Ancient Pagan and Modern Christian Symbolism: With an Essay on Baal Worship, on the Assyrian Sacred "Grove," and Other Allied SymbolsInman, Thomas
Religion
Ancient Pagan and Modern Christian Symbolism: With an Essay on Baal Worship, on the Assyrian Sacred "Grove," and Other Allied Symbols
Inman, Thomas
Christian art and symbolism; Symbolism
Fig. 90 represents an ancient Italian form of the Indian Ling Yoni. It
is copied from a part of the Frontispiece of Faber's Dissertation on the
Cabiri, where it is stated that the plate is a copy of a picture of a
nymphoeum found when excavating a foundation for the Barbarini Palace at
Rome. It deserves notice, because the round mound of masonry surmounted
by the short pillars is precisely similar to similar erections found
in Hindostan on the East and America on the West, as well as in varions
parts of Europe. The oval in the pediment and the solitary pillar
have the same meaning as the Caaba and hole--the upright stone and pit
revered at Mecca long before Mahomet's time--the tree serves to identify
the pillar, and vice versa. Apertures were common in ancient sepulchral
monuments, alike in Hindostan and England; one perforated stone is
preserved as a relic in the precincts of an old church in modern Rome.
The aperture is blackish with the grease of many hands, which have been
put therein whilst their owners took a sacred oath. We have already
remarked how ancient Abraham and a modern Arab have sworn by the Linga;
it is therefore by no means remarkable that some of a different form of
faith should swear by the Yoni.
Figure 91 is stated by Higgins, Anacalypm, p. 217, to be a mark on the
breast of an Egyptian mummy in the Museum of University College, London.
It is essentially the same symbol as the crux ansata, and is emblematic
of the male triad and the female unit.
Figure 92 is simply introduced to show that the papal tiara has not
about it anything particularly Christian, a similar head-dress having
been worn by gods or angels in ancient Assyria, where it appeared
crowned by an emblem of "the trinity." We may mention, in passing, that
as the Romanists adopted the mitre and the tiara from "the cursed brood
of Ham," so they adopted the episcopalian crook from the augurs of
Etruria, and the artistic form with which they clothe their angels from
the painters and um-makers of Magna Gracia and Central Italy.
Figure 98 is the Mithraic lion. It may be seen in Hyde's Religion of the
Ancient Persians, second edition, plate i. It may also be seen in vol.
ii., plates 10 and 11, of Maffei's Gemme Antiche Figurate (Rome, 1707).
In plate 10 the Mithraic lion has seven stars above it, around which
are placed respectively, words written in Greek, Etruscan and Phoenician
characters, ZEDCH. TELKAN. TELKON. TELKON. QIDEKH. UNEULK. LNKELLP.,
apparently showing that the emblem was adopted by the Gnostics. It
would be unprofitable to dwell upon the meaning of these letters. After
puzzling over them, I fancy that "Bad spirits, pity us," "Just one, I
call on thee," may be made out by considering the words to be very bad
Greek, and the letters to be much transposed.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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