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

646 The Significance of the Bull

limbs were dedicated for health restored1. If this was the character
of the Cretan Zeus, it becomes highly probable that his death and
resurrection were annually celebrated as a magical means of re-
viving the life of all that lives2. Of such rites sundry traces are
extant in Greek literature. We must consider their bearing on
the monument before us.

Porphyrios in his Life of Pythagoras says of the philosopher
that,

'when he landed in "Crete, he betook himself to the mystics of Morges, one
of the Idaean Daktyloi, by whom he was purified with the thunder-stone, at
daybreak lying prone beside the sea and at night beside a river, his head
wrapped in the fleece of a black ram. Moreover he went down into the
Idaean Cave, as it is called, wearing black wool, passed thrice nine days
there in accordance with custom, offered a funeral sacrifice to Zeus, beheld
the throne that is strown for him every year, and engraved on the tomb an
epigram entitled " Pythagoras to Zeus," which begins—

"Here lieth dead Zan, whom men name as Zeus3.'"

The essential points are that Pythagoras sacrificed as to a dead
Zeus, and saw the throne that was annually spread for him. For
whom ? Presumably for the dead Zeus come to life again. It
will be remembered that various coins of Asia Minor showed the

youthful satellite—son or paramour, martial or effeminate by turns, but always mortal,
and mourned in various forms. Attis, Adonis or Thammuz, we may add the Ilian
Anchises..., all had tombs within her temple walls. Not least, the Cretan Zeus himself
knew death, and the fabled site of his monument on Mount Juktas proves to coincide
with a votive shrine over which the Goddess rather than the God originally presided. So
too, on the Minoan and Mycenaean signets we see the warrior youth before the seated
Goddess, and in one case actually seem to have a glimpse of the "tomb" within its
temenos. Beside it is hung up the little body-shield, a mourning votary is bowed
towards it, the sacred tree and pillar shrine of the Goddess are hard by [id. ib. 1901 xxi.
177 fig. 53]. In another parallel scene the female mourner lies prone above the shield
itself, the divine connexion of which is shown by the sacred emblems seen above, which
combine the double axe and life symbol [id. ib. 1901 xxi. 176 fig. 52].'

1 G. Karo in the Archiv f. Rel. 1913 xvi. 260 : ' Auf dem Gipfel des Juktas, siidlich
von Knossos, wo man sparer das Grab des Zeus zeigte, hat Evans Reste eines mittelmin-
oischen Heligtums aufgedeckt, darunter auch ein paar geweihte menschliche Gliedmassen
aus Ton, wie die aus dem Heiligtum einer Heilgottheit von Petsofa im Osten der Insel
(Brit. School Annual IX Taf. 12). Man darf daraus schliessen, dass der Himmelsgott
im minoischer Kreta zugleich Heilgott, also der Ahnherr des Zeus Hypsistos und des
Asklepios war.'

2 See inprimis Frazer Golden Boughz: Adonis Attis Osiris2 p. 3 ff.

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