Page:Modern Greek folklore and ancient Greek religion - a study in survivals.djvu/319

 A new edition of some [Greek: Megas Oneirokritês], or 'Great Dream-interpreter,' figures constantly in the advertisements of Athenian newspapers, and the public demand for such works is undeniable. In isolated homesteads, to which the Bible has never found its way, I have several times seen a grimy tattered copy of such a book preserved among the most precious possessions of the family, and honoured with a place on the shelf where stood the icon of the household's patron-saint and whence hung his holy lamp.

One of the pieces of information most frequently imparted to men in dreams is the situation of some buried treasure. The precautions necessary for unearthing it, namely complete reticence as to the dream, and the sacrifice of a cock, have already been mentioned. This kind of dream has been utilized by the Greek Church. There is no article of ecclesiastical property of more value than a venerable icon; to any church or monastery which aspires to become a great religious centre an ancient and reputable icon, competent to work miracles, is indispensable.

Now the most obvious way of obtaining such pictures is, it seems, to dig them up. A few weeks underground will have given the right tone to the crudest copy of crude Byzantine art, and all that is required, in order to determine the spot for excavation, is a dream on the part of some person privy to the interment. It was on this system that the miracle-working icon of Tenos came to be unearthed on the very day that the standard of revolt from Turkey was raised, thus making the island the home of patriotism as well as of religion. And this is no solitary example; the number of icons exhumed in obedience to dreams is immense; wherever the traveller goes in Greece, he is wearied with the same reiterated story, and if the picture in question happens to be of the Panagia, there is often an appendix to the effect that the painter of it was St Luke—an attribution which can only have been based on clerical criticism of the style. Inspection is now difficult; the old pagan custom of covering venerable statues with gold or silver foil by way of thank-offering has, to avoid idolatry, been transferred to icons; and in many cases only the faces and the hands of the saints depicted are left visible, the