doi: 10.2143/ANES.61.0.3294035 ANES 61 (2024) 325–369 The Mother Goddess at the Black Sea: pushing Phrygia towards the north Lâtife SUMMERER and Julia M. KOCH Abstract Scholarship has often drawn attention to the Classical written sources suggesting that the Phrygian cul- tural sphere reached far north to the Black Sea coast; however, direct evidence seemed to lack, given the challenges of gathering and synthesising the disparate archaeological material. Although noted, but not widely appreciated is the early evidence for veneration of the Mother Goddess with the name Kybebos in Amisos, and a few sculptures from the coastal sites that are only tentatively dated to the eighth to seventh century BCE. Yet, the question of the extent and nature of Phrygian influence at the Black Sea coast remains open to discussion. Recent archaeological discoveries at the different excavated sites brought a number of archaeological materials to the light that can be more securely assigned to the Phrygian cul- tural sphere. 1 This paper will present a survey of archaeological evidence for a comprehensive analysis of broader cul- tural networks of Phrygia and draw on the thesis that the southern Black Sea coast was a middle ground for cultural encounters between Greek colonists and Phrygians. Introduction Scholarship has often paid attention to the cultural links between Phrygians and Greeks during the first half of the first millennium BCE. 2 The Phrygian Meter was introduced to Athens in the sixth or fifth century BCE, 3 and a Metroon was established at the state archives, the most promi- nent place in the agora. 4 Trying to justify the adoption of the foreign goddess and her specific cult – characterised by nightly worship, ecstatic dances, and orgiastic rites in democratic Athens – ancient authors tried to find explanations by creating narratives of atonement whose historicity is controversially discussed, and several studies devoted to this topic have achieved no convincing solution. 5 There is, however, a broader consensus that the transfer of the Matar cult from Phrygia 1 We owe thanks to S. Berndt, U. Muss, B. Obrador-Cursach, L. E. Roller, E. Sökmen, and Ş. Yıldırım for com- ments, advice and assistance while preparing this paper. We are also grateful to both of our anonymous reviewers for their valuable comments. 2 See, for example, Kerschner 2005, pp. 121–125 and, most recently, Roller 2019. 3 Vikela 2020, p. 163. 4 Ibid. p. 165; Meijer 2021, p. 219 n. 54. 5 On the cult practice most recently Meijer 2021, pp. 218–219, 256. In an early attempt to explain the apparent para- dox Roller (1999, p. 163) states, “while the importance of the Athenian Metroön is clear, it is much less clear why the cult of Meter should have occupied such a conspicuous place in Athenian civic life.” More recently Parker (2005, p. 407) sums up similarly that “the wild goddess of Phrygian mountains as the guardian of the Athenian state documents is a puzzle.” Munn (2006) refers to the divine mother as a powerful symbol of sovereignty. According to Katsaounou