[611]. Deut. 16 : 21, 22.
[612]. There seems, indeed, to be a connection between the Hebrew words, miphtan, “threshold,” and pethen, “asp,” “adder,” or “serpent,” as first pointed out to me by Mr. Montague Cockle. Although the verbal root is not preserved in the Hebrew, there is no valid reason for doubting that they go back to the same root. In Arabic, the verb is preserved as pathana, “to tempt.” Its derivatives indicate the same meaning. This would seem to confirm the connection of the primitive threshold, the serpent, and temptation. In Leland’s Etruscan Roman Remains (p. 131 f.) are citations from several ancient works, and references to current Italian traditions, showing the supposed connection of the serpent with the threshold, the phallus, and married life, that are in obvious confirmation of the views here expressed.
[613]. See p. [109] f., supra; also, Schrader’s Keilinschriftliche Bibliothek, Vol. III., Pt. 2, p. 72 f.
[614]. See, for example, Rawlinson’s Cuneiform Inscriptions of Western Asia, III., p. 45.
[615]. See Erman’s Life in Anc. Egypt, p. 60.
[616]. Ibid., p. 259, vignette illustration.
[617]. See Wilkinson’s Anc. Egypt., III., 235, pl. lv., fig. 2. Prisse’s Mon. Egypt, pl. xxxvii.; also Layard’s Nineveh and its Remains, p. 169 (Am. ed.), and W. Max Müller’s Asien und Europa, p. 314.
[618]. See Perrot and Chipiez’s History of Art in Chaldea and Assyria, I., 349 f. See, also, Layard’s Monuments, Series ii., pl. 5, for representation of the conflict between Marduk and Tiamat. The serpent is there shown on the feminine Tiamat where it appears on the masculine Nergal.
[619]. See Maspero’s Dawn of Civilization, pp. 690–696; Sayce’s Relig. of Anc. Babylonia, p. 286.
[620]. See Sayce’s Relig. of Anc. Babylonia, pp. 281–283; Wilkinson’s Anc. Egypt., III., 141–155; Fergusson’s Tree and Serpent Worship, pp. 5–72; Squier’s Serpent Symbol, pp. 137–254; Réville’s Native Religions of Mexico and Peru, pp. 29–32, 53, 166.