[406]. Ælian. lib. xii. cap. 34.
[407]. Sacer anguis.
SANCHONIATHON, a Phœnician Historiographer, and Philo Biblius, who translated his Antiquities, have left us a full Account of the Origin of the Apotheosis, or Canonization of Serpents[[408]]; which leads me to say something of what the Ancients called Apotheosis of departed Souls, and the Strange Ceremonies used in the Apotheosis or Deification of the deceased Emperor, who had deserved well of their Country.
[408]. Sanchoniathon is supposed by some to be cotemporary with Gideon.
APOTHEOSIS among the Ancients was a Pagan Ceremony whereby Emperors and great Men were placed among the Gods, called also Deification, and Consecration: Temples and Altars were erected to the new Deities, viz. Serpents and Men, Sacrifices offered to them; and for that end, Colleges of Priests were instituted for the Honour of these Demi-Gods.
It was one of the Doctrines of Pythagoras, which he borrowed from the Chaldeans, that useful and virtuous Persons, after their Death, were raised into the Order of the Gods. Hence the Ancients deified all the Inventors of Things that were beneficial to Mankind, and those who had done Services of Importance to their Country.
By degrees these new Gods grew very numerous. One of their own Poets rallying them for frequent Deifications, introduces poor Atlas, who is said to bear the Heavens on his Shoulders, complaining, that he was ready to sink under the Number and Weight of so many new Gods, as were every day coin’d, and added to the Heavens, which made his Shoulders to warch. N. B. Atlas in Anatomy is the Name of the first Vertebra of the Neck, which supports the Head, and is the highest, so called in allusion to the famous Mountain Atlas in Africa, suppos’d to be the highest in the World, so that it seems to hold up the Heavens; and also to the Fable that makes Atlas King of Mauritania in that Country, to bear up the visible Heavens. I now proceed to the Description which we have in Herodian, a Greek Historian in the third Century, who in speaking of the Apotheosis of the Emperor Severus, gives us a very full Account of that strange Ceremony, viz.
... After the Body of the deceased Emperor had been burnt with the usual Solemnities, they placed an Image of Wax perfectly like him, but of a sickly Aspect, on a large Bed of Ivory, covered with Cloth of Gold, which they exposed to publick View at the Entrance of the Palace-Gate.
The greatest Part of the Day the Senate sat ranged on the left side of the Bed, drest in Mourning Robes; the Ladies of the first Rank sitting on the right side, in plain and white Robes, without any Ornaments.... This lasted for seven Days successively; during which, the Physicians came from time to time to visit the Sick, always making their Report that he grew worse, till at length they publish’d it, that he was dead.
This done, the young Senators and Roman Knights took the Bed of State upon their Shoulders, carrying it thro’ the Via sacra to the old Forum, where the Magistrates used to divest themselves of their Offices: There they let it down between two kinds of Amphitheatres; in the one, were the Youth, and in the other the Maidens of the first Families in Rome, singing Hymns set to solemn Airs in praise of the Deceased.