From: pound@ruf.rice.edu (Christopher Brian Pound)
Subject: Historical references to Dagon
Organization: Rice University
Date: Tue, 13 Oct 1992 21:16:21 GMT

As an undergraduate, I had an account named DAGON.  Some time in the
distant past, I researched the name for some reason (I don't remember
writing it up, but apparently I did :).

Now, I know this is alt.horror.*cthulhu*, but heck, some of you probably
care . . . I know I would like to see more things like this come across
the net.

----

In high school, my world history teacher taught that Dagon was a 
Canaanite sea god, god of sharks.  Coastal villages supposedly  
threw one infant off a cliff and into the sea each year as a sacrifice
intended to protect their sailors from Dagon's sharks.  I've never since
found anything to corroborate that story.  Oh, my teacher also
mentioned Dagon was the son of Baal, supposedly a nice legitimate
fire god, head of the Canaanite pantheon.  Believe what you want, I guess. 

Here are some references to Dagon/Dagan/Oannes . . . Enjoy.

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Extracted from Eusebius' Praeparatio Evangelica -- Book I, Chapter Six
" And thus, Kronus, overcoming Ouranos in Battle, drove him from his
kingdom, and succeeded him in the imperial power. In the battle was 
taken a well-beloved concubine of Ouranos, who was pregnant; Kronus gave
her in marriage to Dagon, and she was delivered, and called the child
Demaroon.

Cory says: "Dagon is represented in I Samuel v.4, as an idol of the
Philistines, with fish's tail; but in Genesis xxvii. 28, nearly the
same word means _corn_ -- the one being Dagon, the other _dagan_."

Abydenus speaks the words of the historian Berosus when he says:
"After him Alaparus reigned three sari; to him succeeded Amillarus,
from the city of Pantibiblon, who reigned thirteen sari; in his time
a semi-daemon called Annedotus, very like to Oannes, came up a
second time from the sea."

Alexander of Polyhistor wrote about Berosus' histories also:
"In the first year there made its appearance, from a part of the
Erythraean Sea [the Persian Gulf] which bordered upon Babylonia,
an animal endowed with reason, who was called Oannes. (According
to the account of Apollodorus) the whole body of the animal was
like that of a fish; and had under a fish's head another head, and
also feet below, similar to those of a man, subjoined to the fish's
tail. His voice, too, and language was articulate and human; and
a representation of him is preserved even to this day.
"This Being, in the day-time, used to converse with men; but took
no food at that season; and he gave them an insight into letters,
and sciences, and every kind of art ... In short, he instructed
them in everything which could tend to soften manners and humanise
mankind. From that time, so universal were his instructions, 
nothing material has been added by way of improvement. When the
sun set it was the custom of this Being to plunge again into the
sea, and abide all night in the deep; for he was amphibious.
" ... Oannes wrote wrote concerning the generation of mankind;
of their different ways of life, and of their civil polity; and the
following is the purport of what he said, ---
"'There was a time in which there was nothing but darkness and an
abyss of waters, wherein resided most hideous beings, which were 
produced of a two-fold principle. Men appeared with two wings, some
had four wings, and two faces. They had one body, but two heads --
the one of a man, the other of a woman. They were likewise, in their
several organs, both male and female. Other human figures were to be
seen with the legs and horns of goats. Some had horses' feet; others
had the limbs of a horse behind, but before were fashioned like men,
resembling hippocentaurs ... '
"... Of all these were preserved delineations in the temple of Belus
at Babylon."

G.T. Bettany says:
"The worship of the Philistines appears to have been of a general
Semitic type, with local deities and special types, as the Baal-
zebub (or god of flies), of Ekron and Dagon the fish-god, whose
image was partly human, partly fish-like. The Philistines carried the
image of their god into battle, and used oracles and divination;
an their ceremonies appear to have been much like those of the
Phoenicians, though we know very little about the details. It is
conjectured that Dagon is derived from the Assyrian Dorgan or
Daken, figured as half-man, half-fish."

Georges Roux writes:
"Sargon says that in Tuttul (recently identified with Tell Bi'a,
near Raqaa) he 'prostrated himself in prayer before Dagan' (the 
grain-god worshipped all along the middle Euphrates) and that 
'Dagan gave him the Upper Region: Mari, Iarmuti and Ebla as far
as the Cedar Forest and the Silver Mountain.'"
" ... In the West [Naram-Sin] 'slew Arman (Aleppo?) and Ebla 
with the weapon of the god Dagan.'"
" ... Ishbi-Irra was, it will be recalled, an Akkadian from Mari,
and in the names of two of his descendents appears the great god 
of that city, the wheat-god Dagan."

N.K. Sandars says:
"It is written of Sargon that he made a victorious campaign through
the northern lands; and Dagon his god gave him the 'upper region' as
far as the 'Cedar Forest' and the 'Silver Mountain'."

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Separated as I am from about half my 'library,' I can't get to the
following items which I am certain would be highly illuminating:

Frazer's _Golden_Bough_, The Bible, Milton's _Paradise_Lost_,
Fred C. Chappell's _Dagon_.

As soon as I can get to the rest of my books, I will work on a more
complete reference for Dagon.

... Christopher Pound

---
I never did that extra work . . . I sure don't have the time (or inclination
really :) to do it now.

-- 
Christopher Pound	+	I am human by my hands and my feet, my guts,
Anthro Grad Student	+	my meat heart, my stomach whose knots fasten
pound@ruf.rice.edu	+	me to the rot of life.	   -- Antonin Artaud