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

vi] The Bull-Sacrament of Atlantis 163
can here be supplemented by other sacrifices in which bulls and
trees and tree-posts are involved.
In the island of Atlantis Plato 1 describes a strange bull-
sacrifice, evidently founded on some actual primitive ritual.
The essential feature of this sacrifice was the actual contact of
the victim's blood with a pillar or post on which laws were
engraved. Here we have direct contact with the object to be
sanctified ; no altar or even table intervenes. It is sacrifice, i.e.
magical contact, in its most primitive form. Kritias in his
description of the sunk island says that in the centre of it was
a sanctuary to Poseidon within which certain sacred bulls ranged
freely. Poseidon it may be noted in passing is one of the gods
who grew out of a bull ; his wine-bearers at Ephesus 2 were Bulls,
and, in answer to the imprecation of Theseus, as a Bull he appears
out of his own flood to wreck the chariot of Hippolytus 3 . It is
to the Cretan Poseidon not to Zeus that Minos 4 promised the
sacrifice of his finest bull.
In this sanctuary of Poseidon was a column of orichalcum on
which were inscribed the injunctions of Poseidon, which seem to
have constituted the laws of the country. On the column, beside
r/
the law, was a Curse ( Op/co