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

Zeus Aktaios or Akraios and his Fleeces 421

right in holding further that the golden ram came to symbolise the
sun, it is easy to see why the procession made the ascent of the
mountain at the hottest season of the year.

The Zeus of Mount Pelion was honoured, not only as Aktaios
' He of the Point/ but also as Akraios, ' He of the Summit.' It
appears from an inscription that white victims without blemish
were sacrificed to him as Akraios, and further that their skins were
sold on the sixteenth day of the month Artemision by sundry
important officials including his priest1. The sixteenth of Arte-
mision, according to the Attic calendar, would be the sixteenth of
Mounichion'2. Hence we might look to find fresh light on the cult
of Zeus Akraios from ceremonies observed in Attike on Mouni-
chion the sixteenth. It is therefore of interest to remark that the
day was considered as in some respects critical for the sun and
moon. Cakes called amphiphontes were then brought to the sanc-
tuary of Artemis Mounichia* and to the shrines of Hekate at the
cross-roads4. They were called amphiphontes, ' shining on both
sides,' because they were made when the sun and moon were both
shining in the morning5, moon-set being, so to speak, caught up by
sun-rise and the sky lit with a two-fold illumination6. Apollodoros
preferred to derive the name from the fact that the cakes, which
were made of cheese7, had small torches stuck in them round about
and kindled for the occasion8—a custom surviving still in the be-
candled loaves of the Greek Church9. The festival of Artemis
Mounichia was so far analogous to that of Artemis Brauroma
that A. Mommsen treats the two as one and the same10. It is,
then, noteworthy that at the Brauronian celebration girls between

1 Append. B.

2 H. van Herwerden Lexicon Graecwn suppletorinm.et dialecticum Lugduni Batavorum
1902 p. 114 s.v. 'Aprefxiatibv.

3 Souid. s.v. avdaraTOi, Poll. 6. 75.

4 Philochoros ap. Athen. 645 A, Methodios ap. et. mag. p. 95, 1 ff. The last-named
authority states that they were sent to Hekate when the moon was full, cp. Plout. de
glor. Ath. 7 TrjP 8e eKrqv eiri dena rod Mowu%tu!/os 'Apre'/CuSt Kadiepwaav, ev rj to?s "EAA^tn
irepl HaXafjuva vlkCktlv eir^Xafi^ev r/ debs iravae\t)vos.

5 Souid. s.vv. ap.cj)LcpG)VTes, <xvolo~t<itoi, Pausanias ap. Eustath. in II. p. 1165, 12.

6 Philochoros ap. Athen. 645 A.

7 Pausanias^. Eustath. in II. p. 1165, 14.

8 Souid. s.vv. dficpL(puivT€s, avdo-Tarot., cp. Pausanias ap. Eustath. in II. p. 1165, 12 ff.,
Hesych. s.v. dp-cptcpQv, et. mag. p. 95, 1, Poll. 6. 75.

9 Lobeck Aglaophamus ii. 1062, citing Goetz de Pistrin. Vet. p. 317. S. Xanthou-
dides in the Ann. Brit. Sch. Ath. 1905—1906 xii. 20 ff. fig. 6 describes and illustrates the
loaves decked with seven lighted candles (and sometimes, like the ancient nepvos or
nepxvos, furnished with receptacles for corn, wine, and oil), which are blessed by the
priest as first-fruits of the earth in the 'AproK\aaia of the Orthodox Greek Church.

10 Mommsen Feste d. Stadt Athen p. 453 ff.