Coffey — Prehistoric Cenotaphs. 25 



The notion that the ghost was a double of the body, and that 

 injury to or mutilation of the body took effect likewise on the ghost, 

 is apparent in the description given in the ^neid of Deiphobus in 

 Hades, "with all his body mutilated" (vi. 494). 



It may be compared with the belief recorded of the Indians of 

 Brazil, " that the dead arrive in the other world wounded or hacked 

 to pieces, in fact, just as they left this."^ 



Prom, no doubt, a similar belief, in this case to render the ghost 

 harmless, Greek murderers used to hack off the extremities of their 

 victims.^ This latter instance is compared by Mr. Frazer with the 

 practice among the Australians of cutting off the thumb of a slain 

 enemy, so that the ghost might not be able to throw the spear.^ The 

 same idea may be traced in the practice at Athens of cutting off the 

 right hand of suicides.* 



It has not been possible within the limits of the present Paper to 

 do more than indicate, by a few striking examples, the general notion 

 underlying the Greek and Eoman theory of the ghost. 



These examples show, however, that in Greek and Eoman burial 

 customs we are brought face to face with the same primitive concep- 

 tions concerning the relations of the ghost to the body which are 

 found widely distributed among primitive peoples, and which, indeed, 

 still survive among advanced peoples to an extent not generally 

 suspected, 



This wider aspect of the subject has been touched on, in order 

 that the reader may more fully realize the force of the direct evidence 

 of the cenotaphs which we shall now discuss. 



The erection of cenotaphs is frequently mentioned by the Greek 

 writers. Throughout Greece, when the relatives had not the body of 

 the deceased, they erected cenotaphs, which were entitled to the same 

 respect as true tombs.^ 



That the idea of such monuments is burial, and not memorial, 

 may be gathered from the following illustrations : — 



When Athene urges Telemachus to seek for his father, she adds : 

 "But if thou shalt hear that he is dead and gone, return then to 



' Tylor, "Primitive Culture," i., 451. 



* Aeschylus, " Choephori," 439 : Sophocles, "Electra," 445— see the scholia 

 on this verse, Jebb's "Electra," Appendix. 



3 Tylor, "Primitive Culture," i., 451. 



* Daremberg and Saglio's " Dictionnaire des Antiquites Grecques et Romaines," 

 "Funus," p. 1370. 



5 Ibid., p. 1370. 



