equated with the
"four quarters" of the celestial regions and the four regions of the
earth, which in Gaelic story are called "the four red divisions of the
world".

Three of the planets may have been heralds of change. Venus, as "
Dilbat", was the "Proclaimer", and both Jupiter and Mercury were
called "Face voices of light", and "Heroes of the rising sun" among
other names. Jupiter may have been the herald of the "Golden Age" as a
morning star. This planet was also associated with bronze, as "Kakkub
Urud", "the star of bronze", while Mars was "Kakkub Aban Kha-urud,"
"the star of the bronze fish stone". Mercury, the lapis lazuli planet,
may have been connected with the black Saturn, the ghost of the dead
sun, the demoniac elder god; in Egypt lapis lazuli was the hair colour
of Ra when he grew old, and Egyptologists translate it as black.[336]
The rare and regular appearances of Mercury may have suggested the
planet's connection with a recurring Age. Venus as an evening star
might be regarded as the herald of the lunar or silver age; she was
propitious as a bearded deity and interchanged with Merodach as a
seasonal herald.

Connecting Jupiter with the sun as a propitious planet, and with Mars
as a destroying planet, Venus with the moon, and Mercury with Saturn,
we have left four colour schemes which suggest the Golden, Silvern,
Bronze, and Iron Ages. The Greek order of mythical ages may have had a
solar significance, beginning as it does with the "golden" period. On
the other hand the Indian and Irish systems begin with the Silvern or
white lunar period. In India the White Age (Treta Yuga) was the age of
perfect men, and in Greece the Golden Age was the age of men who lived
like gods. Thus the first ages in both cases were "Perfect" Ages. The
Bronze Age of Greece was the age of notorious fighters and takers of
life; in Babylonia the bronze planet Mars was the symbol of the
destroying Nergal, god of war and pestilence, while Jupiter was also a
destroyer as Merodach, the slayer of Tiamat. In India the Black Age is
the age of wickedness. The Babylonian Saturn, as we have seen, is
black, and its god, Ninip, was the destroying boar, which recalls the
black boar of the Egyptian demon (or elder god) Set. The Greek Cronos
was a destroyer even of his own children. All the elder gods had
demoniac traits like the ghosts of human beings.

As the Babylonian lunar zodiac was imported into India before solar
worship and the solar