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| Mother Earth by Jessica Galbreth from The Enchanted Art of Jessica Galbreth |
Cybele is the Goddess of caverns and mountains, walls and fortresses, nature, and wild creatures. She is the archetypal Great Mother Goddess. Her worship originated in Anatolia with the Hittite and Phrygian peoples and spread from there westward until She was eventually worshipped throughout the Roman Empire by the beginning of the Christian Era. By tradition She was born on Mount Ida in Southwestern Asia and was associated not only with that mountain but also with Mount Dindymon and Mount Sipylus. Because of this, She was known by the Greeks as Meter Oreie, Mountain Mother. The Romans called Her Magna Mater, Great Mother. Cybele became a life-death-rebirth deity in Greece and Rome due to Her resurrection of Her son and consort, Attis. Some of Her other titles include:
Idaea, Lady of Mount Ida
Dindymene, Lady of Mount Dindymon
Sipylene, Lady of Mount Sipylus
Potnia Theron, Mistress of Beasts
Matar Kubileya, Mother of the Mountain (Phrygian)
Magna Mater Deorum Idaea, Great Idaean Mother of the Gods
The earliest respresentations of a Goddess with attributes tied to Cybele include a figurine found at Çatalhöyük, dating about 6000 BCE, depicting a corpulent and fertile Mother Goddess giving birth while seated on Her throne, which has two hand rests in the form of lion's heads. References to Her as Kubaba are found in 2nd Millenium BCE Hittite inscriptions. In Phrygia, She was also venerated by the name Agdistis and had a great temple in the port city of Pessinos. By tradition, Pessinos was where Her consort Attis castrated himself when She appeared to stop his wedding to the king's daughter. Phrygian depictions of Her from the 6th century BCE show Her as a woman wearing a belted long dress, a polos or high cylindrical hat, and a veil covering the whole body frequently accompanied by birds of prey or driving a chariot drawn by lions. The Greek sculptor Agoracritos created a statue of Cybele which became the model for later depictions of Her in Classical times. This statue showed Her seated on a throne looking matronly, Her hand resting on the neck of a perfectly still lion and the other hand holding the circular frame drum, similar to a tambourine, which resembles the full moon in its shape and is covered with the hide of the sacred lunar bull.
Over the centuries, the worship of Cybele spread from Phrygia to the Aegean coast, to Crete and other Aegean islands, and eventually to mainland Greece. Along the Aegean coast of Anatolia in Ephesus, Her worship can be found as early as the 10th Century BCE, and the city's ecstatic celebration, the Ephesia, honored Her. Later, Cybele found a warm welcome in Athens. "Just as in all other respects the Athenians continue to be hospitable to things foreign, so also in their worship of the gods; for they welcomed so many of the foreign rites ... the Phrygian [rites of Rhea-Cybele are mentioned] by Demosthenes, when he casts the reproach upon Aeskhines' mother and Aeskhines himself, that he was with her when she conducted initiations, that he joined her in leading the Dionysiac march, and that many a time he cried out evoe saboe, and hyes attes, attes hyes; for these words are in the ritual of Sabazios and the Mother [Rhea]." - Strabo, Book 10. Over the centuries, the worship of Cybele was brought by Ptolemy and his followers to Egypt, where She had a large following in Alexandria. There Cybele was invoked as "The Mother of the Gods, the Savior who Hears our Prayers" and as "The Mother of the Gods, the Accessible One".
In Greece and Anatolia, Cybele's priestesses led the people in orgiastic ceremonies with wild music, drumming, dancing, and drinking. Other followers of Cybele, the Phrygian kurbantes, expressed Her ecstatic and orgiastic worship with music, especially drumming, clashing of shields and spears, dancing, singing, and shouting—all at night. Greek stories relate that Broteas, the son of Tantalus, was the first to carve the Great Mother's image into a rock-face. During the 2nd century CE, a sculpture carved into the rock-face of a spur of Mount Sipylus was still held sacred by the Magnesians.
The worship of Cybele was brought to Rome during the Second Punic War (approximately 218 to 201 BCE) along with one of Her ancient images from the holy city of Pessinos, which was moved to Rome with great ceremony and reverence. Consultation with the Sibylline Books during the war uncovered some oracular verses which stated that if a foreign enemy should carry war to Italy, the enemy could be repelled and conquered if the Mater Magna were brought from Pessinos to Rome. The Romans then sent a delegation to the Greek oracle at Delphi, who also recommended bringing the Magna Mater from Her temple in Asia Minor to Rome. "Publius Cornelius Scipio Nasica was ordered to go to the port of Ostia, accompanied by all the matrons, to meet the goddess. He was to receive her image as she left the vessel, and when brought to land he was to place her in the hands of the matrons who were to bear her to her destination, the Temple of Victory on the Palatine Hill. The day on which this event took place, 12 April, was observed afterwards as a festival, the Megalesian." - Livy, History of Rome.
During the time of the Roman Empire, the most important festival of Cybele was the Hilaria, which was celebrated between March 15 and March 28. The Hilaria commemorated the death of Attis and his resurrection by Cybele, and involved days of mourning followed by rejoicing. Celebrations also took place on 12 April with the Megalesia festival, the anniversary of the arrival of Cybele in Rome. From what we know of the Megalesia, the proceedings began on the 10th of April with a processional where Her image was carried to the Circus Maximus and races were held in Her honor. During the reign of the emperor Augustus, Cybele's worship had great prominence due to Her inclusion in Augustan ideology. Augustus also restored Cybele's temple, which was located next to his palace on the Palatine Hill. On the cuirass of the Prima Porta of Augustus, the tympanon of Cybele lies at the feet of the goddess Tellus. The Empress Livia, wife to Augustus, ordered cameos of Cybele portrayed with her likeness, and a statue of Cybele from that period has been found which bears the visage of Livia. The worship of Cybele seems to have been fully accepted under Emperor Claudius as the festival of Magna Mater and Attis are included within the official religious calendar. At the same time the chief priest of Cybele, the archigallus, was permitted to be a Roman citizen, so long as he was not a eunuch.
The most famous of all the rites of Cybele done by the Romans was the taurobolium, an ceremony in which a initiate took their place in a pit beneath a wooden floor. During this rite, a bull was sacrificed on the wooden floor so that the blood would drip through gaps in the floorboards and drench the initiate in a symbolic shower of blood. The purpose of this rite was to cleanse the initiate of sin as part of a process of rebirth. The first recorded taurobolium took place at Puteoli, near modern Naples, in 134 CE. Some of the most devoted followers of Cybele were the Galli, men who ritually castrated themselves to honor Her. After the castration was performed, the Galli dressed as women and assumed female names.
Cybele's worship was carried throughout the Empire to places as far away as Mauretania, where, just outside Setif, those devoted to Her restored the temple of Cybele and Attis after a disastrous fire in 288 CE. The funds raised by Her devotees paid for a magnificent temple which included a silver statue of Cybele and a chariot which carried Her in processions had an exquisite canopy with fringe in the form of silver fir cones. Some Christian theologians have stated that the popularity of Cybele's worship both in Rome and throughout the Empire may have inspired the author of Book of Revelations in his portrayal of the mother of harlots who rides the Beast. Cybele's worship drew ire from Christians throughout the Empire. In an infamous incident, St. Theodore of Amasea is said to have spent the time which was given to him to recant his beliefs going to the temple of Cybele in Amasea and burning it to the ground.
Taken in a swift bark, over deep waters,
Attis, when eagerly, with rapid foot,
He reached those Phrygian woods
And entered where the goddess was,
Shadowy, this: a forest—
It was there, impelled by madness, by rage,
His mind bewildered,
With sharp flint,
He made fall from him his weight of maleness.
Therefore, when she felt
That the structure of her body
Had manhood no longer—
Even while new blood wet the ground's surface—
With clear white hands
She seized the light timbrel,
The timbrel that is yours, Cybele,
Your mystery, as mother of things.
And making the empty oxhide tremble with her soft fingers,
She began to sing, afraid a little,
Thus to her companions:
"Ye Gallae, let us go, go to the mountain woods of Cybele together,
together go,
As a wandering number of persons
Belonging to the Lady of Dindymus.
You wished to be exiles, wanted other houses soon.
You were ruled by me as I led, with you following.
You endured the swiftly flowing salt waters, the fierce seas,
And, through utter disgust with love, made yourselves something
else than men—
Please now the heart of your goddess with your brisk moving about.
Dull slowness put out of your mind.
Go together, come to the house in Phrygia of Cybele;
To the forests in Phrygia of the goddess,
Where is heard the tumult of cymbals,
Where the sound of timbrels is followed by the sound of timbrels,
Where the flute-player, Phrygian, blows a deep instance of sound
on his curved reed.
It is where the Maenads, ivy on their heads, toss these heads
violently,
Where yelling shrilly, they toss their heads with energy;
Where that wandering number of persons belonging to the goddess
like to go, now here, now there;
And to which it is right for us to hasten with lively dance motions.
As soon as Attis,
Woman, yet not truly so,
Said this, in a chant, to her companions,
The lively crowd suddenly, with busy tongues, yell loud,
The light timbrel makes its ringing sound again,
The hollow cymbals clash again.
The rout, with hurrying foot, goes swiftly to green Ida.
Also, Attis, frenzied, breathing hard, unsure,
Their leader, accompanied by the timbrels, wanders
Through the dark forest—
Like a heifer, never tamed,
Running aside from the yoke meant to burden.
The Gallae rapidly follow their leader with his rapid feet,
Until they reach the house of Cybele,
Faint and weary,
After so much labor.
They rest, and they have had no bread.
Sleep, heavy, covers their eyes with weariness, drooping.
The delirious madness that was in their mind
Leaves, in the presence of soft slumber.
But when the sun
With the flashing eyes of his golden face,
Made the now clear heaven light,
The firm lands, too,
And the wild sea;
And drove away the shade night has,
With his renewed eager steeds, tramping,
It was then sleep left Attis, now wakened; sleep was gone.
It was the goddess Pasithea who received him into her tremulous
bosom.
After soft slumber then, and the being freed from strong madness,
As soon as Attis himself in his heart looked at what he had done,
And saw with clear mind what he had lost,
And where he was,
With mind much in motion,
He ran back to the waves.
There, tears running down from his eyes,
She looked upon the empty seas,
And thus piteously spoke to her country,
In a voice having tears.
"O my country, that gave me life!
O my country that gave me birth—
Whom I leave, being a wretch,
As servants who run away leave their masters.
I have taken my foot to the forests of Ida,
There to live with snows and the frozen hiding places of beasts,
And to visit, in my frenzy, all their hidden living places.
Where then, in what part of the world, do I justly see you to be,
O my own land?
These eyeballs of mine, unbidden, long to gaze at you, while, for a
time, my mind is without uncontrol and wildness.
Shall I, taken from my own home, be carried far away into these
forests?—shall I be away from my country, what I possess,
my friends, parents?
Shall I be absent from the market, the place for wrestling, the
racecourse, playground?
Heart, sad heart, again, again, you must tell your sadness.
For what way was there a human could be which I could not be?
For me now to be a woman—I who was a lad, then a youth, a boy,
the flower of the playground!
I was once the glory of the palaestra;
I knew crowded doorways;
Thresholds were warm for me;
There were flowery garlands for me to adorn my house with when,
at sunrise, I left my sleeping place.
What shall I now be called?
A maidservant of the gods,
An attendant of Cybele?
Is it for me to be a Maenad, part of myself, a man in barrenness?
I, shall I live in icy, snowy regions of verdant Ida,
Pass my life beneath Phrygian high peaks,
In the company of the hind whose home is the woods,
Along with the boar who goes up and down the forest?
Now, now what I did makes me sorrowful,
Now, now, I wish that it hadn't occurred."
As these words came from lips in rosy redness,
Saying something new to both ears of the gods,
Cybele, loosening the tight yoke of her lions,
And urging on that foe of a crowd of living beings, a foe eager to
the left,
Spoke in this way:
"Come now," says she, "come, go fiercely, let madness hunt him
from here, make him, by the coming upon him of madness,
take himself to the forest again—he who would be too free
and get away from my rule.
Come, lash in back with your tail, endure your whipping yourselves,
let all about sound with your high, thick roar, shake your
bright mane fiercely on your thick neck."
So speaks Cybele in anger, and, with her hand, makes the yoke easy.
The monster enlivens his courage,
Rouses himself to a fury in himself.
He speeds away, he roars.
With foot swiftly covering the ground, he breaks brushwood.
But when he came to where the water stretched from the shore
gleaming in whiteness,
And saw gentle Attis by the flat spaces of the sea,
He rushed at him.
Attis runs with mad energy into the woods.
He was a handmaid in these woods all his life.
Goddess, Cybele, great goddess, lady of Dindymus, let all thy fury
be far from where I am, O my queen.
Let it be others you drive into frenzy, others you drive into
madness.
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