ANAGOGICO, SENSO: V. BIBLICA. ANÀHITA. — She is an Iranian female divinity of the later Avesta, in which there is a hymn in her honor: Yast 5.
In it, the power and efficacy of her aid are extolled; to obtain it, the ancient heroes vied with one another in offering sacrifices. She appears as the protectress of the waters, indeed as their personification; it is therefore affirmed that A., rising from the mythical mountain Huxaira, partly pours herself impetuously into the Vourukasha Sea, causing its waters to boil, and partly spreads abundantly over the seven regions of the earth. Given this character, the hymn dedicated to her is also called
âbâa, “waters,” and in the cult the temples erected in her honor were built on the banks of rivers.
It is not clear whence this divinity entered the religion of the later Avesta. She may have been a figure of Iranian polytheism predating Zarathustra, which subsequently, despite his reform, succeeded in entering the religion of the Avesta, like so many other divinities abolished by the reformer; the Iranians’ cult of water and of other elements, such as fire, might suggest this. On the other hand, A. is also widely attested outside the Iranian religious sphere; her cult was flourishing in Asia Minor and also in Armenia, especially in the region of Akhlisene, where she had temples even before the decree of Artaxerxes II (cf. below). In these regions she was identified with Artemis and other divinities, but above all with Astarte, that is, Aphrodite, Venus. She was venerated as the goddess of fertility, marriage, and childbirth; and, as in the cult of Astarte, so too in that of A., sacred prostitution was practiced by girls before they married (Strabo, X, 16, 532). The similarities, therefore, both in attributes and in cult, with Astarte could be explained in two ways: either by assuming that A. was introduced from the Babylonian religion into the Iranian one—in favor of this view would be the fact that the latter has a female divinity, protectress of women, but of a less sensual character and more in keeping with the Iranian religious tradition, called Ashi Vanuhi—or by regarding her as an originally Iranian divinity, personifying the waters, later strongly influenced by the cult of Astarte.
Artaxerxes II officially introduced her cult; according to Berossus, he ordered statues of A. to be erected in Babylon, Susa, Ecbatana, in Persis and Bactria, in Damascus, and in Sardis. In the cuneiform inscription of Susa, this king invokes, besides Ahuramazda, also A. and Mithra; it is therefore probable that, in addition to officially introducing A., he also promoted the cult of Mithra.
An idea of the sculptural representation of A. may be gained from the Yašt cited above, which contains an expressive and colorful description suggestive of a statue. A. appears as a graceful maiden, vigorous and noble-featured, displaying her illustrious lineage, adorned with a fine belt and covered with a broad and richly ornamented mantle. She holds in her hand the sacrificial twigs, has very rich pendants in her ears, and a precious cap adorned with a hundred stars; a fillet with hanging strips adorns her head.