Deicide

Deicide has been a wide-spread custom. One variety was putting to death kings and chieftains, believed to be gods incarnate, at set times or when they were approaching disease or death. It was believed that through disease or decay of strength they were unable any longer to keep in safety those who looked to them for blessings. In a second variety, the phenomena of Nature were personified and her processes became incidents in the lives of gods thus originated. Such myth is, for example, Dionysus, god of wine, who was put to death by Juno.