Chapter XX: Part 20

II. _History._--Many alternative names for Delos are given by tradition; one of these, Ortygia, is elsewhere also assigned to an island sacred to Artemis. Of the various traditions that were current among the ancient Greeks regarding the origin of Delos, the most popular describes it as drifting through the Aegean till moored by Zeus as a refuge for the wandering Leto. It supplied a birthplace to Apollo and Artemis, who were born beneath a palm tree beside its sacred lake, and became for ever sacred to these twin deities. The island first appears in history as the seat of a great Ionic festival to which the various Ionic states, including Athens, were accustomed annually to despatch a sacred embassy, or Theoria, at the anniversary of the birth of the god on the 7th of Thargelion (about May). In the 6th century B.C. the influence of the Delian Apollo was at its height; Polycrates of Samos dedicated the neighbouring island of Rheneia to his service and Peisistratus of Athens caused all the area within sight of the temple to be cleared of the tombs by which its sanctity was impaired. After the Persian wars, the predominance of Athens led to the transformation of the Delian amphictyony into the Athenian empire. (See DELIAN LEAGUE.) In 426 B.C., in connexion with a reorganization of the festival, which henceforth was celebrated in the third year of every Olympiad, the Athenians instituted a more elaborate lustration, caused every tomb to be removed from the island, and established a law that ever after any one who was about to die or to give birth to a child should be at once conveyed from its shores. And even this was not accounted sufficient, for in 422 they expelled all its secular inhabitants, who were, however, permitted to return in the following year. At the close of the Peloponnesian War the Spartans gave to the people of Delos the management of their own affairs; but the Athenian predominance was soon after restored, and survived an appeal to the amphictyony of Delphi in 345 B.C. During Macedonian times, from 322 to 166 B.C., Delos again became independent; during this period the shrine was enriched by offerings from all quarters, and the temple and its possessions were administered by officials called [Greek: hieropoioi]. After 166 B.C. the Romans restored the control of Delian worship to Athens, but granted to the island various commercial privileges which brought it great prosperity. In 87 B.C. Menophanes, the general of Mithradates VI. of Pontus, sacked the island, which had remained faithful to Rome. From this blow it never recovered; the Athenian control was resumed in 42 B.C., but Pausanias (viii. 33. 2) mentions Delos as deserted but for a few Athenian officials; and several epigrams of the 1st or 2nd century A.D. attest the same fact, though the temple and worship were probably kept up until the official extinction of the ancient religion. A museum has now been built to contain the antiquities found in the excavations; otherwise Delos is now uninhabited, though during the summer months a few shepherds cross over with their flocks from Myconus or Rheneia. As a religious centre it is replaced by Tenos and as a commercial centre by the flourishing port of Syra.

See Lebegue, _Recherches sur Delos_ (Paris, 1876). Numerous articles
in the _Bulletin de correspondance hellenique_ record the various
discoveries at Delos as they were made. See also Th. Homolle, _Les
Archives de l'intendance sacree a Delos_ (with plan). The best
consecutive account is given in the _Guide Joanne, Grece_, ii.
443-464. For history, see Sir R. C. Jebb, _Journal of Hellenic
Studies_, i. (1889), pp. 7-62. For works of art found at Delos see
GREEK ART. (E. Gr.)

DE LOUTHERBOURG, PHILIP JAMES (1740-1812), English artist, was born at Strassburg on the 31st of October 1740, where his father, the representative of a Polish family, practised miniature painting; but he spent the greater part of his life in London, where he was naturalized, and exerted a considerable influence on the scenery of the English stage, as well as on the artists of the following generation. De Loutherbourg was intended for the Lutheran ministry, and was educated at the university of Strassburg. As the calling, however, was foreign to his nature, he insisted on being a painter, and placed himself under Vanloo in Paris. The result was an immediate and precocious development of his powers, and he became a figure in the fashionable society of that day. In 1767 he was elected into the French Academy below the age required by the law of the institution, and painted landscapes, sea storms, battles, all of which had a celebrity above those of the specialists then working in Paris. His debut was made by the exhibition of twelve pictures, including "Storm at Sunset," "Night," "Morning after Rain." He is next found travelling in Switzerland, Germany and Italy, distinguishing himself as much by mechanical inventions as by painting. One of these, showing quite new effects produced in a model theatre, was the wonder of the day. The exhibition of lights behind canvas representing the moon and stars, the illusory appearance of running water produced by clear blue sheets of metal and gauze, with loose threads of silver, and so on, were his devices. In 1771 he came to London, and was employed by Garrick, who offered him L500 a year to apply his inventions to Drury Lane, and to superintend the scene-painting, which he did with complete success, making a new era in the adjuncts of the stage. Garrick's own piece, the _Christmas Tale_, and the pantomime, 1781-1782, introduced the novelties to the public, and the delight not only of the masses, but of Reynolds and the artists, was unbounded. The green trees gradually became russet, the moon rose and lit the edges of passing clouds, and all the world was captivated by effects we now take little notice of. A still greater triumph awaited him on his opening an entertainment called the "Eidophusicon," which showed the rise, progress and result of a storm at sea--that which destroyed the great Indiaman, the "Halsewell,"--and the Fallen Angels raising the Palace of Pandemonium. De Loutherbourg has been called the inventor of the panorama, but this honour does not belong to him, although it first appeared about the same time as the eidophusicon. The first panorama was painted and exhibited by Robert Barker.

All this mechanism did not prevent De Loutherbourg from painting. "Lord Howe's Victory off Ushant" (1794), and other large naval pictures were commissioned for Greenwich Hospital Gallery, where they still remain. His finest work was the "Destruction of the Armada." He painted also the Great Fire of London, and several historical works, one of these being the "Attack of the Combined Armies on Valenciennes" (1793). He was made R.A., in addition to other distinctions, in 1781, shortly after which date we find an entirely new mental impulse taking possession of him. He joined Balsamo, comte de Cagliostro, and travelled about with this extraordinary person--leaving him, however, before his condemnation to death. We do not hear that Mesmer had attracted De Loutherbourg, nor do we find an exact record of his connexion with Cagliostro. A pamphlet published in 1789, _A List of a few Cures performed by Mr and Mrs De Loutherbourg without Medicine_, shows that he had taken up faith-healing, and there is a story that a successful projection of the philosopher's stone was only spoiled by the breaking of the crucible by a relative. He died on the 11th of March 1812. His publications are few--some sets of etchings, and _English Scenery_ (1805).

DELPHI (the Pytho of Homer and Herodotus; in Boeotian inscriptions [Greek: Belphoi], on coins [Greek: Dalphoi]), a place in ancient Greece in the territory of Phocis, famous as the seat of the most important temple and oracle of Apollo. It was situated about 6 m. inland from the shores of the Corinthian Gulf, in a rugged and romantic glen, closed on the N. by the steep wall-like under-cliffs of Mount Parnassus known as the Phaedriades or Shining Rocks, on the E. and W. by two minor ridges or spurs, and on the S. by the irregular heights of Mount Cirphis. Between the two mountains the Pleistus flowed from east to west, and opposite the town received the brooklet of the Castalian fountain, which rose in a deep gorge in the centre of the Parnassian cliff. About 7 m. to the north, on the side of Mount Parnassus, was the famous Corycian cave, a large grotto in the limestone rock, which afforded the people of Delphi a refuge during the Persian invasion. It is now called in the district the Sarant' Aulai or Forty Courts, and is said to be capable of holding 3000 people.

I. _The Site._--The site of Delphi was occupied by the modern village of Castri until it was bought by the French government in 1891, and the peasant proprietors expropriated and transferred to the new village of Castri, a little farther to the west. Excavations had been made previously in some parts of the precinct; for example, the portico of the Athenians was laid bare in 1860. The systematic clearing of the site began in the spring of 1892, and it was rapidly cleared of earth by means of a light railway. The plan of the precinct is now easily traced, and with the help of Pausanias many of the buildings have been identified.

The ancient wall running east and west, commonly known as the Hellenico, has been found extant in its whole length, and the two boundary walls running up the hill at each end of it, traced. In the eastern of these was the main entrance by which Pausanias went in along the Sacred Way. This paved road is easily recognized as it zigzags up the hill, with treasuries and the bases of various offerings facing it on both sides. It mounts first westwards to an open space, then turns eastwards till it reaches the eastern end of the terrace wall that supports the temple, and then turns again and curves up north and then west towards the temple. Above this, approached by a stair, are the Lesche and the theatre, occupying respectively the north-east and north-west corner of the precinct. On a higher level still, a little to the west, is the stadium. There are several narrow paths and stairs that cut off the zigzags of the Sacred Way.

In describing the monuments discovered by the French excavators, the simplest plan is to follow the route of Pausanias. Outside the entrance is a large paved court of Roman date, flanked by a colonnade. On the north side of the Sacred Way, close to the main entrance, stood the offering dedicated by the Lacedaemonians after the battle of Aegospotami. It was a large quadrangular building of conglomerate, with a back wall faced with stucco, and stood open to the road. On a stepped pedestal facing the open stood the statues of the gods and the admirals, perhaps in rows above one another.

The statues of the Epigoni stood on a semicircular basis on the south side of the way. Opposite them stood another semicircular basis which carried the statues of the Argive kings, whose names are cut on the pedestal in archaic characters, reading from right to left. Farther west was the Sicyonian treasury on the south of the way. It was in the form of a small Doric temple _in antis_, and had its entrance on the east. The present foundations are built of architectural fragments, probably from an earlier building of circular form on the same site. The sculptures from this treasury are in the museum, as are the other sculptures found on the site. These sculptures, which are in rough limestone, most likely belong to the earlier building, as their surface is in a better state of preservation than could be possible if they had been long exposed to the air. The earlier treasury was probably destroyed either by earthquake or by the percolation of water through the terracing.

The Cnidian treasury stands on the south side of the way farther west. This building was originally surmised by the excavators to be the treasury of Siphnos, but further evidence led them to change their opinion. The treasury was raised on a quadrangular structure, supported on its south side by the Hellenico, and built of tufa. The lower courses are left rough and were most likely hidden. A small Ionic temple of marble with two caryatids between antae stood on this substructure. The sculpture from this treasury, which ornamented its frieze and pediment, is of great interest in the history of the development of the art, and the fragments of architectural mouldings are of great delicacy and beauty. The whole work is perhaps the most perfect example we possess of the transitional style of the early 5th century. Standing back somewhat from the path just as it bends round up the hill is the Theban treasury. Farther north, where the path turns again, is the Athenian treasury. This structure, which was in the form of a small Doric temple _in antis_, appears to have suffered from the building above it having been shaken down by an earthquake. It has now been rebuilt with the original blocks. There can be no doubt about the identity of the building, for the basis on which it stands bears the remains of the dedicatory inscription, stating that it was erected from the spoils of Marathon. Almost all the sculptured metopes are in the museum, and are of the highest interest to the student of archaic art. The famous inscriptions with hymns to Apollo accompanied by musical notation were found on stones belonging to this treasury.

Above the Athenian treasury is an open space, in which is a rock which has been identified as the Sybil's rock. It has steps hewn in it, and has a cleft. The ground round it has been left rough like the space on the Acropolis at Athens identified as the ancient altar of Athena. Here too was placed the curious column, with many flutes and an Ionic capital, on which stood the colossal sphinx, dedicated by the Naxians, that has been pieced together and placed in the museum.

A little farther on, but below the Sacred Way, is another open space, of circular form, which is perhaps the [Greek: halos] or sacred threshing-floor on which the drama of the slaying of the Python by Apollo was periodically performed. Opposite this space, and backed against the beautifully jointed polygonal wall which has for some time been known, and which supports the terrace on which the temple stands, is the colonnade of the Athenians. A dedicatory inscription runs along the face of the top step, and has been the subject of much dispute. Both the forms of the letters and the style of the architecture show that the colonnade cannot date, as Pausanias says, from the time of the Peloponnesian War; Th. Homolle now assigns it to the end of the 6th century. The polygonal terrace wall at the back, on being cleared, proves to be covered with inscriptions, most of them concerning the manumission of slaves.

After rounding the east end of the terrace wall, the Sacred Way turns northward, leaving the Great Altar, dedicated by the Chians, on the left. After passing the altar, it turns to the left again at right angles, and so enters the space in front of the temple. Remains of offerings found in this region include those dedicated by the Cyrenians and by the Corinthians. The site of the temple itself carries the remains of successive structures. Of that built by the Alcmaeonids in the 6th century B.C. considerable remains have been found, some in the foundations of the later temple and some lying where they were thrown by the earthquake. The sculptures found have been assigned to this building, probably to the gables, as they are archaic in character, and show a remarkable resemblance to the sculptures from the pediment of the early temple of Athena at Athens. The existing foundations are these of the temple built in the 4th century. They give no certain information as to the sacred cleft and other matters relating to the oracle. Though there are great hollow spaces in the structure of the foundations, these appear merely to have been intended to save material, and not to have been put to any religious or other use. Up in the north-eastern corner of the precinct, standing at the foot of the cliffs, are the remains of the interesting Cnidian Lesche or Clubhouse. It was a long narrow building accessible only from the south, and the famous paintings were probably disposed around the walls so as to meet in the middle of the north side. Some scanty fragments of the lower part of the frescoed walls have survived; but they are not enough to give any information as to the work of Polygnotus.

At the north-western corner of the precinct is the theatre, one of the best preserved in Greece. The foundations of the stage are extant, as well as the orchestra, and the walls and seats of the auditorium. There are thirty-three tiers of seats in seven sets, and a paved diazoma. The sculptures from the stage front, now in the museum, have the labours of Heracles as their subject. The date of the theatre is probably early 2nd century B.C.

The stadium lies, as Pausanias says, in the highest part of the city to the north-west. It stands on a narrow plateau of ground supported on the south-east by a terrace wall. The seats have been cleared, and are in a state of extraordinary preservation. A few of those at the east end are hewn in the rock. No trace of the marble seats mentioned by Pausanias has been found, but they have probably been carried off for lime or building, as they could easily be removed. An immense number of inscriptions have been found in the excavations, and many works of art, including a bronze charioteer, which is one of the most admirable statues preserved from ancient times.

II. _History._--Our information as to the oracle at Delphi and the manner in which it was consulted is somewhat confused; there probably was considerable variation at different periods. The tale of a hole from which intoxicating "mephitic" vapour arose has no early authority, nor is it scientifically probable (see A. P. Oppe in _Journal of Hellenic Studies_, xxiv. 214). The questions had to be given in writing, and the responses were uttered by the Pythian priestess, in early times a maiden, later a woman over fifty attired as a maiden. After chewing the sacred bay and drinking of the spring Cassotis, which was conducted into the temple by artificial channels, she took her seat on the sacred tripod in the inner shrine. Her utterances were reduced to verse and edited by the prophets and the "holy men" ([Greek: hosioi]). For the influence and history of the oracle see ORACLE.

Delphi also contained the "Omphalos," a sacred stone bound with fillets, supposed to mark the centre of the earth. It was said Zeus had started two eagles from the opposite extremities and they met there. Other tales said the stone was the one given by Rhea to Cronus as a substitute for Zeus.

For the history of the Delphic Amphictyony see under AMPHICTYONY. The oracle at Delphi was asserted by tradition to have existed before the introduction of the Apolline worship and to have belonged to the goddess Earth (Ge or Gaia). The Homeric Hymn to Apollo evidently combines two different versions, one of the approach of Apollo from the north by land, and the other of the introduction of his votaries from Crete. The earliest stone temple was said to have been built by Trophonius and Agamedes. This was destroyed by fire in 548 B.C., and the contract for rebuilding was undertaken by the exiled Alcmaeonidae from Athens, who generously substituted marble on the eastern front for the poros specified (see CLEISTHENES, _ad init._). Portions of the pediments of this temple have been found in the excavations; but no sign has been found of the pediments mentioned by Pausanias, representing on the east Apollo and the Muses, and on the west Dionysus and the Thyiades (Bacchantes), and designed by Praxias, the pupil of Calanias. The temple which was seen by Pausanias, and of which the foundations were found by the excavators, was the one of which the building is recorded in inscriptions of the 4th century. A raid on Delphi attempted by the Persians in 480 B.C. was said to have been frustrated by the god himself, by means of a storm or earthquake which hurled rocks down on the invaders; a similar tale is told of the raid of the Gauls in 279 B.C. But the sacrilege thus escaped at the hands of foreign invaders was inflicted by the Phocian defenders of Delphi during the Sacred War, 356-346 B.C., when many of the precious votive offerings were melted down. The Phocians were condemned to replace their value to the amount of 10,000 talents, which they paid in instalments. In 86 B.C. the sanctuary and its treasures were put under contribution by L. Cornelius Sulla for the payment of his soldiers; Nero removed no fewer than 500 bronze statues from the sacred precincts; Constantine the Great enriched his new city by the sacred tripod and its support of intertwined snakes dedicated by the Greek cities after the battle of Plataea. This still exists, with its inscription, in the Hippodrome at Constantinople. Julian afterwards sent Oribasius to restore the temple; but the oracle responded to the emperor's enthusiasm with nothing but a wail over the glory that had departed.

Provisional accounts of the excavations have appeared during the
excavations in the _Bulletin de correspondance hellenique_. A summary
is given in J. G. Frazer, _Pausanias_, vol. v. The official account is
entitled _Fouilles de Delphes_. For history see Hiller von Gartringen
in Pauly-Wissowa, _Realencyclopadie, s.v._ "Delphi." For cult see L.
R. Farnell, _Cults of the Creek States_, iv. 179-218. For the works of
art discovered see GREEK ART. (E. Gr.)

DELPHINIA, a festival of Apollo Delphinius held annually on the 6th (or 7th) of the month Munychion (April) at Athens. All that is known of the ceremonies is that a number of girls proceeded to his temple (Delphinium) carrying suppliants' branches and seeking to propitiate Apollo, probably as a god having influence on the sea. It was at this time of year that navigation began again after the storms of winter. According to the story in Plutarch (_Theseus_, 18), Theseus, before setting out to Crete to slay the Minotaur, repaired to the Delphinium and deposited, on his own behalf and that of his companions on whom the lot had fallen, an offering to Apollo, consisting of a branch of consecrated olive, bound about with white wool; after which he prayed to the god and set sail. The sending of the maidens to propitiate the god during the Delphinia commemorates this event in the life of Theseus.

See A. Mommsen, _Festeder Stadt Athen_ (1898); L. Preller,
_Griechische Mythologie_ (4th ed., 1887); P. Stengel, _Die griechische
Kultusaltertumer_ (1898); Daremberg and Saglio, _Dictionnaire des
antiquites_; G. F. Schomann, _Griechische Altertumer_ (4th ed.,
1897-1902).

DELPHINUS ("THE DOLPHIN"), in astronomy, a constellation of the northern hemisphere, mentioned by Eudoxus (4th century B.C.) and Aratus (3rd century B.C.); and catalogued by Ptolemy (10 stars), Tycho Brahe (10 stars), and Hevelius (14 stars), [Gamma] _Delphini_ is a double star: a yellowish of magnitude 4, and a bluish of magnitude 5.

DELTA (from the shape of the Gr. letter [Delta], delta, originally used of the mouth of the Nile), a tract of land enclosed by the diverging branches of a river's mouth and the seacoast, and traversed by other branches of the stream. This triangular tract is formed from the fine silt brought down in suspension by a muddy river and deposited when the river reaches the sea. When tidal currents are feeble, the delta frequently advances some distance seawards, forming a local prolongation of the coast.

DELUC, JEAN ANDRE (1727-1817), Swiss geologist and meteorologist, born at Geneva on the 8th of February 1727, was descended from a family which had emigrated from Lucca and settled at Geneva in the 15th century. His father, Francois Deluc, was the author of some publications in refutation of Mandeville and other rationalistic writers, which are best known through Rousseau's humorous account of his ennui in reading them; and he gave his son an excellent education, chiefly in mathematics and natural science. On completing it he engaged in commerce, which principally occupied the first forty-six years of his life, without any other interruption than that which was occasioned by some journeys of business into the neighbouring countries, and a few scientific excursions among the Alps. During these, however, he collected by degrees, in conjunction with his brother Guillaume Antoine, a splendid museum of mineralogy and of natural history in general, which was afterwards increased by his nephew J. Andre Deluc (1763-1847), who was also a writer on geology. He at the same time took a prominent part in politics. In 1768 he was sent to Paris on an embassy to the duc de Choiseul, whose friendship he succeeded in gaining. In 1770 he was nominated one of the Council of Two Hundred. Three years later unexpected reverses in business made it advisable for him to quit his native town, which he only revisited once for a few days. The change was welcome in so far as it set him entirely free for scientific pursuits, and it was with little regret that he removed to England in 1773. He was made a fellow of the Royal Society in the same year, and received the appointment of reader to Queen Charlotte, which he continued to hold for forty-four years, and which afforded him both leisure and a competent income. In the latter part of his life he obtained leave to make several tours in Switzerland, France, Holland and Germany. In Germany he passed the six years from 1798 to 1804; and after his return he undertook a geological tour through England. When he was at Gottingen, in the beginning of his German tour, he received the compliment of being appointed honorary professor of philosophy and geology in that university; but he never entered upon the active duties of a professorship. He was also a correspondent of the Academy of Sciences at Paris, and a member of several other scientific associations. He died at Windsor on the 7th of November 1817.

His favourite studies were geology and meteorology. The situation of his native country had naturally led him to contemplate the peculiarities of the earth's structure, and the properties of the atmosphere, as particularly displayed in mountainous countries, and as subservient to the measurement of heights. According to Cuvier, he ranked among the first geologists of his age. His principal geological work, _Lettres physiques et morales sur les montagnes el sur l'histoire de la terre et de l'homme_, first published in 1778, and in a more complete form in 1779, was dedicated to Queen Charlotte. It dealt with the appearance of mountains and the antiquity of the human race, explained the six days of the Mosaic creation as so many epochs preceding the actual state of the globe, and attributed the deluge to the filling up of cavities supposed to have been left void in the interior of the earth. He published later an important series of volumes on geological travels in the north of Europe (1810), in England (1811), and in France, Switzerland and Germany (1813). These were translated into English.

Deluc's original experiments relating to meteorology were valuable to the natural philosopher; and he discovered many facts of considerable importance relating to heat and moisture. He noticed the disappearance of heat in the thawing of ice about the same time that J. Black founded on it his ingenious hypothesis of latent heat. He ascertained that water was more dense about 40 deg. F. (4 deg. C.) than at the temperature of freezing, expanding equally on each side of the maximum; and he was the originator of the theory, afterward readvanced by John Dalton, that the quantity of aqueous vapour contained in any space is independent of the presence or density of the air, or of any other elastic fluid.

His _Recherches sur les modifications de l'atmosphere_ (2 vols. 4to, Geneva, 1772; 2nd ed., 4 vols. 8vo, Paris, 1784) contains many accurate and ingenious experiments upon moisture, evaporation and the indications of hygrometers and thermometers, applied to the barometer employed in determining heights. In the _Phil. Trans._, 1773, appeared his account of a new hygrometer, which resembled a mercurial thermometer, with an ivory bulb, which expanded by moisture, and caused the mercury to descend. The first correct rules ever published for measuring heights by the barometer were those he gave in the _Phil. Trans._, 1771, p. 158. His _Lettres sur l'histoire physique de la terre_ (8vo, Paris, 1798), addressed to Professor Blumenbach, contains an essay on the existence of a General Principle of Morality. It also gives an interesting account of some conversations of the author with Voltaire and Rousseau. Deluc was an ardent admirer of Bacon, on whose writings he published two works--_Bacon tel qu'il est_ (8vo, Berlin, 1800), showing the bad faith of the French translator, who had omitted many passages favourable to revealed religion, and _Precis de la philosophie de Bacon_ (2 vols. 8vo, Paris, 1802), giving an interesting view of the progress of natural science. _Lettres sur le Christianisme_ (Berlin and Hanover, 1801, 1803) was a controversial correspondence with Dr Teller of Berlin in regard to the Mosaic cosmogony. His _Traite elementaire de geologie_ (8vo, Paris, 1809, also in English, by de la Fite, the same year) was principally intended as a refutation of the Vulcanian system of Hutton and Playfair, who deduced the changes of the earth's structure from the operation of fire, and attributed a higher antiquity to the present state of the continents than is required in the Neptunian system adopted by Deluc after D. Dolomieu. He sent to the Royal Society, in 1809, a long paper on separating the chemical from the electrical effect of the pile, with a description of the electric column and aerial electroscope, in which he advanced opinions so little in unison with the latest discoveries of the day, that the council deemed it inexpedient to admit them into the _Transactions_. The paper was afterwards published in Nicholson's _Journal_ (xxvi.), and the dry column described in it was constructed by various experimental philosophers. This dry pile or electric column has been regarded as his chief discovery.

Many other of his papers on subjects kindred to those already
mentioned are to be found in the _Transactions_ and in the
_Philosophical Magazine_. See _Philosophical Magazine_ (November
1817).

DELUGE, THE (through the Fr. from Lat. _diluvium_, flood, _diluere_, to wash away), a great flood or submersion of the earth (so far as the earth was known to the narrators), or of heaven and earth, or simply of heaven, by which, according to primitive and semi-primitive races, chaos was restored. It is, of course, not meant that all the current flood stories, as they stand, answer to this description. There are flood stories which, at first sight, may plausibly be held to be only exaggerated accounts of some ancient historical occurrences. The probability of such traditions being handed down is, however, extremely slight. If some flood stories are apparently local, and almost or quite without mythical colouring, it may be because the original myth-makers had a very narrow conception of the earth, and because in the lapse of time the original mythic elements had dwindled or even disappeared. The relics of the traditional story may then have been adapted by scribes and priests to a new theory. Many deluge stories may in this way have degenerated. It is at any rate undeniable that flood stories of the type described above, and even with similar minor details, are fairly common. A conspectus of illustrative flood stories from different parts of the world would throw great light on the problems before us; see the article COSMOGONY, especially for the North American tales, which show clearly enough that the deluge is properly a second creation, and that the serpent is as truly connected with the second chaos as with the first. One of them, too, gives a striking parallel to the Babylonian name Hasis-andra (the Very Wise), whence comes the corrupt form Xisuthrus; the deluge hero of the Hare Indians is called Kunyan, "the intelligent." Polynesia also gives us most welcome assistance, for its flood stories still present clear traces of the primitive imagination that the sky was a great blue sea, on which the sun, moon and stars (or constellations) were voyagers. Greece too supplies some stimulus to thought, nor are Iran and Egypt as unproductive as some have supposed. But the only pauses that we can allow ourselves are in Hindustan, Babylonia and Canaan. The peoples of these three countries, which are religiously so prominent in antiquity, have naturally connected their name equally with thoughts about earth production and earth destruction.

Indian Tradition.

The Indian tradition exists in several forms.[1] The earliest is preserved in the Satapatha Brahmana. It is there related that Manu, the first man, the son of the sun-god Vivasvat, found, in bathing, a small fish, which asked to be tended, and in reward promised to save him in the coming flood. The fish grew, and at last had to be carried to the sea, where it revealed to Manu the time of the flood, and bade him construct a ship for his deliverance. When the time came, Manu, unaccompanied, went on board; the grateful fish towed the ship through the water to the summit of the northern mountain, where it bade Manu bind the vessel to a tree. Gradually, as the waters fell, Manu descended the mountain; he then sacrificed and prayed. In a year's time his prayer was granted. A woman appeared, who called herself his daughter Ida (goddess of fertility). It is neither stated, nor even hinted, that sin was the cause of the flood.

Another version occurs in the great epic, the Mahabharata. The lacunae of the earlier story are here supplied. Manu, for instance, embarks with the seven "rishis" or wise men, and takes with him all kinds of seed. The fish announces himself as the God Brahman, and enables Manu to create both gods and men. A third account is given in the Bhagavata Purana. It contains the details of the announcement of the flood seven days beforehand (cf. Gen. vii. 4) and of the taking of pairs of all kinds of animals (cf. Gen. vi. 19), besides the seeds of plants (as the epic; cf. Gen. vi. 21). This story, however, is a late composition, not earlier than the 12th century A.D. A first glance at these stories is somewhat bewildering. We shall return, however, to this problem later with a good hope of mastering it.

Israelite and Babylonian.

The Israelite (Biblical) and the Babylonian deluge-stories remain to be considered. Neither need be described here in detail; for the former see Gen. vi. 5-ix. 17, and for the latter GILGAMESH. As most students are aware, the Biblical deluge-story is composite, being made up of two narratives, the few lacunae in which are due to the ancient redactor who worked them together.[2] The narrators are conventionally known as J. (= the Yahwist, from the divine name Yahweh) and P. (= the Priestly Writer) respectively. It is important to notice that P., though chronologically later than J., reproduces certain elements which must be archaic. For instance, while J. speaks only of a rain-storm, P. states that "all the fountains of the great ocean were broken up, and the windows of heaven opened" (Gen. vii. 11), i.e. the lower and the upper waters met together and produced the deluge. It is also P. who tells the story of the appointment of the rainbow (Gen ix. 12-17), which is evidently ancient, though only paralleled in a Lithuanian flood-story, and near it we find the divine declaration (Gen. ix. 2-6) that the golden age of universal peace (cf. Gen. i. 29, 30), already sadly tarnished, is over.[3] Surely this too has a touch of the archaic; nor can we err in connecting it with the tradition of man's first home in Paradise, where no enemy could come, because, in the original form of the tradition, Paradise was the abode of God. (See PARADISE.)

Berossus: four points.

The Babylonian tradition exists in two main forms,[4] nor can we affirm that the shorter form, due to Berossus, is superseded by the larger one in the Gilgamesh epic, for it communicates four important points: (1) Xisuthrus, the hero of the deluge, was also the tenth Babylonian king; cf. Noah, in P., the tenth patriarch as well as the survivor from the deluge; (2) the destination of Xisuthrus is said to be "to the gods," a statement which virtually records his divine character. In accordance with this, the final reward of the hero is declared to be "living with the gods." This suggests that Noah (?) may originally have been represented as a supernatural man, a demigod. True, Gen. ix. 20, 21 is not consistent with this, but it is very possible that Noah was substituted by a scribe's error for Enoch,[5] who, like Xisuthrus, "walked with God (learning the heavenly wisdom) and disappeared, for God had taken him" (Gen. v. 22, 24); (3) the birds, when sent out by Xisuthrus the second time, return with mud on their feet. This detail reminds us of points in some archaic North American myths which probably supply the key to its meaning;[6] (4) in the time of Berossus the mountain on which the ark grounded was considered to be in Armenia.

Details on relation of Israelite story to Babylonian.

We pass on to the relation of J. and P. to the Babylonian story. (1) The polytheistic colouring of the latter contrasts strongly with the far simpler religious views of J. and P. Note the capricious character of the god Bel who sends the deluge, while at the end of the story the catastrophe is represented as a judgment upon human sins. It is the latter view which is adopted by J. and P. We cannot, however, infer from this that the narratives which doubtless underlie J. and P. were directly taken from some such story as that in the Gilgamesh epic. The theory of an indirect and unconscious borrowing on the part of the Israelitish compilers will satisfy all the conditions of the case. (2) In the general scheme the three accounts very nearly agree, for J. must originally have contained directions as to the building of the vessel, and a notice that the ark grounded on a certain mountain. P.'s omission of the sacrifice at the close seems to be arbitrary. His theory of religious history forbade a reference to an altar so early, but his document must have contained it. J. expressly mentions it (Gen. viii. 20, 21), though not in such an original way as the cuneiform text. (3) As to the directions for building the ship (epic) or chest (J. and P.). Here the Babylonian story and P. have a strong general resemblance; note, e.g., the mention of bitumen in both. Whether the Hebrew reference to a chest (_tebah_) is, or is not, more archaic than the Babylonian reference to a ship (_elippu_) is a question which admits of different answers. (4) As to the material cause of the deluge. According to P. (see above) the water came both from above and from below; J. only speaks of continuous rain. The Gilgamesh epic, however, mentions besides thunder, lightning and rain, a hurricane which drove the sea upon the land. We can hardly regard this as more original than P.'s representation. (5) As to the extent of the flood. From the opening of the story in the epic we should naturally infer that only a single S. Babylonian city was affected. The sequel, however, implies that the flood extended all over Babylonia and the region of Nisir. More than this can hardly be claimed. Similarly the earlier story which underlies J. and P. need only have referred to the region of the myth-framers, i.e. either Canaan or N. Arabia. (6) As to the duration of the flood the traditions differ. P. reckons it at 365 days, i.e. a solar year, which is parallel to the 365 years of the life of Enoch (who, as we have seen, may have been the original hero of the flood). It is probable (see below) that P.'s ultimate authority, far back in the centuries, represented the deluge as a celestial occurrence. The origin of J.'s story is not quite so clear, owing to the lacunae in the narrative. If the text may be followed, this narrator made the flood last forty days and nights, after which two periods of seven days elapse, and then the patriarch leaves the ark. The epic shortens the duration of the flood to seven days, after which the ship remains another seven days (more strictly six full days) on the mountain of the land of Nisir (P., the mountains of Ararat; J., unrecorded). (7) As to the despatch of the birds. J. begins, the epic closes, with the raven. Clearly the epic is more original. Besides, one of the two missions of the dove is evidently superfluous. Dove, swallow, raven, as in the epic, must be more primitive than raven, dove, dove.

That the Hebrew deluge-story in both its forms has been at least indirectly influenced by the Babylonian is obvious. We cannot indeed reconstruct the form either of the Canaanitish (or N. Arabian) story, which was recast partly at least under the influence of a recast Babylonian myth, nor can we conjecture where the sanctuary was, the priests of which, yielding to a popular impulse, adopted and modified the fascinating story. But the fact of the ultimate Babylonian origin of the Israelitish narratives cannot seriously be questioned. The Canaanites or the N. Arabians handed on at least a portion of their myths to the Israelites, and the creation and deluge stories were among these. That the Israelitish priests gradually recast them is an easy and altogether satisfactory conjecture.

History and significance of deluge-myths.

It remains to ask, What is the history and significance of the deluge-myth? The question carries us into far-off times. We have no version of the Babylonian myth which goes back to about 2100 B.C., while its text was apparently derived from a still older tablet. But even this is not primitive; behind it there must have been a much shorter and simpler myth. The recast represented by the existing versions of the myth must have been produced partly by the insertion, partly by the omission or modification, of mythic details, and by the application to the story thus produced of a particular mythic theory respecting the celestial world. The shorter myth referred to may--if we take hints from the very primitive myths of N. America--have run somewhat thus, omitting minor details: "The earth (a small enough earth, doubtless) and its inhabitants proved so imperfect that the beneficent superhuman Being, who had created it, or perhaps another such Being, determined to remake it. He, therefore, summoned the serpent or dragon who controlled the cosmic ocean, and had been subjugated at creation, to overwhelm the earth, after which the creator remade it better,[7] and the survivor and his family became the ancestors of a new human race."

This, however, is only one possible representation. It may have been said that the serpent of his own accord, not having been killed by the creator, maliciously flooded the earth (cf. the Algonquian myth), but was again overcome in battle, or that the serpent, after filling the earth with violence and wrong, was at length slain by the Good Being, and that his blood, streaming, out, produced a deluge.[8] In any case it is unnatural to hold that the first flood (that which preceded creation) had a dragon, but not the second. An old cuneiform text, recopied late, however, appears to call the year of the deluge (i.e. of what we here call the second flood) "the year of the raging (or red-shining) serpent,"[9] and certainly the N. American myths distinctly connect serpents with the deluges.

Among the probable minor details (omitted above) of the presumed shorter and older myth we may include: (1) the warning of "Very-Wise,"[10] either by friendly animals or by a dream; (2) the construction of a chest to contain "Very-Wise," his wife and his sons, together with animals;[11] (3) the despatch of three birds with a special object (see below); (4) the landing of the survivors on a mountain. As to (1), Berossus suggests that the notice came to Xisuthrus in a dream; in the Indian myth it is the sacred fish which warns Manu. In the archaic N. American myths, however, it is some animal which gives the notice--an eagle or a coyote (a kind of wolf). As to (2), nothing is more common than the story of a divine child cast into the sea in a box.[12] The ship-motive is also found,[13] but it is not too rash to assume that the box-motive is the earlier, and, in accordance with the parallels, that the hero of the deluge was originally a god or a demigod. The translation of the hero to be with the gods is a transparent modification of the original tradition. As to (3), the original object of sending out the birds was probably not to find out where dry land was, but to use them as helpers in the work of re-creation. Take the story of the Tlatlasik Indians, where the diving-bird (one of three sent out) comes back with a branch of a fir-tree, out of which O'meatl made mountains, earth and heaven;[14] so, too, the Caingangs relate[15] that those who escaped from the flood, as they tarried on a mountain, heard the song of the _saracura_ birds, who came carrying earth in baskets, and threw it into the waters, which slowly subsided. As to (4), the mountain would naturally be thought of as a place of refuge even in the old, simple flood-story. But when Babylonian mythology effected an entrance, the mountain would receive a new and much grander significance. It would then come to represent the summit of that great and most holy mountain, which, save by the special favour of the gods, no human eye has seen.

That a didactic element entered the deluge-tradition but slowly, may be surmised, not only from the genuinely old N. American stories, but from the inconsistent statements, to which Jastrow has already referred, in the Babylonian story. We may imagine that between the creation and the deluge some great and wise Being had initiated the early men, not only in the necessary arts of life, but in the "ways" that were pleasing to the heavenly powers. The Babylonians apparently think of neglected sacrifices, the Australians of a desecrated mystery as the cause of the flood. Some such violation of a sacred rule is the origin that naturally occurs to an adapter or expander of primitive myths.

Celestial myth theory.

And now as to the application of the celestial mythic theory to the early deluge-story. In the agricultural stage it was natural that men should take a deeper interest than before in the appearance of the sky, and especially of the sun and moon, and of the constellations, even though an astrological science or quasi-science would very slowly, if at all, grow up. That the Polynesian myths (which show no vestige of science) originally referred to the supposed celestial ocean, seems to be plain. Schirren[16] regarded the New Zealand cosmogonies as myths of sunrise, and the deluge-stories as myths of sunset. We may at any rate plausibly hold, with the article "Deluge" (by Cheyne) in the ninth edition of this work[17] (1877), that the deluge-stories of Polynesia and early Babylonia (we may now probably add India) were accommodated to an imaginative conception of the sun and moon as voyagers on the celestial ocean. "When this story had been told and retold a long time, rationalism suggested that the sea was not in heaven but on earth, and observation of the damage wrought in winter by excessive rains and the inundations of great rivers suggested the introduction of corresponding details into the new earthly deluge-myth." "This accounts for the strongly mythological character of Par-napishti (Ut-napishti) in Babylonia and Maui in New Zealand, who are in fact solar personages. Enoch, too, must be classed in this category, his perfect righteousness and superhuman wisdom now first become intelligible. Moreover, we now comprehend how the goddess Sabitu (the guardian of the entrance to the sea) can say to Gilgamesh (himself a solar personage), 'Shamash the mighty (i.e. the sun-god) has crossed the sea; besides (?) Shamash, who can cross it?' For though the sea in the epic is no doubt the earth-circling ocean, it was hardly this in the myth from which the words were taken."[18] And, what is still more important, we can understand better how, in the Gilgamesh epic (lines 115-116), the gods, after cowering like dogs, go up to the "heaven of Ana." They, too, fear the deluge, and only in the highest heaven can they feel themselves secure.

Such an explanation seems indispensable if the wide influence of the Babylonian form of the deluge-myth is to be accounted for. As Gunkel well remarks,[19] neither the tenacity and self-propagating character of this myth, nor the solemn utterance of Yahweh (who corresponds to the Babylonian Marduk) in Gen. viii. 21_b_ (J.) and ix. 8-17 (P.) can be understood, if the deluge-story is nothing more than an exaggerated account of a historical, earthly occurrence. We, therefore, venture to hold that it is an insufficient account to give of the story in the Gilgamesh epic that it is a combination of a local tradition of the destruction of a single city with a myth of the destruction of mankind--a myth exaggerated in its present form, but based on accurate knowledge of the yearly recurring phenomenon of the overflow of the Euphrates.[20] There are no doubt points in the story as it now stands which indicate a composite origin, but it is probable that even the tradition which apparently limits the destruction to a single city, equally with many other local flood-stories, has a basis in what we may fairly call a celestial myth.

Indian myth reconsidered.

We can now return with some confidence to the Indian deluge-story. It is unlikely that so richly gifted a race as the Aryans of India should not have produced their own flood-story out of the same primeval germs which grew up into the earliest Babylonian flood-story,[21] and almost inconceivable that in its second form the Indian story should not have become adapted to what may be called the celestial mythic theory. The phrase "the northern mountain" for the place where the ship grounded may quite well be the name of an earthly substitute (the epic has "the highest summit of the Himalaya") for the mythic mountain of heaven. Nor is it unimportant that Manu is the son of the sun-god, and that the phrase "the seven rishis" in classical Sanskrit is a designation of the seven stars of the Great Bear. For such problems all that we can hope for is a probable solution. The opposite view[22] that the deluge is a historical occurrence implies a self-propagating power in early tradition which is not justified by critical research, and leaves out of sight many important facts revealed by comparative study.

For a conspectus of deluge-stories see Andree, _Die Flutsagen,
ethnographisch betrachtet_ (1891), by a competent anthropologist; E.
Suess, _Face of the Earth_, i. 17 (1904); also Elwood Worcester,
_Genesis in the Light of Modern Knowledge_ (New York, 1901), Appendix
ii., in tabular form, from Schwarz's _Sintfluth und
Volkerwanderungen_. Dr Worcester's work is popular, but based on
well-chosen authorities. The article "Flood" in Hastings' D. B. is
comprehensive; it represents the difficult view that flood-stories,
&c., are generally highly-coloured traditions of genuine facts.
(T. K. C.)

FOOTNOTES:

[1] See Muir, _Sanscrit Texts_, i. 182, 206 ff.

[2] Cf. Carpenter and Harford-Battersby, _The Hexateuch_, ii. 9,
where the documents are printed separately in a tabular form.

[3] Isa. xi. 6-8 prophesies that one day this idyllic state shall be
restored.

[4] For a discussion of the Babylonian version of the Deluge Legend,
recently discovered among the tablets from Nippur, see NIPPUR.

[5] The genealogy in Gen. v. is hardly in its original form. Enoch is
probably misplaced, and Noah inserted in error.

[6] Cf. COSMOGONY, and Cheyne's _Traditions and Beliefs of Ancient
Israel_ (on deluge-story).

[7] Cf. the myths of the Pawnees and the Quiches of Guatemala.

[8] See the cuneiform text described in _KAT_^3, pp. 498-499.

[9] Zimmern, _KAT_^3, p. 554.

[10] i.e. Atrahasis (Xisuthrus).

[11] To have omitted the animals would have been an offence against
primitive views of kinship.

[12] Usener, _Die Sintflutsagen_, pp. 80-108, 115-127.

[13] Ib. p. 254.

[14] Stucken, _Astralmythen_, pp. 233-234.

[15] _Amer. Journ. of Folklore_, xviii. 223 ff.

[16] Schirren, _Wandersagen der Neuseelander_ (1856), p. 193.