Agyieus

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Illustration of a coin of Apollo Agyieus from Ambracia, depicting the conical representation of the god.
Illustration of a coin of Apollo Agyieus from Ambracia, depicting the conical representation of the god.

Agyieus (Gr. Ἀγυιεύς) was an epithet of the Greek god Apollo de­scribing him as the protector of the streets, public places, and the entrances to homes.[1] As such he was worshiped at Acharnae,[2] Mycenae,[3] and at Tegea.[4] The origin of the worship of Apollo Agyieus in the last of these places is related by Pausanias.[5][6]

The cult of Apollo Agyieus was aniconic, and this facet of Apollo was worshiped in the form of a pointed column or obelisk,[7] often kept by the front door of a private home,[8][9] or in the open country, rather than in a temple. Some writers have held that the omphalos of the oracle at Delphi was a modified pillar of Agyieus.[10] When standing before a house, the stone objects would be decorated with offerings of ribbon, or wreaths of myrtle or bay.

[edit] References

  1. ^ Schmitz, Leonhard (1867), “Agyieus”, in Smith, William, Dictionary of Greek and Roman Biography and Mythology, vol. 1, Boston: Little, Brown and Company, pp. 83 
  2. ^ Pausanias, Description of Greece i. 31. § 3
  3. ^ Pausanias, Description of Greece ii. 19. § 7
  4. ^ Pausanias, Description of Greece viii. 53. § 1
  5. ^ Comp. Horace, Carmines iv. 6. 28
  6. ^ Macrobius, Saturnalia i. 9
  7. ^ Liddell, Henry; Robert Scott (1996). A Greek-English Lexicon. Oxford: Oxford University Press, 16. ISBN 0-19-864226-1. 
  8. ^ Pherecrates, 87
  9. ^ Dieuchidas, 2
  10. ^ Farnell, Lewis Richard (1907). The Cults of the Greek States. Oxford: Clarendon Press, 308. 

This article incorporates text from the public domain Dictionary of Greek and Roman Biography and Mythology by William Smith (1870).