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

Addenda

785

Page 585 : on the snake-entwined statues at Hierapolis. P. Gauckler in the Comptes
rendus de VAcad. des inscr. et belles-lettres 1909 pp. 117 ff., 424 ff., 617 ff. illustrates these
statues by a remarkable statuette of gilded bronze (ib. p. 425 fig. 1) found lying in the
cavity of a triangular altar, which forms the centre-piece of an octagonal chapel in
the fourth-century Syrian sanctuary on the Ianiculum. The statuette shows a deity
(Atargatis?) cased like a mummy and encircled by the seven coils of a crested snake.
Seven hen's-eggs deposited between the coils recall the myth of the Syrian Venus (supra
p. 584 n.) and incline Gauckler to think 'que la statuette... represente la Nativite
d 'Atargatis,,'

Page 660 : on coins of Praisos showing Zeus suckled by a cow. My friend Prof. R. C.
Bosanquet informs me (Jan. 5, 1914) that he has always taken the beast represented on
these coins to be a sow, not a cow, and compared the story told by Agathokles {supra
p. 653). It would certainly be a gain if we could regard the coins as illustrating the
story in question. But fig. 507 is described by E. Babelon as ' Taureau' (sic), by J. N.
Svoronos as ' Vac he (?),' by B. V. Head as ' Cow'; and the rendering of a sow on Greek
and Roman coins is very different (see Imhoof-Blumer and O. Keller Tier- und Pflan-
zenbilder auf Miinzen und Gemmen des klassischen Altertums Leipzig 1889 p. 26 pi. 4,
19, 20, Brit. Mus. Cat. Coins Sicily p. 1 f. Abakainon, id. Italy p. 397 Tuder, Garrucci
Mon. It. ant. p. 11 pi. 22, 1 b, p. 58 pi. 75, 16, Babelon Monn. rip. rom. ii. 471, Morell.
Thes. Num. Imp. Rom. ii. 298 pi. 10, 31). As to fig. 508, H. Weber says ' Cow (?) or
mare,' and Prof. Bosanquet admits that it looks ' more like a mare'; but B. V. Head is
content to describe this too as a ' Cow.'

Page 676 f.: on the Orphic formula 2pL<pos es yaX 'iiveTov. Dr L. R. Farnell in The
Year's Work in Class. Stud, igij p. 135 draws attention to an article by Delatte in
the Musee Beige 1913 p. 125, who 'proposes a new and attractive explanation of the
cryptic formula Zpupos es ydX' 'iireTov, as meaning " I entered earthly life as a Dionysos-
Kid," milk being in Orphic-Pythagorean myth the object of desire which lured souls into
birth, and which was used by magicians to evoke souls (he quotes Plut., De gen. Socr.,
c. 16; Porph., Antr. Nymph., 28; Papyr. Berlin., 1. 20).'

Page 676 f.: on the ritual use of milk among the Thraco-Phrygians. C. Avezou and
C. Picard in the Btdl. Corr. Hell. 1913 xxxvii. 97 ff. publish a quadrangular altar of
white marble (height i.02m) from the neighbourhood of Thessalonike. On the left side
is carved a pedum, on the right a caduceus. In front, between two antae, is the following

inscription (s. iii A.D.?) :............ | ......6 apxifJ-ay[e±~\\pe>bs /ecu apx<-ve\u)Kopos /ecu irar^p \

awrjWeov /ecu Avp. \ "LwcriiraTpa rj ya\a\KTf](f)6pos, KL<TTacpo\prjaaaa<v > eryj X \ rou fiwfxbv
e/c t&v I IS'iwv avedy]Kav. \ evTvx&s. The precise nature of the cult in question is doubtful.

Page 677: on the bath of boiling milk as a means of ritual rebirth. Mr F. M. Cornford
in his recent book The Origin of Attic Comedy London 1914 (a contribution of capital
importance to our understanding of Greek drama) discusses the examples of rejuvenation
in Aristophanes' plays and infers (p. 89) ' that these stories reflect a rite of regeneration or
resurrection, which has an established place in the cycle of Dionysiac ritual.' He justly
observes (p. 90) that my hypothesis 'is strengthened by the instance of Demos in the
Knights, who renews his youth in the Sausage-seller's cauldron and emerges as a new
King and (as the parallel cases allow us to add) a new God, ready for his marriage.'
Mr Cornford has also kindly brought to my notice a valuable article by E. Maass in the
Neue Jahrb. f. klass. Altertum 1913 xxxi. 627 ff. on the Trophot of Aischylos, in which
Medeia was represented as boiling the attendants of Dionysos, both male and female, in
order to make them young again (Aisch. frag. 50 Nauck2 ap. schol. Eur. Med. argum.
and schol. Aristoph. eq. 1321). A propos of Medeia's rejuvenating cauldron Maass writes

C.

50