"The Goddess of Many Names", a direct reference to the writings of mythologist Joseph Campbell, evokes the many faces of the sacred feminine encountered across civilizations: Isis, Inanna, Aphrodite, Mary, Sophia… So many names for a single presence, one that seems to have accompanied humanity since its beginnings, and whose metamorphoses tell us something about our own inner quest.
“Behold, Lucius, I have come, moved by your prayers:
I, the Mother of all Nature, mistress of all the elements,
the beginning and origin of the ages, sovereign of the gods,
queen of the spirits of the dead, foremost among the dwellers in heaven,
the single embodiment of all gods and goddesses.[…]
The whole world worships my one divinity
under manifold forms, with different rites,
and by many names.The Phrygians call me the Pessinuntine Mother of the Gods;
the Athenians, Cecropian Minerva;
the people of Cyprus, Paphian Venus;
the Cretans, Dictynnian Diana;
the Sicilians, Stygian Proserpina;
the Eleusinians, ancient Ceres.Some call me Juno, others Bellona,
some Hecate, others Rhamnusia.[…]
The Egyptians […] honour me with the rites that are truly mine
and call me by my true name:Isis, the Queen.”
Apuleius, Metamorphoses (The Golden Ass), Book XI, Chapter 5.
