Note 39 — PART II CHAPTER VIII ORIGINS OF THE BELIEF IN IMMORTALITY THE THRACIAN WORSHIP OF DIONYSOS

Mela, 2, 21 (and from him Solin. 10, 5, p. 75, 16 Mom.) says of the Thracians epulantibus ubi super ignes quos circumsident quaedam semina ingesta sunt, similis ebrietati hilaritas ex nidore contingit (cf. [Plu.] de Flu. 3, 3). There can be no doubt that it was hemp-seed (κάνναβις) which had this effect. Hdt. iv, 74, says expressly that the Thracians knew hemp. It was thus with a sort of hashish that they intoxicated themselves (hashish is an extract of cannabis indica). The Scythians did something similar: Hdt. tells of their vapour-baths in tightly closed huts (iv, 75): they produced a smoke by laying hempseeds on red-hot stones and—though Hdt. does not say so—must necessarily have got into a state of wild intoxication. This may have been a religious performance. Drunkenness is generally regarded by savage tribes as a religiously inspired condition. Further, the Scythian practice has the most striking parallel in the use of “vapour-huts” among the North American Indians, in which case the religious intention is certain (see the account in Klemm, Culturg. ii, 175–8; J. G. Müller, Amerik. Urrelig. 92). Hdt. i, 202, also mentions intoxication from the fumes of certain “fruits” among the Massagetai; these last, after they had completely bemused themselves, stood up to dance and sing. The Thracians, too, may very well have used intoxication through hashish-fumes as a means of exciting themselves to their ecstatic religious dances.—The ancients were quite familiar with the practice of inhaling aromatic smoke to produce religious hallucinations: [Galen] ὅρ. ἰατρ. 187 (xix, p. 462 K) ἐνθουσιασμός ἐστι καθάπερ ἐξίστανταί τινες ἐπὶ (ὑπὸ?) τῶν ὑποθυμιωμένων ἐν τοῖς ἱεροῖς, <φάσματα (om. edd.)> ὁρῶντες ἢ τυμπάνων ἢ αὐλῶν ἢ συμβόλων (scr. κυμβάλων) ἀκούοντες; cf. odorum delenimento potest animus humanus externari, Apul., Ap. 43.—For the use of smoke in the Korybantic ceremonies see below.—The γαγάτης λίθος ὑποθυμιαθείς is useful as an ἐπιληπτικῶν ἔλεγχος (Dioscor. v, 145); it brings on the convulsions of the victim of ἱερὰ νόσος (epilepsy) [Orph.] L. 478 ff. (cf. further Damigeron, de Lap. 20, p. 179 Ab.; Plin., NH. 36, 141; and also Gal. xii, p. 203 K.).