STONE, CULT OF. — The cult of stone is universal and is found, either in practice or as a survival, under every latitude.
To the primitive mind a stone may assume a mystical value, and thus become sacred, depending on its shape and quality, and be regarded as an embodiment of powerful spirits capable of producing, if skillfully invoked, the most wonderful effects. Stones are therefore used as a primary magical means. They can bring rain in times of drought if thrown into water, as the Samaoni do, or if sprinkled with water, as the Romans did with the lapis manalis in the ceremony of the aquaelicium; or they can bring fertility to trees, fields, and people. Megalithic stones are considered a means of fertilizing young couples who approach them and rub against them, believing that the spirits of their ancestors are enclosed within them. Among the Bhil of central India, megalithic stones are thought to be temporary lodgings for the souls of the deceased and are usually found at a distance from the tomb; but if the deceased died a violent death, by lightning, or from an animal bite, the megalith is erected precisely at the place of death and is believed to fertilize the fields because of the buried corpse lying there.
The stone, with its character of stability, is a symbolic guarantee of the maintenance of promises and pacts; therefore oaths are sworn upon II. Thus the Brahmin novice, keeping one foot on a stone, swears to remain steadfast in his resolve; and in Athens the archons swore before a stone to safeguard the laws of the city. In Rome, from the temple of Jupiter Feretrius, the sacred stone (*lapis silex*) was taken, which the fetials carried with them when concluding treaties, and oaths were sworn by *lorem lapidem*. Also sacred were the stones (*termini*) that marked property boundaries: they were venerated during the Terminalia festival.
The cult of stone is documented from prehistoric times, as shown by megalithic monuments. The prehistoric cult of the axe is well known (and is also widely documented in Minoan civilization), a cult evidenced even in folklore, in which stone axes and arrowheads are considered to have come from the sky and are called “thunderstones.” The black stone set in the head of the statue of Cybele and the stone worshipped by pagan Arabs in the Kaaba at Mecca, whose cult has persisted in Islam, should be considered meteorites. The cult of stone, whether aniconic (in the form of a cylinder, cone, or squared block) or crudely carved, is found throughout the East even in historical times (v. BETYL). Among the Canaanites, the cult of high places with sacred stones (*masiébhah*) was widespread, to which, despite the protests of the prophets, the Hebrews also directed their worship. The statue of Aphrodite at Paphos was a conical stone, and so was the black stone of Emesa. A conical stone with an ovoid point was also the omphalos of Delphi. Sacred stones were also the herms that stood in Greece to protect crossroads; stones that later took on the appearance and meaning of the god Hermes. Pausanias bears witness to the abundance of stone images in the sanctuaries of Greece.