FACES OF GODS, GODS WITHOUT FACES? STARTING A DEBATE ABOUT THE CASE OF THE DACIAN RELIGION AND CULT
FACES OF GODS, GODS WITHOUT FACES? STARTING A DEBATE ABOUT THE CASE OF THE DACIAN RELIGION AND CULT

Summary/Abstract: This article raises the issue of the anthropomorphism of deities and of their cult images in the period of the Dacian kingdom (1st c. B.C.E. – 1st c. C.E.), a matter that has not been sufficiently addressed in the specialized literature. Some of the main information, and their limits, from ancient sources regarding the situation in various areas of temperate Europe during the second Iron Age is also mentioned. A find from a Dacian fortification is discussed (the zoomorphically richly decorated iron discs from Piatra Roșie, in the region of the Dacian kingdom's capital) which could represent one of the few examples of objects involved in cult, found in a round temple’s inner apse room and near it, in a favissa. The issue of the absence of anthropomorphic representations in cult remains open, during the period when religion in the Orăștie Mountains region can be said to have undergone institutionalization of the cult, a period when monumental temples were in use (the second half of the 1st century BC – 1st century AD).

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