MOTHER EARTH. - The concept of T. M., that is, of the earth as the origin and mother of all things, is found widely both among various primitive peoples and in the pagan religions of antiquity.
T. M. has its more or less perfect counterpart in the concept of "Father Sky," that is, of the sky as the origin and father of everything, as is in fact found, for example, in the ancient religions belonging to the so-called Indo-European stock, of which Iupiter is a most evident document.
Generally speaking, it may be said that while the concept of Father Sky is meant to reflect civilizations of the patriarchal type, that of T. M. indicates, instead, matriarchal civilizations. It must be added, however, that just as in each of these two types of civilization the other necessarily coexists as well, so in religions the cult of M. T. is associated in a more or less evident manner with that of Father Sky (sometimes replaced by the Sun), and vice versa.
In archaic Greek mythology Gaia (=Earth), together with Uranus, appears as the genitrix of primordial beings (Hesiod, Theogony, 116-54), and in the Homeric hymn she is called mother of all gods and men (v. 31). Yet even in archaic Greek religion she never had the well-defined characteristics of a divinity and, apart from a few oracles (v. below) of some importance, her places of worship were few (Olympia, Tegea, Sparta and Athens). Instead, especially under the influence of the religions of the Near East (Kybele) and of the Cretan religion (Rhea) and through the spread of the Mysteries, T. M. enjoyed notable favor in popular cults, where she was venerated under the name of various female divinities. Among these, which were originally venerated together with Gaia and later separated from her, carrying with them her mythical and cultic elements, one recalls above all Demeter (= T. M.), with her numerous epithets (such as καρποφάγος, κουροτρόφος, γλόη, etc.) denoting her character as genitrix of men and of nature; and her daughter Kora (originally a single figure with her mother), whose abduction by Pluto was meant precisely to signify the death of vegetation until the return of the Mother Goddess of nature; the latter motif being ancient and already widespread in the Sumerian-Babylonian world, where, while the goddess Innini-Ishtar descended to the Underworld, life up in the world risked remaining suspended. A very important aspect of Gaia is that of being the prophetess par excellence (Aeschylus calls her πριστόμαντις: Eumen., 2); in fact, archaic oracles sacred to her are found almost everywhere in the Greek world: at Dodona (together with Zeus), at Delphi, at Olympia, in which places in time she was replaced by other divinities such as Themis, Phoibe, etc.
In Rome, T. M. in the most ancient age was venerated principally under the name of "Tellus Mater" and associated with Iupiter, the Father Sky. Very soon Tellus Mater became associated with various divinities of analogous attributions such as: Flora, Dea Dia, but above all with Ceres (Ceres), together with whom she was often venerated in specific ceremonies, such as, for example: the Feriae sementivae (celebrated after sowing), in which a pregnant sow was sacrificed to the two divinities (Ovid, Fasti, I, 673); the Fordicidia (v.) of April 15, which, although sacred to Tellus, were part of a cycle of festivals in which the Cerealia were also celebrated: in them the Vestalis Maxima burned the fetus of a cow, and the ashes mixed with the blood of the October horse (October equus) were used in the celebration of the Parilia; the Flamen cerealis sacrificed: "Telluri et Cereri, etc." Tellus, moreover, like Demeter in Greece, was connected with the underworld and the Manes, and was also invoked in nuptial ceremonies. Only one temple in Rome was erected in honor of Tellus Mater (in 268 B.C. by the consul P. Sempronius). - See plate CXLIII.
Bibliography4 works
Cesare D'Onofrio