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)

764

The olive of Athena

rather put it thus. Athena was the mountain-mother of the Akro
polis. Everything that issued from its rocky surface was instinct
with her vitality and must be accepted as a manifestation of herself
The rock is primary, the tree is secondary: it is the divinity of the
former that makes the latter also divine.

(2) The snake of Athena.

But life emerging from the surface of the Akropolis might be
animal as well as vegetable. There was a widespread belief if
antiquity that snakes were the children of Mother Earth. Herodotos
makes the Lycian priests tell Kroisos that the snake is the child of
Earth. Centuries later the same thing is said by Artemidoros2;
'A child of Earth he is, and in the earth he dwells.' Pliny3 too
remarks: 'Some creatures will not harm natives, though they kill
strangers. This is the case with the small serpents at Tiryns, which
are said to be sprung from the earth.'

Now the Akropolis, since it abounds in crevices and holes>
must in early days have harboured plenty of these reptiles, especially
the Tarbophis fallax, a species that still haunts the rocks and ruins
of Greece4. A peltke from Kameiros already figured5 shows two such
snakes, apparently male and female6, creeping out of the Akropoh5
rock to protect the infant Erichthonios, who sits up in his basl<et
and takes notice of Athena. The basket-lid has been lifted off D)7
the disobedient sisters Aglauros and Herse. Scared by the snal<eS'
they flee for dear life and are represented on the other side of the
vase hurrying off to their death7.

Hdt. 1. 78 X^yoires 6<piv efrcu 777s iratda.

2 Artemid. oneirocr. 2. 13 777s yap eori koL adr&s irais Kal ras 5iarpi/3as T#
iroteiTcii. ^ ^

3 Plin. nat. hist. 8. 229 iam quaedam animalia indigenis innoxia advenas interim
sicut serpentes parvi in Tirynthe (so J. Dalechamps for viiHnthe codd. Salnias
cj. Myunte), quos terra nasci proditur. 0j

4 My colleague Dr J. A. Ramsay kindly refers me to G. A. Boulenger The ^na^,js>
Europe London 1913 pp. 217—219 fig. 32 (a poisonous species of the genus ^'ar^.,js,
which 'grows to a length of 2 feet ioinches.... Thenames Katzenschlange and Aih'r0P
translated Cat-snake, probably originated from the way in which this snake stal
prey, and suddenly pounces upon it.... Stony localities, old walls, and ruins, ar
favourite abodes of this snake, which does well in captivity').

8 Supra p. 248 n. 6 with pi. xxix and fig. 154. o(j0,

6 One bearded (!), the other beardless. For bearded snakes cp. e.g. supra i>. n
1061 fig. 914, 1128 n. o fig. 956. See further the interesting observations of Ha ^f
Proleg. Gk. Ret.2 pp. 326—328, with the criticisms of E. Ktister Die Schlange *
griechischen Kunst and Religion Giessen 1913 p. 76 n. 2.

7 Supra p. 2 39 f.