Order and objects of Mythology. Ορφεὺς μὲν γὰρ τελέτας θἡμῖν κατέδειξε, φόνων τ' ἀπέχεσθαι ... Aristoph. Ran. 1030. In these words are set forth, with tolerable accuracy, the main native written sources of Hellenic legend, in their order and objects, viz., 1st, The teaching of doctrinal mysteries, and the abstinence from animal food, by Orpheus: 2ndly, Medical and oracular lore, by Museus: 3rdly, Husbandry, ploughing, and the adaptation of the seasons to the fruits of the earth, by Hesiod; including, of course, the mythology contained in his two treatises: and, 4thly, The marshalling of armies, and the military achievements of heroes, by Homer. But as we have now access to the inferential authority of a philology, almost equal to the broad outlines of history,' the evidences of ancient monuments, and the light of comparative mythology, advantages not possessed by 1 See Bopp's Vergleichende Grammatik, &c. Aristophanes, a more simple division will subserve the purposes of historical truth. Greek its character scale of Hesiod. There are two main sources of Grecian written legend, viz., The Sources of Indo-Collegiate theogonies, relics of which are found in the writings written of Orpheus and Hesiod: 2ndly, The Homeric poems. The first are legend and doctrinal and direct, and by their dogmatic form stand out in bold istics. contradistinction to the second, which are purely narrative and inventive, in which, if any doctrines appear, they are rather inferential than direct. In Hesiod, the earliest systematist of the Greek theogony,' we Artificial find the mythical cosmogony ranged upon a highly-artificial scale, though the detail is imperfectly carried out; some portions being highly elaborated by original system, others more crudely filled up by the poet's imagination. His mythological genesis opens with a graduated scale of gods, heroes, and men. With the first, faithful to his oriental model, he has grouped monstrous yet sentient agencies, possessed of might surpassing the powers of man, yet participating in many of man's physical and mental endowments: of such a nature Mixed are the Gorgons, the Harpies, the Dragon of the Hesperides, Echidna, Hed, and the semi-nymph and serpent, the Sphinx, the Cyclops, and the Centaurs, their whose primitive type we shall notice in its proper place. As it would be utterly beyond the scope of the present work to embrace the whole circle of mythologic creation, we shall here merely reproduce such great outlines, as may serve to give a general view of their form and dimension. agencies of character. and Greek not The Greek mythical world, opens with the display of the resistless power of supreme intellect, in calming the grand crash, tumult, and confusion of opposing agencies, and in vindicating the supremacy of order; and in this it coincides with the principles of the Indian cos- Coincidence mogony, between which and the Greek system there is, as we shall of the Indian demonstrate, more than an accidental uniformity. Hesiod has placed cosmogonies in the order of time, first Chaos, next Gæa, or the Earth, with the accidental. deep and gloomy Tartarus as her foundation. Then sprang into being Eros, or Love, the vanquisher of gods and men. Gæa then gave birth Gæa gives to Uranos, whom she afterwards married: their progeny was, the birth to Titan race, the Cyclopes, renowned for their manual skill in forging the thunderbolts of Zeus, and the three Hecatoncheires-the "Hundred-handed." Horrified by this tremendous brood, Uranos hid them in the cavities of the earth, whence he would not permit them to escape. Upon this, Gæa, who could find no room for them, and groaned beneath the pressure, conjured her offspring to avenge her, and Mr. Grote observes (Hist. Greece, vol. i. p. 19, note), "That the Hesiodic theogony is referable to an age considerably later than the Homeric poems appears now to be the generally admitted opinion; and the reasons for believing so are in my opinion satisfactory." In this opinion we concur only so far as respects the mere language of the poem. The didactic principles and great narrative outline of Hesiod are of an antiquity ages beyond the Homeric writings, being found in the Vishnu Purana, Ramayuna, and Mahabharata, with such changes as might be anticipated from traditional preservation. Uranos. Uranos dethroned, and Cronos and the Titans liberated. Uranos was at length dethroned. Cronos, and the rest of the Titans, now recovered their liberty, and became the dominant power. The Hecatoncheires and the Cyclopes meanwhile continued in Tartarus, where they had been cast by Uranos. The Titan Oceanus, by intermarriage with his sister Tethys, had three thousand daughters, the Ocean nymphs, and the same number of sons. But the Cronida were the most powerful of the Titan race. From the union of Cronos, Progeny of with his sister Rhea, sprang three daughters, Demeter, Hestia, and Cronos and Hērē; and three sons, Poseidon, Hades, and Zeus, all of whom play Rhea. a prominent part in the Hellenic theogony. The artificial structure of these intermarriages, and the nicely-quadrated number of sons and daughters, form a strong feature of poetic invention; while the forces generated and applied, point to the great legends of the Indian school. Character of Powerful as was Cronos, his prophetic forebodings warned him of impressive. destruction from one of his own children. Zeus That child was Zeus; a being clothed with untiring energy and resistless might. And so strong was the impression of this godlike type upon the Hellenic race, that the republican tendencies of Greece, in its most palmy days, never affected his sovereign sway. He ever continued the "king of gods and men." Zeus was the head of the family of the Cronidæ, who constituted the august assembly of the twelve great divinities of Olympus, on whose lofty summit Zeus fixed his magnificent abode. But the son of Cronos did not reach the full meridian of imperial sway, without imminent and numerous perils. His sire had already devoured five of his off spring, and the infant Zeus only escaped destruction by being hurried 1 Poseidon, Apollo, Ares, Hermes, Hephaistos, Hestia, Demeter, Hērē, Athēnē, Aphrodite, and Artemis. Other deities not included in the twelve were, Hades, Hecate, Helios, Lethe, Dionysus, Dione, Persephone, Themis, Selene, Eōs; the Charites, Harmonia, the Muses, the Moræ, the Nereids, the Eileithyæ, Proteus, Eidothæa, Leucothea, the Nymphs, Nemesis, Phorcys, Eolus. Iris, the Hora, and Hebe were servitors. by night to a woody cavern on Mount Ida, in Crete, while Cronos, being presented with a stone wrapped in swaddling clothes, eagerly swallowed it, supposing it to be his child. Thus did Zeus escape. Meanwhile, he grew up, remarkable for bodily and mental energy; and being resolved to crush the tyrannical power of Cronos and the Titans, Zeus he convoked to Olympus all the gods and goddesses to aid him in the overcomes desperate struggle against the Titans, while he gained over to his side the Cyclopes and Hecatoncheires, or the hundred-handed beings. These were powerful auxiliaries; and though the conflict continued ten fearful years, the gigantic struggle was successful. the Titans. between Hades, and The mighty Cyclopes supplied their stores of thunder and lightning, the uptor craggy cliffs and mountains were launched against the Titans, who were crushed, overwhelmed, and thrust down to Tartarus. In that gloomy dungeon were they and Cronos for ever imprisoned, with the three Hecatoncheires to keep guard over the walls of brass built around them by Zeus, who committed to Poseidon the sovereignty Division of of the sea, to Hades the under world, while he himself retained the power etherial atmosphere, and the grand presiding sway over all things. Poseidon, The first consort of Zeus was Metis, the sagacious goddess, but being Zeus. forewarned that her progeny would overpower him, he swallowed her when pregnant with Athene; and, having thus incorporated her wisdom with his own nature, he produced Athene from his brain." But though the Titans were subdued, the Cronidae were not yet at their ease. Gæa had intermarried with Tartarus, and had given birth Hes. Theog. 885. 1 Cooke's Hesiod, 995. monster Typhous. Birth of the to a prodigious monster, Typhous, who, had he been permitted to reach maturity, would have become supreme. This peril, Zeus with his usual forecast prevented. Hurling a thunderbolt from Olympus, Typhoeus was blasted by the candent fires of the thunderer, and dashed down into Tartarus. This crowning triumph left no one to dispute the supremacy of Zeus: His destruction by the bolts of Zeus. Machinery of the Titanic war in the : If we contemplate the machinery of the Titanic war and its accessories, we shall find not merely its counterpart, but its original type, in Indian epic. the Indian epic; the identity of the nomenclature, and the whole cast of the dramatic action are not to be mistaken. Here the Daityas,' or Titans, make war upon Diupeti (Jupiter), the lord of the firmament, whose celestial abode was situated upon Mount Mērū (the Mēros of the Greeks,3), a place of most magnificent description, thus beautifully apostrophized in the hymn to Indra: Indian heaven of Diupeti, or Greek 2 Hail mountain of delight!4 Palace of glory blessed by Glory's King! With prospering shade embower me while I sing This mountain, the Greeks with their easy uninvestigating spirit, placed in India, because their early oriental mythology told them that adaptations Mērū was a "mountain of Indra," and the name of the deity was very Mythology. naturally changed to the name of the country. As Mēru, however, of Indian was not a Greek vocable, their pliant language easily wove an etymology for the term. "Mēros," a thigh, suggested to them a prominent of the myth of Dionysus. He was, say they, sewn up in the 1 Accus. Daityam, pronounced Dytyam (rírav). So called from being the sons of Diti. part 2 Literally, the Lord of Heaven; he was king of the firmament (Zeu-pater, or Dies-pater); called also Indra, from "Indra," excellent. 3 Arrian, v. 1; Polyænus, 1. 1, 2. We shall again recur to this in the history of Dionysus. The garden of Indra is styled "Nandana," or delight. 5 Sir W. Jones, Hymn to Indra. |