CADMILUS (Kadmilos) - Greek Demi-God of the Samothracian Mysteries (original) (raw)

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Translation

Kadmiloi Priests

KADMILOS (Cadmilus) was the demi-god father of the Kabeiroi (Cabeiri) of Samothrake. The ministrants of the Mysteries of the Great Gods (Megaloi Theoi) were named Kadmiloi or Kadôloi after him.

PARENTS

HEPHAISTOS & KABEIRO (Strabo 10.3.21)

OFFSPRING

THE KABEIROI (Strabo 10.3.21)

ENCYCLOPEDIA

CA′DMILUS, CA′SMILUS, or CADMUS (Kadmilos, Kadmilos, or Kadmos), according to Acusilaus (ap. Strab. x. p. 472) a son of Hephaestus and Cabeiro, and father of the Samothracian Cabeiri and the Cabeirian nymphs. Others consider Cadmilus himself as the fourth of the Samothracian Cabeiri. (Schol. ad Apollon. Rhod. i. 917.)

Source: Dictionary of Greek and Roman Biography and Mythology.

ALTERNATE NAME SPELLINGS

Translation

Round Shield (kadmos)

CLASSICAL LITERATURE QUOTES

Strabo, Geography 10. 3. 19 (trans. Jones) (Greek geographer C1st B.C. to C1st A.D.) :
"Akousilaüs (Acusilaus) [mythography C5th B.C.], the Argive, calls Kadmilos (Cadmilus) the son of Kabeiro (Cabeiro) and Hephaistos (Hephaestus) , and Kadmilos the father of three Kabeiroi (Cabeiri), and these the fathers of the Nymphai (Nymphs) called Kabeirides (Cabeirides)."

COMMENTARY

The names Kadmilos and Kadmos were both were derived from the Greek word kadmos "round shield". The shield was the iconic attribute of the Samothrakian Korybantes (Corybantes), shield-clashing demi-gods of the Mysteries.

Kadmilos was sometimes identified with Kadmos of Thebes. In one myth the marriage of Kadmos and Harmonia took place on the island of Samothrake and during the wedding celebrations Harmonia's stepbrother Iasion lay with the goddess Demeter and was killed by Zeus. Kadmos then migrated to Boiotia where he established the Theban Mysteries of the Great Gods after those in Samothrake. According to some the Titan Prometheus established the Mysteries of Thebes and he was the father of the Kabeiroi--in this version Prometheus and Kadmilos were one and the same.

SOURCES

GREEK

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