Editing Agdistis (section)

==Cult==
Agdistis' main cultic center was apparently the sacred city of [[Pessinus]].<ref>Baudy, [https://referenceworks-brillonline-com.wikipedialibrary.idm.oclc.org/entries/brill-s-new-pauly/*-e107470 s.v. Agdistis]; Walton and Scheid, [https://oxfordre-com.wikipedialibrary.idm.oclc.org/classics/display/10.1093/acrefore/9780199381135.001.0001/acrefore-9780199381135-e-187  s.v. Agdistis]; Lancellotti, p. 9; Grimal, s.v. Agdistis.</ref> From there her cult presumably spread to other places in [[Anatolia]], as well as to Greek islands in the [[Aegean Sea]], mainland Greece, [[Crimea]], and [[Egypt]].<ref>Walton and Scheid, [https://oxfordre-com.wikipedialibrary.idm.oclc.org/classics/display/10.1093/acrefore/9780199381135.001.0001/acrefore-9780199381135-e-187  s.v. Agdistis]; for a detailed description of the epigraphic evidence for the cult of Agdistis, see Sfameni Gasparro, pp. 34&ndash;37.</ref>

In Anatolia, an  inscription from [[Iconium]] invokes Agdistis, alongside Apollo and Artemis, as among those gods considered to be "saviors" (the so-called ("theoi sōtēres"), and an altar at [[Sizma]] represents both Agdistis and the Great Mother.<ref>Walton and Scheid, [https://oxfordre-com.wikipedialibrary.idm.oclc.org/classics/display/10.1093/acrefore/9780199381135.001.0001/acrefore-9780199381135-e-187  s.v. Agdistis]; Sfameni Gasparro, pp. 34&ndash;35.</ref> There was also a religious community at [[Alaşehir|Lydian  Philadelphia]], which enforced a strict moral code, based at a sanctuary of Agdistis (1st century BC).<ref>Walton and Scheid, [https://oxfordre-com.wikipedialibrary.idm.oclc.org/classics/display/10.1093/acrefore/9780199381135.001.0001/acrefore-9780199381135-e-187  s.v. Agdistis]; Sfameni Gasparro, p. 36.</ref> From [[Sardis]], a copy of a 4th-century BC degree forbids the priests of Zeus from attendance at the "mysteries" of Agdistis.<ref>Sfameni Gasparro, p. 37.</ref>

Her name appears on a dedication from the Ancient Greek town of [[Methymna]] on the East [[Aegean Islands|Aegean]] island of [[Lesbos]], off the coast of Anatolia, as well as on a marble base (c. 2nd century BC?), found on the mid-Aegean Greek island of [[Paros]].<ref>Sfameni Gasparro, p. 35.</ref>

Evidence of Agdistis' cult is found in mainland Greece, as early as the 4th&ndash;3rd centuries BC.<ref>Walton and Scheid, [https://oxfordre-com.wikipedialibrary.idm.oclc.org/classics/display/10.1093/acrefore/9780199381135.001.0001/acrefore-9780199381135-e-187  s.v. Agdistis].</ref> A relief of Agdistis and Attis, whose identities are secured by inscription, is found on a marble votive [[stele]] (late 4th or early 3rd-century), from the [[Metroon]] in the [[Piraeus]] the port of ancient Athens ([[Antikensammlung Berlin]] SK 1612). It depicts two figures. On the left is a young male in oriental dress sitting on a rock facing right. In front of him on the right stands a female figure facing left, holding a ''[[Tympanum (hand drum)|tympanum]]'' in her left hand down at her side, and offering a cup in her right hand to the youth who holds out his right hand to receive it.<ref>Lancellotti, p. 63; Sfameni Gasparro, p. 25, n. 24; Vermaseren, [https://archive.org/details/legendofattising0000verm/page/22/mode/2up p. 22], [https://archive.org/details/legendofattising0000verm/page/70/mode/2up Plate XI]; [[Lexicon Iconographicum Mythologiae Classicae|LIMC]] [https://weblimc.org/page/monument/2075020 4381 (Attis 416)].</ref> The  votive dedication reads: "Timothea to Angdistis [an alternate spelling] and Attis on behalf of her children according to command".<ref>Bremmer, p. 540. For the varying forms of the goddesses' name, see Bremmer, p. 552 n. 77.</ref> From a copy of a public decree (1st-century BC?) kept in the Metroon of Athens, we know that she also a had a sanctuary of her own at [[Rhamnous|Rhamnus]], an [[Ancient Greece|ancient Greek]] city in [[Attica]] situated on the coast, overlooking the [[Euboea|Euboean Strait]].<ref>Sfameni Gasparro, p. 35 with n. 38; Lancellotti, p. 63 n. 19, which suggests that the "cult of Agdistis at Rhamnous" was possibly "imported by foreigners, possibly mercenaries".</ref>

Her name also appears on a dedication from [[Panticapaeum]], an ancient Greek city on the eastern shore of [[Crimea]], and, in [[Egypt]], in an inscription<ref>[[Wilhelm Dittenberger|Dittenberger]], ''[[OGIS]]'' [https://archive.org/details/orientisgraeciin01dittuoft/page/56/mode/2up 28]</ref> recording the construction of a ''[[cella|naos]]'' and its ''[[temenos]]'' (temple and temple precinct), during the reign of [[Ptolemy Philadelphus]] (284&ndash;246 BC).<ref>Sfameni Gasparro, p. 36.</ref>

While some of the occurrences of the name "Agdistis" are found together, and in the same context, with the Great Mother (such as in the altar at Sizma) and thus the two goddesses can be assumed to have been considered distinct, most are not. In such cases, where the name is found alone, it is impossible to know whether it was being used as one of the many epithets of the Great Mother, or instead used as a reference to Agdistis as a separate goddess.<ref>Sfameni Gasparro, pp. 34&ndash;37.</ref> In either case, it is also unknown to what extant, if any, Agdistis' peculiar hermaphroditic nature informed Agdists' cult practice.<ref>Sfameni Gasparro, p. 37.</ref>

There is also [[epigram|epigraphic]] evidence that Agdistis was considered to be "a goddess with benevolent and healing traits".<ref>Lancellotti, p. 50 n. 176.</ref>