Bird Gods in Ancient Euro 



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myths short off at the most interesting point, 

 with the express statement that they are forbid 

 or do not wish to tell more. Herodotus the 

 peerless is one of the most 'exasperating, be- 

 cause he tells so much concerning the world 

 of his day and its beliefs that one can scarce 

 reconcile one's self to the fact that he refrained 

 purposely from telling more. Pausanias is an- 

 other. The Eleusinian, the Orphic mysteries 

 — why not have thrown a few rays into them ? 

 Doubtless they were simple enough : doubt- 

 less it was the very homely simplicity of the 

 ideas they divulged which made them uncom- 

 municable, lest the priestly fabrics overhead 

 should by that simplicity appear feeble and 

 vain. 



So here was the prophetic bird beneath 

 whose graven image the Sabines asked for 

 answers from the gods ! There he clung at 

 end of a dead branch, as if carved against a 

 wooden column, like the pillar Ovid mentions 

 with a picus atop, or like the soapstone birds 



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