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

The Mountain as the Throne of Zeus 139

ranges over the valley of the Hermus, stretched like a map at one's
feet. There seems to be little doubt that this remarkable rock-cut
seat, perched on the pinnacle of the dizzy crag, is no other than
the " throne of Pelops" mentioned by Pausanias in the present
passage. What the original intention of the cutting may have
been, is a different question. Professor W. M. Ramsay thinks it
was probably an altar on which offerings were laid.'

C. Humann, who discovered this throne in the year 1880,
gives a most graphic account of his experiences in reaching it;
and I am indebted to his article for the accompanying sketch
(fig. 103)1. W. Reichel adds the suggestion that the houses built
on the upper part of the peak belonged in reality to a colony
of priests, whose duty it was to serve the god represented by the
throne above them. He also conjectures that this god was Apollon
or some other form of the sun-god, if not Hypsistos himself, and
that the name of Pelops became attached to the throne as did that
of Danaos to the throne of Apollon Lykios at Argos, or that of
Midas to the throne at Delphoi2. Reichel holds that in all these
cases the empty throne was by rights the throne of a god, which
came to be regarded wrongly as the throne of a by-gone king. Its
transference from a god to a king is—I would point out—much
facilitated, if we may suppose that the king was viewed as the god
incarnate. And in the case before us there are good reasons for
suspecting that Pelops was regarded as in some sense a human
Zeus3. Thus a rocky seat connected by the Greek inhabitants of
Magnesia with Zeus, the chief Magnesian god4, would readily come
to be called the ' throne of Pelops.' This does not of course pre-
clude the possibility that the original possessor of the throne was
neither Pelops, nor Zeus, but some other pre-Greek occupant such
as Plastene, Mother of the Gods, whose primitive rock-cut image
is still to be seen in its niche on the mountain-side 300 feet above
the plain5.

1 C. Humann 'Die Tantalosburg im Sipylos' in the Ath. Mitth. 1888 xiii. 22—41.
The measurements of the throne, as given by him, are: height above sea-level 35om or
1120 feet, length 1.55111, depth 1.30'", height 1.20™.

'2 W. Reichel Uber vorhellenische Gbtterculte p. 32 f. For the throne of Danaos in the
temple of Apollon Lykios at Argos (Paus. 2. if). 5) see ib. p. 18, and for that of Midas at
Delphoi (Hdt. 1. 14) ib. p. 17.

3 Class. Rev. 1903 xvii. 271 ff., Folk-Lore 1904 xv. 398 ff. See further an important
chapter on the origin of the Olympic games by Mr F. M. Cornford in Miss J. E. Harrison's
latest book Themis (ch. vii).

4 W. M. Ramsay in theJourn. Hell. Stud. 1882 iii. 56 : 'on the autonomous coins of
Magnesia Zeus is the most characteristic type.' Cp. Append. B Lydia.

5 W. M. Ramsay in the Journ. Hell. Stud. 1882 iii. 33 ff., C. Humann in the Ath.
Mitth. 1888 xiii. 26 ff. with map and pi. r, 2, J. G. Frazer on Paus. 5. 13. 7 (iii. 553 f.).