[Doctor Stochastic]

I read the short (single volume) of "The Golden Bough" some years ago. (The novel "Day of the Arrow" and movie "Eye of the Devil" were based on ideas from "The Golden Bough.")

But did Fraser get his title (as the movie-makers did) from:

Bring me my Bow of burning gold;
Bring me my Arrows of desire;
Bring me my Spear: O clouds, unfold:
Bring me my Chariot of Fire!

[Ruy Dias de Bivar]

According to Frasier, it has to do with the priesthood at Lake Nemi in Italy.

"Within the sanctuary at Nemi grew a certain tree of which no branch might be broken. Only a runaway slave slave was allowed to break off, if he could, one of it's boughs. Success in the attempt entitled him to fight the priest in single combat, and if he slew him he reigned in his stead with the title of The King of The Wood."
According to the ancients this branch was the Golden Bough.

The book then goes into a deeeep study of world superstitions.
Be warned, it is not a pro-Christian book.