Salutary Gods (Salutares)

SALUTARY GODS (Salutares). - These are the gods who protect physical health. They belong directly or indirectly to the sphere of Apollo (v.), the solar god who with his rays brings disease and epidemics but also healing and health, whence his epithets of ἀλεξίωστος "averter of evils"; ἀποτρόπαιος "repeller"; πατέρων "liberator."

His son, who is a hypostasis of his healing power, is Ἀσκληπιός, god of medicine, connected in a particular way with the underworld, as is demonstrated by his constant attribute of the chthonic animal, the serpent, and by the rite of incubation practiced in his sanctuaries. To his sphere belong Ἀληξάνος "the savior," Ἀράτος "the desired one"; Ἐλπίνος, his paredra "she who heals"; Εὐχάριον "the augurer of a good day"; Ἀκήριος "the one who wards off harm"; Ἔγλιος "health"; Ἐλβόφορος "he who brings to a good end," the last of whom had a special prominence in the Asclepieion of Pergamum and from there during the first centuries of the Empire radiated toward the West, to Epidaurus, in the Argolid, to Athens, Naupactus, Sicyon. Telesphorus is represented as a child (protector of youthful health) entirely wrapped in a cloak provided with a hood (bardocantillus, penula).

In Greece even the heroes have the function of d. s. insofar as they are prophets and protectors not only of the city that honors them but also of the good health of those who have recourse to them. The two physicians Machaon (tomb and sanctuary at Gerenia in Laconia) and Podalirius (sanctuary in Apulia near the Gargano), Iatros (in Athens near the Theseum), Aristomachus (at Marathon) are all heroes who have made explicit their power as d. s.

Nicola Turchi