0:00:05 > 0:00:07'From the dawn of time,
0:00:07 > 0:00:10'men and women have felt the need to worship.
0:00:10 > 0:00:14'To make sense of life and what lies beyond.
0:00:14 > 0:00:18'To find a purpose and to bring a shape to human existence.
0:00:20 > 0:00:25'Women have always been at the heart of our relationship with the divine.
0:00:25 > 0:00:29'But this part of our history is often hidden.'
0:00:32 > 0:00:34If you leave out Jesus and the Apostle Paul,
0:00:34 > 0:00:38it's perfectly possible to tell the story of early Christianity
0:00:38 > 0:00:41without ever mentioning a man.
0:00:41 > 0:00:45I think the wives of the Prophet would be quite shocked actually
0:00:45 > 0:00:48if they saw many Muslim majority countries today.
0:00:49 > 0:00:52'For thousands of years, all over the world,
0:00:52 > 0:00:55'religion has shaped the lives of billions.'
0:00:57 > 0:00:59This is why I want to go back,
0:00:59 > 0:01:02to uncover the remarkable and neglected stories
0:01:02 > 0:01:05of women and religion.
0:01:05 > 0:01:09'Their stories can unlock a secret history of the world.'
0:01:09 > 0:01:13It's not the male god who created this universe. It's the female.
0:01:18 > 0:01:19'I start at the beginning.
0:01:19 > 0:01:23'At a time when women were thought to be sacred.
0:01:23 > 0:01:27'Creators of life who were touched by the divine.
0:01:28 > 0:01:31'Found at the birth of organised religion.
0:01:33 > 0:01:37'Some were fearsome goddesses who controlled life and death.'
0:01:37 > 0:01:42She's the big mamma. She will protect you, but you don't want to mess with her.
0:01:42 > 0:01:46'And I go to a place where divine women are still all-powerful today.'
0:01:48 > 0:01:51For us, she's a living being who's always around us, taking care of us.
0:01:51 > 0:01:53'I'm going in search of a world
0:01:53 > 0:01:59'where goddesses ruled the heavens and the Earth.'
0:02:13 > 0:02:1730 years ago, I was shown an old black-and-white slide
0:02:17 > 0:02:19of this amazing creature.
0:02:19 > 0:02:21'But nobody could tell me
0:02:21 > 0:02:23'whether this prehistoric figurine was a goddess,
0:02:23 > 0:02:26'a priestess or just an ordinary woman.'
0:02:26 > 0:02:30From that moment on, I was determined
0:02:30 > 0:02:33to try to get to the bottom of her story.
0:02:33 > 0:02:39'She gave me a tantalising glimpse of an intriguing history.
0:02:39 > 0:02:41'One that's been buried.
0:02:41 > 0:02:46'Evidence of a distant past where women were sacred.
0:02:46 > 0:02:50'The Ashmolean Museum contains a treasure trove
0:02:50 > 0:02:53'of artefacts from across the world.
0:02:53 > 0:02:57'When I studied at Oxford, I came face to face with the enigmatic figurine
0:02:57 > 0:03:02'who first inspired me to explore civilisation's story.
0:03:02 > 0:03:07'She was made on the island of Crete around 1600 BC.'
0:03:07 > 0:03:10I don't know if you agree, but she seems to me
0:03:10 > 0:03:14to radiate a kind of fierce, dangerous sexuality.
0:03:14 > 0:03:17The remarkable thing about her
0:03:17 > 0:03:20is that if you search the collections here,
0:03:20 > 0:03:23you'll find that she's not alone.
0:03:24 > 0:03:26'For tens of thousands of years,
0:03:26 > 0:03:31'our ancestors fashioned a multitude of mysterious female figurines.
0:03:31 > 0:03:36'They've been found in religious spaces right across the globe,
0:03:36 > 0:03:39'and most of them are explicitly sexual.'
0:03:39 > 0:03:42But the terrible thing is that when many of them were discovered,
0:03:42 > 0:03:45particularly by Victorian archaeologists,
0:03:45 > 0:03:49they were described as disgusting and barbaric
0:03:49 > 0:03:54and were hidden away in storage boxes at the backs of museums.
0:03:57 > 0:04:00These represent just a tiny fraction
0:04:00 > 0:04:03of what's been dug up all over the world.
0:04:03 > 0:04:06If you look at the total number of human figures
0:04:06 > 0:04:10unearthed between now and around 30,000 BC,
0:04:10 > 0:04:15then the massive majority of them are of the female form.
0:04:16 > 0:04:18So, what is going on here?
0:04:18 > 0:04:22To understand the full story of human history
0:04:22 > 0:04:24and the nature of religion itself,
0:04:24 > 0:04:30I think we have to follow the trail of these little women.
0:04:35 > 0:04:38CALL TO PRAYER CHANT
0:04:43 > 0:04:48'I'm travelling to the East, where organised religion began.
0:04:50 > 0:04:55'To places where some of the oldest of these little women were found.
0:04:56 > 0:04:59'Today, most of the world's major religions
0:04:59 > 0:05:02'have a distinctly masculine flavour.
0:05:02 > 0:05:08'For millions of Jews, Christians and Muslims, God is male.
0:05:08 > 0:05:10'Of course, women have a presence,
0:05:10 > 0:05:14'but more often than not, they're fighting for space.
0:05:15 > 0:05:20'But if you travel back in time, you'll find a very different world.
0:05:20 > 0:05:23'I'm making the journey from Europe to Asia
0:05:23 > 0:05:29'to a time and a place where women were touched by the divine.'
0:05:29 > 0:05:32I'm going back to the beginning of society itself,
0:05:32 > 0:05:34close on 12,000 years ago.
0:05:34 > 0:05:38And to a place where religion as we know it began.
0:05:43 > 0:05:47'This is south-east Turkey, near the Syrian border.
0:05:50 > 0:05:53'Back then, this landscape was untamed.
0:05:53 > 0:05:57'Wild beasts roamed free.
0:05:58 > 0:06:02'In 1994, archaeologists began excavating here
0:06:02 > 0:06:06'at a site called Gobekli Tepe.
0:06:06 > 0:06:09'They discovered something extraordinary.
0:06:09 > 0:06:11'A sophisticated temple
0:06:11 > 0:06:13'pre-dating Stonehenge and the Pyramids
0:06:13 > 0:06:18'by a staggering 7,000 years.'
0:06:18 > 0:06:21What the archaeologists had uncovered here
0:06:21 > 0:06:24is the oldest religious building in the world.
0:06:32 > 0:06:36The people who built this place lived in small nomadic bands.
0:06:36 > 0:06:39There were no towns, there were no villages,
0:06:39 > 0:06:42there was no writing, there was no metalworking.
0:06:42 > 0:06:45And yet, somehow, they managed to shift
0:06:45 > 0:06:47these 16-tonne blocks of stone up here.
0:06:47 > 0:06:50They've carved them with fantastical figures
0:06:50 > 0:06:54and decided to turn this side of the hill into a sacred space.
0:06:57 > 0:06:59'The site is still being excavated
0:06:59 > 0:07:04'and yielding new clues about how our ancestors worshipped.
0:07:04 > 0:07:09'Intriguingly, there's no evidence of a permanent settlement here.'
0:07:09 > 0:07:12We always used to think that organised religion began
0:07:12 > 0:07:15when men and women started to come in
0:07:15 > 0:07:19off vast landscapes like this and settle down together.
0:07:19 > 0:07:22But the evidence from Gobekli Tepe
0:07:22 > 0:07:24seems to suggest exactly the opposite.
0:07:24 > 0:07:28Here, you've got people collaborating for the first time,
0:07:28 > 0:07:31not in order to farm or to set up a little village community,
0:07:31 > 0:07:36but specifically to have a religious experience.
0:07:36 > 0:07:39So society isn't creating religion,
0:07:39 > 0:07:43it's religion that's forming human society itself.
0:07:50 > 0:07:54'Carved into the massive limestone pillars that make this stone circle
0:07:54 > 0:07:56'are savage beasts.
0:07:56 > 0:08:00'Images of nature red in tooth and claw.'
0:08:03 > 0:08:06There was one particular figure discovered here
0:08:06 > 0:08:08between a stone carved with two lions
0:08:08 > 0:08:12that gives an intriguing glimpse into what it was that mattered
0:08:12 > 0:08:16to the people who came here close on 12,000 years ago.
0:08:17 > 0:08:20'She was found in a sacred spot
0:08:20 > 0:08:23'which archaeologists called the Lion Temple.'
0:08:36 > 0:08:39So far, only three explicitly human figures
0:08:39 > 0:08:42have been found at the site, and this is one of them.
0:08:42 > 0:08:44She's obviously a woman.
0:08:44 > 0:08:47She's either lying down, or it's more likely that she's squatting.
0:08:47 > 0:08:51And there is clearly something very sexual going on here.
0:08:51 > 0:08:54It looks like she's both being penetrated
0:08:54 > 0:08:57and giving birth at the same time.
0:08:57 > 0:09:00Because the image has been scratched out of the rock,
0:09:00 > 0:09:02there's a real vigour to it.
0:09:02 > 0:09:05It's like a bit of Stone Age graffiti.
0:09:05 > 0:09:06And whoever made it
0:09:06 > 0:09:09obviously thought it was both important and appropriate
0:09:09 > 0:09:12that a woman should be commemorated
0:09:12 > 0:09:16right at the heart of a prehistoric temple.
0:09:17 > 0:09:22'I think this shows women were central to our relationship with the divine
0:09:22 > 0:09:27'long before we'd even come together to build villages or towns.
0:09:27 > 0:09:31'For millennia, we lived as nomads, hunting and fishing to survive.
0:09:31 > 0:09:36'But by 7,000 BC, there'd been a major development.
0:09:37 > 0:09:41'Our ancestors discovered how to farm,
0:09:41 > 0:09:44'and their lives were totally transformed.
0:09:44 > 0:09:49'I'm heading 400 miles west to one of the oldest cities in the world.'
0:09:50 > 0:09:54It's called Catalhoyuk and, around 7000 BC,
0:09:54 > 0:09:59it was almost certainly the largest human settlement in existence.
0:09:59 > 0:10:01It was actually discovered in the 1960s
0:10:01 > 0:10:04by an English archaeologist called James Mellaart.
0:10:04 > 0:10:06And what he unearthed here
0:10:06 > 0:10:09would shape a generation's ideas about early religion.
0:10:15 > 0:10:19'In this town, more than 5,000 people lived together,
0:10:19 > 0:10:22'cheek by jowl, in mud brick houses.
0:10:22 > 0:10:23'In and around these houses,
0:10:23 > 0:10:26'Mellaart uncovered numerous female figurines
0:10:26 > 0:10:30'and what he thought were small shrines.
0:10:30 > 0:10:34'He believed the people who lived here worshipped a mother goddess.
0:10:34 > 0:10:37'His key evidence was this.
0:10:39 > 0:10:42'A remarkable figure found buried deep in a grain bin.
0:10:42 > 0:10:46'This is a replica of his discovery.'
0:10:46 > 0:10:48She's obviously female
0:10:48 > 0:10:52and she's sitting on a throne flanked by two lions
0:10:52 > 0:10:56and she is wonderfully voluptuous and potent.
0:10:56 > 0:10:58There's nothing actually to say
0:10:58 > 0:11:00whether she's a real woman or a goddess,
0:11:00 > 0:11:02but Mellaart was convinced.
0:11:02 > 0:11:03He wrote,
0:11:03 > 0:11:07"The statues allow us to recognise that the main deity
0:11:07 > 0:11:12"worshipped by the Neolithic peoples of Catalhoyuk was a goddess."
0:11:15 > 0:11:19'Mellaart's conclusions captured the public's imagination,
0:11:19 > 0:11:22'but current excavations are revising this picture.
0:11:23 > 0:11:27'I want to find out why figures like this were made.
0:11:27 > 0:11:32'Shahina Farid is the Field Director at Catalhoyuk.'
0:11:32 > 0:11:33Clearly, they had a meaning,
0:11:33 > 0:11:36they had a symbolism to the Neolithic people.
0:11:36 > 0:11:41And the fact that they're made in this very voluptuous form,
0:11:41 > 0:11:44I don't think we've found any skinny women,
0:11:44 > 0:11:47means that they were aspiring to something
0:11:47 > 0:11:49that's big and opulent and voluptuous.
0:11:49 > 0:11:54Some symbol of fertility and a life-giving force.
0:11:54 > 0:11:57But when we find the graves of women,
0:11:57 > 0:12:00size doesn't indicate that they were large women.
0:12:00 > 0:12:04So there is a difference between the portrayal of these women
0:12:04 > 0:12:07and how we find their human remains afterwards.
0:12:07 > 0:12:11So I like to think that they're an ideal.
0:12:11 > 0:12:16That beautiful figurine found in a grain bin. Do you think she was placed there for a reason?
0:12:16 > 0:12:19We're at the beginning of agriculture,
0:12:19 > 0:12:22the introduction of growing crops,
0:12:22 > 0:12:28and so to start seeing this symbol of this female at this time,
0:12:28 > 0:12:32we can interpret that she's a life-giving force.
0:12:32 > 0:12:37Because women give birth and produce a next generation of children,
0:12:37 > 0:12:41it does suggest that there's some kind of connection being made
0:12:41 > 0:12:45between their life-giving powers and the fertility of the earth.
0:12:45 > 0:12:49Certainly, that interpretation fits with what we find, yes.
0:12:49 > 0:12:51Catalhoyuk marks a seismic shift
0:12:51 > 0:12:54in our ancestors' relationship with nature.
0:12:54 > 0:12:58The survival of this community now depended on growing food.
0:12:58 > 0:13:00And the evidence suggests
0:13:00 > 0:13:03the fertility of the earth was linked to women.
0:13:04 > 0:13:08So, who, or what, is that figurine?
0:13:08 > 0:13:11I don't think she's a goddess at this stage
0:13:11 > 0:13:13and I think we're at the beginning
0:13:13 > 0:13:16of this role of the female form becoming a goddess.
0:13:16 > 0:13:18She's kind of halfway to being a goddess.
0:13:18 > 0:13:22Mother Goddess did not come from nowhere. She has to start somewhere.
0:13:22 > 0:13:28And we think that Catalhoyuk is one of the places where she started.
0:13:28 > 0:13:32'Other evidence from Catalhoyuk suggests the people here
0:13:32 > 0:13:37'saw a darker, more dangerous side to women's ability to give life.
0:13:37 > 0:13:41'This is another figurine found in the city.'
0:13:41 > 0:13:44From the front, she's plump and actually quite welcoming.
0:13:44 > 0:13:46She's probably pregnant
0:13:46 > 0:13:50and she's very definitely fertile and fecund.
0:13:50 > 0:13:53But if you turn her around, then it's a rather different story.
0:13:53 > 0:13:57She starts to morph into something a bit more sinister.
0:13:57 > 0:13:59Her flesh starts to fall away from her bones,
0:13:59 > 0:14:03and from the back, she just looks like a skeleton.
0:14:03 > 0:14:06Now, I think there's a good reason for this.
0:14:06 > 0:14:10Life in early societies like Catalhoyuk was very precarious.
0:14:10 > 0:14:12And when women gave birth,
0:14:12 > 0:14:16for every child that was born alive, one would be born dead.
0:14:16 > 0:14:19And so I think they were considered to be creatures
0:14:19 > 0:14:25who could actually create both life and death.
0:14:27 > 0:14:29'I believe this powerful idea
0:14:29 > 0:14:33'shaped human religion for thousands of years,
0:14:33 > 0:14:37'giving extraordinary status to the female.
0:14:39 > 0:14:41'As centuries wore on, through the Middle East,
0:14:41 > 0:14:44'Asia Minor and North Africa,
0:14:44 > 0:14:47'we find the ground littered with striking female figures.
0:14:47 > 0:14:51'And many of them were very definitely goddesses.'
0:14:51 > 0:14:55As prehistory gives way to history,
0:14:55 > 0:14:59and men and women start to write down the stories of their lives,
0:14:59 > 0:15:04we begin to learn the names of some of these divine women.
0:15:04 > 0:15:05Isis,
0:15:05 > 0:15:08Ishtar, Innana, the Queen of Heaven.
0:15:08 > 0:15:12They actually come in all shapes and sizes.
0:15:12 > 0:15:15But a notable number share two key traits.
0:15:15 > 0:15:20These are still creatures in charge of both life and death,
0:15:20 > 0:15:23of conflict and fertility.
0:15:23 > 0:15:25They inspire awe,
0:15:25 > 0:15:29and they are terrifying.
0:15:32 > 0:15:35'I'm going to the wild highlands of Central Turkey
0:15:35 > 0:15:38'in search of one of them, to see how divine women evolved
0:15:38 > 0:15:43'as small societies grew into vast kingdoms.
0:15:43 > 0:15:45'In the first millennium BC,
0:15:45 > 0:15:49'a people called the Phrygians lived on this mountainous frontier.
0:15:49 > 0:15:53'Blasted by long, hard winters
0:15:53 > 0:15:57'and bordered by the great warrior empires of the Near East,
0:15:57 > 0:16:00'life was a constant battle for survival.
0:16:00 > 0:16:03'They worshipped a great goddess
0:16:03 > 0:16:06'who would be revered and feared across three continents.
0:16:08 > 0:16:10'She was known as Kybele,
0:16:10 > 0:16:13or Mater, the Mother.
0:16:13 > 0:16:17'But this goddess is not very maternal.
0:16:17 > 0:16:22'She stands on her own in wild and savage places.'
0:16:22 > 0:16:27This is where you'll find one of the most mysterious monuments to the goddess in the East,
0:16:27 > 0:16:30because this is the place where she was thought
0:16:30 > 0:16:32to emerge from her mountain home.
0:16:35 > 0:16:39'The Phrygians believed that at monuments like this,
0:16:39 > 0:16:40'the Mother would appear
0:16:40 > 0:16:43'from a doorway in the side of the mountain to be worshipped.'
0:16:45 > 0:16:47The goddess originally stood in the middle here,
0:16:47 > 0:16:50and you can probably just make out
0:16:50 > 0:16:54that she's flanked on either side by two lions.
0:16:54 > 0:16:55The terrible thing is that
0:16:55 > 0:16:59up until a couple of years ago, she did still stand here.
0:16:59 > 0:17:03But treasure hunters have hacked her out of the rock.
0:17:03 > 0:17:08For close on 3,000 years, the goddess protected this mountain.
0:17:08 > 0:17:10And now she's just a pile of fragments.
0:17:13 > 0:17:14'Solitary, crumbling shrines
0:17:14 > 0:17:18'give us tantalising glimpses of a powerful ancient goddess
0:17:18 > 0:17:23'in danger of disappearing from the landscape, and from history.
0:17:24 > 0:17:26'Following her trail,
0:17:26 > 0:17:30'I'm going to the most important Kybele site in Phrygia.
0:17:30 > 0:17:33'A whole city dedicated to her worship.
0:17:36 > 0:17:40'Midas City is named after the kingdom's most famous ruler,
0:17:40 > 0:17:44'whose touch was said to turn everything to gold.
0:17:47 > 0:17:49'I'm meeting Professor Taciser Sivas
0:17:49 > 0:17:53'to find out what this goddess meant to her people.'
0:17:53 > 0:17:57Why do you think she was always worshipped in mountains and high places like this?
0:17:57 > 0:18:02The high places were the main sanctuaries for the Mother Goddess
0:18:02 > 0:18:05because she controlled the nature.
0:18:05 > 0:18:07She controls the animals.
0:18:07 > 0:18:10She controls the wild world.
0:18:10 > 0:18:14- It's almost as if without her nature is an enemy, not an ally?- Yes.
0:18:14 > 0:18:19Without the Goddess Mother, there's a wild nature here and dangers.
0:18:19 > 0:18:23So the Mother Goddess was the protector of the people.
0:18:23 > 0:18:26Do you think they really believed this goddess inhabited these rocks,
0:18:26 > 0:18:28that this was her earthly home?
0:18:28 > 0:18:32Yes. They shaped the rocks as temples, open-air temples.
0:18:32 > 0:18:35This doorway, it's obviously a doorway into her home in the rocks.
0:18:35 > 0:18:39Could it be a doorway between life and death?
0:18:39 > 0:18:42Yes. She is responsible for life and afterlife.
0:18:42 > 0:18:45- That's a pretty powerful position to be in.- Yes, sure.
0:18:45 > 0:18:46She's the Mother Goddess.
0:18:49 > 0:18:52'This goddess who controlled life and death
0:18:52 > 0:18:54'seems to have a lot in common
0:18:54 > 0:18:57'with those semi-divine figures we saw back in Catalhoyuk.
0:18:57 > 0:19:00'But she's evolved.'
0:19:03 > 0:19:08As societies developed in scale and got more sophisticated,
0:19:08 > 0:19:10the goddess has got bigger.
0:19:10 > 0:19:14She's no longer a diminutive little figurine at Catalhoyuk.
0:19:14 > 0:19:18Now she's a kind of dominatrix,
0:19:18 > 0:19:22guarding and ruling over a vast landscape.
0:19:23 > 0:19:26'But the domination of Kybele and other powerful goddesses like her
0:19:26 > 0:19:29'wouldn't go unchallenged.'
0:19:29 > 0:19:33The goddess would have to deal with a new pretender to her throne.
0:19:33 > 0:19:36He was a belligerent boy, spoiling for a fight.
0:19:36 > 0:19:40A god who would be king.
0:19:42 > 0:19:43'I'm going to the country
0:19:43 > 0:19:47'we think of as the birthplace of Western civilisation
0:19:47 > 0:19:51'to see that titanic struggle played out in myth and in stone.
0:19:51 > 0:19:55'The Greeks worshipped one of the most powerful goddesses of all time.
0:20:07 > 0:20:11'In the 8th Century BC, Hesiod, the celebrated Greek poet,
0:20:11 > 0:20:15'recorded the epic story of the birth of the universe.
0:20:15 > 0:20:20'At its heart was the primal goddess Gaia.'
0:20:20 > 0:20:23Hesiod described the creation of the world
0:20:23 > 0:20:25out of a kind of primordial chaos.
0:20:25 > 0:20:28And Gaia was there right from the start.
0:20:28 > 0:20:32"In the beginning, there was only chaos, the abyss.
0:20:32 > 0:20:36"But then Gaia the beautiful rose up.
0:20:36 > 0:20:39"Her broad bosom the firm foundation of all.
0:20:39 > 0:20:43"And fair Gaia first bore starry heaven itself
0:20:43 > 0:20:45"to cover her on all sides
0:20:45 > 0:20:47"and be a home forever for the blessed gods.
0:20:47 > 0:20:50"And then she created the mountains.
0:20:50 > 0:20:56"And then the barren, raging sea."
0:21:00 > 0:21:03'Gaia also creates the gods themselves.
0:21:03 > 0:21:08'But within a generation, a divine war of the sexes is raging.
0:21:11 > 0:21:15'For 10 long years, a series of epic battles is waged
0:21:15 > 0:21:19'between three generations of gods and goddesses,
0:21:19 > 0:21:22'all vying for supremacy.
0:21:22 > 0:21:26'Through these titanic clashes, the youngest god, Zeus,
0:21:26 > 0:21:30'overthrows his elders and becomes supreme.
0:21:30 > 0:21:32'He is now top god.
0:21:32 > 0:21:37'The power of Gaia, the creator, is massively diminished.'
0:21:37 > 0:21:39In Hesiod's words,
0:21:39 > 0:21:41"Now, king of the gods, Zeus,
0:21:41 > 0:21:46"was wiser than any other god or any mortal man."
0:21:46 > 0:21:48The message is clear.
0:21:48 > 0:21:52He's also now greater than any goddess or any woman.
0:21:54 > 0:21:59'The mother of all the gods had been firmly demoted.
0:21:59 > 0:22:01'I'm meeting historian Edith Hall
0:22:01 > 0:22:06'to find out why the Greeks elevated Gaia's grandson, Zeus.'
0:22:07 > 0:22:10Gaia is rather a peaceful goddess,
0:22:10 > 0:22:13whereas the hallmark of Zeus is that he's an agent.
0:22:13 > 0:22:15He hurls thunderbolts.
0:22:15 > 0:22:17He helps you win on the battlefield.
0:22:17 > 0:22:21You always set up a trophy on the battlefield in honour of Zeus.
0:22:21 > 0:22:24That was Zeus' own thing. And he's retributive,
0:22:24 > 0:22:28which means if anybody does wrong, he goes around administering justice.
0:22:30 > 0:22:34The thunderbolt of Zeus is very similar to Jehovah,
0:22:34 > 0:22:38who smites the opponents of the Israelites
0:22:38 > 0:22:42or smites people who dare to go near the Ark of the Covenant.
0:22:42 > 0:22:45This is a god who actually intervenes with brute force
0:22:45 > 0:22:48to police morality on earth.
0:22:48 > 0:22:52Do they actually reflect what's going on in real historical terms?
0:22:52 > 0:22:55Walled cities start to be built all around the Mediterranean world
0:22:55 > 0:22:58and you get large armies, you get very powerful kings,
0:22:58 > 0:23:01you get accumulation of money and capital.
0:23:01 > 0:23:03You get something you've got to defend,
0:23:03 > 0:23:05something really worth fighting for.
0:23:05 > 0:23:08And violence, in terms of policing the world,
0:23:08 > 0:23:11becomes, I think, much more common.
0:23:11 > 0:23:14Mass violence between different communities.
0:23:14 > 0:23:17And that's the moment you start to get these big, masculine gods.
0:23:17 > 0:23:20It's, I think, a reflection
0:23:20 > 0:23:22of a much more militaristic culture on the ground.
0:23:24 > 0:23:27'Hard evidence for the demotion of goddesses can be found here,
0:23:27 > 0:23:31'in one of the most important sites in the ancient world.
0:23:31 > 0:23:35'Nestled amongst the slopes of Mount Parnassus in Central Greece
0:23:35 > 0:23:38'is the sanctuary of Delphi.
0:23:38 > 0:23:42'It's dedicated to the god Apollo, the son of Zeus,
0:23:42 > 0:23:45'and was home to a famous oracle.
0:23:45 > 0:23:49'Here, people came to find out what the future held.
0:23:51 > 0:23:55'But this was a sacred place long before Apollo's temple was built.'
0:23:57 > 0:24:01What's interesting is there's absolutely no evidence whatsoever
0:24:01 > 0:24:04that it was dominated by a male deity.
0:24:04 > 0:24:08In fact, what we have suggests exactly the opposite.
0:24:08 > 0:24:10When the site was excavated,
0:24:10 > 0:24:13hundreds of these little things were found.
0:24:13 > 0:24:17They're Bronze Age figurines, close on 3,500 years old.
0:24:17 > 0:24:22And they're a kind of incarnation of a sublime, female power.
0:24:23 > 0:24:27'The Greeks believed that in the distant past,
0:24:27 > 0:24:29'this was a sanctuary of the goddess Gaia.
0:24:29 > 0:24:34'They used to tell stories that this holy place had been taken by force.
0:24:34 > 0:24:37'It was said that the young Apollo had come here
0:24:37 > 0:24:40'and strangled to death the Python,
0:24:40 > 0:24:44'the monstrous guardian of the place, with his bare hands.'
0:24:44 > 0:24:46The Python was one of the children of Gaia.
0:24:46 > 0:24:48And, what's really interesting
0:24:48 > 0:24:51is that the archaeology actually matches the myth.
0:24:51 > 0:24:54This is a much later polygonal wall
0:24:54 > 0:24:58and it's been built slap bang on top of the original sanctuary of Gaia.
0:24:58 > 0:25:00So, in some senses, this is a new world
0:25:00 > 0:25:04crushing out the distant past.
0:25:04 > 0:25:06'The goddess didn't disappear,
0:25:06 > 0:25:10'but now she shared the stage with many macho gods,
0:25:10 > 0:25:14'recognising one as lord and master.
0:25:15 > 0:25:17'This hierarchy would be adopted
0:25:17 > 0:25:21'by one of the greatest powers in the ancient world.
0:25:23 > 0:25:27'Rome was founded on an ideal of masculinity.
0:25:27 > 0:25:30'The Romans worshipped the same gods as the Greeks in all but name.
0:25:30 > 0:25:34'They looked to Jupiter and his son Mars, the god of war,
0:25:34 > 0:25:36'to lead them to victory.
0:25:36 > 0:25:39'By the 3rd century BC,
0:25:39 > 0:25:41'the Romans were locked in a life or death struggle
0:25:41 > 0:25:45'with Carthage, an ancient empire in modern-day Tunisia.
0:25:45 > 0:25:48'Led by their famous general, Hannibal,
0:25:48 > 0:25:52'the Carthaginians had battled their way across the Alps into Italy
0:25:52 > 0:25:54'and had pushed to the gates of the capital.'
0:25:55 > 0:25:59The survival of Rome was absolutely not certain.
0:25:59 > 0:26:01And the omens were clearly not good.
0:26:01 > 0:26:05Strange meteor showers in the sky
0:26:05 > 0:26:07threatened to throw the people into a panic.
0:26:07 > 0:26:09And the leaders of Rome realised
0:26:09 > 0:26:11that in order to avoid mass hysteria,
0:26:11 > 0:26:15they had to turn to the most powerful force available to them.
0:26:17 > 0:26:20'The most direct way to talk to the gods was to consult an oracle.
0:26:22 > 0:26:25'Rome's greatest prophet was a woman, called the Sybil,
0:26:25 > 0:26:29'whose predictions were collected in an extraordinary set of scrolls.'
0:26:31 > 0:26:35They were so precious they were guarded by a select group of keepers
0:26:35 > 0:26:38called the Quindecimviri Sacris, the Sacred 15.
0:26:38 > 0:26:42These men promised to guard the scrolls with their lives
0:26:42 > 0:26:46and to keep their contents sacred and secret forever.
0:26:47 > 0:26:52'Originally they were all stored in the massive temple of Jupiter that stood here.
0:26:52 > 0:26:56'But the temple is long gone and most of the scrolls were burnt in fires.
0:26:56 > 0:26:59'So I have to seek them out elsewhere.'
0:27:07 > 0:27:11Down the centuries, a few fragments of the sacred prophecies were preserved.
0:27:11 > 0:27:14And I'm told you can find some of them in here.
0:27:15 > 0:27:20'This library holds 180,000 books and scrolls,
0:27:20 > 0:27:22'covering 2,000 years of human history.
0:27:26 > 0:27:29'All sorts of treasures are hidden in their pages.
0:27:34 > 0:27:36'I want to consult the words of the Sybil,
0:27:36 > 0:27:39'just as the Romans did when Hannibal was at their gates.'
0:27:47 > 0:27:50One of the premiere officials in the city came,
0:27:50 > 0:27:54desperate to find an answer to Rome's problems in the oracle.
0:28:01 > 0:28:03The oracles were written in Greek hexameter verse,
0:28:03 > 0:28:06so he needed two translators to help him.
0:28:06 > 0:28:09But eventually, he found what he was looking for.
0:28:09 > 0:28:12"Should a foreign enemy ever invade Italy,
0:28:12 > 0:28:15"he could be defeated and driven out
0:28:15 > 0:28:18"if Kybele, Idaean mother of the gods,
0:28:18 > 0:28:21"was brought to Rome."
0:28:21 > 0:28:25So it seemed that in her hour of need,
0:28:25 > 0:28:28the all-protecting mother of the gods
0:28:28 > 0:28:29was going to be Rome's salvation.
0:28:32 > 0:28:35'With the gods' stamp of approval,
0:28:35 > 0:28:38'Rome immediately arranged for the sacred icon of Kybele
0:28:38 > 0:28:41'to be sent from her home in Phrygia.
0:28:45 > 0:28:48'On April 12th, 204 BC,
0:28:48 > 0:28:53'a delegation of the highest ranking most virtuous men and women in Rome
0:28:53 > 0:28:58'came to the port of Ostia to greet the goddess.'
0:28:58 > 0:29:00Amidst huge jubilations,
0:29:00 > 0:29:03her boat was towed up this river, the Tiber,
0:29:03 > 0:29:08and then her icon was triumphantly and tenderly carried into the city.
0:29:08 > 0:29:11The Mother had arrived at Rome.
0:29:14 > 0:29:17'The Romans believed Kybele's arrival
0:29:17 > 0:29:21'changed the course of the war, and history.
0:29:21 > 0:29:23'A grateful city embraced the potent goddess
0:29:23 > 0:29:27'they called the Magna Mater, the Great Mother.
0:29:27 > 0:29:30'A temple was built for her here, overlooking the forum
0:29:30 > 0:29:32'in the heart of the capital.
0:29:32 > 0:29:37'And each April, the Romans, led by the goddess' priests, the Galli,
0:29:37 > 0:29:41'honoured her in a great annual festival.'
0:29:41 > 0:29:43But in the middle of the celebrations
0:29:43 > 0:29:46came an aspect of the festival that was shocking to the Romans
0:29:46 > 0:29:50and is still pretty hard for us to stomach.
0:29:50 > 0:29:53The young priests would whip themselves into a frenzy
0:29:53 > 0:29:55and then, just as the sun was setting,
0:29:55 > 0:30:00they would make the ultimate sacrifice to the Great Mother.
0:30:00 > 0:30:03Taking a knife or a sharp stone or a piece of pottery shard,
0:30:03 > 0:30:06they would castrate themselves.
0:30:14 > 0:30:19For Romans, the idea of castration was absolutely abhorrent.
0:30:19 > 0:30:22Rome drew real strength from an idealisation
0:30:22 > 0:30:24of a kind of rock-hard virility.
0:30:24 > 0:30:27Roman men were meant to be real men.
0:30:27 > 0:30:28Hello.
0:30:44 > 0:30:48And yet these eunuch priests wore women's clothes,
0:30:48 > 0:30:51they used to put their long hair up in elaborate styles
0:30:51 > 0:30:53and wear very garish make-up.
0:30:53 > 0:30:55There are even rumours that some of them worked
0:30:55 > 0:31:00as temple prostitutes and indulged in orgiastic sex frenzies.
0:31:00 > 0:31:02It's little surprise that, originally,
0:31:02 > 0:31:06Roman citizens were banned from being priests of the Great Mother.
0:31:06 > 0:31:10I'm fascinated by these eunuch priests
0:31:10 > 0:31:13and why they'd emasculate themselves for a goddess.
0:31:13 > 0:31:17Professor Corey Brennan is from the American Academy in Rome.
0:31:17 > 0:31:24The Galli were what I'd call a negative foil to the Goddess.
0:31:24 > 0:31:27In other words, you have this very, very powerful woman
0:31:27 > 0:31:32and her powers are even magnified by being surrounded by effeminate men
0:31:32 > 0:31:37with high voices, wearing feminine dress, make-up
0:31:37 > 0:31:38and who had been castrated.
0:31:38 > 0:31:41How does self-castration become a religious act?
0:31:41 > 0:31:45I think the Galli worked themselves into a state of ecstasy
0:31:45 > 0:31:48and this allowed them also to do the self-mutilation
0:31:48 > 0:31:53and some of the more outrageous forms of worship that went along with the cult.
0:31:53 > 0:31:57One thing that runs through is the sort of initiates' remorse
0:31:57 > 0:32:01after having been initiated and come out of this frenzied, ecstatic state
0:32:01 > 0:32:06and say, "What have I done?" Because you really are painted into a corner.
0:32:06 > 0:32:12You are, de facto, in the service of this Goddess for the rest of your life.
0:32:12 > 0:32:18I'm really curious to understand what the war-mongering Romans made of these emasculated priests.
0:32:18 > 0:32:23I tell you what I can't quite get my head round is how the Romans,
0:32:23 > 0:32:28who adore masculinity so much, how it is that they allow
0:32:28 > 0:32:32these self-castrating priests to be a part of their society?
0:32:32 > 0:32:36The self-castrated priests were so foreign to the Romans
0:32:36 > 0:32:39that they decreed that only foreigners could serve in the cult.
0:32:39 > 0:32:41Romans were banned.
0:32:41 > 0:32:45This didn't mean that it didn't have a certain attraction for Romans.
0:32:45 > 0:32:47Every once in a while, we can actually detect Romans sneaking
0:32:47 > 0:32:52into the cult and, in fact, going the full measure,
0:32:52 > 0:32:55including self-castration in service of the Goddess.
0:32:57 > 0:33:01Magna Mater's subversive cult went from strength to strength
0:33:01 > 0:33:02in Roman society.
0:33:02 > 0:33:04Within a hundred years,
0:33:04 > 0:33:08even Roman citizens were allowed to become her priests.
0:33:08 > 0:33:10And, at another critical moment in her history,
0:33:10 > 0:33:14Rome turned to the Goddess once more.
0:33:14 > 0:33:19In the 1st century BC, Rome was plunged into the horrors
0:33:19 > 0:33:20of civil war.
0:33:23 > 0:33:28Men vied for control of what would become the world's greatest empire.
0:33:28 > 0:33:33In 44 BC, Julius Caesar, the famous general and statesman,
0:33:33 > 0:33:35was assassinated.
0:33:35 > 0:33:42His adopted heir emerged triumphant as Augustus, Rome's first emperor.
0:33:42 > 0:33:47To cement his control, he called on the Magna Mater.
0:33:47 > 0:33:51I'm meeting historian Alexander Evers to find out why.
0:33:51 > 0:33:55The Republic has come to an end and Augustus is the heir apparent,
0:33:55 > 0:33:58who begins to build an empire from scratch almost
0:33:58 > 0:34:01and he really needs all the forces on board.
0:34:01 > 0:34:04He makes Magna Mater one of his central figures.
0:34:04 > 0:34:07She's the big mamma, she will protect you.
0:34:07 > 0:34:12She's there, not just with Augustus, but she's also there for the Romans.
0:34:12 > 0:34:14But why did he choose her?
0:34:14 > 0:34:17Because he's got lots of very powerful male gods,
0:34:17 > 0:34:20very warlike gods and yet, he goes for a goddess.
0:34:20 > 0:34:26On the one side, she's powerful, aggressive, violent, scary.
0:34:26 > 0:34:29On the other hand, she's the Great Mother and she will look after you,
0:34:29 > 0:34:31she will protect you, she will nurse you.
0:34:31 > 0:34:34And so, these two elements make her the perfect fit, in a way.
0:34:34 > 0:34:38- I suppose you want to have that on your side, rather than one of your enemies.- You do.
0:34:38 > 0:34:40She represents the entire cycle of life.
0:34:40 > 0:34:42She's there at the beginning, and the end.
0:34:42 > 0:34:44But you don't want to mess with her,
0:34:44 > 0:34:47because she can upset that whole cycle.
0:34:47 > 0:34:51Although she was now part of the official, state religion,
0:34:51 > 0:34:54this wild goddess was not tamed.
0:34:54 > 0:34:55Across the Empire,
0:34:55 > 0:35:00live bulls were sacrificed in their thousands to satisfy her bloodlust.
0:35:02 > 0:35:04She doesn't lose her taste for blood, also.
0:35:04 > 0:35:08You see it in the sacrifices. People bring in the bull.
0:35:08 > 0:35:11You know, there's this huge male animal,
0:35:11 > 0:35:14and the person who's sacrificing, standing underneath the platform,
0:35:14 > 0:35:17is taking a rather bloody shower.
0:35:17 > 0:35:20It's such a gruesome form of sacrifice.
0:35:20 > 0:35:25I wonder if that just drives home again that this is not a creature to be messed with.
0:35:25 > 0:35:29Absolutely not, no. She can't be controlled.
0:35:29 > 0:35:35You can have her on your side, but, at the end, she's still the Goddess.
0:35:35 > 0:35:37For four centuries, the Great Mother's blood rites
0:35:37 > 0:35:42and her eunuch priests flourished here in the capital.
0:35:42 > 0:35:45And then, in the early centuries of the first millennium,
0:35:45 > 0:35:48a new religion would emerge from the East
0:35:48 > 0:35:51that would challenge the Goddess's control of the Empire.
0:35:53 > 0:35:58Christians fervently believed there was just one God.
0:36:03 > 0:36:08Its followers were hostile to the Goddess and her ritual sacrifices.
0:36:08 > 0:36:11Their new faith spread and grew in strength
0:36:11 > 0:36:13and, by the end of the fourth century,
0:36:13 > 0:36:16it was the official religion of the Roman Empire.
0:36:16 > 0:36:19Pagan worship was banned.
0:36:19 > 0:36:22The Goddess was now an outlaw.
0:36:22 > 0:36:24Christianity had triumphed.
0:36:24 > 0:36:27And there's physical evidence of that victory.
0:36:27 > 0:36:30Just up here is St Peter's Basilica.
0:36:30 > 0:36:33It's one of the most influential and totemic
0:36:33 > 0:36:36of all of Christianity's power bases.
0:36:36 > 0:36:40But this complex was not built on virgin soil.
0:36:43 > 0:36:45Hundreds of years before St Peter's was built,
0:36:45 > 0:36:49Kybele's worshippers came here in their droves.
0:36:49 > 0:36:54Priests made bloody sacrifices to the Great Mother.
0:36:54 > 0:36:57This is where they slaughtered bulls in her honour,
0:36:57 > 0:36:59drenching themselves in animals' blood.
0:37:01 > 0:37:05In 1609, a Vatican archivist called Giacomo Grimaldi
0:37:05 > 0:37:09made very detailed notes of some reconstruction work that was going on here.
0:37:09 > 0:37:11And what's fascinating, if you read them,
0:37:11 > 0:37:16is that you find out that underneath this entire Basilica complex
0:37:16 > 0:37:22there are vast numbers of remains of the sanctuary of the Great Mother.
0:37:23 > 0:37:25"About 30 spans deep into the ground,
0:37:25 > 0:37:28"the remains of the pagan altars were discovered,
0:37:28 > 0:37:32"some of which were smashed into pieces with iron bars by Christians,
0:37:32 > 0:37:36"dumped and buried in contempt for this idolatry,
0:37:36 > 0:37:39"one thrown on top of the other."
0:37:42 > 0:37:46Christians wouldn't allow the Great Mother to survive in the new order.
0:37:47 > 0:37:49Her cult was obliterated.
0:37:49 > 0:37:53She was symbolically and physically buried.
0:37:53 > 0:37:58Worshipping one god left no space for goddesses.
0:38:10 > 0:38:13But in societies that honour many gods,
0:38:13 > 0:38:17goddess worship has proven incredibly durable.
0:38:17 > 0:38:21I'm heading East to pick up the goddess trail.
0:38:21 > 0:38:24Nearly 900 million people follow Hinduism,
0:38:24 > 0:38:27making it the third largest religion in the world
0:38:27 > 0:38:32and the most popular polytheistic faith of the modern age.
0:38:33 > 0:38:37I've pieced together the clues from prehistory and the ancient world
0:38:37 > 0:38:40to try to recover those goddesses that were buried long ago.
0:38:40 > 0:38:44But here in India, they are alive and well.
0:38:51 > 0:38:54While Christianity was suppressing goddess worship,
0:38:54 > 0:38:58in Central Asia, right the way across to Afghanistan
0:38:58 > 0:39:01and here in the Indian subcontinent, it was gathering strength.
0:39:07 > 0:39:10One object of devotion was the goddess Durga.
0:39:10 > 0:39:14She sits right at the heart of Hinduism,
0:39:14 > 0:39:16one of the most ancient living religions.
0:39:18 > 0:39:21Hinduism emerged more than 3,500 years ago.
0:39:26 > 0:39:30Its central beliefs were written down in an ancient language
0:39:30 > 0:39:34called Sanskrit, in sacred texts known as the Vedas.
0:39:36 > 0:39:40These record many of the gods and goddesses of the Hindu pantheon.
0:39:47 > 0:39:52Wherever I've been, whether it's been Greece or Turkey or Rome,
0:39:52 > 0:39:55I've found this kind of jigsaw puzzle of evidence
0:39:55 > 0:39:59that people believe that the central sacred power was feminine.
0:39:59 > 0:40:02And what's really intriguing about coming here
0:40:02 > 0:40:05is that I've discovered that that idea been physically set in stone.
0:40:05 > 0:40:08There's a temple that I'm going to now
0:40:08 > 0:40:12where hundreds of thousands of worshippers still come every year.
0:40:29 > 0:40:30Can I have one of these?
0:40:34 > 0:40:37This is Kamakhya Temple, high in the hills of Assam,
0:40:37 > 0:40:40one of the most sacred goddess temples in India.
0:40:42 > 0:40:46It's dedicated to her yoni, Sanskrit for womb or vagina,
0:40:46 > 0:40:48which, it's believed, fell here from heaven.
0:40:48 > 0:40:50For nine days every year,
0:40:50 > 0:40:54hundreds of thousands of Hindus come to worship Durga
0:40:54 > 0:40:57and to celebrate a great festival in her honour, the Durga Puja.
0:40:57 > 0:41:00Hi, nice to meet you. Do you love the Goddess here?
0:41:00 > 0:41:03- Yes.- Yeah. Why do you love her?
0:41:03 > 0:41:08Because she gives us protection and she also loves us very much.
0:41:08 > 0:41:12She gives us many things, like lives,
0:41:12 > 0:41:15and then things to eat, things to wear.
0:41:15 > 0:41:17- So, she really looks after you?- Yes.
0:41:17 > 0:41:22The festival celebrates the birth of the goddess Durga
0:41:22 > 0:41:24and her epic battle with the evil demon king.
0:41:24 > 0:41:29This famous story was first recorded in the 5th or 6th centuries AD,
0:41:29 > 0:41:32in one of the most important religious texts in Hinduism,
0:41:32 > 0:41:34called the Devi Mahatmyam
0:41:34 > 0:41:37According to the sacred text,
0:41:37 > 0:41:39the demon king takes the form of a buffalo
0:41:39 > 0:41:41and terrorises the heavens and Earth.
0:41:41 > 0:41:44Neither man nor god can defeat him,
0:41:44 > 0:41:49so the gods combine their celestial power to create Durga -
0:41:49 > 0:41:52the Shining One.
0:41:52 > 0:41:57She appears riding a lion and carrying a fearsome weapon in each of her many arms.
0:41:57 > 0:42:01After a titanic series of battles, Durga slays the buffalo demon,
0:42:01 > 0:42:04liberating humanity and the gods.
0:42:04 > 0:42:08Almost 1,500 years later, Durga's worshippers re-enact
0:42:08 > 0:42:14her great victory by sacrificing buffalos in her honour.
0:42:17 > 0:42:21The animal's being prepared for sacrifice by the priest,
0:42:21 > 0:42:23who's covering it in garlands and flowers and herbs.
0:42:23 > 0:42:26And, actually, the blade that's going to be used
0:42:26 > 0:42:27is being prepared too.
0:42:27 > 0:42:31It's just so poignant, this, because this is exactly as it would've been
0:42:31 > 0:42:35in those great temples of the goddess of antiquity, like Kybele,
0:42:35 > 0:42:39because the drums and the cymbals are working themselves up into a frenzy.
0:42:40 > 0:42:43The man who's doing the sacrifice has just walked in
0:42:43 > 0:42:46in his ceremonial robes, dressed.
0:42:46 > 0:42:48He's got garlands around him as well.
0:42:48 > 0:42:52And he's preparing himself in front of the buffalo's head.
0:42:52 > 0:42:54CYMBALS CLASH LOUDLY
0:42:54 > 0:42:56So, the head's come off.
0:42:56 > 0:43:00It's being held up by the priest on his shoulders as if it's his own head
0:43:00 > 0:43:02and now it's being carried into the temple.
0:43:02 > 0:43:04This bloody celebration is inspired
0:43:04 > 0:43:07by the story told in the Devi Mahatmyam.
0:43:07 > 0:43:12This sacred text marked a radical new direction in Hinduism -
0:43:12 > 0:43:15the emergence of an all-conquering goddess
0:43:15 > 0:43:20who could perform feats that no male god could manage.
0:43:20 > 0:43:24When it was written, in the 5th or 6th centuries AD,
0:43:24 > 0:43:28the Brahmins, elite priests in charge of the sacred texts,
0:43:28 > 0:43:31were consolidating their power in this part of India.
0:43:31 > 0:43:35To understand what role their arrival here played in the emergence of the Goddess,
0:43:35 > 0:43:38I'm meeting Professor Nilima Chitgopekar.
0:43:38 > 0:43:42We found inscriptions where the patrons are giving Brahmins
0:43:42 > 0:43:45these huge grants of land in areas like Bengal, Orissa,
0:43:45 > 0:43:49you know, in the eastern area where we are right now, in Assam.
0:43:49 > 0:43:52They actually started exactly in the 5th century.
0:43:52 > 0:43:54Now, when those Brahmins must have come here,
0:43:54 > 0:43:56when they were granted the land,
0:43:56 > 0:44:00they must have encountered people like this, you know, powerful goddesses.
0:44:00 > 0:44:04Maybe there was conflict to begin with, but they must have said,
0:44:04 > 0:44:07"Hey, we have to incorporate this because it's not going to go away."
0:44:07 > 0:44:10And that's when they incorporated it into their own text.
0:44:10 > 0:44:14The powerful local goddesses encountered in areas like this
0:44:14 > 0:44:19were gradually accepted into mainstream Hindu religion, in works like the Devi Mahatmyam.
0:44:19 > 0:44:25And Professor Chitgopekar believes these divine beings were inspired by real women.
0:44:25 > 0:44:30There must have been an army, if not an army, sets of women,
0:44:30 > 0:44:33who were good with weaponry, who were good at warfare
0:44:33 > 0:44:38and who were taking part in all that, otherwise you just couldn't have goddesses like that.
0:44:38 > 0:44:41You know, religion very often reflects reality in a way, you know?
0:44:41 > 0:44:47And maybe it's a forgotten culture today which has got crystallised in religion.
0:44:47 > 0:44:52Just like those semi-divine females I encountered back in prehistory,
0:44:52 > 0:44:56Durga's power comes from a kind of inner life force,
0:44:56 > 0:44:59found both in the spirit world and in real-life women.
0:44:59 > 0:45:03The Devi Mahatmyam calls this feminine force Shakti.
0:45:03 > 0:45:05For the Goddess's worshippers,
0:45:05 > 0:45:10Shakti is a kind of subatomic energy and the foundation of life itself,
0:45:10 > 0:45:14animating every living thing in the universe.
0:45:14 > 0:45:18Shakti means alive. Shakti means nature.
0:45:18 > 0:45:21Shakti means creative force, the kinetic energy,
0:45:21 > 0:45:24the creative force that a woman has within her.
0:45:24 > 0:45:27The whole idea that she procreates, so she's the Shakti,
0:45:27 > 0:45:29and for the followers who come here,
0:45:29 > 0:45:33it's not the male God who created this universe. It's the female.
0:45:33 > 0:45:36We believe that this is the origin of the universe.
0:45:36 > 0:45:37I see. And do you bring your daughter here?
0:45:37 > 0:45:40Yeah, she is my Shakti.
0:45:40 > 0:45:44- She is.- The goddess, a small goddess.- You are a small goddess.
0:45:46 > 0:45:49Deep inside the temple of Kamakhya is a secret underground chamber
0:45:49 > 0:45:52which is particularly sacred for those seeking the blessing
0:45:52 > 0:45:54of the great Goddess.
0:45:54 > 0:45:59Her worshippers believe that this cave is the womb or vagina
0:45:59 > 0:46:01of the Goddess herself.
0:46:04 > 0:46:06During the festival of the Goddess,
0:46:06 > 0:46:08thousands of Hindus come before dawn,
0:46:08 > 0:46:12queuing all day for the chance to enter this secret space.
0:46:12 > 0:46:17I feel incredibly privileged to be able to share their experience.
0:46:17 > 0:46:21But this site is so sacred, the cameras aren't allowed,
0:46:21 > 0:46:23so I'll have to see you on the other side.
0:46:29 > 0:46:33That was a fairly extraordinary experience and a very, very hot one
0:46:33 > 0:46:35because you go right into the temple,
0:46:35 > 0:46:38deep down into this inner rock-cut sanctum,
0:46:38 > 0:46:42which is where the holy water of the Goddess herself flows.
0:46:42 > 0:46:46The priest will bend you down, he allows you to touch the holy water,
0:46:46 > 0:46:50he covers your face with water and also, as you can probably see,
0:46:50 > 0:46:51covers you with red.
0:46:51 > 0:46:54It was a peculiar experience. I do feel inspired, though, in a way
0:46:54 > 0:46:58because the rice they were putting all over my head was for my children
0:46:58 > 0:47:00and they reminded me that I needed to be a good mother.
0:47:05 > 0:47:06In the Devi Mahatmyam,
0:47:06 > 0:47:10the Goddess is incarnated in several different forms.
0:47:10 > 0:47:13The most terrifying is Kali.
0:47:13 > 0:47:17She emerges when Durga finds herself in an even more desperate battle
0:47:17 > 0:47:19against another demon king.
0:47:19 > 0:47:22Each time Durga lands a blow on her enemy
0:47:22 > 0:47:25and a drop of his blood hits the Earth, he's cloned,
0:47:25 > 0:47:29until she finds herself battling countless demon hordes.
0:47:31 > 0:47:33At a critical point in the battle,
0:47:33 > 0:47:38a monstrous creature emerges from Durga's fierce frown.
0:47:38 > 0:47:43She has demonic red eyes, her tongue lolls out of her mouth
0:47:43 > 0:47:46and she is filled with fury.
0:47:48 > 0:47:52In a murderous rampage, Kali slays the demon king
0:47:52 > 0:47:56and his many clones, lapping up their blood.
0:47:56 > 0:47:59The Hindu texts leave us in no doubt whatsoever
0:47:59 > 0:48:02as to just how powerful she was.
0:48:02 > 0:48:05She's described as the beginning of all things,
0:48:05 > 0:48:09the creator, the protector and the destroyer of all.
0:48:10 > 0:48:13This terrifying face of a goddess, who can be both a killer
0:48:13 > 0:48:19and a giver of life, seems to be an incredibly enduring idea.
0:48:19 > 0:48:24I've found it in prehistory at the very beginning of human society in Catalhoyuk,
0:48:24 > 0:48:26in ancient Phrygia and in Rome.
0:48:26 > 0:48:29I'm meeting Professor Madhu Khanna
0:48:29 > 0:48:33to find out how it's embodied in this Hindu goddess.
0:48:33 > 0:48:36She's just the antithesis, the opposite of Durga,
0:48:36 > 0:48:39when the battle becomes more and more fierce.
0:48:39 > 0:48:43She's Durga's anger all rolled into one.
0:48:43 > 0:48:46I know from lots of ancient cultures, you often have male gods
0:48:46 > 0:48:51who vanquish demons or, you know, warriors sent out to kill monsters.
0:48:51 > 0:48:54So, why here have you got a goddess doing all of that?
0:48:54 > 0:48:56But may I ask, why not?
0:48:56 > 0:48:58She is a mother, she is a nurturer.
0:48:58 > 0:49:00In the times of calamity, she becomes Kali.
0:49:00 > 0:49:06And one of the reasons why goddess culture has survived is
0:49:06 > 0:49:13because of the very reconstruction of the notion of femininity
0:49:13 > 0:49:16which is so unique, because she's an all-embracing goddess.
0:49:16 > 0:49:20She has a terrific side as well as a benign side,
0:49:20 > 0:49:25so all aspects of the human psyche are part and parcel of her personality.
0:49:25 > 0:49:29It's just interesting for me that those two sides, you know,
0:49:29 > 0:49:32the terrifying and the maternal and the protective,
0:49:32 > 0:49:37that we want to see those united in a female figure, in a woman, rather than in...
0:49:37 > 0:49:40- A man can be one thing, but a woman can be two things.- Too many.
0:49:40 > 0:49:43A woman can be many things. So, within the Devi Mahatmyam context,
0:49:43 > 0:49:48the Goddess is a nurturing mother and she never really loses that role
0:49:48 > 0:49:51and, at the same time, she can also be fearful.
0:49:52 > 0:49:56After years spent piecing together the Goddess's story from fragments,
0:49:56 > 0:49:59I want to find out what she means as a real, living force
0:49:59 > 0:50:01to her followers today.
0:50:02 > 0:50:04Politically and economically,
0:50:04 > 0:50:08India is one of the most successful nations in the world.
0:50:08 > 0:50:12And despite the massive changes that have swept this country,
0:50:12 > 0:50:15the Goddess seems stronger than ever.
0:50:15 > 0:50:20I want to know how she fits into this thriving, modern society.
0:50:20 > 0:50:22I've come to Kolkata in Bengal,
0:50:22 > 0:50:25where her festival - the Durga Puja,
0:50:25 > 0:50:27has taken over the city.
0:50:28 > 0:50:32Like most Bengalis, Tanushree Ghosh is celebrating Durga's festival.
0:50:33 > 0:50:37She's invited me to join her as she gets ready for its finale.
0:50:37 > 0:50:41Yeah, over here, it's a very big day because it happens once a year,
0:50:41 > 0:50:42we wait for these four days.
0:50:42 > 0:50:45And also today is a very women-centric day
0:50:45 > 0:50:49because, today, women do the Pujas, the majority of them, it's for them.
0:50:49 > 0:50:51So, this is where you do your make-up?
0:50:51 > 0:50:55- We do. This is Lotha.- Hi, namaste. - Hi, namaste.
0:50:55 > 0:50:57- Please have a seat.- Thank you.
0:50:57 > 0:51:01And this is where all the make-up happens for the four days
0:51:01 > 0:51:05that we get ready for the Puja, all the saris, everything.
0:51:05 > 0:51:07So, this is where we get dressed and all the heavy make-up.
0:51:07 > 0:51:10This is the only time when we put on very heavy make-up
0:51:10 > 0:51:12and heavy jewellery, not before this.
0:51:30 > 0:51:33Tanushree is taking me to her community's pandal,
0:51:33 > 0:51:36a temporary shrine built especially for the festival.
0:51:36 > 0:51:39When you think of the Goddess, what's in your mind?
0:51:39 > 0:51:44Do you think she actually exists as a creature with eight or ten arms?
0:51:44 > 0:51:46She does exist.
0:51:46 > 0:51:50For us, she's a living being who's always around us, blessing us,
0:51:50 > 0:51:52protecting us, taking care of us.
0:51:52 > 0:51:56So, for us, we've seen her drawn like this throughout...
0:51:56 > 0:52:00Yet, actually, we don't believe she has ten arms, but it shows that,
0:52:00 > 0:52:03you know, she's multi-tasking, a woman who's multi-tasking.
0:52:03 > 0:52:06So, really she's a kind of role model goddess?
0:52:06 > 0:52:08She controls the world,
0:52:08 > 0:52:11so she's a role model for men and for women because,
0:52:11 > 0:52:17in a different way, she shows women how to control and she also shows men
0:52:17 > 0:52:20that even if women can be quiet, but still, you know,
0:52:20 > 0:52:24don't meddle with her too much, don't mess with her,
0:52:24 > 0:52:27then she can take up ten weapons in ten hands and kill you,
0:52:27 > 0:52:29and can be the monster.
0:52:35 > 0:52:37- Are we a bit late? - Yeah, we are late.- OK.
0:52:42 > 0:52:46Every year, thousands of different neighbourhoods all over Kolkata
0:52:46 > 0:52:50come together to create their own special Durga shrine.
0:52:50 > 0:52:54- Are you married?- I am married, yeah. - So, then we put it in our hair.
0:52:56 > 0:53:00Durga's image is made from clay and water from the sacred Ganges.
0:53:00 > 0:53:04Described by many as the Mother of India, for nine days,
0:53:04 > 0:53:09she is celebrated, worshipped and treated with the greatest respect.
0:53:10 > 0:53:12She's not a goddess to be messed with, is she?
0:53:12 > 0:53:16She's the power god. Everybody finds solace and power, everything.
0:53:16 > 0:53:20And everybody come and pray, give us the power to sustain another year.
0:53:20 > 0:53:23At the end of the festival, Durga will return home.
0:53:23 > 0:53:25She'll be brought to the sacred Ganges,
0:53:25 > 0:53:28which flows from the Himalayas, the seat of the gods.
0:53:28 > 0:53:30But first, she must be prepared.
0:53:30 > 0:53:34So, the idea is that I've given the Goddess food for her journey,
0:53:34 > 0:53:37I've looked after her, that's why I'm smoothing her cheeks,
0:53:37 > 0:53:40and because she's married I'm giving her the red mark on her forehead.
0:53:40 > 0:53:45But, all the time, I have to remember just how powerful she is and do it right.
0:54:04 > 0:54:07It's like doing the... There.
0:54:07 > 0:54:09Do one.
0:54:09 > 0:54:11- BANG! - Oh!
0:54:11 > 0:54:12LOUD BANGS
0:54:12 > 0:54:15- Hi, are you enjoying yourselves today?- Very much.
0:54:15 > 0:54:18I hear that some girls come here and you meet up with young boys,
0:54:18 > 0:54:21- is that true, at this festival? - ALL: Yeah!
0:54:22 > 0:54:24- Is it the mating season here?- Yeah.
0:54:42 > 0:54:46In the ancient world, when women danced ecstatic dances for the Goddess,
0:54:46 > 0:54:4899% of the time, men weren't there,
0:54:48 > 0:54:52so they used to write about it as being these demonic, sad, terrifying occasions.
0:54:52 > 0:54:56I've always had a sneaking suspicion that, actually, the women were having a great time
0:54:56 > 0:54:59and this seems, to me, to prove it.
0:55:00 > 0:55:02Now we're on the way to the Ganges,
0:55:02 > 0:55:04where the idol's going to be immersed in the river.
0:55:04 > 0:55:08So, how many of these idols will go down? How many pandals?
0:55:08 > 0:55:11- Around 100,000. - Will you be sorry to see her go?
0:55:11 > 0:55:13Yes, it's very emotional,
0:55:13 > 0:55:17because you're going to wait another year for her to come back, so it's like your mother going away.
0:55:17 > 0:55:20- Like your mother leaving for a year? - Absolutely.
0:55:20 > 0:55:23- Bolo Durga mai-ki.- Jai.
0:55:23 > 0:55:24What are they saying?
0:55:24 > 0:55:28"Bolo Durga mai-ki" is to the glory of Mother Durga.
0:55:28 > 0:55:31And "aashchhe bochhor abar hobe" is we will celebrate again next year.
0:55:31 > 0:55:33OK.
0:56:00 > 0:56:03We're actually on the banks of the Ganges now
0:56:03 > 0:56:06and it's heading down to the sacred water.
0:56:14 > 0:56:17This is the moment Hindus think she's starting to return to heaven,
0:56:17 > 0:56:19to her husband Shiva.
0:56:36 > 0:56:40Across the globe, the Goddess has pretty much been consigned to history.
0:56:40 > 0:56:43But, just like those great ancient goddesses of antiquity,
0:56:43 > 0:56:46here, she's celebrated and worshipped
0:56:46 > 0:56:49with a wild and heartfelt passion.
0:56:49 > 0:56:51And also, just like them
0:56:51 > 0:56:54and, I suspect, like the women who've worshipped her for centuries,
0:56:54 > 0:56:57she's thought to be both protective and threatening.
0:56:57 > 0:57:02Someone who demands respect and inspires devotion.
0:57:05 > 0:57:08By following in the trail of that enigmatic female figurine
0:57:08 > 0:57:11who inspired me as a teenager, I've come to know the goddesses
0:57:11 > 0:57:13who shaped our ancestors' lives.
0:57:15 > 0:57:18Their fortunes might have waxed and waned,
0:57:18 > 0:57:20but one thing has remained constant.
0:57:20 > 0:57:26By giving birth, real women have always danced with life and death.
0:57:26 > 0:57:29For our ancestors,
0:57:29 > 0:57:33this meant the female of the species was close to divine.
0:57:33 > 0:57:37And what I've seen has proved to me just how tenacious this idea was
0:57:37 > 0:57:40and continues to be.
0:57:46 > 0:57:51In the next episode, I discover a time when women were priestesses who walked with the gods.
0:57:54 > 0:57:59When the fate of an empire depended on a woman's virginity.
0:57:59 > 0:58:04And when a major new faith gave women unprecedented power -
0:58:04 > 0:58:06and freedom.
0:58:08 > 0:58:10For a free Open University booklet,
0:58:10 > 0:58:13covering the issues and themes featured in this programme
0:58:13 > 0:58:18and to learn about controversies surrounding women and goddesses in religion, ring:
0:58:22 > 0:58:23Or go to:
0:58:26 > 0:58:29And follow the links to the OU.
0:58:37 > 0:58:40Subtitles by Red Bee Media Ltd