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)

284 Rain-magic in modern Greece

§ 9. Zeus and the Rain.
(a) Rain-magic,
i. Rain-magic in modern Greece.

Rain-making by means of magic, with some admixture of prayer,
is practised even nowadays in the less frequented parts of Greece.
Mr J. C. Lawson1 tells us that in Thera {Santorini) he found the
local rain-maker high busy with her spells :

' I chanced one day upon a very old woman squatting on the extreme edge
of the cliff above the great flooded crater which, though too deep for anchorage,
serves the main town of the island as harbour—a place more fascinating in its
hideousness than any I have seen. Wondering at her dangerous position, I asked
her what she was doing; and she replied simply enough that she was making
rain. It was two years since any had fallen, and as she had the reputation of
being a witch of unusual powers and had procured rain in previous droughts, she
had been approached by several of the islanders who were anxious for their
vineyards. Moreover she had been prepaid for her work—a fact which spoke
most eloquently for the general belief in her; for the Greek is slow enough (as
doubtless she knew) to pay for what he has got, and never prepays what he is
not sure of getting. True, her profession had its risks, she said; for on one
occasion, the only time that her spells had failed, some of her disappointed clients
whose money she had not returned tried to burn her house over her one night
while she slept. But business was business. Did I want some rain too ? To
ensure her good will and.further conversation, I invested a trifle, and tried to
catch the mumbled incantations which followed on my behalf, Of these however
beyond a frequent invocation of the Virgin {ILavayla fiov) and a few words about
water and rain I could catch nothing; but I must acknowledge that her charms
were effectual, for before we parted the thunder was already rolling in the
distance, and the rain which I had bought spoilt largely the rest of my stay in
the island. The incantations being finished, she became more confidential. She
would not of course let a stranger know the exact formula which she employed;
that would mar its efficacy: she vouchsafed to me however with all humility the
information that it was not by her own virtue that she caused the rain, but
through knowing "the god above and the god below" {top Sua, 8e6 koi tov <ax<i
6eo). The latter indeed had long since given up watering the land ; he had
caused shakings of the earth and turned even the sea-water red. The god above
also had once rained ashes2 when she asked for water, but generally he gave her
rain, sometimes even in summer-time.'

The names of Zeus and Poseidon have long since passed into
oblivion3. But, in view of this remarkable confession, who shall say
that their memory does not in some sense linger yet ?

1 J. C. Lawson Modem Greek Folklore and Ancient Greek Religion Cambridge r£M°
p. 49 f. Supra ii. 829.

- In the drying-up of the springs and in the rain of ashes Mr Lawson sees an alius'011
to the great eruptions of r866, which were graphically described to him by the old crone-

3 Supra i. 165-