Kybele or Cybele – The Goddess as Mistress of the Animals, riding sideways on a lion, seated on a throne of two lions, appears in Mesopotamia, Anatolia and Syria, etched on seals from 1700 BCE. There She was known as Matar, mother of the gods, humans and animals whom She healed and protected. Her domain extends to bountiful crops, plentiful herds and healthy children.
As She was a sovereign Goddess, Kings must be blessed by Her priestesses and have intercourse with the principal one of them in Her Temple, before they may claim title or govern as King. The images of Matar riding on a lion, driven in a chariot pulled by a pair of lions through the streets of the cities, and seated upon a throne of lions with sacred cymbal in one hand, are portraits that link Her so significantly to the later Goddess Cybele or Kybele, brought by followers first to Greece around 600 BCE and later to Rome about 200 BCE.
In Greece, Her priestesses were known as Mellissae, Bee Priestess to the Holy Queen Bee Mother Goddesses. Honey was used in sacred rituals, made into an alcoholic drink and used as a preservative.
On her head, She wore a crown, the high cylindrical hat of Egyptian Hepat, depicting a turret in city walls, indicating that She also protected cities and city dwellers. As the land was becoming more populated, Her older stable agricultural villages grew, and because most were on overland trade routes or trading waterways, the villages expanded into city areas.
Cybele is one of the few Goddess figures not to have a daughter. Rather, She is most associated with Her son/lover/Attis, once again, a dying year god.
Her flute playing son, Attis, was a youthful Sheherd, who was attacked and died. The nature of the attack has several versions: One says that he was pursued by a wild boar. The other says a monster man, Agdistus by name, attacked young Attis intending to sexually assault him. Whether out of revulsion toward the monster or fear of becoming unfaithful to the Magna Mater, Goddess Cybele, the stories of Attis all end the same: Something happened to Attis which cut or tore off his genitals, and he consequently bled to death under an evergreen tree. Violets sprang from the ground where his blood seeped into the earth.
Cybele/Kybele found his mutilated, emasculated body, wrapped it in woolen mourning bands, took the body and the tree to the cave in the mountain where She lived. The tree was planted at the cave entrance, and She buried Attis beneath it. Every year in the spring, the time of his death, Cybele came back to mourn the death of Her son/lover.
The Goddess Cybele loved music, dancing and the pipes, flutes and drums. Her followers danced themselves into ecstatic states during Her festivals. They drank and engaged in sacred sexual activities, made offerings of plants and animals to the altars in the Temples, often covering the altar stones with blood, both human and animal.
The Goddess Cybele’s original journey to Rome is steeped in legend:
From Her Anatolian homeland, Cybele was carried on the voices of the Sibil priestesses. After twelve years of war between Rome and Carthage (in North Africa), the priestesses who were known for giving both prophetic wisdom and decreeing laws to be carried out, declared that the sacred stone of Kybele – a small black meteorite mentioned in the Sbylline Books, called the holy heaven rock of the Goddesses, still in Anatolia – must be transported to Rome and have a temple built to house its sacredness, honoring the great Kybele if Romans wanted to end the war.
What follows in the legendary journey is even more remarkable. The sacred black stone was put on a ship to sail from the west coast of Anatolia to the Tiber River in present day Italy. Before the ship entered the river, it was stuck on rocks from which none of the seamen could dislodge her.
Then a woman, named Claudia Quinta, gently pulled on the ship’s ropes which she had tied to a girdle around her waist and brought the ship back into the water. Around her had gathered many women, perhaps many hundred, or even a thousand women, who began to move the ship. By handing off the ropes from one to the next, these women of the Goddess pulled the ship, walking along the riverbank, all the way to the city of Rome which was a distance of several hundred miles.49
On the fourth day of April, Kybele’s stone was placed in the Temple of Victory on the ancient Palatine hill of Rome. Later that same year, Romans enjoyed not only a most bountiful harvest but also the defeat of Hannibal with whom they had been at war. Roman officials gratefully gave the Goddess the title Mater Deium Magna Idea. Thirteen years later, April 10,171 BCE, in Rome, a huge new Temple was dedicated to Kybele/Cybele and its marble walls glistened in the Roman spring sunlight. Each year, in spring, during the celebration of Vernal Equinox, the sacred Megalesia festival was held, when the silver image of Kybele was carried in a chariot drawn by lions through the city of Rome with Her priestesses, eunuchs and followers walking behind the chariot. All the followers reenacted the ancient Attis/Cybele legend. They cut down the sacred pine tree, wrapped it in mourning bands, hung an effigy of Attis on it and carried it to the Temple of Cybele in the heart of Rome. As part of this ritual ceremony, women lamenters stood at the door of the Temple, loudly wailing in mourning for Attis.
Three days of sacred dancing and three days of lamentation passed. Blood was spilled on the ground as ritual death of Attis. After three days, it is said that a light shone from the depth of the Temple tomb of Attis where he had been buried in effigy. And as this Light, Attis arose from the dead as Cyblele’s son/lover to greet the followers in feasting and celebration.
“Be of good cheer … Attis had been saved and so in turn we shall be saved,” shouted the followers.50
The rejoicers then carried a silver statue of Cybele in parade around the city of Rome stopping at the banks of the river Tiber where they ritually washed the Goddess statue, even washing Her chariot, and covered both with fresh violets before returning the image and Her chariot to the Roman Temple of the Magna Mater to wait for yet another spring. This first temple was destroyed by fire, and when another was built, Augustus, Emperor of Rome, joined the Megalesia – declaring its importance to the city of Rome. (In the next fifty years, it is recorded that Jesus was born and died.) Roman Emperor Claudius also joined the Megalesia to “lament the dead son Attis whose image hung upon the tree, and to pay homage to the mighty Anatolian Mother of Deities, Ma Kybele, Ma Rhea of Rome.”51
GREECE
Artemis/Diana – The imagery for Artemis/Diana springs from a different foundation of Goddess lore. Lato, the Goddess of Crete, Anatolia and Arabia, is said to be the mother of the Goddess Artemis/Diana.
The Ephesians of Anatolia, later the Greek city of Ephesus, claimed that Mother Lato brought her “fleet-footed” daughter Artemis into the world near their ancient city, built around a holy tree. The shrine to Artemis is on ancient site, and was built originally by the Amazons.
A long time ago,
the warrior Amazons
set up an image
of the Mother of Deities
under the shade of a great tree
and there Queen Hippolyta offered sacrifice
while Amazons danced an armed dance,
and the shield of the sacred rattles,
beating time upon the ground in unison
as syrinx flutes sang their songs.
Callimachas52
This original temple constructed by Amazons was a major pilgrimage site for visitors from the known world: Goddess worshippers revering the spirit of the Amazon warrior women who defended their Goddess from Eurasia to Greece. Another Temple was built later, when Ephesus became an Ionian city, a satellite territory of Greece.
This enormous Temple of Artemis/Diana built by Greeks in the city of Ephesus, Anatolia, about 550 BCE, was considered one of the original “Seven Wonders of the Western World” along with the Hanging Gardens of Babylon also built for a woman. (Others were The Pyramids of Egypt, the Lighthouse of Alexandria, the Colossus of Rhodes, and the Statue of Zeus in Greece.) The Seven Wonders were built from about 2700 BCE to 270 BCE. Only the pyramids have survived intact from the fires, earthquakes, volcanic eruptions, and human destruction that f
ollowed their original construction.
A description of the Greek Temple to Artemis/Diana is quite amazing. It had a marble sanctuary and a tile-covered roof. Conceived by architect Chersiphyron and his son, Metgenes, the temple’s inner space had a double row of as many as 106 columns, each estimated to be 40 to 60 feet high. The foundation of the Temple measured approximately 200 feet by 400 feet, a massive structure, even by modern standards.53
Artemis was also spoken of as Mother Queen Bee, Her Millessae Bee Priestesses serving Her at Altar, and eunuchs, who were called Megabyzi, attended to Her needs.
At the town of Magnesia are carved images of the Amazon women in battle. At Hacilor, the ancient Neolithic city in Anatolia, are found statues of Mother Lato and daughter Artemis, the mother with her hair pulled back into a braided bun and the daughter with braids.
On the Lycian coast are megaliths, massive stone monuments to the women warriors who defended the Great Mother from North Africa to Turkey to Greece, in effect – throughout the ancient world. In Greek and Roman times, Greek Goddess Artemis becomes the Roman Goddess Diana, known throughout the Western world as a triple Deity: Queen of Heaven, Mother of Creatures and Huntress/Destroyer, reminiscent of the triple aspect of the much older Neolithic Goddess as life giver, receiver of the dead, regeneratrix. In fact, the ideas, while somewhat modified over several thousand years, connote much the same information and can be viewed as a continuous spiritual belief system. Her pilgrimage centers were primarily the Temple at Ephesus and Nemi, a sacred grove.
She also had the dying god aspect within Her worship, but with a difference: This is now a reenactment of the transition times battle between men for possession, and a battle between potential kings; the winner became Her consort, the loser dying as the god Hippolytus. He was called the son of the Amazon Queen, who embodied the spirit of Artemis/Diana. The Roman Hippolytus was slain by a herd of horses on August 13, Diana’s Day, and then resurrected in Diana’s sacred grove of Nemi. In other legends, he was reborn as his own son Virbus, the virile one.
Diana at Ephesus is shown as the “many breasted one,” giving milk to all creatures, human and animal. A remarkable statue of Her as this giver of abundance still survives at a Roman museum. She is patroness of childbirth, nursing and healing. Roman towns all over the Empire had a local Mother Goddess they called Diana. Still revered across Old Europe as late as 500 CE, the Gauls (French/German) regarded Her as supreme deity.
At Ephesus, She was called Mother of the Animals, Lady of Wild Creatures, Many-Breasted Artemis/Diana, and Her Temple worship continued until Christians of Rome destroyed Her Temple in 400 CE.
Lilith – She stands alone as a Goddess and Transition Times example. Lilith is a Mesopotamian Goddess called Lillake on a tablet from Ur, surfacing around 2000 BCE in the midst of turmoil. Winged Lilith, with talons and legs of a bird of prey, is seen standing on a lion flanked by owls and another lion. Her crown/headdress is conical, topped with cow horns. She is regarded, initially, as protector of pregnant women, mothers, and children. In her outstretched hands, She holds a ring and staff, meting out Justice. Her nude image with flowing long hair was placed in Temples and made into small clay votives.
The image of this Goddess Lilith would change as people from the Levant entered Babylon around 1600 BCE. Hebraic tradition says that Lilith was the first wife of Adam. In that creation story, the man had no woman counterpart and was relegated to consorting with animals which the Levite priests called a sin. (Deut. 27: 21 “Cursed is the one who lies with any kind of animal, and the people say Amen.”)
Adam tried to force Lilith to lie beneath him while having sexual intercourse with him. Outraged, Lilith refused, cursed him, and flew off to Her home by the Red Sea, the ocean of blood which gives birth to all things. Messengers from the male Hebrew god were sent to take Lilith back to Adam, but She refused them, too.
Once Lilith is gone, Eve is created for Adam. Eve is not a Goddess. When this transition has been accomplished, the mythological process begins to demonize Lilith and Her independence, which is no longer acceptable in this context. Instead of being the Goddess of protections and rejuvenation, She is portrayed as having sex with demons, accused of kidnapping babies, and of fondling men in their sleep causing them to have wet dreams. Her Goddess sexuality is turned against Her and vilified. Moreover, the “crimes” of which She is now accused will be revisited fifteen hundred years later, carried forward amazingly intact, as the language and accusations used by priests against thousands of women during the European Inquisition.
THE PRIESTESSES
Called Mellessae, (such as the Hebrew Queen Deborah, priestess of Asherah, whose name also means ‘bee’) the priestesses attended the Goddess in Temples from Anatolia to Crete to Rome and Canaan.
Honey was one of the few preservatives, along with salt, known in the ancient world. As such, it became known as a substance of resurrection. In Asia Minor, from 3500 to 1750 BCE, the dead were embalmed in honey. Life was restored through the magic of Bee Balm, much as in today’s cosmetics and natural supplements.
Worshippers of Demeter, at Her Thesmophora festivals, displayed honey cakes shaped as female genitals. The symbol of Aphrodite, the Goddess of Love, was a honeycomb.
Bees are called hymenoptera: veil-winged, after the hymen or veil that covered the inner sanctum of the Goddess Temples and later labeled as that part of women’s genitalia existing before first intercourse.
Honey was put on a woman’s genitalia before initial intercourse with a man and marriage: ergo the term “honeymoon” which lasted one month, to include a menstrual period. A combination of menstrual blood and honey was considered the universal elixir of life, i.e. the “nectar” created by Aphrodite and Her sacred bees, the priestesses.54
The fabled “land of milk and honey,” about which future generations dreamed, was in reality the ancient agricultural lands of the Great Goddess, and everyone alive in those times knew it as home, no matter from what specific region they originated.
There can be no doubt as to the significant relationship between the sacred honey and sacred sexual union when one reads the prayer song from the Goddess Innana to Her son/lover: Her Honeyman (cited earlier).
The Horae
Certain women dedicated a portion of their lives to serving the Goddess. They left the home of their own mother to stay at the Temple for one year or more to pay honor to the Goddess and serve Her. It was both an honor and a duty to be performed, so that one’s family would continue to find favor from the Goddess.
Some called these women Aphrodite’s nymphs, who performed the “dances of the hours,” dancing to create ecstatic energy to serve the Goddess. These dances in turn created the earthly horae: priestesses whose primary purposes was to reunite the Goddess with Her male followers in the community, so that no man – whether attractive or ugly, young or old, would be left unfulfilled in his sacred union with the Goddess Creatrix of heaven and earth.
These horae, trained by older Goddess priestesses who were dedicated to Her service for life, were taught to train the men who visited the Temples, not only in sacred sexual union with their Goddess but also in the great mysteries of spiritual birth, death and final regeneration through the Goddess.
In the Dance of the Hours, the Priestess/Horae imitates the zodiac’s circle of the hours of a life. Modern time keeping is called “horology” due to these ancient Goddess systems.
The sacred Horae were called the “fair ones, begetters of all things, who in appointed order bring on day and night, summer and winter, so as to make months and years grow full.” These sacred Horae became, in time, the Persian Houris, the Babylonian Horines, the Semitic Hor-hole, ancestors of the Horites.55
Vestal Virgins
Priestess of Rome 700 BCE to 400 CE serving their oldest Goddess, the matriarchal Vesta, the same as the Greek Goddess Hestia, are descended from the ancient order of lifetime holy women serving the Goddess in the Temple of Vesta. They were the keepers of the public
hearth and altar, the keepers of the eternal flame in the heart of Rome. Their mission was to assure that the everlasting flame was alive; because it was believed that this flame was the mystical heart of the Roman Empire and if it were extinguished, the Empire would end. In fact, the legend came true.
The Vestal Virgins vowed never to marry; therefore, they were called Virgins, not because they never had sexual intercourse with men but because they remained unattached to any specific male.
Their own personal sacred sexual union was to the phallic deity of the Palladium, consecrated in great secrecy in Vesta’s Temple. This ceremony was performed by a male priest called Pontifex Maximus, which translates as “great bridge,” meaning he created a sexual bridge between heaven and earth, between female and male.
Originally, the ancient Vestals who ruled by virtue of mystical power and motherhood were the governing force of Latinium. They were not required to pay taxes to Rome and were exempt from any other civil duty. The first Vestal was the Goddess Rhea, transplanted to Roman colonies. According to legend, She gave birth to Romulus and Remus, the founders of Rome. Their midwife, Acca Larentia, gave birth to all the ancestral Roman spirits called “lares.” Later mythology shows Romulus and Remus nursed by a she-wolf, not a woman.
There were at least two major Temples to Vesta in Rome: one on the Tiber River and one in front of the Senate. On the Tiber River, the Temple is round. The other in the old heart of Rome has both a round Temple for the perpetual flame and an enclosed courtyard adjacent where there were living quarters and ceremonial spaces.56
Mysteries – Greece and Rome
“Classical Greece … actually came into being twenty five centuries after the invention of writing and was itself deeply influenced by the Near Eastern cultures that had preceded it by thousands of years.”57
Robert Graves’ introduction to Greek Myths (1955) writes, “Achean invasions 1300 BCE seriously weakened the matrilineal tradition … when the Dorians arrived, toward the close of the 2nd millennium (2000 BCE) patrilineal succession became the rule. With these northern people came the worship of Indo-European Dyaus Pitar, God Father, eventually known in Greece as Zeus and later in Rome as Jupiter.”58 But Homer probably wrote about the Mycenaean age (1450 to 1100 BCE), which was heavily influenced by the Cretan/Minoan Goddess worshipping civilization.
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