Extract

A Thracian goddess. Little is known of the character of her cult; Strabo says—but does he know?—that it was orgiastic (10. 3. 16). Greek artists represented her as a booted huntress, rather like Artemis; she is sometimes described as δίλογχος, twin-speared. Her cult was introduced to Athens in two stages: by 430/29 bce she shared with the Phrygian Adrasteia a small treasury under the control of the Treasurers of the Other Gods; and a decree of (probably) 413/2 (Inscriptiones Graecae 13. 136) assigned her a priestess and founded the great festival in the *Piraeus known from the opening of *Plato (1)'s Republic, at which twin processions, of native Thracians and of Athenians, were followed by a torch-race on horseback and an ‘all-night celebration’ (παννυχίς). The role played by Thracians in the Athenian public cult is confirmed by decrees issued by a body of Thracian ‘*orgeōnes of Bendis’ in the 3rd cent.