- tle, and goddess of marriage. Hecate, orphically, occupies
the centre of the world as Aphrodite and Gaia, even as the world soul in general. On a carved gem[86] she is represented carrying the cross on her head. The beam on which the criminal was scourged is called [Greek: e(ka/tê].[1] To her, as to the Roman Trivia, the triple roads, or Scheideweg, "forked road," or crossways were dedicated. And where roads branch off or unite sacrifices of dogs were brought her; there the bodies of the executed were thrown; the sacrifice occurs at the point of crossing. Etymologically, scheide, "sheath"; for example, sword-sheath, sheath for water-shed and sheath for vagina, is identical with scheiden, "to split," or "to separate." The meaning of a sacrifice at this place would, therefore, be as follows: to offer something to the mother at the place of junction or at the fissure. (Compare the sacrifice to the chthonic gods in the abyss.) The Temenos of Ge, the abyss and the well, are easily understood as the gates of life and death,[87] "past which every one gladly creeps" (Faust), and sacrifices there his obolus or his [Greek: pelanoi/],[2] instead of his body, just as Hercules soothes Cerberus with the honey cakes. (Compare with this the mythical significance of the dog!) Thus the crevice at Delphi, with the spring, Castalia, was the seat of the chthonic dragon, Python, who was conquered by the sun-hero, Apollo. (Python, incited by Hera, pursued Leta, pregnant with Apollo; but she, on the floating island of Delos [nocturnal journey on the sea], gave birth to her child, who later slew the Python; that is to say, conquered in
