[145] Cp. Job xxvi. 10: “He hath worked out a circle (ḥôq ḥāg) upon the face of the waters”; or perhaps better: “He hath circumscribed a boundary....” This illustrates the root meaning of ḥag, “a circle”; and this is the formation of the festival dance. See, further, Driver and Gray, Job, Part II., Philological Notes, pp. 154, 180 (1921); Budde, Hiob, p. 146 (1896); Ball, The Book of Job, p. 322 (1922). See also Prov. viii. 27, and cp. Isa. xix. 17: “And the land of Judah shall be for a reeling (ḥagga’) to Egypt,” i.e. Egypt will become giddy through fear at the sight of Judah, and will thus “reel.” Ḥagga’ “may either be from an original sense of ḥāgag, or it may be equivalent to being excited as at a ḥag” (Oxf. Hebr. Lex.). More probably it is simply a derivative from ḥag, giddiness as a result of going round at the festival dance; it is used in Isa. xix. 17 in a metaphorical way.
[146] Mishnah, Sukkah, iv. 2.
[147] See above, pp. 48 ff. The prince-poet Imra-al-Kais refers in one of his poems to girls, gown-clad, going swiftly round the Davar (EB, I. 998).
[148] Nili Opera, Narrat. III. 8 (in Migne, Patrol. Graec. LXXIX. 612 f.) “In later Arabia, the ṭawâf, or act of circling the sacred stone, was still a principal part of religion; but even before Mohammed’s time it had begun to be dissociated from sacrifice, and became a meaningless ceremony,” Robertson Smith, op. cit. p. 340.
[149] “Damit wäre dann der kultische Tanz als Produkt der altorientalischen Vorstellungswelt erwiesen” (de la Saussaye, Religionsgeschichte, I. 380 [1905]).
[151] De Dea Syria, XLIX.; see Strong and Garstang, The Syrian Goddess, and Garstang’s notes on pp. 83 f. (1913).
[152] Robertson Smith, op. cit. pp. 185, 335.
[153] See Curtiss, Primitive Semitic Religion To-day, p. 91, where a good photograph of one of these trees is given.
[154] Nöldeke, Geschichte der Perser und Araber zur Zeit der Sasaniden. Aus der arabischen Chronik des Tabari, p. 181 (1879). I am indebted to the kindness of Prof. Bevan, of Cambridge, for this reference.
[155] See Dussaud, Histoire et Religion des Nosairis, pp. 149 f. (1900).
[156] Ohnefalsch-Richter, op. cit. I. 360; it is numbered xvii. 5 in vol. II.
[157] Now in the Berlin Mus. Antiq., T.C. 668238.
[158] Ohnefalsch-Richter, op. cit. I. 360; numbered xvii. 6 in vol. II.
[159] Op. cit. I. 445; numbered cxxvii. 3 in vol. II.
[160] Cp. Suidas, s.v. Ἀμφιδρόμια.
[161] See Lobeck, Aglao., 237 ff., 639 ff., 695 (1829); Bekker, Anecdota Graeca, p. 207 (1814-1821); Pauly, Realencycl. der classischen Alterthumswissenschaft, IV. 1240 ff. (1862).
[162] Warde Fowler in ERE, X. 827 b.
[163] Religion und Kultus der Römer, p. 390 (1912).
[164] Das Privatleben der Römer, p. 83 and the notes (1886).
[165] The Indian Tribes of the United States, I. 146 ff.; ed. by F. S. Drake (1891).
[166] Speck, Ethnology of the Yuchi Indians, p. 28 (1909).
[167] Les Religions des Peuples Non-civilisés, I. 269 (1883).
[168] GB, Spirits of the Corn..., I. 97.
[169] Frazer, GB, Spirits of the Corn..., I. 240 ff., II. 326 ff.; The Scapegoat, 232 ff., 251 ff., 315.
[170] Mannhardt, Baumkultus, pp. 190 ff. (1875-1877); Wald- und Feldkulte, I. 244 (1904-1905).
[172] Frazer, GB, Spirits of the Corn..., I. 136 ff.
[173] Mannhardt, Baumkultus, p. 174; Frazer, The Magic Art, II. 58 ff.
[174] On the subject generally see Hölscher, Die Profeten: Untersuchungen zur Religionsgeschichte Israels, pp. 129-158 (1914).
[175] In speaking of the exercises of the early prophetical bands Robertson Smith says that “they were sometimes gone through in sacred processions, sometimes at a fixed place, as at the Naioth at Ramah, which ought probably to be rendered ‘dwellings’—a sort of coenobium. They were accompanied by music of a somewhat noisy character, in which the hand-drum and the pipe played a part, as was otherwise the case in festal processions to the sanctuary (2 Sam. vi. 5; Isa. xxx. 29). Thus the religious exercises of the prophets seem to be a development in a peculiar direction of the ordinary forms of Hebrew worship at the time, and the fact that the ‘prophesying’ was contagious establishes its analogy to other contagious forms of religious excitement” (The Prophets of Israel, p. 392 [1897]). See further, Gressmann, Palestinas Erdgeruch in der Israelitischen Religion, pp. 34 ff. (1909).
[176] Robertson Smith, The Religion of the Semites, p. 432.
[177] See, for interesting parallels, S. A. Cook, in Essays and Studies presented to William Ridgeway, p. 397 (1913).
[178] The Religion of the Semites, p. 432. But see S. A. Cook in the work just cited.
[179] The R.V. rendering of 1 Kings xviii. 26, “And they leaped about the altar,” is misleading.
[180] The text emendation here is obvious, it should be yithgôdâdu (“they cut themselves”) for yithgôrâru (“they assemble themselves”).
[181] This has been illustrated by the excavations on the site of ancient Gezer undertaken by the Palestine Exploration Fund.
[182] Genesis, p. 329 (1901).
[183] See, further, von Gall, Altisraelitische Kultstätten, pp. 148 ff. (1898).
[184] The word is also used for limping, or stumbling, in a figurative sense (Jer. xx. 10 and elsewhere; in Job xviii. 12, Ball would read balaʿ). According to Driver the cognate Arabic word means “to curve” (Oxford Hebr. Lex.); one thinks of the bent or curved position of the body during the performance of the “limping” dance.
[185] See the various works of Schrader, Winckler, Zimmern, Jensen, O. Weber, Jastrow, etc.
[186] See, e.g., Wiedemann, Die Religion der alten Aegypter, pp. 85-87 (1890); Erman, Die ägyptische Religion, pp. 61 f., 90 (1909), and the works of other authorities mentioned in previous chapters.
[187] Eastern Customs in Bible Lands, pp. 207-210 (1894); a good account of the Dancing Dervishes is given in W. Tyndale’s An Artist in Egypt, pp. 26-30 (1912); and see especially Gressmann, Palestinas Erdgeruch in der Israelitischen Religion, pp. 34 ff. (1909).
[188] See Herodotus, II. 133.
[189] The Prophets of Israel, p. 392 (1897); cp. Stade, Geschichte des Volkes Israel, I. 477 (1886).
[190] Snouck-Hurgronje, Mekka, II. 281 (1888-1889). And see, further, Doughty, Arabia Deserta, II. 119 (orig. ed.); Robinson Lees mentions this dancing as taking place at holy places in Palestine, Village Life in Palestine, pp. 27, 28 (1897).
[191] See Golénischeff, Recueil de Travaux, XXI. 22 f.; Gressmann, Altorientalische Texte und Bilder zum A.T., I. 225 ff. (1909).
[192] Regarding the musical accompaniment to such ecstatic dances, Iamblichus propounds the extraordinary theory that the reason why certain sounds and melodies produce an ecstatic state is because before the soul entered the body it was “an auditor of divine harmony,” and when, being in the body, it hears these, it recollects the divine harmony and participates in it; hence the cause of the ecstatic state and the faculty of divination (De Mysteriis, III. 9 end).
[193] Die sequenti variis coloribus indusiati et deformiter quisque formati, facie caenoso pigmento delita et oculis obunctis graphice prodeunt, mitellis et crocotis et carbasinis et bambycinis iniecti, quidam tunicas albas in modum lanciolarum quoquoversum fluente purpura depictas cingulo subligati, pedes luteis induti calceis; deamque serico contectam amicuio mihi gerendam imponunt brachiisque suis humero tenus renundatis, attollentes immanes gladios ac secures, evantes exsiliunt incitante tibiae cantu lymphaticum tripudium. Nec paucis pererratis casulis ad quandam villam possessoris beati perveniunt et ab ingressu primo statim absonis ululatibus constrepentes fanatice pervolant, diuque capite demisso cervices lubricis intorquentes motibus crinesque pendulos in circulum rotantes, et nonnunquam morsibus suos incursantes musculos, ad postremum ancipiti ferro quod gerebant sua quisque brachia dissicant. Inter haec unus ex illis bacchatur effusius ac de imis praecordiis anhelitus crebros referens, velut numinis divino spiritu repletus, simulabat sauciam vecordiam, prorus quasi deum praesentia soleant homines non sui fieri meliores sed debiles effici vel aegroti.... Arrepto denique flagro, quod semiviris illis proprium gestamen est, contortis taeniis lanosi velleris prolixe fimbriatum et multiiugis talis ovium tesseratum, indidem sese multinodis commulcat ictibus, mire contra plagarum dolores praesumptione munitus. Cerneres prosectu gladiorum ictuque flagrorum solum spurcitia sanguinis effeminati madescere.... The translation is that of S. Gaselee in “Loeb Classical Library” (1915).
[194] In ERE, VI. 403 a; we give the quotation in full as this large Encyclopaedia is not, for many, easily accessible.
[195] On the Korybantes, the mythical attendants on Kybele, who were supposed to dance in wild fashion with the goddess on the mountains, see Rohde, Psyche..., II. 48 ff. (1907); the name was also given to the eunuch priests of the goddess in Phrygia.
[196] Panofka, Dionysos und Thyiden, pl. I. 2 (1853).
[197] Harrison, Prolegomena to the Study of Greek Religion, p. 453 (1903).
[198] The treasure is in the Berlin Museum, Cat. 2290; Harrison, op. cit., p. 428.
[199] Harrison, op. cit. p. 393; see also Gruppe, Griechische Mythologie und Religionsgeschichte, I. 162, II. 840, 1293; Lobeck, Aglao., II. 1085 ff.; Bekker, Anecdota Graeca, I. 234.
[200] Harrison, op. cit. p. 397; Gruppe, op. cit. II. 748, 1293; Reinach, Orpheus, p. 123.
[201] Philo, De Vita Contempl. II.
[202] Diodorus, IV. iii. 2.
[203] Rohde, Psyche, II. 11 ff.; Roscher, Ausführliches Lexikon..., II. 2243-2283 (1894-1897).
[204] Pausan. X. iv. 1, 2.
[205] Harrison, op. cit. p. 540 (omitting the interjected words of Xanthias and Dionysos).
[206] See Mommsen, op. cit. p. 224; cp. Foucart, Les grands mystères d’Eleusis, pp. 121 f.; and for the dancing at the celebration of the mysteries, see p. 142 (1904).
[207] Quoted by Harrison, Pyth. III. 77.
[208] Pausan. II. vii. 6. Cp. also Lobeck, Aglao., II. 1088; Reinach, Orpheus, pp. 153 ff.
[209] Lines 680-691.
[210] IV. 3.
[211] Harrison, op. cit. p. 500; and the same author’s Themis, pp. 23 ff. (1912). Rohde, Psyche, I. 272.
[212] Protr. II. 12. Concerning them Gruppe says: “Die Kureten, nach denen ein Magistratskollegium hiess, das unter dem proto-koures mystische Opfer feierte, sollten durch den Lärm der Waffen Hera vertrieben haben; eine Sagenbildung, die auf eine Angleichung an die Riten die zwar ebenfalls euboisch-boiotischen, aber vielleicht erst hier mit dem Artemis-dienst in Verbindung gesetzten Kultus der grossen Göttin hinweist” (Griech. Myth. I. 284; see also II. 820, 898, 1106, 1198).
[213] Frazer, GB, Adonis, Attis, and Osiris, pp. 250 f. (1907). See further, Hepding, Attis, seine Mythen und sein Kult, pp. 128 ff. (1903).
[214] Ep. I. 49, II. 34, VI. 40; Dill, Roman Society in the last century of the Western Empire, p. 16 (1910).
[215] On the Galli see Lucian, De Dea Syria, XLIII, L-LX.
[216] Frazer, op. cit. p. 223. See further Cicero, De Divinatione, II. 50; Catullus, Carm. LXIII.; Lucretius, II. 598 ff.; Hepding, op. cit., pp. 142 ff.; Glover, The Conflict of Religions in the early Roman Empire, pp. 20 f. (1909).
[217] Fallaize, in ERE, X. 124 b.
[218] Tylor, Primitive Culture, II. 133 f. (1920); he also mentions this type of dance among the Patagonians, Fijians and others, pp. 419 ff.
[219] Frazer, GB, Adonis, Attis, Osiris, p. 61.
[220] Réville, Les Religions des peuples non-civilisés, p. 267 (1883); Schoolcraft, op. cit. I. 286.
[221] Native Religions of Mexico and Peru (Hibbert Lectures, 1884), p. 225.
[222] Malay Magic, p. 463 (1900).
[223] Fallaize, in ERE, X. 124 b.
[224] Frazer, GB, The Magic Art, I. 408; N. Tsaki, La Russie Sectaire, pp. 66 ff. The Shakers of New Lebanon attempt in the dance to obtain the Holy Spirit, Lilly Grove, op. cit. p. 7.
[225] J. Macmillan Brown, Maori and Polynesian, p. 204 (1907).
[226] Folk-lore in the Old Testament, III. 277 (1918).
[227] In Allerlei, I. 164-168.
[228] Introduction to the Study of Religion, p. 174 (1904).
[229] “They prophesied until the time of the evening oblation” (עֲלוֹת הַמִּנְחָה), 1 Kings xviii. 29.
[230] An inspired prophet.
[231] A five-thonged scourge, with iron at the extremity of each thong.
[232] The Sun and the Serpent, pp. 99 f. (1905).
[233] The feast of Pesach (“Passover”) coincided with this; it was also a spring festival at which the firstlings of the herds were offered (Exod. xxxiv. 25).
[234] E.g. 1 Kings viii. 2, xii. 32; Judg. xxi. 19; Lev. xxiii. 39, 41.
[235] This is also true of the Targums, where an allusion to the dance is sometimes strikingly obvious, e.g. in the Targ. of Onkelos to Deut. xvi. 14; the people are bidden to rejoice at their feasts with the playing of flutes; this was one of the most usual accompaniments to the sacred dance all the world over.
[236] See Moore, Judges, pp. 304 f. (1903).
[237] Cp. Judges ix. 27.
[238] See e.g. Reinach, Orpheus, p. 273 (1909); Carl Rathjens, Die Juden in Abessinien, p. 78 (1921).
[239] Talmudische Archäologie, III. 101, and the references on p. 285.
[240] Mishnah, Sukkah, V. 1.
[241] Sukkah, IV. 1-4.
[242] Cp. Reinach, op. cit. p. 271.
[243] See Megillath Taanith, IV. 8-10; this was before the Day of Atonement had become a Fast-day; one sees, therefore, how ancient the custom was.
[244] Megillath Taanith, V.
[245] Bell. Jud. II. xvii. 6.
[246] See further on this, Krauss, op. cit. III. 102, 285.
[247] On these see further Doughty, Travels in Arabia Deserta, I. 340 ff., 391 f. (1921).
[248] Alois Musil, Arabia Petraea, III. 200 ff. (1908).
[249] Dalman, Palestinischer Diwan, p. 254 (1901).
[250] Featherman, Social History of Mankind, I. 334 f. (1881).
[251] See G. Friedlander’s edition of this work, p. 208 (1916).
[252] Cp. Enclow, JE, IV. 425 b, and Jacobs, JE, IV. 96 ff.
[253] See Curtiss, op. cit. pp. 164 ff.
[254] Kees, Der Opfertanz des ägyptischen Königs, pp. 105-226 (1912); Maspero, Études de mythologie et de l’archéologie égyptiennes, VIII. 313 (1893-1916); Blackman, Rock Tombs of Meir, I. 23 f., II. 25, and the same writer in the Journal of Egyptian Archaeology, VII. 21 f.
[255] Erman, Aegypten ..., I. 336.
[256] Erman, op. cit. I. 340; see also Voss, Der Tanz und seine Geschichte, p. 20 (1869), who unfortunately omits references to authorities.
[257] See further, Flinders Petrie, Stud. Hist. III. 69 (1904), and for festivals generally the same author’s Egyptian Festivals ... (1908).
[258] Schol. in Luc. Dialog. Meretr. VII. 4 (ed. Rabe, 1906), referred to by Harrison, op. cit. p. 146; see also Lübker, op. cit. 298 b.
[259] Mommsen, Feste ..., pp. 359 ff.; Harpocration, s.v. Ἁλῷα, I. 24 (ed. Dindorf [1853]). For Vintage Festivals see, further, Mommsen, Heortologie, pp. 66 ff.
[260] Harrison, op. cit. pp. 146 f. On this festival see also Bekker, op. cit. I. 384 f.; Farnell, Cults ..., III. 315 f.; Frazer, GB, The Spirits of the Corn and of the Wild, I. 60 ff.
[261] The author refers to his note on Pausanias, VIII. xxxvii. 3 in vol. IV. pp. 375 ff. of his Pausanias.
[262] GB, Spirits of the Corn and of the Wild, II. 339.
[263] Gruppe, op. cit. II. 783; Preller, Griechische Mythologie, pp. 618 ff. (1872).
[264] Cp. Pausan. VIII. xxv. 1 ff.; Ovid, Metam. V. 106; Pliny, XVI. 33; and for the Charites see Gruppe, op. cit. I. 81, II. 1073, 1083, 1189, 1284; Lobeck, op. cit. II. 1085 ff.; Julii Pol. Onom. IV. 95. For the Thesmophoria see Frazer, GB, Spirits of the Corn ..., II. 16 ff.; Farnell, Cults ..., III. 85-93; and for the Thargelia, GB, The Scapegoat, pp. 254 ff.; Farnell, Cults ..., IV. 268 ff.
[265] E.g. in the cult of Ἄρτεμις Κορδάκα, see Lobeck, De myst. priv. II. 959; Farnell, Cults ..., II. 445; Pausan. VI. xxii. 1. The procession called φαλλοφορία was especially associated with Dionysos and Hermes, see Farnell in ERE, VI. 417 a.
[266] See Farnell in ERE, VI. 403 b; he says: “this privilege of ecstasy might be used for the practical purposes of vegetation-magic.”
[267] Mars was originally a god of vegetation; he appears subsequently as the god of war.
[268] See Aust, Die Religion der Römer, p. 171 (1899).
[269] A translation in full is given by Carter in ERE, II. 10 b, 11 a.
[270] See further on the whole subject Pauly-Wissowa, Realencycl. der klassischen Altertumswissenschaft, II. 1463 ff. (1896).
[271] See Marquardt, Römische Staatsverwaltung, III. 444 (1885).
[272] Cp. the name of the month in which the festival was held, February, which gets its name from februare “to purify.”
[273] March 19 was a special day as being the birthday of Minerva (Ovid, Fasti, III. 812; see Mommsen, Feste ..., p. 59).
[274] “... per urbem ire canentes carmina cum tripudiis solemnique saltatu,” Liv. I. 20. 4. See, further, Wissowa, op. cit. I. 482, who refers to Dion. Hal. II. 70. 2. Cp. de la Saussaye, op. cit. II. 441 ff.; and see Seneca, Epp. XV.; Quintilian, I. 2. 18.
[275] GB, The Scapegoat, p. 232.
[276] Frazer, ibid.; Marquardt, Römische Staatsverwaltung, III. 427 f. (1885); Aust, op. cit. p. 130; Cirilli, Les Prêtres Danseurs de Rome, pp. 97 ff. (1913); for Harvest Festivals generally among the Romans see Wissowa, Religion und Kultus der Römer, pp. 191 ff., for the Hilaria, pp. 321 ff. (1912); Roscher, Ausführliches Lexikon der griechischen und römischen Mythologie, s.v. Attis, I. 715 ff. (1884); for the Vinalia, Aust, op. cit. p. 173. Cp. Farnell, The Evolution of Religion, p. 145 (1905).