... Legend represented that Adonis died while hunting from a wound inflicted by a boar, and that out of his blood Aphrodite (q.v.) made the anemone grow.  Loved by both Aphrodite and Persephone, it was decided by Zeus that he should pass half the year with each goddess.  In the Adonis-cult there was a yearly Festival of Adonis, observed by women.  This spread from Phoenicia to Cyprus, Greece, Egypt and ultimately to Rome.  First a figure supposed to represent Adonis' corpse received sad and solemn funeral rites; then its resurrection was celebrated with wild rejoicing.  "Adonis-gardens" were a feature of the celebration.  These were baskets or pots of earth sown with plants of various kinds that sprung up quickly and as quickly faded.  The plants were afterwards thrown into the water.  There is an allusion to them in the Old Testament (Isaiah xvii., 10, Revised Version margin, "plantings of Adonis").  It has been suggested that Adonis is another form of the Babylonian deity Tammuz (q.v.) who seems to have been honoured with a similar festival... (An Encyclopedia of Religions, Canney, 1921)