ABSTRACT
OF the Titans described in the last chapter, by far the most important are KRONOS and his consort Rhea or Rheia. The former of these venerable figures is in all probability a pre-Greek god, for attempts to give his name a Greek etymology have so far failed.1 He was but little worshipped in classical times; the one festival of any importance connected with him, the Kronia, is known to have existed in three places only, Athens, Rhodes and Thebes. It was a harvestfestival, and we know that at it all social distinctions were for the time being abolished, and master and man feasted together,—a rite not uncommon in festivals of this sort. We have some reason to suppose that human sacrifice was occasionally offered to him, which in Greece at any rate marks an early rite. The rare representations of him in art show him as a majestic but sorrowful old man, holding a curved object traditionally interpreted as the knife wherewith he wounded Uranos, but which is quite as likely, considering the time of his festival, to be a reaping-hook. The Greeks frequently identified him with unlovely foreign deities such as Moloch. To the Roman theorists, he was identical with Saturn (Saturnus or Saeturnus), a deity whose name and functions are alike obscure, and quite possibly foreign, although early.
