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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

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https://doi.org/10.11588/diglit.14698#0110

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Nephelokokkygia

65

Zeus, seeing Hera all by herself, was minded to consort with her.
To secure her by guile, he transformed himself into a cuckoo and
perched on a mountain, which had previously been called Tlironax,
the 'Throne,' but was thenceforward known as Kokkyx, the 'Cuckoo.'
He then caused a terrible storm to break over the district. Hera,
faring alone, came to the mountain and sat on the spot where there
is now a sanctuary of Hera Teleia. The cuckoo flew down and settled
on her knees, cowering and shivering at the storm. Hera out of pity
covered it with her mantle. Thereupon Zeus changed his shape and
accomplished his desire, promising to make the goddess his wedded
wife. Pausanias1 adds that Mount Kokkygion and Mount Pron over
against it were topped by sanctuaries of Zeus and Hera respectively.
Further2, he brings the myth into connexion with the famous cult
of Hera at Argos. The temple-statue was a chryselephantine master-
piece by Polykleitos. The goddess sat enthroned. On her head was
a band decorated with figures of the Charites and the Horai. In one
hand she held a pomegranate, about which a tale not rashly to be
repeated was told; in the other she had a sceptre surmounted by
a cuckoo, the subject of the foregoing myth. Strabo3 says of this
statue that, though in point of costliness and size it fell short of the
colossal works of Pheidias, yet for sheer beauty it surpassed all
others. Maximus Tyrius4 in a few well-chosen epithets records the

the modern Greek kovko fxov, KOVK&Kifiov, j Kia.pyvpoKOVKa.kl fxov, | -rrdcrovs xpbvovs Be vc. ^crw ;
(J. Grimm op. cit. ii. 676 n. 3). Etienne de Bourbon, a thirteenth-century Dominican,
states that the cuckoo-oracle was consulted on the first of May (A. Lecoy de la Marche
Anecdotes historiques legendes et apologues tire's du recueil inidit d'Etienne de Bourbon
Paris 1877 § 52 p. 59 f., §356 p. 315). Prokosz therefore may, after all, be right in what he
tells us of the May-day celebration on Mt Zywiec. His further assertions, that the ruler
of the world was believed to take the form of a cuckoo and that the killing of a cuckoo
was a capital offence, cannot be controlled, but are at least consistent with one another
and not per se wholly incredible. Yet the cautious enquirer would do well to digest what
Seemann in the Handwbrterbuch des deutschen Aberglaubens Berlin—Leipzig 1933
v. 749—751 has to say against e.g. W. Mannhardt's attempt to treat the cuckoo as an
animal form of Donar or Kro and C. L. Rochholz' contention that St Gertrude with her
cuckoo was ' eine Stellvertreterin Ereyas oder Idunas.'

7 Aristot. frag. 287 {Frag. hist. Gr. ii. 190 f. Muller) ap. schol. vet. Theokr. 15. 64 -
Eudok. viol. 414'' cited supra ii. 893 n. 2.

1 Paus. 2. 36. 2 quoted supra ii. 893 n. 2.

2 Paus. 2. 17. 4 t6 5^ dyaXfia r^s"Hpas etrl Bpbvov KdBrjrat p-eytBei p.(ya, xpverov fiev Kal
eX4<pai>T0S, HoXvKXehov de Zpyov' t-7T€0~tl di oi o-ritpapos Xdptras %xwv Kai 'Qpas e'-rret.pyao--
M^as, Kal rwv xeipwp t77 p.ev xaptrbv tpepet poids, rrj be fxkt/tttpov. ra p.ev odv it tt]i> poidv
—airoppTiTbrepos yap eanv 6 Xbyos—dtpeicrBw ftof KOKKvya Se £tI tu} GK-qirTpip KaBfjuBai
tpaat Xtyovres top Aia, ore -rjpa irapBevov t77s "Hpas, es tovtov top tipviffa dXXay^at, rr/e Se
are italyvtov B-qpaaai. Supra ii. 893 n. 2.

3 Strab. 372.

4 Max. Tyr. 14. 6 Tyv "Hpav, oiav UoXvkXcitos 'Apydois Belfe, XevKioXevov, eXe<pavrb-
7r7lXl"'t evwiriv, evelfiova, §aaiXiKi)v, iSpvixivr/v cm xpvtrov Bpbvov.

c. in. 5
 
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