XLIXJ Studies in primitive Greek religion. 25 



down the mice were supposed to leave it ^). The inhabitants 

 of Amaxitos near Troy worshipped mice as gods; some were 

 kept tame in the teraple of Apollo and fed at the state's 

 expense ^). 



It is curious to see that even insects held a certain place 

 in Greek religion some of them being worshipped as super- 

 natnral beings. In fact, insects of a peculiar shape or en- 

 dowed with remarkable powers may be as likely to strike un- 

 civilised man as great and powerful beasts ^). Probably it 

 was for such a reason that the Thessalians worshipped the 

 ants *). The ilies were in the opinion of the ancients pesti- 

 ferous insects and the greater gods were sometimes invoked 

 against them ^). In Acarnania the flies were worshipped in 

 the temple of Apollo on the mount Action. An ox at cer- 

 tain times was sacrificed to them with the ejäect, that the flies, 

 being filled with blood, disappeared ®). 



In fine, there are numerons facts to show that among 

 the Greeks the tendency to look upon stränge and uncom- 

 mon things and phenomena as snpernatiiral had application 

 to animals as well. To assume a totemistic origin for all these 

 animal-cults is, it seems to me, by no meaas necessary; to 

 argue as Mr. Jevons does ') that, for instance, the worship of 

 the lobster in some parts of Greece necessarily presupposes a 

 belief in lobster-clans, and the Myrmidonian worship of ants 

 a belief in aut-clans. cau occur only to a writer to whom the 

 totemistic origin of religion has grown into a dogma and who 

 sees in it „the only satisfactory answer to the question why 

 certain plants and animals are sacred". But if we are able 

 to adopt a more critical attitude of mind towards the well- 

 known theory of Eobertson Smith we may doubtwhether tote- 



') Plin. op. dt. VIII, 28; -42. 



*) Aelian. De nat. anim. XII, 5. Clem. Alex. ProU-. II, 40. Cf. He- 

 rod. II, 141. Strabo, XIII, 1, 48. 

 ^) Cf. Plin. op. cit. XI, 2, 11. 

 *) Clera. Alex. op. cit. II, 40. 

 *) Plin. op. cit. X, 75. 



') Aelian. De nat. anim. XI, 8. Clem. Alex. op. df. II, 40, 

 '') Jevons, Introduction to the History oj Religion, pp. 125 - 6. 



