If either a male or female colt resembles a dog, herds of cattle will die, and there will be famine.
If a colt is born without a head, its master will be strong.
If a colt is born without eyes, the god Bel will bring about a change of dynasty.
If a colt is born without feet, the king increases his army and a slaughter will ensue.
If a colt is born without ears, for three years the gods will reduce the land.
If a colt is born without a tail, the ruler will die.
In conclusion it may be observed that, apart from the unusual character of these freaks which would suffice to attribute a special import to them, the notions current among the Babylonians, as among so many people of a period when creatures existed, the various parts of which were compounded of different animals, may be regarded as an additional factor that served to add force to the class of omens we are considering. The monsters guarding the approaches to temples and palaces[658] were but one form which this popular belief assumed, and when a colt was observed to have a lion's or a dog's claw, an ocular demonstration was afforded which at once strengthened and served to maintain a belief that at bottom is naught but a crude and primitive form of a theory of evolution. In a dim way man always felt the unity of the animal world. Animals resembled one another, and man had some features in common with animals. What more natural than to conclude that at some period, the animals were composite creatures, and that even mankind and the animal world were once blended together.
The prevailing religious and semi-mythological ideas, accordingly, enter as factors in the significance that was attached to infants or to the young of animals, serving as illustrations of 'hybrid' formations.
Omens from the Actions of Animals.
The same order of ideas, only still further extended, may be detected in the sacredness attached to certain animals by so many nations of antiquity. It is now generally admitted that this 'sacredness' has two sides. A sacred animal may be 'taboo,' that is, so sacred that it must not be touched, much less killed or eaten; and, on the other hand, its original sanctity may lead people to regard it as "unclean," something again to be avoided, because of the power to do evil involved in the primitive conception of 'sacredness.'[659]