[44] Cf. Dieterich, _Archiv für Relig. Wiss._, xi, p. 173.
[45] Soph. _Ant._ 965.
[46] Eumelus, cp. Schol. _Il. Z._ 131.
[47] _British Central Africa_, p. 439.
[48] Cf. Du Chaillu, _A Journey to Ashongo Land_, p. 52.
[49] Alldridge, _The Sherbro and its Hinterland_, pp. 153 ff.
[50] Plat. (_Rep._ 565 d). Cf. De Visser, _Nicht-menschengestaltige
Götter_, p. 46.
[51] _Theog._ 386 ff.
[52] Dionys. Hal. _Antiq._ i. 71.
[53] Plut. _Num._ 15.
[54] See _Folklore_, xv. 304.
[55] According to the White Book of Papua for 1907, containing the
governor’s report to the Federal Government, the only murder of a white
man committed during last year was due to a wish for this medicine.
A native called Hariki had built a new house and wished to make it
strong and paint it with a mixture of red-clay and coconut-oil. For
this purpose, it seems, special medicine was necessary, and in order to
have it as strong as possible, Hariki determined to get it from a white
man. He obtained it by killing a market-gardener called Weaver, with
whom he was on quite friendly terms. Indeed, when the medicine had been
obtained, Hariki and his friends ‘proceeded, under the guidance of one
of the party who was skilled in charms,’ to bring Weaver back to life.
They began at the feet, and succeeded, so they said, in reviving all
the lower part of the body; but there was a great wound in the chest
which they could not pass. So at last they hid the corpse away, and
arranged that it should seem to have been eaten by alligators.
[56] Phorbas, being the strongest of the Phlegyai, was chosen their
king. He lived under an oak, wrestled with all comers, and hung their
heads on the oak. Kerkyon (et. _quercus_?) of Eleusis did much the
same. So did Oinomaos. His daughter’s suitors had to challenge him to a
chariot race; he hung up the heads of those whom he defeated. Pelops,
having defeated him, slew him and took the kingdom. Apparently the
daughter’s hand carried the kingdom with it, as the daughter of Zeus in
the _Birds_ is Basileia, ‘Royalty.’ Kyknos made a pyramid of skulls.
The others killed their rivals in various ways.
[57] _Theog._ 485 ff. Cf. 690, where Zeus fights with the thunder as
his weapon; also 853 ff., where he crushes Typhoeus, who ‘would have
become king over mortals and immortals, but that Zeus saw him and used
the thunder’.
[58] Thus in our present version of the _Theogony_ Zeus is not
swallowed at all: only the stone is swallowed. And when it reappears
Zeus sets it to be a sign at Pytho. Comment is hardly needed. No one
supposes that we have the stories of the _Theogony_ in their original
state. There is ‘contamination’ and ‘conciliation’ visible throughout
the book.
[59] Paus. x. 24, 5; cp. ix. 2, 7 and Frazer’s note.
[60]
ὄρσει νεογιλοῦ παιδὸς ἁυτὴν
μαίης ἑν κόλπῳ κεκληγότος ἁμφὶ γάλακτι (_Lithica_, 360-99).
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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