Once one of the Se en Wonders of the World, the Artemision (below) presents a sorry sight at the close of die 20th century, with only a lone column and some masonry to hint at its former grandeur. Here also rose a sacred spring, but the greater attraction was a statue of Artemis, the mother goddess, that stood imposingly within the main chamber. Although the original was destroyed long ago, life-size Roman adaptations, like the one shown on the opposite page, gi'e an impression of what the work must have looked like.
Artemis had a long evolution, from the plump Anatolian mother goddess of the Neolithic period, through her local transformation into Kybele, to her eventual Roman incarnation as Diana. The temple site lies close to Ephesus, the city where Saint Paul preached and, local belief holds. Saint John the Apostle accompanied the Virgin Mary after die Ascension of Jesus. In addition, legend has it that Mary died in the vicinity.
Once Chrisianity gained the upper hand in the region, the temple ii'as stripped of many of its stones so that die Church of Saint John, seen crowning the hill beloM', on the left, could be built in the sixth century AD. Some years earlier, a gathering of early church fadiers convening at Ephesus officially sanctioned the Cult of the Virgin, whose members were already worshiping Mary as the Mother of God.
The four-inch-tall jjold priestess shown below was left at the temple as a votive offering. The priestess wean d bea-tifie smile as an idolator of Artemis, who was not only the mother goddess but the queen of all the animals.
Flanked by deer and beehives, Artemis stretches out her arms in this sccond-eentnry-AD Roman sculpture. In addition to an animal-ornamented headdress and skirt, her attire includes a necklace beneath which can be seen the sijjns of the zodiac, and a vest from which protrude symbols of fertility—perhaps breasts, fruit, e_ggs, or even bull’s testes.
World History
