Correspondence. 125
The modern versions on the other hand belong to popular hagiology, and supply an aitiological account of why it is that, as a matter of fact, the tops of mountains throughout Greek lands are dedicated to St. Elias and adorned with little churches in his honour. The motif of the enmity with the sea-god has naturally disappeared. St. Elias is just a worn-out mariner, so tired of the sea that he wishes to get right away from it. The details of the story tend to lose their individuality in the less com- plex setting. Mr. Paton's story retains the picturesque in the mistaking of the oar, not indeed for a winnowing shovel, but, — very plausible and good, — for a baker's peel. The two versions given by Polites are duller. "A bit of wood" (^vAo) is the form of the desired response.
The habitual dedication of mountain tops to St. Elias appears to have excited popular curiosity. In the Argolid it is explained that Mahomet was chasing him and indeed almost caught him in the plain, but up the mountain he was unable to follow, and at the summit the saint found a safe refuge.'^
The learned have a different answer to the riddle.^ This St. Elias, who, ecclesiastically speaking, is either the prophet Elijah of the Old Testament or a Christian hermit of the fourth century a.d., is "merely the Christian successor to Helios, the Sun." Indeed almost every modern Greek saint has by now been declared to be the avatar of an ancient Greek god. In many cases, however, the arguments for these identifications are none too strong, and in every case they demand careful examination before the con- clusions are accepted. At present I will do no more than confess that the alleged identity of St. Elias and Helios appears to me possible rather than probable, and certainly very far from proven.
W. R. Hallidav.
Polites, op. cit.. No. 20S.
- Polites, 6 "HXioj Kord toi)s 8rjfiu5eis (jlvOovs, pp. 45 ci seq ; J. C. Lawson,
Modern Greek Folklore and Ancient Greek Religion, p. 44. The question is also dealt with in Miss M. Hamilton, (Mrs. Dickins), Greek Saints and their Festivals, pp. 19-24.
