Observe that, although the mother of an illegitimate child, she, like all the mothers of such children when their father is divine or mysterious, is "pure," the "virgin-mother," etc.
These virgin-mothers are not copies of the Christian Mary Most, if not all of them, were known long before the days of Christianity.
The mother of the Siamese 'Somona Cadom' was impregnated by sun-beams, another form of Danae's golden shower. She was called Maha Maria or Maya Maria, i. e., "the Great Mary." And this brings out some curious coincidences in name among virgin-mothers. Thus:
Marietta of the Kalevala has already been referred to above.
The mother of Hermes or Mercury was Myrrha or Maia.
Maya, the mother of Buddha, is identical in name with the Hindu goddess Maya, who is represented as walking upon the waters, with her peplum teeming with animals, to show her fecundity. Maya is also a well-known Hindu term for 'illusion."
The month of May (so nearly like the name of Maia) was sacred to some of the virgin-goddesses of ancient times, as it is now to Mary, the Mother of Jesus. The Christian Virgin Mary was also called Myrrha; and she is still called Santa Maria in Southern Europe and in Mexico. The title bestowed on her of "Star of the Sea" a title given to the Egyptian Virgin-mother, Isis, perhaps two thousand years earlier shows how close a resemblance tradition and folklore have traced between both of these virgin-mothers and the ancient genitrix of the waters. Also, the Latin "mare" and the French "mer" for "the sea," and the French "mere" for 'mother" bear a striking resemblance to the name Mary in sound. And Venus was born from the foam of sea presiding divinity of love between the sexes. She is credited with having been "indulgent Venus" to a mortal man Anchises, to whom she bore the hero of Virgil's Aeneid, a Borderland espousal, this though here it is the wife and not the husband who comes from the invisible world.
