Zeus : a study in ancient religion - Warburg Institute

134
The Pillar of Light
" I am glad thou hast come, child." And he called me and gave me a mouthful
of the curds from his milking. And I received it with joined hands and ate ; and
all that stood round about said "Amen." And at the sound of their voice I awoke,
still eating something sweet. And straightway I told it to my brother, and we
understood that it meant suffering and thenceforward began to lose all hope in
this life.'
Since the remaining visions of Perpetua seem to contain certain
elements of mystical or mythical import^ it is at least possible that
here too we should recognise sundry pre-Christian traits. Orphism
is suggested both by the celestial ladder and by the milky diet of
the newborn soul", if not also by the very name of Satyros.
Perpetua is by no means the only saint associated with a ladder.
Saint Sadoth (Feb. 29), who was martyred at Seleukeia on the
Tigris in 344 A.D., dreamed that his predecessor Simeon Bar-Saboe
stood at the top of a ladder, beckoning him from earth to heaven^.
Saint Alexis of Rome (.-' Constantinople) or Edessa, who lived at
the end of the fifth century and is commemorated on July 17 (by
the Greeks on March 17), is represented with a ladder in his arms^
Saint Leonard (Nov. 6), who died as abbot of Limoges in 559 A.D.
but is nowadays reckoned the principal saint of Bavaria', as patron
of prisoners holds by a chain a youth mounting a ladder". Saint
John Klimax (March 30), who died in 606 A.D., was abbot of Mount
Sinai and reverenced as a second Moses": he got his title from the
^ E.g. in cap. 7 the boy Deinokrates retains his gangrenous wound even after death
(cp. the sons of Herakles on the Orphic ' Underworld ' vase at Munich : Furtwangler
Reichhold Gr. Vasenmalerei '\. 50 pi. 10, supra i. 222 n. 5) and cannot reach the water
that he fain would drink (cp. Tantalos, supra i. 205 fig. 148) ; in cap. 10 Perpetua,
stripped for the conflict, becomes a man, is pitted against an Egyptian wrestler and feels
as though she were uplifted from the ground, but with joined hands pulls him down and
wins the bout (cp. Herakles v. Antaios), receiving as her prize a green bough with
golden apples on it (cp. Herakles and the apples of the Hesperides).
^ Supra i. 676 f
3 Acta Sanctorum edd. Holland. Antverpia; 1658 Februarius iii. 176 B {Acta 2) Vidi
in somnis hac nocte scalam cum magna gloria, cuius initium erat in coelo. Ei autem super-
stabat sanctus Episcopus Simeon cum infinita gloria : ego vero infra in terra consistebam.
Atque iile magna me cum hilaritate compellans, Ascende, inquit, ad me Sadoth, ascende :
ne timeas, ego enim heri ascendi, tu vero hodie ascendes. Etc., M.. and W. Drake
Saints and their Emblems 'L.oxid.ovi 1916 pp. 114, 188.
* C. Cahier Caractt'ristiques des Saints dans fart populaire Paris 1867 i- 3^8, 387 f.,
D. H. Kerler Die Patronate der Htiligen Ulm 1905 p. 36 ('Treppe'), M. and W. Drake
op. cit. pp. 6, 188.
5 R. Andree Votive und Weihegaben des kathoUschen Volks in Siiddeutschland Braun-
schweig 1904 p. 39 ff.
« M. and W. Drake op. cit. pp. 74, 188.
" Acta Sanctorum edd. Holland. Antverpiae 1668 Martius iii. 837 A {Vita Auctore
\
Daniele monacho coffcuo 2. 9) Nam & montem Dei ipse accessit, inaccessarhque nebulam
ingressus, scalteq; coelestis gradibus admotus, scriptam Dei digito legem accepit, etc.,
S. Baring-Gould The Lives of the Saints Edinburgh 1914 iii. 506 ff.