[9] What we have been able to ascertain of the Sumerian-Babylonian religion points to it rather as a religion of mourning and supplication, than of joy and thanksgiving. The people seem to have been in perpetual dread of their gods, who require to be appeased by continual acts of humiliation. Thus the 9th, 15th, 19th, 28th, and 29th of the month were all days of sack-cloth and ashes, days of wailing; the 19th especially was ‘the day of the wrath of Gulu.’ [10] Cf. Langdon, _op. cit_. p. 24. [11] Cf. Langdon, _op. cit_. p. 26. [12] The most complete enquiry into the nature of the god is to be found in Baudissin, _Adonis und Esmun_. For the details of the cult cf. Farnell, _Cults of the Greek States_, Vol. II.; Vellay, _Adonis_ (_Annales du Musée Guimet_). For the Folk-lore evidence cf. Mannhardt, _Wald un Feld-Kulte;_ Frazer, _The Golden Bough_, and _Adonis, Attis and Osiris_. These remarks apply also to the kindred cult of Attis, which as we shall see later forms an important link in our chain of evidence. The two cults are practically identical and scholars are frequently at a loss to which group surviving fragments of the ritual should be assigned. [13] In this connection note the extremely instructive remarks of Miss Harrison in the chapter on Herakles in the work referred to above. She points out that the _Eniautos Daimon_ never becomes entirely and Olympian, but always retains traces of his ‘Earth’ origin. This principle is particularly well illustrated by Adonis, who, though, admitted to Olympus as the lover of Aphrodite, is yet by this very nature forced to return to the earth, and descend to the realm of Persephone. This agrees well with the conclusion reached by Baudissin (_Adonis und Esmun_, p. 71) that Adonis belongs to “einer Klasse von Wesen sehr unbestimmter Art, die wohl über den Menschen aber unter den grossen Göttern stehen.” [14] Cf. Vellay, _op. cit_. p. 93. Dulaure, _Des Divinités Génératrices_. If Baudissin is correct, and the introduction of the Boar a later addition to the story, it would seem to indicate the intrusion of a phallic element into ritual which at first, like that of Tammuz, dealt merely with the death of the god. The Attis form, on the contrary, appears to have been phallic from the first. Cf. Baudissin, _Adonis und Esmun_, p. 160. [15] _Op. cit_. p. 83. [16] Cf. L. von Schroeder, _Vollendung den Arischen Mysterium_, p. 14. [17] It may be well to explain the exact meaning attached to these terms by the author. In Professor von Schroeder’s view _Mysterium_ may be held to connote a drama in which the gods themselves are actors; _Mimus_ on the contrary, is the term applied to a drama which treats of the doings of mortals. [18] _Op. cit_. Vol. II. p. 647.