Why ever an egg?
Before writing up a long put off life of Castor and Polyduces, the Classical Heavenly Twins, and their worship, we need to speak of one more background detail about them that needs a post all to itself. Why ever did the Greeks have them being born from an egg? It is not something we find spoken of about the Aśvinau, even though they are withmeted to birds in the Ṛgvedaḥ. It is true that swans and (white) horses seem particularly connected to Castor and Polyduces, no doubt as metaphors for the twin stars or fires that are their primordial symbol, but we have already seen that other paired beasts like lions, dragons/snakes or wolves could also be thought of as betokening them. Whilst it is tempting to see the egg birth as a straightforward outcome of Zeus begetting them on Leda (Λήδα) in the shape of a swan, we shall see that there is much more to it than that. For the egg was not seemingly an original feature of their myth, but has
rather found its way into it from that general confusion we have
already spoken of in earlier posts with ideas of the first man and
woman. But let us begin at the beginning.
Apollodorus tells us in his Library 3.10.7 that:
Hyginus Fabulæ 77 will have this taking place on the Eurotas that runs through what is rightly called Laconia (Λακωνία) or Lacedaemonia (Λακεδαίμονα) - both meaning more of less meaning the "land of Lakon" - though most English-speakers know it as Sparta from its headborough:" Διὸς δὲ Λήδᾳ συνελθόντος ὁμοιωθέντος κύκνῳ, καὶ κατὰ τὴν αὐτὴν νύκτα Τυνδάρεω, Διὸς μὲν ἐγεννήθη Πολυδεύκης καὶ Ἑλένη, Τυνδάρεω δὲ Κάστωρ καὶ Κλυταιμνήστρα.""But Zeus in the form of a swan consorted with Leda, and on the same night Tyndareus cohabited with her; and she bore Pollux and Helen to Zeus, and Castor and Clytaemnestra to Tyndareus." (awend. Sir J. G. Frazer)
"Iuppiter Ledam Thestii filiam in cygnum conversus ad flumen Eurotam compressit et ex eo peperit Pollucem et Helenam, ex Tyndareo autem Castorem et Clytaemnestram."
"Zeus, shifted into the shape of a swan, lied with Leda the daughter of Thestius by the water of the Eurotas and she brought forth from him Polydeuces and Helen, but from Tyndareus Castor and Clytemnestra." (ᚷᚳ)
But this is wholly against the chronology of the Greek myth, for Tyndareus (Τυνδάρεος) was still a bachelor when he was driven out of Laconia by his younger brother Hippocoon and his sons. It was whilst he was in exile at the court of Thestius (Θέστιος) at Calydon (Καλυδών) in Aetolia (Αἰτωλία) (see Apollodor. Lib. 3.10.4-5), in a colony of Aeolian Greeks, that he wed Thestius' daughter Leda. For he had won her hand in wedlock for his helping of Thestius against the neighbouring Curetes of Pleuron (Πλευρών) to the west. Hyginus' Eurotas should therefore be read as the Evenus. But it seems that the newly wed couple left Aetolia soon after their wedding for Thalamæ (Θαλάμαι or Θαλάμη) in Messenia (Μεσσηνία) so as Castor and Polyduces and their sisters could be born on the eyot of Pephnus (see Paus. 3.1.4). Thalamæ being a colony of folk from Boeotia who settled there when Niobe the sister of Pelops wed Amphion (Strabo Geog. 8) the brother of Zethus and who are the older Dioscuri who built the walls of seven gated Thebes in Boeotia!
Apollodorus himself only speaks of Helen as being born from an egg in his paraphrase of the lost Cypria (see below). And in the time of Pausanias (3.16.1) it is Helen's egg that was to be seen hanging by ribbons from the roof of the temple of Hilaira and Phoebe at Sparta.
But it is clear that Castor and Polyduces were also born in this egg. Third Vatican mythographer III. De Iove (lf.173 of Angelo Maio outsetting):
"6. Habet etiam fabula, Iovem in cygnum conversum cum Leda concubuisse, eamque ex illo conceptu ovum peperisse; unde tres nati sunt, Castor scilicet et Pollux et Helena."
"It also one has a tale, that Jove changed into a swan slept with Leda, and by him she conceived and to give rise to an egg; whence three were born, namely Castor, Polyduces and Helen."
But elsewhere we read of two eggs, thus the same mythographer under the heading xv De Duodecim Caeli Signis (lvs.375-6 of 1831 Angelo Maio outsetting):
3 “Iuppiter concubuit cum Leda in specie cygni, ex qua genuit duo ova; et ex uno natae sunt Helena et Clytemnestra, ex alio nati sunt Pollux et Castor, qui peritissimi et probissimi imperatores fuerunt in Graecia.”
“Jupiter slept with Leda in the shape of a swan, from which were begotten two eggs; and from one was born Helen and Clytemnestra, and from the other was born Pollux and Castor, who were the most skillful and worshipful in Greece.”
The first vatican mythographer book 3, ch. 204. De genealogia deorum vel heroum. (lf. 72) says the say:
“Item concubuit cum Laeda uxore Tyndari , in specie cygni: inde duo ova nata sunt; ex quorum altero Castor et Pollux, ex alio Clytemnestra et Helena natae sunt.'”And Leonardo da Vinci gives us a painting of this birth scene.
The hats, caps or helms that Castor and Polydeuces almost always wear, were even sometimes understood as the halves of this selfsame egg. Thus Lycophron Alexandra lines 506-7 (awend. A. W. Mair):
ὧν ὀστράκου στρόβιλος ἐντετμημένοςAnd thus Tertullian tells us that eggs were the tokens of Castor and Polyduces in his De Spectaculis - On the Shows (awend. Rev. S. Thelwall) cap. 8:
κόρσην σκεπάζει ῥῦμα φοινίου δορός.
those [wolves of Acte=Castor and Polydeuces] whose head a cloven egg-shell covers,
to guard them from the bloody spear;
"Singula ornamenta circi singula templa sunt. Ova honori Castorum adscribunt qui illos ovo editos credendo de cygno Iove non erubescunt. "
"Every ornament of the circus is a temple by itself. The eggs are regarded as sacred to the Castors, by men who are not ashamed to profess faith in their production from the egg of a swan, which was no other than Jupiter himself."
The egg-birth tale is also shared with the Heavenly Twins of Elis, the Molionidæ, thus Athenæus' Deipnosophistæ 2.50 (57f - 58a) (awend. Gullick) has a fragment of Ibycus:
"... Ἴβυκος δὲ ἐν πέμπτῳ μελῶν περὶ Μολιονιδῶν φησι·
[58a] Τούς τε λευκίππους κόρους
τέκνα Μολιόνας κτάνον,
ἅλικας, ἰσοκεφάλους, ἑνιγυίους,
ἀμφοτέρους γεγαῶτας ἐν ὠέῳ
ἀργυρέῳ. ...".
"Ibycus, in the fifth book of his Lyrics, says of the Molionidæ :
‘I [Herakles] likewise slew the white-horsed youths,
sons of Molione, equal in age and in height,
with their limbs joined in one, both hatched
in a silver egg.’ ...".
Above: The Eurotas River, downstream from Mistra by Aeleftherios - Own work, CC BY-SA 3.0, https://commons.wikimedia.org/w/index.php?curid=3955019
The waters of the Evenus in Aetolia by Χρήστος Μακροζαχόπουλος, Attribution, https://commons.wikimedia.org/w/index.php?curid=2792918
The Orphic Egg...
Before going any further it is well to mark here the old scholion on Aristophanes' comedy The Birds.
In this play Aristophanes has set out a bit of an Orphic creation
myth lines 695 to 697 where a wind-egg is marked. The lines about this egg then raises
the following comment from the scholiast on line 695:
" τίκτει πρώτιστον ὑπηνέμιον […ᾠόν ]: ὑπηνέμια καλεῖται τὰ δίχα συνουσίας καὶ μίξεως. καὶ τοῦτο δὲ οὐχ ὡς ἔτυχεν αὐτῷ προσέρριπται, ἀλλ’ ἀπὸ ἱστορίας τῆς κατὰ τοὺς Διοσκούρουs· φασὶ γὰρ αυτούς ἐξ ῷοῦ γεγονέναι."
" “ laid a wind-egg”: they call a “wind-egg” those [made] without coupling and sexual intercourse. And certainly not that it [wind] happens to be added to it, others [say] from the history concerning the Dioscuri. For they say that they were born from an egg."(ᚷᚳ)
I wholly overgo here the whisper that Castor and Polydeuces might be the outcome of a "virgin-birth" for someone else to follow up if they will. But I will draw the reader's thoughts to the idea that that the egg or eggs from which the Dioscuri and their sisters are born, may well have something to do with the egg of the Orphic teachings, though the scholiast doesn't specifically say as much.
When it comes to write about Helen's birth, Apollodorus' Bibliotheca 3.10.7 paraphrases a more or less lost pœm called the Cypria. But as luck would have it, Athenæus has written down a good bit of what we need from this pœm in the eighth book of his Deipnosophistæ 344c-d:
Τοὺς δὲ μέτα
τριτάτην Ἑλένην τέκε, θαῦμα βροτοῖσι·
τήν ποτε
καλλίκομος Νέμεσις φιλότητι μιγεῖσα
Ζηνὶ θεῶν
βασιλῆι τέκεν κρατερῆς ὑπ´ ἀνάγκης.
Φεῦγε γὰρ
οὐδ´ ἔθελεν μιχθήμεναι ἐν φιλότητι
[334d] πατρὶ
Διὶ Κρονίωνι· ἐτείρετο γὰρ φρένας
αἰδοῖ
καὶ νεμέσει·
κατὰ γῆν δὲ καὶ ἀτρύγετον μέλαν ὕδωρ
φεῦγεν, Ζεὺς
δ´ ἐδίωκε· λαβεῖν δ´ ἐλιλαίετο θυμῷ
ἄλλοτε μὲν
κατὰ κῦμα πολυφλοίσβοιο θαλάσσης
ἰχθύι
εἰδομένην, πόντον πολὺν ἐξορόθυνεν,
ἄλλοτ´ ἀν´
Ὠκεανὸν ποταμὸν καὶ πείρατα γαίης,
ἄλλοτ´ ἀν´
ἤπειρον πολυβώλακα. Γίγνετο δ´ αἰεὶ
θηρί´ ὅς´
ἤπειρος αἰνὰ τρέφει, ὄφρα φύγοι νιν.
And which Evelyn-White has awent for us thus:
Rich-haired Nemesis gave birth to her (Helen) when she had been joined in love with Zeus the king of the gods by harsh violence. For Nemesis tried to escape him and liked not to lie in love with her father Zeus the son of Cronus; for shame and indignation vexed her heart: therefore she fled him over the land and fruitless dark sea. But Zeus ever pursued and longed in his heart to catch her. Now she took the form of a fish and sped over the waves of the loud-roaring sea, and now over Oceanus' stream and the furthest bounds of Earth, and now she sped over the furrowed land, always turning into such dread creatures as the dry land nurtures, that she might escape him.
Now what we have turned up here is something utterly unlooked for. It is nothing other than the tale of Prajapati begetting the animals, with Zeus for Prajapati, and which we may read in the Bṛhadāraṇyaka Upaniṣad 1.4.3-4, although it is widely alluded to elsewhere in the East, and which lived on in the British Isles to give rise to, among other things, the ballad called the "Twa Magicians" (Roud 1350, Child 44). Although to be fair, in the East the egg is what Prajapati himself is born from (see Śatapatha Brāhmaṇa 11.1.6 1-2) rather than something which he himself begets.
Macrobius Saturnalia book 7 chapitle 16, §8
Et, ne videar plus nimio extulisse ovum elementi vocabulo, consule initiatos sacris Liberi patris: in quibus hac veneratione ovum colitur, ut ex forma tereti ac paene sphaerali atque undique versum clausa et includente intra se vitam mundi simulachrum vocetur: ...
And so that I do not seem to you to have raised the condition of the egg, by naming it an element, consult the initiates in the mysteries of Liber Pater, in which the egg is honoured with so much worship, as made of a rounded and almost spherical shape, which by being shut up to conceal, and by enclosing life in itself, is called a likeness of the universe. (ᚷᚳ)
Liber Pater - if anyone doesn't know - is the Latin name for the god Dionysus. Now the followers of Orpheus were great worshippers of Dionysus, and this is worth keeping in mind for what comes next.
And Orpheus' death on the earthly plane so to speak, matches Dionysus' "death" on the cosmic plane. Thus Proclus, Commentary on Plato's Republic 398 (awend. R. Eisler):
“ἀλλ’ Ὀρφεὺς μὲν ἅτε τῶν Διονύσου τελετῶν ἡγεμὼν γενόμενος τὰ ὅμοια παθεῖν ὑπὸ τῶν μύθων εἴρηται τῷ σφετέρῳ θεῷ (καὶ γὰρ ὁ σπαραγμὸς τῶν Διονυσιακῶν ἕν ἐστιν συνθημάτων), …”.
"Orpheus, as the founder of the Dionysiac mysteries, is said in the myths to have suffered the same fate as the god himself; and the tearing in pieces is one of the Dionysiac rites.”
Apollodorus Library 1.3.2 (awend. Sir J. Frazer):
εὗρε δὲ Ὀρφεὺς καὶ τὰ Διονύσου μυστήρια, καὶ τέθαπται περὶ τὴν Πιερίαν διασπασθεὶς ὑπὸ τῶν μαινάδων.
Orpheus also invented the mysteries of Dionysus, and having been torn in pieces by the Maenads he is buried in Pieria.
Most of the Orphic writings are lost but we have a few scraps, some dug up by the archæologist, some quoted by other writers, and all helped out by paraphrases of what they were meant to believe. But here we are only worried about this egg of theirs. Damascius (Δαμάσκιος) gives us a line or so of an Orphic writ in his Difficulties and Solutions of First Principles (ἀπορίαn καὶ λύσεις περὶ τῶν πρώτων ἀρχῶν):
ἔπειτα δ’ἔτευξε μέγας Χρόνος αἰθέρι δίῳ ὠεὸν ἀργύφεον.
Then great Time brought out from the god Aither a bright-white egg.
As to what happens next, we have to hope the later Christian writer Athenagoras has got it something like right when he writes, swapping Heracles for Time:
οὗτος ὁ Ἡρακλῆς ἐγέννησεν ὑπερμέγεθες ᾠόν, ὃ … εἰς δύο ἐρράγη. τὸ μὲν οὖν κατὰ κορυφὴν αὐτοῦ Οὐρανὸς εἶναι ἐτελέσθη, τὸ δὲ κάτω ἐνεχθὲν Γῆ· προῆλθε δὲ καὶ θεὸς τρίτος δισώματος.
This Heracles brought forth an over-great egg, which … broke into two. From the top (κορυφὴν) of it heaven was fulfilled, and in the lower earth was brought forth. And a third, twy-bodied god came forth.
Now the "twy-bodied god" (θεὸς... δισώματος) is mostly given the name of Phanes (Φάνης) by those who have written about him, yet from the scraps of the Orphic writings themselves, this is little more than one of a number of titles bestowed upon the egg-born god. I mark here from an Orphic hymn (6) the "egg-born" (ὠογενῆ→"ὤιογενῆς") god is named, among other things, the "first-born" (Πρωτόγονον→"πρωτόγονος") and is said to be "of two-kinds" (διφυῆ→ "διφυής"- this can be either of two sexes or two kinds of living beings).
Many of those who have written about Phanes then like to say that in the East, the god Prajapati is also born from an egg, and, in the Atharva Veda book 19, hymn 53,§8, this same Prajapati is also said to be the son of Time (Kāla). And although a good deal more is said about Prajapati by the India-folk over and above what we find said of Phanes in the West, yet I think we can still see, through all, to a point where at one time where both these two gods, Phanes and Prajapati, were indeed a match for one another.
Who truly is the "twy-bodied god" (θεὸς... δισώματος) in the egg?
From the scrap of Orphic theology that Aristophanes has borrowed for his play The Birds, it would seem Phanes is there understood under the name of Eros "Love", and in the Orphic hymn to Eros (57), I mark that Eros also is said to be "of two kinds" (διφυῆ→ "διφυής"). But among mankind we see that love everywhere makes one out of two (or more) does it not? More telling may be Eros' wings and that Aristophanes has him as the father of the birds, for birds lead us upward.
More clues can be gathered from who the three other times in the well-known Orphic hymn corpus
where this self same word "of two kinds" (διφυῆ→ "διφυής") is found.
For they are to be found in the main hymn to Dionysus (29) - where he is
also called "twy-shaped" (δίμορφον), and, tellingly, "first-born"
(Πρωτόγονον). In the hymn to Corybas (38) who is a
"swift-shape-shifting king" (αἰολόμορφον ἄνακτα) and "many shaped"
(πολύμορφον). And in the hymn to Misa (Μίση - 41) where Iacchus is
"male and female, of two kinds" (ἄρσενα καὶ θῆλυν, διφυῆ). Now Iacchus
is widely evened with Dionysus. What is said of Corybas could fit
Dionysus as well, and to say that Corybas and Dionysus are likely to be
one and the same is not to say that much. But the epithet of "first
born" being shared by both Dionysus and Phanes in their Orphic hymns
allows us to be a bit bolder than most here and say that Phanes must be
Dionysus. And we should call to mind that these are Orphic hymns, and
Orpheus was a great worshipper of Dionysus.
But is this our answer? Almost. Phanes is indeed only a title of Dionysus in an Orphic verse to be found in Macrobius's Saturnalia book 1 chapitle 18:
“[12] Orpheus quoque solem volens intellegi ait inter cetera:
Τήκων αἰυέρα δι᾽ ὃν, άκίνητον πρὶν ἐοντα,
ἐξανέφηνε θεοῖσιν ὁρᾶν κάλλιστον ίδέσθαι,
ὃν δὴ νῦν καλέουσι Φάνητά τε καὶ Διόνυσον
Εὐβουλῆα τ᾽ ἄνακτα καὶ Ἀνταύγην ἀρίδηλον·
ἄλλοι δ᾽ ἄλλο καλοῦσιν ἐπιχθονίων ἀνθρώπων.
Πρῶτος δ᾽ ἐς φάος ἤλθε, Διόνυσος δ᾽ ἐπεκλήθη,
οὗνεκα δινεῖται κατ᾽ ἀπείρονα μακρὸν Ὄλυμπον·
ἀλλαχθεὶς δ᾽ ὄνομ᾽ ἔσχε, προσωνυμίας πρὸς ἕκαστον
παντοδαπὰς κατὰ καιρὸν, ἀμειβομένοιο χρόνοιο.
“[13] Φάνητα dixit solem ἀπὸ τοῦ φῶτὸς καὶ φανεροῦ, id est a lumine atque inluminatione, quia cunctis visitur cuncta conspiciens: ...”.
Also Orpheus says among other things, wishing the sun to be understood :
... for which, dissolving the ether, that aforetime was without motion,
he brought up and showed forth to the gods the fairest thing to be seen;
him, whom now men call Phanes and Dionysus
and king Eubouleus and far seen Antauges -
some of earthly men call him this, others that.
but he came first to light, and was afternamed Dionysus
wherefore he whirls through endless-great Olympus
changing the name he had, each one of the names according to
every season of changing time.
He called the sun Phanes from light and lightening for the all-seeing sun is seen by all.”
But
with this verse of course we also see now that by Dionysus-Phanes,
Orpheus truly means the sun! And what else other than the sun was
Athenogoras' "twy-bodied god" all along seeing it is born out of an
egg, the upper half of which becomes the dome of the heavens and the
lower half the earth. But isn't the sun Apollo not Dionysus? Well there
were those of old who understood Apollo and Dionysus as the selfsame
god, notwithstanding that they are in many ways wholly witherward to
each other, thus Dion Chrysostomos, when speaking to the folk of Rhodes (31), sayeth [awend. A. B. Cook]:
That is Apollo, the sun and Dionysus. See also Servius' commentary on Vergil's Æneid. 3. 93, and his commentary on Vergil's Eclogues 5.66. And that this is how we should mainly undrstand Phanes the egg-born go can be gathered from Macrobius' Saturnalia book 1 chapitle 18, §34 in a run through of the bynames of Apollo:
“ ... καίτοι τὸν μὲν Ἀπόλλω καὶ τὸν Ἥλιον καὶ τὸν Διόνυσον ἔνιοί φασιν εἶναι τὸν αὐτόν, καὶ ὑμεῖς οὕτω νομίζετε,...”
“Yet some maintain that Apollon, Helios, and Dionysos are all one and the same; and that is your own accepted view.”
That is Apollo, the sun and Dionysus. See also Servius' commentary on Vergil's Æneid. 3. 93, and his commentary on Vergil's Eclogues 5.66. And that this is how we should mainly undrstand Phanes the egg-born go can be gathered from Macrobius' Saturnalia book 1 chapitle 18, §34 in a run through of the bynames of Apollo:
" Item Φάνητα appellant ἀπὸ τοῦ φαίνειν: ..."
"Also, they call him Phanes from phainein "to shine forth"...".
Any Finns reading all this might well be laughing their arses off here for they have long known this. Thus in the Kalevala we may read (awend. J. M. Crawford):
But what about Prajapati? As luck would have it, the Chāndogya Upaniṣad 3.19 still has the early shape of the egg-born god myth for us in the East (awend. P. Olivelle):
From one half the egg, the lower,
Grows the nether vault of Terra:
From the upper half remaining,
Grows the upper vault of Heaven;
From the white part come the moonbeams,
From the yellow part the sunshine,
From the motley part the starlight,
From the dark part grows the cloudage;
And the days speed onward swiftly,
Quickly do the years fly over,
From the shining of the new sun
From the lighting of the full moon.
But what about Prajapati? As luck would have it, the Chāndogya Upaniṣad 3.19 still has the early shape of the egg-born god myth for us in the East (awend. P. Olivelle):
asad evedam agra āsīt | tat sad āsīt | tat samabhavat | tad āṇḍaṃ niravartata | tat saṃvatsarasya mātrām aśayata | tan nirabhidyata | te āṇḍakapāle rajataṃ ca suvarṇaṃ cābhavatām ||
||tad yad rajataṃ seyaṃ pṛthivī | yat suvarṇaṃ sā dyauḥ | yaj jarāyu te parvatāḥ | yad ulbaṃ (sa) samegho nīhāraḥ | yā dhamanayas tā nadyaḥ | yad vāsteyam udakaṃ sa samudraḥ ||
atha yat tad ajāyata so 'sāv ādityaḥ | taṃ jāyamānaṃ ghoṣā ulūlavo 'nūdatiṣṭhant sarvāṇi ca bhūtāni sarve ca kāmāḥ | tasmāt tasyodayaṃ prati pratyāyanaṃ prati ghoṣā ulūlavo 'nūttiṣṭhanti sarvāṇi ca bhūtāni sarve ca kāmāḥ ||
1. ...In the beginning this world was simply what is nonexisting; and what is existing was that. It then developed and formed into an egg. It lay there for a full year and then it hatched, splitting in two, one half becoming silver and the other half gold.
2 The silver half is this earth, while the golden half is the sky. The outer membrane is the mountains; the inner membrane, the clouds and the mist; the veins, the rivers; and the amniotic fluid, the ocean.
3 Now, the hatchling that was born was the sun (ādityaḥ - son of Aditi) up there. And as it was being born, cries of joy and loud cheers rose up in celebration, as did all beings and all desires. Therefore, every time the sun rises and every time it returns, cries of joy and loud cheers rise up in celebration, as do all beings and all their hopes.
And
this shows us that the roots of Prajapati as an egg-born god, must be,
when all is said and done, are only as another sun-god, and we call to
mind here Ṛgvedaḥ
4, 53, 2 that Prajapati is only a title of Savitṛi ("divo dharttā
bhuvanasya prajāpatiḥ" "the supporter of the sky, of being, the lord of
creatures" - see Taittirīya Brāhmaṇa, 1. 6, 4, 1 & Śatapatha Brāhmaṇa 12:3:5:1
where Prajapati is said to be the same as Savitṛi), who is widely, if
not always, to be understood as only another name for the sun.
And the one becomes two
But
before we get too happy with ourselves, haven't we forgotten that the
egg-born god is "twy-bodied"? But this now almost answers itself
doesn't it? Macrobius again, th'ilk Book 1, ch.17, §64 (awend. P. V. Davies):
“ἀπόλλωνα Διδυμαῖον vocant, quod geminam speciem sui numinis praefert ipse inluminando formandoque lunam: etenim ex uno fonte lucis gemino sidere spatia diei et noctis inlustrat: unde et Romani solem sub nomine et specie Iani Didymaei Apollinis appellatione venerantur.”
“Men call Apollo "the Twin God" (Διδυμαῖος) because he presents a twin form of his own divinity, by himself giving light and shape to the moon, for, as a twofold star giving light from a single source, he illumines the periods of day and night. And this too is the reason why the Romans worship the sun under the name and form of Janus, with the style of Didymæan Apollo.”
That
is Apollo and his twin sister Artemis, whom the Romans called Diana,
and were commonly understood as the sun and moon. And we may also see
here that the erstwhile "floating-island" of Delos wherein Apollo and
Artemis are said to have been born, is no more than a misunderstanding
of our world-egg which at times is said to be floating on the primordial
waters. The verb δηλοῦν moreover, from which Delos is meant to stem,
is almost a synonym for φαίνειν.
And this also outfolds Ṛgvedaḥ 9, 5, 9 where Soma is called Prajapati. Soma is the moon-god in the East, or blended with him, and so, as a god stemming from the other half of Prajapati, he is a Prajapati too. Albeit with Soma this is meant more by way of reflection, as the moon only reflects the sun's light. If we stop and look about us a while here, I think we can now see a few helpful things. Prajapati, although it would that he was often understood only as his own active solar or fiery side, he is truly a god like the Romans' Janus wherein the two halves or sides of the god are still together and undivided. Whence the likenesses of Prajapati under the name of Brahma are seen to match those of the Romans' Janus; the four faces only being a doubling up of the two to emphasise the inherant duality of all things.
Prajapati's two halves were understood in many ways. Often much is inferred rather than spelled out for us, but
toward the beginning of the Laws of Manu 1.32, we get this said of the egg-born (see 1.9) god (awend. J. Muir) :
dvidhā kṛtvātmano deham ardhena puruṣo 'bhavat /The sun and moon might well be meant but understood more stavely we have the first man and woman whether understood as Yama and Yamī or maybe Manu and his unnamed wife whom Yāska brings into relationship with the Aśvinau in his birth tale of all three in his Nirukta Ch. 12. 10 (which we have already marked [here]). However, Yāska makes these the children of Vivasvat that is of the sun, by one Saraṇyū (Manu by her likeness Savarṇī), but it would seem that Prajapati/Savitṛi is to be understood for Vivasvat. And the tale of a father begetting a son/daughter has been brought in here only as another way to outfold what is truly nothing more than the splitting of Prajapati himself into two. That is, son and daughter (or son and son in the case of the Aśvinau) are only the two halves of the father once they are considered as wholly sundered from eachother. If we think that Apollo and Artemis are for the sun and moon then our Heavenly Twins must be the same and in Yāska's list of what the Aśvināu might be thought to be in his Nirukta Ch. 12, 1 [here] he does indeed have "sūryā.candramasā" "sun and moon" but these are two gods in India rather than a god and a goddess like they are in the West. And to show how these two pairs of twins are essentially the same in the West we find that Leda the mother of Castor and Polydeuces, and Leto (the Romans' Latona) the mother of Apollo and Artemis actually have different spellings of the same name which is from the Lydian word "lada" meaning wife. But we have overlooked that the Heavenly Twins themselves have two sisters who are truly their own other halves. And in short Apollo and Artemis are simply a reduction to one pair of the two pairs that are Castor and Polydeuces and their sisters Helen and Clytemnestra. We might then think of Castor and Polydeuces as two sun gods and Helen and Clytemnestra as two moon goddesses. Macrobius gives us a solar meaning for Castor and Polydeuces in his Saturnalia Book 1, ch.21 §22 (awend. P.V. Davies):
ardhena nārī...
" Dividing his own body into two, became with the half a man, and with the half a woman; ...".
“Gemini autem, qui alternis mortibus vivere creduntur, quid aliud nisi solem unum eundemque significant modo descendentem in ima mundi modo mundi in summam altitudinem resurgentem?”
“ The Twins, who are believed to die and to come to life again in turn, surely represent the sun which, ever one and the same, now descends to the lowest parts of the world and now rises again to the highest.”
But
among their sisters we find that Helen has such a solar meaning and
indeed stands in the stead of a sun goddess elsewhere that she at least
can't be written off as a moon goddess. But we shouldn't get ourselves
too worried about the genders here as Proclus tells us in his Commentary
on the Timæus of Plato Book I (awending Thomas Taylor):
“ἐν μὲν γὰρ θεοῖς οὕτω ταῦτα συμπέφυχεν ἀλλήλοις, ὥστε καὶ ἀῤῥενόθηλον ἀποκαλεῖσθαι τὸν αὐτὸν, καθάπερ Ἥλιον καὶ Ἑρμῆν καὶ ἄλλους τινὰς θεούς.”
“For in the gods, indeed, these are so connascent with each other, that the same divinity is called both male and female, as is the case with Sun and Mercury, and certain other gods.”
So
sometimes we have sun gods at other times sun goddesses, sometimes moon
gods and other times moon goddesses. But we are truly talking
universal principles here. From an earlier post ([here] where I discuss Yāska’s Nirukta Ch. 7, 5 and the Bṛhaddevatā
of Shaunaka bk. 1, ch.14, §69) we know that the sun is only the
heavenly shape taken upon itself by the primordial Agni. And from this
we can see at once that the sun and the moon are truly only for the
universal principles that underlie them and with which they are often
blended: Agni and Soma. Thus Śatapatha Brāhmaṇa 10:4:2:1:
saṃvatsaro vai prajāpatiragniḥ somo rājā candramāḥVerily, Pragâpati, the year, is Agni, and King Soma, the moon.
day and night and the world halves?
That Prajapati is said to be the father of both the gods (devāḥ) and the so-called "demons" (asurāḥ) (as in Bṛhadāraṇyaka Upaniṣad 1.3.1 - these last being the eldest of the two),
is a markworthy outgrowth from the foregoing tale. And we should know
that the gods are always linked to day and light and the "demons" to
night and darkness. But in India a day and night of the gods is what
we call a "year" thus the Laws of Manu 1.67 (awend. M. Müller):
But all this then allows us to see where the Parsees are also coming from in making Zurvan (Time - there are sometimes two gods with this name, a greater and a lesser) the father of the good and light Ohrmuzd and the evil and dark Ahriman. That the Greeks linked Ohrmazd to Zeus and Ahriman to Hades or Pluto is also worth bearing in mind here. And that Porphyry tells us:
daive rātryahanī varṣaṃ pravibhāgas tayoḥ punaḥ /(And whence Prajapati, the father of gods and "demons", that is of day and night so to speak, is often spoken of crypticly as "the year" as at Śatapatha Brāhmaṇa 10:4:2:1).
ahas tatrodagayanaṃ rātriḥ syād dakṣiṇāyanam //
A year is a day and a night of the gods ; their division is (as follows) : the half year during which the sun progresses to the north will be the day, that during which it goes southwards the night.
But all this then allows us to see where the Parsees are also coming from in making Zurvan (Time - there are sometimes two gods with this name, a greater and a lesser) the father of the good and light Ohrmuzd and the evil and dark Ahriman. That the Greeks linked Ohrmazd to Zeus and Ahriman to Hades or Pluto is also worth bearing in mind here. And that Porphyry tells us:
"Πλούτων δὲ ὁ Κόρης ἅρπαξ κυνῆν μὲν ἔχει τοῦ ἀφανοῦς πόλου σύμβολον, τὸ δὲ σκῆπτρον τὸ κολοβὸν σημεῖον τῆς τῶν κάτω βασιλείας· ..."So Hades or Pluto was sometimes thought of a god of the southern hemisphere wherein the sun (Koré, otherwise Persephone) is through the darker-half of the year. And if Hades is to be so thought of, what hinders his brother Zeus being thought of as a god of the northern hemisphere, the seen pole, wherein the sun is through the lighter half of the year?
"But Pluto, the ravisher of Koré, has a helmet as a symbol of the unseen pole, and his shortened sceptre as an emblem of his kingdom of the nether world; ..." (awend. E. H. Gifford).
Looking to the halves of the egg which the Heavenly Twins where as caps it becomes likely that we should understand the Heavenly Twins, not as the sun but as the world halves born at the same time.
Sextus Empiricus Adversus Mathematicos 9.37 (awend. A. B. Cook)
“καὶ τοὺς Τυνδαρίδας δέ φασι τὴν τῶν Διοσκούρων δόξαν ὑπελθεῖν πόλιν νομιζομένων εἶναι θεῶν· τὰ γὰρ δύο ἡμισφαίρια, τό τε ὑπὲρ γῆν καὶ τὸ ὑπὸ γῆν, Διοσκούρους οἱ σοφοὶ τῶν τότε ἀνθρώπων ἔλεγον. διὸ καὶ ὁ ποιητὴς τοῦτο αἰνιττόμενός φησιν ἐπ’ αὐτῶν
ἄλλοτε μὲν ζώουσ’ ἑτερήμεροι, ἄλλοτε δ’ αὖτε
τεθνᾶσιν, τιμὴν δὲ λελόγχασιν ἶσα θεοῖσιν. (Od. 11. 303f.)
πίλους τ’ ἐπιτιθέασιν αὐτοῖς, καὶ ἐπὶ τούτοις ἀστέρας, αἰνισσόμενοι τὴν τῶν ἡμισφαιρίων κατασκευήν."
" Moreover, they say that the Tyndaridai usurped the reputation of the Dioskouroi, who were thought to be gods. For in those days wise folk spoke of the two hemispheres, the one above the earth and the other below it, as Dioskouroi. Wherefore also the poet, hinting at this, says of them :
One day they are alive, the next day dead
In alternation, honoured like to gods.
And men put piloi on their heads with stars atop, hinting at the arrangement of the hemispheres."
Martianus Capella Wedding of Mercury... I. 82-83:
“Dehinc admissi Tonantis ipsius filii. … Post hos duorum una quidem germanaque facies; sed alius lucis sidere, opacae noctis alius refulgebat.
“Then the sons of the Thundering One himself were let in …/ And after these came two brothers with the same anseens (=faces)-but one seated himself shining with light; the other darkened by night.”
And the one becomes three
Damascius tells us that under the name of Phanes we should understand a "threefold god" ("τρίμορφον θεὸν"):
“τὴν δὲ τρίτην τὸν Μῆτιν ὡς νοῦν, τὸν Ἠρικεπαῖον ὡς δύναμιν, τὸν Φάνητα αὐτὸν ὡς πατέρα”
“in the third triad, Metis as intellect, Erikepaios as power, and Phanes himself as father”.
Metis? Proclus at least gives us an odd bit of Orpheus where Phanes and Metis are the same:
πρῶτον δαίμονα σεμνόν
Μῆτιν σπέρμα φέροντα θεῶν κλυτόν, ὅν τε Φάνητα
πρωτόγονον μάκαρες κάλεον κατὰ μακρὸν Ὄλυμπον.
First the holy dæmon
Metis bearing the far-known seed of the gods, that also Phanes
first-born the blessed call throughout great Olympus.
So, if you put all this together then, you will see that although Phanes is often thought of as only one godhead, it turns out that nothing truly hinders him being thought at the same time as three gods or rather two gods (Phanes and Erikepæus) and a goddess Metis. If I tell you that Metis means "Wisdom" I hope that things will start to fall into place for you, for she is the sun-goddess who is mother and sister of the twins. And with Phanes and Erikepæus, here both understood to be wholly gods, we have the beginning of the egg-born Heavenly Twins: Castor and Polydeuces!
As luck would have it, we have a wonderful way to more or less prove this is right. The Greeks had this little saying "Πάντα ὀκτώ" "eight is all" but they understood this in many ways. Now Theon of Smyrna has a saying of Orpheus to outfold this which runs:
ναὶ μὴν ἀθανάτων γεννήτορας αἰὲν ὲόντων
πῦρ καὶ ὕδωρ, γαῖάν, οὐρανὸν ὴδὲ σελήνην,
ἠέλιόν τε φανῆ τε μέγαν καὶ νύκτα μέλαιναν.
By the creators of things ever immortal,
Fire and water, earth and heaven, moon,
And sun, the great Phanes and the dark night.
But Zenobius the sophist has:
Πάντα ὀκτώ: ἔφη ὀκτὼ τοὺς πάντων εἶναι κρατοῦντας θεοὺς, Πῦρ, Ὕδωρ, Γῆν, Οὐρανὸν, Σελήνην, Ἥλιον, Μίθραν, Νύκτα.
Evander said that the gods who rule over everything are eight: Fire, Water, Earth, Heaven, Moon, Sun, Mithras, Night.
Spot the difference? So Mithras is the same as Phanes! Now this goes a long way to outfolding why Mithras at Housesteads is being shown born from an egg instead of his more wanted rock.
Above: the unmended image of Mithras being born from an egg, as it was found between two altars at Housesteads. From Observations on the Roman Station of Housesteads, and on some Mithraic Antiquities discovered there, in a Letter from the Rev. J. Hodgson to the Rev. A. Hedley of Newcastle upon Tyne dated 22nd. Nov, 1822, in Archaeologia Aeliana, Or, Miscellaneous Tracts Relating to Antiquity, Volume 1 of the Society of Antiquaries of Newcastle upon Tyne between lvs. 264 and 265. Mark that the zodiac is in a Greek letter Ω (omega), the first letter of ᾠόν “egg”, ὤιον in the Æolian dialect, not far off the sound of αἰών æon, and that omega is also the first letter of Ὠκεᾰνός Oceanus which Zosimus links to Χρόνος/Κρόνος Chronus/Cronus. And also that the zodiac is arranged with the winter signs ruled by Saturn, Aquarius and Capricorn at the bottom, and the summer signs, ruled by the sun and moon, Leo (cracked) and Cancer (missing) at the top, so dark/heavy to light, south to north, and along the axis of the gates of the gods (Capricorn) and of men (Cancer) in Porphyry's On the Homeric Cave of the Nymphs.
Mithras also is a threefold god thus (as I marked in an earlier post [here]) we find the "threefold Mithras" in a letter said to have been written by Dionysius the Areopagite:
"μάγοι τὰ μνημόσυνα τοῦ τριπλασίου Μίθρου τελοῦσιν"
"Magi celebrate the memorials of the threefold Mithras." [here]
The threefold Mithras being understood as Mithras himself and the twin-like Cautes and Cautopates who are often shown alongside him. Again, as I said in another earlier post [here], it would seem that sometimes the myth was told where the third god is left out, or at least unmarked, and only two gods, even twins (not unlike Cautes and Cautopates) are thought of. And this it seems is what we have with the myth of the birth of Castor and Polydeuces. But it is more likely their sisters are for a sun goddess and that Mithras is in their stead whence the odd words of Herodotus in his Histories 1.131.3 about Mithras :
... καλέουσι δὲ Ἀσσύριοι τὴν Ἀφροδίτην Μύλιττα, Ἀράβιοι δὲ Ἀλιλάτ, Πέρσαι δὲ Μίτραν.
... and the Assyrians call Aphrodite Mylitta, the Arabians Alitta, and the Persians Mitra.
Some further things to mark
The Jaiminīya Brāhmaṇa, 3.14 Prajapati is said to take the shape of a horse to create the creatures (prajāpatiḥ prajā asṛjata/ tā āśvenaivāśvo bhūtvāsṛjata/). The Śatapatha Brāhmaṇa 8.2.2.7 would seem to make Prajapati the father of the Aśvinau:
"yadveva vaiśvadevīrupadadhāti | etadvai prajāpatiretasminnātmanaḥ pratihite
'kāmayata prajāḥ sṛjeya prajāyeyeti sa ṛtubhiradbhiḥ prāṇaiḥ saṃvatsareṇāśvibhyāṃ
sayugbhūtvaitāḥ prajāḥ prājanayattathaivaitadyajamāna etābhirdevatābhiḥ
sayugbhūtvaitāḥ prajāḥ prajanayati tasmādu sarvāsveva sajūḥ-sajūrityanuvartate"
"And, again, as to why he lays down the Vaisvadevî (bricks). At that time, when that (part) of his body had been restored, Pragâpati desired, 'May I create creatures, may I be reproduced!' Having entered into union with the seasons, the waters, the vital airs, the year, and the Asvins, he produced these creatures; and in like manner does this Sacrificer, by entering into union with those deities, now produce these creatures. Hence with all (of these bricks, the word) sagush ('in union with') recurs." (awend. Eggeling)
And 11.1.6.2 shows us where the floating island idea comes from:
" tataḥ saṃvatsare puruṣaḥ samabhavat sa prajāpatistasmādu saṃvatsara eva strī vā
gaurvā vaḍabā vā vijāyate saṃvatsare hi prajāpatirajāyata sa idaṃ hiraṇmayamāṇḍaṃ
vyarujannāha tarhi kā cana pratiṣṭhāsa tadenamidameva hiraṇmayamāṇḍaṃ
yāvatsaṃvatsarasya velāsīttāvadbibhratparyaplavata"
" In a year's time a man, this Pragâpati, was produced therefrom; and hence a woman, a cow, or a mare brings forth within the space of a year; for Pragâpati was born in a year. He broke open this golden egg. There was then, indeed, no resting-place: only this golden egg, bearing him, floated about for as long as the space of a year." (awend. Eggeling)
That is, it is the bottom half of the egg-shell, here understood as the earth herself.
Prajapati's weakness from having expended himself in the creation of the universe is made good by the and as Prajapati is the first man we can see here that we have our ἀρχανθρωπος = Dionysus, and his (half-)brothers the Cabeiri who healed him. Śatapatha Brāhmaṇa 8.2.1. 11-14:
[11] yadvevaitā āśvinīrupadadhāti | prajāpatiṃ visrastaṃ devatā ādāya vyudakrāmaṃstasya
yadūrdhvam pratiṣṭhāyā avācīnam madhyāttadasyāśvināvādāyotkramyātiṣṭhatām
[12]tāvabravīt | upa metam prati ma etaddhattaṃ yena me yuvamuda !kramiṣṭamiti kiṃ
nau tato bhaviṣyatīti yuvaddevatyameva ma etadātmano bhaviṣyatīti tatheti
tadasminnetadaśvinau pratyadhattām
[13] tadyā etāḥ pañcāśvinyaḥ | etadasya tadātmanastadyadetā atropadadhāti yadevāsyaitā
ātmanastadasminnetatpratidadhāti tasmādetā atropadadhāti
[14] dhruvakṣitirdhruvayonirdhruvāsīti | yadvai sthiraṃ yatpratiṣṭhitaṃ taddhruvamatha
vā asyaitadasthiramivādhruvamivātmana āsīttadevaitatsthiraṃ dhruvaṃ kṛtvā"11. Now as to why he lays down these Âsvinî (bricks). When Pragâpati had become relaxed (disjointed), the deities took him and went away in different directions. Now what part of him there was above the feet and below the waist, that part of him the two Asvins took and kept going away from him.
12. He said to them, 'Come to me and restore unto me that wherewith ye have gone away from me!'--'What will accrue to us therefrom?'--'That part of my body shall be sacred unto you!'--'So be it!' so the Asvins restored that (part) unto him.
13. Now these five Âsvinî (bricks) are that same (part) of his (Agni's) body; and when he now puts them into this (layer of the altar), he thereby restores to him what (part) of his body these (bricks) are: that is why he puts them into this (layer).
14. 'Thou art firmly founded, firmly seated, firm,' he says, for whatsoever is steady and established that is firm. Now that part of his (Pragâpati-Agni's) body was, as it were, unsteady, unfirm; and having made it steady and firm they (the Asvins) restored it to him." (awend. Eggeling)
7.4.1.15 -16:
[15] atha puruṣamupadadhāti | sa prajāpatiḥ so 'gniḥ sa yajamānaḥ sa hiraṇmayo bhavati
jyotirvai hiraṇyaṃ jyotiragniramṛtaṃ hiraṇyamamṛtamagniḥ puruṣo bhavati puruṣo
hi prajāpatiḥ[16] yadveva puruṣamupadadhāti | prajāpatervisrastādramyā tanūrmadhyata
udakrāmattasyāmenamutkāntāyāṃ devā ajahustaṃ yatra devāḥ
samaskurvaṃstadasminnetāṃ ramyāṃ tanūm madhyato 'dadhustasyāmasya devā
aramanta tadyadasyaitasyāṃ ramyāyāṃ tanvāṃ devā aramanta tasmāddhiramyaṃ
hiramyaṃ ha vai taddhiraṇyamityācakṣate paro 'kṣam paro 'kṣakāmā hi
devāstathaivāsminnayametāṃ ramyāṃ tanūm madhyato dadhāti tasyāmasya devā
ramante prāṇo vā asya sā ramyā tanūḥ prāṇamevāsminnetam madhyato dadhāti15. He then lays the (gold) man thereon,--he is Pragâpati, he is Agni, he is the Sacrificer. He is made of gold, for gold is light, and fire is light; gold is immortality, and fire is immortality. It is a man (purusha), for Pragâpati is the Man.
16. And, again, why he lays down the man. When Pragâpati was relaxed, his pleasing form went out from within; when it had gone out of him, the gods left him. When the gods restored him, they put that pleasing form into him, and the gods were pleased with that (form) of his; and inasmuch as the gods were pleased (ram) with that pleasing (ramya) form of his, it is called 'hiramya;' 'hiramya' being what is mystically called 'hiranya' (gold), for the gods love the mystic. And in like manner does this (Sacrificer) now put that pleasing form into him (Agni), and the gods are pleased with that (form) of his. But that pleasing form of his is the vital air: it is that vital air he thus puts into him.
(awend. Eggeling)
Among other considerations the swan and the horse seem to have been chosen by the Greeks as the foremost tokenings of the Dioscuri as bearing witnes to a Hyperborean beginning to things. The swan is a migratory bird spending half the year in the far north and the other half further south. They were deemed to be sacred to Apollo Archigetes as the lord of Hyperborea for the same reason. Whilst the horse points to that blending of Hyperborea and Scythia which caused Hesiod to speak of the "well-horsed Hyperboreans" (Ὑπερβορέων εὐίππων) as we marked in an earlier post [here].
Farewell.
