HON 293 Representing Animals
Dr. Morillo
Herodotus, Histories from
Book II: (http://classics.mit.edu/Herodotus/history.2.ii.html)
The following are the peculiarities of the crocodile:- During the four winter months they eat nothing; they are
four-footed, and live indifferently on land or in
the water. The female lays and hatches her eggs ashore, passing the greater portion of the day on dry land, but at
night retiring to the river, the water of which is
warmer than the night-air and the dew. Of all known
animals this is the one which from the smallest size grows to be the greatest: for the egg of the crocodile is but
little bigger than that of the goose, and the young
crocodile is in proportion to the egg; yet when it
is full grown, the animal measures frequently seventeen cubits and even more. It has the eyes of a pig, teeth large
and tusk-like, of a size proportioned to its frame;
unlike any other animal, it is without a tongue; it
cannot move its under-jaw, and in this respect too it is singular, being the only animal in the world which moves the
upper-jaw but not the under. It has strong claws
and a scaly skin, impenetrable upon the back. In
the water it is blind, but on land it is very keen of sight. As it
lives chiefly in the river, it has the inside of
its mouth constantly covered with leeches; hence it
happens that, while all the other birds and beasts avoid
it, with the trochilus it lives at peace, since it owes much to that bird: for the crocodile, when he leaves the water and
comes out upon the land, is in the habit of lying
with his mouth wide open, facing the western breeze:
at such times the trochilus goes into his mouth and devours the leeches. This benefits the crocodile, who is pleased,
and takes care not to hurt the trochilus.
The crocodile is esteemed sacred by some of the Egyptians, by others he is treated as an enemy. Those who live near Thebes,
and those who dwell around Lake Moeris, regard them
with especial veneration. In each of these places
they keep one crocodile in particular, who is taught to be tame and tractable. They adorn his ears with ear-rings of
molten stone or gold, and put bracelets on his
fore-paws, giving him daily a set portion of bread, with
a certain number of victims; and, after having thus treated him with the greatest possible attention while alive, they
embalm him when he dies and bury him in a sacred
repository. The people of Elephantine on the other hand,
are so far from considering these animals as sacred that they even eat their flesh. In the Egyptian language they are not
called crocodiles, but Champsae. The name of
crocodiles was given them by the Ionians, who remarked
their resemblance to the lizards, which in Ionia live in the walls and are called crocodiles.
The modes of catching the crocodile are many and various. I shall only describe the one which seems to me most worthy of
mention. They bait a hook with a chine of pork and
let the meat be carried out into the middle of the
stream, while the hunter upon the bank holds a living pig, which he belabours. The crocodile hears its cries, and
making for the sound, encounters the pork, which he
instantly swallows down. The men on the shore haul,
and when they have got him to land, the first thing the hunter does is to plaster his eyes with mud. This once
accomplished, the animal is despatched with ease,
otherwise he gives great trouble.
The hippopotamus, in the canton of Papremis, is a sacred animal, but not in any other part of Egypt. It may be thus
described:- It is a quadruped, cloven-footed, with
hoofs like an ox, and a flat nose. It has the mane
and tail of a horse, huge tusks which are very conspicuous, and a voice like a horse's neigh. In size it equals the
biggest oxen, and its skin is so tough that when
dried it is made into javelins.
Otters also are found in the Nile, and are considered sacred. Only two sorts of fish are venerated, that called the
lepidotus and the eel. These are regarded as sacred
to the Nile, as likewise among birds is the vulpanser,
or fox-goose.
They have also another sacred bird called the phoenix which I myself have never seen, except in pictures. Indeed it is a
great rarity, even in Egypt, only coming there
(according to the accounts of the people of Heliopolis)
once in five hundred years, when the old phoenix dies. Its size and appearance, if it is like the pictures, are
as follow:- The plumage is partly red, partly
golden, while the general make and size are almost exactly
that of the eagle. They tell a story of what this bird does, which does not seem to me to be credible: that he comes all
the way from Arabia, and brings the parent bird,
all plastered over with myrrh, to the temple of the
Sun, and there buries the body. In order to bring him, they say, he first forms a ball of myrrh as big as he finds that
he can carry; then he hollows out the ball, and
puts his parent inside, after which he covers over
the opening with fresh myrrh, and the ball is then of exactly the same weight as at first; so he brings it to Egypt,
plastered over as I have said, and deposits it in
the temple of the Sun. Such is the story they tell
of the doings of this bird.
In the neighbourhood of Thebes there are some sacred serpents which are perfectly harmless. They are of small size, and
have two horns growing out of the top of the head.
These snakes, when they die, are buried in the
temple of Jupiter, the god to whom they are sacred.
I went once to a certain place in Arabia, almost exactly opposite the city of Buto, to make inquiries concerning the
winged serpents. On my arrival I saw the back-bones
and ribs of serpents in such numbers as it is
impossible to describe: of the ribs there were a multitude of heaps, some great, some small, some middle-sized. The place
where the bones lie is at the entrance of a narrow
gorge between steep mountains, which there open
upon a spacious plain communicating with the great plain of Egypt. The story goes that with the spring the winged snakes
come flying from Arabia towards Egypt, but are met
in this gorg
e by the birds called ibises, who
forbid their entrance and destroy them all.