Cook, Arthur B.: Zeus: a study in ancient religion (Band 3,1): Zeus god of the dark sky (earthquake, clouds, wind, dew, rain, meteorits): Text and notes (Cambridge, 1940)

Vlll

Preface

The former may simplify things and enable you to get more directly
to your destination. But the latter invites you to explore the neigh-
bourhood, marks the field-paths, puts in the contour-lines, colours
the water-ways, and prints in Gothic lettering the local antiquities.
Time is lost, but knowledge is gained, and the traveller returns
well-content with his trapesings. So I have deliberately chosen the
more devious method, and I can only fall back on Herodotos' plea
that 'my subject from the outset demanded digressions.' Indeed, it
was just this need for latitude that led me to widen the title Zeus
by adding the subtitle 'a Study in Ancient Religion.' That is
the real justification for long-winded footnotes and a fringe of
Appendixes.

With regard to the Appendixes I regret, not so much the
fifteen that I have written, as the three that I have failed to
write—letters C, D, and O. Ideally C should have dealt with Zeus
at Corinth, D with Zeus at Dodona, O with Zeus at Olympia.
I did indeed pen a screed on 'Korinthos son of Zeus,' but I sup-
pressed it because the aetiological myth that I thought to detect
implied the existence of customs for which I could produce no
adequate evidence. As to Dodona, I have made certain interim
observations in the Classical Review for 1903 xvii. 178—186, 268 f.,
278; but the problems presented by the oracular cult cannot be
securely solved till the oracle itself has been fully excavated {infra
p. 1131). On Olympia too I have said my say both in the Classical
Review for 1903 xvii. 270—277 and in Foik-Lore,{0? 1904 xv. 397—
402. To describe the material remains of the famous tSmenos was
no part of my programme. Dr E. N. Gardiner has covered the
ground {Olympia Oxford 1925), and Dr W. Dorpfeld dug deep
beneath it (AIt-Olympia Berlin 1935).

The quarter-century that has intervened between the publication
of Volume I and that of Volume III has of course brought an
annual harvest of discoveries and discussions bearing on the subject
of Zeus, all grist to my mill. Hence the mass of miscellaneous
Addenda from page 1066 onwards—'1066 and all that'! It was a
cheer to find that these additions, almost without exception, fitted
well into the framework of the book and very seldom called for the
retraction of a definitely expressed opinion.

As before, I write with a sense of profound obligation to others.
First and foremost stands my debt of gratitude to the Syndics of
the University Press, who once again have borne the whole financial