The Religious Experience of the Roman People Part 13

_C.D._ vii. 23 and 28, Agahd, p. 152. Wissowa shows this conclusively, _R.K._ p. 246. Orcus was Graecised as Plutus, but was himself totally without personality.

[303] Dr. Frazer wrongly translates this as "ancient prayers" (p. 411), adding "the highest possible authority on the subject." _Oratio_ is never used in this sense until Christian times: the word is always _precatio_. All scholars are agreed that what is meant is invocations to deities in old speeches, such as occur once or twice in Cicero (_e.g._ at the end of the _Verrines_); cp. Livy xxix. 15. As the recording of speeches cannot be a.s.sumed to have begun before the third century B.C., this does not carry us very far back. That century is also the age in which the pontifices were probably most active in drawing up _comprecationes_; see below, p. 285 foll.

[304] See Appendix B at end of volume.

[305] Cp. Ovid, _Fasti_, iii. 850, "_forti_ sacrificare deae." In _R.F._ p. 60 foll., I have criticised the attempts, ancient and modern, to make this Nerio the subject of myths.

[306] Macrob. i. 12. 18. This word Maiestas shows the doubtful nature of these feminine names, and probably betrays the real meaning of Maia. I may mention here that Bellona instead of Nerio is ascribed as wife to Mars by Seneca ap. Aug. _C.D._ vi. 10; also Venus to Volca.n.u.s instead of Maia. Neither have any connection, so far as we know, with the G.o.ds to whom Seneca ascribes them as wives: Venus-Vulcan is, of course, Greek. Both Augustine and Dr. Frazer might with advantage have abstained from citing Seneca on such a point: as a Spaniard by birth he was not likely to know much about technical questions of Roman ritual.

[307] See Schanz, _Gesch. der rom. Literatur_, i. 274.

[308] In the Graeco-Roman age Mars seems to have been rather a favourite subject of myth-making; see Usener's article on Italian myths in _Rhein. Mus._ vol. x.x.x.; Roscher in _Myth. Lex._ for works of Graeco-Etruscan art in which he appears in certain mythical scenes.

[309] H. Jordan, quoted in _R.F._ p. 61 note. I relegate to an appendix what needs to be said about the other pairs of deities mentioned by Gellius.

[310] Leipzig, 1898, p. 7 foll.

[311] Wissowa, _R.K._ p. 168. Carter, _op. cit._ p. 21.

[312] See Buecheler, _Umbrica_, pp. 22 and 98.

[313] So Fides is usually explained, as originally belonging to Jupiter (Wissowa, _R.K._ p. 103 foll.); but a different view is taken by Harold L. Axtell in his work on the _Deification of Abstract Ideas at Rome_ (Chicago, 1907), p. 20.

[314] In the Festschrift f. O. Hirschfeld, p. 243 foll.

[315] _Religion of the Babylonians_, introductory chapter.

[316] _Op. cit._ p. 412.

[317] _L.L._ v. 64.

[318] This fragment is No. 503 in Baehrens, _Fragm.

Poet. Rom._

[319] Lactantius, _Div. inst._ iv. 3.

[320] Crawley, _The Tree of Life_, p. 256; Farnell, _Evolution of Religion_, p. 180; von Domaszewski, _Abhandlungen_, p. 166, "Man ruft sie an im Gebete als pater und mater zum Zeichen der Unterwerfung unter ihren Willen, wie der Sohn dem Gebote des paterfamilias sich fugt. Der sittlich strenge Gehorsam, der das Familienleben der Romer beherrscht, die pietas, ist der Sinn der romischen religio." Cp. also Appel, _de Rom.

precationibus_, pp. 102-3, who thinks that they regarded the G.o.ds "velut patriarchas sive patres familias." He quotes Preller-Jordan i. 55 and Dieterich, _Eine Mithrasliturgie_, p. 142 sq. So too with mater--"velut mater familias."

[321] The expression seems to mean "a father made for the purpose of the emba.s.sy." Wissowa, _R.K._ p. 477, note 3.

[322] p. 19. This was written, it may be noted, several years after Aust had thoroughly investigated the cult of Jupiter for his article in the _Mythological Lexicon_; in which cult, if anywhere, one may be tempted to see evidence of a personal conception of deities. As Dr.

Frazer has referred to the cult of Jupiter at Praeneste, to which I referred him as evidence of a possibly personal conception of the G.o.d in that Latin city, I may say here that I adhere to what I said about this in _R.F._ p. 226 foll.; no piece of antique cult has occupied my attention more than this, and I have tried to lay open every source of confirmation or criticism.

Wissowa has expressed himself in almost exactly the same terms in _R.K._ p. 209: we arrived at our conclusions independently.

[323] Tertullian, _ad Nationes_ 11, and _de Anima_, 37 foll.; Aug. _de Civ. Dei_, iv. _pa.s.sim_, and especially ch. xi.; R. Peter compiled a complete list (_Myth.

Lex._, _s.v._ "Indigitamenta," p. 143) from these and other sources.

[324] Aug. _C.D._ vii. 17. That this was what Varro meant by _di certi_ was first affirmed by Wissowa in a note to his edition of Marquardt, p. 9; it has been generally accepted as the true account. A full discussion will be found in Agahd's edition of the fragments of Varro's work, p. 126 foll.; cf. Peter's article quoted above, and Wissowa, _R.K._ pp. 61 and 65.

A somewhat different view is given in Domaszewski's article in _Archiv_ for 1907, p. 1 foll., suggested by Usener's _Gotternamen_.

[325] The evidence for this will be found in Marquardt's note 4 on p. 9. I have no doubt that Wissowa is right in explaining Indigitamenta as "Gebetsformeln," formulae of invocation; in which the most important matter, we may add, would be the name of the deity. See his _Gesammelte Abhandlungen_, p. 177 foll. The Indigitamenta contained, as one section, the invocations of _di certi_.

[326] Chiefly by Ambrosch in his _Religionsbucher der Romer_. Peter's article contains a useful account of the whole progress of research on this subject.

[327] _Lex._ p. 137; it was that of his master Reifferscheid. Cp. Wissowa, _op. cit._ (_Ges. Abhandl._ p. 306 foll.).

[328] _R.F._ pp. 191, 341.

[329] "The place of the Sondergotter in Greek Polytheism," printed in _Anthropological Essays addressed to E. B. Tylor_, p. 81. Usener's discussion of the Roman and Lithuanian Sondergotter is in his _Gotternamen_, p. 73 foll.

[330] Wissowa writes (_Ges. Abhandl._ p. 320 note) that he has reason to believe that a great number of the Lithuanian Sondergotter only became such through the treatment of the subject by the mediaeval writers on whom Usener relied!

[331] _Ges. Abhandl._ p. 304 foll.

[332] Servius (Interpol.) _ad Georg._ i. 21.

[333] Henzen, _Acta Fratr. Arv._ p. 147; _C.I.L._ vi.

2099 and 2107.

[334] _Op. cit._ p. 323 foll.; for _famuli_ and _anculi divi_, Henzen, _op. cit._ p. 145.

[335] See above, p. 121.

[336] p. 312; cp. 320, where he further a.s.serts his belief that Varro is responsible himself for the creation of a great number of these Sondergotter, owing to his extreme desire to fix and define the function of every deity in relation to human life; just as the mediaeval writers Laskowski and Pretorius may have created many Lithuanian Sondergotter. As I am not quite clear on this point, I have not mentioned it in the text.

[337] _Op. cit._ p. 314, note 1. See above, note 33.

[338] _e.g._ Vatica.n.u.s, "qui infantum vagitibus praesidet"; _Rusina_ from _rus_; _Consus_ from _consilium_, etc.

[339] See above, p. 84.

LECTURE VIII

RITUAL OF THE _IUS DIVINUM_

I have already frequently mentioned the _ius divinum_, the law governing the relations between the divine and human inhabitants of the city, as the _ius civile_ governed the relations between citizen and citizen.[340] When we examined the calendar of Numa, we were in fact examining a part of this law; we began with this our studies of the religion of the Roman city-state, because it is the earliest doc.u.ment we possess which illuminates the dark ages of city life, so far as religion is concerned. The study of the calendar naturally led us on to consider the evidence it yields, taken together with other sources of information, as to the nature of the deities for whose wors.h.i.+p it fixes times and seasons, or, more accurately, the amount of knowledge to which the Romans had attained about their divine beings. But we must now return to the _ius divinum_, and study it in another aspect, for which the calendar itself does not suffice as evidence.

Perhaps the simplest way of explaining this _ius_ is to describe it as laying down the rules for the maintenance of right relations between the citizens and their deities; as ordaining what things are to be done or avoided in order to keep up a continual _pax_, or quasi-legal covenant, between these two parties. The two words _ius_ and _pax_, we may note, are continually meeting us in Roman religious doc.u.ments. In a prayer sanctioned by the pontifices for use at the making of a new clearing, we read: "Si deus, si dea sit cuius illud sacrum est, _ut tibi ius siet_ porco piaculo facere illiusce sacri coercendi ergo,"[341] _i.e._ "O unknown deity, whether G.o.d or G.o.ddess, whose property this wood is, let it be legally proper to sacrifice to thee this pig as an expiatory offering, for the sake of cutting down trees in this wood of thine."

"Pacem deorum exposcere" (or "petere") is a standing formula, as all readers of Virgil know;[342] and it occurs in many other authors and religious doc.u.ments. When Livy wants to express the horror of the old patrician families at the idea of plebeians being consuls--men who had no knowledge of the _ius divinum_ and no right to have any--he makes Appius Claudius exclaim, "Nunc nos, tanquam iam nihil pace deorum opus sit, omnes caerimonias polluimus."[343] How can we maintain our right relations with the G.o.ds, if plebeians have the care of them?

Thus it is not going too far to describe the whole Roman religion of the city-state as a _Rechtsverkehr_,[344] a legal process going on continually. When a _colonia_ was founded, _i.e._ a military outpost which was to be a copy in all respects of the Roman State, it was absolutely essential that its _ius divinum_ should be laid down; it must have a religious charter as well as a civil one. Even at the very end of the life of the Republic, when Caesar founded a colony in Spain, he ordained that, within ten days of its first magistrates taking office, they should consult the Senate "quos et quot dies festos esse et quae sacra fieri publice placeat et quos ea sacra facere placeat," _i.e._ as to the calendar, the ritual, and the priesthood.[345] The Romans, of course, a.s.sumed that Numa, their priest-king, had done the same thing for Rome; Livy describes him as ordaining a pontifex to whom he entrusted the care of all these matters, with written rules to follow.[346] This was the imaginary religious charter of the Roman State. Without it the citizen, or rather his official representative, would not know with the necessary accuracy the details of the _cura_ and _caerimonia_; without it, too, the deities could not be expected to perform their part of advancing the interests of the State, and indeed, as I think we shall find, could not be expected to retain the strength and vitality which they needed for the work. Support was needed on each side; the State needed the help of the G.o.ds, and the G.o.ds needed the help of the State's care and wors.h.i.+p.

The ways and means towards the maintenance of this _pax_ were as follows. First, the deities must be duly placated, and their powers kept in full vigour, by the ritual of sacrifice and prayer, performed at the proper times and places by authorised persons skilled in the knowledge of that ritual. Secondly, there must be an exact fulfilment of all vows or solemn promises made to the deities by the State or its magistrates, or by such private persons as might have made similar engagements.

Thirdly, the city, its land and its people, must be preserved from all evil or hostile influences, whether spiritual or material or both, by the process broadly known as _l.u.s.tratio_, which we commonly translate _purification_. Lastly, strict attention must be paid to all outward signs of the will of the G.o.ds, as shown by omens and portents of various kinds. This last method of securing the _pax_ became specially prominent much later in Roman history, and I prefer to postpone detailed discussion of it for the present; but the other three we will now examine, with the help of evidence mainly derived from facts of cult, not from the fancies of mythologists.