DOI Page / Citation link:
https://doi.org/10.11588/diglit.7416#0020
10
exploring the foundations of ruined cities, where money was con-
cealed, modern cabinets have been enriched with more complete
serieses of coins than could have been collected in any period of
antiquity. We can thus bring under one point of view the whole
progress of the art from its infancy to its decline, and compare the
various religious symbols which have been employed in ages and
countries remote from each other. These symbols have the great
advantage over those preserved in other branches of sculpture, that
they have never been mutilated or restored ; and also that they ex-
hibit two compositions together, one on each side of the coin,
■which mutually serve to explain each other, and thus enable us to
read the symbolical or mystical writing with more certainty than
we are enabled to do in any other monuments. It is principally,
therefore, under their guidance that we shall endeavour to explore
the vast and confused labyrinths of poetical and allegorical fable ;
and to separate as accurately as we can, the theology from the my-
thology of the ancients: by which means alone we can obtain a com-
petent knowledge of the mystic, or, as it was otherwise called,
the Orphic faith/ and explain the general style and language of
symbolical art in which it was conveyed.
18. Ceres and Bacchus,2 called, in iEgypt, Isis and Osiris;
and, in Syria, Venus and Adonis, were the deities, in whose
names, and under whose protection, persons were most com-
monly instructed in this faith.3 The word Bacchus or lacchus is a
1 Pausan. 1. i. c. 39.
z Tl\Ti<riov vaos 6<rri Atj^tit/jos' ayah/iaraSe (tUTjjTe icat yj trais, itai Safiaexw laKXos.
Pausan. in Att. c. ii. s. 4.
3 Tijp pzv yap Offtp&os t€\ztt]v tt/ Aiovuvoii tt\v avrt\v eivai, tt\v ItnSos tt? tt\s tyi\p.t\'
Tprjs (fyiotOTGCT7]i> viiapx^iVj tojv ovoixarxv [j.ovoif evy]\Xay^vwv. Diodor. Sic. lib. i. p.
104. Ed. Wessel.
Oaipw biovvaov fivai Xeyowiv (Aiymrioi). Herodot. lib. ii. c. 42.
H fj.a.Ko.p, offTts eu5a£|Uwv
fStorav ayi&Tevei'
tote MaTpos fieya\as
upyta Ku/3eAas 6efxt{rrevtnvt
ava. Qvpaov Te TLvaaatav,
Klfffftp re (TTtrpavaidtis,
tiiovvaov Bepairtvti. Eurip. Baccl). v. 73.
exploring the foundations of ruined cities, where money was con-
cealed, modern cabinets have been enriched with more complete
serieses of coins than could have been collected in any period of
antiquity. We can thus bring under one point of view the whole
progress of the art from its infancy to its decline, and compare the
various religious symbols which have been employed in ages and
countries remote from each other. These symbols have the great
advantage over those preserved in other branches of sculpture, that
they have never been mutilated or restored ; and also that they ex-
hibit two compositions together, one on each side of the coin,
■which mutually serve to explain each other, and thus enable us to
read the symbolical or mystical writing with more certainty than
we are enabled to do in any other monuments. It is principally,
therefore, under their guidance that we shall endeavour to explore
the vast and confused labyrinths of poetical and allegorical fable ;
and to separate as accurately as we can, the theology from the my-
thology of the ancients: by which means alone we can obtain a com-
petent knowledge of the mystic, or, as it was otherwise called,
the Orphic faith/ and explain the general style and language of
symbolical art in which it was conveyed.
18. Ceres and Bacchus,2 called, in iEgypt, Isis and Osiris;
and, in Syria, Venus and Adonis, were the deities, in whose
names, and under whose protection, persons were most com-
monly instructed in this faith.3 The word Bacchus or lacchus is a
1 Pausan. 1. i. c. 39.
z Tl\Ti<riov vaos 6<rri Atj^tit/jos' ayah/iaraSe (tUTjjTe icat yj trais, itai Safiaexw laKXos.
Pausan. in Att. c. ii. s. 4.
3 Tijp pzv yap Offtp&os t€\ztt]v tt/ Aiovuvoii tt\v avrt\v eivai, tt\v ItnSos tt? tt\s tyi\p.t\'
Tprjs (fyiotOTGCT7]i> viiapx^iVj tojv ovoixarxv [j.ovoif evy]\Xay^vwv. Diodor. Sic. lib. i. p.
104. Ed. Wessel.
Oaipw biovvaov fivai Xeyowiv (Aiymrioi). Herodot. lib. ii. c. 42.
H fj.a.Ko.p, offTts eu5a£|Uwv
fStorav ayi&Tevei'
tote MaTpos fieya\as
upyta Ku/3eAas 6efxt{rrevtnvt
ava. Qvpaov Te TLvaaatav,
Klfffftp re (TTtrpavaidtis,
tiiovvaov Bepairtvti. Eurip. Baccl). v. 73.