"Despite the documented evidence of chess historian H.J.R. Murray, I have always thought that chess was invented by a goddess." George Koltanowski, from Women in Chess, Players of the Modern Game
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Sunday, August 9, 2009
Goddess: Maize Goddess Chicomecoatl - Follow-up
Prior post. Following-up on my comment to Carlos in response to his comment under the original post, I am not able to post images in a comment, so I thought I would post some images here, to show the remarkable coincidence of imagery between the old world and the new.
When I first saw Chicomecoatl, I was very much struck by the "tower"-like crown she wears. It reminded me of other Goddesses I've seen wearing similar headdresses/crowns.
Here is an image of the Goddess Cybele (which may be from Pergamum) - I was wrong in the information in my post - this is NOT the image of Cybele sent to Rome in c. 204 BCE. That Cybele was a sacred Black Stone that fell from the sky (a meterorite), similar to many other sacred Black Stones from Heaven worshipped as the Goddess -- Diana of Ephesus, for instance, and the sacred Black Stone in the Kabala at Mecca, which pre-dates the foundation of Islam. I do not have a date on this Cybele. By the way, Diana of Ephesus was also often depicted with a tower-like crown, many-breasted, and with cornucopias of fruit and grains.
There are many sculptures and icons, going back as far as Catyl Hoyuk, showing a Goddess seated on a throne flanked by two lions, often wearing a towering crown or an actual tower as a crown. Here is an image of the Syrian goddess Atargatis, also known as Dea Syria by the Romans: Goddess wearing an impressive mural crown and flanked by doves, probably Artargatis identified with Aphrodite/Venus. Relief from the temple of Adonis at Duro-Europos. Dated to around the 1st century BCE. (Bilde attributes it to Khirbet Et-Tannur.)Drawing © S. Beaulieu, after Bilde 1990: 175, fig. 7.
More tomorrow - got to show down now - another severe thunderstorm with a lot of lightning is rolling through now. I can see this is going to be a sleepless night. Time to pull out a good book.
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