| Dictionary, Encyclopedia and Thesaurus - The Free Dictionary 1,822,908,945 visitors served. |
|
Dictionary/ thesaurus | Medical dictionary | Legal dictionary | Financial dictionary | Acronyms | Idioms | Encyclopedia | Wikipedia encyclopedia | ? |
hieros gamos |
Also found in: Wikipedia | 0.02 sec. |
hieros gamos(Greek: “sacred marriage”) Sexual relations of fertility deities enacted in myths and rituals, characteristic of societies based on cereal agriculture (e.g., Mesopotamia, Phoenicia, and Canaan). At least once a year, people dressed as gods engaged in sexual intercourse to guarantee the fertility of the land. The festival began with a procession to the marriage celebration, which was followed by an exchange of gifts, a purification rite, the wedding feast, preparation of the wedding chamber, and a secret nocturnal act of intercourse. How to thank TFD for its existence? Tell a friend about us, add a link to this page, add the site to iGoogle, or visit webmaster's page for free fun content. |
|
| ? Mentioned in | ? References in periodicals archive | |
|---|---|---|
| People erect a maypole and enact the dance of the sacred marriage to symbolize the fertility of the land. The second is the hieros gamos, the sacred marriage of god and goddess, or king and goddess, or god with representative human female, sometimes perhaps ritually enacted in temple cults. If a politician is willing to break sacred marriage vows made to the most important people in their life, what chance does their constituency have for honest representation? |
| Encyclopedia |
| Free Tools: |
For surfers:
Free toolbar & extensions |
Word of the Day |
Help
For webmasters: Free content | Linking | Lookup box | Double-click lookup | Partner with us |
|---|