[1] Hist. Arabûm.
[2] Entdeckes Judenthum.
[3] This legend may have been in the mind of the writer of the Book of Revelations when (xii. 14) he describes the Woman who received wings that she might escape the Serpent. Lilith’s wings bore her to the Serpent.
[4] Inferno, ix. 56–64.
[5] She was a Lybian Queen beloved by Zeus, whose children were victims of Hera’s jealousy. She was daughter of Belus, and it is a notable coincidence, if no more, that in Gen. xxxvi. ‘Bela’ is mentioned as a king of Edom, the domain of Samaël, who married Lilith.
[6] The martial and hunting customs of the German women, as well as their equality with men, may be traced in the vestiges of their decline. Hexe (witch) is from hag (forest): the priestesses who carried the Broom of Thor were called Hagdissen. Before the seventeenth century the Hexe was called Drud or Trud (red folk, related to the Lightning-god). But the famous female hunters and warriors of Wodan, the Valkyries, were so called also; and the preservation of the epithet (Trud) in the noble name Gertrude is a connecting link between the German Amazons and the political power so long maintained by women in the same country. Their office as priestesses probably marks a step downward from their outdoor equality. By this route, as priestesses of diabolised deities, they became witches; but many folk-legends made these witches still great riders, and the Devil was said to transform and ride them as dapplegrey mares. The chief charge against the witches, that of carnal commerce with devils, is also significant. Like Lilith, women became devils’ brides whenever they were not content with sitting at home with the distaff and the child.
[7] Mr. W. B. Scott has painted a beautiful picture of Eve gazing up with longing at a sweet babe in the tree, whose serpent coils beneath she does not see.