104 CHAPTER 1
so-called Serpent-Legged Goddess (half-maiden, half-snake). Out of this
liaison came three sons, the youngest of whom was Scythes. He became the
ancestor of the Scythian kings.394 The demi-serpent image of the ancestress of
the Scythians, as well as the cave she lived in, indicate her chthonic nature and
her connection to the fertility functions of the earth. It is therefore believed
that the goddess is Api (Gaea—the Earth). Since the etymological meaning
of the word api is “water”, it could be concluded that this goddess symbolized
earth and water for the Scythians. Alternatively, she was the Great Mother
Goddess.
Diodorus calls the Serpent-Legged Goddess “a maiden born of the Earth”,395
i.e. a daughter of the Great Goddess. She conceived Scythes by Zeus. At the
same time, Targitaus was the son of Zeus from the daughter of the Borysthenes
River. The various female figures actually represent one goddess. As the wife of
Zeus she is the Great Mother Goddess, but as a maiden she conceives from her
son Targitaus and gives birth to the Scythians and their first ruler. The marriage
of the Maiden Goddess ensures the fertility of the land. This is why each year
the Scythian king inseminated the virgin land with a symbolic first ploughing
and thus consummated his marriage with the goddess.396 Thus, the Scythian
Great Mother Goddess is also a Maiden. A similar belief is probably reflected in
the myth of Hera who restored her virginity by immersing herself in the waters
of Kanathos.397
The marriage of the Scythian king and the goddess could also be seen as
a union of two fires—“a divine, supreme one, embodied in the fire goddess
Tabiti, and a corporal one, embodied in the sun and represented by its epiph-
any, the king”.398 Through the marriage of the solar fire (represented by the
Scythian king) and the divine one (the Celestial Goddess Tabiti), the Sun
(the king) received new strength. Hence, each year the Scythian king married
the goddess anew. This belief is associated with the notion of the waning and
death of the sun and its rebirth. This leads to the annual killing of the ritual
vicegerent of the Scythian king. Initially, he slept (which was equivalent to
a temporary, symbolic death) next to the sacred golden royal objects. Once
394 Raevskii 1977, 21–22; Marazov 1976, 51; Venedikov 1997, 142–146. See Herodotus. Histories
4.8–10 in Dimitrov 1990, 11–12.
395 Diodorus. Historical Library 2.43, quoted from Raevskii 1977, 24.
396 Raevskii 1977, 20, 24, 42, 45, and 48–49; Raevskii 1985, 38, 41, and 53; Marazov 1976, 50 and
52; Abaev 1962, 447–448.
397 Marazov 1976, 49.
398 Raevskii 1977, 102.