In the course of the evening we had a visit from the Commandant. Among other civilities, he made the agreeable proposal that we should join a party formed by the Conte di T—— to hunt in the mountains south of Ozieri, following the sport for several days. This scheme suited us exactly, as it would lead us into the forest district of Barbagia, which it was our design to visit. Such is the warmth of the climate, that though it was now the middle of November, after the Commandant took his leave we sat to a late hour in our shirt-sleeves, with the casements wide open on the now solitary piazza, while I wrote and my companion was drawing. So employed, a strain of distant music stole on the ear in the stillness of the night, one of those plaintive melodies common among the Sardes, a sort of recitative by a tenor voice, with others joining in a chorus.
Among the many usages derived by the Sardes from their Phenician ancestors, one of a singular character is still practised by the Oziese, of which Father Bresciani gives the following account:—“Towards the end of March, or the beginning of April, it is the custom for young men and women to agree together to fill the relation of godfathers and godmothers of St. John, compare e comare—such is the phrase—for the ensuing year. At the end of May, the proposed comare, having procured a segment of the bark of a cork tree, fashions it in the shape of a vase, and fills it with rich light mould in which are planted some grains of barley or wheat. The vase being placed in the sunshine, well watered and carefully tended, the seed soon germinates, blades spring up, and, making a rapid growth, in the course of twenty-one days,—that is, before the eve of St. John,—the vase is filled by a spreading and vigorous plant of young corn. It then receives the name of Hermes, or, more commonly, of Su Nennere, from a Sarde word, which possibly has the same signification as the Phenician name of garden; similar vases being called, in ancient times, ‘the gardens of Adonis.’”
On the eve of St. John, the cereal vase, ornamented with ribbons, is exposed on a balcony, decorated with garlands and flags. Formerly, also, a little image in female attire, or phallic emblems moulded in clay, such as were exhibited in the feasts of Hermes, were placed among the blades of corn; but these representations have been so severely denounced by the Church, that they are fallen into disuse. The young men flock in crowds to witness the spectacle and attend the maidens who come out to grace the feast. A great fire is lit on the piazza, round which they leap and gambol, the couple who have agreed to be St. John's compare completing the ceremony in this manner:—the man is placed on one side of the fire, the woman on the other, each holding opposite ends of a stick extended over the burning embers, which they pass rapidly backwards and forward. This is repeated three times, so that the hand of each party passes thrice through the flames. The union being thus sealed, the comparatico, or spiritual alliance, is considered perfect.[57] After that, the music strikes up, and the festival is concluded by dances, prolonged to a late hour of the night.
In some places the couple go in procession, attended by a gay company of youths and damsels, all in holiday dresses, to some country church. Arrived there, they dash the vase of Hermes against the door, so that it falls in pieces. The company then seat themselves in a circle on the grass, and feast on eggs fried with herbs, while gay tunes are played on the lionedda.[58] A cup of wine is passed round from one to another, and each, laying his hand on his neighbour, repeats, with a certain modulation of voice, supported by the music of the pipes, “Compare e comare di San Giovanni!”. The toast is repeated, in a joyous chorus, for some time, till, at length, the company rise, still singing, and, forming a circle, dance merrily for many hours.
Father Bresciani, La Marmora, and other writers, justly consider the Nennere as one of the many relics of the Phenician colonisation of Sardinia. Every one knows that the Sun and Moon, under various names, such as Isis and Osiris, Adonis and Astarte, were the principal objects of worship in the East from the earliest times; the sun being considered as the vivifying power of universal nature, the moon, represented as a female, deriving her light from the sun, as the passive principle of production. The abstruse doctrines on the origin of things, thus shadowed out by the ancient seers, generated the grossest ideas, expressed in the phallic emblems, the lewdness and obscenities mixed up in the popular worship of the deified principles of all existence. Of the prevalence in Sardinia of the Egypto-Phenician mythology, in times the most remote, no one who has examined the large collection of relics in the Royal Museum at Cagliari, or who consults the plates attached to La Marmora's work, can entertain any doubt. But it is surprising to find, among the usages of the Sardes at the present day, a very exact representation of the rites of a primitive religion, introduced into the island nearly thirty-five centuries ago, though it now partakes rather of the character of a popular festival than of a religious ceremony.
The Phenicians worshipped the sun under the name of Adonis, while the moon, Astarte, the Astaroth of the Bible, and the Venus-Ouranie of the Greeks, was their goddess of heaven. The story of Adonis is well known:—how, being slain by a wild boar in the Libanus, his mistress sought him in vain, with loud lamentations, throughout the earth, and following him to the infernal regions, prevailed on Proserpine by her tears and prayers to allow him to spend one half the year on earth, to which he returned in youth perpetually renewed. Thus was shadowed out the annual course of the sun in the zodiac, and especially his return to ascendancy at the summer solstice, a season devoted to joy and festivity. In after times, this period corresponding with the feast of St. John the Baptist (24th June), that festival was celebrated in many parts of Christendom with bonfires and merriment,—usages adopted from pagan traditions. The practices of the Nennere, in the neighbourhood of Ozieri and other parts of Sardinia, still more distinctly coincide with the rites which accompanied the ancient festival.
It was the custom of the Phenician women, towards the end of May, to place before the shrine, or in the portico of the temples, of Adonis, certain vessels, in which were sown grains of barley or wheat. These vessels were made of wicker-work or pieces of bark, and sometimes wrought of plaster. The seeds, sown in rich earth, soon sprung up, and formed plants of luxuriant growth. These verdant vases were then called by the Phenicians “the Gardens of Adonis.” The ceremonies of the summer solstice commenced over night with lamentations by the women, expressive of grief for the loss of Adonis. But on the morrow, “when the sun came out of his chamber like a giant refreshed,” all was changed to joy; the garden vases were crowned with wreaths of purple and various-coloured ribbons, and the resurrection of the boy-god was celebrated by dancing, feasting, and revelry. The priestesses of Adonis led the way in a mysterious procession, bearing the vases, with other symbols already alluded to, and on re-entering the temples, dancing and singing, they cast the vases and scattered their verdure at the feet of the god. All the women then danced in a circle round the altar, and the day and night were spent in pious orgies, feasting, and revelry. It is needless to point out the close identity of the Oziese Nennere with these Phenician rites.
The worship of Adonis, under the name of Tammuz[59], with all its seductive abominations, was one of the Canaanitish idolatries into which the Israelites were prone to fall. Father Bresciani considers these rites to be emphatically referred to in the indignant apostrophe of Isaiah:—How is the faithful city become an harlot!... ye shall be confounded with idols to which ye have sacrificed, and be ashamed of the gardens which ye have chosen.[60] And again, in the prophet's terrible denunciation:—Behold, the Lord will come with fire, and with his chariots like a whirlwind, to render his anger with fury, and his rebuke with flames of fire ... and the slain of the Lord shall be many. They that sanctified themselves and esteemed themselves clean in the garden of the portico[61] shall be consumed together, saith the Lord.
Whether the learned Jesuit's interpretation of these passages be well founded or not, we may add another from the prophet Ezekiel, not referred to by him, but of the application of which to some of these rites there can be no doubt. In one of those lofty visions, vividly portraying the iniquities of Israel, her idolatries and wicked abominations, the prophet's attention is directed to the intolerable scandal that, even at the gate of the Lord's house, behold there sat women weeping for Tammuz.[62]
“Thammuz came next behind,
Whose annual wound in Lebanon allured
The Syrian damsels to lament his fate,
In amorous ditties, all a summer day,
While smooth Adonis, from his native rock
Ran purple to the sea, supposed with blood
Of Thammuz, yearly wounded: the love tale
Infected Zion's daughters with like heat;
Whose wanton passions in the sacred porch
Ezekiel saw, when, by the vision led,
His eye surveyed the dark idolatries
Of alienated Judah.”—Par. Lost, i. 447.