Page:Syria, the land of Lebanon (1914).djvu/54

SYRIA, THE LAND OF LEBANON during the millenniums of its progress westward from the Euphrates to the Atlantic. We find it first in the Babylonian Creation Epic, which tells of the destruction of the chaos-monster by the solar deity, Marduk. When the Greeks took over the ancient Asiatic mythology, it was Perseus, child of the sun-god, who slew the dragon at Jaffa and released the beautiful Andromeda. In the sixth century A. D., the exploit was transferred to St. George, whose victory over the sea-monster was perhaps an unconscious parable of the overthrow of heathenism by Christianity.

St. George appears to have been a real person, who suffered martyrdom about the year 300, possibly at Lydda in Palestine, where his tomb is still shown. Singularly enough, this Syrian Christian has not only been the patron saint of England since Richard Cœur de Lion came to the Holy Land on the Third Crusade, but is also a very popular hero of the Moslems.

The historic character had, of course, nothing to do with any dragon, and it was only many centuries after his death that he became identified with the hero of the ancient Semitic myth, under its Perseus form. A mighty monster, so the story runs, had long terrified the district of Beirut, and was prevented from destroying the city only by receiving the annual sacrifice of a beautiful virgin. One year the fateful lot fell upon the daughter of the governor. When [ 28 ]