Cook, Arthur B.: Zeus: a study in ancient religion (Band 1): Zeus god of the bright sky (Cambridge, 1914)

The Blue Globe 53

type of the infant Zeus seated on a globe surrounded by stars is
of Greek extraction. On the other hand, most of the representa-
tions considered above can be legitimately derived from the cult-
statue of Iupiter Capitolinus, which had at its left side a ball resting
on a pedestal or pillar. This was a definitely Roman adjunct: it
had no counterpart iu the temple of Zeus at Olympia.

Enquiry might be pushed further. The temple of Iupiter
Capitolinus was, as is well known, essentially an Etruscan
building. Now a ball resting on a pedestal or pillar occurs in
Etruscan art sometimes as a grave-ste'le1, sometimes as a sacred
land-mark or boundary-stone2. Such monuments varied much
in shape and size. A fine example from Orvieto, now in the
Museum at Florence, consists of a rectangular moulded base
topped by a spheroidal black stone (fig. 30)3. Another, in
the Orvieto Museum, is a cone of tufa hollow inside, and bears
an inscription (Tinia Tinscvil) which connects it with Tinia,
the Etruscan Iupiter (fig. 31)4. Are we then to infer that in the
cella of Iupiter Capitolinus, side by side with the most august
statue in Rome, there was a grave-ste'le or a boundary stone ?
The fact is luckily beyond question5. When the foundations of
the temple were first laid by Tarquinius Priscus, the god Terminus
—otherwise known as Iupiter Terminus—was already in possession
of the site and resisted the process of exauguration. Hence the
ancient boundary-stone that passed as his image was allowed to
remain in close proximity6 to the statue of Iupiter Capitolinus.
Moreover, a small opening was contrived in the roof above it,
since sacrifices to Terminus had to take place in the open air.
Lactantius asserts that the rude stone worshipped as Terminus

1 Durm Baukunst d. Etrusk? p. 128 fig. 141, Raoul Rochette op. cit. pp. 141 n. 5,
402, 405. These balls on pillars were originally Grabphalli (Forrer Reallex. p. 297): see
A. Koerte in the Ath. Mitth. 1899 xxiv. 6 ff. pi. 1, 1, A. Dieterich Mutter Erde Leipzig
and Berlin 1905 p. 1041".

2 Raoul Rochette op. cit. p. 4041". pi. 75 (a funeral urn in the museum at Volterra):
G. Korte / Rilievi delle Urne Etrusche Berlino 1890 ii. 1. 97 pi. 38, 3 describes and
figures the object on the pillar as ' un vaso tondo.' Cp. the stone balls on our lodge-
gates (see, however, S. Baring-Gould Strange Survival^ London 1905 p. 53).

3 L. A. Milani in the Rendiconti delta Reale Accademia dei Lincei. Classe di Scienze
Morali, Storiche e Filologiche. Serie Quinta. Roma 1900 ix. 295 fig. 4, Sttidi e materiali
di archeologia e numistnatica Firenze 1902 i. 60 f. fig. 226.

A similar Grabaufsatz from Orvieto, now at Berlin, is an elliptical block of polished
serpentine resting on a moulded base of trachyte [Ant. Skulpt. Berlin p. 481 no. 1244 fig.)-

4 Milani locc. citt. ix. 293 fig. 3 cp. ib. p. 294 'un cono tufaceo vuoto internamente,'
i. 60 f. fig. 227. Cp. J. Six ' Der Agyieus des Mys' in the Ath. Mitth. 1894 xix. 340 ff.

5 The evidence is collected by Preller-Jordan Rom. Myth? i. 255 f., Wissowa Rel.
Kult. Rom. p. 124 f., C. Hulsen in Pauly-Wissowa Real-Enc. iii. 1532.

6 Dion. Hal. 3. 69 -wkqaiov rod e8ovs. »