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At all events, we can hardly doubt that the Day of Blood
witnessed the mourning for Attis over an effigy of him which was
afterwards buried. The image thus laid in the sepulchre was probably
the same which had hung upon the tree. Throughout the period of
mourning the worshippers fasted from bread, nominally because Cybele
had done so in her grief for the death of Attis, but really perhaps
for the same reason which induced the women of Harran to abstain
from eating anything ground in a mill while they wept for Tammuz. To
partake of bread or flour at such a season might have been deemed a
wanton profanation of the bruised and broken body of the god. Or the
fast may possibly have been a preparation for a sacramental meal.
But when night had fallen, the sorrow of the worshippers was turned
to joy. For suddenly a light shone in the darkness: the tomb was
opened: the god had risen from the dead; and as the priest touched
the lips of the weeping mourners with balm, he softly whispered in
their ears the glad tidings of salvation.


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