DOI Page / Citation link:
https://doi.org/10.11588/diglit.7416#0065
55
strongest vegetable productions of the Nortli, were employed by
the Celtic nations as symbols of the supreme Godwhose pri-
mary emanation, or operative Spirit, seems to have been signified
by the misletoe which grew from its bark ; and, as it were, ema-
nated from its substance ; whence probably came the sanctity at-
tributed to that plant.
72. Such symbols seem once to have been in general use; for
among the vulgar, the great preservers ol ancient customs, they
continued to be so down to the latest periods of Heathenism.
" The shepherd," says Maximus Tyrius, " honors Pan by conse-
crating to him the high fir, and deep cavern, as the husband-
man does Bacchus by sticking up the rude trunk of a tree."1 Art
and refinement gradually humanised these primitive emblems, as
well as others ; but their original meaning was still preserved in the
crowns of oak and fir, which distinguished the statues of Jupiter
and Pan, in the same manner as those of other symbolical plants
did those of other personifications.3
73. The sanctity, so generally attributed to groves by the bar-
barians of the North, seems to have been imperfectly transmitted
from them to the Greeks : for the poets, as Strabo observes, call
any sacred place a grove, though entirely destitute of trees;4- so
that they must have alluded to these obsolete symbols and modes
of worship. The SEA/iOl, the priests of Dodona, mentioned
in the Iliad, had disappeared, and been replaced by women long
before the time of Herodotus, who relates some absurd tales,
which he heard in iEgypt, concerning their having come from that
1 Maxim. Tyr. Dissert, viii. s. 8.
* See ibid. p. 79.; also Plin. lib. ii. t. )., and Tacit, de M. Germ. Even as
late as the eighth century of Christianity, it was enacted by Luitprand, king
of the Lombards, that whoever paid any adoration or performed any incan-
tation to a tree should be punished by line. Paul. Diacon. de Leg. Longo-
bard.
3 See heads of Jupiter of Dodona on the coins of Pyrrhus.
4 Ot 5e -jronjrcu Kotrfj-ouffiv, a\atj KaAourrey to tfpa Travra Kav r] tyiAct. Strab. 1. ix.
p. 599. ed. Oxon.
strongest vegetable productions of the Nortli, were employed by
the Celtic nations as symbols of the supreme Godwhose pri-
mary emanation, or operative Spirit, seems to have been signified
by the misletoe which grew from its bark ; and, as it were, ema-
nated from its substance ; whence probably came the sanctity at-
tributed to that plant.
72. Such symbols seem once to have been in general use; for
among the vulgar, the great preservers ol ancient customs, they
continued to be so down to the latest periods of Heathenism.
" The shepherd," says Maximus Tyrius, " honors Pan by conse-
crating to him the high fir, and deep cavern, as the husband-
man does Bacchus by sticking up the rude trunk of a tree."1 Art
and refinement gradually humanised these primitive emblems, as
well as others ; but their original meaning was still preserved in the
crowns of oak and fir, which distinguished the statues of Jupiter
and Pan, in the same manner as those of other symbolical plants
did those of other personifications.3
73. The sanctity, so generally attributed to groves by the bar-
barians of the North, seems to have been imperfectly transmitted
from them to the Greeks : for the poets, as Strabo observes, call
any sacred place a grove, though entirely destitute of trees;4- so
that they must have alluded to these obsolete symbols and modes
of worship. The SEA/iOl, the priests of Dodona, mentioned
in the Iliad, had disappeared, and been replaced by women long
before the time of Herodotus, who relates some absurd tales,
which he heard in iEgypt, concerning their having come from that
1 Maxim. Tyr. Dissert, viii. s. 8.
* See ibid. p. 79.; also Plin. lib. ii. t. )., and Tacit, de M. Germ. Even as
late as the eighth century of Christianity, it was enacted by Luitprand, king
of the Lombards, that whoever paid any adoration or performed any incan-
tation to a tree should be punished by line. Paul. Diacon. de Leg. Longo-
bard.
3 See heads of Jupiter of Dodona on the coins of Pyrrhus.
4 Ot 5e -jronjrcu Kotrfj-ouffiv, a\atj KaAourrey to tfpa Travra Kav r] tyiAct. Strab. 1. ix.
p. 599. ed. Oxon.