IX

ON THE MAGICAL SIGNIFICANCE OF THE TAIL

From time to time, often at long intervals, I used to come across representations in literature or the visual arts in which the tail of an animal, almost always a bull or a horse, played a significant part. At first I could not explain them, but little by little vague impressions began to cohere and the various details formed them­ selves into what I thought was a satisfactory synthesis. I concern myself, at least in this article, exclusively with the Indo-European cultural sphere. Things outside it will be treated only incidentally. So far as I know the topic has not received more than an occasional mention, although Eitrem did observe quite rightly, in his Beitriige zur Griechischen Religionsgeschichte: 1 'The important role of the tail in religion and superstition can be established in many ways among the Greeks and Romans as well.' He then refers to the Roman 'October Horse', which first started me thinking about the question. Perhaps it would be best first of all to examine the three cases which specially aroused my curiosity and base my further examination on that. Let us begin then with the October Horse. It is well-known that among the time-honoured rites which the Romans kept up through the centuries was a ceremony on the rsth October in honour of the god Mars. On the Campus Martius chariot races were held. When they were over the strongest horse of the victorious team, which was always the right-hand one, was sacrificed to Mars, after its head and tail had first been cut off. Then there was a fight for the head between the residents of two quarters of the city, the Via Sacra and the Subura. The victorious party was allowed to fasten the head to a wall in its own quarter. But the bleeding tail had to be taken by a fast runner at full speed to the Regia and the blood made to drip still warm on the sacred Hearth of State. According to Verrius Flaccus (in Paul. ex Festo 246 L.) this was done ob frugum eventum. But whether this means 'in thanks for

1 Skrijter Videnskapsselskapet i Kristiania. II Hist.-jilos. Kl. (1919) zB. !48 ON THE MAGICAL SIGNIFICANCE OF THE TAIL the completed harvest' or 'for the sake of the next harvest' scholars are not agreed. For my purposes only one thing is important, that an old source connects the blood from the tail with the promotion of fertility. Wissowa (R.u.K. 2 145), it is true, writes to contest Verrius' explanation: 'This explanation is ruled out by the associa­ tion of the rite with the Equirria in the middle of the War Festival of Mars, especially as there is a much plainer one. The champion steed ... is sacred to the war god (Plut. Qu. Rom. 97) and therefore sacrificed ... to him.'. However, Verrius had seen this too: in Paulus the immediately following words are, et equus potius quam bos immolabatur, quod hie bello, bos frugibus pariendis est aptus. But this in no way explains the ceremony with the horse's tail. We must add, moreover, that there exist strong indications that the original function of Mars was that of a fertility god and at the same time of an underworld god. 2 We shall return to the October Horse, but now direct our attention to the second occasion for my researches, a well-known feature of the illustrations of the Mithras-cult. Numerous reliefs show the Persian god killing the cosmic bull at the command of Ahriman. With his left hand he grips his nostrils and with his right plunges the dagger in his neck. To left and right usually stand Cautes and Cautopates, the one with raised, the other with lowered torch, to personify the morning and evening stars. The death of the bull will bring fertility on earth and summon men, beasts, and plants to existence. Several reliefs symbolize this in such a way that ears of corn are seen growing from the tip ot the animal's tail (Plate II). Why the tail? Would it not be more natural it they came out of the head, or, even more intelligibly, out of the wound? This last does in fact occur exceptionally, once and no more among hundreds of illustrations, on a relief in the British Museum (Plate III). In another way too this relief makes an exception, since it puts

2 Cf. Wagenvoort, Studies in Roman Literature, Culture, and Religion (1956), 193ff. What another passage in Paulus (so L) actually refers to is unfortunately not clear. But the words 'Caviares hostiae dicebantur, quod caviae pars hostiae cauda tenus dicitur, et ponebatur in sacrificio pro collegio pontificum quinto quoque anno' seem to show that the tail was cut from other sacrificial animals as well. We do not know for what purpose. The passage cannot refer to the October Horse, since that was an annual festival. Cf. Walde-Hofmann s.v.