Ivan Yefremov - Thais of Athens

“You are giving me another priceless object. Why?” Thais asked.

“I am giving it to you along with the vials containing poison. Beauty and death are always together, since the dawn of men.”

“Death for whom?”

“For the one who is beautiful, or for the one who takes it, or for both.”

“Is there no other way?”

“No. Such is the way of the Mother of Gods, and it is not up to us to discuss it,” the mistress of the temple said sternly. Her tone almost threatened.

“I thank you. Your gift is truly beyond all treasures.”

“Are you not afraid?”

“Of what?”

“Of the mysteries of the Great Mother.” She narrowed her eyes while Thais shook her head. “No? Then come.”

In the north portion of the sanctuary a thick column protruded from the middle of a dark opening in the floor. A spiral stone staircase circled the column, leading down. The poorly lit passage led into a temple, decorated in a way Thais had never seen before. Broad stone benches on each side of the passage were set with real horns of huge bulls, or aurochs, curved with closely set, vertical tips. The low, square space of the sanctuary, with its coarse half-pillars of red terracotta, were decorated with beautifully-made heads of bulls constructed of stone or clay but with real horns. The bull’s horns on the western wall stuck out like those of the aurochs on the northern wall: bent down. The ones on the eastern wall were spread out broadly in wavy, horizontal blades after the fashion of the ancient bulls of Mesopotamia.

This ancient sanctuary was strange, sinister, even frightening. Enormous horns were everywhere, including on the short, square pillars and long benches, making it difficult to move around the temple. Silhouette frescoes of red ocher outlined figures of the bulls on the walls closest to the entrance.

Between the bulls’ heads were women’s breasts made of blood red clay, their nipples decorated with beaks of black griffons and snarling ferret skulls. The first room was followed by a smaller hall, with a sharp-cornered niche in the northern wall. Three horned bulls’ heads were set vertically, one above the other, with the figure of the goddess soaring above them with her arms and legs spread. On each side of the niche, two black passages loomed black.

The horns bothered Thais for some reason she was having trouble placing. Suddenly a vivid recollection flashed in her memory. The same symbols, but made of stone and magnified to titanic dimensions, marked sacred places on Crete. In one of the frescoes the Athenian had seen the image of a sanctuary, similar to the one she was in now. Horns of different sizes had separated the fresco’s sacrificial room into different segments. But here the real horns of wild bulls seemed particularly sinister. Though they were relatively small, they made just as strong an impression as the gigantic stone horns rising from the soil of Crete. Thais could clearly see the deep connection between the ancient religion of the Great Mother in Asia and the faith of her ancestors on Crete.

The sculptures of bulls in the sanctuary were particularly terrifying. They did not look like the blunt-faced Cretan giants with their tall horns pointed up. The bulls of the ancient sanctuary were portrayed with long lowered heads, their huge horns pointed forward. They either converged over the forehead with their tips curved menacingly, or were spread wide and arched like knives. This was definitely a different breed, and the Athenian thought that the sacred Cretan dance with the bulls wouldn’t have been successful with these frightening creatures as they seemed hellbent on a fight.

The high priestess paused and listened. Deep, low, rhythmic sounds of gipatas, the strings on the very bottom of a sitar, could be heard in the distance, interwoven with female voices, moans and screams.

Thais’ heart beat faster, expecting something terrible. The priestess silently picked up a torch from a horn-decorated pedestal, lit it from the coals simmering on the sacrificial stone, and stepped into the left passage. After passing through another dark corridor which felt more like a dungeon, Thais found herself in a spacious building, level with the temple garden.

Thais would never tell anyone about the things she saw here, but she remembered every single moment. In Egypt she had been struck by the frescoes in the dungeons of the Dead, portraying Tiau or the Path of the Night Sun. That was the Egyptian version of hell, located on the other invisible side of the Moon. But those were only images. Here at the temple that was almost as ancient as the stone mirror, the ten thousand year old rituals of the Great Mother took place in reality, and were performed by real people.

Strengthened by Rhea’s potion, Thais managed to withstand the performance to the end. All four stages of the incredible ritual passed before her eyes, gradually clarifying their secret meaning. The roots of Earth-Gaea and all things living on it descended into the abyss of chaotic storms, sweeping over Tartar in the terrible darkness of Erebus. That was why the roots of the soul also rose from the darkness of primal feelings, swirling in the womb of Kibela. These feelings, the darkness and terrors had to be experienced in order to become free from their secret power. They had to be released before the eyes of the women who were simultaneously the victims and the participants of the great union with the roots of all nature in the image of Ananka, an unavoidable necessity.

Late at night, accompanied by a black priestess, Thais returned to her temporary home feeling astonished, tired and depressed. Za-Asht was awake, waiting for her mistress. The slave girl’s eyes were swollen from tears, and Thais noticed nail marks in her palms. Thais had no energy to ask, and fell into bed without a bath. As a result, Ptolemy’s letter remained unread.

Thais could not sleep. The Finikian also tossed and sighed until the hetaera called her over.

“Sit down and tell me what happened. Did Lykophon offend you?” Za-Asht nodded silently, and anger flashed in the dark depths of her eyes.

“I shall call him tomorrow and ask the lokhagos to punish the Thessalian.”

“No, no, Mistress. He didn’t do anything and I don’t want to see him anymore.”

“Really? What a strange young man. You are beautiful, and I saw the way he looked at you. Did you give him more wine?”

“He downed a goblet as if it were nasty desert water. He didn’t touch the food and said nothing, simply stared at the door after that Lamia, daughter of the dark. This went on forever until I lost my patience and kicked him out. And then he left without a thank you or a word, as if he were drunk with millet beer.”

“I had never expected this,” Thais exclaimed. “Did the Lamia truly strike him with Eros? Why? He had seen you dance balarita, how agile your body is and how slender your legs are.”

“You are kind to me, Mistress,” the Finikian replied, barely holding back tears. “But you are a woman and won’t understand the black Lamia’s power. I looked at her carefully. Everything in her is contrary to what is in me.”

“How so?”

“Everything that is narrow in me is wide in her: hips, ankles and eyes. Everything that is wide in me is thin in her: shoulders and waist,” the Finikian said, clearly upset. “She is built like you, Mistress, but heavier, more muscular. And it drives men mad, especially those like this boy.”

“So he rejected you and thinks about her?” Thais shrugged. “That is all right. We shall soon travel on and the Lamia will fade from Lykophon’s memory. Oh, I forgot. Do you still want to stay here? Do you?”

“Now more than ever, Mistress. We Finikians have a teaching of Senhuniathon. It says that desire is creation. And I want to create myself anew.”