Birth-omens to which attention should be directed, and which will further
illustrate the cultural significance of the views that gave rise to this
extensive subdivision of Babylonian-Assyrian divination. We have in the
course of our investigations noted the tendency in the collections of the
=bârû=-priests to allow a free scope to the reins of fancy, which led to
the amplification of entries of actual occurrences by adding entries of
abnormalities that do not occur. In order to be prepared for all
contingencies, the priests, as we saw, extended the scope of birth-omens
in all directions, through entries for an ascending scale of multiple
births which went far beyond the remotest possibility, through equally
extravagant entries of the number of excess organs or of excess parts of
the body, and through the most fanciful combinations of the features,
aspects and parts of various animals in the case of new-born infants and
the young of animals. The omission of the preposition 'like'[203] in the
case of these entries obscured the starting-point for such comparisons,
and it was natural for the idea of an ewe =actually= giving birth to a
lion, or for a woman to some animal or the other--a lion, dog, fox,
etc.--to take root[204]. Strange as this may seem to us, yet if we bear in
mind the ignorance of people in the ancient world as to the origin and
course of pregnancy and the general lack of knowledge of the laws of
nature, the dividing line between the possible and the impossible would be
correspondingly faint. At all events, the transition from the abnormal to
the belief in monstrosities that were quite out of the question and that
represent the outcome of pure fancy would be more readily made. Indeed,
through a combination of all the features involved in the entries of the
=bârû=-priests, we obtain a reasonable basis for the belief, widespread
throughout the ancient Orient as well as in the Greek and Roman world and
existing up to the threshhold of modern science, in all kinds of monstrous
beings which find their reflex in the fabulous creatures of mythology,
legend and folklore. In other words, the Babylonian-Assyrian birth-omens
form the first chapter in the history of monsters. The very term
=monstrum=, as already suggested, reflects the Babylonian-Assyrian point
of view, as a being which is sent as a sign--'pointing' (monstrare) to
some coming event. A =monstrum= is in fact a =demonstration= of the will
or intent of a deity, which becomes definite through the interpretation
put upon it. Perhaps this point will become a little clearer, if we
consider some of the possibilities included in the Babylonian-Assyrian
birth-omens. An ewe giving birth to a lamb with two or even more heads, or
to a creature with some of the organs and parts of the body doubled and
with some single is certainly a monstrosity; and it is only a small step
from such monstrosities which fall within the category of the abnormally
possible to supposed combinations of the parts or features of various
animals in one being. We actually read in one of these texts[205] of an
=isbu= or a young lamb having the head of a lion and the tail of a fox, or
the head of a dog and the mouth of a lion, or the head of a mountain goat
and the mouth of a lion; or in another text[206] of colts with heads or
manes of lions, or with the claws of lions or feet of dogs or with the
heads of dogs. It is only necessary to carry this fanciful combination a
little further to reach the conception that led to picturing the Egyptian
sphinxes or the Babylonian =sedu= or =lamassu=[207]--the protecting
spirits or demons guarding the entrances to palaces and temples, as having
the head of a man, the body of a lion or bull; and in the case of the
Assyrian sphinxes also the wings of an eagle. Similarly, in the case of
infants we find actual monstrosities recorded as a child with a double
face, four hands and four feet[208], or with the ear of a lion and the
mouth of a bird. Here again the step is a small one to the assumption of
hybrid beings as hippocentaurs--half man and half horse--or tritons and
mermaids--half human, half fish--or satyrs and fawns or monsters like
Cerberus with several heads.
It has commonly been held that the conception of such fabulous hybrid
beings rested on a popular belief in a kind of primitive theory of
evolution, according to which in an early stage creatures were produced in
a mixed form and that gradually order was brought out of this chaotic
stage of creation. Berosus[209] in his account of creation according to
Babylonian traditions voices this theory, and gives a description of the
'mixed' creatures that marked this earliest period of time, "men with
double wings, some with four wings and two faces, some with one body but
two heads and having both male and female organs, others with goat's legs
and horns, with horses feet, the hind parts of the body like a horse, in
front like a man, (i. e., hippocentaurs). There were also bulls with human
heads, dogs with four bodies and fish tails, horses with the head of dogs,
men and other creatures with heads and bodies of horses but tails of
fishes, and various other creatures with the forms of all kinds of animals
... all kinds of marvellous hybrid beings". The description, which is
confirmed in part by the Marduk Epic or the 'Babylon' version of creation
where we encounter 'scorpion men', 'fish-men', 'goat-fish', dragons and
other monstrous beings[210] as the brood of Tiamat the symbol of primaeval
chaos, reads like an extract from the birth-omens in the
Babylonian-Assyrian handbooks of divination. As a matter of fact, many of
the hybrid beings described by Berosus can be parallelled in those parts
of the collections that have been published[211].
My thesis, therefore, is that the birth-omens gave rise to the belief in
all kinds of monstrous and fabulous beings. The resemblances between men
and animals, as well as between an animal of one species with that of
another, led to the supposition that all manner of hybrid beings =could=
be produced in nature. The fanciful combinations in the collections of the
=bârû=-priests, in part reflecting popular fancies, in part 'academical'
exercises of the fancies of the priests, formed the basis and
starting-point for the theory that at the beginning of time, pictured as a
condition of chaos and confusion, such hybrid beings represented the norm,
while with the substitution of law and order for chaos and confusion,
their occurrence was exceptional and portended some approaching deviation
from the normal state of affairs. It is not unusual in the history of
religious and of popular beliefs to find fancy and fanciful resemblances
leading to the belief in the reality. Once the thought suggested by the
manifold abnormalities occurring in the young of domestic animals and
among infants firmly rooted, there was no limit to the course of unbridled
fancy in this direction. Adding to this the practical importance attached
to birth-omens, what would be more natural than that with the development
and spread of systems of divination devised to interpret the strange
phenomena observed at birth, the belief in all kinds of monsters and
monstrosities should likewise have been developed and should have spread
with the extending influence of Babylonian-Assyrian divination.
Babylonian literature furnishes many examples of the persistency of such
beliefs. It is sufficient to refer (a) to the gigantic scorpion-men who
keep guard at the gate of the sun in the mountain Masu and who are
described in the Gilgamesh epic[212] as 'terrible', whose very aspect is
death, (b) to Engidu, the companion of Gilgamesh, who is pictured as a man
with the body of a bull, and the horns of a bison[213], (c) to the monster
Tiamat in the creation tale pictured in art with the mouth and foreclaws
of a lion, wings and hind-feet of an eagle[214], or as a monstrous dragon
with the head of a serpent, fore feet of a panther, hind talons of an
eagle, or again described as a serpent of seven heads[215], and (d) to the
'mixed' creatures--man, bull or lion and eagle combined--above referred to
and that appear in such various forms in Babylonian and Assyrian art[216],
and reappear as sphinxes in Hittite[217] and Egyptian art. The
Hippocentaur in various forms also appears in the Babylonian art of the
Cassite period[218].
If we are correct in tracing the spread of Babylonian-Assyrian birth-omens
to the peoples of Asia Minor and thence to the Greeks and Romans, and in
associating the belief in all kinds of monstrous and fabulous beings with
these birth-omens and as a direct outcome of the fanciful combinations
embodied in the collections of the =bârû=-priests, the spread of this
belief would accompany the extension of the sphere of influence of
Babylonian-Assyrian divination and of Euphratean culture in general. The
thesis here proposed would, therefore, carry with it the assumption that
the fabulous creatures of Greek and Roman mythology, as well as the wide
spread belief in monstrosities of all kinds found in Greek and Roman
writers, and which belief through the influence of Greek and Roman ideas
was carried down to the middle ages and up to our own days, reverts in the
last instance to the Babylonian-Assyrian birth-omens.
IX
The thesis that the fabulous figures of Greek mythology were suggested by
malformations was set forth some twelve years ago by Prof. Friedrich
Schatz in a monograph on '_Die griechischen Götter und die menschlichen
Mißgeburten_' (Wiesbaden 1901), in which he endeavored to show that the
conceptions of such beings as the Cyclops, Harpies, Centaurs and Sirens
were merely the fanciful elaborations of the impression made by actually
occurring abnormal phenomena in the case of infants. The cyclops (9 seq.
with illustrations) was suggested by the child born with one eye[219], the
siren (11 seq. with illustration) by the abnormal but actually occurring
phenomenon of a child born with the feet united[220]. A double headed god
like Janus (12 seq.) was suggested by the monstrosity of a child with two
heads and even such a tale as that of the head of the Gorgon, Schaatz
believes is based (24 seq. with illustrations) or, at all events,
suggested by the fact that a woman gave birth to an undeveloped embryo
which suggests a human head[221]. The three heads of Cerberus, Diana of
the many breasts and even harpies are similarly explained as suggested by
malformations or by excess parts or organs. Having reached my conclusions
long before I learned of Dr. Schaatz's monograph, I was naturally glad to
find that the idea had occurred to some one who had approached the subject
from an entirely different point of view and without reference to
birth-omens. I would not go so far as Dr. Schaatz in the attempt to trace
back =all= the fabulous creatures of mythology, to certain specific
malformations. Indeed some of his combinations are almost as fanciful as
the creatures themselves, e. g., his endeavor to explain the Prometheus
myth as suggested by 'extopy of the liver' (36), whereas the tale clearly
rests upon the old theory of the liver as the seat of the life[222], but
the main thought that the idea of monstrous beings was suggested by actual
malformations =plus= the factor of unbridled fancy is, I venture to think,
correct. We must, of course, add to human malformations the many abnormal
phenomena occurring in the young of animals in which the determining
factor is again the =significance= attached to all kinds of malformation
among human beings and animals as birth-omens. This factor must be taken
as our point of departure; it furnishes a reason not merely for the rise
of the belief in all kinds of fabulous creatures but also for the
elaboration and the persistency of the belief and for its embodiment in
the religious thought of peoples. It is because the malformation is an
omen that it leads to further beliefs and fancies. The direct association
of the belief in fabulous creatures with birth-omens in Babylonia and
Assyria lends a presumption in favor of the same association among the
Greeks. If, therefore, we can trace the attachment to birth-omens among
Greeks and Romans to the Euphrates Valley, we will have found a reasonable
explanation for the part played by monsters and fabulous beings in the
mythology and the religion of the Greeks and Romans. Further than this, it
is not necessary to go. It is not essential to the establishment of the
thesis to trace =all= the fabulous beings of classical mythology to actual
malformations. The factor of fancy would lead to the extension of the
sphere far beyond the original boundaries; nor is it necessary to find
parallels to all the creatures of Greek and Roman mythology in Babylonian
and Assyrian literature or art in order to justify the dependence of the
former upon Babylonian-Assyrian birth-omens. No doubt the Greeks, more
particularly, developed the conception in their own way, adding other
features to it, just as they modified Babylonian-Assyrian astrology in
adapting it to their environment and their way of thinking, and just as
the Etruscans and Romans modified the Babylonian-Assyrian
hepatoscopy[223]. All that is claimed here is that the =conception= of
monstrous and fabulous beings is a direct outcome of the importance
attached to Birth-omens; and since the Babylonians and Assyrians are the
only people who developed an elaborate system of divination in which the
interpretation of birth-omens constituted an important division, and which
spread with the extension of Euphratean culture to Asia Minor and thence
to Greece and Rome, I claim that the ultimate source of the belief itself
is to be sought in the Euphrates Valley.
Can we trace the conception likewise to the distant East? Dr. Bab in an
interesting essay on '_Geschlechtsleben, Geburt und Mißgeburten_' in the
_Zeitschr. für Ethnologie_[224] adopts the thesis of Dr. Schaatz and
applies it to account for the frequent representation of gods in India
with excess organs or an excess number of parts of the body--gods and
goddesses with many heads, with three or four eyes, various breasts and
more the like. The same would of course apply to representations of
Chinese gods and demons. Bab's paper is elaborately illustrated and the
juxtaposition of actual malformations with the representation of gods and
demons in India and China leaves no doubt of at least a partial dependence
of these artistic fancies upon actual occurrences in nature[225]. Again,
however, a warning is in order not to carry the thesis too far; nor is it
possible to furnish definite proofs for the spread of Babylonian-Assyrian
systems of divination to the distant East, though we now have some
evidence pointing to a spread in this direction of Babylonian-Assyrian
astrology[226] and perhaps also of Babylonian-Assyrian hepatoscopy[227].
In a general way, we are also justified in seeking for an early
connection--commercial, artistic and social--between the Euphrates Valley
and distant India and China, but for the present we must rest content with
the assertion of the possibility that Babylonian-Assyrian birth-omens, and
with this system of divination also the conception of and belief in hybrid
monsters and fabulous creatures spread eastwards as well as westwards.
How stands the case with Egypt, where we find sphinxes that represent a
combination of man and animal and where we encounter numerous gods
composed of human bodies with the heads of animals? The question of
foreign influences in the earlier art of Egypt is one that has as yet
scarcely been touched, and we are equally at sea as to the possibility of
very early connections between the Euphratean culture and that which arose
in the valley of the Nile. The fact that the oldest pyramid--that of King
Zoser at Sakkarah--is formed of a succession of terraces[228] like the
=zikkurats= or stage-towers of Babylonia and moreover is of brick was
regarded by Ihering[229] as an evidence of an influence exerted by
Babylonia upon Egypt. An isolated phenomenon is too slender a thread on
which to hang a weighty theory, and the step pyramid of Zoser can be
explained as a transition from a form of the =mastaba= to the genuine
pyramid, without recourse to foreign models. All attempts to find a
connection between the Egyptian hieroglyphics and the oldest hieroglyphics
forms from which the Babylonian cuneiform script developed have likewise
ended in negative results and the same is to be said of endeavors to find
any direct connection between Babylonian and Egyptian beliefs and rites
and myths and despite certain rather striking points of resemblance[230].
And yet it is difficult to suppress the impression one receives that much
in Egyptian art and in the Egyptian religion suggests early outside
influences. With Babylonia and Egypt in more or less close touch as far
back at least as 1700 B. C., and with Asiatic entanglements reverting to a
still earlier period, the possibility of some connection between the
Egyptian forms of the sphinx--the crouching lion with the human head, the
falcon-headed and ram-headed sphinxes--and the combinations of the human
face with bulls and lions in Babylonian art to which the Assyrians added
the wings, cannot be summarily set aside. The question as to the age of
the sphinx at Gizeh--the oldest of all--is still in abeyance. Maspero
ascribes it to the early Memphite art[231], Spiegelberg to the middle
kingdom[232], while others bring it down to the 18th dynasty. If we
accept Spiegelberg's date we will be close to the period when by general
consent the Mediterranean culture--including therefore Syria, Palestine
and Western Asia in general--exercised a decided influence on Egypt. It is
during the time of the new kingdom that the sphinxes become frequent, as
it is at this period that the tendency to represent the gods as a
combination of the human and animal form becomes prominent and reaches its
highest form of expression.
Now, to be sure, we have not as yet come across any traces of
Babylonian-Assyrian divination in any of its forms in Egypt, but that may
be due to the rationalistic character of the Egyptian religion in the
'official' form revealed by the monuments and the literature which, while
full of rites and ceremonials connected so largely with the cult of the
dead, is yet relatively free of magic or divination. It is possible,
however, that in the unofficial popular customs divination may have played
a greater part than we suspect. Be this as it may, the conception of
monstrous beings may have found its way into Egypt even without the
transfer of the practice of interpreting birth-omens. The thesis of
outside influences to account for the Egyptian sphinxes and for the
combination of the human and animal form as a means of representing gods
and goddesses, is on the whole more plausible than to assume that
Babylonians and Egyptians should have independently hit upon the idea of
carving sphinxes to protect the entrances to temples and palaces.
Naturally, we must again be on our guard not to carry the theory too far.
The form given to the images of the gods by the Egyptians suggests the
almost perfect blending of the human and animal, and as such is a distinct
expression of the genius of Egyptian art. All that is claimed here is that
the =thought= of reproducing hybrid and fabulous beings in art did not
arise in Egypt without some outside influences. Resemblances between the
human form and the features of animals may have suggested themselves to
all peoples without any influence exerted by one on the other, but in
order to take the further step, leading to the belief in the =actual=
existence of beings in which the human and the animal are combined, the
resemblances must have been fraught with some practical significance. This
condition, I hold, is fulfilled if the resemblances--as well as all kinds
of other abnormalities--are looked upon as =signs= sent for a specific
purpose i. e. to point to some unusual happening that may be confidently
expected. The monster in short presupposes what the word implies, that it
is a 'sign'--an omen of some kind.
A warning may also not be out of place against connecting the belief in
monsters and fabulous creatures with the mental processes that give rise
to totemistic beliefs. In so far as totemism implies the descent of a clan
or group from some animal, it rests in part upon the supposed resemblance
between man and animals. Without this feature the thought of a descent of
human beings from some animal would hardly have occurred to people, but
this is only one factor involved. Ignorance as to processes of nature in
bringing about a new life is an equally important factor; and there are
others. But totemism does not involve the combination of the human and the
animal form in one being. That combination belongs to an entirely
different process of thought, though it also has as its starting-point the
recognition of a resemblance between man and animals. The conception of
hybrid beings is allied to that of human creatures or of animals who
through defects or through an excess number of organs or of parts of the
body represent striking deviations from the normal. Both classes fall
within the category of monsters, i. e., they are signs sent for a specific
purpose. Descent from an animal totem, however, where the belief exists,
is not looked upon as abnormal, but on the contrary as the rule.
Still a third direction taken by the impression made upon man through the
recognition of a resemblance between him and certain species of the animal
world is represented by the belief--so widespread--of the possibility of
the change of the human form into the animal. References to such phenomena
are not infrequent in Latin Literatures. Pliny[233] refers to several
instances of women being transformed into men. Livy[234] also speaks of
this phenomenon as a matter of common belief; and it is merely another
phase of this same belief that we encounter in the famous Metamorphoses of
Ovid where the gods take on the form of animals, Io being changed to a cow
and back again to human form, Jupiter to a bull, Cadmus to a dragon, Medea
to a fish, and so on through quite a long list. Circe by virtue of her
powers can change men to swine, just as she transforms her rivals into
trees. Apuleius' famous tale of the Golden Ass where the hero is changed
into a talking ass rests upon the same deep-rooted belief, which appears
again in a modified form in the Jatakas or Birth-stories of India where
Buddha takes on the form of all kinds of animals and which lead to the
beast fables of Bidpai where animals are introduced at every turn who talk
and act as men[235]. Even such a tale as that of Balaam's talking ass
would not have arisen without the antecedent belief in the possibility of
a transformation of man to animals and the reverse. In fact the talking
animal in all fairy tales rests in the last instance on a metamorphosis.
But this metamorphosis has nothing to do with hybrid creatures or
monsters. The universal spread of totemistic beliefs preclude =a priori= a
single centre as a starting-point for such beliefs; and the same in all
probabilities holds good for the belief that men may be changed into
animals and the reverse. In both, however, the factor of the resemblance
between man and animals is undoubtedly involved. All that is claimed by my
thesis is that the development of this recognition of a resemblance
between man and animal in the direction which led to the belief in
fabulous creatures and monsters, that is to say combinations of man and
animal in one being, side by side with abnormalities through defective
organs or parts of the body, or through an excess in the number of the
organs or parts of the body is associated, wherever it is found, with
birth-omens; that is, with the observation of striking or peculiar
phenomena observed at the time of birth in the case of infants or the
young of animals and regarded as omens. =Monstra=, =prodigia=, =ostenta=
and =portenta= to use the terms employed by Latin writers. All these terms
convey the idea that such phenomena are signs sent by the gods as a means
of indicating what the gods have in mind, or, to put it more generally,
what the future has in store. This chain of ideas and conceptions and
beliefs is restricted to culture circles which have been subject to common
influences.
X
The history of monsters forms an interesting division in the annals of
mankind, and I should like in conclusion to call attention to the
persistency of this belief down to the threshhold almost of our own days.
Among the Romans up to the latest period the old law of either burning the
monsters or of throwing them into the sea was generally carried out[236].
This was done on the supposition that the monster was an ill omen
foreboding evil and which was sent as a punishment. Plutarch tells a
story[237] which despite the skeptical attitude assumed by the narrator,
shows that the same point of view prevailed among the Greeks. From the
Greeks and Romans the belief in all kinds of monsters and the view that
they were signs of divine anger was handed down to Christian Europe.
Precisely as among the Babylonians and Assyrians, no distinction was drawn
between monstrosities that actually occurred--such as infants, or the
young of animals with two heads, or with only one eye, or with no nose, or
an otherwise defective face, or with an excess number of hands or feet in
the case of children, or an excess number of feet in the case of animals
and the like[238]--and such as are purely imaginary, or in which the
imagination plays at least a leading factor.