Then the lords of the Philistines gathered them together for to offer a great sacrifice unto Dagon their god, and to rejoice: for they said, Our god hath delivered Samson our enemy into our hand. Unto Dagon their god - Diodorus Siculus describes their god thus:
Το μεν προσωπον εχει γυναικος, το δ' αλλο σωμα παν ιχθους;
"It had the head of a woman, but all the rest of the body resembled a fish."
Dagon was called Dorceto among the heathens. Horace, in the following lines, especially in the third and fourth, seems to have in view the image of Dagon: -
Humano capiti cervicem pictor equinam
Pingere si velit; et varias inducere plumas,
Undique collatis Inembris; ut turpiter atrum
Desinat in piscem mulier formosa superne;
Spectatum admissi risum teneatis amici?
De Art. Poet., V. 1.
"Suppose a painter to a human head
Should join a horse's neck; and wildly spread
The various plumage of the feather'd kind
O'er limbs of different beasts, absurdly join'd;
Or if he gave to view a beauteous maid,
Above the waist with every charm array'd,
Should a foul fish her lower parts infold,
Would you not smile such pictures to behold?"
Francis.