feems to be Oan-da-Mon, the Oannes Por Noah of the Ark; and he was worshipped by the ancient Tyrrhenians in conjunction with Vefta, whom they denominated Horchia, or the goddess of the Arka. Titèa, who is mentioned by Pfeudo-Berofus, as the wife of Noah, bore the fame title of Horchia, and for the very fame reafon; the Ark being frequently defcribed as the allegorical confort of the principal arkite deity'.

As Cronus then is faid by Sanchoniatho to

lib. i. cap. 13. Pfeudo-Berofus alfo afferts, that Janus was the patriarch Noah, and that he derived his name from Jain }", wine. Ob beneficium inventæ vitis et vini dignatus eft (fcil. Noe) cognomento Jano, quod Arameis fonat vitifer et vinifer. Berof. Ant. lib. iii. fol. 25. It may be proper here to observe, that the writings of this Berofus, which I fhall frequently have occafion to cite, were published by Annius of Viterbo, and are certainly not those of the real Berofus. We are informed by Pliny, (Nat. Hift. lib. vi. cap. 55.) that the genuine history of Berofus contained the events of 480 years; but of that work there now only remain a few fragments, cited by Jofephus in his Writings against Apion, and by Alexander Polyhiftor in the Chronographia of Syncellus.

P The hiftory of Oannes or Dagon shall be considered at the latter end of the present chapter.

Soli Turreni colunt Janum et Veftam, quos lingua fua vocant Janib Vadimona et Labitb Horchiam. Myrfil. de bello Pelafg. cap. 6. Labith seems to be a contraction of Labeneth, ; whence Labith Horchia will fignify the arkite

tbe (לבנת)

crefcent.

moon

Berof. Ant. lib. v. fol. 64.

have

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have had three fons, Cronus the younger, Jupiter-Belus, and Apollo, in allufion to the triple offspring of Noah; fo, in reference to the number of the arkite family exclufive of their head, he is alfo defcribed, like Sydyk, as being the father of feven fons by Rhea, and of feven daughters by Aftartè. These last of his children were called Titans, and Titanides; whence it will follow, that the war of the Titans, fo celebrated in Grecian story, relates to the deluge, and not to the events which took place at Babel. The traditional history indeed of the Titans is involved in fome degree of confufion, because the name is equally applied to all, who lived at the era of the deluge, both those who were destroyed by that catastrophe, and those who were faved; but the genealogy, afcribed to them, by Sanchoniatho, along with various matters which fhall hereafter be adduced, abundantly proves the truth of the foregoing affertion. The legend however of the feven Titans muft be referved for future confideration; at prefent

Vide infra chap. ix. Since Cronus is the fame perfon as Sydyk, the feven Titans will of course be the fame as the seven Cabiri; and fince Agruerus is also the fame perfon as Cronus or Sydyk, we shall fee the exact propriety of Sanchoniatho's afsertion, that Agruerus and his family were known by the general name of Titans or Aleta.

there

therefore I fhall only notice that of Astartè, and her children the Titanides.

Aftartè, the mythological confort of Cronus, or Noah, is the fame deity as Venus', who was ufually reprefented by the poets rifing in youthful beauty from the waves of the troubled ocean, and furrounded by fishes and other aquatic animals. She is in fhort the Noëtic Ark, which by the allegorizing fpirit of antiquity was perfonified in the character of a graceful female ". Accordingly we find, that the dove is always faid to be the peculiar favourite of Venus; an opinion, which will easily be accounted for, when we recollect, that that bird brought the first tidings of the waters having retired from off the surface of the earth. Hyginus has preferved a curious tradition refpecting the Affyrian Venus, in which the arkite dove, and the mundane egg, make a very confpicuous

* Την δε Ασαρτην Φοίνικες την Αφροδίτην είναι λεγεσι. Euf. Præp. Evan. lib. i. cap. 10. Aftartè is alfo in fact the fame as Rhea. The identity of the heathen goddetles will be fhewn in the following chapter.

"Venus, like Ceres, was fometimes alfo efteemed the earth, and fometimes the moon. Affyriorum, apud quos Veneris Architidis―maxima olim veneratio viguit, quam nunc Phoenices tenent: nam Phyfici terræ fuperius hemifphærium, cujus partem incolimus, Veneris appellatione coluerunt. Macrob. Saturn, lib. i. cap. 21.

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appearance. An egg of wonderful magnitude was reported to have fallen from heaven into the river Euphrates, and to have been rolled by fifhes to the bank. Upon it fat doves; and out of it was at length produced that Venus, who was afterwards styled the Syrian goddess. The fame writer, upon the authority of Diogenetes Erythrèus, mentions. the peril to which Venus was expofed by the attack of the monster Typhon, or the sea 2.

X

* Ampelius is more exact in this particular than Hyginus; for, in relating the fame fable, he fpeaks of only one dove. Amp. cap. 2.

y In Euphratem de cœlo ovum mira magnitudine cecidiffe dicitur, quod pifces ad ripam evolverunt: fuper quod columbæ confederunt, et excalfactum exclufiffe Venerem, quæ poftea dea Syria eft appellata. Hyg. Fab. 197.

Mr. Whifton fuppofes, that the deluge was occafioned by the too near approach of a comet; and he calculates, that it was that comet, which appeared in the year 1680. Many parts of his theory may perhaps be thought objectionable; but at the fame time it is not impoffible, that the power of attraction, exerted by a comet, might force the waters of the great abyfs to rush forth in a tremendous torrent, and thus produce the catastrophe of the deluge. It is foreign however to my prefent fubject to examine into the merits of Mr. Whifton's system; I mention it only for the purpofe of introducing fome very fingular coincidences with his opinion refpecting a comet's being the natural caufe of the flood. Sanchoniatho afferts, that while Aftartè was travelling about the world, (or in other words, while the Ark floated in an erratic ftate upon the furface of the waters,) the found a ftar falling from the sky, which she afterwards confecrated at Tyre: Pliny affirms, that a comet ap

peared

Closely pursued by her irresistible enemy, she affumed the shape of a fifh, and thus avoided the threatened danger.

Venus then, or Aftartè, being a perfonification of the Ark emerging from the waters of the deluge, and being uniformly attended by the Noëtic dove, we shall see the propriety with which the Laconians confecrated a temple to Venus-Juno, on account of a flood supposed to have been occafioned by the river Eurotas b. Juno is Juneh, the dove; whence Venus-Juno will be equivalent to Venus attended by her dove. To this deluge of the Eurotas, and to fuch other traditions.

peared during the reign of Typhon or the deluge, the effects of which were extremely detrimental and tremendous: and Hyginus mentions, that, when Phaethon the fon of Apollo had fet the whole world on fire by mifmanaging the chariot of his father, Jupiter, to quench the flames, caufed a general inundation, from which Pyrrha and Deucalion alone efcaped. Sanch. apud Euf. Præp. Evan. lib. i. cap. 10-Plin. Nat. Hift. lib. ii, cap. 25.-Hyg. Fab. 152.

Diogenetes Erythræus ait, quodam tempore Venerem cum Cupidine filio in Syriam ad flumen Euphratem veniffe, et eodem loco repente Typhona giganta apparuiffe. Venerem autem cum filio in flumen fe projeciffe, et ibi figuram pifcium forma mutaffe: quo facto periculo effe liberatos. Hyg. Poet. Aftron. lib. ii. cap. 30.

• Ήρας δε ἱερὸν ὑπερχειρίας κατα μαντείαν εποιήθη, το Ευρωτα πολυ της γης σφισιν επικλύζοντος ξοανον δι αρχαίον καλεσιν ΑφροδίτηςHeas. Pauf. Lacon. p. 239.

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