Persians and the worship of statues (1)

Text
Aphrodite Anaitis (= Anāhitā) was syncretized with Nanaya.

Berossus, Babyloniaca F11 (Clement of Alexandria, Protreptikos 5.65.2-3):
The Persians, Medes and Magi do not make statues of their gods from wood or stone but honour fire and water like the philosophers. Later, however, after many years they began to worship statues in human form as Berossus reports in the third book of his Chaldean history. Artaxerxes, the son of Darius, the son of Ochus, introduced this practice. He was the first to set up an image of Aphrodite Anaitis in Babylon and to require such worship from the Susians, Ecbatanians, Persians and Bactrians and from Damascus and Sardis.

Sources (list of abbreviations)
Berossus, Babyloniaca F11
Clement of Alexandria, Protreptikos 5.65.2-3

Bibliography

Amar Annus

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