Section 1. Songs of the Corn Reapers.
IN THE PRECEDING pages an attempt has been made to show
that in the Corn-mother and Harvest-maiden of Northern Europe
we have the prototypes of Demeter and Persephone. But an
essential feature is still wanting to complete the resemblance. A
leading incident in the Greek myth is the death and resurrection of
Persephone; it is this incident which, coupled with the nature of
the goddess as a deity of vegetation, links the myth with the cults
of Adonis, Attis, Osiris, and Dionysus; and it is in virtue of this
incident that the myth finds a place in our discussion of the Dying
God. It remains, therefore, to see whether the conception of the
annual death and resurrection of a god, which figures so
prominently in these great Greek and Oriental worships, has not
also its origin or its analogy in the rustic rites observed by reapers
and vine-dressers amongst the corn-shocks and the vines. 1
Our general ignorance of the popular superstitions and customs
of the ancients has already been confessed. But the obscurity
which thus hangs over the first beginnings of ancient religion is
fortunately dissipated to some extent in the present case. The
worships of Osiris, Adonis, and Attis had their respective seats, as
we have seen, in Egypt, Syria, and Phrygia; and in each of these
countries certain harvest and vintage customs are known to have
been observed, the resemblance of which to each other and to
the national rites struck the ancients themselves, and, compared
with the harvest customs of modern peasants and barbarians,
seems to throw some light on the origin of the rites in question. 2
It has been already mentioned, on the authority of Diodorus, that
in ancient Egypt the reapers were wont to lament over the first
sheaf cut, invoking Isis as the goddess to whom they owed the
discovery of corn. To the plaintive song or cry sung or uttered by
Egyptian reapers the Greeks gave the name of Maneros, and
explained the name by a story that Maneros, the only son of the
first Egyptian king, invented agriculture, and, dying an untimely
death, was thus lamented by the people. It appears, however, that
the name Maneros is due to a misunderstanding of the formula
maa-ne-hra, "Come to the house," which has been discovered in
various Egyptian writings, for example in the dirge of Isis in the
Book of the Dead. Hence we may suppose that the cry
maa-ne-hra was chanted by the reapers over the cut corn as a
dirge for the death of the corn-spirit (Isis or Osiris) and a prayer
for its return. As the cry was raised over the first ears reaped, it
would seem that the corn-spirit was believed by the Egyptians to
be present in the first corn cut and to die under the sickle. We
have seen that in the Malay Peninsula and Java the first ears of
rice are taken to represent either the Soul of the Rice or the
Rice-bride and the Rice-bridegroom. In parts of Russia the first
sheaf is treated much in the same way that the last sheaf is treated
elsewhere. It is reaped by the mistress herself, taken home and set
in the place of honour near the holy pictures; afterwards it is
threshed separately, and some of its grain is mixed with the next
year's seed-corn. In Aberdeenshire, while the last corn cut was
generally used to make the clyack sheaf, it was sometimes,
though rarely, the first corn cut that was dressed up as a woman
and carried home with ceremony. 3
In Phoenicia and Western Asia a plaintive song, like that
chanted by the Egyptian corn-reapers, was sung at the vintage
and probably (to judge by analogy) also at harvest. This
Phoenician song was called by the Greeks Linus or Ailinus and
explained, like Maneros, as a lament for the death of a youth
named Linus. According to one story Linus was brought up by a
shepherd, but torn to pieces by his dogs. But, like Maneros, the
name Linus or Ailinus appears to have originated in a verbal
misunderstanding, and to be nothing more than the cry ai lanu,
that is "Woe to us," which the Phoenicians probably uttered in
mourning for Adonis; at least Sappho seems to have regarded
Adonis and Linus as equivalent. 4
In Bithynia a like mournful ditty, called Bormus or Borimus, was
chanted by Mariandynian reapers. Bormus was said to have been
a handsome youth, the son of King Upias or of a wealthy and
distinguished man. One summer day, watching the reapers at work
in his fields, he went to fetch them a drink of water and was never
heard of more. So the reapers sought for him, calling him in
plaintive strains, which they continued to chant at harvest ever
afterwards. 5