Book contents
- Frontmatter
- PREFACE
- Contents
- LIST OF PLATES IN VOL. I
- INTRODUCTION
- CHAPTER I THE ANICONIC AGE
- CHAPTER II THE ICONIC AGE
- CHAPTER III CRONOS
- CHAPTER IV ZEUS
- CHAPTER V THE CULT-MONUMENTS OF ZEUS
- CHAPTER VI
- CHAPTER VII HERA
- CHAPTER VIII THE CULT-MONUMENTS OF HERA
- CHAPTER IX IDEAL TYPES OF HERA
- CHAPTER X ATHENA
- CHAPTER XI MONUMENTS OF ATHENA-WORSHIP
- CHAPTER XII IDEAL TYPES OF ATHENA
- GEOGRAPHICAL REGISTER OF ATHENA CULTS
- Plate section
CHAPTER III - CRONOS
Published online by Cambridge University Press: 05 October 2010
- Frontmatter
- PREFACE
- Contents
- LIST OF PLATES IN VOL. I
- INTRODUCTION
- CHAPTER I THE ANICONIC AGE
- CHAPTER II THE ICONIC AGE
- CHAPTER III CRONOS
- CHAPTER IV ZEUS
- CHAPTER V THE CULT-MONUMENTS OF ZEUS
- CHAPTER VI
- CHAPTER VII HERA
- CHAPTER VIII THE CULT-MONUMENTS OF HERA
- CHAPTER IX IDEAL TYPES OF HERA
- CHAPTER X ATHENA
- CHAPTER XI MONUMENTS OF ATHENA-WORSHIP
- CHAPTER XII IDEAL TYPES OF ATHENA
- GEOGRAPHICAL REGISTER OF ATHENA CULTS
- Plate section
Summary
It is generally believed that the worship of Zeus was primeval among the Hellenes, their ancestors bringing it from a common Aryan centre, and that in the popular religion no organized system of divinities existed prior to the Olympian. Stated thus, this belief is reasonable, and yet we must take notice of cults that were perhaps pre-Hellenic, or at least belonged to an earlier period than the developed ‘ Olympian ’ religion and survived long in certain localities by the side of this. We have to account for the prevalent legends concerning Cronos with his Titan dynasty and the Titanomachia which overthrew them. The question of origins must here be glanced at, for on the answers will depend whether we shall consider Cronos as a real personage in tradition and worship. Welcker, who maintains that Zeus is the starting-point of Greek religion, explains away Cronos very ingeniously: he arose from a misunderstanding of an epithet of Zeus—Kρoνίδης or Kρoνίων: this meant originally the Son of Time, a figurative way of naming the ‘ Eternal ’ or ‘ the Ancient of Days.’ At a pre-Homeric period this was misinterpreted and understood as a son of Cronos, a mere nominis umbra. This theory, though accepted by some later writers, was born of false philology, a misleading theological bias, and an ignorance of what is really primitive in ancient religion.
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- The Cults of the Greek States , pp. 23 - 34Publisher: Cambridge University PressPrint publication year: 2010