Zeus : a study in ancient religion - Warburg Institute

258 Dionysos displaced by ApoUon
and Apollon, who were completely unified by the solar syncretism
of the Graeco-Roman age. But it would be a gross blunder to regard
these two as identical from the outset. Rather they were analogous
gods, of whom one proved a not uncongenial intruder upon the
other. The welcome guest became in time a recognised member of
the family circle, and ultimately the main representative of the hou.se,
his former naturalisation having been obscured by the later developments
of religion and philosophy.
The situation thus arising may be illustrated by a short sequence
of Greek vase-paintings \ A polychrome /^//-^^ from Juz Oba, now
at Petrograd (pi. xvi)^ Attic work of the fourth century B.C.,
has for its principal figures the earlier personnel of the Delphic
oracle. The obverse design shows Zeus, with golden bay-wreath
and sceptre, enthroned beside Themis, who, clad in a chiton and a
himation partly blue partly red, sits on the yellow-touched gold-
filleted omphalos, her left foot raised upon a stone. God and goddess
are in earnest conversation, as befits the supreme counsellors of all
the worlds The subject of their talk is presumably the glorification
^ The Etruscan mirror from the Luynes collection (Gerhard Etr. Spiegel iv. 24 f.
pi. 292), now at Paris (Balielon— Blanchet Cat. Bronzes de la Bibl. Nat. p. 517 f.
no. 1300 fig.), adduced by Miss Harrison in her Themis p. 442 f. fig. 136 as representing
Apollon and Dionysos vis-a-vis with the sun's disk between them, would make a delightful
illustration of the same point. But unfortunately the interpretation of the second figure
as Dionysos is far from certain. The due de Luynes in the Bull. d. Inst. 1848 p. 36
described it as Diana; E. Gerhard loc. cit., E. Babelon and J. A. Blanchet loc. cit., as
Artemis.
- Stephani Vasensa?n>nl. St. Petersburg \\. 324 ff. no. 1793, id. Coinpte-rendu St. Pdt.
i860 p. 39 ff. Atlas pi. 2, I f. = Reinach R^p. Vases i. 3, if., C. Strube Studien iiber den
Bilderkreis von Eleusis Leipzig 1870 p. 86 n. , Overbeck Gr. Kunstmyth. Zeus pp. 181 K,
183, J85f, Wien. Vorlegebl. A pi. 9, i, (.,. Robert Archaeologische Maerchen aus alter
und fieuer Zeit BeiMn 1886 p. i8«ff. pi. ,\. W. Klein 'Zur Einleitungsscene der Kyprien'
in \.\\Qjahrb. d. kais. deutsch. arch. Inst. 1894 ix. 251 ff. fig. i, and above all Furtwangler
Reichhold Gr. Vasentnalerei ii. 46—50 fig. 21 f. pi. 69 ( = my pi. xvi). Height 0"443"'.
^ Themis as an earth-goddess [supra p. 176 n. i) knows the right order of events and
from experience of the past can give good advice for the future. In poetry she is evjiovXos
(Bind. 01. 13. II, Isthm. 8. 68 cited infra §9
p. 37 n. i), dpd6^ov\os (Aisch. /'. v. 18), vivxjra. (Bakchyl. 14. 55, c^. frag adesp. 82 A
(h) ii {K).frag. 30. i Schroeder cited supra
as completed by Bergk'' ad loc), in prose BofXaia (Flout, praec. ger. reip. 5, Synes.
de reg)io 15 (Ixvi. 1093 Migne)).
Zeus is wise as a forefather (Aisch. suppl. 592 |
Tra\ai6(ppwv fifyas |
ff. Trariip vTovpy6s avroxetp dva^
y^vovs
riKTcjv, to irav fxrixo-p oiiptos Zeus. Cp. for his wisdom as conceived
by Aischylos P. v. 61 f., suppl. 105s f., and the remarks of W. Kausche in the Disserta-
tiones philologicae Halenses Halis Saxonum 1888 ix. 137), as a magician {supra i. 14 n. i,
758 n. I f.), as an all-seeing sky-god (supra i. 187 n. 9, 196 f., 459 ff., 731 n. i, 783), and
as ideal mind (Nonn. Dion. 20. 266 Trepicrcrovboio Aios, Tzetz. chil. 6. 930 6 ZfiVs 6 vovs
b Tra,vao