82 Sacred Books of the East, Legge, vol. III, Shû King; also W. H.
Medhurst, Shanghai, 1846.
83 An interesting note in connection with the assignment of color to
the cardinal points in Asia, is given by Schlagintweit (Buddhism in
Thibet, 27, 3), who relates that “the walls of the temples look
towards the 4 quarters of heaven and each side should be painted
with its particular colour, viz.: north=green, east=white,
south=yellow, west=red, but this rule is not strictly adhered to;
most, indeed, are painted red.” As a parallel to this I refer to
Sahagun’s description of the temple of the high-priest Quetzalcoatl
at Tula, which held four chambers facing the cardinal points; “The
east chamber was termed the golden house and was lined with plates
of gold; the west chamber was termed the house of emeralds and
turquoises; the south chamber was inlaid with silver and mother of
pearl and the north chamber with red jasper and shells.” Sahagun
describes also a second building of the same kind, in which the
decoration of the four rooms was carried out in the same colors, in
feather-mosaic (_op. cit._ Book X, chap. XXIX).
84 The alligator-altar of Copan and the “Great Turtle” of Quirigua, on
which four limbs may be discerned, are the most remarkable examples
of the native employment of the quadruped figure as a symbol of
clan-organization and the great Quadruplicate Plan. An interesting
instance of the association, in China, of the form of a four-footed
animal with numerical divisions is furnished by the following
passage from the Book of Yu, Shoo-King, ed. Legge. Khung-she has
said that “Heaven conferred on Yü the divine tortoise bearing a book
out of the river; on its back were various numbers, up to nine. Yü
arranged them and completed the 9 species. On the head of the
tortoise was 9, on the tail 1, on the left side 3, on the right 7.
The shoulders were formed by 2 and 4, the thighs by 6 and 8.”
85 As Prof. E. B. Taylor has aptly pointed out: “By accident the
[Mexican] Calendar may be exactly illustrated with a modern pack of
cards laid out in rotation of the four suits, as an ace of hearts, 2
of spades, 3 of diamonds, 4 of clubs, 5 of hearts, etc.... This
system [of combining signs with numerals] is similar to that of
central southwestern Asia where, among the Mongols, Tibetans and
Chinese, etc., series of signs are thus combined to reckon years,
months and days.... Humboldt makes this comparison in his Vue des
Cordillères, p. 212”.... (Article “Mexico,” Ency. Brit.).
86 The following passages contain interesting evidences of the ancient
application of the number seven to tribal organization in China. “In
the time of the Suy dynasty Manchuria went by the name of Mo-ho in
China ... the people being _then divided into seven tribes_....
Towards the end of the eleventh century one Yang-ko was elected as
their chief ... and he organized something of a regular government
throughout the various tribes of Jou-tchi or Niô-tchi’s and
collected taxes from them. The highest of his officers were all
styled po-k-eih-lee and _were distinguished by the names of the sun,
planets and 28 constellations of the Zodiac_. Every five, every ten
and every hundred men had their special officers.... From the chief
of five to the chief of ten thousand, each trained his dependents in
military art....” Wylie: On the origin of the Manchus (Chinese
Researches, p. 244).
87 The Nestorian Tablet in Si-ngan-foo (p. 24, Chinese Researches.
Shanghai, 1897).
88 (The Religion of Japan, Wm. Elliott Griffis. London, 1895, p. 67 and
note 9.) This curious agreement between the Japanese and other
ethnic traditions, in locating Paradise, the origin of the human
family and of civilization at the north pole, has not escaped the
attention of Dr. W. F. Warren, President of Boston University, who
makes extended reference to it in his suggestive book, “Paradise
Found, The Cradle of the Human Race at the North Pole. A Study of
the Prehistoric World. Boston, 1885.”
89 An interesting parallelism in the development or evolution of the
idea of rotation around a central pole was brought to my notice by a
model in the Indian Department of the South Kensington Museum. It
represents the Hindu fanatical religious rite known as the “Churruck
Puja.” Four individuals are suspended by cords, with hooks drawn
through their flesh, to a movable wooden structure like a wheel
surmounting a high pole, similar to that used by the Ancient Mexican
“flyers” (see p. 24) which likewise served as a pivot for the
circling motion of the performers. The torture voluntarily endured
by the latter recalls that accompanying the sacred sun pole-dance of
certain North American Indian tribes. It is interesting to contrast
the ancient Mexican refined and intellectual symbolization of
circumpolar motion with the fanatical and hideous self-torture
associated with the North American and Hindu modes of representing
the same phenomena, as it throws much light on the development of
certain sides of human nature.
90 Mr. Wm. H. Goodyear, from whose admirable work, the Grammar of the
Lotus, the above quotations are taken, remarks that “the myth of
Horus rising from the lotus, as found in the Egyptian texts, is the
exact counterpart of this idea and as far as Brahmanism is
concerned, is much the older;” also that “it is possible that the
lotus symbolism of Egypt and India dates from a race which divided
into separate branches; it is also possible that the people of India
experienced the influence, direct or indirect, of Egypt.”
91 Researches into the origin of the primitive constellations of the
Greeks, Phœnicians and Babylonians (Robert Brown, jun., F. S. A., M.
R. A. S., vol. I, 1899, p. 357).
92 In Assyria we find one of the oldest temples bearing the name
E-kharsag-kurkura, that stamps the edifice as the reproduction of
the “mountain of all lands” and there are other temples that
likewise bear names in which the idea of a mountain is
introduced.... The zikkurat or “mountain-house”=E-kur was at Nippur,
Sippar, Uruk, Ur and Larsa, “the centre of a considerable group of
buildings; while at Babylon ... the temple area of E-sagila must
have presented the appearance of a little city of itself, shut off
from the rest of the town by a wall which invariably enclosed the
sacred quarter.” The name E-kur was used at Nippur, by extension, to
denote the entire sacred precinct which contained the zikkurat or
staged tower, the great court where worshippers assembled, shrines
and other minor structures. The excavations at Nippur have afforded
us, for the first time, a general view of a sacred quarter in an
ancient Babylonian city. The extent of the quarter was considerable.
Dr. Peters’ estimate is eight acres for the zikkurat and surrounding
structures.... “A factor that contributed largely to the growth of
the sacred precinct in the large centres was the circumstance that
the political importance of such centres as Nippur, Lagash, Ur,
Babylon and Nineveh led the rulers to group around the worship of
the chief deity, the cult of the minor ones who constituted the
family or court of the chief god.” A “list of temples in Lagash,
recently published by Scheil, ... furnishes the name of no less than
thirteen sacred edifices, and we are certain that as many as four or
five smaller chapels surrounded the precinct in which stood the
great temple E-ninnu ...” (Jastrow, _op. cit._).
93 These facts shed additional light and interest upon the Mt. Meru of
India, where the Brahmans sought union with their god Brahma.
94 “Diodorus Siculus maintains that the E-kur was employed as an
astronomical observatory. The antiquity of Babylonian astronomy is
indicated by the testimony of Simplicius and Porphyrius who relate
that Callisthenes, the companion of Alexander the Great during his
campaigns, brought back from Babylon and communicated to Aristoteles
a series of observations which had been made there for a period of
1,903 years. Accordingly, the Chaldæans must have begun to make
astronomical notes more than 2,200 years before the Christian era.
It stands indeed to reason that they must have made observations
during countless centuries, since they discovered the Saros, known
as the Chaldæan period of 6583-1/3 days, which served for the
prediction of eclipses and were also acquainted with the precession
of the equinoxes.”
95 Professor Jastrow tells us that the name Shamash merely signifies
vassal or servitor. I venture to point out what is doubtlessly a
fact familiar to Assyriologists, that the name closely resembles the
Babylonian-Assyrian name Shame=heaven, the equivalent of the
Sumerian an, a word of which the most ancient cuneiform signs were
four crossed lines, forming eight lines proceeding from a common
centre.
96 A striking corroboration of the view that China derived its
civilization from Asia Minor is afforded by the resemblance between
the Assyrian Anu and the Chinese Shang, both signifying Heaven, and
the Assyrian Ea and Chinese Lea, both applied to “the Below.”
97 An analytical study of the Babylonian and Assyrian divinities
enumerated in Professor Jastrow’s hand-book enables us to detect
some of the natural associations of ideas that influenced the
formation of one artificial theological system after another, all
springing from a single root.
The fundamental realization of the antithesis of light and darkness
giving rise to the division of the universe into two distinct parts,
the conception of an eternal antagonism between both followed and
led to the stage of thought set forth by Mr. Robert Brown who tells
us (_op. cit._) that “the original twins were the Sun and Moon” and
that an archaic cosmogonic legend attached to the third month of Kas
(twins) is that of two hostile brethren and the building of the
first city. The great twin-brethren who join together to build the
city are the Sun and Moon, engaged in preserving cosmic order yet
also constantly antagonistic to each other and who constantly chase
each other, one being up when the other is down. Mr. Brown also
relates the myth of antagonistic satraps Namaros and Parsondas and
states that, in the twin stars, Castor and Pollux, named by the
Euphrateans the great Twins=Mastab-bagal-gal, the Sun and Moon were
re-duplicated. The Euphratean abbreviation is mas=twin or mas-mas,
and Pollux is equated with the fourth antediluvian king Ammenon, a
name derived from Akkadian: umun=offspring, an=heaven _i. e._ the
Sun, “the son or offspring of heaven.”
98 “There are reasons for believing, however, that Sarpanitum, the
offspring-producing goddess once enjoyed considerable importance of
her own; that, prior to the rise of Marduk to his supreme position,
a goddess was worshipped in Babylon, one of whose special functions
it was to protect the progeny while still in the mother’s womb. A
late king of Babylon, the great Nebuchadnezzar, appeals to this
attribute of the goddess. To her was also attributed the possession
of knowledge concealed from men.... A late ruler of Babylon,
Shamash-Shumu-kin, calls her ‘the queen of the gods’ and declares
himself to have been nominated by her to lord it over men” (Jastrow,
_op. cit._ p. 122).
The following extracts from Assyrian prayers addressed to Ishtar
further define her position at one time: “The producer, queen of
heaven, the glorious lady. To the one who dwells in E-babbara.... To
the queen of the gods to whom has been entrusted the commands of the
great gods. To the lady of Nineveh.... To the daughter of Sin, _the
twin-sister of Shamash_, ruling over all kingdoms. Who issues
decrees, the goddess of the universe.... _Besides thee there is no
guiding deity_....”
99 As an illustration of the ideas connected with Astarte it is
interesting to note that fish and doves, inhabitants of the sea and
air, became her sacred emblems. The horns which she is sometimes
represented as wearing seem to be not only symbolical of the moon,
but also to be a remnant of a more ancient form of symbolism which
associated the goddess with the cow. It is stated that, in Canaan,
Astarte was represented under the form of a cow and it will be shown
that, in the Egyptian zodiac Polaris and Ursa Major were represented
under the form of a bull or cow or its thigh. The eye painted on the
prow of the ship was also a symbol of the goddess, an interesting
fact considering that the eye expresses a star among other primitive
people.