Golden Bough. A Study in Magic and Religion. Part 3. The Dying God

PREFACE

Episode 0 · 3:13

I. THE MORTALITY OF THE GODS. Mortality of Savage Gods, Mortality of Greek Gods, Mortatlity of Egyptian Gods, Death of the Great Pan, Deaths of the King of the Jinn and of the Grape Cluster

Episode 1 · 11:35

II. THE KILLING OF THE DIVINE KING. Part I. PREFERENCE FOR A VIOLENT DEATH. Human gods killed to prevent them from growing old and feeble, Preference for a violent death, the sick and old killed.

Episode 2 · 10:25

II. PART 2. KINGS KILLED WHEN THEIR STRENGTH FAILS. Divine kings put to death, the Chitome of Congo and the Ethiopian kings of Meroe, kings of Fazoql on the Blue Nile, divine kings of the Shilluk put to death on any symptom of failing health, parallel between the Shilluk kings and the King of the Wood at Nemi, rain-makers of the Dinka not allowed to die a natural death, kings of Unyoro and other parts of Africa put to death on signs of failing health, the Matiamvo of Angola, Zulu kings killed on the approac

Episode 3 · 1:09:04

II PART 3. KINGS KILLED AT THE END OF A FIXED TERM. Suicide of the kings of Quilacare at the end of a reign of twelve years, kings of Calicut liable to be attacked and killed by their successors at the end of every period of twelve years, kings of Bengal and Passier and old Slavonic kings liable to be killed by their successors, custom of a five years reign followed by decapitation in Malabar, custom of the Sultans of Java, religious suicides in India, kings killed by proxy, Aun, King of Sweden, and the sac

Episode 4 · 26:22

II PART 4. Octennial Tenure of the Kingship, Spartan kings liable to be deposed on the appearance of a meteor at the end of eight years, Superstitions as to meteors and stars, Octennial period of king's reign connected with the octennial cycle of the early Greek calendars, which in turn is an attempt to reconcile solar and lunar time, The octennial cycle in relation to the Greek doctrine of rebirth, Octennial tenure of the kingdom at Cnossus in Crete, Sacred marriage of the King and Queen of Cnossus (Minos

Episode 5 · 1:01:55

II PART 5. FUNERAL GAMES. Tradition of the funeral origin of the great Greek games, In historical times games instituted in honour of many famous men in Greece, Funeral games celebrated by other peoples ancient and modern, The great Irish fairs, in which horseraces were conspicuous, said to have been founded in honour of the dead, Their relation to the harvest, Theory of the funeral origin of the Olympic games insufficient to explain all the features of the legends, Suggested theory of the origin of the Oly

Episode 6 · 55:21

III. THE SLAYING OF THE KING IN LEGEND. Story of Lancelot and the proffered kingdom in the High History of the Holy Graal, Story of King Vikramaditya of Ujjain in India, Vikramaditya the son of an ass by a human mother, Stories of this type (Beauty and the Beast) probably based on totemism, Story of the parentage of Vikkramaditya points to a line of rajahs who had the ass for their crest, Similarly the maharajahs of Nagpur trace their descent from a cobra father and have the cobra for their crest.

Episode 7 · 29:56

IV. THE SUPPLY OF KINGS. Traces in legend of a custom of compelling men to accept the fatal sovereignty, False conceptions of the primitive kingship, The modern European fear of death not shared in an equal degree by other races, Men of other races willing to sacrifice their lives for motives which seem to the modern European wholly inadequate, Indifference to death displayed in antiquity by the Thracians, Gauls, and Romans, and in modern times by the Chinese, Error of judging all men's fear of death by our

Episode 8 · 28:22

V. TEMPORARY KINGS. Annual abdication of kings and their places temporarily filled by nominal sovereigns, Temporary kings in Cambodia and Siam, Temporary kings in Samarcand and Upper Egypt, Temporary sultans of Morocco, Temporary king in Cornwall, Temporary kings at the beginning of a reign in Sumatra and India, Temporary kings entrusted with the discharge of divine or magical functions, Temporary kings substituted in special emergencies for Shahs of Persia.

Episode 9 · 22:34

VI.SACRIFICE OF THE KING'S SON. Temporary kings sometimes related by blood to the royal family, Aun, King of Sweden, and the sacrifice of his nine sons, Tradition of King Athamas and his children, Family of royal descent liable to be sacrificed at Orchomenus, Thessalian and Boeotian kings seem to have sacrificed their sons instead of themselves, Sacrifice of king's sons among the Semites, Sacrifice of children to Baal among the Semites, Canaanite and Hebrew custom of burning firstborn children in honour of

Episode 10 · 1:08:59

VII. SUCCESSION TO THE SOUL. Tendency of a custom of regicide to extinguish a royal family no bar to the observance of such a custom among peoples who set little value on human life, Transmission of the soul of the slain divinity to his successor, Transmission of the souls of chiefs and others in Nias, America, and elsewhere, Inspired representatives of dead kings in Africa, Right of succession to the kingdom conferred by the possession of corporeal relics of dead kings, such as their skulls, their teeth, o

Episode 11 · 16:18

VIII. PART 1. THE KILLING OF THE TREE SPIRIT. PART 1. The Whitsuntide Mummers. The single combat of the King of the Wood at Nemi probably a mitigation of an older custom of putting him to death at the end of a fixed period, The theory confirmed by traces of a custom of periodically putting the representative of the treespirit to death in Northern Europe, Bavarian and Swabian customs of beheading the representatives of the tree-spirit at Whitsuntide, Killing the Wild Man in Saxony and Bohemia, Beheading the

Episode 12 · 1:11:33

VIII. PART 2. PART 5. Sawing the Old Woman,Sawing the Old Woman at Mid-Lent in Italy, In France, In Spain and among the Slavs, Sawing the Old Woman on Palm Sunday among the gipsies, Seven-legged effigies of Lent in Spain and Italy, PART 6. Bringing in Summer, Custom of Carrying out Death followed by a ceremony of bringing in Summer, represented by a tree or branches, New potency of life ascribed to the effigy of Death, The Summer-tree equivalent to the May-tree, The Summer-tree a revival of the image of Dea

Episode 13 · 1:04:16

NOTE A Chinese Indifference to Death. NOTE B Swinging as a Magical Rite. ADDENDA

Episode 14 · 29:20

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