A private landmark was a sacred boundary, and was a threshold altar for
its possessor. To remove or to disregard such a local threshold, was an
offense not only against its owner, but against the deity in whose name
it had been set up.
Among the earliest remains from unearthed Babylonia are local landmarks,
or threshold boundary stones, inscribed, severally, with a dedication
and an appeal to the deity honored by him who erected the stone. These
local landmarks were ordinarily in the form of a phallus; as phallic
forms were numerous under Babylonian temple thresholds. Among the
records of those peoples are writings, showing the importance attached
to such threshold stones, in the contracts accompanying their setting
up, and in the sacred ceremonies on that occasion.
Illustrations of the importance attached by the ancient Babylonians to a
boundary stone, or threshold landmark, are found in the records of the
imprecations inscribed on these phallic pillars, as directed against the
violator of their sacredness.[471] For example, a Babylonian, Sir-usur
[“O snake-god protect”], a descendant of the house of Habban, presented
a valuable tract of land to his daughter on her betrothal to
Tâbashâp-Marduk. The withering curse inscribed on the conventional
boundary-stone pillar is as follows:
“For all future time: Whosoever, of the brothers, sons, family,
relatives, descendants, servants purchased or house-born, of the house
of Habban, be he a prefect, or an overseer, or anybody else, shall rise
and stand up to take this field away, or to remove this boundary stone,
and causes this field to be presented to a god, or sends some one to
take it away [for the state], or brings it into his own possession; who
changes the area, the limit, or the boundary stone, divides it into
pieces, or takes a piece from it, saying, ‘The field and _mulugi_[472]
have not been presented;’ or who on account of the dire curse [written]
on this boundary stone, sends a fool, a deaf man, a blind man, a
reckless man, an enemy, an alien, an ignorant man, and causes this
inscribed stone to be removed, throws it into the water, hides it in the
earth, crushes it with a stone, burns it with fire, effaces it and
writes something else on it, or puts it into a place where nobody can
see it,–upon this man may the great gods Anu, Bêl, Ea, and Nusku, look
wrathfully, uproot his foundation, and destroy his offspring. May
Marduk, the great lord, cause him to carry dropsy as an ever-entangling
net; may Shamash the judge, greatest of heaven and earth, decide all his
lawsuits, standing relentlessly against him; may Sin, the light dwelling
in the brilliant heavens, cover him with leprosy as a garment; like a
wild ass may he lie down at the wall surrounding his city; may Ishtar,
mistress of heaven and earth, lead him into evil daily before the god
and the king; may Ninib, born in the temple Ekura, the sublime son of
Bêl, uproot his area, his limit, and his boundary stone; may Gula, the
great physician, consort of the god Ninib, put never-ceasing poison into
his body till he urinates blood and pus like water; may Rammân, first of
heaven and earth, the strong son of the god Anu, inundate his field, and
destroy the corn, that thorns may shoot up, and may his feet tread down
vegetation and pasturage; may Nabû, the sublime messenger, bring want
and famine upon him, and whatsoever he desires for the hole of his mouth
may he not obtain; and may the great gods, as many names as are
mentioned on this inscribed stone, curse him with a dire curse that
cannot be removed, and destroy his seed for ever and ever.”[473]
Prominence is given, in the ancient laws of India, to the manner in
which disputed boundaries between villages, and between land owners,
shall be settled; and it is made evident that a peculiar sacredness
attaches to these landmarks. The king was to decide the dispute, after
hearing testimony and examining evidence. Trees, and mounds, or heaps of
earth, were preferred as landmarks; and tanks, wells, cisterns, and
fountains, as also temples, were desired on boundary lines.[474]
Emphasis was laid on the sacredness of the local landmark, in the laws
of the Hebrews; and a curse was pronounced against him who dared remove
this threshold altar. “Thou shalt not remove thy neighbor’s landmark,
which they of old time have set, in thine inheritance which thou shalt
inherit, in the land that the Lord thy God giveth thee,” was an
injunction in the fundamental law of the Promised Land.[475] And it
passed into a proverb of duty: “Remove not the ancient landmark, which
thy fathers have set.”[476] It was a reproach to a people that there
were those among them who would “remove the landmarks” and disregard
sacred property rights.[477] And among the curses which were to be
spoken from the summit of Ebal, when Israel took possession of Canaan,
was this: “Cursed be he that removeth his neighbor’s landmark. And,” it
was added, “all the people shall say, Amen.”[478]
Abraham and Abimelech found that their followers were quarreling over
the boundary line between their respective domains on the borders of the
Negeb. Abraham claimed the well at Beer-sheba as his by right, but the
servants of Abimelech forcibly took possession of it. So the two
chieftains met and agreed upon a border line, and made a covenant with
accompanying sacrifices. “And Abraham planted a tamarisk tree in
Beer-sheba” as his border landmark, “and called there on the name of the
Lord, the Everlasting God.”[479] Border landmarks were in the form of a
pillar, a tree, a heap, or a stele, in Oriental countries generally.
When Jacob and Laban agreed to part in peace after their stormy meeting
in Gilead, they set up a heap of stones and a stone pillar as a monument
of witness of their mutual covenant, and as a landmark of their agreed
territorial boundary. This memorial of their covenant was called
“Galeed,” or “Witness Heap,” and “Mizpah,” or “Watch Tower.” “And Laban
said to Jacob, Behold this heap, and behold the pillar, which I have set
betwixt me and thee. This heap be witness, and the pillar be witness,
that I will not pass over this heap to thee, and that thou shalt not
pass over this heap and this pillar unto me, for harm. The God of
Abraham, and the God of Nahor, the God [or, gods] of their father, judge
betwixt us.”[480] The new boundary mark was a token of a sacred
covenant.
In classic literature and customs the sacred boundary landmark is
prominent as devoted to, or as representing, various deities, at
different times. Zeus and Hermes among the Greeks; Jupiter, Mercury,
Silvanus, and Terminus, among the Romans, are sometimes interchangeably
referred to in this connection. The legends and symbols employed seem to
indicate that life and its transmission took their start at the
threshold boundary, and therefore a pillar or a phallus marked every new
beginning along a road or at a territorial boundary.
An image of Zeus, or Jupiter, was sometimes employed as a boundary
landmark, and an image of Hermes, or Mercury, was at the starting-point
of a road, and again at various points along the road. Zeus, or Jupiter,
was chief of gods as the arbiter of life. Hermes, or Mercury, was
earliest known as the fertilizing god of earth, and hence was the
promoter of all forms of life, as guardian of flocks, fish, fields, and
fruits. He also guarded those who went out from the threshold.
Sacrifices were offered to him by Athenian generals as they started on
their expeditions. He was even spoken of as the inventor of sacrifices
and the promoter of commerce and of enrichment.[481]
Of Terminus, Ovid say: “When the night shall have passed away [and the
threshold of a new day is to be crossed], let the god who by his
landmark divides the fields be worshiped with the accustomed honors.
Terminus,[482] whether thou art a stone, or whether a stock sunk deep in
the field by the ancients, yet even in this form thou dost possess
divinity.”[483] This symbol of Terminus was regularly “sprinkled with
the blood of a slain lamb,” in recognition of its sacredness.
It is said that Numa, the second king of Rome, who was revered by the
Romans as the author of their whole system of religious worship,
directed that every one should mark the boundaries of his landed
property by stones consecrated to Jupiter, and that yearly sacrifices
should be offered at these boundary stones, at the festival of the
Terminalia.[484] At this festival the two owners of adjacent property
crowned the statue or stone pillar with garlands, and raised a rude
altar, on which they offered up corn, honeycombs, and wine, and
sacrificed a lamb or a sucking pig, with accompanying praises to the
god.[485]
Silvanus also was a god of the boundary. He was represented by a tree
grove, as Terminus was by a pillar, and offerings of fruit, grain, and
milk, and of pigs, were made to him. When he would be guarded against as
a source of evil in a home, the protectors of the inmates would perform
certain ceremonies at the threshold of the house.
A tree, and sometimes a grove, was the sacred landmark of a village
boundary in primitive lands. Such trees and groves are still to be found
in Equatorial Africa. Describing some of these in Zinga and its
vicinity, Stanley expresses surprise that they have so long remained
untouched in “a country left to the haphazard care of patriarchal chiefs
ignorant of written laws.”[486] But reverence for a threshold landmark
seems to be in the very nature of a primitive people, as truly as any
primitive sentiment; and sentiment is in itself a dominant law.
At the boundary line between two villages in Samoa, in olden time, there
were two stones said to have been two living beings. When any quarrel
arose, those engaged in it were told, “Go and settle it at the stones;”
and they went to those boundary line stones and fought out their
contest.[487]
Trees and stone pillars are still known as boundary landmarks between
parishes and townships in Europe and America, as in Asia, Africa, and
Polynesia in more primitive days; and their importance is recognized as
peculiar, even if not always absolutely sacred. The annual custom of
“beating the bounds” of a parish by the parish authorities survives in
some parts of England to-day. A procession makes the circuit of the
parish boundary, under the care of a “select vestryman,” or other parish
official, halting at every landmark to identify it and carefully to
observe its location.
In former times it was customary to take the boys of the parish on this
round, and beat them at every landmark, in order to impress upon their
memories its precise position. More recently the boys are permitted to
carry willow wands peeled white, and with these to beat the landmarks.
The later plan is certainly more satisfactory to the boys, and it is
quite as likely to impress their memories. Formerly this ceremony was
accompanied by religious services, in which the clergyman invoked curses
on him who “transgresseth the bounds and doles of his neighbor,” and
blessings on him who regarded the landmarks.[488]
It has been suggested that this fixing and honoring of the landmarks by
an annual festival goes back to the Roman Terminalia, in the days of
Numa, but there is reason to believe that it was far earlier than that.
There are traces of it in primitive times, among various primitive
peoples.
In Russia, the Cossacks long had a custom somewhat like this, in the
case of a disputed boundary line. When the boundary had been formally
determined, all the boys of the two contiguous stanitsas, or land
divisions, were collected, and driven by the people along the frontier
line. “At each landmark a number of boys were soundly whipped and
allowed to run home,” in order that in later years they might be able to
testify as to the spot where that landmark stood. In cases where the
boys’ memory failed to be accurate, an arbiter was chosen from the older
inhabitants, and sworn to act honestly to the best of his knowledge; and
his decision was accepted as final.[489]
A similar custom of beating the bounds under a “selectman” of the town
has existed in portions of New England until recently, and perhaps it
has not yet died out there. Thus Ralph Waldo Emerson speaks of the
selectmen of Concord perambulating the bounds of its township “once in
five years,” up to 1858.[490] Is there not a survival of this old custom
in the habit of striking a child on his birthday as many blows as he has
passed years, when he comes to the threshold of another year of his
life?
Mile-posts would seem to have been originally landmarks separating the
public way from private lands, being placed at regular distances along
the road for convenience of measurement and locating. They marked the
threshold of the “king’s highway” to and from his capital in the Roman
empire, as trees marked the border-lines of the principal roads in
Greece.