Forlong - Rivers of Life

Fire Worship.
of Agamedes, which had a Lingam “Column erected by the side of it.” 1 Those who
consulted this oracle of Trophonius had to offer a ram to Agamedes. Now this must
have been very early indeed, long before the great Theseus of the thirteenth century
B.C. who “founded the first dynasty of Atika which ended in Kodrus” of about two
hundred years later, or 1130 B.C.
The Greeks mention the Hyperborei or Kyklops, worshipping Apollo at Delos and
Delphi, which would probably be after the days of Trophonius the architect, and also
of his father, king Hyrieus, who is of no late growth, as we only know that he was
the “son of Poseidon and Alkyone, and that he married one Klonia.” The meaning
of all this seems to be, that this so-called Basileus was a Serpent-king, or leader of a
race of serpent-worshippers, and being a great builder, then most probably a Kyklops,
who lived and constructed this far-famed Serpent-cave, shrine, and treasury: and that
the brother faith was Lingam-worship, the leader of which raised his column, and
demanded a sacrifice of rams from those who came to consult the oracle.
This also became a leading faith, and the two, permeated all the states which
afterwards formed the kingdom of Greece, and were fully and heartily adopted by the
people, who accordingly called their first kings Basileus, and their priestly kings the
same, ever afterwards. The places from whence the orders of the Basileus went forth,
were of course Basilika,—that still well-known word. Trophonius apparently long kept
serpents, and lived quietly, unostentatiously, and beloved by all around him, in a cave
of the grove of Laba-dea in Phokis, with Hera-Kyna (Hera-Kuna), the goddess and discoverer
of the cave. They there delivered oracles, and so gracious were they both, that
they have been called Eskulapius and Hygia; but of course they became unearthly
individuals after the death of Agamedes. I think we merely see in Hygia representative
woman—Juno, Kuna, Cave, or woman—and in the Basileus, a Phallus, the Toroph-on,
or Tower of the Serpent and Sun. None, says Pausanias. could inquire from
Trophonius until they had sacrificed to Apollo, Saturn, Jupiter, Juno, and Ceres, that
is to Op-El Pi-Sol, or to Saturn as the lord of Ops; to Jupiter, who had transformed
himself twice into a serpent in order to seduce Rhea (Ceres) and Proserpine, and to the
other two goddesses who were so famous for their connection with serpents. 2
The Trophonian oracle had the same effect as the African serpents in the
fields at harvest time (see p. 106), and as many other oracles had. “No one ever
came out of the cave smiling,”—and why? “di¦ t¾j tîn Ñfewn kplhxin—because of the
STUPOR occasioned by the serpents.” 3 It was a. property of all serpents to do this.
Plutarch tells us of those of Bacchus causing singular stupor or stupidity, which in
these materialistic days we should probably call “love sickness,” or stupidity
resulting from love. The word Basileus has been reduced to the radicals Pi-il-eus, or the
male sun-god, whom the Egyptians revered as Ileus at least three thousand years,
and probably three times this, before we hear of the Basileus of Beotia.
1 Smith’s Clas. Dict.
2 “On the side of the rock grotto of Trophonius
men sculptured images of Trophonius and Herakuna
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with serpent twined stoves.” Ser. Myths, Egypt,
Cooper, p. 11.
3 Bulenger de Orac. apud Gronou, vii. 44, Deane,
p. 220.