The Golden Bough (Third Edition, Vol. 7 of 12) - Mirrors

Chapter II. Demeter And Persephone. 93to house in the ripe ears no less a personage than the CornmaidenPersephone herself? And if there is any truth in theseconjectures (for conjectures they are and nothing more), we mayhazard a guess as to the other Ancestral Contest which tookplace at the Eleusinian Festival of the Threshing-floor. Perhapsit in like manner was originally a competition between thresherson the sacred threshing-floor of Triptolemus to determine whoshould finish threshing his allotted quantity of corn before therest. Such competitions have also been common, as we shallsee presently, on the threshing-floors of modern Europe, andtheir motive again has not been simple emulation between sturdyswains for the reward of strength and dexterity; it has been adread of being burdened with the aged and outworn spirit ofthe corn conceived as present in the bundle of corn-stalks whichreceives the last stroke at threshing. 266 We know that effigiesof Demeter with corn and poppies in her hands stood on Greekthreshing-floors. 267 Perhaps at the conclusion of the threshingthese effigies, as representatives of the old Corn-spirit, werepassed on to neighbours who had not yet finished threshing thecorn. At least the supposition is in harmony with modern customsobserved on the threshing-floor.It is possible that the Eleusinian games were no more thana popular merrymaking celebrated at the close of the harvest.This view of their character might be supported by modernanalogies; for in some parts of Germany it has been customary [076]for the harvesters, when their work is done, to engage in athleticcompetitions of various kinds, which have at first sight no veryobvious connexion with the business of harvesting. For example,at Besbau near Luckau great cakes were baked at the harvestfestival,and the labourers, both men and women, ran racesfor them. He or she who reached them first received not onlya cake, but a handkerchief or the like as a prize. Again, at266 See below, pp. 147 sqq., 221 sq., 223 sq.267 See above, p. 43.Games at harvestfestivals in modernEurope.