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

Marriage of the Sun and Moon in Crete 529

Fig- 397- Fig. 398.

Fig. 399. Fig. 400.

Doubtless the local die-sinker knew what he was about, and
gave Europe the willow that belonged to her. Yet we need not tax
Theophrastos, who spoke of a plane, with blundering. Both trees
grow in damp marshy soil1 and probably flourished side by side at
Gortyna. A similar variation occurs in the case of another Cretan
Zeus-cult; for, whereas Theophrastos mentions a fruitful poplar
growing in the mouth of the Idaean Cave2, Pliny apparently
regards it as a willow3. There was in fact special cause to con-
nect Zeus with the willow in the neighbourhood of Gortyna. On
Mount Ide he had been nursed by Helike4, whose name denoted

1 Theophr. hist. pi. i. 4. 2, cp. 3. 13. 7.

2 Theophr. hist. pi. 3. 3. 4, cp. 2. 2. 10, Append. B Crete.

3 Plin. nat. hist. 16. no, Append. B Crete.

4 Supra p. 112 n. 3. Another account stated that Zeus was reared by the daughters
of Olenos, two nymphs called Aiga and Helike ; and that these persons respectively gave
their names to Olenos in Aulis, Aiga in Haimonia, and Helike

in the Peloponnese (Hyg. poet. astr. 2. 13: see B. Bunte ad
loc). E. Neustadt De Jove Cretico Berolini 1906 p. 21 f. holds
that this Helike was in Arkadia. But more probably Olenos,
Aiga, and Helike were the eponyms of Olenos or Olene, Aiga or
Aigai, and Helike in Achaia. An autonomous copper struck at
Aigion in the same district shows (fig. 401) Zeus as an infant
suckled by the she-goat Amaltheia between two trees with an
eagle above him ^(Overbeck Gr. Kunst-myth. Zeus p. 327 f.
Munztaf. 5, 1, Imhoof-Blumer and P. Gardner Num. Comm. ^S- 4or-

Pans. ii. 85 f. pi. R, 14, Muller—Wieseler—Wernicke Ant.

Denkm. i. 58 f. pi. 5, 12, Head Hist. Hum.2 p. 413): cp. Strab. 387 17 5' Aiya (/ecu yap
ovtoj \eyovac ras Aryas) vvv fikv ovk olneiTai, rrjv d£ irokiv ^xovatl/ Aiyieis. Acycov 8£
'ucav&s oiKelrai' icrTopovcri 5' epravda top ALa vw' aiybs avaTpcMprjuai, nadairep (prjai /cat
"Aparos • at£ leprj, tt]v fiiv re \6yos Ail p.a£bv ctt l<xxe^v ' ^rt\^Y« 5£ Kai otl

c 34