Page:Folk-lore - A Quarterly Review. Volume 21, 1910.djvu/76

 62 as the images of saints in Roman Catholic processions. One of these god-images from Nineveh (Fig. i) holds in his right hand an axe, and in his left a thunderbolt. It would perhaps have been difficult to say with certainty that this implement, three-pronged at both ends, represents the lightning, had not its shape lived on in Greek art almost unaltered.

The axe that the Assyrian god carries in his hand has but one edge. The axes of other gods from Western Asia are, as a rule, edged on both sides (Fig. 2, Hittite).

Not far from Mylasa in Caria there was a place named Labranda, where a God was worshipped whom the Greeks called Zeus Labrandeus or Zeus Stratios. He is shown on coins from Mylasa as carrying in his hand a double axe, an axe edged on both sides. We also find him represented with javelin and eagle, both usual attributes of the sun god. The fact that the god on some coins is represented with lightning and javelin, whereas he generally carries axe and javelin, is a still further proof of the close connection between the axe and lightning. A wooden image is known of this god carrying a double axe in his right hand and a javelin in his left. The handles of both axe and javelin were so long that they reached the ground.

In some of the east-Mediterranean countries, a word labrys signifies axe, and Plutarch has connected this word with the name of the god. It was suggested by Mr. Max Mayer that the well-known Labyrinthos of Knossos was derived from that name Labrayndos or Labrynthios. Some years after this suggestion had been published. Dr. Arthur Evans found that in the royal palace of Knossos, evidently identical with the Labyrinthos, the double axe, the labrys, had been worshipped. The holy figure of the double axe was found everywhere in this old building (Fig. 3).

Because the double axe was a religious symbol, it was