Iasos: vendita del sacerdozio della Madre degli Dei

Abstract

Iasos: sale of the priesthood of the Mother of the Gods.
A limestone stele found in 2009 in the Agora of Iasos bears witness of anew inscription concerning a sale of a priesthood, confirming a widespreadpractice which was already known in the Carian city and supplementing inthis way our knowledge on this subject. Two contiguous fragments are preserved,which are intact for the first part of the text, but lacunose in the finalpart. The priesthood on sale is the one of the Mother of the Gods, whichfuture priestess will have to exert together with that of the Phrygian Mother.Within the text it is possible to isolate the actual contract, which defines therules the buyer will have to follow. The polis itself sells the hierosyne toits own benefit. The neopoiai take care of the procedure. The priestess willexert her role «on the basis of the νόμος and of the διαγραφή».
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