#shepherd god

So, the other day, someone mentioned offering food to Apollo, so I'm gonna make this little thing on certain foods that I associate with Apollo and I think would appropriate in making a devotional meal for him:

-Apollo was a shepherd god. He had his own herd of sacred cows that a lot of people remember in the story of Hermes' first theft (and steps). He was always punished by Zeus to be the mortal shepherd of a king until his time was served. These all point to him as a representation of shepherds in Ancient Greece, like how Hermes was the Olympian messenger. Just like Hermes as a mortal would've been a messenger and basically wears a messenger uniform in Greek mythology, Apollo's a shepherd god. Therefore, he'd really love a good steak or lamb.

-Apollo was also a pasture god. He was the god of plagues and diseases, and he used his weapon to make people drop dead from disease or any other invisible cause, so in the same way that he's healing god that protects people from death and disease and controls both sides of healing and harm, he also ensures the health of crops and vegetation. One of his epithets was used in celebrations to him as the fruit-ripener. So, I can see as a god of warm summertime orchards and pastures in the sun. This makes me think of a certain recipe for pasta with goat cheese that I love. It has basil, garlic, tomato, pasta, and goat cheese, which is even better as a pasture god or any kind of cheese at all is good, and he might especially like goat cheese as a shepherd god.

Dumuzid, beloved of Inanna. Born as the god of Shepherds, Dumuzid was the son of the water god Enki and the goddess Duttur. Dumuzid‘s fertility brought about abundance in livestock and flora, allowing the mortals of the earth to be healthy and well fed. One day however, Dumuzid was brought to the throne of the war goddess Inanna. Just like Dumuzid, Inanna had been pressured by others to look into her suitors for marriage. With his fellow suitor Enkimdu the farmer, the two would have to argue for the goddess’s hand. Despite both Dumuzid and Inanna having no intention to follow through with whatever bureaucratic marriage that would come out of this, when the two conversed they seemed to gravitate to one another. Inanna’s brother, the sun god Utu, noticed this and began to pester his sister to marry Dumuzid. Putting up her emotional walls, Inanna vehemently refused, saying that if anything Enkimdu would be the logical choice, saying that a lowly shepherd could not be prosperous. Dumuzid defended his lifestyle and told inanna that anything a farmer could bring to her a shepherd could bring something even better. Inanna found Dumuzid’s passion beautiful, and with Utu and even Enkimdu encouraging her she offered her hand to Dumuzid. Inanna hurried to her mother Ningal and asked her for advice on how to woo Dumuzid. Doing as her mother instructed, Inanna bathed, lathered herself in scented oil, donned her brilliant white robes and hung a lapis necklace around her neck. Together with her sukkal Ninshubur, Inanna held a passionate night with Dumuzid, all the while exclaiming her love for him and promising her undying protection over him. The two’s marriage was incredibly fruitful, their love bore an abundance of crops and proliferated livestock. One day Inanna desired her husband, but as he was tending to his flock she could only languish in his absence. At first she was able to hold herself back, but eventually she broke, and flew away to the steppes to reunite with her husband. But when she arrives she’s alerted by the locals the Dumuzid had been murdered by the bandit goddess Bilulu and her son Girgire. In a wrathful fury, Inanna chased down Bilulu, slaughtering her son in front of her eyes, and in an act of retribution, transformed the goddess into a water skin. Still conscious, Inanna used the transformed Bilulu to pour out the funeral offerings for Dumuzid. Inanna wallowed in her grief with Dumuzid’s family, Inanna crys for days on end not once leaving Dumuzid’s side. A fly greatly pitied Inanna, so the fly informed Inanna where Dumuzid could be found in the underworld. Determined, Inanna raids Kur, locating Dumuzid and fleeing with him. However the Galla demons of Kur chase her down, clawing at Dumuzid. Cornering Inanna, Dumuzid’s sister, Geshtinanna, comes forward, offering to replace Dumuzid in Kur, with it being decreed that Dumuzid would spend half the year in the underworld with Inanna’s sister Ereshkigal, and the other half with Inanna, reuniting the two lovers.

Inanna’s worship was heavily tied with Dumuzid, with worshippers offering prayer to Dumuzid for good harvests and fertility. During the harsh dry seasons in Sumer, worshippers would hold public grieving ceremonies for Dumuzid, his death and subsequent resurrection was believed to bring about the dry and wet seasons. Dumuzid was also seen as the god of milk, a drink that was seen as a rare commodity in ancient Sumer, in myths it’s noted that Dumuzid regularly gifts inanna milk, a culturally significant gesture. Inanna’s relationship with Dumuzid was an incredibly popular focus in Sumer, with many scholars noting their close romantic relationship. This is compounded by the multitude of romantic poetry tablets, these tablets describe the two god’s many erotic encounters in great detail, in which their love and praise for one another is highlighted. However in some myths this is contradicted, as Inanna is sometimes recorded as handing Dumuzid over to the Galla demons of Kur for not mourning her after she journeyed to the underworld. Scholars have noted that this rendition seems to be contradictory of the cultural consensus of Dumuzid and Inanna’s relationship. Nonetheless this version of Inanna was the one that the later Akkadians drew upon in their depiction of Inanna, now known as Ishtar. In their rendition of the Epic of Gilgamesh, Ishtar is noted as an abusive lover who turned Dumuzid into an allalu bird. Dumuzid was referred to under the name Tammuz by the Akkadians. Both Dumuzid and Tammuz were associated with the Canaanite word Adon, meaning “Lord”. It was under the name Adonis, descended from Adon, where Dumuzid and Inanna’s worship descended into the Greek Aphrodite and Adonis. Dumuzid himself likely descended from the proto-Semitic traditions of Baal, Astarte and Anat, stemming from the myth of Baal’s death and return by the hands of Mot. In the Bible Tammuz is denounced as a false idol, with emphasis placed on the practices of his worship. Later Tammuz was rendered as a demon in John Milton’s paradise lost, though this view of Tammuz didn’t gain as much traction as Dagon.