Modern Mythology. Lang Andrew
applause of the philological method as applied to other problems of mythology; for example, ‘the genealogical relations of myths… The philological method alone can answer here,’ aided, doubtless, by historical and archæological researches as to the inter-relations of races. This approval of the philological method, I cited; the reader will find the whole passage in the Revue, vol. xii. p. 260. I remarked, however, that this will seem ‘a very limited province,’ though, in this province, ‘Philology is the Pythoness we must all consult; in this sphere she is supreme, when her high priests are of one mind.’ Thus I did not omit to notice Professor Tiele’s comments on the merits of the philological method. To be sure, he himself does not apply it when he comes to examine the Myth of Cronos. ‘Are the God and his myth original or imported? I have not approached this question because it does not seem to me ripe in this particular case.’ 41 ‘Mr. Lang has justly rejected the opinion of Welcker and Mr. Max Müller, that Cronos is simply formed from Zeus’s epithet, κρονιων.’ 42 This opinion, however, Mr. Max Müller still thinks the ‘most likely’ (ii. 507).
My other citation of Professor Tiele in 1887 says that our pretensions ‘are not unacknowledged’ by him, and, after a long quotation of approving passages, I add ‘the method is thus applauded by a most competent authority, and it has been warmly accepted’ (pray note the distinction) by M. Gaidoz. 43 I trust that what I have said is not unfair. Professor Tiele’s objections, not so much to our method as to our manners, and to my own use of the method in a special case, have been stated, or will be stated later. Probably I should have put them forward in 1887; I now repair my error. My sole wish is to be fair; if Mr. Max Müller has not wholly succeeded in giving the full drift of Professor Tiele’s remarks, I am certain that it is from no lack of candour.
Professor Tiele now devotes fifteen pages to the story of Cronos, and to my essay on that theme. He admits that I was right in regarding the myth as ‘extraordinarily old,’ and that in Greece it must go back to a period when Greeks had not passed the New Zealand level of civilisation. [Now, the New Zealanders were cannibals!] But ‘we are the victims of a great illusion if we think that a mere comparison of a Maori and Greek myth explains the myth.’ I only profess to explain the savagery of the myth by the fact (admitted) that it was composed by savages. The Maori story ‘is a myth of the creation of light.’ I, for my part, say, ‘It is a myth of the severance of heaven and earth.’ 44 And so it is! No Being said, in Maori, ‘Fiat lux!’ Light is not here created. Heaven lay flat on Earth, all was dark, somebody kicked Heaven up, the already existing light came in. Here is no création de la lumière. I ask Professor Tiele, ‘Do you, sir, create light when you open your window-shutters in the morning? No, you let light in!’ The Maori tale is also ‘un mythe primitif de l’aurore,’ a primitive dawn myth. Dawn, again! Here I lose Professor Tiele.
‘Has the myth of Cronos the same sense?’ Probably not, as the Maori story, to my mind, has not got it either. But Professor Tiele says, ‘The myth of Cronos has precisely the opposite sense.’ 45 What is the myth of Cronos? Ouranos (Heaven) married Gaea (Earth). Ouranos ‘hid his children from the light in the hollows of Earth’ (Hesiod). So, too, the New Zealand gods were hidden from light while Heaven (Rangi) lay flat on Papa (Earth). The children ‘were concealed between the hollows of their parent’s breasts.’ They did not like it, for they dwelt in darkness. So Cronos took an iron sickle and mutilated Ouranos in such a way, enfin, as to divorce him a thoro. ‘Thus,’ I say, ‘were Heaven and Earth practically divorced.’ The Greek gods now came out of the hollows where they had been, like the New Zealand gods, ‘hidden from the light.’
No, says Professor Tiele, ‘the story of Cronos has precisely the opposite meaning.’ The New Zealand myth is one of dawn, the Greek myth is one of sunset. The mutilated part of poor Ouranos is le phallus du ciel, le soleil, which falls into ‘the Cosmic ocean,’ and then, of course, all is dark. Professor Tiele may be right here; I am indifferent. All that I wanted to explain was the savage complexion of the myth, and Professor Tiele says that I have explained that, and (xii. 264) he rejects the etymological theory of Mr. Max Müller.
I say that, in my opinion, the second part of the Cronos myth (the child-swallowing performances of Cronos) ‘was probably a world-wide Märchen, or tale, attracted into the cycle of which Cronos was the centre, without any particular reason beyond the law which makes detached myths crystallise round any celebrated name.’
Professor Tiele says he does not grasp the meaning of, or believe in, any such law. Well, why is the world-wide tale of the Cyclops told about Odysseus? It is absolutely out of keeping, and it puzzles commentators. In fact, here was a hero and there was a tale, and the tale was attracted into the cycle of the hero; the very last man to have behaved as Odysseus is made to do. 46 But Cronos was an odious ruffian. The world-wide tale of swallowing and disgorging the children was attracted to his too notorious name ‘by grace of congruity.’ Does Professor Tiele now grasp my meaning (saisir)?
I do not here give at full length Professor Tiele’s explanation of the meaning of a myth which I do not profess to explain myself. Thus, drops of the blood of Ouranos falling on Earth begat the Mélies, usually rendered ‘Nymphs of the Ash-trees.’ But Professor Tiele says they were really bees (Hesychius, μελιαι=μελισσαι) – ‘that is to say, stars.’ Everybody has observed that the stars rise up off the earth, like the bees sprung from the blood of Ouranos. In Myth, Ritual, and Religion (i. 299-315) I give the competing explanations of Mr. Max Müller, of Schwartz (Cronos=storm god), Preller (Cronos=harvest god), of others who see the sun, or time, in Cronos; while, with Professor Tiele, Cronos is the god of the upper air, and also of the underworld and harvest; he ‘doubles the part.’ ‘Il est l’un et l’autre’ – that is, ‘le dieu qui fait mûrir le blé’ and also ‘un dieu des lieux souterrains.’ ‘Il habite les profondeurs sous la terre,’ he is also le dieu du ciel nocturne.
It may have been remarked that I declined to add to this interesting collection of plausible explanations of Cronos. A selection of such explanations I offer in tabular form: —
Cronos was God of
Time (?) – Max Müller
Sun – Sayce
Midnight sky – Kuhn
Under-world }
Midnight sky} – Tiele
Harvest }
Harvest – Preller
Storm – Schwartz
Star-swallowing sky – Canon Taylor
Sun scorching spring – Hartung
Cronos was by Race
Late Greek (?) – Max Müller
Semitic – Böttiger
Accadian (?) – Sayce
Etymology of Cronos
Χρονος=Time (?) – Max Müller
Krāna (Sanskrit) – Kuhn
Karnos (Horned) – Brown κραινω – Preller
The pleased reader will also observe that the phallus of Ouranos is the sun (Tiele), that Cronos is the sun (Sayce), that Cronos mutilating Ouranos is the sun (Hartung), just as the sun is the mutilated part of Ouranos (Tiele); Or is, according to others, the stone which Cronos swallowed, and which acted as an emetic.