Chapter I. The Physical Theology of the Greeks

[PLUTARCH] ‘THE physiology of the ancients both among Greeks and Barbarians was a physical doctrine concealed in legends, for the most part a secret and mysterious theology conveyed in enigmas and allegories, containing statements that were clearer to the multitude than the silent omissions, and its silent omissions more liable to suspicion than the open statements. This is evident in the Orphic poems, and in the Egyptian and Phrygian stories: ‘out the mind of the ancients is most clearly exhibited in the orgiastic rites connected with the initiations, and in what is symbolically acted in the religious services.

‘For instance, not to digress far from our present subjects, they do not suppose nor admit any intercourse between Hera and Dionysus; and they guard against combining their worship; and their priestesses at Athens, they say, do not speak to each other when they meet, nor is ivy ever brought into the precincts of Hera, not because of their fabulous and nonsensical jealousies, but because the goddess presides over marriage and bridal processions, and drunkenness is unbecoming to bridegrooms, and most unbefitting to a marriage feast, as Plato says:[1] for the drinking of strong wine causes disorder both in body and soul, whereby what is sown and conceived being shapeless and misplaced does not take root well. Again, those who sacrifice to Hera do not consecrate the gall, but bury it beside the altar, meaning that the wedded life of wife and husband ought to be free from anger and wrath, and undisturbed by rage and bitterness.

‘This symbolical style is more common in the tales and legends. As for instance, they relate that Hera, being brought up in Euboea. was stolen away while yet a virgin by Zeus, and was carried across and hidden in this region, where Cithaeron afforded them a shady recess, nature’s own bridal-chamber. And when Macris----she was Hera’s nurse----came to seek her, and wished to make a search, Cithaeron would not let her pry about, or approach the spot, on pretence that Zeus was there resting and passing the time in company with Leto. And as Macris went away, Hera thus escaped discovery on that occasion, and afterwards calling to mind her debt of gratitude to Leto she adopted her as partner in a common altar and common temple, so that sacrifices are first offered to Leto Μυχία,that is, ‘of the inner shrine’;but some call her Νυχία, ‘goddess of night.’In each of the names, however, there is the signification of secrecy and escape. Some say that Hera had secret intercourse there with Zeus, and, being undiscovered, was thus herself denominated Leto of the night: but when her marriage became openly known, and their intercourse first here in the neighbourhood of Citliaeron and of Plataea had been revealed, she was called Hera Τελεία and Γαμήλιος, goddess of the perfect life, and of marriage.

‘Those who understand the fable in a more physical and becoming sense connect Hera with Leto in the following way. Hera, as has been said, is the Earth, and Leto is night, being a sort of oblivion on the part of those who turn to sleep. And night is nothing else but the shadow of the Earth. For when the Sun has reached the West and been hidden by the shadow, this spreads itself out and darkens the air: and this is the cause of the failure of the full moon in an eclipse, when the shadow of the earth touches the moon in her orbit and obscures her light. Moreover, that Leto is none other than Hera, you may learn from what follows. Artemis we of course call the daughter of Latona, but we also name the same goddess Eileithyia: Hera therefore and Leto are two names of one goddess.

‘Again of Leto is born Apollo, and of Hera Ares, and they both have the same power: and Ares is so called as helping (ἀρήγων) in the mischances of violence and battle, and Apollo as delivering and releasing (ἀπαλλάττων καὶ ἀπολύων)a man from his bodily diseases. For which reason also of the most fiery and blazing luminaries one, the sun, is named Apollo, and the other of a fiery red is surnamed Ares. And it is not unsuitable that the same goddess (Hera) is called the goddess of marriage, and considered to be the mother of Eileithyia and of the sun. For the end of marriage is birth; and birth is the passing out of darkness into the sun and light. And it is a fine saying of the poet:

‘But soon her child, by Eileithyia’s aid, Was brought to light, and saw the sun’s bright rays.’ [2]

Rightly did the poet crowd the composition by the preposition, thereby indicating the hardness of the labour, and made the end of the birth consist in seeing the sun. The same goddess therefore made also the marriage union, in order that she might prepare the way for birth.

‘But perhaps we ought also to mention the more silly legend. For it is said that when Hera was at variance with Zeus, and was no longer willing to consort with him, but hid herself, he was wandering about in perplexity and fell in with Alalcomenes the earth-born, and was taught by him that, to deceive Hera, he must pretend to wed another wife. So Alalcomenes helped him, and they secretly cut down a tall and beautiful oak, and shaped it and dressed it in bridal array, and called it Daedale: then the hymeneal was duly chanted, and the nymphs of Triton brought lustral water, and Boeotia supplied flutes and festal processions. But when these performances went on, Hera could bear it no longer, but came down from Cithaeron, followed by the women of Plataea, and from anger and jealousy came running up to Zeus, and when the counterfeit became manifest, she was reconciled to him and with joy and laughter herself led the bridal procession, and gave additional honour to the statue, and called the festival Daedala, and nevertheless from jealousy burnt the thing, lifeless though it was.

‘Such then is the legend: and the explanation of it is as follows. The variance and quarrel of Hera and Zeus is nothing else than the distemper and confusion of the elements, when they no longer bear a due proportion to each other in the cosmos, but disproportion and roughness arise, and they have a desperate fight and dissolve their connexion, and work the ruin of the universe.

If then Zeus, that is, the force of heat and fire, gives occasion to the variance, a drought overtakes the earth: but if it is on the part of Hera, that is, the element of rain and wind, that any outbreak or excess takes place, there comes a great flood, and deluges and overflows everything. And as something of this kind occurred about those times, and Boeotia especially had been deeply flooded, as soon as ever the plain emerged and the flood abated, the order which followed from the tranquillity of the atmosphere was called the agreement and reconciliation of the deities. The first of the plants that sprang up out of the earth was the oak; and men welcomed this, because it gave a permanent supply of food and safety. For not only for the pious, as Hesiod says, but for all who survive the destruction,

‘The top bears acorns, and the middle bees.’ [3]