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45-413: Sibyls were oracular women believed to possess prophetic powers in ancient Greece. Sybil or Sibyl may also refer to: Sibyl The sibyls prophesied at holy sites. A sibyl at Delphi has been dated to as early as the eleventh century BC by Pausanias when he described local traditions in his writings from the second century AD. At first, there appears to have been only a single sibyl. By

90-513: A city of Dardania in the Troad, a settlement of the ancient Teucri , and, consequently, a town of very great antiquity. Gergis, according to Xenophon , was a place of much strength. It had a temple sacred to Apollo Gergithius, and was said to have given birth to the sibyl, who is sometimes called Erythraea , ‘from Erythrae,’ a small place on Mount Ida , and at others Gergithia ‘of Gergis’. Prof. E. Maass (op cit., p.56) holds that two only of

135-711: A doublet of the Hellespontine Sibyl. The Samian sibyl's oracular site was at Samos . To the classical sibyls of the Greeks, the Romans added a tenth, the Tiburtine Sibyl, whose seat was the ancient Sabino – Latin town of Tibur (modern Tivoli ). The mythic meeting of Augustus with the Sibyl, of whom he inquired whether he should be worshiped as a god, was a favored motif of Christian artists. Whether

180-738: A new set of images was offered to the Presepio by prince Alexander Torlonia." (Lanciani, 1896 ch 1) Like prophets, Renaissance sibyls forecasting the advent of Christ appear in monuments: modelled by Giacomo della Porta in the Santa Casa at Loreto , painted by Raphael in Santa Maria della Pace , by Pinturicchio in the Borgia apartments of the Vatican, engraved by Baccio Baldini, a contemporary of Botticelli, and graffites by Matteo di Giovanni in

225-718: A second Cassandra?" Gargantua and Pantagruel , iii. 16, noted in Brewer's Dictionary of Phrase and Fable , 1897. The best known depiction is that of Michelangelo who shows five sibyls in the frescoes of the Sistine Chapel ceiling ; the Delphic Sibyl, Libyan Sibyl, Persian Sibyl, Cumaean Sibyl, and the Erythraean Sibyl. The library of Pope Julius II in the Vatican has images of sibyls and they are in

270-1082: A tenth, the Tiburtine Sibyl , probably Etruscan in origin, added by the Romans. According to Lactantius ' Divine Institutions (Book 1, Ch. 6), Varro (first century BC) lists these ten: the Persian, the Libyan, the Delphic, the Cimmerian, the Erythræan, the Samian, the Cumæan, the Hellespontine (in Trojan territory), the Phrygian (at Ancyra), and the Tiburtine (named Albunea). Naevius names

315-639: A thousand years with her voice by aid of the god. Walter Burkert observes that "frenzied women from whose lips the god speaks" are recorded very much earlier in the Near East, as in Mari in the second millennium and in Assyria in the first millennium". Until the literary elaborations of Roman writers, sibyls were not identified by a personal name, but by names that refer to the location of their temenos , or shrine. In Pausanias , Description of Greece ,

360-497: Is Heraclides Ponticus in his book On Oracles , in which he appears to have enumerated at least three, namely the Phrygian, the Erythraean, and the Hellespontine. Marcus Terentius Varro Marcus Terentius Varro (116–27 BCE) was a Roman polymath and a prolific author. He is regarded as ancient Rome 's greatest scholar, and was described by Petrarch as "the third great light of Rome" (after Virgil and Cicero ). He

405-538: Is based on the traditional sequence of the consuls of the Roman Republic —supplemented, where necessary, by inserting "dictatorial" and "anarchic" years. It has been demonstrated to be somewhat erroneous but has become the widely accepted standard chronology, in large part because it was inscribed on the arch of Augustus in Rome; though that arch no longer stands, a large portion of the chronology has survived under

450-531: Is sometimes called Varro Reatinus ('Varro of Rieti') to distinguish him from his younger contemporary Varro Atacinus . Varro was born in or near Reate (now Rieti in Lazio) into a family thought to be of equestrian rank. He always remained close to his roots in the area, owning a large farm in the Reatine plain (reported as near Lago di Ripasottile, ) until his old age. He supported Pompey , reaching

495-530: Is worshiped at Tibur as a goddess, near the banks of the Anio , in which stream her image is said to have been found, holding a book in her hand. Her oracular responses the Senate transferred into the capitol. ( Divine Institutes I.vi) An apocalyptic pseudo-prophecy exists, attributed to the Tiburtine Sibyl, written c. AD 380, but with revisions and interpolations added at later dates. It purports to prophesy

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540-745: The Varronian chronology . His Nine Books of Disciplines became a model for later encyclopedists , especially for Pliny the Elder ( c.  23 to 79 AD). The most noteworthy portion of the Nine Books of Disciplines is its use of the liberal arts as organizing principles. Varro decided to focus on identifying nine of these arts: grammar , rhetoric , logic , arithmetic , geometry , astronomy , musical theory, medicine, and architecture . Using Varro's list, mediated through Martianus Capella 's early-5th century allegory, subsequent writers defined

585-729: The "Hebrew Sibyl" who was brought up in Israel named Sabbe, whose father was Berosus and her mother Erymanthe. Some say she was a Babylonian, while others call her an Egyptian Sibyl. The medieval Byzantine encyclopedia, the Suda , credits the Hebrew Sibyl as author of the Sibylline oracles . The Phrygian Sibyl is most well known for being conflated with Cassandra , Priam's daughter in Homer 's Iliad . The Phrygian Sibyl appears to be

630-570: The 48 BC Battle of Pharsalus . Caesar appointed him to oversee the public library of Rome in 47 BC, but following Caesar's death Mark Antony proscribed him, resulting in his losing much of his property, including his library. As the Republic gave way to the Empire c.  27 BC , Varro gained the favour of Augustus , under whose protection he found the security and quiet to devote himself to study and writing. Varro had studied under

675-758: The Cimmerian Sibyl in his books of the Punic War and Piso in his annals. Evander, the son of Sibyl, founded in Rome the shrine of Pan that is called the Lupercal . The sibyl who most concerned the Romans was the Cumaean Sibyl , located near the Greek city of Naples , whom Virgil 's Aeneas consults before his descent to the lower world ( Aeneid book VI: 10). Burkert notes (1985, p. 117) that

720-516: The Greek of Appian , The Civil Wars , II.ii.9). He was one of the commission of twenty that carried out the great agrarian scheme of Caesar for the resettlement of Capua and Campania (59 BC). During Caesar's civil war of 49 to 45 he commanded one of Pompey's armies in the Ilerda campaign of 49 BC. He escaped the penalties of having backed the losing side in the civil war through two pardons granted by Julius Caesar , before and after

765-425: The Greek sibyls were historical, namely Herophile of Erythrae and Phyto of Samos; the former he thinks lived in the eighth century BC, the latter somewhat later Frazer goes on: At first, the Greeks seemed to have known only one sibyl. (Heraclitus, cited by Plutarch, De Pythiae Oraculis 6; Aristophanes, Peace 1095, 1116; Plato, Phaedrus , p. 244b). The first writer who is known to have distinguished several sibyls

810-483: The Greeks who were moving against Ilium both that Troy would be destroyed and that Homer would write falsehoods. The word acrostic was first applied to the prophecies of the Erythraean Sibyl, which were written on leaves and arranged so that the initial letters of the leaves always formed a word. The Hellespontine, or Trojan Sibyl, presided over the Apollonian oracle at Dardania . The Hellespontian Sibyl

855-513: The Roman philologist Lucius Aelius Stilo (died 74 BC), and later at Athens under the Academic philosopher Antiochus of Ascalon (died 68 BC). Varro proved a highly productive writer and turned out more than 74 Latin works on a variety of topics. Aside from his many lost works (known through fragments), two endeavors stand out for historians: Nine Books of Disciplines and his compilation of

900-680: The Villa that celebrate the Tiburtine Sibyl, as prophesying the birth of Christ to the classical world. In Medieval Latin , sibylla simply became the term for "prophetess". It became used commonly in Late Gothic and Renaissance art to depict female Sibyllae alongside male prophets. The number of sibyls so depicted could vary, sometimes they were twelve (See, for example, the Apennine Sibyl ), sometimes ten, e.g. for François Rabelais , "How know we but that she may be an eleventh sibyl or

945-596: The advent of a final emperor named Constans, vanquishing the foes of Christianity, bringing about a period of great wealth and peace, ending paganism, and converting the Jews. After vanquishing Gog and Magog , the emperor is said to resign his crown to God. This would give way to the Antichrist . Ippolito d'Este rebuilt the Villa d'Este at Tibur, the modern Tivoli , from 1550 onward, and commissioned elaborate fresco murals in

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990-481: The chromatic manière from a number of Italian composers, who experimented at the time. The sayings of sibyls and oracles were notoriously open to interpretation (compare Nostradamus ) and were constantly used for both civil and cult propaganda. These sayings and sibyls should not be confused with the extant sixth-century collection of Sibylline Oracles , which typically predict disasters rather than prescribe solutions. Some genuine Sibylline verses are preserved in

1035-528: The church the figures of Augustus and of the Tiburtine Sibyl are painted on either side of the arch above the high altar. In the nineteenth century, Rodolfo Lanciani recalled that at Christmastime the presepio included a carved and painted figure of the sibyl pointing out to Augustus the Virgin and Child, who appeared in the sky in a halo of light. "The two figures, carved in wood, have now [1896] disappeared; they were given away or sold thirty years ago, when

1080-575: The conquest of Cumae by the Oscans in the fifth century destroyed the tradition, but provides a terminus ante quem for a Cumaean sibyl. She is said to have sold the original Sibylline books to Tarquinius Superbus , the last king of Rome. In Virgil's Fourth Eclogue , the Cumaean sibyl foretells the coming of a savior—possibly a flattering reference to the poet's patron, Augustus . Christians later identified this saviour as Jesus. The Delphic Sibyl

1125-498: The fifth-century geographical dictionary of Stephanus of Byzantium , under 'Gergis'). Other places claimed to have been her home. The sibylline collection at Gergis was attributed to the Hellespontine Sibyl and was preserved in the temple of Apollo at Gergis. Thence it passed to Erythrae , where it became famous. It was this very collection, it would appear, which found its way to Cumae and from Cumae to Rome. Gergis,

1170-590: The first ancient writer to distinguish several sibyls: Heraclides names at least three sibyls, the Phrygian , the Erythraean , and the Hellespontine . The scholar David S. Potter writes, "In the late fifth century BC it does appear that 'Sibylla' was the name given to a single inspired prophetess". Like Heraclitus, Plato speaks of only one sibyl, but in course of time the number increased to nine, with

1215-535: The first sibyl at Delphi mentioned ("the former" [earlier]) was of great antiquity, and was thought, according to Pausanias, to have been given the name "sibyl" by the Libyans. Sir James Frazer calls the text defective. The second sibyl referred to by Pausanias, and named "Herophile", seems to have been based ultimately in Samos , but visited other shrines, at Clarus , Delos , and Delphi and sang there, but that at

1260-657: The fourth century BC, there appear to have been at least three more, Phrygian , Erythraean , and Hellespontine . By the first century BC, there were at least ten sibyls, located in Greece, Italy , the Levant , and Asia Minor . The English word sibyl ( / ˈ s ɪ b əl / ) is from Middle English, via the Old French sibile and the Latin sibylla from the ancient Greek Σίβυλλα ( Sibylla ). Varro derived

1305-536: The name from an Aeolic sioboulla , the equivalent of Attic theobule ("divine counsel"). This etymology is not accepted in modern handbooks, which list the origin as unknown. There have been alternative proposals in nineteenth-century philology suggesting Old Italic or Semitic derivation. The first known Greek writer to mention a sibyl is (based on the testimony of Plutarch ) Heraclitus (fl. 500 BC): The Sibyl, with frenzied mouth uttering things not to be laughed at, unadorned and unperfumed, yet reaches to

1350-470: The name of Fasti Capitolini . Varro's literary output was prolific; Ritschl estimated it at 74 works in some 620 books, of which only one work survives complete, although we possess many fragments of the others, mostly in Gellius' Attic Nights . He was called "the most learned of the Romans" by Quintilian , and also recognized by Plutarch as "a man deeply read in Roman history". Varro

1395-547: The office of praetor , after having served as tribune of the people , quaestor and curule aedile . It is probable that Varro was discontented with the course on which Pompey entered when the First Triumvirate formed c. 60 BC, and he may thus have lost his chance of rising to the consulship. He actually ridiculed the coalition in a work entitled the Three-Headed Monster ( Τρικάρανος in

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1440-596: The pantheon of the Classical Greeks that is most familiar to modern readers, Apollo had become the deity represented by Pythia and those who then officiated at the already ancient oracle. The Erythraean Sibyl was sited at Erythrae , a town in Ionia opposite Chios . Apollodorus of Erythrae affirms the Erythraean Sibyl to have been his own countrywoman and to have predicted the Trojan War and prophesied to

1485-591: The pavement of the Siena Cathedral . The Basilica of Santa Maria in Aracoeli crowning the Campidoglio , Rome, is particularly associated with the Sibyl, because a medieval tradition referred the origin of its name to an otherwise unattested altar, Ara Primogeniti Dei , said to have been raised to the "firstborn of God" by the emperor Augustus, who had been warned of his advent by the sibylline books: in

1530-480: The pavement of the Duomo of Siena. Shakespeare references the sibyls in his plays, including Othello , Titus Andronicus , The Merchant of Venice , and especially Troilus and Cressida . In the latter, Shakespeare employed the common Renaissance comparison of Cassandra to a sibyl. A collection of twelve motets by Orlande de Lassus entitled Prophetiae Sibyllarum (pub. 1600) draw inspiration from

1575-407: The same time, Delphi had its own sibyl. James Frazer writes, in his translation and commentary on Pausanias, that only two of the Greek sibyls were historical: Herophile of Erythrae , who is thought to have lived in the eighth century BC, and Phyto of Samos who lived somewhat later. He observes that the Greeks at first seemed to have known only one sibyl, and instances Heraclides Ponticus as

1620-483: The second-century Book of Marvels of Phlegon of Tralles . The oldest collection of written Sibylline Books appears to have been made about the time of Solon and Cyrus at Gergis on Mount Ida in the Troad . The sibyl, who was born near there, at Marpessus, and whose tomb was later marked by the temple of Apollo built upon the archaic site, appears on the coins of Gergis, c. 400–350 BCE. (cf. Phlegon, quoted in

1665-485: The seven classical "liberal arts" of the medieval schools. In c.  37 BC, in his old age, Varro wrote on agriculture for his wife Fundania, producing a "voluminous" work De re rustica (also called Res rusticae )—similar to Cato the Elder 's work De agri cultura —on the management of large slave-run estates . The compilation of the Varronian chronology was an attempt to determine an exact year-by-year timeline of Roman history up to his time. It

1710-470: The sibyl figures of antiquity. The work—for four voices a cappella—consists of a prologue and twelve prophecies, each once corresponding to an individual Sibyl. While the text speaks of the coming of Jesus Christ, the composer reflects the mystical aura of the prophecies by using chromaticism in an extreme manner, a compositional technique that became very fashionable at the time. It is possible that Lassus not only viewed Michelangelo's depictions, but also drew

1755-549: The sibyl in question was the Etruscan Sibyl of Tibur or the Greek Sibyl of Cumae is not always clear. The Christian author Lactantius had no hesitation in identifying the sibyl in question as the Tiburtine Sibyl, nevertheless. He gave a circumstantial account of the pagan sibyls that is useful mostly as a guide to their identifications, as seen by fourth-century Christians: The Tiburtine Sibyl, by name Albunea ,

1800-545: The work is his anticipation of microbiology and epidemiology . Varro warned his readers to avoid swamps and marshland, since in such areas ...there are bred certain minute creatures which cannot be seen by the eyes, but which float in the air and enter the body through the mouth and nose and cause serious diseases. A modern scholar, Bertha Tilly, assesses Varro's work as follows: For the immense mass of work completed, for his patriotic fervour, his high moral sentiments, for versatility in forms of writing and in subjects, for

1845-476: Was a woman who prophesied before the Trojan Wars (c. eleventh century BC). She was noted by Pausanias in his writing during the second century AD about local traditions in Greece. This earliest documented Delphic Sibyl would have predated by hundreds of years the priestess of Apollo active at the oracle from around the eighth century BC who was known as Pythia . As Greek religion passed through transitions to

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1890-496: Was born in the village of Marpessus near the small town of Gergitha, during the lifetimes of Solon and Cyrus the Great . Marpessus, according to Heraclides of Pontus , was formerly within the boundaries of the Troad . The sibylline collection at Gergis was attributed to the Hellespontine Sibyl and was preserved in the temple of Apollo at Gergis. Thence it passed to Erythrae , where it became famous. The so-called Libyan Sibyl

1935-613: Was identified with prophetic priestesses presiding over the ancient Zeus - Amon (Zeus represented with the horns of Amon) oracle at the Siwa Oasis in the Western Desert of Egypt . The oracle here was consulted by Alexander after his conquest of Egypt. The mother of the Libyan Sibyl was Lamia , the daughter of Poseidon . Euripides mentions the Libyan Sibyl in the prologue to his tragedy Lamia . The Persian Sibyl

1980-588: Was recognized as an important source by many other ancient authors, among them Cicero , Pliny the Elder , Virgil in the Georgics , Columella , Aulus Gellius , Macrobius , Augustine , and Vitruvius , who credits him (VII.Intr.14) with a book on architecture. His only complete work extant, Rerum rusticarum libri tres ("Three Books on Agriculture"), has been described as "the well digested system of an experienced and successful farmer who has seen and practised all that he records." One noteworthy aspect of

2025-560: Was said to be a prophetic priestess presiding over the Apollonian Oracle ; although her location remained vague enough so that she might be called the "Babylonian Sibyl", the Persian Sibyl is said to have foretold the exploits of Alexander the Great . Also named Sambethe , she was reported to be of the family of Noah . The second-century AD traveller Pausanias , pausing at Delphi to enumerate four sibyls, mentions

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