But according to the author of “_Die Sabier und Sabismus_” (p. 202) the original form of this word is unknown. Not only the inference which identifies Ṭâ´ûs with Tammuz is based on wrong premises; but, in the Yezidi conception of Melek Ṭâ´ûs, there are no traces of the notion which is held respecting Tammuz. The latter was originally a sun-god, and son of Ea and the goddess Sirdu, and the bridegroom of the goddess Ištar. The legendary poems of Babylonia described him as a shepherd, cut off in the beauty of youth, or slain by the boar’s tusk in winter, and mourned for long and vainly by the goddess Ištar. The god Tammuz made his way to Canaan, Cyprus, and thence to Greece. “He had ceased to be the young and beautiful sun-god, and had become the representative of the vegetation of spring, growing by the side of the canals of Babylonia, but parched and destroyed by the fierce heat of the summer. Hence in Babylonia his funeral festival came to be observed in the month of June, and in Palestine two months later. Tammuz had changed his character in passing from country to country, but the idea of him as a slain god, and of his festival as the idealization of human sorrow, a kind of “All Souls Day,” was never altered wherever he was adored.”[132] Such beliefs are not found in the Yezidi view of their King Peacock. On the contrary his festival is for them the occasion of joy and pleasure. I conclude, then, that Ṭâ´ûs is the Arabic word meaning peacock, just as Melek is the Arabic word meaning king or angel. The sect write it, pronounce it, and believe it to be so. The faith of the sect finds expression in the fact that they represent their angel Azazil in the form of the peacock. It seems to me that the real question is not what Melek Ṭâ´ûs is, but how the devil-god came to be symbolized by the image of a bird. This question finds an answer in the fact that the worship of a bird appears to have been the most ancient of idolatry. It is condemned especially in Deut. 4: 16, 17: “Lest ye corrupt yourselves and make a graven image, the similitude of any figure, the likeness of any winged fowl that flieth in the air.” And Layard, in his _Nineveh and Its Remains_, vol. II, p. 462, gives the sketch of a bird from one of the slabs dug up at Nimrud. He remarks that the Iyuges, or sacred birds, belonged to the Babylonian and probably also to the Assyrian religion. They were a kind of demons, who exercised a peculiar influence over mankind, resembling the feroher of Zoroastrianism. The oracles attributed to Zoroaster describe them as powers anointed by God. Their images, made of gold, were in the palace of the king of Babylonia. According to Philostratus they were connected with magic. In Palestine the dove was sacred for the Phoenicians and Philistines. The Jews brought accusation against the Samaritans that they were worshippers of the dove. Sacred doves were found also at Mecca. Nasar (eagle) was a deity of the tribe of Ḥamyar.[133]