Galli 79918 223744932 2008-07-05T15:58:28Z 16@r 839108 {{three other uses}} {{three other uses||the [[Utah]]n [[armed robber]]|Adam Blue Galli|the ancient peoples|Gaul|other usages|Gallus}} '''Galli''' (singular '''Gallus''') was the Roman name for [[castration|castrated]] followers of the [[Phrygia]]n goddess [[Cybele]], which were regarded as a [[third gender]] by contemporary Roman scholars,{{Fact|date=July 2007}} comparable to [[transgender]]ed people in the modern world. The chief of these priests was referred to as a '''battakes''', and later as the '''archigallus'''.{{ref label|1728|1|^}} Cybele's Galli were similar in form to other colleges of priests in Asia Minor that ancient authors described as "[[eunuch]]s", such as the priests of [[Atargatis]] described by [[Apuleius]] and [[Lucian]], or the ''galloi'' of the temple of [[Artemis]] at [[Ephesus]]. The first Galli arrived in Rome when the Senate officially adopted [[Cybele]] as a state goddess in [[203 BC]]. Until the first century AD, Roman citizens were prohibited from becoming Galli. Under [[Claudius]], however, this ban was lifted. Further information is difficult to come by, given the persecution faced by followers of Cybele and other pagan deities after the [[Theodosius I|Theodosian edict]] of [[391 AD]]. All of her temples were destroyed, with orders that they should never be built upon (in contrast to the usual practice of converting non-Christian religious sites). As a result the only surviving records of the Galli come from historians and archivists. The accuracy of such records is often dubious because of the [[gender]] biases of most ancient writers. The name ''Galli'' may be derived from the Gallus river in Phrygia. Alternatively it may be derived from the [[Sumerian language|Sumerian]] Gallu, (from ''"Gal"'' = Great, ''"Lu"'' = Man) special servants of the Sumerian God [[Enki]]. (One of the first temples to Cybele was built near this river, which led to a rumor that drinking from the Gallus would cause such madness that the drinker would castrate himself. It has also been supposed that ''Galli'' is derived from the Latin word for ''rooster''. [[Jerome|Hieronymus]] believed the name was given by the Romans as a sign of their contempt for the [[Gauls]]. However, in that case, ''gallus'' would have been borrowed from Asia or Greece, where it meant ''eunuch''. The Galli were castrated voluntarily, typically during an ecstatic celebration called [[Dies Sanguinis]], or Day of Blood, which took place on [[March 24]]. ==References== *{{note label|1728|1|^}}{{1728}} [http://digicoll.library.wisc.edu/cgi-bin/HistSciTech/HistSciTech-idx?type=turn&entity=HistSciTech000900240173&isize=L] ==See also== *[[Korybantes]] * [[List of transgender-related topics]] [[Category:Transgender in non-western cultures]] [[Category:Ancient Roman religion]] [[Category:Eunuchs]] [[de:Galloi]] [[es:Galo (Cibeles)]] [[fr:Galles]] [[nl:Galli]] [[pt:Galli]] [[sr:Гали (митологија)]]