ZEUS 
Say nothing, Momus, about either Asclepius or
Heracles, for I see where you are heading in your
speech. As far as they are concerned, one of them
is a doctor who cures people of their illnesses and is
“as good as a host in himself,” Iliad, XI, 514, alluding to Machaon. whilst Heracles,
though my own son, purchased his immortality at
the cost of many labours; so do not denounce them.
 MOMUS 
I shall hold my tongue, Zeus, for your sake, although
I have plenty to say. Indeed, if there were nothing
else, they still carry the marks of fire! Heracles cremated himself, and Asclepius was struck by lightning. Cf. p. 6, n. 1. And if it
were permissible to employ free speech about yourself, I should have plenty to say.





 

 ZEUS 
I assure you, about me it is quite permissible.
But you are not prosecuting me as an alien, are you?
 MOMUS 
Well, in Crete not only that may be heard, but
they tell another story about you and show people
atomb. However, I put no faith either in them or
in the Achaeans of Aegium, who assert that you are a
changeling. Zeus was not only born in Crete, but buried there, in more than one place. His critics in Lucian several times refer to this fact (Timon, 4; Zeus Rants, 45). Lucian very likely means the place that was pointed out to R. Pashley in 1834 as the tomb of Zeus, on Mt. Juktas; see A. J. Cook’s Zeus, I, 157-163. The Achaean version of the birth of Zeus which made him out a changeling is not mentioned elsewhere, but plenty of places gave him other fathers than Cronus, which amounts to the same thing. 
 
But I do intend to speak of one thing
that in my opinion ought by all means to be censured. 
It was you, Zeus, who began these illegalities and
caused the corruption of our body politic by cohabiting with mortal women and going down to visit them,
now in one form, now in another. It has gone so far
that we are afraid that someone may make a victim
of you if he catches you when you are a bull, or that
some goldsmith may work you up when you are gold,
and instead of Zeus we may have you turning up as a
necklace or a bracelet or an earring. However that
may be, you have filled heaven with these—demigods! I do not care to put it otherwise. And it is a
very ridiculous state of things when one suddenly
hears that Heracles has been appointed a god, but
Eurystheus, who used to order him about, is dead;
and that the temple of Heracles, who was a slave,
and the tomb of Eurystheus, his master, stand side
by side; and again, that in Thebes Dionysus is a



 

god, but his cousins Pentheus, Actaeon, and Learchus
were of all mankind the most ill-fated. All three were own cousins of Dionysus, being sons of other daughters of Cadmus; Pentheus of Agave, Actaeon of Autonoe, and Learchus of Ino. Learchus was killed by his father Athamas. 
 
From the moment that you, Zeus, once opened our
doors to such as they and turned your attention to
mortal women, everyone else has copied you, and
not the male sex alone but—what is most unseemly—even the goddesses. Who does not know about
Anchises, Tithonus, Endymion, Iasion, and the rest of
them? So I think I shall omit those incidents, for
it would take too long if I were to pass censure on
them.
 ZEUS 
Say nothing about Ganymede, Momus, for I
shall be angry if you vex the little lad by disparaging
his birth.
 MOMUS 
Then am I not to speak of the eagle, either, and
say that he too is in heaven, where he sits upon your
royal sceptre and all but nests on your head, passing
for a god?
 

Or must I omit him also, for the sake of
Ganymede?
But Attis at all events, Zeus, and Corybas In Icaromenippus, 27 (II, 312) a similar list of “alien gods of doubtful status’’ is given, in which, besides Pan, Attis, and Sabazius, we find the Corybantes. For Lucian’s conception of them, see the note on The Dance, 8 (p. 220, n. 2). Here only one Corybas is remarked in the sacred precincts. Does Lucian think of him as that one who was slain by the others (Clem. Alex., Protr., II, 19), and so as the central figure of the cult ? and
Sabazius Sabazius was the centre of a wide-spread and important mystery-religion, which merged with that of Dionysus (Zagreus). He is frequently represented sitting in the palm of a great hand opened in a gesture like that of benediction (thumb and first two dingo extended), see Cook’s Zeus, I, 390, Fig. 296. Multitudes of attributes always surround him, and the bull, the ram, and the snake figured in his cult. On initiation, a snake was through the clothing of the initiate, and “snake through the bosom” is said to have been the pass-word (Clem. Alex., Protr., III, 15, 1). —how did they get trundled in upon us?





 

Or Mithras yonder, the Mede, with his caftan and
his cap, who does not even speak Greek, so that he
cannot even understand if one drinks his health?
The result is that the Scythians—the Getae among
them—seeing all this have told us to go hang, and
now confer immortality on their own account and
elect as gods whomsoever they will, in the selfsame
way that Zamolxis, a slave, obtained fraudulent
admission to the roster, getting by with it somehow
or other. Lucian recognises that the Getae were not Scythians but Thracians in Icaromenippus, 16, and that Zamolxis belongs to the Thracians in True Story, II, 17, and Zeus Rants, 44. On the other hand, the god is styled Scythian in The Scythian, 1 and 4, and in the passage before us, though he is ascribed to the Getae, they are represented as Scythian. Perhaps these two pieces are earlier than the others, and earlier than Tozaris, where Zamolxis is not mentioned. Zamolxis obtained his ‘fraudulent registration” by hiding in a cave and not appearing for four years, according to Herodotus (IV, 95). Strabo (VII, 5), who says that he was counsellor to the king, who connived at the fraud, adds that he was followed by a continuous succession of such gods; and to these Lucian must be alluding when he speaks of their electing gods. 
 
All that, however, is as nothing, Gods.—You
there, you dog-faced, linen-vested Egyptian, who
are you, my fine fellow, and how do you make out
that you are a god, with that bark of yours? Anubis. And
with what idea does this spotted bull of Memphis Apis. 
receive homage and give oracles and have prophets?
I take shame to mention ibises and monkeys and
billy-goats and other creatures far more ludicrous
that somehow or other have been smuggled out of
Egypt into heaven. How can you endure it, Gods,
to see them worshipped as much as you, or even
more? And you, Zeus, how can you put up with
it when they grow ram’s horns upon you? Zeus Ammon.