Chapter IV: Part I: I (2)

If we allow weight to these considerations, it will be difficult to think that such a method of reckoning the year--involving, as it did, the recognition of the ecliptic star-groups under the fanciful figures of the Zodiac--should have been arrived at by each of these nations independently. Whether one nation borrowed these ideas from another, or whether some “earlier race of men” bequeathed this knowledge to their many descendants, is still an open question. Scholars have not unanimously awarded the palm of seniority in civilization to any one nation, and we are not at variance with proved facts, if we elect to adopt the theory of a common stock, from which the divergent races sprang. If, then, it should appear that these races possessed and incorporated into their mythologies a knowledge of the Zodiac, and of the first degree of Aries as its initial point, their separation from the parent stock must have been subsequent to the formation of the scheme that dealt with a calendar based on an observation of the colure of the winter solstice at that point, and under this supposition the date of 6,000 B.C. becomes a foothold for the chronology of ancient history. We should also be led to think of the common ancestors of the civilized races not as ignorant barbarians, but rather as men graced with high intellectual gifts--men whose teachings have been handed down through all the ages to this present day, and of whose imaginings the Zodiac remains as the most ancient monument of the work of intelligent man.

III

(_GU_), ELEVENTH CONSTELLATION OF THE ZODIAC

[Reprinted from the _Proceedings of the Society of Biblical
Archæology, February 1896_]

In the astronomical tablets (of the 1st and 2nd cent. B.C.) translated by Epping and Strassmaier, the twelve constellations of the Babylonian Zodiac are constantly referred to. Their names appear under very abbreviated forms in the tablets, and are as follows:[22]--

1. (_ku_(_sarikku_)) = aries.
2. (_te_(_mennu_)) = taurus.
3. (_mašu_) = gemini.
4. (_pulukku_) = cancer.
5. (_arū_) = leo.
6. (_serû_) = virgo.
7. (_zibanîtu_) = libra.
8. (_aqrabu_) = scorpio.
9. (_pa_) = arcitenens.
10. (_enzu_) = caper.
11. (_gu_) = amphora [aquarius].
12. (_zib_) = pisces.

[22] _Zeitschrift für Assyriologie_, v Band, 4 Heft, Oct. 1890, p.
351.

Also in Epping and Strassmaier’s work, _Astronomisches aus Babylon_, under the heading _Die Zeichen des Thierkreises_, pp. 170, 171, and _Namen der Sterne_, pp. 174, 175, the twelve abbreviations met with in the tablets are discussed at some length.

From a study of the list here given and of the passages referred to, we learn that it has been found possible to suggest for some of the abbreviations suitable terminations, and in the completed words thus obtained, the familiar constellations of the Zodiac, as we know them, are easily to be recognized.

As regards other of the abbreviations, and amongst them that of (Gu) for the eleventh sign (Amphora or Aquarius), no termination has been suggested; and of it Strassmaier thus writes:[23] p. 171:--“Gu ist sonst fast ausschliesslich nur als Silbenzeichen gu bekannt”; and Jensen, discussing Epping and Strassmaier’s constellation list, writes thus of the abbreviation Gu for the eleventh constellation:[24] “Ob Gu einen ‘Wassereimer,’ ‘Schöpfeimer,’ bezeichnen kann, weiss ich nicht. Die bisher veröffentlichten Texte geben keinen Aufschluss darüber.”

[23] _Astronomisches aus Babylon._

[24] _Kosmologie der Babylonier_, p. 314.

As a probable completion for the abbreviation Gu, the following suggestion is here put forward:--

In the ancient astrological tablets translated by Professor Sayce in his Paper, _The Astronomy and Astrology of the Babylonians_,[25] pp. 189, 190, “the star of Gula” is mentioned. The first syllable of this word is composed of the same cuneiform group as that used in the abbreviation for the eleventh constellation of the Zodiac in the astronomical tablets of the first and second centuries B.C. above referred to. But this fact, if it stood alone, would not be enough to do more than point to a possible identification of Gu in the late tablets with Gula in the ancient astrological works. Amongst the many constellations in the heavens the name of more than one might have begun with the syllable Gu.

[25] _Transactions, Biblical Archæology_, vol. iii., February 1874.

We find, however, at a later page (206) of Professor Sayce’s Paper, this sentence translated from W.A.I., III. 57, 1:--

“Jupiter[26] in the star of Gula lingers.” None of the five planets known to the Babylonians could ever with truth have been described as appearing or “lingering” in any part of the heavens outside the band of the Zodiac stars. “The star (or constellation) of Gula,” we must therefore assume, was a Zodiacal star or constellation. This restriction of the position of the “star of Gula” renders it scarcely a rash conclusion to arrive at, that the _Zodiacal_ Gu of the later tablets is an abbreviation for the _Zodiacal_ Gula of the ancient astrological works.

[26] Or, rather, “Mercury.” See Epping and Strassmaier,
_Astronomisches aus Babylon_, p. 112 _et seq._

As to a mythological reason for the choice of the goddess Gula to preside over the constellation known to us as Aquarius, we find it in the fact that Gula appears as another name for the goddess Bau[27] and Bau (or Bahu) was a personification of _the dark water_, or chaos.

[27] Maspero, _Dawn of Civilization_, p. 672, notes 1, 2.

If we adopt this identification of the star or constellation Gula with the constellation, or some star in the constellation, Aquarius, it will throw light on many of the inscriptions found on statues and other monuments at Telloh (the modern name of the mound which covers the ruins of the ancient city of Lagash),

We find from these inscriptions that the deities especially worshipped at Lagash were not the same as those who held the foremost places contemporaneously in the Accadian, and at a later time in the Babylonian Pantheon. Ningirsu and “his beloved consort,” the goddess Bau, received in Lagash the highest honours. On one of the statues of Gudea, “the priestly governor of Lagash,” this inscription occurs:[28]--

“To Ningirsu, the powerful warrior of Ellilla [this is dedicated] by
Gudea, priestly governor of Lagash, who has constructed the temple of
Eninnu, consecrated to Ningirsu.

“For Ningirsu, his lord, he has built the temple of Ekhud, the tower
in stages, from the summit of which Ningirsu grants him a happy lot.

“Besides the offerings which Gudea made of his free will to Ningirsu
and to the goddess Bau, daughter of Anna, his beloved consort, he has
made others to his god Ningiszida.

“That year he had a block of rare stone brought from the country of
Magan; he had it carved into a statue of himself.

“On the day of the beginning of the year, the day of the festival of
Bau, on which offerings were made: one calf, one fat sheep, three
lambs, six full grown sheep, two rams, seven _pat_ of dates, seven
_sab_ of cream, seven palm buds.

“Such were the offerings made to the goddess Bau in the ancient
temple on that day.”

[28] Evetts, _New Light on the Bible_, p. 162.

Ningirsu, the god--so highly exalted in this and in other inscriptions found in the mounds of Telloh--has been identified with the god Ninib[29] of the Babylonians. Much difference of opinion prevails as to what astronomical ideas were connected by the ancient inhabitants of Mesopotamia with the god Ninib.

[29] Maspero, _Dawn of Civilization_, pp. 637, 645.

Jensen admits that the generally received opinion as to Ninib is that he represents the “southern sun.”[30] He, however, contends, with great eagerness, that this is a mistaken opinion, and that Ninib is really the eastern or rising sun. Many of Jensen’s arguments against the possibility of Ninib representing the southern sun are based on the assumption that the epithet “southern,” applied to the sun, denotes the power of the mid-day sun; whereas, in other descriptions of Ninib, he appears as struggling with, though in the end triumphant over, storm, and cloud, and darkness.

[30] Jensen, _Die Kosmologie der Babylonier_, p. 460.

The sun in his _daily_ course attains the southern meridian at noon, and that may well be described by Jensen as the “alles verzehrenden und versengenden Süd- oder Mittagssonne,” but if we think of the sun in his _annual_ course, the words “southern sun” may more fitly in an astronomical sense mean the struggling and finally triumphant sun of the winter solstice. And if we so understand the expression, the apparently contradictory references to Ninib are easily explained.

At mid-winter the sun rises and sets more to the south than at any other time of the year; at noon on the day of the winter solstice the sun is forty-seven degrees nearer to the south pole of the heavens than it is at the summer solstice.

If, instead of adopting Jensen’s contention, and looking upon Ninib as the eastern rising sun, we revert to the generally held opinion that Ninib was the god of the southern sun, and if we understand the southern sun in its astronomical sense as the winter, or more strictly speaking the mid-winter sun, it will naturally lead us to the conclusion that “the day of the beginning of the year,” the day of the festival of Bau, Ningirsu’s (= Ninib’s) “beloved consort,” was held at the time of the winter solstice.

Speaking in round numbers, from 4,000 to 2,000 B.C., the winter solstice took place when the sun was in conjunction with the constellation Aquarius, which constellation, or some one of its stars, was, as has been suggested, called by the Babylonian astronomers, Gula, Gula being another name for Bau.

It is not therefore surprising to find that those rulers of Lagash, whose dates fell between 4,000 and 2,000 B.C., should have so often associated together Ningirsu and Bau; and further, that Gudea, whose rule is placed at about 2,900 B.C., should on “the day of the beginning of the year” have kept high festival in honour of Bau, as the beneficent deity presiding in conjunction with Ningirsu over the revolving years.

The precession of the equinoxes must necessarily in the course of ages introduce confusion into all Zodiacal calendars, and into all ritual and mythological symbolism founded on such calendars. From 2,000 b.c. down to the beginning of our era, the winter solstice took place when the sun was in conjunction with Capricornus, not with Aquarius. In those later days, if the inhabitants of Lagash still celebrated their new year’s festival at the winter solstice, Bau (= Gula = Aquarius) could only have laid a traditional claim to preside over it.

In accordance with these astronomical facts, we learn from the teachings of the tablets that the especial reverence paid to Bau = Gula, in the Lagash inscriptions was not extended to her in later times.

As to Ninib, we know that even at Gudea’s date in the neighbouring state of Accad, and in later times in Babylon, he did not hold the pre-eminent position accorded to him by the early rulers of Lagash.

This difference in the religious observances of Accad and Lagash regarding Ninib--if we suppose him to be the god of the winter solstice--may also receive an astronomical explanation.

According to the evidence of _The Standard Astrological Work_, the compilation of which is generally attributed to the date 3,800 B.C., and according to the evidence of many other tablets, the year in Accad and afterwards in Babylon began not at the winter solstice, but on the 1st day of Nisan, and Nisan (Acc. Bar zig-gar), the month of “the sacrifice of righteousness,” was, as its name suggests, the month during which the sun was in conjunction with the constellation Aries.

At Gudea’s date, about 2,900 B.C., the 1st of Nisan, if it was dependent on the sun’s entry into Aries, must have fallen about midway between the winter solstice and the spring equinox, and as century succeeded century, the 1st of Nisan must slowly but surely have receded further from the solstice and have approached more and more to the equinoctial point.

In Accad, therefore, neither at Gudea’s nor at any later date, did the year begin at the winter solstice, and hence we can understand why in that state, and afterwards in Babylon, Ninib was not as highly honoured as in Lagash, and why he and his consort Bau (= Gula) were not referred to as the deities presiding over the beginning of the year.

In a former number of these _Proceedings_[31] I drew attention to the Accadian calendar. It was there suggested that the choice of the first degree of Aries as the initial point of the Zodiac was originally made when the winter solstice coincided with the sun’s entry into that constellation, _i.e._ about 6,000 B.C.

[31] January 1892, V. p. 13.

If that suggestion, and the present one concerning the new year’s festival in Lagash are accepted, it will be easy to imagine that the Lagash observance betokened a sort of effort to reform the sidereal calendar in use in Accad, and it may be elsewhere.

In Accad the calendar makers clung to the originally instituted _star-mark_ for the year, and made it begin with the sun’s entry into Aries; therefore by degrees the beginning of their year moved away from the winter solstice, and in the first century B.C. coincided very closely with the spring equinox.

In Lagash, on the contrary, the calendar makers clung to the originally established _season_ of the year, and made it begin at the winter solstice; therefore by degrees the beginning of their year moved away from the constellation Aries, and in Gudea’s time the new year’s festival was held in honour of the goddess Bau = Gula = Aquarius.

IV

THE MEDIAN CALENDAR AND THE CONSTELLATION TAURUS

[Reprinted from the _Proceedings of the Society of Biblical
Archæology, June 1897_]

In a former number[32] of these _Proceedings_ I contrasted as follows, what I believed to be the calendar of the Accadians with that of the inhabitants of Lagash:--

“In Accad the calendar makers clung to the originally instituted
_star-mark_ for the year, and made it begin with the sun’s entry
into [the constellation] Aries; therefore by degrees the beginning
of their year moved away from the winter solstice, and in the first
century B.C. coincided very closely with the spring equinox.

“In Lagash, on the contrary, the calendar makers clung to the
originally established _season_ of the year, and made it begin at
the winter solstice; therefore by degrees the beginning of their year
moved away from the constellation Aries, and in Gudea’s time [about
2,900 B.C.] the new year’s festival was held in honour of the goddess
Bau = Gula = Aquarius.”

[32] V. p. 54.

I now desire to draw attention to the Median calendar, which appears to have differed from that used, as above suggested, in Accad or in Lagash; inasmuch as the beginning of the Median year was not dependent on the sun’s entry into the _constellation Aries_, as in Accad; nor was it fixed to the season of the _winter solstice_ as in Lagash.

The beginning of the Median year was fixed to the _season of the spring equinox_, and remaining true to that season, followed no star-mark. The great importance, however, of Tauric symbolism in Median art seems to point to the fact that _when the equinoctial year was first established_ the spring equinoctial point was in the constellation Taurus. Astronomy teaches us that was the case, speaking in round numbers, from 4,000 to 2,000 B.C.

It is true that we have no documentary proof of the existence of a Median _equinoctial_ calendar in the remote past, such as that which we possess in the Babylonian standard astrological works regarding the ancient _sidereal_ Accadian calendar. We have, however, among the modern representatives of the Medes, the Persians, a very distinctive calendrical observance, namely, that of the Nowroose, or the festival of the new year; and we have the Persian tradition that the institution of this festival was of fabulous antiquity. I quote from Ker Porter’s remarks on this subject:--

“The 21st of March, the impatiently anticipated day of the most
joyous festival of Persia, at last arrived. It is called the feast of
the Nowroose, or that of the commencement of the new year; and its
institution is attributed to the celebrated Jemsheed, who, according
to the traditions of the country, and the fragments yet preserved
of its early native historians, was the sixth in descent from Noah,
and the fourth sovereign of Persia, of the race of Kaiomurs, the
grandson of Noah.... But to return to the feast of the Nowroose. It
is acknowledged to have been celebrated from the earliest ages, in
Persia, independent of whatever religions reigned there; whether the
simple worship of the One Great Being, or under the successive rites
of Magian, Pagan, or Mahomedan institutions.” (_Travels_, vol. i. p.
316.)

This equinoctial and solar year, as the writer proceeds to point out, is adhered to by the Persians, though they, being Mahomedans, also celebrate Mahomedan lunar festivals, and for many purposes make use of the Mahomedan lunar year.

It is easy to see how greatly the Persian Nowroose differs from the purely lunar Mahomedan anniversaries--anniversaries which in the course of about thirty-two and a half years necessarily make a complete circuit through the seasons. The difference, though not so marked, which exists between the purely solar Nowroose, and all soli-lunar festivals, such as those of the Babylonians, should also be taken note of. These last, like our Easter, were dependent on the phases of the moon, and were therefore “moveable.” The Persian Nowroose, like our Christmas Day, is an “immoveable” festival--fixed to the day of the spring equinox.

Modern tradition concerning the distinctively Persian custom of celebrating the Nowroose would, if it stood alone, furnish very slight grounds on which to found a far-reaching theory; but historical evidence confirms this tradition to a great extent, by teaching us that the Median and Persian worshippers of Ahura Mazda, and of Mithras, certainly under the Sassinide dynasty, and almost with equal certainty under the Achæmenid kings, kept their calendar and celebrated their religious festivals in a manner differing from that of the surrounding nations; their months were not lunar, their years were not soli-lunar but distinctly solar, and the spring equinox was the date to which as closely as possible the beginning of their year was fixed.

In Darmesteter’s translation of the _Zend Avesta_ the Persian months are treated of in Appendix C, p. 33, and in Appendix D, p. 37, we read of the Persian years:--

“L’année était divisée en quatre saisons, correspondant aux nôtres.
Cette division ne paraît guère que dans les textes post-avestéens;
mais il y a dans l’Avesta même des traces de son existence ancienne.
La division normale de l’année est, dans l’Avesta, en deux saisons,
été et hiver; l’été, _hama_, qui comprend les sept premiers mois (du
1^{er} Farvardîn au 30 Mihr, soit du 21 mars au 16 octobre).... Cette
division a une valeur religieuse, non seulement pour le rituel, mais
aussi pour les pratiques, qui varient selon la saison.”

The worship of the Persian sun-god Mithras was introduced into Rome about the time of the fall of the Republic. How far this worship differed from that taught in the Zoroastrian writings we need not inquire; however changed it may have been, it was evidently derived originally from a Persian or a Median source. The worship of Mithras, in spite of much opposition, gained many followers in Rome. The birthday of the sun-god was kept at the winter solstice, but the great festivities in his honour, “_the mysteries of Mithras_,” were as a rule celebrated at the season of the spring equinox,[33] and were famous even among Roman festivals. Let us now turn our attention to the Tauric symbolism so closely connected with Mithraic observances in Rome.

[33] Cumont, in the first volume of his _Monuments figurés relatifs
aux mystères de Mithra_, p. 326, having spoken of the solstitial
festival in honour of the birthday of the god, observes as follows:
“Nous avons certaines raisons de croire que les équinoxes étaient
aussi des jours fériés où l’on inaugurait par quelque salutation
le retour des Saisons divinisées. Les initiations avaient lieu de
préférence vers le début du printemps, en mars ou en avril....”

A writer in the _Athenæum_ thus describes a Roman Mithræum:[34]
“Discovery was made during some excavations at Ostia of a handsome
house containing among its various rooms a _mithræum_.... Into
the kitchen opens a narrow and tortuous passage, from which by a
small half-concealed staircase the _mithræum_ is reached; ... it
is quadrangular and regular in shape, as is usually the case in
buildings of the kind. Almost the whole length of the two lateral
walls run two seats, and on the side opposite the door is seen a
little elevation, which served as the place for the usual statue
of Mithras in the act of thrusting his dagger into the neck of the
mystic Bull. A very singular peculiarity of this little Ostian
_mithræum_ is that it is entirely covered with mosaics--pavements,
seats, and walls alike. The various figures and the symbols are
splendidly drawn, and all executed in black _tesseræ_ on a white
ground. Upon each side of the seats, turned to the entrance door, is
figured a genius bearing a lamp, that is, the genius of the spring
equinox, with the face raised, and that of the autumn equinox, with
the face cast down.... It is known, in fact, that the whole myth of
Mithras is related to the phases of the sun ... hence are represented
in the ground below the seats all the twelve signs of the zodiac, by
means of the usual symbols, but each accompanied by a large star.”

[34] _Athenæum_, 1886, October 30 and November 6.

In the many sculptures of the Mithras group similar to that above described, which have been so well figured in Lajard’s _Culte de Mithras_, various heavenly bodies are represented. The Scorpion (the constellation Scorpio of the Zodiac opposed to Taurus) joins with Mithras in his attack upon the Bull, and always the genii of the spring and autumn equinoxes are present in joyous and mournful attitudes.

In looking at these plates the conviction is clearly forced upon our minds that the Bull so persistently, and, it may be added, so serenely, slain by Mithras in these Roman representations, is the Zodiacal Bull, overcome, and as it were destroyed or banished from heaven, in the daytime by the sun-god, and at night by Scorpio, the constellation in opposition. With almost equal conviction we arrive at the conclusion that this triumph of Mithras was associated traditionally--in Roman days it could only have been traditionally--with the occurrence, at a remote date, of the spring equinox during the time that the sun was in conjunction with the constellation Taurus.

In the ruins of Persepolis, ruins of buildings designed, erected, and decorated by the worshippers of the supreme God Ahura Mazda, and of his friend and representative Mithras, Tauric symbolism abounds. We do not amongst these ruins find portrayals of Mithras as a youth wearing a Phrygian cap, and “thrusting his dagger into the neck of the mystic Bull,” but again and again, in the bas-reliefs adorning the walls, we do find a colossal being thrusting his dagger into the body of a still more “mystic” creature than the Bull of the Roman sculptures--a creature combining in one instance at least[35] the attributes of Bull, Lion, Scorpion, and Eagle, and frequently those of two or more of these animals.

[35] See Plate IV.

Persépolis. Combat du roi et du griffon. Palais n^{o} 3.

Perrot et Chipiez. _Histoire de l’Art dans l’Antiquité_, Tome v. opposite page 547.

[_To face p. 64._]

Perrot and Chipiez have supposed this constantly repeated scene to represent imaginary contests between the reigning monarch and all possible or impossible monsters, but a very different impression was produced on the mind of Ker Porter by these same bas-reliefs; and though he did not adopt a purely astronomic theory to explain them, he was firmly convinced that the combat depicted was not one waged between an ordinary human being and an ordinary or extraordinary animal, but that it was a symbolical representation of the combat constantly carried on by Ormuzd (Ahura Mazda), and by his representative Mithras, against the powers of evil and darkness.[36]

[36] “The man who contends with the animals ... is represented as a
person of a singularly dignified mien, clad in long draperied robes,
but with the arms perfectly bare. His hair, which is full and curled,
is bound with a circlet or low diadem; and his sweeping pointed beard
is curled at different heights, in the style that was worn by majesty
alone.... The calmness of his air, contrasted with the firmness
with which he grasps the animals, and strikes to his aim, gives
a certainty to his object, and a sublimity to his figure, beyond
anything that would have been in the power of more elaborate action
or ornament to effect. From the unchanged appearance of the hero,
his unvaried mode of attack, its success, and the unaltered style of
opposition adopted by every one of the animals in the contest, I can
have no doubt that they all mean different achievements towards one
great aim....”--Ker Porter’s _Travels_, vol. i. p. 672.

With the astronomic clue to Persian symbolism put into our hands by the Roman sculptures, of which mention has been made, and by a study of the researches of Lajard, it is not difficult to recognize in the composite animals represented on the bas-reliefs allusions not only to the Zodiacal Bull, traditionally associated with the spring equinox, but also to three other constellations which at the same date of the world’s history (namely, from 4,000 to 2,000 B.C.) marked more or less accurately the remaining colures, _i.e._ the Lion, the Scorpion, and the Eagle.

The constellations of the Lion and the Scorpion, there can be no doubt, were appropriate star marks for the summer and autumn seasons, when the spring equinoctial point was in the Bull,[37] but as regards the Eagle it must be admitted that though it adjoins the Zodiacal Aquarius (the constellation in which the winter solstitial point was then situated), yet its principal stars lie considerably to the north and west of that constellation.

[37] The solstitial and equinoctial colures were situated, speaking
in round numbers, for 2,000 years in the constellations Taurus, Leo,
Scorpio, and Aquarius.

A reason for the substitution of the Eagle (Aquila) for the Zodiacal Water-man or Water-jar (Aquarius or Amphora) may, however, be found in the fact of the very great brilliancy of the star Altair in the Eagle. It is a star of the first magnitude. In the Water-man there is no star above the third. The Persians, we are told, had a tradition that four brilliant stars marked the four cardinal points (_i.e._ the colures). In Taurus, Leo, and Scorpio we find stars of the first magnitude: there was therefore no temptation for Mithraic calendar makers and mythologists to seek for an extra-Zodiacal star to mark and represent the spring, summer, or autumn seasons; but for the winter solstice the only stars of the first magnitude within at all suitable distance were Aquila, to the north-west, or Fomalhaut to the south of Aquarius. For a nation dwelling as far to the north as the Medians are supposed to have done, Fomalhaut (when the winter solstice was in Aquarius very far to the south of the equator) would have been rarely visible. The choice by a Median astronomer and symbolic artist in search of a very brilliant star mark for the solstice would therefore have been restricted to the constellation of the Eagle, containing the conspicuous Altair, a star of the first magnitude.

The very constant association, not only in Persian and Median, but also in the mythologic art of other nations, of the Lion and the Eagle, seems to confirm the view here put forward, _i.e._ that the constellations of Leo and Aquila rather than of Leo and Aquarius were sometimes chosen to symbolise the summer and winter solstices.

The Griffin, a fabulous animal sacred to the sun, composed of a _Lion_ and an _Eagle_, is a well-known figure in ancient classic art.

In Babylonian and Assyrian sculptured and glyptic art Merodach is often represented as in conflict with a Griffin. Merodach has been claimed by Jensen and other writers as a personification of the sun of the spring equinox. The for ever recurring triumph of spring over winter is probably figured in Merodach’s triumph over the Griffin.

The association of Eagle and Lion is to be noticed in the arms of the city of Lagash; they were “a double-headed Eagle standing on a Lion passant or on two demi-lions placed back to back.”[38] In Lagash, as was pointed out in a former paper, the new year’s festival appears to have been held at the winter solstice: such a supposition would furnish an astronomical interpretation for the arms of Lagash.[39]

[38] Maspero, _Dawn of Civilization_, p. 604.

[39] In this connexion the following passage from Sayce’s _Hibbert
Lectures_, p. 261, is interesting:--

A text copied for Assur-banipal, from a tablet originally written
at Babylon, contains part of a hymn which had to be recited “in the
presence of Bel-Merodach ... in the beginning of Nisan,”--

“... O Zamama,
Why dost thou not take thy seat?
Bahu, the Queen of Kis, has not cried to thee.”

He adds in a note that Zamama was the Sun-god of Kis, and was
consequently identified with Adar by the mythologists. On a
contract-stone he is symbolized by an eagle, which is said to be “the
image of the southern sun of Kis.”

It was claimed in a former paper (Feb. 1896) that “_the Southern
sun_” was “_the sun of the winter solstice_,” and that Gula (=
Bahu) was the name of the constellation, or of some stars in the
constellation Aquarius (V. p. 50). In these lines Bahu, as I have
supposed, Aquarius, and Zamama, symbolised by the _Eagle, the image
of the Southern sun or winter solstice_, are closely associated.

Mythological references to the Eagle alone are also to be met with which point to the Celestial Eagle (Aquila) marking the winter solstice in lieu of the constellation Aquarius, as for instance the Babylonian legend of the ambitious storm-bird, Zu,[40] who stole the tablets of destiny, and thus sought to vie in power with “the great gods.” Here we may find allusions to the substitution (deemed by some, no doubt, unauthorized) of an extra-Zodiacal for a Zodiacal constellation.

[40] Maspero, _Dawn of Civilization_, p. 666.

Again, in Grecian mythology the Eagle is sent by Zeus to carry Ganymede up to heaven, and in Grecian astronomy Ganymede is placed in the constellation Aquarius. It does not therefore seem unreasonable to suppose that the Eagle associated in the Persepolitan bas-reliefs with the Lion, the Bull, and the Scorpion (as at Plate IV.), is the constellational Eagle, symbolizing the winter solstice, and that the compound animal is emblematic of the four seasons of the year, and also, it may be, of the four quarters of the world.

If to the composite monster of the bas-reliefs we ascribe an astronomic motive, we shall be ready to grant the same to other Tauric symbolisms prominent in the Persepolitan ruins.

With full conviction we shall recognize in the demi-bulls which crowned the columns in Persepolis and Susa representations of the demi-bull of the Zodiac. The resemblance is so striking that words are scarcely required to point it out when once the outlines of the two figures have been compared (Plate V.). In the spirited description of these capitals, quoted here from Perrot and Chipiez,[41] are some lines, marked with italics, which might be applied with exactness to the demi-bulls of the Zodiac.

[41] _Histoire de l’Art dans l’antiquité_, Perse, p. 519.

THE CONSTELLATION TAURUS

CAPITAL FROM SUSA

[_To face p. 70._]

“On ne saurait cependant ne point admirer le grand goût et l’art
ingénieux avec lequel, dans ses bustes de taureau, il [l’artiste
perse] a plié la forme vivante au nécessités de la décoration
architecturale. Il a su la simplifier sans lui enlever l’accent de
la vie; les traits caractéristiques de l’espèce sur laquelle s’est
porté son choix restent franchement accusés, quoique les menus
détails soient éliminés; ils auraient risqué de distraire et de
troubler le regard. Les poils de la nuque et du dos, de l’épaule,
des fanons, et des flancs sont réunis en masses d’un ferme contour,
auquelles la frisure des boucles dont elles se composent donne un
relief plus vigoureux; en même temps le collier qui pend au col,
orné de rosaces et d’un riche fleuron qui tombe sur la poitrine,
écarte toute idée de réalité; ce sont là des êtres sacrés et presque
divins, que l’imagination de l’artiste a comme créés à nouveau et
modelés à son gré pour les adapter à la fonction qu’elle leur donnait
à remplir. Cependant, tout placé qu’il soit en dehors des conditions
de la nature, l’animal n’a pas perdu sa physionomie propre. Dans le
mouvement de _la tête, légèrement inclinée en avant et sur la côté_,
on sent la force indomptée qui anime ce corps ample et puissant.
Hardiment indiquées, la construction et la musculature des _membres
inférieurs, repliés sous le ventre_, laissent deviner de quel élan le
taureau se lèverait et se dresserait en pied, s’il venait à se lasser
de son éternel repos. J’en ai fait plusieurs fois l’expérience au
Louvre, devant la partie de chapiteau colossal que notre musée doit à
M. Dieulafoy: parmi les visiteurs qui se pressaient dans cette salle,
parmi ceux mêmes qui semblaient le moins préparés à éprouver ce genre
d’impressions, il n’en est pas un qui n’ait; subi le charme, qui de
manière ou d’autre, n’ait rendu hommage à la noblesse et à l’étrange
beauté de ce type singulier.”

For the exquisite columns crowned by these Tauric capitals the same writers have claimed a distinctively Median origin. This claim they sustain at great length, and with much architectural learning. They show that in their proportions, and in every detail of their ornamentation, the Persepolitan differed from the Ninevite, Grecian, or Egyptian column. They also point out that nowhere except at Persepolis and at Susa is the demi-bull of the capital to be met with; and yet they express the opinion that this feature, so far as is known proper to Persia, was mainly derived from, or helped at least by, the models of Assyria.

Very close resemblances can indeed be traced in Medo-Persian to Assyrian art, and as the Medo-Persian buildings, whose ruins are at Persepolis and Susa, were erected certainly at a later date than the palaces of the Assyrian kings discovered on the site of Nineveh, it is natural to attribute, as Perrot and Chipiez, and nearly all writers on the subject attribute, such resemblances to imitations of Assyrian art and symbolism on the part of the Medo-Persians.

There are, however, some considerations which make it difficult to adopt this view. In the first place, the symbolism supposed to have been copied by the Medo-Persians was religious symbolism, and the religion of the Aryan Medo-Persians was very different from that of the Semitic Assyrians.

The Achæmenid kings who built their palaces at Persepolis claimed constantly that they were worshippers of the one great Lord Ahura Mazda, of whom Mithras was the friend and representative. That these kings should have adopted from the polytheistic Assyrians not only the Tauric symbolism above described, but also, as it is suggested, the emblem of their one great Lord Ahura Mazda from that of Assur (see Plate VI. figs. 1, 2, 3), would in itself be strange, but that they should have done so when Assur and all his followers had been utterly vanquished by the victorious worshippers of Ahura Mazda, seems still more improbable.

From the state in which the ruins of Nineveh were when discovered by Layard it is easy to see that, from the very day of the sacking of the city, it had for the most part been left just as it fell. It may have been rifled of its material wealth, but its literary and artistic treasures were left uncared for and undesired. A few hundred years later the very site of Nineveh was unknown.

The great city would not have been treated with such neglect had the Medo-Persian artists turned to it for inspiration and for themes of symbolic art with which to decorate the palaces of Persepolis.

FIG. 1.

The Assyrian god Assur.

FIG. 2.

The Assyrian god Assur.

FIG. 3.

The Median god Ahura Mazda.

FIG. 4.

Western portion of Constellation Sagittarius and the Constellation Corona Australis.

[_To face p. 74._]

The resemblance, however, between Medo-Persian and Ninevite art is in many instances so striking that some way of accounting for it must be sought, and those who are dissatisfied with one explanation will naturally look about to find some alternative suggestion.

The alternative suggestion I would now propose is that _the progenitors of the Assyrians at an early period of the world’s history borrowed Tauric and other religious symbolisms from the ancestors of the Medes_.

In support of this theory the following considerations are put forward:

Tauric symbolism, if it is at all astronomic, points us back to a very remote date for its first institution, to a date considerably earlier than that at which the existence of the Assyrian people as an independent nation is generally put. The symbolism already discussed must, at the latest, have been originated about 2,000 B.C. Of the Assyrians as a nation we have no monumental proof earlier than 1,700 B.C.

But further, in the symbol of Ahura and Assur, I believe an astronomic reference may be traced to the position of the colures amongst the constellations, a reference which points us back not merely to a date between 4,000 and 2,000 B.C., but rather, and with curious precision, to the furthest limit of the time mentioned, namely to 4,000 B.C.

To penetrate into the meaning of this symbol of Ahura we must study both the Median and Assyrian representations of the figure presiding over the winged disc, and we may also seek for further light to be thrown upon it by other references in Assyrian art to the god Assur.

Ahura presiding over the winged circle holds in his hand a ring or crown; Assur in some examples is similarly furnished; but more often he appears armed with bow and arrows. In this figure, variously equipped, I believe that the heavenly Archer, the Zodiacal Sagittarius (Plate VI. fig. 4), is to be recognized--Sagittarius, the constellation in which the autumnal equinoctial point was situated, speaking in round numbers, from 6,000 to 4,000 B.C.

The fact that a crown or wreath or ring often replaces the bow and arrows in the hand of Ahura and of Assur might at first sight make us doubtful as to the connexion of the figure with the constellation Sagittarius, but a glance at the celestial globe will rather make this fact tell in favour of the astronomical suggestion here made: for there we find close to the hand of the Archer the ancient Ptolemaic constellation Corona Australis (the Southern Crown), actually incorporated with the Zodiacal constellation Sagittarius.

Not only do Assur’s bow and crown remind us of Sagittarius, but his horned tiara, resembling so closely that worn by the man-headed Assyrian bulls, inclines us to look for some astronomic and Tauric allusion in this Assyrian and Median symbol.

True it is that, speaking generally, Gemini and not Taurus is the constellation of the Zodiac opposed to Sagittarius, but owing to the irregularity in the shape and size of the portions assigned in the ecliptic to the Zodiacal constellations, the extreme western degrees of Sagittarius are opposed to the extreme eastern degrees of Taurus. Therefore about 4,000 B.C. the equinoctial colure passed through the constellations of the Archer and the Bull.

In the Assyrian Standard (depicted in Layard’s _Monuments of Nineveh_, Plate XXII.) we see the figure of an Archer above that of a galloping Bull, and in another Assyrian Standard, that of Sargon II., we find not only the Archer and the Bull, the two constellations which 4,000 B.C. marked the _equinoctial_ colure, but we may also clearly trace a reference to the two constellations which at the same date marked the _solstitial_ colure, namely, those of the Lion and the Water-man (Plate VII.).

Standard of Sargon II., King of Assyria, 722-705 B.C.

Perrot et Chipiez. _Histoire de l’Art dans l’Antiquité_, Tome v. opposite page 508.

[_To face p. 79._]

Here the _Archer_ dominates over a circle in which symmetrically duplicated _Bulls_ appear, and duplicated _Lions’_ heads emerge out of what appears to be a hollow vessel resembling a _water jar_; the wavy lines that traverse the disc suggest streams that unitedly pour their waters into this jar. Below the jar again are to be seen halved and doubled heads, partly Lion and partly Bull.

This Standard of Assur may (like the Persepolitan monster earlier described) be considered as an astronomic monogram representing the four constellations which marked the four seasons of the year, and the four quarters of the earth.

The monogram of the Standard refers us back, however, to an earlier date for its origin than does the monogram of the composite animal in the Persepolitan bas-relief, for in the Standard the Archer is opposed to the Bull, in the bas-relief the Scorpion takes the place of the Archer, and the Eagle takes the place of the Water-man.

The precession of the equinoxes advances from east to west amongst the stars. Therefore the Scorpion marked the colure at a later date than did the Archer. The Eagle, as has already been pointed out, is considerably to the west of Aquarius, and could scarcely have been chosen as a substitute for that constellation when the colure was in its extreme eastern degrees.

At Plate VIII. is given the position of the colures at 4,000 B.C.; not much earlier or much later than this date can we place the _origin_ of the symbolism in the Standard shown at Plate VII. Earlier _not_ Leo and Aquarius, but Virgo and Pisces, would have marked the solstitial colure. Later _not_ Sagittarius, but Scorpio, would have in opposition to Taurus marked the equinoctial colure.

At this date, 4,000 B.C., suggested with such curious accuracy by this Assyrian Standard, we have absolutely no trace of the existence of the _Semitic nation of the Assyrians_ in Northern Mesopotamia. In Babylonia two hundred years later the Semitic Sargon I. ruled at Accad. In the astrological work drawn up, if not for Sargon yet, as we may judge from internal evidence, for some king of Accad, no mention is made of the Assyrian nation.

Position of Colures amongst the Constellations at the dates 4,500-4,000 and 3,500 B.C.

[_To face p. 80._]

The Phœnicians, the Hittites, the Kings of Gutium, and the “Umman Manda” are then the dreaded foes of Accad. Of the Manda we read as follows: “The Umman Manda comes and governs the land. The mercy seats of the great gods are taken away. Bel goes to Elam.”

Professor Sayce is opposed to the view that the Manda are necessarily identical with the Medes; but he admits that Herodotus, following the authority of Medo-Persian writers, claimed as Median the victories of the Manda.[42]

[42] _Proceedings_, vol. xviii. Part vi. pp. 176, 177.

If now on the authority of Herodotus and the Medo-Persian writers we assume, at least as a possibility, that these Manda were Medes, we should expect to find them worshippers of Ahura Mazda. Ahura, it is on all hands admitted, is the Iranian form of the Vedic Asura, just as Mithras is the Iranian form of the Vedic Mitra. At whatever date the separation between Iranian and Vedic Aryans took place, the worship of Ahura (still probably under the form Asura) must have existed amongst the Iranians; indeed, many have supposed that the monotheistic reform which placed one great Ahura or Asura above all other Asuras, and above the Devas, occasioned the separation of these two great Aryan races.

It is for the Lord Ahura, called, as here supposed, Asura, in early times, by the Aryan Manda, that I would claim the astronomical symbol of the Archer presiding over the circle of the ecliptic, or, in other words, over the circle of the year, and of a year beginning at the spring equinox--a year, as has already been pointed out, distinctively Median.

According then to this supposition, a powerful Median race was established in the vicinity of Babylonia early in the fourth millennium B.C.--a race who worshipped one great Lord, first under the name of Asura, afterwards under that of Ahura.

It is for these Aryan Manda or Medes that I would claim, at the date of 4,000 B.C., the original conception of the astronomic monogram in which so plainly may be read an allusion to the four constellations of the Zodiac, which at that date marked the four seasons and the four cardinal points, _i.e._ Sagittarius and Taurus, Aquarius and Leo. This monogram was used as a Standard thousands of years later by the Semitic Assyrians.

To the Manda or Medes, also, I would, as has been suggested, attribute the first imagining of the astronomic emblem common to Ahura and Assur--that of the divine Being presiding over the circle of the ecliptic.

Berosus mentions a Median dynasty as having reigned in Babylon for one or two hundred years. Let us now suppose that the Manda for more than a thousand years held power in _Northern_ Mesopotamia, but that at last the tide of conquest turned, and after many struggles with the Semites in the south the Aryans were finally driven from the land now known as Assyria, and a Semite race firmly settled in the regions from whence in Sargon’s time the Umman Manda had threatened the inhabitants of the Kingdom of Accad. That this was the case about 2,200 B.C. may perhaps be gathered from the monuments of Ḫammurabi, the Semitic king of Babylon, for he refers in his letters to his troops in _Assyria_, and in a lately discovered inscription of this king he speaks of restoring to the city of _Assur_ its propitious genie, and of honouring Istar in the city of Nineveh.

To account for the existence of the Assyrian nation, their close resemblance in language and race to the ruling Semitic class in Babylon, and yet to explain the great difference in the religion of these two peoples, has always been a difficulty.

The Assyrians worshipped, and worshipped with enthusiasm, all the Babylonian gods; but high above the whole Babylonian Pantheon they placed as their supreme and great Lord Assur--Assur whose very name is not to be met with in Babylonian mythology. This difficulty I would explain in the following manner.

When the Medes had, by Ḫammurabi or his successors, been driven out of Northern Mesopotamia, they were replaced by Semitic settlers who (like the settlers sent into Samaria more than a thousand years later by a king of Assyria) adopted, to a certain extent, the religion of the nation whom they had dispossessed. In 2 Kings xvii. we read that in this parallel instance “the king of Assyria brought men from Babylon, and from Cuthah, and from Ava, and from Hamath, and from Sepharvaim, and placed them in the cities of Samaria instead of the children of Israel: and they possessed Samaria, and dwelt in the cities thereof.” Later in the same chapter we read that in order to appease, as they believed, the wrath of the “God of the land,” these idolatrous settlers, retaining in full the worship of all their own gods, added to it a worship of the Lord of the dispossessed Israelites.

I would suppose then that the polytheistic Semites, who in Ḫammurabi’s time were settled in Northern Mesopotamia, had acted in a similar manner. Coming into a region where for nearly 2,000 years the monotheistic Medes or Manda had been established, they, to avert the wrath of the _god of the land_, adopted to a certain extent his worship. In fact, like the Samaritans, “they feared the Lord [Asura], and served their own gods.”

This explanation of the difference in religion between the Babylonians and the Assyrians seems to yield also an explanation of the resemblances between the Assyrian and Median religions, or rather of the resemblances between the religious art of the two peoples; and thus we return to the problem proposed for discussion earlier in this Paper, namely, the inadequacy of the generally held opinion which accounts for the resemblances in Persepolitan and Ninevite symbolic art by supposing that the Medes borrowed from the Assyrians.

In support of the alternative suggestion put forward at p. 75, that _the progenitors of the Assyrians at an early period of the worlds history borrowed Tauric and other religious symbolisms from the ancestors of the Medes_, I would claim that the Assyrians borrowed not only religious symbolisms, but even the very name of their god Assur from the Medes. For I look upon Assur as a “loan word” adopted from the Aryan Asura.

To the Medes or Manda, who were, as has been argued, in power in Northern Mesopotamia about 4,000 B.C., I have attributed the origin of the astronomic Assyrian and Ahurian emblem. To them, on the same grounds, I attribute the first imagining of the astronomic Assyrian Standard, and the devising of the man-headed and winged monsters so well known as “Assyrian Bulls”; and to them I would, with full conviction, leave the honour of having invented, and not borrowed, the idea of the magnificent Tauric capitals that crowned the columns of Persepolis and Susa.

To all these conclusions I have been led by a consideration of the distinctively equinoctial character of the Median calendar, taken in connexion with the importance given in Median art to the constellation Taurus.

V

ASTRONOMY IN THE RIG VEDA

[Reprinted from the Report of the _Actes_ of the Twelfth Oriental
Congress held at Rome]

Not much more than a hundred years ago the Sanscrit language began to yield to the study of Europeans some of its literary treasures. Almost on the moment, a controversy arose as to the antiquity of the science of astronomy in India; for scholars were amazed to find in this already long dead language many learned astronomical treatises, besides complete instructions for calculating, year by year, the Hindu calendar, as also for calculating horoscopes.

Some then proclaimed the wonderful facts revealed, and extolled the antiquity and accuracy of this Indian science, while others, noticing the many points of resemblance between European and Indian methods, supposed, and warmly advocated the opinion, that much of the astronomy contained in Sanscrit works had been borrowed from the Greeks.

Sir William Jones was amongst the first to enter the lists against this Grecian theory; and he thus throws down his glove in defence of the antiquity and originality of the science of astronomy in India.

“I engage to support an opinion (which the learned and industrious M. Montucla seems to treat with extreme contempt) that the _Indian_ division of the Zodiack was not borrowed from the _Greeks_ or _Arabs_, but, having been known in this country (India) for time immemorial, and being the same in part with that used by other nations of the old _Hindu_ race, was probably invented by the first progenitors of that race before their dispersion.”[43]

[43] _On the Antiquity of the Indian Zodiack. Complete Works_, vol.
i. p. 333.

Since Sir William Jones wrote this challenge, and supported it with whatever linguistic and scientific resources were at his command, volumes of heated controversy by many authors have been devoted to the same subject.

Just at present, however, an almost indifferent calmness has taken the place of the excited interest formerly manifested. The majority of scholars, both European and Indian, appear to have accepted, as an axiom, the opinion that much of Indian astronomy, and certainly the Indian acquaintance with the twelve-fold division of the Zodiac, is to be attributed to Grecian influence.

A minority of writers still hold the view advocated by Sir William Jones about a hundred years ago, and thus reiterated by Burgess (the translator of the Indian standard astronomical work the _Sûrya-Siddhânta_) in 1860. “The use of this (twelve-fold) division, and the present names of the signs, can be proved to have existed in India at as early a period as in any other country.”[44]

[44] _Journal of the American Oriental Society_, vol. vi. p. 477.

The minority who hold this view are so few at present that, as has been said, the majority rest in their opposed opinion in all the calmness of conviction.

I will now as briefly as possible state the chief arguments put forward, for and against, this conviction.

I. In favour of the comparatively late introduction into India of the twelve-fold division of the Zodiac, it is contended that the divisions of the Indian Solar Zodiac so closely resemble those of the Grecian (the Zodiac which we to this day depict on celestial globes), that it is not possible to believe that two nations or two sets of astronomers could independently of each other have imagined the same fanciful and apparently inconsequent series.