that the father of the Cabeiri was
Camillus, a son of Hephaestus, the Cabeiri have been thought to be, like
the Corybantes, Curetes and Dactyli, demons of volcanic fire. But this view
is not now generally held. In Lemnos they fostered the vine and fruits of
the field, and from their connexion with Hermes in Samothrace it would also
seem that they promoted the fruitfulness of cattle.

By far the most important seat of their worship was Samothrace. Here, as
early as the 5th century B.C., their mysteries, possibly under Athenian
influence, attracted great attention, and initiation was looked upon as a
general safeguard against all misfortune. But it was in the period after
the death of Alexander the Great that their cult reached its height.
Demetrius Poliorcetes, Lysimachus and Arsinoe regarded the Cabeiri with
especial favour, and initiation was sought, not only by large numbers of
pilgrims, but by persons of distinction. Initiation included also an asylum
or refuge within the strong walls of Samothrace, for which purpose it was
used among others by Arsinoe, who, to show her gratitude, afterwards caused
a monument to be erected there, the ruins of which were explored in [v.04
p.0917] 1874 by an Austrian archaeological expedition. In 1888 interesting
details as to the Boeotian cult of the Cabeiri were obtained by the
excavations of their temple in the neighbourhood of Thebes, conducted by
the German archaeological institute. The two male deities worshipped were
Cabeiros and a boy: the Cabeiros resembles Dionysus, being represented on
vases as lying on a couch, his head surrounded with a garland of ivy, a
drinking cup in his right hand; and accompanied by maenads and satyrs. The
boy is probably his cup-bearer. The Cabeiri were held in even greater
esteem by the Romans, who regarded themselves as descendants of the
Trojans, whose ancestor Dardanus (himself identified in heroic legend with
one of the Cabeiri) came from Samothrace. The identification of the three
Capitoline deities with the Penates, and of these with the Cabeiri, tended
to increase this feeling.

See C.A. Lobeck, _Aglaophamus_ (1829); F.G. Welcker, _Die Aeschylische
Trilogie und die Kabirenweihe zu Lemnos_ (1824); J.P. Rossignol, _Les
Metaux dans l'antiquite_ (1863), discussing the gods of Samothrace (the
Dactyli, the Cabeiri, the Corybantes, the Curetes, and the Telchines) as
workers in metal, and the religious origin of metallurgy; O. Rubensohn,
_Die Mysteri