10 Rafael Karsten. [Nio 1 



an offering, or a stone anointed with oil ; and the pious 

 wayfarer, arriving atsuch places, dallied in „religious delay", 

 paying his due homage to the daemons haunting the place 

 in order to secure a prosperous journey. The worship of rude 

 stones evidently lingered on as one of the commonest survivals 

 af primitive religions notions and the Christian fathers when 

 trying to show the absurdity of the religions of the heathen 

 used especially to point at their adoration of stooks and 

 stones ^). Even during the golden days of Antiquity there 

 seem to have been persons, who, neglecting the established 

 religions worship, were ready to pay homage to any stona 

 or any animal they met on the road, 2) and Theophrastus when 

 picturing the superstitioas man, describes him as one who, 

 among other practices, when passing an anointed stone on 

 the road, pours some oil on it, and falls on his knees ad or- 

 ing it ^). Pausanias during his travel in Greece, in the second 

 century A. D. found numerous traces of the same primitive 

 practice, and he expressly states that „in ancient times all the 

 Greeks worshipped unwronght stones {ägyoct Xid^oi) instead of 

 images" *). Such an unwrought stone he found, for instance, 

 among the Thespians who worshipped it „most of all gods" 

 under the name of "Eqaog ^), In the tempie of Delphi there 

 was a small stone on which the inhabitants poured oil every 

 day and put unspun wool at every festival ^). Of the Orcho- 

 menians he says that „they chiefiy worship natural stones" 



') ■ ee, for instance, Cleni. Alex. Ström. VII, 1, 4: . . betaibaincov bé 

 é(JTL ö öeötcb? rå baif.iåvLa, o Jiåvra i^eiåQcov xal §vXov xal Xt&ov xal Jivevfia 

 åvi^Qwjzcp TE Xoyixäis ^iovvtl xarabebovXwiiévos. Ibid. VII, 4, 26: 01 avrol ö' 

 ovTOL nåv ^vXov xal nåvxa Xi&ov, tö be Xeyöfxevov XinaQÖv ngooxwovvxes 

 tQia sivQQa xal åXtbs x^^^QOvs ^al bäbag, axiXXav Te xal d-elov bebiåai. Arnob. 

 Adv. gentes I, c. 39 . . Lactantius, De falsa religione; De origine erroris, passim. 



*) Xen. Mem. Socr. I, 14: . . tovs fJ^ev ovd-' Iéqöv ovTt l^cofiöv ovtb 

 åXXo TiJöv Q^eimv ovbev Ttiiåv, tovs be xal Xidovg xal ^vXa Ta Tvxövra xal 

 &T]Qla ot^tad^ai. 



') Theophr. Charact. XVI. 



*j Paus. VII, 22, 4. — Cf. Cleui. Alex. Ström. I, 25, 164: jtqIv yovv 

 åxQt^md^qvai Tag tu>v åyaXtxåTwv a^éoeLg xiovag ioTåvTeg, ol naXaiol eoe^ov 

 TOVTOvs ojg å(pibQV[j.aTa tov i}sov. 



»J Paus. IX, 27, 1. 



"; Ibid. X. 24, 6. 



