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THE RELIGIOUS DEVELOPMENT 15
sacred fire. The sacred fire was, as in Europe, often extin
guished in water. This religion was quite agricultural. In
view of the general agreement of the Slavic and old Armenian
data on this point, one may
well ask whether the Thraco-
Phrygian mysteries just described were not a localized
development of the lightning worship so characteristic of the
Slavic family to which the Thraco-Phrygians and the Arme
nians probably belonged. 9
In fact, according to Tomaschek 10
the lightning-god had a very prominent place in the Thracian
religion.
Lightning worship, more or less confused with the worship
of a storm-god, was widely spread through Indo-European
cults, and it is attested in the Thracian family not only by
the name of Hyagnis, a Phrygian satyr (see chapter on
Vahagn) and Sbel Thiourdos, but also by the title of
that belonged to Dionysos and by such Greek myths
"
Bull
"
as make
him wield the lightning for a short time in the place of Zeus. 11
Soon after their coming into Urartu the Armenians fell
under very strong Iranian influences, both in their social and
their religious life. Now began that incessant flow of Iranian
words into their language, a fact which tempted the philol
ogists of a former generation to consider Armenian a branch
of Iranian. When Xenophon met the Armenians on his fa
mous retreat, Persian was understood by them, and they were
sacrificing horses to the sun (or, perhaps to Mithra). But
we find in the remnants of Armenian paganism no religious
literature and no systematic theology, or cult of a purely Zoro-
astrian type.
It would seem that the reformed faith of Iran
penetrated Armenia very slowly and as a formless mass of
popular beliefs which sometimes entered into mesalliances in
their new home. 12
In fact the names of the Zoroastrian gods
and spirits found in Armenia bear a post-classic and pre-
Sassanian stamp.
Finally the contact with Syria and with Hellenistic culture