XLIX] Studies iu primitive Greek religion. 49 



fessor Gruppe's theory is the „holy sacricifial fire" which is 

 of ouraaian origin and which has communicated to the earth 

 something of its divine spirits. All sacred objects and places 

 have been hallowed by a „wonder". Thus the holy fire has 

 fallen dowu from heaven and taken possession of certain stones, 

 stocks, and plants which from tliat reason have been looked 

 upon as fetishes ^). That savage peoples all över the world 

 vivify any deify inanimate objects without any ideas of „fire 

 phenomena" being attached to them seems to be an unknown 

 fact to Professor Gruppe. The same ignorance of the prin- 

 ciples of primitive religion appears in his theory of animal- 

 fetishes. The explanation, that certain animals even have in 

 one way or another been connected with the phenomena of 

 light, that, for instance, certain birds have been regarded as 

 sacred merely becanse of their habit of dwelling in high and 

 therefore in light or becanse of their fiery eyes as, for example, 

 T.he eagle 2), or certain quadrupeds becanse of their red colour 

 as, for example, the ass ^), is too absnrd to need any serious 

 oonfutation. It may be true that, for instance, the fiery eyes 

 of a mad dog or an outraged lion has contributed to their 

 being looked upon as „demoniacal", but this certainly has 

 nothing to do with the ,,heaveQly fire", from which Professor 

 Gruppe tries to derive everything. In such cases we simply 

 find an application of the general rule that uncivilised man is 

 ready to see something supernatural in anything which seems 

 to him stränge and mysterious *). The same holds good with 

 regard to the explanation that certain localities have originally 

 been hallowed by the lighting which struck them or by being 

 visited with fire of some other nature ^). Thus the statement 

 that places where earthquakes have happened have been 

 primarily looked upon as sacred for this very reason and 

 only låter, „after the appearance of the chtonic deities", be- 

 come regarded as inhabited by supernatural beings ®), is a con- 

 struction for which there is no evidence whatever. 



') Gruppe, Griechische Mythologie nnå Religionsgeschichte. pp. 773 — 792. 



*) Ibid. p. 792. 



ä) Ibid. p. 797. 



■•) Cf. supra, p. 19, sqq. 



5) Ibid. p. 809 sqtj. 



«) Ibid. p. 814. 



4 



