Note 322 — TIT and TITH.

All these histories relate to sacred inclosures; and to the worship of the serpent, and rites of fire, which were practised within them. Such an inclosure was by the Greeks styled [322]τεμενος, and the mound or high place ταφος and τυμβος; which had often a tower upon it, esteemed a sanctuary and asylum. Lycophron makes Cassandra say of Diomedes, [323]ΤYΜΒΟΣ δ' αυτον εκσωσει: the temple, to which he shall fly, shall save him. In process of time both the word τυμβος, as well as ταφος, were no longer taken in their original sense; but supposed uniformly to have been places of sepulture. This has turned many temples into tombs: and the Deities, to whom they were sacred, have been represented as there buried. There was an Orphic Dracontium at Lesbos; where a serpent was supposed to have been going to devour the remains of Orpheus: and this temple being of old styled Petra, it was fabled of the serpent, that he was turned into stone.