36 MARCH/APRIL 2020
Israel, and Turkey. She became linked with
regional deities. In Greece Isis was originally
linked with Demeter, goddess of agriculture.
In and around Lebanon she was associated
with the Middle Eastern goddess Astarte. In
Roman cities she was linked with Fortuna,
goddess of luck, and Venus, goddess of love.
The first- and second-century a.d. writer
Plutarch likened her to Persephone, consort
of Hades, the lord of the underworld.
Temples to Isis were erected throughout
the Mediterranean world. Among them was
the Temple of Isis on Delos in the Aegean, a
tiny, arid island that became an important
trading post in the Ptolemaic era. The im-
pressive Doric Temple of Isis, whose ruins
still stand on the island, was built in the early
second century b.c. Roman merchants operat-
ing on Delos adopted the Isis cult they found
there and took it back with them when they
returned to Naples, Campania, Ostia, Rome,
and Sicily. Isis had become an emblem of Ptol-
emaic hegemony; by the first century b.c., her
cult reached as far west as Spain.
As worship of Isis continued to spread, the
goddess’s responsibilities expanded as well.A PRIEST OF ISIS DEPICTED IN A FRESCO
FROM THE TEMPLE OF ISIS, POMPEII. NATIONAL
ARCHAEOLOGICAL MUSEUM, NAPLES
SCALA, FLORENCEPtolemy III Euergetes, in the third century b.c.
Under Ptolemaic rule, aspects of Osiris and
Apis were combined with traits of Greek gods,
including Zeus and Hades, to create a syncretic
deity, Serapis. His associa-
tion with the underworld,
and therefore with Osiris,
helped the framers of the
new Ptolemaic cult settle on
Isis as Serapis’s consort.
Their center of worship was in Alex-
andria, a major commercial center under
the Ptolemies. To Alexandrian merchants,
Isis and Serapis became associated with pros-
perity in addition to the afterlife, healing, and
fertility.Evolution of a Goddess
As Ptolemaic influence spread through-
out the eastern Mediterranean, worship
of Isis also traveled along the trade routes
to the coastlines of modern-day Syria,HISTORIANS BELIEVE THAT THE
FIGURES DEPICTED ON THIS FIRST-
CENTURY A.D. TOMB NEAR ROME
ARE EGYPTIANS PARTICIPATING IN
THE WORSHIP OF ISIS.
DEA/ALBUM