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

358 The Ram and the Sun in Egypt

ideas of a cosmic ship1, but is simply the Egyptian solar barque.
Amnion was identified with 'the setting sun of Libya'2; and the
Egyptians believed that the sun-god, after travelling all day in his
morning barque, at night-fall reached the Mountains of the West,
where he was received by the goddess of the West and entered his
evening barque to begin his nightly voyage through the Under-
world3. Sesoosis, i.e. Sesostris (Rameses ii), is even said to have
dedicated in the temple of Amen-Ra at Thebes a boat of cedar
wood, 280 cubits in length, gilded without and silvered within4. If,
then, we assume a combination of the Semitic omphalos with the
Egyptian boat, the whole ritual becomes intelligible5.

(e) Zeus Ammon and the Snake.

Amman was said to have transformed himself into a snake in
order to win his bride6; and snakes at Kyrene were called by the

1 See R. Eisler Weltenmantel und Himmelszelt Miinchen ic)ioii. 57611. 4, 622, 7256".

2 Macrob. Sat. 1. 21. 19 Ammonem, quem deum solem occidentem Libyes existimant.

3 A. Erman A Handbook of Egyptian Religion trans. A. S. Griffith London 1907
p. 11 : cp. Plout. de Is. ei Os. 34.

There are but few certain traces of the solar barque in Greek literature or art. The
Pythagorean 6\k&s was cosmic, not solar (Philolaos frag. 12 Diels). Herakleitos
described sun and moon as <r/cct0oet5e?s...ro£s axVlua(TL (Aet. 2. 22. 2, 24. 3, 27. 2, 28. 6,
29. 3 = H. Diels Die Fragmente der Vorsokratiker2 Berlin 1906 i. 59, 4 ff.). An Apulian
krater from Basilicata, now in the Louvre, shows Helios and Selene in a four-horse
chariot, which rises out of a boat : on the left Phosphoros (?) acts as leader; on the right
a Koures brandishes his sword (E. Gerhard Uber die Lichtgottheiten auf Kunstdenk-
mdlern Berlin 1840 p. 8 f. pi. 3, 3 (extr. from the Abh. d. berl. Akad. 1838 Phil.-hist.
Classe p. 383 ff.), Welcker Alt. Denkm. iii. 67—71 pi. 10, r, A. M. Migliarini in the Ann.
d. Inst. 1852 xxiv. 97 ff. pi. F, 3, Lenormant—de Witte El. mon. dr. ii. 384 ff. pi. 114,
Reinach Rep. Vases i. 291, 1, Miss J. E. Harrison in the Ann. Brit. Sch. Ath. 1908—
1909 xv. 335 fig. 8).

The solar cup in which Herakles crossed Okeanos (Athen. 469 c—470 d : a black-
figured vase in the Rom. Mitth. 1902 xvii. 107 ff. pi. 5 ; the red-figured Vatican kylix in
E. Gerhard op. cit. p. 9 pi. 1, 4 and Auserl. Vasenb. ii. 84 ff. pi. 109, Reinach Rip. Vases
ii. 59, 6) is, however, comparable with the cup-shaped boats of Assyrian art (Preller—
Robert Gr. Myth. i. 435 n. 4).

4 Diod. 1. 57.

5 Monsieur E. Naville, the distinguished Egyptologist, has recently (' Le dieu de
l'oasis de Jupiter Ammon' in the Comptes rendus de PA cad. des inscr. et belles-lettres 1906
pp. 25—32) suggested that the schist palettes referred by him to the first three dynasties,
which are often shaped like shields and have on one side a nearly central circular sinking,
were intended to serve as base for a precious stone or perhaps a piece of metal or wood
representing the omphalos or boss of the shield and worshipped as ' le dieu ombilic.'
This somewhat bizarre view must be left for other Egyptologists to criticise. But it can
hardly claim the support of Curt. 4. 7. 23 umbilico maxime similis; for Curtius' timbilicus
is presumably a translation of Kallisthenes' 6/u<pa\6s, and 6/x0aA6s would not convey to
any classical reader the idea of 1 shield-boss' unless there were an express allusion to a
shield in the immediate context (see Stephanus Thes. Gr. ling. v. 2002 c—d).

6 Anth. Pal. 9. 241. 1 ff. (Antipatros of Thessalonike) 13ovk6\os ?Tr\eo, $oi(3e,