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

Talos and the Bronze-founder's Art 723

Phoenician deity too, according to Rabbinic authors1, had a bovine
head2. Identification was almost inevitable. Indeed, the two gods
may have been strictly analogous.

Excavations now in progress beneath the ancient church of
Santa Anastasia in southern Sardinia are said to have disclosed a
large subterranean temple with a spring locally known as the
' Fount of Pains,' sacred images, and mural decorations. ' These
indicate the worship of an earth goddess, and the prevalence of
bull worship, as there is a ponderous statue in basalt of a male
divinity with a bull head3.' Was this the Sardinian Talos ?

iii. Talos and the Bronze-founder's Art.

It is tempting to explain certain traits in the myth of Talos
along rationalistic lines. The single vein running from his neck to
his ankles and closed by a bronze nail thrust through it4 vividly
recalls the cire peirdue method of hollow-casting in bronze, a pro-
cess which was invented at a remote period and lasted throughout
the whole history of Greek art5. A rough model in clay or plaster,

1 M. Mayer in Roscher Lex. Myth. ii. 1505^ draws attention to the old Rabbinic
descriptions of Moloch, adduced by J. Selden De dis Syris syntagmata ii Londini 1617
p. 78 ff. and T. Godwin Moses and Aaron : etc.9 London 1667 p. 144 ff., e.g. Selden
op. fit. p. 78 f. ' Doctissimi Pauli Fagij verba de Moloch, in Chaldseam paraphrasin
Leuitici scripta, & ex Ebrseorum etiam monimentis sumpta, adiungam. Fuit auiem
Moloch Imago concaua habens septem conclauia. vnum aperiebant siniilce offerendce:
aliud Turturibus: tertium Oui: Quartum Arieti: Quintum Vitnlo: Sextum Bout:
Qui verb volebat offerre filium huic aperiebatttr septimum cubicuhun, et fades Aunts
idoli erat vt fades vituli. Manus plane dispositce ad recipiendum at astantibus. et
saltabant interim quo pueri (leg. puer) in idolo succenso igne cremabatur, percutientes
tympana, ne pueri eiulatus audiretur. Habuit hoec ille ex libro Ialkut cuius autor R.
Simeon. Sed ex sere conflatam imaginem esse ait R. Salomon ad Ieremiae VII.'

F. X. Kortleitner De polytheismo tmiverso Oeniponte 1908 p. 221 n. 3 quotes from
the Midrash Echa rabbathi on Lam. 1. 9: ' Molochi imago non constituta erat intra
urbem Hierosolymorum, quemadmodum idola alia, sed extra urbem. Imago fuit in
intimo septem cavearum ; facies eius fuit instar vituli et manus protensae, quemadmodum
qui aliquid accepturus est palmam protendit. Incendebant earn ; sacerdotes (f"l£0)
infantem sumebant et manibus Molochi imponebant, ubi animam efflabat.' Id. ib.
p. 222 n. 3, p. 225 e, p. 227 f j8 compares similar descriptions from other Rabbinic sources.

2 Cp. Cypriote statuettes with bovine heads (L. P. di Cesnola Cyprus: its andent
cities, tombs, and temples London 1877 p. 51 fig., Perrot—Chipiez Hist, de VArt iii. 606
fig. 414 = Ohnefalsch-Richter Kypros pp. 243, 423 pi. 94, 22).

3 So the correspondent of the Daily Chronicle for Sept. 10, 1913, writing from Milan
on Sept. 9. He also mentions 'the uncovering at Ortu Commidu, alongside some ancient
copper mines, of a great prehistoric foundry with all the furnaces for smelting, and moulds
for casting, just as they were abandoned...in the transition period between the ages of
stone and of bronze.' I am indebted for this newspaper-cutting to the kind offices of
Mr F. M. Cornford and Miss Harrison. 4 Supra p. 719.

5 H. Bliimner Tcchnologie und Terminologie der Gezverbe und Kiinste bei Griechen
und R'dmem Leipzig 1887 iv. 2856°., 325 ft"., id. in Pauly—Wissowa Real-Enc. vi. 607 ff.,

46--2