A bust of Asclepius on plinth – 20cm

Asclepius is the god of medicine and mythologized, according to the prevailing tradition, as the son of Apollo and Coronis. Apollo entrusted him to the care of the wise Centaur Chiron, at Pelion. Asclepius was taught by Chiron the treatment of every disease and wound by spells, herbs or surgery. The oldest confirmed cult of Asclepius is of Epidaurus and goes back to the 6th century BC. In the 4th c. a large temple was built in Asclepieion. On-site inscriptions prove that the main element of his worship was "sleep temples", i.e. the stay of sick people in the abode of the temple, who saw in their sleep God advising them about their healing. God's healers, with their long service and daily fellowship with the sick, were taught a healing regimen based on diet, massaging diseased parts of the body, surgery, and the use of warm baths. However, the patients' faith in God's support helped more in the treatment, and the cultivated emotional states often led to spectacular results.)

More generally, it can be argued that the greater spread of his cult is due to the fact that he, in distinction from the gods of the official Olympian religion, belonged to the most "comforting deities". In late antiquity, Asclepius was also proclaimed as the Savior of the World.