Summary

Attendant of Mithras with Signs of the Zodiac
Artist	Anonymous (Category:Roman Empire)Unknown author
Title	Attendant of Mithras with Signs of the Zodiac
Object type	statue
Description	English: Mithras was a Persian creation god, as well as the god of light. Mithraism, the mystery religion associated with him, spread throughout the Roman Empire. Initiation into Mithraism was restricted to men and was especially popular with soldiers in Rome and on the northern frontier during the 2nd and 3rd centuries AD. According to the Persian myth, the sun god sent his messenger, the raven, to Mithras and ordered him to sacrifice the primeval white bull. At the moment of its death, the bull became the moon, and Mithras's cloak became the sky, stars, and planets. From the bull also came the first ears of grain and all the other creatures on earth. This scene of sacrifice, central to Mithraism, is called the Tauroctony and is represented as taking place in a cave, observed by Luna, the moon god, and Sol, the invincible Sun god, with whom he became associated in Roman times. Mithras is generally depicted flanked by his two attendants, Cautes and Cautopates, and accompanied by a dog, raven, snake, and scorpion. This is a fragment of a relief that depicted Mithras standing between his two attendants and surrounded by a circular band that included the twelve signs of the zodiac. Partial images of Capricorn, Sagittarius, and Scorpio are preserved here, as well as Mithras's torch-bearing attendant Cautopates. Astrology was central to the Mithraic religion.
Date	1st century date QS:P571,+050-00-00T00:00:00Z/7
Medium	Pentelic marble
Dimensions	height: 50.4 cm (19.8 in); width: 28.1 cm (11 in); depth: 13.5 cm (5.3 in) dimensions QS:P2048,50.4U174728 dimensions QS:P2049,28.1U174728 dimensions QS:P5524,13.5U174728
Collection	Walters Art Museum    Native name Walters Art Museum Location Baltimore, United States of America Coordinates 39° 17′ 48″ N, 76° 36′ 58″ W   Established 1934  Website thewalters.org Authority file : Q210081 VIAF: 128918374 ISNI: 000000040373611X ULAN: 500279110 LCCN: no00096900 GND: 16029354-6 WorldCat institution QS:P195,Q210081
Accession number	23.238
Place of creation	Rome, Italy
Object history	Max Falk, New York 1984: given to Walters Art Museum
Credit line	Gift of Mr. Max Falk, 1984
Source	Walters Art Museum: Home page  Info about artwork
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This file was provided to Wikimedia Commons by the Walters Art Museum as part of a cooperation project. All artworks in the photographs are in public domain due to age. The photographs of two-dimensional objects are also in the public domain. Photographs of three-dimensional objects and all descriptions have been released under the Creative Commons Attribution-Share Alike 3.0 Unported License and the GNU Free Documentation License. In the case of the text descriptions, copyright restrictions only apply to longer descriptions which cross the threshold of originality. العربيَّة | English | français | italiano | македонски | русский | sicilianu | +/−

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