Atargatis

Classical writers preserve a transformation narrative in which Derceto/Atargatis is said to have drowned herself and been transformed into a fish; this motif (reported via Ctesias and summarized in later authors) became one explanation for fish-bodied images associated with her cult. Philological and comparative evidence in the Aramaic forms of her name (attested as ʿAttarʿattā and variants) has been analyzed by scholars as containing elements linked to older Semitic goddess names (elements related to ʿAṯtar/ʿAštart and to forms related to ʿAnat), indicating continuity and transformation from earlier Levantine divine mothers and fertility figures, though the provided sources present this as an interpretive analysis rather than an uncontested categorical fact.

Sources record variant local depictions. Classical accounts (via Diodorus/Ctesias and Lucian as summarized) describe a mermaid‑like form with "a face of a woman, and otherwise the entire body of a fish" in some shrines, while at Hierapolis Lucian describes an entirely anthropomorphic cult image: a seated woman flanked by two lions, holding a scepter and a spindle, wearing rays and a tower (mural crown), a girdle, and with the head set with a gemstone called lychnis which glowed by night. Archaeological and numismatic evidence shows predominantly anthropomorphic images in the LIMC corpus and Hellenistic coin types, though some Hellenistic coins and classical reports associate fish imagery with the goddess.

Classical sources and modern summaries emphasize her roles in fertility, protection of the city and people (baalat), and as an ancestral/foundational figure for royal houses and social/religious life. Classical authors also describe her (in their accounts) as a patron or supposed inventor of useful appliances. The association of doves and fish as sacred animals links her function to love and sexual/familial fertility (doves) and aquatic fecundity and life (fish). The drowning/transformation motif in classical mythic accounts explains the ichthyomorphic aspect seen in some local cultic representations.