Note 42 — PART II

The Greeks themselves referred to a foreign origin most of their mystical rites, and the deities worshipped therein. No doubt it is often the case that peoples who observe in foreign nations practices akin to those existing among themselves, are apt to derive these from the former; nevertheless it appears certain that while the cults which formed the basis of the mysteries existed, in a primitive form, in the indigenous Greek religion, they received a great impetus, at several distinct periods, through the importation of similar myths and rites from abroad. Thus M. Paul Foucart (Recherches sur l’origine et la nature des Mystères d’Eleusis, p. 75) accepts the Greek theory of the Egyptian origin of the Demeter cult and the Eleusinian rites at a date prior to the eleventh century B.C. These rites, he assumes, were purely agricultural at first, but at a later day (seventh century B.C.) became associated with the doctrine of a future life (pp. 75-9). He further holds that this doctrine was itself brought from Egypt by the philosophers, Pythagoras and others, who are reported by tradition to have travelled thither for instruction (p. 83). This latter part of M. Foucart’s theory presents certain difficulties. The name of Pythagoras is commonly associated with the Orphic mysteries, to which M. Foucart denies any connection with Eleusis, while the conception of a future life which prevailed both in the Orphic and Eleusinian mysteries and in the teaching of Pythagoras, differed in important points from the Egyptian doctrine, as will be pointed out in a later place. Professor Rohde likewise holds that while the Dionysiac mysteries existed in Greece in pre-Homeric times as a minor and local cult, the Dionysos-Zagreus rites, which formed the basis of the Orphic mysteries, were imported from Thrace at an early date; probably, Mr. Nutt suggests (op. cit., ii. 141), during the period of change which followed upon the Dorian invasion. Thrace, apparently, derived the Zagreus myth from Phrygia. Prof. Percy Gardner (Contemporary Review, March 1895) is also inclined to accept the Greek traditions as to the derivation of many of their mystical rites and cults from Asiatic sources, differing herein from Prof. Dieterich, who holds that these were native developments. For a discussion by Mr. Alfred Nutt of these various theories see op. cit., 1. ch. xi.