[93] See above, chap. v, nn. [66], [132].
[94] Medea in E., Med. 385 ff.: οὐ γὰρ μὰ τὴν δέσποιναν ἣν ἐγὼ (as magician) σέβω μάλιστα πάντων καὶ ξυνεργὸν εἱλόμην, Ἑκάτην, μυχοῖς ναίουσαν ἑστίας ἐμὴς.—Δήμητρος κόρη is addressed as πυρὸς δέσποινα, in company with Hephaistos, in E., Phaeth., fr. 781, 59. Probably Hekate is meant being here as frequently combined or confused with Persephone the daughter of Demeter (cf. Ion, 1048).
[95] The pious man cleans and decorates every month τὸν Ἑρμῆν καὶ τὴν Ἑκάτην καὶ τὰ λοιπὰ τῶν ἱερῶν ἃ δὴ τοὺς προγόνους καταλιπεῖν, Theopomp. ap. Porph., Abs. ii, 16 (p. 146, 8–9 N.). Acc. to this Hekate and Hermes belong to the θεοὶ πατρῷοι of the house.—Shrines of Hekate before the house-door (Lob., Agl. 1336 f.); cf. the sacella of the Heroes in the same place: above, chap. iv, [n. 135].
[95a] The late interpolation in Hes., Th. 411–52, in praise of Hekate leaves out the uncanny side of her character altogether. Hekate has here become so much the universally revered goddess that she has lost all definite personality in the process. The whole is a telling example of the sort of extension that might be given to a single divinity who had once been the vital cult-object of a small locality. The name of this universally known daimon becomes finally of little importance (for everything is heaped upon one personality). Hence there is little to be learnt of the special characteristics of Hekate from this Hymn. (In any case it is time we gave up calling this Hymn to Hekate “Orphic”: the word is even more than usually meaningless and conventional in this case.)
[96] Hekate (ναίουσα at the crossroads, S. fr. 492 N.) meets men as an ἀνταία θεός (S. fr. 311) and is herself called ἀνταία (fr. 311, 368; cf. EM. 111, 50, where what precedes is from Sch. A.R. i, 1141). The same adj. applies to a δαίμων that she causes to appear: Hsch. ἀνταία, ἀνταῖος, in this as in most cases with the added sense of hostile. Hek. φαινομένη ἐν ἐκτόποις φάσμασιν, Suid. Ἑκάτην. (from Elias Cret. on Greg. Nz. iv, p. 487 Mg.). She appears or sends apparitions by night as well as by day: Εἰνοδία, θύγατερ Δάματρος, ἃ τῶν νυκτιπόλων ἐφόδων ἀνάσσεις καὶ μεθαμερίων, E., Ion, 1048 ff. Meilinoe, a euphemistically (cf. above, chap. v, [n. 5]) named daimonic creature, either Hekate or Empousa, meets ἀνταίαις ἐφόδοισι κατὰ ζοφοειδέα νύκτα, Orph. H. 71, 9. Hek. appears at midday in Luc., Philops. 22. In this midday vision she opens the earth and τὰ ἐν Ἅιδου ἅπαντα become visible (c. 24). This reminds us of the story told by Herakl. [324] Pont. of Empedotimos to whom Plouton and Persephone appeared ἐν μεσημβρίᾳ σταθερᾷ in a lonely spot and the whole world of the spirits became visible (ap. Procl. in Rp. ii, 119 Kroll). Lucian is probably parodying that story. Elsewhere in the same pamphlet he gives an absurd turn to a fabulous narrative of Plutarch’s (de An. fr. 1 Bern. = Philops. 25).
[97] See [Append. vi].
[98] See [Append. vii].
[99] Hekate herself is regarded as having the head of a dog: undoubtedly an ancient conception of her (she has σκυλακώδεα φωνήν, H. Mag. 5, 17 Ab.). She is sometimes even a dog herself: Hsch. Ἑκάτης ἄγαλμα, and partic. AB. 336, 31–337, 5; Call. fr. 100 h, 4. She is identified with Kerberos: Lyd., Mens. 3, 8, p. 42 W. She is actually invoked as a dog in P. Mag. Par. 1432 ff., p. 80 W.: κυρία Ἑκάτη εἰνοδία, κύων μέλαινα. Hence dogs are sacred to her and are sacrificed to her (earliest witness Sophr. fr. 8 Kaib.). The hounds with whom she flies about at night are daimonic creatures like Hekate herself. Porph. (who was specially well informed about such things) said that σαφῶς the hounds of Hekate were πονηροὶ δαίμονες: ap. Eus., PE. 4, 23, 7–8. In Lycophron’s account (ll. 1174–80) Hekabe is represented exactly in this way, i.e. as a daimonic creature who appears to men as a hound (cf. PLG. iii, 721 f.). She is transformed by Hekate (Brimo) into one of her train (ἑπωπίδα) who by their nocturnal howling strike terror into men who have neglected to make offering to the goddess.—Dogs occur as symbols of the dead on grave-reliefs?—above, chap. v, [n. 105]. (Erinyes as hounds; Keres as “Hounds of Hades”: A.R. iv, 1665; AP. vii, 439, 3 [Theodorid.], etc. Ruhnken, Ep. Cr. i, 94.)
[100] See Dilthey, Rh. Mus. 25, 332 ff.
[101] The Italian Diana who had long become identical with Hekate remained familiar to the Christianized peoples of the early Middle Ages (allusions in Christian authors: Grimm, pp. 283, 286, 933, 949, 1161 f. O. Jahn, Bös. Blick, 108). She was, in fact, the meeting point of the endless mass of superstition that had survived into that time from Graeco-Roman tradition. The nocturnal riding of a mob of women (i.e. “souls” of women) cum Diana, paganorum dea is quoted as a popular superstition by the so-called Canon Episcopi, which in the controversies on witches was so often appealed to. This document, it seems, cannot be traced back further than Regino (end of ninth century). He seems to have got it out of [Aug.] De Sp. et Anima (probably written in the sixth century). It was rescued from oblivion by Burkhard of Wurms, used in the Decretals of Gratian, and became very well known in the Middle Ages. (The passage from Burkhard is printed in Grimm, p. 1741. That the whole is a Canon (24) of the Council of Ancyra, 314 A.D., is, however, only a mistaken idea of Burkhard’s.) This belief in the nightly hunt of Diana with the souls may be regarded as a vestige of the ancient idea of Hekate and her nocturnal crew. It was all the more likely to survive in northern countries with their native legends of wild Hunters and the “furious host” with which it could so easily combine. [“Herne the Hunter,” Merry Wives of Windsor, iv, 4; v, 5.]