The God Notus in History and Mythology

For centuries, Greek mythology has been handed down from generation to generation; in the 8^th century BCE, the poet Homer produced the first written version of the legends surrounding the battle of Troy. These are known as the Iliad and the Odyssey. Within these epic poems, he tells not only the details of the battle itself, but the myths from the ancient world: meetings between the gods and mortals, challenges of heroes, magic, monsters and the creation of life and death.

In Greek mythology, many organic objects were seen to be of divine origin, usually in the form of either a personification or a minor deity (for example, a nymph). The Anemi, the Four Winds, were four deities (Zephyrus from the west, Boreas from the north, Notus from the south and Argestes from the east), who were known as ‘flint-hearted’.

Notus was the son of Astraeus, the Titan god of the stars and planets, and the goddess Eos, the personification of the dawn. He brought with him fog, rain and heat. Hesiod, in his Works and Days, stated that, “Do not wait till the time of the new wine and autumn rain and oncoming storms with the fierce gales of Notos (South Wind) who accompanies the heavy autumn rain of Zeus and stirs up the sea and makes the deep dangerous”.

In one myth, the Psylli decided to make war against Notus when winds from the desert had dried the water in the land (now Tripoli). As they marched into the desert, they were overcome by a simoon and perished to a single man.

In art, Notus was shown as a winged deity, usually pouring rain from a vase as he was believed to bring with him fog and rain wherever he went. In a relief on the column of Marcus Aurelius, the great winged creature showering rain upon the troops is doubtless intended for Notus, and not Jupiter Pluvius.

He seems to appear more frequently to that of his brothers and this might be due to the number of different weather characteristics that he is attributed to, especially by later Latin writers. In Ovid’s Metamorphoses, Notus is the wind employed by Jupiter to bring on the rain for the deluge.

Weather deities and myths are important elements in a culture’s mythology and identity; they are the reasons how and why their crops grew and so allowed the people to survive. However, like with many deities, they could not only be benevolent but could also turn violent and destructive, giving the residents the explanation for bad weather.

Bibliography:

Cotterell, Arthur & Storm, Rachel (1999) The Ultimate Encyclopaedia of Mythology, Hermes House, Anness Publishing House.

McCartney, Eugene S. (1930) Greek and Roman Weather Lore of Winds, the Classical Weekly, Classical Association of the Atlantic States.

The History and Significance of the god Ebisu

As one of the seven Shichi Fukujin, Ebisu was considered to bring good luck and happiness, each deity looking after a different aspect. In this respect, Ebisu was the Shinto god of work and the most popular of the seven deities. He is the most widely revered god in the fishing industry and fishing villages in modern day Japan.

Illustrations of the god show him as a peasant, linking to him being the patron of labourers, with a smile on his face. Due to him being associated with the sea, he is generally shown holding a fishing rod in one hand and a sea bream (sunfish) in the other, this being a symbol of good luck. However, there are images of him that show him depicted as a human corpse floating on the surface of the sea, occasionally as a shark or a whale, sometimes even of a float - the Ebisu-aba or Ebisu-float -and sometimes Ebisu is just a common stone drifted or brought ashore.

There has been some debate amongst scholars as to why an ordinary stone from the ocean could be Ebisu, or the representation of the deity. One scholar states, “The one conclusion that we can draw is that Ebisu, as fishermen worshipfully call him, is the power who, they believe, grants them successful catches. Consequently we may assume that a stone picked up from the sea bottom, a corpse, a shark, or any object believed to have power over the catch, has the potentiality of becoming Ebisu”.

Ebisu is believed to have originated in the Shinto religious belief system as the son of Okuninushi, who was the god of medicine and magic. There are other sources which state he was the third son of Izanagi and Izanami, the primal couple; from this he is seen as one of the first ancestors of the Japanese people.

The etymology of Ebisu’s name comes from the word ‘ebisu’, which means a stranger, foreigner or person from a remote place; this then places the god Ebisu as a god originating from a remote land bringing good luck.

Ebisu is seen to be a mediator between the human world and the Otherworld. The word ‘ebisu’ itself carries the connotation of deformity and abnormality; for example, ebisu-buna means a malformed crucian carp, and ebisu-zen means abnormally arranged dishes on the table. In addition to this, the belief that Ebisu is seen as both as a man and a woman illustrates an aspect as a mediator between the two worlds.

Bibliography:

Naumann, Nelly (1974) Whale and Fish Cult in Japan: A Basic Feature of Ebisu Worship, Asian Folklore Studies, Nanzan Institute for Religion and Culture.

Yoshida, Teigo (1981) The Stranger as God: The place of the Outsider in Japanese Folk Religion, Ethnology, University of Pittsburgh of the Commonwealth System of Higher Education.