Imagens das páginas
PDF
ePub

176

CHAPTER XIV.

THE GODDESSES OF THE WOODS.

DIANA.

HERE comes a goddess, taller than the other goddesses, in whose virgin looks we may ease our eyes, which have been wearied with the horrid sight of those monstrous deities. Welcome, Diana! your hunting habit, the bow in your hand, and the quiver full of arrows, which hang down from your shoulders, and the skin of a deer fastened to your breast, discover who you are. Your behaviour, which is free and easy, but modest and decent; your gar ments, which are handsome and yet careless, show that you are a virgin. Your name indicates your modesty and honour.

Acteon, the son of Aristæus, the famous huntsman, unfortunately observing you, whilst bathing, was changed into a deer, which was afterwards torn in pieces by the dogs.

Further honour is due to you; because you represent the Moon, the glory of the stars, and the only goddess who observed perpetual chastity.

Nor am I ignorant of that famous and deserving action which you did to avoid the flames of Alpheus, when you so hastily fled to your nymphs, who were altogether in one place; and so besmeared both yourself and them with dirt, that when he came he did not know you: whereby your honest deceit succeeded according to your intentions; and the dirt which injures every thing else, added a new lustre to your virtue.

Diana is called Triformis and Tergemina. First, because though she is but one goddess, yet she has three different names, as well as three different offices. In the heavens she is called Luna; on the

[merged small][ocr errors][merged small][merged small][ocr errors]

earth she is named Diana; and in hell she is called Hecate or Proserpine. In the heavens she enlightens every thing by her rays; on the earth she keeps under her power all wild beasts by her bow and her dart; and in hell she keeps all the ghosts and the spirits in subjection to her by her power and authority. The several names and offices are comvrised in an ingenious distich :

"Terret, lustrat, agit; Proserpina, Luna, Diana;
Ima, suprema, feras; sceptro, fulgore, sagitta."

Dempter in Paralip.

But although Luna, Diana, and Hecate, are commonly thought to be only three different names of the same goddess, yet Hesiod esteems them three distinct goddesses. Secondly, because she has, as the poets say, three heads; the head of a horse on the right side, of a dog on the left, and a human head in the midst: whence some call her threeheaded, or three-faced. And others ascribe to her the likeness of a bull, a dog, and a lion. Virgil and Claudian also mention her,three countenances. Thirdly, according to the opinion of some, she is called Triformis, because the moon hath three phases or shapes the new moon appears arched with a semicircle of light; the half moon fills a semicircle with light; and the full moon fills a whole circle or orb with its splendour. But let us examine these names more exactly.

She is named Luna, from shining, either because she only in the night time sends forth a glorious light, or else because she shines by borrowed light, and not by her own; and therefore the light with which she shines is always new light. Her chariot is drawn with a white and a black horse; or with two oxen, because she has got two horns; some

*

* Quod luce aliena splendeat, unde Græce dicitur Esλnvn a id est, lumen novum. Id. ibid.

σέλας νέους

times a mule is added, because she has no children, and shines by the light of the sun. Some say, that Lunæ of both sexes have been worshipped, especially among the Egyptians; and indeed they give this property to all the other gods. Thus both Lunus and Luna were worshipped, but with this difference, that those who worshipped Luna were thought subject to the women, and those who worshipped Lunus were superior to them. We must also observe, that the men sacrificed to Venus, under the name of Luna in women's clothes, and the women in men's clothes. "This Luna had a lover who was named Endymion, and he was courted by her, insomuch, that to kiss him, she descended out of heaven, and came to the mountain Latmus, or Lathynius, in Caria; he lay condemned to an eternal sleep by Jupiter; because, when he was taken into heaven, he attempted to make love to Juno. In reality, Endymion was a famous astronomer, who first described the course of the moon, and he is represented sleeping, because he contemplated nothing but the planetary motions.

Hecate may be derived from ixaev [hekathen] eminus; because the moon darts her rays or ar rows afar off. She is said to be the daughter of Ceres by Jupiter, who being cast out by her mother, and exposed in the streets, was taken up by shepherds, and nourished by them; for which reason she was worshipped in the streets, and her statue was usually set before the doors of the houses, whence she took the name Propylæa. Others derive her name from ixarov [hecaton] centum, because they sacrificed a hundred victims to her: or, be cause, by her edict, those who die and are not buried, wander a hundred years up and down hell. However, it is certain that she is called Trivia, from triviis, "the streets;" for she was believed to preside over the streets and ways; so that they sacri

« AnteriorContinuar »