Cautes and Cautopates are torch-bearers depicted attending the god Mithras in the icons of the ancient Roman cult of Mithraism, known as Tauroctony. Cautes holds his torch raised up, and Cautopates holds his torch pointed downward.
In Mithraic images, Mithras either represents the sun, or is a close friend of the sun god Helios or Sol Invictus (Latin: the invincible sun) with whom Mithras dines. So attendants Cautes and Cautopates are supposed to represent the stations of sunrise and sunset respectively, or perhaps the spring and autumn equinoxes, or equivalently the ascending (spring) and descending (autumnal) nodes of the Sun's apparent path on the celestial sphere. If eclipses of the sun and moon formed part of Mithraic symbolism, they could also represent the ascending and descending nodes where the Moon crosses the ecliptic.
Both are depicted as smaller than Mithras to emphasize his significance, and both wear Persian style garments, notably a Phrygian cap, to emphasize the supposed oriental origins of the cult. [1]
Cautes holds a burning torch pointed up, whereas Cautopates holds a burning torch pointed down. [2] Cautopates is usually depicted on the left, but not always. They are often shown standing with their legs crossed, but not always.
The two torch-bearers are often interpreted as symbols of light, one for the rising, the other for the setting sun. [3] Cautopates could also represent death, while Cautes might represent new life. [4]
An alternative interpretation advanced by David Ulansey is that Cautes represents the spring equinox and Cautopates the autumn equinox. Thus, represented on the left and right of the Tauroctony, they become a realistic cadre of the celestial equator and the constellations included between the two equinoxes during the Age of Taurus. [5]
M. J. Vermasaren [6] shows Mithras, the unconquerable sun, and his two torch-bearers, Cautes, sunrise, and Cautopates, sunset, equally sized in a 3-branch pine tree, visible at Dieburg, Germany. [7] Vermasaren suggests they form a Mithraic "Trinity".
Mithraism, also known as the Mithraic mysteries, was a Roman mystery religion centered on the god Mithras. Although inspired by Iranian worship of the Zoroastrian divinity (yazata) Mithra, the Roman Mithras is linked to a new and distinctive imagery, with the level of continuity between Persian and Greco-Roman practice debated. The mysteries were popular among the Imperial Roman army from about the 1st to the 4th century CE.
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Tauroctony is a modern name given to the central cult reliefs of the Roman Mithraic Mysteries. The imagery depicts Mithras killing a bull, hence the name tauroctony after the Greek word tauroktonos. A tauroctony is distinct from the sacrifice of a bull in ancient Rome called a taurobolium; the taurobolium was mainly part of the unrelated cult of Cybele.
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The "Mithras Liturgy" is a text from the Great Magical Papyrus of Paris, part of the Greek Magical Papyri, numbered PGM IV.475-834. The modern name by which the text is known originated in 1903 with Albrecht Dieterich, its first translator, based on the invocation of Helios Mithras as the god who will provide the initiate with a revelation of immortality. The text is generally considered a product of the religious syncretism characteristic of the Hellenistic and Roman Imperial era, as were the Mithraic mysteries themselves. Some scholars have argued that it has no direct connection to particular Mithraic ritual. Others consider it an authentic reflection of Mithraic liturgy, or view it as Mithraic material reworked for the syncretic tradition of magic and esotericism.
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