Cook, Arthur B.: Zeus: a study in ancient religion (Band 2,1): Zeus god of the dark sky (thunder and lightning): Text and notes (Cambridge, 1925)

Virbius as Dianus

397

hist. 25. 10; hac Iovis mensa verritur, Dioskor. 4. 61 p. 550 Sprengel 01 5e Aids yXaKaTyv,
cp. 'Apuleius Barbaras' op. tit. 4 iidem dios elacaten (the ed. of Albanus Torinus,
Basileae 1528, reads alii diosatim). No proveable connexion with Steph. Byz. s.v.
'HXaKaraiov • opos Qeao~a\ias, oirov Kai Aio? 'HXaKaraiov iepoi>. to edviKov 'WKaKixraievs
Kai Zcijj 'JlXaKciTetis. H. Usener Die Sinijluthsagen Bonn 1899 P- '5^1 cp. id. Kleine
Schriften Leipzig—Berlin 1913 iv. 43 n. 82, would connect Zeus 'HXancaratos with
ffktKTpov, 'UXeKTpa, 'HXe/crcop, 'RXeKTpvuv as Zeus 'the Glittering.' But??), and regard
it as a panacea.

Fig. 301.

Such being its character, vervain would form an appropriate decoration for a bust
of Virbius at Nemi. Indeed, there remains the possibility, already mooted by P. Butt-
mann (in the Abh. d. berl. Akad. 1S19 p. 209 — id. Mythologus Berlin 1829 ii. 152),
Sir James Frazer (Golden Bough3: The Magic Art ii. 379 n. 5) and myself (Folk-Lore
1905 xvi. 290 n. 9), that verbena and Virbius are words of kindred origin. My friend
Dr P. Giles tells me (May 1, 1918) that the difference of vowel may be a matter of
dialect, as in Mercurius beside the Praenestine Mircurios, Mirqurios (Walde Lat. etym.