Note 15 — KASAI

Of the exaltation of minor animals into anthropomorphic gods and goddesses only a few instances need be given. As is shown by Sir J. G. Frazer, Demeter and Proserpine probably both represent the deified pig.15 “The Greek drama has arisen from the celebrations of Dionysus. In the beginning the people sacrificed a goat totem-god, that is to say, Dionysus himself; they wept for his death and then celebrated his resurrection with transports of joy.”16 And again M. Reinach states: “There are more than mere vestiges of totemism in ancient Greece. We may take first the attendant animals of the gods, the eagle of Zeus, the owl of Athena, the fawn of Artemis, the dolphin of Poseidon, the dove of Aphrodite and so on; the sacred animal can develop into the companion of the god, but also into his enemy or victim; thus Apollo Sauroctonos is, as the epithet shows, a killer of lizards; but in the beginning it was the lizard itself which was divine. We have seen that the boar before becoming the slayer of Adonis had been Adonis himself.”17