NYMPH. The belief that the nature which surrounds mankind—the woods, the springs, the hills—is full of a life resembling, yet different from, human life is universal in a primitive stage of thought. At Psophis in Arcadia a row of tall cypress trees was called αί παρθένοι, the damsels. In other places the name κόραι was used, but the general term for the spirits who dwell in external nature was vvμφaι. All three words have the same meaning. There is a close relation between the souls of dead men and the life of nature; the Nymphs often play the part of death and carry away human beings to dwell with them. This idea appears in a slightly different form when heroes and favoured mortals live in communion with them. The connexion of a human being with a Nymph has something unnatural about it, and almost always brings some disaster on the mortal. Yet another form’of the idea appears in the word ννρ,φόληπτος ; he whose mind the Nymphs take possession of loses his human wit and becomes mad, but has wisdom more than human. The worship of the Nymphs was practised throughout the classical period in places where they seemed to have chosen a home for themselves, in shady groves and beside springs of clear water. It retained its primitive simplicity. No temple, no statue, no priest was needed; the offerings of a rural people were placed on the simple altar. The cultus is therefore not often mentioned in literature; but it appears to have been closely connected with the household life of the people, and to have had a strong hold on them. Among the ceremonies of marriage an acknowledgment of the power of the Nymphs was included. The bride, herself a vvμφη, was sprinkled with water from the fresh spring of the Nymphs, or she went to bathe in the ...