[30]. Luc., De dea Syria, c. 41. Cf. the inscription of Narnaka with the note of Clermont-Ganneau, Etudes d'arch. orient., II, p. 163.—For bull worship in Syria cf. Ronzevalle, Mélanges fac. orient. Beyrouth, I, 1906, pp. 225, 238; Vincent, op. cit., p. 169.
[31]. Philo Alex., De provid., II, c. 107 (II, 646 M.); cf. Lucian, De dea Syria, 54.
[32]. For instance on Mount Eryx in Sicily (Ael., Nat. Anim.,
IV, 2).—Cf. Pauly-Wissowa, Realenc., s. v. "Dea Syria," col. 2242.
[33]. Tibullus, I, 7, 17.
[34]. Lucian, De dea Syria, 14; 54. Cf. Diodorus, II, 4, 2; Ovid, Met., IV, 46; V, 331.
[35]. Pauly-Wissowa, loc. cit., col. 2241; W. Robertson Smith, p. 175.
[36]. The ancient authors frequently alluded to this superstition of the Syrians (the texts have been collected by Selden, De dis Syris, II, C. 3, pp. 268 ff., ed. of 1672). W. Robertson Smith (loc. cit., p. 449), is right in connecting it with certain ideas of savages. Like many primitive beliefs, this one has continued to the present day. It has been pointed out to me that at Sam-Keuï, a little west of Doliché, there is a pond fed by a spring and well stocked with fish, which one is forbidden to take. Near the mosque of Edessa is a large pond where catching fish is prohibited. They are considered sacred, and the people believe that any one who would eat them would die instantly. (Sachau, Reise in Syrien, 1883, pp. 196 ff. Cf. Lord Warkworth, Diary in Asiatic Turkey, London, 1898, p. 242). The same is the case at the mosque of Tripoli and elsewhere (Lammens, Au pays des Nosaïris [Revue de l'Orient chrétien], 1908, p. 2). Even in Asia Minor this superstition is found. At Tavshanli, north of Aezani on the upper Rhyndacus, there is to-day a square cistern filled with sacred fish which no one is allowed to take (on the authority of Munro). Travelers in Turkey have frequently observed that the people do not eat fish, even when there is a scarcity of food (Sachau, loc. cit., p. 196) and the general belief that their flesh is unhealthful and can cause sickness is not entirely unfounded. Here is what Ramsay has to say on the subject (Impressions of Turkey, London, 1897, p. 288): "Fish are rarely found and when found are usually bad: the natives have a prejudice against fish, and my own experience has been unfavorable.... In the clear sparkling mountain stream that flows through the Taurus by Bozanti-Khan, a small kind of fish is caught; I had a most violent attack of sickness in 1891 after eating some of them, and so had all who partook." Captain Wilson, who spent a number of years in
Asia Minor, asserts (Handbook of Asia-Minor, p. 19), that "the natives do not eat fish to any extent." The "totemic" prohibition in this instance really seems to have a hygienic origin. People abstained from all kinds of fish because some species were dangerous, that is to say, inhabited by evil spirits, and the tumors sent by the Syrian goddess were merely the edemas caused by the poisoning.
[37]. On the Ἰχθύς symbolism I will merely refer to Usener, Sintflutsagen, 1899, pp. 223 ff. Cf. S. Reinach, Cultes, mythes, III, 1908, pp. 43 ff. An exhaustive book on this subject has recently appeared: Dölger, ΙΧΘYΣ, das Fischsymbol in frühchristlicher Zeit, I, Rome, 1910.