"[11]
The foregoing evidence offers, I think, sufficient proof of the, now
generally admitted, relationship between Classical, Medieval, and
Modern forms of Nature ritual.
But what of the relation to early Aryan practice? Can that, also, be
proved?
In this connection I would draw attention to Chapter 17 of Mysterium
und Mimus, entitled, Ein Volkstumlicher Umzug beim Soma-Fest.
Here Professor von Schroeder discusses the real meaning and
significance of a very curious little poem (Rig-Veda, 9. 112); the
title by which it is generally known, Alles lauft nach Geld, does
not, at first sight, fit the content of the verse, and the suggestion
of scholars who have seen in it a humorous enumeration of different
trades and handicrafts does not explain the fact that the Frog and the
Horse appear in it.
To Professor von Schroeder belongs the credit of having discovered
that the personnel of the poem corresponds with extraordinary
exactitude to the Figures of the Spring and Summer
'Fertility-exciting' processions, described with such fulness of
detail by Mannhardt. Especially is this the case with the Whitsuntide
procession at Vardegotzen, in Hanover, where we find the group of
phallic and fertility demons, who, on Prof. von Schroeder's hypothesis,
figure in the song, in concrete, and actual form.
Pages:
72
73
74
75
76
77
78
79
80
81
82
83
84
85
86
87
88
89
90
91
92
93
94
95
96