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)

946 General Conclusions with regard to

the thunderbolt. Yet its terrors were not wholly terrific1. Zeus
might fall as a lightning-flash, but the Didbletos or ' Zeus-struck'
man was deemed divine and even treated as a god. The spot where
the fatal bolt fell was elysion and its victim enelysios, literally ' in
Elysium2.' He had entered upon the 'road of Zeus/ the Elysian
track, which led up the steeps of heaven and was identified by
Pythagorean sages with the Milky Way3. He, like Er son of
Armenios4, could stand at last on the axis of the world, the central
column supporting the very sky, there to witness all that heaven
could show5. The celestial ascent was sometimes conceived as
a ladder6—a conception which begins with Egyptian amulets7,
continues with Thracian and Orphic beliefs8, only to end with the
mediaeval Ladder of Salvation9. Again, Zeus armed with a
thunderbolt in either hand, a primitive storm-god, at Olympia was
sublimated into Zeus Horkios, ' God of Oaths,' a terror merely to
perjurers10, just as on Italian soil Dius Fidius, 'the Cleaver,' a
lightning-god, became, thanks to popular etymology, a peaceful
' Protector of Pledges11.' In general it may be said that from the
sixth century onwards the thunderbolt of Zeus begins to be replaced
by his sceptre12, surviving mainly as a symbol of omnipotence13 °(
continuous divine activity14. Indeed, under Constantine its old
Anatolian form, the labrys, was deliberately re-shaped into the
labdrum and adopted as the emblem of the all-conquering faith1 •

Omnipotence leads on towards omniscience and omnibenevO'
lence. A Hellenistic type of Zeus enthroned and sceptred sho^
the god with serious deep-set eyes, brow furrowed by thought, a°
head propped on hand in an attitude of serene16 meditation. ^e
can hardly fail to recognise the insight and foresight of the divi^e
ruler, who takes a kindly interest in the affairs of men. His m°°_ '
best described by the Greek term prdnoia or the Latin provident1^
comes close to our own conception of Providence17. Thus
imperial times Iupiter Conservator extends a strong protecting a

L I - fc, c--- " j.

above the puppet emperor18, while his Syrian counterpart Iup1

1 Supra ii. 852. 2 Supra ii. 22 f. 3 Supra ii. 3^ ^'

4 Supra ii. 54, 114. 6 Supra ii. 44, 108, infra iii. 974. 0 Supra ii. i25 '
7 Supra ii. 125 ff. 8 Supra ii. 129 ff. 0 Supra ii- *-36 8', g

10 Supra ii. 722, 726 f. 11 Supra ii. 724 ff. n. o. 12 Stipra ii- 722' l?

13 Supra ii. 852. 14 Supra ii. 854. 16 Supra ii- 601 j^d

10 Mr H. Mattingly draws my attention to the fact that the same gesture 0 .^s
propped on hand occurs also in the Roman numismatic type of a seated J
(Stevenson—Smith—Madden Diet. Rom. Coins p. 726, J. Ilberg in Roscher LeX-
iv. 595 ff., Hartmann in Pauly—Wissowa Real-Enc. ii A. 1000 ff.).

17 Supra i. 34 ff., ii. 762 f. 18 Supra L 276 n. 5 fig. 201.