The gate of the year

Figure on the left:

Wooden statue representing the goddess Mephitis, height 168 cm., discovered in the sanctuary of the Valle d’Ansanto, near Rocca San Felice (Avellino), dating to the VI-V century B.C. and actually in the Museum of Capodimonte, Naples, Italy.
The cult of the goddess Mephitis is documented in the region inhabited by the ancient Italic people of the Osci, particularly in the Valle d’Ansanto, since the VI century B.C. The particular landscape configuration, of volcanic origin, its sulphurous waters and the sulphur exhalations were determining factors for the sacralisation of the place. The goddess reveals indeed a special relationship with thermal and sulphurous waters, to which therapeutic properties were attributed, and with milky springs, which were regarded as propitiators for the secretion of milk in the new mothers. Mephitis assumed in this way the quality of a goddess of health and of women’s fertility. Her cult was deeply rooted, as demonstrated by the fact that it survived to the introduction of Christianity, which has substituted in these places the cult of the Virgin Mary to that of the ancient goddess, maintaining nevertheless the main functions. At Rossano di Vaglio, for example, a chapel was dedicated to the Virgin, just near the spring that flew through the pagan temple, while at Mirabella Eclano was instituted the cult of the Sacred Milk of the Most Blissful Virgin (Calisti, 2006).

[Image: http://www.romanoimpero.com/2011/03/culto-di-mefite.html]

Figure on the right:

Bronze statuette of the goddess Mephitis (II-III century B.C.), from the sanctuary of San Pietro di Cantoni (Sepino, Campobasso) and now in the Saepinum Archaeological Museum, Altilia di Sepino (Campobasso, Italy).
The sanctuary was frequented continually from the IV century B.C. until the V century A.D., and its remains are superimposed by a Christian religious building, now destroyed. In the area of the temple have been discovered several votive objects, reproducing parts of the human body to invoke healing, as well as working tools and loom weights which are associated with the agricultural works, to transhumance and to female activities. The statuette represents the goddess with a duck in her hand, probable reference to the aquatic world, Mephitis’s specific domain, but perhaps also to the periodic migration of the water birds, as marker of the seasonal changes. The powers and characteristics of the goddess are attributable to her function as patroness and propitiator of fertility in women, in the fields and in the animals, as well as her other function as healer and patroness of the health of both humans and animals.

[Image: http://www.romanoimpero.com/2011/03/culto-di-mefite.html]




Female Symbols

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Figure on the left: Wooden statue representing the goddess Mephitis, height 168 cm., discovered in the sanctuary of the Valle d’Ansanto, near Rocca San Felice (Avellino), dating to the VI-V century B.C. and actually in the Museum of Capodimonte, Naples, Italy. The cult of the goddess Mephitis is documented in the region inhabited by the ancient Italic people of the Osci, particularly in the Valle d’Ansanto, since the VI century B.C. The particular landscape configuration, of volcanic origin, its sulphurous waters and the sulphur exhalations were determining factors for the sacralisation of the place. The goddess reveals indeed a special relationship with thermal and sulphurous waters, to which therapeutic properties were attributed, and with milky springs, which were regarded as propitiators for the secretion of milk in the new mothers. Mephitis assumed in this way the quality of a goddess of health and of women’s fertility. Her cult was deeply rooted, as demonstrated by the fact that it survived to the introduction of Christianity, which has substituted in these places the cult of the Virgin Mary to that of the ancient goddess, maintaining nevertheless the main functions. At Rossano di Vaglio, for example, a chapel was dedicated to the Virgin, just near the spring that flew through the pagan temple, while at Mirabella Eclano was instituted the cult of the Sacred Milk of the Most Blissful Virgin (Calisti, 2006). [Image: http://www.romanoimpero.com/2011/03/culto-di-mefite.html] Figure on the right: Bronze statuette of the goddess Mephitis (II-III century B.C.), from the sanctuary of San Pietro di Cantoni (Sepino, Campobasso) and now in the Saepinum Archaeological Museum, Altilia di Sepino (Campobasso, Italy). The sanctuary was frequented continually from the IV century B.C. until the V century A.D., and its remains are superimposed by a Christian religious building, now destroyed. In the area of the temple have been discovered several votive objects, reproducing parts of the human body to invoke healing, as well as working tools and loom weights which are associated with the agricultural works, to transhumance and to female activities. The statuette represents the goddess with a duck in her hand, probable reference to the aquatic world, Mephitis’s specific domain, but perhaps also to the periodic migration of the water birds, as marker of the seasonal changes. The powers and characteristics of the goddess are attributable to her function as patroness and propitiator of fertility in women, in the fields and in the animals, as well as her other function as healer and patroness of the health of both humans and animals. [Image: http://www.romanoimpero.com/2011/03/culto-di-mefite.html]