Perhaps I should start this article by explaining the term Levant(1) since it might not be familiar to all the readers of this blog. The word comes from Middle French and means the Orient. From a geographical perspective, the Levant is that region of West Asia comprising the eastern shores of the Mediterranean. It is bordered to the north by the Taurus mountains of Turkey. It reaches the Zagros mountain range which forms the border between Iraq and Iran to the east and extends southward to the Arabian desert. The Island of Cyprus was historically, and until very recent times culturally, a part of Greater Syria, as the Levant is known to the more fervent Syrian Social Nationalists in Lebanon and Syria. Additionally, Jordan, Palestine, the Sinai Desert and parts of Iraq belong to this region as well. If you are wondering whether I accidentally omitted Israel or not, wonder no more. A sixty-two year old “country” with an acute identity crisis as to claim that it invented Hummus and Falafel, both documented to have been served in popular eating houses in Tartous in the latter part of the 19th century, does not belong here. The apartheid walls they built will mostly keep them, the Israelis, prisoners of their own guilt, further isolating them from a magical place of immense ethnic diversity.
Well now that I have passed my political message across I can focus on the more meaningful aspects of life. Among my most persistent interests in the field of Levantine history is the pursuit of Syrian deities. I find it myopic that the West traces its roots to Greek culture and mythology then stops. The Greeks were outstanding in their own right and they indeed were the catalyst behind the rise of Western civilization. But history predated them and started a little further east, not too far from where I am sitting right now behind my American branded laptop. German Archeologist, Markus Gschwind remarked that “beneath every footstep in Syria is an ancient civilization(2).” Rightly so, as merely a stone throw away from my window Phoenician ships once sailed across the Mediterranean carrying dyes and silk in their holds and the Alphabet and Gods in the language of their sailors. My story today is about one Syrian Goddess by the name of Atargatis(3).
Phoenician sailors brought her to Sicily. From there her followers spread northward reaching Rome, where she was known as Dea Syria, the Syrian Goddess. She was admitted into the Roman pantheon side by side with Jupiter (Syrian Haddad :-) and worshiped as reverently. Her faith continued to grow and spread throughout the Roman Empire and the Gaul (Western Europe) and toward the end of this era she reached the status of the Great Mother Goddess of the Empire.
Atargatis is a Semitic word. She was called Athtart by the Phoenicians and perhaps that explains why she is often confused with Astarte. Strong evidence suggests that they were two different deities as their cults were very distinct from one another initially. Several other goddesses, Syrian, Greek and Roman were later identified with Atargatis, perhaps all better known than her: Ishtar, Venus Urania, Hera, Rhea, Cybele, Aphrodite and Artemis Azzanathcona. Even most Syrians today are more familiar with Atargatis' daughter Semiramis, the famous Assyrian queen who built the hanging gardens.
Early Syrian religions did not provide impetus for the rise of monotheist Judaism, Christianity and Islam only but formed the mythological bedrock of paganism in Europe. The statue of the Little Mermaid in Copenhagen(5) sculpted by Edvard Erichsen in 1913 is said to symbolize a fairy tale. Danish author and poet Hans Christian Andersen wrote about a mermaid who fell in love with a prince living on land and who came to shore everyday to see him. Is it a Viking figment of imagination or simply a Syrian story of old neglected by the sons and daughters of Atargatis?
(1)Levant: also known as Al-Mashriq and Bilad Al-Sham(2)Thaindian News
(3)The Obscure Goddess Online Dictionary
(5)The Little Mermaid