The grouping of twelve deities has origins older than the
Greek or Roman sources.
Hittite The Greek grouping may have
Hittite origins via
Lycia, in
Anatolia. A group of twelve
Hittite gods is known both from
cuneiform texts and from artistic representation. All the Hittite Twelve are male, with no individualizing features. The
Roman Empire period group is a possible reflex of the Lycians' twelve gods: By 400 BCE, a precinct dedicated to twelve gods existed at the marketplace in
Xanthos, Lycia.
Egyptian Herodotus mentions a group of twelve gods in Egypt, but this cannot be confirmed in any
Egyptian sources.
Greek The Greek cult of the
Twelve Olympians can be traced to 6th century BCE
Athens and has no apparent precedent in the
Mycenaean period. The altar to the Twelve Olympians at Athens is usually dated to the
archonship of the
younger Pesistratos, in 522–521 BCE. By the 5th century BCE, there are well-attested
cults of the Twelve Olympians in
Olympia and at the
Hieron on the
Bosphorus.
Etruscan The references to twelve
Etruscan deities come from later Roman authors, writing long after
the influence of the Greek pantheon had become dominant, and must be regarded with skepticism.
Arnobius states that the
Etruscans had a set of six male and six female deities which they called
consentes and
complices because they rose and set together, implying an
astronomical significance, and that these twelve acted as councillors of Jupiter. Scholarly evaluation of this account depends on the hypothesis that the Etruscans originally immigrated to
Italy from
Anatolia. In this case, the Etruscan Twelve might have been cognate to the Hittite Twelve. However, Etruscan artifacts show extensive use of Etruscan translations of Greek mythology; it is just as likely that both the Etruscan Twelve and the Roman Twelve were simply adaptations of the Greek Twelve. ==In modern culture==