(M37) A constant feature in the myth of Adonis was his premature and violent death. If, then, the kings of Paphos regularly personated Adonis, we must ask whether they imitated their divine prototype in death as in life. Tradition varied as to the end of Cinyras. Some thought that he slew himself on discovering his incest with his daughter;(180) others alleged that, like Marsyas, he was defeated by Apollo in a musical contest and put to death by the victor.(181) Yet he cannot strictly be said to have perished in the flower of his youth if he lived, as Anacreon averred, to the ripe age of one hundred and sixty.(182) If we must choose between the two stories, it is perhaps more likely that he died a violent death than that he survived to an age which surpassed that of Thomas Parr by eight years,(183) though it fell far short of the antediluvian standard. The life of eminent men in remote ages is exceedingly elastic and may be lengthened or shortened, in the interests of history, at the taste and fancy of the historian. Chapter IV. Sacred Men and Women. § 1. An Alternative Theory. (M38) In the preceding chapter we saw that a system of sacred prostitution was regularly carried on all over Western Asia, and that both in Phoenicia and in Cyprus the practice was specially associated with the worship of Adonis. As the explanation which I have adopted of the custom has been rejected in favour of another by writers whose opinions are entitled to be treated with respect, I shall devote the present chapter to a further consideration of the subject, and shall attempt to gather, from a closer scrutiny and a wider survey of the field, such evidence as may set the custom and with it the worship of Adonis in a clearer light. At the outset it will be well to examine the alternative theory which has been put forward to explain the facts. (M39) It has been proposed to derive the religious prostitution of Western Asia from a purely secular and precautionary practice of destroying a bride’s virginity before handing her over to her husband in order that “the bridegroom’s intercourse should be safe from a peril that is much dreaded by men in a certain stage of culture.”(184) Among the objections which may be taken to this view are the following:— (M40) (1) The theory fails to account for the deeply religious character of the customs as practised in antiquity all over Western Asia. That religious character appears from the observance of the custom at the sanctuaries of a great goddess, the dedication of the wages of prostitution to her, the belief of the women that they earned her favour by prostituting themselves,(185) and the command of a male deity to serve him in this manner.(186)