122-410: In ancient Roman religion and myth , Janus ( / ˈ dʒ eɪ n ə s / JAY -nəs ; Latin : Ianvs [ˈi̯aːnʊs] ) is the god of beginnings, gates, transitions, time, duality, doorways, passages, frames, and endings. He is usually depicted as having two faces. The month of January is named for Janus ( Ianuarius ). According to ancient Roman farmers' almanacs, Juno was mistaken as
244-505: A piaculum before entering their sacred grove with an iron implement, which was forbidden, as well as after. The pig was a common victim for a piaculum . The same divine agencies who caused disease or harm also had the power to avert it, and so might be placated in advance. Divine consideration might be sought to avoid the inconvenient delays of a journey, or encounters with banditry, piracy and shipwreck, with due gratitude to be rendered on safe arrival or return. In times of great crisis,
366-421: A broad, inclusive and flexible network of lawful cults. At different times and in different places, the sphere of influence, character and functions of a divine being could expand, overlap with those of others, and be redefined as Roman. Change was embedded within existing traditions. Several versions of a semi-official, structured pantheon were developed during the political, social and religious instability of
488-428: A god of motion, Janus looks after passages, causes actions to start and presides over all beginnings. Since movement and change are interconnected, he has a double nature, symbolised in his two-headed image. He has under his tutelage the stepping in and out of the door of homes, the ianua , which took its name from him, and not vice versa. Similarly, his tutelage extends to the covered passages named iani and foremost to
610-426: A lawful oath ( sacramentum ) and breaking a sworn oath carried much the same penalty: both repudiated the fundamental bonds between the human and divine. A votum or vow was a promise made to a deity, usually an offer of sacrifices or a votive offering in exchange for benefits received. In Latin, the word sacrificium means the performance of an act that renders something sacer , sacred. Sacrifice reinforced
732-399: A long-form poem covering Roman holidays from January to June, Ovid presents a unique look at Roman antiquarian lore, popular customs, and religious practice that is by turns imaginative, entertaining, high-minded, and scurrilous; not a priestly account, despite the speaker's pose as a vates or inspired poet-prophet, but a work of description, imagination and poetic etymology that reflects
854-509: A matter of divine destiny. The Roman triumph was at its core a religious procession in which the victorious general displayed his piety and his willingness to serve the public good by dedicating a portion of his spoils to the gods, especially Jupiter , who embodied just rule. As a result of the Punic Wars (264–146 BC), when Rome struggled to establish itself as a dominant power, many new temples were built by magistrates in fulfillment of
976-673: A passage of Johannes Lydus 's De Mensibus (IV 1), a list in Cedrenus 's Historiarum Compendium (I p. 295 7 Bonn), partly dependent on Lydus's, and one in Servius Honoratus 's commentary to the Aeneis (VII 610). Literary works also preserve some of Janus's cult epithets, such as Ovid 's long passage of the Fasti devoted to Janus at the beginning of Book I (89–293), Tertullian , Augustine and Arnobius . As may be expected
1098-518: A passage ritually opened at times of war, and shut again when Roman arms rested. It formed a walled enclosure with gates at each end, situated between the old Roman Forum and that of Julius Caesar, which had been consecrated by Numa Pompilius himself. About the exact location and aspect of the temple there has been much debate among scholars. In wartime the gates of the Janus were opened, and in its interior sacrifices and vaticinia were held, to forecast
1220-446: A pig on behalf of the community. Their supposed underworld relatives, the malicious and vagrant Lemures , might be placated with midnight offerings of black beans and spring water. The most potent offering was animal sacrifice , typically of domesticated animals such as cattle, sheep and pigs. Each was the best specimen of its kind, cleansed, clad in sacrificial regalia and garlanded; the horns of oxen might be gilded. Sacrifice sought
1342-453: A priest on behalf of the community. Public religious ritual had to be enacted by specialists and professionals faultlessly; a mistake might require that the action, or even the entire festival, be repeated from the start. The historian Livy reports an occasion when the presiding magistrate at the Latin festival forgot to include the "Roman people" among the list of beneficiaries in his prayer;
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#17327727832921464-781: A provincial Roman citizen who made the long journey from Bordeaux to Italy to consult the Sibyl at Tibur did not neglect his devotion to his own goddess from home: I wander, never ceasing to pass through the whole world, but I am first and foremost a faithful worshiper of Onuava . I am at the ends of the earth, but the distance cannot tempt me to make my vows to another goddess. Love of the truth brought me to Tibur, but Onuava's favourable powers came with me. Thus, divine mother, far from my home-land, exiled in Italy, I address my vows and prayers to you no less. Roman calendars show roughly forty annual religious festivals. Some lasted several days, others
1586-454: A range of religious activities. Some public rituals could be conducted only by women, and women formed what is perhaps Rome's most famous priesthood, the state-supported Vestals , who tended Rome's sacred hearth for centuries, until disbanded under Christian domination. The priesthoods of most state religions were held by members of the elite classes . There was no principle analogous to separation of church and state in ancient Rome. During
1708-415: A sacred duty and privilege of office. Additional festivals and games celebrated Imperial accessions and anniversaries. Others, such as the traditional Republican Secular Games to mark a new era ( saeculum ), became imperially funded to maintain traditional values and a common Roman identity. That the spectacles retained something of their sacral aura even in late antiquity is indicated by the admonitions of
1830-459: A series of miraculous events. Romulus and Remus regained their grandfather's throne and set out to build a new city, consulting with the gods through augury , a characteristic religious institution of Rome that is portrayed as existing from earliest times. The brothers quarrel while building the city walls, and Romulus kills Remus, an act that is sometimes seen as sacrificial. Fratricide thus became an integral part of Rome's founding myth. Romulus
1952-529: A similar harbor and gateway god, he was concerned with travelling, trading and shipping. Janus had no flamen or specialised priest ( sacerdos ) assigned to him, but the King of the Sacred Rites ( rex sacrorum ) himself carried out his ceremonies. Janus had a ubiquitous presence in religious ceremonies throughout the year. As such, Janus was ritually invoked at the beginning of each ceremony, regardless of
2074-524: A single day or less: sacred days ( dies fasti ) outnumbered "non-sacred" days ( dies nefasti ). A comparison of surviving Roman religious calendars suggests that official festivals were organized according to broad seasonal groups that allowed for different local traditions. Some of the most ancient and popular festivals incorporated ludi ("games", such as chariot races and theatrical performances ), with examples including those held at Palestrina in honour of Fortuna Primigenia during Compitalia , and
2196-503: A small altar for incense or libations . It might also display art works looted in war and rededicated to the gods. It is not clear how accessible the interiors of temples were to the general public. The Latin word templum originally referred not to the temple building itself, but to a sacred space surveyed and plotted ritually through augury: "The architecture of the ancient Romans was, from first to last, an art of shaping space around ritual." The Roman architect Vitruvius always uses
2318-418: A temple or shrine, where a ritual object might be stored and brought out for use, or where an offering would be deposited. Sacrifices , chiefly of animals , would take place at an open-air altar within the templum or precinct, often to the side of the steps leading up to the raised portico. The main room (cella) inside a temple housed the cult image of the deity to whom the temple was dedicated, and often
2440-437: A theonym in its own right. Religion in ancient Rome Religion in ancient Rome consisted of varying imperial and provincial religious practices, which were followed both by the people of Rome as well as those who were brought under its rule. The Romans thought of themselves as highly religious, and attributed their success as a world power to their collective piety ( pietas ) in maintaining good relations with
2562-595: A vow to a deity for assuring their military success. As the Romans extended their dominance throughout the Mediterranean world, their policy in general was to absorb the deities and cults of other peoples rather than try to eradicate them, since they believed that preserving tradition promoted social stability. One way that Rome incorporated diverse peoples was by supporting their religious heritage, building temples to local deities that framed their theology within
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#17327727832922684-462: A white cow); Jupiter a white, castrated ox ( bos mas ) for the annual oath-taking by the consuls . Di superi with strong connections to the earth, such as Mars, Janus, Neptune and various genii – including the Emperor's – were offered fertile victims. After the sacrifice, a banquet was held; in state cults, the images of honoured deities took pride of place on banqueting couches and by means of
2806-479: Is an introducer god (such as Vedic Vâyu and Roman Janus) and a god of ending, and a nurturer goddess who is often also a fire spirit (such as Roman Vesta , Vedic Saraswati and Agni , Avestic Armaiti and Anâitâ ) who show a sort of mutual solidarity. The concept of 'god of ending' is defined in connection to the human point of reference, i.e. the current situation of man in the universe, and not to endings as transitions into new circumstances, which are under
2928-419: Is exceptionally detailed. All due care would be taken of the animals. If any died or were stolen before the scheduled sacrifice, they would count as already sacrificed, since they had already been consecrated. Normally, if the gods failed to keep their side of the bargain, the offered sacrifice would be withheld. In the imperial period, sacrifice was withheld following Trajan 's death because the gods had not kept
3050-520: Is no evidence connecting Janus to gentilician cults or identifying him as a national god particularly venerated by the oldest patrician families. Geminus is the first epithet in Macrobius's list. Although the etymology of the word is unclear, it is certainly related to his most typical character, that of having two faces or heads. The proof are the numerous equivalent expressions. The origin of this epithet might be either concrete, referring directly to
3172-524: Is not attested. A third etymology indicated by Cicero , Ovid and Macrobius , which explains the name as Latin, deriving it from the verb ire ("to go") is based on the interpretation of Janus as the god of beginnings and transitions. While the fundamental nature of Janus is debated, in most modern scholars' view the god's functions may be seen as being organized around a single principle: presiding over all beginnings and transitions, whether abstract or concrete, sacred or profane. Interpretations concerning
3294-415: Is obviously of the greatest importance, even though both Augustine and some modern scholars see it as minor. Augustine shows astonishment at the fact that some of the dii selecti may be engaged in such tasks: " In fact Janus himself first, when pregnancy is conceived, ... opens the way to receiving the semen ". Varro on the other hand had clear the relevance of the function of starting a new life by opening
3416-411: Is perhaps the most frequent epithet of Janus, found also in the composition Ianuspater . While numerous gods share this cultic epithet it seems the Romans felt it was typically pertinent to Janus. When invoked along with other gods, usually only he is called pater. For Janus the title is not just a term of respect; principally it marks his primordial role. He is the first of the gods and thus their father:
3538-447: Is the initiator of human life, of new historical ages, and financial enterprises: according to myth he was the first to mint coins and the as , first coin of the liberal series, bears his effigy on one face. Janus frequently symbolized change and transitions such as the progress of past to future, from one condition to another, from one vision to another, and young people's growth to adulthood. He represented time because he could see into
3660-406: The mos maiorum , "the way of the ancestors" or simply "tradition", viewed as central to Roman identity. Roman religion was practical and contractual, based on the principle of do ut des , "I give that you might give". Religion depended on knowledge and the correct practice of prayer, rite, and sacrifice, not on faith or dogma, although Latin literature preserves learned speculation on
3782-494: The spolia opima , the prime spoils taken in war, in the celebration of the first Roman triumph . Spared a mortal's death, Romulus was mysteriously spirited away and deified. His Sabine successor Numa was pious and peaceable, and credited with numerous political and religious foundations, including the first Roman calendar ; the priesthoods of the Salii , flamines , and Vestals; the cults of Jupiter , Mars, and Quirinus ; and
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3904-704: The Battle of Mylae in the Forum Holitorium . It contained a statue of the god with the right hand showing the number 300 and the left the number 65—i.e., the length in days of the solar year, and twelve altars, one for each month. The four-sided structure known as the Arch of Janus in the Forum Transitorium dates from the 1st century of the Christian era: according to common opinion it was built by
4026-515: The Etruscans had. Etruscan religion was also a major influence, particularly on the practice of augury , used by the state to seek the will of the gods. According to legends , most of Rome's religious institutions could be traced to its founders , particularly Numa Pompilius , the Sabine second king of Rome , who negotiated directly with the gods . This archaic religion was the foundation of
4148-582: The First Jewish–Roman War and the Bar Kokhba revolt . In the wake of the Republic's collapse , state religion had adapted to support the new regime of the emperors . Augustus , the first Roman emperor, justified the novelty of one-man rule with a vast program of religious revivalism and reform. Public vows formerly made for the security of the republic now were directed at the well-being of
4270-406: The Forum Transitorium , although having a different meaning, seems to be connected to the same theological complex, as its image purports an ability to rule over every direction, element and time of the year. It did not give rise to a new epithet though. Patulcius and Clusivius or Clusius are epithets related to an inherent quality and function of doors, that of standing open or shut. Janus as
4392-646: The Greek Olympians , and promoted a sense that the two cultures had a shared heritage. The impressive, costly, and centralised rites to the deities of the Roman state were vastly outnumbered in everyday life by commonplace religious observances pertaining to an individual's domestic and personal deities, the patron divinities of Rome's various neighbourhoods and communities, and the often idiosyncratic blends of official, unofficial, local and personal cults that characterised lawful Roman religion. In this spirit,
4514-461: The Janiculum , a gateway from Rome out to Etruria. The connection of the notions of beginning ( principium ), movement, transition ( eundo ), and thence time was clearly expressed by Cicero. In general, Janus is at the origin of time as the guardian of the gates of Heaven: Jupiter himself can move forth and back because of Janus's working. In one of his temples, probably that of Forum Holitorium ,
4636-526: The Ludi Romani in honour of Liber . Other festivals may have required only the presence and rites of their priests and acolytes, or particular groups, such as women at the Bona Dea rites. Other public festivals were not required by the calendar, but occasioned by events. The triumph of a Roman general was celebrated as the fulfillment of religious vows , though these tended to be overshadowed by
4758-576: The Palladium , Lares and Penates from Troy to Italy. These objects were believed in historical times to remain in the keeping of the Vestals , Rome's female priesthood. Aeneas, according to classical authors, had been given refuge by King Evander , a Greek exile from Arcadia , to whom were attributed other religious foundations: he established the Ara Maxima , "Greatest Altar", to Hercules at
4880-507: The Roman Republic (509–27 BC), the same men who were elected public officials might also serve as augurs and pontiffs . Priests married, raised families, and led politically active lives. Julius Caesar became pontifex maximus before he was elected consul . The augurs read the will of the gods and supervised the marking of boundaries as a reflection of universal order, thus sanctioning Roman expansionism and foreign wars as
5002-572: The Senate 's efforts to restrict the Bacchanals in 186 BC. Because Romans had never been obligated to cultivate one god or one cult only, religious tolerance was not an issue in the sense that it is for monotheistic systems. The monotheistic rigor of Judaism posed difficulties for Roman policy that led at times to compromise and the granting of special exemptions, but sometimes to intractable conflict. For example, religious disputes helped cause
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5124-692: The druids as a positive consequence of the conquest of Gaul and Britain. Despite an empire-wide ban under Hadrian , human sacrifice may have continued covertly in North Africa and elsewhere. The mos maiorum established the dynastic authority and obligations of the citizen- paterfamilias ("the father of the family" or the "owner of the family estate"). He had priestly duties to his lares , domestic penates , ancestral Genius and any other deities with whom he or his family held an interdependent relationship. His own dependents, who included his slaves and freedmen, owed cult to his Genius . Genius
5246-544: The fetial priests. The first "outsider" Etruscan king, Lucius Tarquinius Priscus , founded a Capitoline temple to the triad Jupiter, Juno and Minerva which served as the model for the highest official cult throughout the Roman world. The benevolent, divinely fathered Servius Tullius established the Latin League , its Aventine Temple to Diana , and the Compitalia to mark his social reforms. Servius Tullius
5368-421: The harmonisation of the earthly and divine , so the victim must seem willing to offer its own life on behalf of the community; it must remain calm and be quickly and cleanly dispatched. Sacrifice to deities of the heavens ( di superi , "gods above") was performed in daylight, and under the public gaze. Deities of the upper heavens required white, infertile victims of their own sex: Juno a white heifer (possibly
5490-569: The tutelary deity of the month of January, but Juno is the tutelary deity of the month of June. Janus presided over the beginning and ending of conflict, and hence war and peace. The gates of a building in Rome named after him (not a temple, as it is often called, but an open enclosure with gates at each end) were opened in time of war, and closed to mark the arrival of peace. As a god of transitions, he had functions pertaining to birth and to journeys and exchange, and in his association with Portunus ,
5612-519: The "sister's beam", was a wooden beam said to have been erected on the slope of the Oppian Hill in Ancient Rome by the father of Publius Horatius , one of the three brothers Horatii . Publius Horatius was required to pass under the beam, as if under a yoke, following the decision of the people's assembly to not to punish him for the murder of his sister. According to Livy , writing at
5734-495: The Church Fathers that Christians should not take part. The meaning and origin of many archaic festivals baffled even Rome's intellectual elite, but the more obscure they were, the greater the opportunity for reinvention and reinterpretation – a fact lost neither on Augustus in his program of religious reform, which often cloaked autocratic innovation, nor on his only rival as mythmaker of the era, Ovid . In his Fasti ,
5856-554: The Compitalia shrines, were thought a symbolic replacement for child-sacrifice to Mania, as Mother of the Lares . The Junii took credit for its abolition by their ancestor L. Junius Brutus , traditionally Rome's Republican founder and first consul. Political or military executions were sometimes conducted in such a way that they evoked human sacrifice, whether deliberately or in the perception of witnesses; Marcus Marius Gratidianus
5978-504: The Daecon. Schilling and Capdeville counter that it is his function of presiding over the return to peace that gave Janus this epithet, as confirmed by his association on 30 March with Pax , Concordia and Salus , even though it is true that Janus as god of all beginnings presides also over that of war and is thus often called belliger , bringer of war as well as pacificus . This use is also discussed by Dumézil in various works concerning
6100-565: The Elder declared that "a sacrifice without prayer is thought to be useless and not a proper consultation of the gods." Prayer by itself, however, had independent power. The spoken word was thus the single most potent religious action, and knowledge of the correct verbal formulas the key to efficacy. Accurate naming was vital for tapping into the desired powers of the deity invoked, hence the proliferation of cult epithets among Roman deities. Public prayers ( prex ) were offered loudly and clearly by
6222-683: The Emperor Domitian . However American scholars L. Ross Taylor and L. Adams Holland on the grounds of a passage of Statius maintain that it was an earlier structure (tradition has it the Ianus Quadrifrons was brought to Rome from Falerii ) and that Domitian only surrounded it with his new forum. In fact the building of the Forum Transitorium was completed and inaugurated by Nerva in AD 96. Another way of investigating
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#17327727832926344-660: The Emperor safe for the stipulated period. In Pompeii , the Genius of the living emperor was offered a bull: presumably a standard practise in Imperial cult, though minor offerings (incense and wine) were also made. The exta were the entrails of a sacrificed animal , comprising in Cicero 's enumeration the gall bladder ( fel ), liver ( iecur ), heart ( cor ), and lungs ( pulmones ). The exta were exposed for litatio (divine approval) as part of Roman liturgy, but were "read" in
6466-638: The Empire. Imported mystery religions , which offered initiates salvation in the afterlife, were a matter of personal choice for an individual, practiced in addition to carrying on one's family rites and participating in public religion. The mysteries, however, involved exclusive oaths and secrecy, conditions that conservative Romans viewed with suspicion as characteristic of " magic ", conspiratorial ( coniuratio ), or subversive activity. Sporadic and sometimes brutal attempts were made to suppress religionists who seemed to threaten traditional morality and unity, as with
6588-468: The Gatekeeper has jurisdiction over every kind of door and passage and the power of opening or closing them. Servius interprets Patulcius in the same way. Lydus gives an incorrect translation, "αντί του οδαιον" which however reflects one of the attributes of the god, that of being the protector of roads. Elsewhere Lydus cites the epithet θυρέος to justify the key held by Janus. The antithetical quality of
6710-607: The Late Republican era. Jupiter , the most powerful of all gods and "the fount of the auspices upon which the relationship of the city with the gods rested", consistently personified the divine authority of Rome's highest offices, internal organization and external relations. During the archaic and early Republican eras, he shared his temple , some aspects of cult and several divine characteristics with Mars and Quirinus , who were later replaced by Juno and Minerva . A conceptual tendency toward triads may be indicated by
6832-570: The Middle East and Egypt into a single column representing two torsos and finally a single body with two heads looking at opposite directions. Numa , in his regulation of the Roman calendar , called the first month Januarius after Janus, according to tradition considered the highest divinity at the time. Numa built the Ianus geminus (also Janus Bifrons , Janus Quirinus or Portae Belli ),
6954-612: The Senate could decree collective public rites, in which Rome's citizens, including women and children, moved in procession from one temple to the next, supplicating the gods. Extraordinary circumstances called for extraordinary sacrifice: in one of the many crises of the Second Punic War , Jupiter Capitolinus was promised every animal born that spring (see ver sacrum ), to be rendered after five more years of protection from Hannibal and his allies. The "contract" with Jupiter
7076-512: The Temple of Janus , whose doors stayed open in times of war but in Numa's time remained closed. After Numa's death, the doors to the Temple of Janus were supposed to have remained open until the reign of Augustus. Each of Rome's legendary or semi-legendary kings was associated with one or more religious institutions still known to the later Republic. Tullus Hostilius and Ancus Marcius instituted
7198-489: The absorption of the local Mediterranean mother goddesses, nurturers, and protectresses . As a consequence, the position of the gods of beginning would not be the issue of a diachronic process of debasement undergone by a supreme sky god, but rather a structural feature inherent to the culture's theology. The descent of primordial sky gods into the condition of deus otiosus is a well-known phenomenon in many religions. Dumézil himself observed and discussed in many of his works
7320-520: The addition of a D for the sake of euphony. This explanation has been accepted by A. B. Cook and J. G. Frazer. It supports all the assimilations of Janus to the bright sky, the sun and the moon. It supposes a former *Dianus, formed on *dia- < *dy-eð 2 from the Indo-European root *dey- shine represented in Latin by dies day, Diovis and Iuppiter. However the form Dianus postulated by Nigidius
7442-497: The armed nature of the Mars qui praeest paci , the armed quality of the gods of the third function and the arms of the third function. Koch on the other hand sees the epithet Janus Quirinus as a reflection of the god's patronage over the two months beginning and ending the year, after their addition by king Numa in his reform of the calendar. This interpretation too would befit the liminal nature of Janus. The compound term Ianus Quirinus
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#17327727832927564-539: The broad humor and burlesque spirit of such venerable festivals as the Saturnalia , Consualia , and feast of Anna Perenna on the Ides of March , where Ovid treats the assassination of the newly deified Julius Caesar as utterly incidental to the festivities among the Roman people. But official calendars preserved from different times and places also show a flexibility in omitting or expanding events, indicating that there
7686-482: The case, it is certain that Janus and Juno show a peculiar reciprocal affinity: while Janus is Iunonius , Juno is Ianualis , as she presides over childbirth and the menstrual cycle, and opens doors. Moreover, besides the kalends Janus and Juno are also associated at the rite of the Tigillum Sororium of 1 October, in which they bear the epithets Ianus Curiatius and Iuno Sororia . These epithets, which swap
7808-473: The complex nature of Janus is by systematically analysing his cultic epithets: religious documents may preserve a notion of a deity's theology more accurately than other literary sources. The main sources of Janus's cult epithets are the fragments of the Carmen Saliare preserved by Varro in his work De Lingua Latina , a list preserved in a passage of Macrobius 's Saturnalia (I 9, 15–16), another in
7930-487: The condition of miles , soldier, to that of quiris , citizen occupied in peaceful business, as the rites of the Porta Belli imply. This is in fact the usual sense of the word quirites in Latin. Other scholars, mainly Germanophone, think it is related on the contrary to the martial character of the god Quirinus, an interpretation supported by numerous ancient sources: Lydus, Cedrenus, Macrobius, Ovid, Plutarch and Paul
8052-465: The context of the disciplina Etrusca . As a product of Roman sacrifice, the exta and blood are reserved for the gods, while the meat (viscera) is shared among human beings in a communal meal. The exta of bovine victims were usually stewed in a pot ( olla or aula ), while those of sheep or pigs were grilled on skewers. When the deity's portion was cooked, it was sprinkled with mola salsa (ritually prepared salted flour) and wine, then placed in
8174-451: The emperor. So-called "emperor worship" expanded on a grand scale the traditional Roman veneration of the ancestral dead and of the Genius , the divine tutelary of every individual. The Imperial cult became one of the major ways in which Rome advertised its presence in the provinces and cultivated shared cultural identity and loyalty throughout the Empire. Rejection of the state religion
8296-470: The entry to January, but to all the months: indeed all the kalends are under the jurisdiction of Juno ". At the time when the rising of the new moon was observed by the pontifex minor the rex sacrorum assisted by him offered a sacrifice to Janus in the Curia Calabra while the regina sacrorum sacrificed to Juno in the regia . Some scholars have maintained that Juno was the primitive paredra of
8418-404: The festival had to be started over. Even private prayer by an individual was formulaic, a recitation rather than a personal expression, though selected by the individual for a particular purpose or occasion. Oaths—sworn for the purposes of business, clientage and service, patronage and protection , state office, treaty and loyalty—appealed to the witness and sanction of deities. Refusal to swear
8540-472: The fire on the altar for the offering; the technical verb for this action was porricere . Human sacrifice in ancient Rome was rare but documented. After the Roman defeat at Cannae two Gauls and two Greeks were buried under the Forum Boarium , in a stone chamber "which had on a previous occasion [228 BC] also been polluted by human victims, a practice most repulsive to Roman feelings". Livy avoids
8662-527: The first month in the calendar instead of March by the next reason: "he wished in every case that martial influences should yield precedence to civil and political. For this Janus, in remote antiquity, whether he was a demi-god or a king, was a patron of civil and social order, and is said to have lifted human life out of its bestial and savage state. For this reason he is represented with two faces, implying that he brought men's lives out of one sort and condition into another." Leonhard Schmitz suggests that he
8784-458: The form of a holocaust or burnt offering, and there was no shared banquet, as "the living cannot share a meal with the dead". Ceres and other underworld goddesses of fruitfulness were sometimes offered pregnant female animals; Tellus was given a pregnant cow at the Fordicidia festival. Color had a general symbolic value for sacrifices. Demigods and heroes, who belonged to the heavens and
8906-412: The formula quasi deorum deum corresponds to diuum deus of the carmen Saliare. Similarly, in the expression duonus Cerus , Cerus means creator and is considered a masculine form related to Ceres . Lydus gives Πατρίκιος (Patricius) and explains it as autóchthon : since he does not give another epithet corresponding to Pater it may be inferred that Lydus understands Patricius as a synonym of Pater. There
9028-487: The foundation and rise of the city. These narratives focus on human actors, with only occasional intervention from deities but a pervasive sense of divinely ordered destiny. For Rome's earliest period, history and myth are difficult to distinguish. According to mythology, Rome had a semi-divine ancestor in the Trojan refugee Aeneas , son of Venus , who was said to have established the basis of Roman religion when he brought
9150-437: The founding of Rome. Poets tried to explain this rite by imagining that the gate closed either war or peace inside the ianus , but in its religious significance it might have been meant to propitiate the return home of the victorious soldiers. Quirinus is a debated epithet. According to some scholars, mostly Francophone, it looks to be strictly related to the ideas of the passage of the Roman people from war back to peace, from
9272-589: The founding of the Latin League under Servius Tullius. Many temples in the Republican era were built as the fulfillment of a vow made by a general in exchange for a victory: Rome's first known temple to Venus was vowed by the consul Q. Fabius Gurges in the heat of battle against the Samnites , and dedicated in 295 BC. All sacrifices and offerings required an accompanying prayer to be effective. Pliny
9394-410: The functional qualities of the gods, are the most remarkable apparent proof of their proximity. The rite is discussed in detail in the section below. Consivius , sower, is an epithet that reflects the tutelary function of the god at the first instant of human life and of life in general, conception. This function is a particular case of his function of patron of beginnings. As far as man is concerned it
9516-658: The gates of the city, including the cultic gate of the Argiletum , named Ianus Geminus or Porta Ianualis from which he protects Rome against the Sabines. He is also present at the Sororium Tigillum , where he guards the terminus of the ways into Rome from Latium. He has an altar, later a temple near the Porta Carmentalis , where the road leading to Veii ended, as well as being present on
9638-542: The god's fundamental nature either limit it to this general function or emphasize a concrete or particular aspect of it (identifying him with light, the sun, the moon, time, movement, the year, doorways, bridges, etc.) or else see in the god a sort of cosmological principle, interpreting him as a uranic deity. Almost all of these modern explanations were originally formulated by the ancients. His function as god of beginnings has been clearly expressed in numerous ancient sources, among them most notably Cicero, Ovid, and Varro. As
9760-549: The god. This point bears on the nature of Janus and Juno and is at the core of an important dispute: was Janus a debased ancient uranic supreme god, or were Janus and Jupiter co-existent, their distinct identities structurally inherent to their original theology? Among Francophone scholars, Grimal and (implicitly and partially) Renard and Basanoff have supported the view of a uranic supreme god against Dumézil and Schilling. Among Anglophone scholars Frazer and Cook have suggested an interpretation of Janus as uranic supreme god. Whatever
9882-614: The gods . Their polytheistic religion is known for having honoured many deities . The presence of Greeks on the Italian peninsula from the beginning of the historical period influenced Roman culture , introducing some religious practices that became fundamental, such as the cultus of Apollo . The Romans looked for common ground between their major gods and those of the Greeks ( interpretatio graeca ), adapting Greek myths and iconography for Latin literature and Roman art , as
10004-435: The hands of his statue were positioned to signify the number 355 (the number of days in a lunar year), later 365, symbolically expressing his mastership over time. He presides over the concrete and abstract beginnings of the world, such as religion and the gods themselves, he too holds the access to Heaven and to other gods: this is the reason why men must invoke him first, regardless of the god they want to pray to or placate. He
10126-582: The hierarchy of Roman religion. Inscriptions throughout the Empire record the side-by-side worship of local and Roman deities, including dedications made by Romans to local gods. By the height of the Empire, numerous international deities were cultivated at Rome and had been carried to even the most remote provinces , among them Cybele , Isis , Epona , and gods of solar monism such as Mithras and Sol Invictus , found as far north as Roman Britain . Foreign religions increasingly attracted devotees among Romans, who increasingly had ancestry from elsewhere in
10248-403: The histories of Rome's leading families , and oral and ritual traditions. According to Cicero, the Romans considered themselves the most religious of all peoples, and their rise to dominance was proof they received divine favor in return. Rome offers no native creation myth , and little mythography to explain the character of its deities, their mutual relationships or their interactions with
10370-438: The human world, but Roman theology acknowledged that di immortales (immortal gods) ruled all realms of the heavens and earth. There were gods of the upper heavens, gods of the underworld and a myriad of lesser deities between. Some evidently favoured Rome because Rome honoured them, but none were intrinsically, irredeemably foreign or alien. The political, cultural and religious coherence of an emergent Roman super-state required
10492-465: The idea of going, passing, formed on the root *yā- < *y-eð 2 - theme II of the root *ey- go from which eō, ειμι. Other modern scholars object to an Indo-European etymology either from Dianus or from root *yā-. From Ianus derived ianua ("door"), and hence the English word "janitor" (Latin, ianitor ). Three etymologies were proposed by ancient erudites, each of them bearing implications about
10614-675: The image of the god reproduced on coins and supposed to have been introduced by king Numa in the sanctuary at the lowest point of the Argiletum, or to a feature of the Ianus of the Porta Belli , the double gate ritually opened at the beginning of wars, or abstract, deriving metaphorically from the liminal, intermediary functions of the god themselves: both in time and space passages connected two different spheres, realms or worlds. The Janus quadrifrons or quadriformis , brought according to tradition from Falerii in 241 BC and installed by Domitian in
10736-413: The jurisdiction of the gods of beginning, owing to the ambivalent nature of the concept. Thus the god of beginning is not structurally reducible to a sovereign god, nor the goddess of ending to any of the three categories on to which Dumézil distributed goddesses. There is though a greater degree of fuzziness concerning the function and role of goddesses, which may have formed a preexisting structure allowing
10858-567: The later agricultural or plebeian triad of Ceres , Liber and Libera , and by some of the complementary threefold deity-groupings of Imperial cult. Other major and minor deities could be single, coupled, or linked retrospectively through myths of divine marriage and sexual adventure. These later Roman pantheistic hierarchies are part literary and mythographic, part philosophical creations, and often Greek in origin. The Hellenization of Latin literature and culture supplied literary and artistic models for reinterpreting Roman deities in light of
10980-440: The lists overlap to a certain extent (five epithets are common to Macrobius's and Lydus's list), the explanations of the epithets differ remarkably. Macrobius's list and explanation are probably based directly on Cornelius Labeo 's work, as he cites this author often in his Saturnalia , as when he gives a list of Maia 's cult epithets and mentions one of his works, Fasti . In relating Janus' epithets Macrobius states: "We invoke in
11102-632: The main deity honored on any particular occasion. While the ancient Greeks had no known equivalent to Janus, there is considerable overlap with Culśanś of the Etruscan pantheon. The name of the god Iānus , meaning in Latin 'arched passage, doorway', stems from Proto-Italic *iānu ('door'), ultimately from Proto-Indo-European *ieh₂nu ('passage'). It is cognate with Sanskrit yāti ('to go, travel'), Lithuanian jóti ('to go, ride'), Irish áth (' ford ') or Serbo-Croatian jàhati ('to ride'). Iānus would then be an action name expressing
11224-469: The nature of the divine and its relation to human affairs. Even the most skeptical among Rome's intellectual elite such as Cicero , who was an augur, saw religion as a source of social order. As the Roman Empire expanded, migrants to the capital brought their local cults , many of which became popular among Italians. Christianity was eventually the most successful of these beliefs, and in 380 became
11346-475: The nature of the god. The first one is based on the definition of Chaos given by Paul the Deacon : hiantem , hiare , "be open", from which the word Ianus would derive by the loss of the initial aspirate. In this etymology, the notion of Chaos would define the primordial nature of the god. Another etymology proposed by Nigidius Figulus is related by Macrobius : Ianus would be Apollo and Diana Iana , by
11468-407: The official state religion . For ordinary Romans, religion was a part of daily life. Each home had a household shrine at which prayers and libations to the family's domestic deities were offered. Neighbourhood shrines and sacred places such as springs and groves dotted the city. The Roman calendar was structured around religious observances. Women , slaves , and children all participated in
11590-1063: The opening verses of the Carmen, are devoted to honouring Janus, thence were named versus ianuli . Paul the Deacon mentions the versus ianuli, iovii, iunonii, minervii . Only part of the versus ianuli and two of the iovii are preserved. The manuscript has: Many reconstructions have been proposed: they vary widely in dubious points and are all tentative, nonetheless one can identify with certainty some epithets: The epithets that can be identified are: The above-mentioned sources give: Ianus Geminus, I. Pater, I. Iunonius, I. Consivius, I. Quirinus, I. Patulcius and Clusivius (Macrobius above I 9, 15): Ι. Κονσίβιον, Ι. Κήνουλον, Ι. Κιβουλλιον, I. Πατρίκιον, I. Κλουσίβιον, I. Ιουνώνιον, I. Κυρινον, I. Πατούλκιον, I. Κλούσιον, I. Κουριάτιον (Lydus above IV 1); I. Κιβούλλιον, I. Κυρινον, I. Κονσαιον, I. Πατρίκιον (Cedrenus Historiarum Compendium I p. 295 7 Bonn); I. Clusiuius, I. Patulcius, I. Iunonius, I. Quirinus (Servius Aen. VII 610). Even though
11712-464: The others, because through him is apparent the way of access to the desired deity. A similar solar interpretation has been offered by A. Audin who interprets the god as the issue of a long process of development, starting with the Sumeric cultures, from the two solar pillars located on the eastern side of temples, each of them marking the direction of the rising sun at the dates of the two solstices :
11834-497: The outcome of military deeds. The doors were closed only during peacetime, an extremely rare event. The function of the Ianus Geminus was supposed to be a sort of good omen: in time of peace it was said to close the wars within or to keep peace inside; in times of war it was said to be open to allow the return of the people on duty. A temple of Janus is said to have been consecrated by the consul Gaius Duilius in 260 BC after
11956-483: The past with one face and into the future with the other. Hence, Janus was worshipped at the beginnings of the harvest and planting times, as well as at marriages, deaths and other beginnings. He represented the middle ground between barbarism and civilization, rural and urban space, youth and adulthood. Having jurisdiction over beginnings Janus had an intrinsic association with omens and auspices. Plutarch in his Parallel Lives mention that Numa Pompilius made January
12078-459: The phenomenon of the fall of archaic celestial deities in numerous societies of ethnologic interest. Mircea Eliade evaluated Dumezil's views (1946) positively, and recommended their use in comparative research on Indo-European religions. According to Macrobius who cites Nigidius Figulus and Cicero , Janus and Jana ( Diana ) are a pair of divinities, worshipped as Apollo or the sun and moon , whence Janus received sacrifices before all
12200-466: The political and social significance of the event. During the late Republic, the political elite competed to outdo each other in public display, and the ludi attendant on a triumph were expanded to include gladiator contests. Under the Principate , all such spectacular displays came under Imperial control: the most lavish were subsidised by emperors, and lesser events were provided by magistrates as
12322-431: The powers and attributes of divine beings, and inclined them to render benefits in return (the principle of do ut des ). Offerings to household deities were part of daily life. Lares might be offered spelt wheat and grain-garlands, grapes and first fruits in due season, honey cakes and honeycombs, wine and incense, food that fell to the floor during any family meal, or at their Compitalia festival, honey-cakes and
12444-407: The reference of this rite to Ianus Quirinus to embody the original prophetic interpretation, which ascribes to this deity the last and conclusive spoils of Roman history. The epithet Ποπάνων (Popanōn) is attested only by Lydus, who cites Varro as stating that on the day of the kalendae he was offered a cake which earned him this title. There is no surviving evidence of this name in Latin, although
12566-476: The rite is attested by Ovid for the kalendae of January and by Paul. This cake was named ianual but the related epithet of Janus could not plausibly have been Ianualis: it has been suggested Libo which remains purely hypothetical. The context could allow an Etruscan etymology. Janus owes the epithet Iunonius to his function as patron of all kalends, which are also associated with Juno. In Macrobius's explanation: " Iunonium, as it were, not only does he hold
12688-436: The sacred rites". Labeo himself, as it is stated in the passage on Maia, read them in the lists of indigitamenta of the libri pontificum . On the other hand, Lydus's authority cannot have consulted these documents precisely because he offers different (and sometimes bizarre) explanations for the common epithets: it seems likely he received a list with no interpretations appended and his interpretations are only his own. Pater
12810-431: The sacrificial fire consumed their proper portion ( exta , the innards). Rome's officials and priests reclined in order of precedence alongside and ate the meat; lesser citizens may have had to provide their own. Chthonic gods such as Dis pater , the di inferi ("gods below"), and the collective shades of the departed ( di Manes ) were given dark, fertile victims in nighttime rituals. Animal sacrifice usually took
12932-566: The site that would become the Forum Boarium , and, so the legend went, he was the first to celebrate the Lupercalia , an archaic festival in February that was celebrated as late as the 5th century of the Christian era. The myth of a Trojan founding with Greek influence was reconciled through an elaborate genealogy (the Latin kings of Alba Longa ) with the well-known legend of Rome's founding by Romulus and Remus . The most common version of
13054-739: The southeastern corresponding to the Winter and the northeastern to the Summer solstice. These two pillars would be at the origin of the theology of the divine twins , one of whom is mortal (related to the NE pillar, nearest the Northern region where the sun does not shine) and the other is immortal (related to the SE pillar and the Southern region where the sun always shines). Later these iconographic models evolved in
13176-407: The twins' story displays several aspects of hero myth. Their mother, Rhea Silvia , had been ordered by her uncle the king to remain a virgin, in order to preserve the throne he had usurped from her father. Through divine intervention, the rightful line was restored when Rhea Silvia was impregnated by the god Mars . She gave birth to twins, who were duly exposed by order of the king but saved through
13298-484: The two epithets is meant to refer to the alterning opposite conditions and is commonly found in the indigitamenta : in relation to Janus, Macrobius cites instances of Antevorta and Postvorta , the personifications of two indigitations of Carmentis . These epithets are associated with the ritual function of Janus in the opening of the Porta Ianualis or Porta Belli . The rite might go back to times pre-dating
13420-555: The underworld, were sometimes given black-and-white victims. Robigo (or Robigus ) was given red dogs and libations of red wine at the Robigalia for the protection of crops from blight and red mildew. A sacrifice might be made in thanksgiving or as an expiation of a sacrilege or potential sacrilege ( piaculum ); a piaculum might also be offered as a sort of advance payment; the Arval Brethren , for instance, offered
13542-493: The way to the semen and therefore started his enumeration of the gods with Janus, following the pattern of the Carmen Saliare. Macrobius gives the same interpretation of the epithet in his list: " Consivius from sowing (conserendo), i. e. from the propagation of the human genre, that is disseminated by the working of Janus ." as the most ancient form. He though does not consider Conseuius to be an epithet of Janus but
13664-470: The word templum to refer to this sacred precinct, and the more common Latin words aedes , delubrum , or fanum for a temple or shrine as a building. The ruins of temples are among the most visible monuments of ancient Roman culture. Temple buildings and shrines within the city commemorated significant political settlements in its development: the Aventine Temple of Diana supposedly marked
13786-510: The word "sacrifice" in connection with this bloodless human life-offering; Plutarch does not. The rite was apparently repeated in 113 BC, preparatory to an invasion of Gaul. Its religious dimensions and purpose remain uncertain. In the early stages of the First Punic War (264 BC) the first known Roman gladiatorial munus was held, described as a funeral blood-rite to the manes of a Roman military aristocrat. The gladiator munus
13908-492: Was a gruesome example. Officially, human sacrifice was obnoxious "to the laws of gods and men". The practice was a mark of the barbarians , attributed to Rome's traditional enemies such as the Carthaginians and Gauls. Rome banned it on several occasions under extreme penalty. A law passed in 81 BC characterised human sacrifice as murder committed for magical purposes. Pliny saw the ending of human sacrifice conducted by
14030-508: Was credited with several religious institutions. He founded the Consualia festival, inviting the neighbouring Sabines to participate; the ensuing rape of the Sabine women by Romulus's men further embedded both violence and cultural assimilation in Rome's myth of origins. As a successful general, Romulus is also supposed to have founded Rome's first temple to Jupiter Feretrius and offered
14152-562: Was likely the most important god in the Roman archaic pantheon . He was often invoked together with Iuppiter (Jupiter). In several of his works, G. Dumézil proposed the existence of a structural difference in level between the Proto-Indo-European gods of beginning and ending, and the other gods whom Dumézil postulated fall into a tripartite structure , reflecting the most ancient organization of society. So in IE religions there
14274-434: Was murdered and succeeded by the arrogant Tarquinius Superbus , whose expulsion marked the end of Roman kingship and the beginning of the Roman republic, governed by elected magistrates . Roman historians regarded the essentials of Republican religion as complete by the end of Numa's reign, and confirmed as right and lawful by the Senate and people of Rome : the sacred topography of the city , its monuments and temples,
14396-527: Was never explicitly acknowledged as a human sacrifice, probably because death was not its inevitable outcome or purpose. Even so, the gladiators swore their lives to the gods, and the combat was dedicated as an offering to the Di Manes or the revered souls of deceased human beings. The event was therefore a sacrificium in the strict sense of the term, and Christian writers later condemned it as human sacrifice. The small woollen dolls called Maniae , hung on
14518-457: Was no single static and authoritative calendar of required observances. In the later Empire under Christian rule, the new Christian festivals were incorporated into the existing framework of the Roman calendar, alongside at least some of the traditional festivals. Public religious ceremonies of the official Roman religion took place outdoors, and not within the temple building. Some ceremonies were processions that started at, visited, or ended with
14640-560: Was particularly in vogue at the time of Augustus, its peaceful interpretation complying particularly well with the Augustan ideology of the Pax Romana . The compound Ianus Quirinus is to be found also in the rite of the spolia opima , a lex regia ascribed to Numa, which prescribed that the third rank spoils of a king or chief killed in battle, those conquered by a common soldier, be consecrated to Ianus Quirinus . Schilling believes
14762-459: Was tantamount to treason. This was the context for Rome's conflict with Christianity , which Romans variously regarded as a form of atheism and novel superstitio , while Christians considered Roman religion to be paganism . Ultimately, Roman polytheism was brought to an end with the adoption of Christianity as the official religion of the empire. The Roman mythological tradition is particularly rich in historical myths, or legends , concerning
14884-454: Was the essential spirit and generative power – depicted as a serpent or as a perennial youth, often winged – within an individual and their clan ( gens (pl. gentes ). A paterfamilias could confer his name, a measure of his genius and a role in his household rites, obligations and honours upon those he fathered or adopted. His freed slaves owed him similar obligations. Sororium Tigillum The Sororium Tigillum , which translates as
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