Aristobule () was an

epithet An epithet (, ), also a byname, is a descriptive term (word or phrase) commonly accompanying or occurring in place of the name of a real or fictitious person, place, or thing. It is usually literally descriptive, as in Alfred the Great, Suleima ...

of the

Greek goddess Greek mythology is the body of myths originally told by the ancient Greeks, and a genre of ancient Greek folklore, today absorbed alongside Roman mythology into the broader designation of classical mythology. These stories concern the ancient ...

Artemis, meaning "the best advisor", under which she was worshipped at Athens in ancient Greece. The politician and general Themistocles built a temple of Artemis Aristobule at Athens, near his house in the deme of Melite (Attica), Melite, in which he dedicated his own statue. This annoyed a great many Greeks, who took this as Themistocles boasting of his own good counsel as a politician. Not long after this, Themistocles was Ostracism, ostracized and went into exile. Some scholars contend that "Aristobule" should not be globally conflated with Artemis, and outside Athens was a distinct divine concept in its own right. The philosopher Porphyry (philosopher), Porphyry spoke of Aristobule as one known by this name alone (as opposed to a more surname-like epithet, "Artemis Aristobule"). Scholar Noel Robertson proposed that in Rhodes "Aristoboule" ought to be identified with the Roman Mother goddess, also known as Cybele. It has also been suggested by religion scholar Hermann Usener that "Aristobule" was a euphemism for capital punishment, and that this epithet and its temple had something to do with public executions, though other scholars disagree with this interpretation. This largely comes from speculation around the fact that in Athens the temple of Artemis Aristobule was very near to the place where the bodies of executed criminals who were denied interment (which was the ultimate punishment) were thrown into an open pit to rot.

References

{{DGRBM, author=LS, title= Aristobule, volume=1, page=300, url=https://quod.lib.umich.edu/m/moa/acl3129.0001.001/315 Epithets of Artemis Epithets of Cybele