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)

224 Hephaistos and Athena

My own opinion—if I may be allowed to state it with dogmatic
brevity—is this. The Akropolis at Athens was originally called
A thene, a place-name comparable with the pre-Greek Mykene,Pallene,
Mityline, Priene, etc1. The old singular AtJiene, thanks to its loca-
tival form *Athenai, gave rise to the new plural Atkenai, just as
Mykene came to be replaced by Mykenai or T/tebe {Thebaigenes) by
ThebaP. The goddess was named Athene like the rock, because at
the outset she was the rock, a mountain-mother of the usual Anato-
lian sort. In classical times her motherhood, at first perhaps
compatible with renewed virginity3, had passed into perpetual
maidenhood. But the Elean women, tenacious of archaic beliefs4,
when their land was bereft of men, prayed that they might conceive
so soon as they met their husbands, and on their prayer being heard

Minerva Apollinem eum, cuius in tutela Athenas anliqui historic! esse voluerunt, Clem. Al.
protr. i. 28. 3 p. 21, 5 f. Stahlin vaX iity ' AirbWuva. 0 fitv ' ApurroTiXris irp&Tov 'll<pal<rrov
ko.1 'ABrivas [ivTavdu Sr] ovk^tl irap$^vos r\ 'Ad-r)va), Arnob. adv. nat. 4. 14 sed et Minervae,
inquiunt,.. .quinque sunt, ex quibus prima non virgo, sed ex Vulcano Apollinis procreatrix,
Lyd. de mens. 4. 86 p. 135, 8 f. Wiinsch*q<pai<xtol r^aaapes' irpwros Oipavou ko.1 '~Efitpas<
■!ra.T7]p 'AtoWuvos tov '' Ad-qvaiwv apxriyirov, 4. 142 p. 164, 7 f. Wiinsch 'Aaichrririol rp£'s
\tyovrai yevtvdai- irpuiros 'AirdXhuvos rod 'Hfiaicrrou, 6s e^evpe [mt]\t]i>. There is confusion
in Firm. Mat. 16. 1 quinque Minervas fuisse legentibus nobis tradit antiquitas. una est
Vulcani filia, quae Athenas condidit, etc.). The passage from Clement is printed as Aristot-
frag. 283 in Frag. hist. Gr. ii. 190 Miiller. Lobeck Aglaofihamtts ii. 994 speaks of the
author as ' Aristotelis nescio cujus.' V. Rose Aristolelespseudepigraphus Lipsiae 1863 p> 6'7
suspects a mistake for Aristokles of Rhodes (second half of s. i B.C.: see G. Wentzel in
Pauly—Wissowa Real-Enc. ii. 935 f.). But see now R. Mlinzel Quaestiones mythographicae
Berlin 1883 p. 20, W. Michaelis De origine indicis deorum cognominum Berlin 189^
p. 47 f., R. Hirzel in the Ber. sacks. Gescllsch. d. Wiss. Phil.-hist. Classe 1896 p. 309 n. 3-

1 P. Kretschmer in Glotta 1921 xi. 277, Nilsson Min.-Myc. Rel. p. 419.

2 So K. F. Johansson in the Beitrage zar kutide der indogermanischen sprachen 1888
xiii. in ff. followed by K. Brugmann Griechische Grammatik"1 Miinchen 1890 p-
Particular points are criticised by L. Grasberger Studien zu den griechischen Orisnafill"
Wiirzburg 1888 p. 147 ff. and F. Solmsen in the Zeitschrift fur vergleichende Sprachfo''^
schung 1893 xxxii. 521 n. 1, while A. Thumb in K. Brugmann Griechische Grammatik
Miinchen 1913 p. 267 pronounces the whole contention 'sehr unsicher.' But the principle
seems sound and is of wide application. Examples near at hand are Coton (W. W. Skeat
The Place-Names of Cambridgeshire Cambridge 1901 p. 8: probably 'A. S. cottim, dative
pi. of cot, a cottage...the prep, at (at the) being understood') and Newnham [id. ib. P- 22
and J. B. Johnston The Place-Names of England and Wales London 1915 p. 380 f.:
O.E. dat., "at the new home" ').

3 Hera recovered her virginity every year by bathing in the spring Kanathos neai
Nauplia (Paus. 2. 38. 1 with Sir J. G. Frazer and H. Hitzig—H. BlUmner ad l°C4)'
It was perhaps with the same intention that the Argive women once a year took the imagL
of Athena and the shield of Diomedes (Pallddion) to the river Inachos and washed the"1
there (Kallim. lavacr. Pall. 1 ff. with schol. on lines 1 and 37). On the Athenian Plynterl
as implying a iepbs ydftos of Athena see the important discussion by E. Fehrle Die kulttSen^
Keuschhdt im Altertum Giessen 1910 pp. 171—177. P. Saintyves Les Vierges MZres
les Naissances Miraculeuses Paris 1908 pp. 1—280 ignores the topic.

4 Cp. supra ii. 823 n. 1 (Plout. quaestt. Gr. 36).