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Hierodules (Ancient Greek: ἱερόδουλοι ἄνδρες / hieródouloi ándres or ἱερόδουλαι γυναῖκες / hieródoulai gynaĩkes) were men and women dedicated as slaves to the service of a deity. Hierodules were of Near Eastern origin, and appear most frequently associated with the worship of the deities of Syria, Phoenicia, Mesopotamia, and Asia Minor. They were divided into two classes: the first, consisting of slaves, performed menial tasks associated with worship and maintenance of sacred premises, while the second class included free persons who voluntarily offered themselves as slaves to the gods, often working in temples or engaging in prostitution, with their earnings offered to the gods.

Types

Hierodules were divided into two classes; the first consisted of slaves who performed menial tasks associated with the worship of the gods and the maintenance of sacred premises. Their descendants continued in the same servile condition. The second class included free persons who voluntarily offered themselves as slaves to the gods. They were either assigned to temples or dispersed throughout the country, bringing the money they earned as offerings to the gods. Women belonging to this class engaged in prostitution, offering the money they earned to the gods.

Ancient Near East

Hierodules served the Goddess of a temple, especially those of Inanna and Ishtar. Their services usually included assisting in or performing the hieros gamos, the sacred union (sacred sexual intercourse). In the original cult, temple priestesses led the religious services and managed all aspects of society centered around the temple. They had hierodules at their disposal for various tasks, including tilling the fields surrounding the temple, maintaining the temple itself, and assisting in temple services and ceremonies. The hierodules' duties included performing songs, dances, and music to accompany the sacrifices. The pomp with which religious worship was celebrated in the East and the vast domains which many of the temples possessed required a large number of servants and slaves.

In Mesopotamia

In Uruk, the hierodules were called the nugig in Sumerian (the "purifiers", qadištu Akkadian). Lilith, according to a clay tablet, is said to have been a nugig, "sent out by Inanna to take men off the streets". At the head of the temple was a high priestess (nin-diĝir in Sumerian, ēntu in Akkadian), assisted by the priestesses (lukur/nadītu), which were accomplished women with specific offices, who lived in or near the temple. Initially, hieros gamos was considered a way to achieve unity with the divine principle. Over time, this aspect became increasingly obscured, and the temple service gradually transformed into a carnal practice, later labeled as "temple prostitution". Both male and female hierodules were employed for this purpose.

Fifth century BC historian Herodotus reports that in Babylon, every woman, regardless of social status, is required to sit in the temple of Aphrodite and have intercourse with a stranger at least once in her life; he explains:

The foulest Babylonian custom is that which compels every woman of the land to sit in the temple of Aphrodite and have intercourse with some stranger once in her life. Many women who are rich and proud and disdain to mingle with the rest, drive to the temple in covered carriages drawn by teams, and stand there with a great retinue of attendants. But most sit down in the sacred plot of Aphrodite, with crowns of cord on their heads; there is a great multitude of women coming and going; passages marked by line run every way through the crowd, by which the men pass and make their choice. Once a woman has taken her place there, she does not go away to her home before some stranger has cast money into her lap, and had intercourse with her outside the temple; but while he casts the money, he must say, “I invite you in the name of Mylitta” (that is the Assyrian name for Aphrodite). [4] It does not matter what sum the money is; the woman will never refuse, for that would be a sin, the money being by this act made sacred. So she follows the first man who casts it and rejects no one. After their intercourse, having discharged her sacred duty to the goddess, she goes away to her home; and thereafter there is no bribe however great that will get her. [5] So then the women that are fair and tall are soon free to depart, but the uncomely have long to wait because they cannot fulfill the law; for some of them remain for three years, or four. There is a custom like this in some parts of Cyprus.

— Herodotus, The Histories

In Anatolia

According to Strabo writing in the first century CE, the great temple of Comana in Cappadocia possessed as many as 6,000 hierodules, and that of Morimene numbered 3,000.

In Phoenicia

So numerous were the hierodules in Tyre in Phoenicia that the high priest frequently acceded to the throne with their support..

The evidence for sacred prostitution in Phoenicia is limited, with sparse and late sources mentioning cultic prostitution only in specific locations within the ancient maritime city-states. Byblos and Baalbek (Heliopolis) and are identified as sites of cultic prostitution by second century Syrian historian Lucian, and in Christian writings of the the fourth century CE and later respectively, with accusations of debauchery extending to the mountain sanctuary of Apheca in the hinterland of Byblos. While coastal cities like Tyre, Sidon, and Byblos were centers of Phoenician culture, evidence for sacred prostitution is scarce, and the tradition seems, according to Bird, to be more of a late development influenced by mystery religions. The texts do not provide evidence for a common institution of sacred prostitution associated with fertility cults or for a class of cultic prostitutes in Phoenicia.

Bird argues that the texts cited as evidence for an institution of sacred prostitution in ancient Canaanite/Phoenician society do not provide access to any pre-Hellenistic practice, nor do they describe a single institution or activity. While heavily associated with the figure of Aphrodite, sacred prostitution appears to be strongly localized and restricted to specific sites where she was celebrated as the goddess of erotic sexuality. It is primarily the cult of Cyprian Aphrodite that provides the model for these practices. Unlike modern interpretations, ancient sources do not connect sacred prostitution to agricultural or human fertility or to the concept of "sacred marriage." Fertility themes in the cult of Aphrodite are mainly associated with Adonis, who is rarely mentioned in sacred prostitution texts. None of these texts treat sexual activity as a ritual or symbolic act.

Ancient Greece

Greek temples employed slaves to perform menial tasks, but there are also references to free individuals of various abilities who voluntarily dedicated themselves to serving a god. These individuals are often referred to as hieroduli.

Masters who wished to grant freedom to their slaves but were unable to do so for various reasons would sometimes present them to certain temples as hierodules, either as a gift or through a form of sale. Instances of such emancipation are frequently recorded in inscriptions. Female hierodules, who engaged in prostitution, are only found in Greece in connection with the worship of gods of Near Easter origin or those from whom many religious rites were derived from the Near East.

One such example is Aphrodite whose worship was imported from, or at least influenced by, the cult of Astarte in Phoenicia. In her temple at Corinth, there were a thousand ἱερόδουλοι ἑταῖραι (sacred companions), and a large number of women of the same class were also present in her temple at Eryx, in Sicily.

References

Sources

• Herodotus. Histories. Vol. II.6.

• Bird, Phyllis A. (2020). Harlot or Holy Woman?: A Study of Hebrew Qedešah. Penn State Press. ISBN 978-1-64602-020-1.