Page:Folk-lore - A Quarterly Review. Volume 15, 1904.djvu/440

 4IO The European Sky -god.

is a ball of less size than the ball at the top : this they bind with purple fillets. The end of the staff they deck with a saffron-coloured stuff. They take the topmost ball to denote the sun, regarding Apollo himself as a sun-god ; the ball beneath, to denote the moon, the small balls attached being the stars and planets, and the fillets, of which there are 365, being the year. A boy, whose parents are both living, is the ruler [apyeC] of the laurel-bearing. His nearest relative carries the wreathed staff, which they call kopo (/cwTTco) "^^ ; but the laurel-bearer himself follows hold- ing the laurel. He has his hair long, and wears a golden crown. He is robed in a glittering costume reaching to his feet, which are shod with military shoes (t^t/rpaTiSa?).""^^ A choir of maidens follows after him, holding out branches while they chant hymns of supplication. The laurel- bearing procession used to go to the shrines of Ismenian'^^^ and Chalazian "'^ Apollo." According to Proclus, then, the first laurel-bearer was a victorious Boeotian leader, whose successors at intervals of eight years were said to " rule " the laurel-bearing, and were dressed as kings (golden crown, &c.). Moreover, they obviously represented the sky-god or sun-god — witness not only the long hair and glittering costume, but the staff tipped by a bronze sphere to denote the sun,^^^ with others to denote the moon and

■-" The name /cajTTw might denote " the thing held," cp. kiIitzt] " handle " (connected with the root of capio, capulus). But cod. H. reads kottw, as did the first hand in cod. A. ; and kottw would presumably mean •' the thing cut " (from the root of /coTrreiv), i.e. the branch lopped.

2'* 'l<piKpaTi5ti; were military shoes called after the Athenian general Iphicrates ; cp. our " Wellingtons" or " Bluchers."

-" On the Theban Apollo 'lafirjviog see Wernicke in Pauly-Wissowa, ii., 54.

^ Codd. A. H. have xaXa^i'ov, which would signify Apollo as the averter of hail-storms (xd^uc^n, " hail "). Codd. B. C. have the meaningless yaXi^iov. Wernicke in Pauly-Wissowa, ii., 72, takes XaXd^iioi; to be a by-name of Apollo 'iff/xr/i'toc: at Thebes ; but thinks that FaXa^ior, a name formed from the place Galaxium on Mt. Libethrius in Boeotia (id., ii., 45), may be the right reading.

-' Max. Tyr., 8. 8., mentions a similar custom of the Pasonians : Uaioveg ailSovffi fiiv UXiov, uyak/ia ot'HXiov llaioviKov CitTKog ^paxvg iiirtp fiaxpov