“Moera, baneful gifts dispensing.”
The word μοῖρα originally means lot, portion, part, that which is dealt or divided out to one. In this sense it occurs frequently in Homer, and is there regarded as proceeding from the gods, and specially from Jove. But with an inconsistency natural enough in popular poetry, we sometimes find μοῖρα in Homer, like ἀτη, elevated to the rank of a separate divine personage. “Not I,” says Agamemnon, in the Iliad (XIX. 86), “was to blame for the quarrel with Achilles,
But Jove and Moera and the Fury, walking through the darkness dread.”
The three Fates, Clotho, Lachesis, and Atropos, like the three Furies, were a post-Homeric birth. We thus see how, under the influence of the Polytheistic system, new gods were continually created from what were originally mere functions of the divine mind, or results of the divine activity.
“Due burial in its friendly bosom.”
θάπτειν ἔδοξε γῆς φιλαις κατασκφαῖς. The words here used seem to imply interment in the modern fashion, without burning, but they may also refer to the depositing of the urns in subterranean chambers. Ancient remains, as well as the testimony of classical authors, prove that both practices existed among the ancients, though cremation was latterly the more common. The reader will be instructed by the following extract on this subject from Dr. Smith’s admirable Dictionary of Antiquities, article Funus: “The body was either buried or burnt. Lucian, de luctu, says that the Greeks burn, and the Persians bury, their dead; but modern writers are greatly divided in opinion as to which was the usual practice. Wachsmuth (Hell. Alt. II. 2, p. 79) says that, in historical times, the dead were always buried; but this statement is not strictly correct. Thus we find that Socrates (Plut. Phædon) speaks of his body being either burnt or buried; the body of Timoleon was burnt; and so was that of Philopæmon (Plutarch). The word θάπτειν is used in connection with either mode; it is applied to the collection of the ashes after burning; and accordingly we find the words κάιειν and θάπτειν used together (Dionys. Archæolog. Rom. V. 48). The proper expression for interment in the earth is κατορύττειν; whereas we find Socrates speaking of το σῶμα η καόμενον, ἠ κατορυττόμενον. In Homer, the bodies of the dead are burnt; but interment was also used in very ancient times. Cicero (de leg. II. 25) says that the dead were buried at Athens in the time of Cecrops; and we also read of the bones of Orestes being found in a coffin at Tegea (Herod. I. 68). The dead were commonly buried among the Spartans (Plut. Lycurg. 27) and the Sicyonians (Paus. II. 7); and the prevalence of this practice is proved by the great number of skeletons found in coffins in modern times, which have evidently not been exposed to the action of fire. Both burning and burying appear to have been always used, to a greater or less extent, at different periods; till the spread of Christianity at length put an end to the former practice.”
“Mighty Furies that triumphant
Ride on ruin’s baleful wings.”