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Encyclopedia Britannica - Main :: PAI-PAS |
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PAPHOS , an ancient city and sanctuary on the west coast of Cyprus. The sanctuary and older town (Pa]aepaphos) lie at Kouklia, about 20 M. west of Limasol
York
Paphos owes its ancient fame to the cult of the " Paphian goddess" (rt Hacbial avcw ra, or it IIacpia, in inscriptions , or simply 8ea), a nature-worship of the same type as the cults of Phoenician Astarte, maintained by a college of, orgiastic ministers, practising sensual excess and self-mutilation.2 The Greeks identified both this and a similar cult at Ascalon with their own worship of Aphrodite,3 and localized at Paphos the legend of her birth from the sea foam, which is in fact accumulated here, on certain winds, in masses more than a foot deep.4 Her grave also was1 E. Schrader, Abh. k. Preuss. Ak. Wiss. (1879), pp. 31-36; Sitzb. k. Preuss. Ak. Wiss. (1890), pp. 337-344. 2 Athan. c. graecos, to. On all these cults see J. G. Frazer, Adonis, Attis, Osiris (London, 1906). 3 Herod. i. t05; See further ASTARTE, APHRODITE. 4 Oberhummer, Die Insel Cypern (Munich, 1903), pp. 108-11o. PAPIAS-PAPIE.R MACHE 737 shown in this city. She was worshipped, under the form of a conical stone, in an open-air sanctuary of the usual Cypriote type (not unlike those of Mycenaean Greece), the general form of which is known from representations on late gems, and on Roman imperial coins;' its ground plan was discovered by excavations in x888.2 It suffered repeatedly from earthquakes, and was rebuilt more than once; in Roman times it consisted of an open court, irregularly quadrangular, with porticos and chambers on three sides, and a gateway through them on the east. The position of the sacred stone, and the interpretation of many details shown on the gems and coins, remain uncertain. South of the main court lie the remains of what may be either an earlier temple, or the traditional tomb of Cinyras, almost wholly destroyed except its west wall
After the foundation of New Paphos and the extinction of the Cinyrad and Ptolemaic dynasties, the importance of the Old Town declined rapidly. Though restored by Augustus
New Paphos became the administrative capital of the whole island in Ptolemaic and Roman days, as well as the head of one of the four Roman districts; it was also a flourishing commercial city in the time of Strabo, and famous for its oil, and for " diamonds " of medicinal power. There was a festal procession thence annually to the ancient temple. In A.D. 96o it was attacked and destroyed by the Saracens. The site shows a Roman theatre, amphitheatre, temple and other ruins, with part of the city wall
See W. H. Engel, Kypros (Berlin, 1841) (classical allusions) ; M. R. James and others, Journ. Hellenic Studies, ix. 147 sqq. (history and archaeology); G. F. Hill, Brit. Mus. Cat. Coins of Cyprus (London, 1904) (coins) ; art. " Aphrodite " in Roscher's Lexicon der gr. u. rom. Mythologie; also works cited in footnotes, and article CYPRUS. (J. L. M.) End of Article: PAPHOS If you wish, you can link directly to this article.
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