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Maze Symbolism and the Trojan Game
Published online by Cambridge University Press: 02 January 2015
Extract
In his detailed account of the chambered cairn of Bryn Celli Ddu, Mr W. J. Hemp describes a remarkable pattern stone, found on the site lying flat in a floor of purple clay, as it had been deliberately placed by the builders of the monument. Mr Hemp says that ‘The recumbent position of the stone… and the disposition of the pattern inevitably suggest that it was intended to be set upright in the ground at some stage in the funeral rites in such a way as to display the pattern’. He adds that the meaning of the pattern is unknown but that some form of magic is perhaps the most obvious explanation, and cites references for the occurrence of the style in megalithic monuments of Brittany and Ireland. The pattern is incided on the stone with a leaf-shaped outline. The lines are zigzag, and the design at once suggests an inaccurately rendered maze formation.
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References
1 Archaeologia, 1930, 80, 179–214 CrossRefGoogle Scholar
2 Ibid. 1971f. and pl. XLIX, figs. 1 and 3.
3 M. et E. Péquart et le Rouzic, Z. Corpus des Signes gravées des Monuments méga-lithiques du Morbihan (Paris, 1927).Google Scholar Cf. especially pis. 1, 3, 5, 14, 19, 23, 31, 33, 35, 50, 59, 71, 72, 73, 75 (a good example), 8off. (where wheels are suggestively shown : cf. infr.), 96, 99ff.
4 Coffey, G. Nevi Grange (Dublin, 1912);Google Scholar Cornwell, E.A. Procs. Royal Irish Academy, 16, 72;Google Scholar Frazer, W. Procs. Soc. Ant. Scotland, 27, 294.Google Scholar
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9 Suetonius, , Augustus, 43, 2;Google Scholar Dio Cassius, , 43, 23.Google Scholar
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11 Livy, i, i ; Verg. Aen. 1, 48 ; Dionys. Hal. Ant. Rom. 1, 53.
12 N.H. xxxvi, 85. The whole passage (84ff.) is important. Pliny seems to consider a multicursal form, giving the possibility of mistake, original (84). ™Aen.v, 588ff.
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14 M, 157 (after Deecke). It is countlessly reproduced.
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30 The maze symbolism seems somehow to be associated with maidenhood. Cf. M, 150, for the name ‘Nun’s Fence‘. A vignette on the Tragliatella oenochoe seems to require this explanation : if it has relevance to the magic walls of the Truia, it may represent the correlatively opposite magic. In North European and other mythology the overcoming of difficulties by a hero, often with the help of a magical horse (v. infr.), frequently precedes union with some hidden princess. Cf. Cox, G.W. The Mythology of the Aryan Nations, (London, 1870), 1, 115, 115, 151ff., especially 154 ;Google Scholar Laistner, L. Das Rätsel der Sphinx, (Berlin, 1889), 2, 51, 117f., 143ff.;Google Scholar de Gubernatis, A. Zoological Mythology, (London, 1872), 293ff., 297,Google Scholar Cf. Jones, E. On the Nightmare, (London, 1931), 269ff.Google ScholarPubMed Cf. Hommel, E. in Orientalistische Literaturzeitung, (London, 1919), 26, 63ff.,Google Scholarwho from Babylonian and Cretan evidence connects the spiral labyrinth with human anatomy and with the underworld, the one being the microcosm of the other.
Mr W. J. Hemp tells me that in his opinion the suggestion made by MrCyriax, T. in the Archaeological Journal, 1921), 78, 205–15,CrossRefGoogle Scholar that there is reason to suppose anatomical and genetic symbolism in the form of some barrows, is strongly supported by the plan and certain details of Bryn Celli Ddu. At the same time he considers that the plan represents a step in a long process of development, and that many of its features cannot be associated with any such symbolism. Cf. especially Cyriax (ibid. 211) : ‘To enter the next world, therefore, the spirit would have to be re–born’ . . . ‘The object of the tomb–builder would have been to make the tomb as much like the body of a mother as he was able’. The article is important and seems convincing.
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35 Lucan, , Phars, 1, 592–606.Google Scholar Canon Stacy Waddy has suggested that in the Hebrew Psalms, interpreted as liturgies of service, the mention of the shield usually implies a ritual ‘march round’ some sacred person or object: cf. Psalms, v, 12, XVIII, 3of., XXXIII, 20, LXXXIV, 9. Wheels seem to be defensive symbols sometimes; cf. Simpson, W., The Buddhist Praying Wheel (London and New York, 1896), 116, 258, etc., and supr., note 3.Google Scholar
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37 Festus, 329A.
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40 Cf. Warde, W. Fowler in Anthropology and the Classics (Oxford, 1908), 174,Google Scholar etc. Cf. Eitrem, 6, 18, 29fr., on the question whether the original purpose of these rites was cathartic, as he thinks, or apotropaic, according to Eitrem a developed function.
41 M, 73,78,87,92: cf.201.
42 M, 150f. In North Europe ‘stone fence’, ‘nun’s fence’, ‘round castle’, ‘giant’s castle’ are found: there is also a ‘stone dance’ connected with mazes.
43 M, passim, especially i47ff.
44 M, 92, attributing the suggestion to W. H. Mounsey, who made it in 1858. I owe the following information to the kindness of Professor J. E. Lloyd. In old Welsh literature the city of Troy is sometimes styled ‘Caer Droia’; and the same name is also applied, for reasons difficult to apprehend, to a maze or labyrinth. On the second point Professor Lloyd refers to a notice, with plan, furnished by Roberts, Peter, Cambrian Popular Antiquities (London, 1815), 212f.;Google Scholar who also suggests that the real connexion of the name is not with Homeric Troy, but with the word ‘tro’, ‘turning’. Mr W. J. Hemp kindly contributes the following note:— ‘The ordinary Welsh word for “to turn” is “troi”. The best dictionary (Anwyl) reads as follows:–“Troi: to turn, to revolve, to stir, to convert, to become, to plough. There is also:—tro -ion -tau; turn, curve, screw, twist, time, occasion, walk, tour, conversion. Troad; bend, turning, flexion”’.
45 R.H., Klausen, Aeneas und die Penaten (Hamburg, 1839-1840) 2, 82off.Google Scholar Rasch (De Ludo Troiae [Progr. Jena, 1882], 7), commenting on this, suggests a root meaning ‘turn’. Toutain (Dar. et Sagl. s.v. TROIA) accepts some such origin for the name.
46 M, 71, 78, 90, 173, 230.
47 I have made it already in a letter to The Morning Post (13 September 1930), and in Classical Philology, 1930, XXV, 362, note 3.
48 Sophocles, , Ajax. 1129ff.;Google Scholar Euripides, , Andromache, 107;Google Scholar Verg. Aen. I, 483, cf. II, 272; Quin tus Smyrnaeus, I, 12, 112.
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51 Culex, 324. Cf. Plin. N.H. VIII, 161.
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53 Gruppe, , vol. 1, 199 note 11;Google Scholar and other references at note 39, supra.
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55 D. Servius ad Verg. Aen. II,296; cf. ad 325 and in, 12 (where the Samothracians are said to be akin to the Romans).
56 Plutarch, Cato Minor, in, is sometimes thought to suggest this: but it is by no means a legitimate inference from what Plutarch says.
57 Allcroft, A. Hadrian, in Archaeological Journal, 1921, 78, 325ff. Cf. Eitrem, 23, 27.Google Scholar
58 Cf. Knight, W.F.J. in Classical Philology, 1930, 25, 365, note 4.Google Scholar
59 Malten, L. in Arch. Jahrb., 1915, 29, 179ff.Google Scholar I owe my knowledge of this refer–ence to the kindness of Professor A. D. Nock. I have investigated the incident of the wooden horse, regarded as a magical attack on the wall of Troy, in Vergil’s Troy, (Oxford, 1932), 105ff.Google Scholar
60 Malten, 25ff., 254.
61 Ibid. 253f.
62 I, 84.
63 The wall was called ἰερὸ ν κρήδε μνον; κρήδε μνον means a veil or the seal of a jar, literally a ‘head binding’. ( Paton, W.R. in Classical Review, 1913, 27, 45).Google Scholar
64 For the point of contact between stone circles and foundation rites, cf. together especially M, chap, XVII, Stone Labyrinths and Rock Engravings, 147ff., with figs. 124ff, and Burdick, D.L., Foundation Ceremonies and Some Kindred Rituals (New York, Abbey Press, 1901),Google Scholar chap. XL, Circular Movements and Symbols, 149ff. Burdick’s book is unfortunately out of print and I have not found a copy in England. I owe my know–ledge of the text of it to the very great kindness of Dr Eugene S. McCartney of the University of Michigan. The comparison of these two chapters strongly suggests that the principle of the magic circle, and ideas of exclusion represented also by maze forma–tions, were of great importance in the plans of the builders of early stone monuments. The Trojan game was itself performed as part of the funeral rites of Anchises, according to Vergil. After its revival, it was sometimes performed at funerals; for example round the graves of Caligula and Drusilla (Dio Cassius LIX, II). Cf. Pliny, N.H. XXXVI, 84: he thinks a labyrinth specially suitable either for a palace or a burial, or—as according to him most people believed—as a structure sacred to the sun. Probably all the suggestions are partly right. Cf. ibid. 90fr., where he quotes Varrò on the labyrinth at Porsenna’s tomb. With 92, where bells are mentioned, many uses of bells apparently defensive may be compared.