnation of, as the names are perpetuated.”

333 W. Baldwin Spencer, _An Introduction to the Study of Certain Native
Tribes of the Northern Territory_ (Melbourne, 1912), pp. 41-45.

M77 Theories as to the birth of children among the tribes of Queensland.

334 Walter E. Roth, _North Queensland Ethnography_, _Bulletin_ No. 5,
_Superstition, Magic, and Medicine_ (Brisbane, 1903), pp. 22, § 81.

335 Walter E. Roth, _op. cit._ p. 23, § 82.

336 Walter E. Roth, _op. cit._ p. 23, § 83. Mr. Roth adds, very justly:
“When it is remembered that as a rule in all these Northern tribes,
a little girl may be given to and will live with her spouse as wife
long before she reaches the stage of puberty—the relationship of
which to fecundity is not recognised—the idea of conception not
being necessarily due to sexual connection becomes partly
intelligible.”

337 The Bishop of North Queensland (Dr. Frodsham) in a letter to me,
dated Bishop’s Lodge, Townsville, Queensland, July 9th, 1909. The
Bishop’s authority for the statement is the Rev. C. W. Morrison,
M.A., acting head of the Yarrubah Mission. In the same letter Dr.
Frodsham, speaking from personal observation, refers to “the belief,
practically universal among the northern tribes, that copulation is
not the cause of conception.” See J. G. Frazer, “Beliefs and Customs
of the Australian Aborigines,” _Folk-lore_, xx. (1909) pp. 350-352;
_Man_, ix. (1909) pp. 145-147; _Totemism and Exogamy_, i. 577 _sq._

M78 Theories as to the birth of children in Northern and Western
Australia. Belief that conception in women is caused by the food
they eat.

338 Herbert Basedow, _Anthropological Notes on the Western Coastal
Tribes of the Northern Territory of South Australia_, pp. 4 _sq._
(separate reprint from the _Transactions of the Royal Society of
South Australia_, vol. xxxi. 1907).

M79 Conception supposed to be caused by a man who is not the father.

339 A. R. Brown, “Beliefs concerning Childbirth in some Australian
Tribes,” _Man_, xii. (1912) pp. 180 _sq._ Compare _id._, “Three
Tribes of Western Australia,” _Journal of the Royal Anthropological
Institute_, xliii. (1913) p. 168.

M80 Some rude races still ignorant as to the cause of procreation.

340 Those who desire to pursue this subject further may consult with
advantage Mr. E. S. Hartland’s learned treatise _Primitive
Paternity_ (London, 1909-1910), which contains an ample collection
of facts and a careful discussion of them. Elsewhere I have argued
that the primitive ignorance of paternity furnishes the key to the
origin of totemism. See _Totemism and Exogamy_, i. 155 _sqq._, iv.
40 _sqq._

M81 Legends of virgin mothers.
M82 Procreative virtue apparently ascribed to the sacred stocks and
stones at Semitic sanctuaries.

341 Jeremiah ii. 27. The ancient Greeks seem also to have had a notion
that men were sprung from trees or rocks. See Homer, _Od._ xix. 163;
F. G. Welcker, _Griechische Götterlehre_ (Göttingen, 1857-1862), i.
777 _sqq._; A. B. Cook, “Oak and Rock,” _Classical Review_, xv.
(1901) pp. 322 _sqq._

342 The _ashera_ and the _masseba_. See 1 Kings xiv. 23; 2 Kings xviii.
4, xxiii. 14; Micah v. 13 _sq._ (in Hebrew, 12 _sq._); Deuteronomy
xvi. 21 _sq._; W. Robertson Smith, _Religion of the Semites_,2 pp.
187 _sqq._, 203 _sqq._; G. F. Moore, in _Encyclopaedia Biblica_,
_svv._, “Asherah” and “Massebah.” In the early religion of Crete
also the two principal objects of worship seem to have been a sacred
tree and a sacred pillar. See A. J. Evans, “Mycenaean Tree and
Pillar Cult,” _Journal of Hellenic Studies_, xxi. (1901) pp. 99
_sqq._

343 As to conical images of Semitic goddesses, see above, pp. 34 _sqq._
The sacred pole (_asherah_) appears also to have been by some people
regarded as the embodiment of a goddess (Astarte), not of a god. See
above, p. 18, note 2. Among the Khasis of Assam the sacred upright
stones, which resemble the Semitic _masseboth_, are regarded as
males, and the flat table-stones as female. See P. R. T. Gurdon,
_The Khasis_ (London, 1907), pp. 112 _sq._, 150 _sqq._ So in
Nikunau, one of the Gilbert Islands in the South Pacific, the
natives had sandstone slabs or pillars which represented gods and
goddesses. “If the stone slab represented a goddess it was not
placed erect, but laid down on the ground. Being a lady they thought
it would be cruel to make her stand so long.” See G. Turner, LL.D.,
_Samoa_ (London, 1884), p. 296.

M83 These conclusions confirmed by the excavation of a sanctuary at the
Canaanitish city of Gezer. The infants buried in the sanctuary may
have been expected to be born again.

344 See above, pp. 91 _sqq._

345 As to the excavations at Gezer, see R. A. Stewart Macalister,
_Reports on the Excavation of Gezer_ (London, N.D.), pp. 76-89
(reprinted from the _Quarterly Statement of the Palestine
Exploration Fund_); _id._, _Bible Side-lights from the Mound of
Gezer_ (London, 1906), pp. 57-67, 73-75. Professor Macalister now
inclines to regard the socketed stone as a laver rather than as the
base of the sacred pole. He supposes that the buried infants were
first-born children sacrificed in accordance with the ancient law of
the dedication of the first-born. The explanation which I have
adopted in the text agrees better with the uninjured state of the
bodies, and it is further confirmed by the result of the Austrian
excavations at Tell Ta’annek (Taanach) in Palestine, which seem to
prove that there children up to the age of two years were not buried
in the family graves but interred separately in jars. Some of these
sepulchral jars were deposited under or beside the houses, but many
were grouped round a rock-hewn altar in a different part of the
hill. There is nothing to indicate that any of the children were
sacrificed: the size of some of the skeletons precludes the idea
that they were slain at birth. Probably they all died natural
deaths, and the custom of burying them in or near the house or
beside an altar was intended to ensure their rebirth in the family.
See Dr. E. Sellin, “Tell Ta’annek,” _Denkschriften der Kaiser.
Akademie der Wissenschaften, Philosophisch-historische Klasse_, l.
(Vienna, 1904), No. iv. pp. 32-37, 96 _sq._ Compare W. W. Graf
Baudissin, _Adonis und Esmun_, p. 59 n.3. I have to thank Professor
R. A. Stewart Macalister for kindly directing my attention to the
excavations at Tell Ta’annek (Taanach). It deserves to be mentioned
that in an enclosure close to the standing stones at Gezer, there
was found a bronze model of a cobra (R. A. Stewart Macalister,
_Bible Side-lights_, p. 76). Perhaps the reptile was the deity of
the shrine, or an embodiment of an ancestral spirit.

M84 Semitic custom of sacrificing a member of the royal family. The
burning of Melcarth at Tyre. Festival of “the awakening of Hercules”
at Tyre.

_ 346 The Dying God_, pp. 166 _sqq._ See Note I., “Moloch the King,” at
the end of this volume.

347 Philo of Byblus, quoted by Eusebius, _Praepar. Evang._ i. 10. 29
_sq._; 2 Kings iii. 27.

348 See above, p. 15.

349 Philo of Byblus, in _Fragmenta Historicorum Graecorum_, ed. C.
Müller, iii. pp. 569, 570, 571. See above, p. 13.

350 See above, p. 16.

351 Sophocles, _Trachiniae_, 1191 _sqq._; Apollodorus, _Bibliotheca_,
ii. 7. 7; Diodorus Siculus, iv. 38; Hyginus, _Fab._ 36.

352 [S. Clementis Romani,] _Recognitiones_, x. 24, p. 233, ed. E. G.
Gersdorf (Migne’s _Patrologia Graeca_, i. 1434).

353 Josephus, _Antiquit. Jud._ viii. 5. 3, _Contra Apionem_, i. 18.
Whether the quadriennial festival of Hercules at Tyre (2 Maccabees
iv. 18-20) was a different celebration, or only “the awakening of
Melcarth,” celebrated with unusual pomp once in four years, we do
not know.

354 Eudoxus of Cnidus, quoted by Athenaeus, ix. 47, p. 392 D, E. That
the death and resurrection of Melcarth were celebrated in an annual
festival at Tyre has been recognised by scholars. See
Raoul-Rochette, “Sur l’Hercule Assyrien et Phénicien,” _Mémoires de
l’Académie des Inscriptions et Belles-Lettres_, xvii. Deuxième
Partie (Paris, 1848), pp. 25 _sqq._; H. Hubert et M. Mauss, “Essai
sur le sacrifice,” _L’Année Sociologique_, ii. (1899) pp. 122, 124;
M. J. Lagrange, _Études sur les Religions Sémitiques_,2 pp. 308-311.
Iolaus is identified by some modern scholars with Eshmun, a
Phoenician and Carthaginian deity about whom little is known. See F.
C. Movers, _Die Phoenizier_, i. (Bonn, 1841) pp. 536 _sqq._; F.
Baethgen, _Beiträge zur semitischen Religionsgeschichte_ (Berlin,
1888), pp. 44 _sqq._; C. P. Tiele, _Geschichte der Religion im
Altertum_ (Gotha, 1896-1903), i. 268; W. W. Graf Baudissin, _Adonis
und Esmun_, pp. 282 _sqq._

355 Zenobius, _Centur._ v. 56 (_Paroemiographi Graeci_, ed. E. L.
Leutsch et F. G. Schneidewin, Göttingen, 1839-1851, vol. i. p. 143).

356 Quails were perhaps burnt in honour of the Cilician Hercules or
Sandan at Tarsus. See below, p. 126, note 2.

357 Alfred Newton, _Dictionary of Birds_ (London, 1893-96), p. 755.

358 H. B. Tristram, _The Fauna and Flora of Palestine_ (London, 1884),
p. 124. For more evidence as to the migration of quails see Aug.
Dillmann’s commentary on Exodus xvi. 13, pp. 169 _sqq._ (Leipsic,
1880).

359 The Tyrian Hercules was said to be a son of Zeus and Asteria
(Eudoxus of Cnidus, quoted by Athenaeus, ix. 47, p. 392 D; Cicero,
_De natura deorum_, iii. 16. 42). As to the transformation of
Asteria into a quail see Apollodorus, _Bibliotheca_, i. 4. 1; J.
Tzetzes, _Schol. on Lycophron_, 401; Hyginus, _Fab._ 53; Servius on
Virgil, _Aen._ iii. 73. The name Asteria may be a Greek form of
Astarte. See W. W. Graf Baudissin, _Adonis und Esmun_, p. 307.

360 Quintus Curtius, iv. 2. 10; Arrian, _Anabasis_, ii. 24. 5.

M85 Worship of Melcarth at Gades, and trace of a custom of burning him
there in effigy.

361 Strabo, iii. 5. 5, pp. 169 _sq._; Mela, iii. 46; Scymnus Chius,
_Orbis Descriptio_, 159-161 (_Geographi Graeci Minores_, ed. C.
Müller, i. 200 _sq._).

362 Silius Italicus, iii. 14-32; Mela, iii. 46; Strabo, iii. 5. 3, 5, 7,
pp. 169, 170, 172; Diodorus Siculus, v. 20. 2; Philostratus, _Vita
Apollonii_, v. 4 _sq._; Appian, _Hispanica_, 65. Compare Arrian,
_Anabasis_, ii. 16. 4. That the bones of Hercules were buried at
Gades is mentioned by Mela (_l.c._). Compare Arnobius, _Adversus
Nationes_, i. 36. In Italy women were not allowed to participate in
sacrifices offered to Hercules (Aulus Gellius, xi. 6. 2; Macrobius,
_Saturn._ i. 12. 28; Sextus Aurelius Victor, _De origine gentis
Romanae_, vi. 6; Plutarch, _Quaestiones Romanae_, 60). Whether the
priests of Melcarth at Gades were celibate, or had only to observe
continence at certain seasons, does not appear. At Tyre the priest
of Melcarth might be married (Justin, xviii. 4. 5). The worship of
Melcarth under the name of Hercules continued to flourish in the
south of Spain down to the time of the Roman Empire. See J. Toutain,
_Les Cultes païens dans l’Empire Romain_, Première Partie, i.
(Paris, 1907) pp. 400 _sqq._

363 Livy, xxi. 21. 9, 22. 5-9; Cicero, _De Divinatione_, i. 24. 49;
Silius Italicus, iii. 1 _sqq._, 158 _sqq._

364 Pausanias, x. 4. 5.

365 B. V. Head, _Historia Numorum_ (Oxford, 1887), p. 674; G. A. Cooke,
_Text-Book of North-Semitic Inscriptions_, p. 351.

366 F. Imhoof-Blumer and P. Gardner, _Numismatic Commentary on
Pausanias_, pp. 10-12, with pl. A; Stoll, _s.v._ “Melikertes,” in W.
H. Roscher’s _Lexikon der griech. und röm. Mythologie_, ii. 2634.

M86 Evidence of a custom of burning a god or goddess at Carthage. The
fire-walk at Tyre. The fire-walk at Castabala. The Carthaginian king
Hamilcar sacrifices himself in the fire.

367 Justin, xviii. 6. 1-7; Virgil, _Aen._ iv. 473 _sqq._, v. i. _sqq._;
Ovid, _Fasti_, iii. 545 _sqq._; Timaeus, in _Fragmenta Historicorum
Graecorum_, ed. C. Müller, i. 197. Compare W. Robertson Smith,
_Religion of the Semites_,2 pp. 373 _sqq._ The name of Dido has been
plausibly derived by Gesenius, Movers, E. Meyer, and A. H. Sayce
from the Semitic _dôd_, “beloved.” See F. C. Movers, _Die
Phoenizier_, i. 616; Meltzer, _s.v._ “Dido,” in W. H. Roscher’s
_Lexikon der griech. und röm. Mythologie_, i. 1017 _sq._; A. H.
Sayce, _Lectures on the Religion of the Ancient Babylonians_ (London
and Edinburgh, 1887), pp. 56 _sqq._ If they are right, the divine
character of Dido becomes more probable than ever, since “the
Beloved” (_Dodah_) seems to have been a title of a Semitic goddess,
perhaps Astarte. See above, p. 20, note 2. According to Varro it was
not Dido but her sister Anna who slew herself on a pyre for love of
Aeneas (Servius on Virgil, _Aen._ iv. 682).

368 Justin, xviii. 6. 8.

369 Silius Italicus, i. 81 _sqq._

370 See above, pp. 16, 110 _sqq._

371 Ezekiel xxviii. 14, compare 16.

_ 372 Balder the Beautiful_, ii. 1 _sqq._ But, as I have there pointed
out, there are grounds for thinking that the custom of walking over
fire is not a substitute for human sacrifice, but merely a stringent
form of purification. On fire as a purificatory agent see below, pp.
179 _sqq._, 188 _sq._

373 Strabo, xii. 2. 7, p. 537. In Greece itself accused persons used to
prove their innocence by walking through fire (Sophocles,
_Antigone_, 264 _sq._, with Jebb’s note). Possibly the fire-walk of
the priestesses at Castabala was designed to test their chastity.
For this purpose the priests and priestesses of the Tshi-speaking
people of the Gold Coast submit to an ordeal, standing one by one in
a narrow circle of fire. This “is supposed to show whether they have
remained pure, and refrained from sexual intercourse, during the
period of retirement, and so are worthy of inspiration by the gods.
If they are pure they will receive no injury and suffer no pain from
the fire” (A. B. Ellis, _The Tshi-speaking Peoples of the Gold
Coast_, London, 1887, p. 138). These cases favour the purificatory
explanation of the fire-walk.

374 Euripides, _Iphigenia in Tauris_, 621-626. Compare Diodorus Siculus,
xx. 14. 6.

375 Herodotus, vii. 167. This was the Carthaginian version of the story.
According to another account, Hamilcar was killed by the Greek
cavalry (Diodorus Siculus, xi. 22. 1). His worship at Carthage is
mentioned by Athenagoras (_Supplicatio pro Christianis_, p. 64, ed.
J. C. T. Otto, Jena, 1857.) I have called Hamilcar a king in
accordance with the usage of Greek writers (Herodotus, vii. 165
_sq._; Aristotle, _Politics_, ii. 11; Polybius, vi. 51; Diodorus
Siculus, xiv. 54. 5). But the _suffetes_, or supreme magistrates, of
Carthage were two in number; whether they were elected for a year or
for life seems to be doubtful. Cornelius Nepos, who calls them
kings, says that they were elected annually (_Hannibal_, vii. 4),
and Livy (xxx. 7. 5) compares them to the consuls; but Cicero (_De
re publica_, ii. 23. 42 _sq._) seems to imply that they held office
for life. See G. A. Cooke, _Text-book of North-Semitic
Inscriptions_, pp. 115 _sq._

M87 The death of Hercules a Greek version of the burning of Melcarth.

376 Lucian, _Amores_, 1 and 54.

M88 The Tyrian Melcarth in Cyprus. The lion-slaying god.

377 See above, p. 32.

378 G. A. Cooke, _Text-book of North-Semitic Inscriptions_, Nos. 23 and
29, PP. 73, 83 _sq._, with the notes on pp. 81, 84.

379 G. Perrot et Ch. Chipiez, _Histoire de l’Art dans l’Antiquité_, iii.
566-578. The colossal statue found at Amathus may be related,
directly or indirectly, to the Egyptian god Bes, who is represented
as a sturdy misshapen dwarf, wearing round his body the skin of a
beast of the panther tribe, with its tail hanging down. See E. A.
Wallis Budge, _The Gods of the Egyptians_ (London, 1904), ii. 284
_sqq._; A. Wiedemann, _Religion of the Ancient Egyptians_ (London,
1897), pp. 159 _sqq._; A. Furtwängler, _s.v._ “Herakles,” in W. H.
Roscher’s _Lexikon der griech. und röm. Mythologie_, i. 2143 _sq._

380 However, human victims were burned at Salamis in Cyprus. See below,
p. 145.

M89 The Baal of Tarsus, an Oriental god of corn and grapes.

381 See above, p. 41.

382 For traces of Phoenician influence in Cilicia see F. C. Movers, _Die
Phoenizier_, ii. 2, pp. 167-174, 207 _sqq._ Herodotus says (vii. 91)
that the Cilicians were named after Cilix, a son of the Phoenician
Agenor.

383 As to the fertility and the climate of the plain of Tarsus, which is
now very malarious, see E. J. Davis, _Life in Asiatic Turkey_
(London, 1879), chaps. i.-vii. The gardens for miles round the city
are very lovely, but wild and neglected, full of magnificent trees,
especially fine oak, ash, orange, and lemon-trees. The vines run to
the top of the highest branches, and almost every garden resounds
with the song of the nightingale (E. J. Davis, _op. cit._ p. 35).

384 Strabo, xiv. 5. 13, pp. 673 _sq._

385 Dio Chrysostom, _Or._ xxxiii. vol. ii. pp. 14 _sq._, 17, ed. L.
Dindorf (Leipsic, 1857).

386 F. C. Movers, _Die Phoenizier_, ii. 2, pp. 171 _sq._; P. Gardner,
_Types of Greek Coins_ (Cambridge, 1883), pl. x. Nos. 29, 30; B. V.
Head, _Historia Numorum_ (Oxford, 1887), p. 614; G. F. Hill,
_Catalogue of Greek Coins of Lycaonia, Isauria, and Cilicia_
(London, 1900), pp. 167-176, pl. xxix.-xxxii.; G. Macdonald,
_Catalogue of Greek Coins in the Hunterian Collection_ (Glasgow,
1899-1905), ii. 547; G. Perrot et Ch. Chipiez, _Histoire de l’Art
dans l’Antiquité_, iv. 727. In later times, from about 175 B.C.
onward, the Baal of Tarsus was completely assimilated to Zeus on the
coins. See B. V. Head, _op. cit._ p. 617; G. F. Hill, _op. cit._ pp.
177, 181.

M90 The Baal of Tarsus has his counterpart at Ibreez in Cappadocia. The
pass of the Cilician Gates.

387 Sir W. M. Ramsay, _Luke the Physician, and other Studies in the
History of Religion_ (London, 1908), pp. 112 _sqq._

M91 The rock-sculptures at Ibreez represent a god of corn and grapes
adored by his worshipper, a priest or king.

388 E. J. Davis, “On a New Hamathite Inscription at Ibreez,”
_Transactions of the Society of Biblical Archaeology_, iv. (1876)
pp. 336-346; _id._, _Life in Asiatic Turkey_ (London, 1879), pp.
245-260; G. Perrot et Ch. Chipiez, _Histoire de l’Art dans
l’Antiquité_, iv. 723-729; Ramsay and Hogarth, “Prehellenic
Monuments of Cappadocia,” _Recueil de Travaux relatifs à la
Philologie et à l’Archéologie Égyptiennes et Assyriennes_, xiv.
(1903) pp. 77-81, 85 _sq._, with plates iii. and iv.; L.
Messerschmidt, _Corpus Inscriptionum Hettiticarum_ (Berlin, 1900),
Tafel xxxiv.; Sir W. M. Ramsay, _Luke the Physician_ (London, 1908),
pp. 171 _sqq._; John Garstang, _The Land of the Hittites_ (London,
1910), pp. 191-195, 378 _sq._ Of this sculptured group Messrs. W. M.
Ramsay and D. G. Hogarth say that “it yields to no rock-relief in
the world in impressive character” (_American Journal of
Archaeology_, vi. (1890) p. 347). Professor Garstang would date the
sculptures in the tenth or ninth century B.C. Another inscribed
Hittite monument found at Bor, near the site of the ancient Tyana,
exhibits a very similar figure of a priest or king in an attitude of
adoration. The resemblance extends even to the patterns embroidered
on the robe and shawl, which include the well-known _swastika_
carved on the lower border of the long robe. The figure is
sculptured in high relief on a slab of stone and would seem to have
been surrounded by inscriptions, though a portion of them has
perished. See J. Garstang, _op. cit._ pp. 185-188, with plate lvi.
For the route from Tarsus to Ibreez (Ivriz) see E. J. Davis, _Life
in Asiatic Turkey_, pp. 198-244; J. Garstang, _op. cit._ pp. 44
_sqq._

M92 The fertility of Ibreez contrasted with the desolation of the
surrounding country.

389 See above, pp. 28 _sq._

390 Strabo, xii. 2. 7, p. 537. When Cicero was proconsul of Cilicia
(51-50 B.C.) he encamped with his army for some days at Cybistra,
from which two of his letters to Atticus are dated. But hearing that
the Parthians, who had invaded Syria, were threatening Cilicia, he
hurried by forced marches through the pass of the Cilician Gates to
Tarsus. See Cicero, _Ad Atticum_, v. 18, 19, 20; _Ad Familiares_,
xv. 2, 4.

391 E. J. Davis, in _Transactions of the Society of Biblical
Archaeology_, iv. (1876) pp. 336 _sq._, 346; _id._, _Life in Asiatic
Turkey_, pp. 232 _sq._, 236 _sq._, 264 _sq._, 270-272. Compare W. J.
Hamilton, _Researches in Asia Minor, Pontus, and Armenia_ (London,
1842), ii. 304-307.

M93 The horned god.

392 L. Messerschmidt, _The Hittites_ (London, 1903), pp. 49 _sq._ On an
Assyrian cylinder, now in the British Museum, we see a warlike deity
with bow and arrows standing on a lion, and wearing a similar bonnet
decorated with horns and surmounted by a star or sun. See De Vogüé,
_Mélanges d’Archéologie Orientale_ (Paris, 1868), p. 46, who
interprets the deity as the great Asiatic goddess. As to the horned
god of Ibreez “it is a plausible theory that the horns may, in this
case, be analogous to the Assyrian emblem of divinity. The sculpture
is late and its style rather suggests Semitic influence” (Professor
J. Garstang, in some MS. notes with which he has kindly furnished
me).

393 See below, p. 132.

_ 394 Spirits of the Corn and of the Wild_, i. 16 _sq._, ii. 3 _sqq._

M94 The god of Ibreez a Hittite deity.

395 The identification is accepted by E. Meyer (_Geschichte des
Altertums_,2 i. 2. p. 641), G. Perrot et Ch. Chipiez (_Histoire de
l’Art dans l’Antiquité_, iv. 727), and P. Jensen (_Hittiter und
Armenier_, Strasburg, 1898, p. 145).

396 Ramsay and Hogarth, “Pre-Hellenic Monuments of Cappadocia,” _Recueil
de Travaux relatifs à la Philologie et à l’Archéologie Égyptiennes
et Assyriennes_, xiv. (1893) p. 79.

397 G. Maspero, _Histoire Ancienne des Peuples de l’Orient Classique_,
ii. 360-362; G. Perrot et Ch. Chipiez, _Histoire de l’Art dans
l’Antiquité_, iv. 572 _sqq._, 586 _sq._

398 That the cradle of the Hittites was in the interior of Asia Minor,
particularly in Cappadocia, and that they spread from there south,
east, and west, is the view of A. H. Sayce, W. M. Ramsay, D. G.
Hogarth, W. Max Müller, F. Hommel, L. B. Paton, and L.
Messerschmidt. See _Palestine Exploration Fund Quarterly Statement
for 1884_, p. 49; A. H. Sayce, _The Hittites_3 (London, 1903), pp.
80 _sqq._; W. Max Müller, _Asien und Europa_ (Leipsic, 1893), pp.
319 _sqq._; Ramsay and Hogarth, “Pre-Hellenic Monuments of
Cappadocia,” _Recueil de Travaux relatifs à la Philologie et à
l’Archéologie Égyptiennes et Assyriennes_, xv. (1893) p. 94; F.
Hommel, _Grundriss der Geographie und Geschichte des alten Orients_
(Munich, 1904), pp. 42, 48, 54; L. B. Paton, _The Early History of
Syria and Palestine_ (London, 1902), pp. 105 _sqq._; L.
Messerschmidt, _The Hittites_ (London, 1903), pp. 12, 13, 19, 20; D.
G. Hogarth, “Recent Hittite Research,” _Journal of the Royal
Anthropological Institute_, xxxix. (1909) pp. 408 _sqq._ Compare Ed.
Meyer, _Geschichte des Altertums_,2 i. 2. (Stuttgart and Berlin,
1909) pp. 617 sqq.; J. Garstang, _The Land of the Hittites_, pp. 315
_sqq._ The native Hittite writing is a system of hieroglyphics which
has not yet been read, but in their intercourse with foreign nations
the Hittites used the Babylonian cuneiform script. Clay tablets
bearing inscriptions both in the Babylonian and in the Hittite
language have been found by Dr. H. Winckler at Boghaz-Keui, the
great Hittite capital in Cappadocia; so that the sounds of the
Hittite words, though not their meanings, are now known. According
to Professor Ed. Meyer, it seems certain that the Hittite language
was neither Semitic nor Indo-European. As to the inscribed tablets
of Boghaz-Keui, see H. Winckler, “Vorläufige Nachrichten über die
Ausgrabungen in Boghaz-köi im Sommer 1907, 1. Die Tontafelfunde,”
_Mitteilungen der Deutschen Orient-Gesellschaft zu Berlin_, No. 35,
December 1907, pp. 1-59; “Hittite Archives from Boghaz-Keui,”
translated from the German transcripts of Dr. Winckler by Meta E.
Williams, _Annals of Archaeology and Anthropology_, iv. (Liverpool,
1912), pp. 90-98.

399 G. Maspero, _Histoire Ancienne des Peuples de l’Orient Classique_,
ii. 351, note 3, with his references; L. B. Paton, _op. cit._ p.
109; L. Messerschmidt, _The Hittites_, p. 10; F. Hommel, _op. cit._
p. 42; W. Max Müller, _Asien und Europa_, p. 332. See the preceding
note.

M95 The burning of Sandan or Hercules at Tarsus.

400 A. H. Sayce, “The Hittite Inscriptions,” _Recueil de Travaux
relatifs à la Philologie et à l’Archéologie Égyptiennes et
Assyriennes_, xiv. (1893) pp. 48 _sq._; P. Jensen, _Hittiter und
Armenier_ (Strasburg, 1898), pp. 42 _sq._

401 Georgius Syncellus, _Chronographia_, vol. i. p. 290, ed. G. Dindorf
(Bonn, 1829): Ἡρακλέα τινές φασιν ἐν Φοινίκῃ γνωρίζεσθαι Σάνδαν
ἐπιλεγόμενον, ὡς καὶ μεχρὶ νῦν ὑπὸ Καππαδόκων καὶ Κιλίκων. In this
passage Σάνδαν is a correction of F. C. Movers’s (_Die Phoenizier_,
i. 460) for the MS. reading Δισανδάν, the ΔΙ having apparently
arisen by dittography from the preceding ΑΙ; and Κιλίκων is a
correction of E. Meyer’s (“Über einige semitische Götter,”
_Zeitschrift der Deutschen Morgenländischen Gesellschaft_, xxxi.
737) for the MS. reading Ἱλίων. Compare Jerome (quoted by Movers and
Meyer, _ll.cc._): “_Hercules cognomento Desanaus in Syria Phoenice
clarus habetur. Inde ad nostram usque memoriam a Cappadocibus et
Eliensibus (al. Deliis) Desanaus adhuc dicitur._” If the text of
Jerome is here sound, he would seem to have had before him a Greek
original which was corrupt like the text of Syncellus or of
Syncellus’s authority. The Cilician Hercules is called Sandes by
Nonnus (_Dionys._, xxxiv. 183 _sq._). Compare Raoul-Rochette in
_Mémoires de l’Académie des Inscriptions et Belles-Lettres_, xvii.
Deuxième Partie (Paris, 1848), pp. 159 _sqq._

402 Ammianus Marcellinus, xiv. 8. 3; Dio Chrysostom, _Or._ xxxiii. vol.
ii. p. 16, ed. L. Dindorf (Leipsic, 1857). The pyre is mentioned
only by Dio Chrysostom, whose words clearly imply that its erection
was a custom observed periodically. On Sandan or Sandon see K. O.
Müller, “Sandon und Sardanapal,” _Kunstarchaeologische Werke_, iii.
6 _sqq._; F. C. Movers, _Die Phoenizier_, i. 458 _sqq._;
Raoul-Rochette, “Sur l’Hercule Assyrien et Phénicien,” _Mémoires de
l’Académie des Inscriptions et Belles-Lettres_, xvii. Deuxième
Partie (Paris, 1848), pp. 178 _sqq._; E. Meyer, “Über einige
Semitische Götter,” _Zeitschrift der Deutschen Morgenländischen
Gesellschaft_, xxxi. (1877) pp. 736-740: _id._, _Geschichte des
Altertums_,2 i. 2. pp. 641 _sqq._ § 484.

403 P. Gardner, _Catalogue of Greek Coins, the Seleucid Kings of Syria_
(London, 1878), pp. 72, 78, 89, 112, pl. xxi. 6, xxiv. 3, xxviii. 8;
G. F. Hill, _Catalogue of the Greek Coins of Lycaonia, Isauria, and
Cilicia_ (London, 1900), pp. 180, 181, 183, 190, 221, 224, 225, pl.
xxxiii. 2, 3, xxxiv. 10, xxxvii. 9; F. Imhoof-Blumer, “Coin-types of
some Kilikian Cities,” _Journal of Hellenic Studies_, xviii. (1898)
p. 169, pl. xiii. 1, 2. The structure represented on the coins is
sometimes called not the pyre but the monument of Sandan or
Sardanapalus. Certainly the cone resting on the square base reminds
us of the similar structure on the coins of Byblus as well as of the
conical image of Aphrodite at Paphos (see above, pp. 14, 34); but
the words of Dio Chrysostom make it probable that the design on the
coins of Tarsus represents the pyre. At the same time, the burning
of the god may well have been sculptured on a permanent monument of
stone. The legend ΟΡΤΥΓΟΘΗΡΑ, literally “quail-hunt,” which appears
on some coins of Tarsus (G. F. Hill, _op. cit._ pp. lxxxvi. _sq._),
may refer to a custom of catching quails and burning them on the
pyre. We have seen (above, pp. 111 _sq._) that quails were
apparently burnt in sacrifice at Byblus. This explanation of the
legend on the coins of Tarsus was suggested by Raoul-Rochette (_op.
cit._ pp. 201-205). However, Mr. G. F. Hill writes to me that “the
interpretation of Ὀρτυγοθήρα as anything but a personal name is
rendered very unlikely by the analogy of all the other inscriptions
on coins of the same class.” Doves were burnt on a pyre in honour of
Adonis (below, p. 147). Similarly birds were burnt on a pyre in
honour of Laphrian Artemis at Patrae (Pausanias, vii. 18. 12).

404 Herodian, iv. 2.

405 See Franz Cumont, “L’Aigle funéraire des Syriens et l’Apothéose des
Empereurs,” _Revue de l’Histoire des Religions_, lxii, (1910) pp.
119-163.

M96 Sandan of Tarsus an Asiatic god with the symbols of the lion and the
double axe.

406 F. Imhoof-Blumer, _Monnaies Grecques_ (Amsterdam, 1883), pp. 366
_sq._, 433, 435, with plates F. 24, 25, H. 14 (_Verhandelingen der
Konink. Akademie von Wetenschappen_, Afdeeling Letterkunde, xiv.);
F. Imhoof-Blumer und O. Keller, _Tier- und Pflanzenbilder auf Münzen
und Gemmen des klassischen Altertums_ (Leipsic, 1889), pp. 70 _sq._,
with pl. xii. 7, 8, 9; F. Imhoof-Blumer, “Coin-types of some
Kilikian Cities,” _Journal of Hellenic Studies_, xviii. (1898) pp.
169-171; P. Gardner, _Types of Greek Coins_, pl. xiii. 20; G. F.
Hill, _Catalogue of the Greek Coins of Lycaonia, Isauria, and
Cilicia_, pp. 178, 179, 184, 186, 206, 213, with plates xxxii. 13,
14, 15, 16, xxxiv. 2, xxxvi. 9; G. Macdonald, _Catalogue of Greek
Coins in the Hunterian Collection_, ii. 548, with pl. lx. 11. The
booted Sandan is figured by G. F. Hill, _op. cit._ pl. xxxvi. 9.

M97 Boghaz-Keui the ancient capital of a Hittite kingdom in Cappadocia.

407 Herodotus, i. 76; Stephanus Byzantius, _s.v._ Πτέριον. As to the
situation of Boghaz-Keui and the ruins of Pteria see W. J. Hamilton,
_Researches in Asia Minor, Pontus, and Armenia_ (London, 1842), i.
391 _sqq._; H. Barth, “Reise von Trapezunt durch die nördliche
Hälfte Klein-Asiens,” _Ergänzungsheft zu Petermann’s Geographischen
Mittheilungen_, No. 2 (1860), pp. 44-52; H. F. Tozer, _Turkish
Armenia and Eastern Asia Minor_ (London, 1881), pp. 64, 71 _sqq._;
W. M. Ramsay, “Historical Relations of Phrygia and Cappadocia,”
_Journal of the Royal Asiatic Society_, N.S., xv. (1883) p. 103;
_id._, _Historical Geography of Asia Minor_ (London, 1890), pp. 28
_sq._, 33 _sq._; G. Perrot et Ch. Chipiez, _Histoire de l’Art dans
l’Antiquité_, iv. 596 _sqq._; K. Humann und O. Puchstein, _Reisen in
Kleinasien und Nordsyrien_ (Berlin, 1890), pp. 71-80, with Atlas,
plates xi.-xiv.; E. Chantre, _Mission en Cappadoce_ (Paris, 1898),
pp. 13 _sqq._; O. Puchstein, “Die Bauten von Boghaz-Köi,”
_Mitteilungen der Deutschen Orient-Gesellschaft zu Berlin_, No. 35,
December 1907, pp. 62 _sqq._; J. Garstang, _The Land of the
Hittites_ (London, 1910), pp. 196 _sqq._

M98 The sanctuary in the rocks. The rock-sculptures in the outer
sanctuary at Boghaz-Keui represent two processions meeting. The
central figures.

408 This procession of men is broken (_a_) by two women clad in long
plaited robes like the women on the opposite wall; (_b_) by two
winged monsters; and (_c_) by the figure of a priest or king as to
which see below, pp. 131 _sq._

M99 The rock-sculptures in the inner sanctuary at Boghaz-Keui. The
lion-god. The god protecting his priest. Other representations of
the priest at Boghaz-Keui and Euyuk.

409 W. J. Hamilton, _Researches in Asia Minor, Pontus, and Armenia_
(London, 1842), i. 393-395; H. F. Tozer, _Turkish Armenia and
Eastern Asia Minor_, pp. 59 _sq._, 66-78; W. M. Ramsay, “Historical
Relations of Phrygia and Asia Minor,” _Journal of the Royal Asiatic
Society_, N.S. xv. (1883) pp. 113-120; G. Perrot et Ch. Chipiez,
_Histoire de l’Art dans l’Antiquité_, iv. 623-656, 666-672; K.
Humann und O. Puchstein, _Reisen in Kleinasien und Nordsyrien_, pp.
55-70, with Atlas, plates vii.-x.; E. Chantre, _Mission en
Cappadoce_, pp. 3-5, 16-26; L. Messerschmidt, _The Hittites_, pp.
42-50; Th. Macridy-Bey, _La Porte des Sphinx à Eyuk_, pp. 13 _sq._
(_Mitteilungen der Vorderasiatischen Gesellschaft_, 1908, No. 3,
Berlin); Ed. Meyer, _Geschichte des Altertums_,2 i. 2. pp. 631
_sq._; J. Garstang, _The Land of the Hittites_ (London, 1910), pp.
196 _sqq._ (Boghaz-Keui) 256 _sqq._ (Eyuk). Compare P. Jensen,
_Hittiter und Armenier_, pp. 165 _sqq._ In some notes with which my
colleague Professor J. Garstang has kindly furnished me he tells me
that the two animals wearing Hittite hats, which appear between the
great god and goddess in the outer sanctuary, are not bulls but
certainly goats; and he inclines to think that the two heaps on
which the priest stands in the outer sanctuary are fir-cones.
Professor Ed. Meyer holds that the costume which the priestly king
wears is that of the Sun-goddess, and that the corresponding figure
in the procession of males on the left-hand side of the outer
sanctuary does not represent the priestly king but the Sun-goddess
in person. “The attributes of the King,” he says (_op. cit._ p.
632), “are to be explained by the circumstance that he, as the
Hittite inscriptions prove, passed for an incarnation of the Sun,
who with the Hittites was a female divinity; the temple of the Sun
is therefore his emblem.” As to the title of “the Sun” bestowed on
Hittite kings in inscriptions, see H. Winckler, “Vorläufige
Nachrichten über die Ausgrabungen in Boghaz-köi im Sommer 1907,”
_Mitteilungen der Deutschen Orient-Gesellschaft zu Berlin_, No. 35,
December 1907, pp. 32, 33, 36, 44, 45, 53. The correct form of the
national name appears to be Chatti or Hatti rather than Hittites,
which is the Hebrew form (חתי) of the name. Compare M. Jastrow, in
_Encyclopaedia Biblica_, ii. coll. 2094 _sqq._, _s.v._ “Hittites.”

An interesting Hittite symbol which occurs both in the sanctuary at
Boghaz-Keui and at the palace of Euyuk is the double-headed eagle.
In both places it serves as the support of divine or priestly
personages. After being adopted as a badge by the Seljuk Sultans in
the Middle Ages, it passed into Europe with the Crusaders and became
in time the escutcheon of the Austrian and Russian empires. See W.
J. Hamilton, _op. cit._ i. 383; G. Perrot et Ch. Chipiez, _op. cit._
iv. 681-683, pl. viii. E; L. Messerschmidt, _The Hittites_, p. 50.

M100 The two deities at the head of the processions at Boghaz-Keui appear
to be the great Asiatic goddess and her consort. The Hittite god of
the thundering sky. Jupiter Dolichenus.

410 W. J. Hamilton, _Researches in Asia Minor, Pontus, and Armenia_, i.
394 _sq._; H. Barth, in _Monatsberichte der königl. Preuss. Akademie
der Wissenschaften_, 1859, pp. 128 _sqq._; _id._, “Reise von
Trapezunt,” _Ergänzungsheft zu Petermann’s Geograph. Mittheilungen_,
No. 2 (Gotha, 1860), pp. 45 _sq._; H. F. Tozer, _Turkish Armenia and
Eastern Asia Minor_, p. 69; E. Chantre, _Mission en Cappadoce_, pp.
20 _sqq._ According to Barth, the scene represented is the marriage
of Aryenis, daughter of Alyattes, king of Lydia, to Astyages, son of
Cyaxares, king of the Medes (Herodotus, i. 74). For a discussion of
various interpretations which have been proposed see G. Perrot et
Ch. Chipiez, _Histoire de l’Art dans l’Antiquité_, iv. 630 _sqq._

411 This is in substance the view of Raoul-Rochette, Lajard, W. M.
Ramsay, G. Perrot, C. P. Tiele, Ed. Meyer, and J. Garstang. See
Raoul-Rochette, “Sur l’Hercule Assyrien et Phénicien,” _Mémoires de
l’Académie des Inscriptions et Belles-Lettres_, xvii. Deuxième
Partie (Paris, 1848), p. 180 note 1; W. M. Ramsay, “On the Early
Historical Relations between Phrygia and Cappadocia,” _Journal of
the Royal Asiatic Society_, N.S. xv. (1883) pp. 113-120; G. Perrot
et Ch. Chipiez, _Histoire de l’Art dans l’Antiquité_, iv. 630
_sqq._; C. P. Tiele, _Geschichte der Religion im Altertum_, i.
255-257; Ed. Meyer, _Geschichte des Altertums_,2 i. 2. pp. 633
_sq._; J. Garstang, _The Land of the Hittites_, pp. 235-237; _id._,
_The Syrian Goddess_ (London, 1913), pp. 5 _sqq._

412 K. Humann und O. Puchstein, _Reisen in Kleinasien und Nordsyrien_
(Berlin, 1902), Atlas, pl. xlv. 3; _Ausgrabungen zu Sendschirli_,
iii. (Berlin, 1902) pl. xli.; J. Garstang, _The Land of the
Hittites_, p. 291, with plate lxxvii.; R. Koldewey, _Die Hettitische
Inschrift gefunden in der Königsburg von Babylon_ (Leipsic, 1900),
plates 1 and 2 (_Wissenschaftliche Veröffentlichungen der Deutschen
Orient-Gesellschaft_, Heft 1); L. Messerschmidt, _Corpus
Inscriptionum Hettiticarum_, pl. i. 5 and 6; _id._, _The Hittites_
(London, 1903), pp. 40-42, with fig. 6 on p. 41; M. J. Lagrange,
_Études sur les Religions Sémitiques_2 (Paris, 1905), p. 93. The
name of the god is thought to have been Teshub or Teshup; for a god
of that name is known from the Tel-el-Amarna letters to have been
the chief deity of the Mitani, a people of Northern Mesopotamia akin
in speech and religion to the Hittites, but ruled by an Aryan
dynasty. See Ed. Meyer, _Geschichte des Altertums_,2 i. 2. pp. 578,
591 _sq._, 636 _sq._; R. F. Harper, _Assyrian and Babylonian
Literature_, pp. 222, 223 (where the god’s name is spelt Tishub).
The god is also mentioned repeatedly in the Hittite archives which
Dr. H. Winckler found inscribed on clay tablets at Boghaz-Keui. See
H. Winckler, “Vorläufige Nachrichten über die Ausgrabungen in
Boghaz-köi im Sommer 1907,” _Mitteilungen der Deutschen
Orient-Gesellschaft zu Berlin_, No. 35, December 1907, pp. 13 _sq._,
32, 34, 36, 38, 39, 43, 44, 51 _sq._, 53; “Hittite Archives from
Boghaz-Keui,” translated from the German transcripts of Dr.
Winckler, _Annals of Archaeology and Anthropology_, iv. (Liverpool
and London, 1912) pp. 90 _sqq._ As to the Mitani, their language and
their gods, see H. Winckler, _op. cit._ pp. 30 _sqq._, 46 _sqq._ In
thus interpreting the Hittite god who heads the procession at
Boghaz-Keui I follow my colleague Prof. J. Garstang (_The Land of
the Hittites_, p. 237; _The Syrian Goddess_, pp. 5 _sqq._), who has
kindly furnished me with some notes on the subject. I formerly
interpreted the deity as the Hittite equivalent of Tammuz, Adonis,
and Attis. But against that view it may be urged that (1) the god is
bearded and therefore of mature age, whereas Tammuz and his fellows
were regularly conceived as youthful; (2) the thunderbolt which he
seems to carry would be quite inappropriate to Tammuz, who was not a
god of thunder but of vegetation; and (3) the Hittite Tammuz is
appropriately represented in the procession of women immediately
behind the Mother Goddess (see below, pp. 137 _sq._), and it is
extremely improbable that he should be represented twice over with
different attributes in the same scene. These considerations seem to
me conclusive against the interpretation of the bearded god as a
Tammuz and decisive in favour of Professor Garstang’s view of him.

413 J. Garstang, “Notes of a Journey through Asia Minor,” _Annals of
Archaeology and Anthropology_, i. (Liverpool and London, 1908) pp. 3
_sq._, with plate iv.; _id._, _The Land of the Hittites_, pp. 138,
359, with plate xliv. In this sculpture the god on the bull holds in
his right hand what is described as a triangular bow instead of a
mace, an axe, or a hammer.

414 A. Wiedemann, _Ägyptische Geschichte_ (Gotha, 1884), ii. 438-440; G.
Maspero, _Histoire Ancienne des Peuples de l’Orient Classique_, ii.
(Paris, 1897) pp. 401 _sq._; W. Max Müller, _Der Bündnisvortrag
Ramses’ II. und des Chetitirkönigs_, pp. 17-19, 21 _sq._, 38-44
(_Mitteilungen der Vorderasiatischen Gesellschaft_, 1902, No. 5,
Berlin); L. Messerschmidt, _The Hittites_, pp. 14-19; J. H.
Breasted, _Ancient Records of Egypt_ (Chicago, 1906-1907), iii.
163-174; _id._, _A History of the Ancient Egyptians_ (London, 1908),
p. 311; Ed. Meyer, _Geschichte des Altertums_,2 i. 2. pp. 631, 635
_sqq._; J. Garstang, _The Land of the Hittites_, pp. 347-349. The
Hittite copy of the treaty was discovered by Dr. H. Winckler at
Boghaz-Keui in 1906. The identification of Arenna or Arinna is
uncertain. In a forthcoming article, “The Sun God[dess] of Arenna,”
to be published in the Liverpool _Annals of Archaeology and
Anthropology_, Professor J. Garstang argues that Arenna is to be
identified with the Cappadocian Comana.

415 Ed. Meyer, “Dolichenus,” in W. H. Roscher’s _Lexikon der griech. und
röm. Mythologie_, i. 1191-1194; A. von Domaszewski, _Die Religion
des römischen Heeres_ (Treves, 1895), pp. 59 _sq._, with plate iiii.
fig. 1 and 2; Franz Cumont, _s.v._ “Dolichenus,” in Pauly-Wissowa’s
_Real-Encyclopädie der classischen Altertumswissenschaft_, v. i.
coll. 1276 _sqq._; J. Toutain, _Les Cultes païens dans l’Empire
Romain_, ii. (Paris, 1911) pp. 35-43. For examples of the
inscriptions which relate to his worship see H. Dessau,
_Inscriptiones Latinae Selectae_, vol. ii. Pars i. (Berlin, 1902)
pp. 167-172, Nos. 4296-4324.

M101 The Mother Goddess.

416 As to the lions and mural crown of Cybele see Lucretius, ii. 600
_sqq._; Catullus, lxiii. 76 _sqq._; Macrobius, _Saturn._ i. 23. 20;
Rapp, _s.v._ “Kybele,” in W. H. Roscher’s _Lexikon der griech. und
röm. Mythologie_, ii. 1644 _sqq._

417 Lucian, _De dea Syria_, 31; Macrobius, _Saturn._ i. 23. 19. Lucian’s
description of her image is confirmed by coins of Hierapolis, on
which the goddess is represented wearing a high head-dress and
seated on a lion. See B. V. Head, _Historia Numorum_ (Oxford, 1887),
p. 654; G. Macdonald, _Catalogue of Greek Coins in the Hunterian
Collection_ (Glasgow, 1899-1905), iii. 139 _sq._; J. Garstang, _The
Syrian Goddess_, pp. 21 _sqq._, 70, with fig. 7. That the name of
the Syrian goddess of Hierapolis-Bambyce was Atargatis is mentioned
by Strabo (xvi. 1. 27, p. 748). On Egyptian monuments the Semitic
goddess Kadesh is represented standing on a lion. See W. Max Müller,
_Asien und Europa_, pp. 314 _sq._ It is to be remembered that
Hierapolis-Bambyce was the direct successor of Carchemish, the great
Hittite capital on the Euphrates, and may have inherited many
features of Hittite religion. See A. H. Sayce, _The Hittites_,3 pp.
94 _sqq._, 105 _sqq._; and as to the Hittite monuments at
Carchemish, see J. Garstang, _The Land of the Hittites_, pp. 122
_sqq._

418 Diodorus Siculus, ii. 9. 5.

M102 The youth on the lioness, bearing the double axe, at Boghaz-Keui may
be the divine son and lover of the goddess.

419 In thus interpreting the youth with the double axe I agree with Sir
W. M. Ramsay (“On the Early Historical Relations between Phrygia and
Cappadocia,” _Journal of the Royal Asiatic Society_, N.S. xv. (1883)
pp. 118, 120), C. P. Tiele (_Geschichte der Religion im Alterturm_,
i. 246, 255), and Prof. J. Garstang (_The Land of the Hittites_, p.
235; _The Syrian Goddess_, p. 8). That the youthful figure on the
lioness or panther represents the lover of the great goddess is the
view also of Professors Jensen and Hommel. See P. Jensen, _Hittiter
und Armenier_, pp. 173-175, 180; F. Hommel, _Grundriss der
Geographie und Geschichte des alten Orients_, p. 51. Prof. Perrot
holds that the youth in question is a double of the bearded god who
stands at the head of the male procession, their costume being the
same, though their attributes differ (G. Perrot et Ch. Chipiez,
_Histoire de l’Art dans l’Antiquité_, iv. 651). But, as I have
already remarked, it is unlikely that the same god should be
represented twice over with different attributes in the same scene.
The resemblance between the two figures is better explained on the
supposition that they are Father and Son. The same two deities,
Father and Son, appear to be carved on a rock at Giaour-Kalesi, a
place on the road which in antiquity may have led from Ancyra by
Gordium to Pessinus. Here on the face of the rock are cut in relief
two gigantic figures in the usual Hittite costume of pointed cap,
short tunic, and shoes turned up at the toes. Each wears a
crescent-hilted sword at his side, each is marching to the
spectator’s left with raised right hand; and the resemblance between
them is nearly complete except that the figure in front is beardless
and the figure behind is bearded. See G. Perrot et Ch. Chipiez,
_Histoire de l’Art dans l’Antiquité_, iv. 714 _sqq._, with fig. 352;
J. Garstang, _The Land of the Hittites_, pp. 162-164. A similar, but
solitary, figure is carved in a niche of the rock at Kara-Bel, but
there the deity, or the man, carries a triangular bow over his right
shoulder. See below, p. 185.

With regard to the lionesses or panthers, a bas-relief found at
Carchemish, the capital of a Hittite kingdom on the Euphrates, shows
two male figures in Hittite costume, with pointed caps and turned-up
shoes, standing on a crouching lion. The foremost of the two figures
is winged and carries a short curved truncheon in his right hand.
According to Prof. Perrot, the two figures represent a god followed
by a priest or a king. See G. Perrot et Ch. Chipiez, _Histoire de
l’Art dans l’Antiquité_, iv. 549 _sq._; J. Garstang, _The Land of
the Hittites_, pp. 123 _sqq._ Again, on a sculptured slab found at
Amrit in Phoenicia we see a god standing on a lion and holding a
lion’s whelp in his left hand, while in his right hand he brandishes
a club or sword. See Perrot et Chipiez, _op. cit._ iii. 412-414. The
type of a god or goddess standing or sitting on a lion occurs also
in Assyrian art, from which the Phoenicians and Hittites may have
borrowed it. See Perrot et Chipiez, _op. cit._ ii. 642-644. Much
evidence as to the representation of Asiatic deities with lions has
been collected by Raoul-Rochette, in his learned dissertation “Sur
l’Hercule Assyrien et Phénicien,” _Mémoires de l’Académie des
Inscriptions et Belles-Lettres_, xvii. Deuxième Partie (Paris,
1848), pp. 106 _sqq._ Compare De Vogüé, _Mélanges d’Archéologie
Orientale_, pp. 44 _sqq._

M103 The mystery of the lion-god.

420 Similarly in Yam, one of the Torres Straits Islands, two brothers
named Sigai and Maiau were worshipped in a shrine under the form of
a hammer-headed shark and a crocodile respectively, and were
represented by effigies made of turtle-shell in the likeness of
these animals. But “the shrines were so sacred that no uninitiated
persons might visit them, nor did they know what they contained;
they were aware of Sigai and Maiau, but they did not know that the
former was a hammer-headed shark and the latter a crocodile; this
mystery was too sacred to be imparted to uninitiates. When the
heroes were addressed it was always by their human names, and not by
their animal or totem names.” See A. C. Haddon, “The Religion of the
Torres Straits Islanders,” _Anthropological Essays presented to E.
B. Tylor_ (Oxford, 1907), p. 185.

M104 The processions at Boghaz-Keui appear to represent the Sacred
Marriage of the god and goddess. Traces of mother-kin among the
Hittites.

421 “There can be no doubt that there is here represented a Sacred
Marriage, the meeting of two deities worshipped in different places,
like the Horus of Edfu and the Hathor of Denderah” (C. P. Tiele,
_Geschichte der Religion im Altertum_, i. 255). This view seems to
differ from, though it approaches, the one suggested in the text.
That the scene represents a Sacred Marriage between a great god and
goddess is the opinion also of Prof. Ed. Meyer (_Geschichte des
Altertums_,2 i. 2. pp. 633 _sq._), and Prof. J. Garstang (_The Land
of the Hittites_, pp. 238 _sq._; _The Syrian Goddess_, p. 7).

422 See above, p. 133.

423 See below, p. 285. Compare the remarks of Sir W. M. Ramsay
(“Pre-Hellenic Monuments of Cappadocia,” _Recueil de Travaux
relatifs à la Philologie et à l’Archéologie Égyptiennes et
Assyriennes_, xiii. (1890) p. 78): “Similar priest-dynasts are a
widespread feature of the primitive social system of Asia Minor;
their existence is known with certainty or inferred with probability
at the two towns Komana; at Venasa not far north of Tyana, at Olba,
at Pessinous, at Aizanoi, and many other places. Now there are two
characteristics which can be regarded as probable in regard to most
of these priests, and as proved in regard to some of them: (1) they
wore the dress and represented the person of the god, whose priests
they were; (2) they were ἱερώνυμοι, losing their individual name at
their succession to the office, and assuming a sacred name, often
that of the god himself or some figure connected with the cultus of
the god. The priest of Cybele at Pessinous was called Attis, the
priests of Sabazios were Saboi, the worshippers of Bacchos Bacchoi.”
As to the priestly rulers of Olba, see below, pp. 144 _sqq._

424 See above, p. 132. However, Prof. Ed. Meyer may be right in thinking
that the priest-like figure in the procession is not really that of
the priest but that of the god or goddess whom he personated. See
above, p. 133 note.

425 See above, pp. 36 _sqq._

426 H. Winckler, “Vorläufige Nachrichten über die Ausgrabungen in
Boghaz-köi im Sommer 1907,” _Mitteilungen der Deutschen
Orient-Gesellschaft_, No. 35, December, 1907, pp. 27 _sq._, 29; J.
Garstang, _The Land of the Hittites_, pp. 352 _sq._; “Hittite
Archives from Boghaz-Keui,” translated from the German transcripts
of Dr. Winckler by Meta E. Williams, _Annals of Archaeology and
Anthropology_, iv. (Liverpool and London, 1912) p. 98. We have seen
(above, p. 136) that in the seals of the Hittite treaty with Egypt
the Queen appears along with the King. If Dr. H. Winckler is right
in thinking (_op. cit._ p. 29) that one of the Hittite queens was at
the same time sister to her husband the King, we should have in this
relationship a further proof that mother-kin regulated the descent
of the kingship among the Hittites as well as among the ancient
Egyptians. See above, p. 44, and below, vol. ii. pp. 213 _sqq._

427 Compare Ed. Meyer, _Geschichte des Altertums_,2 i. 2. pp. 629-633.

M105 Sandan at Tarsus appears to be a son of Baal, as Hercules was a son
of Zeus.

428 The figure exhibits a few minor variations on the coins of Tarsus.
See the works cited above, p. 127.

429 Above, p. 119.

_ 430 The Magic Art and the Evolution of Kings_, ii. 358 _sqq._

_ 431 The Dying God_, pp. 166 _sqq._

M106 Priests of Sandan-Hercules at Tarsus. Kings of Cilicia related to
Sandan.

432 Athenaeus, v. 54, p. 215 B, C. The high-priest of the Syrian goddess
at Hierapolis held office for a year, and wore a purple robe and a
golden tiara (Lucian, _De dea Syria_, 42). We may conjecture that
the priesthood of Hercules at Tarsus was in later times at least an
annual office.

433 E. Meyer, _Geschichte des Alterthums_, i. (Stuttgart, 1884) § 389,
p. 475; H. Winckler, in E. Schrader’s _Keilinschriften und das Alte
Testament_,3 p. 88. Kuinda was the name of a Cilician fortress a
little way inland from Anchiale (Strabo, xiv. 5. 10, p. 672).

434 E. Meyer, _op. cit._ i. § 393, p. 480; C. P. Tiele,
_Babylonisch-assyrische Geschichte_, p. 360. Sandon and Sandas occur
repeatedly as names of Cilician men. They are probably identical
with, or modified forms of, the divine name. See Strabo, xiv. 5. 14,
p. 674; Plutarch, _Poplicola_, 17; _Corpus Inscriptionum Graecarum_,
ed. August Boeckh, etc. (Berlin, 1828-1877) vol. iii. p. 200, No.
4401; Ch. Michel, _Recueil d’Inscriptions Grecques_ (Brussels,
1900), p. 718, No. 878; R. Heberdey und A. Wilhelm, “Reisen in
Kilikien,” _Denkschriften der Kaiser. Akademie der Wissenschaften,
Philosoph.-histor. Classe_, xliv. (Vienna, 1896) No. vi. pp. 46, 131
_sq._, 140 (Inscriptions 115, 218, 232).

M107 Priestly kings of Olba who bore the names of Teucer and Ajax. The
Teucrids of Salamis in Cyprus. Burnt sacrifices of human victims at
Salamis and traces of a similar custom elsewhere. Burnt sacrifice of
doves to Adonis.

435 Strabo, xiv. 5. 10, p. 672. The name of the high-priest Ajax, son of
Teucer, occurs on coins of Olba, dating from about the beginning of
our era (B. V. Head, _Historia Numorum_, Oxford, 1887, p. 609); and
the name of Teucer is also known from inscriptions. See below, pp.
145, 151, 159.

436 E. L. Hicks, “Inscriptions from Western Cilicia,” _Journal of
Hellenic Studies_, xii. (1891) pp. 226, 263; R. Heberdey und A.
Wilhelm, “Reisen in Kilikien,” _Denkschriften der Kaiser. Akademie
der Wissenschaften_, xliv. (1896) No. vi. pp. 53, 88.

437 Ch. Michel, _Recueil d’Inscriptions Grecques_, pp. 718 _sqq._, No.
878. Tarkondimotos was the name of two kings of Eastern Cilicia in
the first century B.C. One of them corresponded with Cicero and fell
at the battle of Actium. See Cicero, _Epist. ad Familiares_, xv. 1.
2; Strabo, xiv. 5. 18, p. 676; Dio Cassius, xli. 63. 1, xlvii. 26.
2, l. 14. 2, li. 2. 2, li. 7. 4, liv. 9. 2; Plutarch, _Antoninus_,
61; B. V. Head, _Historia Numorum_ (Oxford, 1887), p. 618; W.
Dittenberger, _Orientis Graeci Inscriptiones Selectae_ (Leipsic,
1903-1905), ii. pp. 494 _sq._, Nos. 752, 753. Moreover, Tarkudimme
or Tarkuwassimi occurs as the name of a king of Erme (?) or Urmi (?)
in a bilingual Hittite and cuneiform inscription engraved on a
silver seal. See W. Wright, _The Empire of the Hittites_2 (London,
1886), pp. 163 _sqq._; L. Messerschmidt, _Corpus Inscriptionum
Hettiticarum_, pp. 42 _sq._, pl. xlii. 9; _id._, _The Hittites_, pp.
29 _sq._; P. Jensen, _Hittiter und Armenier_ (Strasburg, 1898), pp.
22, 50 _sq._ In this inscription Prof. Jensen suggests Tarbibi- as
an alternative reading for Tarku-. Compare P. Kretschmer,
_Einleitung in die Geschichte der griechischen Sprache_ (Göttingen,
1896), pp. 362-364.

438 Isocrates, _Or._ ix. 14 and 18 _sq._; Pausanias, ii. 29. 2 and 4; W.
E. Engel, _Kypros_, i. 212 _sqq._ As to the names Teucer and
Teucrian see P. Kretschmer, _op. cit._ pp. 189-191. Prof. Kretschmer
believes that the native population of Cyprus belonged to the
non-Aryan stock of Asia Minor.

439 W. E. Engel, _Kypros_, i. 216.

440 Porphyry, _De abstinentia_, ii. 54 _sq._; Lactantius, _Divin. Inst._
i. 21. As to the date when the custom was abolished, Lactantius says
that it was done “recently in the reign of Hadrian.” Porphyry says
that the practice was put down by Diphilus, king of Cyprus, “in the
time of Seleucus the Theologian.” As nothing seems to be known as to
the date of King Diphilus and Seleucus the Theologian, I have
ventured to assume, on the strength of Lactantius’s statement, that
they were contemporaries of Hadrian. But it is curious to find kings
of Cyprus reigning so late. Beside the power of the Roman governors,
their authority can have been little more than nominal, like that of
native rajahs in British India. Seleucus the Theologian may be, as
J. A. Fabricius supposed (_Bibliotheca Graeca_,4 Hamburg, 1780-1809,
vol. i. p. 86, compare p. 522), the Alexandrian grammarian who
composed a voluminous work on the gods (Suidas, _s.v._ Σέλευκος).
Suetonius tells an anecdote (_Tiberius_, 56) about a grammarian
named Seleucus who flourished, and faded prematurely, at the court
of Tiberius.

441 Lucian, _De dea Syria_, 49.

442 Diogenianus, _Praefatio_, in _Paroemiographi Graeci_, ed. E. L.
Leutsch et F. G. Schneidewin (Göttingen, 1839-1851), i. 180.
Raoul-Rochette regarded the custom as part of the ritual of the
divine death and resurrection. He compared it with the burning of
Melcarth at Tyre. See his memoir, “Sur l’Hercule Assyrien et
Phénicien,” _Mémoires de l’Académie des Inscriptions et
Belles-Lettres_, xvii. Deuxième Partie (1848), p. 32.

443 Lucian, _De dea Syria_, 54.

M108 The priestly Teucers of Olba perhaps personated a native god Tark.

444 A. H. Sayce, in W. Wright’s _Empire of the Hittites_,2 p. 186; W. M.
Ramsay, “Pre-Hellenic Monuments of Cappadocia,” _Recueil de Travaux
relatifs à la Philologie et à l’Archéologie Égyptiennes et
Assyriennes_, xiv. (1903) pp. 81 _sq._; C. P. Tiele, _Geschichte der
Religion im Altertum_, i. 251; W. Max Müller, _Asien und Europa_, p.
333; P. Jensen, _Hittiter und Armenier_, pp. 70, 150 _sqq._, 155
_sqq._; F. Hommel, _Grundriss der Geographie und Geschichte des
alten Orients_, pp. 44, 51 _sq._; L. Messerschmidt, _The Hittites_,
p. 40. Sir W. M. Ramsay thinks (_l.c._) that Tark was the native
name of the god who had his sanctuary at Dastarkon in Cappadocia and
who was called by the Greeks the Cataonian Apollo: his sanctuary was
revered all over Cappadocia (Strabo, xiv. 2. 5, p. 537). Prof.
Hommel holds that Tarku or Tarchu was the chief Hittite deity,
worshipped all over the south of Asia Minor. Prof. W. Max Müller is
of opinion that Targh or Tarkh did not designate any particular
deity, but was the general Hittite name for “god.” There are grounds
for holding that the proper name of the Hittite thunder-god was
Teshub or Teshup. See above, p. 135 note.

445 J. T. Bent, “Explorations in Cilicia Tracheia,” _Proceedings of the
Royal Geographical Society_, N.S. xii. (1890) p. 458; _id._, “A
Journey in Cilicia Tracheia,” _Journal of Hellenic Studies_, xii.
(1891) p. 222; W. M. Ramsay, _Historical Geography of Asia Minor_
(London, 1890), pp. 22, 364. Sir W. M. Ramsay had shown grounds for
thinking that Olba was a Grecized form of a native name Ourba
(pronounced Ourwa) before Mr. J. T. Bent discovered the site and the
name.

M109 Western or Rugged Cilicia.
M110 The Cilician pirates.
M111 The deep gorges of Rugged Cilicia.

446 J. Theodore Bent, “Explorations in Cilicia Tracheia,” _Proceedings
of the Royal Geographical Society_, N.S. xii. (1890) pp. 445,
450-453; _id._, “A Journal in Cilicia Tracheia,” _Journal of
Hellenic Studies_, xii. (1891) pp. 208, 210-212, 217-219; R.
Heberdey und A. Wilhelm, “Reisen in Kilikien,” _Denkschriften der
kaiser. Akademie der Wissenschaften, Philosoph.-historische Classe_,
xliv. (Vienna, 1896) No. vi. pp. 49, 70; D. G. Hogarth and J. A. R.
Munro, “Modern and Ancient Roads in Eastern Asia Minor,” _Royal
Geographical Society, Supplementary Papers_, vol. iii. part 5
(London, 1893), pp. 653 _sq._ As to the Cilician pirates see Strabo,
xiv. 5. 2, pp. 668 _sq._; Plutarch, _Pompeius_, 24; Appian, _Bellum
Mithridat._ 92 _sq._; Dio Cassius, xxxvi. 20-24 [3-6], ed. L.
Dindorf; Cicero, _De imperio Cn. Pompeii_, 11 _sq._; Th. Mommsen,
_Roman History_ (London, 1868), iii. 68-70, iv. 40-45, 118-120. As
to the crests carved on their towns see J. T. Bent, “Cilician
Symbols,” _Classical Review_, iv. (1890) pp. 321 _sq._ Among these
crests are a club (the badge of Olba), a bunch of grapes, the caps
of the Dioscuri, the three-legged symbol, and so on. As to the
cedars and ship-building timber of Cilicia in antiquity see
Theophrastus, _Historia Plantarum_, iii. 2. 6, iv. 5. 5. The cedars
and firs have now retreated to the higher slopes of the Taurus.
Great destruction is wrought in the forests by the roving Yuruks
with their flocks; for they light their fires under the trees, tap
the firs for turpentine, bark the cedars for their huts and
bee-hives, and lay bare whole tracts of country that the grass may
grow for their sheep and goats. See J. T. Bent, in _Proceedings of
the Royal Geographical Society_, N.S. xii. (1890) pp. 453-458.

M112 The site and ruins of Olba. The temple of Olbian Zeus.

447 D. G. Hogarth, _A Wandering Scholar in the Levant_ (London, 1896),
pp. 57 _sq._

448 J. Theodore Bent, “Explorations in Cilicia Tracheia,” _Proceedings
of the Royal Geographical Society_, N.S. xii. (1890) pp. 445 _sq._,
458-460; _id._, “A Journey in Cilicia Tracheia,” _Journal of
Hellenic Studies_, xii. (1890) pp. 220-222; E. L. Hicks,
“Inscriptions from Western Cilicia,” _ib._ pp. 262-270; R. Heberdey
und A. Wilhelm, “Reisen in Kilikien,” _Denkschriften der kaiser.
Akademie der Wissenschaften, Philos.-histor. Classe_, xliv. (Vienna,
1896) No. vi. pp. 83-91; W. M. Ramsay and D. G. Hogarth, in
_American Journal of Archaeology_, vi. (1890) p. 345; Ch. Michel,
_Recueil d’Inscriptions Grecques_, p. 858, No. 1231. In one place
(_Journal of Hellenic Studies_, xii. 222) Bent gives the height of
Olba as 3800 feet; but this is a misprint, for elsewhere
(_Proceedings of the Royal Geographical Society_, N.S. xii. 446,
458) he gives the height as exactly 5850 or roughly 6000 feet. The
misprint has unfortunately been repeated by Messrs. Heberdey and
Wilhelm (_op. cit._ p. 84 note 1). The tall tower of Olba is figured
on the coins of the city. See G. F. Hill, _Catalogue of the Greek
Coins of Lycaonia, Isauria, and Cilicia_ (London, 1900), pl. xxii.
8.

M113 Limestone caverns of Western Cilicia.

449 Sir Charles Lyell, _Principles of Geology_12 (London, 1875), ii. 518
_sqq._; _Encyclopaedia Britannica_, Ninth Edition, _s.v._ “Caves,”
v. 265 _sqq._ Compare my notes on Pausanias, i. 35. 7, viii. 29. 1.

450 J. T. Bent, in _Proceedings of the Royal Geographical Society_, N.S.
xii. (1890) p. 447.

M114 The city of Corycus. The Corycian cave.

451 Fr. Beaufort, _Karmania_ (London, 1817), pp. 240 _sq._

452 Strabo, xiv. 5. 5, pp. 670 _sq._; Mela, i. 72-75, ed. G. Parthey; J.
T. Bent, “Explorations in Cilicia Tracheia,” _Proceedings of the
Royal Geographical Society_, N.S. xii. (1890) pp. 446-448; _id._, “A
Journey in Cilicia Tracheia,” _Journal of Hellenic Studies_, xii.
(1891) pp. 212-214; R. Heberdey und A. Wilhelm, “Reisen in
Kilikien,” _Denkschriften der kaiser. Akademie der Wissenschaften,
Philos.-histor. Classe_, xliv. (1896) No. vi. pp. 70-79. Mr. D. G.
Hogarth was so good as to furnish me with some notes embodying his
recollections of the Corycian cave. All these modern writers confirm
the general accuracy of the descriptions of the cave given by Strabo
and Mela. Mr. Hogarth indeed speaks of exaggeration in Mela’s
account, but this is not admitted by Mr. A. Wilhelm. As to the ruins
of the city of Corycus on the coast, distant about three miles from
the cave, see Fr. Beaufort, _Karmania_ (London, 1817), pp. 232-238;
R. Heberdey und A. Wilhelm, _op. cit._ pp. 67-70.

M115 Priests of Corycian Zeus.

453 The suggestion is Mr. A. B. Cook’s. See his article, “The European
Sky-god,” _Classical Review_, xvii. (1903) p. 418, note 2.

454 J. T. Bent, in _Proceedings of the Royal Geographical Society_, N.S.
xii. (1890) p. 448; _id_., in _Journal of Hellenic Studies_, xii.
(1891) pp. 214-216. For the inscription containing the names of the
priests see R. Heberdey und A. Wilhelm, _op. cit._ pp. 71-79; Ch.
Michel, _Recueil d’Inscriptions Grecques_, pp. 718 _sqq_., No. 878;
above, p. 145.

M116 The cave of the giant Typhon.

455 Mela, i. 76, ed. G. Parthey (Berlin, 1867). The cave of Typhon is
described by J. T. Bent, _ll.cc._

456 Aeschylus, _Prometheus Vinctus_, 351-372.

457 Pindar, _Pyth._ i. 30 _sqq._, who speaks of the giant as “bred in
the many-named Cilician cave.”

M117 Battle of Zeus and Typhon.

458 Apollodorus, _Bibliotheca_, i. 6. 3.

M118 Fossil bones of extinct animals give rise to stories of giants.

459 Pausanias, viii. 29. 1, with my notes. Pausanias mentions (viii. 32.
5) bones of superhuman size which were preserved at Megalopolis, and
which popular superstition identified as the bones of the giant
Hopladamus.

460 Pausanias, viii. 29. 1.

461 A. Holm, _Geschichte Siciliens im Alterthum_ (Leipsic, 1870-1874),
i. 57, 356.

462 (Sir) Edward B. Tylor, _Researches into the Early History of
Mankind_3 (London, 1878), p. 322, who adduces much more evidence of
the same sort.

M119 Chasm of Olbian Zeus at Kanytelideis.

463 J. T. Bent, “Explorations in Cilicia Tracheia,” _Proceedings of the
Royal Geographical Society_, N.S. xii. (1890) pp. 448 _sq._; _id._,
“A Journey in Cilicia Tracheia,” _Journal of Hellenic Studies_, xii.
(1891) pp. 208-210; R. Heberdey und A. Wilhelm, “Reisen in
Kilikien,” _Denkschriften der kaiserlichen Akademie der
Wissenschaften, Philosophisch-historische Classe_, xliv. (Vienna,
1896) No. vi. pp. 51-61.

M120 The deity of these great chasms was called Zeus by the Greeks, but
he was probably a god of fertility embodied in vegetation and water.

464 See above, pp. 26 _sq._

M121 Analogy of the Corycian and Olbian caverns to Ibreez and the vale of
the Adonis.
M122 Two gods at Olba, perhaps a father and a son, corresponding to the
Baal and Sandan of Tarsus.
M123 Goddesses less prominent than gods in Cilician religion.
M124 The goddess ’Atheh, partner of Baal at Tarsus, seems to have been a
form of Atargatis. The lion-goddess and the bull-god. In later times
the old goddess became the Fortune of the City.

465 B. V. Head, _Historia Numorum_ (Oxford, 1887), p. 616. [However, Mr.
G. F. Hill writes to me: “The attribution to Tarsus of the ’Atheh
coins is unfounded. Head himself only gives it as doubtful. I should
think they belong further East.” In the uncertainty which prevails
on this point I have left the text unchanged. _Note to Second
Edition._]

466 The name ’Athar-’atheh occurs in a Palmyrene inscription. See G. A.
Cooke, _Text-book of North-Semitic Inscriptions_, No. 112, pp.
267-270. In analysing Atargatis into ’Athar-’atheh (’Atar-’ata) I
follow E. Meyer (_Geschichte des Altertums_,2 i. 2. pp. 605, 650
_sq._), F. Baethgen (_Beiträge zur semitischen Religionsgeschichte_,
pp. 68-75), Fr. Cumont (_s.v._ “Atargatis,” Pauly-Wissowa,
_Real-Encyclopädie der classischen Altertumswissenschaft_, ii.
1896), G. A. Cooke (_l.c._), C. P. Tiele (_Geschichte der Religion
im Altertum_, i. 245), F. Hommel (_Grundriss der Geographie und
Geschichte des alten Orients_, pp. 43 _sq._), Father Lagrange
(_Études sur les Religions Sémitiques_,2 p. 130), and L. B. Paton
(_s.v._ “Atargatis,” J. Hastings’s _Encyclopaedia of Religion and
Ethics_, ii. 164 _sq._). In the great temple at Hierapolis-Bambyce a
mysterious golden image stood between the images of Atargatis and
her male partner. It resembled neither of them, yet combined the
attributes of other gods. Some interpreted it as Dionysus, others as
Deucalion, and others as Semiramis; for a golden dove, traditionally
associated with Semiramis, was perched on the head of the figure.
The Syrians called the image by a name which Lucian translates
“sign” (σημήιον). See Lucian, _De dea Syria_, 33. It has been
plausibly conjectured by F. Baethgen that the name which Lucian
translates “sign” was really ’Atheh (עתה), which could easily be
confused with the Syriac word for “sign” (אהא). See F. Baethgen,
_op. cit._ p. 73. A coin of Hierapolis, dating from the third
century A.D., exhibits the images of the god and goddess seated on
bulls and lions respectively, with the mysterious object between
them enclosed in a shrine, which is surmounted by a bird, probably a
dove. See J. Garstang, _The Syrian Goddess_ (London, 1913), pp. 22
_sqq._, 70 _sq._, with fig. 7.

The modern writers cited at the beginning of this note have
interpreted the Syrian ’Atheh as a male god, the lover of Atargatis,
and identical in name and character with the Phrygian Attis. They
may be right; but none of them seems to have noticed that the same
name ’Atheh (עתה) is applied to a goddess at Tarsus.

467 As to the image, see above, p. 137.

468 Lucian, _De dea Syria_, 31.

469 Macrobius, _Saturn_, i. 23. 12 and 17-19. The Greek name of Baalbec
was Heliopolis, “the City of the Sun.”

470 G. A. Cooke, _Text-book of North-Semitic Inscriptions_, pp. 163,
164. The statue bears a long inscription, which in the style of its
writing belongs to the archaic type represented by the Moabite
Stone. The contents of the inscription show that it is earlier than
the time of Tiglath-Pileser III. (745-727 B.C.). On Hadad, the
Syrian thunder-god, see F. Baethgen, _Beiträge zur semitischen
Religionsgeschichte_, pp. 66-68; C. P. Tiele, _Geschichte der
Religion im Altertum_, i. 248 _sq._; M. J. Lagrange, _Études sur les
Religions Sémitiques_,2 pp. 92 _sq._ That Hadad was the consort of
Atargatis at Hierapolis-Bambyce is the opinion of P. Jensen
(_Hittiter und Armenier_, p. 171), who also indicates his character
as a god both of thunder and of fertility (_ib._, p. 167). The view
of Prof. J. Garstang is similar (_The Syrian Goddess_, pp. 25
_sqq._). That the name of the chief male god of Hierapolis-Bambyce
was Hadad is rendered almost certain by coins of the city which were
struck in the time of Alexander the Great by a priestly king
Abd-Hadad, whose name means “Servant of Hadad.” See B. V. Head,
_Historia Numorum_ (Oxford, 1887), p. 654; J. Garstang, _The Syrian
Goddess_, p. 27, with fig. 5.

471 H. Zimmern, in E. Schrader’s _Die Keilinschriften und das Alte
Testament_,3 pp. 442-449; M. Jastrow, _Die Religion Babyloniens und
Assyriens_ (Giessen, 1905-1912), i. 146-150, with _Bildermappe_,
plate 32, fig. 97. The Assyrian relief is also figured in W. H.
Roscher’s _Lexikon der griech. und röm. Mythologie_, _s.v._
“Marduk,” ii. 2350. The Babylonian _ramâmu_ “to scream, roar” has
its equivalent in the Hebrew _ra’am_ (רעם) “to thunder.” The two
names Adad (Hadad) and Ramman occur together in the form Hadadrimmon
in Zechariah, xii. 11 (with S. R. Driver’s note, _Century Bible_).

472 See above, pp. 121, 123.

473 See above, p. 130. However, the animal seems to be rather a goat.
See above, p. 133 note.

474 See above, p. 132.

475 G. F. Hill, _Catalogue of the Greek Coins of Lycaonia, Isauria, and
Cilicia_, pp. 181, 182, 185, 188, 190, 228.

476 E. Meyer, _Geschichte des Alterthums_, i. (Stuttgart, 1884) pp. 246
_sq._; F. Baethgen, _Beiträge zur semitischen Religionsgeschichte_,
pp. 76 _sqq._ The idolatrous Hebrews spread tables for Gad, that is,
for Fortune (Isaiah lxv. 11, Revised Version).

477 Macrobius, _Saturn_. iii. 8. 2; Servius on Virgil, _Aen._ ii. 632.

478 Ephippus, cited by Athenaeus, xii. 53, p. 537.

479 F. Baethgen, _op. cit._ p. 77; G. A. Cooke, _Text-book of
North-Semitic Inscriptions_, p. 269.

480 See above, p. 151.

M125 The Phoenician god El and his wife at Mallus in Cilicia.
Assimilation of native Oriental deities to Greek divinities.

481 Strabo, xiv. 5. 16, p. 675.

482 B. V. Head, _Historia Numorum_ (Oxford, 1887), pp. 605 _sq._; G. F.
Hill, _Catalogue of the Greek Coins of Lycaonia, Isauria, and
Cilicia_, pp. cxvii. _sqq._, 95-98, plates xv. xvi. xl. 9; G.
Macdonald, _Catalogue of Greek Coins in the Hunterian Collection_,
ii. 536 _sq._, pl. lix. 11-14. The male and female figures appear on
separate coins. The attribution to Mallus of the coins with the
female figure and conical stone has been questioned by Messrs. J. P.
Six and G. F. Hill. I follow the view of Messrs. F. Imhoof-Blumer
and B. V. Head. [However, Mr. G. F. Hill writes to me that the
attribution of these coins to Mallus is no longer maintained by any
one. Imhoof-Blumer himself now conjecturally assigns them to
Aphrodisias in Cilicia, and Mr. Hill regards this conjecture as very
plausible. See F. Imhoof-Blumer, _Kleinasiatische Münzen_ (Vienna,
1901-1902), ii. 435 _sq._ In the uncertainty which still prevails on
the subject I have left the text unchanged. For my purpose it
matters little whether this Cilician goddess was worshipped at
Mallus or at Aphrodisias. _Note to Second Edition._]

483 See above, pp. 34 _sq._

484 Philo of Byblus, in _Fragmenta Historicorum Graecorum_, ed. C.
Müller, iii. 569. El is figured with three pairs of wings on coins
of Byblus. See G. Maspero, _Histoire Ancienne des Peuples de
l’Orient Classique_, ii. 174; M. J. Lagrange, _Études sur les
Religions Sémitiques_,2 p. 72.

485 Imhoof-Blumer, _s.v._ “Kronos,” in W. H. Roscher’s _Lexikon der
griech. und röm. Mythologie_, ii. 1572; G. F. Hill, _Catalogue of
Greek Coins of Lycaonia, Isauria, and Cilicia_, pp. cxxii. 99, pl.
xvii. 2.

486 G. F. Hill, _op. cit._ pp. cxxi. _sq._, 98, pl. xvii. 1.

487 Another native Cilician deity who masqueraded in Greek dress was
probably the Olybrian Zeus of Anazarba or Anazarbus, but of his true
nature and worship we know nothing. See W. Dittenberger, _Orientis
Graeci Inscriptiones Selectae_ (Leipsic, 1903-1905), ii. p. 267, No.
577; Stephanus Byzantius, _s.v._ Ἄδανα (where the MS. reading
Ολυμβρος was wrongly changed by Salmasius into Ὄλυμπος).

M126 Sarpedonian Artemis. The goddess Perasia at Hieropolis-Castabala.
The fire-walk in the worship of Perasia. Insensibility to pain
regarded as a mark of inspiration.

488 Strabo, xiv. 5. 19, p. 676. The expression of Strabo leaves it
doubtful whether the ministers of the goddess were men or women.
There was a headland called Sarpedon near the mouth of the
Calycadnus River in Western Cilicia (Strabo, xiii. 4. 6, p. 627,
xiv. 5. 4, p. 670), where Sarpedon or Sarpedonian Apollo had a
temple and an oracle. The temple was hewn in the rock, and contained
an image of the god. See R. Heberdey und A. Wilhelm, “Reisen in
Kilikien,” _Denkschriften der kaiser. Akademie der Wissenschaften,
Philosoph.-histor. Classe_, xliv. (Vienna, 1896) No. vi. pp. 100,
107. Probably this Sarpedonian Apollo was a native deity akin to
Sarpedonian Artemis.

489 E. J. Davis, _Life in Asiatic Turkey_, pp. 128-134; J. T. Bent,
“Recent Discoveries in Eastern Cilicia,” _Journal of Hellenic
Studies_, xi. (1890) pp. 234 _sq._; E. L. Hicks, “Inscriptions from
Eastern Cilicia,” _ibid._ pp. 243 _sqq._; R. Heberdey und A.
Wilhelm, _op. cit._ pp. 25 _sqq._ The site of Hieropolis-Castabala
was first identified by J. T. Bent by means of inscriptions. As to
the coins of the city, see Fr. Imhoof-Blumer, “Zur Münzkunde
Kilikiens,” _Zeitschrift für Numismatik_, x. (1883) pp. 267-290; G.
F. Hill, _Catalogue of the Greek Coins of Lycaonia, Isauria, and
Cilicia_, pp. c.-cii. 82-84, pl. xiv. 1-6; G. Macdonald, _Catalogue
of Greek Coins in the Hunterian Collection_, ii. 534 _sq._

490 On the difference between Hieropolis and Hierapolis see (Sir) W. M.
Ramsay, _Historical Geography of Asia Minor_, pp. 84 _sq._ According
to him, the cities designated by such names grew up gradually round
a sanctuary; where Greek influence prevailed the city in time
eclipsed the sanctuary and became known as Hierapolis, or the Sacred
City, but where the native element retained its predominance the
city continued to be known as Hieropolis, or the City of the
Sanctuary.

491 E. L. Hicks, “Inscriptions from Eastern Cilicia,” _Journal of
Hellenic Studies_, xi. (1890) pp. 251-253; R. Heberdey und A.
Wilhelm, _op. cit._ p. 26. These writers differ somewhat in their
reading and restoration of the verses, which are engraved on a
limestone basis among the ruins. I follow the version of Messrs.
Heberdey and Wilhelm.

492 J. T. Bent and E. L. Hicks, _op. cit._ pp. 235, 246 _sq._; R.
Heberdey und A. Wilhelm, _op. cit._ p. 27.

493 Strabo, xii. 2. 7, p. 537. See above, p. 115. The Cilician
Castabala, the situation of which is identified by inscriptions, is
not mentioned by Strabo. It is very unlikely that, with his intimate
knowledge of Asia Minor, he should have erred so far as to place the
city in Cappadocia, to the north of the Taurus mountains, instead of
in Cilicia, to the south of them. It is more probable that there
were two cities of the same name, and that Strabo has omitted to
mention one of them. Similarly, there were two cities called Comana,
one in Cappadocia and one in Pontus; at both places the same goddess
was worshipped with similar rites. See Strabo, xii. 2. 3, p. 535,
xii. 3. 32, p. 557. The situation of the various Castabalas
mentioned by ancient writers is discussed by F. Imhoof-Blumer, “Zur
Münzkunde Kilikiens,” _Zeitschrift für Numismatik_, x. (1883) pp.
285-288.

494 See _The Magic Art and the Evolution of Kings_, i. 37 _sq._

495 Jamblichus, _De mysteriis_, iii. 4.

496 Another Cilician goddess was Athena of Magarsus, to whom Alexander
the Great sacrificed before the battle of Issus. See Arrian,
_Anabasis_, ii. 5. 9; Stephanus Byzantius, _s.v._ Μάγαρσος; J.
Tzetzes, _Schol. on Lycophron_, 444. The name of the city seems to
be Oriental, perhaps derived from the Semitic word for “cave”
(מגרה). As to the importance of caves in Semitic religion, see W.
Robertson Smith, _Religion of the Semites_,2 pp. 197 _sqq._ The site
of Magarsus appears to be at Karatash, a hill rising from the sea at
the southern extremity of the Cilician plain, about forty-five miles
due south of Adana. The walls of the city, built of great limestone
blocks, are standing to a height of several courses, and an
inscription which mentions the priests of Magarsian Athena has been
found on the spot. See R. Heberdey und A. Wilhelm, “Reisen in
Kilikien,” _Denkschriften der kaiser. Akademie der Wissenschaften,
Philosoph.-histor. Classe_, xliv. (1896) No. vi. pp. 6-10.

497 E. T. Atkinson, _The Himalayan Districts of the North-Western
Provinces of India_, ii. (Allahabad, 1884) pp. 826 _sq._

498 The Rev. G. E. White (Missionary at Marsovan, in the ancient
Pontus), in a letter to me dated 19 Southmoor Road, Oxford, February
11, 1907.

M127 The divine triad, Baal, ’Atheh, and Sandan, at Tarsus may have been
personated by priests and priestesses.
M128 Tarsus said to have been founded by the Assyrian king Sardanapalus,
who burned himself on a pyre. Deaths of Babylonian and Assyrian
kings on the pyre.

499 Strabo, xiv. 5. 9, pp. 671 _sq._; Arrian, _Anabasis_, ii. 5;
Athenaeus, xii. 39, p. 530 A, B. Compare Stephanus Byzantius, _s.v._
Ἀγχιάλη; Georgius Syncellus, _Chronographia_, vol. i. p. 312, ed. G.
Dindorf (Bonn, 1829). The site of Anchiale has not yet been
discovered. At Tarsus itself the ruins of a vast quadrangular
structure have sometimes been identified with the monument of
Sardanapalus. See E. J. Davis, _Life in Asiatic Turkey_, pp. 37-39;
G. Perrot et Ch. Chipiez, _Histoire de l’Art dans l’Antiquité_, iv.
536 _sqq._ But Mr. D. G. Hogarth tells me that the ruins in question
seem to be the concrete foundations of a Roman temple. The mistake
had already been pointed out by Mr. R. Koldewey. See his article,
“Das sogenannte Grab des Sardanapal zu Tarsus,” _Aus der Anomia_
(Berlin, 1890), pp. 178-185.

500 See G. Perrot et Ch. Chipiez, _Histoire de l’Art dans l’Antiquité_,
iv. 542 _sq._ They think that the figure probably represented the
king in a common attitude of adoration, his right arm raised and his
thumb resting on his forefinger.

501 L. Messerschmidt, _Corpus Inscriptionum Hettiticarum_, pp. 17-19,
plates xxi.-xxv.; G. Perrot et Ch. Chipiez, _Histoire de l’Art dans
l’Antiquité_, iv. 492, 494 _sq._, 528-530, 547; J. Garstang, _The
Land of the Hittites_, pp. 107-122.

502 Prof. W. Max Müller is of opinion that the Hittite civilization and
the Hittite system of writing were developed in Cilicia rather than
in Cappadocia (_Asien und Europa_, p. 350).

503 According to Berosus and Abydenus it was not Sardanapalus
(Ashurbanipal) but Sennacherib who built or rebuilt Tarsus after the
fashion of Babylon, causing the river Cydnus to flow through the
midst of the city. See _Fragmenta Historicorum Graecorum_, ed. C.
Müller, ii. 504, iv. 282; C. P. Tiele, _Babylonisch-assyrische
Geschichte_, pp. 297 _sq._

504 Diodorus Siculus, ii. 27; Athenaeus, xii. 38, p. 529; Justin, i. 3.

505 G. Maspero, _Histoire Ancienne des Peuples de l’Orient Classique_,
iii. 422 _sq._ For the inscriptions referring to him and a full
discussion of them, see C. F. Lehmann (-Haupt), _Šamaš-šumukîn,
König von Babylonien, 668-648 v. Chr._ (Leipsic, 1892).

506 Abydenus, in _Fragmenta Historicorum Graecorum_, ed. C. Müller, iv.
282; Georgius Syncellus, _Chronographia_, i. p. 396, ed. G. Dindorf;
E. Meyer, _Geschichte des Alterthums_, i. (Stuttgart, 1884) pp. 576
_sq._; G. Maspero, _Histoire Ancienne des Peuples de l’Orient
Classique_, iii. 482-485. C. P. Tiele thought that the story of the
death of Saracus might be a popular but mistaken duplicate of the
death of Shamash-shumukin (_Babylonisch-assyrische Geschichte_, pp.
410 _sq._). Zimri, king of Israel, also burned himself in his palace
to escape falling into the hands of his enemies (1 Kings xvi. 18).

M129 Story that Cyrus intended to burn Croesus alive. It is unlikely that
the Persians would thus have polluted the sacred element of fire.

507 Herodotus, i. 86 _sq._

508 Raoul-Rochette, “Sur l’Hercule Assyrien et Phénicien,” _Mémoires de
l’Académie des Inscriptions et Belles-Lettres_, xvii. Deuxième
Partie (Paris, 1848), p. 274.

509 J. Darmesteter, _The Zend-Avesta_, vol. i. (Oxford, 1880) pp.
lxxxvi., lxxxviii-xc. (_Sacred Books of the East_, vol. iv.).

_ 510 Zend-Avesta_, _Vendîdâd_, Fargard, v. 7. 39-44 (_Sacred Books of
the East_, iv. 60 _sq._).

_ 511 Zend-Avesta_, translated by J. Darmesteter, i. pp. xc. 9, 110 _sq._
(_Sacred Books of the East_, iv.).

512 Strabo, xv. 3. 14, p. 732. Even gold, on account of its resemblance
to fire, might not be brought near a corpse (_id._ xv. 3. 18, p.
734).

M130 The older and truer tradition was that in the extremity of his
fortunes Croesus attempted to burn himself.

513 Sardes fell in the autumn of 546 B.C. (E. Meyer, _Geschichte des
Alterthums_, i. (Stuttgart, 1884), p. 604). Bacchylides was probably
born between 512 and 505 B.C. See R. C. Jebb, _Bacchylides, the
Poems and Fragments_ (Cambridge, 1905), pp. 1 _sq._

514 Bacchylides, iii. 24-62.

515 F. G. Welcker, _Alte Denkmäler_ (Göttingen, 1849-1864), iii. pl.
xxxiii.; A. Baumeister, _Denkmäler des klassischen Altertums_
(Munich and Leipsic, 1885-1888), ii. 796, fig. 860; A. H. Smith,
“Illustrations to Bacchylides,” _Journal of Hellenic Studies_,
xviii. (1898) pp. 267-269; G. Maspero, _Histoire Ancienne des
Peuples de l’Orient Classique_, iii. 618 _sq._ It is true that
Cambyses caused the dead body of the Egyptian king Amasis to be
dragged from the tomb, mangled, and burned; but the deed is
expressly branded by the ancient historian as an outrage on Persian
religion (Herodotus, iii. 16).

516 Raoul-Rochette, “Sur l’Hercule Assyrien et Phénicien,” _Mémoires de
l’Académie des Inscriptions et Belles-Lettres_, xvii. Deuxième
Partie (Paris, 1848), pp. 277 _sq._; M. Duncker, _Geschichte des
Alterthums_, iv.5 330-332; E. Meyer, _Geschichte des Alterthums_, i.
(Stuttgart, 1884) p. 604; G. Maspero, _Histoire Ancienne des Peuples
de l’Orient Classique_, iii. 618.

517 Herodotus, i. 7.

518 See above, pp. 115 _sq._, 173 _sq._

M131 Legend that Semiramis burnt herself on a pyre.

519 Hyginus, _Fab._ 243; Pliny, viii. 155.

520 See W. Robertson Smith, “Ctesias and the Semiramis Legend,” _English
Historical Review_, ii. (1887) pp. 303-317. But the legend of
Semiramis appears to have gathered round the person of a real
Assyrian queen, by name Shammuramat, who lived towards the end of
the ninth century B.C. and is known to us from historical
inscriptions. See C. F. Lehmann-Haupt, _Die historische Semiramis
und ihre Zeit_ (Tübingen, 1910), pp. 1 _sqq._; _id._, _s.v._
“Semiramis,” in W. H. Roscher’s _Lexikon der griech. und röm.
Mythologie_, iv. 678 _sqq._; _The Scapegoat_, pp. 369 _sqq._

521 See above, p. 114.

522 In ancient Greece we seem to have a reminiscence of widow-burning in
the legend that when the corpse of Capaneus was being consumed on
the pyre, his wife Evadne threw herself into the flames and
perished. See Euripides, _Supplices_, 980 _sqq._; Apollodorus,
_Bibliotheca_, iii. 7. 1; Zenobius, _Cent._ i. 30; Ovid, _Tristia_,
v. 14. 38.

M132 The “great burnings” for Jewish kings.

523 Isaiah xxx. 33. The Revised Version has “a Topheth” instead of
“Tophet.” But Hebrew does not possess an indefinite article (the few
passages of the Bible in which the Aramaic חת is so used are no
exception to the rule), and there is no evidence that Tophet
(Topheth) was ever employed in a general sense. The passage of
Isaiah has been rightly interpreted by W. Robertson Smith in the
sense indicated in the text, though he denies that it contains any
reference to the sacrifice of the children. See his _Lectures on the
Religion of the Semites_,2 pp. 372 _sq._ He observes (p. 372, note
3): “Saul’s body was burned (1 Sam. xxxi. 12), possibly to save it
from the risk of exhumation by the Philistines, but perhaps rather
with a religious intention, and almost as an act of worship, since
his bones were buried under the sacred tamarisk at Jabesh.” In 1
Chronicles x. 12 the tree under which the bones of Saul were buried
is not a tamarisk but a terebinth or an oak.

524 2 Chronicles xvi. 14, xxi. 19; Jeremiah xxxiv. 5. There is no ground
for assuming, as the Authorized version does in Jeremiah xxxiv. 5,
that only spices were burned on these occasions; indeed the burning
of spices is not mentioned at all in any of the three passages. The
“sweet odours and divers kinds of spices prepared by the
apothecaries’ art,” which were laid in the dead king’s bed (2
Chronicles xvi. 14), were probably used to embalm him, not to be
burned at his funeral. For though “great burnings” were regularly
made for the dead kings of Judah, there is no evidence (apart from
the doubtful case of Saul) that their bodies were cremated. They are
regularly said to have been buried, not burnt. The passage of Isaiah
seems to show that what was burned at a royal funeral was a great,
but empty, pyre. That the burnings for the kings formed part of a
heathen custom was rightly perceived by Renan (_Histoire du peuple
d’Israel_, iii. 121, note).

525 Josephus, _Bell. Jud._ v. 4. 1. See _Encyclopaedia Biblica_, _s.v._
“Jerusalem,” vol. ii. 2423 _sq._

526 As to the Moloch worship, see Note I. at the end of the volume. I
have to thank the Rev. Professor R. H. Kennett for indicating to me
the inference which may be drawn from the identification of the
Valley of Hinnom with the Tyropoeon.

M133 The great burnings for Jewish Rabbis at Meiron in Galilee.

527 W. M. Thomson, _The Land and the Book, Central Palestine and
Phoenicia_ (London, 1883), pp. 575-579; Ed. Robinson, _Biblical
Researches in Palestine_3 (London, 1867), ii. 430. _sq._; K.
Baedeker, _Palestine and Syria_4 (Leipsic, 1906), p. 255.

528 Herodotus, v. 92. 7.

529 C. Bock, _Temples and Elephants_ (London, 1884), pp. 73-76.

M134 Death by fire regarded by the ancients as a kind of apotheosis. Fire
was supposed to purge away the mortal parts of men, leaving the
immortal.

530 This view was maintained long ago by Raoul-Rochette in regard to the
deaths both of Sardanapalus and of Croesus. He supposed that “the
Assyrian monarch, reduced to the last extremity, wished, by the mode
of death which he chose, to give to his sacrifice the form of an
apotheosis and to identify himself with the national god of his
country by allowing himself to be consumed, like him, on a pyre....
Thus mythology and history would be combined in a legend in which
the god and the monarch would finally be confused. There is nothing
in this which is not conformable to the ideas and habits of Asiatic
civilization.” See his memoir, “Sur l’Hercule Assyrien et
Phénicien,” _Mémoires de l’Académie des Inscriptions et
Belles-Lettres_, xvii. Deuxième Partie (Paris, 1848), pp. 247 _sq._,
271 _sqq._ The notion of regeneration by fire was fully recognized
by Raoul-Rochette (_op. cit._ pp. 30 _sq._). It deserves to be noted
that Croesus burned on a huge pyre the great and costly offerings
which he dedicated to Apollo at Delphi. He thought, says Herodotus
(i. 50), that in this way the god would get possession of the
offerings.

531 As to Isis see Plutarch, _Isis et Osiris_, 16. As to Demeter see
Homer, _Hymn to Demeter_, 231-262; Apollodorus, _Bibliotheca_, i. 5.
1; Ovid, _Fasti_, iv. 547-560. As to Thetis see Apollonius Rhodius,
_Argon_, iv. 865-879; Apollodorus, _Bibl._ iii. 13. 6. Most of these
writers express clearly the thought that the fire consumed the
mortal element, leaving the immortal. Thus Plutarch says, περικαίειν
τὰ θνητὰ τοῦ σώματος. Apollodorus says (i. 5. 1), εἰς πῦρ κατετίθει
τὸ βρέφος καὶ περιῄρει τὰς θνητὰς σάρκας αὐτοῦ, and again (iii. 13.
6), εἰς τὸ πῦρ ἐγκρυβοῦσα τῆς νυκτὸς ἔφθειρεν ὂ ἦν αὐτῷ θνητὸν
πατρῷον. Apollonius Rhodius says,

ἡ μὲν γὰρ βροτέας αἰεὶ περὶ σάρκας ἔδαιεν νύκτα διὰ μέσσην φλογμῷ
πυρός.

And Ovid has,

“_Inque foco pueri corpus vivente favilla Obruit, humanum purget ut
ignis onus._”

On the custom of passing children over a fire as a purification, see
my note, “The Youth of Achilles,” _Classical Review_, vii. (1893)
pp. 293 sq. On the purificatory virtue which the Greeks ascribed to
fire see also Erwin Rohde, _Psyche_3 (Tübingen and Leipsic, 1903),
ii. 101, note 2. The Warramunga of Central Australia have a
tradition of a great man who “used to burn children in the fire so
as to make them grow strong” (B. Spencer and F. J. Gillen, _The
Northern Tribes of Central Australia_, London, 1904, p. 429).

532 She is said to have thus restored the youth of her husband Jason,
her father-in-law Aeson, the nurses of Dionysus, and all their
husbands (Euripides, _Medea_, Argum.; Scholiast on Aristophanes,
_Knights_, 1321; compare Plautus, _Pseudolus_, 879 _sqq._); and she
applied the same process with success to an old ram (Apollodorus,
_Bibl._ i. 9. 27; Pausanias, viii. 11. 2; Hyginus, _Fab._ 24).

533 Pindar, _Olymp._ i. 40 _sqq._, with the Scholiast; J. Tzetzes,
_Schol. on Lycophron_, 152.

534 Jamblichus, _De mysteriis_, v. 12.

535 Lucian, _De morte Peregrini_, 27 _sq._

536 Diogenes Laertius, viii. 2. 69 _sq._

537 Lucian, _De morte Peregrini_, 25; Strabo, xv. 1. 64 and 68, pp. 715,
717; Arrian, _Anabasis_, vii. 3.

_ 538 The Dying God_, pp. 42 _sqq._

M135 The Lydian kings seem to have claimed divinity on the ground of
their descent from Hercules, the god of the double-axe and of the
lion; and this Lydian Hercules or Sandon appears to have been the
same with the Cilician Sandan. Lydian kings held responsible for the
weather and the crops.

539 Herodotus, i. 7.

540 Joannes Lydus, _De magistratibus_, iii. 64.

541 See above, p. 144, note 2.

542 Plutarch, _Quaestiones Graecae_, 45. Zeus Labrandeus was worshipped
at the village of Labraunda, situated in a pass over the mountains,
near Mylasa in Caria. The temple was ancient. A road called the
Sacred Way led downhill for ten miles to Mylasa, a city of white
marble temples and colonnades which stood in a fertile plain at the
foot of a precipitous mountain, where the marble was quarried.
Processions bearing the holy emblems went to and fro along the
Sacred Way from Mylasa to Labraunda. See Strabo, xiv. 2. 23, pp. 658
_sq._ The double-headed axe figures on the ruins and coins of Mylasa
(Ch. Fellows, _An Account of Discoveries in Lycia_, London, 1841, p.
75; B. V. Head, _Historia Numorum_, Oxford, 1887, pp. 528 _sq._). A
horseman carrying a double-headed axe is a type which occurs on the
coins of many towns in Lydia and Phrygia. At Thyatira this
axe-bearing hero was called Tyrimnus, and games were held in his
honour. He was identified with Apollo and the sun. See B. V. Head,
_Catalogue of the Greek Coins of Lydia_ (London, 1901), p. cxxviii.
On a coin of Mostene in Lydia the double-headed axe is represented
between a bunch of grapes and ears of corn, as if it were an emblem
of fertility (B. V. Head, _op. cit._ p. 162, pl. xvii. 11).

543 L. Preller, _Griechische Mythologie_, i.4 (Berlin, 1894) pp. 141
_sq._ As to the Hittite thunder-god and his axe see above, pp. 134
_sqq._

544 Nicolaus Damascenus, in _Fragmenta Historicorum Graecorum_, ed. C.
Müller, iii. 382 _sq._

_ 545 Ibid._ iii. 381.

M136 The lion-god of Lydia.

546 Herodotus, i. 84.

547 Eusebius, _Chronic._ i. 69, ed. A. Schoene (Berlin, 1866-1875).

548 Herodotus, i. 50. At Thebes there was a stone lion which was said to
have been dedicated by Hercules (Pausanias, ix. 17. 2).

549 B. V. Head, _Historia Numorum_ (Oxford, 1887), p. 553; _id._,
_Catalogue of the Greek Coins of Lydia_ (London, 1901), pp. xcviii,
239, 240, 241, 244, 247, 253, 254, 264, with plates xxiv. 9-11, 13,
XXV. 2, 12, xxvii. 8.

M137 Identity of the Lydian and Cilician Hercules.

550 See above, p. 143.

M138 The Cilician and Lydian Hercules (Sandan or Sandon) seems to have
been a Hittite deity.

551 Herodotus, ii. 106; G. Perrot et Ch. Chipiez, _Histoire de l’Art
dans l’Antiquité_, iv. 742-752; L. Messerschmidt, _Corpus
Inscriptionum Hettiticarum_, pp. 33-37, with plates xxxvii.,
xxxviii.; J. Garstang, _The Land of the Hittites_, pp. 170-173, with
plate liv.

552 Pausanias, iii. 24. 2, v. 13. 7 with my note; G. Perrot et Ch.
Chipiez, _op. cit._ iv. 752-759; L. Messerschmidt, _op. cit._ pp. 37
_sq._, pl. xxxix. 1; J. Garstang, _The Land of the Hittites_, pp.
167-170, with plate liii. Unlike most Hittite sculptures the figure
of Mother Plastene is carved almost in the round. The inscriptions
which accompany both these Lydian monuments are much defaced.

553 The suggestion that the Heraclid kings of Lydia were Hittites, or
under Hittite influence, is not novel. See W. Wright, _Empire of the
Hittites_, p. 59; E. Meyer, _Geschichte des Alterthums_, i.
(Stuttgart, 1884) p. 307, § 257; Fr. Hommel, _Grundriss der
Geographie und Geschichte des alten Orients_, p. 54, note 2; L.
Messerschmidt, _The Hittites_, p. 22.

M139 Death and resurrection of the Lydian hero Tylon. Feast of the Golden
Flower at Sardes.

554 See above, pp. 110 _sqq._

555 Dionysius Halicarnasensis, _Antiquit. Roman._ i. 27. 1.

556 Nonnus, _Dionys._ xxv. 451-551; Pliny, _Nat. Hist._ xxv. 14. The
story, as we learn from Pliny, was told by Xanthus, an early
historian of Lydia.

557 Thus Glaucus, son of Minos, was restored to life by the seer
Polyidus, who learned the trick from a serpent. See Apollodorus,
_Bibliotheca_, iii. 3. 1. For references to other tales of the same
sort see my note on Pausanias, ii. 10. 3 (vol. iii. pp. 65 _sq._).
The serpent’s acquaintance with the tree of life in the garden of
Eden perhaps belongs to the same cycle of stories.

558 B. V. Head, _Catalogue of the Greek Coins of Lydia_, pp. cxi-cxiii,
with pl. xxvii. 12. On the coins the champion’s name appears as
Masnes or Masanes, but the reading is doubtful. The name Masnes
occurred in Xanthus’s history of Lydia (_Fragmenta Historicorum
Graecorum_, ed. C. Müller, iv. 629). It is probably the same with
Manes, the name of a son of Zeus and Earth, who is said to have been
the first king of Lydia (Dionysius Halicarnasensis, _Ant. Rom._ i.
27. 1). Manes was the father of King Atys (Herodotus, i. 94). Thus
Tylon was connected with the royal family of Lydia through his
champion as well as in the ways mentioned in the text.

559 Dionysius Halicarnasensis, _l.c._

560 See above, p. 183.

561 B. V. Head, _Catalogue of the Greek Coins of Lydia_, p. cxiii.

562 B. V. Head, _Catalogue of the Greek Coins of Lydia_, pp. cx, cxiii.
The festival seems to be mentioned only on coins.

563 See above, p. 154.

564 V. Hehn, _Kulturpflanzen und Haustiere_7 (Berlin, 1902), p. 261. He
would derive the name from the Semitic, or at all events the
Cilician language. The Hebrew word for saffron is _karkôm_. As to
the spring flowers of North-Western Asia Minor, W. M. Leake remarks
(April 1, 1800) that “primroses, violets, and crocuses, are the only
flowers to be seen” (_Journal of a Tour in Asia Minor_, London,
1824, p. 143). Near Mylasa in Caria, Fellows saw (March 20, 1840)
the broom covered with yellow blossoms and a great variety of
anemones, like “a rich Turkey carpet, in which the green grass did
not form a prominent colour amidst the crimson, lilac, blue,
scarlet, white, and yellow flowers” (Ch. Fellows, _An Account of
Discoveries in Lycia_, London, 1841, pp. 65, 66). In February the
yellow stars of _Gagea arvensis_ cover the rocky and grassy grounds
of Lycia, and the field-marigold often meets the eye. At the same
season in Lycia the shrub _Colutea arborescens_ opens its yellow
flowers. See T. A. B. Spratt and E. Forbes, _Travels in Lycia_
(London, 1847), ii. 133. I must leave it to others to identify the
Golden Flower of Sardes.

M140 The custom of burning a god may have been intended to recruit his
divine energies.
M141 The custom of burning a god may have stood in some relation to
volcanic phenomena.
M142 The great extinct volcano Mount Argaeus in Cappadocia.

565 Strabo, xii. 2. 7, p. 538. Mount Argaeus still retains its ancient
name in slightly altered forms (_Ardjeh_, _Erdjich_, _Erjäus_). Its
height is about 13,000 feet. In the nineteenth century it was
ascended by at least two English travellers, W. J. Hamilton and H.
F. Tozer. See W. J. Hamilton, _Researches in Asia Minor, Pontus, and
Armenia_, ii. 269-281; H. F. Tozer, _Turkish Armenia and Eastern
Asia Minor_, pp. 94, 113-131; Élisée Reclus, _Nouvelle Géographie
Universelle_ (Paris, 1879-1894), ix. 476-478. A Hittite inscription
is carved at a place called Tope Nefezi, near Asarjik, on the slope
of Mount Argaeus. See J. Garstang, _The Land of the Hittites_, pp.
152 _sq._

566 H. F. Tozer, _op. cit._ pp. 125-127.

M143 Persian fire-worship in Cappadocia. Worship of natural fires which
burn perpetually. The perpetual fires of Baku.

567 Strabo, xv. 3. 14 _sq._, pp. 732 _sq._ A bundle of twigs, called the
Barsom (_Beresma_ in the Avesta), is still used by the Parsee
priests in chanting their liturgy. See M. Haug, _Essays on the
Sacred Language, Writings and Religion of the Parsis_3 (London,
1884), pp. 4, note 1, 283. When a potter in Southern India is making
a pot which is to be worshipped as a household deity, he “should
close his mouth with a bandage, so that his breath may not defile
the pot.” See E. Thurston, _Castes and Tribes of Southern India_
(Madras, 1909), iv. 151.

568 Baron Charles Hügel, _Travels in Kashmir and the Panjab_ (London,
1845), pp. 42-46; W. Crooke, _Things Indian_ (London, 1906), p. 219.

569 Jonas Hanway, _An Historical Account of the British Trade over the
Caspian Sea: with the Author’s Journal of Travels_, Second Edition
(London, 1754), i. 263. For later descriptions of the fires and
fire-worshippers of Baku, see J. Reinegg, _Beschreibung des
Kaukasus_ (Gotha, Hildesheim, and St. Petersburg, 1796-1797), i.
151-159; A. von Haxthausen, _Transkaukasia_ (Leipsic, 1856), ii.
80-85. Compare W. Crooke, _Things Indian_, p. 219.

M144 The Burnt Land of Lydia.

570 Strabo, xii. 8. 18 _sq._, p. 579; xiii. 4. 11, p. 628. The wine of
the district is mentioned by Vitruvius (viii. 3. 12) and Pliny
(_Nat. Hist._ xiv. 75).

571 W. J. Hamilton, _Researches in Asia Minor, Pontus, and Armenia_, i.
136-140, ii. 131-138. One of the three recent cones described by
Strabo is now called the _Kara Devlit_, or Black Inkstand. Its top
is about 2500 feet above the sea, but only 500 feet above the
surrounding plain. The adjoining town of Koula, built of the black
lava on which it stands, has a sombre and dismal look. Another of
the cones, almost equally high, has a crater of about half a mile in
circumference and three or four hundred feet deep.

572 Strabo, xiii. 4. 11, p. 628. Compare his account of the Catanian
vineyards (vi. 2. 3, p. 269).

M145 Earthquakes in Asia Minor. Worship of Poseidon, the earthquake god.

573 Strabo, xii. 8. 16-18, pp. 578 _sq._; xiii. 4. 10 _sq._, p. 628.

574 Strabo, xii. 8. 18, p. 579. Compare Tacitus, _Annals_, xii. 58.

575 Strabo, i. 3. 16, p. 57. Compare Plutarch, _De Pythiae oraculis_,
11; Pliny, _Nat. Hist._ ii. 202; Justin, xxx. 4. The event seems to
have happened in 197 B.C. Several other islands are known to have
appeared in the same bay both in ancient and modern times. So far as
antiquity is concerned, the dates of their appearance are given by
Pliny, but some confusion on the subject has crept into his mind, or
rather, perhaps, into his text. See the discussion of the subject in
W. Smith’s _Dictionary of Greek and Roman Geography_ (London, 1873),
ii. 1158-1160. As to the eruptions in the bay of Santorin, the last
of which occurred in 1866 and produced a new island, see Sir Charles
Lyell, _Principles of Geology_12 (London, 1875), i. 51, ii. 65
_sqq._; C. Neumann und J. Partsch, _Physikalische Geographie von
Griechenland_ (Breslau, 1885), pp. 272 _sqq._ There is a monograph
on Santorin and its eruptions (F. Fouqué, _Santorin et ses
éruptions_, Paris, 1879). Strabo has given a brief but striking
account of Rhodes, its architecture, its art-treasures, and its
constitution (xiv. 2. 5, pp. 652 _sq._). As to the Rhodian schools
of art see H. Brunn, _Geschichte der griechischen Künstler_
(Stuttgart, 1857-1859), i. 459 _sqq._, ii. 233 _sqq._, 286 _sq._

576 Aristophanes, _Acharn._ 682; Pausanias, iii. 11. 9, vii. 21. 7;
Plutarch, _Theseus_, 36; Aristides, _Isthmic._ vol. i. p. 29, ed. G.
Dindorf (Leipsic, 1829); Appian, _Bell. Civ._ v. 98; Macrobius,
_Saturn._ i. 17. 22; G. Dittenberger, _Sylloge Inscriptionum
Graecarum_2 (Leipsic, 1898-1901), ii. p. 230, No. 543.

577 Cornutus, _Theologiae Graecae Compendium_, 22.

M146 Spartan propitiation of Poseidon during an earthquake.

578 Xenophon, _Hellenica_, iv. 7. 4. As to the Spartan headquarters
staff (οἱ περὶ δαμοσίαν), see _id._ iv. 5. 8, vi. 4. 14; Xenophon,
_Respublica Lacedaem_. xiii. 1, xv. 4. Usually the Spartans desisted
from any enterprise they had in hand when an earthquake happened
(Thucydides, iii. 59. 1, v. 50. 5, vi. 95. 1).

579 Thucydides, v. 70. 1. The use of the music, Thucydides tells us, was
not to inspire the men, but to enable them to keep step, and so to
march in close order. Without music a long line of battle was apt to
straggle in advancing to the charge. As missiles were little used in
Greek warfare, there was no need to hurry the advance over the
intervening ground; so it was made deliberately and with the bands
playing. The air to which the Spartans charged was called Castor’s
tune. It was the king in person who gave the word for the flutes to
strike up. See Plutarch, _Lycurgus_, 22.

580 Xenophon, _Respublica Lacedaem_. xi. 3; Aristophanes, _Lysistrata_,
1140; Aristotle, cited by a scholiast on Aristophanes, _Acharn._
320; Plutarch, _Instituta Laconica_, 24. When a great earthquake had
destroyed the city of Sparta and the Messenians were in revolt, the
Spartans sent a messenger to Athens asking for help. Aristophanes
(_Lysistrata_, 1138 _sqq._) describes the man as if he had seen him,
sitting as a suppliant on the altar with his pale face and his red
coat.

581 I have assumed that the sun shone on the Spartans at Thermopylae.
For the battle was fought in the height of summer, when the Greek
sky is generally cloudless, and on that particular morning the
weather was very still. The evening before, the Persians had sent
round a body of troops by a difficult pass to take the Spartans in
the rear; day was breaking when they neared the summit, and the
first intimation of their approach which reached the ears of the
Phocian guards posted on the mountain was the loud crackling of
leaves under their feet in the oak forest. Moreover, the famous
Spartan saying about fighting in the shade of the Persian arrows,
which obscured the sun, points to bright, hot weather. It was at
high noon, and therefore probably in the full blaze of the mid-day
sun, that the last march-out took place. See Herodotus, vii.
215-226; and as to the date of the battle (about the time of the
Olympic games) see Herodotus, vii. 206, viii. 12 and 26; G. Busolt,
_Griechische Geschichte_, ii.2 (Gotha, 1895) p. 673, note 9.

M147 Modes of stopping an earthquake by informing the god or giant that
there are still men on the earth.

582 S. Müller, _Reizen en Onderzoekingen in den Indischen Archipel_
(Amsterdam, 1857), ii. 264 _sq._ Compare A. Bastian, _Indonesien_
(Berlin, 1884-1889), ii. 3. The beliefs and customs of the East
Indian peoples in regard to earthquakes have been described by G. A.
Wilken, _Het animisme bij de volken van den Indischen Archipel_,
Tweede Stuk (Leyden, 1885), pp. 247-254; _id._, _Verspreide
Geschriften_ (The Hague, 1912), iii. 274-281. Compare _id._,
_Handleiding voor de vergelijkende Volkenkunde van
Nederlandsch-Indië_ (Leyden, 1893), pp. 604 _sq._; and on primitive
conceptions of earthquakes in general, E. B. Tylor, _Primitive
Culture_2 (London, 1873), i. 364-366; R. Lasch, “Die Ursache und
Bedeutung der Erdbeben im Volksglauben und Volksbrauch,” _Archiv für
Religionswissenschaft_, v. (1902) pp. 236-257, 369-383.

583 Epiphanius, _Adversus Haereses_, ii. 2. 23 (Migne’s _Patrologia
Graeca_, xlii. 68).

584 H. N. van der Tuuk, “Notes on the Kawi Language and Literature,”
_Journal of the Royal Asiatic Society_, N.S. xiii. (1881) p. 50.

585 J. G. F. Riedel, _De sluik- en kroesharige rassen tusschen Selebes
en Papua_ (The Hague, 1886), p. 398; compare _id._ pp. 330, 428.

586 G. Bamler, “Tami,” in R. Neuhauss’s _Deutsch Neu-Guinea_, iii.
(Berlin, 1911) p. 492.

587 Mrs. Leslie Milne, _Shans at Home_ (London, 1910), p. 54.

588 De St. Cricq, “Voyage du Pérou au Brésil par les fleuves Ucayali et
Amazone, Indiens Conibos,” _Bulletin de la Société de Géographie_
(Paris), ive Série, vi. (1853) p. 292.

589 Miss Alice Werner, _The Natives of British Central Africa_ (London,
1906), p. 56.

590 Mgr. Lechaptois, _Aux Rives du Tanganika_ (Algiers, 1913), p. 217.

591 Rev. J. Roscoe, _The Baganda_ (London, 1911), pp. 313 _sq._

M148 Conduct of the Bataks during an earthquake.

592 W. Ködding, “Die batakschen Götter und ihr Verhältniss zum
Brahmanismus,” _Allgemeine Missions-Zeitschrift_, xii. (1885) p.
405.

593 G. A. Wilken, “Het Animisme bij de volken van den Indischen
Archipel,” _Verspreide Geschriften_, ii. 279; H. N. van der Tuuk,
_op. cit._ pp. 49 _sq._

M149 Various modes of prevailing upon the earthquake god to stop.

594 J. G. F. Riedel, “De Topantunuasu of oorspronkelijke Volkstammen van
Central Selebes,” _Bijdragen tot de Taal- Land- en Volkenkunde van
Nederlandsch-Indië_, xxxv. (1886) p. 95.

595 John Williams, _Narrative of Missionary Enterprises in the South Sea
Islands_ (London, 1838), p. 379.

596 G. Turner, _Samoa_ (London, 1884), p. 211; Ch. Wilkes, _Narrative of
the United States Exploring Expedition_, New Edition (New York,
1851), ii. 131.

597 A. Schadenburg, “Die Bewohner von Süd-Mindanao und der Insel Samal,”
_Zeitschrift für Ethnologie_, xvii. (1885) p. 32.

598 W. Mariner, _Account of the Natives of the Tonga Islands_, Second
Edition (London, 1818), ii. 112 _sq._

599 Sangermano, _Description of the Burmese Empire_ (Rangoon, 1885), p.
130.

600 P. A. Kleintitschen, _Die Küstenbewohner der Gazellehalbinsel_
(Hiltrup bei Münster, N.D.), p. 336.

601 A. Pinart, “Les Indiens de l’État de Panama,” _Revue
d’Ethnographie_, vi. (1887) p. 119.

602 E. J. Payne, _History of the New World called America_, i. (Oxford,
1892) p. 469.

603 A. B. Ellis, _The Tshi-speaking Peoples of the Gold Coast_ (London,
1887), pp. 35 _sq._

M150 Religious and moral effects of earthquakes.

604 J. Jackson, in J. E. Erskine’s _Journal of a Cruise among the
Islands of the Western Pacific_ (London, 1853), p. 473. My friend,
the late Mr. Lorimer Fison, wrote to me (December 15, 1906) that the
name of the Fijian earthquake god is Maui, not A Dage, as Jackson
says. Mr. Fison adds, “I have seen Fijians stamping and smiting the
ground and yelling at the top of their voices in order to rouse
him.”

605 J. T. Nieuwenhuisen en H. C. B. von Rosenberg, “Verslag omtrent het
eiland Nias,” _Verhandelingen van het Bataviaasch Genootschap van
Kunsten en Wetenschappen_, xxx. (Batavia, 1863) p. 118; Th. C.
Rappard, “Het eiland Nias en zijne bewoners,” _Bijdragen tot de
Taal- Land- en Volkenkunde van Nederlandsch-Indië_, lxii. (1909) p.
582. In Soerakarta, a district of Java, when an earthquake takes
place the people lie flat on their stomachs on the ground, and lick
it with their tongues so long as the earthquake lasts. This they do
in order that they may not lose their teeth prematurely. See J. W.
Winter, “Beknopte Beschrijving van het hof Soerokarta in 1824,”
_Bijdragen tot de Taal- Land- en Volkenkunde van
Nederlandsch-Indië_, liv. (1902) p. 85. The connexion of ideas in
this custom is not clear.

M151 The god of the sea and of the earthquake naturally conceived as one.

606 On this question see C. Neumann und J. Partsch, _Physikalische
Geographie von Griechenland_ (Breslau, 1885), pp. 332-336. As to the
frequency of earthquakes in Achaia and Asia Minor see Seneca,
_Epist._ xiv. 3. 9; and as to Achaia in particular see C. Neumann
und J. Partsch, _op. cit._ pp. 324-326. On the coast of Achaia there
was a chain of sanctuaries of Poseidon (L. Preller, _Griechische
Mythologie_, i.4 575).

607 See Sir Ch. Lyell, _Principles of Geology_,12 ii. 147 _sqq._; J.
Milne, _Earthquakes_ (London, 1886), pp. 165 _sqq._

608 See, for example, Thucydides, iii. 89.

609 Strabo, viii. 7. 1 _sq._, pp. 384 _sq._; Diodorus Siculus, xv. 49;
Aelian, _Nat. Anim._ xi. 19; Pausanias, vii. 24. 5 _sq._ and 12,
vii. 25. 1 and 4.

610 Diodorus Siculus, xv. 49. 4 _sq._ Among the most famous seats of the
worship of Poseidon in Peloponnese were Taenarum in Laconia, Helice
in Achaia, Mantinea in Arcadia, and the island of Calauria, off the
coast of Troezen. See Pausanias, ii. 33. 2, iii. 25. 4-8, vii. 24. 5
_sq._, viii. 10. 2-4. Laconia as well as Achaia has suffered much
from earthquakes, and it contained many sanctuaries of Poseidon. We
may suppose that the deity was worshipped here chiefly as the
earthquake god, since the rugged coasts of Laconia are ill adapted
to maritime enterprise, and the Lacedaemonians were never a
seafaring folk. See C. Neumann und J. Partsch, _Physikalische
Geographie von Griechenland_, pp. 330 _sq._, 335 _sq._ For Laconian
sanctuaries of Poseidon see Pausanias, iii. 11. 9, iii. 12. 5, iii.
14. 2 and 7, iii. 15. 10, iii. 20. 2, iii. 21. 5, iii. 25. 4.

M152 Poisonous mephitic vapours.

611 Sir Ch. Lyell, _Principles of Geology_,12 i. 391 _sqq._, 590.

612 “Extract from a Letter of Mr. Alexander Loudon,” _Journal of the
Royal Geographical Society_, ii. (1832) pp. 60-62; Sir Ch. Lyell,
_Principles of Geology_,12 i. 590.

613 Sir Ch. Lyell, _l.c._

M153 Places of Pluto or Charon. The valley of Amsanctus.

614 Lucretius, vi. 738 _sqq._

615 Strabo, v. 4. 5, p. 244, xii. 8. 17, p. 579, xiii. 4. 14, p. 629,
xiv. 1. 11 and 44, pp. 636, 649; Cicero, _De divinatione_, i. 36.
79; Pliny, _Nat. Hist._ ii. 208. Compare [Aristotle,] _De mundo_, 4,
p. 395 B, ed. Bekker.

616 Servius on Virgil, _Aen._ vii. 84, who says that some people looked
on Mefitis as a god, the male partner of Leucothoë, to whom he stood
as Adonis to Venus or as Virbius to Diana. As to Mefitis see L.
Preller, _Römische Mythologie_3 (Berlin, 1881-1883), ii. 144 _sq._;
R. Peter, _s.v._ “Mefitis” in W. H. Roscher’s _Lexikon der griech.
und röm. Mythologie_, ii. 2519 _sqq._

617 Virgil, _Aen._ vii. 563-571, with the commentary of Servius; Cicero,
_De divinatione_, i. 36. 79; Pliny, _Nat. Hist._ ii. 208.

618 Letter of Mr. Hamilton (British Envoy at the Court of Naples), in
_Journal of the Royal Geographical Society_, ii. (1832) pp. 62-65;
W. Smith’s _Dictionary of Greek and Roman Geography_, i. 127; H.
Nissen, _Italische Landeskunde_ (Berlin, 1883-1902), i. 242, 271,
ii. 819 _sq._ Another place in Italy infested by poisonous
exhalations is the grotto called _dei cani_ at Naples. It is
described by Addison in his “Remarks on Several Parts of Italy”
(_Works_, London, 1811, vol. ii. pp. 89-91).

M154 Sanctuaries of Charon or Pluto in Caria.

619 Strabo, xiv. 1. 11, p. 636.

620 Strabo, xiv. 1. 44, pp. 649 _sq._ A coin of Nysa shows the bull
carried to the sacrifice by six naked youths and preceded by a naked
flute-player. See B. V. Head, _Catalogue of the Greek Coins of
Lydia_, pp. lxxxiii. 181, pl. xx. 10. Strabo was familiar with this
neighbourhood, for he tells us (xiv. 1. 48, p. 650) that in his
youth he studied at Nysa under the philosopher Aristodemus.

M155 Sanctuary of Pluto at the Lydian or Phrygian Hierapolis.

621 Some of the ancients assigned Hierapolis to Lydia, and others to
Phrygia (W. M. Ramsay, _Cities and Bishoprics of Phrygia_, i.
(Oxford, 1895) pp. 84 _sq._

622 Strabo, xiii. 4. 14, pp. 629 _sq._; Dio Cassius, lxviii. 27. 3;
Pliny, _Nat. Hist._ ii. 208; Ammianus Marcellinus, xxiii. 6. 18.

M156 The hot springs and petrified cascades of Hierapolis.

623 Ammianus Marcellinus (_l.c._) speaks as if the cave no longer
existed in his time.

M157 The hot pool of Hierapolis with its deadly exhalations.
M158 Deposits left by the waters of Hierapolis.

624 Strabo, xiii. 4. 14, pp. 629, 630; Vitruvius, viii. 3. 10. For
modern descriptions of Hierapolis see R. Chandler, _Travels in Asia
Minor_2 (London, 1776), pp. 228-235; Ch. Fellows, _Journal written
during an Excursion in Asia Minor_ (London, 1839), pp. 283-285; W.
J. Hamilton, _Researches in Asia Minor, Pontus, and Armenia_, i.
517-521; E. Renan, _Saint Paul_, pp. 357 _sq._; E. J. Davis,
_Anatolica_ (London, 1874), pp. 97-112; É. Reclus, _Nouvelle
Géographie Universelle_, ix. 510-512; W. Cochran, _Pen and Pencil
Sketches in Asia Minor_ (London, 1887), pp. 387-390; W. M. Ramsay,
_Cities and Bishoprics of Phrygia_, i. 84 _sqq._ The temperature of
the hot pool varies from 85 to 90 degrees Fahrenheit. The volcanic
district of Tuscany which skirts the Apennines abounds in hot
calcareous springs which have produced phenomena like those of
Hierapolis. Indeed the whole ground is in some places coated over
with tufa and travertine, which have been deposited by the water,
and, like the ground at Hierapolis, it sounds hollow under the foot.
See Sir Ch. Lyell, _Principles of Geology_,12 i. 397 _sqq._ As to
the terraces of Rotomahana in New Zealand, which were destroyed by
an eruption of Mount Taravera in 1886, see R. Taylor, _Te Ika A
Maui, or New Zealand and its Inhabitants_2 (London, 1870), pp.
464-469.

M159 Hercules the patron of hot springs.

625 Athenaeus, xii. 6. p. 512.

626 Aristophanes, _Clouds_, 1044-1054.

627 Scholiast on Aristophanes, _Clouds_, 1050; Scholiast on Pindar,
_Olymp._ xii. 25; Suidas and Hesychius, _s.v._ Ἡράκλεια λουτρά;
Apostolius, viii. 66; Zenobius, vi. 49; Diogenianus, v. 7; Plutarch,
_Proverbia Alexandrinorum_, 21; Diodorus Siculus, iv. 23. 1, v. 3.
4. Another story was that Hercules, like Moses, produced the water
by smiting the rock with his club (Antoninus Liberalis, _Transform._
4).

628 Apostolius, viii. 68; Zenobius, vi. 49; Diogenianus, v. 7; Plutarch,
_Proverbia Alexandrinorum_, 21.

629 Lucian, _Dialogi Deorum_, 13.

M160 Hot springs of Hercules at Thermopylae.

630 Strabo, ix. 4. 13, p. 428.

631 Herodotus, vii. 176; Pausanias, iv. 35. 9; Philostratus, _Vit.
Sophist._ ii. 1. 9.

632 Scholiast on Aristophanes, _Clouds_, 1050.

633 I have described Thermopylae as I saw it in November 1895. Compare
W. M. Leake, _Travels in Northern Greece_ (London, 1835), ii. 33
_sqq._; E. Dodwell, _Classical and Topographical Tour through
Greece_ (London, 1819), ii. 66 _sqq._; K. G. Fiedler, _Reise durch
alle Theile des Königreichs Griechenland_ (Leipsic, 1840-1841), i.
207 _sqq._; L. Ross, _Wanderungen in Griechenland_ (Halle, 1851), i.
90 _sqq._; C. Bursian, _Geographie von Griechenland_ (Leipsic,
1862-1872), i. 92 _sqq._

M161 Hot springs of Hercules at Aedepsus.

634 Thucydides, iii. 87 and 89; Strabo, i. 3. 20, pp. 60 _sq._; C.
Neumann und J. Partsch, _Physikalische Geographie von Griechenland_,
pp. 321-323.

635 Aristotle, _Meteora_, ii. 8, p. 366 A, ed. Bekker; Strabo, ix. 4. 2,
p. 425. Aristotle expressly recognized the connexion of the springs
with earthquakes, which he tells us were very common in this
district. As to the earthquakes of Euboea see also Thucydides, iii.
87, 89; Strabo, i. 3. 16 and 20, pp. 58, 60 _sq._

636 Plutarch, _Sulla_, 26.

637 Plutarch, _Quaest. Conviviales_, iv. 4. 1; _id._, _De fraterno
Amore_, 17.

638 As to the hot springs of Aedepsus (the modern _Lipso_) see K. G.
Fiedler, _Reise durch alle Theile des Königreichs Griechenland_, i.
487-492; H. N. Ulrichs, _Reisen und Forschungen in Griechenland_
(Bremen, 1840—Berlin, 1863), ii. 233-235; C. Bursian, _Geographie
von Griechenland_, ii. 409; C. Neumann und J. Partsch,
_Physikalische Geographie von Griechenland_, pp. 342-344.

639 Strabo, i. 3. 20, p. 60.

640 Athenaeus, iii. 4, p. 73 E, D.

M162 Reasons for the association of Hercules with hot springs.

641 The hot springs of Himera (the modern _Termini_) were said to have
been produced for the refreshment of the weary Hercules. See
Diodorus Siculus, iv. 23. 1, v. 3. 4; Scholiast on Pindar, _Olymp._
xii. 25. The hero is said to have taught the Syracusans to sacrifice
a bull annually to Persephone at the Blue Spring (_Cyane_) near
Syracuse; the beasts were drowned in the water of the pool. See
Diodorus Siculus, iv. 23. 4, v. 4. 1 _sq._ As to the spring, which
is now thickly surrounded by tall papyrus-plants introduced by the
Arabs, see K. Baedeker, _Southern Italy_7 (Leipsic, 1880), pp. 356,
357.

642 The splendid baths of Allifae in Samnium, of which there are
considerable remains, were sacred to Hercules. See G. Wilmanns,
_Exempla Inscriptionum Latinarum_ (Berlin, 1873), vol. i. p. 227,
No. 735 C; H. Nissen, _Italische Landeskunde_, ii. 798. It is
characteristic of the volcanic nature of the springs that the same
inscription which mentions these baths of Hercules records their
destruction by an earthquake.

643 H. Dessau, _Inscriptiones Latinae Selectae_, vol. ii. Pars i.
(Berlin, 1902) p. 113, No. 3891.

644 Speaking of thermal springs Lyell observes that the description of
them “might almost with equal propriety have been given under the
head of ‘igneous causes,’ as they are agents of a mixed nature,
being at once igneous and aqueous” (_Principles of Geology_,12 i.
392).

645 See above, p. 194.

M163 The hot springs of Callirrhoe in Moab.

646 S. I. Curtiss, _Primitive Semitic Religion To-day_ (Chicago, New
York, and Toronto, 1902), pp. 116 _sq._; Mrs. H. H. Spoer, “The
Powers of Evil in Jerusalem,” _Folk-lore_, xviii. (1907) p. 55. See
above, p. 78.

647 Josephus, _Antiquit. Jud._ xvii. 6. 5. The medical properties of the
spring are mentioned by Pliny (_Nat. Hist._ v. 72).

648 C. L. Irby and J. Mangles, _Travels in Egypt and Nubia, Syria and
the Holy Land_ (London, 1844), pp. 144 _sq._; W. Smith, _Dictionary
of Greek and Roman Geography_ (London, 1873), i. 482, _s.v._
“Callirrhoë”; K. Baedeker, _Syria and Palestine_4 (Leipsic, 1906),
p. 148; H. B. Tristram, _The Land of Moab_ (London, 1873), pp.
233-250, 285 _sqq._; Jacob E. Spafford, “Around the Dead Sea by
Motor Boat,” _The Geographical Journal_, xxxix. (1912) pp. 39 _sq._
The river formed by the springs is now called the Zerka.

M164 Prayers and sacrifices offered to the hot springs of Callirrhoe.

649 Antonin Jaussen, _Coutumes des Arabes au pays de Moab_ (Paris,
1908), pp. 359 _sq._ The Arabs think that the evil spirits let the
hot water out of hell, lest its healing properties should assuage
the pains of the damned. See H. B. Tristram, _The Land of Moab_
(London, 1873), p. 247.

M165 Worship of volcanic phenomena in other lands.
M166 The great volcano of Kirauea in Hawaii.

650 W. Ellis, _Polynesian Researches_, Second Edition (London,
1832-1836), iv. 235 _sqq._ Mr. Ellis was the first European to visit
and describe the tremendous volcano. His visit was paid in the year
1823. Compare _The Encyclopaedia Britannica_,9 xi. 531.

651 W. Ellis, _op. cit._ iv. 246 _sq._

M167 The divinities of the volcano. Offerings to the volcano. Priestess
impersonating the goddess of the volcano.

652 W. Ellis, _op. cit._ iv. 248-250.

653 W. Ellis, _op. cit._ iv. 207, 234-236. The berries resemble currants
in shape and size and grow on low bushes. “The branches small and
clear, leaves alternate, obtuse with a point, and serrated; the
flower was monopetalous, and, on being examined, determined the
plant to belong to the class _decandria_ and order _monogynia_. The
native name of the plant is _ohelo_” (W. Ellis, _op. cit._ iv. 234).

654 W. Ellis, _op. cit._ iv. 263.

655 W. Ellis, _op. cit._ iv. 350.

656 W. Ellis, _op. cit._ iv. 309-311.

657 W. Ellis, _op. cit._ iv. 361.

M168 Sacrifices to volcanoes. Human victims thrown into volcanoes. Annual
sacrifices to the volcano Bromo in Java.

658 Fernandez de Oviedo y Valdés, _Historia General y Natural de las
Indias_ (Madrid, 1851-1855), iv. 74.

659 A. C. Kruijt, _Het Animisme in den Indischen Archipel_ (The Hague,
1906), pp. 497 _sq._

660 W. B. d’Almeida, _Life in Java_ (London, 1864), i. 166-173.

661 J. H. F. Kohlbrugge, “Die Tĕnggĕresen, ein alter Javanischer
Volksstamm,” _Bijdragentot de Taal- Land- en Volkenkunde van
Nederlandsch-Indië_, liii. (1901) pp. 84, 144-147.

662 J. H. F. Kohlbrugge, _op. cit._ pp. 100 _sq._

M169 Other sacrifices to volcanoes.

663 I. A. Stigand, “The Volcano of Smeroe, Java,” _The Geographical
Journal_, xxviii. (1906) pp. 621, 624.

664 Pausanias, iii. 23. 9. Some have thought that Pausanias confused the
crater of Etna with the _Lago di Naftia_, a pool near Palagonia in
the interior of Sicily, of which the water, impregnated with naphtha
and sulphur, is thrown into violent ebullition by jets of volcanic
gas. See [Aristotle,] _Mirab. Auscult._ 57; Macrobius, _Saturn._ v.
19. 26 _sqq._; Diodorus Siculus, xi. 89; Stephanus Byzantius, _s.v._
Παλική; E. H. Bunbury, _s.v._ “Palicorum Iacus,” in W. Smith’s
_Dictionary of Greek and Roman Geography_, ii. 533 _sq._ The author
of the ancient Latin poem _Aetna_ says (vv. 340 _sq._) that people
offered incense to the celestial deities on the top of Etna.

M170 No evidence that the Asiatic custom of burning kings or gods was
connected with volcanic phenomena.

665 See above, pp. 190 _sq._

666 On Mount Chimaera in Lycia a flame burned perpetually which neither
earth nor water could extinguish. See Pliny, _Nat. Hist._ ii. 236,
v. 100; Servius on Virgil, _Aen._ vi. 288; Seneca, _Epist._ x. 3. 3;
Diodorus, quoted by Photius, _Bibliotheca_, p. 212 B, 10 _sqq._, ed.
Im. Bekker (Berlin, 1824). This perpetual flame was rediscovered by
Captain Beaufort near Porto Genovese on the coast of Lycia. It
issues from the side of a hill of crumbly serpentine rock, giving
out an intense heat, but no smoke. “Trees, brushwood, and weeds grow
close round this little crater, a small stream trickles down the
hill hard bye, and the ground does not appear to feel the effect of
its heat at more than a few feet distance.” The fire is not
accompanied by earthquakes or noises; it ejects no stones and emits
no noxious vapours. There is nothing but a brilliant and perpetual
flame, at which the shepherds often cook their food. See Fr.
Beaufort, _Karmania_ (London, 1817), p. 46; compare T. A. B. Spratt
and E. Forbes, _Travels in Lycia_ (London, 1847), ii. 181 _sq._

667 In the foregoing discussion I have confined myself, so far as
concerns Asia, to the volcanic regions of Cappadocia, Lydia, and
Caria. But Syria and Palestine, the home of Adonis and Melcarth,
“abound in volcanic appearances, and very extensive areas have been
shaken, at different periods, with great destruction of cities and
loss of lives. Continual mention is made in history of the ravages
committed by earthquakes in Sidon, Tyre, Berytus, Laodicea, and
Antioch, and in the island of Cyprus. The country around the Dead
Sea exhibits in some spots layers of sulphur and bitumen, forming a
superficial deposit, supposed by Mr. Tristram to be of volcanic
origin” (Sir Ch. Lyell, _Principles of Geology_,12 i. 592 _sq._). As
to the earthquakes of Syria and Phoenicia see Strabo, i. 3. 16, p.
58; Lucretius, vi. 585; Josephus, _Antiquit. Jud._ xv. 5. 2; _id._,
_Bell. Jud._ i. 19. 3; W. M. Thomson, _The Land and the Book,
Central Palestine and Phoenicia_, pp. 568-574; Ed. Robinson,
_Biblical Researches in Palestine_,3 ii. 422-424; S. R. Driver, on
Amos iv. 11 (Cambridge _Bible for Schools and Colleges_). It is said
that in the reign of the Emperor Justin the city of Antioch was
totally destroyed by a dreadful earthquake, in which three hundred
thousand people perished (Procopius, _De Bello Persico_, ii. 14).
The destruction of Sodom and Gomorrah (Genesis xix. 24-28) has been
plausibly explained as the effect of an earthquake liberating large
quantities of petroleum and inflammable gases. See H. B. Tristram,
_The Land of Israel_, Fourth Edition (London, 1882), pp. 350-354; S.
R. Driver, _The Book of Genesis_4 (London, 1905), pp. 202 _sq._

M171 Results of the preceding inquiry.
M172 Our knowledge of the rites of Adonis derived chiefly from Greek
writers.
M173 Festivals of the death and resurrection of Adonis. The festival at
Alexandria. The festival at Byblus.

668 Plutarch, _Alcibiades_, 18; _id._, _Nicias_, 13; Zenobius, _Centur._
i. 49; Theocritus, xv. 132 _sqq._; Eustathius on Homer, _Od._ xi.
590.

669 Besides Lucian (cited below) see Origen, _Selecta in Ezechielem_
(Migne’s _Patrologia Graeca_, xiii. 800), δοκοῦσι γὰρ κατ᾽ ἐνιαυτὸν
τελετάς τινας ποιεῖν πρῶτον μὲν ὅτι θρηνοῦσιν αὐτὸν [scil. Ἄδωνιν]
ὡς τεθνηκότα, δεύτερον δὲ ὅτι χαίρουσιν ἐπ᾽ αὐτῷ ὡς ἀπὸ νεκρῶν
ἀναστάντι. Jerome, _Commentar. in Ezechielem_, viii. 13, 14 (Migne’s
_Patrologia Latina_, xxv. 82, 83): “_Quem nos_ Adonidem
_interpretati sumus, et Hebraeus et Syrus sermo_ THAMUZ (תמוז)
_vocat: unde quia juxta gentilem fabulam, in mense Junis amasius
Veneris et pulcherrimus juvenis occisus, et deinceps revixisse
narratur, eundem Junium mensem eodem appellant nomine, et
anniversariam ei celebrant solemnitatem, in qua plangitur a
mulieribus quasi mortuus, et postea reviviscens canitur atque
laudatur ... interfectionem et resurrectionem Adonidis planctu et
gaudio prosequens._” Cyril of Alexandria, _In Isaiam_, lib. ii.
tomus iii. (Migne’s _Patrologia Graeca_, lxx. 441), ἐπλάττοντο
τοίνυν Ἔλληνες ἑορτὴν ἐπὶ τούτῳ τοιαύτην. Προσεποιοῦντο μὲν γὰρ
λυπουμένῃ τῇ Ἀφροδίτῃ, διὰ τὸ τεθνάναι τὸν Ἄδωνιν, συνολοφύρεσθαι
καὶ θρηνεῖν; ἀνελθούσης δὲ ἐξ ᾅδου, καὶ μὴν καὶ ηὐρῆσθαι λεγούσης
τὸν ζητούμενον, συνήδεσθαι καὶ ἀνασκιρτᾶν; καὶ μεχρὶ τῶν καθ᾽ ἡμᾶς
καιρῶν ἐν τοῖς κατ᾽ Ἀλεξάνδρειαν ἱεροῖς ἐτελεῖτο τὸ παίγνιον τοῦτο.
From this testimony of Cyril we learn that the festival of the death
and resurrection of Adonis was celebrated at Alexandria down to his
time, that is, down to the fourth or even the fifth century, long
after the official establishment of Christianity.

670 Theocritus, xv.

671 W. Mannhardt, _Antike Wald- und Feldkulte_ (Berlin, 1877), p. 277.

672 Lucian, _De dea Syria_, 6. See above, p. 38. The flutes used by the
Phoenicians in the lament for Adonis are mentioned by Athenaeus (iv.
76, p. 174 F), and by Pollux (iv. 76), who say that the same name
_gingras_ was applied by the Phoenicians both to the flute and to
Adonis himself. Compare F. C. Movers, _Die Phoenizier_, i. 243 _sq._
We have seen that flutes were also played in the Babylonian rites of
Tammuz (above, p. 9). Lucian’s words, ἐς τὸν ἠέρα πέμπουσι, imply
that the ascension of the god was supposed to take place in the
presence, if not before the eyes, of the worshipping crowds. The
devotion of Byblus to Adonis is noticed also by Strabo (xvi. 2. 18,
p. 755).

M174 Date of the festival at Byblus. The anemone and the red rose the
flowers of Adonis. Festivals of Adonis at Athens and Antioch.

673 Lucian, _De dea Syria_, 8. The discoloration of the river and the
sea was observed by H. Maundrell on 17/27 March 1696/1697. See his
_Journey from Aleppo to Jerusalem, at Easter, __A.D.__ 1697_, Fourth
Edition (Perth, 1800), pp. 59 _sq._; _id._, in Bohn’s _Early Travels
in Palestine_, edited by Thomas Wright (London, 1848), pp. 411 _sq._
Renan remarked the discoloration at the beginning of February
(_Mission de Phénicie_, p. 283). In his well-known lines on the
subject Milton has laid the mourning in summer:—

“_Thammuz came next behind,_
_ Whose annual wound in Lebanon allur’d_
_ The Syrian damsels to lament his fate_
_ In amorous ditties all a summer’s day._”

674 Ovid, _Metam._ x. 735; Servius on Virgil, _Aen._ v. 72; J. Tzetzes,
_Schol. on Lycophron_, 831. Bion, on the other hand, represents the
anemone as sprung from the tears of Aphrodite (_Idyl._ i. 66).

675 W. Robertson Smith, “Ctesias and the Semiramis Legend,” _English
Historical Review_, ii. (1887) p. 307, following Lagarde. Compare W.
W. Graf Baudissin, _Adonis und Esmun_, pp. 88 _sq._

676 J. Tzetzes, _Schol. on Lycophron_, 831; _Geoponica_, xi. 17;
_Mythographi Graeci_, ed. A. Westermann, p. 359. Compare Bion,
_Idyl._ i. 66; Pausanias, vi. 24. 7; Philostratus, _Epist._ i. and
iii.

677 Plutarch, _Alcibiades_, 18; _id._, _Nicias_, 13. The date of the
sailing of the fleet is given by Thucydides (vi. 30, θέρους
μεσοῦντος ἤδη), who, with his habitual contempt for the superstition
of his countrymen, disdains to notice the coincidence. Adonis was
also bewailed by the Argive women (Pausanias, ii. 20. 6), but we do
not know at what season of the year the lamentation took place.
Inscriptions prove that processions in honour of Adonis were held in
the Piraeus, and that a society of his worshippers existed at Loryma
in Caria. See G. Dittenberger, _Sylloge Inscriptionum Graecarum_,2
Nos. 726, 741 (vol. ii. pp. 564, 604).

678 Ammianus Marcellinus, xxii. 9. 15.

M175 Resemblance of these rites to Indian and European ceremonies. The
death and resurrection of Adonis a mythical expression for the
annual decay and revival of plant life. Adonis sometimes taken for
the sun.

_ 679 The Dying God_, pp. 261-266.

680 In the Alexandrian ceremony, however, it appears to have been the
image of Adonis only which was thrown into the sea.

681 Apollodorus, _Bibliotheca_, iii. 14. 4; Scholiast on Theocritus, i.
109; Antoninus Liberalis, _Transform._ 34; J. Tzetzes, _Scholia on
Lycophron_, 829; Ovid, _Metamorph._ x. 489 _sqq._; Servius on
Virgil, _Aen._ v. 72, and on _Bucol._ x. 18; Hyginus, _Fab._ 58,
164; Fulgentius, iii. 8. The word Myrrha or Smyrna is borrowed from
the Phoenician (Liddell and Scott, _Greek Lexicon_, _s.v._ σμύρνα).
Hence the mother’s name, as well as the son’s, was taken directly
from the Semites.

682 W. Mannhardt, _Antike Wald- und Feldkulte_, p. 383, note 2.

683 Above, p. 9.

684 Jeremiah xliv. 17-19.

685 Scholiast on Theocritus, iii. 48; Hyginus, _Astronom._ ii. 7;
Lucian, _Dialog. deor._ xi. 1; Cornutus, _Theologiae Graecae
Compendium_, 28, p. 54, ed. C. Lang (Leipsic, 1881); Apollodorus,
_Bibliotheca_, iii. 14. 4.

686 The arguments which tell against the solar interpretation of Adonis
are stated more fully by the learned and candid scholar Graf
Baudissin (_Adonis und Esmun_, pp. 169 _sqq._), who himself formerly
accepted the solar theory but afterwards rightly rejected it in
favour of the view “_dass Adonis die Frühlingsvegetation darstellt,
die im Sommer abstirbt_” (_op. cit._ p. 169).

687 Bailly, _Lettres sur l’Origine des Sciences_ (London and Paris,
1777), pp. 255 _sq._; _id._, _Lettres sur l’Atlantide de Platon_
(London and Paris, 1779), pp. 114-125. Carlyle has described how
through the sleety drizzle of a dreary November day poor innocent
Bailly was dragged to the scaffold amid the howls and curses of the
Parisian mob (_French Revolution_, bk. v. ch. 2). My friend the late
Professor C. Bendall showed me a book by a Hindoo gentleman in which
it is seriously maintained that the primitive home of the Aryans was
within the Arctic regions. See Bâl Gangâdhar Tilak, _The Arctic Home
in the Vedas_ (Poona and Bombay, 1903).

688 Cornutus, _Theologiae Graecae Compendium_, 28, pp. 54 _sq._, ed. C.
Lang (Leipsic, 1881), τοιοῦτον γάρ τι καὶ παρ᾽ Αἰγυπτίοις ὁ
ζητούμενος καὶ ἀνευρισκόμενος ὑπὸ τῆς Ἴσιδος Ὄσιρις ἐμφαίνει καὶ
παρὰ Φοίνιξιν ὁ ἀνὰ μέρος παρ᾽ ἔξ μῆνας ὑπὲρ γῆν τε καὶ ὑπὸ γῆν
γινόμενος Ἄδωνις, ἀπὸ τοῦ ἀδεῖν τοῖς ἀνθρώποις οὔτως ὠνομασμένου τοῦ
Δημητριακοῦ καρποῦ. τοῦτον δὲ πλήξας κάπρος ἀνελεῖν λέγεται διὰ τὸ
τὰς ὗς δοκεῖν ληιβότειρας εἶναι ἢ τὸν τῆς ὕνεως ὀδόντα αἰνιττομένων
αὐτῶν, ὑφ᾽ οὖ κατὰ γῆς κρύπτεται τὸ σπέρμα. Scholiast on Theocritus,
iii. 48, ὁ Ἄδωνις, ἤγουν ὁ σῖτος ὁ σπειρόμενος, ἔξ μῆνας ἐν τῇ γῇ
ποιεῖ ἀπο τῆς σπορᾶς καὶ ἔξ μῆνας ἔχει αὐτὸν ἡ Ἀφροδίτη, τουτέστιν ἡ
εὐκρασία τοῦ ἀέρος. καὶ ἐκτότε λαμβάνουσιν αὐτὸν οἱ ἄνθρωποι.
Origen, _Selecta in Ezechielem_ (Migne’s _Patrologia Graeca_, xiii.
800), οἱ δὲ περὶ τὴν ἀναγωγὴν τῶν Ἑλληνικῶν μύθων δεινοὶ καὶ μυθικῆς
νομιζομένης θεολογίας, φασί τὸν Ἄδωνιν σύμβολον εἶναι τῶν τῆς γῆς
καρπῶν, θρηνουμένων μὲν ὅτε σπείρονται, ἀνισταμένων δέ, καὶ διὰ
τοῦτο χαίρειν ποιούντων τοὺς γεωργοὺς ὅτε φύονται. Jerome,
_Commentar. in Ezechielem_, viii. 13, 14 (Migne’s _Patrologia
Latina_, xxv. 83), “_Eadem gentilitas hujuscemodi fabulas poetarum,
quae habent turpitudinem, interpretatur subtiliter, interfectionem
et resurrectionem Adonidis planctu et gaudio prosequens: quorum
alterum in seminibus, quae moriuntur in terra, alterum in segetibus,
quibus mortua semina renascuntur, ostendi putat._” Ammianus
Marcellinus, xix. 1. 11, “_in sollemnibus Adonidis sacris, quod
simulacrum aliquod esse frugum adultarum religiones mysticae
docent_.” _Id._ xxii. 9. 15, “_amato Veneris, ut fabulae fingunt,
apri dente ferali deleto, quod in adulto flore sectarum est indicium
frugum_.” Clement of Alexandria, _Hom._ 6. 11 (quoted by W.
Mannhardt, _Antique Wald- und Feldkulte_, p. 281), λαμβάνουσι δὲ καὶ
Ἄδωνιν εἰς ὡραίους καρπούς. _Etymologieum Magnum_ _s.v._ Ἄδωνις
κύριον; δύναται καὶ ὁ καρπὸς εἶναι ἄδωνις; οἶον ἀδώνειος καρπός,
ἀρέσκων. Eusebius, _Praepar. Evang._ iii. II. 9, Ἄδωνις τῆς τῶν
τελείων καρπῶν ἐκτομῆς σύμβολον. Sallustius philosophus, “De diis et
mundo,” iv. _Fragmenta Philosophorum Graecorum_, ed. F. G. A.
Mullach, iii. 32, οἱ Αἰγύπτιοι ... αὐτὰ τὰ σώματα θεοὺς νομίσαντες
... Ἴσιν μὲν τὴν γῆν ... Ἄδωνιν δὲ καρπούς. Joannes Lydus, _De
mensibus_, iv. 4, τῷ Ἀδώνιδι, τουτέστι τῷ Μαΐῳ ... ἢ ὡς ἄλλοις,
δοκεῖ, Ἄδωνις μέν ἐστιν ὁ καρπός, κτλ. The view that Tammuz or
Adonis is a personification of the dying and reviving vegetation is
now accepted by many scholars. See P. Jensen, _Kosmologie der
Babylonier_ (Strasburg, 1890), p. 480; _id._,
_Assyrisch-babylonische Mythen und Epen_, pp. 411, 560; H. Zimmern,
in E. Schrader’s _Keilinschriften und das Alte Testament_,3 p. 397;
A. Jeremias, _s.v._ “Nergal,” in W. H. Roscher’s _Lexikon der
griech. und röm. Mythologie_, iii. 265; R. Wünsch, _Das
Frühlingsfest der Insel Malta_ (Leipsic, 1902), p. 21; M. J.
Lagrange, _Études sur les Religions Sémitiques_,2 pp. 306 _sqq._; W.
W. Graf Baudissin, “Tammuz,” _Realencyclopädie für protestantische
Theologie und Kirchengeschichte_; _id._, _Esmun und Adonis_, pp. 81,
141, 169, etc.; and Ed. Meyer, _Geschichte des Altertums_,2 i. 2.
pp. 394, 427. Prof. Jastrow regards Tammuz as a god both of the sun
and of vegetation (_Religion of Babylonia and Assyria_, pp. 547,
564, 574, 588). But such a combination of disparate qualities seems
artificial and unlikely.

M176 Tammuz or Adonis as a corn-spirit bruised and ground in a mill.

689 D. Chwolsohn, _Die Ssabier und der Ssabismus_ (St. Petersburg,
1856), ii. 27; _id._, _Ueber Tammûz und die Menschenverehrung bei
den alten Babylioniern_ (St. Petersburg, 1860), p. 38. Compare W. W.
Graf Baudissin, _Adonis und Esmun_, pp. 111 _sqq._

M177 The mourning for Adonis interpreted as a harvest rite.

690 M. J. Lagrange, _Études sur les Religions Sémitiques_2 (Paris,
1905), pp. 307 _sq._

691 Hence Philo of Alexandria dates the corn-reaping in the middle of
spring (Μεσοῦντος δὲ ἔαρος ἄμητος ἐνίσταται, _De special. legibus_,
i. 183, vol. v. p. 44, ed. L. Cohn). On this subject Professor W. M.
Flinders Petrie writes to me: “The Coptic calendar puts on April 2
beginning of wheat harvest in Upper Egypt, May 2 wheat harvest,
Lower Egypt. Barley is two or three weeks earlier than wheat in
Palestine, but probably less in Egypt. The Palestine harvest is
about the time of that in North Egypt.” With regard to Palestine we
are told that “the harvest begins with the barley in April; in the
valley of the Jordan it begins at the end of March. Between the end
of the barley harvest and the beginning of the wheat harvest an
interval of two or three weeks elapses. Thus as a rule the business
of harvest lasts about seven weeks” (J. Benzinger, _Hebräische
Archäologie_, Freiburg i. B. and Leipsic, 1894, p. 209). “The
principal grain crops of Palestine are barley, wheat, lentils,
maize, and millet. Of the latter there is very little, and it is all
gathered in by the end of May. The maize is then only just beginning
to shoot. In the hotter parts of the Jordan valley the barley
harvest is over by the end of March, and throughout the country the
wheat harvest is at its height at the end of May, excepting in the
highlands of Galilee, where it is about a fortnight later” (H. B.
Tristram, _The Land of Israel_, Fourth Edition, London, 1882, pp.
583 _sq._). As to Greece, Professor E. A. Gardner tells me that
harvest is from April to May in the plains and about a month later
in the mountains. He adds that “barley may, then, be assigned to the
latter part of April, wheat to May in the lower ground, but you know
the great difference of climate between different parts; there is
the same difference of a month in the vintage.” Mrs. Hawes (Miss
Boyd), who excavated at Gournia, tells me that in Crete the barley
is cut in April and the beginning of May, and that the wheat is cut
and threshed from about the twentieth of June, though the dates
naturally vary somewhat with the height of the place above the sea.
June is also the season when the wheat is threshed in Euboea (R. A.
Arnold, _From the Levant_, London, 1868, i. 250). Thus it seems
possible that the spring festival of Adonis coincided with the
cutting of the first barley in March, and his summer festival with
the threshing of the last wheat in June. Father Lagrange (_op. cit._
pp. 305 _sq._) argues that the rites of Adonis were always
celebrated in summer at the solstice of June or soon afterwards.
Baudissin also holds that the summer celebration is the only one
which is clearly attested, and that if there was a celebration in
spring it must have had a different signification than the death of
the god. See his _Adonis und Esmun_, pp. 132 _sq._

692 Diodorus Siculus, i. 14. 2. See below, vol. ii. pp. 45 _sq._

_ 693 Spirits of the Corn and of the Wild_, ii. 180 _sqq._, 204 _sqq._

M178 But probably Adonis was a spirit of fruits, edible roots, and grass
before he became a spirit of the cultivated corn.
M179 The propitiation of the corn-spirit may have fused with the worship
of the dead.

694 W. Mannhardt, _Mythologische Forschungen_ (Strasburg, 1884), pp. 1
_sqq._; _Spirits of the Corn and of the Wild_, i. 216 _sqq._

M180 The festival of the dead a festival of flowers.

695 T. B. Macaulay, _History of England_, chapter xx. vol. iv. (London,
1855) p. 410.

696 This explanation of the name _Anthesteria_, as applied to a festival
of the dead, is due to Mr. R. Wünsch (_Das Frühlingsfest der Insel
Malta_, Leipsic, 1902, pp. 43 _sqq._). I cannot accept the late Dr.
A. W. Verrall’s ingenious derivation of the word from a verb
ἀναθέσσασθαι in the sense of “to conjure up” (“The Name
Anthesteria,” _Journal of Hellenic Studies_, xx. (1900) pp.
115-117). As to the festival see E. Rohde, _Psyche_3 (Tübingen and
Leipsic, 1903), i. 236 _sqq._; Miss J. E. Harrison, _Prolegomena to
the Study of Greek Religion_2 (Cambridge, 1908), pp. 32 _sqq._ In
Annam people offer food to their dead on the graves when the earth
begins to grow green in spring. The ceremony takes place on the
third day of the third month, the sun then entering the sign of
Taurus. See Paul Giran, _Magie et Religion Annamites_ (Paris, 1912),
pp. 423 _sq._

697 E. Renan, _Mission de Phénicie_ (Paris, 1864), p. 216.

M181 Pots of corn, herbs, and flowers, called the gardens of Adonis.

698 For the authorities see Raoul Rochette, “Mémoire sur les jardins
d’Adonis,” _Revue Archéologique_, viii. (1851) pp. 97-123; W.
Mannhardt, _Antike Wald- und Feldkulte_, p. 279, note 2, and p. 280,
note 2. To the authorities cited by Mannhardt add Theophrastus,
_Hist. Plant._ vi. 7. 3; _id._, _De Causis Plant._ i. 12. 2;
Gregorius Cyprius, i. 7; Macarius, i. 63; Apostolius, i. 34;
Diogenianus, i. 14; Plutarch, _De sera num. vind._ 17. Women only
are mentioned as planting the gardens of Adonis by Plutarch, _l.c._;
Julian, _Convivium_, p. 329 ed. Spanheim (p. 423 ed. Hertlein);
Eustathius on Homer, _Od._ xi. 590. On the other hand, Apostolius
and Diogenianus (_ll.cc._) say φυτεύοντες ἢ φυτεύουσαι. The earliest
extant Greek writer who mentions the gardens of Adonis is Plato
(_Phaedrus_, p. 276 B). The procession at the festival of Adonis is
mentioned in an Attic inscription of 302 or 301 B.C. (G.
Dittenberger, _Sylloge Inscriptionum Graecarum_,2 vol. ii. p. 564,
No. 726). Gardens of Adonis are perhaps alluded to by Isaiah (xvii.
10, with the commentators).

M182 These gardens of Adonis were charms to promote the growth of
vegetation. The throwing of the “gardens” into water was a
rain-charm. Parallel European customs of drenching the corn with
water at harvest or sowing. Use of water as a rain-charm at harvest
and sowing.

699 In hot southern countries like Egypt and the Semitic regions of
Western Asia, where vegetation depends chiefly or entirely upon
irrigation, the purpose of the charm is doubtless to secure a
plentiful flow of water in the streams. But as the ultimate object
and the charms for securing it are the same in both cases, I have
not thought it necessary always to point out the distinction.

_ 700 The Dying God_, pp. 232, 233 _sqq._

_ 701 The Magic Art and the Evolution of Kings_, i. 272 _sqq._

702 W. Mannhardt, _Der Baumkultus der Germanen und ihrer Nachbarstämme_
(Berlin, 1875), p. 214; W. Schmidt, _Das Jahr und seine Tage in
Meinung und Branch der Romänen Siebenbürgens_ (Hermannstadt, 1866),
pp. 18 _sq._ The custom of throwing water on the last wagon-load of
corn returning from the harvest-field has been practised within
living memory in Wigtownshire, and at Orwell in Cambridgeshire. See
J. G. Frazer, “Notes on Harvest Customs,” _Folk-lore Journal_, vii.
(1889) pp. 50, 51. (In the first of these passages the Orwell at
which the custom used to be observed is said to be in Kent; this was
a mistake of mine, which my informant, the Rev. E. B. Birks,
formerly Fellow of Trinity College, Cambridge, afterwards
corrected.) Mr. R. F. Davis writes to me (March 4, 1906) from
Campbell College, Belfast: “Between 30 and 40 years ago I was
staying, as a very small boy, at a Nottinghamshire farmhouse at
harvest-time, and was allowed—as a great privilege—to ride home on
the top of the last load. All the harvesters followed the waggon,
and on reaching the farmyard we found the maids of the farm gathered
near the gate, with bowls and buckets of water, which they proceeded
to throw on the men, who got thoroughly drenched.”

703 G. A. Heinrich, _Agrarische Sitten und Gebräuche unter den Sachsen
Siebenbürgens_ (Hermanstadt, 1880), p. 24; H. von Wlislocki, _Sitten
und Brauch der Siebenbürger Sachsen_ (Hamburg, 1888), p. 32.

704 G. Drosinis, _Land und Leute in Nord-Euböa_ (Leipsic, 1884), p. 53.

705 Matthäus Prätorius, _Deliciae Prussicae_ (Berlin, 1871), p. 55; W.
Mannhardt, _Baumkultus_, pp. 214 _sq._, note.

706 M. Prätorius, _op. cit._ p. 60; W. Mannhardt, _Baumkultus_, p. 215,
note.

707 H. Prahn, “Glaube und Brauch in der Mark Brandenburg,” _Zeitschrift
des Vereins für Volkskunde_, i. (1891) p. 186.

708 O. Hartung, “Zur Volkskunde aus Anhalt,” _Zeitschrift des Vereins
für Volkskunde_, vii. (1897) p. 150.

709 W. Kolbe, _Hessische Volks-Sitten und Gebräuche_ (Marburg, 1888), p.
51.

_ 710 Bavaria, Landes- und Volkskunde des Königreichs Bayern_, ii.
(Munich, 1863) p. 297.

711 E. H. Meyer, _Badisches Volksleben_ (Strasburg, 1900), p. 420.

712 J. Walter Fewkes, “The Tusayan New Fire Ceremony,” _Proceedings of
the Boston Society of Natural History_, xxvi. (1895) p. 446.

713 “Lettre du curé de Santiago Tepehuacan à son évêque,” _Bulletin de
la Société de Géographie_ (Paris), Deuxième Série, ii. (1834) pp.
181 _sq._

M183 Gardens of Adonis among the Oraons and Mundas of Bengal.

_ 714 The Magic Art and the Evolution of Kings_, ii. 59 _sqq._

715 E. T. Dalton, _Descriptive Ethnology of Bengal_ (Calcutta, 1872), p.
259.

716 E. T. Dalton, _op. cit._ p. 188. As to the influence which trees are
supposed to exercise on the crops, see _The Magic Art and the
Evolution of Kings_, ii. 47 _sqq._

M184 Gardens of Adonis in Rajputana.

717 Lieut.-Col. James Tod, _Annals and Antiquities of Rajast’han_, i.
(London, 1829) pp. 570-572.

718 G. F. D’Penha, “A Collection of Notes on Marriage Customs in the
Madras Presidency,” _Indian Antiquary_, xxv. (1896) p. 144; E.
Thurston, _Ethnographic Notes in Southern India_ (Madras, 1906), p.
2.

M185 Gardens of Adonis in North-Western and Central India.

719 E. T. Atkinson, _The Himalayan Districts of the North-Western
Provinces of India_, ii. (Allahabad, 1884) p. 870.

720 W. Crooke, _Popular Religion and Folk-lore of Northern India_
(Westminster, 1896), ii. 293 _sq._ Compare Baboo Ishuree Dass,
_Domestic Manners and Customs of the Hindoos of Northern India_
(Benares, 1860), pp. 111 _sq._ According to the latter writer, the
festival of Salono [not Salonan] takes place in August, and the
barley is planted by women and girls in baskets a few days before
the festival, to be thrown by them into a river or tank when the
grain has sprouted to the height of a few inches.

721 Mrs. J. C. Murray-Aynsley, “Secular and Religious Dances,”
_Folk-lore Journal_, v. (1887) pp. 253 _sq._ The writer thinks that
the ceremony “probably fixes the season for sowing some particular
crop.”

_ 722 Gazetteer of the Bombay Presidency_, xx. (Bombay, 1884) p. 454.
This passage was pointed out to me by my friend Mr. W. Crooke.

_ 723 Gazetteer of the Bombay Presidency_, xx. 443, 460.

M186 Gardens of Adonis in Bavaria. Gardens of Adonis on St. John’s Day in
Sardinia.

_ 724 Bavaria, Landes- und Volkskunde des Königreichs Bayern_ (Munich,
1860-1867), ii. 298.

725 Antonio Bresciani, _Dei costumi dell’ isola di Sardegna comparati
cogli antichissimi popoli orientali_ (Rome and Turin, 1866), pp. 427
_sq._; R. Tennant, _Sardinia and its Resources_ (Rome and London,
1885), p. 187; S. Gabriele, “Usi dei contadini della Sardegna,”
_Archivio per lo Studio delle Tradizioni Popolari_, vii. (1888) pp.
469 _sq._ Tennant says that the pots are kept in a dark warm place,
and that the children leap across the fire.

M187 Gardens of Adonis on St. John’s Day in Sicily.

726 G. Pitrè, _Usi e Costumi, Credenze e Pregiudizi del Popolo
Siciliano_ (Palermo, 1889), ii. 271-278. Compare _id._, _Spettacoli
e Feste Popolari Siciliane_ (Palermo, 1881), pp. 297 _sq._ In the
Abruzzi also young men and young women become gossips by exchanging
nosegays on St. John’s Day, and the tie thus formed is regarded as
sacred. See G. Finamore, _Credenze, Usi e Costumi Abruzzesi_
(Palermo, 1890), pp. 165 _sq._

M188 In these Sardinian and Sicilian ceremonies St. John may have taken
the place of Adonis. Custom of bathing in water or washing in dew on
the Eve or Day of St. John (Midsummer Eve or Midsummer Day).
Petrarch at Cologne on St. John’s Eve.

727 R. Wünsch, _Das Frühlingsfest der Insel Malta_, pp. 47-57.

728 See above, pp. 10, note 1, 224 _sq._, 226.

729 J. Grimm, _Deutsche Mythologie_,4 i. 490.

730 G. Finamore, _Credenze, Usi e Costumi Abruzzesi_, pp. 156-160. A
passage in Isaiah (xxvi. 19) seems to imply that dew possessed the
magical virtue of restoring the dead to life. In this passage of
Isaiah the customs which I have cited in the text perhaps favour the
ordinary interpretation of טל אורת as “dew of herbs” (compare 2
Kings iv. 39) against the interpretation “dew of lights,” which some
modern commentators (Dillmann, Skinner, Whitehouse), following
Jerome, have adopted.

731 G. Pitrè, _Feste patronali in Sicilia_ (Turin and Palermo, 1900),
pp. 488, 491-493.

732 G. Pitrè, _Spettacoli e Feste Popolari Siciliane_, p. 307.

733 Petrarch, _Epistolae de rebus familiaribus_, i. 4 (vol. i. pp. 44-46
ed. J. Fracassetti, Florence, 1859-1862). The passage is quoted by
J. Grimm, _Deutsche Mythologie_,4 i. 489 _sq._

734 J. Grimm, _op. cit._ i. 489.

735 Letter of Dr. Otero Acevado, of Madrid, _Le Temps_, September 1898.

736 J. Lecœur, _Esquisses du Bocage Normand_ (Condé-sur-Noireau,
1883-1887), ii. 8; A. de Nore, _Coutumes, Mythes et Traditions des
provinces de France_ (Paris and Lyons, 1846), p. 150.

737 A. de Nore, _op. cit._ p. 20; Bérenger-Féraud, _Réminiscences
populaires de la Provence_ (Paris, 1885), pp. 135-141.

738 A. Breuil, “Du Culte de St. Jean Baptiste,” _Mémoires de la Société
des Antiquaires de Picardie_, viii. (1845) pp. 237 _sq._ Compare
_Balder the Beautiful_, i. 193 _sq._

739 Diego Duran, _Historia de las Indias de Nueva España_, edited by J.
F. Ramirez (Mexico, 1867-1880), ii. 293.

M189 The custom of bathing at midsummer is pagan, not Christian, in its
origin.

740 Augustine, _Opera_, v. (Paris, 1683) col. 903; _id._, Pars Secunda,
coll. 461 _sq._ The second of these passages occurs in a sermon of
doubtful authenticity. Both have been quoted by J. Grimm, _Deutsche
Mythologie_,4 i. 490.

741 E. Doutté, _Magie et Religion dans l’Afrique du Nord_ (Algiers,
1908), pp. 567 _sq._; E. Westermarck, “Midsummer Customs in
Morocco,” _Folk-lore_, xvi. (1905) pp. 31 _sq._; _id._, _Ceremonies
and Beliefs connected with Agriculture, Certain Dates of the Solar
Year, and the Weather_ (Helsingfors, 1913), pp. 84-86. See _Balder
the Beautiful_, i. 216.

M190 Old heathen festival of midsummer in Europe and the East.
M191 Midsummer fires and midsummer couples in relation to vegetation.

_ 742 Balder the Beautiful_, i. 160 _sqq._

_ 743 The Magic Art and the Evolution of Kings_, ii. 65 _sq._

_ 744 The Dying God_, p. 262.

745 L. Lloyd, _Peasant Life in Sweden_ (London, 1870), p. 257.

M192 Gardens of Adonis intended to foster the growth of vegetation, and
especially of the crops. Modes of divination at midsummer like the
gardens of Adonis.

_ 746 Balder the Beautiful_, i. 328 _sqq._, ii. 21 _sqq._

747 W. Mannhardt, _Baumkultus_, p. 464; K. von Leoprechting, _Aus dem
Lechrain_ (Munich, 1855), p. 183. For more evidence see _Balder the
Beautiful_, i. 165, 166, 166 _sq._, 168, 173, 174.

748 The use of gardens of Adonis to fertilize the human sexes appears
plainly in the corresponding Indian practices. See above, pp. 241,
242, 243.

749 G. Pitrè, _Spettacoli e Feste Popolari Siciliane_, pp. 296 _sq._

750 G. Pitrè, _op. cit._ pp. 302 _sq._; Antonio de Nino, _Usi e Costumi
Abruzzesi_ (Florence, 1879-1883), i. 55 _sq._; A. de Gubernatis,
_Usi Nuziali in Italia e presso gli altri Popoli Indo-Europei_
(Milan, 1878), pp. 39 _sq._ Compare L. Passarini, “Il Comparatico e
la Festa di S. Giovanni nelle Marche e in Roma,” _Archivio per lo
Studio delle Tradizioni Popolari_, i. (1882) p. 135. At Smyrna a
blossom of the _Agnus castus_ is used on St. John’s Day for a
similar purpose, but the mode in which the omens are drawn is
somewhat different. See Teofilo, “La notte di San Giovanni in
Oriente,” _Archivio per lo Studio delle Tradizioni Popolari_, vii.
(1888) pp. 128-130.

751 Matthäus Prätorius, _Deliciae Prussicae_ (Berlin, 1871), p. 56.

_ 752 The Dying God_, pp. 261 _sq._

_ 753 The Dying God_, pp. 233 _sqq._, 261 _sqq._

M193 Sicilian gardens of Adonis in spring.

754 G. Pitrè, _Spettacoli e Feste Popolari Siciliane_, p. 211.

755 Κήπους ὡσίουν ἐπιταφίους Ἀδώνιδι, Eustathius on Homer, _Od._ xi.
590.

756 Vincenzo Dorsa, _La tradizione Greco-Latina negli usi e nelle
credenze popolari della Calabria Citeriore_ (Cosenza, 1884), p. 50.

M194 Resemblance of the Easter ceremonies in the Greek Church to the
rites of Adonis.

757 C. Wachsmuth, _Das alte Griechenland im neuen_ (Bonn, 1864), pp. 26.
_sq._ The writer compares these ceremonies with the Eleusinian
rites. But I agree with Mr. R. Wünsch (_Das Frühlingsfest der Insel
Malta_, pp. 49 _sq._) that the resemblance to the Adonis festival is
still closer. Compare V. Dorsa, _La tradizione Greco-Latina negli
usi e nelle credenze popolari della Calabria Citeriore_, pp. 49
_sq._ Prof. Wachsmuth’s description seems to apply to Athens. In the
country districts the ritual is apparently similar. See R. A.
Arnold, _From the Levant_ (London, 1868), pp. 251 _sq._, 259 _sq._
So in the Church of the Holy Sepulchre at Jerusalem the death and
burial of Christ are acted over a life-like effigy. See Henry
Maundrell, _Journey from Aleppo to Jerusalem at Easter, __A.D.__
1697_, Fourth Edition (Perth, 1800), pp. 110 _sqq._; _id._, in Th.
Wright’s _Early Travels in Palestine_ (London, 1848), pp. 443-445.

M195 Resemblance of the Easter ceremonies in the Catholic Church to the
rites of Adonis.

758 G. Pitrè, _Spettacoli e Feste Popolari Siciliane_, pp. 217 _sq._

759 G. Finamore, _Credenze, Usi e Costumi Abruzzesi_, pp. 118-120; A. de
Nino, _Usi e Costumi Abruzzesi_, i. 64 _sq._, ii. 210-212. At
Roccacaramanico part of the Easter spectacle is the death of Judas,
who, personated by a living man, pretends to hang himself upon a
tree or a great branch, which has been brought into the church and
planted near the high altar for the purpose (A. de Nino, _op. cit._
ii. 211).

760 The drama of the death and resurrection of Christ was formerly
celebrated at Easter in England. See Abbot Gasquet, _Parish Life in
Mediaeval England_, pp. 177 _sqq._, 182 _sq._

M196 The Christian festival of Easter perhaps grafted on a festival of
Adonis.

761 The comparison has already been made by A. Maury, who also compares
the Easter ceremonies of the Catholic Church with the rites of
Adonis (_Histoire des Religions de la Grèce Antique_, Paris,
1857-1859, vol. iii. p. 221).

M197 The worship of Adonis at Bethlehem. The Morning Star, identified
with Venus, may have been the signal for the festival of Adonis. The
Star of Bethlehem.

762 Jerome, _Epist._ lviii. 3 (Migne’s _Patrologia Latina_, xxii. 581).

763 Bethlehem is בית-לחם, literally “House of Bread.” The name is
appropriate, for “the immediate neighbourhood is very fertile,
bearing, besides wheat and barley, groves of olive and almond, and
vineyards. The wine of Bethlehem (‘Talhamī’) is among the best of
Palestine. So great fertility must mean that the site was occupied,
in spite of the want of springs, from the earliest times” (George
Adam Smith, _s.v._ “Bethlehem,” _Encyclopaedia Biblica_, i. 560). It
was in the harvest-fields of Bethlehem that Ruth, at least in the
poet’s fancy, listened to the nightingale “amid the alien corn.”

764 John vi. 35.

765 Above, p. 227.

766 Ammianus Marcellinus, xxii. 9. 14, “_Urbique propinquans in speciem
alicujus numinis votis excipitur publicis, miratus voces
multitudinis magnae, salutare sidus inluxisse eois partibus
adclamantis._” We may compare the greeting which a tribe of South
American Indians used to give to a worshipful star after its
temporary disappearance. “The Abipones think that the Pleiades,
composed of seven stars, is an image of their ancestor. As the
constellation is invisible for some months in the sky of South
America, they believe that their ancestor is ill, and every year
they are mortally afraid that he will die. But when the said stars
reappear in the month of May, they imagine that their ancestor is
recovered from his sickness and has returned; so they hail him with
joyous shouts and the glad music of pipes and war-horns. They
congratulate him on his recovery. ‘How we thank you! At last you
have come back? Oh, have you happily recovered?’ With such cries
they fill the air, attesting at once their gladness and their
folly.” See M. Dobrizhoffer, _Historia de Abiponibus_ (Vienna,
1784), ii. 77.

767 M. Jastrow, _The Religion of Babylonia and Assyria_, pp. 370 _sqq._;
H. Zimmern, in E. Schrader’s _Die Keilinschriften und das Alte
Testament_,3 p. 424.

768 Sozomenus, _Historia Ecclesiastica_, ii. 5 (Migne’s _Patrologia
Graeca_, lxvii. 948). The connexion of the meteor with the festival
of Adonis is not mentioned by Sozomenus, but is confirmed by
Zosimus, who says (_Hist._ i. 58) that a light like a torch or a
globe of fire was seen on the sanctuary at the seasons when the
people assembled to worship the goddess and to cast their offerings
of gold, silver, and fine raiment into a lake beside the temple. As
to Aphaca and the grave of Adonis see above, pp. 28 _sq._

769 Matthew ii. 1-12.

M198 Attis the Phrygian counterpart of Adonis. His relation to Cybele.
His miraculous birth. The death of Attis.

770 Diodorus Siculus, iii. 59. 7; Sallustius philosophus, “De diis et
mundo,” iv., _Fragmenta Philosophorum Graecorum_, ed. F. G. A.
Mullach, iii. 33; Scholiast on Nicander, _Alexipharmaca_, 8;
Firmicus Maternus, _De errore profanarum religionum_, 3 and 22. The
ancient evidence, literary and inscriptional, as to the myth and
ritual of Attis has been collected and discussed by Mr. H. Hepding
in his monograph, _Attis, seine Mythen und sein Kult_ (Giessen,
1903).

771 Hippolytus, _Refutatio omnium haeresium_, v. 9, p. 168 ed. L.
Duncker and F. G. Schneidewin (Göttingen, 1859); Socrates, _Historia
Ecclesiastica_, iii. 23. 51 _sqq._

772 Ovid, _Fasti_, iv. 223 _sqq._; Tertullian, _Apologeticus_, 15;
_id._, _Ad Nationes_, i. 10; Arnobius, _Adversus Nationes_, iv. 35.
As to Cybele, the Great Mother, the Mother of the Gods, conceived as
the source of all life, both animal and vegetable, see Rapp, in W.
H. Roscher’s _Lexikon der griech. und röm. Mythologie_, _s.v._
“Kybele,” ii. 1638 _sqq._

773 Scholiast on Lucian, _Jupiter Tragoedus_, 8, p. 60 ed. H. Rabe
(Leipsic, 1906), (vol. iv. p. 173 ed. C. Jacobitz); Hippolytus,
_Refutatio omnium haeresium_, v. 9, pp. 168, 170 ed. Duncker and
Schneidewin.

774 Pausanias, vii. 17. 11; Hippolytus, _Refutatio omnium haeresium_, v.
9, pp. 166, 168 ed. Duncker and Schneidewin; Arnobius, _Adversus
Nationes_, v. 6.

775 See above, pp. 99 _sqq._

776 S. I. Curtiss, _Primitive Semitic Religion To-day_, pp. 115 _sq._
See above, pp. 78, 213 _sqq._

777 That Attis was killed by a boar was stated by Hermesianax, an
elegiac poet of the fourth century B.C. (Pausanias, vii. 17);
compare Scholiast on Nicander, _Alexipharmaca_, 8. The other story
is told by Arnobius (_Adversus Nationes_, v. 5 _sqq._) on the
authority of Timotheus, who professed to derive it from recondite
antiquarian works and from the very heart of the mysteries. It is
obviously identical with the account which Pausanias (_l.c._)
mentions as the story current in Pessinus. According to Servius (on
Virgil, _Aen._ ix. 115), Attis was found bleeding to death under a
pine-tree, but the wound which robbed him of his virility and his
life was not inflicted by himself. The Timotheus cited by Pausanias
may be the Timotheus who was consulted by Ptolemy Soter on religious
matters and helped to establish the worship of Serapis. See
Plutarch, _Isis et Osiris_, 28; Franz Cumont, _Les Religions
Orientales dans le Paganisme Romain_2 (Paris, 1909), pp. 77, 113,
335.

778 Pausanias, vii. 17. 10; Julian, _Orat._ v. 177 B, p. 229, ed. F. C.
Hertlein (Leipsic, 1875-1876). Similarly at Comana in Pontus, the
seat of the worship of the goddess Ma, pork was not eaten, and swine
might not even be brought into the city (Strabo, xii. 8. 9, p. 575).
As to Comana see above, p. 39.

779 S. Sophronius, “SS. Cyri et Joannis Miracula,” Migne’s _Patrologia
Graeca_, lxxxvii. Pars Tertia, col. 3624, πρὸς πλάνην Ἑλληνικὴν
ἀποκλίνουσαν [_scil._ τὴν Ἰουλίαν] καὶ ταύτῃ διὰ τὸν Ἀδώνιδος
Θάνατον τὰ κρέα παραιτεῖσθαι τὰ ὕεια.

780 Ovid, _Metam._ x. 103 _sqq._

M199 Worship of Cybele introduced into Rome in 204 B.C.

781 Livy, xxix. chs. 10, 11, and 14; Ovid, _Fasti_, iv. 259 _sqq._;
Herodian, ii. 11. As to the stone which represented the goddess see
Arnobius, _Adversus Nationes_, vii. 49.

782 Pliny, _Nat. Hist._ xviii. 16.

M200 Attis and his eunuch priests the Galli at Rome.

783 Lucretius, ii. 598 _sqq._; Catullus, lxiii.; Varro, _Satir.
Menipp._, ed. F. Bücheler (Berlin, 1882), pp. 176, 178; Ovid,
_Fasti_, iv. 181 _sqq._, 223 _sqq._, 361 _sqq._; Dionysius
Halicarnasensis, _Antiquit. Rom._ ii. 19, compare Polybius, xxii. 18
ed. L. Dindorf (Leipsic, 1866-1868).

784 Joannes Lydus, _De mensibus_, iv. 41. See Robinson Ellis,
_Commentary on Catullus_ (Oxford, 1876), pp. 206 _sq._; H. Hepding,
_Attis_, pp. 142 _sqq._; Fr. Cumont, _Les Religions Orientales dans
le Paganisme Romain_2 (Paris, 1909), pp. 83 _sq._

It is held by Prof. A. von Domaszewski that the Claudius who
incorporated the Phrygian worship of the sacred tree in the Roman
ritual was not the emperor of the first century but the emperor of
the third century, Claudius Gothicus, who came to the throne in 268
A.D. See A. von Domaszewski, “Magna Mater in Latin Inscriptions,”
_The Journal of Roman Studies_, i. (1911) p. 56. The later date, it
is said, fits better with the slow development of the worship. But
on the other hand this view is open to certain objections. (1)
Joannes Lydus, our only authority on the point, appears to identify
the Claudius in question with the emperor of the first century. (2)
The great and widespread popularity of the Phrygian worship in the
Roman empire long before 268 A.D. is amply attested by an array of
ancient writers and inscriptions, especially by a great series of
inscriptions referring to the colleges of Tree-bearers
(_Dendrophori_), from which we learn that one of these colleges,
devoted to the worship of Cybele and Attis, existed at Rome in the
age of the Antonines, about a century before the accession of
Claudius Gothicus. (3) Passages of the Augustan historians (Aelius
Lampridius, _Alexander Severus_, 37; Trebellius Pollio, _Claudius_,
iv. 2) refer to the great spring festival of Cybele and Attis in a
way which seems to imply that the festival was officially recognized
by the Roman government before Claudius Gothicus succeeded to the
purple; and we may hesitate to follow Prof. von Domaszewski in
simply excising these passages as the work of an “impudent forger.”
(4) The official establishment of the bloody Phrygian superstition
suits better the life and character of the superstitious, timid,
cruel, pedantic Claudius of the first century than the gallant
soldier his namesake in the third century. The one lounged away his
contemptible days in the safety of the palace, surrounded by a hedge
of lifeguards. The other spent the two years of his brief but
glorious reign in camps and battlefields on the frontier, combating
the barbarian enemies of the empire; and it is probable that he had
as little leisure as inclination to pander to the superstitions of
the Roman populace. For these reasons it seems better with Mr.
Hepding and Prof. Cumont to acquiesce in the traditional view that
the rites of Attis were officially celebrated at Rome from the first
century onward.

An intermediate view is adopted by Prof. G. Wissowa, who, brushing
aside the statement of Joannes Lydus altogether, would seemingly
assign the public institution of the rites to the middle of the
second century A.D. on the ground that the earliest extant evidence
of their public celebration refers to that period (_Religion und
Kultus der Römer_,2 Munich, 1912, p. 322). But, considering the
extremely imperfect evidence at our disposal for the history of
these centuries, it seems rash to infer that an official cult cannot
have been older than the earliest notice of it which has chanced to
come down to us.

785 Arrian, _Tactica_, 33; Servius on Virgil, _Aen._ xii. 836.

786 On the festival see J. Marquardt, _Römische Staatsverwaltung_, iii.2
(Leipsic, 1885) pp. 370 _sqq._; the calendar of Philocalus, in
_Corpus Inscriptionum Latinarum_, vol. i.2 Pars prior (Berlin,
1893), p. 260, with Th. Mommsen’s commentary (pp. 313 _sq._); W.
Mannhardt, _Antike Wald- und Feldkulte_, pp. 291 _sqq._; _id._,
_Baumkultus_, pp. 572 _sqq._; G. Wissowa, _Religion und Kultus der
Römer_,2 pp. 318 _sqq._; H. Hepding, _Attis_, pp. 147 _sqq._; J.
Toutain, _Les Cultes Païens dans l’Empire Romain_, ii. (Paris, 1911)
pp. 82 _sqq._

M201 The spring festival of Cybele and Attis at Rome. The Day of Blood.

787 Julian, _Orat._ v. 168 C, p. 218 ed. F. C. Hertlein (Leipsic,
1875-1876); Joannes Lydus, _De mensibus_, iv. 41; Arnobius,
_Adversus Nationes_, v. chs. 7, 16, 39; Firmicus Maternus, _De
errore profanarum religionum_, 27; Sallustius philosophus, “De diis
et mundo,” iv., _Fragmenta Philosophorum Graecorum_, ed. F. G. A.
Mullach, iii. 33. As to the guild of Tree-bearers (_Dendrophori_)
see Joannes Lydus, _l.c._; H. Dessau, _Inscriptiones Latinae
Selectae_, Nos. 4116 _sq._, 4171-4174, 4176; H. Hepding, _Attis_,
pp. 86, 92, 93, 96, 152 _sqq._; F. Cumont, _s.v._ “Dendrophori,” in
Pauly-Wissowa’s _Real-Encyclopädie der classischen
Altertumswissenschaft_, v. 1. coll. 216-219; J. Toutain, _Les Cultes
Païens dans l’Empire Romain_, ii. 82 _sq._, 92 _sq._

788 Julian, _l.c._ and 169 C, p. 219 ed. F. C. Hertlein. The ceremony
may have been combined with the old _tubilustrium_ or purification
of trumpets, which fell on this day. See Joannes Lydus, _De
mensibus_, iv. 42; Varro, _De lingua Latina_, vi. 14; Festus, pp.
352, 353 ed. C. O. Müller; W. Warde Fowler, _Roman Festivals of the
Period of the Republic_ (London, 1899), p. 62.

789 Trebellius Pollio, _Claudius_, 4; Tertullian, _Apologeticus_, 25.

790 Lucian, _Deorum dialogi_, xii. 1; Seneca, _Agamemnon_, 686 _sqq._;
Martial, xi. 84. 3 _sq._; Valerius Flaccus, _Argonaut._ viii. 239
_sqq._; Statius, _Theb._ x. 170 _sqq._; Apuleius, _Metam._ viii. 27;
Lactantius, _Divinarum Institutionum Epitome_, 23 (18, vol. i. p.
689 ed. Brandt and Laubmann); H. Hepding, _Attis_, pp. 158 _sqq._ As
to the music of these dancing dervishes see also Lucretius, ii. 618
_sqq._

_ 791 The Magic Art and the Evolution of Kings_, i. 90 _sq._, 101 _sq._

792 Minucius Felix, _Octavius_, 22 and 24; Lactantius, _Divin. Instit._
i. 21. 16; _id._, _Epitoma_, 8; Schol. on Lucian, _Jupiter
Tragoedus_, 8 (p. 60 ed. H. Rabe); Servius on Virgil, _Aen._ ix.
115; Prudentius, _Peristephan._ x. 1066 _sqq._; “Passio Sancti
Symphoriani,” chs. 2 and 6 (Migne’s _Patrologia Graeca_, v. 1463,
1466); Arnobius, _Adversus Nationes_, v. 14; Scholiast on Nicander,
_Alexipharmaca_, 8; H. Hepding, _Attis_, pp. 163 _sq._ A story told
by Clement of Alexandria (_Protrept._ ii. 15, p. 13 ed. Potter)
suggests that weaker brethren may have been allowed to sacrifice the
virility of a ram instead of their own. We know from inscriptions
that rams and bulls were regularly sacrificed at the mysteries of
Attis and the Great Mother, and that the testicles of the bulls were
used for a special purpose, probably as a fertility charm. May not
the testicles of the rams have been employed for the same purpose?
and may not those of both animals have been substitutes for the
corresponding organs in men? As to the sacrifices of rams and bulls
see G. Zippel, “Das Taurobolium,” _Festschrift zum fünfzigjährigen
Doctorjubiläum L. Friedlaender_ (Leipsic, 1895), pp. 498 _sqq._; H.
Dessau, _Inscriptiones Latinae Selectae_, Nos. 4118 _sqq._; J.
Toutain, _Les Cultes Païens dans l’Empire Romain_, ii. 84 _sqq._

793 Arnobius, _Adversus Nationes_, v. 5 _sq._

M202 Eunuch priests in the service of Asiatic goddesses.

794 Strabo, xiv. 1. 23, p. 641.

795 Lucian, _De dea Syria_, 15, 27, 50-53.

796 Lucian, _op. cit._ 10.

797 Lucian, _op. cit._ 15.

798 Lucian, _De dea Syria_, 49-51.

799 Catullus, _Carm._ lxiii. I agree with Mr. H. Hepding (_Attis_, p.
140) in thinking that the subject of the poem is not the mythical
Attis, but one of his ordinary priests, who bore the name and
imitated the sufferings of his god. Thus interpreted the poem gains
greatly in force and pathos. The real sorrows of our fellow-men
touch us more nearly than the imaginary pangs of the gods.

As the sacrifice of virility and the institution of eunuch priests
appear to be rare, I will add a few examples. At Stratonicea in
Caria a eunuch held a sacred office in connexion with the worship of
Zeus and Hecate (_Corpus Inscriptionum Graecarum_, No. 2715).
According to Eustathius (on Homer, _Iliad_, xix. 254, p. 1183) the
Egyptian priests were eunuchs who had sacrificed their virility as a
first-fruit to the gods. In Corea “during a certain night, known as
_Chu-il_, in the twelfth moon, the palace eunuchs, of whom there are
some three hundred, perform a ceremony supposed to ensure a
bountiful crop in the ensuing year. They chant in chorus prayers,
swinging burning torches around them the while. This is said to be
symbolical of burning the dead grass, so as to destroy the field
mice and other vermin.” See W. Woodville Rockhill, “Notes on some of
the Laws, Customs, and Superstitions of Korea,” _The American
Anthropologist_, iv. (Washington, 1891) p. 185. Compare Mrs. Bishop,
_Korea and her Neighbours_ (London, 1898), ii. 56 _sq._ It appears
that among the Ekoi of Southern Nigeria both men and women are, or
used to be, mutilated by the excision of their genital organs at an
annual festival, which is celebrated in order to produce plentiful
harvests and immunity from thunderbolts. The victims apparently die
from loss of blood. See P. Amaury Talbot, _In the Shadow of the
Bush_ (London, 1912), pp. 74 _sqq._ Mr. Talbot writes to me: “A
horrible case has just happened at Idua, where, at the new yam
planting, a man cut off his own _membrum virile_” (letter dated
Eket, Nr Calabar, Southern Nigeria, Feb. 7th, 1913). Amongst the
Ba-sundi and Ba-bwende of the Congo many youths are castrated “in
order to more fittingly offer themselves to the phallic worship,
which increasingly prevails as we advance from the coast to the
interior. At certain villages between Manyanga and Isangila there
are curious eunuch dances to celebrate the new moon, in which a
white cock is thrown up into the air alive, with clipped wings, and
as it falls towards the ground it is caught and plucked by the
eunuchs. I was told that originally this used to be a human
sacrifice, and that a young boy or girl was thrown up into the air
and torn to pieces by the eunuchs as he or she fell, but that of
late years slaves had got scarce or manners milder, and a white cock
was now substituted” (H. H. Johnston, “On the Races of the Congo,”
_Journal of the Anthropological Institute_, xiii. (1884) p. 473;
compare _id._, _The River Congo_, London, 1884, p. 409). In India,
men who are born eunuchs or in some way deformed are sometimes
dedicated to a goddess named Huligamma. They wear female attire and
might be mistaken for women. Also men who are or believe themselves
impotent will vow to dress as women and serve the goddess in the
hope of recovering their virility. See F. Fawcett, “On Basivis,”
_Journal of the Anthropological Society of Bombay_, ii. 343 _sq._ In
Pegu the English traveller, Alexander Hamilton, witnessed a dance in
honour of the gods of the earth. “Hermaphrodites, who are numerous
in this country, are generally chosen, if there are enough present
to make a set for the dance. I saw nine dance like mad folks for
above half-an-hour; and then some of them fell in fits, foaming at
the mouth for the space of half-an-hour; and, when their senses are
restored, they pretend to foretell plenty or scarcity of corn for
that year, if the year will prove sickly or salutary to the people,
and several other things of moment, and all by that half hour’s
conversation that the furious dancer had with the gods while she was
in a trance” (A. Hamilton, “A New Account of the East Indies,” in J.
Pinkerton’s _Voyages and Travels_, viii. 427). So in the worship of
Attis the Archigallus or head of the eunuch priests prophesied;
perhaps he in like manner worked himself up to the pitch of
inspiration by a frenzied dance. See H. Dessau, _Inscriptiones
Latinae Selectae_, vol. ii. Pars i. pp. 142, 143, Nos. 4130, 4136;
G. Wilmanns, _Exempla Inscriptionum Latinarum_ (Berlin, 1873), vol.
i. p. 36, Nos. 119a, 120; J. Toutain, _Les Cultes Païens dans
l’Empire Romain_, ii. 93 _sq._ As to the sacrifice of virility in
the Syrian religion compare Th. Nöldeke, “Die Selbstentmannung bei
den Syrern,” _Archiv für Religionswissenschaft_, x. (1907) pp.
150-152.

M203 The sacrifice of virility. The mourning for Attis.

800 Arnobius, _Adversus Nationes_, v. 7 and 16; Servius on Virgil,
_Aen._ ix. 115.

801 Diodorus Siculus, iii. 59; Arrian, _Tactica_, 33; Scholiast on
Nicander, _Alexipharmaca_, 8; Firmicus Maternus, _De errore
profanarum religionum_, 3 and 22; Arnobius, _Adversus Nationes_, v.
16; Servius on Virgil, _Aen._ ix. 115.

802 See above, p. 267.

803 Arnobius, _l.c._; Sallustius philosophus, “De diis et mundo,” iv.,
_Fragmenta Philosophorum Graecorum_, ed. F. G. A. Mullach, iii. 33.

804 Above, p. 230.

805 See below, p. 274.

M204 The Festival of Joy (_Hilaria_) for the resurrection of Attis on
March 25th. The procession to the Almo.

806 Firmicus Maternus, _De errore profanarum religionum_, 22, “_Nocte
quadam simulacrum in lectica supinum ponitur et per numeros digestis
fletibus plangitur: deinde cum se ficta lamentatione satiaverint,
lumen infertur: tunc a sacerdote omnium qui flebant fauces
unguentur, quibus perunctis hoc lento murmure susurrat:_

θαρρεῖτε μύσται τοῦ θέου σεσωσμένου; ἔσται γὰρ ἡμῖν ἐκ πόνων
σωτήρια.

_Quid miseros hortaris gaudeant? quid deceptos homines laetari
compellis? quam illis spem, quam salutem funesta persuasione
promittis? Dei tui mors nota est, vita non paret.... Idolum sepelis,
idolum plangis, idolum de sepultura proferis, et miser cum haec
feceris, gaudes. Tu deum tuum liberas, tu jacentia lapidis membra
componis, tu insensibile corrigis saxum._” In this passage Firmicus
does not expressly mention Attis, but that the reference is to his
rites is made probable by a comparison with chapter 3 of the same
writer’s work. Compare also Damascius, in Photius’s _Bibliotheca_,
p. 345 A, 5 _sqq._, ed. I. Bekker (Berlin, 1824), τότε τῇ Ἱεραπόλει
ἐγκαθευδήσας ἐδόκουν ὄναρ ὁ Ἄττης γένεσθαι, καί μοι ἐπιτελεῖσθαι
παρὰ τῆς μητρὸς τῶν θεῶν τὴν τῶν ἱλαρίων καλουμένων ἑορτήν; ὅπερ
ἐδήλου τὴν ἐξ ᾅδου γεγονυῖαν ἡμῶν σωτηρίαν. See further Fr. Cumont,
_Les Religions Orientales dans le Paganisme Romain_2 (Paris, 1909),
pp. 89 _sq._

807 Macrobius, _Saturn_. i. 21. 10; Flavius Vopiscus, _Aurelianus_, i.
1; Julian, _Or._ v. pp. 168 D, 169 D; Damascius, _l.c._; Herodian,
i. 10. 5-7; Sallustius philosophus, “De diis et mundo,” _Fragmenta
Philosophorum Graecorum_, ed. F. G. A. Mullach, iii. 33. In like
manner Easter Sunday, the Resurrection-day of Christ, was called by
some ancient writers the Sunday of Joy (_Dominica Gaudii_). The
emperors used to celebrate the happy day by releasing from prison
all but the worst offenders. See J. Bingham, _The Antiquities of the
Christian Church_, bk. xx. ch. vi. §§ 5 _sq._ (Bingham’s _Works_
(Oxford, 1855), vii. 317 _sqq._).

808 Aelius Lampridius, _Alexander Severus_, 37.

_ 809 Corpus Inscriptionum Latinarum_, i.2 Pars prior (Berlin, 1893), pp.
260, 313 _sq._; H. Hepding, _Attis_, pp. 51, 172.

810 Ovid, _Fasti_, iv. 337-346; Silius Italicus, _Punic._ viii. 365;
Valerius Flaccus, _Argonaut._ viii. 239 _sqq._; Martial, iii. 47. 1
_sq._; Ammianus Marcellinus, xxiii. 3. 7; Arnobius, _Adversus
Nationes_, vii. 32; Prudentius, _Peristephon._ x. 154 _sqq._ For the
description of the image of the goddess see Arnobius, _Adversus
Nationes_, vii. 49. At Carthage the goddess was carried to her bath
in a litter, not in a wagon (Augustine, _De civitate Dei_, ii. 4).
The bath formed part of the festival in Phrygia, whence the custom
was borrowed by the Romans (Arrian, _Tactica_, 33). At Cyzicus the
Placianian Mother, a form of Cybele, was served by women called
“marine” (Θαλάσσιαι), whose duty it probably was to wash her image
in the sea (Ch. Michel, _Recueil d’Inscriptions Grecques_, Brussels,
1900, pp. 403 _sq._, No. 537). See further J. Marquardt, _Römische
Staatsverwaltung_, iii.2 373; H. Hepding, _Attis_, pp. 133 _sq._

M205 The mysteries of Attis. The sacrament. The baptism of blood. The
Vatican a centre of the worship of Attis.

811 Clement of Alexandria, _Protrept._ ii. 15, p. 13 ed. Potter;
Firmicus Maternus, _De errore profanarum religionum_, 18.

812 Above, p. 272.

813 H. Hepding, _Attis_, p. 185.

814 Prudentius, _Peristephan._ x. 1006-1050; compare Firmicus Maternus,
_De errore profanarum religionum_, 28. 8. That the bath of bull’s
blood (_taurobolium_) was believed to regenerate the devotee for
eternity is proved by an inscription found at Rome, which records
that a certain Sextilius Agesilaus Aedesius, who dedicated an altar
to Attis and the Mother of the Gods, was _taurobolio criobolioque in
aeternum renatus_ (_Corpus Inscriptionum Latinarum_, vi. No. 510; H.
Dessau, _Inscriptiones Latinae Selectae_, No. 4152). The phrase
_arcanis perfusionibus in aeternum renatus_ occurs in a dedication
to Mithra (_Corpus Inscriptionum Latinarum_, vi. No. 736), which,
however, is suspected of being spurious. As to the inscriptions
which refer to the _taurobolium_ see G. Zippel, “Das Taurobolium,”
in _Festschrift zum fünfzigjährigen Doctorjubiläum L. Friedlaender
dargebracht von seinen Schülern_ (Leipsic, 1895), pp. 498-520; H.
Dessau, _Inscriptiones Latinae Selectae_, vol. ii. Pars i. pp.
140-147, Nos. 4118-4159. As to the origin of the _taurobolium_ and
the meaning of the word, see Fr. Cumont, _Textes et Monuments
Figurés relatifs aux Mystères de Mithra_ (Brussels, 1896-1899), i.
334 _sq._; _id._, _Les Religions Orientales dans le Paganisme
Romain_,2 pp. 100 _sqq._; J. Toutain, _Les Cultes Païens dans
l’Empire Romain_, ii. 84 _sqq._; G. Wissowa, _Religion und Kultus
der Römer_,2 pp. 322 _sqq._ The _taurobolium_ seems to have formed
no part of the original worship of Cybele and to have been imported
into it at a comparatively late date, perhaps in the second century
of our era. Its origin is obscure. In the majority of the older
inscriptions the name of the rite appears as _tauropolium_, and it
has been held that this is the true form, being derived from the
worship of the Asiatic goddess Artemis Tauropolis (Strabo, xii. 2.
7, p. 537). This was formerly the view of Prof. F. Cumont (_s.v._
“Anaitis,” in Pauly-Wissowa’s _Real-Encyclopädie der classischen
Altertumswissenschaft_, i. 2. col. 2031); but he now prefers the
form _taurobolium_, and would deduce both the name and the rite from
an ancient Anatolian hunting custom of lassoing wild bulls.

815 Sallustius philosophus, “De diis et mundo,” iv., _Fragmenta
Philosophorum Graecorum_, ed. F. G. A. Mullach, iii. 33.

816 Sallustius philosophus, _l.c._

_ 817 Corpus Inscriptionum Latinarum_, vi. Nos. 497-504; H. Dessau,
_Inscriptiones Latinae Selectae_, Nos. 4145, 4147-4151, 4153;
_Inscriptiones Graecae Siciliae et Italiae_, ed. G. Kaibel (Berlin,
1890), p. 270, No. 1020; G. Zippel, _op. cit._ pp. 509 _sq._, 519;
H. Hepding, _Attis_, pp. 83, 86-88, 176; Ch. Huelsen, _Topographie
der Stadt Rom im Alterthum, von H. Jordan_, i. 3 (Berlin, 1907), pp.
658 _sq._

_ 818 Corpus Inscriptionum Latinarum_, xiii. No. 1751; H. Dessau,
_Inscriptiones Latinae Selectae_, No. 4131; G. Wilmanns, _Exempla
Inscriptionum Latinarum_ (Berlin, 1873), vol. ii. p. 125, No. 2278;
G. Wissowa, _Religion und Kultus der Römer_,2 p. 267; H. Hepding,
_Attis_, pp. 169-171, 176.

_ 819 Corpus Inscriptionum Latinarum_, xiii. No. 1751; G. Wilmanns,
_Exempla Inscriptionum Latinarum_, vol. i. pp. 35-37, Nos. 119, 123,
124; H. Dessau, _Inscriptiones Latinae Selectae_, Nos. 4127, 4129,
4131, 4140; G. Wissowa, _Religion und Kultus der Römer_,2 pp. 322
_sqq._; H. Hepding, _Attis_, p. 191.

M206 The sanctity of the pine-tree in the worship of Attis.

820 As to the monuments see H. Dessau, _Inscriptiones Latinae Selectae_,
Nos. 4143, 4152, 4153; H. Hepding, _Attis_, pp. 82, 83, 88, 89.

821 Firmicus Maternus, _De errore profanarum religionum_, 27.

_ 822 The Magic Art and the Evolution of Kings_, ii. 47 _sq._, 71;
_Spirits of the Corn and of the Wild_, i. 138, 143, 152, 153, 154,
155, 156, 157, 158.

823 Etymologicum Magnum, p. 220, line 20, Γάλλος, ὁ φιλοπάτωρ
Πτολεμαῖος; διὰ τὸ φύλλα κισσοῦ κατέστιχθαι, ὡς οἱ γάλλοι. ᾽Αεὶ γὰρ
ταῖς Διονυσιακαῖς τελεταῖς κισσῷ ἐστεφανοῦντο. But there seems to be
some confusion here between the rites of Dionysus and those of
Attis; ivy was certainly sacred to Dionysus (Pausanias, i. 31. 6
with my note). Compare C. A. Lobeck, _Aglaophamus_ (Königsberg,
1829), i. 657, who, in the passage quoted, rightly defends the
readings κατέστιχθαι and ἐστεφανοῦντο.

_ 824 Encyclopaedia Britannica_,9 xix. 105. Compare Athenaeus, ii. 49, p.
57. The nuts of the silver-pine (_Pinus edulis_) are a favourite
food of the Californian Indians (S. Powers, _Tribes of California_
(Washington, 1877), p. 421); the Wintun Indians hold a pine-nut
dance when the nuts are fit to be gathered (_ib._ p. 237). The
Shuswap Indians of British Columbia collect the cones of various
sorts of pines and eat the nutlets which they extract from them. See
G. M. Dawson, “Notes on the Shuswap People of British Columbia,”
_Proceedings and Transactions of the Royal Society of Canada_, ix.
(Montreal, 1892) Transactions, section ii. p. 22. With regard to the
Araucanian Indians of South America we read that “the great staple
food, the base of all their subsistence, save among the coast
tribes, was the _piñon_, the fruit of the Araucanian pine
(_Araucaria imbricata_). Every year during the autumn months
excursions are made by the whole tribe to the pine forests, where
they remain until they have collected sufficient for the following
year. Each tribe has its own district, inherited by custom from
generation to generation and inviolate, by unwritten law, from other
tribes, even in time of warfare. This harvest was formerly of such
supreme importance, that all inter-tribal quarrels and warfares were
suspended by mutual accord during this period.” See R. E. Latcham,
“Ethnology of the Araucanos,” _Journal of the Royal Anthropological
Institute_, xxxix. (1909) p. 341. The Gilyaks of the Amoor valley in
like manner eat the nutlets of the Siberian stone-pine (L. von
Schrenk, _Die Völker des Amur-Landes_, iii. 440). See also the
commentators on Herodotus, iv. 109 φθειροτραγέουσι.

825 Pliny, _Nat. Hist._ xiv. 103.

826 Strabo, x. 3. 12 _sqq._, pp. 469 _sqq._ However, tipsy people were
excluded from the sanctuary of Attis (Arnobius, _Adversus Nationes_,
v. 6).

827 Scholiast on Lucian, _Dial. Meretr._ ii. 1, p. 276 ed. H. Rabe
(Leipsic, 1906).

M207 Attis as a corn-god. Cybele as a goddess of fertility. The bathing
of her image either a rain-charm or a marriage-rite.

828 Hippolytus, _Refutatio omnium haeresium_, v. 8 and 9, pp. 162, 168
ed. Duncker and Schneidewin; Firmicus Maternus, _De errore
profanarum religionum_, 3; Sallustius philosophus, “De diis et
mundo,” _Fragmenta Philosophorum Graecorum_, ed. F. G. A. Mullach,
iii. 33. Others identified him with the spring flowers. See
Eusebius, _Praeparatio Evangelii_, iii. 11. 8 and 12, iii. 13. 10
ed. F. A. Heinichen (Leipsic, 1842-1843); Augustine, _De civitate
Dei_, vii. 25.

829 W. Helbig, _Führer durch die öffentlichen Sammlungen klassischer
Altertümer in Rom_2 (Leipsic, 1899), i. 481, No. 721.

830 The urn is in the Lateran Museum at Rome (No. 1046). It is not
described by W. Helbig in his _Führer_.2 The inscription on the urn
(_M. Modius Maxximus archigallus coloniae Ostiens_) is published by
H. Dessau (_Inscriptiones Latinae Selectae_, No. 4162), who does not
notice the curious and interesting composition of the cock’s tail.
The bird is chosen as an emblem of the priest with a punning
reference to the word _gallus_, which in Latin means a cock as well
as a priest of Attis.

831 Gregory of Tours, _De gloria confessorum_, 77 (Migne’s _Patrologia
Latina_, lxxi. 884). That the goddess here referred to was Cybele
and not a native Gallic deity, as I formerly thought (_Lectures on
the Early History of the Kingship_, p. 178), seems proved by the
“Passion of St. Symphorian,” chs. 2 and 6 (Migne’s _Patrologia
Graeca_, v. 1463, 1466). Gregory and the author of the “Passion of
St. Symphorian” call the goddess simply Berecynthia, the latter
writer adding “the Mother of the Demons,” which is plainly a
Christian version of the title “Mother of the Gods.”

832 Above, p. 265. In the island of Thera an ox, wheat, barley, wine,
and “other first-fruits of all that the seasons produce” were
offered to the Mother of the Gods, plainly because she was deemed
the source of fertility. See G. Dittenberger, _Sylloge Inscriptionum
Graecarum_,2 vol. ii. p. 426, No. 630.

833 H. Hepding, _Attis_, pp. 215-217; compare _id._ p. 175 note 7.

834 Ptolemaeus, _Nov. Hist._ i. p. 183 of A. Westermann’s _Mythographi
Graeci_ (Brunswick, 1843).

835 Pausanias, viii. 25. 5 _sq._

836 Aelian, _Nat. Anim._ xii. 30. The place was in Mesopotamia, and the
goddess was probably Astarte. So Lucian (_De dea Syria_) calls the
Astarte of Hierapolis “the Assyrian Hera.”

837 Pausanias, ii. 38. 2.

838 Julian, _Orat._ v. 173 _sqq._ (pp. 225 _sqq._ ed. F. C. Hertlein);
H. Hepding, _Attis_, pp. 155-157. However, apples, pomegranates, and
dates were also forbidden. The story that the mother of Attis
conceived him through contact with a pomegranate (above, pp. 263,
269) might explain the prohibition of that fruit. But the reasons
for tabooing apples and dates are not apparent, though Julian tried
to discover them. He suggested that dates may have been forbidden
because the date-palm does not grow in Phrygia, the native land of
Cybele and Attis.

M208 The name Attis seems to mean “father.”

839 P. Kretschmer, _Einleitung in die Geschichte der griechischen
Sprache_ (Göttingen, 1896), p. 355.

840 Diodorus Siculus, iii. 58. 4; Hippolytus, _Refutatio omnium
haeresium_, i. 9, p. 168 ed. Duncker and Schneidewin. A Latin
dedication to _Atte Papa_ has been found at Aquileia (F. Cumont, in
Pauly-Wissowa’s _Realencyclopädie der classischen
Altertumswissenschaft_, ii. 2180, _s.v._ “Attepata” H. Hepding,
_Attis_, p. 86). Greek dedications to Papas or to Zeus Papas occur
in Phrygia (H. Hepding, _Attis_, pp. 78 _sq._). Compare A. B. Cook,
“Zeus, Jupiter, and the Oak,” _Classical Review_, xviii. (1904) p.
79.

841 Arnobius, _Adversus Nationes_, v. 6 and 13.

842 (Sir) Edward B. Tylor, _Primitive Culture_2 (London, 1873), i. 223.

M209 Relation of Attis to the Mother Goddess. Attis as a Sky-god or
Heavenly Father. Stories of the emasculation of the Sky-god.

843 Rapp, _s.v._ “Kybele,” in W. H. Roscher’s _Lexikon der griech. und
röm. Mythologie_, ii. 1648.

844 She is called a “motherless virgin” by Julian (_Or._ v. 166 B, p.
215 ed. F. C. Hertlein), and there was a _Parthenon_ or virgin’s
chamber in her sanctuary at Cyzicus (Ch. Michel, _Recueil
d’Inscriptions Grecques_, p. 404, No. 538). Compare Rapp, in W. H.
Roscher’s _Lexikon der griech. und röm. Mythologie_, ii. 1648;
Wagner, _s.v._ “Nana,” _ibid._ iii. 4 _sq._ Another great goddess of
fertility who was conceived as a Virgin Mother was the Egyptian
Neith or Net. She is called “the Great Goddess, the Mother of All
the Gods,” and was believed to have brought forth Ra, the Sun,
without the help of a male partner. See C. P. Tiele, _Geschichte der
Religion im Altertum_, i. 111; E. A. Wallis Budge, _The Gods of the
Egyptians_ (London, 1904), i. 457-462. The latter writer says (p.
462): “In very early times Net was the personification of the
eternal female principle of life which was self-sustaining and
self-existent, and was secret and unknown, and all-pervading; the
more material thinkers, whilst admitting that she brought forth her
son Rā without the aid of a husband, were unable to divorce from
their minds the idea that a male germ was necessary for its
production, and finding it impossible to derive it from a being
external to the goddess, assumed that she herself provided not only
the substance which was to form the body of Rā but also the male
germ which fecundated it. Thus Net was the type of
partheno-genesis.”

845 Quoted by Eustathius on Homer, _Il._ v. 408; _Fragmenta Historicorum
Graecorum_, ed. C. Müller, iii. 592, Frag. 30.

846 (Sir) Edward B. Tylor, _Primitive Culture_,2 i. 321 _sqq._, ii. 270
_sqq._ For example, the Ewe people of Togo-land, in West Africa,
think that the Earth is the wife of the Sky, and that their marriage
takes place in the rainy season, when the rain causes the seeds to
sprout and bear fruit. These fruits they regard as the children of
Mother Earth, who in their opinion is the mother also of men and of
gods. See J. Spieth, _Die Ewe-Stämme_ (Berlin, 1906), pp. 464, 548.
In the regions of the Senegal and the Niger it is believed that the
Sky-god and the Earth-goddess are the parents of the principal
spirits who dispense life and death, weal and woe, among mankind.
The eldest son of Sky and Earth is represented in very various
forms, sometimes as a hermaphrodite, sometimes in semi-animal shape,
with the head of a bull, a crocodile, a fish, or a serpent. His name
varies in the different tribes, but the outward form of his
ceremonies is everywhere similar. His rites, which are to some
extent veiled in mystery, are forbidden to women. See Maurice
Delafosse, _Haut-Sénégal-Niger_ (Paris, 1912), iii. 173-175.

847 Hesiod, _Theogony_, 159 _sqq._

848 Porphyry, _De antro nympharum_, 16; Aristides, _Or._ iii. (vol. i.
p. 35 ed. G. Dindorf, Leipsic, 1829); Scholiast on Apollonius
Rhodius, _Argon._ iv. 983.

849 A. Lang, _Custom and Myth_ (London, 1884), pp. 45 _sqq._; _id._,
_Myth, Ritual, and Religion_ (London, 1887), i. 299 _sqq._ In
Egyptian mythology the separation of heaven and earth was ascribed
to Shu, the god of light, who insinuated himself between the bodies
of Seb (Keb) the earth-god and of Nut the sky-goddess. On the
monuments Shu is represented holding up the star-spangled body of
Nut on his hands, while Seb reclines on the ground. See A.
Wiedemann, _Religion of the Ancient Egyptians_ (London, 1897), pp.
230 _sq._; E. A. Wallis Budge, _The Gods of the Egyptians_, ii. 90,
97 _sq._, 100, 105; A. Erman, _Die ägyptische Religion_2 (Berlin,
1909), pp. 35 _sq._; C. P. Tiele, _Geschichte der Religion im
Altertum_, i. 33 _sq._ Thus contrary to the usual mythical
conception the Egyptians regarded the earth as male and the sky as
female. An allusion in the _Book of the Dead_ (ch. 69, vol. ii. p.
235, E. A. Wallis Budge’s translation, London, 1901) has been
interpreted as a hint that Osiris mutilated his father Seb at the
separation of earth and heaven, just as Cronus mutilated his father
Uranus. See H. Brugsch, _Religion und Mythologie der alten Aegypter_
(Leipsic, 1885-1888), p. 581; E. A. Wallis Budge, _op. cit._ ii. 99
_sq._ Sometimes the Egyptians conceived the sky as a great cow
standing with its legs on the earth. See A. Erman, _Die ägyptische
Religion_,2 pp. 7, 8.

850 Compare _The Dying God_, pp. 105 _sqq._

851 Julian, _Or._ v. pp. 165 B, 170 D (pp. 214, 221, ed. F. C.
Hertlein); Sallustius philosophus, “De diis et mundo,” iv.
_Fragmenta Philosophorum Graecorum_, ed. F. G. A. Mullach, iii. 33.

852 Drexler, _s.v._ “Men,” in W. H. Roscher’s _Lexikon der griech. und
röm. Mythologie_, ii. 2745; H. Hepding, _Attis_, p. 120, note 8.

853 H. Dessau, _Inscriptiones Latinae Selectae_, vol. ii. Pars i. pp.
145 _sq._, Nos. 4146-4149; H. Hepding, _Attis_, pp. 82, 86 _sq._, 89
_sq._ As to Men Tyrannus, see Drexler, _s.v._ “Men,” in W. H.
Roscher’s _Lexikon der griech. und röm. Myth._ ii. 2687 _sqq._

854 On the other hand Sir W. M. Ramsay holds that Attis and Men are
deities of similar character and origin, but differentiated from
each other by development in different surroundings (_Cities and
Bishoprics of Phrygia_, i. 169); but he denies that Men was a
moon-god (_op. cit._ i. 104, note 4).

M210 The high priest of Attis bore the god’s name and seems to have
personated him. The drawing of the high priest’s blood may have been
a substitute for putting him to death in the character of the god.
The name of Attis in the royal families of Phrygia and Lydia. The
Phrygian priests of Attis may have been members of the royal family.

855 In letters of Eumenes and Attalus, preserved in inscriptions at
Sivrihissar, the priest at Pessinus is addressed as Attis. See A.
von Domaszewski, “Briefe der Attaliden an den Priester von
Pessinus,” _Archaeologische-epigraphische Mittheilungen aus
Oesterreich-Ungarn_, viii. (1884) pp. 96, 98; Ch. Michel, _Recueil
d’Inscriptions Grecques_, pp. 57 _sq._ No. 45; W. Dittenberger,
_Orientis Graeci Inscriptiones Selectae_ (Leipsic, 1903-1905), vol.
i. pp. 482 _sqq._ No. 315. For more evidence of inscriptions see H.
Hepding, _Attis_, p. 79; Rapp, _s.v._ “Attis,” in W. H. Roscher’s
_Lexikon der griech. und röm. Mythologie_, i. 724. See also
Polybius, xxii. 18 (20), (ed. L. Dindorf), who mentions a priest of
the Mother of the Gods named Attis at Pessinus.

856 The conjecture is that of Henzen, in _Annal. d. Inst._ 1856, p. 110,
referred to by Rapp, _l.c._

_ 857 The Magic Art and the Evolution of Kings_, ii. 75 _sq._; _The Dying
God_, pp. 151 _sq._, 209.

858 Article “Phrygia,” in _Encyclopaedia Britannica_, 9th ed. xviii.
(1885) p. 853. Elsewhere, speaking of the religions of Asia Minor in
general, the same writer says: “The highest priests and priestesses
played the parts of the great gods in the mystic ritual, wore their
dress, and bore their names” (_Cities and Bishoprics of Phrygia_, i.
101).

859 Strabo, xii. 5. 3, p. 567.

860 (Sir) W. M. Ramsay, “A Study of Phrygian Art,” _Journal of Hellenic
Studies_, ix. (1888) pp. 379 _sqq._; _id._, “A Study of Phrygian
Art,” _Journal of Hellenic Studies_, x. (1889) pp. 156 _sqq._; G.
Perrot et Ch. Chipiez, _Histoire de l’Art dans l’Antiquité_, v. 82
_sqq._

861 Herodotus, i. 94. According to Sir W. M. Ramsay, the conquering and
ruling caste in Lydia belonged to the Phrygian stock (_Journal of
Hellenic Studies_, ix. (1888) p. 351).

862 Herodotus, i. 34-45. The tradition that Croesus would allow no iron
weapon to come near Atys suggests that a similar taboo may have been
imposed on the Phrygian priests named Attis. For taboos of this sort
see _Taboo and the Perils of the Soul_, pp. 225 _sqq._

863 H. Stein on Herodotus, i. 43; Ed. Meyer, _s.v._ “Atys,” in
Pauly-Wissowa’s _Real-Encyclopädie der classischen
Altertumswissenschaft_, ii. 2 col. 2262.

864 See above, pp. 13, 16 _sq._, 48 _sqq._

_ 865 The Dying God_, pp. 161 _sqq._

866 See (Sir) W. M. Ramsay, _s.v._ “Phrygia,” _Encyclopaedia
Britannica_, 9th ed. xviii. 849 _sq._; _id._, “A Study of Phrygian
Art,” _Journal of Hellenic Studies_, ix. (1888) pp. 350 _sq._ Prof.
P. Kretschmer holds that both Cybele and Attis were gods of the
indigenous Asiatic population, not of the Phrygian invaders
(_Einleitung in die Geschichte der griechischen Sprache_, Göttingen,
1896, pp. 194 _sq._).

M211 The way in which the representatives of Attis were put to death is
perhaps shown by the legend of Marsyas, who was hung on a pine-tree
and flayed by Apollo.

867 Diodorus Siculus, iii. 58 _sq._ As to Marsyas in the character of a
shepherd or herdsman see Hyginus, _Fab._ 165; Nonnus, _Dionys._ i.
41 _sqq._ He is called a Silenus by Pausanias (i. 24. 1).

868 Pausanias, x. 30. 9.

869 Apollodorus, _Bibliotheca_, i. 4. 2; Hyginus, _Fab._ 165. Many
ancient writers mention that the tree on which Marsyas suffered
death was a pine. See Apollodorus, _l.c._; Nicander,
_Alexipharmaca_, 301 _sq._, with the Scholiast’s note; Lucian,
_Tragodopodagra_, 314 _sq._; Archias Mitylenaeus, in _Anthologia
Palatina_, vii. 696; Philostratus, Junior, _Imagines_, i. 3; Longus,
_Pastor._ iv. 8; Zenobius, _Cent._ iv. 81; J. Tzetzes, _Chiliades_,
i. 353 sqq. Pliny alone declares the tree to have been a plane,
which according to him was still shown at Aulocrene on the way from
Apamea to Phrygia (_Nat. Hist._ xvi. 240). On a candelabra in the
Vatican the defeated Marsyas is represented hanging on a pine-tree
(W. Helbig, _Führer_,2 i. 225 _sq._); but the monumental evidence is
not consistent on this point (Jessen, _s.v._ “Marsyas,” in W. H.
Roscher’s _Lexikon der griech. und röm. Mythologie_, ii. 2442). The
position which the pine held in the myth and ritual of Cybele
supports the preponderance of ancient testimony in favour of that
tree.

870 Herodotus, vii. 26; Xenophon, _Anabasis_, i. 2. 8; Livy, xxxviii.
13. 6; Quintus Curtius, iii. 1. 1-5; Pliny, _Nat. Hist._ v. 106.
Herodotus calls the river the Catarrhactes.

871 Aelian, _Var. Hist_. xiii. 21.

M212 Marsyas apparently a double of Attis. The hanging and spearing of
Odin and his human victims on sacred trees. The hanging and spearing
of human victims among the Bagobos.

872 Catullus, lxiii. 22; Lucretius, ii. 620; Ovid, _Fasti_, iv. 181
_sq._, 341; Polyaenus, _Stratagem._ viii. 53. 4. Flutes or pipes
often appear on her monuments. See H. Dessau, _Inscriptiones Latinae
Selectae_, Nos. 4100, 4143, 4145, 4152, 4153.

873 Hippolytus, _Refutatio omnium haeresium_, v. 9, p. 168, ed. Duncker
and Schneidewin.

874 Adam of Bremen, _Descriptio insularum Aquilonis_, 27 (Migne’s
_Patrologia Latina_, cxlvi. 643).

875 S. Bugge, _Studien über die Entstehung der nördischen Götter- und
Heldensagen_ (Munich, 1889), pp. 339 _sqq._; K. Simrock, _Die Edda_8
(Stuttgart, 1882), p. 382; K. Müllenhoff, _Deutsche Altertumskunde_
(Berlin, 1870-1900), iv. 244 _sq._; H. M. Chadwick, _The Cult of
Othin_ (London, 1899), pp. 3-20. The old English custom of hanging
and disembowelling traitors was probably derived from a practice of
thus sacrificing them to Odin; for among many races, including the
Teutonic and Latin peoples, capital punishment appears to have been
originally a religious rite, a sacrifice or consecration of the
criminal to the god whom he had offended. See F. Liebrecht, _Zur
Volkskunde_ (Heilbronn, 1879), pp. 8 _sq._; K. von Amira, in H.
Paul’s _Grundriss der germanischen Philologie_,2 iii. (Strasburg,
1900) pp. 197 _sq._; G. Vigfusson and F. York Powell, _Corpus
Poeticum Boreale_ (Oxford, 1883), i. 410; W. Golther, _Handbuch der
germanischen Mythologie_ (Leipsic, 1895), pp. 548 _sq._; Th.
Mommsen, _Roman History_, bk. i. ch. 12 (vol. i. p. 192, ed. 1868);
_id._, _Römisches Strafrecht_ (Leipsic, 1899), pp. 900 _sqq._; F.
Granger, _The Worship of the Romans_ (London, 1895), pp. 259 _sqq._;
E. Westermarck, _The Origin and Development of the Moral Ideas_, i.
(London, 1906) pp. 439 _sq._ So, too, among barbarous peoples the
slaughter of prisoners in war is often a sacrifice offered by the
victors to the gods to whose aid they ascribe the victory. See A. B.
Ellis, _The Tshi-speaking Peoples of the Gold Coast_ (London, 1887),
pp. 169 _sq._; W. Ellis, _Polynesian Researches_2 (London,
1832-1836), i. 289; Diodorus Siculus, xx. 65; Strabo, vii. 2. 3, p.
294; Caesar, _De bello Gallico_, vi. 17; Tacitus, _Annals_, i. 61,
xiii. 57; Procopius, De bello Gothico, ii. 15. 24, ii. 25. 9;
Jornandes, _Getica_, vi. 41; J. Grimm, _Deutsche Mythologie_4
(Berlin, 1875-1878), i. 36 _sq._; Fr. Schwally, _Semitische
Kriegsaltertümer_ (Leipsic, 1901), pp. 29 _sqq._

_ 876 Havamal_, 139 _sqq._ (K. Simrock, _Die Edda_,8 p. 55; K.
Müllenhoff, _Deutsche Altertumskunde_, v. 270 _sq._).

877 Fay-Cooper Cole, _The Wild Tribes of Davao District, Mindanao_
(Chicago, 1913), pp. 114 _sqq._ (_Field Museum of Natural History,
Publication 170_).

M213 The hanging of Artemis. The hanging of Helen. The hanging of animal
victims.

878 Pausanias, viii. 23. 6 _sq._ The story, mentioned by Pausanias, that
some children tied a rope round the neck of the image of Artemis was
probably invented to explain a ritual practice of the same sort, as
scholars have rightly perceived. See L. Preller, _Griechische
Mythologie_, i.4 305, note 2; L. R. Farnell, _The Cults of the Greek
States_ (Oxford, 1896-1909), ii. 428 _sq._; M. P. Nilsson,
_Griechische Feste_ (Leipsic, 1906), pp. 232 _sqq._ The Arcadian
worship of the Hanged Artemis was noticed by Callimachus. See
Clement of Alexandria, _Protrept._ ii. 38, p. 32, ed. Potter.

879 Eustathius on Homer, _Od._ xii. 85, p. 1714; I. Bekker, _Anecdota
Graeca_ (Berlin, 1814-1821), i. 336 _sq._, _s.v._ Ἄγαλμα Ἑκάτης. The
goddess Hecate was sometimes identified with Artemis, though in
origin probably she was quite distinct. See L. R. Farnell, _The
Cults of the Greek States_, ii. 499 _sqq._

880 Antoninus Liberalis, _Transform._ xiii.

881 Pausanias, iii. 19. 9 _sq._

882 H. von Fritze, “Zum griechischen Opferritual,” _Jahrbuch des kaiser.
deutsch. Archäologischen Instituts_, xviii. (1903) pp. 58-67. In the
ritual of Eleusis the sacrificial oxen were sometimes lifted up by
young men from the ground. See G. Dittenberger, _Sylloge
Inscriptionum Graecarum_,2 vol. ii. pp. 166 _sq._ No. 521 (ἤραντο δὲ
καὶ τοῖς μυστηρίοις τοὺς βοῦς ἐν Ἐλευσῖνι τῇ θυσίαι, κτλ.); E. S.
Roberts and E. A. Gardner, _Introduction to Greek Epigraphy_, ii.
(Cambridge, 1905) pp. 176 _sq._, No. 65. In this inscription the
word ἤραντο is differently interpreted by P. Stengel, who supposes
that it refers merely to turning backwards and upwards the head of
the victim. See P. Stengel, “Zum griechischen Opferritual,”
_Jahrbuch des kaiser. deutsch. Archäologischen Instituts_, xviii.
(1903) pp. 113-123. But it seems highly improbable that so trivial
an act should be solemnly commemorated in an inscription among the
exploits of the young men (_epheboi_) who performed it. On the other
hand, we know that at Nysa the young men did lift and carry the
sacrificial bull, and that the act was deemed worthy of
commemoration on the coins. See above, p. 206. The Wajagga of East
Africa dread the ghosts of suicides; so when a man has hanged
himself they take the rope from his neck and hang a goat in the
fatal noose, after which they slay the animal. This is supposed to
appease the ghost and prevent him from tempting human beings to
follow his bad example. See B. Gutmann, “Trauer und Begrabnissitten
der Wadschagga,” _Globus_, lxxxix. (1906) p. 200.

883 See above, p. 146.

M214 Use of the skins of human victims to effect their resurrection.

_ 884 The Scapegoat_, pp. 294 _sqq._

885 Herodotus, iv. 71 _sq._

M215 Skins of men and horses stuffed and set up at graves. Some tribes of
Borneo use the skulls of their enemies to ensure the fertility of
the ground and of women, the abundance of game, and so forth.

886 Jean du Plan de Carpin, _Historia Mongalorum_, ed. D’Avezac (Paris,
1838), cap. iii. § iii.

_ 887 Voyages d’Ibn Batoutah, texte Arabe accompagné d’une traduction_,
par C. Défrémery et B. R. Sanguinetti (Paris, 1853-1858), iv. 300
_sq._ For more evidence of similar customs, observed by Turanian
peoples, see K. Neumann, _Die Hellenen im Skythenlande_ (Berlin,
1855), pp. 237-239.

888 Captain R. Fitz-roy, _Narrative of the Surveying Voyages of His
Majesty’s Ships __“__Adventure__”__ and __“__Beagle__”_ (London,
1839), ii. 155 _sq._

889 Herodotus, iv. 103. Many Scythians flayed their dead enemies, and,
stretching the skin on a wooden framework, carried it about with
them on horseback (Herodotus, iv. 64). The souls of the dead may
have been thought to attend on and serve the man who thus bore their
remains about with him. It is also possible that the custom was
nothing more than a barbarous mode of wreaking vengeance on the
dead. Thus a Persian king has been known to flay an enemy, stuff the
skin with chaff, and hang it on a high tree (Procopius, _De bello
Persico_, i. 5. 28). This was the treatment which the arch-heretic
Manichaeus is said to have received at the hands of the Persian king
whose son he failed to cure (Socrates, _Historia Ecclesiastica_, i.
22; Migne’s _Patrologia Graeca_, lxvii. 137, 139). Still such a
punishment may have been suggested by a religious rite. The idea of
crucifying their human victims appears to have been suggested to the
negroes of Benin by the crucifixes of the early Portuguese
missionaries. See H. Ling Roth, _Great Benin_ (Halifax, 1903), pp.
14 _sq._

890 W. H. Furness, _Home-Life of Borneo Head-Hunters_ (Philadelphia,
1902), p. 59. According to Messrs. Hose and McDougall, the spirits
which animate the skulls appear not to be those of the persons from
whose shoulders the heads were taken. However, the spirits (called
_Toh_) reside in or about the heads, and “it is held that in some
way their presence in the house brings prosperity to it, especially
in the form of good crops; and so essential to the welfare of the
house are the heads held to be that, if through fire a house has
lost its heads and has no occasion for war, the people will beg a
head, or even a fragment of one, from some friendly house, and will
instal it in their own with the usual ceremonies.” See Ch. Hose and
W. McDougall, _The Pagan Tribes of Borneo_ (London, 1912), ii. 20,
23.

891 Spenser St. John, _Life in the Forests of the Far East_2 (London,
1863), i. 197.

892 Hugh Low, _Sarawak_ (London, 1848), pp. 206 _sq._ In quoting this
passage I have taken the liberty to correct a grammatical slip.

893 Spenser St. John, _op. cit._ i. 204. See further G. A. Wilken, “Iets
over de schedelvereering,” _Bijdragen tot de Taal- Land- en
Volkenkunde van Nederlandsch-Indië_, xxxviii. (1889) pp. 89-129;
_id._, _Verspreide Geschriften_ (The Hague, 1912), iv. 37-81. A
different view of the purpose of head-hunting is maintained by Mr.
A. C. Kruyt, in his essay, “Het koppensnellen der Toradja’s van
Midden-Celebes, en zijne Beteekenis,” _Verslagen en Mededeelingen
der koninklijke Akademie van Wetenschappen_, Afdeeling Letterkunde,
Vierde Reeks, iii. 2 (Amsterdam, 1899), pp. 147 _sqq._

The natives of Nias, an island to the west of Sumatra, think it
necessary to obtain the heads of their enemies for the purpose of
celebrating the final obsequies of a dead chief. Their notion seems
to be that the ghost of the deceased ruler demands this sacrifice in
his honour, and will punish the omission of it by sending sickness
or other misfortunes on the survivors. Thus among these people the
custom of head-hunting is based on their belief in human immortality
and on their conception of the exacting demands which the dead make
upon the living. When the skulls have been presented to a dead
chief, the priest prays to him for his blessing on the sowing and
harvesting of the rice, on the fruitfulness of women, and so forth.
See C. Fries, “Das ‘Koppensnellen’ auf Nias,” _Allgemeine
Missions-Zeitschrift_, February, 1908, pp. 73-88. From this account
it would seem that it is not the spirits of the slain men, but the
ghost of the dead chief from whom the blessings of fertility and so
forth are supposed to emanate. Compare Th. C. Rappard, “Het eiland
Nias en zijne bewoners,” _Bijdragen tot de Taal- Land- en
Volkenkunde van Nederlandsch-Indië_, lxii. (1909) pp. 609-611.

M216 The stuffed skin of the human representative of the Phrygian god may
have been used for like purposes.

_ 894 Spirits of the Corn and of the Wild_, ii. 4-7.

_ 895 Spirits of the Corn and of the Wild_, ii. 169 _sqq._

M217 Popularity of the worship of Cybele and Attis in the Roman Empire.

896 H. Dessau, _Inscriptiones Latinae Selectae_, Nos. 4099, 4100, 4103,
4105, 4106, 4116, 4117, 4119, 4120, 4121, 4123, 4124, 4127, 4128,
4131, 4136, 4139, 4140, 4142, 4156, 4163, 4167; H. Hepding, _Attis_,
pp. 85, 86, 93, 94, 95, Inscr. Nos. 21-24, 26, 50, 51, 52, 61, 62,
63. See further, J. Toutain, _Les Cultes Païens dans l’Empire
Romain_ (Paris, 1911), pp. 73 _sqq._, 103 _sqq._

897 S. Dill, _Roman Society in the Last Century of the Western Empire_2
(London, 1899), p. 16.

898 Augustine, _De civitate Dei_, vii. 26.

899 But the two were publicly worshipped at Dyme and Patrae in Achaia
(Pausanias, vii. 17. 9, vii. 20. 3), and there was an association
for their worship at Piraeus. See P. Foucart, _Des Associations
Religieuses chez les Grecs_ (Paris, 1873), pp. 85 _sqq._, 196; Ch.
Michel, _Recueil d’Inscriptions Grecques_, p. 772, No. 982.

900 Rapp, _s.v._ “Kybele,” in W. H. Roscher’s _Lexikon der griech. und
röm. Mythologie_, ii. 1656.

901 As to the savage theory of inspiration or possession by a deity see
(Sir) Edward B. Tylor, _Primitive Culture_,2 ii. 131 _sqq._ As to
the savage theory of a new birth see _Balder the Beautiful_, ii. 251
_sqq._ As to the use of blood to wash away sins see _The Magic Art
and the Evolution of Kings_, ii. 107 _sqq._; _Psyche’s Task_, Second
Edition, pp. 44 _sq._, 47 _sqq._, 116 _sq._ Among the Cameroon
negroes accidental homicide can be expiated by the blood of an
animal. The relations of the slayer and of the slain assemble. An
animal is killed and every person present is smeared with its blood
on his face and breast. They think that the guilt of manslaughter is
thus atoned for, and that no punishment will overtake the homicide.
See Missionary Autenrieth, “Zur Religion der Kamerun-Neger,” in
_Mitteilungen der geographischen Gesellschaft zu Jena_, xii. (1893)
pp. 93 _sq._ In Car Nicobar a man possessed by devils is cleansed of
them by being rubbed all over with pig’s blood and beaten with
leaves. The devils are thus transferred to the leaves, which are
thrown into the sea before daybreak. See V. Solomon, “Extracts from
diaries kept in Car Nicobar,” in _Journal of the Anthropological
Institute_, xxxii. (1902) p. 227. Similarly the ancient Greeks
purified a homicide by means of pig’s blood and laurel leaves. See
my note on Pausanias, ii. 31. 8 (vol. iii. pp. 276-279). The
original idea of thus purging a manslayer was probably to rid him of
the angry ghost of his victim, just as in Car Nicobar a man is rid
of devils in the same manner. The purgative virtue ascribed to the
blood in these ceremonies may be based on the notion that the
offended spirit accepts it as a substitute for the blood of the
guilty person. This was the view of C. Meiners (_Geschichte der
Religionen_, Hanover, 1806-1807, ii. 137 _sq._) and of E. Rohde
(_Psyche_,3 Tübingen and Leipsic, 1903, ii. 77 _sq._).

902 A good instance of such an attempt to dress up savagery in the garb
of philosophy is the fifth speech of the emperor Julian, “On the
Mother of the Gods” (pp. 206 _sqq._ ed. F. C. Hertlein, Leipsic,
1875-1876).

M218 The spread of Oriental faiths over the Roman Empire contributed to
undermine the fabric of Greek and Roman civilization by inculcating
the salvation of the individual soul as the supreme aim of life.

903 As to the diffusion of Oriental religions in the Roman Empire see G.
Boissier, _La Religion Romaine d’Auguste aux Antonins_5 (Paris,
1900), i. 349 _sqq._; J. Reville, _La Religion à Rome sous les
Sévères_ (Paris, 1886), pp. 47 _sqq._; S. Dill, _Roman Society in
the Last Century of the Western Empire_2 (London, 1899), pp. 76
_sqq._

904 Compare Servius on Virgil, _Aen._ ii. 604, vi. 661; Origen, _Contra
Celsum_, viii. 73 (Migne’s _Patrologia Graeca_, xi. 1628); G.
Boissier, _La Religion Romaine d’Auguste aux Antonins_5 (Paris,
1900), i. 357 _sq._; E. Westermarck, _The Origin and Development of
the Moral Ideas_ (London, 1906-1908), i. 345 _sq._; H. H. Milman,
_History of Latin Christianity_,4 i. 150-153, ii. 90. In the passage
just cited Origen tells us that the Christians refused to follow the
Emperor to the field of battle even when he ordered them to do so;
but he adds that they gave the emperor the benefit of their prayers
and thus did him more real service than if they had fought for him
with the sword. On the decline of the civic virtues under the
influence of Christian asceticism see W. E. H. Lecky, _History of
European Morals from Augustus to Charlemagne_3 (London, 1877), ii.
139 _sqq._

905 To prevent misapprehension I will add that the spread of Oriental
religions was only one of many causes which contributed to the
downfall of ancient civilization. Among these contributory causes a
friend, for whose judgment and learning I entertain the highest
respect, counts bad government and a ruinous fiscal system, two of
the most powerful agents to blast the prosperity of nations, as may
be seen in our own day by the blight which has struck the Turkish
empire. It is probable, too, as my friend thinks, that the rapid
diffusion of alien faiths was as much an effect as a cause of
widespread intellectual decay. Such unwholesome growths could hardly
have fastened upon the Graeco-Roman mind in the days of its full
vigour. We may remember the energy with which the Roman Government
combated the first outbreak of the Bacchic plague (Th. Mommsen,
_Roman History_, iii. 115 _sq._, ed. 1894). The disastrous effects
of Roman financial oppression on the industries and population of
the empire, particularly of Greece, are described by George Finlay
(_Greece under the Romans_,2 Edinburgh and London, 1857, pp. 47
_sqq._).

M219 Popularity of the worship of Mithra; its resemblance to Christianity
and its rivalry with that religion. The festival of Christmas
borrowed by the Church from the religion of Mithra.

906 See Fr. Cumont, _Textes et Monuments figurés relatifs aux Mystères
de Mithra_ (Brussels, 1896-1899); _id._, _s.v._ “Mithras,” in W. H.
Roscher’s _Lexikon der griech. und röm. Mythologie_, ii. 3028 _sqq._
Compare _id._, _Les Religions Orientales dans le Paganisme Romain_2
(Paris, 1909), pp. 207 _sqq._

907 Fr. Cumont, _Textes et Monuments_, i. 333 _sqq._

908 E. Renan, _Marc-Aurèle et la Fin du Monde Antique_ (Paris, 1882),
pp. 576 _sqq._; Fr. Cumont, _Textes et Monuments_, i. 339 _sqq._

909 Tertullian, _De corona_, 15; _id._, _De praescriptione
haereticorum_, 40; Justin Martyr, _Apologia_, i. 66; _id._,
_Dialogus cum Tryphone_, 78 (Migne’s _Patrologia Graeca_, vi. 429,
660). Tertullian explained in like manner the resemblance of the
fasts of Isis and Cybele to the fasts of Christianity (_De jejunio_,
16). Justin Martyr thought that by listening to the words of the
inspired prophets the devils discovered the divine intentions and
anticipated them by a series of profane and blasphemous imitations.
Among these travesties of Christian truth he enumerates the death,
resurrection, and ascension of Dionysus, the virgin birth of
Perseus, and Bellerophon mounted on Pegasus, whom he regards as a
parody of Christ riding on an ass. See Justin Martyr, _Apology_, i.
54.

910 J. de Acosta, _Natural and Moral History of the Indies_, translated
by E. Grimston (London, 1880), bk. v. chs. 11, 16, 17, 18, 24-28,
vol. ii. pp. 324 _sq._, 334 _sqq._, 356 _sqq._

911 Compare S. Dill, _Roman Society in the Last Century of the Western
Empire_2 (London, 1899), pp. 80 _sqq._; _id._, _Roman Society from
Nero to Marcus Aurelius_ (London, 1904), pp. 619 _sqq._

912 E. Renan, _Marc-Aurèle et la Fin du Monde Antique_ (Paris, 1882),
pp. 579 _sq._; Fr. Cumont, _Textes et Monuments_, i. 338.

913 Pliny, _Nat. Hist._ xviii. 221; Columella, _De re rustica_, ix. 14.
12; L. Ideler, _Handbuch der mathematischen und technischen
Chronologie_ (Berlin, 1825-1826), ii. 124; G. F. Unger, in Iwan
Müller’s _Handbuch der klassischen Altertumswissenschaft_, i.1
(Nördlingen, 1886) p. 649.

914 In the calendar of Philocalus the twenty-fifth of December is marked
_N. Invicti_, that is, _Natalis Solis Invicti_. See _Corpus
Inscriptionum Latinarum_, i.2 Pars prior (Berlin, 1893), p. 278,
with Th. Mommsen’s commentary, pp. 338 _sq._

915 Cosmas Hierosolymitanus, _Commentarii in Sancti Gregorii Nazianzeni
Carmina_ (Migne’s _Patrologia Graeca_, xxxviii. 464): ταύτην
[Christmas] ἧγον ἔκπαλαι δὲ τὴν ἡμέραν ἑορτὴν Ἔλληνες, καθ᾽ ἤν
ἐτελοῦντο κατὰ τὸ μεσονύκτιον, ἐν ἀδύτοις τισὶν ὑπεισερχόμενοι, ὄθεν
ἐξιόντες ἔκραζον: “Ἡ παρθένος ἕτεκεν, αὔξει φῶς.” ταύτην Ἐπιφάνιος ὁ
μέγας τῆς Κυπρίων ἱερεύς φησι τὴν ἑορτὴν καὶ Σαῤῥακηνούς ἄγειν
τῇπαρ᾽ αὐτῶν σεβομένῃ Ἀφροδίτῃ, ἤν δὴ Χαμαρᾶ τῇ αὐτῶν προσαγορεύουσι
γλώττῃ. The passage is quoted, with some verbal variations, by Ch.
Aug. Lobeck, _Aglaophamus_ (Königsberg, 1829), ii. 1227 note 2. See
Franz Cumont, “Le Natalis Invicti,” _Comptes Rendus de l’Académie
des Inscriptions et Belles-Lettres, 1911_ (Paris, 1911), pp.
292-298, whose learned elucidations I follow in the text. That the
festival of the Nativity of the Sun was similarly celebrated in
Egypt may be inferred from a Greek calendar drawn up by the
astrologer Antiochus in Lower Egypt at the end of the second or the
beginning of the third century A.D.; for under the 25th December the
calendar has the entry, “Birthday of the Sun, the light waxes”
(Ἡλίου γενέθλιον; αὔξει φῶς). See F. Cumont, _op. cit._ p. 294.

916 Macrobius, _Saturnalia_, i. 18. 10.

917 F. Cumont, _s.v._ “Caelestis,” in Pauly-Wissowa’s _Real-Encyclopädie
der classischen Altertumswissenschaft_, v. i. 1247 _sqq._ She was
called the Queen of Heaven (Jeremiah vii. 18, xliv. 18), the
Heavenly Goddess (Herodotus, iii. 8; Pausanias, i. 14. 7), or the
Heavenly Virgin (Tertullian, _Apologeticus_, 23; Augustine, _De
civitate Dei_, ii. 4). The Greeks spoke of her as the Heavenly
Aphrodite (Herodotus, i. 105; Pausanias, i. 14. 7). A Greek
inscription found in Delos contains a dedication to Astarte
Aphrodite; and another found in the same island couples Palestinian
Astarte and Heavenly Aphrodite. See G. Dittenberger, _Sylloge
Inscriptionum Graecorum_,2 vol. ii. pp. 619 _sq._, No. 764; R. A.
Stewart Macalister, _The Philistines, their History and
Civilization_ (London, 1913), p. 94.

918 Dedications to Mithra the Unconquered Sun (_Soli invicto Mithrae_)
have been found in abundance. See Fr. Cumont, _Textes et Monuments_,
ii. 99 _sqq._ As to the worship of the Unconquered Sun (_Sol
Invictus_) see H. Usener, _Das Weihnachtsfest_2 (Bonn, 1911), pp.
348 _sqq._

919 Fr. Cumont, _op. cit._ i. 325 _sq._, 339.

920 J. Bingham, _The Antiquities of the Christian Church_, bk. xx. ch.
iv. (Bingham’s _Works_, vol. vii. pp. 279 _sqq._, Oxford, 1855); C.
A. Credner, “De natalitiorum Christi origine,” _Zeitschrift für die
historische Theologie_, iii. 2 (1833), pp. 236 _sqq._; Mgr. L.
Duchesne, _Origines du Culte Chrétien_3 (Paris, 1903), pp. 257
_sqq._; Th. Mommsen, in _Corpus Inscriptionum Latinarum_, i.2 Pars
prior, p. 338. The earliest mention of the festival of Christmas is
in the calendar of Philocalus, which was drawn up at Rome in 336
A.D. The words are _VIII. kal. jan._, _natus Christus in Betleem
Judee_ (L. Duchesne, _op. cit._ p. 258).

M220 Motives for the institution of Christmas.

921 Quoted by C. A. Credner, _op. cit._ p. 239, note 46; by Th. Mommsen,
_Corpus Inscriptionum Latinarum_, i.2 Pars prior, pp. 338 _sq._; and
by H. Usener, _Das Weihnachtsfest_2 (Bonn, 1911), pp. 349 _sq._

922 Augustine, _Serm._ cxc. 1 (Migne’s _Patrologia Latina_, xxxviii.
1007).

923 Leo the Great, _Serm._ xxii. (_al._ xxi.) 6 (Migne’s _Patrologia
Latina_, liv. 198). Compare St. Ambrose, _Serm._ vi. 1 (Migne’s
_Patrologia Latina_, xvii. 614).

M221 The Easter celebration of the death and resurrection of Christ
appears to have been assimilated to the celebration of the death and
resurrection of Attis, which was held at Rome at the same season.
Heathen festivals displaced by Christian.

924 A. Credner, _op. cit._ pp. 236 _sqq._; E. B. Tylor, _Primitive
Culture_,2 ii. 297 _sq._; Fr. Cumont, _Textes et Monuments_, i. 342,
355 _sq._; Th. Mommsen, in _Corpus Inscriptionum Latinarum_, i.2
Pars prior, pp. 338 _sq._; H. Usener, _Das Weihnachtsfest_2 (Bonn,
1911), pp. 348 _sqq._ A different explanation of Christmas has been
put forward by Mgr. Duchesne. He shows that among the early
Christians the death of Christ was commonly supposed to have fallen
on the twenty-fifth of March, that day having been “chosen
arbitrarily, or rather suggested by its coincidence with the
official equinox of spring.” It would be natural to assume that
Christ had lived an exact number of years on earth, and therefore
that his incarnation as well as his death took place on the
twenty-fifth of March. In point of fact the Church has placed the
Annunciation and with it the beginning of his mother’s pregnancy on
that very day. If that were so, his birth would in the course of
nature have occurred nine months later, that is, on the twenty-fifth
of December. Thus on Mgr. Duchesne’s theory the date of the Nativity
was obtained by inference from the date of the Crucifixion, which in
its turn was chosen because it coincided with the official equinox
of spring. Mgr. Duchesne does not notice the coincidence of the
vernal equinox with the festival of Attis. See his work, _Origines
du Culte Chrétien_3 (Paris, 1903), pp. 261-265, 272. The tradition
that both the conception and the death of Christ fell on the
twenty-fifth of March is mentioned and apparently accepted by
Augustine (_De Trinitate_, iv. 9, Migne’s _Patrologia Latina_, xlii.
894).

925 See above, pp. 253 _sqq._

926 However, the lament for Adonis is mentioned by Ovid (_Ars Amat._ i.
75 _sq._) along with the Jewish observance of the Sabbath.

927 See above, pp. 268 _sqq._

928 Columella, _De re rustica_, ix. 14. 1; Pliny, _Nat. Hist._ xviii.
246; Macrobius, _Saturn._ i. 21. 10; L. Ideler, _Handbuch der
mathematischen und technischen Chronologie_, ii. 124.

929 Mgr. L. Duchesne, _Origines du Culte Chrétien_,3 pp. 262 _sq._ That
Christ was crucified on the twenty-fifth of March in the year 29 is
expressly affirmed by Tertullian (_Adversus Judaeos_, 8, vol. ii. p.
719, ed. F. Oehler), Hippolytus (_Commentary on Daniel_, iv. 23,
vol. i. p. 242, ed. Bonwetsch and Achelis), and Augustine (_De
civitate Dei_, xviii. 54; _id._, _De Trinitate_, iv. 9). See also
_Thesaurus Linguae Latinae_, iv. (Leipsic, 1906- 1909) col. 1222,
_s.v._ “Crucimissio”: “_POL. SILV.__ fast. Mart 25 aequinoctium.
principium veris. crucimissio gentilium. Christus passus hoc die._”
From this last testimony we learn that there was a gentile as well
as a Christian crucifixion at the spring equinox. The gentile
crucifixion was probably the affixing of the effigy of Attis to the
tree, though at Rome that ceremony appears to have taken place on
the twenty-second rather than on the twenty-fifth of March. See
above, p. 267. The Quartodecimans of Phrygia celebrated the
twenty-fifth of March as the day of Christ’s death, quoting as their
authority certain acts of Pilate; in Cappadocia the adherents of
this sect were divided between the twenty-fifth of March and the
fourteenth of the moon. See Epiphanius, _Adversus Haeres._ l. 1
(vol. ii. p. 447, ed. G. Dindorf; Migne’s _Patrologia Graeca_, xli.
884 _sq._). In Gaul the death and resurrection of Christ were
regularly celebrated on the twenty-fifth and twenty-seventh of March
as late as the sixth century. See Gregory of Tours, _Historia
Francorum_, viii. 31. 6 (Migne’s _Patrologia Latina_, lxxi. 566); S.
Martinus Dumiensis (bishop of Braga), _De Pascha_, 1 (Migne’s
_Patrologia Latina_, lxxii. 50), who says: “_A plerisque Gallicanis
episcopis usque ante non multum tempus custoditum est, ut semper
VIII. Kal. April. diem Paschae celebrent, in quo facta Christi
resurrectio traditur._” According to this last testimony, it was the
resurrection, not the crucifixion, of Christ that was celebrated on
the twenty-fifth of March; but Mgr. Duchesne attributes the
statement to a mistake of the writer. With regard to the Roman
practice the twenty-fifth and twenty-seventh of March are marked in
ancient Martyrologies as the dates of the Crucifixion and
Resurrection. See _Vetustius Occidentalis Ecclesiae Martyrologium_,
ed. Franciscus Maria Florentinus (Lucca, 1667), pp. 396 _sq._, 405
_sq._ On this subject Mgr. Duchesne observes: “Hippolytus, in his
Paschal Table, marks the Passion of Christ in a year in which the
fourteenth of Nisan falls on Friday twenty-fifth March. In his
commentary on Daniel he expressly indicates Friday the twenty-fifth
of March and the consulship of the two Gemini. The Philocalien
Catalogue of the Popes gives the same date as to day and year. It is
to be noted that the cycle of Hippolytus and the Philocalien
Catalogue are derived from official documents, and may be cited as
evidence of the Roman ecclesiastical usage” (_Origines du Culte
Chrétien_,3 p. 262).

930 Mgr. L. Duchesne, _op. cit._ p. 263.

931 Mgr. L. Duchesne, _l.c._ A sect of the Montanists held that the
world began and that the sun and moon were created at the spring
equinox, which, however, they dated on the twenty-fourth of March
(Sozomenus, _Historia Ecclesiastica_, vii. 18). At Henen-Su in Egypt
there was celebrated a festival of the “hanging out of the heavens,”
that is, the supposed reconstituting of the heavens each year in the
spring (E. A. Wallis Budge, _The Gods of the Egyptians_, ii. 63).
But the Egyptians thought that the creation of the world took place
at the rising of Sirius (Porphyry, _De antro nympharum_, 24;
Solinus, xxxii. 13), which in antiquity fell on the twentieth of
July (L. Ideler, _Handbuch der mathematischen und technischen
Chronologie_, i. 127 _sqq._).

932 See above, pp. 263, 281 _sqq._

_ 933 The Magic Art and the Evolution of Kings_, ii. 324 _sqq._

934 Above, pp. 246 _sqq._

_ 935 The Magic Art and the Evolution of Kings_, i. 14 _sqq._

936 See below, vol. ii. pp. 81 _sqq._

937 Above, pp. 302 _sqq._

938 Another instance of the substitution of a Christian for a pagan
festival may be mentioned. On the first of August the people of
Alexandria used to commemorate the defeat of Mark Antony by Augustus
and the entrance of the victor into their city. The heathen pomp of
the festival offended Eudoxia, wife of Theodosius the Younger, and
she decreed that on that day the Alexandrians should thenceforth
celebrate the deliverance of St. Peter from prison instead of the
deliverance of their city from the yoke of Antony and Cleopatra. See
L. Ideler, _Handbuch der mathematischen und technischen
Chronologie_, i. 154.

M222 Coincidence between the pagan and the Christian festivals of the
divine death and resurrection.

939 Lactantius, _De mortibus persecutorum_, 2; _id._, _Divin. Institut._
iv. 10. 18. As to the evidence of the Gallic usage see S. Martinus
Dumiensis, quoted above, p. 307 note.

M223 Different theories by which pagans and Christians explained the
coincidence.

940 The passage occurs in the 84th of the _Quaestiones Veteris et Novi
Testamenti_ (Migne’s _Patrologia Latina_, xxxv. 2279), which are
printed in the works of Augustine, though internal evidence is said
to shew that they cannot be by that Father, and that they were
written three hundred years after the destruction of Jerusalem. The
writer’s words are as follows: “_Diabolus autem, qui est satanas, ut
fallaciae suae auctoritatem aliquam possit adhibere, et mendacia sua
commentitia veritate colorare, primo mense quo sacramenta dominica
scit celebranda, quia non mediocris potentiae est, Paganis quae
observarent instituit mysteria, ut animas eorum duabus ex causis in
errore detineret: ut quia praevenit veritatem fallacia, melius
quiddam fallacia videretur, quasi antiquitate praejudicans veritati.
Et quia in primo mense, in quo aequinoctium habent Romani, sicut et
nos, ea ipsa observatio ab his custoditur; ita etiam per sanguinem
dicant expiationem fieri, sicut et nos per crucem: hac versutia
Paganos detinet in errore, ut putent veritatem nostram imitationem
potius videri quam veritatem, quasi per aemulationem superstitione
quadam inventam. Nec enim verum potest, inquiunt, aestimari quod
postea est inventum. Sed quia apud nos pro certo veritas est, et ab
initio haec est, virtutum atque prodigiorum signa perhibent
testimonium, ut, teste virtute, diaboli improbitas innotescat._” I
have to thank my learned friend Professor Franz Cumont for pointing
out this passage to me. He had previously indicated and discussed it
(“La Polémique de l’Ambrosiaster contre les Païens,” _Revue
d’Histoire et de Littérature religieuses_, viii. (1903) pp. 419
_sqq._). Though the name of Attis is not mentioned in the passage, I
agree with Prof. Cumont in holding that the bloody expiatory rites
at the spring equinox, to which the writer refers, can only be those
of the Day of Blood which formed part of the great aequinoctial
festival of Attis. Compare F. Cumont, _Les Religions Orientales dans
le Paganisme Romain_2 (Paris, 1909), pp. 106 _sq._, 333 _sq._

M224 Compromise of Christianity with paganism. Parallel with Buddhism.

941 On the decadence of Buddhism and its gradual assimilation to those
popular Oriental superstitions against which it was at first
directed, see Monier Williams, _Buddhism_2 (London, 1890), pp. 147
_sqq._

942 The historical reality both of Buddha and of Christ has sometimes
been doubted or denied. It would be just as reasonable to question
the historical existence of Alexander the Great and Charlemagne on
account of the legends which have gathered round them. The great
religious movements which have stirred humanity to its depths and
altered the beliefs of nations spring ultimately from the conscious
and deliberate efforts of extraordinary minds, not from the blind
unconscious co-operation of the multitude. The attempt to explain
history without the influence of great men may flatter the vanity of
the vulgar, but it will find no favour with the philosophic
historian.

M225 The Greek Hyacinth interpreted as the vegetation which blooms and
withers away.

943 G. F. Schömann, _Griechische Alterthümer_4 (Berlin, 1897-1902), ii.
473; L. Preller, _Griechische Mythologie_, i.4 (Berlin, 1894) pp.
248 _sq._; Greve, _s.v._ “Hyakinthos,” in W. H. Roscher’s _Lexikon
der griech. und röm. Mythologie_, i. 2763 _sq._ Other views of
Hyacinth have been expressed by G. F. Welcker (_Griechische
Götterlehre_, Göttingen, 1857-1862, i. 472), G. F. Unger (“Der
Isthmientag und die Hyakinthien,” _Philologus_, xxxvii. (1877) pp.
20 _sqq._), E. Rohde (_Psyche_,3 i. 137 _sqq._) and S. Wide
(_Lakonische Kulte_, Leipsic, 1893, p. 290).

944 Apollodorus, _Bibliotheca_, i. 3. 3, iii. 10. 3; Nicander, _Ther._
901 _sqq._, with the Scholiast’s note; Lucian, _De saltatione_, 45;
Pausanias, iii. 1. 3, iii. 19. 5; J. Tzetzes, _Chiliades_, i. 241
_sqq._; Ovid, _Metam._ x. 161-219; Pliny, _Nat. Hist._ xxi. 66.

945 Theophrastus, _Histor. Plant._ vi. 8. 1 _sq._ That the hyacinth was
a spring flower is plainly indicated also by Philostratus (_Imag._
i. 23. 1) and Ovid (_Metam._ x. 162-166). See further Greve, _s.v._
“Hyakinthos,” in W. H. Roscher’s _Lexikon der griech. und röm.
Mythologie_, i. 2764; J. Murr, _Die Pflanzenwelt in der griechischen
Mythologie_ (Innsbruck, 1890), pp. 257 _sqq._; O. Schrader,
_Reallexikon der Indogermanischen Altertumskunde_ (Strasburg, 1901),
pp. 383 _sq._ Miss J. E. Harrison was so kind as to present me with
two specimens of the flower (_Delphinium Ajacis_) on which the woful
letters were plainly visible. A flower similarly marked, of a colour
between white and red, was associated with the death of Ajax
(Pausanias, i. 35. 4). But usually the two flowers were thought to
be the same (Ovid, _Metam._ xiii. 394 _sqq._; Scholiast on
Theocritus, x. 28; Pliny, _Nat. Hist._ xxi. 66; Eustathius on Homer,
_Iliad_, ii. 557, p. 285).

946 Xenophon, _Hellenica_, iv. 5. 7-17; Pausanias, iii. 10. 1.

M226 The tomb and the festival of Hyacinth at Amyclae.

947 Pausanias, iii. 1. 3, iii. 19. 1-5.

948 Hesychius, _s.v._ Ἑκατομβεύς; G. F. Unger in _Philologus_, xxxvii.
(1877) pp. 13-33; Greve, _s.v._ “Hyakinthos,” in W. H. Roscher’s
_Lexikon der griech. und röm. Mythologie_, i. 2762; W. Smith,
_Dictionary of Greek and Roman Antiquities_,3 i. 339. From Xenophon
(_Hellenica_, iv. 5) we learn that in 390 B.C. the Hyacinthian
followed soon after the Isthmian festival, which that year fell in
spring. Others, however, identifying Hecatombeus with the Attic
month Hecatombaeon, would place the Hyacinthia in July (K. O.
Müller, _Dorier_,2 Breslau, 1844, i. 358). In Rhodes, Cos, and other
Greek states there was a month called Hyacinthius, which probably
took its name from the Hyacinthian festival. The month is thought to
correspond to the Athenian Scirophorion and therefore to June. See
E. Bischof, “De fastis Graecorum antiquioribus,” _Leipziger Studien
für classische Philologie_, vii. (1884) pp. 369 _sq._, 381, 384,
410, 414 _sq._; G. Dittenberger, _Sylloge Inscriptionum Graecarum_,2
vol. i. pp. 396, 607, Nos. 614, note 3, 744, note 1. If this latter
identification of the month is correct, it would furnish an argument
for dating the Spartan festival of Hyacinth in June also. The
question is too intricate to be discussed here.

949 Athenaeus, iv. 17, pp. 139 _sq._ Strabo speaks (vi. 3. 2, p. 278) of
a contest at the Hyacinthian festival. It may have been the chariot
races mentioned by Athenaeus.

950 Hesychius, _s.v._ Πολύβοια.

M227 Hyacinth an aboriginal god, perhaps a king, who was worshipped in
Laconia before the invasion of the Dorians. His sister Polyboea may
perhaps have been his spouse.

951 E. Rohde, _Psyche_,3 i. 137 _sqq._

952 Pausanias, iii. 19. 3. The Greek word here used for sacrifice
(ἐναγίζειν) properly denotes sacrifices offered to the heroic or
worshipful dead; another word (θύειν) was employed for sacrifices
offered to gods. The two terms are distinguished by Pausanias here
and elsewhere (ii. 10. 1, ii. 11. 7). Compare Herodotus, ii. 44.
Sacrifices to the worshipful dead were often annual. See Pausanias,
iii. 1. 8, vii. 19. 10, vii. 20. 9, viii. 14. 11, viii. 41. 1, ix.
38. 5, x. 24. 6. It has been observed by E. Rehde (_Psyche_,3 i.
139, note 2) that sacrifices were frequently offered to a hero
before a god, and he suggests with much probability that in these
cases the worship of the hero was older than that of the deity.

953 Pausanias, iii. 19. 14.

954 See above, p. 44; and below, vol. ii. pp. 213 _sqq._

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