194 FLORA OF THE 



The Persians, for the Assyrian tree of life, appear 

 to have substituted a fire-altar. 



Whether the crescent of the Mahomedans can be 

 placed in the same category, and on the same footing 

 as the horseshoe, is doubtful, the crescent-moon, the 

 sun, and the star being frequently met with on the 

 cylinders. 



All the same, there is ample evidence to show that 

 the Mahomedans borrowed freely from Assyrian sym- 

 bols, as fig. 97 plainly shows. 



Nothing, in my opinion, can be clearer in these 

 standards than that (a) is the symbol of the date 

 tree, supported by horns ; (/;) the head of foliage of 

 the date tree ; (c) the uplifted hand seen frequently 

 on Assyrian sculptures and cylinders. As to (d) it 

 simply consists of two hollow £-ont-hovns, with a circle 

 between the horns. This might well stand for the 

 horns of the crescent, with the planet Venus between 

 them ! ^ — the ensign of Turkey. 



Hughes, in his ' Dictionary of Islam,' says the hand 

 on the standard of the Mohurrum is meant for the 



with emblems of the tree of Hfe ; he is holding up three fingers of the right 

 hand, I suppose, as a substitute for a trident. Both Buddha and the Pope 

 hold up three fingers, as seen in fig. 96, only they are not the same fingers. 

 In his left hand St. Peter has a large ordinary key, as a substitute for Sek/tet's 

 'key of life;' and, curiously enough, in a small side picture, there is St. Peter 

 kneeling before the figure of Christ, who shoulders a cross of the Archaic 

 shape T. AH this would tend to show that the early Christians absorbed the 

 so-called Pagan symbols wholesale. 



' Turning the money in one's pocket for hick, on sighting the new moon, 

 may be a derivation of this notion, because of the moon's horns ! 



