[1] This is by some authorities divided into two.
ATH, or AATH, an ancient town of the province of Hainaut, Belgium,
situated on the left bank of the Dender. Pop. (1890) 9868; (1904)
11,201. Formerly it was fortified, but after the change in the defensive
system of Belgium in 1858 the fortress was dismantled and its ramparts
superseded by boulevards. Owing to a fire caused by lightning its fine
church of St Julien, dating from the 14th century, which had escaped
serious injury during many wars, was destroyed in 1817 (since rebuilt).
This left the Tour Burbant as its sole relic of the middle ages. This
tower formed part of the _donjon_ of the fortress erected by Baldwin
IV., count of Hainaut, about the year 1150. Near Ath is the fine castle
of Beloeil, the ancient seat of the princely family of Ligne. Ath is
famous for its gild of archers, whose butts are erected on the plain of
the Esplanade in the centre of the town. The town militia has the
privilege of being armed with bows and crossbows. Ath is also well known
in Hainaut for its annual fete called _le jour de ducasse--ducasse_
being the Walloon word for kermesse (fete). On this occasion a
procession escorting figures of two giants, Goliath, called locally
Goyasse, and Samson, forms the chief feature of the celebration. The
emperor Joseph II. stopped it for its "idolatrous" character, but this
act was one of the causes of the Brabant revolution of 1789. The
procession, revived in 1790, was again stopped by the French republicans
five years later, but was revived under the Empire, and has flourished
ever since.
ATHABASCA (_Athiapescow_), or ELK, a river and lake Of the province of
Alberta, Canada. The river rises in the Rocky Mountains near the
Yellowhead Pass in 52 deg. 10' N. and 117 deg. 10' W., and flows
north-east as far as Athabasca Landing, and thence north into Lake
Athabasca. It is 740 m. long and has a number of important tributaries,
including the McLeod, Pembina, Lesser Slave, which drains the lake of
that name, and Clearwater. Athabasca lake is 195 m. long, west to east,
from 20 to 32 m. wide has an area of 3085 sq. m., and is 690 ft. above
the sea. It discharges its waters northward by Slave river and the
Mackenzie system to the Arctic Ocean. On its north shore the country is
high and rocky; on the south, sandy and barren. Shallow draught steamers
navigate the lake and river, and Lesser Slave lake and river, with one
interruption--at Grand Rapids near the mouth of the Clearwater river.
ATHALARIC (516-534), king of the Ostrogoths, grandson of Theodoric,
became king of the Ostrogoths in Italy on his grandfather's death (526).
As he was only ten years old, the regency was assumed by his mother
Amalasuntha (q.v.). The murmurs of the Gothic nobles procured for their
young sovereign too early emancipation from the schoolroom. He drank
heavily, and indulged in vicious excesses which ruined his constitution.
He died on the 2nd of October 534.
ATHALIAH, in the Bible, the daughter of Ahab, and wife of Jehoram, king
of Judah. After the death of Ahaziah, her son she usurped the throne and
reigned for six years. She is said to have massacred all the members of
the royal house of Judah (2 Kings xi. 1-3), but a similar atrocity is
also ascribed to Jehu (2 Kings x. 12-14); with both notices contrast 2
Chron. xxi. 17. The sole survivor Joash was concealed in the temple by
his aunt, Jehosheba, wife of the priest Jehoida (2 Chron. xxii. 11)
These organized a revolution in favour of Joash, and caused Athaliah and
her adherents to be put to death (2 Kings xi.; 2 Chron. xxii. 10-12,
xxiii., xxiv. 7).
The story of Athaliah forms the subject of one of Racine's best
tragedies. It has been musically treated by Handel and Mendelssohn.
ATHAMAS, in Greek mythology, king of the Minyae in Boeotian Orchomenus,
son of Aeolus, king of Thessaly, or of Minyas. His first wife was
Nephele, the cloud-goddess, by whom he had two children, Phrixus and
Helle (see ARGONAUTS). Athamas and his second wife Ino were said to have
incurred the wrath of Hera, because Ino had brought up Dionysus, the son
of her sister Semele, as a girl, to save his life. Athamas went mad, and
slew one of his sons, Learchus; Ino, to escape the pursuit of her
frenzied husband, threw herself into the sea with her other son
Melicertes. Both were afterwards worshipped as marine divinities, Ino as
Leucothea, Melicertes as Palaemon (_Odyssey_ v. 333). Athamas, with the
guilt of his son's murder upon him, was obliged to flee from Boeotia. He
was ordered by the oracle to settle in a place where he should receive
hospitality from wild beasts. This he found at Phthiotis in Thessaly,
where he surprised some wolves eating sheep; on his approach they fled,
leaving him the bones. Athamas, regarding this as the fulfilment of the
oracle, settled there and married a third wife, Themisto. The spot was
afterwards called the Athamanian plain (Apollodorus i. 9; Hyginus,
_Fab_. 1-5; Ovid, _Metam._ iv. 416, _Fasti_, vi. 485; Valerius Flaccus
i. 277).
According to a local legend, Athamas was king of Halos in Phthiotis from
the first (Schol. on Apoll. Rhodius ii. 513). After his attempt on the
life of Phrixus, which was supposed to have succeeded, the Phthiots were
ordered to sacrifice him to Zeus Laphystius, in order to appease the
anger of the gods. As he was on the point of being put to death,
Cytissorus, a son of Phrixus, suddenly arrived from Aea with the news
that Phrixus was still alive. Athamas's life was thus saved, but the
wrath of the gods was unappeased, and pursued the family. It was
ordained that the eldest born of the race should not enter the
council-chamber; if he did so, he was liable to be seized and sacrificed
if detected (Herodotus vii. 197). The legend of Athamas is probably
founded on a very old custom amongst the Minyae--the sacrifice of the
first-born of the race of Athamas to Zeus Laphystius. The story formed
the subject of lost tragedies by Aeschylus, Sophocles, Euripides and
other Greek and Latin dramatists.
ATHANAGILD (d. 547) became king of the Visigoths (in Spain) in 534,
having invoked the aid of the emperor Justinian for his revolt against
his predecessor Agila. Athanagild, when himself king, vainly tried to
oust his late allies from the footing which they had gained in Spain,
nor were the Greeks finally expelled from Spain till seventy years
later. Athanagild himself is chiefly remembered for the tragic fortunes
of his daughters Brunechildis and Gavleswintha, who married two Frankish
brother kings, Sigebert and Chilperic. Athanagild died ("peacefully," as
the annalist remarks) in 547.
ATHANARIC (d. 381), a ruler of the Visigoths from about 366 to 380. He
bore the title not of king but of judge, a title which may be compared
with that of ealdorman among the Anglo-Saxon invaders of Britain.
Athanaric waged, from 367 to 369, an unsuccessful war with the emperor
Valens, and the peace by which the war was ended was ratified by the
Roman and Gothic rulers meeting on a barge in mid-stream of the Danube.
Athanaric was a harsh and obstinate heathen, and his short reign was
chiefly famous for his brutal persecution of his Christian
fellow-countrymen. In 376 he was utterly defeated by the Huns, who a few
years before had burst into Europe. The bulk of the Visigothic people
sought refuge within the Empire in the region now known as Bulgaria, but
Athanaric seems to have fled into Transylvania. Being attacked there by
two Ostrogothic chiefs he also, in 381, sought the protection of the
Roman emperor. Theodosius I. received him courteously, and he was
profoundly impressed by the glories of Constantinople, but on the
fifteenth day after his arrival he died, and was honoured by the emperor
with a magnificent funeral.
ATHANASIUS (293-373), bishop of Alexandria and saint, one of the most
illustrious defenders of the Christian faith, was born probably at
Alexandria. Of his family and of his early education nothing can be said
to be known. According to the legend, the boy is said to have once
baptized some of his playmates and thereupon to have been taken into his
house by Bishop Alexander, who recognized the validity of this
proceeding. It is certain that Athanasius was young when he took orders,
and that he must soon have entered into close relations with his bishop,
whom, after the outbreak of the Arian controversy, he accompanied as
archdeacon to the council of Nicaea. In the sessions and discussions of
the council he could take no part; but in unofficial conferences he took
sides vigorously, according to his own evidence, against the Arians, and
was certainly not without influence. He had already, before the opening
of the Council, defined his personal attitude towards the dogmatic
problem in two essays, _Against the Gentiles_ and _On the Incarnation_,
without, however, any special relation to the Arian controversy.
The essay _On the Incarnation_ is the _locus classicus_ for the
presentation of the teaching of the ancient church on the subject of
salvation. In this the great idea that God himself had entered into
humanity becomes dominant. The doom of death under which mankind had
sighed since Adam's fall could only then be averted, when the immortal
Word of God ([Greek: Logos]) assumed a mortal body, and, by yielding
this to death for the sake of all, abrogated once for all the law of
death, of which the power had been spent on the body of the Lord. Thus
was rendered possible the leading back of mankind to God, of which the
sure pledge lies in the grace of the resurrection of Christ. Athanasius
would hear of no questioning of this religious mystery. In the catchword
_Homousios_, which had been added to the creed at Nicaea, he too
recognized the best formula for the expression of the mystery, although
in his own writings he made but sparing use of it. He was in fact less
concerned with the formula than with the content. Arians and Semi-Arians
seemed to him to be pagans, who worship the creature, instead of the God
who created all things, since they teach two gods, one having no
beginning, the other having a beginning in Time and therefore of the
same nature as the heathen gods, since, like them, he is a creature.
Athanasius has no terms for the definition of the Persons in the one
"Divine" ([Greek: to theion]), which are in their substance one; and yet
he is certain that this "Divine" is not mere abstraction, but something
truly personal: "They are One," so he wrote later in his _Discourses
against the Arians_. "not as though the unity were torn into two parts,
which outside the unity would be nothing, nor as though the unity bore
two names, so that one and the same is at one time Father and then his
own Son, as the heretic Sabellius imagined. But they are two, for the
Father is Father, and the Son is not the same, but, again, the Son is
Son, and not the Father himself. But their Nature ([Greek: physis]) is
one, for the Begotten is not dissimilar ([Greek: anomoios]) to the
Begetter, but his image, and everything that is the Father's is also the
Son's."
Five months after the return from the council of Nicaea Bishop Alexander
died; and on the 8th of February 326 Athanasius, at the age of
thirty-three, became his successor. The first years of his episcopate
were tranquil; then the storms in which the remainder of his life was
passed began to gather round him. The council had by no means composed
the divisions in the Church which the Arian controversy had provoked.
Arius himself still lived, and his friend Eusebius of Nicomedia rapidly
regained influence over the emperor Constantine. The result was a demand
made by the emperor that Arius should be readmitted to communion.
Athanasius stood firm, but many accusers soon rose up against one who
was known to be under the frown of the imperial displeasure. He was
charged with cruelty, even with sorcery and murder. It was reported that
a bishop of the Meletian party (see MELETIUS) in the Thebaid, of the
name of Arsenius, had been unlawfully put to death by him. He was easily
able to clear himself of these charges; but the hatred of his enemies
was not relaxed, and in the summer of 335 he was peremptorily ordered to
appear at Tyre, where a council had been summoned to sit in judgment
upon his conduct. There appeared plainly a predetermination to condemn
him, and he fled from Tyre to Constantinople to appeal to the emperor
himself. Refused at first a hearing, his perseverance was at length
rewarded by the emperor's assent to his reasonable request that his
accusers should be brought face to face with him in the imperial
presence. Accordingly the leaders of the council, the most conspicuous
of whom were Eusebius of Nicomedia and his namesake of Caesarea, were
summoned to Constantinople. Here they did not attempt to repeat their
old charges, but found a more effective weapon to their hands in a new
charge of a political kind--that Athanasius had threatened to stop the
Alexandrian corn-ships bound for Constantinople. It is very difficult to
understand how far there was truth in the persistent accusations made
against the prince-bishop of Alexandria. Probably there was in the very
greatness of his character and the extent of his popular influence a
certain species of dominance which lent a colour of truth to some of the
things said against him. On the present occasion his accusers succeeded
at once in arousing the imperial jealousy. Without obtaining a hearing,
he was banished at the end of 335 to Treves in Gaul. This was the first
banishment of Athanasius, which lasted about one year and a half. It was
brought to a close by the death of Constantine, and the accession as
emperor of the West of Constantine II., who, in June 337, allowed
Athanasius to return to Alexandria.
He reached his see on the 23rd of November 337, and, as he himself has
told us, "the people ran in crowds to see his face; the churches were
full of rejoicing; thanksgivings were everywhere offered up; the
ministers and clergy thought the day the happiest in their lives." But
this period of happiness was destined to be short-lived. His position as
bishop of Alexandria placed him, not under his patron Constantine, but
under Constantius, another son of the elder Constantine, who had
succeeded to the throne of the East. He in his turn fell, as his father
had done in later years, under the influence of Eusebius of Nicomedia,
who in the latter half of 339 was transferred to the see of
Constantinople, the new seat of the imperial court. A second expulsion
of Athanasius was accordingly resolved upon. The old accusations against
him were revived, and he was further charged with having set at naught
the decision of a council. On the 18th of March 339 the exarch of Egypt
suddenly confronted Athanasius with an imperial edict, by which he was
deposed and a Cappadocian named Gregory was nominated bishop in his
place. On the following day, after tumultuous scenes, Athanasius fled,
and four days later Gregory was installed by the aid of the soldiery. On
the first opportunity, Athanasius went to Rome, to "lay his case before
the church." A synod assembled at Rome in the autumn of 340, and the
great council--probably that which met at Sardica in 342 or 343, where
the Orientals refused to meet the representatives of the Western
church--declared him guiltless. This decision, however, had no immediate
effect in favour of Athanasius. Constantius continued for some time
implacable, and the bold action of the Western bishops only incited the
Arian party in Alexandria to fresh severities. But the death of the
intruder Gregory, on the 26th of June 345, opened up a way of
reconciliation. Constantius decided to yield to the importunity of his
brother Constans, who had succeeded Constantine II. in the West; and the
result was the restoration of Athanasius for the second time, on the
21st of October 346. Again he returned to Alexandria amid the
enthusiastic demonstrations of the populace, which is described by
Gregory of Nazianzus, in his panegyric on Athanasius, as streaming forth
like "another Nile" to meet him afar off as he approached the city.
The six years of his residence in the West had given Athanasius the
opportunity of displaying a momentous activity. He made long journeys in
Italy, in Gaul, and as far as Belgium. Everywhere he laboured for the
Nicene faith, and the impression made by his personality was so great
that to hold fast the orthodox faith and to defend Athanasius were for
many people one and the same thing. This was shown when, after the death
of the emperor Constans, Constantius became sole ruler of East and West.
With the help of counsellors more subtle than discerning, the emperor,
with the object of uniting the various parties in the Church at any
cost, sought for the most colourless possible formula of belief, which
he hoped to persuade all the bishops to accept. As his efforts remained
for years fruitless, he used force. "My will is your guiding-line," he
exclaimed in the summer of 355 to the bishops who had assembled at Milan
in response to his orders. A series of his most defiant opponents had to
go into banishment, Liberius of Rome, Hilarius of Poitiers and Hosius of
Corduba, the last-named once the confidant of Constantine and the actual
originator of the _Homousios_, and now nearly a hundred years old. At
length came the turn of Athanasius, now almost the sole upholder of the
banner of the Nicene creed in the East. Several attempts to expel him
failed owing to the attitude of the populace. On the night of the
8th-9th of February 356, however, when the bishop was holding the
Vigils, soldiers and police broke into the church of Theonas. Athanasius
himself has described the scene for us: "I was seated upon my chair, the
deacon was about to read the psalm, the people to answer, 'For his mercy
endureth for ever.' The solemn act was interrupted; a panic arose." The
bishop, who was at first unwilling to save himself, until he knew that
his faithful followers were in safety, succeeded in escaping, leaving
the town and finding a hiding-place in the country. The solitudes of
Upper Egypt, where numerous monasteries and hermitages had been planted,
seem at this time to have been his chief shelter. In this case, benefit
was repayed by benefit, for Athanasius during his episcopate had been a
zealous promoter of asceticism and monachism. With Anthony the hermit
and Pachomius the founder of monasteries, he had maintained personal
relations, and the former he had commemorated in his _Life of Anthony_.
During his exile his time was occupied in writing on behalf of his
cause, and to this period belong some of his most important works, above
all the great _Orations or Discourses against the Arians_, which furnish
the best exposition of his theological principles.
During his absence the see of Alexandria was left without a pastor. It
is true that George of Cappadocia had taken his place; but he could only
maintain himself for a short while (February 357-October 358). The great
majority of the population remained faithful to the exile. At length, in
November 361, the way was opened to him for his return to his see by the
death of Constantius. Julian, who succeeded to the imperial throne,
professed himself indifferent to the contentions of the Church, and gave
permission to the bishops exiled in the late reign to return home. Among
others, Athanasius availed himself of this permission, and in February
362 once more seated himself upon his throne, amid the rejoicings of
the people. He had begun his episcopal labours with renewed ardour, and
assembled his bishops in Alexandria to decide various important
questions, when an imperial mandate again--for the fourth time--drove
him from his place of power. The faithful gathered around him weeping.
"Be of good heart," he said, "it is but a cloud: it will pass." His
forecast proved true; for within a few months Julian had closed his
brief career of pagan revival. As early as September 363, Athanasius was
able to travel to Jovian, the new emperor, who had sent him a letter
praising his Christian fidelity and encouraging him to resume his work.
He returned to Alexandria on the 20th of February 364. With the emperor
he continued to maintain friendly relations; but the period of repose
was short. In the spring of 365, after the accession of Valens to the
throne, troubles again arose. Athanasius was once more compelled to seek
safety from his persecutors in concealment (October 365), which lasted,
however, only for four months. In February 366 he resumed his episcopal
labours, in which he henceforth remained undisturbed. On the 2nd of May
373, having consecrated one of his presbyters as his successor, he died
quietly in his own house.
Athanasius was a man of action, but he also knew how to use his pen for
the furtherance of his cause. He left a large number of writings, which
cannot of course be compared with those of an Origen, a Basil, or a
Gregory of Nyssa. Athanasius was no systematic theologian. All his
treatises are occasional pieces, born of controversy and intended for
controversial ends. The interest in abstract exposition of clearly
formulated theological ideas is everywhere subordinate to the polemical
purpose. But all these writings are instinct with a living personal
faith, and serve for the defence of the cause; for it was not about
words that he was contending. Even those who do not sympathize with the
cause which Athanasius steadfastly defended cannot but admire his
magnanimous and heroic character. If he was imperious in temper and
inflexible in his conception of the Christian faith, he possessed a
great heart and a great intellect, inspired with an enthusiastic
devotion to Christ. As a theologian, his main distinction was his
zealous advocacy of the essential divinity of Christ. Christianity in
its Arian conception would have evaporated in a new polytheism. To have
set a dam against this process with the whole force of a mighty
personality constitutes the importance of Athanasius in the world's
history. It is with good reason that the Church honours him as the
"Great," and as the "Father of Orthodoxy."
The best edition of the works of Athanasius is the so-called Maurine
edition of Bernard de Montfaucon in 3 vols. (Paris, 1698); this was
enlarged in the 3rd edition by Giustiniani (4 vols., Padua, 1777), and
is printed in this form in Migne's _Patrologia_, vols. xxv.-xxviii. An
English translation of selections, with excellent introductions to the
several writings, was published by Archibald Robertson in the _Library
of the Nicene and Post-Nicene Fathers_, second series, vol. 4 (Oxford
and New York, 1892). There is no biography satisfactory from the
modern point of view. Studies preliminary to such a biography began to
be published by E. Schwartz in his essays, "Zur Geschichte des
Athanasius" (in the _Nachrichten der koniglichen Gesellschaft der
Wissenschaften zu Gottingen_, 1904, &c.). The life of Athanasius,
however, is so completely intertwined with the history of his time
that it is permissible to refer, for a knowledge of him, to the
general descriptions which will be found at the close of the article
ARIUS. Of the older literature, Tillemont's _Memoires pour servir a
l'histoire ecclesiastique des six premiers siecles_, vols. vi. and
viii., are still a mine of material for the historian. Of the newer
literature the following deserve to be read:--Johann Adam Mohler,
_Athanasius der Grosse und die Kirche seiner Zeit_, 2 vols. (2nd ed.,
Mainz, 1844); and Fr. Boehringer, "Arius und Athanasius," _Die Kirche
Christi und ihre Zeugen_, vol. i. part 2 (2nd ed., Stuttgart, 1874).
(G. K.)
ATHAPASCAN, a widely distributed linguistic stock of North American
Indians, the chief tribes included being the Chippewyan, Navajo, Apache,
Jicarilla, Lipan, Hupa and Wailaki. The Athapascan family is
geographically divided into Northern, Pacific and Southern. The Northern
division (Tinneh or Dene) is about Alaska, and the Yukon and Mackenzie
rivers,--the eponymous "Athabasca" tribe living round Lake Athabasca, in
the province of Alberta in Canada. The Pacific division covers a strip
of territory, some 400 m. in length, from Oregon southwards into
California. The Southern division includes Arizona and New Mexico, parts
of Utah, Colorado, Kansas and Texas, and the northern part of Mexico.
The typical tribes are those of the Northern division.
See _Handbook of American Indians_ (Washington, 1907).
ATHARVA VEDA, the fourth book of the Vedas, the ancient scriptures of
the Brahman religion. Like the other Vedas it is divided into Samhita,
Brahmanas and Upanishads, representing the spiritual element and its
magical and nationalistic development. The mantras or sayings composing
the Samhita of the Atharva Veda differ from those of the other Vedas by
being in the form of spells rather than prayers or hymns, and seem to
indicate a stage of religion lower than that of the Rig Veda.
ATHEISM (from Gr. [Greek: a-], privative, and [Greek: theos], God),
literally a system of belief which denies the existence of God. The term
as generally used, however, is highly ambiguous. Its meaning varies (a)
according to the various definitions of deity, and especially (b)
according as it is (i.) deliberately adopted by a thinker as a
description of his own theological standpoint, or (ii.) applied by one
set of thinkers to their opponents. As to (a), it is obvious that
atheism from the standpoint of the Christian is a very different
conception as compared with atheism as understood by a Deist, a
Positivist, a follower of Euhemerus or Herbert Spencer, or a Buddhist.
But the ambiguities arising from the points of view described in (b) are
much more difficult both intellectually and in their practical social
issues. Thus history shows how readily the term has been used in the
most haphazard manner to describe even the most trivial divergence of
opinion concerning points of dogma. In other words, "atheism" has been
used generally by the orthodox adherents of one religion, or even of a
single sect, for all beliefs which are different or even differently
expressed. It is in fact in these cases, like "heterodoxy," a term of
purely negative significance, and its intellectual value is of the
slightest. The distinction between the terms "religion" and "magic" is,
in a similar way, often due merely to rivalry between the adherents of
two or more mutually exclusive religions brought together in the same
community. When the psalmist declares that "the fool hath said in his
heart, there is no God," he probably does not refer to theoretical
denial, but to a practical disbelief in God's government of human
affairs, shown in disobedience to moral laws. Socrates was charged with
"not believing in the gods the city believes in." The cry of the heathen
populace in the Roman empire against the Christians was "Away with the
atheists! To the lions with the Christians!" The ground for the charge
was probably the lack of idolatry in all Christian worship. Spinoza, for
whom God alone existed, was persecuted as an atheist. A common
designation of Knox was "the atheist," although it was to him "matter of
satisfaction that our most holy religion is founded on faith, not on
reason."
In its most scientific and serious usage the term is applied to that
state of mind which does not find deity (i.e. either one or many gods)
in or above the physical universe. Thus it has been applied to certain
primitive savages, who have been thought (e.g. by Lord Avebury in his
_Prehistoric Times_) to have no religious belief; it is, however, the
better opinion that there are no peoples who are entirely destitute of
some rudimentary religious belief. In the second place, and most
usually, it is applied to a purely intellectual, metaphysical disbelief
in the existence of any god, or of anything supernatural. In this
connexion it is usual to distinguish three types of atheism:--the
_dogmatic_, which denies the existence of God positively; the
_sceptical_, which distrusts the capacity of the human mind to discover
the existence of God; and the _critical_, which doubts the validity of
the theistic argument, the proofs for the existence of God. That the
first type of atheism exists, in spite of the denials of those who
favour the second or the third, may be proved by the utterances of men
like Feuerbach, Flourens or Bradlaugh. "There is no God," says
Feuerbach, "it is clear as the sun and as evident as the day that there
is no God, and still more that there can be none." With greater passion
Flourens declares "Our enemy is God. Hatred of God is the beginning of
wisdom. If mankind would make true progress, it must be on the basis of
atheism." Bradlaugh maintained against Holyoake that he would fight
until men respected the name "atheist." The answer to dogmatic atheism,
that it implies infinite knowledge, has been well stated in John
Foster's _Essays_, and restated by Chalmers in his _Natural Theology_,
and its force is recognized in Holyoake's careful qualification of the
sense in which secularism accepts atheism, "always explaining the term
atheist to mean 'not seeing God' visually or inferentially, never
suffering it to be taken for anti-theism, that is, hating God, denying
God--as _hating_ implies personal knowledge as the ground of dislike,
and _denying_ implies infinite knowledge as the ground of disproof." But
dogmatic atheism is rare compared with the sceptical type, which is
identical with agnosticism (q.v.) in so far as it denies the capacity of
the mind of man to form any conception of God, but is different from it
in so far as the agnostic merely holds his judgment in suspense, though,
in practice, agnosticism is apt to result in an attitude towards
religion which is hardly distinguishable from a passive and unaggressive
atheism. The third or critical type may be illustrated by _A Candid
Examination of Theism_ by "Physicus" (G.J. Romanes), in which the writer
endeavours to establish the weakness of the proofs for the existence of
God, and to substitute for theism Spencer's physical explanation of the
universe, and yet admits how unsatisfying to himself the new position
is. "When at times I think, as think at times I must, of the appalling
contrast between the hallowed glory of that creed which once was mine,
and the lonely mystery of existence as now I find it--at such times I
shall ever feel it impossible to avoid the sharpest pang of which my
nature is susceptible."
Atheism has to meet the protest of the heart as well as the argument of
the mind of mankind. It must be judged not only by theoretical but by
practical arguments, in its relations either to the individual or to a
society. Voltaire himself, speaking as a practical man rather than as a
metaphysician, declared that if there were no God it would be necessary
to invent one; and if the analysis is only carried far enough it will be
found that those who deny the existence of God (in a conventional sense)
are all the time setting up something in the nature of deity by way of
an ideal of their own, while fighting over the meaning of a word or its
conventional misapplication.
ATHELM (d. 923), English churchman, is said to have been a monk of
Glastonbury before his elevation in 909 to the see of Wells, of which he
was the first occupant. In 914 he became archbishop of Canterbury.
ATHELNEY, a slight eminence of small extent in the low level tract about
the junction of the rivers Tone and Parrett in Somersetshire, England.
It was formerly isolated by marshes and accessible only by boat or
artificial causeway, and under these conditions it gained its historical
fame as the retreat of King Alfred in 878-879 when he was unable to
withstand the incursions of the Danes. After regaining his throne he
founded a monastery here in gratitude for the retreat afforded him by
the island; no traces of it exist above ground, but remains have been
excavated. There was also found here, in 1693, the celebrated Alfred
jewel, bearing his name, and preserved in the Ashmolean Museum at
Oxford. An inscribed pillar commemorating the king was set up in 1801.
The name of Athelney signifies the Isle of Princes (A.S.
_AEthelingaea_). Athelney is a railway station on a branch of the Great
Western line.
ATHENA (the Attic form of the Homeric Athene, also called Athenaia,
Pallas Athene, Pallas), one of the most important goddesses in Greek
mythology. With Zeus and Apollo, she forms a triad which represents the
embodiment of all divine power. No satisfactory derivation of the name
Athena has been given[1]; Pallas, at first an epithet, but after Pindar
used by itself, may possibly be connected with [Greek: pallakhe]
("maiden"). Athena has been variously described as the pure aether, the
storm-cloud, the dawn, the twilight; but there is little evidence that
she was regarded as representing any of the physical powers of nature,
and it is better to endeavour to form an idea of her character and
attributes from a consideration of her cult-epithets and ritual.
According to the legend, her father Zeus swallowed his wife Metis
("counsel"), when pregnant with Athena, since he had been warned that
his children by her might prove stronger than himself and dethrone him.
Hephaestus (or Prometheus) subsequently split open his head with a
hatchet, and Athena sprang forth fully armed, uttering a loud shout of
victory (Hesiod, _Theogony_, 886; Pindar, _Olympia_, vii. 35). In Crete
she was said to have issued from a cloud burst asunder by Zeus.
According to Roscher, the manner of her birth represents the storm-cloud
split by lightning; Farnell (_Cults of the Greek States_, i. p. 285)
sees in it an indication that, as the daughter of Metis, Athena was
already invested with a mental and moral character, and explains the
swallowing of Metis (for which compare the story of Cronus and his
children) by the desire to attribute an extraordinary birth to one in
whom masculine traits predominated. In another account (as [Greek:
Tritogeneia]) she is the daughter of the river Triton, to which various
localities were assigned, and wherever there was a river (or lake) of
that name, the inhabitants claimed that she was born there. It is
probable that the name originated in Boeotia (C.O. Muller, _Geschichten
hellenischer Stamme_, i. pp. 351-357; but see Macan on Herodotus, iv.
180), whence it was conveyed by colonists to Cyrene and thence to Libya,
where there was a river Triton. Here some local divinity, a daughter of
Poseidon, connected with the water and also of a warlike character, was
identified by the colonists with their own Athena. In any case, it is
fairly certain that Tritogeneia means "water-born," although an old
interpretation derived it from [Greek: trito], a supposed Boeotian word
meaning "head," which further points to the name having originated in
Boeotia. Roscher suggests that the localization of her birthplace in the
extreme west points to the western sea, the home of cloud and storm.
In Homer Athena already appears as the goddess of counsel, of war, of
female arts and industries, and the protectress of Greek cities, this
last aspect of her character being the most important and pronounced.
Hence she is called [Greek: polias], [Greek: poliouchos], in many Greek
states, and is frequently associated with [Greek: Zeus polieus]. The
most celebrated festival of the city-goddess was the Panathenaea at
Athens and other places. Other titles of kindred meaning are [Greek:
archegeris] ("founder") and [Greek: tanachais], the protectress of the
Achaean league. At Athens she presided over the phratries or clans, and
was known as [Greek: apatouria] and [Greek: fratria], and sacrifice was
offered to her at the festival Apaturia. The title [Greek: meter], given
her by the inhabitants of Elis, whose women, according to the legend,
she had blessed with abundance of children, seems at variance with the
generally-recognized conception of her as [Greek: parthenos]; but
[Greek: meter] may bear the same meaning as [Greek: kourotrophos], the
fosterer of the young, in harmony with her aspect as protectress of
civic and family life. At Alalcomenae, near the Tritonian lake in
Boeotia, she was [Greek: alalkomeneis] ("defender"). Her temple, which
was pillaged by Sulla, contained an ivory image, which was said to have
fallen from heaven. The inhabitants claimed that the goddess was born
there and brought up by a local hero Alalcomeneus. Her images, called
Palladia, which guarded the heights (cf. her epithets [Greek: acria,
kranaia]), represented her with shield uplifted, brandishing her spear
to keep off the foe. The cult of Athena Itonia, whose earliest seat
appears to have, been amongst the Thessalians, who used her name as a
battle-cry, made its way to Coronea in Boeotia, where her sanctuary was
the seat of the Pamboeotian confederacy. The meaning of Itonia is
obscure: Dummler connects it with [Greek: iteones], the "willow-beds" on
the banks of the river Coralios (the river of the maiden, i.e. Athena);
Jebb (on Bacchylides, _fr._ xi. 2) suggests a derivation from [Greek:
ienai], the goddess of the "onset." At Thebes she was worshipped as
Athena Onka or Onga, of equally uncertain derivation (possibly from
[Greek: ogkos], "a height"). Peculiar to Arcadia is the title Athena
Alea, probably = "warder off of evil," although others explain it as =
"warmth," and see in it an allusion to her physical nature as one of the
powers of light. Farnell (_Cults_, p. 275) points out that at the same
time she is certainly looked upon as in some way connected with the
health-divinities, since in her temple she is grouped with Asclepius and
Hygieia (see HYGIEIA).
She already appears as the goddess of counsel ([Greek: poluboulos]) in
the _Iliad_ and in Hesiod. The Attic bouleutae took the oath by Athena
Boulaia; at Sparta she was [Greek: agoraia], presiding over the popular
assemblies in the market-place; in Arcadia [Greek: mechanitis] the
discoverer of devices. The epithet [Greek: pronoia] ("forethought") is
due, according to Farnell, to a confusion with [Greek: pronaia],
referring to a statue of the goddess standing "before a shrine," and
arose later (probably spreading from Delphi), some time after the
Persian wars, in which she repelled a Persian attack on the temples "by
divine forethought"; another legend attributes the name to her skill in
assisting Leto at the birth of Apollo and Artemis. With this aspect of
her character may be compared the Hesiodic legend, according to which
she was the daughter of Metis. Her connexion with the trial of Orestes,
the introduction of a milder form of punishment for justifiable
homicide, and the institution of the court [Greek: to epi Palladio],
show the important part played by her in the development of legal ideas.
The protectress of cities was naturally also a goddess of war. As such
she appears in Homer and Hesiod and in post-Homeric legend as the slayer
of the Gorgon and taking part in the battle of the giants. On numerous
monuments she is represented as [Greek: areia], "the warlike," [Greek:
nikephoros], "bringer of victory," holding an image of Nike (q.v.) in
her outstretched hand (for other similar epithets see Roscher's
_Lexikon_). She was also the goddess of the arts of war in general;
[Greek: stoicheia], she who draws up the ranks for battle, [Greek:
zosteria], she who girds herself for the fray. Martial music (cp.
[Greek: Athene salpinx], "trumpet") and the Pyrrhic dance, in which she
herself is said to have taken part to commemorate the victory over the
giants, and the building of war-ships were attributed to her. She
instructed certain of her favourites in gymnastics and athletics, as a
useful training for war. The epithets [Greek: ippia], [Greek:
chalinitis], [Greek: damasippos], usually referred to her as goddess of
war-horses, may perhaps be reminiscences of an older religion in which
the horse was sacred to her. As a war-goddess, she is the embodiment of
prudent and intelligent tactics, entirely different from Ares, the
personification of brute force and rashness, who is fitly represented as
suffering defeat at her hands. She is the patroness and protectress of
those heroes who are distinguished for their prudence and caution, and
in the Trojan War she sides with the more civilized Greeks.
The goddess of war develops into the goddess of peace and the pursuits
connected with it. She is prominent as the promoter of agriculture in
Attic legend. The Athenian hero Erechtheus (Erichthonius), originally an
earth-god, is her foster-son, with whom she was honoured in the
Erechtheum on the Acropolis. Her oldest priestesses, the
dew-sisters--Aglauros, Herse, Pandrosos--signify the fertilization of
the earth by the dew, and were probably at one time identified with
Athena, as surnames of whom both Aglauros and Pandrosos are found. The
story of the voluntary sacrifice of the Attic maiden Aglauros on behalf
of her country in time of war (commemorated by the ephebi taking the
oath of loyalty to their country in her temple), and of the leap of the
three sisters over the Acropolis rock (see ERECHTHEUS), probably points
to an old human sacrifice. Athena also gave the Athenians the
olive-tree, which was supposed to have sprung from the bare soil of the
Acropolis, when smitten by her spear, close to the horse (or spring of
water) produced by the trident of Poseidon, to which he appealed in
support of his claim to the lordship of Athens. She is also connected
with Poseidon in the legend of Erechtheus, not as being in any way akin
to the former in nature or character, but as indicating the contest
between an old and a new religion. This god, whose worship was
introduced into Athens at a later date by the Ionian immigrants, was
identified with Erechtheus-Erichthonius (for whose birth Athena was in a
certain sense responsible), and thus was brought into connexion with the
goddess, in order to effect a reconciliation of the two cults. Athena
was said to have invented the plough, and to have taught men to tame
horses and yoke oxen. Various arts were attributed to her--shipbuilding,
the goldsmith's craft, fulling, shoemaking and other branches of
industry. As early as Homer she takes especial interest in the
occupations of women; she makes Hera's robe and her own peplus, and
spinning and weaving are often called "the works of Athena." The custom
of offering a beautifully woven peplus at the Panathenaic festival is
connected with her character as Ergane the goddess of industry.[2] As
patroness of the arts, she is associated with Hephaestus (one of her
titles is [Greek: Ephaistia]) and Prometheus, and in Boeotia she was
regarded as the inventress of the flute. According to Pindar, she
imitated on the flute the dismal wail of the two surviving Gorgons after
the death of Medusa. The legend that Athena, observing in the water the
distortion of her features caused by playing that instrument, flung it
away, probably indicates that the Boeotians whom the Athenians regarded
with contempt, used the flute in their worship of the Boeotian Athena.
The story of the slaying of Medusa by Athena, in which there is no
certain evidence that she played a direct part, explained by Roscher as
the scattering of the storm-cloud, probably arose from the fact that she
is represented as wearing the Gorgon's head as a badge.
As in the case of Aphrodite and Apollo, Roscher in his _Lexikon_ deduces
all the characteristics of Athena from a single conception--that of the
goddess of the storm or the thunder-cloud (for a discussion of such
attempts see Farnell, _Cults_, i. pp. 3, 263). There seems little reason
for regarding her as a nature-goddess at all, but rather as the
presiding divinity of states and cities, of the arts and industries--in
short, as the goddess of the whole intellectual side of human life.
Except at Athens, little is known of the ceremonies or festivals which
attended her worship. There we have the following. (1) The ceremony of
the _Three Sacred Ploughs_, by which the signal for seed-time was given,
apparently dating from a period when agriculture was one of the chief
occupations of her worshippers. (2) The _Procharisteria_ at the end of
winter, at which thanks were offered for the germination of the seed.
(3) The _Scirophoria_, with a procession from the Acropolis to the
village of Skiron, in the height of summer, the priests who were to
entreat her to keep off the summer heat walking under the shade of
parasols ([Greek: skyron]) held over them; others, however, connect the
name with [Greek: skiros] ("gypsum"), perhaps used for smearing the
image of the goddess. (4) The _Oschophoria_, at the vintage season, with
races among boys, and a procession, with songs in praise of Dionysus and
Ariadne. (5) The _Chalkeia_ (feast of smiths), at which the birth of
Erechtheus and the invention of the plough were celebrated. (6) The
_Plynteria_ and _Callynteria_, at which her ancient image and peplus in
the Erechtheum and the temple itself were cleaned, with a procession in
which bunches of figs (frequently used in lustrations) were carried. (7)
The _Arrhephoria_ or _Errephoria_ (perhaps = _Ersephoria_,
"dew-bearing"), at which four girls, between seven and eleven years of
age, selected from noble families, carried certain unknown sacred
objects to and from the temple of Aphrodite "in the gardens" (see J.E.
Harrison, _Classical Review_, April 1889). (8) The _Panathenaea_, at
which the new robes for the image of he goddess were carried through the
city, spread like a sail on a mast. The reliefs of the frieze of the
cella of the Parthenon enable us to form an idea of the procession.
Athletic games, open to all who traced their nationality to Athens, were
part of this festival. Mention should also be made of the Argive
ceremony, at which the _xoanon_ (ancient wooden statue) of Athena was
washed in the river Inachus, a symbol of her purification after the
Gigantomachia.
The usual attributes of Athena were the helmet, the aegis, the round
shield with the head of Medusa in the centre, the lance, an olive
branch, the owl, the cock and the snake. Of these the aegis, usually
explained as a storm-cloud, is probably intended as a battle-charm, like
the Gorgon's head on the shield and the faces on the shields of Chinese
soldiers; the owl probably represents the form under which she was
worshipped in primitive times, and subsequently became her favourite
bird (the epithet [Greek: glaukopis], meaning "keen-eyed" in Homer, may
have originally signified "owl-faced"); the snake, a common companion of
the earth deities, probably refers to her connexion with
Erechtheus-Erichthonius.
As to artistic representations of the goddess, we have first the rude
figure which seems to be a copy of the Palladium; secondly, the still
rude, but otherwise more interesting, figures of her, as e.g. when
accompanying heroes, on the early painted vases; and thirdly, the type
of her as produced by Pheidias, from which little variation appears to
have been made. Of his numerous statues of her, the three most
celebrated were set up on the Acropolis. (1) Athena _Parthenos_, in the
Parthenon. It was in ivory and gold, and 30 ft. high. She was
represented standing, in a long tunic; on her head was a helmet,
ornamented with sphinxes and griffins; on her breast was the aegis,
fringed with serpents and the Gorgon's head in centre. In her right hand
was a Nike or winged victory, while her left held a spear, which rested
on a shield on which were represented the battles of the Amazons with
the giants. (2) A colossal statue said to have been formed from the
spoils taken at Marathon, the so-called Athena _Promachos_. (3) Athena
_Lemnia_, so called because it had been dedicated by the Athenian
cleruchies in Lemnos. In this she was represented without arms, as a
brilliant type of virgin beauty. The two last statues were of bronze.
From the time of Pheidias calm earnestness, self-conscious might, and
clearness of intellect were the main characteristics of the goddess. The
eyes, slightly cast down, betoken an attitude of thoughtfulness; the
forehead is clear and open; the mouth indicates firmness and resolution.
The whole suggests a masculine rather than a feminine form.
From Greece the worship of Athena extended to Magna Graecia, where a
number of temples were erected to her in various places. In Italy proper
she was identified with Minerva (q.v.).
See articles in Pauly-Wissowa's _Realencyclopadie_; W.H. Roscher's
_Lexikon der Mythologie_; Daremberg and Saglio's _Dictionnaire des
antiquites_ (s.v. "Minerva"); L. Preller, _Griechische Mythologie_;
W.H. Roscher, "Die Grundbedeutung der Athene," in _Nektar und
Ambrosia_ (1883); F.A. Voigt, "Beitrage zur Mythologie des Ares und
Athena," in _Leipziger Studien_, iv. (1881); L.R. Farnell, _The Cults
of the Greek States_, i. (1896); J.E. Harrison, _Prolegomena to the
Study of Greek Religion_ (1903), for the festivals especially; O.
Gruppe, _Griechische Mythologie_, ii. (1907). In the article GREEK
ART, fig. 21 represents Athena in the act of striking a prostrate
giant; fig. 38 a statuette of Athena Parthenos, a replica of the work
of Pheidias. (J. H. F.)