and in Eastern Asia.1 Boll has found in the texts which he treats of in his Sphcera a division of the globe into twelve zones (Dode- kaoros) which correspond to the twelve-year periods of the Eastern Asiatic zodiacal cycle, of which each one is named after a beast. The twelve parts of the Dodekaoros which correspond to the signs of the zodiac are as follows :— 2
Land.   Dodekaoros.   Zodiac (celestial earth).
Persia   Mouse   (Aries) (ram).
Babylon   Hound   Taurus (bull).
Cappadocia   Serpent   Gemini (twins).
Armenia   Beetle   Cancer (crab).
Asia   Ass   Leo (lion).
Ionia   Lion   Virgo (virgin).
Libya   Duck   (Capricorn, i.e. goat), libra (scales).
Italy   Bull   Scorpio (scorpion).
Crete   Hawk   Sagittarius (archer).
Syria   Ape   Capricornus (ibex goat).
Egypt   Ibis   Aquarius (water-bearer).
India   Crocodile   Pisces (fish).
In Chinese mythical history also the earth appears as an image of the cosmos. Yao (about 2350 B.C.) restored the land from the results of a flood like the Deluge, "dug out the hills, made the mountains disappear*, and controlled the heavens,” as the Shu-king says. The land was divided amongst his followers according to the four cardinal points, and according to the four mountains, and over each one was set a chief; twelve mandarins who ruled the people, six overseers, for agriculture, domestic life, handicrafts and food, and finally over music and education, for their protection. Somewhat later the whole was divided into nine provinces, each one given to a regent, the central province, Ki, being ruled over by the Emperor himself. In the centre was the palace, surrounded bv fields, then in a surrounding circle lay the fields of the people, in a second circle the meadows for pasturage, and in a third the woods and hunting grounds. The provinces stretched out towards each other in the woods, and a highwa}* led from one chief city to the other. The Emperor was chief-priest, he established the festivals, and he alone amongst the people sacrificed to Tien, the Lord of Heaven; see Gon*es, Mythengeschichtc, p. 17.
1   See Ideler, Zcitrechnung der Chinesen, 1839, 5 ff.
2   Boll, Sphcera, 296, and also Winckler, O.L.Z., 1904, 96 [ = Krit. Schr., iii. 96), with the explanation of Capricornus in Syria. The Zodiac and the Dodekaoros together are shown in the Egyptian Globe (Kircher, CEdipus ^Egyptiacus, ii. 2, 206 set/.). In denoting the ecliptic, the figures of the animal cycle are used in Japan, even making the first animal correspond to Aries (see Stern, Gott. Gel. Am., 1840, 2013^.).
EARTHLY IMAGE OF THE CELESTIAL WORLD 57
2.   The Temple
The rule of the gods upon earth corresponds to their rule in heaven. And as each divinity has his special sphere of action and place of manifestation in heaven (“ houses ” in heaven, see p. 29, temens, rejuei'o?, templum), so he has also his province upon earth. In this sense the deity is Lord of the Country (Canaanite, ba'cil; Babylonian, belli), and for this reason the conqueror of a country would remove the statue of the god and put in its place a statue of the god of that part of the country in which he reigned, and when the deity had abandoned the country, the land became masterless.1 In the war against Judea the Ark of the Covenant represented the statue of the god in the mind of the King of Babylon. And the people held this same view when they said: “Jehovah seeth us not; Jehovah hath forsaken the land.'1 According to Ezekiel’s vision Jehovah dwelt in Babylon during the Exile ; the Merkaba (lion, bull, man, eagle), four supporters, form the chariot upon which he journeys thither; in Ezek. ix. 3, x. 4, he visits his throne in Jerusalem.
The whole country is a counterpart of the celestial world, and the temple in particular represents it. As each celestial “ house11 is represented by an earthly place of worship, so the cosmos is portrayed in the temple towers (comp. p. 307), each story dedicated to one planet, and showing the corresponding colour (see Chap. XII.). Gudea speaks of the temple of the seven tubqati, the ascent of which symbolises the ascent to heaven and therefore is a work well pleasing to God : Ningirsu foretells a happy fate to whomsoever mounts to the summit.2 Hammurabi says3 he made the Ebarra temple, the Sun-temple of Sippar, very large, it was “ like the heavenly dwelling-place ” (slmbat).
The stories of the Temple correspond to the stages of the zodiac,4 the pillars of the Temple to the culminating points
1 See Winckler in K. A. T., 3rd ed., 15S, and for the following Gesch. Isr., ii. 2; F., iii. 383.
“ Cyl. G, col. i.
3   Cod. iii. 29 f.
4   Comp. p. 6 and the “celestial ladder” of Jacob’s dream.
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(east and west or north and south, according to the orientation). In individual cases the nSurov represented again the throne of God, steps led up to the statue of the Deity.
But as the Temple is the reputed centre of a world, so every district is a microcosmos in which the myths of the Creation, of the combat with and final victory over the powers of darkness, and all the other phenomena of the celestial world, are supposed to repeat themselves. It is for this reason we meet with the myths in such thousandfold variations which, however, all refer back to the same fundamental Babylonian ideas, as already said on p. 4. The mark of their common extraction lies in the ever-recurring motif (story, plot, nucleus) always derived from the same celestial, astral, mythological source.
The Sanctuary (Adyton) represents the seat of the summits deus. Each temple represents the centre of gravity of the world, and each local deity is, in his district, the chief god. The Temple teaching points out that its own place of worship answers to a corresponding place in the cosmos. And since each divine manifestation is potentially in itself the complete Omnipotence, it is obvious that the blessings of the Divinity must be revealed in each respective place of worship through the person of the particular deity honoured there.
The plan of the Temple is given from heaven. The Gudea architectural texts, for example, treat to a great extent of this divine definition—the individual parts of the Temple correspond to the celestial model.
The same conception is shown in the Israelite Sanctuary, only more spiritualised and corresponding to each stage in the development of the idea of Jehovah as “ Lord of Lords, the God of Gods,” or as the only God, who made heaven and earth : 1. In the 'Okel mo‘ed, where Jehovah is throned upon the Cherubim, with the objects used in his worship Avhich represent the astral world. 2. In the Temple of Solomon. 3. In the visionary Temple of Ezekiel. These will be spoken of in detail in their respective places.
3.   The Throne
To the oriental mind the king was representative of God upon earth, God incarnate. The king ascended the Kussu ilvti (“ throne of the Deity ”), the palace itself as heavenly throne
EARTHLY IMAGE OF THE CELESTIAL WORLD 59
(“lofty gate”) enjoyed divine honour. To fear God and reverence the king was held to be the chief commandment.1 The victories of the king appear as victories over the powers of darkness. The accession and the reign are in certain instances described as the dawn of the New Age, as the Golden Age. The ideas of the Kingdom of God and of the Empire of the World are Ancient-Oriental.2 In the Etana myth Ishtar and Bel searched throughout the earth for a king, and meanwhile the insignia, sceptre, fillet, cap, and staff lay ready in heaven before Anu, the summus dens. And a hymn to Marduk says: “He brings forth for the king sceptre, itkurtu (?), weapons, and crown.”
Consequently the King- of Babylon represented Marduk. In the Babylonian age the sun stood in Taurus, but the planet Jupiter is designated “ Bull of the Sun,” and his place in the heavens ‘•'Furrow of Heaven” (pidnu sha shame, see Honnnel, Auf and Abh., 356), and a plough is the attribute of Osiris. The king is therefore endowed with the motifs of the Marduk-bull, which brings the spring, the New Age. Nebuchadnezzar calls himself ‘•'husbandman (ikkaru) of Babylon.” The Emperor of China draws a furrow every year with a yellow plough: this is now looked upon simply as a country festival custom, but the Ancient-Oriental teaching shows the original meaning. Compare the plough motif at the beginning of a new epoch in the case of Saul, the Polish Piast, the Czechish Primislaus, and the custom at the founding of a city of marking round the boundary with a plough ; see Winckler, Ex orientc bur, ii. 2, 52. Comp. p. 74-.
In Babylon New Year was the festival of the inauguration of the king. He then “ grasps the hands of Marduk,” thereby taking over the government from him. The punt dkrur (“ I cast the lot ”) of the Assyrian kings has the same meaning; on New Years Day destiny is settled by the deity, and the king acts as his representative.
The king’s court is counterpart of the celestial court, the throne representing the seat of the summits dcus, led up to
1   “Thou shalt fear God, thou shalt honour the King” (C.T., xiii. 29 f.). Comp. 1 Pet. ii. 17 : “ Fear God, honour the King.”
2   The kings of South Babylonia use the divine determinative, as do Sargon I. and Naramsin. Hammurabi calls himself “divine king of the city.” The Pharaohs lay claim to the same honour. The Emperor of China is “Son of Heaven” {Tien, “heaven”; Shang-ticn, “highest Lord of the uppermost heaven”).
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by steps.1 The highest offices (because the most ancient) are those of baker and cupbearer, and they also correspond to a divine function : in Marduk’s court there are the two offices, Mind-tkul-beUy “What drinks my lord?1-’ and Mma-ishti-beli, 44 What eats my lord?”; also in the Adapa myth the 44 divine baker ”2 appears. The third dignity which is occasionally met with (e.g. amongst the Assyrians) is that of commander-inchief of the army.
In Rev. iv. 2 ff. we have a description of a meeting of the celestial senate; comp. Dan. vii. 9 et seq., and see B.K.T., 14 ff. Near the divan the chief office-holders sit on the right and left; the mother of the sons of Zebedee had this idea in her mind. Another ceremonial places the king’s mother by his side; see 1 Kings ii. 19; Jer. xiii. 18; and comp. 1 Kings xv. 19, She then corresponds to the Mother-goddess, Queen of Heaven, by the side of the summits dens ; see pp. 39 f- and 111.
The throne, led up to by steps, corresponds to the throne of the Deity in the Adyton.3
X. ASTROLOGY
4* Originally astrology was not a superstition, but the expression, that is, the result of a religion, or conception of imposing uniformity.”4 It is founded upon a consistent application of the post hoc ergo propter hoc, and it can no longer be denied that this conception originated in Babylon. By an unquestioned tradition astrology is held to be 44 the wisdom of the Chaldees,” and long before the discovery of any records Dodwell recognised Babylonia as the source. Ideler, Histor. Untersuchungen, p. 1-17, considers Egypt the home. This is comprehensible, as it was through Egypt that the wisdom of the ancient East passed to the West. India was considered (Bohlen) after the discovery of Indian records, and the old hypothesis of China as the source was reawakened by the
1   Hebr. miftan ; see Zeph. i. 9. Comp. 1 Sam. v. 1 ff.
2   See Gen. xli. 10. Comp. Zimmern, D.Z.M.G., liii. 115 ff.
3   Wunsche, “Salomos l'hron und Hippoclrom,” Ex or. lux, ii. 3, offers much valuable confirmatory material.
4   Doll, Splusra, pp. 45 f., in relation to H. Winckler’s explanation of the Ancient- Oriental conception of the universe. The texts in Thompson’s Reports of the Magicians and Astrologers. Comp. Ungnad, “ Die Deutung der Zukunft bei den Babyloniern und Assyriern,’’ A.O., 3rd ed.; A. Jeremias, A.B.A., 2nded.,pp. 26 ff.
ASTROLOGY
81
punitive expedition against that land. One by one the clues leading from farthest East through Persia to China and India have been followed, and in the same wav the connection between the ancient Mexican calendar and Babylon will be made clear. On the Babylonian origin of Chinese astronomy, see p. 12.
Pliny, in his Hist. Xat., vii. 56, speaks of ancient Babylonian observations which were recorded on burnt bricks or tiles (“ e diverso Epigenes apud Babylonios DCCXX annorum observationes siderum coctilibus laterculis inscriptas docet”). Simplicius says in his Commentary to the works of Aristotle de ccele (p. 123a), that Callis- thenes, who accompanied Alexander the Great to Asia, sent a number of astronomical observations from Babylon to his teacher Aristotle, which Porphyrius assures us embraced a period of 1905 years before Alexander. Diodorus, ii. 145, speaks of the 473,000 years of Babylonian observations, and Cicero, De divinatione, i. 19 (comp, also ii. 46), jeers at the pride of the Babylonians in boasting of 470,000 years’ (“ CCCCLXX milia annorum ”) observations of the stars. These enormous figures agree with the statements of Berossus about the primeval kings of the ages before the Flood. Thales journeyed to the East in order to calculate the eclipses. Pythagoras was an Assju’ian mercenary, who,according to Jamblichus, Vita Pyth., allowed himself to be persuaded by Thales to go to Egypt to receive instruction from the priests in Memphis and Thebes, and there learnt the Chaldean wisdom. Ptolemy, according to his “ excerpts,” got his facts from Hipparchus, but the source of Hipparchus’s learning was Babylon. The Ptolemaic Canon, codified observations extending through hundreds of years, starts with the beginning of the age of Aries and the corresponding reforms of the Babylonian king Nabonassar. Syncellus, Chronogr., 207 (comp, p. 75), says: c: Since Nabonassar the Chaldeans have noted the movements of the stars.”
Since the aim of the Ancient-Oriental u revealed11 teaching was to prove all phenomena of the world to be the outcome of the ruling power of divinity, so, naturally, the will and actions of the gods were read from the movements of the stars and constellations. The priests of a sanctuary observed the corresponding cosmic 7-eyuei'o?, temenos (temple), and read the will of the gods and the course of fate from the motion of the stars ; or he read the will of the gods from the sheep’s liver, which in its lines and form reflected the universe.
Ptolemy, in his work On the Influence and Character of the Stars, iii. 3, tells us more of the secret: “ What may be understood of the nature of things is to be learnt from study of the configuration of the related places.” First one observes the
m   
place in the zodiac which is connected with, or related to, the circumstance in question. Then one considers the stars which rule over or have power in that place. Further, one notes the nature of those stars and their position in regard to the horizon and the zodiac, and finally one draws conclusions from their general position at morning and evening in regard to the sun and the horizon.” In Diodorus, ii. 81 : “At birth the planets are most influential for good or for evil. From their nature or appearance may be gathered what the person must encounter. They (the Chaldeans) have foretold the fortunes of many kings, for instance, Alexander when he conquered Darius, and Antigonus and Seleucus Nicator after him. And they seem always to have foretold correctly.” The astronomer Julius Firmieus, who warned the sons of Constantine against heathenish errors, addressed prayers to the planets for the welfare of the emperor and his house, according to his Astron., i. T, IT. In the Middle Ages emperors and popes consulted astrologers. Tycho Brahe, who in his Calendarium naturale magicum scientifically defended astrology, lived at the court of Rudolph II. The philosopher Bacon calls astrology the most important science. Philip Melanchthon in 15-15 wrote a recommendatory preface to the horoscope drawn for the Emperor Maximilian by the astrologer Schoner. Kepler deprecates superstitious misuse, but remains firm in the theory of the unity of the stars with the earth and with the souls of men. At the present day astrologers are consulted about important events in Persia, Turkey, India, and in China. In the nineteenth century the astronomer Pfaff in Erlangen defended the connection of the stars “ with the life of the earth and the actions and sufferings of the earthly creation,” and the philosopher and chemist Fechner of Leipzig taught the old conception in new form in his psychophysics. The hour of birth of the Crown Prince of Italy wras foretold lately by the position of the planets by the astrologer Pap us for a Neapolitan newspaper. For astrology amongst the Jews, see   p. 50 ft'.
XI. THE SACKED NUMBERS
Since the movements of the stars and constellations by which the will of the divinity is revealed and also the “ correspondence ” of the parts of the cosmos are expressed in numbers, it follows that there is a mathematical foundation for the Ancient-Oriental religion and for mathematics a religious, that is, an astral foundation.1 In this lies the significance of the mystic numbers.
1 Therefore Oannes brings   ara to mankind, see p. 4S. This is the
foundation of the teaching of Pythagoras. Further, upon this paragraph see now Iiommel, in Oriental Lit. Zlg., May 1907. Upon the Babylonian origin of the “ Platonic number” 5, see   2nd ecb, pp. 73 ff.
THE SACRED NUMBERS
63
All numbers are sacred, and when here and there certain of them take precedence it may be ascribed to the influence of some particular calendar system.
The fundamental ciphers of the astral system are, as we have already seen, 5 and 7, the number of the interpreters of the divine will. They give the root numbers of the duodecimal, that is, the sexagesimal system : 5 + 7 = 12; 5x12 = 60.1 Syncellus 2 says the Babylonians had a sossos of 60 years, a neros of 10 x 60 years, and a saros of 60 x 60 years. The cuneiform figures express with the same sign (a vertical wedge) 1 and 60 and 3600 = 60 x 60. But the nature of the cuneiform numbers shows that the decimal system also was known in Babylon. Both systems are of prehistoric origin. We give in the following some specimens of the application of the numbers ;—3
0.   The introduction of the cipher betokens a great intellectual achievement.4 We cannot tell whether it was already known to the Babylonians. There seem to be hints of it, e.g. in the writing of 600 (neros?).
2.   Sun and moon, division of the year into two; summer and winter, seedtime and harvest, frost and heat, day and night. Corresponding to this in the universe is the division into two as we find it in the oldest Attic poetry (Uranus and Gaia in zEschylus, etc.).
3.   Triple division of the universe, corresponding to triple division of the zodiac and of the year. Three great stars as rulers of the zodiac, thence arising the two divine triads, Anu, Bel, Ea; and Sin, Sham ash, and Ishtar. To this may be added the triads of the divine emanations :5 Apsu, Tiamat, Mummu ; Ea, Dam kina, Marduk ; on the other hand, Ea, father ; Marduk,
1   The division of the zodiac into twelve according to the solar orbit, that is, into twenty-four according to the lunar orbit (V. R. 46, very likely by the twenty-four days of the sidereal month in which the moon is visible), cannot be held as the origin of the duodecimal system. See under “ 12.”
2   Chronogr., ed. Goar, p. 17.
3   Comp. Winckler, “ Himmels- und Weltenbild der Babylonier,” A.O., iii. 2-3. For drawing parallels from other than Babylonian and from non-Oriental people, compare the fundamental remark, pp. 4 seq., 61. A preference for uneven numbers is universal: Nitmero dens impare gandet.
4   See Gustav Oppert, Berl. Gesellsch. fiir Anthropologic, 1900, 122 seq.
5   Compare the triads of the Egyptian religion : Keb, Nut, Shu, fig. 1 ; Hathor with sun and moon. Ancient Iranian moon, sun, Tishtrya (Sirius).
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son: Nabu, teacher of the will. In measurement of time the three seasons correspond to them, spring, summer, and winter (as in Homer), where probably six months are given to winter; further, the division of the months into 3x9, that is, 3x10 davs, and the night in 3 weeks.
4.   The quarterly phenomena of the solar orbit and the phases of the moon and Venus. Corresponding to them are the four
planets (without Venus) as representatives of the four ends of the earth: Jupiter, Mars, Mercury, Saturn.1
5.   The enlargement to 7 for root number of the duodecimal cipher system (division into 12 of the orbits of sun and mocn) and also along with 12 the second root number of 60 which is indicated (in cuneiform with 1) as a unit, 5x12 = 60. It arises in changing the hepta- gram into the pentagram, and two methods of calculation are possible. Either the two planets of misfortune are eliminated, when Saturn is replaced bv the sun and Mars by the moon, or the sun and moon are left out from the 7 ; see the drawings on p. 37. The 7 planet colours then correspondingly become 5.2 In the division of time 5 (Ijamushtu) appears in the 5-day
1   Compare the four span of horses in Zech. vi. i seq., which are sent out to the four quarters of heaven. Comp. M.V.A.G., 1901, 327, the four throne- bearers as representative of the four corners of the world in the Merkaba of Ezekiel, etc. Compare also the Coptic picture of the circle of the universe, fig. 22, and compare with this p. 24, n. 3 ; and p. 31, n. 2.
2   Blue, Mercury ; black, Saturn ; yellow, Jupiter; white, Venus ; red, Mars ; see Hommel, Anfs. u. Abhandl., 383 seq., and comp. B.N.T. with Rev. xxi. The five colours of the Chinese, which amongst the Manchus and Mongolians are doubled (like the corresponding five elements of the Chinese, see p. iS, n. 2, comp. p. 53, n. 1), forming the ten-day cycle, serve according to Vettius Valens in ? Salmasius, de annis climactericis et de antiqua astroiogia, 164S, p. 260, “amongst the ancients to designate the five planets ” ; see Stern, Gott. gel. Ans., 1840, 2031. For the planetary colours amongst the “ Mandreans,” see Chwolsohn, ii. 401, 65S, 839-
 
FIG. 22.—Coptic representation of the circle of life, after Kircher. CEdipus ^Egyptiacus, ii. 2, 193 ; iii. 154.
THE SACRED NUMBERS
65
week, which, according to the witness of the so-called Cappadocian cuneiform tablet, was in use in Babylon simultaneously with the 7-day week (shcbua).1 Traces of such a 5-day week are possibly to be found in the calendar V. R. 48, where on the 5th and 25th days intercourse with women is forbidden. Twelve 5-day weeks (hamushat) give a double month of 60 days: 70 5-day weeks give a lunar year of 350 (instead of 354) days; 72 give a solar year of 360 (instead of 365^); 73 give a solar year including the 5 (5J) equalising days (compare the 5 Gata days along with the intercalary month every 120 years in the old Persian calendar, and the 5 “waste days’’’’ in the Mexican calendar). This explains the significance of the 70 with variations 72 or 73 as the number of the complete cycle. As the 7-dav weeks in the Apocalypse correspond to “weeks of years1’’ of 7 and 70 years, so the 5-day week corresponds to the lustrum? The sexagesimal system gives the period of 60 years =5x12 (having the same significance in the East as the “ century11 of the decimal system). But chiefly in myths and festival plays the 5 plays a great part as the number of the “superfluousv’ equalising days: festival of Epagomenae, feast of the Expulsion of Tyrants, etc. Comp, p. 93.®
6.   The number of the double months = 12 5-day weeks. These were still extant in the Roman calendar (established by Numa Pompilius, originating in the East and introduced through the Etruscans), and in the “seasons’" of 2 months each of the pre-Islamite Arabs.4 In this case the sun (that is to say, Saturn) disappears from the order of 7 planets. The colour lists II. R. 26, 48 note 6 colours ; to the 5 planet colours which we mentioned before, green, the colour belonging to the moon, is added.5
1   See Winckler, F., ii. 95 ff., 354 ff.
2   Dan. vii. 25, “after two times and a half” the end shall appear, i.e. in one and a half hamushtu—week of years ; see Winckler, h.A. T., 3rd ed., 335 ; Ex. or. lux, i. I, p. iS ; and chiefly F., ii. 95 ff.
3   Upon five and seven as lunar number and solar number, see Winckler, Baby- ionische Geisterkultur, p. 74.
4   See Wellhausen, Skizzen, iii. 101.
5   IT. R. 26, 4S counts six colours ; green as colour of the moon, see Stricken, M.V.A.G., 1902, 159 ff.
VOL. I.
a
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7.   The number of the planets, including the sun and moon. This has undoubtedly led to the introduction of a 7-day week.1 7 is the number of the sacrificers, of the deadly sins, of the vengeances, of the prayers.2 3 In the greater cycle the “ week ” of 7, that is of 70, years corresponds to the 7-day week ; hence the meaning in the Apocalypse. The evil 7 is connected with the 7 planets (Nergal, Underworld) and with the 7 stars (Pleiades), the star of Nergal, representing the season of storm, the time of the equinoctial storms before the beginning of spring, in its 40 days’ disappearance below the horizon ; see p. 68.
9.3 In the Babylonian East 9 might be looked for as a quartering of the orbit:   4x9 = 56 decani (see p. 12),
4x90 = 360. The Egyptian doctrine of On-Heliopolis is dominated by 9, the greater and the lesser “Nine” gods. In the Mexican calendar 9 is the root number. Occasionally too 9 is current as the third part of the sidereal lunar months : 27-1-3 = 9. This idea is indicated by the nones in the Roman calendar, which is a fossilised remnant of a past system.4 Possibly it exists also in the calendar laws of Numa. The 27 places for sacrifice also point to the number of days of the sidereal months.
10. See p. 63 for the decimal system. Tenths correspond to the 36 decani in the circle of 360. The division would give a week of 10 days. In later ages the twelve thousands became, perhaps through Eastern influence, changed into ten thousands, as with the Persians.
1   Comp. p. 15, n. 3, pp. 43 ff. ; and in Gen. ii. 3. As is known, Dio Cassius refers the allotment of the days of the week to the planets back to the Egyptians. For Western Asia the coherence of the Nabatsean document Maqrisi bears witness ; see pp. 42 ff. For the seven-day week, compare also ICampf um Babel u. Bibel, 4th ed., pp. 33, 43 ff.
2   Numb, xxiii. 29: Balaam offers seven bullocks and seven rams upon seven altars. Another characteristic example is Josh. vi. : on the seventh day Jericho falls, after seven priests have blown the trumpet seven days, on the seventh day seven times.
3   W. H. Roscher in his “ Die Sieben- u. Neunzahl im Kultus u. Mythus der Griechen,” Kgl. Sachs. Ges. der Wissenschaft. Phil.-hist., Kl. 24, No. 1, offers rich material in regard to seven and nine. The connection of the theory of numbers with the ancient East is here unfortunately ignored.
4   As also by the festival weeks of the nundince remaining out of a vanished calendar, corresponding to the later epagomenen ; see Winckler, Ex oriente lux, 1. 1, p.„2i.
THE SACRED NUMBERS
67
11.   Marduk’s number, which as star of the new seon builds the zodiac. 11 is the number of the zodiac because a picture of the sun is veiled in it; comp. Joseph’s cosmic dream, Gen. xxxvii.: sun, moon, and the 11 signs of the zodiac bow themselves before him.
12.   The duodecimal system does not arise from the zodiac (comp. pp. 10 ff.), but formerly the system of 12 was favoured by its means.1 Since Jupiter takes 12 years to move round the zodiac, one looks for a Jupiter year : but I think there has as yet no trace of it been found in Babylonian texts.'2 Another form of the 12-vear cycle is found in the Eastern Asiatic zodiac; see p. 50. In Babylonia 12 corresponds to the division of the year by lunar months, as also to the calculation of theoretical months by the equalisation of the solar and lunar year. After 12 revolutions the moon again meets with the sun in the same zodiacal sign; comp. p. 25. The cycle of the solar year corresponds to the day of the Micro year, and is therefore divided into 12 double hours.3 The corresponding measure of distance is the mile, which according to Oriental ideas answers to a double hour. The counting simply by hours would correspond to the division of the year into 2 (summer and winter = day and night). The unit of this division is the second: 3600 seconds (chief unit of the sexagesimal system) = 60 minutes = 1 hour. 12 possesses a peculiar significance as
1   The division of the earth into twelve countries, symbolised by beasts, and the twelve-year periods of the East-Asiatic animal cycle, correspond to the cycle of twelve ; see p. 55 seq.
2   In India a twelve-year cycle is called vrihaspaii mana, Jupiter year. Also the Chinese have an ancient cycle of twelve years ; see Stern, Bott. Gel. Anz., 1840, 202S.
•! That there is no Hebrew word for hour is, of course, no proof that the timereckoning of the hour did not exist. The sundial of Ahaz, 2 Kings x.x. 9-11, and comp. Isa. xxxviii, S, must have marked hours which correspond to the stages. In the Letters of Amarna the hours are called in “ Canaanite ” she-ti. Comp. III. R. 51, No. I : In the day and night equinoxes six Kaspu day, and six Kaspu night. Achilles Tatius, Isag. in A rattan (see Winckler, IG.A.T., 3rd ed., 32S) says the Chaldeans took the 30th part of the hour in the equinox as the unit of the solar orbit. The unit of the Micro-year, therefore, is the double minute, which corresponds to the daily forward movement of the sun through the ecliptic. In the twelve hours of its daily course overhead the sun moves a 720th part of the circuit. The corresponding part of the day (of the Micro-year) is a double minute.
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the number of the intercalary days (instead of 5) in the bringing up of the true lunar year (354) to 366 days.1
13.   In the calculation of 12 intercalary days as festival time the 13th day is the beginning of business ; see pp. 18, ii. f. It is so in the Arabian lunar year; see Winckler, /'., ii. 350. This is the meaning; of 13 alon^ with the lunar number 318; Gen. xiv. 4, 14. On the other hand, 13 is the number of an intercalary month which is signified by the 13th zodiacal sign, the Raven. The Persian calendar, e.g., reckons 360 days—5 Gata and a 13th month every 120 years besides. In the Mexican Tona- lamatl (that is, Book of Fate, or Book of Good and Evil Days), which is founded upon calculations by means of Venus, 13 is one of the root numbers.2
14.   Number of the gate of the Underworld ; for example, in the Erishkigal myth, see A.O., i. 3, 2nd ed.
15.   Number of the full moon (comp. fig. 15, p. 36); for instance, for this reason Nebuchadnezzar is said to have built his palace in 15 clays; comp. Ex or. lux, ii. note 2, 24 and 42.
40. Rain and winter time are embodied in the Pleiades, which disappear in the light of the sun for 40 days, roughly speaking, and are heliacally abolished at the beginning of spring; see p. 66. They are days of storm and misfortune, IV. R. 5 ; days of equinoctial storm when, according to Hesiod, Opera et dies, v. 385, navigation begins (see Winckler, K.A.T., 3rd ed., 389), comp. A.G., 27. 9. The number of the Pleiades is, therefore, that of all want and privation : 40 years in the wilderness under Moses, according to the Priestly Code ; Elijah wandered 40 days in the desert; Ezra hid himself with 5 men for 40 days in a secret place, Ezra iv. 14, 22; 40 days1 fast, Matt. iv. 2; 40 days of the castus in the worship of Attis
1   Up to the present attested only in Germanic regions there is twelfth night, with processions of the gods and decisions of Fate in Germanic mythology ; dreams predict the events of the coming twelve months.
2   The short period here amounts to 13 x 20 days, the long period to fifty-two years. It may be explained as follows : the average time of the synodic revolution of Venus, which is repeatedly expressed in the Tonalamall, amounts (broadly speaking) to 584 days ; eight solar years equal five revolutions of Venus. One solar year 5x73 and one lunar year 8 x 73 give together 13 x 73 days. 20 x 13 x 73 days are fifty-two years. See Seler, Codex Vaticanus, No. 3773, 1st part, p. 3 seq., Berlin, 1902.
THE AGES
69
in Rome; 40 days’ fast in the Roman calendar ; 40 stripes save one, 2 Cor. ii. 24, etc. : comp.   2nd ed., p. 87 f.
70, 72, 73. The number of the cycle according to the fyamushtu reckoning : 70 = 350 -j- 5 ; 72 = 360 A 5 ; 73 = 365 4- 5 ; see p. 65. Hence 70 nations in the table of nations; 70 (variant 72) disciples as the larger cycle; 72 elders in the academy of Rabbi Elieser; 70 (72) translators of the Bible (Septuagint), etc.; see Winckler, Ex or. lux, ii. 12, p. 62.
XII. THE AGES
The cycle of the great stars gives the divisions of time in the calendar: day, year, a?on. The division of the cycle into 721 corresponds to the periods of the 72 solar years in which the movement of the fixed stars has advanced one day ahead of the sun. Five such periods correspond to the year of 360 days,2 50x72 gives the Babylonian Saros.3 The most important calculation in the Babylonian calendar is that which reckons the cycle by the gradual backward movement of the equinoctial points through the zodiac.1
1 See above. The “ Egyptian” division into 2 or 4 or 12 or 36 or 72 is borne witness to by Jamblichus, De Mystcriis, viii. 3 (Bunsen, Die Plejadcn, p. 22).
- In practice it corresponds equally in solar or lunar reckoning, as the month has by solar reckoning thirty days (and to these are added the intercalary days) and the new moon falls also alternately on the 29th or 30th.
“ 500 x 72 = 36,000 years amounts to the cycle of Berossus; 5000x72 = 360,000 years is the great year of the Chinese. This corresponds literally to the idea, a thousand years are as one day, Ps. xc. 4 (see Bunsen, loc. cit., iS ff.). Upon the Egyptian Sirius periods, see   2nd ed., pp. 61 ff., and comp. Mahler in
O.L.Z., 1905, 473 ff. : “Just as the Egyptian conception of the earthly geography of Egypt was a picture of celestial geography, so also the calendar was a copy of the great celestial calendar, the ‘day’ corresponded to the ‘quadriennium,’ the ‘ year ’ to the great ‘ Sothis period ’: the quadriennium consisted of 1461 earthly days, the Sothis period of 1461 Egyptian years.”
4   The following material may be noted in regard to the universally prevalent idea of the ages: according to Plutarch and Bundehesh, the “ruling age of the long period” following on the “ infinite age” consists of 12,000 years which are ordained by Ormuzd for this world : 4 x 3000 years. A sign of the zodiac marks each millennium. The Book of Laws of Mani has four ages, each one worse than the last ; 4S00 plus 3600 plus 2400 plus 1200 (an artificial system founded on old ideas). The Etruscans, according to Suidas, s.v. Tvpprjvia (Tyrrhenia), have twelve thousand years, each under the rule of a sign of the zodiac. Hesiod and Ovid witness to the teaching of the ever-deteriorating ages (gold, silver, copper, iron) in the classical world ; Hesiod, Opera, 90 ff. ; Ovid, Metam., i. 89 ff. The Biblical and Jewish material will be treated later ; see Index, “Ages.”
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The inclination of the earth’s axis to the sun’s path is variable. Corresponding to this the point of intersection of the apparent path of the sun with the equator also moves. The ancients observed the following phenomenon : the position of the sun at the spring equinox moves as observed from year to year farther westward. In seventy-two years the advance has reached a length of one degree, so that it takes 72 x 360 = 25920 years for the equinoctial point to move through the whole zodiac, and on an average 2160 years for it to move through one zodiacal sign. The spring point passes in this course once through the water region and the fire region. Here lies the basis for the teaching of the destruction of the world by the Deluge and by aJire-flood.1 2 We believe it to be beyond all doubt that the Babylonians already knew of the precession (even if only in approximate calculations) in the oldest time known to us, and based the teaching of the ages of the world upon it. The establishment of the east direction by the gnomon must have forced the phenomenon upon the notice of the observer. For further detail upon this, see A.B.A., 2nd ed., pp. 67 ff.
“ Berossus, who interpreted Bel, says that everything (previously described) is ruled by the course of the stars, and he is so certain of this, that he fixes the times of the burning of the world and of the Flood. He maintains that the world will be burnt when all the stars which now move in different orbits meet together in Cancer (in the Aries reckoning the solstitial point is in Cancer; we still speak of the tropic of Cancer), so that they all stand in even line in the same sign, and that the future flood (following thereupon) will occur when the same conjunction happens in Capricorn (i.e. winter solstice). For the former is the summer solstice and the latter winter solstice; these are the determinative zodiacal signs, for in them lie the solstice points (momenta) of the ages” (Seneca, see Muller, Fragm. hist, grcec., ii. 510).- Compare Jos., Ant., j 2, 3. Adam foretold a fire-flood and a deluge.
1   A light-Jlood in opposition to the water-flood (Jensen, K.B., vi. i, 563, 580, and with him Zimmern, A'.A. 71, 3rd ed., 495, 549) does not exist. The Biblical story of the Deluge, meant as an historical event, is related after the manner of the mythological teaching of the ages of the universe (water-flood); the end of the world is in like manner told according to this teaching (fire-flood).
2   The opinion might be held that the statement of Berossus can only be explained by the precession through the water region and fire region. According to Seneca, Berossus based it upon something else. When to the eye of the observer all the planets stand in Cancer, the destruction of the world by fire will occur (that is to say, the planetary divinities gather together to build a new world) ; when all the planets stand in Capricorn, the deluge will occur. Has the recorder varied one of the statements ? The conflagration of the world in the Avesta can also only rest upon the teaching of the passage of the world in its development through the fire region. The Mexicans have four ages of the world, amongst them the fire-flood and water-flood ; nearly all the American cosmogonies mention both these catastrophes ; see Ehrenreich, Die My then u. Legenden der siidamerikanischen Urvolker, p. 30.
THE AGES
71
The statement of Berossus about the age of the Deluge agrees with the mention of kings before the Flood ” in contradistinction to kings after the Flood, for one conceives in the past:
1. Lam ububi, the Age before the Flood.—That would correspond to the time when the spring point moved through Anu’s realm in the zodiac (4. Signs). The beginning was the age of Paradise, and then the sages lived.1 Berossus mentions along with the sages the primeval kings, who together lived through 120 Saren. See chapter on “ Ancestors ”; and comp. Rost., M.V.A.G., 1897, 105 seq.
2.   Age of the Flood.—The spring point passed through Ea’s realm, before passing into Gemini, where history begins.
3.   The Historical Age.—The spring point passes through Bel’s kingdom. The end is the fire-flood, the summer solstice of the ages. Thence arises the new world.
From traces of calendar reforms in the course of Babylonian history it would appear that the Babylonians in historical ages made use of calculations taken from records of the most ancient times.2
The observation was then continued into the periods of history which we know, and explains the application of the theory of the ages of the world in the Book of Daniel, in Persia and in India, etc.
Age of Gemini
In the most remote time upon which we have as jet any historical light,3 the spring equinox was in the zodiacal sign of Gemini.4 Sin and Nergal, i.c. moon and sun, were looked upon
1   Assurbanipal speaks of inscriptions from the time before the Flood ; a magic text mentions a decision of the old sages before the Flood. K.A.T., 3rd ed., 537. V. R. 44, 20 a speaks of kings “after the Flood.”
2   The importance of the age-reckoning in Ancient-Oriental history is acknowledged by H. Winckler ; see Geschichte Israels, ii. 282 seq. Ex or. lux, 1. 27. 50 ; comp. F., ii. 370, and now also iii. 2S9 seq.
3   About the traces of older ages, see Winckler, F., ii. 368, and Hommel, Aufs. u. Abh., ii. 446 seq. The late Egyptian Cancer-reckoning is an archaism.
4   This at least appears to be so looking backward from the zodiacal age best known to us in legend. In the historical age of Gemini it did not fall at the spring point, but at the autumn point. But the fact remains the same. If the sun was in Gemini at the spring equinox the full moon would be in opposition at the autumn point.
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as twins by the Babylonians, as we shall see later,1 that is to say, the waxing and the waning moon. But in their solar and lunar reckoning the moon takes foremost place, being in this system the life-bringer, in opposition to the sun, which represents the Underworld. Therefore an age of Gemini must in every case have been an age of the Moon-god. Sargon says in his state inscription of the kings of Meluhha that since far-distant days,
 
since the icon of the moon (ctdt Nannar), his fathers had sent no more messengers to his predecessors. The royal astrologers therefore who connected the events with the stars appear to have calculated by the old age. Other statements by Sargon also show the same phenomenon that, instead of Nisan, Sivan, which lies two places backwards, is treated as the beginning of the year, as the month of the destiny-ruling Moon-god (bcl purusse).2 In the age of Gemini the year began with Sivan and ended with Ijjar.3
1   P. 114.
2   This was the age of the immigration of the Semitic Babylonians.
3   Comp, with this pp. 42 f.
THE AGES
73
The Roman calendar begins the year with Janus, whose two faces represent the two halves of the moon; he therefore corresponds to the age of Gemini (lunar age, see fig. 23), and the Dioroscuros myth is also therefore established as the beginning of Roman history; see Winckler. This seems to be an artificial archaism reaching back possibly to the Etruscans. In the Roman calendar the 7-12 month is called Quinctilis till December; one sees therefore that by the great time-piece of the universe one is two stages slow.1
Age of Taurus
From about 3000 onwards the calendar did not agree with the actual position of the spring equinoctial point, and the reckoning would have to be changed and made to agree with Taurus, for in that sign the old spring point was behindhand. This happened in fact, and the reform was carried out by Sargon. The advancement of the spring point was used by Hammurabi to glorify his own reign as the beginning of a new epoch, and the “ exaltation of Marduk,” tutelary deity of Babylon, fell to him ; but we have no direct evidence, as in the case of the reform of the calendar under Nabonassar.
To correspond with the precession the beginning of the year must have been transferred into Ijjar, one month backwards, and the end of the year into Misan. For this we have no direct evidence, but when the King of Assyria is inaugurated in the second month Ijjar, instead of in Misan, which in the age of Gemini is the spring equinox point and the new year, it can only be explained by this phenomenon.2 That this new age, following that of Gemini, that is, “ the Lunar Age,'’ should bear the sun character was to be expected, because the Hammurabi dynasty originated in the City of the Sun, Sippar. And it is also in agreement in so far as Marduk is essentially the Sun-god.3 But the sun appears here, not as partner of the
1   For the meaning of the Roman names, comp. p. 42.
2   It is proved by HommePs Abh., 461 ff., that the eponymy of Sargon corresponds quite accurately to the age of Aries ; in the third year of his reign he was eponym, corresponding to the third age. The same reckoning is shown with Nebuchadnezzar. Sargon showed his friendliness to Babylon by this recognition of the calendar of Nabonassar. But at certain times in Assyria they did not adopt the advance ; perhaps in conscious opposition to Babylon they kept to the old calendar, like the Russians of the present day.
3   HommePs view, that sun-worship is genuine Babylonian and moon-worship West Semitic (Grundriss, p. 84), is untenable in the form brought forward. It is
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moon, but as divided into two and four, and the chief point is in every case that which marks the spring equinox, the victory of summer over the power of darkness. This point in the universe, as we saw p. 26 above, was originally given to Nebo; Nabu is called “ foreteller,” and as Morning Star he foretells the new day in the year and in the year of the universe cycle. But we know that his place was taken by Marduk, and thus the privileges of Babylon were founded upon occurrences in the astral universe.
Hammurabi boasts that the elevation of Marduk has fallen to him. Babylon was metropolis of the world because Marduk, symbolised by the bull, was represented in the age of the Sun as the victorious god of the year, who then also represented the entire astral universe.1
only correct in so far that the agricultural Babylonians preferably always fostered sun-worship (the sun bringing growth and harvest), whilst the nomadic Babylonians west of the Euphrates preferably fostered moon-worship, for the heat of the sun was their enemy, the light of the moon their friend. But the worship of sun and moon have always coexisted. Its astral character, as we have seen, makes the Ancient-Oriental religion a calendar religion, but every calendar which reckons by the seasons is necessarily founded upon the equalisation of sun and moon periods, and the relationship of astral to natural phenomena runs throughout them all. Certainly one or the other has been made most conspicuous for reasons possibly resting upon local cult, possibly caused by the interests of nomadic life on the one hand and of agricultural life on the other. The calendars may be founded upon a system which embraces the whole Eastern world, for Babylon is the land of the moon, and Egypt is the land of the sun, but neither in doctrine nor in popular mythology of the East can there ever be a question of the sun without its relationship to the moon coming into consideration, and vice versa. In the oldest theories known to us the moon had preference, later the sun. When, from the time of Sargon onwards, the sun took foremost rank, still lunar-worship also retained its rights, and was never superseded in its places of worship. For example, Hammurabi received the laws from the Sun-god, but he also cared for the wellbeing of the moon-city, Ur. The preference for the sun in later ages takes its rise in the spiritual supremacy of Babylon. In very late times the moon was again brought into prominence in the East, through the reformation of Mohammed, which was intentionally connected with the calendar and institutions of the moon- city of Haran. In this as in many other points the work of Mohammed shows itself to be the latest Ancient-Babylonian Renaissance ; see Winckler, ill. V.A. G., 1901, 237 ff. Upon G. Hiising’s opposing view, see Im Kanipfe urn den Alten Orient, i. 1, 14 f., 34 t.
1 In any case it was partly owing to chance; the calendar reform came to the help of the political and social situation, comp. Monotheistisc/ien Str'dmnngen innerhalb der babyl. Religion, p. 7 seq. Also the Jupiter character of Marduk comes into account. After Venus, Jupiter is the brightest planet. Did Jupiter,
THE AGES
7o
Age of Aries
In the eighth centurv B.C. the spring point retrograded into the sign of Aries. The otherwise insignificant King Nabonassar (Xabii-nat.sir, 747 to 734 B.C.) is brought into prominent notice through the astronomical recognition and establishment of this fact. Both the cuneiform “Babylonian Chronicle1'’ and the Canon of Ptolemy begin with him.1 for. from an astronomical point of view, he begins a new age, and we may conclude that he carried out a reform in calendar and time-reckoning which was acknowledged as authoritative in Babylon, and Syncellus says that according to the testimony of Alexander Polyhistor and Berossus certain historical records relating to his predecessors were destroyed by Nabonassar in order that chronology should begin only with him.2 The reform of the age of Aries did not come into full force in Babylon, for its astronomical beginning fell together with the gradual decline of Babylon. But the overwhelming power of Babylonian civilisation is still shown by the influence of the Marduk-Taurus age throughout centuries following. Till Xerxes Babylon remained mistress of
which passes through one sign of the zodiac yearly, roughly speaking, happen just at the decisive time to stand in Taurus? Marduk is pictured standing upon the bull ; was this symbol given him because of the new age and to establish him as chief of the gods? Or was the bull character of Merodach, tutelary deity of the town, decided by the change of residence of the Hammurabi dynasty from Sippar to Babylon ? We may compare with this the place taken by the sanctuary of Aries in the oasis of Ammon, when, in the age of Aries, the intellectual centre of Babylonia was transferred to Egypt. It is to be noted that the ideogram of the planet Jupiter means “Bull of the Sun,” and is explained as “Furrow of Heaven” (ploughed by the Bull of the Sun); see Hommel, Anfs. it. Abhand'., p. 356, and comp. p. 59 above. The tremendous influence exercised by the Marduk-Jupiter age over times reaching beyond its own limits may be recognised in the fact that Greeks as well as Romans elevated Zeus-Jupiter, though not a specially prominent deity to them, to be summits dens in place of their own tutelary town-god. Also the doctrine upon which the Mithra cult is founded indicates the age of Taurus as its origin.
1   K.B., ii. 274, 290.
2   Chronographia, 207 (comp. p. 61 above): avvayay&v Tas irpagis raiv r/pb aiiTov $a<xi\£a>v iftpauitreu, oirais air’ aiirov rj Ka.6apiQp.T}<rts yeur/Tai TS>V Xa\5attov fiacriXitav. In reforms in other ages the fables of the burning of the Books, in Persia under Alexander, and in China under Tshin-shi-hoang, 213 B.C., correspond to the breaking of the Tables. This motif may be taken into consideration also in regard to the burning of the library of Alexandria. It indicates the beginning of the era of Islam in Egypt under Omar ; see Winckler, Ex or. lux, ii. 2, 63.
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the East, and after the destruction of the temple of Marduk the care of the traditions passed over into Egypt. The oracle of Jupiter Ammon in the oasis of Ammon was held in peculiar veneration by the Greeks ; Alexander the Great consulted this oracle, and Jupiter Ammon is essentially identical with Marduk, but he is worshipped with the ram’s head corresponding to the new age. Evidence of the use of the Aries reckoning is to be found in the figure of the apvlov, which in Egyptian soothsaying about a new age appeared speaking in the time of King Bokchoris, according to Manetho.1 In the same sense Christ, as bringer of the new age, is described in the Apocalypse as apvlov.2
XIII. MOTIFS OF THE AGES AND ASTRAL MYTHOLOGICAL MOTIFS IN HISTORY
Oriental history unconnected with the ages of the universe is inconceivable; the stars ruled the changes of time. That the oldest Biblical writers are silent on the subject does not prove ignorance, and the Israelites also were certainly acquainted with the calculations in all times before Daniel, and we shall find traces, though the form of it varies.3
There is a great liking for indicating the ages by metals. Certain metals, like certain colours, etc., correspond to the planets. Silver belongs to the moon, gold to the sun, copper to Venus. The three ages, accordingly, in Babylonian reckon-
1   See Kroll, “ Vom Konig Bokchoris” in the Festgabefiir Biidinger, 1S9S.
2   See B.N.T., pp. 16 ff. Our calendar to the present day still names the
spring point in Aries, though it has long ago moved back in the course of the precession into the fish (Tisces), and it speaks of the tropics of Cancer and of Capricorn, though they should for long past be called tropics of Gemini and of Sagittarius. Possibly the “ fish ” symbol of early Christianity may be explained by Pisces. On the catacomb lamps there are two fish, one swallowing the other ; the explanation out of the letters of the word   : lyo-ovs Hpurros 6eov vios
aoortjp, is a later ingenious play. The Christians, influenced by the Oriental custom of characterising the ages according to the precession, may have symbolised the dawning era by the fish, to distinguish it from the heathen age of Aries. The zodiacal signs are of varied size, and the picture of the fish is lengthened out and begins close to the ram. In the Talmud the Messiah is called pa:, who will bring a new law. That is certainly a play of words on min, “fish.” A Jewish commentary on Daniel (fourteenth century) expects the Messiah in the sign of Pisces.
3   For further detail, see in section “ Biblical Ages.”
MOTIFS OF THE AGES
/1
ing, must be the silver, the gold, and the copper age. Instead of this, however, in later times, for various reasons, the reckoning was used which gave the first rank to the sun—gold, silver, and copper ages.1 As we have seen, the sun in divine operations equals Saturn, therefore the Golden Age is also the age of Saturn.2 That is the reckoning used in Daniel and in the West bv Hesiod. There has been added to the three past ages the present, the Iron age. Whether this iron age corresponds to the astral system, or is only a practical addition arising out of the conflicts of the present, may be left undecided. In any case, the order suggests the pessimistic thought, that the times become worse, and the world yearns for the return of the Golden Age.3
The change in the actual ages is represented in certain myths which mirror the system of the universe.4 These myths are for the Ancient-Oriental historian what metrics and language are for the poet, and light and shade or colour for the painter. Tire characteristic of the beginning of the history of every age is specially that the beginning person bears the features of the astral god who corresponds to the beginning of the age.5
Examples.—The stories of the birth of Sargon I. with tire motif of secret birth, exposure, and deliverance ; and see the stories of the infancy of Moses (Exod. ii. 2), to which a host of parallels from Babylonian texts and from all over the world may be found. The Indian legends of Buddha and Krishna, the Persian Zoroaster, the Chinese Fohi, begin in the same way. The same motifs are shown in Egyptian stories in the mythology of the birth stories of the king’s son (see Ernran, Agyptische Religion, p. 40, where they are characterised as "crazy”). It is the Marduk-Osiris legend, corresponding to the Taurus age, which is known to us in this form only at present, as the myth of the founder of a dynasty, and
1   It corresponds to the Egyptian view through which the philosophia orientalis passed to the West.
2   Winckler, F., iii. 1S7 set/., holds that according to the Babylonian order an age of Nebo followed that of Marduk. But the division in two parts, Nebo-Marduk (winter and summer), corresponds in division in quarters to beginning with Nergal-Saturn.
“ Beginning with the sun corresponds to the order of the week, which begins with Sunday ; beginning with Saturn to the order (Jewish) starting with Saturday.
4   Compare with this the conclusions drawn by Winckler in Ex oriente lux, i.
1, p. 33 et seq., from which, as may be seen from the deductions given above, I differ in some points.   5 H. Winckler, Gesch. Isr., ii. 10.
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not yet in the Marduk myths themselves, though they doubtless existed. The Romulus legend adds the motif of the Twin (Gemini) age, an archaism which we met with on p. 73, as also in the Persian Cyrus-Cambyses legend and the Athenian legend of the expulsion of the tyrants. H. Winckler explains from the motif of this oldest of the ages the origin of all historical legends, which show on the one side the moon form, and on the other a Dioroscuros legend (see p. 73). The main stream of the emigration seems to occur in the Taurus age. We meet with the motif of the Aries age in Alexander, who had himself painted by Apelles as Jupiter, and who consulted the oracle of the ram-headed Ammon-Jupiter in the oasis of Jupiter-Ammon (see p. 76). In the Apocalypse the symbolising of the victorious Christ as the Arnion corresponds to the age of Aries (see p. 76). Following another motif, Sennacherib, who desired to open a new epoch by the destruction of Babylon, had himself represented as a new Adam (Adapa abkallu = Marduk, see Chap. IV.). Sargon says that 350 kings reigned before him, and with him begins a new lunar age. Babylonian and Assyrian rulers were specially fond of having the tablet inscriptions of their reigns adorned with the motifs of the age of Deliverance (Assurnasirpal, Mardukbaladan II., Assurbanipal, and also Cyrus; see B.N.T., pp. 27 ff.). Since the nabi (prophet) was “foreteller,” that is, “bringer” of the new age (see p. 90), his history also was endowed with the motif of the new age, as we find in the stories of Elijah and Elisha. It is the same with the figures of that “Deliverer” who comes to the rescue in any trouble, and thus is the type of the great expected deliverer (in the Biblical sphere : Abraham, Joseph, Moses, Joshua, the Judges, David, and others).
The myth shows itself in word motif, and play upon words and motifs, either interwoven with the historical material or joined on to the unessential features of the story, especially in the application of artificial names and pseudonyms. Certain mythological presentments are commonly used as the typical expression for certain events. The victory of a hero appears as victory over the dragon ; crossing the sea or river in a dangerous crisis is the “ dismemberment of the dragon v> motif. Instead of the combat with the dragon we find the Slaughter of Five, (Epagomena as representative of the end of winter time), killing of the tyrant (Orion) or the giant,1 with the motif of drunkenness in harvest time or at sheep-shearing, battle of the Titans, slaughter of the seventy sons in extermination of a race, and so on.
1   Comp. p. 93.
MOTIFS OF THE AGES
79
The same thing; may be said of this mythological web as of the poems : “The true myth poem, like creative nature, is never arbitrary, there is an appointed place even for things seemingly introduced only for ornament.'” The historical legends of the time of Alexander, of the Persians, and of old Roman history bear the same marks ; and particularly the history of Mohammed and his followers. In Western Europe we have the histories of King Arthur and the Frankish stories of Charlemagne.
The assertion that this mythologic historical form of story plays its part also in Bible history has now stirred up considerable excitement.1 Winckler's Gesehichte Israels, ii., has a tendency to point out Bible history as a specially characteristic example of the mythological form of presentment. In this Winckler goes too far. We do not believe, for instance, that the triad (moon and sun in the manifestation of the two halves, Marduk and Nebo) is systematically used—Saul-moon, David- Marduk, Solomon, Nebo: it should only be taken as the motif in individual cases. But there is no doubt that the fabulous embellishment of later times is worked in systematically. In any case we are dealing with an epoch-making discovery, which is of utmost importance in understanding the Old Testament inode of speaking. It is therefore with fullest consideration that in the controversial treatise, Im Kampf um Babel and Bibel,2 we have spoken in behalf of the “ mythological web; and it will be the aim of this book also to show how the Ancient-Babylonian ideas and myths of the universe have left their traces in the Old Testament. Since the appearance of the first edition of this book the existence of this mythological garb of Old Testament narration has gained such wide- spread recognition that its admission to the ranks of Biblical exegesis amongst experts is now assured. A most important
1   Tammuz motifs in the history of Joseph ; Tammuz, or Marduk-Nebo motifs in the history of Moses. Marduk motifs in Joshua, David, etc. Examples of typical motifs : Dragon combat in the exodus from Egypt ; dismemberment of the dragon in the passage through the sea and in the passing over Jordan (see Exod. xiv., Joshua iii.) ; killing of the seventy sons of Ahab, 2 Kings x. 6 seq. (comp. C. Niebuhr, O.L.Z., 1S97, 380 seq.) ; conquest of the five kings (Gen. xiv., Joshua x. seq., Numb. xxxi.).
2   Leipzig, J. C. Hinrichs, 4th ed., 1903,
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question is, then:   In tracing the mythological allusions,
how much of historical circumstance is to be left ? No general rules can be laid down, and the decision must be made in each individual case.
I would propose the following leading propositions for discussion. So far as concerns the mythological connection, they lie at the root of the deductions of this book :—
1.   Mythological motifs, which adhere to the narrative, prove nothing against the historical probability of the whole fact. Sargon I. was held by Assyriologists to be a mythical person, because the stories of the secret birth, exposure in a basket, and discovery by Ishtar were told of him. Now we possess transcripts of annals of his and of his son Naramsin showing them to be powerful rulers. Minos till latety was taken to be unhistorical on account of the mythological character of the stories handed down about him; but in the latest discoveries of Cretan civilisation there are at least traces of a person very like Minos. Midas of Phrygia, in spite of the asses1 ears, the mythical lust for gold, and the Gordian knot, is established by Assyrian inscriptions as a historical personality. In view of these considerations it seems not impossible to find historic foundation even for such a figure as Samson, whose story can only be taken as pure mythology, and whose very name has been used as proof of his mythical character. From this point of view Winckler also takes some historic contents to be possible in the stories of the fathers which are held bv the “ critical-historical” school to be quite without foundation in history.
Winckler, in his Geschichte Israels, has not altogether avoided the obvious sophism which with the establishment of mvtho- logical features eliminates the historical fact, but in the closing chapter, in a recapitulation of the deductions, he expressly agrees that a correct knowledge of these forms of expression and of the conceptions of the ages of antiquity may be united with the most perfect faith in regard to the facts related just as well as with the most far-reaching scepticism.
2.   A distinction is to be made between the various parts of the Old Testament. The primitive tales of the Bible must be
MOTIFS OF THE AGES
81
judged differently to the legends of the fathers and the stories of the time before the kings, and these again differently to the stories of the time of the kings lying in full light of history.
The primitive tales are an introduction to the history and laws of the Israelites, which were edited, that is, collected, in later revision. In the light of the knowledge of their time they take their material of the creation and development of the world from the Ancient-Oriental teaching (comp, herewith Chap. IV.). They ai’e not fables nor diluted myths,1 but a view of life made use of as religion. The System, the outlines of which they kept in the background as far as possible, was for them a means for conveyance of creative religious ideas. How far it may have to do, for example, in the story of the Flood, with a tradition of actual facts cannot be decided with our present means for criticism.
The stories of the Patriarchs must be tested anew as to their historical credibility. It is not possible that they present an ideal story taken from former times, for the milieu has proved itself to be historic down to the minutest detail, and the actors also are histo

THE ZODIAC
19
In order to make the following clearer, a few astronomical phenomena may be mentioned here, and compare therewith fig. 10. Sunrise is on an average four minutes later every day. This gives a spiral line of 180 circles from solstice to solstice. The rising and setting points of the sun describe a circular line on the horizon, the mid-day point a corresponding circular line in the heavens. Twelve times a year the moon’s orbit shows the same phenomena. The full moon stands in opposition to
 
the sun ; therefore in winter, when the sun is moving through the lower zodiacal signs, the full moon is in the upper signs, and in summer the positions are reversed. When it is full moon at midnight of the summer solstice the sun touches its lowest point. When the sun is at the winter solstice point, and a dark moon begins at the same time, the sun and moon meet in the Underworld ; i.e. they are both in the lower signs of the zodiac. At the vernal equinox at sunrise, 6 a.m., the full moon sets in the west. At sunset of the autumn equinox, 6 p.m., the full moon rises in the east.
The ancients thought the eclipse of sun or moon to be a swallowing
20   
up by the dragon of one or the other.1 IV. R. 5 shows that the Babylonians knew the importance of the sun’s light to the moon; but, as the sun also swallows up all the stars., he himself sometimes figures as a dragon in the myths. They noted that in 18 years and 10 or 11 days eclipses were repeated in the same order, and recognised the connection between this phenomenon and the moon’s course. In 27 days 7 hours 13 minutes the moon moves once round the fixed-star heaven, crossing the sun’s orbit in an "ascending” ("head of the dragon”) and a "descending ” ("tail of the dragon ”) node. At the one point of intersection there may be eclipse of the sun and at the other of the moon. In each rotation these nodes move backwards about three breadths of the moon towards the west; this is observable by means of the fixed stars with the naked eye. In 1S3-5 years the nodes have completed a circle backwai-ds. There are therefore three movements to distinguish in the moon’s course : (l) The sidereal revolution from one fixed star back to the same star again = 27 days 7 hours 43 minutes ; (2) the synodic revolution from the sun back again to the sun (which in the meantime has moved backwards about 2 days 5 hours I minute) = 2f) days 12 hours 44 minutes ; (3) the Dragon month, from one ascending or descending node on the sun’s orbit to the next corresponding one, which meantime has retrograded 2 hours 3S minutes towards the west = 27 days 5 hours 5 minutes. The retrogression of the nodes explains the 18-vear periods of the eclipses.2 Solar eclipse takes place when the moon is in proximity to the sun and at the same time reaches a node ; thus, when a synodic and a Dragon month begin simultaneously. The Babylonians reckoned (the Chinese possessed the same knowledge) that 223 synodic months make 242 Dragon months, that is, 6585 days, or 18 years 10 or 11 days. Thales, taught by the Chaldeans, calculated by this means the solar eclipse of May 2S, 585 B.C.
The time of revolution of the seven planets3 (including sun and moon). The movement of the five true planets is in the form of a loop. Variation from the circle is small.
1.   The Moon. For her revolution see above. She does not move more than 10 degrees away from the ecliptic.
2.   Mercun) is morning and evening star, and is therefore also sometimes called Dilbat. It is only visible when twilight is
1   A myth of the fight between the moon and the seven evil spirits (Powers of the Underworld) is translated Chap. II., under "Sin.” On a boundary stone from Susa the new moon and the sun appear as one, together with the picture of the eight-rayed Venus; see A. Jeremias, article on "Shamash” in Roscher’s Lexikon der Mythologie.
- Comp. Das Alter der bahylonischen Astrononiie, 2nd ed.
A unity of seven planetary gods is certainly to be assumed as already existing in ancient Babylonia. Sun, moon, and Venus are the ruling triad in the ancient records ; Jupiter, Mercury, Mars, and Saturn make their appearance together as mythical gods in the Babylonian story of the Deluge.
THE CULMINATING POINT OF THE UNIVERSE 21
short.1 It completes the circle round the ecliptic in one year and one day.
3.   Feints, like Mercury, always in close proximity to the sun, appears as morning and evening star, and in 1 year and 7 months moves again into the same position in regard to the sun. Her revolution approaches nearest to the sun’s orbit.
4.   Mars takes 2 years 49 days to return to his original position. The remarkable red colour contributes to its character as the planet of misfortune.
5.   Jupiter, the brightest star after Venus, passes on an average through one zodiacal stage every year. The Babylonians possibly knew its satellites.
6.   Saturn’s revolution takes 29| years. The movement is so slow it can only be observed in the neighbourhood of bright, fixed stars.
III.   THE CULMINATING POINT OE THE UNIVERSE
1.   Xibiru
In the Babylonian epos Marduk at the building of the worlds places “ the Manzaz, the standing-place of Nibiru,” in order to form the “ knot ”2 of the courses of the stars. The solstice point in the cycle is this Nibiru : in the cosmic picture it is the “ Pass” between the two peaks of the Mountain of the World, above which the summits dens is enthroned.3
This summits dcus may be especially :—
1. Jmt, as in the fifth tablet of the epic Enuma elish, where the zodiac is divided between Anu, Bel, and Ea, and the uppermost part is given to Anu, corresponding to his throne in the north heaven when the universe is divided into three parts. In the text of the deluge story the heaven of Anu is the highest heaven.
1 Had the ancients optical instruments? and can we thus explain their observations of Mercury (?) and Venus in different phases, the moons of Jupiter (?), etc. ? The invention of the telescope in A. D. 160S may mean the rediscovery of a miracle of civilisation lost for thousands of years.
- Compare the eight- or sixteen-rayed ideogram for God, which, according to Jensen and Zimmern, denotes the meeting of the meridians at the celestial pole. See p. 50, n. I.
3   Upon Nibiru, properly “ pass,” as solstitial point, compare the evidence cited upon the culmination of Marduk. Upon the cosmic Nibiru, compare the following section upon the Mountain of the World, and what has been said upon Sichern, p. 24, n. 4. On the Greek race-course, which had a cosmic meaning (comp. Zech. vi. 1 ff.), the pass which the runners passed through between meta and the boundary corresponded to Nibiru.
22   
2.   Ninib. In division of the zodiac into four or two dominions (the latter counting by the solstices) the north point, the turning-point of the summer solstice (which, following the law of analogy, corresponds in the zodiac to the north point of the universe), belongs to Ninib. Therefore the step tower of Lagash, dedicated to Ningirsu-Ninib, is called “ House of the Fifty 11; “ fifty11 signifying, however, the completion of the circle (see p. 32). Ninib is therefore called miikil markets shame u irtsitim, “ overseer of the pole of heaven and earth.”
3.   Shi, who as full moon reaches its highest point at the north when the sun stands in opposition at the southern point of the universe (belonging then to the sun). For the moon, because of its continual return to life, suggesting resurrection from the dead, is held in antithesis to the sun, in whose light the stars disappear. Hence results the equation already found, which under certain circumstances identifies Anu, Ninib, and Sin. See article on “ Ram man ” in RoscheFs Lexikon der Mijthologie.
4.   Adad-Ramman, God of Storm, in so far as, under certain circumstances he, “the GU-GAL of heaven and earth,1'’appears, like Ninib, as summits deus.
5.   Marduk (Merodach) as summits deus, Demiurgos, representative of the circle of the universe. (V. R. 46. 34c; comp. II. R. 54, No. 5, obv. col. 11. 6.) In the last tablet of the epic Enuma elish it is said of him:
“ The Kirbish-Tiamat he strode through, without resting; His name be Nibiru, which contains [the middle] ;
He who fixes the courses of the stars of heaven,
Like sheep shall pasture the gods all together.11
As Nibiru, Marduk is also designated by the number 50, being the number representing the complete circle. The statement of the Astronomical Text, III. R. 54, No. 5, agrees with this : “ When the star of Marduk stands in the centre (kabal) of the heavens, he is called Nibiru.”l
1   Comp. p. 85, when Marduk, manifested in twelve forms in the month of Teshrit, also bears the name of Nibiru (III. R. 53, 8i£). The passage refers to a calendar according to which the year, and therefore the orbit of the universe,
THE CULMINATING POINT OF THE UNIVERSE 23
As Nibiru, Marduk is identical with Ninib in the Babylonian doctrine, and Ninib again is identical with the “Canaanite” Adad- Ramraan (Teshup of the Hittites, German Thor), the god with double hammer and shafts of forked lightning (see Chap. II., under Ramman)d The northern point of the ecliptic, which in the age of Taurus was in Leo, corresponds to the Fire Kingdom (zenith of the sun’s course, region of meteoric showers) ; hence the mythological character of this divinity as <! the smith.” Also it is the turning-point of the moon’s course (motif of lameness).2 The fiery passage, known also to the Gnostics (Purgatory!), led into the
 
FIG. 11.—Shamash the Sun-god entering the eastern gate of heaven. (Seal cylinder No. 89,110 of the Brit. Mus.)
2. The Double-peakecl Mountain of the World
The culminating point of the celestial “ earth 'n (the zodiac) appears in Babylonian mythology as a double-peaked mountain. Above this mountain is the vault of the north heaven with the north pole of the universe, which was held to be the throne of the .summits dews. Corresponding to cycle and cosmos, the cosmic throne of God appears also as a double-peaked mountain. “ Scientifically the two peaks correspond to the highest points of the monthly lunar and yearly solar orbit.3 The corre-
began in autumn, and yet in which Jupiter-Marduk retained the role of beginner of the cycle, which, properly speaking, belonged to Mercury-Nebo (comp. p. 26).
1   Comp. Donar in Donnerstag, in place of Jupiter (jeudi, [ovis dies).
?? Comp. H. Winckler, F., iii. 82 ; M. V.A.G., 1901, 356. Details, p. 31.
3 Upon this, see description and drawing in Das Alter des babylonischen Astro- nomie, 2nd ed., pp. 16 f., where there is a picture of the Babylonian double-peaked mountain with the Deity standing above the summit. Winckler’s idea of the defile between two mountains, and of the peaks as antipodal points of the universe, can hardly be correct (F., iii. 306; M. V.A.G., X901, 241 f.).
24   
sponding points on the horizon give further the two-peaked “ Mountain of the East ” and “ Mountain of the West.” In the winter solstice the sun sets at the lowest, while the full moon rises at the highest point of the horizon ; in the summer solstice the reverse.1
Since the earth and every country upon it correspond as a
microcosmos to the celestial picture, it follows that the “ Mountain of Countries ” {hcir- mg kurkura, .'shad matati), the summit of the earthly universe, must be a double mountain. In the myth the two peaks correspond to the two trees in the cosmic sanctuary (Paradise), one signifying Life, the other Death ; compare Helios and Selene as centre, i.e. summit
FIG. 12.—Sun and moon as summit of 0f the zodiac, and Dodekaoros the zodiac and Dodekaoros upon an
Egyptian marble plate.2   on an Egyptian marble .'slab
(fig. 12), and also the trees Helios and Selene, found by Alexander as substitute for the Deity in Paradise.3
Each country as microcosmos has its own double-peaked “ Mountain of the World.” In the Biblical presentation this is particularly obvious in Ebal and Gerizim, Deut. xi. 29, xxvii. 12, the most ancient places of worship on Israelite territory, where six tribes (corresponding to six “ houses ” of the zodiac, symbolising the half of the sun’s orbit) stood upon the Mount of Blessing (Gerizim), and six stood opposite upon the Mount of Cursing (Ebal).1
1   Fig. n possibly shows the mountain, with the Sun-god emerging from between the two peaks. Compare the two mountains in Zech. vi. 1-7, from between which the four chariots come forth, drawn by four spans of horses, which are the four corners of the world. The original myth had four horses to one chariot.
2   See Boll, Sp/nera, table vi.
3   Winckler, O.L.Z., 1904, 103 (= Kritische Schriften, iii. 110): Geschichte Israels, ii. 108 ; II. V.A. G., 1901, 306, 345. Further, on the Coptic tablet, p. 64, fig. 22, the circle of the universe (recognisable by the serpent and the four animals representing the corners of the world) has the sun and moon for its centre.
1 Upon the land as microcosmos, see pp. 53 ff. For the signs of the zodiac as
 
THE FOUR POINTS OF THE UNIVERSE 25
IV.   THE FOUR POINTS OF THE UNIVERSE
The orbits of the moon and of the sun are divided, like the non-circumpolar stars, into two natural halves by the arch of day and night (see fig. 10). The points of intersection at the beginning of each six months are characterised as the vernal and autumn points of the sun and also by certain stages of the moon’s course.
In the zodiacal age, i.c. by calendar reckoning starting from the vernal equinox in the sign of Taurus, the east point is very probably Aldebaran, brightest star in the Hyades, a group belonging to the constellation Taurus, and the west point is in Scorpio,1 almost certainly the star Antares, about 180 degrees distant from Aldebaran. These two stars represent in ancient astronomy the first and fourteenth lunar stages, thus dividing the twenty-eight stages, which are otherwise at varying distances, into equal halves.
This double division, by the halves of the moon’s orbit and by the equinoctial points,'2 corresponds to another division of the cycle according to the solstices, which shows the “arch of day and the arch of night,” i.c. the visible and invisible part of the zodiac differently (for the geographical latitude of Babylonia, 5 : 7). This bipartition appears to be the more ancient in Babylonia. The combination of the two divisions gives a quartering of the zodiac into the seasons with four cosmic critical points. Now, according to the Babylonian conception,
symbols of the Twelve Tribes, see Gen. xlix. : also the symbolism of the Tabernacle.”
The sun and moon as the points of life and death (pp. 30, 34 ff.) correspond respectively each to six signs of the zodiac of summer and winter. Upon the meaning of Sinai and Horeb, Mountain of the Moon and Mountain of the Sun, Ebal and Gerizim, see Winckler, F., iii 360 ff. The name Sichem (Shekem) has a cosmic meaning ; it signifies the same thing as the Babylonian name discussed on p. 21, ‘ pass,” “ highway.” The rupture of the tradition between Sinai and Horeb perhaps arose when the meaning of the double-peaked mountain (Sinai = moon, Horeb = sun) was no longer understood. Near Tokyo a double-peaked mountain is the holy place of the Creator brother and sister of the Shinto religion ; they correspond to sun and moon.
1   In the epic of Gilgamesh the Underworld is guarded by scorpion-headed men. - Shil/cuht, i.e. “hold the scales,” for example, III. R. 51, is the technical expression for equinox.
26   
the Divine Power manifests itself in the four critical points.1 Since each of the three great star Divinities which rule over the zodiac manifests himself likewise in two half or four quarter phenomena (moon and Venus as true planets have always four phases, and the seasons of the year serve as phases of the sun), the points are suitable places for an embodiment of the Divine Power. And as the sun, moon, and Venus always have a critical point (apogee or turning-point of the orbit), a certain point of the zodiac belongs to each of the four “phases” as special place of manifestation in the universe.
Since in the three thousand years of history known to us the constellations have passed through great changes, it follows of necessity that a mythology founded upon phenomena of the stellar system must also undergo change. And it being a question of a circle completing itself in the antitheses of night and day, summer and winter (summer and winter of the universe), there arises the principle that the antitheses in course of time change places. In the age of Hammurabi (Babylon's supremacy) the four chief points of the solar orbit were apportioned as follows : 2
Marduk: Morning, Spring ) East and North, the two light
Ninib :   Mid-day, Summer ) halves of the year "and day.
Nebo :   Evening, Autumn ) West and South, the two night
Ncrgal: Night, Winter ) halves of the year and day.
Accordingly, therefore, to Marduk belongs the Morning of the Spring equinox (sunrise of the Spring sun on 21st March, 6 a.m.); to Nebo, the evening of the Autumn equinox (21st September, 6 p.m.); to Ninib, the Summer solstitial point (21st June, 12 midday : from that time the sun sinks into Winter and the Realm of Death ; this is the turning-point, the Tammuz point); to Nergal, the Winter solstitial point (21st December, midnight: from then the sun again ascends).3
1   Three, when the Underworld point is omitted ; for example, three pillars of heaven among the Sabaeans (Chwolsohn, ii. 6): East, Centre (of the heavens), and West.
2   A fifth direction, upwards, was possibly represented by Venus, who is united with sun and moon in the Triad, but who appears, on the other hand, as belonging together with the four planets. The character of Venus as Queen of Heaven would correspond to her character as “upward direction.”
3   This “exchange in the order of the planets” demonstrated by Winckler and Hommel has been vehemently disputed by Kugler, loc. cit. See upon this my deductions in A.B.A., 2nd ed., pp. 76 ff.
THE FOUR POINTS OF THE UNIVERSE 27
In periods preceding the age of Hammurabi, as in the epochs after the destruction of Babylonian supremacy, the order was reversed for reasons which should be clear from the following deductions:
Jupiter (Gudud-Marduk) takes the place of Mercury (Nebo).
Mercury (Dunpauddua-Nebo) takes the place of Jupiter (Marduk).
Mars (Keiwan-Ninib) takes the place of Saturn (Nergal).
Saturn (Zalbatanu-Nergal) takes the place of Mars (Ninib).
These chief points of the zodiac answer according to the law of parallels (zodiac as celestial microcosmos) to the four corners of the world.1 In so far as they refer to the zodiac, the summit of which is seat of the summus deus, they are the four supporters of the throne of the summus deus, and they appear embodied in the corresponding figures of the zodiac: Taurus (bull), Leo (lion), Eagle,2 Man,3 (Aquarius).
In this we find the explanation of the Merkaba4 (four beasts,
1   The earth has four corners to correspond, whence come the four winds. See Rev. vii. i.
2   The eagle is the bird of the summus deus. Compare the eagle on the shield of Ningirsu (Index, under “ Eagle’'), the eagle in the cosmic picture of the world, (fig. 13), the eagle of Jupiter of the classic period, the eagle in the Mithraic mysteries (see Monotheist.-Stromungen, p. 17); further, Rev. viii. 13, the eagle at the sound of the four trumpets (motif of Marduk-Jupiter, see B.N.T., pp. 25 f.). The sign of the Eagle is between Aquarius and Capricorn, a part of the heavens where very bright stars show, and not far from the zodiac. It might very probably be included in the actual signs of the zodiac on account of Acair, the brilliant star in the Eagle. Comp. A.B.A., 2nd ed., p. 4S f. ; Zimmern, K.A.T., iii. 6S1 f. ; and (differing) Winckler, F., iii. 299 ff. In the course of time the Eagle deviates further from the region of the zodiac ; Winckler, F., iii. 297, differing further.
Probably corresponding to Scorpio and Arcitenens, represented as one picture by the Babylonians (comp. Izdubar-Nimrod, p. 67), with which compare the Scorpion-men in the epic of Gilgamesh, who guard the Underworld, and to whom, therefore, the autumn point of the cycle corresponds. Also Amphora, Water-bearer (Aquarius of Manilius and Ovid), may be considered. Note that the First Man (Adapa) rises from the ocean, and that Ea ( = i/u ameln) is god and man. See Chap. III., under “Creation of Man.” Comp, also Heuzey, Rev. d. Ass. el d'Arch. Orient., pp. 129 ff., and Homrnel, G.G.G., 227, n. 7, where the Fishman is made equivalent to the ilu-amelu of the mythological texts and to Aquarius in the zodiac.
4   The Merkaba is the heavenly throne or chariot of Ezekiel; Ma’asch Merkaba, the lore concerning the chariot. Many references to this occur in rabbinical sayings. Thus Sandalfon (“the angel of prayer,” see Longfellow) is
28   
tetrarnorph) of Ezekiel and of the throne with the four beasts, surrounded by the sea of glass (Rev. iv. 6; comp. B.N T., 13)— and of the symbols of the four Evangelists (according to Irenseus, adv.
luer., 3. 11, the four pillars of the world ; see B.X. T., 87). The order, Matthew, bull; Mark, lion; Luke, man; John, eagle, corresponds to right, left, below, above. In Ezekiel the bull is to the left, therefore the Kibla is e: oriented” to the south (comp. p. 32) ; in front, man (beginning of the world, see p. 6); behind, the lion (Fireflood in Leo, the north point); right, eagle. For detail see Ezek.
i.   4 ff. Fig. 13 shows the zodiac and the corners of the world in the Grecian age : Jupiter (highest at the north point), Neptune, Mars, and Mercury. The Coptic picture reproduced on p. shows sun and moon in the middle of the circle of the universe symbolised by the snake and four beasts. See p. 24, n. 3.
 
DOCUMENTARY EVIDENCE OE THE ARRANGEMENT OK THE “CORNERS OF THE WORLD'1 IN THE ZODIACAL AGE
There is no text which says Marduk-Jupiter corresponds to east, Nebo to west, etc. ; the evidence is gathered from the sense of the calendars and from mythology, yet there are occasional instances of cuneiform statements
said to stand behind the Merkaba. The Hekalot or books of Enoch are called Merkaba.
A vision of the Merkaba was brought about by fasting. The ascetics who attained to this vision were thought to ride in the chariot of the Merkaba. The idea of the ride is of Mithraic origin.
THE FOUR POINTS OF THE UNIVERSE 29
1.   Marduk = the Spring or East Point
The spring or east point belongs in the historical age of Babylon to Marduk, for Marduk’s festival is the New Year feast, festival of the spring equinox. Of the four planets amongst whom the corners of the world were divided, the New Year’s point probably belonged in a prehistoric age to Mercury, whose name Nabu,
-c Foreteller,” characterises him as Morning Star, therefore as bringer of the new day, of the new age, of the new cycle. The year must, according to this, have begun in autumn. Under the dominion of Babylon, Marduk, whose planet Jupiter has its ruling point at the east point of the universe, became the Bringer of the New' Age. In K. 759 (Thompson’s Reports, No. 1S9) it is said:
“ When" the star of Marduk is seeu in the beginning of the year, the growth of plants will thrive that year.” This star is Jupiter. When Mercury is praised as the New Year star of good fortune in other texts (Kugler, Sfernkunde, vol. ii.), it corresponds to the older teaching. Upon this, and especially upon the exchange in the roles of Marduk and Nebo, see A.B.A., ‘2nd ed., pp. )6 ff. ; in addition also p. JO, n. 2.
2.   Xeho at the Autumn or West. Point1
A text dating from the Arsacid age (250 B.C.-2S0 A.D.), but which certainly reflects ancient ideas (for in later times they did not invent such things, only speculated about them), says that at the winter solstice the “daughters of Ezida” (priestesses of the temple of Nebo at Borsippa) remove to the “ House of Day ” (i.e. the temple of Marduk of Babylon) “to lengthen the days,” and that in the summer solstice the “daughters of Esagil ” remove to the “House of Night” (i.e. the temple of Nebo of Borsippa) “to shorten the days ” : that is to say, the light half of the year, the east point, belongs to Marduk, the dark half to Nebo; and at the equinox each one solemnly abdicates his rule to the other.2 Theocritus hands down to us the same astral mythological idea (Id., xv. 103,
1   Compare the Greek Hermes (Mercury), biformis, with parti-coloured black-and- white cap, as guide to Hades. Libra belongs to the autumn; but it symbolises the scales of the dead, not the autumn equinox, otherwise it would appear in the spring quarter as well. “Sol exaltatur in ariete, in libra dejicitur” (Firmicus). Next to Libra comes the Serpent, because the equinoxes begin with the rise of the star Serpentarius. Hence, in Roman mythology, /Equitas holds the scales in her right hand, and serpents lie at her feet, and Proserpina Libera (Venus in Hades) has a girdle of snakes.
2   Comp, most recently Winckler, F. iii., 27S ff., contrary to H. Zimmern’s remarks, K.A.T., iii, 400; A. Jeremias, A.B.A., p. 78. Certainly Zimmern is right in observing that the connection between Nabu and Capricorn (Goat-fish),
V.   R. 46. 3S, argues a connection between this divinity and the winter season (autumn equinox) ; but there are no grounds for the assertion that this connection existed in the earliest times.
SO   
106) when he says of Tammuz-Adonis, the ancient Eastern divinity with characteristics of the year, or half-year (Marduk + Nebo):1 “ He completes his ascent and descent in twelve months, and the Horse” (this also explains what is meant by “ daughters of the House of Day” and “daughters of the House of Night”) “accompany him from the realm of Proserpine (Ishtar of the winter half) into the dwelling of Venus (Ishtar of the summer half) ” ; these “ dwellings ’’ signifying the “Houses” possessed (fig. 2) by stars and constellations in the zodiac, which is divided into two halves by the equator and equinoctial points. Compare further the passage in the liturgy of Mithra (Dieterich, p. 7): “Thou shalt behold the divine order (!); the gods who rule the day ascend into heaven, and the others descend” (i.e. the zodiacal figures descend) ; “and the path of the visible gods will appear by means of the sun.”
3.   Nergal at the Winter or South Point
Nergal has characteristics of the Underworld, which is also named after his place of worship, Kutha. Therefore only the unseen—that is, the “ under’’-lying—south point belongs to him ; Nergal-Saturn is explicitly made synonymous with the sun by the Babylonians (comp. Thompson’s Reports, No. 176, Rev. 1 : Lubat Lagush, Saturn = Star of the Sun). An astronomical text2 says : “On the 18th of Tammuz Nergal descends into the Underworld, and on the 28th of Kislev he ascends again. Shamash and Nergal are one." Eratosthenes, “Simplicius,” and Diodorus attest the same. The sun is represented as Underworld divinity because in his light the stars disappear and perish; the moon, on the contrary, as Upperworld divinity because in her ever-recurrent renewal she represents the resurrection from the dead (Inbu ska ina remanishu ibbami, i.e. “ Fruit which reproduces itself from itself”). The Egyptian of the middle kingdom says -to the mummy: “Thou art Osiris!” (moon in the same sense); that is, “ Thou shalt live again !
4.   Ninib at the Summer or North Point
When the sun is at the south point, in the Underworld, the place assigned to him in the universe,3 the moon is diametrically opposite, at the north point, the lunar point in this system, as we have already recognised in the Anu-point (Anu — Sin ; see p. 14, comp. p. 36). That it should also belong to Ninib is to be expected, since the three other corners of the world are disposed
1   See p. 35.
2   Zimmern, K.A.T., 3rd ed., 3S8 ; also Winckler, F., iii. 2S6 ff. The passage in Diodorus so often quoted (ii. 30) makes Kronos and Helios equal.
3   In the Babylonian calendar, this occurs when the solstices are emphasised (the middle of the season, division of the year into quarters). Then Marduk is the sun, and Nebo the moon, as in the text quoted, p. 32.
THE FOUR POINTS OF THE UNIVERSE 3]
of to Marduk, Nebo, and Nergal. But we may prove it another way. This point is called Nibiru, that is, the Pass through which everyone must go, and farther northwards than which he cannot go (see p. 21). The epic Enuma elish describes on the Fifth Tablet (K.T., p. 122 f.) the establishment of the Nibiru point. We will try to analyse the difficult passage (continuation p. 113) :
“ He made the abiding-places of the great gods; constellations in their likeness he placed as Lumashi-stars (houses of the zodiac?). He determined the year, marked the boundaries; twelve months ; he fixed the stars in three divisions (the so-called thirty-six decani, which are in three divisions, four stages to each, and of which again each one belongs specially to Ann, Bel, and Ea?—or is the division of the year into three parts, analogous to the three great gods, meant?). After he had established firm sections for the days of the year, he erected the station at Nibiru to mark their (the stars’) knot. In order that none (of the stars) should go wrong, none go astray, he established besides the stations of Inlil and Ea ” (variation Ann is surely an error; Nibiru marks Anu’s province in the zodiac). “ He opened doors on both sides ” (the equinoctial points in east and west and also the doors of sunrise and sunset),1 “made a firm barrier to left and right” (i.e. north and south), “in the centre (of the gate) he placed the eltau(?).”
Note further, that in the final tablet of the epic Marduk has fifty titles, of which the highest is Nibiru (see p. 22). Fifty corresponds to the number and the ideogram of Ea, and denotes the complete circle of the universe embodied in Marduk.2 Now, since it is distinctly attested that the previously mentioned “ House of the Fifty ” in Lagash (p. 22) (a seven-storied temple) belongs to Ningirsu- Ninib (see Winckler, M.V.A.G., 1901, 356), it is thereby indirectly attested that the north point belongs to Ninib-Mars, with which conclusion also all the phenomena correspond. Since, further, as we have already seen, Nibiru is the lunar point, it follows that Ninib-Mars may be identified with the moon (she is therefore called Nibiru) as Nergal-Satum with the sun.3 The north point is mythologically important as critical point both of sun and of moon.
1   Compare the presentment on the cylindrical seal, fig. u.
2   Accordingly, he is called “he who grasps the head and tail” (lu stsabit rSshu arkai), Winckler, K.T., 2nd ed., 128, “he who makes the forepart the hindpart.” This recalls the symbolic presentment of the universal orbit, showing a serpent biting its own tail, which is found on Egyptian, Hindoo, and Phoenician monuments : e.g. the upper rim of a Phoenician sacred vessel in the Vorderasiatisches Museum in Berlin ; also the representation of Eternity on Roman coins. In the Coptic picture of the universal orbit, p. 64, the figures of cherubim indicate the four corners of the world within the circle of the serpent.
3   On this point see Winckler, F., iii. 193, 20S ; M.V.A.G., 1901, 266; and the proof supplied by the Egyptian list of five intercalary gods bringing the 360 days of the year up to 365. Saturn (sun !), Mars (moon !), Mercury, Venus, Jupiter : see Spiegelberg, O.L.Z., 1902, 6 ff.
32   
In the sun’s cycle it is the summer solstice point, which in the cycle of the year brings destroying heat and in the cycle of the universe brings the conflagration of the worlds. The Fire Realm (cleansing fire and passage into the Anu-heaven) is a substitution for it; from thence fire comes to the earth (meteor showers in midsummer), and there is the point of the "lame smith ” ; comp. p. 2"). In V.R. 46, No. 1, Rev. 41, when a planet which kills the cattle is called (Litbad bulim mushmif), the planet of Nibiru, Mars in particular is meant.
Besides these indirect evidences for Ninib = north point1 already partly shown by us in A/T.A.O., 1st ed., H. Winckler has now added authentic first-hand documentary proof out of the First Tablet of the cuneiform work on evil spirits: C.T., xvi., pi. iv., pp. 143 ff.
To understand the text, one must bear in mind that the point of sight is in the east, according to Babylonian reckoning, and representing the equinox, Marduk = sun and Nebo = moon. The passage runs:
"Shamash before me, Sin behind me,
Nergal to my right,
Ninib to my left.”
In so far as the four planets represent the chief points of the sun’s orbit, each of them bears also in a special sense the solar character: Marduk is spring or morning sun ; Nebo, autumn or evening sun ; Ninib, midday or summer sun ; Nergal, night or winter sun.
In the same way, on the principle that sun, moon (and Venus) show the same corresponding phenomena, the four planets also correspond to the moon’s phases.
V. ORIENTATION OF THE UNIVERSE
From the arrangement of the “Corners of the World” different theories present themselves about the orientation of the world (Mohammedan Kibla).'2
The theory of Creation arising from the primeval ocean
1   Still considered uncertain by Zimmern, K.A.T., 3rd ed., 408 seq. The whole system, and the inferences it entails, stands or falls according to the view taken of this question.
2   To be distinguished from the points of direction established by the gnomon, for example on the compass surrounding the Cyl. of Sargon, 66 {z/iihrit viii share). Upon Kibla, see Winckler, F., iii. 296 ff., and compare alos p. 33. When the south is given as first direction (north second, east third, west fourth) in III. R. 66, Rev. 27c; II. R. 29, 1-4, it is not treating of the Kibla, but of the relation of the points of direction in regard to the wind points.
ORIENTATION OF THE UNIVERSE
33
agrees with the Kibla to the south.1 The correct astronomical “ orientationis that which makes north the chief direction, the celestial north pole; this may be either the north point of the universe, which belongs to Anu, or the north point of the zodiac, which, according to the above deductions, belongs to Ninib or Sin, the moon ; therefore in the Babylonian mythological system Sin = Ninib and = Anu.
This is the true orientation, which the Babylonians used so long as moon-worship lasted, and which also corresponds to the fact that the river Euphrates flows from north to south (hence, above = north, beloxo = south). For this reason the temple belonging to the Tower of Nippur is on the north-east side ; here the north corner is the Kibla. This Kibla is found amongst the Sabaeans (Chwolsohn, ii. 5. 601), and in the direction for prayer of the Mandaeans they turn towards the north point of the heavens.2
There is possibly another orientation, which, however, seems secondary to the north Kibla ; namely, to the zvest, the other night point. It corresponds with the division of the universe into two (summer and winter, day and night)—in it Nebo is equivalent to the moon, Marduk to the sun,—and may be founded upon the following simple astronomical observation : when the spring sun rises at the equinoctial point (therefore 6 a.m.) the full moon sets in opposition in the west. Therefore here also the orientation is drawn from moon-worship. This orientation is shown by the year beginning in autumn (Tishri is called Beginning3), and is
1   See above, p. 6.
2   Upon the north as chief direction, compare the designations above and below = north and south (or north and west, and south and east). Comp., for example, H. C., 24, 30 f. (“I have rooted out the enemy dish and shaplish, above and below As standard direction the north is called direction No. 1, ishtami, iltami. The sacred character of fire may perhaps be explained by the fact that the importance of the north is rather cosmographical than astronomical (north, the region of fire, see p. 31). Thus in the Zoroastrian or ancient Persian religion, probably the reverence paid to fire originated in the worship of Zoroaster’s native place. The opposition here is the kingdom of water, so important to the Babylonians (Ahriman and his Dragons).
3   A similar arrangement will be found in the age of Aries. It is plain that the year also began in autumn in the Mithraic calendar, since the sixteenth day (full moon) and therefore the seventh month, which occupies the same position in the year as the sixteenth day does in the month, are both consecrated to Mithra.
VOL. I,   3
34   
historically supported by the phenomenon that originally Nebo took the place of Marduk, and vice versa.
Both theories agree with moon-worship. This changed when the age of Sin 1 (according to this theory = Nebo) came to an end, and the age of Marduk began, i.e. when the spring sun passed into the sign of Taurus out of the sign of Gemini, and when the city of Babylon (whose tutelary deity, Marduk, was symbolised as a bull) became, under the rulership of the Hammurabi dynasty, metropolis of the world. Then there arose a theory which fitted everything to Marduk, that is, to the east point. From that time the New Year was celebrated in spring.2
The alteration of the Kibla does not absolutely necessitate change of the north and south points. It depends upon the direction of the circuit. The yearly movement of the sun is towards the east; the feon-movement of the precession of the equinoxes (see “Ages of the Universe,” p. 69) is towards the west.
VI. SOLSTICE AND EQUINOX Sun and Moon
It may be concluded from the foregoing deductions that there are two methods of calculation possible in the religious calendar system.
One emphasises the solstices: the other, which lays stress on the phenomena of nature, accentuates the central point of the arc from solstice to solstice—the equinoctial points. That both methods exist is shown by the Babylonian festivals. The New Year festival, which is spoken of in the Arsacid text quoted on p. 29, celebrates the equinoxes. The Tannnuz festival, in the form of worship best known to us, celebrates the solstices (birth
1   Details under the heading “Ages of the World,” p. 69 seq.
2   The autumn celebration of new year corresponds to the Sumerian orientation, which accounts for, e.g., the festival of Ningirsu in Gudea. When Babylon became metropolis, the Babylonian calendar prevailed, and the year began in spring. The preference for the north is Sumerian, in contrast to the Babylonian arrangement of the cardinal points ; thus in the Jewish state calendar under Shesbazar, the year begins in autumn : see p. 46. A mosaic map of Jerusalem (of the sixth century A.D.), found in Medeba, shows that the main gate of the old city faced north, and the street of columns ran north. The orientation of the map is to the east, with the sea at the bottom.
SOLSTICE AND EQUINOX
35
and death of Tammuz), or, accentuating the relations between sun and moon, the wedding and death of Tammuz (see fig. 14). It depends upon this, therefore, whether there is a division of the circle into two or four. In division into two,
(Full moon point)
Solstice
Ninib-Nibiru
 
Winter Solstice
(Dark moon)
FIG. 14.—Sun and mo"ni with their mythological motifs.
either Nergal or Ninib retires into the background (summer and winter, day and night; comp. Gen. viii. 22); then is Marduk:   Day,   summer.
Nebo:   Night,   winter.
When the moon has the Overwork! and the sun the Underworld character,1 Marduk represents the latter and Nebo the former, as we find in the text quoted p. 32 ; or Marduk and Nebo retire, and then Ninib represents the moon and Nergal the sun.2 The
1   Comp. p. 30. In Deut. xxxiii. 13 the sun and the culmination of the moon (tm Septuagint, crwoSos) are mentioned as parallels to Heaven and Tehom ; see Winckler, F., iii. 306.^7.
2   Then not east and west, but north and south are named as dish and shaplish, above and below.
36   
complete circle can also be represented by one divinity. This is shown in the figure of Tammuz, so far as the myth represents the moon. The waning moon is Tammuz sinking into the Underworld ; the growing moon is the triumphant resurrection of Tammuz with the crescent sword after three days (!) of the
 
N.B. On the large circles the dots show the parts lighted by the night sun, but invisible from the earth.
* Death motif; the corresponding sun motif is the veiling.
** The moon triumphs with the sickle sword over the Powers of Darkness, or is represented as spring new moon (after three days dark moon) rescued by the sun, or bears the sun upon his shoulders through the water region (Christopher). In the emphasis of moon motifs the figure bearing the burden or being borne represents the growing or waning moon.
*** Meeting of the spring full moon (after three days dark moon) with the rescue of Tammuz (sun after winter time), celebrated as New Year.
SOLSTICE AND EQUINOX
37
dark moon time.1 Tammuz is then Nergal + Ninib. Nergal and Ninib appear as twins: are also, therefore, according to
V.   R. 46. 4a, b, associated with the zodiacal sign Gemini.
Emphasising the solar cycle, Tammuz is cither = Marduk + Nebo (marking the equinoxes, as in the passage from Theocritus,
 
FIG. 16.—Tablet from Nippur (?) with figure of the heptagram. Comp. Hilprecht, Expl. in Bible Lands, p. 530.
 
Mercury
 
quoted p. 29) or = Ninib + Nergal (marking the solstice, as in the astronomical cuneiform text quoted p. 30). A third point of view presents in Tammuz the relation of sun and moon. The one rescuing the other out of the Underworld, either the spring new moon rescues the sun (bears him on his shoulders: St Christopher) at the equinoctial points, or the
1   After the Hilal (Arabic, first day of new moon) the moon moves away from his twin brother for fourteen days, then “recognises” him, turns towards him, and wastes away till his death fourteen days later.
58   
spring dark moon, sinking into the Underworld, is rescued by the spring sun. We have a classical witness to the lunar combat in the text reproduced in Chap. II., p. 111. Elsewhere Islitar appears as the partner of Tammuz. Ishtar rescues Tam muz out of the Underworld (journey to hell of Ishtar). Here the rescuing and the rescued equally can bear either solar or lunar character, and on the other hand either can represent the masculine or feminine element.1
Emphasising the solstices, the crisis is the meeting of the full moon with the sun at the summer solstice (24th June : wedding of Tammuz, at the same time the death point of Tammuz).2 Emphasising the equinoxes, the crisis is the meeting of the spring new moon with the spring sun at its victorious point.
Another representation of the cycle of the universe places the seven planets as seven points within a circle in the form of a heptagram. We find the picture of this heptagram on an ancient Babylonian tablet (see fig. 16), and it is well known how great a role it still played in medieval astrology. When the circle is divided into two parts the heptagram becomes a pentagram by the elimination of two planets. Both the eliminated planets were then held as planets of misfortune. In the astrology known to us this is particularly the case with Nergal-Satuni and Ninib-Mars. The pentagram is the astrological magic charm. It is identical with the “ Druid’s-foot,”3 pentalpha, the fairy-cross, and the Sains pythagoras, which were put on the threshold of medieval churches as protection against the entrance or exit of evil spirits (comp. Otte, Kirchliche Archdologie, 5th ed., i. 479). On an Etruscan
1   Ishtar and Tammuz; Isis and Osiris; Attar and Shamash ; Baalat of Gebal and Adonis ; Nergal and Erishkigal; Orpheus and Eurydice. We find the same myth in the Japanese Koyiki, the sacred book of the Shinto sect (see Chap. III., under “Japan ” ), also among the South American races (see Ehrenreich, Die Mythen der siid-amerikanischen Urvolker, p. 37). Ehrenreich testifies that Peruvian myths current before the time of the Incas show an Asiatic character; nevertheless he doubts their Asiatic origin, because he does not take into account the possibility of prehistoric transmission.
a This is the meaning of the motif of ‘1 looking back ” (see p. 36), which is found throughout the whole world. Compare, for example, the South American myth of Yurakare (Ehrenreich, ioc. cit., p. 37), where the moon is hewn in pieces and grows again, follows the sun home, but disappears because she looks back in defiance of the command.
3   Pentagram and “Druid’s-foot” are exactly the same. Drttide or Trade meant a witch in medieval German. See first part of Faust: Mephistopheles cannot pass the pentagram on Faust’s doorstep. — Trans, note.
THE CALENDAR
mirror the pentagram is represented on a ball held by the Goddess of Fate, therefore certainly represents the cosmos (see Gerhard, Ges. Abaci. Ahhandiungen, pictorial atlas, table iv. No. 6).
The myths of the conjUct icith the Poicer of Darkness (Dragon-combat) in the revolution of the day,1 year, and universe vear are based upon the teaching outlined here. In the combat either the moon or sun, or both, are always in antagonism,2 and the Deliverer is he who brings the time of new light. In the Babylonian epoch this is Marduk (Merodach), but that this is artificial and secondary is evident. How can Jupiter be the Deliverer ? The fact is, Marduk-Jupiter has taken the place of Nebo-Mercury (see p. 27). Mercury is the morning star; his name signifies ‘'foreteller": here we see also the astral meaning of the word Nabi, “ prophet11; he is the foreteller or bringer of the new epoch.3 A curious part is played in the combat by the third of the three great stars, Ishtar (Venus). During the combat “ Ishtar strives to become Queen of Heaven” (see p. 112; comp. 119).4 She is counted as the equal inner part of the great triad (with sun and moon), and therefore, when the culminating point is not possessed by either of the other two, she becomes the superior and obtains it—the point of the universe belonging to Ann.5
VII. THE CALENDAR
Since the whole edifice of civilised life was represented as reflecting celestial phenomena, the calendar, which regulates the arrangements of life according to the revolution of the stars,
1   “Wobistdu Sonne blieben? die Nacht hat dich vertrieben, die Nacht des Tages Feind” (Hymn No. 43S in the German Evangelical Hymn-Book, by Paul Gerhardt, 1606-76).
2   Our calendar celebrates the 24th of June instead of the 21st (e.g. in Leipzig), St John’s Day, as the Festival of the Dead, and places the 24th of December (birthday of the Deliverer) instead of the 21st; this is probably because the three- day lunar reckoning is added to the half-year solar reckoning.
3   See Winckler, F., 290 ; comp. 280, 299, 412.
4   Ishtar as Virgo in the zodiac and Ishtar as the planet Venus are identical in the cosmic myth ; see A.B.A., 2nd ed., iii. 56-
5   Compare the motifs in the Book of Esther. Mordecai (Marduk) and Hainan are enemies; Esther (Ishtar) ascends the throne (comp. Winckler, F iii. 1 ft'.). For details upon the Triad, seepp. S6 ff. In the poetic language of the Old Testament (the fight between Yahveh and the dragon) we may recognise the battle according to both lunar and solar motifs.
40   
is the most important political act, a matter of legislation ;1 and every possible event could be based upon solar and lunar
calculations. For the fundamental law of Oriental chronology is: the small and the large cycle correspond to each other, each forming a universe: day— month — year; lustrum — cycle—aeon, etc.
In the cycle of the year observation of the equinoctial points was in the historic age of Babylonia (spring sun in Taurus) of special importance; as they are noted, for example, in the astronomical texts III. R. 51. In these the observation of the heavens emphasised the heliacal rising of the star Aldebaran,2 whose rising coincides with the setting of Antares in Scorpio. That gives almost exactly half the sun’s orbit, and divides the whole of the moon stations, which otherwise lie at FIG. 19.— Ancient-Babylonian various distances from each other, into
calendar nail. Original in ^wo halves. Counting twenty-eight author s possession.   0   .0
moon stations, this gives therefore fourteen Overworld and fourteen Underworld.3 In the division into
 
1   In Memphis the young king vowed in the temple, on his accession, to change neither the order of the festivals nor the calendar. He then carried the yoke of Apis for a certain distance, to indicate his desire to be “defender of the faith.” ('AvaKX-nr-fipia, see Pauly-Wissowa, s.v.). It is noteworthy, further, what importance calendar reform has in the foundation of the supremacy of Mohammed (Winckler, Ex oriente lux, i. 1, 7 : “The oldest traditions of Islam also refer to the regulation of the year ”). The legendary history of Rome records the calendar legislation of Numa Pompilius. The dictator clavis Jigendi causa is the ancient Roman calendar-maker. Clay cones in the shape of nails have come down to us from the earliest age of Babylonia ; these cones were thrust into the inner walls of their temples to mark divisions of time (see fig. 19). In China the calendar- makers are called the “College or Board of Celestial Affairs”; comp. Ideler, Chronologic der Chinesen, 1839.
2   The largest star of the Hyades (see p. 25).
3   Note that amongst the Chinese, Hindus, and Arabs the Pleiades form the first station of the moon and Scorpio the fourteenth. Comp. Foachan, Astral- my then, 430, and von Bunsen’s work, Die Plcjaden u. dcr Ticrkreis, based on

THE OLD TESTAMENT IN THE LIGHT OF THE ANCIENT EAST (sumer) II

https://archive.org/stream/oldtestamentinli2jere#page/n8/mode/1up starts with Abraham

https://archive.org/details/oldtestamentinli2jere
 
ABBREVIATIONS, ETC.
A.B.A., Das Alter der Babylonischen Astronomie; A. Jeremias. (Hinrichs, 1909.)
A.B., Assyriologische Bibliothek, by Delitzsch and Haupt, 1881 fif. (pub. by Hinrichs, Leipzig).
*   A.O., Der Alte Orient. Publication of the Vorderasiat. Gesellschaft.
(Hinrichs, 1899 ff.)
A.   O. I., Alter Orient, I. Jahrgang.
B.   A., Beitrage zur Assyriologie, by Delitzsch and Haupt. (Hinrichs,
1889 ff.)
B.   N.T., Babylonisches im Neuen Testament; A. Jeremias. (Hinrichs,
l9°5.)
C.   T., Cuneiform Texts from Babylonian Tablets in the Brit. Museum,
1896   ff.
Handw., Handworterbuch ; Delitzsch. (Hinrichs, 1896.)
G.   G.G., Grundrisz der Geographic und Geschichte des Alten Orient;
Hommel.
H.   C., Hammurabi Code.
I~N., Izdubar-Nimrod, eine altbabylonische Beschworungslegende;
A. Jeremias. (B. G. Teubner, 1891.)
K.A.T., Die Keilinschriften und das Alte Testament, 3rd ed., 1903;
Eberhard Schrader. (English translation 1885-1888.)
K.B., Keilinschriftliche Bibliothek; Eberhard Schrader. (Reuther, 1889.) K.T., Keilinschriftliches Textbuch zum Alten Testament; Winckler. (Hinrichs, 1903.)
Le:r., Lexikon der griech. und romischen Mythologie; Roscher. (Teubner.)
M.D.P. K, Mitteilungen des Deutschen Palastina-Vereins.
M.V.A.G., Mitteilungen der Vorderasiat. Gesellschaft. (Peiser, Berlin.)
O.   L.Z., Orientalistische Literaturzeitung. (Peiser, 1898 ff.)
P.   S.B.A., Proceedings of the Society of Biblical Archaeology.
R.P. Th., Realencyklopadie fur Prot. Theol. und Kirche, edited by Hauck. (Hinrichs, 1896 ff.)
V.A.B., Vorderasiatische Bibliothek. (Hinrichs, 1906.)
Winckler, F., Altorientalische Forschungen; H. Winckler. (Pfeiffer,
1897   ff.)
Z.A., Zeitschrift fur Assyriologie ; Bezold.
XI
ABBREVIATIONS
xii
Z.A.W., Zeitschrift fur Alttest. Wissenschaft; B. Stade.
Zimmern, Beit., Beitrage zur Kenntnis der Babyl. Religion \A.Bxii.]. (Hinrichs, 1901.)
Z.D.M.G., Zeitschrift der Deutschen Morgenlandischen Gesellschaft.
Z.P. VZeitschrift des Deutschen Palastina-Vereins.
I.   R. II. R. etc., Cuneiform Inscriptions of Western Asia, Brit. Museum. Abh. phil.-hist. Cl. Konigl. Sachs. Gesell. der Wissenschaften=Abhand- lungen der philologisch-historischen Classe der Konigl. Sachsischen Gesellschaft der Wissenschaften.
Genesis, Delitzsch = English, The Chaldean Account of Genesis, 1876. New ed., Sayce. (G. Smith.)
Astralmythen, Stucken = Astralmythen der Hebraer, Babylonier und Aegypter.
Holle u?id Paradies, English translation, The Babylonian Conception of Heaven and Hell. No. IV. of a series of short studies called the “Ancient East,” published by D. Nutt, Long Acre.
THE OLD TESTAMENT IN THE LIGHT OF THE ANCIENT EAST
CHAPTER XIV
ABRAHAM AS BABYLONIAN
THE stories in Genesis from chapter xi. 26 onwards give the tradition, founded upon various documentary sources, current in pious circles of Israel in regard to the primeval history of the nation. We may consider, besides Genesis, Joshua xxiv. 2; Isa. lxiii. 16, li. 1 f.; Jer. xxxiii. 26; and (in regard to Sodom and Gomorrah), Amos iv. 11, and Isa. i. 9.
In the form before us the histories of the Patriarchs are incomplete and idealised. We do not know how the documentary sources ran from which the stories are gathered, and how much else was verbally related. The author of the so-called Priestly Document had two sources before him, agreeing together in main facts. He made excerpts from them according to certain points of view, probably also adding, besides his genealogical sketch, something from other sources. But his excerpts are incomplete} From suppositions contained in the traditions of the Mosaic period, we should expect, for example, more vivid references to
1   We may surely supplement the tradition from legends of extra-Biblical and Islamic traditions. (Islamic religion is, like Biblical, founded upon Abraham.) In both spheres we find material independent of the Biblical sources, and which cannot have been simply invented. The New Testament writers also (for a summary of these passages, see B.JV.T., 112 ; comp, also Heb. xi. 21, p. 57) use for ancestral history sources which rank with the Bible and which have the same right to be observed as those portions of the tradition retained for us by the editor. It is, for example, not out of the question that in some cases they descend from portions of the sources which were dropped out in the editing; comp. Th.L.BL, 1906, pr. 348.
VOL. II.
1
1
2
ABRAHAM AS BABYLONIAN
Arabia; we should especially expect records of a place of worship of the God of the Hebrews.1
That they had relations with the Arabian deserts is shown by the history of Lot, and the emigration of Abraham with Sarah in time of famine. The scene of the sacrifice of Isaac, Gen. xxii. 2, was probably, according to the original text, “ upon a mountain in the land of Muzri11 (the Mas. text writes it Moriah, see p. 48), upon Sinai-Horeb. But the tradition is vague.
Also about the rites of blood, which the Feast of the Passover, Exod. xii. 7, assumes as well known, nothing is said in the stories of the Patriarchs; it is, however, affirmed in a pre-Israelite age of Canaan by the discovery of the column in the houses (p. 344, i.) which were sprinkled with blood on the posts.
The stories of the Patriarchs bear signs of idealisation. Thus in P circumcision is introduced into the story in order to give these documents a specially sacred character, whilst at the same time it is expressly affirmed that Moses and his sons were uncircumcised.2 But just the fact that idealisation in itself is not made an object, answers for a historical nucleus to the story. An idealistic legend with no background of fact would certainly not have made the Patriarchs dwell as strangers in the land, obliged to bargain with barbarians for a burial- place. They would further have suppressed the marriage of Jacob to two sisters, forbidden in Lev. xviii. 18.3 Also many strong human features, showing as blemishes in the brilliant popular heroes, would be inexplicable in the composition of fables of popular ideal characters. But, above all, the correctness of milieu testifies we are dealing with tradition, not with poetry. The background of contemporary history and the details of manners and customs agree with those we find recorded upon the monuments of these periods, and answer for it that the Biblical tradition was drawn from good sources.
1   See Exod. iii. 18, x. 3, 9 ; comp. I Kings xix. 8, where the forty days is not in reference to the map of the country (see p. 94, i.); Deut. xxxii. 2; Judges v. 4.
2   Exod. iv. 24 ff. This contradiction between tradition and the law was once
used in a remarkable way by Jesus in controversy with the Pharisees; see John vii. 22.   3 Comp. p. 37.
ABRAHAM AS BABYLONIAN
3
The objection has been raised that it is not possible for such a tradition to have been transmitted through centuries. In proof, it has been tried how far back war traditions and such like can be traced amongst the peasantry.
Neither the objection nor the proof holds good. The isolated memories of the present cannot be compared to the popular memory of decisive, or even supposed, religious events. The Odenwald, for instance, is to the present day full of ancient Germanic remembrances. But we must have lived amongst the people (perhaps as pastor) for many years to gain the confidence of these old peasants of the Odenwald, who still love to name their sons Siegfried, before they will tell secretly what they have learnt from their forefathers. And in the Wendei or East Prussia may still be found “witch” women who, at the “witches’ sabbath” or night of the solstice, offer the old heathen sacrifices, and guard secrets they have inherited from their mothers of ancient times. We must remember that three generations are always living together, and that amongst hardy tribes there would not be so veiy many generations to the thousand years. And in addition, we have to do here with the Oriental memory. Anyone reading the Thousand and One Nights, with some knowledge of the Ancient East, sees with amazement the strength of the tradition in the East. Besides this, we may assume that the sources of the Elohist and Yahvist were not only verbal, but that also written traditions1 were available, like the stories which in the modern Babylonian period gave records of the heroes of the Hammurabi age, being themselves transcripts or newly composed poems from ancient documents; comp. pp. 232, i. ff.2
1   Compare now Erbt, Die Ebrdery pp. 61 ff. : “Abraham appears in the flesh in the Hammurabi age,” Erbt thinks that historical documents existed from the Canaanite age. The sanctuaries of Penuel-Mahanaim and Sichem may have had archives with records from the Hammurabi age. Also in Jerusalem written traditions may have been preserved (comp. Melchizedek in Ps. cx. : see p. 29).
2   According to the law of ethnographical research, family history cannot be the starting-point for a national history. Nations and tribes arise by the amalgamation of families and houses, not by multiplication and division of families. But, “also families did not drop out of the heavens ” (Nikel, Genesis, and K.F., 2ll). The names of most of the tribes of Israel were originally personal nouns (Hommel, G. G. G., pp. 185 f.). In Arabia at the present day many tribes descend from one ancestor (comp. Cornill, Geschichie des Vi. 37 f., where Turkish statistics upon Bedouin tribes of the Jaulan and Hauran are pointed out, and Z.D.P.V., xxiii. 58). Besides, the laws of ethnography would not in any case prevent us taking the descent of Israel as from one family, but the tradition itself does not assert the autochthonistic descent of the Children of Israel.
The same laws shut out the descent of man from one pair, which from the Christian point of view we hold fast. Laws are categories of human thought. In the history of Israel there is much for which there is no analogy in history or religion. We might quite well allow the origin of the nation to be an exception, if we recognise the special part given to Israel in the history of the education of
4
ABRAHAM AS BABYLONIAN
Abraham appears in the presentment before us as 44 Father of the family.” It is characteristic of all ancient history that the tribe, like the race, appears as a family, tracing back its descent from one forefather. But in this tradition itself we may see that the family is not meant to be understood as an ethnological division.
It is historical only in so far as the family design retains the traditions of prominent leaders of the u Children of Israel,” amongst whom there was also a Jacob, with twelve sons. The genealogical tables have been artificially composed later. Everyone wished to be descended from primeval aristocracy. Further upon this subject, see pp. 42 ff.
Abraham was not father of the family in an ethnological, but in a spiritual sense :   44 Father of the faithful.” When he
is 44 to become a great nation,” it must be understood of a religious community, as in Numb. xiv. 12, where Moses is to be the father of a new people, since the old must be rooted out.
The ethnographical misunderstanding, e lumbis Abrahce, has been the misfortune of the Jews. John the Baptist and Jesus had to combat it. All the more emphatically do we emphasise the religious signification of the descent from Abraham. Israelite religion, which later assembled itself round the name miT, does not begin first with Moses. It is founded upon revelation. Moses was in a special sense a bearer of this revelation, but the revelation itself had stages in the pre-Mosaic age. And in those stages also it could only work through individuals. The leading religious individualities and bearers of revelation in the primitive ages of Israel are the Patriarchs.
We may gather from the Biblical tradition that the beginning of the religious community, known later as the 44 Children of Israel,” took its rise in a migration1 out of Babylonia, therefore
the human race. Upon the ground of axioms, according to which the problem of the origin of man is held unsolvable, it is customary, certainly, to brand such deductions as a priori unscientific. Some day this may be changed. But, as has been said, the assertion of an autochthonic descent of the “Children of Israel” does not agree with the sense of the tradition.
1   Klostermann, in his Geschichte Israels, 31, holds a similar view in regard to the migration of Abraham being an historical migration of a tribe. We have
ABRAHAM “ FATHER OF THE FAITHFUL” 5
a kind of religious hegira. Abraham was the leader, like a Mahdi. “ The people that they had won in Haran ” may be quite well taken to mean adherents.1 In that case, we see how he could equip 318 people ; also the story of the separation from Lot (Gen. xiii. 6 ff.) shows that it is a question of still larger bands. Later we find recorded reinforcements from Egypt, that is to say, Muzri (Gen. xii. 15 f. and xx.), and from Gerar.2 (Gen. xx. 14). Even though these were primarily slaves (Hagar, Gen. xvi. 1, and Ishmael’s wife, Gen. xxi. 21, belonged to them) still they could be included in the religious community, and later in the national community, then called “ Children of Israel.” Also in Gen. xxxii. 4 f. there is explicitly another reinforcement from Haran.
According to other Oriental occurrences of the like type (Mohammed), we must take the march of Abraham to have been, even though in the mildest form, a march to make conquest. In idealising the Biblical records this has been veiled. The Oriental tradition outside the Bible, according to which “ Abraham (whose father was a Babylonian General) overthrew the army of Nimrod, and seized upon the land of Canaan for himself,” is certainly not pure invention.3 Gen. xxi. 22 pre
arrived at the same conclusion by different ways. Klostermann has won much honour by a new critical examination- of the histories of the Patriarchs. At pp. 42 ff. his traces are followed.
1   In Gen. xii. 5 it is hannephesh (Kautzsch, like Luther, translates this as souls).
According to Ezek. xxvii. 13, nephesh may mean “ slaves ” (here, however, it is nephesh-adam), and is then equivalent to the Babylonian napishtu, which, so far as I am aware, has not been observed. The translation “ slaves which they had bought”   is very questionable. And why is it nephesh here, which
designates man as a spiritual being (in special antithesis to the beasts) ? In other places the slave is called lebed. Why should not nephesh, if it should be called “slave,” be reckoned before the other possessions, or, as elsewhere (comp. p. 264, n. 3), be included in possession (rekush) as real property? The mysterious hanikim, moreover, argues for the meaning being “adherents,” Gen. xiv. 14; see p. 27.
2   That these were “ Philistines” (Gen. xxvi. 1), is founded upon a later misunderstanding. The Philistines (remnants of the seafaring tribes) had not yet entered the country. Upon the inclusion of such Jewish traditions, see p. I, n. I ; 11, n. I ; B.N.T., p. 65, n. 2, and p. 67 ; also Boeklen, Archiv f. Rel. Wiss., vi. p. 6.
3   See Beer, Leben Mosis naeh Auffassung der jiidischen Sage, p. 40, and his Leben Abrahams, p. 1.
6
ABRAHAM AS BABYLONIAN
supposes the ability of Abraham to make war, and the episode in Gen. xiv. clearly describes him as a leader in battle, exactly like the Egyptian fugitive Sinuhe, who (about 2000 B.C.) was a leader in Syria of the tribes in their wars. In Sichem Abraham joined an alliance of the tribes (called ba<‘ale-berit\ see p. 30. Perhaps the change of name to Abraham “ Father of tumult11 ( = Sin qarid ilani, war-hero of the gods), may be interpreted in this sense.1
MIGRATION OF THE PEOPLE OF ABRAHAM
In Gen. xi. 28 Ur Kasdim (Ur of the Chaldees) is named in P1 2 as the original starting-point of the migration.3 The Sibylline books speak of the land of Ur of the Chaldees (Kautzsch, Pseudepigr., 189). This is Uru of the cuneiform writings; the name includes both city and country.
After the patesi of Lagash, the best-known being Gudea, “ kings of Ur ” held supremacy in Babylonia in the first half of the third millennium. They call themselves also kings of Kingi and Urtu.4 The most ancient king known to us of a kingdom in Ur is Ur-Gur. He built and renewed many temples. Though up to the present inscriptions relating to him are only known in South Babylonia, undoubtedly his kingdom also included North Babylonia. His son Dungi, who reigned for over fifty years, calls himself “ King of the four quarters of the earth.” His followers (the so-called “ second dynasty of Ur ” must be abandoned) have Semitic names. After
1   Hommel, Anc. Heb. Trad., takes D.VQK to be an older orthographical form. But the double name of both the Patriarchs Abram-Abraham and Jacob-Israel must certainly have some special meaning.
2   Gen. xi. 28 is held to be a gloss from the P. The descent, according to Elohist sources, has been lost. According to later hints the starting-point was in the neighbourhood on the right of the Euphrates. The Yahvist makes the migration start from Harran. All three points are upon the road leading from Babylonia to Canaan. The uniformity of the tradition is shown by Ur and Harran belonging together as the two places of moon-worship ; see pp. 9 f.
3   Many legends of Abraham are also connected with Urfa. This naturally should not mislead into looking for the cities of Ur there (Rassam, Joh. Lepsius). Another tradition names Arpakshad as the original home. Those would be the consonants for Urfa Kasdim ; but Urfa is probably only a modern name (according to Hommel, G.G.G., 193, n. 3, to be separated formally from Orrhoe ; Syrian Urhoi, 'imiN ; Arabic Ruha = Edessa ; ‘Urfa = nsny, ridge of land).
4   In political geography, that is, like Sumer and Akkad, South and North Babylonia. According to the vocabularies, Kingi specially is = Sumer and Urtu = Akkad.
MIGRATION OF THE PEOPLE OF ABRAHAM 7
the dynasty of Ur follows a dynasty of Isin (to this belongs Ishme- Dagan with the Canaanite name), then one of Larsa, which under Rim-Sin was overthrown by Hammurabi, who says of himself upon one of his stele of laws: “who makes Sin, who makes Ur rich, who brings the kingdom to Gish-shir-gal (temple of the moon in Ur).” The city of Ur has been rediscovered in the ruins of El- Mugayyar (el-Mugheir) in South Babylonia, upon the right bank of the Euphrates. Here Royal seals with the name Uru have been found, inscriptions of Dungi, Kudur-Mabug, Ishme-Dagan, but also more of Nabonidus. The city was chief place of worship of the South Babylonian moon cult.1
Gen. xi. 31 : The people of Abraham journey towards Harran the northern moon city, chief place of Mesopotamia proper.2
 
FIG. 120.—Ruins of El-mugayyar (Ur Kasdim of the Bible, Abraham’s home).
Should their goal have been even then Canaan, this was the usual caravan route out of Babylonia, in spite of the enormous detour.3
1   Eupolemos (about 160 B.c.), in Eusebius, Prcep. evang., ix. 7 (Muller, Fragm., iii. 211 f.), says that Abraham was born in the Babylonian city Kamarine, which many call Ovp'nj. Kamarine, probably to be interpreted by the Arabian Kamar moon, is also to be read in the Sibylline books (Kautzsch, Pseudepr., 189) as name of a city “in the land of Ur.”
2   It is from the old point of view of the primitive life in the desert of Israel when Gupkel {Genesis, 150) says that, according to Gen. xii. I, Abraham’s forefathers were not thought of as dwellers in cities when they were described as going out from Harran. But when Guthe, Geschichte Israels, 10, says : “ they or their fathers turned their backs upon civilisation for the sake of the freedom of the desert,” this is, in fact, contradicted not only by the circumstances of the Israelite primitive age, but it contains in general an impossibility in the history of civilisation.
3   The migration of Esau, which is related in the same words as that of Abraham (Gen. xxxvi. 6, comp. xii. 5), has another motif, but it was also viewed as the migration of a community, as Klostermann has seen, Geschichte Israels, 30.
8
ABRAHAM AS BABYLONIAN
The special name of the Moon-god here, side by side with Sin, was Bel-IJarran, and as such he exercised a strong influence upon Syria.1 The reforms of Islam are largely connected with Harran. Right into the Middle Ages traces of moon-worship were retained amongst the Sabaeans of Harran, in this stronghold of heathenism.
From Harran the road led by Biredjik over the Euphrates. Sachau found traces of the old road. In the Thousand and One Nights an interesting journey is related from Harran to Samaria. The way of the people of Abraham was by the primeval caravan and military road connecting Egypt with Babylonia. Damascus might be expected as chief halting- place.1 2 In fact, Gen. xv. 2 does hint a connection between the Biblical stories of the Patriarchs and Damascus. The tradition still lives in Damascus.3 Berossus records, according to Josephus, Ant., i. 7, that in his time the name of Abram was still celebrated in the land of the Damascenes, and Josephus quotes from the fourth book of the Histories of Nicholas of Damascus the following story :
In Damascus reigned Abram, who came there with an army from the land of the Chaldees,4 bordering on the upper half of Babylon. And not long after he moved out again from there with his people towards Canaan, which is now called Judea, where he greatly increased.
1   A relief from Zenjirli in Syria gives evidence of the civilisation of that country. In Nerab near Aleppo two gravestones were found, erected for priests of the Moon-god of Harran. In a treaty between Mati-ilu, Prince of Arpad (see p. 49), and the Assyrian king Ashurmirari, Sin of IJarran is invoked in the first passage.
2   Assyrian Dimashqi, Timasqi in the lists of Thothmes from the sixteenth century (comp. pp. 328, i. f.).
3   The Jebel Qasyun rising above Damascus is held sacred by the Moslems. It was here that Abraham reached the knowledge of the unity of God ; see Baedeker.
4   This is certainly a later addition, which confounds Harran with Ur, or reckons Ur with Chaldea. Otherwise Lepsius, who holds Urfa for the home, might have appealed to it.
CHAPTER XV
ABRAHAM AS CANAANITE
THE RELIGION OF THE PEOPLE OF ABRAHAM
THE Yahveh religion of the Mosaic period has, according to the Biblical tradition, previous stages in the religion of the Patriarchs (comp. Exod. iii. 16). We are of opinion that this tradition corresponds to a fact of religious history. Abraham’s migration brought the tradition into connection with the two great intellectual cities of the Moon-god (Sin of Ur and Bel-^arran). The tradition of Josephus, xxiv. 2, says of Abraham’s forefathers that beyond the Euphrates they served “ other gods,” 1 therefore the gods of the Babylonian astral religion. We have seen the monotheistic undercurrent which for initiates underlay this astral religion. These undercurrents must have become particularly strong in the regions of moon-worship before the age of Hammurabi. Moon-worship ruled the age till the worship of Marduk of Babylon brought solar phenomena to the fore.2 That the moon should be held as summus deus (that is to say, by initiates: it is the abstract of all divine power) followed naturally in more than one respect from the system (see my article on “Sin” in Roscher’s Lexicon der Mythologie). Beneath the heaven of the seven planets, that of the moon formed the topmost stage, leading into the heaven of Anu. Therefore Sin = Anu as “ father of the gods ” and “ king of the gods,” p. 109, i. In the trinitarian conception of
1   Comp. Sura vi. 76 : “Say : Truly my Lord hath led me in the right way, to the faith of the orthodox Abraham, who was no idolater.” Islamism is the religion of Abraham.
2   P. 86, i. Comp, further, Monotheist. Stromungen innerhalb der baby Ion. Religion, Leipzig, 1904 ; and Baentsch, Altorientalischer und israelitischer Monotheismus, Tubingen, 1906.
10
ABRAHAM AS CANAANITE
the divine power which we may gather from the zodiac, the moon was held as father.1 The conception Ab, that is “ (divine) father,” in the name Ab-ram bears reference to the moon, (comp. p. 16). We possess a hymn to Sin of Ur which praises the moon as “ merciful father.” We reproduce here a passage of this magnificent hymn :2
Mighty Guide, whose deep mind no god may penetrate;
Swift One, whose knee wearieth not, who openeth the way of the gods, his brothers.
Who moveth glittering from the foundation of the heavens to the height of the heavens,
who openeth there the gates of the heavens, bestowing light upon all mankind;
Father, begetter of all, who looketh upon all things living, .... who upon .... thinketh
Lord, who holdeth the fate of heaven and earth, whose command none (changeth);
who holdeth fire and water, who guideth all things living, what god is like unto thee ?
Who in heaven is exalted ?   Thou, thou only art exalted !
Who upon earth is exalted ?   Thou, thou only art exalted !
At thy word, thine, when it resounds in heaven, the Igigi cast themselves upon their faces ;
at thy word, thine, when it resounds upon earth, the Anunnaki kiss the ground.
At thy word, thine, when it goeth forth above like the tempest, prosper food and drink;
at thy word, thine, when it cometh down upon the earth, the green things arise.
Thy word, thine, maketh fat both stall and herd, increaseth all things living;
thy word, thine, maketh truth and justice to arise, so that men speak truth.
thy word, thine, is like unto the distant heavens, the hidden underworld, which none may penetrate ; thy word, thine, who may understand it, who is like unto it ?
O   Lord, in dominion in the heavens, in rule upon earth, amongst the gods thy brothers, hast thou no rivals;
King of Kings, Mighty One, whose command none may dispute, there is no god like unto thee.
We can naturally only conjecture the religious motives which led to the migration of Abraham. By analogy with other phenomena of religious history in the Ancient-East, we may
1 P. 109, i.   2 Zimmern, A.O., vii. 3, 13; comp, also p. 17*
RELIGION OF THE PEOPLE OF ABRAHAM 11
take it that it had to do with a movement of reform, protesting against the religious degeneration of the ruling classes.1 According to circumstances, it may either have been against degeneration in moon-worship, or it may have been a protest against the cult of the new astronomical age (worship of Marduk, see p. 73, i.),1 2 introduced by the Hammurabi dynasty. In neither case would it have to do with a total denial of the astral system in question, but only with a protest against the polytheistic worship founded upon the system. The teaching itself was well known to the holders of the Yahveh religion in the patriarchal age, just as it was at later stages (in Mosaic and prophetic religion). This shows itself in the astral-mythological motifs,3 so far as they are made use of; and more than all, as we shall see later, in the symbolism of the worship, in which the elements of the astral system were retained.4
In Abraham, therefore, we see a Mahdi. The march out from Babylonia appears to us a hegira. The religious movement under Mohammed offers in many points an historical analogy. Like the religion of Mohammed, so that of Abraham is a reforming advance upon the current intellectual ideas.5
1   Jewish and Islamic legends make Abraham a martyr under Nimrod. We are of opinion here also that it is not treating of phantoms and mere speculations, but of a truth of religious history brought forward in legendary form and endowed with mythological motifs.
2   Thus now Winckler, Abraham als Babylonier, pp. 24 ff. ; the Laws of Hammurabi, p. xxxi.
3   Upon the traditions of Abraham, see pp. 16 ff. Baentsch, loc. cit., p. 60, overestimates, in our opinion, the religious meaning of these poetic motifs, when he assumes that they are a sign that the patriarchal religion was unwilling as yet to indicate any break in principle with the astral religion, though it presented a step beyond the Ancient-Babylonian religion.
4   We shall include in this symbolism the meaning of the mountain of divine revelation, Sinai, which, according to Exod. iii. (it is here called Horeb), was already held as a place of worship in the patriarchal age.
5   Acts vii. 2 seem to refer to a tradition according to which Abraham had already carried on a religious propaganda from Ur into Mesopotamia. The passage states that Abraham received the command to migrate “in Mesopotamia, before he dwelt in Haran.”
The most perverted use of the name Mesopotamia could not allow of Haran, chief city of Mesopotamia, as its antithesis. The apocalyptical history of Abraham does, in fact, seem to be aware of an earlier journey to Fandana, i.e. Padan Aram (see “ Apok. Abrahams” in Siudien zur Geschichte der Theologie und Kirche, i. 1st ed., Bonwetsch); comp, article on Mesopotamia in Hauck, R.B.Tk., 3rd ed.
12
ABRAHAM AS CANAANITE
The tradition tells of visionary events in Ur (Neh. ix. 7) as in Haran (Gen. xii. 1). Following the divine command, he led his people towards the Westland; towards, as it appears, the region lying beyond the realm of Babylonian dominion. His whole life in Canaan is characterised by visionary and ecstatic events: Gen. xii. 17; xiii. 14; xv. 1 ff. ; xvii. 1 IF. ; particularly xv. 12 ff.
Now appears a fact in full force, which can neither be proved nor refuted by means of historical-critical investigation. Abraham recognised, in his own life and in the education of the human race, the power of the living God.1 God revealed His way to Abraham and the working of His power to the people of Abraham. He showed Himself as the merciful God who hears prayer and forgives sins. This was the beginning of “ revelation ” in the Biblical sense, which finds its goal in Christianity, and which, in its beginnings and development, could always only work through individuals. Only religious experience can unravel the mystery of the method. But one law of this revelation we do know. It never falls direct from heaven, but is always closely joined on to what has been already given, and works by refining upon a gradual religious and moral development. We can only offer conjectures as to other detail.
The next question that presents itself is, whether the traditions that have come down to us permit of a conclusion (Rilck- schluss) upon the nature of the religion of Abraham’s time.
Characteristic names for God are in the traditions of the Patriarchs, which cannot be set down to later revision.2 The
1 The critic naturally says this must be taken in the sense meant in later religion of the prophets. But that is petitio principii. Besides, if God revealed Himself to the prophets, why should He have been silent in the beginning of the Israelite religion? If it is asked : Where, then, was His revelation before Abraham ? we reply with Acts xiv. 16 : “He sufifereth all nations to go their own way,” but in the same sense as in Rom. i. 19 ff., where the author included the KadopacrSat ra aijpara, that is to say, the Swap.is KCU 6IT6TTIS of God in nature. With the “Father of the Faithful” began the new era, a revelation tending towards a dispensation of salvation.
2   Baentsch, loc. cit., 56: “They would scarcely have invented an 'El shaddai or an abstract Elohim specially for Abraham. It is precisely this point, therefore, in which we must see an ancient, truly historic tradition, not to be lightly set aside, and a theology which so intentionally marks itself as being one of religious history should be very scrupulously valued.”
RELIGION OF THE PEOPLE OF ABRAHAM 13
God of Abraham was called VZ (Gen. xxi. 33) at the sanctuary of Beer-sheba,1 VZ 4olam—is it possible that in this ancient name 4olam,44 world ” is denoted, as later in the Jewish ? Space and time are identical to the Oriental mind—“God from Everlasting,” and W shaddai (Gen. xvii. 1, Exod. vi. 3; comp. Gen. xlix. 25 f.), for which no satisfactory interpretation has yet been found. The divine designation ilu does not in itself mean anything more than a general conception of God. Besides, the same divine name is also often to be found evidencing a monotheistic tendency upon Babylonian and Canaanite ground;2 the plural ’elohim is found also in the Amarna Letters, ii., as designation for God in majesty plmralis (ilani).
Possibly a hint as to the nature of their conception of divinity is given in the epithet VZ 4olam applied by Abraham to his god when making his alliance with Abimelech.3 ’El 4olam may mean 44 God from Everlasting,” or 44 God of the World ” ([‘olam used for time and space), as specially the divinity who (as summits deus) is enthroned at the north point of the universe.4 The meeting with Melchizedek is also characteristic. Melchizedek, priest of Jerusalem (for the historical view of this character, see pp. 27 ff.), names the God of Abraham VZ 6elyon, Creator (imp,5 not Sift) of heaven and earth (Gen. xiv. 19). Abraham makes use of the same name in speaking with the King of Sodom. It is therefore the name by which the God of Abraham was worshipped in Sichem; see Gen. xiv. 22.
In regard to the name Yahveh in the history of Abraham. From the form of the tradition we may naturally quite justifi-
1   Well of the “seven,” i.e. the Pleiades, which represent the powers of the Underworld.
2   Delitzsch, B.B.I., 4thed., 75 : Ilu-amranni, “ Uu, look upon me” ; Uu-turam, “ Ilu, turn thou again” ; Ilu-ittia, “ Ilu with me” ; Ilu amtahar, “I cry unto Uu ” ; Uu-abi, “Ilu is my father”; Iluma-ili, “Ilu is god”; Shuma-ilu-la-ilia, “If Ilu were not god, ” and so on. On the Amarna tablets there are names like Shabi-ilu, Milki-ilu, Ili-Milku, Yabni-ilu; with this comp. Homme], Altisr. Uberl., chap. iii.; and now, above all, Ranke, Early Babylonian Personal Names, Philadelphia, 1905.
3   See Klostermann, Gesck.-lsr., p. 35, where he rightly contradicts the conjecture of aViy in p,(?y, and supposes the name shows a recognition of the eternal god of all.
4   'Olam, antithesis to Qedem as south point (primeval ocean from which the world proceeded); see Winckler, F., iii. 305 f. (also upon time = space). This is also the meaning of ‘olam in Ps. xxiv. 7.
5   Compare the name El-kana, and the fact of the name of God, by which Elieser must swear, Gen. xxiv. 3. Or nip = owner. It is a motif word,
14
ABRAHAM AS CANAANITE
ably refer it back to an original scripture. At the same time it must be allowed that in Babylonian nomenclature a corresponding name also existed, in the form Ya’u.1 In passages like Exod. xv. 2 (“ my father’s God is Jah ! ”), Isa. xii. 2 (Jah together with Yahveh), in the cry hallelu-jah, in personal nouns joined on to liT, this Babylonian form of the name of God seems to present itself.1 2 But even if the designation for God existed previously in the patriarchal age, that would give no evidence about the conception of God in the primitive period of Israel.
Besides, “What’s in a name?” The name gives no clue to the idea contained in the conception.3 Chief emphasis is laid by the tradition upon the moral relation to divinity, indicating an absolutely new position, in opposition to polytheism and astral religion. “ Walk before me, and be thou perfect,” Gen. xvii. 1; “ Yahveh, before whom I walk,” Gen. xxiv. 40. In every part of the tradition the story gives prominence to the way in which Abraham’s circumstances made him the friend of God and imparter of blessings to the future.
Now in what way did Abraham carry out his propaganda P Surely it would be in the same manner as St Paul in Athens, or the Christian missionaries in heathen Germany. He joined it on to existing sanctuaries and cults, having a special preference for the “ sacred trees” (pp. 207, i. ff.).4 The oracle tree of Moreh, Gen. xii. 6, in the neighbourhood of the Canaanite holy cities of Shechem, and the oracle tree of Mamre in Hebron, Gen. xiii. 18, represent the Tree of the World.5 Here
1   See Delitzsch, B.B., i. 74 £ j comp. Kampf um Babel und Bibel, 4th ed., p. 20.
2   In the tetragrammaton nin’ we see a ceremonious differentiation from the ‘ ‘ heathen ” name, which was the signal for a religious concentration at Sinai. See Kampf um Babel und Bibel, 4th ed., p. 20 ; Hommel, Die altor. Denkmaler und das Alte Testament supplement.
3   Our word “god ” also comes down from heathendom, just as does the Beds of the New Testament; compare with this now also Erbt, Hebraer, p. 39.
4   Gen. xxi. 33 : “He planted a tamarisk tree in Beer-sheba, and called there on the name Yahveh as 'el ‘olam.”
5   According to Winckler, F., iii. 406, these two are identical: Moreh = Mamre, the one belonging to the tradition which made Abraham dwell in the south (Hebron), the other to the tradition which placed his history in the north (Sichem) ; comp, also p. 26. The tree of Moreh (miD = instruction, like Thora) corresponds to the tree of knowledge ; see pp. 207, i. f.
RELIGION OF THE PEOPLE OF ABRAHAM 15
he gathered together believers. According to this sense Luther’s translation gives the correct meaning: “ He preached the name of the Lord.1'’
Jewish legends amplify this. We draw attention here to a fable which strikingly recalls the milieu of the Sinuhe story:—
Abraham next founded a refuge for homeless wanderers 1 and entertained them. Instead of receiving any recompense or thanks, he referred them to the master of the house. “ Where shall we find this gracious Being ? ” asked the wanderers. “ He is the God Who has made heaven and earth.” And when they desired to know how to pray to that Almighty Being, he taught them the words (still used as the opening formula of the Jewish prayer at meals when three or more men eat together) : “ Praised be the Everlasting, the ever Blessed; praised be the God of the Universe, from Whose bounties we have eaten ” (comp. Beer, Leben Abrahams, lvi. 174).
It goes without saying we do not assume that the religion of Israel only hangs on “ thin threads from the long past ages.” Just as the history of morality unfolded itself, so also did religion in Israel. Only here also we must think of the development not as a straight line, but as an undulating curve.1 2 * * 5
The conception sketched here of the religion of Abraham is in opposition to the conception of the so-called “historical school,” which, parallel with its construction of the history, distinguishes a progressive development in the religion of Israel: (1) Bedouin religion ; (2) Peasant religion; (3) Religion of the prophets. Though we also recognise as relatively correct that Israel passed through a nomadic and an agricultural period, yet this “development” had nothing to do with the Biblical religion. We distinguish absolutely between Yahveh religion and Israelite popular religion.
The popular religion of Israel was pagan, and even in circles
1   Comp. p. 56, the founding of a refuge by Jacob.
2   On the other hand, we cannot break the links of the chain by which, according to tradition, the history Of the religious community, later known as a nation
under the name of “Children of Israel,” is bound to Abraham as founder of its
religion (“Father of the Faithful”), even if not in an ethnological sense (see p.
5 and comp. pp. 42 ff.). Baentsch, loc, cit., still holds firmly to the opinion which looks upon Abraham as a Canaanite character, holding that the Israelite tradition took the Canaanite tradition of Abram and put Abram into the place of honour amongst the Patriarchs of Israel.
16
ABRAHAM AS CANAANITE
where Yahveh was included in the religious conception as 44 God of Gods,” it still remained a Yahveh-popular religion, saturated with pagan conceptions (for an example, see p. 48). Pure Yahveh religion was the ideal, fostered by the religious leaders and by religiously stimulated circles. From the first there was a 44 spiritual Israel.11 But only at critical points of their historical development were the people seized by an impulse of the pure religion. For this reason their condition was rightly held to be one of 44 revolt.11 The prophets called to them to 44 return.11 A development, in the sense held by the “historical school,11 holds good only of certain phenomena of the popular religion, which stood in opposition to the Yahveh religion.1
^ Astral Mythological Motifs
The stories of Abram are endowed with special astral motifs, because Abram (with Lot) is the founder of a new era, as the blessing in Gen. xii. 3 f. expressly says.
Oriental historical stories always endow the bringer of a new era with the motifs of the astral figure who represents the beginning of the age.* Abram lived in the Marduk age ; see pp. 73, i. f. The religious movement, into which he entered, would be directed against the ruling cult. The preceding age was that of the Moon, or of the Twins, as has been shown at pp. 71, i. ff. In speaking about Abram, ancient Canaanite records would be induced, for this reason, to let traces of the corresponding motifs of those ages show in the presentment. It is to be observed here that the critical point, giving the motifs, did not, as in the Marduk age, lie in the spring point, but in the solstice (see pp. 34, i. f. and fig. 14).
Whether the author of our text still understood the allusions is another question. Possibly many such features were lost in his work of recapitulation. Later Judaism, again, learnt to know the
1 And also this development is differently formed throughout, as the predominating view presupposes, which starts from low forms of animism and totemism, etc. The popular religion was astral religion with phenomena in nature emphasised which move in parallel course to the star cycle. Comp. A. Jeremias, Der Ein- Jluss Babyloniens auf das Verstandnis des Alten Testaments, 1906, and Winckler’s
work named in note, p. 16. The deductions given above are taken from a presentment of the “ connection of Babylonian religion with Israelite religion” which the author laid before the theological conference at Eisenach, Whitsuntide 1906. At the same time appeared Winckler’s work, Religionsgeschichtler und geschicht- licher Orient, an examination of the suppositions in the “considerations of religious history” of the Old Testament and the school of Wellhausen, and Baentsch, Allorient. und israelit. Monotheismus: Ein Wort zur Revision der entwickelungsgeschichtlichen Aujfassung der israelitischen Religionsgeschichte.
NAMES OF THE PEOPLE OF ABRAHAM 17
motifs and revivified the teaching, as is shown by the construction of the pseud-epigraphical writings and the Rabbinical fables.
1.   The Astral Character of the Name.—Ab-ram is a pure Babylonian name.1 It signifies "the (divine) father is sublime”; comp. Ab-ner, "the (divine) father is the light.” They had a special preference for designating the Moon-god as "father” (Sin abu il&ni, comp. p. 109, i-); for example, in the hymn to the Moon- god Sin of Ur, the home of Terah, IV. R. 9, he is called upon nine times as " father,” and it is said amongst other things :1 2
Merciful, gracious Father, in whose hand lies the life of the whole land,
Lord, thy divinity is like the far heaven, like the wide sea, filling with awe, ....
Father, begetter of gods and men, who establisheth dwellings, ordaineth sacrifice,
Who calleth to the kingdom, lendeth the sceptre, who ordaineth Fate to distant days.
Compare also 1 Kings xvi. 34 : Abiram with the name Abram.
In South Arabian inscriptions the theophorous names with Ab = Moon-god bear evidence of being specially priests’ names. Comp. Ab as designation of priest in Judges xvii. 9; Elisha is so called by the king. The name therefore points perhaps to a priestly character of Abraham. The other name, Ab-raham, introduced in P (Gen. xvii. 5) as a re-naming, and signifying "Father of Tumult,” would correspond to Sin as Qarid ilani, "War hero of the Gods”; see p. 6.
Sarai’s 3 name corresponds to the designation of the Moon-goddess of Harran: Nikkal-sharratu (sharratu = queen); and the name of Abraham’s sister-in-law, Milka, fits together with Malkatu, an epithet applied to Ishtar.4 She appears as the beautiful sister-wife of Abraham and receives the veil. Gen. xx. 6.
In the name of Abram’s father, Terah, possibly the name for the moon* Yerah, may be veiled; the name might be intentionally
1   The much-quoted name upon a contract tablet of King Apil-Sin (grandfather of Hammurabi) should not be read Abi-ramu, but (with Ranke) Abi-eraji, “ the moon is my father.” But the Assyrian eponym of the year 677-76 (see K.B., i. 207 ; comp. Zimmern, K.A.T., 3rd ed., 482), bore the same name: Abi-rama likewise, the sister of Esarhaddon’s mother; see Johns, Deeds No. 70, Rev. vi. Ranke, in Personal Names, records (p. 86), as variant for Hammurabi, Ha-am- mi-ra-am, which means "my (divine) uncle is sublime.” By this, therefore, according to the meaning, Hammurabi had the same name as his contemporary (pp. 23 f.) Abraham. Compare again Hommel in P.S.B.A., May 1894, and Anc. Heb. Trad.
2   Zimmern, K.A.T., 3rd ed., 607 ff. A.O., vii. 3. For another passage from this hymn, see pp. 10 f.
3   Sa-ra-ai, name in a cuneiform letter, K 1274, Obv. 2. nib', 'Zappa, is the Canaanite form ; njp, Sa-ra-ai, Arabic Aramaic feminine form (Hommel, G.G.G., p. 186, 3rd ed.).
4   See Zimmern, K.A.T., 3rd ed., 364 f. For the divine name, contained in Nahor,[see ibid. 477 f.
VOL. II.
2
18
ABRAHAM AS CANAANITE
mutilated, as was often done with the theophorous names of “ pagan ” characters.1
The name Laban denotes the moon (Hebrew poetry, lebana, Song of Songs, vi. 9 ; Isa. xxiv. 23, xxx. 26, and in the Jewish planetary days of the week the name for Monday).1 2
2.   Moon-Motifs in the Stories of Abraham.3
(a) The number 318 in Gen. xiv. 14, which is, however, certainly not historic. It is the number of warriors given in stories of fights embellished with mythological motifs. It is the number of days in the lunar year when the moon is visible (354 days less 12x3 days of dark moon = 318 days). In Abraham’s warfare with enemies, 318 companions support him, as the moon in warfare against the darkness has light 318 days.4 They are for this reason mysteriously named in Gen. xiv. 14 hanikim, the meaning of which is people of the sun ; see p. 239, i-, and p. 32. If the cabalistic sign for the name of Eliezer, Abraham’s servant, is equivalent to the number 318, that would show that late Judaism knew astral symbolism thoroughly. In Christian symbolism the number 318 is often met with right into the Middle Ages.
(5) The number 13 for the beginning of action, Gen. xiv. 4 : “Twelve years they served Chedorlaomer, and in the thirteenth year they rebelled.” This is distinctly a lunar number. The lunar year (354) requires twelve additional days for equalisation with the solar year. These twelve days are current as lying “between the years,” like the five epagomenae in the equalisation of 360 and 365, new year festival days. We know them as the twelve days with fateful nights at the turn of the year, ending in England with Twelfth Night. With the thirteenth day the new year begins. This is why Mohammed, the Moon-worshipper, was born, according to the legends (Ibn Hisham, 102), on the thirteenth of Rebi‘ I, and on a Monday.5
(c) The moon is “the Wanderer.” Possibly this motif also was in the mind of the chronicler in naming the chief halting-places
1   Winckler, Gesch. Is., ii. 23, spoke in this connection of Abraham as a “heroic precipitation of the Moon-god,” and of “the figure of Abraham as emanation of the Moon-god.” Stucken forms the same opinion in his astral myths. But later Winckler escaped this sophism. The opinion of Procksch, Nordhebr. Sagenbuch, p. 332, on “the celestial historical astrology which looks for the terrestrial patriarchs in the wrong places,” and which for this reason “ need not be taken into consideration,” does not fall in with the interpretation of either Winckler or myself.
2   Has the divine name Ilu La-ban, III. R. 66, 6b, to do with this ? It follows Nebo, and it precedes Shamash and Bel labiru, therefore probably Sin (see Hommel, Assyrian Notes, 50, where the list III. R. 66 is transcribed).
3   Baentsch, Altorient. und israel. Monotheismus, sees in the moon motifs with
which the tradition of Abram is endowed an indication that the religion of Abram does not yet mean any break in principle with that religion. In my opinion this is an overestimation of the motifs.   4 See Baentsch, loc. cit., pp. 61 f.
5   Comp. Winckler, F., ii. 350, 266. For another example, see p. 86.
ASTRAL MOTIFS IN THE STORY OF ABRAHAM 19
of the march. Abraham moved from east to west, like the moon. Harran, the city of Bel-Harran, means “way”; Gerar, where Abraham dwelt as a stranger, contains a play of words on girru, “path.” In Gen. xiii. 3 Abraham went “unto the place where his tent had been at the beginning,” VJJDDS, like the moon, as has been observed by Winckler, F., iii. 407.
We find the same motif again in the migration to Sinai. The word only appears among the halting-places of the journey through the wilderness ; see p. 106.
3.   Twin (Dioscuri) Motif.—This motif, which places moon and sun in opposition,1 is shown in the story of Abram and Lot. They represent the new age. Therefore their history is endowed with Dioscuri motifs.1 2 If the summer solstice is taken as the beginning of the new age, then one of the Twins bears lunar motifs at the apogee (see fig. 14, p. 35); the other bears, in opposition, motifs of the sun, in the Underworld.3 The Twins are the parted, that is to say, the hostile brothers. This is the motif in Gen. xiii. 9:
“If thou wilt take the left hand, then I will go to the right; or if thou wilt go to the right hand, then I will go to the left.”
Further, the motif of hospitality,4 belongs to the Dioscuri. Abram and Lot entertain celestial visitors; Gen. xviii. 3 ff. and xix. 3. Further, the rnotif of support. Hygin’s account of the chivalrous support given to Castor by Pollux (fab. lxxx.) shows numerous motifs related to the allusive stories in Gen. xiv. Finally, the motif of renouncement of reward.
The Babylonian teaching shows us (pp. 35, i. f., 125) that the moon as well as the sun (likewise the third great star Venus) may appear in the figure of Tammuz, in so far as they all sink into the Underworld and rise again. Legends outside the Bible are fond of attaching Tammuz motifs to the figure of Abraham. Abram, cast into the fiery furnace by Nimrod,5 and rescued from it, corresponds
1   Twins = sun and moon, or the growing and waning moon (two faces, comp. Janus as Moon-god, p. 72, i.); or, in the fixed-star heaven, which is a commentary upon the planetary heaven, Castor and Pollux.
2   P.17, comp. pp. 76, i. ff. Moses has the motifs of the later, Taurus (Marduk) age; see Exod. ii. Lot takes the place of the dead father.
3   m1? means “veiling.” Here also there is a play upon the words. The old astral mythological interpretations (Dupuis, Nork) already kept this in mind: “ Abraham from Ur (city of light) and Lot (darkness) could not live together.”
4   “Dioscuri maxime hospitales sese prsebent” ; see Jos. Schmeitz, De Dioscuris Grcecorum diis, cap. 5, quotation p. 39. Quoted according to Stucken, Astral- mythen, pp. 82 f.; also to be compared with the following: “It goes without saying that such assonances might be accidental. But the acceptance of such accident is no longer justifiable when the small, seemingly unimportant analogies multiply and link together.”
5   Quoted passages in Beer’s Leben Abrahams.

XXIX A SHORT HISTORY OF SUN TEMPLES 309
The May-Year Monuments in Britain.
In the first glimpses of the May year in Egypt we have dates from 5000 B.c. It does not follow that it did not reach Great Britain before about 2000 B.c. because monuments made their appearance about that time. It is clear, also, that with the possibilities of coastwise traffic as we have found it, it might as easily have reached Ireland by then ; 2000 B.C., therefore, is a probable date for the May worship to have reached Britain arguing on general principles; we now come to a detailed summary of the facts showing that it really reached Britain earlier.
Alignments in British monuments designed to mark the place of the sun’s rising or setting on the quarter- days of the May year have been found as follows:— 1
   Position.   May and Aug.   Feb. and Nov.
Monument.                     
               I      l
   | Lat. N.   | Long. W.
1 1   1 Rising. Setting.   Rising.   Setting.
Merry Maidens . . .   1
50° 3' 40"   5°   35' 25"   *   *      •
Boscawen-un ....   50 5 20   5   37 0   *   1   •   
Tregaseal ....   1 50 7 50   , 5   39 20   *
1   1      
Longstone (Tregaseal)   50 8 10   5   38 20   *   1 i      
Down Tor      50 30 10 ,   3   59 30   *         
Merrivale      50 33 15   1 4   2 30   *         
The Hurlers ....   50 31 0   I 4   27 20      | I   *   
Stonehenge       51 10 40   1 1   49 30   #   * 1      
Stanton Drew....   51 22 0   2   34 30 :   * I   I ;      *
      1      circle   1      avenue
            along   |      to
            avenue         circle
Stenness      59 0 10    1   3   13 40   »   1
*
1   *   
1 have already shown that it was the practice in ancient times for the astronomer-priests not only to
3io
STONEHENGE
CHAP.
watch the clock-stars during the night, but also other stars which rose or set about an hour before sunrise, to give warning of its approach on the days of the principal festivals.
Each clock-star, if it rose and set very near the north point, might be depended on to herald the sunrise on one of the critical days of the year, but for the others other stars would require to be observed. This practice was fully employed in Britain.
May Warnings.—The following table gives the stars I have so far noted which were used as wamers for the May festival.
Monument. |   Star.
i   Date or dates B.O.
Stonehenge       Pleiades (R)   1950
Merry Maidens      Pleiades (R)   1930
   Antares (   1310
The Hurlers      An tares (S)   1720
   Pleiades (R)   1610
Merriv&le      Pleiades (R) »»   1610 | 1420
Boscawen-un      Pleiades (R)   | 1480
Tregaseal      ! Pleiades (R)   1270
1
Stenness      Pleiades (R)   1230
Longstone (Tregaseal). . .   j Pleiades (R)   j 1030
i
(R) = rising. (S) = setting.
It is convenient here to give a list of the May warning stars found by Mr. Penrose in Greece, as it shows that the same stars were observed for the same
purpose.
XXIX A SHORT HISTORY OF SUN TEMPLES 311
      Decl.   Day. Year.
Archaic temple of Minerva . . . Hiero of Epidaurus, Asclepieion.
Hecatompedon   
Older Erechtheum   
Temple of Bacchus   
Corinth   
Aegina      Pleiades (R)
„ (R) „ (R)
Antares (S) Pleiades (R) Antares (S) „ (S)   + 7° 50* + 9 15 + 9 58 -14 31 + 10 35 -16 0 -16 45   April 20 „ 28 „ 26 „ 29 „ 29 May 6 >» 7   B.C.
2020
1275
1150
1070
1030
770
630
The warning stars at Athens were the Pleiades for temples facing the east, and Antares for temples using the western horizon.
August warnings.—Sunrise at the August festival was heralded by the rising of Arcturus, which, as we have seen, was also used as a clock-star. The alignments and dates given in the Arcturus table therefore hold good for August. At the Hurlers, where the hill over which Arcturus was observed fell away abruptly, we find Sirius supplanting Arcturus as the warning star for August in 1690 B.c.
November warnings.—So far I have discovered no evidence that any star was employed to herald the November sun. There may be two reasons for this. In the first place the November festival “ Halloween ” took place at sunset and the sun itself could be watched, no heralding star being necessary.
Secondly, the atmospheric conditions which prevail in Britain during November would not be conducive to the making of stellar observations at the horizon, and only risings or settings were observed with regard to the quarter-days.
312
STONEHENGE
CHAP.
February Warnings.—In the same way that Arcturus served the double purpose of clock-star and herald for the August sun, so did Capella serve to warn the February sun in addition to its use at night. The alignments and dates given in the Capella table will therefore hold good for its employment at the February quarter-day.
The Solstitial Year Monuments.
In Egypt generally, the solstitial worship followed that of the May and equinoctial years. The religion of Thothmes III. and the Rameses was in greatest vogue 2200-1500 B.c.
We find little trace of it in Greece proper, though Mr. Penrose has traced it in Calabria and Pompeii, and in some of the islands.
The solstitial cult was born in Egypt; it is a child of the Nile-rise. I have shown in my Daum of Astronomy that the long series of temples connected with the solstice may have commenced about 3000 B.C.; but for long it was a secondary cult; it was parochial until the twelfth dynasty, say 2300 B.C. Egypt’s solstitial “golden age” may be given as 1700 B.C., and her influence abroad was very great, so that much travel, “coastwise” and other, may be anticipated. It is for some centuries after the first date that the introduction of the solstitial worship into Britain may be anticipated. It, for instance, is quite probable that the pioneers of this worship should have reached Stonehenge in 2000 B.c.
XXIX A SHORT HISTORY OF SUN TEMPLES 313
The solstitial alignments found by Mr. Penrose in Greece are as follows :—
Temples.      Decl.   Day.   Year.
i   1
JUNE.         I B.C.
Athens, Dionysus (Upper Temple) Pompeii (Isis)      ' Antares(setting) jS-Geminorum   -11° 2' -16 44   June 20 „ 19   1700
750
   DECEMBER.
1         
Metapontum   
Locri      3-Gem i norum (setting) !
>» I   +29“ 38' + 29 40   Dec. 21 „ 21   610
610
We find plentiful evidence that the worship of the solstitial sun such as was carried on in Egypt at Karnak and at other places1 was introduced into Britain some time after the May-year worship was provided for in the monuments.
Although some of the alignments already discovered are in all probability solstitial, the variation of the sun’s solstitial declination is so slow and takes place between such narrow limits that a most careful determination of the actual azimuths and of the angular heights of the various horizons must be made before any definite conclusion as to dates can be arrived at. The necessity for this care is illustrated in the paper on Stonehenge 2 communicated to the Royal Society by Mr. Penrose and myself in 1891, where, after taking the greatest precautions, the resulting date was in doubt to the amount of 200 years in either direction.
1   Dawn of Astronomy, p. 78.
2   Proc. Roy. Soc., vol. 69.
3H
STONEHENGE
CHAP.
So far Stonehenge is the only temple at which these observations have been made, so that for the other alignments contained in the following list no dates can yet be given. I
Monument.   Alignment.      As.      ^ Decl.
1 (provisional).   j Season.   Date
B.C.
Stonehenge .   ; Direction of avenue . .   N. 49°   84'   18*15.   28®   64'   80"N.   | Summer (R) 1   1680
Boecawen*un   1 Circ. to fine menhir . .   N. 68   80   0 E.   22   68   18   Summer (R) j
   „ Blind Fiddler .   N. 64   80   0 E.   22   24   12   »? j
Tregaseal . .   Circ. to row of holed   N. 58   20   25 E.   22   68   26   Summer (R)
   stones
1 Circ. to two barrows 900'   N. 60   0   0 E.   24   7   0   
   1 distant                  i   i ’* j
Longstone   ! M6n-an-tol to Longstone   S. 60   80   0 W.   > 24   88   0 8.   Winter (S)
1   
(Tregaseal)            |   I            1
The Hurlers.   N. circ. to S.E. stone .   S. 60   50   0 E.   24   17   20 S.   Winter (   
Stanton Drew   Gt Circle to N.E. circle   N. 51   0   0 E* ,   28   48   46 N.   Summer (R)   
Stenness . .   Circle to Hindera Fiold   N. 89   80   0 E.   24   8   15 N.   Summer (R)   
   Barnstone to Maeshowe   N. 41   16   0 E.      —         
   Circ. to Ward Hill   S. 41   0   0 E. 1   —      Winter (R)
|   
   tumulus                  1      
   Circ. toOnston tumulus   S. 86   80   0 W.      —   1   1 „ <S)   
   ,, tumuli         0   0 W.   1
1         Summer (S)   
(R) = rifling.   (S)=setting.
I cited an alignment at the Hurlers which marked the rising point of Betelgeuse. This star warned the summer solstice sunrise at about the Hurlers’ date. So far, however, I have not yet found any suggestion of its use elsewhere.
At Shovel Down and Challacombe on Dartmoor there are avenues pointing a few degrees west of north. The sight-lines along these avenues would mark the setting-point of Arcturus at the time that that star (setting) warned the rising of the sun at the summer solstice; but this use cannot be considered as established, as Arcturus would scarcely set before its light was drowned in that of the rising sun. The absence of
XXIX A SHORT HISTORY OF SUN TEMPLES 315
darkness in high summer in these latitudes and the bad weather in the winter may both be responsible for so few alignments for the solstices.
The Equinoctial Year Monuments.
The equinoctial pyramid and Babylonian cult in vogue in Egypt in the early dynasties (4000 B.C.), with the warning stars Aldebaran (March) and Yega (September), was represented in Greece at a much later period. The facts for Greece, according to Mr. Penrose, are as follows :—
      Deck   Day.   Year.
   MARCH.            B.C.
NikeApteros      Spica (setting)   +6°   1 O'   Mar. 17   ! 1130
Juno Lacinia (near Groton). . .   a-Arietis   +7   27   „ 28   j 1000
Paestum (Neptune)      Spica (setting)   + 3   5   „ 22   535
Gergenti (Hercules)      ft   +2   30   „ 30   470
1
   SEPTEMBER.            
Rhamnus (Themis)      Spica (rising)   + 0°   O'   Sept. 17   1092
Tegea (Minerva)      tt tt   +5   51   „ 18   1075
Syracuse (? Minerva)      tt   + 4   30   „ 20   815
Athens (dedication unknown). .   tt   + 4   17   „ 23   . 780
Rhamnus (Nemesis)      tt tt   + 4   5   „ 22   747
Basra (Apollo)      tt tt   + 3   57   ,, 22   728
Ephesus (Diana).....   tt tt   + 3   57   „ 25   ! 715
Syracuse (Diana)   
Ephesus (Diana) (re-orientation).   tt tt   +2   22   „ 26   450
   tf         i Oct. 6   i 355
In Britain equinoctial alignments are not wanting, but so few have been traced that I have reserved them for future inquiry.
CHAPTER XXX
THE LIFE OF THE ASTRONOMER-PRIESTS
THE facts contained in the preceding chapters have suggested, at all events, that whatever else went on some four thousand years ago in the British circles there was much astronomical observation and a great deal of preparation for it.
In a colony of the astronomer-priests who built and used the ancient temples we had of necessity:—
(l)   Observatories, i.e., circles in the first place; next something to mark the sight-lines to the clock-star for night work, to the rising or setting of the warning stars, and to the places of sunrise and sunset at the chief festivals. This something, we have learned, might be another circle, a standing stone, a dolmen, a cove, or a holed stone.
A study of the sight-lines shows us that these col- limation marks, as we may call them, were of set purpose, generally placed some distance away from the circles, so far that they would require to be illuminated in some way for the night and dawn observations. When there was no wind, one or more hollows in a stone, whether a menhir or a quoit, might have held
xxx LIFE OF THE ASTRONOMER-PRIESTS 317
grease to feed a wick or a pine-wood torch. But in a wind some shelter would be necessary, and the light might have been used in a cromlech or allde couverte. Stones have been found with such cups, and debris of fires have been found in cromlechs.
It must not be forgotten that here there was no oil as in the Semitic countries whence, as we have seen, the immigrants came; and it was not a question of a light on the sight-line alone. If wood were used, it must have been kept dry for use, and whether wood or animal fat were employed the most practical and convenient way of lighting up would have been to keep a fire ever burning in some sheltered place.
(2)   Dwellings, which would be cromlechs or many- chambered barrows, according to the number of astronomer-priests at the station. These dwellings would require to be protected against the invasions of the local fauna, very different from what it is now, and for this a small, and on that account easily blocked, entrance would be an essential.
These dwellings would naturally suggest themselves as the shelter place for the ever-burning fire or the supply of dry wood. Tradition points with no uncertain sound to the former existence of life and light in these “hollow hills.” Mr. MacRitchie’s book1 contains a mine of most valuable and interesting information on this subject.
(3)   A water supply for drinking and bathing, which might be a spring, river or lake, according to the locality.
Given a supply of food we have now provided for 1 The Testimony of Tradition.
CHAP.
318   STONEHENGE
the shelter and protection of the astronomer and the man.
But the man who brought this new astronomical knowledge was, before he came, astrologer and magician as well, and, further, he was a priest; hence on account of his knowledge of the seasons, he could not only help the aboriginal tiller of the soil as he had never been helped before, by his knowledge; but he could appeal in the strongest way to his superstitious fears and feelings, by his function as the chief sacrificer and guardian of the sacrificial altars and fires. Hence it was that everything relating to the three different classes of things to which I have referred was regarded as very holy because they were closely associated with the astronomer-priests, on whom the early peoples depended for guidance in all things, not only of economic, but of religious, medical and superstitious value.
The perforated stones were regarded as sacred, so that passing through them was supposed to cure disease. Whether men and women, or children only, passed through the hole depended upon its size. But a hole large enough for a head to be inserted was good for head complaints.
The wells, rivers, and lakes used by the priests were, as holy places, also invested with curative properties, and offerings of garments (skins?), and pins to fasten them on, as well as bread and wine and cheese, were made at these places to the priests.
The fact that the tree on which the garment was hung was either a rowan or a thorn shows that these offerings commenced as early as the May-November worship.
The holed stones, besides being curative, were in long
xxx LIFE OF THE ASTRONOMER-PRIESTS 319
after years, when marriage had been instituted, used for the interchange of marriage vows by clasping hands through the opening.
The cups for the light would also be sacred objects; and many of them have been since used for holy water.
The cursus at Stonehenge and the avenues on Dartmoor may be regarded as evidences that sacred processions formed part of the ceremonial on the holy days, but sacrifices and sacred ceremonials were not alone in question; many authors have told us that feasts, games and races were not forgotten. This, so far as racing is concerned, is proved, I think, by the facts that the cursus at Stonehenge is 10,000 feet long and 350 feet broad, that it occupies a valley between two hills, thus permitting of the presence of thousands of spectators, and that our horses are still decked in gaudy trappings on May Day.
Nor is this all. It is hard to understand some of the folklore and tradition unless we recognise that at a time before marriage was instituted, at some of the sacred festivals the intercourse of the sexes was permitted if not encouraged. This view is strengthened by the researches of Westermarck1 and Rhys.2 Given such a practice, the origin of matriarchal customs and of the couvade is at once explained ; and it is clear that the charges against the Druids of special cruelty and impurity must be withdrawn. Their sacrifices and customs were those common to all priesthoods in the ancient world.
1   History of Human Marriage, Chapter II.
2   Celtic Folklore, ii., 654.
320
STONEHENGE
CHAP.
I have shown that some circles used in the worship of the May year were in operation 2200 B.C., and that there was the introduction of a new cult about 1600 B.C., or shortly afterwards, in southern Britain, so definite that the changes in the chief orientation lines in the stone circles can be traced.
To the worship of the sun in May, August, November and February was added a solstitial worship in June and December.
The associated phenomena are that the May-November Balder and Beltaine cult made much of the rowan and may thorn. The June-December cult brought the worship of the mistletoe.
The flowering of the rowan and thorn tree in May, and their berries in early November, made them the most appropriate and striking floral accompaniments of the May and November worships, and the same ideas would point to a similar use of the mistletoe in June and December.
The fact that the June-December cult succeeded and largely replaced the May-November one could hardly have been put in a cryptic and poetic statement more happily than it appears in folklore : Balder was killed by mistletoe.
This change of cult may be due to the intrusion of a new tribe, but I am inclined to attribute it to a new view taken by the priests themselves due to a greater knowledge, among it being the determination, in Egypt, of the true length of the year which could be observed by the recurrence of the solstices, and of the intervals between the festivals reckoned in days.
However this may have been, all the old practices
xxx LIFE OF THE ASTRONOMER-PRIESTS 321
and superstitions were retained, only the time of year at which they took place was changed. As the change of cult was slow, in any one locality the celebrations would be continued at both times of the year, and for long both sets of holidays were retained.
Since I have shewn that the solstitial worship came last, traces of this, as a rule, would be most obvious in places where it eventually prevailed over the cult of the May year. In such places the absence of traces of the May festival would be no valid argument against its former prevalence. In other places, like Scotland, where the solstitial cult was apparently introduced late and was never prevalent, we should expect strong traces of the May worship, and, as a matter of fact, it is very evident in the folk lore and customs of Scotland; even the old May year quarter days are still maintained.
Between the years 2300 B.c. and 1600 B.C., whether we are dealing with the same race of immigrants or not, we pass from unhewn to worked stones. The method of this working and its results have been admirably shown to us by Prof. Gowland’s explorations at Stonehenge.
From the tables, given in Chap. XXVIII, it can be seen that, so far as the present evidence goes, there was a pretty definite time—about 2300 B.c.—of beginning the astronomical work at the chief monuments; Cornwall came first, Dartmoor was next.
Almost as marked as the simultaneous beginning are the dates of ending the observations, if we may judge of the time of ending by the fact that the precessional changes in the star places were no longer marked by the marking out of new sight lines.
Y
322
STONEHENGE
CHAP.
The clock-star work was the first to go, about 1500 BX\ The May-warning stars followed pretty quickly.
We may say, then, that we have full evidence of astronomical activity of all kinds at the circles for a period of some 700 years.
What prevented its continuance on the old lines? It may have been that the invention of some other method of telling time by night had rendered the old methods of observation, and therefore the apparatus .to carry them on, no longer necessary.
On the other hand, it may have been that some new race, less astronomically inclined, had swept over the land.
I am inclined to take the former view. It is quite certain that for the clock-stars other observations besides those on the horizon would soon have suggested themselves for determining the lapse of time during the night The old, high, bleak, treeless moorlands might then in process of time have been gradually forsaken, and life may have gone on in valleys and even in sheltered woods, except on the chief festivals. When this was so astronomy and superstition would give way to politics and other new human interests, and the priests would become in a wider sense the leaders and the teachers of the more highly organised community.
It is clear that in later days as at the commencement they were still ahead in the knowledge of the time. “ Hi terrae mundique magnitudinem et formam, motus coeli ac siderum, ac quod dii velunt sciere profitentur” is Pomponius Mela’s statement concerning them.1 From 1500 B.c. to Csesar’s time is a long interval, and yet
1 Pomp. Mela, Lib. II. c. 2. I have already (p. 52) quoted Cies&r’s
testimony to the same effect.
xxx LIFE OF THE ASTRONOMER-PRIESTS 323
the astronomical skill of the so-called Druids, who beyond all question were the descendants of our astronomical- priests, was then a matter of common repute. Csesar’s account of the Druids in Gaul (Bello Gallico, vi. c. 13, 14, 15) is extremely interesting because it indicates, I think, that the Druid culture had not passed through Gaul and had therefore been waterborne to Britain, whither the Gauls therefore went to study it.1
Simultaneously with the non-use of the ancient stones, we may imagine that the priests—of ever-increasing importance—no longer dwelt in their cromlechs, but, rather, occupied such buildings as those which remain at Chysoister, and from this date it is possible that burials may have taken place in some of the mounds then given up as dwelling places. As sacred places they were subsequently used for burials, as Westminster Abbey has been; but burials were not the object of their erection.1 2 This new habit may have started the practice of cist burial by later people in barrows thrown up for that special purpose.
I cannot close this Chapter without expressing my admiration of the learning and acumen displayed by Dr. Borlase in his treatment of the subject of the Druids in his History of Cormvall, published in 1769; I find he has anticipated me in suggesting that the hollowed
1   ‘ Disciplina in Britannia reperta, atque in Galliano translata esse existimatur.”—C. Bell. Gall. lib. vi. c. 13. This “ discipline also included magic according to Pliny. “ Britannia hodie earn (i.e. Magi am) attonite celebrat tantis ceremoniis, ut earn Persis dedisse videri possit ” (lib. xxx. c. 1.)
2   Bertrand and Beinach, Les Celtes et les Gaulois dans les Vallies du Po et du Danube, p. 82. Tregellis, “Stone Circles in Cornwall.” Trane. Penzance Natural History and Antiquarian Society, 1893-4.
Y 2
324
STONEHENGE
CH. XXX
stones were used for fires. It is clear, now that the monuments have been dated, that the astronomical knowledge referred to by Caesar and Pomponius Mela was no new importation ; if, therefore, the present view of ethnologists that the Celtic intrusion took place about 1000 B.c. is correct, it is certain the Celts brought no higher intelligence with them than was possessed by those whom they found here; nor is this to be expected if, as the inquiry has suggested, the latter were the representatives of the highest civilisation of the East with which possibly the former had never been brought into contact.
APPENDICES
I. DETAILS OF THE THEODOLITE OBSERVATIONS AT STONEHENGE
THE instrument chiefly employed was a six-inch transit theodolite by Cooke with verniers reading to 20" in altitude and azimuth. Most of the observations were made at two points very near the axis, which may be designated by a, b. Station a was at a distance of 61 feet to the south-west of the centre of the temple, and b 364 feet to the north-east. The distance from the centre of Stonehenge to Salisbury Spire being 41,981 feet, the calculated corrections for parallax at the points of observation with reference to Salisbury Spire are:—
Station a + 4' 12".
„   6 — 25 20.
(1)   Relative Azimuths.—Theodolite at station a—
Salisbury Spire       0°   0'   0"
N. side of opening in N.E. trilithon         
of the external ring      237   27   40
Tree in middle of clump on Sidbury         
Hill       237   40   20
Highest point of Friar's Heel      239   47   25
S. side of opening in N.E. trilithon...   240   14   40
Middle „ „ „ ...   238   51   10
(2)   Absolute Azimuths.—All the azimuths were referred to that of Salisbury Spire, the azimuth of which was determined by observations of the Sun and Polaris.
326
APPENDICES
(a) Observation of Sun, June 23, 1901, 3.30—3.40 P.M.
Mean of observed altitudes of Sun       41*   26'   35'
Refraction    — 1' 4" |   0   0   58
Parallax    + 6 J         
True altitude of Suns centre ...   41   25   37
Latitude = 51° 10' 42*. Sun’s declination = 23° 26' 43*. Using the formula
cosHA = siDHA+c-*)sin$(A+g-c) sin c . sin z
where A = azimuth from south, A = polar distance, c = co-latitude, and z = zenith distance,
we get
Azimuth of Sun   S. 75° 30' 30* W.
Mean circle reading on Sun     84   38   35
Azimuth of Salisbury Spire    S. 9   8   5 E.
(b) Observations of Polaris.—June 23, 1901. Time of greatest easterly elongation, calculated by formula cos A = tan <j> cot h, is G.M.T. 1.34 A.M.
Azimuth at greatest easterly elongation, calculated by the formula
sin A = cos 8 sec <f>, is 181° 57' 0" from south.
Observed maximum reading of circle     256° 33' 0"
True azimuth of star    181 57 0
Meridian (S.) reading of circle    74 36 0
Circle reading on Salisbury Spire     65 28 0
Azimuth of Salisbury Spire ...S.   9   8 0 E.
The mean of the two determinations gives for the azimuth of Salisbury Spire S. 9° 8' 2" E. This result agrees well with the value of the azimuth communicated by the Ordnance Survey Office, namely, 9° 4' 8" from the centre of the circle, which
APPENDICES   327
being corrected by + 4' 12' for the position of station a, is increased to 9° 8' 20".
Hence, from the point of observation a, 9° S' 20" has been adopted as the azimuth of Salisbury Spire.
We thus get the following absolute values of the principal azimuths from the point a:
Highest point of Friar's Heel          239°   47'   25*   
   -9   8   20   
   230   39   5   
   or N. 50   39   5   E.
Middle of opening in N.E. trilithon       238   51   10   
   -9   8   20   
   229   42   50   
   or N. 49   42   50   E.
The difference of 8*' between this and the assumed axis 49° 34' 18" is so slight that considering the indirect method which has necessarilly been employed in determining the axis of the temple from the position of the leaning stone, and the want of verticality, parallelism and straightness of the inner surfaces of the opening in the N.E. trilithon, we are justified in adopting the azimuth of the avenue as that of the temple.
Next, with regard to the determination of the azimuth of the avenue as indicated by the line of pegs to which reference is made on p. 65. The small angle between the nearest pegs A and B (which are supposed to be parallel to the axis of the avenue), observed from station a, was measured, and the corresponding calculated correction was applied to the ascertained true bearing of the more
distant peg B.
Thus
True bearing of peg B =     238° 35' 0"
Calculated correction to peg A = ...   0   12   8
True bearing of line AB     238 47 8
Bearing of Salisbury Spire     189   8 20
True bearing of a line parallel to the axis of near part of avenue    N. 49 38 48 E.
328
APPENDICES
The mean of the three independent determinations by another observer was 49° 39' 6".
The calculated bearing of the more distant part of the axis of the avenue determined in the same manner by observations from station b is 49° 32' 54". The mean of the two, namely, 49° 35' 51", justifies the adoption of the value 49° 34' 18" as given by the Ordnance Survey for the straight line from Stonehenge to Sidbury Hill.
(3)   Observation of Stmrise.—On the morning of June 25, 1901, sunrise was observed from station a, and a setting made as nearly as possible on the middle of the visible segment as soon as could be done after the Sun appeared.
The telescope was then set on the highest point of the Friar’s Heel, and the latter was found to be 8' 40" south of the Sun.
Sun’s declination at time of observation ... Elevation of horizon at point of sunrise ... Assuming 2' vertical of Sun to have been visible at observation, we have apparent
altitude of Sun’s upper limb    0
Refraction    — 27' 27" f
Parallax    + 0   9 )
True altitude of upper limb     0
Sun’s semi-diameter     0
True altitude of Sun’s centre    
From this it results that the true azimuth of the Sun at the time of observation = N. 50' And since azimuth of Friar’s Heel    =
2' of sunrise should be N. of Friar’s Heel Observed difference of azimuth    =
Observed—calculated    =
23°   25'   5'
0   35   48
0   37   48
-0   27   18
0   10   30
0   15   46
-0   5   16
.50°   30'   54'
50   39   5
0   8   11
0   8   40
0   0   29
E.
The observation thus agrees with calculation, if we suppose about 2'of the Sun’s limb to have been above the horizon when it was made, and therefore substantially confirms the azimuth above given of the Friar’s Heel and generally the data adopted.
APPENDICES
• 329
II. HINTS ON MAKING, AND METHOD OF REDUCING, THE FIELD OBSERVATIONS.
IT will probably be found useful if I give here a few hints as to- the precautions which must be taken in making the field observations and an example of their reduction to an astronomical basis.
For the azimuths of the sight-lines the investigator of these monuments cannot do better than use the 25-inch, or 6-inch, maps published by the Ordnance Survey. Their accuracy is of a very high order and is not likely to be exceeded, even if approached, by any casual observer having to make his own special arrangements for correct time before he can begin his surveying work.
In some cases, however, it may be found that the Survey has not included every outstanding stone which may be found by an investigator on making a careful search; many of the stones are covered by gorse, &c.’, and are not, therefore, easily found.
In such cases the azimuth of some object that is marked on the map should be taken as a reference line and the difference of azimuth between that and the unmarked objects determined. By this means the azimuths of all the sight-lines may be obtained.
When using the 25-inch maps for determining azimuths it must be borne in mind that the side-lines are not, necessarily, due north and south. The Director-General of the Ordnance Survey, Southampton, will probably on application state the correction to be applied to the azimuths on this account, and this should be applied, of course, to each of the values obtained.
If for any reason it is found necessary or desirable to make observations of the azimuths independently of the Ordnance Survey, full instructions as to the method of procedure may be found in an inexpensive instruction book1 issued by the Board of Education. The instructions given on p. 49, § 3, are most
1 Demonstrations and Practical Work in Astronomical Physics at the Royal College of Science, South Kensington. Wyman and Sons, Is.
APPENDICES
33°#
generally applicable, and the form on p. 76 will be found very handy for recording and reducing the observations.
In making observations of the angular elevation of the horizon a good theodolite is essential. Both verniers should be read, the mean taken, and then the telescope should be reversed in its Ys, reset, and both readings taken again. One setting and reading are of little use.
The Ordnance Survey maps may also be employed in a preliminary reconnaissance to obtain approximate values of the horizon elevations. This may be done by measuring the distances and contour-lines shown on the one-inch maps. This method, however, is only very roughly approximate owing to the fact that sharp but very local elevations close to the monuments may not appear on these maps and yet be of sufficient magnitude to cause large errors in the results.
Where trees, houses, &c., top the horizon, they should, of course, be neglected and the elevation of the ground level, at that spot, taken. Should the top of the azimuth mark (stone, &c.) show above the actual horizon, its elevation should be recorded and not that of the horizon.
Having measured the angular elevation of the horizon along the sight-line, it is necessary to convert this into actual zenith distance and to apply the refraction correction before the computations of declination can be made.
The process of doing this and of calculating the declination will be gathered from the examples given below:—
Data.
Monument:—E. circle Tregeseal, lat. 50° 8' N. i.c. colat = 39° 52'.
Alignment. Centre of circle to Longstone.
Az. (from 25* Ordnance Map). N. 66° 38' E.
Elevation of horizon (measured) 2° 10/
Reference to the May-Sun curve, given on p. 263, indicates that this is probably an alignment to the sunrise on May morning. Therefore, in determining the zenith distance, the correction for the sun's semi-diameter (16') must be taken into account, allowing that 2' of the sun's disc was above the horizon when the observation was made.
APPENDICES
33i
Zenith Distance:—
Zenith distance of true horizon   =   90°
„   „ local „   =90° - 2° 10'   =   87° 50'
Bessel’s tables show that refraction, at altitude 2° 10', raises sun 17'. If 2' of sun’s limb is above horizon, sun’s centre is 14' below.
.\ True zenith distance of sun’s centre = 87° 50'+17' +14' = 88° 21'.
Declination :—
Having obtained the zenith distance, and the azimuth, the latitude being known, the N.P.D. (North Polar Distance) of the sun may be found by the following equations:—
(1)   tan 0 = tan z. cos A,
where 0 is the subsidiary angle which must be determined for the purpose of computation, z is the true zenith distance, and A is the distance from the North point.
(2)
cos
* __cos z. cos (c-0)1 cos 0   ’
where A is the N.P.D. of the celestial object, and c is the colatitude (90° — lat.) of the place of observation.
In the example taken this gives us—
(1)   tan 0 = tan 88° 21'. cos 66° 38'
(2)
0 = 85° 50' 45*
cos 88° 21'. cos (39° 52'-85° 50' 45") cos 85° 50' 45"
A = 73° 57' 50"
Declination, 8, = (90°—A) = 16° 2' 10" N.
Reference to the Nautical Almanac shows that this is the sun’s declination on May 5 and August 9. We may therefore conclude that the Long-stone was erected to mark the May sunrise, as seen from the Tregeseal Circle.
Had we been dealing with a star, instead of the sun, the only modification necessary in the process of calculating the declination would have been to omit the semi-diameter correction of 14'.
Having obtained a declination, we must refer to the curves given on pp. 115-6 in order to see if there is any star which fits it, and to find the date.
1 cos (c - 0)=cos - (c - $).
332
APPENDICES
Take, for example, the case of the apex of Cam Kenidjack, as seen from the Tregeseal circle—
Az. = N. 12° 8' E.; hill = 4° 0/ lat. = 50° 8'.
This gives us a declination of 42° 33' N., and a reference to the stellar-declination curves (p. 115-6) shows that Arcturus had that declination in 2330 B.c. From the table given on p. 117, we see that at that epoch Arcturus acted as warning-star for the August sun.
In cases where the elevation of the horizon is 30', or in preliminary examinations, where it may be assumed as 30', the refraction exactly counterbalances the hill, and therefore the true zenith distance at the moment of star-rise is 90°. Hence the N.P.D. of the star may be found from the following simple equation—
(3)   cos A=cos A cos X
where A and A have the same significance as before and X is the latitude of the place of observation.

is not confined to Cornwall. At Eden Hall, Giant’s Cave, water with sugar is drunk on the third Sunday in May. A vast concourse of both sexes is present.4
At Rorrington, a township in the parish of Chirbury, was a holy well at which a wake was celebrated on Ascension Day.
In the account of this well given by Gomme (p. 82) we get a glimpse of many associated usages.
“ The well was adorned with a bower of green boughs, rushes, and flowers, and a may-pole was set up. The people walked round the well, dancing and frolicking as they went. They threw pins into the well to bring good luck and to preserve them from being bewitched, and they also drank some of the water. Cakes were also
1 Hope, p. 14.   2 The Land's End District, p. 72.
3 Edmunds, p. 72.   * Hope, p. 40.
Q 2
228
STONEHENGE
CHAP.
eaten; they were round flat buns from three to four inches across, sweetened, spiced, and marked with a cross, and they were supposed to bring good luck if kept.”
The legend given by Quiller-Couch (p. 55) respecting St. Cuthbert’s well in North Cornwall is that “ in olden times mothers on Ascension Day brought their deformed or sickly children here, and dipped them in, at the same time passing them through the aperture connecting the two cisterns; and thus, it is said, they became healed of their disease or deformity. It would seem that other classes also believed virtue to reside in its water; for it is said that the cripples were accustomed to leave their crutches in the hole at the head of the well.”
At the village of Tissington, near Ashbourne, in Derbyshire, the custom of well-flowering is still observed on every anniversary of the Ascension (Hope, p. 48).
We may gather from these associated observances at different places that the wells themselves were situated near circles, for the worshippers would not be distributed at such a time. This argument is strengthened by the custom of “ waking the well ” which took place on the patron saint’s day.
With regard to the time of the day or night at which well-worship took place, there seems little doubt that for the most part it was carried on at night. The practices connected with the “ waking of the well ” indicate this clearly, and when it is remembered that these ancient worships were carried on at a time when marriage had not been instituted, we can understand that many ‘ pagan ’ rituals savoured of sensualism as we should now think and call it.
XXI HOLY WELLS AND STREAMS   229
The particular times when it was considered most propitious for the sick to visit the wells appear anciently to have been at daybreak or sunrise.
At the well at Farr, in Sutherlandshire, it is held that the patient, after undergoing his plunge, drinking of the water, and making his offering, “ must be away from the banks so as to be fairly out of sight of the water before the sun rises, else no cure is effected.” At Roche Holy- well, in Cornwall, before sunrise on holy Thursday was the appointed time.
Sometimes the moment of sunrise is chosen. To bathe in the well of St. Medan, at Kirkmaiden in Wigtonshire, as the sun rose on the first Sunday in May was considered an infallible cure for almost any disease.
On the other hand, in some cases, as at St. Madron’s well, noon is chosen on the first three Sundays in May, “ not believing that these waters have any virtue if resorted to on any other days of the year, or at any other hour of the day.”
With regard to the August festival, there is a holy well at St. Cleer, near the Hurlers; the festival is held on August 9th.1 I have no special references to August wells in Ireland, but there is evidence given by Piers 1 2 that at that time cattle were bathed.
“ On the first Sunday in harvest, viz., in August, they will be sure to drive their cattle into some pool or river and therein swim them ; this they observe as inviolable as if it were a point of religion, for they think no beast will live the whole year thro’ unless they be thus drenched.
1   St. Cleer = St. Cledod, A.D. 482. The arms of St. Cleer are the Sun in its glory.
2   Description of Westmeath, 1682, quoted by Vallencey, i., 121.
230
STONEHENGE
CHAP.
I deny not but that swimming cattle, and chiefly in this season of the year, is healthful unto them, as the poet hath observed:—
“ Balanbemque gregem flavio mersare salubri.”—Virg.
In th’ healthful flood to plunge the bleating flock.
but precisely to do this on the first Sunday in harvest, I look on as not only superstitious but profane.”
I next come to the solstice in June.
There is evidence concerning wells quite akin to that furnished by the astronomical use of the circles, that the May year festivals were subsequently changed to solstitial dates. The well worship does not appear to have lteen carried on in the cold weather—hence the absence of references to February and November; for the same reason we have only now to do with the summer solstice.
Hazlitt quotes the following from the Irish Hudibras (1689) concerning June worship at a well in the North of Ireland:—
“ Have you beheld, when people pray At St. John's well on Patron-Day,
By charm of priest and miracle,
To cure diseases at this well;
The valleys filled with blind and lame,
And go as limping as they came.”
At Barnwell (Beirna-well=youths’ well), near Cambridge, the festival took place on St. John’s Day.1
Brand, in his history of Newcastle (ii. 54), refers to a well still called Bede’s Well, near Jarrow. “As late as 1740 it was a prevailing custom to bring children troubled with any disease or infirmity ; a crooked pin was put in, aud the well laved dry between each dipping.
1 Hazlitt, ii., 616.
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My informant has seen twenty children brought together on a Sunday, to be dipped in this well, at which also, on Midsummer Eve, there was a great resort of neighbouring people, with bonfires, music, etc.”
Hope gives references to seven wells dedicated to “ St. John,” one to “St. John the Baptist,” and four to St. Peter. These may have been solstitial wells, but the information given is very slight and not to the present point. He states (xxii) that the most important celebrations were first held in May and at the summer solstice. He then adds, “ later Easter and Ascensiontide were the favoured seasons.” May, Summer Solstice and Easter was, I think, the true order.
Finally, I may refer to the earliest holy well known to history. This is the famous well at Heliopolis where Ra used to wash himself, and Piankhi, B.c. 740, went and washed his face in it. At this same well the Virgin sat and washed her Son’s swaddling bands in it. Its water made the balsam trees to grow. It is now called by the Arabs “ The Fountain of the Sun ” ‘l£yn ash-Shems.
CHAPTER XXII
WHERE DID THE BRITISH WORSHIP ORIGINATE ?
THE recent chapters have, I think, established, by the evidence derived from folklore and tradition, that there was in the long past a combined worship of trees, wells and streams in the neighbourhood of sacred places, the sacred place being a stone circle or some other monument built up of stones.
We have gathered also that the chief times of worship were on or near the most important dates defined for us by the May year, the original year marked out by the various agricultural and other operations proper to the various seasons.
It is again imperative that I should point out that if the basis of this worship was not utility it must have been started by men sufficiently skilled to indicate by their astronomical knowledge the proper times for the various operations to which I have referred. In this we see the reason for the local combination of the worship in the neighbourhood of the stones, for the stones were really the instruments which enabled the astronomer-priest to be useful to
CH. xxii ORIGIN OF BRITISH WORSHIP 233
the community; that he in process of time became powerful and sacred because he was wise, and added medicine and magic to his other qualifications, was only what was to be expected.
I am not the first to have been driven by the facts to note the close association to which I have referred, that the cults were not separate but were parts of one whole.
Wood-Martin speaks with the most certain sound on this point. “ It will be seen that, from a review of the whole subject, stone, water, tree, and animal- worship are intimately connected.”1
What the analysis in the recent chapters, taken in connection with the astronomical results previously stated, has done is perhaps to give a clear reason for the connection. Not only were the cults started together, but they remained together for a long time; it is only in quite late years that the traditions have become so dim that practices once closely connected are now dealt with apart from the rest.
Hope points out (p. xxii) that the 16th of the canons of the reign of Edgar, A.D. 963, which enjoins the clergy to be diligent, advance Christianity, and extinguish heathenism, mentions especially the worship of stones, trees, and fountains. The laws of Knut (A.D. 1018) specify the worship “ of heathen gods, the sun, moon, fire, rivers, fountains, rocks, or trees.”
Now, although the folklore evidence I have brought together has been gathered for the most part from the British Isles, my inquiries have not been limited to that area.
1 Wood-Martin, p. 265.
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It was natural that when the study of folklore had suggested that there was a close connection between the worship carried on in Britain at stone monuments, sacred trees, and sacred wells an attempt should have been made to see whether these three cults had been associated out of Britain with the ceremonials of any of the early peoples for which complete and trustworthy information is available.
On this point the traditions of widely sundered countries is amazingly strong.
The folklore of the Pyrenees, France, Spain and Portugal regarding sacred wells is very similar to that of Ireland. Borlase writes :1
“ It is interesting to notice that the pre-Christian custom called dessil, or circuit around a venerated spot, which is practised in Ireland in the case of one dolmen at least, as well as at wells and Churches innumerable, is found also in Portugal.”
In the Pyrenees, too, fairies and spirits are thought much of in this connection. Borlase tells us: * “ They are the presiding genii of certain wells.” He adds :
“ It is not in Ireland alone that dolmens are associated with the notion of w’ells and water springs. The Portuguese names, Anta do Fontao, Fonte Coberta, Anta do Fonte-de Mouratao, and the French names, Fonte de Rourre, and Fonte nay le Marmion, show this to be the case.”3
In Persia Sir Win, Ouseley saw a tree covered with rags, and similar trees in the Himalayas are associated with large heaps of stones (Gomme, p. 105).
1 Dolmens of Ireland, ii., p. 696.
- Ibid., ii., p. 580.   3 Ibid., p. 772.
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The late General Pitt-Rivers affirms that the customs of well-offerings I referred to in the last chapter are invariably associated with cairns, megalithic monuments or some such early Pagan institutions, and he adds that the area in which traces of well-offerings are found is conterminous with the area of the megalithic monuments.1
The idea that the waters of certain wells have marvellous healing powers is also not confined to the British Isles, for in a great many parts of Europe, perhaps more especially in France, Spain and Portugal, we find instances.
The practice of worshipping in connection with wells and the sacred stones and sacred trees which were associated with them, as we have seen, was indeed in ancient days almost, if not quite, universal wherever man existed. The traditions of the past, therefore, are to be gathered over a very wide area. I quote a summary of the universality of this practice given by the late General Pitt-Rivers in the paper already noticed :
“ Burton says it extends throughout northern Africa from west to east; Mungo Park mentions it in western Africa ; Sir Samuel Baker speaks of it on the confines of Abyssinia, and says that the people who practised it were unable to assign a reason for doing so; Burton also found the same custom in Arabia during his pilgrimage to Mecca; in Persia Sir William Ouseley saw a tree close to a large monolith covered with these rags, and he describes it as a practice appertaining to a religion long since proscribed in that country; in the Dekkan and Ceylon Colonel Leslie says that the trees in the neighbourhood of 1 Journal Eth. Soc.y N.S., i., 64.
STONEHENGE
CHAP.
236
wells may be seen covered with similar scraps of cotton; Dr. A. Campbell speaks of it as being practised by the Limboos near Darjeeling in the Himalaya, where it is associated, as in Ireland, with large heaps of stones; and Hue in his travels mentions it among the Tartars.”
The astronomical facts given in this book, gathered from a study of the monuments in these islands, can only give us information touching the introduction of the combined worship here.
My investigations have strongly suggested, to say the least, that there were men here with knowledge enough to utilise the movements of the sun and stars for temple, and no doubt practical purposes before 2000 B.C., that is, a thousand years before Solomon was born, and at about the time that the Hecatompedon was founded at Athens.
If this is anywhere near the truth, these men must have been representatives of a very old civilisation.
Now the civilisation principally considered by archaeologists in connection with the building of the monuments which I have studied is the Aryan, of which the Celts formed a branch. This view, however, is not universally held; the late General Pitt-Rivers, and I know of no higher authority, stated his opinion that ?“ The megalithic monuments . . . take us back to pre- Aryan people, and suggest the spread of this people over the area covered by their remains.” 1 Mr. Gomme is of the same opinion (p. 27) :
“ Ceremonies which are demonstrably non-Aryan in India, even in the presence of Aryan people, must in origin have been non-Aryan in Europe, though the 1 Journ. Eth. Soc., N.S., i., 64.
XXII ORIGIN OF BRITISH WORSHIP 237
race from whom they have descended is not at present identified by ethnologists.”
Sergi also points out:—
“ Indo-Germanism led to almost entire forgetfulness of the most ancient civilisations of the earth, those born in the valleys of the Euphrates and the Tigris, and in the valley of the Nile; no influence was granted to them over Greco-Roman classic civilisation, almost none anywhere in the Mediterranean.”1
It is not necessary for me to deal at length with the great Aryan controversy in this book, even if the subject were within my competence, which it is not; but now that we have a large number of monuments dated, say, within twenty years of their use, it is important to bring forward some dates arrived at by archaeologists and philologists to compare with those which the astronomical method of inquiry has revealed.
Hall2 gives evidence to show that the Aryans did not reach Greece till after the earlier period of the Mycenaean age, which he dates at about 1700 B.C.
With regard to the date of the Aryan invasion of Britain, Mr. Read, of the Department of Ethnography, British Museum, informs me that it may be taken as about 1000 B.C.; it was associated with cremation. It is highly probable that these Aryans were the Goidels or the Gael. These were followed some 700 years later by another Aryan sept—the Brythons. Mr. Read is also of opinion that the Goidels reached Britain from the country round the South Baltic, and the Brythons from or through north-east France.
1   The Mediterranean Races, p. 4.
2   The Oldest Civilisation of Greece, p. 105.
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Archaeologists, however, recognise a pre-Aryan invasion, about 1800 B.c. (a date determined by the introduction of bronze), of a brachycephalic folk who built covered barrows, different in these respects from the neolithic folk, who were long-skulled and built long barrows. Now, in relation to the stone structures to which this book especially refers, the question arises, are we then dealing with this swarm or the people whom they found on the soil?
There are some indications in the traditions which imply that we are really dealing with an early stone age, when flints were the only weapons, and there were no clothes to speak of. I will give one or two examples of these traditions. Gomme (p. 53) refers to a singular fact preserved among the ceremonies of witchcraft in Scotland :
“ In order to injure the waxen image of the intended victim, the implements used in some cases by the witches were stone arrowheads, or elf-shots, as they were called, and their use was accompanied by an incantation. Here we have, in the undoubted form of a prehistoric implement, the oldest untouched detail of early life which has been preserved by witchcraft.”
Gomme (p. 39) also tells us that one of the May practices at Stirling is for boys of ten and twelve years old to divest themselves of their clothing, and in a state of nudity to run round certain natural or artificial circles. “ Formerly the rounded summit of Demyat, an eminence in the Ochil range, was a favourite scene of this strange pastime, but for many years it has been performed at the King’s Knot, in Stirling, an octagonal mound in the Royal Gardens. The per
XXII
ORIGIN OF BRITISH WORSHIP
239
formances are not infrequently repeated at Midsummer and Lammas.” He adds, “ The fact that in this instance the practice is continued only by ‘boys of ten and twelve years old/ shows that we have here one of the last stages of an old rite before its final abolition.”
Baring-Gould (p. 21) provides us with a practice in Brittany which would seem to be a remnant of a pre- clothing age.
Near Carnac is a menhir, at which a singular “ceremony took place till comparatively recently, and may perhaps still be practised in secret. A married couple that have no family repair to this stone when the moon is full, strip themselves stark naked and course one another round it a prescribed number of times, whilst their relations keep guard against intrusion at a respectful distance.”
Now it is in connection with this question that I am in hopes that some help may be got from the astronomical results recorded in the present volume. The dates revealed by the orientation of the circles and outstanding stones already dealt with (and there is a large number to follow) indicate that it is among the records of some people of whom the civilisation is very ancient that we must look in the first instance with a view of tracing the origin of our British monuments.
Further, now that we have been able to follow their astronomical methods, to note how sound they were, and to gather the purposes of utility they were intended to serve, it is simply common sense to inquire, in the first instance, if they may have been connected with these ancient peoples whose astronomical skill is
240
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universally recognised, and whose records and even observations have come down to us.
Now, while we know nothing of the astronomy of the Aryans generally, or that of the Celts in particular, the astronomical knowledge of the Babylonians and Egyptians is one of the wonders of the ancient world.
Hence Babylonia and Egypt are at once suggested, and the suggestion is not rendered a less probable one when we remember that both these peoples studied and utilised astronomy at least some 8,000 years ago.
But here we are dealing with two peoples. It is more than probable that they both were associated more or less near the origin with one race, the ideas of which permeated both civilisations.
I have it on the highest authority, that of Dr. Budge, that in Babylonia there were originally the Sumerians and the Semites. The primitive race which conquered the Egyptians seems to have been connected with the former as regards civilisation, and with the latter as regards some aspects of the Egyptian language.
This race was Semitic, and as the pyramids, built some 6,000 years ago, are a proof of the interaction of the two civilisations at that time, for the Easter festival celebrated on the banks of the Nile came from the valleys of the Tigris and Euphrates, we may omit the pre-Semites from our consideration.
There is other evidence that the connection between the Semites and Egyptians was close astronomically, so that any Semitic influence in later times or in other lands would be sure to show traces of this
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ORIGIN OF BRITISH WORSHIP
241
connection, and in temple worship it would be traceable. While the carefully oriented Egyptian temples built of stone remain and have been carefully studied, those erected in the centres of Semitic power, built of unbaked brick, have for the most part disappeared, but for the most part only; some stone structures remain, but in regard to them there has been no Lepsius; of their orientation, too, little is known. This is all the more to be regretted since Layard, in addition to many E. and N. buildings found at Nimrood, noted at the mound of Kouyunjik, the site of Nineveh, lat. 36° 20' N., that Sennacherib’s palace, which appears to have been built round a central temple, was oriented to the May year.1 (Az. N. 68° 30' E. =Dec. N. 16°.)
Now, calling in the Babylonians as the originators of what went on in Britain 4,000 years ago may seem to some to be far-fetched in more ways than one; but the Babylonians were a remarkable people ; according to some they originated all the voyaging of the early world, though other authorities point out that the first ships in the eastern seas must have been Indian.
Ihering2 adduces a series of facts which indicate clearly that the Babylonians carried on maritime navigation at least as early as about 3500 B.c. But, whatever this time was, the Semites and Egyptians had already a rich culture behind them at a time when the Aryans, whatever or wherever their origin, had not made themselves a place in the world’s history. An ancient
1   This I gather from the plan prepared by Lieut. Glascott, R.N., who apparently accompanied Mr. Layard. He indicates the true north point with a sailor’s precision in such matters. (See p. 305).
2   Evolution of the Aryan, Translation by Drucker, § 32.
R
242.
STONEHENGE
CHAP.
sea connection between Babylonia and India may explain the similarity of the British and Indian folklore.
Some facts with regard to long distance ancient travel are the following. Our start-point may be that Gudea, a Babylonian king who reigned about 2500 B.C., brought stones from Melukhkha and Makan, that is, Egypt and Sinai (Budge, Ilistoi'y of Egypt, ii., 130). Now these stones were taken coastwise from < Sinai to Eridu, at the head of the Persian Gulf, a distance of 4,000 miles, and it is also said that then, or even before then, there was a coast-wise traffic to and from Malabar, where teak was got to be used in house- and boat-building. The distance from Eridu coastwise to Malabar, say the present Cannanore, is 2,400 miles.
The distance, coastwise, from Alexandria to Sandwich, where we learn that Phoenicians and others shipped the tin extracted from the mines in Cornwall, is only 5,300 miles, so that a voyage of this length was quite within the powers of the compassless nan- gators of 2500 B.c.
The old idea that the ancient merchants could make a course from Ushant to, say, Falmouth or Penzance need no longer be entertained; the crossing from Africa to Gibraltar and from Cape Grisnez to Sandwich were both to visible land, i.e. coastwise. The cliffs on the opposite land are easily seen on a clear day.
Hence it would have been easier before the days of astronomical knowledge and compasses to have reached England, and therefore Ireland and the Orkneys,
ORIGIN OF BRITISH WORSHIP
XXII
H3
than to get to some of the islands in the Mediterranean itself.1
It is seen then that it is possible that Semites might have built our stone monuments between 2000 and 1200 B.C., while it is quite certain that the Aryans did not build them, if the archaeologists are not widely wrong in their dates.
Let us, then, begin our inquiries by considering the information available with regard to the Semites. Let us see in the first instance whether they h$d stone monuments, and sacred trees and sacred wells; a system of worship; and whether this worship was connected with the sun and stars.
It is fortunate for us in this matter that one of the most fully equipped scholars which the last century produced, Robertson Smith, devoted his studies for many years to The Religion of the Semites, and information on the points raised is to our hand; all I need do is to give as shortly as possible a statement of the various conclusions he had reached on the points to which our attention may in the first instance be confined. I quote from his book The Religion of the Semites.
The Semites include the Babylonians, who spoke a Semitic dialect, for there were Sumerian speaking peoples among them, Assyrians, Phoenicians, Hebrews, Arabs and Aramaeans, who in ancient times occupied the
1 The prevalence of solstitial customs in Sardinia and Corsica, with apparently no trace of the May year, tends to support this view, which is also strengthened by the fact that the solstitial customs in Morocco are very similar to those we read of in Britain : the May year is unnoticed, and there is a second feast at Easter (March 16th). See Westermarck in Folk-lore, vol. xxi., p. 27.
R 2
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fertile lands of Syria, Mesopotamia and Irak from the Mediterranean coast to the base of the mountains of Iran and Armenia. They also embrace the inhabitants of the great Arabian peninsula, which is believed to have been th,e centre of dispersion.
The ordinary artificial mark of a Semitic sanctuary was the sacrificial pillar, cairn, or rude altar (p. 183); it was a fixed point where, according to primitive rule, the blood of the offering was applied to the sacred stones; or where a sacred tree, as we shall see presently, was hung with gifts ; the stones and tree being symbols of the God (p. 151).
Further, it is certain that the original altar among the northern Semites was a great unhewn1 stone, or a cairn, at which the blood of the victim was shed (p. 185).
Monolithic pillars or cairns of stones are frequently mentioned in the more ancient parts of the Old Testament as marking sanctuaries ; Shechem, Bethel, Gilead, Gilgal, Mizpah, Gibeon, and En-Rogel are referred to (p. 186).
There is evidence that in very early times the sanctuary was a cave (p. 183). The obvious successors of a natural cave are, (1) an artificial cave made in the earth like the natural one, and (2) a model or representation of a cave built of stone, with a small entrance which would be barred, and covered over with earth, thus protecting the priests from wild animals and the weather.
The dolmens and cromlechs which are found in the Semitic area where there are stones doubtless had this origin.
1 And if thou wilt make me an altar of stone, thou shalt not build it of hewn stone: for if thou lift up thy tool upon it, thou hast polluted it.—Exodus, xx., 25.
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The use of a cave was probably borrowed both by the Egyptians and Greeks (there is a cave, for instance, at Eleusis) from the Semites.
In later times, when caves or their equivalents were no longer in vogue and temples were erected, they enclosed a Bit-ili or Beth-el, an upright stone, consecrated by oil.1
We next learn (pp. 170 and 183) that no Canaanite high place was complete without its sacred tree standing beside the altar.
In tree-worship pure and simple as in Arabia, the tree is adored at an annual feast (? May), when it is hung with clothes and women’s ornaments (p. 169).
The tree at Mecca to which offerings are made is spoken of as a “ tree to hang things on.”
The references to “ groves ” given in the Bible as associated with temple worship are misleading, “ groves ” being a wrong translation of the word Asherah, which was a pole made of wood which the Jews adopted from the Canaanites. It was ornamented and perhaps draped, and was most probably originally a tree. It may have been used in the “ high places ” because single trees would not grow there in the East any more than on the moors in Devon and Cornwall.
The antiquity of this emblem is proved by Smith’s statement (p. 171) that in an Assyrian monument from
1 And Jacob rose up early in the morning, and took the stone that he had put for his pillows, and set it up for a pillar, and poured oil upon the top of it.
And this stone, which I have set for a pillar, shall be God’s house ; and of all that thou shalt give me I will surely give the tenth unto thee.—Genesis, xxviii., 18, 22.
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Khorsabad an ornamental pole is shown beside a portable altar. “ Priests stand before it engaged in ao act of worship and touch the pole with their hands or perhaps anoint it with some liquid substance.”
The draping of the tree seems to be proved by the passage which suggested the mistranslation to me before I wrote to some Hebrew scholars among my friends who allowed me to consult them. The passage is as follows (II. Kings, xxiii., 6, 7) :—
“ And he brought out the grove from the house of the Lord, without Jerusalem, unto the brook Kidron, and burned it at the brook Kidron, and stamped it small to powder, and cast the powder thereof upon the graves of the children of the people.
“ And he brake down the houses of the Sodomites, that were by the house of the Lord, where the women wove hangings for the grove.”   1
To show how little variation there was in the Semitic practices to those recorded in British folklore I may state that one of my friends—one of the revision committee—informed me that his impression was that the Asherah was furnished with pegs or hooks, so that the garments, &c., might be easily hung on it. I
I next come to the sacred waters. A sacred fountain, as well as the sacred tree, was a common symbol at Semitic sanctuaries (p.   183). Nevertheless, they
were sometimes absent, the main place being given to altar worship. Further, Robertson Smith was of opinion that this altar worship did not originate with tree [?or water] worship (p. 170); but still, sacred wells are among the oldest and most ineradicable
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objects of reverence among all the Semites, and were credited with oracular powers (pp. 128, 154). The fountain or stream was not a mere adjunct to the temple, but was itself one of the principal sacra of the spot (p. 155).
Undoubtedly there were ordeals among other things at these wells (p. 163). One case is given in Numbers, v., 17, where the words “holy water” occur, and other water “ that causeth the curse ” is referred to. Ordeal by water is not unknown among British customs.
It is interesting to note that special sanctity was attached to groups of seven wells (p. 167), and that one such group was called Thorayga = Pleiades (p. 153).1 We may gather from this that one of the most sacred times for Semitic worship was at the May festival, marked by the rising of the Pleiades.
Although I do not find many references in Robertson Smith’s book as to great festival days, there is other evidence which shows that the May festival was the greatest, and represented New Year’s Day. I have already shown that the May-November year is the one recognised in the present Turkish, Armenian and I believe Persian calendars (p. 29). As this was the year used at Thebes 3200 B.C., we may take it that at that time it was universal in W. Asia and the adjacent lands. The Jews afterwards adopted the equinoctial year.
It seems highly probable that we may learn from
1 Herodotus, iii., 8, refers to an Arabian rite in which seven stones are smeared with blood among peoples whose only gods were Dionysos and Urania, whom they called Orotalt and Alilat.
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many passages in the Old Testament what the Semitic temple practices were generally. There were sacrifices of men and beasts, burnt offerings, and lighting of fires, through which the children were made to pass.
I give some references to these fire practices.
“ And thou shalt not let any of thy seed pass through the fire to Molech.”—Leviticus, xviii., 21.
“ There shall not be found among you any one that maketh his son or his daughter to pass through the fire, or that usetli divination, or an observer of times, or an enchanter, or a witch,
“Or a charmer, or a consulter with familiar spirits, or a wizard, or a necromancer.”—Deuteronomy, xviii.. 10, 11.
“ He walked in the way of the kings of Israel, yea. and made his son to pass through the fire.”—II. Kings, xvi., 3.
“ And they caused their sons and their daughters to pass through the fire, and used divination and enchantments.”—II. Kings, xvii., 17.
“ And he defiled Topheth, which is in the valley of the children of Hinnom, that no man might make his son or his daughter to pass through the fire to Molech.”—II. Kings, xxiii., 10. (See also 4 and 5.)
Fire sacrifices which were interpreted as offerings of fragrant smoke were prevalent among the settled Semites (p. 218). Sacrificial fat was burned on the altar. Smith remarks: “ This could be done without any fundamental modification of the old type of sacred stone or altar pillar, simply by making a hollow on the top to receive the grease, and there is some reason to thiuk that fire-altars of this simple kind, which in certain
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Phoenician types are developed into altar candlesticks, are older than the broad platform altar proper for receiving a burnt offering” (p. 364).
With regard to the worship of the sun and stars by the Semites, we read th$t the Semite addressed his God as Baal or Bal. The simple form of Baal was the sun.1
By the Semites the stars were, on account of their movements, held to be alive; they were therefore gods, and it was in consequence of this widespread belief that the stars were worshipped (p. 127). The worshippers “ burned incense unto Baal, to the sun, to the moon and to the planets, and to all the hosts of heaven” (II. Kings, xxiii., 5). Job congratulated himself that “ his heart had not been enticed, nor his mouth kissed his hand, if he beheld the sun when it shined, or the moon walking in her brightness ” (Job, xxxi., 26-27). The worship of the morning star as a god is the old Semitic conception (Isa., xiv., 12), “ Lucifer son of the Dawn.”
We gather from the later practices of the Saracens that the sacrifices to the morning star could not be made after the star had disappeared in the dawn.2 The God had to be in the presence of the worshippers.
The Semitic worship was generally carried on in ?“ high places ” ; in the Babylonian temples built in a river valley the “ high places ” were secured by building towers with the sanctuary on the top.
1   Sayce, Babylonians and Assyrians, p. 234.
2   Nili op. quaedam(Paris, 1639), pp. 28, 117, quoted by Robertson Smith, p. 151.
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These high places were necessary because exact observations of the risings of the heavenly bodies formed part of the ceremonial, and a clear horizon was absolutely imperative. That this was generally understood and acted on is well evidenced by the fact that in the Old Testament the mention of high places is nearly always associated with the references to the religion of the Canaanites and other Semitic nations as if the high places were among the most important points in it.
Other arguments may be founded upon linguistic considerations. Prof. J. Morris Jones1 finds that the syntax of Welsh and Irish differs from that of other Aryan languages in many important respects, e.g. the verb is put first in every simple sentence. Prof. Rhys had suggested that these differences represented the persistence in Welsh and Irish of the syntax of a pre-Aryan dialect, and as the anthropologists hold that the pre-Aryan population of these islands came from North Africa, it seemed to Prof. Jones that that was the obvious place to look for the origin of these syntactical peculiarities. He finds the similarities between Old Egyptian and neo-Celtic syntax to be astonishing; he shows that practioally all the peculiarities of Welsh and Irish syntax are found in the Hamitic languages.
This conclusion practically implies that the bulk of the population of these islands, before the arrival of the Celts, spoke dialects allied to those of North Africa. The syntactical peculiarities must have repre
1 “ Pre-Aryan Syntax in Insular Celtic,” in the Welsh People, by Rhys and Brynmor-Jones, pp. 617-641.
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sented the habits of thought of the people, which survived in the Celtic vocabulary imposed upon them.
These conclusions were not known to me when I began to see the necessity of separating the cult of the June from that of the May year, and the identity of the conclusions drawn from astronomical and linguistic data is to me very striking and also suggests further special inquiries.
It is also worth while to state that the Semites, including the Hebrews and Phoenicians, did not burn their dead. Finally, I may quote a remark made by General Pitt-Rivers in the paper already referred to :—“ If we da not accept one old civilization as the origin of the various practices, then we must assume accidental origins in each country.”
CHAPTER XXIII
THE SIMILARITY OF THE SEMITIC AND BRITISH WORSHIPS
I PROPOSE in this chapter to bring into juxtaposition the various British and Semitic-Egyptian practices which we have so far considered.
I confess I am amazed at the similarities we have •come across in the first cast of the net; we have found so much that is common to both worships in connection with all the points we considered separately. I will, for convenience, deal with the various points seriatim. 1
1.   The cult of sacred stones or cairns.
The only objection which, so far as I can see, may be raised to these practices being absolutely common is the idea among many British archaeologists that the cairns, in which term I include chambered barrows or dolmens and their skeletons, the cromlechs and stone passages, were set up for burial and not for worship. This idea has arisen because some of them have been used for burials. But I cannot accept this argument, because since the burials might have taken place at any time subsequent to their erection they' prove
CH. xxrii SEMITIC AND BRITISH WORSHIPS 253
nothing as to the reason of the erection; and further, if these chambered cairns were meant for burials, there should be burials in all of them, and yet there are none in the most majestic of them £ all, Maeshowe.
Let us consider a few facts in relation to the Semitic use of cairns referred to on p. 244.
That the cromlechs found both in Britain and Syria— there are 780 in Ireland and 700 in Moab—are the remains of chambered cairns is pretty clear from the evidence brought forward by Borlase.1
Mr. John Bell, of Dundalk, disinterred over sixty cromlechs from cairn3 in Ulster. All dolmens were covered by tumuli according to Mr. Bell and Mr. Lukis. Monuments called cairns in the earliest Ordnance Survey have been marked dolmens in subsequent surveys (e.g. Townland of Leana in Clare) because the earth covering the stones had disappeared in the meantime.
Among the evidences of natural and artificial caves preceding cairns which replaced them are the twenty-four caves which have been explored in France (op. cit.y p. 568).2
Borlase points out with regard to the Irish dolmens
1   Dolmens of Ireland, p. 426.
2   “ France, indeed, furnishes us with a stepping-stone, as it were,, between the natural cave and the dolmen in certain artificial caves which offer comparison both with the former and the latter .... the natural cave was scooped out into a large chamber or chambers either by the swirling of water pent up in the limestone or other yielding rock and finding its way out through some narrow crevice. The ground plan and section, therefore, is that of an alUe couverte with a vestibule .... the artificial cave is modelled on the natural one, and yet bears, as M. Mortillet points out, a close resemblance to the dolmen.”
254
STONEHENGE
CHAP.
that large tumuli were not essential; all that was necessary was that the walls of the cell or crypt should he impervious to the elements and to wild animals. A creep or passage communicating with the edge of the mound is common to Ireland, Wales, Portugal and Brittany (op. cit., p. 428).
The facts that the cairns so often had their open ends facing the N.E. or S.E., and that the west end was generally higher, like the naos trilithons at Stonehenge, must be borne in mind.
Most of what we know of earliest man has been obtained from their lives in caves; what they ate, the contemporary fauna and their art are thus known to us, but caves have not been considered as tombs, though men have died and left their remains in them.
In the case of a dolmen, however, an artificial cave, as we shall see, the possibility of people living in them appears never to have been considered seriously, and the tomb theory has led to bad reasoning and forced argument.
When burials are absent it has been suggested that “ owing to some peculiarity of the soil, the entire of the human remains have become decomposed, only the imperishable stone implements entombed with the body remaining.” 1
Mr. Spence has pointed out the extreme improbability of Maeshowe being anything but a temple, and I may now add on the Semitic model. There were a large central hall and side rooms for sleeping, a stone door which could have been opened or shut from the inside, and a niche for a guard, janitor or hall porter! So 1 Wandle, Remains of Prehistoric Age in England, p. 147.
XXIII SEMITIC AND BRITISH WORSHIPS 255
high an authority as Colonel Leslie has pointed out that neither Maeshowe, New Grange and Dowth on the Boyne, nor Gavr Innis in Brittany bear any internal proof of being specially prepared as tombs.1
There is another point connected with these dolmens and cromlechs. An origin in the Semitic area easily explains why in Asia and Britain the dolmens are so alike, down to small details, such as the perforation of one of the side stones. Borlase has remarked also upon the similarity of Indian and Irish dolmens (op. cit., p. 755), similar holes also being common to them. The curious concentric circles, &c., found on some dolmen stones are common to Assyrian vessels.1 2 * *
The most philosophical study of this question I have seen8 certainly suggests that much light may be expected from this source.
Part of the cult of the sacred stones was the ceremony of anointing them. Robertson Smith (p. 214) gives us the meaning and history of anointing among the Semites, and notes its continuation from Jacob’s pouring oil on sacred stones at Bethel, through the time of Pausanias to that of the Pilgrims of the fourth century A.D.
The anointing of stones was certainly carried on in
1   It is interesting to point out in relation to the fact that different swarms successively introduced the May and solstitial years that the “ sleeping rooms ” of the May year cairns at New Grange are about 3 feet square, while at the solstitial Maeshowe, built very much later, the dimensions are 6 feet X 4J feet. There were differences of sleeping posture in the old days among different peoples as well as different methods of burial.
2   Borlase, p. 617.
8 “ The Builders and the Antiquity of our Cornish Dolmens,” by
Rev. D. Gath Whitley {Journal R.I. Cornwall, No. 4).
STONEHENGE
CHAP.
256
ancient times in Britain and Brittany. Baring-Gould tells us:1
“ Formerly the menhir was beplastered with oil and honey and wax, and this anointing of the stones was condemned by the bishops. In certain places the local clergy succeeded in diverting the practice to the Churches. There are still some in Lower Brittany whose exterior walls are strung with wax lines arranged in festoons and patterns.
“ In some places childless women still rub themselves against menhirs, expecting thereby to be cured of barrenness, but in others, instead, they rub themselves against stone images of saints.”
When I visited the Cave of Elephanta in 1871 I was told that the barren women of Bombay visit the cave once a year and anoint the standing stone in the chief chamber. In Egypt they still rub their bodies on the Colossi.
2.   Sacred fires.
Among the Semites the sacrificial fat was burned on the altar. And we have seen that “ this could be done without any fundamental modification of the old type
of sacred stone or altar pillar, simply by making a hollow
on the top to receive the grease.” 2 * * * * *
Baring-Gould8 has written on the question of sacrificial and sacred fires in ancient times in Britain, and points out that there still remain in some of our churches (in Cornwall, York and Dorset) the contrivances—now called cresset-stones—used.   They are
1 Book oj Brittany, p. 21.   2 History of the Semites, p. 364.
3 Strange Survivals, p. 122.
XXIII SEMITIC AND BRITISH WORSHIPS
257
blocks of stone with cups hollowed out precisely as described by Robertson Smith, lamp-niches furnished with flues.
On these he remarks (p. 122):—
“ Now although these lamps and cressets had their religious signification, yet this religious signification was an afterthought. The origin of them lay in the necessity of there being in every place a central light, from which light could at any time be borrowed.”
3.   The cult of the sacred tree.
I have shown that the sacred
trees in Britain, whether rowan, thorn or mistletoe, were at their best at the times of the festivals at which they were chiefly worshipped. Mrs. J. H. Philpot, in her valuable book on “ the sacred tree,” gives us the names of some used in different countries; it would be interesting to inquire whether the same consideration applies to them in the Semitic and other areas.
There seems to be no doubt that the Semitic Asherah was the precursor of the British Maypole, even to its dressing of many coloured ribands, and from the May- pole customs we may infer something of the Semitic practices which have not come down to us. Even “ Jack o’ the Green ” may eventually be traced to Al-Khidr (p. 29) of the old May festivals. 4
4.   The cult of the sacred well.
Here we find only trifling differences. The chief
s
Some are placed in
 
FTO. 49. —Cresset-stone, Lew- annick. From Baring- Gould’s Strange Survivals.
STONEHENGE
CHAP.
258
one is the use of pins in Britain. If we knew more about the Asherah with its hooks this difference might disappear.
It has been pointed out by several authors that the worship of wells and water would be most likely to arise in a dry and thirsty land.
5.   The time of the chief festivals.
Here we find beyond all question that the festival times were the same to begin with. May is the chief month both in West Asia and West Europe.
It was not till a subsequent time that June and December were added in Egypt and Britain, and April and September among the Jews.
6.   The characteristics of the festivals.
Here again is precise agreement. The list I gave on p. 205 of what can be gathered from British folklore is identical with the statements as to Semitic practices which I quoted from Robertson Smith in the last chapter.
7.   The worship in high places.
Absolute identity; and from this we can gather that the ancient condition of the high places wherever selected for temple worship was as treeless as it is now ; otherwise the observations of sun- and star-rise and -set would be greatly interfered with.
Of course, there may have been “ groves ” associated with, but away from, sanctuaries in both Semitic aud British areas ; but it is not impossible that much which has been written on this subject with regard to Britain
XXIII SEMITIC AND BRITISH WORSHIPS 259
and the “ Druids ” may have been suggested in part by the erroneous translation of Asherah to which I have referred. It has also been stated that an early transcriber who, in error, substituted lucus for locus may also be held partly responsible, even if lucus does not mean a clearing in a grove, as some maintain.
8.   The god or gods worshipped.
The year-gods in Babylonia and Egypt respectively were Baal and Thoth. It is worth while to inquire whether either name has made its appearance as a loan-word in the traditions of Western Europe.
About Baal there can be no question as to the coincidence, whether accidental, as some philologists affirm, or not.
We find Bel or Baal common to the two areas. Mr. Borlase informs us (op. cit., p. 1164) that in Western Europe Bel, Beal, Balor, Balder, and Phol, Fal, F4il are the equivalents of the Semitic Baal. Balus, indeed, is named as the first king of Orkney. A May worship is connected with all the above. Beltaine and many variants describe the fires lighted at the festival, and it is worthy of note that although this fire worship has been extended to the solstitial ceremonials in June, the name Baltaine has never been applied to it at that time except by writers who think that the term “midsummer” may be applied indiscriminately to the beginning of May and the end of June.
I next deal with the Egyptian year-god Thoth. In Greece he became Hermes, among the Romans Mercury. In this connection I can most usefully refer to Rhys’s Hibbert Lectures and his chapter on the Gaulish
S 2
26O
STONEHENGE
CH. XXIII
Pantheon. He tells us (p. 5) that “ Mercury is the god with whom the monuments lead one to begin.” There is also mention of a god Toutates or Teutates, and a Toutius, who might have been a public official (? priest of Toutates). Only Celtic or other later origins of the words are suggested; it is not said whether the possible Egyptian root has been considered.
We may even, I think, go further and ask whether some of the constellations were not figured as in Egypt, otherwise it is difficult to account for the horror of the black pig (p. 195) at Hallowe’en. The whole Egyptian story is told in my Dawn of Astronomy1 in connection with the worship of Set, that is the stars visible at night, blotted out at dawn by the rising sun, or becoming predominant after sunset. 9
9.   The worship of the sun and stars.
Here also, as I have shown, is complete agreement The same astronomical methods have been employed for the same purpose. The chief difference lies in the fact that by lapse of time the precessional movement caused different stars to be observed as clock stars or to herald the sunrise on the chief ceremonial days.
1 Pp. 146, 215, and elsewhere.
CHAPTER XXIV
THE MAY-YEAR IN SOUTH-WEST CORNWALL
THE previous pages of this volume have apparently dealt with two distinct subjects; the use of the British monuments on the orientation theory, and the folklore and tradition which enable us to get some glimpses into the lives, actions, habits and beliefs of the early inhabitants of these islands, and the region whence these early inhabitants had migrated.
But although these subjects are apparently distinct, I think my readers will agree that the study of each has led to an identical result, namely, that in early times it was a question of the May year, and that the solstitial year was introduced afterwards. This was the chief revelation of the monuments when they were studied from the astronomical point of view.
"Without confirmation from some other sources this result might have been considered as doubtful, and the orientation theory might have been thought valueless. It has, however, been seen that folklore and tradition confirm it up to the hilt. I think it may be said, therefore, that the theory I put forward in this book touching the astronomical use of our ancient temples is so far justified.
The British monuments I had considered before this appeal to tradition was made were the circles at Stone-
262
STONEHENGE
CHAP.
henge, Stenness, The Hurlers and Stanton Drew, and the avenues on Dartmoor. These were studied generally, the main special result being that to which I have referred ; we not only found alignments to sunrise and sunset on the critical quarter-days of the May years, but we found alignments to the stars which should have been observed either at rising or setting to control the morning sacrifices.
But this inquiry had left out of account several circles in south-west Cornwall, of which I had vaguely heard but • never seen. When I had written the previous chapters showing how fully May-year practices are referred to in the folklore of that part of the cduntry, I determined to visit the circles, dealing with them as test- objects in regard to this special branch of orientation. I had not time to. make a complete survey; this I must leave to others; but with the help so readily afforded me, which I shall acknowledge in its proper place, I thought it possible in a brief visit to see whether or not there were any May-year alignments. In the following chapters I will give an account of the observations made, but before doing so, in order to prove how solid the evidence afforded by the Cornish monuments is, I will state the details of the local astronomical conditions depending upon the latitude of the Land’s End region, N. 50°. In the chapter containing some astronomical hints to archaeologists I referred (p. 122) to the solstice conditions for Stenness beyond John o’ Groat’s, because those conditions afforded a special case, the solstice being determined by the arrival*of the sun at its highest or lowest declination, which happens on particular dates which recur each year. But with regard to the
XXIV THE MAY-YEAR IN S.W. CORNWALL 263
May year, during the first week of May the sun’s declination is changing by over a quarter of a degree daily, so' that we must not expect to find the declination of 16* 20' (see p. 22) rigidly adhered to.
As I have shown (p. 23), the sun’s passage through this declination four times on its annual path on the dates stated accurately divides the year into four equal parts. But this accuracy might have been neglected by the early observers, so that, for instance, the sun’s position on the 4th or 8th of May instead of that on the 6th might have been chosen as being in greater harmony with the agricultural conditions at the place.
 
The conditions of the sunrise from John o’ Groat’s to Land’s End, 2' of the sun being visible above the skyline, can be gathered from the following diagram :—
FIG. 50.—Place of first appearance of the May sun, in British latitudes.
264
STONEHENGE
CH. XXIV
The exact azimuths for this sunrise in the Land’s End region (Lat. 50°) in relation to the place of the sunrise when half the sun has risen, with a sea horizon, are shown in Fig. 51.
 
.1
c
s
O
6 ®
Z 8 % O
K
aj
©’a
u
21
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2* m m
9 \ X 0
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to
6
£
CHAPTER XXY
THE MERRY MAIDENS CIRCLE (LAT. 50° 4' N.)
ONE of the best preserved circles that I know of is near Penzance. It is called the Merry Maidens1 (Dawns- Maen), and is thus described by Lukis* (p. 1):—
“This very perfect Circle, which is 75 feet 8 inches in diameter, stands in a cultivated field which slopes gently to the south.
“It consists of 19 granite stones placed at tolerably regular distances from each other, but there is a gap on the east side, where another stone was most probably once erected.
“Many of the stones are rectangular in plan at the ground level, vary from 3 feet 3 inches to 4 feet in height, and are separated by a space of from 10 to 12 1 2
1   I may here remark that “ 9 maidens ” is very common as a name for a circle in Cornwall. It is a short title for 19 maidens. Lukis implies that Dawns-Maen once consisted of 20 stones. If all the circles followed suit it would be interesting to note if the present number of 19 is always associated with a gap on the eastern side. The “pipers” are, of course, the musicians who keep the maidens merry, as does the “ blind fiddler ” at Boscowen-un Circle.
2   Prehistoric Stone Monuments, Cornwall.
266
STONEHENGE
CHAP.
feet. There is a somewhat shorter interval between four of the stones on the south side.
“ In the "vicinity of this monument are two monoliths called the Pipers; another called Goon-Rith; a holed stone (not long ago there were two others); and several [5] Cairns.”
Lukis thus describes the “ Pipers ” :—
“ Two rude stone pillars of granite stand erect, 317 feet apart, and about 400 yards , to the north-east of the Circle of Dawns-Maen. No. 1 is 15 feet high, 4 feet 6 inches in breadth, and has an average thickness of 22 inches, and is 2 feet 9 inches out of the perpendicular. The stone is of a laminated nature, and a thin fragment has flaked off from the upper part No. 2 is 13 feet 6 inches high, and is much split ?perpendicularly. At the ground level its plan in section is nearly a square of about 3 feet.”
Goon-Rith is next described:—“ No. 3 is naturally of a rectangular form in plan, and is 10 feet 6 inches in height. The land on which it stands is called Goon-Rith, or Red Downs. The upper part of the stone is of irregular shape.”
Borlase, in his History of Cornwall (1769), only mentions the circle, but W. C. Borlase, in his Nmia Cornubm (1872), gives a very rough plan including the stones before mentioned and several barrows, some of which have been ploughed up.
At varying distances from the circle and in widely different azimuths are other standing stones, ancient crosses and holed stones, while some of the barrows can still be traced.
The descriptions of the locality given by Borlase
xxv   THE MERRY MAIDENS   267
and Lukis, however, do not exhaust the points of interest. Edmonds1 writes as follows :—
“ A cave still perfect ... is on an eminence in the tenement of Boleit (Boleigh) in St. Buryan, and about a furlong south-west of the village of Trewoofe (Trove). It is called the ‘Fowgow,’ and consists of a. trench 6 feet deep and 36 long, faced on each side with unhewn and uncemented stones, across which, to serve as a roof, long stone posts or slabs are laid covered with thick turf, planted with furze. The breadth of the cave is about 5 feet. On its north-west side, near the south-west end, a narrow passage leads into a branch cave of considerable extent, constructed in the same manner. At the south-west end is an entrance by a descending path; but this, as well as the cave itself, is so well concealed by the furze that the whole looks like an ordinary furze break without any way into it. The direction of the line of this cave is about north-east and south-west, which line, if continued towards the south-west, would pass close to the two ancient pillars called the Pipers, and the Druidical temple of Dawns My in, all within half of a mile.”
This fougou is situated on a hill on the other side of the Lamorna Valley, near the village of Castallack, and the site of the Roundago shown in the 1-inch Ordnance map.
Borlase2 says that many similar caves were to be seen “in these parts” in his time, and others had been destroyed by converting the stones to other uses.
There is evidence that the circle conditions at the Merry Maidens were once similar to those at Stenness,
1 The Land's End District, p. 46.   2 Antiquities, p. 274.
268
STONEHENGE
CHAP.
Stanton Drew, the Hurlers, Tregaseal and Botallack, that is that there was more than one, the numbers running from 2 to 7. Mr. Horton Bolitho, without whose aid in local investigations this chapter in all probability would never have been written, in one of his visits came across “ the oldest inhabitant,” who remembered a second circle. He said, “It was covered with furze and never shown to antiquarians”; ultimately the field in which it stood was ploughed up and the stones removed. It is to prevent a similar fate happening to the “Merry Maidens” themselves that Lord Falmouth will not allow the field in which they stand to be ploughed, and all antiquarians certainly owe him a debt of gratitude for this and other proofs of his interest in antiquities. Mr. Bolitho carefully marked the site thus indicated on a copy of the 2 5-inch map. I shall subsequently show that the circle which formerly existed here, like the others named, was located on an important sight-line.
Mr. Horton Bolitho was good enough to make a careful examination of the barrows A and B of Borlase.1 In A (S. 69° W.) he found a long stone still lying in the barrow, suggesting that the barrow had been built round it, and that the apex of the barrow formed a new alignment. In B there is either another recumbent long stone or the capstone of a dolmen. This suggests work for the local antiquarians.
I should state that there may be some doubt about barrow A, for there are two not far from each other with approximate azimuths S. 69° W. and S. 64° W.
1 Ncenia, p. 214.
XXV
THE MERRY MAIDENS
269
The destruction of these and other barrows was probably the accompaniment of the reclamation of waste lands
and the consequent interference with antiquities which in Cornwall has mostly taken place since 1800.
But it did not begin then, nor has it been confined to barrows. Dr. Bor- 1 lase, in his parochial memoranda under date September 29, : 1752, describes a monolith 20 feet above ground, and planted 4 feet in it, the “ Men Peru (stone of sorrow) in the parish of Constantine. A farmer acknowledged that he had cut it up, and had made twenty gate-posts out of it.
My wife and I visited the Merry Maidens at Easter, 1905, for the pur-
 
FIG. 52.—The Merry Maidens (looking East).
270
STONEHENGE
CHAP.
pose of making a reconnaissance. Mr. Horton Bolitho and Mr. Cornish were good enough to accompany us.
On my return to London I began work on the 25-inch Ordnance map, and subsequently Colonel R. C. Hellard, R.E., director of the Ordnance Survey, was kind enough to send me the true azimuths of the Pipers. In October, 1905, Mr. Horton Bolitho and Captain Henderson, whose help at the Hurlers I have already had an opportunity of acknowledging, made a much more complete survey of the adjacent standing stones and barrows.
In this survey they not only made use of the 25-inch map, but of the old plan given by V. C. Borlase dating from about 1870. Although the outstanding stones shown by Borlase remain, some of the barrows indicated by him have disappeared.
In January, 1906, my wife and I paid other visits to the monuments, and Mr. Horton Bolitho was again good enough to accompany us. Thanks to him permission had been obtained to break an opening in the high wall-boundary which prevented any view along the “Pipers” sight-line. I may here add that unfortunately in Cornwall the field boundaries often consist of high stone walls topped by furze, so that the outstanding stones once visible from the circles can now no longer be seen from them; another trouble is that from this cause the angular height of the sky-line along the alignment cannot be measured in many cases.
I will now proceed to refer to the chief sight-lines seriatim. The first is that connecting the circle which still exists with the site of the ancient one. On this
xxv   THE   MERRY MAIDENS   271
line exactly I found four points, a barrow (L) which Borlase had missed (further from the circle than his barrow A), the site, the present circle, and the fougou; azimuth from centre of circle N. 64° E. and S. 64° W. This is the May-year line found at Stonehenge, Stenness, the Hurlers and Stanton Drew.
In connection with this there is another sight-line which must not be passed over; fro

!54
STONEHENGE
CHAP.
To simplify matters we may deal with the Ordnance values and neglect the small change of direction in the southern avenue. We have, then, the two dates 1580 B.c. and 1420 B.c. for the two avenues. The argument for the Pleiades is strengthened by the fact that at Athens the Hecatompedon was oriented to these stars in 1495 B.e. according to Mr. Penrose’s determination of the azimuth.
Now this is not the first time I have referred to
rmnnuor
 
FIG. 43.—Plan, from the Ordnance Map, showing the avenues, circle and stones at Merrivale, with their azimuths.
avenues in these notes. The azimuth of one at Stonehenge was used to fix the date at which sun worship went on there.   That avenue, unlike the Dartmoor
ones, was built ot earth, and it is not alone. There is another nearly two miles long called the Cursus. So far, I have found no solstitial worship on Dartmoor, so there are no avenues parallel to the one at Stonehenge leading N.E. from the temple. But how about the other ? It is roughly parallel to the avenues at
XV   THE DARTMOOR AVENUES   155
Merrivale, and I think, therefore, was, like them, used as a processional road,a via sacra, to watch the rising of the Pleiades.
I said roughly parallel; its azimuth is about the same (N. 82° E. roughly); but the horizon is only about 1° high; it was therefore in use before those at
 
FIG. 44.—Reprint of Ordnance Map showing that the Cursus at Stonehenge is nearly parallel to the Merrivale Avenue. The azimuth is 82° and not 84° as shown in the figure.
Merrivale; the exact date of use must wait for theodolite values of the height of the horizon, but in the meantime we can see from the above estimates that the decliuation of the Pleiades was about N. 5° 28' 30" and the date of use 1950 B.C., that is some 300 years before the solstitial restoration.
Mr. Worth’s survey gives another line of stones. It is undoubtedly, I think, an ancient line, although it is not shown in the Ordnance map, a clear indication of
STONEHENGE
CHAP. XV
I56
the difficulty of discriminating these avenues on land cumbered with stones in all directions. Its azimuth is N. 24° 25' E., and the height of the horizon 5° 10'. This gives us Arcturus at the date 1860 B.C., showing that, as at the Hurlers, Arcturus was used as a clock- star. Hence a possible astronomical use is evident, while this row, like the others, could have been of no practical use to anybody. It is interesting to note that this single row of stones is older than the double ones; this seems natural.
It is worth while to say a word as to the different treatment of the ends of the south avenue now that it seems probable that it was used to watch the rising of the Pleiades. At the east end there is what archaeologists term a “ blocking stone ”; these observations suggest that it was really a sighting stone. At the west end such a stone is absent, but the final stones in the avenue are longer than the rest. This may help us in the true direction of the sight-lines in other avenues; and, indeed, I shall show in the sequel that this consideration affords a criterion which, in the cases I have come across, is entirely in harmony with others.
CHAPTER XVI
THE DARTMOOR AVENUES (continued)
MY inquiries began at Merrivale because there is a circle associated with the avenues a little to the south of the west end of the longest; and again nearly, or quite, south of this there is a fine menhir, possibly used to give a north-south line. There is another menhir given on the Ordnance map, azimuth N. 70° 30' E., which, with hills 3° high, points out roughly the place of sunrise from the circle in May (April 29). Although this stone has been squared and initialed, I think I am justified in claiming it as an ancient monument. There is still another, azimuth N. 83° E., giving a line from the circle almost parallel to the avenue. I hope some local archaeologist will examine it, for if ancient it will tell us whether the N. avenue or the circle was built first, a point of which it is difficult to overrate the importance, as it will show the strict relationship between the astronomy of the avenues and that of the circle, and we can now, 1 think, deal with the astronomical use of circles after the results obtained at Stonehenge, Stenness and the Hurlers as an accepted fact. With the above approximate values
STONEHENGE
CHAP.
I58
the date comes out 1750 B.C., the declination of the Pleiades being N. 6° 35'.
I now pass on from Merrivale as an example of those avenues the direction of which lies somewhere in the E.-W. direction. Others which I have not seen, given by Rowe, are at Assacombe, Drizzleeombe and Trowlesworthy; to these Mr. Worth adds Harter or Har Tor (or Black Tor).
The avenues which lie nearly N. and S. are more numerous. Rowe gives the following:—Fernworthy, Challacombe, Trowlesworthy, Stalldon Moor, Batten- don, Hook Lake, and Tristis Rock. Of these I have visited the first two, as well as one on Shovel Down not named by Rowe, and the next two I have studied on the 6-inch Ordnance map.
Fernworthy (lat. 50° 38').—Here are two avenues, one with azimuth N. 15° 45' E., hills 1° 15'. There is a sighting stone at the N. end. We appear to be dealing with Arcturus as clock-star 1610 B.C. This is about the date of the erection of the N. avenue at Merrivale.
The second avenue has its sighting stone built into a wall at the south end. Looking south along the avenue, the conditions are azimuth S. 8° 42' W., hills 3° 30'.
Both these avenues are aligned on points within, but not at the centre of, the circle.
Challacombe (lat. 50° 36').—This is a case of a triple avenue, probably the remains of eight rows, in a depression between two hills, Challacombe Down and Warrington. There is no circle. The azimuth is 23° 37' N.W. or S.E., according to direction. The northern end has been destroyed by an old stream work; there is no blocking stone to the south on
THE DARTMOOR AVENUES
XVI
*59
n
'
either of the remaining avenues, but one large menhir terminates one row of stones. The others may have been removed. So it is probable that the alignment was to the north. If so, we are dealing with the setting of Arcturus, warning the summer solstice sunrise in 1860 B.c. To the S. the hills are 4° 48', to the N. 4° 50'.
To this result some importance must be attached, first, because it brings us into presence of the cult of the solstitial year, secondly, because it shows us that the system most in vogue in Brittany was introduced in relation to that year.
In Brittany, as I have before shown, the complicated alignments, there are 11 parallel rows at Le Mdnac (p. 99) (there were 8 parallel rows at Challacombe), were set up to watch the May and August sunrises, and the solstitial alignments came afterwards. The Brittany May alignments, therefore, were probably used long before 1860 B.C., the date we have found for Challacombe, where not the sunrise but the setting star which gave warning of it was observed.
It is worth while to point out that at Challacombe, as elsewhere, the priest-astronomers so
 
FIG. 45.—The remains of the eight rows of the Challacombe Avenue. Looking North of East. Terminal Menhir on
the extreme right.
i6o
STONEHENGE
CHAP.
located their monuments that the nearly circumpolar stars which were so useful to them should rise over an horizon of some angular height. In this way the directionlines would be available for a longer period of time, for near the north point the change of azimuth with change in the declination of the star observed is very rapid.
Shovel Doion, near Batworthy (lat. 50° 39' 20").—A group of five rows of stones, four double, one single, with two sets of azimuths.
One set gives az. 22°, 25°, and 28°. They seem to be associated. I will call them A, B, and C. A is directed to the circle on Godleigh Common. Its ends are free. B is a single line of stones to the E. of the triple circle, about which more presently. It is not marked on the Ordnance map; its ends are also free. C has its south end blocked, I think in later times, by a kistvaen. The astronomical direction may be, therefore, either N.W. or S.E. We find a probable use in the X.W. quadrant, as at Challacombe, Arcturus setting at daybreak as a warner of the summer solstice.
The height of hills is 46'; we have then :—
Az.   N. Dec.   Star.   Date.
N. 22 W.   36c 19' 40"   Arcturus   1210 B.C.
N. 25 W.   35" 23' 20"   >>   1040 „
N. 28° W.   34° 19' 30"   >>   850 „
Adjacent   to A, B, C,   is another   avenue, which I
will call D. Unlike the others, its northern end points 2° E. of X. Its southern end is blocked by a remarkable triple circle, the end of the avenue close to it being defined by two tall terminal stones. We are justified, then, in thinking that its orientation was towards the north ; the height of the horizon 1 measured as 45'. It
XVI
THE DARTMOOR AVENUES
161
may have been an attempt to mark the N. point of the horizon.
The triple circle to which I have referred is not an ordinary circle. I believe it to be a later added, much embellished, cairn. According to Ormerod, the diameters are 26, 20, and 3 feet, and there are three small stones at the centre.
All the above avenues are on the slope of the hill to the north. On the south slope we find the longest of all, as shown on the Ordnance map survey of 1885. There is a “ long stone ” in its centre, and at the southern end was formerly a cromlech, the “ three boys.” Part of this avenue, and two of the three “ boys,” have been taken to build a wall. The long stone remains, because it is a boundary stone!
The azimuth is 2° 30' W. of north or E. of south. Looking N. from the long stone, the height of the horizon is 2° 30'. I think this avenue was an attempt to mark the S. point.
Trowlesworthy (lat. 50° 27' 30").—The remains here are most interesting. This is the only monument on Dartmoor in which I have so far traced any attempt to locate the sun’s place at rising either for the May or solstitial year. But I will deal with the N.-S. avenue first, as it is this feature which associates it with Fern worthy and Challacombe.
As at Merrivale. the avenue has a decided “ kink ” or change of direction. The facts as gathered from the 6-inch map are as follows:—
Az.   Hills. Dec. N.   Star.   Date.
S. part of Avenue N. 7CE. 2° 52' 41° 29'10" Arcturus 2130 B.C. N. „   „ N. 12° E. 2° 52' 41° 6'20"   „   2080 B.C.
M
i6z
STONEHENGE
CHAP.
This date is very nearly that of the use of the S. circle at the Hurlers, and it is early for Dartmoor; but it is quite possible that local observations on an associated avenue a little to the west of the circle which terminates the N.-S. avenue will justify it.
 
This is not far from parallel to that at Merrivale, but its northern azimuth is greater, so that if it turns out to have been aligned on the Pleiades its date will be some time before that of Merrivale, that is, before 1580 B.c. I can say nothing more about it till I have visited it.
The new features to which I have referred are two
XVI
THE DARTMOOR AVENUES
163
tumuli which in all probability represent more recent additions to the original scheme of observation, as we have found at Stenness, and show that Trowlesworthy was for long one of the chief centres of worship on Dartmoor. Their azimuths are S. 64° E. and S. 49° W., dealing, therefore, with the May year sunrises in November and February and the solstitial sunset in December.   It is   probable   that, as   at   the Hurlers,
tumuli were used instead of stones not earlier than 1900 B.c.
Stalldon   Moor   (lat. 50°   27' 45")   I   have already
incidentally referred to. The azimuth of the stone row as it leaves the circle, not from its centre as I read the 6-inch map, is N. 3° E.; as the azimuth gradually increases for a time,   we may   be   dealing with
Arcturus, but local observation is necessary.
The differences between the Cornish and Dartmoor monuments give much food for thought, and it is to be hoped that they will be carefully studied by future students of orientation, as so many questions are suggested. I will refer to some of them.
(1)   Are the avenues, chiefly consisting of two rows of stones, a reflection of the sphinx avenues of Egypt ? -and, if so, how can the intensification of them on Dartmoor be explained ?
(2)   Was   there   a double   worship   going on in the
avenues and the circles at the same time ? If not, why wfere the former not aligned on the circles ? On a dead level, of course, if the avenues were aligned on the centre of the circle towards the rising or setting of the sun or a star, the procession in the via sacra would block the view of those in the circle. We have the
M 2
164
STONEHENGE
CHAP.
avenue at Stonehenge undoubtedly aligned on the centre of the circle, but there the naos was on an eminence, so that the procession in the avenue was always below the level of the horizon, and so did not block the
view.
(3)   Do all the cairnsV and cists in the avenues represent later additions, s<v late, indeed, that they may have been added after tlwe avenues had ceased to be used for ceremonial purposes ? The cairn at nearly the central point of the IS. avenue at Merrivale was certainly not there as a pa Vt of the structure when the avenue was first used as a sacra for observing the rising of the Pleiades. I ha^L always held that these ancient temples, and even th®1 attendant long and chambered barrows, were for the ^fcving and not for the dead, and this view has been str^pgthened by what have observed on Dartmoor.
There was good reason for burials%*^er ^ nature of the spot had been established^an^ ^e' ma- have taken place at any time since; the^F0St Pro^e time being after 1000 B.c. up to a date ®s reeent 15 archaeologists may consider probable.
Mr. Worth, whose long labours on theA®artm00r avenues give such importance to his opinioiV’ °^ett> to the astronomical use of those avenues becarse ^eR are so many of them ; he informs me that ®c ^n0S>
of 50; I think this objection may be consid valid if the avenues show that they were to different uses, some practical and others s;j different times of the year. For instance, Chailu is not a duplicate of Merrivale; one is solstitl other deals with the May year; and a t*(P
bred les dedicated icred. at
lUeombe
XVI
THE DARTMOOR AVENUES
i65
examination of them—I have only worked on the fringe —may show other differences having the same bearing.
In favour of the astronomical view it must be borne in mind that the results obtained in Devon and Cornwall are remarkably similar, and the dates are roughly the same. Among the whole host of heaven from which objectors urge it is free for me to select any star I choose, at present only six stars have been considered, two of which were certainly used, as in Egypt, as clock-stars as they just dipped below the northern horizon, and other two afterwards at Athens; and these six stars are shown by nothing more recondite than an inspection of a precessional globe to have been precisely the stars, the “morning stars,” wanted by the priest- astronomers who wished to be prepared for the instant of sunrise at the critical points of the May or solstitial year.
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CHAPTER XVII
STANTON DREW (Lat. 51° 10' N.)
OTHER circles to which I have given some attention are at Stanton Drew in Somerset. I regret to say that I have not as yet had an opportunity of visiting them. But a cursory inspection on the Ordnance map of the possible sight-lines from circle to circle, for there are three, suggested at once that we were dealing with the same problem as that worked out, if somewhat differently, at the Hurlers.
The three circles, t'wo avenues leading from two of the circles towards the river, and some outr standing stones were most carefully surveyed by Mr. C. E. Dymond some years ago. He was good enough to send me copies of his plans and levelling sections. I have not had the advantage of perusing his memoir, but I have studied the monuments as well as I could by means of the 25-inch Ordnance map. This, combined with an azimuth which Colonel Johnston, the Director-General of the Ordnance Survey, was kind enough to send me, should give me bearings within a degree.
CH. XVII
STANTON DREW
167
I will begin by giving a short account of the stones which remain, abridged from the convenient pamphlet prepared for the British Association meeting at Bristol in 1898 by Prof. Lloyd Morgan.
The circles at Stanton Drew, though far less imposing than those of Avebury and Stonehenge, are thought to be more ancient than are the latter, for the rough- hewn uprights and plinths of Stonehenge bear the marks of a higher and presumably later stage of mechanical development. Taken as a group, the Somersetshire cirdles are in some respects more complex than their better known rivals in Wiltshire. There are three circles, from two of which “ avenues ” proceed for a short distance in a more or less easterly direction; there is a shattered but large dolmen—if we may so regard the set of stones called “ the cove ” ; and there are outlying stones—the “ quoit,” and those in Middle Ham—which bear such relations to the circles as to suggest that they too formed parts of some general scheme of construction.
From the photograph of the Ordnance map (Fig. 47) it will be seen, as pointed out by Prof. Lloyd Morgan,
(1) That the centre of the great circle, that of the S.W. circle, and that of the quoit, are nearly in the same straight line.
(2)   That the cove, the centre of the great circle, and that of the N.E. circle, are nearly in the same straight line.
The quoit, which generally means the covering stone of a cromlech—“ Hautville’s Quoit,” as it is named on the Ordnance map—looms large in Stanton Drew tradition; it is locally as much respected as the
' 168
STONEHENGE
CH. XVII
circles themselves. It is pointed to most unmistakably by the fact that a line from it to the S.W. circle passes nearly through the centre of the great circle.
If the observation line, then, meant anything astronomically, it can only have had to do with the rising of a star far to the north, in a position far more northerly than the sun ever reaches.
The “ quoit,” lying in an orchard by the roadside, has nothing very impressive about its appearance—a recumbent mass of greyish sandstone; but it seems to be a brick in the Stanton Drew building. By some regarded as a sarsen block from Wiltshire, it is, in Prof. Lloyd Morgan’s opinion, more probably derived from the Old Red Sandstone of Mendip. In any case it is not, geologically speaking, in situ; nor has it reached its present position by natural agency.
With regard to two of the megalithic circles, at first sight the constituent stones seem irregularly dotted about the field; but as we approach them the unevenly spaced stones group themselves.
The material of which the greater number of the rude blocks is composed is peculiar and worthy of careful examination. It is a much altered rock consisting, in most of the stones, of an extremely hard siliceous breccia with angular fragments embedded in a red or deep brown matrix, and with numerous cavities which give it a rough slaggy appearance. Many of these hollows are coated internally with a jasper-like material, the central cavity being lined with gleaming quartz-crystals.
The majority of the stones were probably brought from Harptree Ridge on Mendip, distant some six
JW
 
Fig. 47.—The Circles and Avenues at Stanton Drew. Photograph of 25-inch Ordnance map, shewing approximate azimuths of sight-lines.
STONEHENGE
CHAP.
X70
miles. Weathered blocks of Triassic breccia, showing various stages of silicification, there lie on the surface; and there probably lay the weathered monoliths which have been transported to Stanton Drew. It is important to note that they were erected unhewn and untouched by the tool. A few stones are of other material—sandstone, like the “quoit,” or oolite from Dundry.
In the great circle, of the visible stones some retain their erect position, others are recumbent, several are partially covered by accumulation of grass-grown soil. Others are completely buried, their position being revealed in dry seasons by the withering of the grass above them.
To the east of this circle a short avenue leads out, there being three visible stones and one buried block on the one hand, and two visible stones on the other. But one’s attention is apt to be diverted from these to the very large and massive megaliths of the small N.E circle. This is composed of eight weathered masses, one of which (if indeed it do not represent more than one), Prof. Lloyd Morgan tells us, is recumbent and shattered. From this circle, all the stones of which are of the siliceous breccia, a short avenue of small stones also opens out eastwards.
The third or S.W. circle lies at some little distance from the others. The average size of the stones is smaller than in either of the other circles, and not all are composed of the same material.
“The Cove,” which has been variously regarded as a dolmen, a druidical chair of state, and a shelter for sacrificial fire, is close to the church.
STANTON DREW
XVII
171
The dimensions and numbers of the stones are as follow:
Great circle, diameter 368 feet, 30 stones.
N.E.   „   „   97   „   8   „
S.W.   „   „   145   „   12   „
As I was not able to visit Stanton Drew when the significance of the northerly alignments struck me, I made an appeal to Prof. Lloyd Morgan, of whose pamphlet I have so largely made use, to obtain some theodolite observations. As a result such observations have been made by himself and Mr. Morrow, from whom I have recently received a report with full permission to make use of it in this place.
The monuments are not easy to measure, as the centres of the circles are not readily determined, as so many of the stones are either absent, recumbent or buried.
In my rough reading of the Ordnance map given in Fig. 47, I thought I might be guided by taking centres, such that the avenues would be aligned on them as at Stonehenge. I had not then seen the Dartmoor avenues, which in some cases are not aligned on the centres. In this it is possible that I was wrong, as both Mr. Dymond’s and Mr. Morrow’s observations suggest that the avenues are really of the Dartmoor pattern. Mr. Morrow writes: “The centres of the circles are (to a certain small extent) a matter of choice, a difference of a few minutes may easily occur. In dealing with the avenues a larger discrepancy may occur.   I have taken what, in my
opinion, was the best centre line of each avenue and
STONEHENGE
CHAP.
172
thus determined its azimuth. But I believe that originally the southern line of stones forming each avenue was directed towards the centre of the corresponding circle, and that the avenue was then completed by the erection of a parallel line of stones. A difference of a few degrees may thus be accounted for in the azimuth supposed to have been originally marked out.”
About Mr. Morrow’s azimuths there can be no question. He writes:
“ The instruments used were, first, a 6" theodolite, and second, a 6" transit theodolite. The final results were obtained with the latter. It cannot be reversed w'hen measuring elevations. I tested it very carefully for the adjustments of (a) line of collimation at right angles to the horizontal axis, (6) horizontal axis perpendicular to vertical axis, and (c) line of collimation and spirit level parallel to each other. The instrument was in first-rate order, the error in elevation, for example, being within that corresponding to a slope of 1 in 40,000; that is well within the limit of 20" to which vertical angles can be read.
“ The meridian was obtained by two different methods applied several times, the results agreeing very closely. Readings of azimuths and altitude of sun were taken between three and four hours after noon, corrected for semi-diameter, &c., and the true bearing obtained with the aid of the latitude and the declination given in Nautical Almanac (corrected for time).
“With regard to the elevations of the horizon, the existence of trees on or just below the sky-line renders readings to the nearest minute uncertain. In all cases
XVII
STANTON DREW
173
I have tried to give the most probable value, supposing the trees to be absent. In some places the heights will have altered slightly during recent years owing to the construction of railways.
“ The values given are the means of observations. They are not corrected for height of instrument above ground, which might increase the angles by about 5 mins. Trees on the sky-line appear to make a difference of some 35. mins.”
The azimuths as found by Mr. Morrow and myself
are as under:   Morrow.   Lockyer.   Hoight of horieoni (excluding trees),
Morrow.
1 From centre of great circle to Haute- ville’s quoit      N. 17° 59' E.   17°   2° 23'
From centre of great circle to N.E. circle      53° 0'   51°   1° 5'
From centre of great circle along great circle avenue       68° 43'   65°   0° 38'
From centre of N.E. circle along N.E. circle avenue      S. 83° 52' E.   79°   1° 40'
From centre of S.W. circle to centre of great circle       19° 51' E.   20°   1°44'
The azimuths to which I first direct attention are these :
Az.
Great circle to quoit . .   .   N. 17° E
S.W. circle to great circle. .   N. 20° E.
These azimuths indicate that at Stanton Drew as at
1 With regard to these values Mr. Morrow writes : “At present Hauteville’s quoit is not visible from the centre of great circle. If the stone were erect, however, and any intervening trees and walls % removed, the top of the stone would no doubt be within view. The Hauteville quoit line is thus rather a difficult one to obtain with accuracy, but the azimuth given should be correct to the nearest minute.”
174
STONEHENGE
CHAP.
the Hurlers and elsewhere we are dealing with Arcturus as a clock-star. The facts are :
Az.   N.   Decln. Height of hills.   Star.   Date.
N. 17° E.   38° 59' 0"   2° 23'   Arcturus   1690
20°   37°   26' 50"   1° 44'   „   1410
One of the greatest differences between Mr. Morrow’s local observation and my reading of the 25-inch Ordnance map occurs in the case of the direction of the avenue from the great circle. It may be suggested that the use of this avenue was to observe the May and August sunrises of the May year. If we take the sun’s declination at 16° 20' N., see p. 22, the azimuth should be about N. 64° E.; this is 1° from my value and 5° from that given by Mr. Morrow, but it must not be forgotten that the choice of a day in May and August slightly differing from the normal date might easily produce such a variation.
It seems probable that the great circle was one of the first erected, and the fact that, like Stonehenge, it had an avenue, but that, unlike Stonehenge, the avenue was directed towards the May and not the June (solstitial) sunrise further, I think, suggests that the May worship was considered the most important and was the first provided for.
There is reason for supposing that the great circle was at all events built before the S.W. one. The great circle is situated at a lower level than the S.W. one. The angular elevation of the hills over which ?Arcturus rose would appear, therefore, to be higher from the great than from the S.W. circle. Arcturus has been reducing its declination for centuries in consequence of the precessional movement. It would
XVII
STANTON DREW
!75
therefore rise gradually in a greater azimuth, that is, nearer the east. An observer in the centre of the great circle, to follow this more easterly rising over the quoit, would have to change his position gradually to the westward. But there was another way. The original direction could be nearly maintained if the observation were made at a higher level near the original line, as then the relative elevation of the rising- place would be reduced.
This is what possibly was done, and this indeed may be the vera causa of the building of the S.W. circle.
This view of the possible function of the “quoit” is, of course, strengthened by the fact that we find traces of high northerly alignment in other stone circles. I have already shown that there are such alignments in Cornwall.
The “ quoit ” is nearly on a level with the great circle, while the hills rise behind it. It has been suggested that it would have been more useful on the top of the hill, but this suggestion cannot be accepted for a moment if it were used in the way I have indicated. On a dark night it would have been invisible, and it also would have prevented the observation of star-rise if it were truly aligned. Being comparatively near the circle it could easily have been illuminated at the critical time, and thus have anticipated the bright line micrometer of more modern times.
So far I have found no obvious use for the avenue attached to the N.E. circle. The conditions are:
Az.   Height of Hills.   Dec.
Morrow.   Lockyer. Morrow. Morrow.   Lockyer.
S. 83° 52' E. S. 79° E. 1° 40'   3° 52' 30" S. 5° 49' 30" S.
176
STONEHENGE
CHAP.
With regard to this N.E. circle, in relation to the large circle, the data are as follows:
,   Az.   Height of Hills.   Dec. N.
Morrow.   Lockyer. Morrow. Morrow.   Lockyer.
N. 53° E. N. 51° E. 1° 5'   22° 43' 50"   23° 48' 46"
As Mr. Morrow states, the choice of centre of the circle may alter the azimuth obtained by as much as “ a few degrees,” but the value obtained from the Ordnance map is, definitely, N. 51° E., and with the height of hills determined by Mr. Morrow this would suggest that the N.E. circle was really erected to provide the alignment, from the centre of the great circle, or from the Cove, to the summer solstitial sun, about the year 870 B.C., Stockwell’s values for the obliquity being taken. This result is the more striking as it gives a date for the substitution of the June for the May worship at Stanton Drew, which is in full accordance with that obtained for the similar change at Stenness.
There is other evidence, to which I attach importance, as it deals with a method and policy found in many temple fields in Egypt, that of blocking the alignment of an older star- or sun-cult, which the astronomer- priests replaced by their own. The stones of the avenue of the solstitial N.E. circle I expect once blocked the May sunrise line from the great circle; judging from the Ordnance map, and remembering the number of stones that have disappeared, this is probable if not certain.
If this were so, then the N.E. circle was the last to be erected, and this suggestion is strengthened by Mr. Lewis’s statement that it is the most perfect of the three.
Prof. Lloyd Morgan concludes his interesting account
STANTON DREW
XVII
177
of which I have made so much use with the following remarks:
“ In what order the circles were constructed we do not know. Whether the small N.E. circle with its more massive megaliths preceded or succeeded the great circle with its more numerous but, on the average, less massive stones, is a matter of mere conjecture. They may have been contemporaneous : but it is more likely that so large a work took a long time in execution ; nor does the unity of plan of the final product preclude a gradual process of development. Finally as to the purpose of the erection, and its hidden astronomical, mythological, or social meaning (if it have one), we are once more at the mercy of more or less plausible conjecture. There stand the circles in a quiet Somersetshire valley, silent memorials of a race concerning whose modes of life, of labour, and of thought we can but speculate.”
It is to be hoped that before the monument has disappeared like so many of its fellows, some student with more knowledge and time to devote to the inquiry than myself will endeavour to answer more of the questions raised by it.
N
CHAPTER XVIII
FOLKLORE AND TRADITION
WE have so far considered the circles at Stonehenge. Stenness, the Hurlers and Stanton Drew, and the avenues in Brittany and on Dartmoor. Before I refer to my later work in the south-west of England or attempt to present a summary of the results of the inquiry, I think it will be convenient to turn for a time to another branch of it. for that there is another closely connected series of facts to be considered in relation to the monuments folklore and tradition abundantly prove.
So far in this book I have dealt chiefly with stones—as I hold, associated with, or themselves composing, sanctuaries. We have become acquainted with circles, menhirs, dolmens, altars, vise sacrse, various structures built up of stones. Barrows and earthern banks represented them later.
The view which I have been led to bring forward so far is that these structures had in one way or another to do with the worship of the sun and stars; that they had for the most part an astronomical use in connection with religious ceremonials.
The next question which concerns us in an attempt to
CH. xviii FOLKLORE AND TRADITION
179
get at the bottom of the matter is to see whether there are any concomitant phenomena, and, if there be any, to classify them and study the combined results.
Tradition and folklore, which give dim references to the ancient uses of the stones, show in most unmistakable fashion that the stones were not alone; associated with them almost universally were many practices referred to on p. 26, such as the lighting of fires, passing through them, and dancing round them ; in the neighbourhood of the stones and associated with the fire practices were also sacred trees and sacred wells or streams.
Folklore and tradition not only thus may help us, but I think they will be helped by such a general survey, brief though it must be. So far as my reading has gone •each special tradition has been considered by itself; there has been no general inquiry having for its object the study of the possible origin and connection of many of the ancient practices and ideas which have so dimly come down to us in many cases and which we can only completely reconstruct by piecing together the information ?derived from various sources.
I now propose to refer to all these matters with the view of seeing whether there be any relation between practices apparently disconnected in so many cases if we follow the literature in which they are chronicled. We must not blame the literature, since the facts which remain to be recorded now here, now there, are but a small fraction of those that have been forgotten. Fortunately, the practices forgotten in one locality have been remembered in another, so that it is possible the picture can be restored more completely than one might have thought at first.
It will be seen at once that from the point of view with
N 2
i8o
STONEHENGE
CHAP.
which we are at present concerned, one of the chief relations we must look for is that of time, seeing that my chief affirmation with regard to the stone monuments is that they were used for ceremonial purposes at certain seasons, those seasons being based first upon the agricultural, and later upon the astronomical divisions of the year, to which I drew attention in Chapter III. In Chapter IV., when referring to the agricultural and astronomical new years’ days, I indicated a possible relation between the temple worship and the floral celebrations of that time, and later on (p. 40), in connection with the monuments in Brittany, I pointed out the coincidence of fire customs at the same time of the year.
But in a matter of this kind it will not do to depend upon isolated cases; the general trend of all the facts available along several lines of inquiry must be found and studied, first separately and then inter se, if any final conclusion is to be reached.
This is what I now propose to do in a very summary manner. It is not my task to arrange the facts of folklore and tradition, but simply to cull from the available sources precise statements which bear upon the questions before us. These statements, I think, may be accepted as trustworthy, and all the more so as many of the various recorders have had no idea either of the existence of a May year at all or of the connection between the different classes of the phenomena which ought to exist if my theory of their common origin in connection with ancient worship and the monuments is anywhere near the truth.
This question of time relations is surrounded by difficulties.
I gave in Fig. 7 the Gregorian dates of the beginning
XVIII FOLKLORE AND TRADITION   181
of the quarters of the May year, if nothing but the sun’s declination of 16° 20' N. or S., four times in its yearly path, be considered. These were :—
   May   Greek   Roman
   Year.   Calendar.   Calendar.
End of Winter    
Beginning of Spring ...   | Feb. 4   ... Feb. 7 .   .. Feb. 7
„ Summer...   ... May 6   May 6   .. May 9
End of Summer   
Beginning of Autumn...   j-Aug. 8   Aug. 11   .. Aug. 8
„ Winter ...   Nov. 8   ... Nov. 10 .   .. Nov. 9
In the table I also give, for comparison, the dates in the Greek and Roman calendars (p. 20).
There is no question that on or about the above days festivals were anciently celebrated in these islands; possibly not all at all holy places, but some at one and some at another; this, perhaps, may help to explain the variation in the local traditions and even some of the groupings of orientations.
The earliest information on this point comes from Ireland.
Cormac, Archbishop of Cashel in the tenth century, states, according to Vallancey, that “in his time four great fires were lighted up on the four great festivals of the Druids, viz., in February, May, August and November.” 1
I am not aware of any such general statement as early as this in relation to the four festivals of the May year in Great Britain, but in spite of its absence the fact is undoubted that festivals were held, and many various forms of celebration used, during those months.
1 Hazlitt, Dictionary of Faiths and Folklore, under Gule of August.
I 82
STONEHENGE
CHAP.
From the introduction of Christianity attempts of different kinds were made to destroy this ancient time system and to abolish the so-called “ pagan ” worships and practices connected with it. Efforts were made to change the date and so obliterate gradually the old traditions; another way, and this turned out to be the more efficacious, was to change the venue of the festival, so to speak, in favour of some Christian celebration or saint’s day. The old festivals took no account of weekdays, so it was ruled that the festivals were to take place on the first day of the week; later on some of them were ruled to begin on the first day of the month.
When Easter became a movable feast, the efforts of the priests were greatly facilitated, and indeed it would seem as if this result of such a change was not absent from the minds of those who favoured it.
The change of style was, as I have before stated, a fruitful source of confusion, and this was still further complicated by another difficulty. Piers1 tells us that consequent upon the change “ the Roman Catholics light their fires by the new style, as the correction originated from a pope; and for that very same reason the Protestants adhere to the old.”
I will refer to each of the festivals and their changes of date.
February 4.
Before the movable Easter the February festival had been transformed into Ash Wednesday (February 4). The eve of the festival was Shrove Tuesday, and it is
1 Survey of the South of Ireland, p. 232.
XVIII FOLKLORE AND TRADITION 183
quite possible that the ashes used by the priests on Wednesday were connected with the bonfires of the previous night.
It would seem that initially the festival, with its accompanying bonfire, was transferred to the first Sunday in Lent, February 8.
I quote the following from Hazlitt1:—
“Durandus, in his ‘Rationale,’ tells us, Lent was counted to begin on that which is now the first Sunday in Lent, and to end on Easter Eve; which time, saith he, containing forty-two days, if you take out of them the six Sundays (on which it was counted not lawful at any time of the year to fast), then there will remain only thirty-six days: and, therefore, that the number of days which Christ fasted might be perfected, Pope Gregory added to Lent four days of the week beforegoing, viz., that which we now call Ash Wednesday, and the three days following it. So that we see the first observation of Lent began from a superstitious, unwarrantable, and indeed profane, conceit of imitating Our Saviour’s miraculous abstinence. Lent is so called from the time of the year wherein it is observed : Lent in the Saxon language signifying Spring.”
Whether this be the origin of the lenten fast or not it is certain that the connection thus established between an old pagan feast and a new Christian one is very ingenious: 24 days in February plus 22 days in March (March 22 being originally the fixed date for Easter) gives us 46 days (6x7) + 4, and from the point of view of priestcraft the result was eminently satisfactory, for thousands of people still light fires on 1 Under Ash Wednesday.
184
STONEHENGE
CHAP.
Shrove Tuesday or on the first Sunday of Lent, whether those days occur in February or March. They are under the impression that they are doing homage to a church festival, and the pagan origin is entirely forgotten not only by them but even by those who chronicle the practices as “ Lent customs.”1
Finally, after the introduction of the movable Easter, the priests at Rome, instead of using the “ pagan ” ashes produced on the eve of the first Sunday in Lent or Ash Wednesday in each year, utilised those derived from the burning of the palms used on Palm Sunday of the year before.
Further steps w’ere taken to conceal from future generations the origin of the “ pagan ” custom due on February 4. February 3 was dedicated to St. “ Blaze.” How well this answered is shown by the following quotation from Percy.2 “ The anniversary of St. Blazeus is the 3rd February, when it is still the custom in many parts of England to light up fires on the hills on St. Blayse night: a custom antiently taken up perhaps for no better reason than the jingling resemblance of his name to the word Blaze.”
This even did not suffice. A great candle church festival was established on February 2. This was called “Candlemas,” and Candlemas is still the common name of the beginning of the Scotch legal year. In the Cathedral of Durham when Cosens was bishop he “ busied himself from two of the clocke in the afternoone till foure, in climbing long ladders to stick up wax candles in the said Cathedral Church ; the number of all the candles burnt that evening
1   Frazer, Golden Bough, iii., 238 et seq.
2   Notes to Northumberland Household Book, 1770, p. 333.
XVIII FOLKLORE AND TRADITION 185
was 220, besides 16 torches; 60 of those burning tapers and torches standing upon and near the high altar.” 1 There is evidence that the pagan fires at other times of the year were also gradually replaced by candles in the churches.
May 6.
The May festival has been treated by the Church in the same way as the February one. With a fixed Easter Sunday on March 22, 46 days after brought us to a Thursday (May 7), hence Holy Thursday 2 and Ascension Day. With Easter movable there of course was more confusion. Whit Sunday, the Feast of Pentecost, was only nine days after Holy Thursday, and it occurred, in some years, on the same day of the month as Ascension Day in others. In Scotland the festival now is ascribed to Whit Sunday.
It is possibly in consequence of this that the festival before even the change of style was held on the 1st of the month.
In Cornwall, where the celebrations still survive, the day chosen is May 8.
August 8.
For the migrations of the dates of the “ pagan ” festival in the beginning of August from the 1st to the 12th, migrations complicated by the old and new style, I refer to
1   Quoted by Hazlitt.
2   Much confusion has arisen with regard to the Holy Thursday in Kogation week because there is another Holy or Maundy Thursday in Easter week. Archaeologists have also been often misled by the practice of many writers of describing the May festivals as midsummer festivals. The first of May, of course, marked the beginning of summer.

STONEHENGE   CHAP.
VIII ARCHAEOLOGICAL OBSERVATIONS IN 1901 71
 
FIG. 17.—The cradle and supports, looking west.
intendence. Mr. Blow thus describes the arrangements (1Journal Institute of British Architects, 3rd series, ix., January, 1902):—
72
STONEHENGE
CHAP.
“A strong cradle of 12-inch square baulks of timber was bolted round the stone, with packing and felt, to prevent any marking of the stone. To the cradle were fixed two 1-inch steel eyebolts to receive the blocks for two six-folds of 6-inch ropes. These were secured, and wound on to two strong winches fifty feet away, with four men at each winch. When the ropes were thoroughly tight, the first excavation was made as the stone was raised on its west side.”
The method employed by Professor Gowland in the excavation should be a model for all future work of the kind.
Above each space to be excavated was placed a frame of wood, bearing on its long sides the letters A to H, and on its short sides the letters R M L, each letter l>eing on a line one foot distant from the next. By this means the area to be excavated was divided into squares each having the dimension of a square foot. ' A long rod divided into 6-inch spaces, numbered from 1 to 16, was also provided for indicating the depth from the datum line of anything found. In this way a letter on the long sides of the frame, together with one on the short sides, and a number on the vertical rod, indicated the position of any object found in any part of the excavation.
Excavations were necessary because to secure the stone for the future the whole of the adjacent soil had to be removed down to the rock level, so that it could be replaced by concrete.
All results were registered by Professor Gowland in relation to a datum line 337‘4 feet above sea level. The material was removed in buckets, and carefully sifted through a series of sieves 1-inch, ^-inch, ^-incli, and
1
VIII ARCHEOLOGICAL OBSERVATIONS IN 1901 73
l
 
FIG. 18.—The frame used to locate the finds.
74   STONEHENGE   CHAP.
£-inch mesh, in order that the smallest object might not be overlooked.
From the exhaustive account of his work given by Professor Gowland to the Society of Antiquaries (Archaeo- logia, lviii.), I gather three results of the highest importance from the point of view I am considering. These were, first, the finding of an enormous number of implements ; secondly, the disposition and relative quantities of the chippings of the sarsen and blue stones; and thirdly, the discovery of the method by which the stones were originally erected.
I will take the implements first. This, in a condensed form, is what Professor Gowland says about them:—
More than a hundred flint implements were found, and the greater number occurred in the stratum of chalk rubble which either directly overlaid or was on a level with the bed rock. They may all be arranged generally in the following classes :—
Class I.—Axes roughly chipped and of rude forms, but having well-defined, more or less sharp cutting edges.
Class II.—Hammerstones, with more or less well- chipped, sharp curved edges. Most may be correctly termed hammer-axes. They are chipped to an edge at one end, but at the other are broad and thick, and in many examples terminated there by a more or less flat surface. In some the natural coating of the flint is left- untouched at the thick end.
Class III.—Hammerstones, more or less rounded. Some specimens appear to have once had distinct working edges, but they are now much blunted and battered by use.
VIII ARCHEOLOGICAL OBSERVATIONS IN 1901 75
In addition to the above flint implements were found about thirty hammerstones, consisting of large pebbles or small boulders of the hard quartzite variety of sarsen. Some have been roughly broken into convenient forms for holding in the hand, whilst a few have been rudely trimmed into more regular shapes. They vary in weight from about a pound up to six and a half pounds. To these we have to add mauls, a more remarkable kind of hammerstone than those just enumerated. They are ponderous boulders of the quartzite variety of sarsen with their broadest sides more or less flat. Their weights range from about 40 lb. to 64 lb.
How came these flints and stones where they were found ? Prof. Gowland gives an answer which everybody will accept. The implements must be regarded as the discarded tools of the builders of Stonehenge, dumped down into the holes as they became unfit for use, and, in fact, used to pack the monoliths as they were erected. We read :—“ Dealing with the cavity occupied by No. 55 before its fall, the mauls were found wedged in below the front of its base to act together with the large blocks of sarsen as supports" (p. 54). Nearly all bear evidence of extremely rough usage, their edges being jagged and broken, just as we should expect to find after such rough employment. We evidently have to deal with builders doing their work in the Stone and not in the Bronze age. But was the age Palaeolithic or Neolithic ?
Prof. Gowland writes :—
“ Perhaps the most striking features of the flint implements is their extreme rudeness, and that there
STONEHENGE
CHAP.
76
is not a single ground or polished specimen among them. This, at first sight and without due consideration, might be taken to indicate an extremely remote age. But in this connection it must be borne in mind that in the building of such a stupendous structure as Stonehenge, the tools required must have been numbered by thousands. The work, too, was of the •roughest character, and for such only rude tools were required. The highly finished and polished implements which we are accustomed to consider, and rightly so, as characteristic of Neolithic man, would find no place in such work. They required too much labour and time for their manufacture, and, when made, could not have been more effective than the hammer-axes and hammer- stones found in the excavations, which could be so easily fashioned by merely rudely shaping the natural flints, with which the district abounds, by a few well directed blows of a sarsen pebble.”
On this ground Prof. Gowland is of opinion that, notwithstanding their rudeness, they may be legitimately ascribed to the Neolithic age, and, it may be. near its termination, that is, before the Bronze age, the commencement of which has been placed at 1400 B.C. by Sir John Evans for Britain, though he is inclined to think that estimate too low, and 2000 B.c. by Montelius for Italy.
Prof. Gowland guardedly writes :—
“ The occurrence of stone tools does not alone prove with absolute certainty that Stonehenge belongs to the Neolithic age, although it affords a strong presumption in favour of that view. But, and this is important, had bronze been in general or even moderately exten-
VIII ARCHAEOLOGICAL OBSERVATIONS IN 1901 77
 
78
STONEHENGE
CHAP.
sive use when the stones were set up, it is in the highest degree probable that some implement of that metal would have been lost within the area of the excavations, and if so lost, it would certainly have been found together with the stone tools. Further, the employment of deer’s horn picks for the extensive excavations made in the chalk around the base of the monoliths also tends to support the view that bronze implements cannot have been in common use. If they had it would seem not unreasonable to assume that they would have been employed, as they would have been so much more effective for such work than the picks of deer’s horn.
“ Again, the chippings of the stones of Stonehenge in two of the Bronze age barrows1 in its neighbourhood show that it is of earlier date than they.”
And finally:—
“ In my opinion, the date when copper or bronze was first known in Britain is a very remote one, as no country in the world presented greater facilities for their discovery. The beginning of their application to practical uses should, I think, be placed at least as far back as 1800 B.C., and that date I am inclined to give, until further evidence is forthcoming, as the approximate date of the erection of Stonehenge.”
Now the date arrived at by Mr. Penrose and myself on astronomical grounds was about 1700 B.C. It is not a little remarkable that independent astronomical and archaeological inquiries conducted in the same year
1 Sir Richard Colt Hoare, Ancient History of South Wiltshire, p. 127. (London, 1812); W. Stukeley, Stonehenge, p. 46. ('London, 1740).
VIII ARCHAEOLOGICAL OBSERVATIONS IN 1901 79
should have come so nearly to the same conclusion. If a general agreement be arrived at regarding it, we have a firm basis for the study of other similar ancient monuments in this country.
I have previously in this book referred to the fact that the trilithons of the naos and the stones of the outer circle are all built up of so-called “ sarsen ” stones. To describe their geological character, I cannot do better than quote, from Mr. Cunnington’s “ Geology of Stonehenge,”1 their origin according to Prestwich.
“Among the Lower Tertiaries (the Eocene of Sir Charles Lyell) are certain sands and mottled clays, named by Mr. Prestwich the Woolwich and Reading beds, from their being largely developed at these places, and from these he proves the sarsens to have been derived; although they are seldom found in situ, owing to the destruction of the stratum to which they belonged. They are large masses of sand concreted together by a siliceous cement, and when the looser portions of the stratum were washed away, the blocks of sandy rocks were left scattered over the surface of the ground.
“ At Standen, near Hungerford, large masses of sarsen are found, consisting almost entirely of flints, formed into conglomerate with the sand. Flints are also common in some of the large stones forming the ancient temple of Avebury.
“The abundance of these remains, especially in some of the valleys of North Wilts, is very remarkable. Few persons who have not seen them can form an adequate
1 Wilts Archaeological and Natural History Magazine, xxi. pp. 141-149.
8o
STONEHENGE
CHAP.
idea of the extraordinary scene presented to the eye of the spectator, who standing on the brow of one of the hills near Clatford, sees stretching for miles before him, countless numbers of these enormous stones, occupying the middle of the valley, and winding like a mighty stream towards the south.”
These stones, then, may be regarded as closely associated with the local geology.
The exact nature of the stones, called “ blue stones,” can best be gathered from a valuable “ Note ” by Prof. Judd which accompanies Prof. Gowland’s paper. These blue stones are entirely unconnected with the local geology; they must, therefore, represent boulders of the Glacial drift, or they must have been brought by man, from distant localities. Prof. Judd inclines to the first opinion.
The distinction between these two kinds of stone are well shown by Prof. Gowland :—
“ The large monoliths of the outer circle, and the trilithons of the horse-shoe are all sarsens. [See general plan, Fig. 15.] These sarsens in their composition are sandstones, consisting of quartz-sand, either fine or coarse, occasionally mixed with pebbles and angular bits of flint, all more or less firmly cemented together with silica. They are the relics of the concretionary masses which had become consolidated in the sandstone beds that once overlaid the chalk of the district, and had resisted the destructive agencies by which the softer parts of the beds were removed in geological times. They range in structure from a granular rock resembling loaf sugar in internal appearance to one of
VIII ARCHEOLOGICAL OBSERVATIONS IN 1501 81
great compactness similar to and sometimes passing into quartzite.
“The monoliths and trilithons all consist of the granular rock. The examples of the compact quartzite variety, of which many were found in the excavations, were almost without exception either hammerstones that had been used in shaping and dressing the monoliths, or fragments which had been broken from off them in these operations.
“ The small monoliths, the so-called ' blue stones,’ which form the inner circle and the inner horse-shoe, are, with the undermentioned exceptions, all of diabase more or less porphyritic. Two are porphyrite (formerly known as felstone or hornstone). Two are argillaceous sandstone.
“ Mr. William Cunnington, in his valuable paper,
‘ Stonehenge Notes,’ records the discovery of two stumps of * blue stones ’ now covered by the turf. One of these lies in the inner horseshoe between Nos. 61 and 62, and 9 feet distant from the latter. It is diabase. The other is in the inner circle between Nos. 32 and 33, 10 feet from the former, and consists of a soft calcareous altered tuff, afterwards designated for the sake of brevity fissile rock.
“ The altar stone is of micaceous sandstone.”
I now come to the second point, to which I shall return in the next chapter.
In studying the material obtained from the excavations, it was found in almost every case that the number of chippings and fragments of blue stone largely exceeded that of the sarsens; more than this, diabase
G
82
STONEHENGE
CHAP.
 
(blue stone) and sarsen were found together in the layer overlying the solid chalk (p. 15). Chippings of diabase were the most abundant, but there were few large pieces of it. Sarsen, on the other hand, occurred most abundantly in lumps (p. 20); very few small chips of
sarsen were found (p. 42). Hence Prof. Gowland is of opinion that the sarsen blocks were roughly hewn where they were found (p. 40); the local tooling, executed with the small quartzite hammers and mauls, would produce not chips but dust.
FIG. 20.—Showing the careful tooling of the Sarsens.
VIII ARCHEOLOGICAL OBSERVATIONS IN 1901 83
Finally, I reach the third point of importance from the present standpoint; the excavations produced clear evidence touching the mode of erection. Prof. Gowland’s memoir deals only with the leaning, stone, but I take
ATUM LINE I
 
TURF4*. MOULD
EARTHY CHALK RUBBLE WH/TE CHALK RUBBLE
CHALK HOCH
? FL/HF /MRLEMEHT
• SARSEN HAHHflSTOMt
I
r
. FEET
FIG. 21.—Face of rock against which a stone was made to rest.
it for granted that the same method was employed throughout: the method was this.
(l)   The ground in the site a stone was to occupy was removed, the chalk rock being cut into in such a manner as to leave a ledge, on which the base of the stone was to rest, and a perpendicular face rising from it, against which as a buttress one side would bear when set up. From the bottom of this hole an inclined plane was cut to the surface down which the monolith which
G 2
84   STONEHENGE   CHAP.
had already been dressed was slid until its base rested on the ledge.
(2)   It was then gradually raised into a vertical position by means first of levers and afterwards of ropes. The levers would be long trunks of trees, to one end of which a number of ropes was attached (this method is still employed in Japan); so that the weights and pulling force of many men might be exerted on them. The stronger ropes were probably of hide or hair, but others of straw, or of withes of hazel or willow, may have been in use for minor purposes.
(3)   As the stone was raised, it was packed up -with logs of timber and probably also with blocks of stone placed beneath it.
(4)   After its upper end had reached a certain elevation, ropes were attached to it, and it was then hauled by numerous men into a vertical position, so that its back rested against the perpendicular face of the chalk which had been prepared for it. During this part of the operation, struts of timber would probably be placed against its sides to guard against slip, a precaution taken when the leaning stone was raised and until the foundation was properly set.
As regards the raising of the lintels, and imposts, and the placing of them on the tops of the uprights, there would be even less difficulty than in the erection of the uprights themselves.
It could be easily effected by the simple method practised in Japan for placing heavy blocks of stone in position. The stone, when lying on the ground, would be raised a little at one end by means of long wooden levers. A packing of logs would then be placed under
VIII ARCHAEOLOGICAL OBSERVATIONS IN 1901 85
 
FIG. 22.—The leaning stone upright before the struts were removed.
the end so raised, the other extremity of the stone would be similarly raised and packed, and the raising and packing at alternate ends would be continued
86
STONEHENGE
CHAP.
 

 

 
Fid. 23.—Stonehenge, lOOi).
VIII ARCHAEOLOGICAL OBSERVATIONS IN 1901 87
until the block had gradually reached the height of the uprights. It would then be simply pushed forward by levers until it rested upon them.
It is not often that an engineering operation has been made so subservient to the interests of science as the one we have dealt with in this chapter. It is satisfactory to know not only that much new knowledge has been acquired by Professor Gowland and his coadjutors, but that the famous leaning stone has now been set upright in such fashion that it will remain upright for hundreds of years. May the other leaning stones soon receive the same treatment.
CHAPTER IX
WAS THERE AN EARLIER CIRCLE?
WHEN we come to examine Stonehenge carefully in relation to the orientation theory, it soon becomes clear that its outer circle of upright stones with lintels, and the inner naos, built of trilithons, oriented in the line of the “ avenue ” and the summer solstice sunrise, are not the only things to be considered. These stones, all composed of sarsen, which, be it remarked, have been trimmed and tooled, are not alone in question. We have*:—
(1)   An interior circle broken in many places, and other stones near the naos, composed of stones, “ blue stones,” which, as we have seen, are of an entirely different origin and composition.
(2)   Two smaller untrimmed sarsen stones lying near the vallum, not at the same distance from it, the line joining them passing nearly, but not quite, through the centre of the sarsen eircle. The amplitude of the line joining them is approximately 26“ S. of E. and 26° N. of W. Of these stones, the stump of the N.W. one is situated 22 feet from the top of the vallum according to the Ordnance plan. The S.E. stone has fallen, but according to careful observations and
CH. ix WAS THERE AN EARLIER CIRCLE? 89
measurements by Mr. Penrose, when erect its centre was 14 feet from the top of the vallum. The centre of the
 
FIG. 24.—Map of the Stones made by the Ordnance Survey.1 A, N.W. stone; B, S.E. stoner; c, Friars Heel; D, Slaughter stone.
line joining the stones is therefore about 4 feet to the S.E. of the axis of the present circles, which, it may be
1 Flans and photographs of Stonehenge, <fcc., by Colonel Sir Henry James, R.E., F.R.S., Director-General of the Ordnance Survey, 1867.
90
STONEHENGE
CHAP.
stated, passes 3 feet to the N.W. of the N.W. edge of the Friar’s Heel (see Fig. 24).
There are besides these two large untrimmed sarsen stones, one standing some distance outside the vallum, one recumbent lying on the vallum; both nearly, but not quite, in the sunrise line as viewed from the centre of the sarsen circle. These are termed the “ Friar’s Heel ” and “ Slaughter Stone ” respectively.
I will deal with (1) first, and begin by another quotation from Mr. Cunnington, who displayed great acumen in dealing with the smaller stones not sarsens.
“ The most important consideration connected with the smaller stones, and one which in its archaeological bearing has been too much overlooked, is the fact of their having been brought from a great distance. I expressed an opinion on this subject in a lecture delivered at Devizes more than eighteen years ago, and I have been increasingly impressed with it since.   I
believe that these stones would not have been brought from such a distance to a spot where an abundance of building stones equally suitable in every respect already existed, unless some special or religious value had been attached to them. This goes far to prove that Stonehenge was originally a temple, and neither a monument raised to the memory of the dead, nor an astronomical calendar or almanac.
“ It has beeq suggested that they were Danams, or the offerings of successive votaries. Would there in such case have been such uniformity of design, or would they have been all alike of foreign materials ? I would make one remark about the small impost of a trilithon of syenite, now lying prostrate within the circle. One
IX WAS THERE AN EARLIER CIRCLE? 9r
writer has followed another in taking it for granted that there must have been a second, corresponding with it, on the opposite side. Of this there is neither proof nor record, not a trace of one having been seen by any person who has written on the subject. This small impost, not being of sarsen, but syenite, must have belonged to the original old circle; it may even have suggested to the builders of the present Stonehenge the idea of the large imposts, and trilithons with their tenons and mortices.”
In Prof. Gowland’s examination of the contents of the holes necessarily dug in his operations, it was found over and over again, indeed almost universally, that the quantity of blue stone chippings was much greater than that from the sarsen stones. While the sarsen stones- had only been worked or tooled on their surface, the blue stones had been hewed and trimmed in extraordinary fashion; indeed it is stated by Prof. Judd that they had been reduced to half their original dimensions in this process, the chippings almost equalling the volume of the stones themselves.
It seems, then, that when the sarsen stones were set up, the sarsen and blue stones were treated very differently. This being so, the following quotation from Prof. Judd’s “Note” is interesting (Arcliaeologia, lviii,
p. 81):—
“ I may repeat my conviction that if the prevalent beliefs and traditions concerning Stonehenge were true, and the “ bluestone ” circles were transported from some distant locality, either as trophies of war or as the sacred treasures of a wandering tribe, it is quite inconceivable that they should have been hewed and
-92
STONEHENGE
CHAP.
chipped, as we now know them to have been, and reduced in some cases to half their dimensions, after having been carried with enormous difficulty over land and water, and over hills and valleys. On the other hand, in the glacial drift, which once probably thinly covered the district, the glacial deposits dying out very gradually as we proceed southwards, we have a source from which such stones might probably have been derived. It is quite a well-known peculiarity of the glacial drift to exhibit considerable assemblages of stones of a particular character at certain spots, each of these assemblages having probably been derived from the same source.
“ I would therefore suggest as probable that when the early inhabitants of this island commenced the erection of Stonehenge, Salisbury Plain was sprinkled over thickly with the great white masses of the sarsen- stones (‘ grey wethers ’), and much more sparingly with darker coloured boulders (the so-called ‘ blue- stones’), the last relics of the glacial drift, which have been nearly denuded away. From these two kinds of materials the stones suitable for the contemplated temple were selected. It is even possible that the abundance and association of these two kinds of materials so strikingly contrasted in colour and appearance, at a particular spot, may not only have decided the site, but to some extent have suggested the architectural features of the noble structure of Stonehenge.’'
If we grant everything that Prof. Judd states, the question remains—why did the same men in the same place at the same time treat the sarsen and blue stones so differently?
IX WAS THERE AN EARLIER CIRCLE ?   93
I shall show subsequently that there is a definite answer to the question on one assumption.
I next come to (2). The important point about these stones is that with the amplitude 26°, at Stonehenge, a line from the centre of the circle over the N.W. stone would mark the sunset place in the first week in May, and a line over the S.E. stone would similarly deal with the November sunrise. We are thus brought in presence of the May-November year.
Another point about these stones is that they are not at the same distance from the centre of the sarsen stone circle, which itself is concentric with the temenos mound; this is why they lie at different distances from the mound. Further, a line drawn from the point of the Friar’s Heel over the now recumbent Slaughter Stone with the amplitude determined by Mr. Penrose and myself for the summer solstice sunrise in 1680 B.c. cuts the line joining the stones at the middle point, suggesting that the four untrimmed sarsen stones provided alignments both for the May and June years at about that date.
Nor is this all ; the so-called tumuli within the vallum (Fig. 10) may have been observation mounds, for the lines passing from the northern tumulus over the N.W. stone and from the southern tumulus over the S.E. one are parallel to the avenue, and therefore represent the solstitial orientation.
So much, then, for the stones. We see that, dealing only with the untrimmed sarsens that remain, the- places of the May sunset and June and November sunrises were marked from the same central point.
Statements have been made that there was the stump
94
STONEHENGE
CHAP.
•of another stone near the vallum to the S.W., in the line of the Friar’s Heel and Slaughter Stone, produced backwards, at the same distance from the old centre as the N.W. and S.E. stones. This stone was not found in an exploration by Sir Edmund Antrobus, Mr.
 
Fig. 25.—The rod on the recumbent stone is placed in and alone the common axis of the present circle and avenue. It is seen that the Friars Heel, the top of which is shown in the distance, would hide the sunrise place if the axis were a little further to the S.E.
Penrose and Mr. Howard Payn by means of a sword and an auger. But the question will not be settled until surface digging is permitted, as a “ road ” about which there is a present contention passes near the spot.
But even this is not the only evidence we have for
IX
WAS THERE AN EARLIER CIRCLE? 95
the May worship in early times. There is an old tradition of the slaughter of Britons by the Saxons at Stonehenge, known as “The Treachery of the Long Knives ”; according to some accounts, 460 British chieftains were killed while attending a banquet and conference. Now at what time of the year did this take place ? Was it at the summer solstice on June 21? I have gathered from Guest’s “ Mabinogion,” vol. ii. p. 433, and Davies’s “ Mythology of the British Druids,” p. 333, that the banquet took place on May eve “ Meinvethydd.” Is it likely that this date would have been chosen in a solar temple dedicated exclusively to the solstice?
Now the theory to which my work and thought have led me is that the megalithic structures at Stonehenge —the worked sarsens with their mortices and lintels, and above all the trilithons of the magnificent naos— represent a re-dedication and a reconstruction, on a more imposing plan and scale, of a much older temple, which, was originally used for worship in connection with the May year.
CHAPTER X
THE MAY AND JUNE WORSHIPS IN BRITTANY
I PURPOSE next to inquire whether in the wonderful series of Megalithic remains in Brittany, remains more extensive than any in Britain, any light is thrown on the suggestion I have made that the May Worship preceded the Solstitial Worship at Stonehenge.
It has long been known that the stones which compose the prehistoric remains in Brittany are generally similar in size and shape to those at Stonehenge, but, as I have already stated, in one respect there is a vast difference. Instead of a few, arranged in circles as at Stonehenge, we have an enormous multitude of the so-called menhirs arranged in many parallel lines for great distances. Some of these are unhewn like the Friar’s Heel, some have as certainly been trimmed.
The literature which has been devoted to them is very considerable, but the authors of it, for the most part, have taken little or no pains to master the few elementary astronomical principles which are necessary to regard the monuments from the point of view of orientation.
It is consoling to know that this cannot be said of the last published contribution to our knowledge of this region, which we owre to Monsieur F. Gaillard, a member
CH. x THE MAY AND JUNE WORSHIPS 97
of the Paris Anthropological Society and of the Poly- mathic Society of Morbihan at Plouharnel.1
M. Gaillard is a firm believer in the orientation theory, and accepts the view that a very considerable number of the alignments are solstitial. But although he gives the correct azimuths for the solstitial points and also figures showing the values of the obliquity of the ecliptic as far as 2200 B.C., his observations are not sufficiently precise to enable a final conclusion to be drawn, and his method of fixing the alignments and the selection of the index menhir are difficult to gather from his memoir and the small plans which accompany it, which, alas! deal with compass bearings only.
All the same, those interested in such researches owe a debt of gratitude to M. Gaillard for his laborious efforts to increase our knowledge, and will sympathise with him at the manner in which his conclusions were treated by the Paris anthropologists. One of them, apparently thinking that the place of sun rising is affected by the precession of the equinoxes, used this convincing argument:—“ Si, it l’origine les alignments etaient orient^s, comme le pense M. Gaillard, ils ne le pourraient plus 6tre aujourdhui ; au contraire, s’ils le sont. actuellement, on peut afiirmer qu’ils ne l’etaient pas alors ! ”
M. Gaillard is not only convinced of the solstitial orientation of the avenues, but finds the same result in the case of the dolmens.
I cannot find any reference in the text to any orientations dealing with the farmers’ years, that is with ampli
1 “ L’Astronomic Prehistorique.” Published in “Les Sciences Popu- laires, revue mensuelle internationale,” and issued separately by the administration des “Sciences populaires,” 15 Rue Lebrun, Paris.
H
STONEHENGE
CHAP.
98
tudes of about 25° N. and S. of the E. and W. points; bat in the diagrams on pp. 78 and 127 I find both avenue and dolmen alignments, which within the limits of accuracy apparently employed may perhaps with justice be referred to them ; but observations of greater accuracy must be made, and details of the heights of the horizon at the various points given, before anything certain can be said about them.
I append a reproduction of one of M. Gaillard’s plans, which will give an idea of his use of the index menhir. It shows the alignments at Le Mdnec, lat. 47|-° (Fig. 26). The line A—Soleil runs across the stone alignments and is fixed from A by the menhir B, but there does not seem any good reason for selecting B except that it appears to fall in the line of the solstitial azimuth according to M. Gaillard. But if we take this azimuth as N. 54° E., then we find the alignments to have an azimuth roughly of X. 66° E., which gives us the amplitude of 24° N. marking the place of sunrise at the beginning of the May and November years, and the alignments may have dealt principally with those times of the year.
I esteem it a most fortunate thing that while I have been casting about as to the best way of getting more accurate data, Lieutenant Devoir, of the 'French Navy and therefore fully equipped with all. the astronomical knowledge necessary; who resides at Brest and has been studying the prehistoric monuments in his neighbourhood for many years, has been good enough to give me the results of his work in that region, in which the problems seem to be simpler than further south; for while in the vicinity of Carnac the menhirs were erected in groups numbering five or six thousand, near Brest, lat. 48^°, thev
X THE MAY AND JUNE WORSHIPS 99
are much more restricted in number. I am much indebted to him for permission to use and publish his results.
Lieutenant Devoir, by his many well-planned and
 
FIG. 26.—Alignments at Le M£nec.
approximately accurate observations, has put the solstitial orientation beyond question, and, further, has made important observations which prove that the May and August sunrises were also provided for in the systems of
H 2
CHAP.
ioo   STONEHENGE
alignments. I give the following extracts from his letter:—
“It is about twelve years ago that I remarked in the west part of the Department of Morbihan (near Lorient) the parallelism of the lines marked out by monuments of all sorts, and frequently oriented to the N.E., or rather
 
FIG. 27.—Menhir (A) on Melon Island.
between N. 50° E. and N. 55° E. I had ascertained, moreover, the existence of lines perpendicular to the first named, the right angle being very well measured.
“ The plans, which refer to the cantons of Ploudal- mdzeau and of St. Renan (district of Brest) and of Crozon (district of Chateaulin), have been made on a plane-table; the orientations are exact to one or two degrees.
“ In the cantons of Ploudalm^zeau and of St. Renan,
X THE MAY AND JUNE WORSHIPS IOI
the monuments are generally simple; seven menhirs are visible of enormous dimensions, remarkable by the polish of their surface and the regularity of their section. The roughnesses hardly ever reach a centimetre ; the sections are more often ovals, sometimes rectangles with the angles rounded or terminated by semicircles. In the canton of Crozon the monuments are, on the contrary, complex; we find a cromlech with
B   AC
 
FIG. 28.—Melon Island, showing Menhir (A) and Cromlech (B and C).
an avenue leading to it of a length of 800 metres, another of 300 metres. Unfortunately, the rocks employed (sandstone and schist from Plungastel and Crozon) have resisted less well than the granulite from the north part of the Department. The monuments are for the most part in a very bad condition; the whole must, nevertheless, formerly have been comparable with that of Carnac-Leomariaquer.
“ For the two regions, granitic and schistose, the results of the observations are identical.
“ The monuments lie along lines oriented S. 54° W.
102
STONEHENGE
CHAP.
-> N. 54° E. (54° = azimuth at the solstices for L = 48° 30' and i = 23° 30') and N. 54° W. -» S. 54° E. Some of them determine lines perpendicular to the meridian.
“ One menhir (A), 6m. 90 in height and 9m. 20 in circumference, erected in the small island of Melon
D   E F
 
FIG. 29.—Menhirs of St. Dourz&l, D, E, F.
(canton of Ploudalmdzeau, latitude 48° 29' 05") a few metres from a tumulus surrounded by the ruins of a cromlech (B and C), has the section such that the faces, parallel and remarkably plane, are oriented N. 54° E. (Figs. 27 and 28).
“At 1300 metres in the same azimuth there is a line of three large menhirs (D, E, F), of which one (E) is overthrown. The direction of the line passes exactly
 
X THE MAY AND JUNE WORSHIPS 103
by the menhir A. Prolonged towards the N.E. it meets at 3k. 700m. an overturned block of 2m. 50 in height, which is without doubt a menhir; towards the S.W. it passes a little to the south some lines of the island of Molene. . . . (Fig. 29).
“ There exists in the neighbourhood other groups, forming also lines of the same orientation and that of
FIG. 30.—Alignment at Lagatjar, G G\
the winter solstice. It is advisable to remark that orientations well determined for the solstices are much less so for the equinoxes, which is natural, the rising amplitude varying very rapidly at this time of year.
“The same general dispositions are to be found in the complex monuments of the peninsula of Crozon. I take for example the alignments of Lagatjar. Two parallel lines of menhirs, GG' H H', are oriented to S. 54° E. and cut perpendicularly by a third line, IF. There existed less than fifty years ago a menhir at K,
104
STONEHENGE
CHAP.
6 metres high, which is to-day broken and overturned. This megalith, known in the country by the name of ‘ pierre du Conseil ’ (a bronze axe was found underneath it) gives with a dolmen situated near Camaret the direction of the sunrise on June 21 (Fig. 31).
“ I have just spoken of the lines perpendicular to the solstitial one; there exists more especially in the complex monuments another particularity which merits
 
FIG. 31.—Alignments at Lagatjar, showing the pierre du Conseil and the direction of the dolmen. From the pierre du Conseil the dolmen marks the sunrise place at the summer solstice, and the avenue GG' HH' the sunset place on the same day.
attention. Between two monuments, M and N, on a solstitial line, sometimes other menhirs are noticed, the line joining them being inclined 12° to the solstitial line, always towards the east ” (Fig 32).
I must call particular attention to this important observation of Lieutenant Devoir, for it gives us the amplitude 24° N., the direction of sunrise at the beginning of the May and August years. It shows, moreover, that, as at Le Mdnec according to M. Gaillard, the solstitial and May-August directions were both provided
X THE MAY AND JUNE WORSHIPS 105
for at the monuments in the neighbourhood of Brest so carefully studied by Lieutenant Devoir.
Lieutenant Devoir points out the wonderful regularity of form and the fine polish of many of the menhirs. It will have been gathered from his account that those most carefully trimmed and tooled belong to the solstitial .alignments. The one at Kerloas (11 metres high) heads
 
FIG. 32.—Menhirs, M N on N.E.-S.W. solstitial alignment. Menhirs 1, 2, on May-August years alignment, sunrise May-August, sunset November-February.
the list in point of size; others in the island of Melon (7 metres), at Kergadion (8 metres and 10 metres), Kerenneur, Kervaon and Kermabion follow suit. He considers them to have been erected at the time of the highest civilisation of the Megalithic peoples. He also states that these regularly formed menhirs do not exist at Carnac, or in the region of Pont l’Abb^, so rich in other remains which certainly refer chiefly to the May- No vember year. It seems, then, that in these localities
io6
STONEHENGE
CH. X
the May-August worship first chiefly predominated, and that the index menhirs of M. Gaillard which indicate the solstice and which do not form part of the alignments were erected subsequently.
Finally, then, the appeal to Brittany is entirely in favour of the May-November year worship having preceded the solstitial one.
I have already stated the evidence at Stonehenge j that the sunrise at the beginning of the May and j August years was observed in an earlier temple which existed before the present structure existed. Were this so we have another point common to the British and j Breton monuments. I therefore think that I may justly . claim the Brittany evidence as entirely in favour of the suggestion put forward in Chap. IX with regard to Stonehenge.
CHAPTER XI
ASTRONOMICAL HINTS FOR ARCHAEOLOGISTS
THE foregoing chapters will have shown that in dealing with the ancient monuments from an astronomical point of view, we have to consider chiefly the direction of the sight-lines, whether they are marked as in Brittany by long rows of stones—alignments; as at Stonehenge by an avenue ; as in some of our British circles, by two or more circles the direction being indicated from the central stone of one to the central stone of the other, or finally by a single standing stone or barrow.
It is important then that before we proceed further in our inquiries we should consider how a meaning is got out of these directions, and I propose, to devote this chapter to this question, so that the full use of the “ azimuths ” already referred to and others which are to follow may be fully understood.
There is another matter, at which I hinted on pp. 36 and 42. We have to inquire whether there are any stones or barrows marking the direction of the rising or setting of stars, as well as those which deal with the rising and setting of the sun at different times of the year, which we have already found at Stonehenge and in Brittany. To face this question we have to consider the stellar as well as
io8
STONEHENGE
CHAP.
solar conditions of observations, and as the former are the simpler I will begin with them, especially as now there is no question whatever that the rising and setting of stars were provided for.
In continuation of my work in Egypt in 1891, and Mr. Penrose’s in Greece in 1892, I have recently endeavoured to see whether there are any traces in Britain of star observations, including those connected with the worship of the sun at certain times of the year. We both discovered that stars, far out of the sun’s course, especially in Egypt, were observed in the dawn as heralds of sunrise—“ warning-stars ”—so that the priests might have time to prepare the sunrise sacrifice. To do this properly the star should rise while the sun is still about 10° below the horizon. There is also reason to believe that stars rising not far from the north point were also used as clock-stars to enable the time to be estimated during the night in the same way as the time during the day could be estimated by the position of the sun.
I stated (Dawn of Astronomy, p. 319) that Spica was the star the heliacal rising of which heralded the sun on May-day 3200 B.C. in the temple of Menu at Thebes. Sirius was associated with the summer solstice at about the same time.
Mr. Penrose found this May-day worship continued at Athens on foundations built in 1495 B.c. and 2020B.c.,on which the Hecatompedon and older Erechtheum respectively were subsequently built, the warning star being now no longer Spica, but the cluster of the Pleiades rising, or Antares setting, in the dawn.
It is generally known that Stonehenge is associated with the solstitial year, and I have suggested that it was
XI
ASTRONOMICAL HINTS
109
originally connected with the May year ; but the probable date of its re-dedication, 1680 B.C., was determined by Mr. Penrose and myself by the change of obliquity.
Now if Stonehenge or any other British stone circle could be proved to have used observations of warning stars, the determination of the date when such observations were made would be enormously facilitated. Mr. Penrose and myself were content to think that our date might be within 200 years of the truth, whereas if we could use the rapid movement of stars in declination brought about by the precession of the equinoxes, instead of the slow change of the sun’s declination brought about by the change of the value of the obliquity, a possible error of 200 years would be reduced to one of 10 years.
In spite of this enormous advantage, no one so far as I know has yet made any inquiry to connect star observations with any of the British circles.
I have recently obtained clear evidence that some circles in different parts of Britain were used for night work and also in relation to the May year, which we know was general over the whole of Europe in early times, and which still determines the quarter-days in Scotland.
If the Egyptian and Greek practice were continued here, we should expect then to find some indications of the star observations utilised at the temple of Min and at the Hecatompedon for the beginning, or the other chief months, of the May year.
I have found them, and I will now show the method employed.
To begin with, if we assume that the astronomer-
IIO
STONEHENGE
CHAP.
priests here did attempt such observations, what is the most likely way in which they would have gone to work ?
The easiest way for the astronomer-priests to conduct such observations in a stone circle would be to erect a stone or barrow indicating the direction of the place on the horizon at which the star would rise as seen from the centre of the circle. If the dawn the star was to herald occurred in the summer, the stone or barrow itself might be visible if not too far away, but there was a reason why they should not be too close ; in a solemn ceremonial the less seen of the machinery the better.
Doubtless such stones and barrows would be rendered obvious in the dark by a light placed on or near them. Cups which could hold oil or grease are known in connection with such stones, and a light thus fed would suffice in the open if there were no wind; but in windy weather a cromlech or some similar shelter must have been provided for it.
Now if these standing stones or barrows were ever erected and still remain, accurate plans—not the slovenly plans with which Ferguson and too many others have provided us, giving us either no indication of the north or any other point, or else a rough compass bearing without taking the trouble to state the variation at the time and place—will help us.
I have already pointed out that much time has been lost in the investigation of our stone circles, for the reason that in many cases the exact relations of the monuments to the chief points of the horizon, and therefore to the place of sunrise at different times of the year, have not been considered; and when they were, the observations
XI
ASTRONOMICAL HINTS
111
were made only with reference to the magnetic north, which is different at different places, and besides is always varying; few indeed have tried to get at the real astronomical conditions of the problem. The first, I think, was Mr. Jonathan Otley, who in 1849 showed the “orientation” of the Keswick circle “according to the solar meridian,” giving true solar bearings throughout the year.
In my opinion the most accurate plans conceivable, in the absence of a long and minute local inquiry, are the 25-inch maps of the Ordnance Survey, on which, I have it on the authority of Colonel Johnston the distinguished Director, each stone may be taken to be shown with a limit of error of 6 feet. With a large circular protractor azimuths can be read to one minute of arc, and in critical cases the true azimuth of the side lines, which are not necessarily meridians as latitudes are not marked, can be found on inquiry at the Ordnance Office, Southampton.
Having then true azimuths, the next question concerns the declinations of the stars which may have been observed.
The work of Stockwell in America, Danckworth in Germany,1 and Dr. W. J. S. Lockyer in England, has provided us with tables of the changing declinations of stars throughout past time, or enough of it for our purpose.
An accurate determination on the 2 5-inch map of either the azimuth (angular distance from the N. or S. points) or amplitude (angular distance from the E. or W. points)
1 Dr. O. Danckworth, Vierteljahrschrift der Astronomischen Gesell- schaft} 16 Jahrgang 1881, p. 9. Dr. Stockweirs results have been communicated to me by letter. Some, but not all, of Dr. Lockyer’s calculations appeared in The Dawn of Astronomy.
112
STONEHENGE
CH. XI
of the stone or barrow as seen from the centre of the stone circle will enable us to determine the declination of the star at the time when it was observed.
I give a diagram which enables this determination to be made with the greatest ease for any monuments between Land’s End and John o’ Groats, whether the direction is recorded by amplitude or azimuth ; the declination is read at the side from the value of either indicated, say, by a dot, at the proper latitude.
This, of course, only gives us a first approximation. The angular height of the point on the horizon to which the alignment or sight-line is directed by the stone or barrow from the centre of the circle must be most accurately determined, otherwise the declinations may be one or two degrees out.
In the absence of measurements it is convenient to assume, in the first instance, that the horizon is half a degree high, as with this elevation refraction is compensated, as the following table will show:
Elevation of actual horizon.   Bessel’s
refraction.   Combined effect.
OW   34'54"   -34'54"
0°10'   32*49"   -22'49"
20'   30'52"   -10*52"
30'   29'3*5"   + 0*56*5"
40'   27'22*7"   + 12*37 *3*
50'   25'49*8"   +2410*2*
ro'   24'24*6"   + 35*35*4"
In the absence of theodolite observations the actual elevation of the horizon can be roughly found by a study of the contour lines on the 1-inch map. The following heights will agree with the previous assumption of hills high : Distance 1 mile   Height = 46 feet
2   miles   „ = 92   
4   »   „ =184   J>
8      „ =368   
10      „ =460   )>
 
FIG. 33.—Diagram for finding declination from given amplitudes or azimuths in British latitudes.
114
STONEHENGE
CHAP.
I also give other diagrams showing the changing declinations of the brightest stars, those which] would naturally be observed, between the years 150 A.D. and 2150 B.c. These have been plotted from the calculations of the authorities I have named.
Fig. 34 deals with the Northern stars. The stars are numbered as follows:—
Number. Name of star.   Number. Name of star.
1   0 Ursae Minoris.   14   a Coronae.
2   a Ursae Minoris (Polaris).   15   a Geminorum (Castor).
3   a Draconis.   16   0 Geminorum (Pollux).
4   a Ursae Majoris (Dubhe).   17   a Bootes (Arcturus).
5   y Ursae Majoris.   18   0 Leonis.
6   11 Ursae Majoris (Benetnasch).   19   a Leonis (Regulus).
7   y Draconis.   20   a Andromedae.
8   0 Cassiopeiae.   21   ri Tauri (Alcyone).
9   a Cassiopeiae.   22   a Tauri (Aldebar&n).
10   a Persei.   23   a Canis Minoris (Procyon).
11   a Aurigae (Capella).   24   a Aquilae.
12   a Cygni.   25   a Orionis (Betelgeuse).
13   a Lyrae (Vega).   26   a Virginis (Spica).
On Fig. 35, dealing with the Southern stars, the names are given along the curves.
Now supposing that we have our plans; that we have determined the azimuth of the sight lines; and have found the declination of the star observed ; we may find more than one star occupying that declination at various dates.
Which of these stars, then, must we consider?
Obviously those most conveniently situated for enabling the time to be estimated during the night, or those which could have been used as warning stars.
The warning stars can be conveniently picked up by using a precessional globe. From it we gather that about 1900, 1400 and 800 B.c. they were as follows for the critical