Themis, a study of the social origins of Greek ... - Warburg Institute

IV] Sanctity of Birds 115
themselves imagined but feared to picture Zeus. He is fantastic
and beautiful with his wings and eagle beak and claws, riding the
clouds in his circle of heavenly thunder-drums. The Greeks had
just the same picture in their minds—a bird-god, a cloud-god,
Fig. 21.
a thunder-god—but they dare not adventure it all together, so
they separate off the ' attributes ; rationalists as they are they
'
divide and distinguish, and give us pictures like the lovely coins
of Elis (Fig. 22). But there is loss as well as gain.
Fig. 22.
With this primitive sanctity of birds rather than their definite
divinity in our minds, much that is otherwise grotesque becomes
simple and beautiful—Bird-bridegrooms, Bird-parentages, Egg-
cosmogonies, Bird-metamorphoses. We no longer wonder that
]—2