In many historical societies, the position of kingship carried a sacral meaning and was identical with that of a high priest and judge . Divine kingship is related to the concept of theocracy , although a sacred king need not necessarily rule through his religious authority; rather, the temporal position itself has a religious significance behind it. The monarch may be divine, become divine, or represent divinity to a greater or lesser extent.
67-506: Sir James George Frazer used the concept of the sacred king in his study The Golden Bough (1890–1915), the title of which refers to the myth of the Rex Nemorensis . Frazer gives numerous examples, cited below, and was an inspiration for the myth and ritual school . However, "the myth and ritual , or myth-ritualist, theory" is disputed; many scholars now believe that myth and ritual share common paradigms , but not that one developed from
134-458: A cottage industry of amateurs looking for " pagan survivals" in such things as traditional fairs , maypoles , and folk arts like morris dancing . It was widely influential in literature , being alluded to by D. H. Lawrence , James Joyce , Ezra Pound , and in T. S. Eliot 's The Waste Land , among other works. Robert Graves used Frazer's work in The Greek Myths and made it one of
201-576: A public lectureship in social anthropology at the universities of Cambridge, Oxford, Glasgow and Liverpool was established in his honour in 1921. He was, if not blind, then severely visually impaired from 1930 on. He and his wife, Lilly, died in Cambridge , England, within a few hours of each other. He died on 7 May 1941. They are buried at the St Giles aka Ascension Parish Burial Ground in Cambridge. Frazer
268-469: A book of children's stories, The Leaves from the Golden Bough . His sister Isabella Katherine Frazer married the mathematician John Steggall . The study of myth and religion became his areas of expertise. Except for visits to Italy and Greece , Frazer was not widely travelled. His prime sources of data were ancient histories and questionnaires mailed to missionaries and imperial officials all over
335-455: A chameleon's mouth so that the nicotine poisons it and the creature dies, writhing while turning colours. Variations of the tale are found in other parts of Africa. The Akamba say the messengers are the chameleon and the thrush while the Ashanti say they are the goat and the sheep. The Bura people of northern Nigeria say that, at first, neither death nor disease existed but, one day,
402-599: A consort for the Goddess was annually replaced. According to Frazer, the sacred king represented the spirit of vegetation, a divine John Barleycorn . He came into being in the spring, reigned during the summer, and ritually died at harvest time, only to be reborn at the winter solstice to wax and rule again. The spirit of vegetation was therefore a " dying and reviving god ". Osiris , Dionysus , Attis and many other familiar figures from Greek mythology and classical antiquity were re-interpreted in this mold (Osiris in particular
469-405: A man became ill and died. The people sent a worm to ask the sky deity, Hyel, what they should do with him. The worm was told that the people should hang the corpse in the fork of a tree and throw mush at it until it came back to life. But a malicious lizard, Agadzagadza , hurried ahead of the worm and told the people to dig a grave, wrap the corpse in cloth, and bury it. The people did this. When
536-527: A professor at Trinity College Dublin , though this theory "is nowadays used as the default explanation for the choice of 25 December as Christ's birthday, few advocates of this theory seem to be aware of how paltry the available evidence actually is." In Anglo-Saxon England the winter solstice was generally deemed to be December 25, and in Old English , midwinter could mean both the winter solstice and Christmas . The North Germanic peoples celebrated
603-542: A revival in Early Modern Europe and became chemistry . On the other hand, Frazer displayed a deep anxiety about the potential of widespread belief in magic to empower the masses, indicating fears of and biases against lower-class people in his thought. Frazer collected stories from throughout the British Empire and devised four general classifications into which many of them could be grouped: This type of story
670-622: A role in Romanticism and Esotericism (e.g. Julius Evola ) and some currents of Neopaganism ( Theodism ). The school of Pan-Babylonianism derived much of the religion described in the Hebrew Bible from cults of sacral kingship in ancient Babylonia . The so-called British and Scandinavian cult-historical schools maintained that the king personified a god and stood at the center of the national or tribal religion. The English "myth and ritual school" concentrated on anthropology and folklore, while
737-454: A significant time of year in many cultures and has been marked by festivals and rites . It marked the symbolic death and rebirth of the Sun; the gradual waning of daylight hours is reversed and begins to grow again. Some ancient monuments such as Newgrange , Stonehenge , Cahokia Woodhenge , and Ahu Tongariki are aligned with the sunrise or sunset on the winter solstice. There is evidence that
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#1732852503428804-499: A supplemental thirteenth volume added in 1936. He published a single-volume abridged version, largely compiled by his wife Lady Frazer, in 1922, with some controversial material on Christianity excluded from the text. The work's influence extended well beyond the conventional bounds of academia, inspiring the new work of psychologists and psychiatrists. Sigmund Freud , the founder of psychoanalysis , cited Totemism and Exogamy frequently in his own Totem and Taboo : Resemblances Between
871-693: A winter holiday called Yule . The Heimskringla , written in the 13th century by the Icelander Snorri Sturluson , describes a Yule feast hosted by the Norwegian king Haakon the Good (c. 920–961). According to Snorri, the Christian Haakon had moved Yule from "midwinter" and aligned it with the Christian Christmas celebration. Historically, this has made some scholars believe that Yule originally
938-587: Is a festival day in the Hindu calendar , in reference to deity Surya (sun). It is observed each year in January. It marks the first day of Sun's transit into Makara (Capricorn) , marking the end of the month with the winter solstice and the start of longer days. Iranian people celebrate the night of the Northern Hemisphere's winter solstice as, " Yalda night ", which is known to be the "longest and darkest night of
1005-405: Is also used synonymously with the winter solstice, although it carries other meanings as well. Traditionally, in many temperate regions, the winter solstice is seen as the middle of winter; although today in some countries and calendars it is seen as the beginning of winter. Other names are the "extreme of winter" ( Dongzhi ), or the "shortest day". Since prehistory, the winter solstice has been
1072-474: Is celebrated between December 22 and January 6. Buzmi is a ritualistic piece of wood (or several pieces of wood) that is put to burn in the fire ( zjarri ) of the hearth ( vatër ) on the night of a winter celebration that falls after the return of the Sun for summer (after the winter solstice), sometimes on the night of Kërshëndella on December 24 ( Christmas Eve ), sometimes on the night of kolendra , or sometimes on New Year's Day or on any other occasion aound
1139-579: Is common in Africa. Two messages are carried from the supreme being to mankind: one of eternal life and one of death. The messenger carrying the tidings of eternal life is delayed, and so the message of death is received first by mankind. The Bantu people of Southern Africa, such as the Zulu , tell that Unkulunkulu , the Old Old One, sent a message that men should not die, giving it to the chameleon . The chameleon
1206-470: Is commonly interpreted as an atheist in light of his criticism of Christianity and especially Roman Catholicism in The Golden Bough . However, his later writings and unpublished materials suggest an ambivalent relationship with Neoplatonism and Hermeticism . In 1896 Frazer married Elizabeth "Lilly" Grove , a writer whose father was from Alsace . She would later adapt Frazer's Golden Bough as
1273-489: Is conspicuous in this as he was a figure of Egyptian mythology). The sacred king, the human embodiment of the dying and reviving vegetation god, was supposed to have originally been an individual chosen to rule for a time, but whose fate was to suffer as a sacrifice , to be offered back to the earth so that a new king could rule for a time in his stead. Especially in Europe during Frazer's early twentieth century heyday, it launched
1340-456: Is his six-volume commentary on the Greek traveller Pausanias ' description of Greece in the mid-2nd century AD. Since his time, archaeological excavations have added enormously to the knowledge of ancient Greece, but scholars still find much of value in his detailed historical and topographical discussions of different sites, and his eyewitness accounts of Greece at the end of the 19th century. Among
1407-404: Is that the creator in the sky would lower gifts to mankind on a rope and, one day, a stone was offered to the first couple. They refused the gift as they did not know what to do with it, so the creator took it back and lowered a banana. The couple ate this with relish, but the creator told them that they would live as the banana, perishing after having children rather than remaining everlasting like
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#17328525034281474-571: Is the summer solstice . The winter solstice occurs during the hemisphere's winter . In the Northern Hemisphere, this is the December solstice (December 21, December 22, or December 23) and in the Southern Hemisphere, this is the June solstice (June 20, June 21, or June 22). Although the winter solstice itself lasts only a moment, the term also refers to the day on which it occurs. The term midwinter
1541-570: The Saturnalia (December 17–23), Rome's most joyous holiday season since Republican times, characterized by parties, banquets, and exchanges of gifts". A widely-held theory is that the Church chose December 25 as Christ's birthday ( Dies Natalis Christi ) to appropriate the Roman winter solstice festival marking the sun god's birthday ( Dies Natalis Solis Invicti ). According to C. Philipp E. Nothaft,
1608-653: The cultus in the Hittite city of Nerik, J. D. Hawkins remarked approvingly in 1973, "The whole work is very methodical and sticks closely to the fully quoted documentary evidence in a way that would have been unfamiliar to the late Sir James Frazer." More recently, The Golden Bough has been criticised for what are widely perceived as imperialist , anti-Catholic , classist and racist elements, including Frazer's assumptions that European peasants, Aboriginal Australians and Africans represented fossilised, earlier stages of cultural evolution. Another important work by Frazer
1675-497: The Year-King has not been borne out by field studies. Yet The Golden Bough , his study of ancient cults, rites, and myths, including their parallels in early Christianity, continued for many decades to be studied by modern mythographers for its detailed information. The first edition, in two volumes, was published in 1890; and a second, in three volumes, in 1900. The third edition was finished in 1915 and ran to twelve volumes, with
1742-549: The hibernal solstice , occurs when either of Earth 's poles reaches its maximum tilt away from the Sun . This happens twice yearly, once in each hemisphere ( Northern and Southern ). For that hemisphere, the winter solstice is the day with the shortest period of daylight and longest night of the year, and when the Sun is at its lowest daily maximum elevation in the sky. Each polar region experiences continuous darkness or twilight around its winter solstice. The opposite event
1809-619: The talmudic hypothesis that Adam first established the tradition of fasting before the winter solstice , and rejoicing afterward, which festival later developed into the Roman Saturnalia and Kalendae . When the First Man saw that the day was continuously shortening, he said, "Woe is me! Because I have sinned, the world darkens around me, and returns to formlessless and void. This is the death to which Heaven has sentenced me!" He decided to spend eight days in fasting and prayer. When he saw
1876-737: The "magic wand of science". Larsen criticizes Frazer for baldly characterized magical rituals as "infallible" without clarifying that this is merely what believers in the rituals thought. Larsen has said that Frazer's vivid descriptions of magical practices were written with the intention to repel readers, but, instead, these descriptions more often allured them. Larsen also criticizes Frazer for applying western European Christian ideas, theology, and terminology to non-Christian cultures. This distorts those cultures to make them appear more Christian. Frazer routinely described non-Christian religious figures by equating them with Christian ones. Frazer applied Christian terms to functionaries , for instance calling
1943-575: The Christian doctrine of reconciliation . When Spencer, who had studied the aboriginals firsthand, objected that the ideas were not remotely similar, Frazer insisted that they were exactly equivalent. Based on these exchanges, Larsen concludes that Frazer's deliberate use of Judeo-Christian terminology in the place of native terminology was not to make native cultures seem less strange, but rather to make Christianity seem more strange and barbaric. Winter solstice The winter solstice , also called
2010-404: The Christian terms were loaded with Christian connotations that would be completely foreign to members of the cultures he was describing, Frazer insisted that he should use Abrahamic terms instead, telling him that using native terms would be off-putting and would seem pedantic. A year later, Frazer excoriated Spencer for refusing to equate the non-estrangement of Aboriginal Australian totems with
2077-460: The Psychic Lives of Savages and Neurotics . The symbolic cycle of life, death and rebirth which Frazer divined behind myths of many peoples captivated a generation of artists and poets. Perhaps the most notable product of this fascination is T. S. Eliot 's poem The Waste Land (1922). Frazer's pioneering work has been criticised by late-20th-century scholars. For instance, in the 1980s
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2144-518: The Scandinavian "Uppsala school" emphasized Semitological study. A sacred king, according to the systematic interpretation of mythology developed by Frazer in The Golden Bough (published 1890), was a king who represented a solar deity in a periodically re-enacted fertility rite . Frazer seized upon the notion of a substitute king and made him the keystone of his theory of a universal, pan- European , and indeed worldwide fertility myth, in which
2211-404: The angular diameter of the Sun. Observing that it occurred within a two-day period is easier, requiring an observation precision of only about 1/16 of the angular diameter of the Sun. Thus, many observations are of the day of the solstice rather than the instant. This is often done by observing sunrise and sunset or using an astronomically aligned instrument that allows a ray of light to be cast on
2278-635: The burden of leadership and the ultimate responsibility of personal sacrifice, including Sword at Sunset , The Mark of the Horse Lord , and Sun Horse, Moon Horse . In addition to its appearance in her novel Lammas Night noted above, Katherine Kurtz also uses the idea of sacred kingship in her novel The Quest for Saint Camber . General "English school" "Scandinavian school" Sir James George Frazer Sir James George Frazer OM FRS FRSE FBA ( / ˈ f r eɪ z ər / ; 1 January 1854 – 7 May 1941)
2345-942: The elders of the Njamus of East Africa "equivalent to the Levites of Israel" and the Grand Lama of Lhasa "the Buddhist Pope ... the man-god who bore his people's sorrows, the Good Shepherd who laid down his life for the sheep". He routinely uses the specifically Christian theological terms " born again ", "new birth", " baptism ", " christening ", " sacrament ", and "unclean" in reference to non-Christian cultures. When Frazer's Australian colleague Walter Baldwin Spencer requested to use native terminology to describe Aboriginal Australian cultures, arguing that doing so would be more accurate, since
2412-569: The foundations of his own personal mythology in The White Goddess , and in the fictional Seven Days in New Crete he depicted a future in which the institution of a sacrificial sacred king is revived. Margaret Murray , the principal theorist of witchcraft as a "pagan survival," used Frazer's work to propose the thesis that many kings of England who died as kings, most notably William Rufus , were secret pagans and witches , whose deaths were
2479-475: The globe. Frazer's interest in social anthropology was aroused by reading E. B. Tylor 's Primitive Culture (1871) and was also encouraged by his friend, the biblical scholar William Robertson Smith , who was comparing elements of the Old Testament with early Hebrew folklore. Frazer was the first scholar to describe in detail the relations between myths and rituals . His vision of the annual sacrifice of
2546-411: The grand trajectory of human thought." He thus ultimately proposed – and attempted to further – a narrative of secularization and one of the first social-scientific expressions of a disenchantment narrative. At the same time, Frazer was aware that both magic and religion could persist or return. He noted that magic sometimes returned so as to become science, such as when alchemy underwent
2613-601: The house, kinship or neighborhood, a practice performed in order to give strength to the Sun according to the old beliefs. The rites related to the cult of vegetation, which expressed the desire for increased production in agriculture and animal husbandry, were accompanied by animal sacrifices to the fire, lighting pine trees at night, luck divination tests with crackling in the fire or with coins in ritual bread, making and consuming ritual foods, performing various magical ritualistic actions in livestock, fields, vineyards and orchards, and so on. Nata e Buzmit, " Yule log 's night",
2680-508: The idea that man should or might return from death in a similar way. Stories that associate the moon with the origin of death are found especially around the Pacific region. In Fiji , it is said that the moon suggested that mankind should return as he did. But the rat god, Ra Kalavo , would not permit this, insisting that men should die like rats. In Australia, the Wotjobaluk aborigines say that
2747-457: The latter, then mankind would have shed their skins like crabs and so lived eternally. The banana plant bears its fruit on a stalk which dies after bearing. This gave people such as the Nias islanders the idea that they had inherited this short-lived property of the banana rather than the immortality of the crab. The natives of Poso also based their myth on this property of the banana. Their story
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2814-483: The moon used to revive the dead until an old man said that this should stop. The Cham have it that the goddess of good luck used to revive the dead, but the sky-god sent her to the moon so she could not do this any more. Animals which shed their skin , such as snakes and lizards , appeared to be immortal to primitive people. This led to stories in which mankind lost the ability to do this. For example, in Vietnam , it
2881-658: The most influential elements of the third edition of The Golden Bough is Frazer's theory of cultural evolution and the place Frazer assigns religion and magic in that theory. Frazer's theory of cultural evolution was not absolute and could reverse, but sought to broadly describe three (or possibly, four) spheres through which cultures were thought to pass over time. Frazer believed that, over time, culture passed through three stages, moving from magic, to religion, to science. Frazer's classification notably diverged from earlier anthropological descriptions of cultural evolution, including that of Auguste Comte , because he thought magic
2948-412: The other. According to Frazer, the notion has prehistoric roots and occurs worldwide, on Java as in sub-Saharan Africa , with shaman -kings credited with rainmaking and assuring fertility and good fortune. The king might also be designated to suffer and atone for his people, meaning that the sacral king could be the pre-ordained victim in a human sacrifice , either killed at the end of his term in
3015-551: The position, or sacrificed in a time of crisis (e.g. the Blót of Domalde ). In Africa, sacred kings are often represented as volatile and potentially dangerous wild animals. The Ashanti flogged a newly selected king ( Ashantehene ) before enthroning him. From the Bronze Age in the Near East , the enthronement and anointment of a monarch is a central religious ritual, reflected in
3082-461: The precise timing of its occurrence is now public knowledge. The precise instant of the solstice cannot be directly detected (by definition, people cannot observe that an object has stopped moving until it is later observed that it has not moved further from the preceding spot, or that it has moved in the opposite direction). To be precise to a single day, observers must be able to view a change in azimuth or elevation less than or equal to about 1/60 of
3149-524: The re-enactment of the human sacrifice that stood at the centre of Frazer's myth. This idea used by fantasy writer Katherine Kurtz in her novel Lammas Night . Monarchies carried sacral kingship into the Middle Ages , encouraging the idea of kings installed by the Grace of God . See: Many of Rosemary Sutcliff 's novels are recognized as being directly influenced by Frazer, depicting individuals accepting
3216-564: The same period, a tradition that is originally related to the cult of the Sun. In East Asia , the winter solstice has been celebrated as one of the Twenty-four Solar Terms , called Dongzhi (冬至) in Chinese . In Japan , in order not to catch cold in the winter, there is a custom to soak oneself in a yuzu hot bath ( Japanese : 柚子湯 = Yuzuyu). Makara Sankranti, also known as Makara Sankrānti ( Sanskrit : मकर संक्रांति) or Maghi,
3283-406: The seasons. Starvation was common during the first months of the winter, January to April (northern hemisphere) or July to October (southern hemisphere). Livestock were slaughtered so they would not have to be fed during the winter, so it was almost the only time of year when a plentiful supply of fresh meat was available. Because the winter solstice is the reversal of the Sun's apparent ebbing in
3350-566: The sky, in ancient times it was seen as the symbolic death and rebirth of the Sun or of a Sun god . In cultures which used cyclic calendars based on the winter solstice, the "year as reborn" was celebrated with reference to life-death-rebirth deities or "new beginnings" (such as Hogmanay 's redding , a New Year cleaning tradition), and "reversal" (as in Saturnalia 's slave and master reversals). Some important Neolithic and early Bronze Age archaeological sites in Europe are associated with
3417-478: The social anthropologist Edmund Leach wrote a series of critical articles, one of which was featured as the lead in Anthropology Today , vol. 1 (1985). Leach criticised The Golden Bough for the breadth of comparisons drawn from widely separated cultures, but often based his comments on the abridged edition, which omits the supportive archaeological details. In a positive review of a book narrowly focused on
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#17328525034283484-624: The stone. Frazer married in 1896 and his new wife perceived that Frazer's reputation was not equal to his abilities. Lilly Frazer had the pushiness that he lacked, and she became his manager and publicist guarding access to his office. He did not care too much for prizes but she valued them. She was particularly involved in publishing his work, where she arranged translation to French, and to children, where she adapted his stories. According to historian Timothy Larsen , Frazer used scientific terminology and analogies to describe ritual practices, and conflated magic and science together, such as describing
3551-421: The themes of leadership and the responsibility to supply food and protection, as well as superiority. As the mediator between the people and the divine, the sacral king was credited with special wisdom (e.g. Solomon or Gilgamesh ) or vision (e.g. via oneiromancy ). Study of the concept was introduced by Sir James George Frazer in his influential book The Golden Bough (1890–1915); sacral kingship plays
3618-412: The titles " Messiah " or " Christ ", which became separated from worldly kingship. Thus Sargon of Akkad described himself as "deputy of Ishtar ", just as the modern Catholic Pope takes the role of the " Vicar of Christ ". Kings are styled as shepherds from earliest times, e.g., the term applied to Sumerian princes such as Lugalbanda in the 3rd millennium BCE. The image of the shepherd combines
3685-529: The winter solstice celebrate the return of the Sun ( Dielli ) for summer and the lengthening of the days. The Albanian traditional rites during the winter solstice period are pagan, and very ancient. Albanologist Johann Georg von Hahn (1811 – 1869) reported that Christian clergy, during his time and before, have vigorously fought the pagan rites that were practiced by Albanians to celebrate this festivity, but without success. The old rites of this festivity were accompanied by collective fires ( zjarre ) based on
3752-461: The winter solstice was deemed an important moment of the annual cycle for some cultures as far back as the Neolithic (New Stone Age). Astronomical events were often used to guide farming activities, such as the mating of animals, the sowing of crops and the monitoring of winter reserves of food. The winter solstice was important because the people were economically dependent on monitoring the progress of
3819-585: The winter solstice, and he saw that the day was continuously lengthening, he said, "It is the order of the world!" He went and feasted for eight days. The following year, he feasted for both. He established them in Heaven's name, but they established them in the name of idolatry Although the instant of the solstice can be calculated, direct observation of the moment by visual perception is elusive. The Sun moves too slowly or appears to stand still (the meaning of "solstice"). However, by use of astronomical data tracking ,
3886-573: The winter solstice, such as Stonehenge in England and Newgrange in Ireland. The primary axes of both of these monuments seem to have been carefully aligned on a sight-line pointing to the winter solstice sunrise (Newgrange) and the winter solstice sunset (Stonehenge). It is significant that at Stonehenge the Great Trilithon was oriented outwards from the middle of the monument, i.e. its smooth flat face
3953-573: The worm arrived and said that they should dig up the corpse, place it in a tree, and throw mush at it, they were too lazy to do this, and so death remained on Earth. This Bura story has the common mythic motif of a vital message which is diverted by a trickster . In Togoland , the messengers were the dog and the frog, and, as in the Bura version, the messengers go first from mankind to God to get answers to their questions. The moon regularly seems to disappear and then return. This gave primitive peoples
4020-546: The year". Yalda night celebration, or as some call it "Shabe Chelleh" ("the 40th night"), is one of the oldest Iranian traditions that has been present in Persian culture from ancient times. In this night all the family gather together, usually at the house of the eldest, and celebrate it by eating, drinking and reciting poetry (esp. Hafez). Nuts, pomegranates and watermelons are particularly served during this festival. An Aggadic legend found in tractate Avodah Zarah 8a puts forth
4087-655: Was a Scottish social anthropologist and folklorist influential in the early stages of the modern studies of mythology and comparative religion . Frazer was born on 1 January 1854 in Glasgow , Scotland, the son of Katherine Brown and Daniel F. Frazer, a chemist. He attended school at Springfield Academy and Larchfield Academy in Helensburgh . He studied at the University of Glasgow and Trinity College, Cambridge , where he graduated with honours in classics (his dissertation
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#17328525034284154-618: Was a sun festival on the winter solstice. Modern scholars generally do not believe this, as midwinter in medieval Iceland was a date about four weeks after the solstice. During the Christianisation of the Germanic peoples , Yule was incorporated into the Christmas celebrations and the term and its cognates remain used to refer to Christmas in modern Northern European languages such as English and Swedish. Albanian traditional festivities around
4221-761: Was both initially separate from religion and invariably preceded religion. He also defined magic separately from belief in the supernatural and superstition, presenting an ultimately ambivalent view of its place in culture. Frazer believed that magic and science were similar because both shared an emphasis on experimentation and practicality; his emphasis on this relationship is so broad that almost any disproven scientific hypothesis technically constitutes magic under his system. In contrast to both magic and science, Frazer defined religion in terms of belief in personal, supernatural forces and attempts to appease them. As historian of religion Jason Josephson-Storm describes Frazer's views, Frazer saw religion as "a momentary aberration in
4288-467: Was published years later as The Growth of Plato 's Ideal Theory ) and remained a Classics Fellow all his life. From Trinity, he went on to study law at the Middle Temple , but never practised. Four times elected to Trinity's Title Alpha Fellowship, he was associated with the college for most of his life, except for the year 1907–1908, spent at the University of Liverpool . He was knighted in 1914, and
4355-565: Was said that the Jade Emperor sent word from heaven to mankind that, when they became old, they should shed their skins while the serpents would die and be buried. But some snakes overheard the command and threatened to bite the messenger unless he switched the message, so that man would die while snakes would be eternally renewed. For the natives of the island of Nias , the story was that the messenger who completed their creation failed to fast and ate bananas rather than crabs. If he had eaten
4422-534: Was slow and dawdled, taking time to eat and sleep. Unkulunkulu meanwhile had changed his mind and gave a message of death to the lizard who travelled quickly and so overtook the chameleon. The message of death was delivered first and so, when the chameleon arrived with its message of life, mankind would not hear it and so is fated to die. Because of this, Bantu people, such as the Ngoni , punish lizards and chameleons. For example, children may be allowed to put tobacco into
4489-419: Was turned towards the midwinter Sun. In the ancient Roman calendar, December 25 was the date of the winter solstice. In AD 274, the emperor Aurelian made this the date of the festival Dies Natalis Solis Invicti , the birthday of Sol Invictus or the 'Invincible Sun'. Gary Forsythe, Professor of Ancient History, says "This celebration would have formed a welcome addition to the seven-day period of
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