CHAPTER X.
VARIOUS ATTRIBUTES OF ÆSCULAPIUS.
In this chapter I will speak briefly of various attributes, more or less generally accorded to Æsculapius. Some of them are decidedly significant, but none so much so as the staff and serpent of which I have fully treated.
In many, indeed most, of the representations of Æsculapius, he is crowned with a wreath of laurel. This mark of merit, like rays of light which were given in some instances, has been commonly held to have been accorded him because he was the son of Apollo, to whom the tree was sacred. According to this view, one has in it a remnant of the oracular laurel at Delphi. Another way of accounting for it is, to use the words of Tooke, “because that tree is powerful in curing many diseases,”[265] an exaggerated claim. The ancients regarded it as effective against evil spirits.[266]
A bunch of herbs was at times represented in one of the hands of the god. This was very appropriate. The district of Greece[267] in which, according to the legend, he studied under Chiron, was famous for its medicinal plants.
A bowl was occasionally shown in connection with figures of Æsculapius. It was indicative of the administration by him of medicinal potions.
A scroll was an attribute of some Æsculapian figures. It is an admirable one for an ideal physician. In modern times it should certainly be regarded as an indispensable one. Medicine has been evolved from recorded experience, and its progress is dependent on the same.
An unpublished discovery of any kind is, in a manner, none at all. Curiously enough the name of the Egyptian god of medicine, Imhotep, means, “I bring the offering,” the ideograph for hotep, or offering, being a papyrus roll.
Fig. 10.—Telesphorus.