I ;
Li
^t Ì-1
* ì\
poisoneth the body.” Coriander is held to be under the planetary
influence of Saturn.
CO RN .—The generic name of Corn, which is applied to all
kinds of grain, is one of several words, which being common to the
widely-separated branches of the Indo-European race, prove the
pradtice of tillage among our ancestors before they left their first
home in Central Asia. The Greeks worshipped Demeter, and
the Romans Ceres, as the goddess of Corn, and she is supposed to
have been the same deity as Rhea and Tellus, and the Cybele,
Bona Dea, Berecynthia of the Phrygians, the Isis of the Egyptians,
Atergates of the Syrians, and the Hera of the Arcadians. Ceres
was generally represented as a beautiful woman, with a garland of
ears of Corn on her head, a wheatsheaf by her side, and the cornucopia,
or horn of plenty, in her hand. To commemorate the abduction
of her daughter Proserpine by Pluto, a festival was held
about the beginning of harvest, and another festival, lasting six
days, was held in remembrance of the goddess’s search for her
daughter, at the time that Corn is sown in the earth. During the
quest for Proserpine, the earth was left untilled and became barren ;
but upon the return of Ceres, she instructed Triptolemus of Eleusis
in all the arts appertaining to agriculture and the cultivation of
Corn, and gave him her chariot, drawn by two dragons, wherein
he might travel over the whole earth and distribute Com to all its
inhabitants. On his return to Eleusis, Triptolemus restored the
chariot to Ceres, and established the famed Eleusinian festivals and
mysteries in her honour. This festival, observed every fourth year,
and dedicated to Demeter (Ceres) and Proserpine, was the most
solemn of all the sacred feasts of Greece, and was so religiously
observed, that anyone revealing its secret mysteries, or improperly
taking part in the ceremonials, was put to an ignominious death.
During the festival, the votaries walked in a solemn procession, in
which the holy basket of Ceres was carried about in a consecrated
cart, the people on all sides shouting Hail, Demeter ! In their sacrifices,
the ancients usually offered Ceres a pregnant sow, as that
animal often destroys the Corn and other crops. While the Corn
was yet in grass they offered her a ram, after the victim had been
thrice led round the fields. Among the Romans, twelve priests
named Arvales, supposed to have been descended from the nurse of
Romulus, celebrated in April and Ju ly the festivals called Ambar-
valia. These priests, who wore crowns composed of ears of Corn,
conduéled processions round the ploughed fields in honour of Ceres,
and offered as sacrifices at her shrine a sow, a sheep, and a bull. The
rites of the Arvales were founded specially on the worship of Cora.
It is believed that among the Greeks, the story of Proserpine
brought back from the infernal regions by her mother Ceres, and
finally adjudged to pass six months on earth, and six months in
Hades, symbolises Corn as the seed of Wheat, and its condition
during Winter and Summer. De Gubernatis considers that the
story of Proserpine has its Indian equivalent in the myth of the
birth of Sîtâ, daughter of King Janaka, the Fecundator. Sîtâ
was not born of a woman, but issued either from a furrow in the
earth, or from the middle of an altar. The Vishnupurâna mentions
several species of grain which have been specially created by thè
gods ; amongst them being Rice, Barley, Millet, and SesamumJ
In the sacrifices of the Hindoos, they offer several sorts of Corn
to ensure abundant harvests. Indra is the great husbandman of
the heavens, which he renders fertile : he is also the divinity of the
fields, and, like the Scandinavian god Thor, the presiding deity o f
Corn. It is he who fertilises the earth in his capacity of god of
tempests and rain. The employment of Corn in sacrificial ritesj
was common in India of the Vedic period, in Greece, and in Rome;
and in the same countries we find Corn used during nuptial cero*»
monies. Thus in Vedic India, it was customary to scatter two
handfuls of Corn over the clasped hands of the bride and bridegroom,
and a similar proceeding still takes place amongst the
Parsees. An analogous custom existed amongst the Romans, At
an Indian wedding, after the first night, the mother of the husband^,
with all the female relatives, come to the young bride, and place on
her head a measure of Corn—emblem of fertility. The husband
then comes forward and takes from his bride’s head some handfuls
of the grain, which he scatters over himself. Similar usages exist
at the present day in many parts of Italy, relics of the old Roman
custom of offering Corn to the bride. In Gwalior, at one part o f
the marriage ceremony, the priests shout vociferously, only stopping
now and then to cast over the bride and bridegroom showers o f
Corn, Millet, and Rice. In some parts of Central India, at the end
of the rainy season, the people congregate on the banks of the-
lakes, and launch on the water, as an offering, pots of earth, containing
sprouting Wheat, On the banks of the Indus, there i»
believed to grow some miraculous Corn on the spot where formerly
were burnt the remains of the Buddhist King 5 ivika, who sacrificed'
his life for a pigeon. The Chinese Buddhists made pilgrimages^
during the middle ages, to the place where 5 ivika had lived and
died ; and here it was that the miraculous Wheat grew, which the
sun had no power to scorch. A single grain of this Wheat kept
its happy possessor from all ills proceeding from cold as well
as from fever. The Chinese, regarding Corn as a gift from’
heaven, celebrate with sacrifices, prayers, and religious rites, both
seedtime and harvest. They also think that in the heavens there-
is a special constellation for Corn, composed of eight black stars*,
each of which has under its special protedlion one of the eight
varieties of Corn, viz.. Rice, Millet, Barley, Wheat, Beans, Peas;
Maize, and Hemp. When this cereal constellation is clear, it is a
sign that the eight kinds of Corn will ripen; but when, on the contrary,
it is dim and obscured, a bad harvest is looked for. The-
Emperor Ven-ti, who reigned 179 years befpre Christ,, is said ta