The epithets 'Qiicen of Ephesus' and 'i^roat' or '(greatest* teem to liave l)cen specially appropriutt'<l to Artemis m Asia ; so CJ(r 29U3 c. r^( /uyitiv (liii "A., 11707, 'E;iir«u i.»rr« ; Xen. Evh. i. 11. p. 15, rr.r fMy^Xyt* 'l\,Tiffitn "A. ; Achillea, Tat. viii. 9. p. 601, J "A. li <iiy<i>i Ci«t : lliiks, No. 481, 1. 278 rjte iMyirrvA Slit 'A. Further, the expression ^i>-«x»i ' A;>tiuh seems to have been a formula of an invocatory character ; see
606
DIBLAH
DIKLAH
the inecriptionfl given in Bulletin de Corrtsp. HelUnujue^ 1880,
&430, from Lesbos ; and in Ramsay, Uist. Geogr. oj As. in. p. 410, from I'isidia (cf. ^ya; *A»*W*», id. Cities and Bishoprics of I'hrj/gia, p. 151, No. 49, fuyec>.yi ' Ateurif ; ilous. et Bihliotheca Sjnyrji, No. vX^'). It is therefore probable that the shoutfl o( the excited crowd in the Ephesian theatre (Ac 19**) were really invocations to the goddess, as her wor- shippers repeated a formula familiar in her ritual (see Ramsay, Church in Horn. Bmp. p. 138 f.).
The Nao! or Shrines of Artemis, which were made in silver by artis.'ins such as Demetrius, and in other less expensive materials (esp. marble and terra-cotta) by ' the workmen of like occupation ' (rt,u( rt/>l ra Ttteturai ipyaTete, Ac 19'^), were first correctly explained by Prof. E. Curtiufl {Athen. Mittheil. d. Instituts, ii. p. 49 f.). They were not mere statuettes of the Ephesian Diana,* for such could not be called * shrines." The worshippers of the goddess dedicated to her representations of herself in her shrine : * a great city erected a great temple with a colossal statue of the goddess ; private indi\iduals propitiated her with miniature shrines containing embodiments of her living presence. The vast temple and the tiny terra-cotta shrine were equally acceptable to Artemis ; she accepted from her votaries offerings according to their means ; she dwelt neither in the temple nor in the terra-cotta shrine ; she lived in the life of nature ; mother of all, and nurse of all, she was most really present wherever the unrestrained Ufe of nature was most freely manifested : in the woods, on the mountains, among the wild beasts. Her worshippers expressed their devotion, and their belief in her omnipresence, by offering shrines to her, and doubtless by keeping shrines of the same kind in their own homes, certainly also by placing such shrines in graves beside the corpse, as a sign that the dead had gone back to the mother who bore them ' (Church in Bom. Emp. p. 125 f.). These small dedicatory shrines were not modelled after the splendid Gr. temple of Artemis ; for the creations of Gr. art in sculpture and architecture, beautiful as they were, were never so holy in the estimation of devotees as the simple and rude tj'pes of primitive art and religion. The t>'pe most familiar to us from extant remains shows the goddess seated in a niche or naiskos, sometimes alone, sometimes accompanied by one or two figures (among them her favourite Atys). In the ruder examples, she sits in stiff fashion, holding in one hand the tambourine (rv^vctiot), in the otlier a cup ($j<eA»;). Beside her are one or two lions. In some more artistic examples, she has laid aside the stiff s^'mbols, and sometimes caresses with one hand the lion which climbs to her knee or lies in her lap. Sometimes the lion serves her as a footstool ; in other cases two sit in stiff sjTnmetry, one on each side of her throne. Works of this class are found very widely both at Ephesus and elsewhere, in marble and in terra-cotta ; the examples in marble are usually marked by inscriptions as dedi- catory : no examples in silver have been preserved, but naturally their intrinsic value led to their being melted down. The pre- cise relation between this t.N'pe and the Lydian t^'pe already described (commonly designated, wherever found, as the Eph. Artemis) has not .vet been determined. It is highly probable that the whole class of sacred dedicatory objects fabricated by the artisans for use in the cultus of Artemis were designated by the generic term naoi, taken from the most commoo and characteristic type.
LmsRATCRB. — See under Ephbsub.
W. M. Ramsay.
DIBLAH (.1^?^), Ezk 6'*.— Four MSS read Riblah (which is accepted by Cheyne, Davidson, Hitzie, Smend, Comill, Sie^'fried-Stade, and Or/. Heb. Lex.). It was near a wilderness, and this would suit for Riblah. It has also been supposed to be Beth-Piblathaim. There is a village in Upper Galilee called Dibl. See SWP vol. i. sh. iu.
C. R. CONDER.
DIBLAIM (n-'?!'!, Aipri'Xalti), the father of Gomer, Hosea's wife. See Gomer, Hosea.
DIBON 1. (jbn in MT, but the spelling p"i of
the Moabite Stone and Atu^wr of LXX indicate that the • had a consonantal va'ue ; see Driver, Notes on Heb. Text of Samuel, Ixxxix. ). A city east of the Dead Sea and north of the Amon in the land which, before the coming of the Israelites, Sihon, king of the Amorites, had taken from a former king of Moab (Nu21'**'). The Israelites disnos- sessed Sihon, and the territory was assi^ed to Reuben (Jos 13'- "), but the city Dibon is men- tioned among those built (or rebuilt) by Gad (Nu 32'- "), hence the name Dibon-gad by which it is once called (Nu 33"). The children of Israel were not able to retain possession of the land, and in the time of Isaiah Dibon is reckoned among the cities of Moab (Is 15). In Is 15" Dimon is supposed to be a mudilied form of Dibon, adopted in order