Zalmoxis, Apollo Soranus & le Mannerbünde

On the occasion of the publication of the first paperback for newborn girls Axis Mundi Editions, we publish a preview of the first chapter of The Angel of the Abyss. Apollo, Avalon, the Polar Myth and the Apocalypse dedicated to Geto-Thracian shamanism (in the mythical figure of the demigod Zalmoxis) and its relationship with the sacred practices of the Apollonian iatromancers.

di Marco Maculotti

Extract from chap. I §8 de the angel of the abyss.
apollo, avalon, the polar myth and the apocalypse,
axis mundi editions 2022

In fact, an expert in apparent death, he was also a semi-mythical character who is sometimes remembered in the bed of iatromancers even though he is not Greek: this is Zalmoxis [1], defined by Mircea eliade "a daimon or theos which 'reveals' an eschatological doctrine and 'founds' an initiatory cult on which the ontological state of theotherworldly existence» [2]. Revered by Getae, semi-nomadic tribe of the Thrace whose territory was a bridge between the Hellenic ecumene and the Eurasian steppes, some Greek authors considered him a disciple or even a slave of Pythagoras, narrating that the latter would have initiated him to the "sciences of the skies" in Samos. It goes without saying that legends of this kind are the result of late ancient processes of evemerization and trivialization of much more complex historical and meta-historical processes; nevertheless, for those who know how to read "between the lines", they are able to provide more than implicit information, for example, in this specific case, a tangible connection through the Pythagorean School with the Apollonian sacral bed. The ecstatic brotherhoods dacio-gete, on the other hand, they have often been compared to the iatromantic and Orphic ones, as well as to the druidic ones [3].

Of Zalmoxis, the Getae hand down that he passed on to his disciples the doctrine of the immortality of the soul, teaching them that after death they would pass into a place where they would enjoy all imaginable blessings for eternity. Then he retired to a natural quarry (andreon) on the sacred mountain of Kogainon [4] in Bucegi mountains in Dacia (in today's Romania) and descended into the underworld, where he remained for three years (some stories have it that during this period he was in Hades) [5]. His followers - to whom he appeared in vision in the form of a "disembodied soul" - mourned his untimely departure, but in the fourth year he returned to the surface, thus confirming his teaching. [6]. Then he disappeared again to appear here and there from time to time, among his people: and not with the physical body that he had in life, but in the form of daimon ("Immortal spirit"). As Eliade comments,

«The 'disappearance' (occultation) and the 'reappearance' (epiphany) of a divine or semi-divine being (messianic king, prophet, magician, legislator) is part of a mythical-ritual scenario very widespread in the Mediterranean and Asian world. "

[7]
The cave of Zalmoxis [via RomaniaJournal]

Herodotus relates the religious doctrines of the Getae: they believed in the immortality of the soul and, once initiated into the related Mysteries, they considered the death simply a journey to rejoin their god Zalmoxis in dimension other which he had first discovered (similarly to the Indo-Iranian Yama / Yima, who is both the "Primordial Man" and the Judge of the Dead). Hellenic also speaks of two Thracian tribes bordering the Getae, in particular the Terizi and the Crobizi, who also believed to have reached, after their physical departure, the demigod Zalmoxis; however, in the opinion of the latter, "the stay with the god was not definitive and they consoled themselves by thinking that the dead would return" [8]

The Armenian tradition knows one cave where it was said that meher (that is Mihr /Mithras) went away to get out of it only once a year [9]; Iranian theme that also affects the Christian legends of the Nativity in the Bethlehem grotto. Onetymology of the name Zalmoxis, which the Greek manuscripts also report in alternative forms such as Salmoxis, Zamolxis, Samolxis, the ancients advanced several theories. The preponderant one approaches his name to that of telluric deities like Zemelo e Žemelė, Phrygia the first Baltic the second, as well as with the Lithuanian god Zjameluks. If this etymology were correct, the correlation with would also be undeniable Semele, mother of the Thracian Dionysus (we recall that the Getae were Thracians). All these terms derive from the Indo-European root * G'HEMEL ("Earth, soil, belonging to the earth"), which brings us back to the symbolic chthonic-telluric context: and in fact, apparently Zalmoxis was also called Gebelezis [10].

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As for his best known name, however, it seems that the question does not change: being xais a Scythian term for "lord, king, chief", we can translate Zalmoxis as "Lord of the Earth" or "King of the Soil" [11] (or probably, better, del underground, understood in the esoteric sense of dimension under or rather behind the ordinary one). Geticus proposed the translation of "King of the World" [12], citing Guénon and Ossendowski, and Porphyry also recorded the existence of a Thracian term, zalmon, which would have the meaning of "hidden": if founded, it would make Zalmoxis the "hidden god", or the "Occult god". From this, some would see in Zalmoxis also the "Lord of the Dead", but in the opinion of others, including the famous researcher of Thracian history II Russu, "the semantic value of the theme zamol - it is "the earth", "the power of the earth" and Zalmoxis can mean nothing other than the "god of the earth", personification of every form of life and of the womb in which all men return " [13]. Nonetheless, it remains to underline the use of the term "hidden" in the Hungarian tradition with reference to the state of shamans during the cataleptic trance. [14].

However, Diogenes Laertius testified that in Thracian Zalmoxide means "Bear skin", which actually could make sense if read from an initiatory perspective of männerbünde [15] of the type of Luperci Romans or gods Berserker and to the Ulfhedinn - or respectively "those who have bearskin" and "those who have wolfskin" [16] - and at the same time in connection with theincubation practiced by Apollonian iatromancers, as well as from Zalmoxis.

This connection is not to be underestimated when compared with the ritual practices of the "Apollonian shamanism", as it is assumed that the institution of the Luperci and the celebration of the Lupercals [17] were originally the responsibility of the priests of Sur / Soranus, known as the "Black Apollo""God Wolf" pre-Roman, Italic and Etruscan, which finds inApollo Lyceus of Licî [18] a perfect match), venerated with ancestral rites on the summit of Mount Soratte. His priests became famous in ancient Rome under the name of Hirpi Sorani ("Wolves of Soranus"; from the Oscan-Samnite-Sabine language hirpus = "Wolf"), among other things because the rituals referred to them were deeply imbued with shamanic suggestions: during the ceremonies, they walked on hot coals, holding the entrails of sacrificed goats in their hands. According to an ancient tradition, "an oracle advised their ancestors to lead a life devoted to robberies and raids to escape a plague" and to make an annual sacrifice in honor of Apollo at Mount Soratte. [19]. With this premise, perhaps, one can venture the hypothesis that Zalmoxis was not so much a deity, but rather a sacral function, founded precisely on the initiatory experience ofincubation and visionary lethargy, within the Apollonian cultic and ritual bed.

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The mystery rituals related to the spirit of a named iatromancer Amphiaraus, who was said to have been "sucked" from the earth in Thebes and made immortal in the guise of daimon underground [20] - which, come to think of it, is pretty much the exact same story being told about Zalmoxis [21] - can give us reasons why we might lean towards the interpretation of Diogenes Laertius. In the hypogeum where Anfiarao acted as an oracle, in fact, theincubation it took place inside freshly skinned ram skins, an initiatory practice that is also found in various oracle centers of Puglia as well as, in the Archaic age, in the rituals of Vedic India. The skin of sacrificed animals was widely used in these wisdom centers, from forecasting the future to meteorological magic to purifying rites; similar practices are still in place today in the Mongolian-Siberian and Caucasian steppes.

This tradition is also reported with regard to the hero Podalirius, who was said to be the son of Asclepius, and therefore Apollonian. He too had become, after physical death, a daimon underground, and the pilgrims who reached his tomb "sacrificed a ram and after having skinned it, wrapped themselves in its skin, lying down to sleep right on the tomb", since, to borrow the words of Licofron, "to all those who will fall asleep on the his tomb in sheepskin he will reveal truthful oracles in a dream and [...] will be invoked as a healer of diseases " [22].

In addition, returning to Zalmoxis and the hypothesis of Diogenes, it must be added that the bear è the shamanic animal par excellence in Asia as in America (where he holds the role of mythical ancestor and initiator [23]) and is always symbolically present in the rituals of incubation of this kind, as the neophyte or the adept, emulating the hibernation of the bearded nicely (ie, with the use of the so-called "sympathetic magic") a put yourself in his shoes. Such practices have long been alive not only in Siberia and Eurasia, but also in Western Europe, especially in the Pyrenees - where the Bear is still today the central character of the celebration of the Carnival, as the "scapegoat" to be sacrificed to "chase the winter" - and in the British Isles. Philippe Walter (author of a valuable study on the myth of King Arthur which will be useful later in our study [24]) relates the shaman god of the Getae to the Artu Breton, also based on the etymological profile and arriving at the same conclusions suggested by Laertius:

“This name derived from the Thracian zalmos, “Fur, skin”, recalls the bearish character of the divine being wrapped at birth in a bear skin [25]. [...] Not only does Zalmoxis exalt the existence of an afterlife in which to live in the company of his faithful, but his "posthumous" destiny has many points in common with that of Arthur, who temporarily leaves for Avalon, and then return to reign over his own. "

[26]

Note:

[1] See Mircea Eliade, From Zalmoxis to Genghis Khan, Astrolabio-Ubaldini, Rome 1975, cap. II, "Zalmoxis", pp. 26-71.

[2] Id., Ibid., P. 33.

[3] Id., Ibid., P. 61.

[4] Id., Ibid., P. 56.

[5]  Id., Ibid., Pp. 34-35. The Nartis and Ossetians, descendants of the Scythians, also have similar traditions. They believe that post-mortem the soul "reaches [a] a crossroads of three roads: the two on the side lead one to heaven, the other to hell; the middle one must be preferred: the dead man who takes it reaches the place where Barastyr, king of the Dead, reigns among the Narti in Assisi. Here we find an important theme for the purpose of our research: traditionally it is believed that the soul after death must enter one way to the detriment of the others and that only those who know the right way can reach the afterlife of the god. This is a point of primary importance. Knowledge of the heavenly ways, often represented in the form of rivers (think, for example, of the four infernal rivers of Greek mythology, or of the four that rise from the summit of Mount Meru in Vedic cosmology) is indispensable to reach the presence of the god, in a preferential post-mortem state to the undifferentiated mass of non-initiates. Kowalewski derives the figure of the ruler of the dead Barastyr from Mazdeism, putting him in relation with the Indo-Iranian Yima. However Dumézil, who cites him, is of the opinion that Barastyr is a specifically Ossetian god, deriving, in any case, from a common mythology to which also belongs the Vedic India afterlife which, in the author's opinion, is more next to the description of the Ossetian Underworld [George Dumézil, Stories of the Scythians, Rizzoli, Milan 1980, p. 254].

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[6] Eliade, Zalmoxis, cit., p. 26.

[7] Id., Ibid., P. 31.

[8] Id., Ibid., P. 34.

[9] Id., Ibid., P. 32.

[10] Id., Ibid., P. 26.

[11] Id., Ibid., P. 46.

[12] Geticus [alias Vasile Lovinescu], The hyperborean Dacia, Editions under the banner of Veltro, Parma 1984, op. cit., p. 42.

[13] Eliade, Zalmoxis, cit., p. 47.

[14] Anikó Steiner, Shamanism and folklore, Editions under the banner of Veltro, Parma 1980, pp. 34-36.

[15] Id., Ibid., Chap. I, “The Dacians and the Wolves”, pp. 10-25.

[16] See Marco Maculotti, Metamorphosis and ritual battles in the myth and folklore of the Eurasian populations, on «AxisMundi.blog», May 18, 2016.

[17] For two brief but acute comments on the prisca brotherhood of the Luperci and the rites to be performed on the occasion of the Lupercals, cf. George Dumézil, Ancient Roman religion, Rizzoli, Milan 1977; & Renato DelPonte, Italic gods and myths. Archetypes and forms of Roman-Italic sacredness, Arya - Company of Tradition, Genoa 2020, pp. 129-135.

[18] See. infra, Postal Code. II §6.

[19] Christian Sighinolfi, The wolf-warriors in archaic Europe. Aspects of the warrior function and ritual metamorphosis among the Indo-Europeans, the Circle, Rimini 2011, pp. 91-92.

[20] See. infra, § 13.

[21] It is interesting in this regard the passage of Mneso di Patara, disciple of Eratosthenes, according to which "the Getae venerated Cronos and called him Zalmoxis", which Eliade considers to be connected to the cult of Saturn as "ruler of the Happy Islands where the souls of the righteous stay" [Eliade, Zalmoxis, cit., p. 34]; in this regard, cf. infra, especially capp. III §8 IV §1, 3.

[22] Mariateresa Fumagalli Beoni Brocchieri Giulio Guidorizzi, Glorious bodies. Greek heroes and Christian saints, Laterza, Bari 2012, p. 62.

[23] See Antonio Bonifacio, The peoples of the Great Bear: Along the path of bears and shamans. The shaman, the bear and the celestial hunter, Symmetry Editions, Rome 2021. 

[24] See. infra, Postal Code. IV §§5 et seq.

[25] The bear is also linked to royalty, as well as to shamanic practices: Arthur of the bear is in fact an anthropomorphic “double”, and at the same time the bear is his zoomorphic “double”. It is no coincidence that in ancient Celtic Ireland the word Article it stood indifferently for "Bear" and "King"; certainly the Arthurian cycle, historically born in Brittany (or in another Gaelic land) has reused much more archaic mythical motifs under a new guise, suitable for the medieval and "chivalrous" period.

[26] Philippe Walter, Arthur. The bear and the king, Arkeios, Rome 2005, p. 86.

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