Chapter III: The Birth of Aphrodite 140

LIST OF ILLUSTRATIONS

FACING PAGE
Fig. 1.--The conventional Egyptian representation of the burning
of incense and the pouring of libations 2

Fig. 2.--Water-colour sketch by Mrs. Cecil Firth, representing a
restoration of the early mummy found at Medûm by Professor
Flinders Petrie, now in the Museum of the Royal College of
Surgeons in London 16

Fig. 3.--A mould taken from a life-mask found in the Pyramid of Teta
by Mr. Quibell 17

Fig. 4.--Portrait statue of an Egyptian lady of the Pyramid Age 18

Fig. 5.--Statue of an Egyptian noble of the Pyramid Age to show the
technical skill in the representation of life-like eyes 52

Fig. 6.--Representation of the ancient Mexican worship of the Sun 70

Fig. 7.--A mediæval picture of a Chinese Dragon upon its cloud
(after the late Professor W. Anderson) 80

Fig. 8.--A Chinese Dragon (after de Groot) 80

Fig. 9.--Dragon from the Ishtar Gate of Babylon 81

Fig. 10.--Babylonian Weather God 81

Fig. 11.--Reproduction of a picture in the Maya Codex Troano
representing the Rain-god _Chac_ treading upon the Serpent's
head, which is interposed between the earth and the rain the
god is pouring out of a bowl. A Rain-goddess stands upon the
Serpent's tail 84

Fig. 12.--Another representation of the elephant-headed Rain-god. He
is holding thunderbolts, conventionalized in a hund-like form.
The serpent is converted into a sac, holding up the
rain-waters. 84

Fig. 13.--A page (the 36th) of the Dresden Maya Codex. 86

Fig. 14.--A. The so-called "sea-goat" of Babylonia, a creature
compounded of the antelope and fish of Ea.--B. The "sea-goat"
as the vehicle of Ea or Marduk.--C to K--a series of varieties
of the _makara_ from the Buddhist Rails at Buddha Gaya and
Mathura, circa 70 B.C.--70 A.D., after Cunningham
("Archæological Survey of India," Vol. III, 1873, Plates IX and
XXIX).--L. The _makara_ as the vehicle of Varuna, after Sir
George Birdwood. It is not difficult to understand how, in the
course of the easterly diffusion of culture, such a picture
should develop into the Chinese Dragon or the American
elephant-headed god 88

Fig. 15.--Photograph of a Chinese embroidery in the Manchester
School of Art representing the Dragon and the Pearl-Moon
Symbol 98

Fig. 16.--The God of Thunder (from a Chinese drawing (? 17th
Century) in the John Rylands Library) 136

Fig. 17.--From Joannes de Turrecremata's "Meditationes seu
Contemplationes". _Rome: Ulrich Han_, 1467 137

Fig. 18.--(a) The Archaic Egyptian slate palette of Narmer showing,
perhaps, the earliest design of Hathor (at the upper corners
of the palette) as a woman with cow's horns and ears (compare
Flinders Petrie "The Royal Tombs of the First Dynasty," Part
I, 1900, Plate XXVII, Fig. 71). The pharaoh is wearing a belt
from which are suspended four cow-headed Hathor figures in
place of the cowry-amulets of more primitive peoples. This
affords corroboration of the view that Hathor assumed the
functions originally attributed to the cowry-shell. (b) The
king's _sporran_, where Hathor-heads (H) take the place of the
cowries of the primitive girdle 150

Fig. 19.--The front of Stela B (famous for the realistic
representations of the Indian elephant at its upper corners),
one of the ancient Maya monuments at Copan, Central America
(after Maudslay's photograph and diagram). The girdle of the
chief figure is decorated both with shells (_Oliva_ or
_Conus_) and amulets representing human faces corresponding to
the Hathor-heads on the Narmer palette (Fig. 18) 151

Fig. 20.--Diagrams illustrating the form of cowry-belts worn in
(a) East Africa and (b) Oceania respectively. (c) Ancient
Indian girdle (from the figure of Sirima Devata on the Bharat
Tope), consisting of strings of pearls and precious stones,
and what seem to be (fourth row from the top) models of
cowries. (d) The Copan girdle (from Fig. 19) in which both
shells and heads of deities are represented. The two objects
suspended from the belt between the heads recall Hathor's
sistra 153

Fig. 21.--(a) A slate triad found by Professor G. A. Reisner in the
temple of the Third Pyramid at Giza. It shows the Pharaoh
Mycerinus supported on his right side by the goddess Hathor,
represented as a woman with the moon and the cow's horns upon
her head, and on the left side by a nome goddess, bearing upon
her head the jackal-symbol of her nome. (b) The Ecuador
Aphrodite. Bas-relief from Cerro-Jaboncillo (after Saville,
"Antiquities of Manabi, Ecuador," Preliminary Report, 1907,
Plate XXXVIII). A grotesque composite monster intended to
represent a woman (compare Saville's Plates XXXV, XXXVI, and
XXXIX), whose head is a conventionalized Octopus, whose body
is a _Loligo_, and whose limbs are human 164

Fig. 22.--(a) _Sepia officinalis_, after Tryon, "Cephalopoda".
(b) _Loligo vulgaris_, after Tryon. (c) The position usually
adopted by the resting Octopus, after Tryon 168

Fig. 23.--A series of Mycenæan conventionalizations of the Argonaut
and the Octopus (after Tümpel), which provided the basis for
Houssay's theory of the origin of the triskele (a, c, and d)
and swastika (b and e), and Siret's theory to explain the
design of Bes's face (f and g) 172

Fig. 24.--(a) and (b) Two Mycenæan pots (after Schliemann). (a) The
so-called "owl-shaped" vase is really a representation of the
Mother-Pot in the form of a conventionalized Octopus (Houssay).
(b) The other vase represents the Octopus Mother-Pot, with a
jar upon her head and another in her hands--a three-fold
representation of the Great Mother as a pot. (c) A Cretan vase
from Gournia in which the Octopus-motive is represented as a
decoration upon the pot instead of in its form, (d), (e), (f),
(g), and (h) A series of coins from Central Greece (after Head)
showing a series of conventionalizations of the Octopus, with
its pot-like body and palm-tree-like arms (f). (i) _Sepia
officinalis_ (after Tryon). (h) and (l) The so-called "spouting
vases" in the hands of the Babylonian god Ea, from a cylinder
seal of the time of Gudea, Patesi of Tello, after Ward ("Seal
Cylinders, etc.," p. 215) 180

Fig 25.--(a) Winged Disk from the Temple of Thothmes I. (b) Persian
design of Winged Disk above the Tree of Life (Ward, "Seal
Cylinders of Western Asia," Fig. 1109). (c) Assyrian or
Syro-Hittite design of the Winged Disk and Tree of Life in an
extremely conventionalized form (Ward, Fig. 1310).
(d) Assyrian conventionalized Winged Disk and Tree of Life,
from the design upon the dress of Assurnazipal (Ward, Fig.
670). (e) Part of the design from a tablet of the time of
Dungi (Ward, Fig. 663). (f) Design on a Cretan sarcophagus from
Hagia Triada (Blinkenberg, Fig. 9). (g) Double axe from a gold
signet from Acropolis Treasure, Mycenæ (after Sir Arthur Evans,
"Mycenæan Tree and Pillar Cult," p. 10). (h) Assyrian Winged
Disk (Ward, Fig. 608). (i) "Primitive Chaldean Winged Gate"
(Ward, Fig. 349). (k) Persian Winged Disk (Ward, Fig. 1144).
(l) An Assyrian Tree of Life and Winged Disk crudely
conventionalized (Ward, Fig. 691). (m) Assyrian Tree of Life
and Winged Disk in which the god is riding in a crescent
replacing the Disk (Ward, Fig. 695) 184

Fig. 26.--(a) An Egyptian picture of Hathor between the mountains
of the horizon (on which trees are growing) (after Budge,
"Gods of the Egyptians," Vol. II, p. 101). (b) The mountains
of the horizon supporting a cow's head as a surrogate of
Hathor, from a stele found at Teima in Northern Arabia, now in
the Louvre (after Sir Arthur Evans, _op. cit._, p. 39).
(c) The Mesopotamian sun-god Shamash rising between the
Eastern Mountains, the Gates of Dawn (Ward, _op. cit._, p.
373). (d) The familiar Egyptian representation of the sun
rising between the Eastern Mountains (the splitting of the
mountain giving birth to "the ridiculous mouse"--Smintheus).
(e) Part of the design from a Mycenæan vase from Old Salamis
(after Evans, p. 9). (f) Part of the design from a lentoid gem
from the Idæan Cave, now in the Candia Museum (after Evans,
Fig. 25). (g) The Eastern Mountains supporting the pillar-form
of the goddess (after Evans, Fig. 66). (h) Another Mycenæan
design comparable with (e). (i) Design from a signet-ring from
Mycenæ; (after Evans, Fig. 34). (k) The famous sculpture above
the Lion Gate at Mycenæ 188

ILLUSTRATIONS IN THE TEXT.

PAGE
Fig 1.--Early representation of a "Dragon" compounded of the
forepart of an eagle and the hindpart of a lion (from an
Archaic Cylinder-seal from Susa, after Jequier) 79

Fig. 2.--The earliest Babylonian conception of the Dragon Tiamat
(from a Cylinder-seal in the British Museum, after L. W. King) 79

Fig. 3.--Wm. Dennis's drawing of the "Flying Dragon" depicted on the
rocks at Piasa, Illinois 94

Fig. 4.--Two representations of Astarte (Qetesh) 155

Fig. 5.--_Pterocera bryonia_, the Red Sea spider-shell 170

Fig. 6.--(a) Picture of a bowl of water--the hieroglyphic sign
equivalent to _hm_ (the word _hmt_ means "woman"--Griffith,
"Beni Hasan," Part III, Plate VI, Fig. 88 and p. 29). (b) "A
basket of sycamore figs"--Wilkinson's "Ancient Egyptians," Vol.
I, p. 323. (c) and (d) are said by Wilkinson to be hieroglyphic
signs meaning "wife" and are apparently taken from (b). But (c)
is identical with (i), which, according to Griffith (p. 14),
represents a bivalve shell (g, from Plate III, Fig. 3), more
usually placed obliquely (h). The varying conventionalizations
of (a) or (b) are shown in (d), (e), and (f) (Griffith,
"Hieroglyphics," p. 34). (k) The sign for a lotus leaf, which
is a phonetic equivalent of the sign (h), and, according to
Griffith ("Hieroglyphics," p. 26), "is probably derived from
the same root, on account of its shell-like outline". (l) The
hieroglyphic sign for a pot of water in such words as _Nu_ and
_Nut_. (m) A "pomegranate" (replacing a bust of Tanit) upon a
sacred column at Carthage (Arthur J. Evans, "Mycenæan Tree and
Pillar Cult," p. 46). (n) The form of the body of an octopus as
conventionalized on the coins of Central Greece (compare Fig.
24 (d)) 179

Fig. 7.--(a) An Egyptian design representing the sun-god Horus
emerging from a lotus, representing his mother Hathor (Isis).
(b) Papyrus sceptre often carried by goddesses and
animistically identified with them either as an instrument of
life-giving or destruction. (c) Conventionalized lily--the
prototype of the trident and the thunder-weapon. (d) A
water-plant associated with the Nile-gods 180

Fig. 8.--(a) "Ceremonial forked object," or "magic wand," used in
the ceremony of "opening the mouth," possibly connected with
(b) (a bicornuate uterus), according to Griffith
("Hieroglyphics," p. 60). (c) The Egyptian sign for a key.
(d) The double axe of Crete and Egypt 191

Fig. 9.--The Egyptian emblem for gold, the sign _nub_ 222