Kybele cult site (Neuss)
The so-called Kybele cult site in Gnadental , Neuss , is a late antique cellar built with dry stone, which was discovered during excavations in 1956.
When the small cellar with two opposite stairs was uncovered in the area of the Roman military camp and canabae legionis , it was believed that a baptismal font for the Taurobolium , the bull's blood baptism of the Cybele cult, had been found. The interpretation was based u. a. to the description of the ritual by the late Roman poet Prudentius . However, this calls the place of the taurobolium a "pit dug into the earth". Two small clay votive figures as well as the figurine of a crowned, seated goddess, which were found in the vicinity of the cellar, are not to be interpreted as a representation of Cybele, but as local mother goddesses, perhaps Sunuxal .
The construction of only 1.80 m × 1.80 m large cellar can be due to the lehmgebundenen Spolienmauerwerks and a built-in wall Jupiter - consecration stone only generally dated to the late antiquity. The 42 coins found in the cellar backfill provide clues for the abandonment of the cellar. The youngest of them is a 341/346 minted follis of the Emperor Constans . However, like the holy stones discovered in the cellar backfill, the coins seem to be offerings to a nearby figure of Jupiter, the fragments of which were also in the cellar backfill.
Which (presumably sacral) function the cellar actually served is still in the dark. Visitors can visit the cellar, which is now in the "Fossa Sanguinis" pavilion ( Neuss-Gnadental ), at any time.
The Kybele cult site is also part of the "historical tour" on the site of Novaesium , the former Roman military camp in what is now Neuss-Gnadental.
- Finds from the "Fossa Sanguinis"
Seated mother goddess with patera (2nd century)
Mother goddess with child (2nd century)
Mother goddess in the form of a bathing Venus (1st to mid 2nd century)
Clay canteen,
2nd – 4th centuries century
Web links
Coordinates: 51 ° 11 '2.05 " N , 6 ° 43' 2.93" E