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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#0549

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The myth of Danae and analogous myths 475

superstitions about meteors1, Radermacher suggests that Danae's
golden rain was essentially just a fine display of shooting stars. His
Suggestion would indeed account well for the curious persistence
With which stars appear in connexion with Danae's coffer2. But
shooting stars, after all, were a phenomenon familiar enough to the
Greeks, and were never confused by them with rain, golden or
otherwise.

Looking further afield we find that ordinary rain is sometimes
Credited with procreative powers. H. H. Bancroft3 in his account of
^e Pueblo religion describes the birth of 'the great leader, teacher,
and god Montezuma':

j ^— Radermacher in the Sitzungsber. d. kais. Akad. d. IViss. in Wien Phil.-hist. Classe
ni-r Clxxxii. 3. 69 (Basileios, Bishop of Seleukeia in Isauria c. 435—460 a.d., de vita ac
fegy T>. Theclae 2. 10 (lxxxv. 581 a Migne) notes that S. Thekla attended her yearly
he' I at ^eleukeia, and that any one who on the vigil of the feast kept watch upon the
tyoO S a'Jove Dalisandos might see her cross the sky in a fiery chariot (opa irvplvq ap/mn
8 r70" ^Pos fiefiaiuirdv (leg. fiefiwadv) re ji\v irapBtvov nal Si<ppt]\aTovcrav, cp. //. 5. 745 ff.,
(;n _°™0)i A. Wuttke Der deutsche Volksaberglaube der Gegenwart'1 Berlin 1869 p. 183
(in f\]rnian^' Switzerland, etc. a shooting star implies the death of a man), id. ib.2 p. 94
Jurist' 6n'5ur& 1 Boviste sind ausgebrannte Sternschnuppen...u. machen die Kiihe
^°nn ^undel Sterne midSternbilder im Glauben des Altertnms undder Neuzeit

Bock P2^ 1922 p. 29f. ('Die Griechen bezeichneten einzelne Sternschnuppen als
den lv, U Geissen, und die Deutschen sahen besonders in den Kometen, aber auch in
^U-iiS e°ren' Schlaagen und das damonische Fabeltier, den Drachen'), N. G. Polites
""KTre' S„'ieT£wP°^07"f' p-vdoi (extract from Ylapvaaaos) Athens 1880 p. 12 (''0 \abs

f a\ ^°''Tt ^lrov /cara7ri7rret Kepavvbs <7x*?Ma7"tT0I/TCU Aitfot, davixauiovs KeKTTifUvoi idioTijras,

Qn aaTP°Te\eKlz 17 dcrTpo7reXfko.' k.t.X. Supra ii. 506, 844).
J. Qr: 10otlng stars in relation to souls see further the beliefs and practices adduced by
l888 iv m Tcuton'c Mythology trans. J. S. Stallybrass London 1883 ii. 722, iii. 917 n. o,
■ttapaj/ '5o6' P. Sebillot LeFolk-lore de France Paris 1904 i. 48—51, N. G. Polites

"f^'eligio* Athens I0o4 860 ("• on no- 273>' w- Wallis in J. Hastings Encyclopedia
den JCi,^ a"d Fthics Edinburgh 1918 x. 37ib, J. Bolte—G. Poltvka Anmerkungen zu
'Hie Si " ^""smarchen der Briider Grimm Leipzig 1918 iii. 234 (n. on no. 153

a^ler'). * Supra

™ter pr ' ancroft The Native Races of the Pacific States London 1875 iii. 175 n. o
"l's versi0 ° ^" Hartland The Legend of Perseus London 1894 i. 136 n. 3 regards
^•thnologicalaS m°re prirmtlve tnan that given by A. W. Bell in The Journal of the
s'tuatec) ^a Society 0f London jjew Series 1868—69 i. 250f. 'Two good-sized ruins are
Grande ^Jhe Pima villages; one is known as Casa Montezuma, the other as Casa
°ulh of tn ^ aS° a woman of exquisite beauty ruled over the valleys and the region
°^ c°rn, sk'm' ^anv su'tors came from far to woo her, and brought presents innumerable
Un"iarnecj ' cattle to lay at her feet. Her virtue and determination to continue
'ncreased that'113'116^ ""shaken; and her store of worldly possessions so greatly

1 tler great 'vi* drought and desolation came upon her land, she fed her people out
av asleepi n a undance and did not miss it, there was so much left. One night, as she
bPlrit fell Upeor earment was blown from off her breast, and a dewdrop from the Great
„°re a So... , ner oosom, entered her blood, and caused her to conceive. In time, she
Ule oil,. ' who wa

a'e °ther ruins° "°ne otner than Montezuma, and who built the large casas and all
Us of civiHzaf- 0,1 are scaltercd through the land. After instructing his people in the
<»» he departed for the south and then disappeared.'
 
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