Forlong says:—“I began my study of British ruins about eight years ago (from 1882), during a two-year-furlough, attracted to it at first by my friend the late Sir James Simpson—President of the Society of Antiquaries, Edinburgh—at that time writing and debating much on these matters; and I came then to the same conclusion as I hold to-day; viz.: that the ruins of Armorika, those of Stonehenge, Abury, and various others, known popularly as ‘Druid Circles,’ are, or originally were, Phallo-Pythic—Solar shrines, or places where all the first five elemental faiths more or less flourished; the first (Tree) very little, and the last (Sun) very abundantly; and if so, then we see the cause why European writers so pugnaciously hold out, some for Sun, some for Fire; one that they are mere places for sacrifices or burial, or for assembly of rulers, clans, &c.; whilst a few outlying writers hint that the large stones are Lingams, or mere groups of such stones as that of Kerloaz—the Newton stone, &c. Colonel Forbes Leslie, in his ‘Ancient Races of Scotland,’ has very nearly told us the truth, his long residence and travels in Asia having enabled him almost to pierce the cloud, though he seems at first not to have fully appreciated the ever very close connection between Sun, Fire, Serpent and Lingam faiths, which I believe he does now.”
“The European mind having once lost the old ideas of what these words meant, and from having still such objects as Sun, Fire, and Serpent before them, is always thinking of these visible objects, which I might almost say a true Sivaite never recognises per se; for in fire the true Phallic worshipper sees no flame, and in the sun no far-out resplendent orb as we know, standing apart, as it were, in space, and to which we all gravitate; he sees simply a source of fertility, without which the Serpent has no power or passion, and in whose absence the animal and vegetable world must cease to exist. The fire here, then, is not that which the real Sivaite sees or cooks by, but Hot or Holy Fire, or the ‘Holy Spirit,’ or the fire of passion, which to a certain small extent, and in certain symbolic forms and positions, he recognises in flame, as when raised on a tower, coming out of an obelisk, or rising in a column or pillar over an ark, or smouldering in the secret adytum; for the first impresses him with the Arkite, the second with the Phallic and Arkite, and the third with the purely feminine idea; in all, he merely sees representative male and female energies which are excited and fructified by the Sun, Apollo, or the Sun-Serpent, as in his old coin, where fertility fed by fire feeds the shell. In a column, be it wood, stone, or fire, he sees the Sun-stone, such as the Mudros of Phœnicia, the Mindir of Ireland, and obelisk of Egypt; and in the cist, shell, or Akros, the womb, Yoni, or sun-box; in all, the column or Palas, and its Caput-oline.”
“Leaping or walking through the fire, so frequently mentioned in Jewish writings in connection with Molek, is still quite common in the less civilised parts of India, being usually done in fulfilment of a vow for blessings desired, or believed to have been conferred by the deity upon the Nazarite or Vower. I have known of it being gone through for recovery from a severe illness, and for success in an expedition or project which the Nazarite had much at heart.”
Some say fire should be trod because Drupadi, the mythical wife of the Pandoos, did this, after defilement through the touch of Kichaka, and because Sita proved her purity by fire. Where the British Government can prevent this rite, flowers are thrown into the fire-pit, which seems as if the fire were looked upon as a female energy. Fire-treading is commonly accomplished by digging a deepish narrow pit, and filling it with firewood, and then when the flames are scorching hot, leaping over it; usually the rite begins by first walking closely round the fire, slowly at first, then faster and faster, with occasional leaps into and out of it in the wildest excitement. Mr. Stokes, of the Madras Civil Service, thus describes the rite as it came officially to notice in April, 1873.
In a level place before the village deity, who was Drupadi Ama (Mother D.), a fire-pit, in size 27 by 7½ feet by 9 inches deep, was excavated east and west, and the goddess set up at the west end. Six Babool or Acacia trees (this being a fiercely burning wood) were cut and thrown in; thirteen persons trod this fire, and one died from the effects. They followed each other, some with tabors, others ringing a bell, and each, after passing through the fire, went into a pit filled with water, called the “milk pit.” All merely wore a waist cloth, and had their bodies daubed over with sandal. The one who died, fell into the fire, and had to be pulled out. The fire was lit at noon, and “walking it” took place at two p.m., when it had become very bright and hot. The Poojore, or priest of the temple, said it was his duty to walk annually through the fire, and that he had done so for seven or eight years. It was the mother of the dead man who had vowed that if her son recovered from an attack of jaundice she would tread the fire, but the old woman being blind, her son fulfilled the vow. Some said that the dead man himself had vowed thus to the Goddess Drupadi: “Mother, if I recover, I shall tread on your fire.” Death is rarely the result of this practice, but Mr. Stokes adds that a few years ago, a mother and her infant died from the effects.
“On the 29th of June, men, and even babes, had to be passed through the fire. ‘On this night,’ says Dr. Moresin, ‘did the Highlanders run about on the mountains and high grounds with lighted torches, like the Cicilian women of old, in search of Proserpine,’ and Scotch farmers then used to go round their corn-fields with blazing torches, as was the custom at the Cerealia. The ancient Roman Kalendar states, among other matter, that fires are made on the 23rd; ‘Boys dress in girls’ clothes; waters are swum in during the night. Water is fetched in vessels and hung up for purposes of divination; fern is esteemed by the vulgar because of the seed...; girls gather thistles, and place a hundred crosses by the same;’ for has not the thistle a cap like the lotus, and is it not a trefoil?
“In the ‘Englishwoman in Russia,’ p. 223, a writer says that ‘on midsummer eve a custom still (1855) exists in Russia, among the lower classes, that could only be derived from a very remote antiquity, and is perhaps a remnant of the worship of Baal. A party of peasant women and girls assemble in some retired unfrequented spot, and light a large fire, over which they leap in succession. If by chance one of the other sex should be found near the place, or should have seen them in the act of performing the rite, it is at the imminent hazard of his life, for the women would not scruple to sacrifice him for his temerity.’ The writer was assured that such instances had often been known. Thus this ‘Fire-dance’ is a very serious matter, and one which under the circumstances, we can learn very little about: from its secret practice here by women it is clearly connected with Agni, the Procreator or Fertiliser. Our ancestors were inveterate fire-worshippers, especially at the four great solar festivals. They thought no cattle safe unless passed through the May Day and Midsummer Beltine fires, and no person would suffer a fire within their parish which had not been then kindled afresh from the Tin-Egin, or sacred fire produced by friction.”
The Medes were undoubtedly worshippers of Fire, “as the most subtle, ethereal, incomprehensible, and powerful agent. They were averse to all temples or personification of the material things, or of Ormazd. Like our Parsee fellow-subjects, they never allowed their hearth-fires to be extinguished, nor would they even blow out any ordinary fire or candle; in the Magian days, he who did so forfeited his life.”
“We still see the remains—some very perfect—of the lone Fire-towers, which Greeks called Puraitheia, amidst the lofty hills of Armenia, Azerbijan, Koordistan and Looristan, some of which were Dakmas, or ‘Towers of Silence,’ having gratings for roofs, through which the bones fell when the body was destroyed. The Fire-God was called At-Ar.”
The Sabines were, perhaps, more nearly related to our ancestors than is generally thought; at least we may believe so from the Sabine and Gælic languages having more affinity even than the Welsh and Irish, and from other evidence. Dr. Leatham, in his work on Descriptive Ethnology, says that ‘much of the blood of the Romans was Keltic, and so is much of the Latin language,’ and a study of the movements of ancient peoples will show how this is so. Like the Skyths, these old Sabines were devoted to all the worship of Sivaites, and particularly of Mars’ symbol, the Quiris or Spear, after which we still call their greatest fête Quirinalia, and their Mount Zion, the Quirinal. The worship of the Quiris has not yet ceased in high Asia, nor, I believe, in America. It was prominent on the summits of all the Skythian bonfire piles and mounds at which these Aryan fathers worshipped, and is connected with most rites. We also see it on numerous sculpturings which have been unearthed from the ruins of the Skuti, or Kelts of Ireland and Scotland—much to the perplexity of local antiquaries. Hue, in his ‘Travels in Tartary,’ gives us these Phalli as existing all over the immense extent of country he traversed, including Northern China, Mongolia, Thibet. Spears are, however, too valuable to be left sticking in ‘these Obos,’ as he calls them, and therefore ‘dried branches of trees’ are substituted in very good imitation of spears.