| Attis | |
|---|---|
.jpg) Statue of Attis from RomanHierapolis | |
| Genealogy | |
| Died | Castrated/Emasculated himself and died |
| Parents | |
| Consort | Cybele |
Attis (/ˈætɪs/;Ancient Greek:Ἄττις, alsoἌτυς,Ἄττυς,Ἄττης)[2] was the consort ofCybele, inPhrygian andGreek mythology.[a]
His priests wereeunuchs, theGalli, as explained byorigin myths pertaining to Attiscastrating himself. Attis was also aPhrygianvegetation deity. His self-mutilation, death, and resurrection represents the fruits of the earth, which die in winter only to rise again in the spring.[5]
According toOvid'sMetamorphoses, Attis transformed himself into a pine tree.[6]
An Attis cult began around 1250 BCE inDindymon (today's Murat Dağı ofGediz, Kütahya,Turkey). He was originally a local semi-deity ofPhrygia, associated with the great Phrygian trading city ofPessinos, which lay under the lee ofMount Agdistis. The mountain was personified as adaemon, whom foreigners associated with the Great MotherCybele.
In the late 4th century BCE, a cult of Attis became a feature of the Greek world. The story of his origins at Agdistis, as recorded by the travellerPausanias, have some distinctly non-Greek elements.[7]
Pausanias was told that thedaemonAgdistis initially boreboth male and femalesexual organs. TheOlympian gods feared Agdistis and conspired to cause Agdistis to accidentally castrate itself, ridding itself of its male organs. From thehemorrhage of Agdistis germinated analmond tree. When the fruits ripened, Nana, daughter of theriver Sangarius, took an almond, put it in her bosom, and later became pregnant with baby Attis, whom she abandoned.[7]
The infant was tended by ahe-goat. As Attis grew, his long-haired beauty was godlike, and Agdistis (as Cybele) then fell in love with him. But Attis'foster parents sent him toPessinos to wed the king's daughter.[7] According to some versions the king of Pessinos wasMidas.
Just as the marriage-song was being sung, Agdistis/Cybele appeared in her transcendent power, and Attis went mad andcastrated himself under a pine. When he died as a result of his self-inflicted wounds,violets grew from his blood. The king followed suit, prefiguring the self-castratingcorybantes who devoted themselves to Cybele. The heartbroken Agdistis beggedZeus, the Father God, to preserve Attis so his body would never decay ordecompose.[7]
The geographerStrabo recounted in hisGeographica that the mother of the gods at the temple of Cybele in Pessinus was still referred to as Agdistis; Strabo wrote theGeographica in either the late first century BCE or the early first century CE.[8]
As neighbouringLydia came to control Phrygia, the cult of Attis was given an additional Lydian context. Attis is said to have introduced to Lydia the cult of the Mother Goddess Cybele, incurring the jealousy of Zeus, who sent awild boar to destroy the Lydian crops. Then certain Lydians, with Attis himself, were killed by the boar. Pausanias adds, to corroborate this story, that the Gauls who inhabited Pessinos abstained from eatingpork. This myth element may have been invented solely to explain the unusualdietary laws of theLydian Gauls. In Rome, the eunuch followers of Cybele were calledgalli.
Julian describes theorgiastic cult of Cybele and its spread.[9] It began in Anatolia and was adopted in Greece, and eventuallyRepublican Rome; the cult of Attis, her reborn eunuchconsort, accompanied her.
The temple of Cybele at Pessinus was the center of the cult of Cybele and Attis, and remained relevant during the Roman Empire. TheGalli (priests of Cybele and Attis) held a theocracy here, with leaders perhaps creating succession by adoption. The highest ranking Gallus was known as "Attis", and his junior as "Battakes".[10] At this time, the Galli were eunuchs, and some modern scholars have compared the mythology of the self-castration of Attis to the ritual castration of the Galli.[11][12] Later, during theFlavian period, these followers took the form of a college of ten priests, who were Roman citizens and not castrated. However, they still used the title "Attis".[13]
Modern scholars have examined how the Galli subverted Roman gender norms. Because the Galli castrated themselves and wore women's clothing, accessories and makeup, some modern scholars have interpreted them astransgender.[14][15] Another interpretation is that the Galli may have occupied athird gender in Roman society. Jacob Latham has examined how the foreignness of the cult and the priests' nonconforming gender presentation may have existed outside Roman constructions of masculinity and femininity altogether. Roman writers, often male citizens of Rome, who described the Galli often derided their gender presentation, and the priests' transgressions of Roman norms can explain this hostility.[16]
The Romans, beginning with thePrincipate, celebrated Attis and Cybele with a March festival week called theHilaria.[17] Citizens and freedmen who were members of specific priestlycolleges could participate in rites for Attis in constrained ways. TheCannophores ("reed bearers") and theDendrophores ("tree bearers") each had ritual roles during the first days.[18]
On the 24th of March, theDies Sanguinis (Day of Blood), followers mourned Attis's death by flogging themselves until they bled on his altar. The Galli also performed their initiation ritual, which involved ritual castration. By night, Attis was ritually entombed.[19] The next day, the Day of Joy (Hilaria), featured Attis' rebirth. It was also thevernal equinox on the Roman calendar.[20] Some early Christian sources associate this day with theresurrection of Jesus.[21]
The first literary reference to Attis is the subject of one of the most famous poems byCatullus (Catullus 63),[22] apparently before Attis had begun to be worshipped in Rome, as Attis' worship began in the early Empire.[23]
In 1675,Jean-Baptiste Lully, who was attached to Louis XIV's court, composed an opera titledAtys. In 1780, Niccolo Piccinni composed his ownAtys.
Oscar Wilde mentions Attis' self-mutilation in his poemThe Sphinx, published in 1894:
Emperor Julian's "Hymn to the Mother of Gods"[25] contains a detailedNeoplatonic analysis of Attis. In that work Julian says: "Of him [Attis] the myth relates that, after being exposed at birth near the eddying stream of the river Gallus, he grew up like a flower, and when he had grown to be fair and tall, he was beloved by the Mother of the Gods. And she entrusted all things to him, and moreover set on his head the starry cap."[26] On this passage, the scholiast (Wright) says: "The whole passage implies the identification of Attis with nature...cf. 162A where Attis is called 'Nature,' φύσις."[26]
The most important representation of Attis is the lifesize statue discovered atOstia Antica, near the mouth of Rome's river. The statue is of a reclining Attis, after the emasculation. In his left hand is ashepherd's crook, in his right hand apomegranate. His head is crowned with apine garland with fruits, bronze rays of the sun, and on his Phrygian cap is a crescent moon. It was discovered in 1867 at the Campus of theMagna Mater together with other statues. The objects seem to have been hidden there in late antiquity. A plaster cast of it sits in the apse of the Sanctuary of Attis at the Campus of theMagna Mater, while the original was moved to theVatican Museums.[27]
A marblebas-relief depictingCybele in her chariot and Attis, fromMagna Graecia, is in the archaeological museum in Venice. The pair also feature prominently on the silverParabiago plate.
A finely executed silvery brass Attis that had been ritually consigned to theMoselle River was recovered during construction in 1963 and is kept at theRheinisches Landesmuseum of Trier. It shows the typically Anatolian costume of the god: trousers fastened together down the front of the legs with toggles and thePhrygian cap.[b]
In 2007, in the ruins ofHerculaneum a wooden throne was discovered adorned with a relief of Attis beneath a sacred pine tree, gathering cones. Various finds suggest that the cult of Attis was popular in Herculaneum at the time of the eruption ofVesuvius in 79 CE.[28]
Nineteenth century scholarship wrongly identified the godAttis with the similar-sounding name of the godAtys. Thename "Atys" is often seen in ancientAegean cultures; it was mentioned byHerodotus,[3]however Herodotus was describingAtys, the son ofCroesus, a human in a historical account. The 19th-century conflation of the man Atys's name with the mythology of the god he was presumably named after, "Atys the sun god, slain by the boar's tusk of winter",[29] and hence a connection to similar-sounding Attis was a mistake, but the long-standing error is still found in modern sources.[4]: 536–539 [c]
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This article incorporates text from a publication now in thepublic domain: Chisholm, Hugh, ed. (1911). "Attis".Encyclopædia Britannica (11th ed.). Cambridge University Press.
This article incorporates text from a publication now in thepublic domain: Smith, William, ed. (1870). "Atys 1.".Dictionary of Greek and Roman Biography and Mythology. The full text of"The myth and ritual of Attis" [in]The Golden Bough at Wikisource The full text of"Attis as a god of vegetation" [in]The Golden Bough at Wikisource
{{cite book}}: CS1 maint: location missing publisher (link)
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