Wenzel_1967_The Dioscuri in the Balkans_Slavic Review.pdf

The Dioscuri in the BalkansAuthor(s): Marian WenzelSource: Slavic Review, Vol. 26, No. 3 (Sep., 1967), pp. 363-381Published by:Stable URL: http://www.jstor.org/stable/2492722 .Accessed: 06/06/2013 03:07

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Articles

MARIAN WENZEL

The Dioscuri in the Balkans

his article is an attempt to establish a certain number of conclusions concerning the Dioscuri which are different from previous surmises. These conclusions are: First, an individual, on horseback or on foot, shown stab- bing another figure beneath need not represent the triumph of good over evil, or the vanquishing of a foe, and in a set number of cases does not represent this. Second, at least one kind of antique mystery cult did not develop from a puberty initiation ritual, but from something else. Third, much of pre-Greek, or perhaps Thracian, religion, as indicated by contem- porary ethnographic survivals, may have consisted of one extended ritual which could be segmented for a number of different purposes, excluding that of puberty initiation, for which, in this context, I have found no trace. Finally, the Dioscuri were an anthropomorphized object, of an ascertain- able kind. The evidence leading to these conclusions is given below.

In the village of Mijatovci, in Hercegovina, at the site known as "Kalufi," there was a tombstone dated to the fifteenth century on which is depicted a woman between horsemen (Figure i). The same, or a similar, motif appears on other tombstones in neighboring graveyards (Figure 2, d, e).1 These horsemen have been identified with the Dioscuri.2 That is to say, they ex- hibit such striking features in common with classical monuments known to be representations of the Dioscuri that the possibility of chance coincidence is, in fact, eliminated. It is also likely that monuments of this kind were confined to the horse-breeding Vlach population of this area, whose manners and customs were different from those of the other inhabitants.3

1 See Marian Wenzel, Ukrasni motivi na steccima (Ornamental Motifs on Tombstonesfrom Medieval Bosnia and Surrounding Regions) (Sarajevo, I965), P1. CV-CVII. The research leading to this book and to the present article, which is being extended with added material into book form, has been sponsored by the Bollingen Foundation, New York, to which I owe considerable thanks.

2 M. Wenzel, "A Mediaeval Mystery Cult in Bosnia and Hercegovina," Journal of the Warburg and Courtauld Institutes, XXIV (London, 196I), 95.

3 M. Wenzel, "Bosnian and Herzegovinian Tombstones-Who Made Them and Why," Sudost-Forschungen, XXI (Munich, I962), I02-43.


364 SLAVIC REVIEW

My purpose here is to explain why the Dioscuri should appear on fifteenth-century gravestones in Hercegovina. As might be expected, the explanation is complicated. It takes us rather far afield and involves some con- sideration of who, or rather what, the Dioscuri originally were, a point which seems still not to have been settled. To avoid misunderstanding, I ought perhaps to state here that by the explanation of an object or a representation I mean the identification of its ritual function. There are, of course, other kinds of explanation, but they are purposely excluded from the scope of this work.

It will be necessary to take into account some other motifs which appear upon the tombstones, and I shall first describe these. Two snakes sometimes appear on adjoining faces of the same stone as the two horsemen (Figure 2, a).4 Two stars sometimes appear above the horsemen, and sometimes there is a crescent between the two stars (Figure 2, b),5 as sometimes there is a woman between the horsemen (Figures i, 2, d, e).6 On one occasion the woman and horsemen appear flanked by two trees and topped by stars (Figure 2, d). On another occasion certain objects, a man and perhaps a fish, appear under the horses' hoofs (Figure 2, C).7 In this case the stars surmount an architectural arrangement, over side pillars. These are all variants on the twin horsemen motif. There is one other relevant motif which appears frequently on these tombstones. It consists basically of a row of dancing figures with joined hands,8 and is subject to certain variations. For example, the leader of the dance often carries a sword (Figure 3, a, b, c),9 and the dancers sometimes hold flowers or bunches of vegetation in their linked hands (Figure 3, a, c).10 A grouping of three women is common- place.

We now turn to certain late classical objects upon which the motif of the two horsemen is to be observed and some of which were found in the same area. These are some lead or stone tablets of the late Roman period, which

4 See also M. Wenzel, Ukrasni motivi, p. 287, P1. LXXVI, Figs. 2-3, at Glumina, in Herce- govina.

I Two stars, or rosettes, accompany two horsemen at Strizirep, Sinj region, and Voltane, Trilj region, Croatian Dalmatia (ibid., p. 383, P1. CIII, Figs. 2, 3). See also ibid., p. 385, P1. CIV, Fig. 7. Although falling today into different Yugoslav republics, these sites have a certain geographical unity and are practically all in the karst hinterlands and plains formed -by the Dinaric Alps.

6 See ibid., p. 387, P1. CV, and p. 389, P1. CVI. There are more examples known of the woman between horsemen than of opposing horsemen without the woman. The interesting problem presented by the woman turning into a deer between horsemen, notably at Cengic Bara, Kladovo polje, Ulog region, Hercegovina, where the woman is depicted with deer's antlers (ibid., p. 39I, P1. CVII, Fig. i), does not enter into the scope of this paper.

7 In Fig. 2, c, a column surmounted by a star appears between the two horsemen instead of a woman, but on the opposite end of the same tombstone there is a woman between horsemen, and the woman is given a headdress with rays (ibid., p. 389, P1. CVI; Fig. 8).

8 Ibid., pp. 347-59, P1. XCIII-XCVI. 9See also ibid., p. 355, P1. XCIV, Fig. I2, at Miruge, site "Mistihalj," Bileca region,

Hercegovina. 10 See also ibid., p. 353, P1. XCIII, Figs. 13, I7; p. 355, P1. XCIV, Fig. 5; p. 357, P1. XCV,

Figs. 9, 13, I5; p. 359, P1. XCVI, Fig. 6.


THE DIOSCURI IN THE BALKANS 365

we shall call the Danube cult tablets,'1 and certain carved magic gems of probably the same date but of unknown provenance. On the Danube cult tablets, prone figures always appear under the hoofs of the two horses, and there is always a woman between the two horsemen (Figures 4, 5). In some cases one of the figures may be a fish.'2 The horsemen may hold spears or rods.'3 There are also two stars, which sometimes surmount side pillars, and two snakes.'4 Thus nearly all the features of the twin horsemen motif which appear separately on the medieval tombstones are found together on the Danube tablets. Dances, however, do not appear on the tablets. Still, it is important to observe that the Danube cult tablets, themselves usually of lead, are often found in conjunction with other lead objects,'5 among which are small lead casts, a few inches in height, representing three women with joined hands,'6 or a woman between two branches (Figure i8, a),'7 or Night,'8 or Venus holding a mirror,'9 or Isis-Fortuna.20 Another important kind of lead object, found in numbers in the same area as the Danube cult tablets, is a small mirror frame, the mirror surface of which was formed by a piece of glass about one inch in diameter (Figure 11).21

The carved gems show twin horsemen with accouterments similar to those on the Danube cult tablets (Figure 6).22 A notable feature of the gems is the long spear or stick held by the horsemen. This stick has a snake attached to the butt end, and the point is sometimes touching the prone figure under the horse's hoofs.23 It is very natural to suppose that the horseman is spear-

1I See D. Tudor, "I cavalieri Danubiani," Ephemeris Dacoromana, Annuario della Scuola Romana (Rome, 1937), VII, 189-356; and D. Tudor, "Nuovi monumenti sui cavalieri Danubiani," Dacia, N. S. IV (Bucharest, ig60), 333-62.

12 Tudor, "Nuovi monumenti," p. 346, Fig. i o, gives a typical example. "lbid., p. 338, Fig. 3; p. 348, Fig. ii. 14 Tudor, "I cavalieri Danubiani," p. 298, Fig. i4; p. 313, Fig. 36; p. 324, Fig. 56; p. 333,

Fig. 65; p. 337, Fig. 68; p. 338, Fig. 69. 15 Intercisa II, Archaeologia Hungarica, XXXIII (Budapest, 1957), 383, the section "Bleige-

genstande," P1. LXXIV ff. 16 Ibid., P1. LXXVI, Fig. 8; and Edith B. Thomas, "Olom fogadalmi eml6kek Pannoniaiban:

Poganytelki olomonto mu'hely (Monuments votifs en plomb sur le territoire de la Pannonie: La fondrie de plomb de Poganytelek)" (pr6cis), Archaeologiai Artesfti, LXXIX (Budapest, 1952), 32-37, P1. IV, Fig. 5, and P1. V, Figs. 5, 7.

17 See also Thomas, P1. V, Figs. 2, 4. 18 Ibid., P1. VI, Fig. 7, from Brigetio (Kallay-gyuj-temeny). 19 Ibid., P1. VI, Fig. i, from Brigetio. 20Ibid., P1. IV, Figs. I, 4, 6. 21 E. Michon, "Miroirs Antiques de verre double de plomb," Bulletin Archeologique du comite

des travaux historiques et scientifiques (Paris), No. 2, 1909, pp. 231-50; E. Michon, "Nouvelles Observations sur les miroirs de verre," ibid., No. 2, I9I I, pp. I96-207; D. Tudor, "Le depot de miroirs de verre double de plomb trouve A Sucidava," Dacia, N. S. III (1959), 415-32; M. Veli6kovic, "Olovni okviri antickih staklenih ogledala iz Narodnog Muzeja," Zbornik radova Narodnog Muzeja, 1958-59 (Belgrade, 1959), II, 55-72.

22 F. Chapouthier, Les Dioscures au service d'une dgesse (Paris, 1935), p. 287, Fig. 56, and p. 288; T,udor, "I cavalieri Danubiani," pp. 343-48, cat. nos. I20-28; G. Q. Giglioli, "Due gemme basilidiane del Museo Archeologico di Perugia," Archeologia Classica, III (Rome, 1951), I99 f., P1. XLIX, L.

28 Gems possessing this feature are one formerly in the Odeschalchi collection, sketched in I752 (Fig. 6, c), and another in the collection of the German Archaeological Institute, Rome


366 SLAVIC REVIEW

ing the prone figure and that he has the attitude of a hero vanquishing an enemy, as has been assumed by several authorities in the past.24 This theory does not explain the snakes, although it has been suggested that they may be flags, namely, the draco standard as employed by Dacian sol- diers and the Roman legions.25 Everyone will agree, I think, that it is a very odd situation for a snake, or even for a flag. To raise the flag, the spear would be held upside down, which is normally regarded as unlucky, or an attitude of surrender. Furthermore, while spearing with the spear, one would have to avoid grabbing hold of the flag, which would impair ef- ficiency.

I must now turn to a third group of monuments, namely, those which are known to be representations of the Dioscuri. As these classical representations are familiar, I shall not specify them in detail. The Dioscuri appear in a number of different forms and in a number of different settings. They are represented as young men on horseback or on foot,26 often with stars on their caps (Figure 7, b),27 sometimes carrying long spears or rods (Figure 7, b),28 sometimes with a woman between them,29 sometimes with other objects such as an altar (Figure 7, a)30 or a table with food on it.31 In another series of representations they appear as young men joined by crosspieces (Figures 6, b, and 7, c),32 or as twin pillars or hats surmounted by stars with objects between (Figure 7, d),33 or possibly as rods entwined (Tudor, "I cavalieri Danubiani," pp. 344, 345, cat. nos. I2I, I24, Figs. 78, 8i). A gem in the Kunsthistorisches Museum, Vienna (Fig. 6, a), shows the sticks with snakes but lacks the feature of their being directed toward the prone figures below.

24 Tudor, "I cavalieri Danubiani," pp. 230, 23I; D. Tudor, "Intorno al culto dei cavalieri Danubiani," Dacia, N. S. V (I96I), 338. A. Delatte and Ph. Derchain (Les Intailles magiques greco-egyptiennes [Paris, I964], p. I93), in discussing figures standing on other figures which are represented horizontally, remark: "Nemesis, Hecate et Osiris interviennent donc, dans cette attitude, evidemment en qualite de divinit6s qui vainquent l'ennemi, c'est-a-dire le mal. II est probable qu'il faille donner cette signification a 1'ensemble de la s6rie. En particulier, les deux exemplaires qui montrent une d6esse entre deux cavaliers font songer a une curieuse association de Nemesis et des Dioscures, qui pourraient avoir 6t6 invoqu6s ici contre '1'ennemi' en qualit6 de dieux saveurs." The inheritors of this iconographic arrangement, St. George and St. Theodore, shown spearing a serpent and a man, sometimes with Christ between, are automatically interpreted in this way (M. Wenzel, "Some Notes on the Iconography of St. Helen," Actes du XIIe Congres International des Etudes Byzantines, III [Belgrade, I964], 415, 4I6, 4i8, Fig. 4).

25 Tudor, "Intorno al culto dei cavalieri Danubiani," p. 32I; Tudor, "I cavalieri Danu- biani," p. 237.

26 Chapouthier, cat. nos. 2-22, 26-54, 57, 58, 6I-70, 72-75. 27 See also ibid., cat. nos. 26-29, 32-36, 40, 4I, 45-48, 50-58, 6o, 66, 69, 73-75. 28 See also ibid., cat. nos. I4, 20, 2I, 26-30, 35-37, 4I, 42, 44, 47-50, 53, 54, 57, 58, 64, 66,

69, 73-75. 29 Ibid., cat. nos. I-23, 26-37, 6o, 6i, 64-69, 73, 74. 30 See also ibid., cat. nos. 37, 38. 31 Ibid., cat. nos. 52, 56. 32 M. C. Waites, "The Meaning of the Dokana," American Journal of Archaeology (Norwood,

Mass.), XXIII (I9I9), 7, Fig. 6. Two Etruscan mirrors with this detail, similar to those discussed by Miss Waites, are preserved as part of the Ravestein collection in the Musees Royaux d'Art et d'Histoire, Brussels, one from Vulci (Fig. 7, c) and the other (cat. no. R. I 290) from Palestrine. I am extremely grateful to J.-Ch. Balty for allowing me access to this material. Fig. 6, b, presents this feature on an engraved gem.

33 See also Chapouthier, cat. nos. 59, 76, 79-87, 92-94, 99, i oi, and also p. 280, Figs. 53, 54.



by snakes,34 or as jars (Figure 8, a).35 It is certain that snake-entwined sticks and jars are attributes of the Dioscuri even if they are not necessarily the Dioscuri themselves.

Perhaps the most remarkable representation of the Dioscuri, and, accord- ing to Plutarch, one of the oldest,36 is the dokana. The dakana consisted of two vertical wooden beams joined by two parallel transverse beams. Plutarch interprets it as a symbol of brotherly love.37 The dokana is actually depicted on a votive relief dedicated to the Dioscuri by a certain Argenidas on his safe completion of a voyage at sea (Figure 8, a).38 Admit- tedly, the dokana here has only one crosspiece. It is an "H"-shaped object reminiscent of the zodiacal sign of the heavenly twins.89 There is also a representation of some sacred structure at Samothrace which appears to in- clude: the dokana, again with a single crosspiece (Figure 8, b).40 In her work on the meaning of the dokana Margaret Waites discusses the series of Etruscan mirrors on the backs of which are the Dioscuri themselves, joined by a crosspiece. Miss Waites formed the hypothesis that the Dioscuri themselves were originally doorposts,4' but her hypothesis explains only this particular image. It does not explain anything else about the Dioscuri.

34 Ibid., pp. I 76, I 77, Fig. 17. 35 Ibid., p. 24I, Fig. 36, shows twin amphorae on a monument dedicated to the Corybantes,

identified with the Dioscuri, from Pergamon. Daremberg-Saglio, Dictionnaire des antiquites (Paris, I889), Vol. D-E, s.v. "Dioscuri," p. 255, Fig. 2437, depicts Spartan bronze coins with the heads of the Dioscuri surmounted by stars on one side and twin amphorae wrapped round with snakes on the other. Taranto, a Spartan colony, had on its money twin amphorae surmounted by stars. Fig. 8, a (the votive relief dedicated by Argenidas to the Dioscuri), shows them standing beside twin amphorae.

36 Plutarch, "De fraterno amore," Moralia, 478, A, B. 37 "The ancient representations of the Dioscuri are called by the Spartans 'beam-figures'

(dokana); they consist of two parallel wooden beams joined by two other transverse beams placed across them, and this common and indivisible character of the offering appears entirely suitable to the brotherly love of these gods." Ibid. ("Loeb Classical Library" edition, trans. W. C. Helmbold [London, I939], VI, 247). The word translated here as "offering," aphidru'mata, is translated by Jane Harrison (Themis [Cambridge, Eng., I927], p. 305) as anything set apart, a dedication.

38J. Rendel Harris, The Cult of the Heavenly Twins (Cambridge, Eng., I906), P1. V, gives a photograph of this monument demonstrating that there is only one crosspiece, and none across the top. Drawings are given in Harrison, p. 305, Fig. 84, and A. B. Cook, Zeus (Cam- bridge, Eng., I925), Vol. II, Part 2, Appendixes and Index, p. I062, Fig. 9I6. The inscrip- tion reads, "Argenidas, son of Aristogenidas, to the Dioscuri, a vow." Under the two dokana is written "Anakeion," implying that they formed a double sanctuary to the "Lords."

39 A. Bouch6 Leclercq, L'Astrologie grecque (Paris, I899), p. I35, s.V. "les g6meaux." The zodiacal sign of the Dioscuri is usually shown as a kind of "H" with two crosspieces, the two upper terminations of the "H" bending slightly outward. The two principal stars have been interpreted differently as Castor and Pollux, Apollo and Hercules, Apollo and Bacchus, Amphion and Zethus, and the Cabiri of Samothrace.

40 See P. M. Fraser, Samothrace, the Inscriptions on Stone (New York, I960), Appendix IV, pp. I I 2-I 6. The relief shown in Fig. 8, b (second century B.C.), which mentions a list of mystai from Cyzicus, is usually taken to be a representation of a round building with two bases and has not previously been recognized as a dokana, but it seems to resemble most closely the dokana as it actually exists today. Chapouthier, p. 177, Fig. 17, sketches the dokana rather differently from the photograph on which Fig. 8, b, was based and discusses a barely distinguishable snake entwined around one of the uprights.

41 Waites, p. 8. Further published examples are those given in E. Gerhard, Etruschische Spiegel (Berlin, 1843), Part I: Abbildungen, P1. XLV-XLVI. The dating of these mirrors is ,discussed in G. A. Mansuelli, "Studi sugli specchi Etruschi IV: La Mitologia figurata negli


368 SLAVIC REVIEW

The classical works do not tell us much. We learn that the Dioscuri, with Helen, were born from an egg,42 that there were two of them, that they were alike in almost every way,43 that they often seemed to ride horses,44 and that Castor, in particular, protected horses and equestrian games.45 They rode on the sea and sometimes appeared, as did Helen, on the masts of ships in the form of little flames which protected sailors and guided them to shore.46 Their functions have been summarized by Plutarch, who explains that they are among certain souls who have achieved the moon but who have ascended again to earth, "to take charge of oracles, to attend and participate in the highest of mystic rituals, to act as warders against mis- deeds and chastisers of them, and to flash forth as saviors manifest in war and at sea." 47 They had to do with the mysteries at Samothrace.48

No ritual function is described for them which would explain all this corpus of representations and paraphernalia. Those who had passed through the mysteries at Samothrace are singularly uninformative, no doubt as the result of their vows.49 The traditional functions of the Dioscuri are not helpful, and the myths are of very little use in interpreting the monumental material. The only serious modern suggestion that seems to have been made is that mentioned before, that they are doorposts of some sacred place, such as the temple at Samothrace, with which they did have connection.50

The traditional ways of attacking this problem have thus been ex- hausted, without any significant result. It remains to apply unconven- tional ways, such as exploring the local folk customs. I will not suggest that we seek the origin of the Dioscuri in folk custom, that origin being so far specchi Etruschi," Studi Etruschi (Florence, I948-49), XX, 6i, 87. Those with the crosspiece come late in the series, about the third century B.C. This is roughly the same date as a South Italian red-figure vase, showing Greek influence, on which the Dioscuri stand with staffs and stars on either side of a divided circle on which is inscribed an "H." This vase is preserved in the Museum of Decorative Arts, Prague.

4 Pausanias, XVI, 1-3. 43 Lucian, Dialogi deorum, XXVI. 44 Cicero, De natura deorum, II, 5-6; Ovid, Fasti, I, 705-8; Pausanias, IV, 27, I. I' Homer, Odyssey, XI, 300; Oppian, Cynegeticus, II, 14. 46 Xenophanes, Diels-Kranz, A.39; Pliny, Nat. Hist., II, Ioi; Lucian, Dialogi deorum,

XXVI; Horace, Odes, I, Ode III; Plutarch, Moralia, 426 C. See also K. Jaisle, Die Dioskuren als R.tter zur See bei Griechen und Romern und ihr Fortleben in christlichen Legenden (Tiubingen, I907), pp. 26, 30, 36 ff.; and J. Rendel Harris, Dioscuri in the Christian Legends (London, I903), p. 5.

47 Plutarch, Moralia, 944 D. 48Jaisle, p. 30, quotes Ampelius, in his Scholia to Germanicus' Aratea, as saying that the

Dioscuri were present to the initiates at Samothrace and protected them from tempests on ships. N. Lewis, Samothrace, the Ancient Literary Sources (New York, I958), presents a number of sources to this effect, among which is the following: Cat. no. I 79, Servius, In Aeneidem, 3, I2, says the Penates may be the Great Gods, and also the Great Gods may be two male statues before the door in Samothrace, representing Castor and Pollux. Pausanias, X, 37, 7, says the Dioscuri, Curetes, and Cabiri are identified as Boy Lords. Lewis, cat. no. 2I4, Strabo, IO, 3, 7, tells that people confuse the Corybantes, the Cabiri, the Idaean Dactyli and the Telchines with the Curetes, and that the rites of the Samothracians and of those in Lemnos and several other places have a common relationship, because the divine attendants are called the same.

49 VOWS of secrecy taken at Samothrace are mentioned in Lewis, cat. nos. 14I, 174, I 74a, 22I, 222, 224, 225, 229.

50 Ibid., cat. no. 179, Servius, In Aeneidem, 3, I2.



back. But it is feasible to consider folk customs for understanding the Dioscuri on fourteenth- and fifteenth-century monuments, especially as our records for such customs go back to the eighteenth century.51 The gap is not large. I say one other thing in defense of this method, since it has been attacked by some people. Namely, why is it regarded as possible to recon- struct ruined buildings and emend corrupt manuscripts but impossible to separate the old from the new in folk customs? We will return, therefore, to our stones at Mijatovci.

Examining the area of the Mijatovci monuments, we find that there does not seem to be anything in the local folklore immediately relevant to a pair of twin horsemen with a woman between. Dances, however, are a different matter. The round dance called the kolo is popular all over Yugoslavia. However, there is one dance represented on the medieval tombstones which is not a kolo of the ordinary type but has certain striking features which permit of identification. This dance, which we have mentioned before, consists of a row of men and women, usually a small odd number, with men not infrequently at each end (Figure 3, a-c). Groupings of three women are common. The dancers have linked hands, and in their linked hands they hold bunches of vegetation. The man at one of the ends sometimes carries an uplifted sword. A dance of predsely similar appear- ance is performed by Vlach inhabitants of the village of Duboko, near the Danube, in the Homolje Mountains east of Belgrade, in the month of May or June of each year. It is the only part of Yugoslavia where such a dance is now performed. The dance is not carried out in isolation but is part of a festival, beginning at Whitsun and occupying the space of three days. This festival is called the Rusalje. It is a festival for the dead.52 It will be necessary for me to recali this ritual, which I shall henceforth refer to as the Duboko ritual, in some detail.

The sequence of events, in what we shall regard as the first stage of the

51 Abbe A. Fortis, Travels into Dalmatia (London, I 778), is one of the earliest sources. 62 Duboko was a noted mining area in Roman times, though many of its inhabitants prob-

ably were always stockbreeders, as today. The village lies on a small tributary of the River Pek (ancient "Pincus"), which flows from a large cave a few miles from the village. The river was reputed to have carried gold. At the point where the Pek enters the Danube there are remains of the Roman castrum "Pincum" (M. M. Vasic, "Dionisos i nas folklor," Glas Srpske Akademije Nauka [SAN], CCXIV [Belgrade, I954], Odeljenje drustvenih nauka, N.S. 3, pp. I33, I34. The festival of Rusalje, as celebrated there and elsewhere in the Balkans, was identified by Miklosich with the Roman rosalia or dies rosae, which was a festival for the dead (F. Miklosich, "Rusalien," Sitzungsberichte der kais. Akad. d. Wiss. Phil.-Hist. Cl., XLVI [Vienna, 1864], 386-405). The rosalia is, however, not mentioned in Ovid's Fasti among official Roman celebrations, and there is confusion about its date. It may have been imported into Rome from the Balkans, rather than the Balkan ritual deriving from Rome. Certainly, modern authorities recognize that the problem of the Rusalje is far more complicated than admitted by Mikdosich. See F. Tailliez, "Rusalile, les Rosalies et la Rose," Cahiers Sextil Puscariu, Linguistique- Philologie-Literature Roumains (Valle Hermoso, I952), Vol. I, fasc. 2, pp. 30I-I7.

I attended the ritual on June 2, 3, and 4, I 963, in the company of Dimitrije Stefanovic and Olga Moskovljevic, from the Music Institute and Ethnographic Institute of the Serbian Academy of Sciences. I am grateful for their various notes, of which they have kindly al- lowed me copies. I am also grateful to Milica Ilijin, also of the Institute of Music, who visited the ritual at Duboko in 1952 and saw many additional details.


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ritual, is as follows. Early on the morning of the first day people visit the graves of their deceased relatives. The dead are buried in the back yards of the houses. They place food and drink on the graves and cry, "Come back to us, come back to us," or words to that effect.53

Later in the day the people go in procession from the grave to the village square carrying food and drink. Whether this is the same food and drink is not clear, but, knowing the parsimonious habits of peasants, I should guess that some of it is. The procession is formed as follows. First comes a row of female relatives carrying food and drink. Then comes a row consisting of three virgins and either two or three young men.54 The essential feature of this row is that there must be a young man at each end.55 At least one of the end men carries an uplifted sword, and sometimes both do so. The dancers link hands, and in their linked hands they hold bunches of vegetation, including garlic, herbs, and certain flowers, as well as flasks of wine, eggs, and sometimes lighted candles (Figure 3, d). On their backs they have attached white towels and small mirrors, often with an effective diameter of only about two inches (Figure lo).56 Following these so-called kings and queens there comes a row of musicians, usually now consisting of two violinists, with lighted candles and money attached to their vio- lins.57 The whole procession moves with a curious halting gait, involving a forward thrust of the shoulders in time to the music. The impression is of people trying to draw some heavy or reluctant object behind them.

Before going on, I should like to make a few remarks about the function of the mirrors. It will not have escaped attention that the effective size of the mirrors on the backs of the dancers at Duboko is about the same as that of the mirrors found in conjunction with the Danube cult tablets (Figure 1 i). When some participants were asked about the function of these mirrors, they said, "They are so that the dead can look back into this world." I think myself that "look" may be a distortion of the original in- tention, which was rather to bring the dead back to this world.

There are many indications that mirrors are believed to be able to capture or entangle objects that look into or are reflected in them.58 One of

53 A disconnected translation from the Rumanian, as recorded by Dimitrije Stefanovic on June 2, I963, is: "That you should come to have a talk. Come on, Dad, for lunch and supper. We have come to meet you, and we are all waiting for you. Here is water for you to clean yourself. For a long time you haven't washed or bathed." This was apparently supposed to have really aroused the deceased, because when we hesitated about accepting food offered to us that had been on the grave, they said, "Don't worry, he won't come after you."

14 Vasic, p. I30, mentions as a possible variant that there need be only two young men. 55 The traditional order is the leader with a sword, one virgin, the second young man, two

virgins, and the third young man, who is sometimes, but not always, also carrying a sword. 56 The effective diameter is frequently reduced by hanging a round honey-cake or cooky

with a hole in the middle over the mirror, so that the mirror is seen through the hole. The mirrors that are used are square pocket mirrors, but the effect is that of a small, round mirror, strikingly like those of the Roman period which were found in the same area. It is hard to say whether or not this is coincidence.

17 In the nineteenth century, and until fairly recently, the instruments employed were bagpipes, as recorded in the earliest written source mentioning this ritual (M. Dj. Mili6evic, Knezevina Srbia [Belgrade, I876], p. Io85).

58 H. Schwartz, "The Mirror of the Artist and the Mirror of the Devout: Observations on


THE DIOSCURI IN THE BALKANS 37I

the most striking examples local to Duboko is perhaps the well-known recipe for moon-cake.59 Three witches meet at the house of the youngest during an eclipse of the moon. They set a pan of water between two branches stuck into the ground or between two fruit trees. They draw down the moon and capture it in the water by observing its reflection there. They then mix flour with the water in which the moon is captured and bake a cake, which obviously contains the water of the moon. The magical powers of this moon-cake are perhaps something of an anticlimax-it is used to cure constipation and chest pains. Perhaps this also explains the legend of the Thessalian witches-mentioned by Aristophanes,60 Apuleius,61 Plu- tarch,62 and Lucian63-who drew down the moon. Apuleius is, further, the only classical source mentioning mirrors worn on the backs of participants in a procession. They occur in the famous description of the procession of Isis64 (a deity whose monuments, in the form of Isis-Fortuna, are often found in the Danube region)65 and were worn by people immediately in front of the image or other representation of the goddess, which is not

Some Paintings, Drawings and Prints of the Fifteenth Century," in Studies in the History of Art Dedicated to William E. Suida (New York, I959), pp. I02-4. Schwartz has demonstrated that small lead mirrors, sold to pilgrims as souvenirs, were held up to reflect the image of sacred relics and thus capture some of their holy power, so as to take it away with them.

59 P. Kemp, Healing Ritual: Studies in the Technique and Tradition of the Southern Slavs (London, I955), pp. 78-8I.

60 Aristophanes, Clouds, 745-50, mentions bringing down the moon and keeping it in a round box like a mirror.

61 Apuleius, Metamorphoses, I, 2; II, 4. 62 Plutarch, Moralia, 4I7 A, The Obsolescence of Oracles, tells how the women of Thessaly

were said to draw down the moon. This notion gained credence when one of them, skilled at astronomy, always claimed at an eclipse that she was bewitching the moon and bringing it down.

63 Lucian, Dialogues of the Hetaerae, I: "Her mother Chrysarium is a witch; she knows Thessalian charms and can draw down the moon."

64 Apuleius, XI, 9: "Mulieres candido splendentes amicimine, vario laetantes gestamine, verno florentes coronamine, quae de gremio per viam, qua sacer incedebat comitatus; aliae quae nitentibus speculis pone tergum reversis venientu deae obvium commonstrarent obsequium." There is no evidence that this particular detail of mirrors worn on the back was a feature of the cult of Isis as practiced in Egypt, and it may have been a result of local syncretism.

65 In addition to the small lead casts representing Isis-Fortuna (see note 20 above), there are a number of engraved gems with the same motif in the collections of the Archaeological Museum, Zagreb, and the National Museum, Belgrade. No reproductions of these have been published. Other monuments relating to the cult of Isis found in the Danube region are given in V. Wessetzky, Die Agyptischen Kulte zur Rdmerzeit in Ungarn (Leiden, I96I), p. 32, P1. III, Fig. 5; P1. XIV, Fig. i8; P1. XVI, Fig. 20. Monuments dedicated to Isis were found in both Zadar and Solin, along the Dalmatian coast (Jacob Spon, Voyage d'Italie, de Dalmatie, de Grece et Yu Levant [Lyons, i678], p. 76; George Wheeler, A Journey into Greece [London, I682], Part I, p. i I; and J. Zeiller, "Sur les cultes de Cybele et de Mithra, a propos de quelques inscriptions de Dalmatie," Revue archeologique, XXVIII [Paris, i928], 2i9). That the Isis cult penetrated to the Stolac region of Hercegovina is demonstrated by a monument found in the Bregava River, with certain Illyrian names and representations of the sistrum of Isis (D. Sergejevski, "Nove akvizicije odeljenja klasicne arheologije Zemaljskog Muzeja," Glasnik Zemaljskog Muzeja [Sarajevo, I948], N. S. III, I69, P1. I, Fig. i). Further, the "ankh" or sign of Life, frequently related with Egyptian cults and the cult of Isis in particular, is represented six times on certain rustic medieval tombstones to the north and south of the Bregava River, all in Hercegovina (Wenzel, Ukrasni motivi, p. I 09, P1. XXVI, Figs. 25-28; p. i i i, P1. XXVII, Figs. I6, I 7). It is a known fact that imported deities in these regions became popular if they could be affiliated to some local goddess or god.


372 SLAVIC REVIEW

precisely described by Apuleius. Their purpose, as explained by Apuleius, was to enable her to observe the people behind her as if they were coming toward her. On optical grounds it is extremely unlikely that the goddess would have been able to do this, unless the mirrors were of very great size, bigger than those the Romans usually produced. It is also possible that the goddess Isis was not amenable to the laws of optics, which may very well be the case, except that then she would not have needed a mirror at all.

In the Duboko ritual the second stage of the proceedings is as follows. On reaching the town square, the procession halts by a table, which has been set there for the purpose, and places the food and drink on it. The musicians sit down behind the table and proceed to sing a song in praise of the deceased (Figure 9). When the song is finished, the dancers engage in another dance, in the same order and with linked hands as before.66 While they are dancing, they are fed with food and wine from the table by the female relatives of the deceased. The end of this dance, which may be repeated several times, terminates the proceedings as far as an individual dead person is concerned. There may be as many as a dozen of these individual rites going on in the square at the same time, and in some cases the deceased may not be deceased at all but may be lying under the table listening to everything.67 The explanation given for this odd proceeding is that the person fears that this may not be done for him after he is dead and since it is important that it should be, he himself pays to have it done.

The other part of the ceremony consists of a large ring dance which goes on continuously in the square, from late afternoon until the following morning.68 This dance is distinct from the other proceedings I have described, and the participants are not the same. Any villager may take part

66 We were told that if the deceased is a young, unmarried person, the leader may carry a flag decorated with his name, photograph, and certain of his belongings, as if the dance leader were acting the part of the dead person himself. This was observed by Milica Ilijin when she visited Duboko in I952. A photograph alone may substitute for the flag. On the Sunday following the Duboko festival, at the nearby village of Neresnica, a similar festival is held on the occasion of Mali Dukovi. Here, in the summer of I963, I observed such a flag, but the dances had degenerated beyond recognition.

67 This was last observed by Milica Ilijin in 1952, but in I963 we were told that a good head of a household (dobar domacin) would take care to have it done for himself or that it could be done for a living husband or wife at the time of the celebration for the deceased spouse. John Fine, Harvard, has kindly sent me information of a ritual observed by Mme. Holenkoff in 1938, in a village of the Morava region, very near Kragujevac. A slava could be held for a man who was very old, but not necessarily dying. The man paid the priest for his part in the prayers and also paid for food and drink, although he himself did not eat or drink any of it. Instead, he lay under the table, which was set up at the entrance to the church, but not inside the church. The guests made merry, with or without music, and talked of the good qualities of the man under the table. The man could not have another funeral banquet after his actual death. Both of these customs relate to a kind of mystery initiation, in which the initiate has a "trial run" at death to assure his safe passage later on.

68 Slobodan Ze6evi6, "Ljeljenovo kolo," Narodno stvaralastvo (Belgrade), No. 9-I0, Jan.- April, I964, p. 708, remarks that only certain rare Yugoslav dances are carried on at night. As everybody knows that the souls of the dead are abroad at night, people usually avoid dancing at that time and terminate their dancing at sundown. These night dances are defi- nitely chthonic in character.


Figure i. 'Toimibstone, fifteenth century. Mijatovci, "Kalufi," Nevesinje region, IHereegovina. Now in the Vojni Muzej JNA (Jugoslavenske Narodne Armije), Kaleciriegdan, Belgrade.


Figutre 2. Tombstones, fifteenth century. From M. Wenzel, Ukrasni motivi na stec'cima (Ornamental Motifs on Tombstones from Medieval Bosnia and Sur- rounding Regions) (Sarajevo, i965). (a) Hodovo, "Pogrebnice," Stolac region, Hercegovina (p. 287, Pl. LXXVI, Fig. I ). (b) Ravno, "Ravanjska vrata," Kupres region, Bosnia (p. 385, Pl. CIV, Fig. 6). (c) Zborna gomila (tumulus), Avtovac region, Hercegovina (p. 387, PI. CV, Fig. I ). (d) Ravno, "Kr'sa," Kupres region, Bosnia (p. 387, Pl. CV, Fig. II). (e) Risovac, Blidinje region, Hercegovina tp. 387, PI. CV, Fig. 6).


-b

Figure 3. (a) Tombstone, fifteenth century. Boljuni, Stolac region, Hercegovina. From M. Wenzel, Ukrasni motivi na steccima (Sarajevo, I965), p. 357, P1. XCV, Fig. i6. (b) Tombstone, fifteenth century. Gvozno, Kalinovik region, Bosnia. Ibid., p. 359, P1. XCVI, Fig. 3. (c) Tombstone, fifteenth century. Oplicici, "Jelaca," Stolac region, Hercegovina. Ibid., Fig. I 8. (d) Vlach dance, at Whitsun, of "kings and queens." Duboko, Homolje, Serbia, I963. Author's drawing.


. ..... ...

Figure 4. Danube cult tablet, lead. Narodni Muzej, Belgrade.

Figure 5. Danube cult tablet, stone. Narodni Muzej, Belgrade.


~~~x AN

d e Figure 6. Engraved gems, Greco-Roman period. (a) Vienna, Kunsthistorisches Museum, Antikensammiung, Inventory No. IX B i67. (b) Unknown location (after C. Bonner, "Amulets Chiefly in the British Museum," Hesperia, Journal of the American School of Classical Studies at Athens, Vol. XXVIII [Baltimore, I95I], P1. gb, Fig. I9). (c) Unknown location, formerly Odeschalchi collection (after G. Q. Giglioli, "Due gemme basilidiane del Museo Archeologico di Perugia," Archeologia Classica, Vol. III [Rome, I95I], P1. L, Fig. 2). (d) Unknown location (after Giglioli, P1. L, Fig. i), averse. (e) Reverse of (d).


Figure 7. (a) Roman period relief, stone. Vid (Narona), Hercegovina. After M. Abramic, /, - __ "Reljef Dioskura iz Narone," Vjesnik za arheologiju i historiju dalmatinsku (Split, 1952), LIV,

I20-26, P1. VI, Fig. i. (b) Engraved gem. London, British Museum. From H. B. Walters, - - \ Catalogue of the Engraved Gems and Cameos, Greek, Etruscan and Roman, in the British Museum (London,

/. I:^ -r4 b, 1926), P1. XXIV, No. i86o. (c) Etruscan mirror. Vulci. Brussels, Musees Royaux d'Art et d'Histoire, cat. no. R. 1292. (d) Coin. Amisos, Pontos. After F. Chapouthier, Les Dioscures au

7g - ..( S > ~k+j strvice d'une dtesse (Paris, 1935), p. 82, cat. no. 8o.

a V~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

Figure 8. (a) Votive relief to the Dioscuri. Verona, Museo Lapidario, cat. no. . After Jane Harrison, . Themis (Cambridge, Eng., 1927), ,-- P. 305, Fig. 84. (b) Relief from '1 7 . Samothrace, second century B.C. I. . - Owned by Viscount Mersey, Bignor Park, Pulborough, Sussex. After ; photograph in P. M. Fraser, Samo- - L thrace, the Inscriptions on Stone (New York, I960), P1. XXIII, Fig. I.


Figure 9. Table set up in honor of the dead. Duboko, Homolje, Serbia, I963. Photograph by the author.

* s. _ = , sK F

3u; l i F ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~.. ....

Figure i o. Mirror and cooky worn on the backs of participants in the dance for the dead. Duboko, Ho.. molje, Serbia, i963. Photograph by the author.


Figure II. Lead backs for small glass mirrors, Roman period. Sucidava, Rumania. From D. Tudor, "Le depot de miroirs de verre double de plomb trouve a Sucidava," Dacia, N.S. III ('959), 419.

Muzej, Belgrade.

_s ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~., .... .. ...... ..... .. .. ... . ... ... ... .. l~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~.._... ...] .

Z~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~... ......

iS~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~... .. ... ;!, -i

.. .. .. . ..._

. ... . .

.... .t .. .. I..i |E. ..

perid. uciava Ruani. Fo D. Tuo, L dio

Daia N.S II.159,49

,'igr i2 Woa alni rac.Dbk,H mle,Sri,i6.Poogaho torfk

Muzj Begrade


'.4-~~~~~~~.

Figure 13. Fire-making apparatus. (a) North Serbia. After photograph of Etnografski Muzej, Belgrade. (b) Macedonia. After V. Titelbach, "Roznecovani ziveho ohne u Jihosla- vanu," Cesky Lid (Prague, I896), Vol. V, No. 4, p. 342, Fig. i.

b

Figure i 4. (a) Ritual for curing epileptics. Serbia. Reconstruc- tion. (b) Purification ritual using new fire. Setonje, Serbia. After V. Titelbach, "Roznecovafni iv6ho ohfne u Jihoslavanu," Cesky Lid (Prague, I896), Vol. V, No. 4, p. 345, Fig. 4; and P. Kemp, Healing Ritual: Studies in the Technique and Tradition of the Southern Slays (London, I935), illustration facing p. I48.


~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~-4

A ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~

F E4.. . T.

Figure 15. Volovska botomn1ja (purification ritual for cattle). Temnic~, Serbia, I9''I Photograph of Etnografski Muzej, Belgrade.


Figure i6. (a) Fire-making apparatus. Macedonia, Yugoslavia. After V. Titelbach, "Rozn6covanf ziveho ohn6 u Jihoslavanui,"

- tXw 'V Cesky L(d (Prague, I 896), Vol. V, No. 4, P. 344, Fig. 3. (b) Medieval tombstone. Tekija, Srebrenica /\)- "{ti region, Bosnia. Now in Zemaljski i22; ? Z - . rmJ t t;; d e ~~Muzej, Sarajevo. Afer D. Serge-

Figure \ Icon, SS Forus andLaurusw, jevski, "Ste,ak kod sela Tekie," t \ l l { \ X ~~~~~~~~~~Glasnik Zemaljskog Muga N.S

Gallery. From K Onasch Iko (Be , 1 , p , P1. I , Fi8J;1954) 273-74, B~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~I. 1, Fig.\An

"

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~. . ......

ti'1 _ W -

Figure I 7. Icon, SS. Florus and Laurus with Speushippos, Elashippos, and Melashippos. Moscow school, sixteenth century. Moscow, Trct'iakov Gallery. From K. Onasch, Ikonen (Berlin, I96I), p. 394, P1. I I8.


~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ 0

a b

C

Figure I 8. (a) Votive plaque to goddess Sylvana, lead. From Poganytelek, near Gyula- fir'atot. Now in the museum at Veszprem, Hungary. After Edith B. Thomas, "Olom fogadalmi ernlekek Pannoni'aban: Poganytelki olom'onto mu'ihely (Monuments votifs en plomb sur le territoire de la Pannonie. La fondrie de plomb de Poganytelek)" (pr6cis), Akchaeo- logiai ErtesitJ (Budapest, I952), LXXIX, P1. V, Fig. 3. (b) Artemis of Ephesus, coin of Caracalla, before 2I2 A.D., reverse. From F. Chapouthier, Les Dioscures au service d'une deesse (Paris, I935), p. 76, P1. XII, cat. no. 68. (c) Detail, French-English manuscript. Late thirteenth or early fourteenth century. John Rylands Library, Manchester, England, Latin I 17, folio ga recto.


THlE DIOSCURI IN THE BALKANS 373

in this large kolo, but married women are obliged to engage in it.A It is particularly important that brides of the preceding year should dance in this dance.

There is one other event of importance which does not now occur every year, although in former times it seems to have been an essential part of the proceedings. Certain women known as padalice, or "falling ones," fall to the ground in a trance (Figure 12).70 They know beforehand that they are going to do this and come to the village square especially for this purpose. They need not engage in any of the dances. The process for returning them to consciousness is important. A group from one of the processions consisting of the "kings and queens" and musicians carries the tranced woman in the direction of the river bank and then puts her down. The principal sword-bearer makes a sign of a cross on her chest with his sword. The same principal sword-bearer chews garlic and absinthe (pelen) and spits this on her cheek. He and all the others then touch her with their feet and dance around her three times chanting an exorcistic magic spell.7' Then they carry her a bit further. The whole process is repeated three times, by which time the river bank is reached. In former times the tranced woman was carried across the river, but this is no longer done. On the river bank they raise her to a standing position. The two sword-bearers cross their swords over her head, and water is poured over the swords. One of the "kings" catches it in his free hand and gives it to the tranced woman to drink. Usually she recovers consciousness at this stage; if not, the whole process is repeated several times. If she does not then recover consciousness, honey is placed in her mouth, and she is left to recover by herself.

The local inhabitants either do not know or will not say precisely what the purpose of this elaborate series of ceremonies is. In response to ques- tioning they answer, in respect to the first part, that it is in memory of the deceased, and, in respect to the revival of the trance-woman, that if this ceremony is not performed either she would go mad or die.72 Little attempt is made to explain why the women fall into trances on that certain day only. I should stress that the trances are not prophetic in character.

69 When, on the early morning of the third day, June 4, I963, shortly before dawn, we at- tempted to locate the mistress of the house where we had been sleeping, she was nowhere to be found, as she was dancing in the kolo, whose participants could not be distinguished in the dark. We were told that it was an evil housewife (crna doma6ica) who would not be dancing in the kolo at that time.

70 The main accessible sources for this part of the ritual are M. Majzner, "Dubo6ke Rusalje, poslednii tragovi iz kulta velike majke bogova," Godiinjica Nikole Cupica, XXXIV (Belgrade, I921), 226-57; Mili6evi6, pp. 1085-86; Vasic, pp. I29, I64-67, Figs. I-5, including a small map of the area; D. Gligorid, "Rusalje, srbovlaski narodni obi6aji iz srpskog kraja u Zvizdu u Srbiji," Bosanska Vila (Sarajevo), No. 8, I893; S. Milosavljevic, "Srpski narodni obi6aji iz sreza Omoljskog," Srpski etnografski zbornik, XIX (Belgrade, I913), 315 (this article contains many other interesting customs from this area, including the recipe for moon-cake quoted above).

71 Majzner, p. 233, gives four different versions in Rumanian and Serbian. 721 Ibid., p. 234.


374 SLAVIC REVIEW

These women do engage in prophesy, but they do not enter the trance state for that purpose.73

I will now state my own suggested explanation of these proceedings without attempting to justify it by argument at present. The purpose of the calling at the grave is to attract the attention of the deceased, who is presumably resident therein. The purpose of the procession with the mirrors to the town square is to draw the soul of the deceased to a place where death can be removed from him. The purpose of the trance-woman is to remove death from the dead person;74 that is, she enters the other world as a substitute for him, so that he may be released.75 She herself is then brought back by magic means. This would explain why she would go mad or die if the magic were not employed-she would not be able to return from the other world. The purpose of the other proceedings in the town square and afterwards is to ensure fertility to the brides and wives who are the principal participants in the dancing, and possibly to ensure that the deceased stands a good chance of being reborn. Otherwise the soul of the dead person will remain unattached as it were, and become a vila, or nymph.76 Everyone agrees that there are plenty of these around at that time.77

73 Milica Ilijin said that the prophesies, when made, were singularly uninteresting, usually that such and such a dead person was all right. It was possible that the trance-woman, upon re - covery, did not prophesy at all, but she would agree that she had been with the vile (nymphs) or that a vila had been inside of her. When questioned further about the vila, she would laugh and say no more.

74 In roughly the same part of the Balkans there are a number of cases of people falling into trances in order to remove sickness from a sick person and transfer it to themselves. The sick person is then healed, automatically, and they themselves are brought out of their trances by ritual dancing not unlike that which is performed at Duboko for the dead (Persida Tomic, " 'Vilarke' i 'vilari' kod vlaskih cigana u Temni6u i Belici," Zbornik radova, Etnografski Institut SAN, IV [Belgrade, 1950], 237-62; M. Arnaudov, "Kukeri i rusalii (Studii vtirkhu builgarski- tie obredi i legendi)," Sbornik za narodni umotvoreniia i narodopis, XXXIV [Sofia, 1920], I65-69). An additional ritual exists in the Homolje district which concerns the shifting of death from an endangered person to an animal of his choice, which is then killed and buried under a rose bush, this bush being identified with the powerful female supernatural being-the vila or rusalja or whatever-who has been about to seize the person and take him away. The endangered person is then resurrected (Kemp, pp. go-92).

75J. A. MacCulloch, Medieval Faith and Fable (London, 1932), p. 170, quotes a passage from St. Augustine (De Civ. Dei, XXII, 8) in which recovery from a trance is called restora- tion from death. MacCulloch gives other early medieval sources in which visionaries in trances are said to have visited Purgatory.

76 The word rusalje (and its variants) has the confusing characteristic of meaning, in both Serbo-Croatian and Rumanian, the souls of certain dead, female supernatural beings connected with rivers, the festival of Whitsun or Pentecost (Duhovi), a kind of dance, and certain dancers who usually, but far from always, dance at Whitsun (Majzner, pp. 227, 228; Ljubica S. Janliovi6 and Danica S. Jankovic, Narodne Igre (Belgrade, I948), IV, I85; Tailliez, pp. 30I-I7).

77 Jankovic and Jankovic, IV, I84, mention that an inhabitant of the Duboko region told them one didn't dare bathe in the river for a certain period of time beginning a few days before Pentecost, because if one did, the rusalje would enter one from the river. The same man remarked that when the women fell into a trance, it was said alternately that they had been seized (i) by the rusalje (uzele su je rusalje) or (2) by the Duhovi (uzeli su je Duhovi; the word Duhovi can mean ghosts or spirits as well as Whitsun, the Holy Ghost being Sveti Duh), or (3) that they had been taken by the Holy Trinity (uzela je Sveta Trojica). We were ourselves told that the trance-woman had been entered by a vila and that she had been with the vile. A



On the basis of this explanation, one can already see certain hints of the Dioscuri in these events. The two swordsmen obviously play a very important part both in bringing the deceased person back from the other world and subsequently in bringing back the trance-woman. Thus they imitate the psychopompic character of the Dioscuri implied in the numerous ac- counts of the Dioscuri leading endangered souls to safety at sea.78 The two swordsmen can also be identified with similar figures on the medieval tombstones. The dances, and other activities in which they engage, are strikingly similar to those depicted on the tombstones, notably, when they stand with the trance-woman between them, crossing their swords over her head (Figure 2, d, e).

It has been possible to confirm and extend these ideas in rather a striking way. The ritual for the dead that I have just described is only part of a considerable body of interconnected rites which are undertaken in the Duboko region and elsewhere in the Balkans. It appears that the Duboko ritual is only the second part of a larger ritual, the first part of which has become detached and may be performed at another time of the year. In Bosnia and Hercegovina, for instance, this second part is now performed alone.79 However, the two parts are not always detached from each other; they appear as one activity in certain other rituals which may be seen to be formally variants of the ritual at Duboko but which in practice have quite a different function.

I shall now describe the first half which is common to these several, different "second halves," so to speak, and which can be considered in isolation. It is a ritual for making new fire.80 All other fires are put out. It is thought that under some circumstances the old fire in use in the village becomes defective, or diseased, or dangerous. The procedure is as follows.

Duboko wise woman or witch whom we visited the second day of Duhovi, Nejatasa Kur6ilovic, was unable to prophesy at that time, as she and others told us, because there were so many vile about just then that they would surely enter into her and cause her to fall into a trance, and she was too old for this. It was possible for her to prophesy at other times without falling into a trance.

78 See p. 368 above and note 46. It will be observed that at Duboko in earlier times the swordsmen were responsible for carrying the trance-woman across water (Majzner, pp. 229, 230). Another mythological pair of psychopompic characters whose icons show strong simi- larities to those of the Dioscuri with the woman between are Hermes and Orpheus flanking Eurydice. The group illustrated on a Thracian coin of Gordianus Pius (A.D. 238-44) shows a small figure under the feet of Eurydice, similar to that under the feet of the woman between the Dioscuri on certain gems, for example, that in Vienna (Fig. 6, a); see W. K. C. Guthrie, Orpheus and Greek Religion (London, I952), p. 2i, Fig. c. Gems with this feature are given in Tudor, "I cavalieri Danubiani," pp. 343, 344, Fig. 79; and Delatte and Derchain, pp. I94, I95.

79 E. Lilek, "Vadjenje zive vatre u Bosni i Hercegovini," Glasnik Zemaljskog Muzeja (Sara- jevo, I893), V, 35-36.

80There are many sources mentioning the new-fire ritual in the Danube region. In Rumania it is confined to the southernmost part of the country, but the practice extends through Serbia, Macedonia, and Bulgaria, one may say in the direction of Samothrace. It is preserved in some mountain parts of Bosnia and Hercegovina, but I have found no mention of it in Croatia or Montenegro. The sources most relevant to this article are S. Trojanovic, Vatra (Belgrade, I930); Lilek, V, 35, 36; V. Titelbach, "Roznecov6ni ziveho ohne u Jihoslavanu," Cesky Lfd (Prague, I896), V, No. 4, 34I-46; Kemp, pp. I45 ff.


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A forked branch is selected from a fir, lime, or willow tree. The two prongs of this fork must be equal in dimension and growth. As the local inhabitants put it, they must be twins. The two prongs are then cut off separately, dried, and made into two posts which are implanted into the ground, and circular notches are cut in them near the top (Figure 13, a, b). A piece of wood, which may be of the same kind but is usually a softer wood, is inserted into these notches, to permit rotation, the two notches serving as bearings. Sometimes a fourth piece of wood is attached about halfway down the two vertical posts, in order to make the whole firm and steady, or a piece of rope may be used. A piece of cord is then passed around the top horizontal stick and held by two men, one at each end of the string. These men move the string back and forth with a sawing motion, rotating the horizontal piece of wood rapidly in the sockets in which it is imbedded. The friction engenders heat in the sockets, causing two snakelike plumes of smoke to arise and, ultimately, sparks of fire to burst forth from the tops of the verticals. Some of these sparks are caught in a piece of tinder by a third person and carried away. This operation is done in secrecy. It may not be watched by anyone other than the participants, although everyone knows it is going on.81

An important feature of the phenomenon is that the two men who are the principals in the fire-making procedure must be twins. If twins are not available, the men must be as near twinhood as possible or must be made into twins by a special ceremony. The fire-making apparatus bears the most striking resemblance to the Dioscuri's dokana (Figure 8, a, b). Indeed, it is difficult to see what the dokana could be but this kind of fire-making apparatus,82 and the sparks which fly in such a striking way from the tops of the posts may well explain the stars which the Dioscuri so often wear just above their heads (Figure 7, b).

I will now describe the nature and purpose of some of the other proceedings which follow upon the fire-making ritual. In general, these rituals are intended for purification or healing, either of an individual or of a community, often including its livestock.83 The procedure is as follows. A

81 Kemp, p. I49. That the ritual should be general knowledge was the case with certain antique mystery cults, although not with that at Samothrace in the classical period. See Lewis, cat. no. I4I, p. 64, Diodorus 5, 77, 3: "The initiatory rite which is celebrated by the Athenians at Eleusis . .. and that of Samothrace, and the one practiced in Thrace among the Cicones, whence Orpheus came who introduced them-these are all handed down in the form of a mystery, whereas at Cnosus in Crete it has been the custom from ancient times that these initiatory rites should be handed down to all openly, and what among other people was not to be divulged, this the Cretans conceal from no one who may wish to inform himself upon such matters."

81 Kemp mentioned a fire-making machine in a village near Plav, Bulgaria, that had been set apart as a monument, similar to that described by Plutarch at Sparta: "A large apparatus of the kind described above was made entirely of a tree struck by lightning and was set up in the middle of the village street. It required considerable effort to produce fire and was not often done. It was also apparently a rite adapted to the usages on which I could not obtain definite information" (p. I46).

83 When applied to livestock, the procedure is called volovska bogomolja and as such may be found in the ethnographic literature; see B. Drobnjakovic, Etnologija naroda Jugoslavije (Bel- grade, 1960), I, 219-23.



tunnel is dug, usually by a river bank and under the roots of an oak tree (Figure 14, b, i5). The new fire is divided and placed at either side of the entrance to this tunnel. The brothers who made the fire stand at each side of the exit. The people, or subjects to be purified, are passed through the water, between the fires, and through the tunnel; and as they leave the tunnel on their hands and knees (Figure 14, b), frequently unclothed, they are tapped on the back by the twin brothers with sticks charred in the new fire (Figure 15). The top of these sticks is sometimes split, and a living snake inserted in the division.84 Sometimes, in place of tapping, an "H" figure, resembling the dokana itself, is drawn upon their backs (Figure 14, b). Also posted at the exit are two or three old women with two jars, one containing milk and the other honey or melted fat. The people under- going purification, after they have been marked on their backs, crawl to the two jars, are given a sip of milk from the first, and are made to gaze into the honey or melted fat. After they have looked into the fat, they must recite certain spells85 and then partake of a feast cooked by the old women over the new fire. The process is now complete. The householders are al- lowed to take coals from the new fire to introduce into their homes, so that the whole district may be furnished with new fire to replace that which has been eliminated.86

The whole procedure is subject to certain variations and may in some circumstances become simplified. There are, so to speak, degenerate versions of this ritual which may be used for various purposes. For example, a wooden hoop may be added to or even substituted for the tunnel under the roots of the oak tree,87 the fires may be differently placed,88 and the people to be purified are not always obliged to remove their clothes. From our point of view, the most important variant is the process for curing epilepsy (Figure 14, a).89 The fire on the hearth of the epileptic's house is divided and placed on each side of the hearth. It is not stated that the fire must be new fire, although one would expect it to be. A small table or platform is placed over the hearth. The local wise woman-that is, one like the trance-women at the Duboko ritual-who plays an important part in the life of the community,90 then stands on this platform. The

84 Kemp, p. i5o. 8"Ibid., p. 15I. The charm to be said on coming through the tunnel is usually: "I have

crossed water and not been drowned. I have gone through the fire and not been burnt. I have gazed into the fat and not been drowned." That which is gazed into is replaced by a mirror in a variant ritual. See note 92 below.

86 Cicero, De natura deorum, 1, 42, says that the festival connected with the Cabiri at Lemnos, which related to the rites at Samothrace, took place at night and lasted for nine days, during which all fires of the island, which were thought to be impure, were extinquished. Sacrifices were offered to the dead, and a sacred vessel was sent out to fetch new fire from Delos. During these sacrifices the Cabiri were thought to be absent with the sacred vessel, after the return of which the new fire was distributed and a new life began.

87Kemp, p. I55 88 Ibid., p. I50. 89 Ibid., p. I!24. The "falling sickness" (pripad6iva bolest, or padavica) bears a name strikingly

like that of the trance-woman, the padalica. 90 Ibid., p. I 53. It is often thought that those who have been unconscious a long time may


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epileptic is drawn under the table and out the other side.91 Afterwards, he is made to look into a mirror, or at an egg, and sometimes at a lump of sugar, a substitute, possibly, for honey.92 This completes the cure.

I have described these rituals in some detail because they serve to il- luminate the seemingly diverse aggregation of icons briefly described at the beginning of this article, of which the only common feature seems to be that personages resembling the Dioscuri appear upon them and some of which have a related provenance. Let us consider first the object upon which the identification of the Dioscuri is certain, namely, the Argenidas relief from Verona (Figure 8, a). Not only does something resembling a fire-making machine appear here in duplicate, but also there are two jars, one of which perhaps contains milk, and the other, honey. There are other features of this relief which may be explained, but since they may possibly be considered too remote, I will not elaborate them at this point.93

Next let us consider some of the Danube cult tablets (Figure 4). Here the twins, on horseback, are standing over prone figures. Between them stands a woman, and underneath a feast is taking place. When snakes are represented, they spring, along with twin stars, from the tops of side columns or, as in the case of a stone tablet from Ptuj or Poetovio,94 from the heads of the horsemen. There is another example in which two uplifted arms of the horsemen turn into twisting, smokelike snakes.95 It will be remembered that these tablets are found in association with small mirrors.

Finally, I select certain of the magic gems. On the gem formerly in the Odeschalchi collection two horsemen with stars above them are to be seen

receive the power of healing others. A local Yugoslav ethnographer reported that a sick person "falls as it were into an ecstasy and becomes inspired (vetrovit) . . . and a healthy person can- not be a doctor (vrazalc)" (ibid., p. 209).

91 Ibid., p. I53. It is interesting that the Samothracian twin gods were thought by the Romans to be the same as the Lars (Lewis, cat. no. 173, Arnobius, Adversus nationes, 3, 43) or, more frequently, to have been identical with the Penates, "which were carried off by Aeneas from Samothrace and brought to Italy, wherefore the Samothracians are said to be kinsmen of the Romans" (Lewis, cat. no. I79, Servius, In Aeneidem, 3, I2; and also cat. nos. I80-89). Dionysius of Halicarnassus (Lewis, cat. no. i86, Antiquitates Romanae, I, 68, 2-4, and 69, 4) reports that the holy objects brought into Italy by Aeneas were images of the Great Gods of Samothrace and that these objects were kept by the holy virgins in the temple of Vesta. Plu- tarch (Lewis, cat. no. I88, Camillus, 2o, 6-7) says that these objects were two smal jars stored away, visible to the vestal virgins only. In any case, it is clear from the sources that the Dioscuri or Samothracian twins, who could be represented by twin sparks or fires, had some objects sacred to them deposited at the temple of Vesta, which was sacred to the hearth. Further, passing under the litter of a vestal virgin while it was being carried along the street was pun- ishable by death (Plutarch, Numa, IO, 4). Might this have been sacrilegious duplication of some sacred rite, similar, perhaps, to that mentioned above?

92 Kemp, p. I 25- 93 There is, for instance, the parallel of the sea voyage taken by Argenidas, presumably

from the side of the water where are the fire-making machines to the other side where are the two jars, relating to the route taken by a fire-ritual initiate, between the fires, across the water, and finishing with the two jars.

94 Tudor, "I cavalieri Danubiani," p. 325, Fig. 56. The same feature appears again on a stone tablet from Almus, Bulgaria (ibid., p. 3I3, Fig. 36).

95 D. Tudor, "Der Kult der donaulandischen Reiter," Das Altertum (Berlin, I962), VIII, 240.



with a woman between (Figure 6, c). The horsemen are touching two prone, unclothed figures with their long sticks. On the tops of the sticks are snakes. Behind the two mounted figures are two figures on foot. An- other gem shows a somewhat similar arrangement on one face, except that the two mounted figures do not carry sticks (Figure 6, d). The snakes are at the sides of the scene. The sticks in this case are in fact carried by the figures on foot. The reverse of this gem is also interesting. It consists of two snake-entwined, upright sticks, with stars and a pair of urns between them (Figure 6, e). Flanking the scene are two bows. These are not weapons. The bow is in fact utilized in a variant form of the fire-making ritual (Fig- ure 16, a).96 The fire-making axle can be rotated by one person alone (Figure i6, a). There is also a medieval tombstone representing this bow (Figure 16, b).

This concludes my evidence, and it now remains to draw some conclusions from it. First, it seems to be established that both the Danube cult tablets and the pictures on the medieval tombstones are memorials of a group of rituals which are still carried on at Duboko and at whose core is the fire-making ritual. In the case of the Danube tablets the ritual is one to avert danger from a living person or to secure him the help of powerful beings, namely, the Dioscuri. In the case of the medieval tombstones, it is the ritual for the dead that is depicted. Likewise the magic gems we have described, and some other monuments, can be interpreted in the same way as representing various segments of this complex ritual. Next, it seems pretty evident to me that the two horsemen, and sometimes the two men on foot depicted on these various objects, and actually represented by the sword-bearing "kings" in the Duboko ritual, are the very same as the Dioscuri, or Cabiri, or Curetes, those paired gods of whom Nonnus said (Dionysiaca, 29, 193-96): "Two fire-strong citizens of Samothrace also ran wild, sons of Lemnian Cabiro. Their eyes flashed out their own natural sparks, which came from the red smoky flame of their father Hephaestus." 97

It is permissible to speculate that the mysteries of Samothrace were similar, and perhaps even were the original complex of rituals of which the Duboko ritual is a remote, but still reliable, descendant. As to the Dioscuri themselves, from the iconographic evidence alone, I do not see what else they could have been originally but the two uprights of the dokana, and there is not much if anything the dokana could have been except a fire- making machine. No wonder the sparks sprang from their eyes.

In conclusion, I will mention two points which seem to require explanation. One is the fact that the Dioscuri are always, or nearly always, on horseback. In classical times no one would have expected to meet the Dioscuri on foot. But no one can work a fire-making machine on horseback. In explanation I point to the tradition, mentioned by Pausanias, that the

96 See also Kemp, facing p. 130. 9 Lewis, cat. no. I67, p. 77.


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original Dioscuri were on foot and their sons on horseback.98 The fire- making ritual prevails today, and most probably did so in the past, among stockbreeding, and even horse-breeding, groups. The arrangement of two men on foot with sticks and the Dioscuri on horseback which is found on gems (Figure 6, d) is shown also on the tombstone at Mijatovci (Figure 1) and on some Russian icons of the same date (Figure 17).99 The twin saints Florus and Laurus, who had taken over from the Dioscuri the function of protecting horses, stand flanking an archangel, who in turn surmounts a tunnel, or cave. They are on foot. Passing beneath them and between them, and in one case over a little stream, are horses being driven along by special saints-a kind of cowboy saint. These are the three holy horse- drivers, Speushippos, Melashippos, and Elashippos, whose cult extended from Georgia and Cappodocia across Russia to Spain and France.100 It may be suggested that their emergence would be a necessity of the ritual above described. If the twin fire-makers were occupied in flanking the livestock and tapping them as they passed, someone else would be required to drive them along. The sons of the Dioscuri, in fact, on horseback. They are to be seen on the medieval tombstones of Bosnia and Hercegovina, driving along horses in the direction of the woman between horsemen.101 It would seem, therefore, that the horses were an addition and that the original fire-makers were naturally on foot.

The other problem is how two wooden posts can develop into two hu- man beings, or anthropomorphic gods. To judge from a motif on the bottom section of one of the Danube cult tablets,102 where the fire-making instrument appears in the form familiar from the astronomical sign of the Dioscuri, with the upper ends curving slightly outwards (Figure 5), the original fire-making machine required the support of two men who held the uprights in position. When, with the improvement of technique, namely, with the addition of a second crosspiece which could tighten or

98 Pausanias, I, XIII. 99 They are of the Moscow and Novgorod schools, dating from the fifteenth and sixteenth

centuries. See K. Onasch, Ikonen (Berlin, I96I), pp. 394-95; and N. P. Kondakov, Die Rus- sische ikone (Prague, I929), Vol. II, P1. 88. Russian peasants have a ritual like the volouska bogomolja (see note 83 above and Fig. I5) but involving horses, new fire, and SS. Florus and Laurus (J. Rendel Harris, Dioscuri in the Christian Legends, p. 63).

100 Onasch, p. 394. 101 The most notable example is the tombstone from Zborna gomila mentioned in note 7

above. It has been at present removed to Sarajevo, but the scene was originally on the north side, the horses pointing toward the west end, on which the woman between horsemen was depicted, and away from the east end, which represented paired horsemen with figures beneath their horses' hoofs. Paired stars are on both ends. There is here only one horse, and it is being led by horsemen. See Wenzel, Ukrasni motivi, p. 279, P1. LXXII, Fig. Ii. The same scene appears again in the same graveyard, on another stone also showing the woman between horsemen, but by a different hand (ibid., p. 383, P1. CIII, Fig. 7). The end with the woman and horseman is given on p. 389, P1. CVI, Fig. 9.

102 This stone tablet in the Narodni Muzej, Belgrade, photo No. B I 240, closely resembles a similar tablet represented among the Dal Pozzo-Albani drawings of classical antiquities in the Royal Library at Windsor Castle; see Tudor, "I cavalieri Danubiani," pp. 342, 343, Fig. 76. It may be assumed that there is a single individual working the machine with the aid of the bow mentioned before.



loosen the tension to taste, these two men became redundant, it would be natural enough to associate them with the improved uprights.103 The men would have continued to hold the uprights, as sticks or spears, and it is probable that purified initiates were originally tapped with the actual uprights themselves.

Concerning the crosspiece, it may be suggested that this, too, has been anthropomorphized, into a woman. I shall not now attempt to argue this point, but show two monuments from widely separated areas and widely separated dates. The first is a coin of Artemis of Ephesus, shown between the Dioscuri (Figure 18, b). The second, an English-French manuscript of the late thirteenth or early fourteenth century, exhibits a woman being touched with sticks or spears (Figure 18, c),104 as is the trance-woman at Duboko, and the woman on the medieval tombstones. The only difference is that she is holding two upright posts. An intermediate example is, of course, the Roman goddess Sylvana of the Danube area, shown in the small lead casts found in conjunction with the mirrors and the Danube tablets. She stands upright, and in her outstretched arms holds two vertical branches, with bases implanted in the ground (Figure i8, a).

We forget the immense importance that fire-making had in the primitive world. This has been destroyed, not only among civilized people but throughout the whole world, by the introduction of the safety match, and it is only among the really eccentric inhabitants of Duboko that the tradition of fire-making survives. It is a genuine survival, not a so- phisticated revival, and it, too, is on the way out.

103 The reason for the confusion in classical sources and representations as to whether the dokana had one or two crosspieces has not previously been explained.

104 The detail shown in Fig. i8, c, may, of course, be an adaption from a classical model, because it is almost unique in Western iconography.


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Issue Table of ContentsSlavic Review, Vol. 26, No. 3 (Sep., 1967), pp. i-vi+363-540Front Matter [pp. i-iv]From the Editors [pp. v-vi]The Dioscuri in the Balkans [pp. 363-381]Marxist Legal Thought in Poland [pp. 382-394]Filling the Gap between Radishchev and the Decembrists [pp. 395-413]The Emigration and Apostasy of Lev Tikhomirov [pp. 414-429]The Polish Communist Party 1938-1942 [pp. 430-444]Constantine Pavlovich: An Appraisal [pp. 445-452]Argonauts of Peace: The Soviet Delegation to Western Europe in the Summer of 1917 [pp. 453-467]Notes and CommentsBishop Strossmayer and Mme. Olga Novikov: Two Unpublished Letters, 1879 [pp. 468-473]The Leningrad Collection of Zemstvo Publications [pp. 474-478]

ReviewsReview: untitled [pp. 479-480]Review: untitled [pp. 480-481]Review: untitled [pp. 481]Review: untitled [pp. 482-484]Review: untitled [pp. 484-485]Review: untitled [pp. 485-486]Review: untitled [pp. 486-487]Review: untitled [pp. 487-488]Review: untitled [pp. 488-489]Review: untitled [pp. 489-491]Review: untitled [pp. 491]Review: untitled [pp. 491-492]Review: untitled [pp. 492-493]Review: untitled [pp. 493-495]Review: untitled [pp. 495-496]Review: untitled [pp. 496-497]Review: untitled [pp. 497-498]Review: untitled [pp. 499]Review: untitled [pp. 499-500]Review: untitled [pp. 500-501]Review: untitled [pp. 501]Review: untitled [pp. 502-503]Review: untitled [pp. 503-505]Review: untitled [pp. 505-507]Review: untitled [pp. 507-509]Review: untitled [pp. 509-510]Review: untitled [pp. 510-511]Review: untitled [pp. 511-513]Review: untitled [pp. 513-514]Review: untitled [pp. 514-515]Review: untitled [pp. 516-517]Review: untitled [pp. 518]Review: untitled [pp. 519-520]Review: untitled [pp. 520-522]Review: untitled [pp. 522-523]Review: untitled [pp. 523-524]

Letters [pp. 525-527]News of the Profession [pp. 528-533]Books Received [pp. 534-539]Back Matter [pp. 540-540]

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