 dwelleth in Jerusalem."[53] Very frequently, especially in
early times, this home or haunt of the god was a tree; his ceremonial
worship was conducted beneath its shadow, and the offerings of his
worshippers were hung upon its branches, or placed at its foot, or upon
a table by its side, and assumed thereby to have reached the god. Thus
the sacred sycamores of Egypt were believed to be actually inhabited by
Hathor, Nu'it, Selkit, Nit, or some other deity, and were worshipped and
presented with offerings as such. The vignettes in the _Book of the
Dead_ demonstrate this belief unmistakably. They frequently depict the
soul on its journey to the next world coming to one of these miraculous
sycamores on the edge of the terrible desert before it, and receiving
from the goddess of the tree a supply of bread, fruit, or water, the
acceptance of which made it the guest of the deity and prevented it from
retracing its steps without her express permission. "O, sycamore of the
Goddess Nu'it," begins one of the chapters in the _Book of the Dead_,
"let there be given to me the water which is in thee." As a rule in the
vignettes the bust of the goddess is represented as appearing from
amidst the sheltering foliage, but sometimes only her arm is seen
emerging from the leaves with a libation-bowl in the hand. The
conception is illustrated still more clearly on an ancient sarcophagus
in the Marseilles Museum, where the trunk from which the branches spread
is represented as the actual body of the deity.[54]

[Illustration: Fig. 10.--The goddess Nu'it in her sacred sycamore
bestowing the bread and water of the next world.(Maspero, Dawn of
Civilisation.)]

[Illustration: Fig. 11.--Sacred tree of Dionysus, with a statue of the
god and offerings.(Boetticher, Fig. 24.)]

As man's conception of the deity became more definitely anthropomorphic
on the one hand and less local on the other, this primitive
representation of the god in the tree underwent a change in two
corresponding directions. In the one case an attempt was made to express
m