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For the ‘table of the sun’ cf. Pomp. Mela, iii. 87, who repeats H., and Paus. vi. 26. 2, who treats it as an impossible fable. It is probably a misunderstood myth; the Egyptians spoke of a ‘meadow of offerings’, to which the souls of the dead came to eat; this was easily turned into a fact, as food was actually left on the tombs (Maspero, iii. 667 n.). The informants of H. give this myth a Greek colouring by bringing in the sun, and he is the more ready to believe the tale because of the Homeric ‘feasts’ of the Ethiopians (v. s.） Heeren (African Nations, i. 327 seq.) finds a foundation of fact for the story in the record of Cosmas (sixth century A. D.), who says the traders in the land of Sasu exposed joints of meat in dumb commerce for gold (cf. iv. 196 for similar methods). This explanation is interesting, but the evidence of Cosmas is too late and doubtful to be accepted. Vases, with animals (not men) feeding from an altar-like table, were found (1909) at Karanòg in Nubia, which may perhaps be explained by the ‘table of the sun’ (Woolley and MacIver, Karanòg, 1910, p. 56). The same explorers (ib. p. 55) confirm H.'s statement that Dionysus was worshipped at Meroe (ii. 29). προαστίῳ, like the ‘changing officials’, is a Greek touch.
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