that part of her legend which is peculiarly Semitic in colour. For the rest, though she, like Hermes, gives good luck in general, she is a recognised personification of passion and the queen of love.
Hermes.
Another child of Zeus whose elemental origin and character have been much debated is Hermes. The meaning of the name[1] (Ἑρμείας, Ἑρμέας, Ἑρμῆς) is confessedly obscure.
Opinion, then, is divided about the elemental origin of Hermes, and the meaning of his name. His character must be sought, as usual, in ancient poetic myth and in ritual and religion. Herodotus recognised his rites as extremely old, for that is the meaning of his remark[2] that the Athenians borrowed them from the Pelasgians, who are generally recognised as prehistoric Greeks. In the rites spoken of, the images of the god were in one notable point like well-known Bushmen and Admiralty Island divine representations, and like those of Priapus.[3] In Cyllene, where Hermes was
- ↑ Preller, i. 307. The name of Hermes is connected by Welcker (Greisch. Göt., i. 342) with ὁρμᾶν, and he gives other examples of the Æolic use of ο for ε. Compare Curtius's Greek Etymology, English translation, 1886, vol. i. p. 420. Kuhn compares ὁρμή with Indic Sarámā, and Sārāmējās, the son of the latter, with Ἑρμείας, ascribing to both the same meaning, "storm." Mr. Max Müller, on the other hand (Lectures, ii. 468), takes Hermes to be the son of the Dawn. Curtius reserves his opinion. Mr. Max Müller recognises Saramejas and Hermes as deities of twilight. Preller (i. 309) takes him for a god of dark and gloaming.
- ↑ Herod., ii. 51.
- ↑ Can the obscene story of Cicero (De Nat. Deor., iii. 22, 56) be a repetition of the sacred chapter, ἰρόν τινα λὀγον, by which Herodotus says the Pelasgians explained the attribute of the image?
