The Syncretization of Zeus Ammon and the Oracle of Siwa

Zeus was identified with the Roman god Jupiter and associated in the syncretic classical imagination with various other deities, such as the Etruscan Tinia and the Egyptian Amun (Ammon). He, along with Dionysus, absorbed the role of the chief Phrygian god Sabazios as well in the syncretic deity known in Rome as Sabazius.

Ammon was origiinally a Libyan deity.  His oracle, situated in the Siwa oasis, 500 kilometers west of Memphis became known by the Egyptians as "Amun of Siwa, lord of good counsel." Siwa is believed to have been occupied as early as Paleolithic and Neolithic times, and some believe at one time it was the capital of an ancient kingdom that may have included Qara, Arashieh and Bahrein. 

According to one myth the temple at Siwa was founded by the Greek god Dionysus. While lost in the Western Desert, Dionysus was perishing of thirst when a man appeared and guided him to the spring at Aghurmi. In gratitude, Dionysus erected the temple. In other myths, the Oracle of Siwa is reputed to have cursed Andromeda who was then tied to a rock to be devoured by a sea-serpent. Perseus is said to have stopped off to visit the Oracle prior to beheading Medusa, and Hercules is though to have visited it before he fought Bursiris.

"Siwa was too far away and too isolated to be a real part of the Egyptian kingdom, but there may have been indirect control. We are certain that during the Nineteenth Dynasty, there was a fort north of Siwa, at Umm el-Rakham on the coast. This proves that the pharaohs were interested in the far west. After the fall of the New Kingdom, Siwa was certainly independent, and it is no strange idea that the Libyan kings of the Twenty-Second and Twenty-Third Dynasties were somehow related to the rulers of Siwa."

"Siwa finally became a fully integrated part of Egypt after the domestication of the dromedary had made desert travel easier, for example to Egypt in the east, the Cyrenaica in the northwest and the Nasamones in the west. Among the oasis' exports was salt." - Livius.org

When the Libyan tribes assisted in the ascension of the pharaoh Amasis (r. 570-526 BCE), the pharoah built a shrine at site.  The Lydian king Croesus, an ally of Amasis, is said to have offered sacrifices to the god Ammon. Documented by Herodotus, it is assumed that the cult had spread beyond Egypt by then (560-546 BCE). A second temple at the oasis was built by Nectanebo II ( (r. 359/358-342/341 BCE). 

The first Greeks to visit the shrine were people from Cyrenaica, who knew the site through caravan trade. They called the god Zeus Ammon and the poet Pindar (522-445 BCE) was the first Greek to dedicate an ode to the god and one of the first Greeks to erect a statue to the god at Thebes and at Sparta. 

“and one day Apollo, in his gold-filled house,
will admonish him by oracle,
when at length he enters the Pythian shrine,
to lead a host of men in ships
to the rich precinct of Zeus Ammon by the Nile.”

Pindar, Pythian 4

Later visitors included the Persian king Cambyses, the Athenian commander Cimon, the athlete Eubotas, the Spartan general Lysander, the Macedonian king Alexander the Great, and the Carthaginian commander Hannibal.

Cambyses was said to have wanted to destroy the Oracle but lost his army in a raging sandstorm in the Western Desert instead. Pliny tells us that this was because the sacred stone at the temple was touched by a sacrilegious hand.

In 449 BCE Cimon, the Athenian general, waiting at Cyprus, sent emissaries to the Oracle to ask if he should attack Egypt.  Upon reaching the temple, his emissaries were told "Cimon is already with me!". When they returned to Cyprus they learned that Cimon had died at the same moment as they were speaking with the Oracle.

About 409 BCE, Eubotas, the famous Cyrene athlete sought advice from the Oracle and Lysander, the Spartan general, made two treks to consult with the Oracle. 

In his "History of Alexander," Quintus Curtius writes:

What is worshipped as the god does not have the same form that artificers have commonly given to the deities; its appearance is very like that of a navel fastened in a mass of emeralds and other gems. When an oracle is sought, the priests carry this in a golden boat with many silver cups hanging from both sides of the boat; matrons and maidens follow, singing in the native manner a kind of rude song, by which they believe Jupiter is propitiated and led to give a trustworthy response. (4. 23-25)

Then, after sacrifice had been offered, gifts were given both to the priests and to the god, and the king’s friends also were allowed to consult Jupiter. They asked nothing more than whether the god authorized them to pay divine honours to their king. The prophets replied that this also would be acceptable to Jupiter. (4. 28-29)

Such was the oracle's reputation among the Classical Greeks that Alexander the Great, declared "the son of Amun" by the oracle at Siwa, thereafter considered himself divine.

As for Hannibal, I only found a reference that he visited the Oracle. I wish we knew what he asked and what response he received.

Under Roman administration, the Oracle began to decline in importance.  Not before Cato (the Younger?), though, attempted to consult the Oracle about the freedom of Rome. One source claims the Oracle refused to answer.  Another source claims it was Cato who refused to speak in his effort to challenge and disparage the Oracle. Inscriptions dating to as late as the reign of Trajan have been found there, though.

 

Fragment of a clay slab depicting Jupiter Ammon, 1st century CE, polychrome terracotta at the Museo Barracco in Rome, courtesy of Wikimedia Commons contributor Archeologo

Bronze bust of god Sabazios, 2nd-century CE, in the collections of the Musei Vaticani courtesy of Wikimedia Commons contributor Jebulon.

Tinia, highest god in Etruscan mythology, equivalent to the Roman Jupiter and the Greek Zeus. Terracotta, 300-250 B.C.E. now in the collections of the Staatliche Antikensammlungen in Munich, Germany, courtesy of Wikimedia Commons contributor Dan Mihai Pitea.

Head of a colossal statue of ram-horned Zeus Ammon, Roman Tunisia (?), 150-180 CE, courtesy of Wikimedia Commons contributor Carole Raddato.

Zeus Ammon. Roman copy of a Greek original from the late 5th century BCE. The Greeks of the lower Nile Delta and Cyrenaica combined features of supreme god Zeus with features of the Egyptian god Amun-Ra, now in the collections of the Staatliche Antikensammlungen in Munich, courtesy of Wikimedia Commons contributor Dan Mihai Pitea.

Ancient Roman statue of Zeus Ammon found in Pergamon, now in the collections of the Istanbul Archaeological Museum, courtesy of Wikimedia Commons contributor Giovanni Dall'Orto

Aequipondium (steelyard counterweight) in the shape of a Jupiter Ammon, 190-210 CE, courtesy of Wikimedia Commons contributor Sailko

Head of Zeus Ammon, 1st-2nd centuries CE, Roman copy of a Greek original now in the collections of the Hermitage Museum in St. Petersburg, Russia.

Diorite head of a Ptolemaic king (Ptolemy I?) as Zeus Ammon, from Egypt, now in the collections of the Istanbul Archaeological Museum

A Marble Head of Zeus Ammon, Roman Imperial, 120-160 CE recently sold for $3,554,500. by Sotheby's.

Coin from Cyrene, showing Zeus-Ammon now in the collections of the Kunsthistorisches Museum, Vienna (Austria)

Entrance to the oracle courtesy of (https://www.livius.org/pictures/egypt/siwa/siwa-oracle/)

View of the sanctuary courtesy of (https://www.livius.org/pictures/egypt/siwa/siwa-oracle-1/) Note: with sky replacement - hey, plain blue sky is boring!!

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Do new discoveries disprove sacred sex in ancient temples?

It seems that scholars are never quite sure if they should embrace the reports of ancient historian Herodotus or not. Now a controversy has arisen over his statements that the "ugliest of customs", prostitution, actually took place as part of the sacred rituals inside the Temple of Ishtar.

[Image: Ertoic fresco excavated from Pompeii displayed in the 'Secret Room' of the Naples Archaeological Museum.  Photo by Mary Harrsch]

If you've ever visited the "Secret Room" inside the Museo Archaeologico di Napoli in Naples, you will have no doubt that the ancients definitely enjoyed their carnal pleasure. But did they go so far as to make the deflowering of virgins part of their worship of their respective goddesses of love?

The Greek geographer Strabo thought so claiming that Persians living along the shores of the Black Sea dedicated their "virgin daughters," hardly 12 years old, to cult prostitution.

But, a small group of female gender researchers led by American scholar Julia Assante claim it's all the product of overactive male imaginations. (After all, I saw a program this week on Good Morning America about the differences in the male and female brain where a doctor was discussing how the male brain is "marinated" in testoterone!)

More moderate scholars, however, think disavowing all sacred sexual practices goes a bit too far and have expressed their opinions that there were once:

* Temples that operated brothels on the side;

* Temples in which girls held the highest offices of the priesthood, even before their first menstruation;

* Professional harlots who donated their own money to cult sites, such as a site devoted to the goddess "Aphrodite Porne."

But with all those huge buildings dedicated to Ishtar, the goddess of love, there was not a single instance of ritual depravity?

Gernot Wilhelm, an Orientalist at Julis Maximilian University in Würzburg, Germany discovered a 3,300 year-old legal document that recounts how a man delivered his own daughter to the Temple of Ishtar to serve as a Harimtu.

According to the document, the man wanted a loan from the priests and was offering his daughter as collateral.

But what exactly did the pawned daughter do for her new employers? Wilhelm speculates that the young girl worked as a prostitute, "but outside the temple."

As evidence, the professor cites the "Book of Baruch" in the Old Testament. It describes prostitutes standing "along the paths" between the dusty houses of Babylon. They too were somehow associated with a sacred organization. - "Did Prostitution Really Exist in the Temples of Antiquity? by Matthius Schulz

Assante and her colleagues dispute this interpretation, however.  She says a Harimtu was not a prostitute but just a single woman serving as a cult official.

Her reinterpretation of the word Harimtu doesn't make semantic sense, says economic historian Morris Silver. He insists that the Harimtu were clearly "professional prostitutes with cultic connections," who offered a "sexual service" on behalf of the temple. Priests acted as pimps and collected some of the profits. - "Did Prostitution Really Exist in the Temples of Antiquity? by Matthius Schulz

Other scholars point to the accounts of prostitution surrounding the Temple of Aphrodite in Corinth.  Strabo reports the temple owned a stable of over 1,000 prostitutes (I thought he was supposed to be interested in geography?)  Tanja Scheer, a professor of ancient history at the University of Oldenburg in northern Germany blames it all on an ode to Pindar.

"Pindar writes that a wealthy Olympic champion dedicated the temple to a "hundred-limbed" throng of prostitutes in 464 B.C.," Scheer points out,  "It is unlikely that the prostitutes lounged directly at the altar. Instead the wealthy athlete probably offered the temple financial assistance in the form of female slaves."

Scheer bases her theory on the fact that the Athenian statesman Solon taxed prostitutes working in government houses of pleasure in Athens around 590 B.C.. The revenues were subsequently used to build a temple for worshipers of the goddess of love.  Then somehow the construction of the temple became entangled with the source of the money used to build it in subsequent oral histories .
 
Besides, if you take Pindar literally, a "hundred-limbed" throng of prostitutes would have been only a mere 25 if you count all four limbs or 50 if you count just their arms - that seems a far cry from 1,000.

Strabo's sexual fantasies didn't end there, though, either.  He went on to claim that loose women also inhabited the Temple of Amun in Thebes (Egypt) where they served as godly consorts.

Strabo writes, "a maiden of greatest beauty and most illustrious family prostitutes herself, and cohabits with whatever men she wishes until the natural cleansing of her body takes place" (menstruation). 


 Researchers do admit that a recently translated papyrus fragment does refer to young girls in service to the god.

According to the text, girls are permitted to work in the temple until their first menstruation. After that, however, "they are cast out from their duties." - "Did Prostitution Really Exist in the Temples of Antiquity? by Matthius Schulz

So, as they say on that tabloid TV show, "What side are you on?"

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