CULTUL LUI CYBELE - MAGNA MATER ÎN DACIA ROMANĂ
THE CULT OF CYBELE – MAGNA MATER IN ROMAN DACIA

Summary/Abstract: In this article the authors discuss the local specificities of the cult of Magna Mater – Cybele in Roman Dacia. Although, the main aim of the article is not to fulfill the great gap of the literature on the cult – being one of the less researched topic in the Roman religious studies of Dacia – but more to shape the outlines of further studies on the topic, reanalyzing the historical context and the main features of the cult in the province and reinterpreting some of the epigraphic and sculptural monuments. The cult was spread in military environments merely by romanised elements came from danubian provinces. There are six iconographic representations of Cybele in roman Dacia made by stone: marble (4), tuff (1) and calcareous sandstone (1). There is no cult or votive image of Attis in roman Dacia. The iconographic style of the goddess’s representations is the following: the deity sitting on the throne, accompanied by lions, wearing chiton and himation, keeping patera in the right hand and the tympanon in the left. The existence of sanctuaries is problematic, but it seems that a cult edifice has existed at Drobeta, on the left bank of Danube, in the southern Dacia. The epigraphic sources are very few, a number of eight inscriptions were discovered along the time, the most of them (four) at Apulum, the biggest urban center of the province. In spite of its development in the scale of the entire Empire, this cult was worshiped by narrow religious communities in Roman Dacia.

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