CAVE ORACLES
Standing upon the pinnacle upon which is planted the marvellous
Romanesque cathedral of Le Puy, and looking north, is seen in the
distance the basaltic mass of Polignac crowned by a lofty donjon.
That mass of columnar basalt was occupied and held sacred in Roman
times, and was dedicated to Apollo. In the courtyard of the castle is a
well, l'Albime it is called, that descends to the depth of 260 feet,
and there still exists an enormous stone mask of the solar god that
closed it, and from the mouth of which oracles were given. How these
were produced is now made clear. In the side of the well is a chamber
cut out of the rock that concealed a confederate who uttered the
response to the questioner, and the voice came up hollow and with
reverberation betwixt the gaping lips of stone, to overawe and satisfy
the inquirer.
"Before the old tribes of Hellas created temples to the divinities,"
says Porphyry in his treatise 'On the Cave of the Nymphs,' "they
consecrated caverns and grottoes to their service in the island of
Crete to Zeus, in Arcadia to Artemis and Pan, in the isle of Naxos to
Dionysos."
And from caves issued the most famous Grecian oracles, and the
mysteries were often celebrated in them. The cave in which Zeus as an
infant was concealed on Mount Ida naturally became sacred. Kronos had
received the Kingdom of the World on condition that he should rear no
male children. Accordingly when one was born he ate it. But when Zeus
arrived, his mother gave Kronos a stone to eat in place of the child,
and hurried off the babe to Crete, where it was nourished in a cave by
the Corybantes, who sounded cymbals and drums to drown his cries.
There was a Charonion at Hierapolis, an account of which we get from
Apulæus and Dio Cassius. It was deep. From the orifice, which was
surrounded by a balustrade, escaped so dense a vapour that animals held
in it died, and men who inhaled it were stupefied. The priests who
ministered to the oracle professed to be immune, but Strabo tells us
that they simply held their breath when they stooped over the fumes. He
who desired to consult the oracle was for a while placed on a platform
above the opening.
On the flank of Mount Citheron was a cave dedicated to the Nymphs.
Those who desired to inquire of them entered the grotto, when it was
supposed that the Nymphs inspired them with a knowledge of the future;
and such persons were entitled _Nympholeptes_. The corresponding
expression among the Latins was _lymphatici_, expressive of the
pale and exhausted condition in which they were when they issued from
the cave. Eusebius, Bishop of Cæsarea says: "There are exhalations that
produce drowsiness and procure visions;" and Apulæus says: "Due to the
religious fury they inspire, men remain without eating or drinking, and
some become prophets and reveal future things."
Apollo was the god of prophecy above all others. He was born at Delos,
according to the poets; and it is there that the Homeric poems say was
one of his most ancient sanctuaries. Thence, doubtless, issued the
twenty famous oracles at the epoch of the colonisation. At Delphi the
priestess was seated on a tripod over a crack in the rock, from which
exhaled mephitic vapours that rendered her delirious, and her
incoherent exclamations were reduced into hexameters by the attendant
priests. But there was also at Delos the Manteion, the prophetic
grotto. This has of late years been discovered along with the
foundations of the temple. The Manteion is a gallery, naturally bored
in the rock. The winds that penetrate it cause strange pipings and
hollow moans, that served as an accompaniment to the oracles. But the
most remarkable of these caverns was that of Trophonios in Beotia.
Pausanius tells us the legend of its origin. The Beotians had suffered
from drought for two years and sent to consult the oracle of Delphi.
The reply received was that they must refer themselves to Trophonios at
home. But who was the party? The Beotians had never heard of him. Then
the oldest of their deputies recalled having once pursued a swarm of
bees and followed it till it disappeared in a cave. That doubtless was
the spot, and there, after the offering of sacrifices, Trophonios
obligingly showed himself, and explained who he was and what were his
powers. Since that time his oracle was much consulted, and happily an
account of how he, or his priests, befooled visitors to the cave has
been given us by Pausanius from his personal experience.
Those who wished to consult the oracle had first to purify themselves
by spending some days in the sanctuary of the Guardian Spirit and of
Fortune, to abstain from warm baths, but to bathe in the river
Hercynia; they might eat as much as they liked of the meat offered in
sacrifice. "You are conducted during the night to the river, where you
are bathed and rubbed with oil by two boys of the age of thirteen. Then
the priests take possession of you, and you are conducted to two
fountains side by side. You drink of one, that of Oblivion, so as to
disengage your thoughts from what is past, then that of Remembrance, to
assure your recollecting what is about to take place. After having
addressed your prayers to a statue, you go to the oracle, dressed in a
linen tunic girded below the breast, and booted in the fashion of the
country. The oracle is on the mountain above the sacred grove. It is
surrounded by a marble wall, about the height of your waist. On this wall
are planted twigs of copper linked together by copper filaments, and the
gates are in this grating. Within this enclosure is a chasm, not
natural, but excavated with a good deal of art and regularity, in form
like a baker's oven. There is no ladder there for descent into the
cave, and one is brought, that is light and narrow. Once at the bottom
you see on one side, between the ground and the masonry, a hole about
large enough for a man to squeeze through. One lies on the back, and
holding in one hand a honey-cake, thrust the feet in at the opening,
and then work oneself till the legs are in up to the knees. Then, all
at once, the rest of the body is dragged down with force and rapidity,
just as if you were swept forward by an eddy in a river.
"Once arrived in the secret place, all do not learn the future in the
same manner. Some see what is to befall them unrolled in vision, others
hear it by the ear. Then you ascend by the same opening whereby you
descended, going feet foremost. No one, it is said, has died in the
cave, with the exception of one of the guardsmen of Demetrius, and he
went down, not to consult the god, but in hopes of plundering the
sanctuary of its gold and silver; his carcase, they say, was not
ejected by the orifice that is sacred, but was found in another spot.
On issuing from the cave of Trophonios the priests lay hold of you, and
after having planted you on the seat of Remembrance, question you as to
what you have seen and heard. When you have told them, they hand you
over, overwhelmed with fear, and unrecognisable by yourself and others,
to other ministers who convey you to the edifice dedicated to the Good
Genius and to Fortune."
Those issuing from the cave for long after remained dejected, pale, and
melancholy. Pausanius says that after a while one who had gone through
the ordeal could laugh; but Suidas tells us that those who returned
from having made the descent never smiled again, and this gave occasion
to a saying relative to a preternaturally grave personage, "He has
consulted the oracle of Trophonios."
Plutarch gives us some further particulars. The description made by one
of the characters he introduces speaks of visions caught by inhaling a
stupefying gas. Under its influence hallucinations were produced in
which Trophonios himself was thought to appear, and the tortures of
Tartarus were revealed. On emerging from the cave into fresh air, the
questioner fell into fits of delirium, and thought he still saw strange
visions. In the biography of Apollonios of Tyana, Philostratus tells us
that the sage and wonder-worker was very desirous to penetrate into the
cave, but that the priest raised objections and made difficulties, till
at last his patience failed and he entered by main force and remained
within seven days. So much in this semi-fictitious biography is true
perhaps--that this hero did force his way in. It is also true that he
had sufficient discretion not to tell what he had discovered of the
tricks there perpetrated.
There was another of these caves at Acharaca, near Nysa, on the road to
Tralles. The gas there exhaled had a medical healing virtue, and also
gave occasion to the delivery of oracles. Persons suffering from an
illness and placing confidence in the power of the gods, travelled
thither and stayed some time with the priests, who lived near the cave.
Those ministers of the gods then entered the cavern and spent a night
in it. After that they prescribed to their patients the remedies
revealed to them in their dreams. Often, however, they took their
patients along with them into the cave, where they were expected to
remain for several days fasting and falling into prophetic sleep.
About four centuries before the Christian era, there existed at Rome a
temple dedicated to Jupiter Capitolinus, by the Tarquins, and beneath
it was a subterranean chamber in which were preserved a collection of
ancient oracles, the keeping of which was confided to his officers, the
duumviri, and the penalty of death attached to the divulgation
unlicensed, of their contents.
According to the legend, a strange woman, the sibyl of Cumæ, brought to
Tarquin the old nine books of oracles, and demanded for them three
hundred pieces of gold. The king considered the price exorbitant,
scoffed at the woman, and refused to buy. Thereupon the sibyl cast
three of the volumes into the fire, and demanded the same sum precisely
for the remaining six. Tarquin again declined to purchase. She then
burnt three more, but still required for the remainder the original
price. The king now thought that he had acted unwisely, and hastened to
conclude the bargain and secure the oracles that contained prophecies
relative to the destiny of the Roman people.
The oracles were written on palm-leaves in Greek, and with various
signs and hieroglyphs, and the volumes were bundles of these leaves
tied together.
In the year 671 of Rome, eighteen years before the Christian era, the
old Temple of Jupiter, built by the Tarquins, was destroyed by fire,
and with it perished the Books of Destiny. Six years after the temple
was rebuilt, and an attempt was made to recover the Sibylline oracles,
by sending throughout Italy for oracles reported to be Sibylline. The
deputies sent brought back from Erythæa a thousand verses, but the
collection rapidly increased in such quantities that Augustus ordered
them to be examined, and such as proved to be worthless he burnt. After
a second sifting, those that remained were put into two golden coffers
and placed under the pedestal of the statue of the Palatine Apollo.
As is well known, there were in circulation a number of forged
Sibylline oracles; some of these were the product of the Jewish
Therapeutæ, others of Christians. In his hatred of Christianity, the
Emperor Julian ordered search to be made for these fictitious oracular
books, that they might be destroyed. In 363 the Temple of the Palatine
Apollo caught fire and was destroyed. The Christians charged Julian
with having caused the fire so as to get rid of the Sibylline oracles
hid under the statue of Apollo. But these had not been injured; the
gold boxes in which they were, were opened, and to their confusion the
Christians found that the oracles contained no prophecies concerning
Christ, only _sortes_ celebrating the gods Zeus, Aphrodite, Hera,
&c.
The accusation brought by the Christians against Julian recoiled upon
them, for it was they who, later, by the hands of Stilicho, destroyed
the collection. The order for the destruction was given by two
Christian emperors, Honorius and Arcadius, on the plea that these
oracles favoured and encouraged paganism.
Saul, it will be remembered went to consult a witch in the cave of
Endor, where she conjured up before him the spirit of Samuel.
Isaiah rebukes the Jews for "lodging in the monuments," doubtless to
obtain oracles from the dead, to raise up the ghosts of the deceased,
and exhort from them prophecies as to the future. As already pointed
out, the dead and the pagan gods were one and the same. To consult a
deity was to consult a hero or an ancestor of a former age.
There is a curious story in an Icelandic Saga of a shepherd, named
Hallbjörn, on a farm where was a huge cairn over the dead scald or poet
Thorleif. The shepherd, whilst engaged on his guard over his master's
flock, was wont to lie on the ground and sleep there. On one occasion
he saw the cairn open and the dead man come forth, and Thorleif
promised to endow him with the gift of poetry if he would compose his
first lay in his, the dead man's praise. And he further promised that
Hallbjörn should become a famous scald and sing the praises of great
chieftains. Thereupon the tenant of the tomb retired within again, and
the shepherd on waking found himself endowed with poetic gift, and he
sang a lay in honour of Thorleif. "And he became a famous scald, and
went abroad, and sang songs in honour of many great men, and obtained
high honour, and good gifts, and became very wealthy." [Footnote:
Fornmavma Sögur, Copenh. 1827, iii. pp. 102-3.]
It will be remembered that Saul's interview was with the ghostly Samuel
through the intervention of the witch. And there are many stories of
living men endeavouring to obtain knowledge of the future through
invocation of the spirits of the dead. Indeed spiritualists at the
present day carry on the same business.
One thing that conduced to the belief that certain caves were inhabited
by gods and spirits, was that strange sounds at times issued from them.
These were caused by currents of air entering some of the apertures and
vibrating through the passages, provoking notes as if these galleries
were organ pipes. This is the explanation of the Æolian cavern of
Terni, supposed to be the abode of spirits; and a cave near Eisenach
was long reported to be an entrance to hell, because of the moans and
sighs that were heard issuing from it.
The echo also was quite inexplicable to the ignorant, and was assumed
to be the voice of some spirit or mountain gnome living in the heart of
the rock, to whose habitation a cave gave access.
An abandoned mine with a pool at the bottom, on Dartmoor, is thought to
be the abode of a spirit whose wails may be heard when the wind blows,
and whence a voice issues calling out the name of that person who is
next doomed to die in the parish of Walkhampton.
The most remarkable representative in the Middle Ages of the cave of
Trophonios was that in Lough Derg in Ireland, the purgatory of S.
Patrick as it was called. The origin is obscure, but it sprang into
notoriety through the publication by a monk, Henry of Saltrey, of the
descent of a knight Owain into it. Owain had been in the service of
King Stephen, and he made his descent in the year 1153. Whether there
ever were such a person as the knight Owain, or whether he was a mere
invention of Henry of Saltrey is uncertain. Saltrey's account is
precise as to the various stages through which Owain passed, and it is
a vulgar rendering of the common stories of visits to purgatory, of
which Dante's is the highest and most poetical version.
Lough Derg is among the dreary and barren mountains and moorlands in
the south of the County of Donegal; in it is an island, with ribbed and
curiously shaped rocks, and among these was supposed to be the entrance
to purgatory.
Giraldus Cambrensis, who wrote his "Topography of Ireland" in 1187,
mentions the island in Lough Derg as among the wonders of Ireland.
[Footnote: But there is no mention of it among the wonders of Ireland
in the Irish Nennius.] It was, he says, divided into two parts, of
which one was fair and pleasant, while the other part was wild and
rough, and believed to be inhabited only by demons. In this part of the
island, he adds, there were nine pits, in any one of which, if a person
was bold enough to pass the night, he would be so much tormented by the
demons that it was a chance if he were found alive in the morning; and
it was reported that he who escaped alive would, from the anguish he
suffered there, be relieved from the torments of the other world.
Giraldus continues by telling us that the natives called the place
Patrick's purgatory, and that it was said that the saint had obtained
from God this public manifestation of the punishments and rewards of
the other world, in order to convince his incredulous hearers.
Numerous visitors to Lough Derg in the Middle Ages published the
narrative of what they had there seen and undergone, and rivalled each
other in the extravagance of their accounts. There was a monastery on
Lough Derg, and the monks had the key to the entrance to the cavern,
but no visitor was suffered to pass within without the consent of the
bishop of the diocese, and the payment of a heavy fee. Among all the
extravagance that was written by visitors about the purgatory, some
retained their common sense, and perceived that there was either fraud
or hallucination in the visions there supposed to be seen.
Froissart gives an account of a conversation he had with Sir William
Lisle on this subject: "On the Friday in the morning we rode out
together, and on the road I asked him if he had accompanied the King in
his expedition to Ireland. He said he had. I then asked him if there
was any foundation of truth in what was said of S. Patrick's Hole. He
replied that there was, and that he and another knight had been there.
They entered it at sunset, remained there the whole night, and came out
at sunrise the next morning. I requested him to tell me whether he saw
all the marvellous things that are said to be seen there. He made me
the following answer: 'When I and my companion had passed the entrance
of the cave, called the purgatory of S. Patrick, we descended three or
four steps (for you go down into it as into a cellar), but found our
heads so much affected by the heat that we seated ourselves on the
steps, which are of stone, and such a drowsiness came on that we slept
there the whole night.' I asked if, when asleep, they knew where they
were, and what visions they had. He replied that they had many and
strange dreams, and they seemed, as they imagined, to see more than
they would have done had they been in their beds. This they were both
assured of. 'When morning came and we were awake, the door of the cave
was opened, and we came out, but instantly lost all recollection of
everything we had seen, and looked on the whole as a phantasm.'"
It is apparent from this that the wild descriptions given by others
were merely an account of their dreams or hallucinations; in many cases
purely imaginary accounts, given for the sake of creating a sensation.
I do not suppose that the monks of Lough Derg devised any scenic
effects, but left the imagination of the dupes to riot of its own
accord unassisted. In the fifteenth century a monk of Eymstadt, in
Holland, undertook the pilgrimage to Lough Derg. He arrived at the
lake, and applied to the prior for admission, who referred him to the
bishop of the diocese. The monk then repaired to him, but as he was
"poor and moneyless," the servants refused to admit him into their
master's presence. Having, however, with difficulty obtained an
audience, he begged humbly to be suffered to visit S. Patrick's
purgatory. The Bishop of Clogher demanded a certain sum of money,
which, he said, was due to him from every pilgrim who came on this
errand. The monk represented his poverty, and after much urgent
solicitation, the bishop grudgingly gave him the necessary licence. He
then went to the prior, performed the usual ceremonies, and was shut up
in the cavern. There he remained all night, in constant expectation of
seeing something dreadful; but when the prior let him out next morning
he had to admit that he had seen no vision of any sort. Thoroughly
dissatisfied with his experiences, he went direct to Rome, and reported
what he thought of S. Patrick's purgatory to Pope Alexander VI. The
Pope was convinced that the whole thing was a fraud, and ordered the
destruction of the purgatory. It was the eve of the Reformation;
mistrust of miracles was rife, and the Pope was anxious to suppress one
that when investigated might prove a scandal.
The purgatory was accordingly suppressed, the cave closed, but not
destroyed, and no pilgrims admitted to it; this was in 1497. The
closing of the cave did not, however, interfere with the pilgrimage,
and the Archbishop of Armagh in 1503 urged on Pope Pius III. to
withdraw the prohibition. This was done, and profuse indulgences were
offered to such as revisited the cave or at all events took part in the
Lough Derg pilgrimage. On 12th September 1632, Sir James Balfour and
Sir William Stewart, carrying out the orders of the Government, seized
"for her Majesty's use and benefit the Island of the Purgatory," and
unroofed and otherwise destroyed the monastic buildings there. But
superstition is not to be killed by Acts of Parliament. By a statute of
the second year of Queen Anne all pilgrimages to S. Patrick's purgatory
were decreed to be "riotous and unlawful assemblies," and were made
punishable as such; and resort to the purgatory had become more
frequent owing to Clement X. having granted a Plenary Indulgence to
such as visited it. Since then these Indulgences have been repeatedly
renewed. At present the pilgrimages are again in full swing, and there
is a prior on the island, a hospice for the reception of the visitors,
and a chapel of S. Patrick and another of S. Mary. "Between the two
churches the space is taken up with the Campanile and Penitential beds.
There are five of these beds, and they are dedicated to SS. Dabeoc,
Columba, Catherine, Brendan, and Bridget. They are circular in form,
measuring, with the exception of S. Columba's, about ten feet in
diameter. S. Columba's is about twice the size of the others. They are
surrounded with walls, varying in height from one to two feet and each
of them is entered by a narrow gap or doorway." [Footnote: "Lough
Derg," by Rev. J. E. McKenna, Dublin, n.d.]
It would seem then that the old superstitious practices are being
reverted to as nearly as the spirit of the times will allow, and the
destruction of the cave itself will admit.
It is perhaps needless to add that there is no historical evidence for
the apostle of Ireland having ever been at Lough Derg. Derg is probably
a mistake for Deirg, and Lough Deirg would mean the Lake of the Cave.
Gough, in his additions to Camden, thus described the purgatory: "It
was about sixteen feet and a half long, by two feet one inch wide,
built of freestone, covered with broad flags and green turf laid over
them, and was so low and narrow that a tall man could hardly sit, much
less stand in it. In the side was a window just wide enough to admit a
faint ray of light; in the floor a cavity capable of containing a man
at his length, and under a large stone at the end of the pavement a
deep pit; the bottom of the cave was originally much below the surface
of the ground. It stood on the east side of the church, in the
churchyard, encompassed with a wall, and surrounded by circles or
cells, called the beds, scarcely three feet high, denominated from
several saints. The penitents who visited the island, after fasting on
bread and water for nine days and making processions round these holy
stations thrice a day barefoot, for the first seven days, and six times
on the eighth, washing their weary limbs each night in the lake, on the
ninth enter the cave. Here they observe a twenty-four hours fast,
tasting only a little water, and upon quitting it bathe in the lake,
and so conclude the ceremony.
"Leave being first obtained of the bishop, the prior represented to the
penitents all the horror and difficulty of the undertaking, suggesting
to them at the same time an easier penance. If they persevered in their
resolution, they were conducted to the door with a procession from the
convent, and after twenty-four hours confinement let out next morning
with the like ceremony." [Footnote: "St. Patrick's Purgatory," by
Thomas Wright, London, 1844. _Analecta Bollandiana,_ t. xxvii.
(1908). O'Connor, "St. Patrick's Purgatory," Dublin, 1895. MacRitchie,
"A Note on St. Patrick's Purgatory," in the Journal of the Roy. Soc. of
Ant. of Ireland, 1901.]
As may well be supposed, after the long preliminaries and the heavy
fees paid, the penitents could hardly, unless unusually strong-minded
like the Dutch monk, declare roundly that they had seen nothing. I do
not suppose, as already said, that there was any fraud deliberately
enacted, personages dressing up as devils and angels, but that the
visitor's own dreams, and his vanity or lively imagination were left to
propagate the story of the marvels to be seen and heard in Lough Derg.
But wonderful caves, entrances to a mysterious underworld, are common
in all countries. A story is told of Friar Conrad, the Confessor of S.
Elizabeth of Thuringia, a barbarous, brutal man, who was sent into
Germany by Gregory IX. to burn and butcher heretics. The Pope called
him his "dilectus filius." In 1231 he was engaged in controversy with a
heretical teacher, who, beaten in argument, according to Conrad's
account, offered to show him Christ and the Blessed Virgin, who with
their own mouths would ratify the doctrine taught by the heretic. To
this Conrad submitted, and was led into a cave in the mountains. After
a long descent they entered a hall brilliantly illumined, in which sat
a King on a golden throne and by him the Queen Mother. The heretic
prostrated himself in adoration, and bade Conrad do the same. But the
latter drew forth a consecrated host and adjured the vision, whereupon
all vanished.
The German stories of the mountain of Venus, in which the Tannhäuser
remains, or of Frederick Barbarossa, in the Unterberg, or the Welsh
stories of King Arthur in the heart of the mountain, seen occasionally,
or the Danish fables of Holger Dansk in the vaults under the
Kronnenburg, all refer to the generally spread belief in an underworld
inhabited by spirits.
In the year 1529 died Lazarus Aigner of Bergheim, near Salzburg, a poor
man. At his death he handed over to his son a MS. account of a descent
he had made into the underworld in 1484, and this was at once published
and created a considerable sensation.
According to his account, in the year just mentioned, he was on the
Unterberg with his master, the parish priest, Elbenberger, and another,
when they visited a chapel on the rock, above the entrance to which
were cut the letters S.O.R.G.E.I.S.A.T.O.M., out of which they could
make nothing.
On returning home the priest observed that he wished that Lazarus would
revisit the place, and make sure that the inscription had been
accurately copied. Accordingly, next day, Aigner reascended the
mountain and found the chapel again. But he had started late, having
his ordinary work to do before he had leisure to go, and the evening
was darkening in. As the way led by precipices, he deemed it
inadvisable to retrace his steps that night, and so laid himself down
to sleep. Next morning, Thursday, he woke refreshed, but to his
amazement saw standing before him an aged barefooted friar, who asked
him whence he came and what had brought him there. To this Lazarus
Aigner answered truthfully. Then the hermit said to him, "I will
explain to you what is the signification of these letters, and will
show you something in vision."
Then the barefooted friar led him into a chasm, and unlocked an iron
door in the rock, by means of which Lazarus was admitted into the heart
of the mountain. There he saw a huge hall out of which went seven
passages that led to the cathedral of Salzburg, the church of
Reichenhall, Feldkirch in Tirol, Gemund, Seekirchen, S. Maximilien, S.
Michael, Hall, St. Zeno, Traunstein, S. Dionysius and S. Bartholmæ on
the Konigsee. Here also Aigner saw divine worship conducted by dead
monks and canons, and with the attendance of countless dead of all
times in strange old-world costumes. He recognised many whom he had
known when alive. Then he was shown the library, and given the
interpretation of the mysterious letters, but as it was in Latin,
Aigner forgot it. After seven days and as many nights spent in the
underground world, he returned to daylight, and as the hermit parted
with him he solemnly bade him reserve the publication of what he had
seen and heard till the expiration of thirty-five years, when times of
distress and searchings of heart would come, and then the account of
his vision might be of profit. And exactly at the end of the thirty-
five years Lazarus Aigner died. There can be little doubt that, if the
whole was not a clumsy fabrication, it was the record of a dream he had
when sleeping, on the mountain outside the chapel of the Unterberg.
Roderic, the last of the Goths, has been laid hold of by legend and by
poetry. Southey wrote his poem on the theme, and Scott his "Vision of
Don Roderic," an odd blunder in the title, as _don_ was not used
prior to the ninth century. Roderic ascended the throne of the Goths in
Spain in 709. According to the legend he seduced the daughter of
Julian, Count of the Gothic possessions in Africa. She complained to
her father, and he in revenge invited the Moors, whom he had hitherto
valiantly opposed, to aid him in casting Roderic from his throne, the
issue of which was the defeat and death of Roderic, and the occupation
of nearly the whole peninsula by the Moors. At Toledo is a cave with a
tower at its entrance formerly dedicated to Hercules, and tradition
said that he who entered would learn the future fate of Spain. The cave
still exists. The entrance lies near San Ginos; it was opened in 1546
by Archbishop Siliceo, but has never since, according to Forbes, been
properly investigated. The story went that in spite of the entreaties
of the prelate and some of his great men, Roderic burst open the iron
door, and descended into the cave, where he found a bronze statue with
a battle-axe in its hands. With this it struck the floor repeatedly,
making the hall reverberate with the sound of the blows. Then Roderic
read on the wall the inscription, "Unfortunate king, thou hast entered
here in evil hour." On the right side of the wall were the words, "By
strange nations thou shalt be dispossessed and thy subjects departed."
On the shoulders of the statue were written the words, "I summon the
Arabs," and on its breast, "I do mine office." The king left the cave
sorrowful, and the same night an earthquake wrecked the tower and
buried the entrance to the cave.
Evidently Shakespeare had this story in his mind when he wrote the
scene of the descent of Macbeth into the cave of Hekate.
Although the oracles had ceased to speak in the pagan temples and
caves, yet the desire remained to question the spirits and to inquire
into the future, and for this purpose throughout the Middle Ages either
wizards were had recourse to that a look might be taken in their magic
mirrors, or else the churches were resorted to and the sacred text
received as the response of God to some question put by the inquirer.
When Chramm revolted against his father Clothair, he approached Dijon,
when, says Gregory of Tours, the priests of the cathedral having placed
three books on the altar, to wit the Prophets, the Acts of the
Apostles, and the Gospels, they prayed God to announce to them what
would befall Chramm, and by His power reveal whether he would be
successful and come to the throne, and they received the reply as each
opened the book.
Gregory also says that Meroveus, flying before the wrath of his father
Chilperic, placed three books on the tomb of S. Martin at Tours, the
Psalter, the Book of Kings, and the Gospels; he kept vigil all night,
and passed three days fasting. But when he opened the books at random,
the responses were so alarming that he despaired, and left the
sepulchre in tears. [Footnote: For many more instances see Lalanne
(L.), _Curiosités des Traditions_, Paris, 1847.]
The councils sought to put an end to this superstition. The sixteenth
canon of the Council of Vannes, held in 465, forbade clerks, under pain
of excommunication, to consult these _sortes sacræ_, as they were
called. This prohibition was extended to the laity by the Council of
Agde in 506, and by that of Orleans in 511. It was renewed repeatedly,
as, for instance, in the Council of Auxerre in 595, by a capitulary of
Charlemagne in 789, and by the Council of Selingstadt in 1022, but
always in vain. If inquirers might not seek for answers in the
churches, at the tombs of the Saints, they would seek them in the dens
of necromancers. In spite of this condemnation, consultation of the
divine oracles even formed a portion of the liturgy; and at the
consecration of a bishop, at the moment when the Book of the Gospels
was placed on his head, the volume was opened, and the first verse at
the head of the page was regarded as a prognostication of the character
of his episcopate. There are numerous accounts of such presages in the
chronicles. Guibert of Nogent relates, for instance, that when Landric,
elected Bishop of Noyon, was receiving episcopal unction, the text of
the Gospel foreshadowed evil--"A sword shall pierce through thine own
soul also." After having committed several crimes, he was assassinated.
He had, as his successor, the Dean of Orleans; the new bishop on being
presented for consecration, there was sought, in the Gospel, for a
prognostication concerning him, but the page proved a blank. It was as
though God had said, "With regard to this man I have nothing to say."
And in fact he died a few months later.
The same usage was practised in the Greek Church. At the consecration
of Athanasius, nominated to the patriarchate of Constantinople by
Constantine Porphyrogenetos, "Caracalla, Bishop of Nicomedia, having
brought forward the Gospel," says the Byzantine historian Pachymeros,
"the people were alert to learn the oracle of the opening of the
volume. The Bishop of Nicomedia having perceived that the leading words
were 'prepared for the devil and his angels,' groaned in his heart, and
covering the passage with his hand, turned the leaves and opened at
these words, 'and the birds of the air lodged in the branches of it,'
which seemed to have no connection with the ceremony. All that could be
was done to conceal the oracles, but it was found impossible to cover
up the fact. It was said that these passages condemned the
consecration, but they were not the effect of chance, because there is
no such thing as chance in the celebration of the divine mysteries."
When Clovis was about to attack the Visigoths and drive them out of
Aquitaine, he sent to inquire of the oracles of God at the tomb of S.
Martin. His envoys arrived bearing rich presents, and on entering the
church they heard the chanter recite the words of the psalm, "Thou hast
girded me with strength unto the battle: Thou shalt throw down mine
enemies under me. Thou hast made mine enemies also to turn their backs
upon me: and I shall destroy them that hate me" (Ps. xviii. 39, 40).
They returned with joy to the king, and the event justified the oracle.
I might fill pages with illustrations, but as these have no immediate
reference to cave oracles, I will quote no more. It is obvious that
recourse to churches and the tombs of the saints had taken the place of
inquiries at the temples of the gods, and the grottoes dedicated to
Fawns and Nymphs. So also it was by no means uncommon for recourse to
be had to churches in which to sleep so as to obtain an oracle as to
healing, as it had been customary for the same purpose to seek pagan
temples. This was called _Incubation_.
The dreams produced were often the result of inhaling a gas that
escaped in some of the caves, or through fissures in the floors of the
temples. At Hierapolis in Phrygia was a cavern of Cybele. At the close
of the fifth century, when the temple of the goddess had been
completely abandoned through the interdiction of paganism, the
philosopher Damascius, who had remained faithful to the old beliefs of
his country, descended, along with a companion, into the Charonion in
spite of the danger attending it, or was supposed to exist. He came
forth safe and sound, according to his own account, but hardly had he
reached his home before he dreamt that he had become Attys, the lover
of Cybele, and that he assisted at a festival held in his honour. There
were other such caves. In the visions seen by those sleeping in them,
the divinities of healing appeared and prescribed the remedies to be
taken by those who consulted them. Pilgrimages to these resorts--
temples and caves of Æsculapius, Isis, and Serapis, were common events.
Those who desired to consult Serapis slept in his temple at Canope.
When Alexander was sick of the malady whereof he died, his friends went
thither to learn if any cure were possible. "Those who go to inquire in
dream of the goddess Isis," says Diodorus Siculus, "recover their
health beyond expectation. Many have been healed of whom the physicians
despaired." The temples were hung with ex-votos. At Lebedes, in Lydia,
the sick went to pass the night in the temple of the Soteri, who
appeared to them in dreams. It was the same in a temple in Sardinia. So
also in one of Ino in Laconia. In the Cheronese, the goddess Hemithæa
worked the same miracles as did Isis. She appeared in dream to the
infirm and prescribed the manner in which they might be healed. In the
Charonion of Nyssa it was the priest who consulted the gods in dream.
In the temple of Æsculapius near Citheræa, a bed was always ready for
incubation. Christianity could not uproot so deeply founded
superstitious convictions and practices.
The Emperor Constantine consecrated to the archangel Michael two
churches near Byzantium, one was at Anaplous, on the Bosphorus, the
other on the opposite shore at Brochoi. This second church replaced a
temple that had, according to tradition, been founded by the Argonauts,
and was called the Sosthenion. According to John Malala, Constantine
slept in the temple and asked that he might be instructed in dream to
whom the church which was to replace it should be dedicated. Great
numbers from Byzantium and the country round had resort to these
churches to seek the guidance of the archangel in their difficulties
and a cure when sick. Sozomen, the ecclesiastical historian, relates an
instance of a cure effected in one of the churches of S. Michael.
Aquilinus, a celebrated lawyer, was ill with jaundice. "Being half
dead, he ordered his servants to carry him to the church, in hopes of
being cured there or dying there. When in it, God appeared to him in
the night and bade him drink a mixture of honey, wine and pepper. He
was cured, although the doctors thought the potion too hot for a malady
of the bile. I heard also that Probian, physician of the Court, was
also cured at the Michaelon by an extraordinary vision, of pains he
endured in his feet." "Not being able to record all the miracles in
this church, I have selected only these two out of many." [Footnote:
_Hist. Eccles._, ii. 3; see for many illustrations Maury (A.),
_La Magic_, Paris, 1860. Part II., chap. i.]
That which took place at the Michaelons on the Bosphorus occurred
elsewhere, in churches dedicated to SS. Cosmas and Damian. At Ægae in
Cilicia was a shrine of Æsculapius, and incubation was practised in his
temple. It afterwards became a church of Cosmas and Damian, and the
same practices continued after the rededication. The chain of
superstitious practices continued after the change in religion without
any alteration. In the church of S. Hilaire in France is to be seen the
saint's bed, "to which they carry insane persons, and after certain
prayers and religious rites, they lay them to sleep in the bed, and
they recover." [Footnote: _Jodocus Sincerus, Itin. Galliae,
1617._]
In my "Book of South Wales" I have shown that the same usage continued
as late as the beginning of the nineteenth century in the church of
Christchurch near Caerleon, on the gravestone of one John Colmer, and
have reproduced a print of 1805, representing a man lying there to get
cured.
We have accordingly a series of customs beginning in caves dedicated to
heathen deities, transferred to their temples, then to churches under
the invocation of Christian saints and of angels.
One might well have supposed that with the advance of education, there
would have been an end to all cave oracles and grotto apparitions. But
not so--there is a special mystery in a cave that stimulates the
imagination, and the final phase of this tendency is the apparition at
Lourdes, and the consecration of the grotto. The vision at Le Salette
has not retained its hold on the superstitious, because it was on an
alp, but that of Lourdes being in a cave, roused religious enthusiasm
to the highest pitch. That the supposed apparition talked nonsense made
the whole the more delightfully mysterious.
"Yonder, beneath the ivy which drapes the rock, the grotto opens,"
writes Zola, "with its eternally flaming candles. From a distance it
looks rather squat and misshapen, a very narrow and humble aperture for
the breath of the Infinite which issued from it. The statue of the
Virgin has become a mere speck, which seems to move in the quiver of
the atmosphere heated by the little yellow flames. To see anything it
is necessary to raise oneself; for the silver altar, the harmonium, the
heaps of bouquets thrown there, the votive offerings streaking the
smoky walls, are scarcely distinguishable from behind the railing."
The floor of the grotto is scarcely raised above the level of the river
Gave, which has had to be thrust back to make room for a passage to the
mouth of the cavern. The whole story of the apparition of the Virgin
there rests on the unsupported assertion of an hysterical scrofulous
peasant girl. But who can say that the cult of sacred grottoes is a
thing of the past when tens of thousands of pilgrims visit Lourdes
annually, and believe in the story that confers sanctity on it!
[Illustration: KYNASTON'S CAVE. Interior. On the right is Kynaston's
chamber, on the left is the stable of his horse. The lettering and date
cut in the pier were made subsequent to his death.]
[Illustration: NESS CLIFF. Cave occupied by Humphrey Kynaston the
outlaw, with his horse. In the interior is the stable as well as
Kynaston's own cell.]