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)

898

Kybele and meteorites

at first by B. V. Head1, made the interesting conjecture that it is
represented on new-style tetradrachms of
Athens bearing the names Kleophanes and
Epithetes (figs. 727—730)2. The magis-
trate's badge on these coins is an upright
conical stone with projections suggestive
of a face and seemingly with a ktets be-
neath it. Attached to its apex by a knot
is a fillet or covering, which hangs down
on either side and recalls Damaskios'
description of the baitylos 'concealed in its
garments3.'

A possible parallel to the baitylos of
Kybele, set in silver and decked with a
necklace, may be found in a singular object
here published for the first time (pi. lxvii
and fig. 731). It is, essentially, a neolithic
pounder (6\ inches high) of dull green
stone, which has been subsequently facetted
and inlaid with tin4. Since facetted axe-
hammers occur sporadically throughout,
central Europe towards the end of the stone
age5, and since tin-inlay is frequent on the
contemporaneous pottery of the Swiss pile-
dwellings6, it may be inferred on technical
grounds that this pounder was decorated
c. 2000 B.C. Several of its features—green Flg' 73

1 Head Hist, num.1 p. 324. But id. ib.- p. 386 says merely : ' Conical stone (fSalrvW^
with knotted taenia hanging over it. Date, shortly after Sulla's conquest ([J.] Sundw3 t
[Untersuchitngen iiber die attischen Miinzeti des neueren Stiles Helsingfors 1908] p.
And B. Pick in J. N. Svoronos Les monnaies d'Athenes Munich 1923—1926 Index p-

is equally rcfl«-committal: ' BETYLE, entoure des deux c6tes par une tenie.'
G. Macdonald in Hunter Cat. Coins ii. 68 had hazarded the curious idea that 'hang1"'
down on either side, is a goatskin' [palrvkos from pairr/].

2 Brit. Mus. Cat. Coins Attica etc. pp. lii, 60 nos. 431 pi. 13. 2 ( = my fig. 727)1 +^
433, Hunter Cat. Coins ii. 68 f. nos. 145 (cp. my fig. 728), 146, J. N. Svoronos
monnaies d'Athenes Munich 1923—1926 pi. 73, 3 Berlin ( = my fig. 729), 4 A. Rorna11
5 Munich (cp. my fig. 730), 6 Glasgow, 7 Glasgow, 8 Athens. 3 Supra p. 888. .

4 On submitting this implement to the Department of Mineralogy and Petrol°=^s
the University of Cambridge, I received the following expert opinion from Dr F. C PDl ^
(Feb. 24, 1937): 'The metal is tin, with a small amount of antimony. The rock is s
kind of chloritic schist, much softer than nephrite, and easily worked and facetted- ^

6 Forrer Reallex. p. 332, J. Schlemm Wdrterbuch zur Vorgeschichte Berlin 'j^j
p. 139 f. figs, a—c, V. Gordon Childe The Danube in Prehistory Oxford 1929 pP' j,
fig. 90, 151 ff., 208, cp. O. Menghin Weltgeschichteder SteinzeitWien 1931 p. 287 pi- ^' (j

0 R. Munro The Lake-Dwellings of Europe London 1890 pp. 42 with figs-