Asklepios
ASKLEPIOS, also known as Asklapios (Gr.) and Aesculapius (Lat.), was the ancient Greek god of healing. The etymology of the name Asklepios is uncertain, but it may derive from ēpiotēs, meaning "gentleness."
Origin of the Cult
Asklepios's cult seems to have originated at Tricca (modern Trikkala in Thessaly), where he must have been consulted as a hērōs iatros ("hero physician"). Though excavated, his site there has yielded no further information about his cult. From Tricca, Asklepios traveled in the form of a baby in swaddling clothes to Titane on the Peloponnese. His fame as a healer grew, and he came to settle at nearby Epidaurus. There he ranked already as a god and was recognized by the state cult (as was also the case later in Kos, Athens, Rome, and Pergamum). Epidaurus maintained the cult and the rites associated with it; furthermore, the city founded numerous sanctuaries elsewhere that were dedicated to the god. Two hundred are known to have existed throughout the Greco-Roman world. Migrations of the cult were always effected by transporting one of Asklepios's sacred snakes from the sanctuary in Epidaurus. The snake was the god in his theriomorphic manifestation, for Asklepios was an essentially chthonic deity (one having origins in the earth), as his epithets "snake" and "dog" amply testify.
