Cox, George - Aryan Mythology Vol 2.pdf

;os MYTHOLOGY OF THE ARYAN NATIONS.
BOOK
II.
Ceres and
Saturn.
Erichtho-
nios.
hunger the earth-tearer Erysichthon. As possessing and
guarding the wealth of the earth, she takes her place among
the Chthonian deities, whose work is carried on unseen by
mortal eyes. As teaching men how to plough, to sow, and
to reap, she is Demeter Thesmophoros, the lover of law,
order, peace and justice.
Of the Latin Ceres it is enough to say that although, like
other Latin deities, she has no special mythology, her name
at least is significant. She is strictly the ripener of the
fruits of the earth ; and since, as such, she could have no
attribute wholly inconsistent with the character of the Greek
Demeter, it became easy to attach to Ceres all the stories
told of the Hellenic goddess. 1 With the name of Ceres we
ought to connect that of Saturn, a god who has no feature
in common with the Greek Kronos with whom the later
Eomans identified him, as they identified his wife Ops, a
name corresponding in meaning with that of Ploutos, with
Rhea. Saturn, as the sower of the seed, 2 answers far more
nearly to the Greek Triptolemos, who is taught by Demeter.
At the end of his work Saturn is said to have vanished from
the earth, as Persephone disappears when the summer has
come to an end ; and the local tradition went that Latium
was his lurking-place. 3
Section III.—THE CHILDREN OF THE EARTH.
As the Eleusinian myth tells the stoiy of the earth and
her treasures under the name of Demeter, so the Athenian
legend tells the same story under the name of Erechtheus or
Erichthonios, a son of Hephaistos, according to one version,
by Atthis, a daughter of Kranaos, according to another, by
Athene herself. 4 In the latter version Athene becomes his
1 The name has by some been identified
with the Greek Kore, by others with
the Latin G-aranus or Recaranus. By
Professor Max Miiller it is referred to
the root which yields the Sanskrit Sarad,
autumn, viz. sri or sri, to cook or ripen.
Sri, or Lakshmi, is in the Ramayana the
wife of Vishnu. Like Aphrodite, she
rises from the sea, but with four arms,
and her dwelling is in the Lotos.
2 Breal, H