The Greeks An Introduction to Their Culture, 3rd edition

RELIGION AND SOCIAL LIFE 111

anthropomorphic form (the Greeks rejected the animal-headed figures of Egyptian
detities) but wearing an Egyptian headdress (fig. 29). The Syrian goddess Atargatis
by the early third century was worshipped in Egypt and Greece, reflecting the growing
cosmopolitanism of religious cults in post-Classical Greece. The cult of Isis in the
Hellenistic world seems to have been gradually modified. In a later inscription from
an Anatolian city, Isis presents herself as a daughter of Cronos and thesmophoros, the
bringer of laws, taking upon herself the role of the Greek Demeter. The new cults by
no means replaced the old but in a more fluid world lived alongside them. There were
evident continuities with the Classical past. The Hellenistic kings identified with the
Olympians as patrons or ancestors and also continued the practice of endowing
famous Greek sanctuaries at Delphi and Olympia with statues and new buildings.
With the breakdown of the polis,religious loyalties and practice may have been less
localized but the main cults, particularly of Dionysus, Apollo and Asclepius, had
universal characteristics that enabled them to survive new political realities. Athena,
for example, became the presiding deity of Pergamum. In the light of what was to
come with the advent of Christianity and Islam, changing religious practice in the
Hellenistic centuries was comparatively gradual.

Pan-Hellenic games

Games were a part of Greek life from the earliest times, as witnessed in the funeral
games held in honour of Patroclus and presided over by Achilles (Iliad23). They were
established throughout the Greek world, becoming a major part of religious festivals,
the most famous being the Olympian and the Nemean, both in honour of Zeus in the
Peloponnese, the Pythian at Delphi in honour of Apollo, and the Isthmian at Corinth

FIGURE 28 A gold stater with the

head of Alexander the Great,

depicted with ram’s horns (indicating

his identification with the god

Ammon); issued by Lysimachos, the

coin dates to about 297–281 BC

Source:Photo courtesy of CNG Coins