a fish with a boar's head, as a sphinx, a chimaera, or a harpy. The depiction of the Chaos-dragon as a spotted snake with a bird's head combines spatial opposites (the bird representing "above" and the snake representing "below") also has parallels in ancient Indo-Aryan and modern Balkans folklore. Thracian Mythology Thracian Orphism The myths and doctrines constituting the Thracian religion are collectively called by modern-day scholars as "Thracian Orphism," to distinguish it from the Greek Orphism, which was a later derivation from the Thracian religion from the late 6th century BCE. In the mythology of "Thracian Orphism," represented the initial state of the world, which was at rest. The goddess self-fertilised herself and gave birth to a first son, , who represented the male principle and had a dual nature, being both a sky-god identified with the Sun, and an underworld-god identified with Fire. This process constituted the four phases of the goddess's life, in which are present the four elements, and which consist consecutively of: rest, representing Earth. self-fertilisation, representing Air. pregnancy, representing Water. giving birth to her first son, , representing Fire. These four phases were themselves succeeded by four more phases representing the life cycle of : In the fifth phase, illuminated the world with his light. In the sixth phase, reaches his zenith. In the seventh phase, enters into a sacred marriage with . Then, as Zagreus and in accordance to the ritual of him being sacrificed, is dismembered into seven pieces: a head, a torso, two legs, two arms, and a phallus. The seven ram skins that Zagreus wears are scattered to the four cardinal points in this phase. In the eighth cosmic phase, the son of and , the priest-king Orpheus, is born. In this phase, is also reborn and he protects Orpheus. Through the sacred marriage of and , another son, Orpheus, was born. Orpheus personified the energies of creation and set them free: thus, from the union of and her first son, all the potent elements of the world were fertilised, ensuring the continuation of life in the world. Orpheus was the first initiate into the mystery cult of the sacred marriage of , and thus was the first priest-king, carrying the teachings of his own origins, was both a prophet and preacher of the mystery cult of , and was therefore predestined to bring order to the world. Only through