Page:Legends of Old Testament Characters.djvu/118

96 reference to this event. One, a coin of Philip, bears on the reverse something like a box, containing a man and woman; on the panel of the box, under the man, is written "Noe," the dove is bringing the olive branch, and the raven is seated on the edge of the box above the head of the female figure. The same two persons are also represented on dry land, with the right hand uplifted in the attitude of prayer. Another coin with the same subject, on the reverse has, inscribed on the ark,.

To elucidate these coins, reference is made to a passage in the Sibylline Oracles to this effect: "In Phrygia lies steep, to be seen from afar, a mountain, named Ararat. . . . Therefrom streams the river Marsyas; but on its crest rested the ark when the rain abated." As the ancient name of Apamea seems to have been Kibotos, it is not unlikely that the Sibylline writer mixed together in those lines the Mosaic and the Phrygian traditions. It must, however, be admitted that it is quite as probable that the box represents a temple, and the two figures tutelary deities, and that the "Noe" is a contraction for "Neocoros," the most important title assumed by Greek cities, and often recorded on their coins. The ancient Persian account in the Bundehesch is this:—"Taschter (the spirit ruling the waters) found water for thirty days and thirty nights upon the earth. Every water-drop was as big as a bowl. The earth was covered with water the height of a man. All idolaters on earth died through the rain; it penetrated all openings. Afterwards a wind from heaven divided the water and carried it away in clouds, as souls bear bodies; then Ormuzd collected all the water together and placed it as a boundary to the earth, and thus was the great ocean formed." The ancient Indian tradition is, "that in the reign of the sun-born monarch Satyavrata, the whole earth was drowned, and the whole human race destroyed by a flood, except the pious prince himself, the seven Rishis and their several wives." This general pralaya, or destruction, is the subject of the first Purana, or sacred poem; and the story is concisely told in the eighth book of the Bhagavata, from which the following is an abridged extract:—"The demon Hayagriva having