compared certain points in the cults of Juno and Hercules, of which we
have a meagre knowledge from Roman literature, with some works of art of
Etruscan or ancient Italian origin (i. e. not Greek), and found that
they seemed to throw new and unexpected light on each other.
The Roman women, we are told[575], did not swear by Hercules, but by
‘their Juno’; the men swore by Hercules, Dius Fidius, or by their
Genius[576]. Women were excluded from the cult of Hercules at the ara
maxima[577]; men were excluded, not indeed from the cult of Juno, but
(as Reifferscheid puts it) ‘from that of Bona Dea, who was not far
removed from Juno[578].’ At the birth of a child, a couch (_lectus_) was
spread in the _atrium_ for Juno, a _mensa_ for Hercules[579]. The
bride’s girdle (_cingulum_) seems to have given rise to a cult-title of
Juno, viz. Cinxia, while the knot in it which was loosed by the
bridegroom at the _lectus genialis_ was called the _nodus
herculaneus_[580].
Now Reifferscheid believed that he found the same conjunction of Juno
and Hercules in several works of art, which may be supposed to be
reflections from the same set of ideas which produced the usages just
indicated. In the most important of these there is indeed no doubt about
it; this is a mirror of Etruscan workmanship[581], in which three
figures are marked with the Latin names IOVEI (Jupiter), IUNO and
HERCELE. Jupiter sits on an altar in the middle, and with his right hand
is touching Juno, who has her left hand on his shoulder; Hercules stands
with his club, apparently expectant, on the left. From certain
indications in the mirror (for which I must refer the reader to the
illustration on p. 2259 of Roscher’s _Lexicon_) Reifferscheid concluded
that Jupiter was here giving Juno in marriage to Hercules; and, in spite
of some criticism, this interpretation has been generally accepted[582].
In other works of art he found the same conjunction, though no names
mark the figures; in these Hercules and Juno, if such they be, appear to
be contending for the mastery, rather than uniting peacefully in
wedlock[583]. This conjunction, or opposition, of Juno and Hercules, is
thus explained by Reifferscheid. The name Juno represents the female
principle in human nature[584]; the ‘genius’ of a woman was called by
this name, and the cult of Juno as a developed goddess shows many
features that bear out the proposition[585]. If these facts be so, then
the inference to be drawn from the conjunction or opposition of Juno and
Hercules is that the name Hercules indicates the _male_ principle in
human nature. But the male principle is also expressed in the word
Genius, as we see e. g. in the term _lectus genialis_; Hercules
therefore and Genius mean the same thing—the former name having
encroached upon the domain of the latter, as a Latinized form of
Heracles, of all Greek heroes or divinities the most _virile_. And if
Hercules, Semo Sancus and Dius Fidius are all different names for the
same idea, then the word Genius may be taken as equivalent to the two
last of these as well as to Hercules[586].
But why does Reifferscheid go on to tell us that this Genius, i. e.
Hercules = Sancus = Dius Fidius, is the _Genius Iovis_? How does he
connect this many-titled conception with the great father of the sky? As
a matter of fact, he has but slender evidence for this; he relies on the
mirror in which he found Jupiter giving Juno to Hercules, and on the
conjecture that the Greek Hercules, the son of Zeus, would easily come
to occupy in Italy the position of Genius, if the latter were, in an
abstract form and apart from individual human life, regarded as the
Genius of Jupiter[587]. And in this he is followed by Wissowa and other
writers in Roscher’s _Lexicon_.
It would perhaps have been wiser not to go so far as this. He has
already carried us back to a world of ideas older than these varying
names which so often bewilder us in the Roman worship—to a world of
spirits, Semones, Lares, Cerri, ghosts of deceased ancestors, vegetation
demons, and men’s ‘other souls.’ When he talks of a _Genius Iovis_[588],
he is surely using the language of later polytheism to express an idea
which belonged, not to a polytheistic age, but to that older world of
religious thought. He is doing, in fact, the very thing which the Romans
themselves were doing all through the period of the Republic—the one
thing which above all others has made the study of their religious ideas
such a treacherous quagmire for the modern student.
VI ID. IUN. (JUNE 8). N.
MENTI IN CAPITOLIO. (VEN. MAFF. VI MINORES.)
The temple of Mens was vowed by T. Otacilius (praetor) in 217 B.C.,
after the battle of Trasimenus ‘propter neglegentiam caerimoniarum
auspiciorumque[589],’ and dedicated in 215 B.C., by the same man as
_duumvir aedibus dedicandis_[590]. The vow was the result of an
inspection of the Sibylline books, from which we might infer that the
goddess was a stranger[591]. If so, who was she, and whence? Reasoning
from the fact that in the same year, in the same place, and by the same
man, a temple was dedicated to Venus Erycina[592], Preller guessed that
this Mens was not a mere abstraction, but another form of the same
Venus; for a Venus Mimnermia or Meminia is mentioned by Servius[593],
‘quod meminerit omnium.’
However this may be, the foundation of a cult of Mens at so critical a
moment of their fortunes is very characteristic of the Roman spirit of
that age; it was an appeal to ‘something not themselves which made for
righteousness’ to help them to remember their caerimoniae, and not to
neglect their auspicia. It is remarkable that this temple of Mens was
restored by M. Aemilius Scaurus probably amid the disasters of the
Cimbrian war a century later[594].
VII ID. IUN. (JUNE 7). N.
VESTA APERIT. (PHILOC.)
V ID. IUN. (JUNE 9). N.
VESTALIA. (TUSC. VEN. MAFF.)
XVII KAL. QUINCT. (JUNE 15). N.
VESTA CLUDITUR. (PHILOC.)
XVII KAL. QUINCT. (JUNE 15). Q. ST. D. F.
It would seem from these notes in the calendars, and from passages in
Ovid and Festus[595], that both before and after the day of the true
Vestalia there were days set apart for the cult of the goddess, which
were _nefasti_ and also _religiosi_[596]. Ovid’s lines are worth
quoting; he consults the Flaminica Dialis[597] about the marriage of his
daughter:
Tum mihi post sacras monstratur Iunius idus
Utilis et nuptis, utilis esse viris,
Primaque pars huius thalamis aliena reperta est,
Nam mihi sic coniunx sancta Dialis ait;
‘Donec ab Iliaca placidus purgamina Vesta
Detulerit flavis in mare Thybris aquis,
Non mihi detonsos crines depectere buxo,
Non ungues ferro subsecuisse licet,
Non tetigisse virum, quamvis Iovis ille sacerdos,
Quamvis perpetua sit mihi lege datus.
Tu quoque ne propera. Melius tua filia nubet
Ignea cum pura Vesta nitebit humo.’
What is the meaning of this singular aspect of the Vesta-cult? Why
should these days be so ill-omened or so sacred that during them
marriages might not be celebrated, and the priestess of Jupiter might
not hold any intercourse with her husband, cut her hair, or pare her
nails? And what is the explanation of the annotation Q[uando] St[ercus]
D[elatum] F[as][598], which on the 15th indicated the breaking of the
spell, and a return to ordinary ways of life? Before attempting to
answer these questions, it will be as well to say a few words about the
nature and probable origin of the worship of Vesta. Owing to the
remarkable vitality and purity of this cult throughout the whole of
Roman history, we do not meet here with those baffling obscurities which
so often beset us in dealing with deities that had lost all life and
shape when Roman scholars began to investigate them. And yet we know
that we are here in the presence of rites and ideas of immemorial
antiquity.
In an article of great interest in the _Journal of Philology_ for
1885[599], Mr. J. G. Frazer first placed the origin of the cult in a
clear light for English scholars. By comparing it with similar practices
of existing peoples still in a primitive condition of life, he made
apparent the real germ of the institution of the Vestal Virgins. Helbig,
in his _Italiker in der Poebene_[600], had already recognized that germ
in _the necessity of keeping one fire always alight in each settlement_,
so that its members could at any time supply themselves with the flame,
then so hard to procure at a moment’s notice; and Mr. Frazer had only to
go one step further, and show that the task of keeping this fire alight
was that of the daughters of the chief. This step he was able to take,
supported by evidence from Damaraland in South Africa, where the
priestess of the perpetual fire is the chief’s daughter; quoting also
the following example from Calabria in Southern Italy: ‘At the present
day the fire in a Calabrian peasant’s house is never (except after a
death) allowed to die quite out, even in the heat of summer; it is a bad
omen if it should chance to be extinguished, and the girls of the house,
whose special care it is to keep at least a single brand burning on the
hearth, are sadly dismayed at such a mishap.’ The evidence of the Roman
_ius sacrum_ quite confirms this modern evidence; the Vestals were under
the patria potestas of the pontifex maximus, who represented in
republican times the legal powers of the Rex, and from this fact we may
safely argue that they had once been the daughters of the primitive
chief. The _flamines_ too, or _kindlers_, as being under the potestas of
the pontifex, may be taken as representing the sons of the primitive
household[601]. But from various reasons[602] the duties of the
_flamines_ became obsolete or obscure; while those of the Vestals
remained to give us an almost perfect picture of life in the household
of the oldest Latins.
From the first, no doubt, the tending of the fire was in some sense a
religious service, and the flame a sacred flame[603]. There must have
been many stages of growth from this beginning to the fully developed
Vesta of the Republic and Empire; yet we can see that the lines of
development were singularly simple and consistent. The sacred fire for
example was maintained in the aedes Vestae, adjoining the king’s
house[604] (_regia_); and the penus Vestae, which must originally have
contained the stores on which the family depended for their sustenance,
was always believed to preserve the most sacred and valuable objects
possessed by the State[605].
We return to the Vestalia, of which the ritual was as follows. On June
7, the penus Vestae, which was shut all the rest of the year, and to
which no man but the pontifex maximus had at any time right of entry,
was thrown open to all matrons. During the seven following days they
crowded to it barefoot[606]. Ovid relates his own experience[607]:
Forte revertebar festis Vestalibus illa
Qua nova Romano nunc via iuncta foro est.
Huc pede matronam vidi descendere nudo:
Obstipui tacitus sustinuique gradum.
The object of this was perhaps to pray for a blessing on the household.
On plain and old-fashioned ware offerings of food were carried into the
temple: the Vestals themselves offered the sacred cakes made of the
first ears of corn plucked, as we saw, in the early days of May[608];
bakers and millers kept holiday, all mills were garlanded, and donkeys
decorated with wreaths and cakes[609].
Ecce coronatis panis dependet asellis
Et velant scabras florida serta molas.
On June 15 the temple (aedes, not templum) was swept and the refuse
taken away and either thrown into the Tiber or deposited in some
particular spot[610]. Then the _dies nefasti_ came to an end; and the
15th itself became _fastus_ as soon as the last act of cleansing had
been duly performed: ‘Quando stercus delatum fas.’
In this account of the ritual of these days, two features claim special
attention: (1) the duties of the Vestals in connexion with the provision
of food; (2) the fact that the days were _religiosi_, as is illustrated
by the prohibition of marriage and the mourning of the Flaminica Dialis.
That these two features were in some way connected seems proved by the
cessation of the mourning when the penus Vestae was once more closed.
1. It needs but little investigation to discover that, though the germ
of the cult was doubtless the perpetual fire in the king’s house, the
cult itself was by no means confined to attendance on the fire; and this
was so probably from the very first. The king’s daughters fetched the
water from the spring, both for sacred and domestic purposes; and this
duty was kept up throughout Roman history, for water was never ‘laid on’
to the house of the Vestals, but carried from a sacred fountain[611].
They also crushed the corn with pestle and mortar, and prepared the
cakes for the use of the family—duties which survived in all their
pristine simplicity in the preparation of the _mola salsa_ in the early
days of May[612]; and they swept the house, as the Vestals afterwards
continued to cleanse the penus Vestae, on June 15. The penus, or
store-closet of the house, was under their charge; on the state of its
contents the family depended for its comfort and prosperity, and from
the very outset it must have had a kind of sacred character[613]. The
close connexion of Vesta and her ministrants with the simple materials
and processes of the house and the farm is thus quite plain; and we may
trace it in every rite in which they took any part. The Fordicidia and
the Parilia in April were directly concerned with the flocks and herds
of the community; in May the festival of the Bona Dea and the mysterious
ceremony of the Argei point to the season of peril during the ripening
of the crops. After the Vestalia the Vestals were present at the
Consualia and the festival of Ops Consiva in August, which, as we shall
see, were probably harvest festivals; and on the Ides of October the
blood of the ‘October horse’ was deposited in their care for use at the
Fordicidia as a charm for fertility. So constant is the connexion of
Vesta with the fruits of the earth, that it is not surprising that some
Roman scholars[614] should have considered her an earth goddess;
especially as, in a volcanic region, the proper home of fire would be
thought to be beneath the earth. But such explanations, and also the
views of modern scholars who have sought to find in Vesta a deity of
abstract ideas, such as ‘the nourishing element in the fire’[615], are
really superfluous. The associations which grew up around the sacred
hearth-fire can all be traced to the original germ, if it be borne in
mind that the fire, the provision-store, and the protecting deities of
that store, were all placed together in the centre of the house, and
that all domestic operations, sacrificial or culinary, took place at or
by means of, the necessary fire. ‘What is home but another word for
cooking?’ Nor must we forget that the living fire was for primitive man
a mysterious thing, and invested from the first with divine
attributes[616].
2. The fact that from the 5th to the 15th the days were not only
_nefasti_ but also _religiosi_ is not easy to explain. It is true that
in two other months, February and April, we find a parallel series of
_dies nefasti_ in the first half of the month; in February it extended
from the Kalends to the Lupercalia (15th), and in April from the Nones
to the Vinalia (23rd)[617]. But these days in February and April were
_nefasti_ in the ordinary sense of the word, i. e. the cessation of
judicial business, and we are not told of them that they were also
_religiosi_, or that the Flaminica Dialis lay during them under any
special restrictions, as in the days we are speaking of. On the other
hand, we find to our surprise that the other days on which this
priestess was forbidden to comb hair or cut nails were not even
_nefasti_ in the ordinary sense, viz. those of the ‘moving’ of the
_ancilia_ and of the ceremony of the Argei[618]: so that we are baffled
at every point in looking for a solution to the calendar.
But there is one fact that is quite clear, namely, that the _tempus
nefastum_ was in some way or other the result of the purification of the
aedes Vestae, since it ceased at the moment the last act of cleansing
was completed. Now it does seem to be the case that among some peoples
living by agriculture but as yet comparatively uncivilized, special
importance is attached to the days immediately before harvest and the
gathering of the first-fruits—at which time there is a general cleaning
out of house, barns, and all receptacles and utensils, and following
upon this a period of rejoicing. Mr. Frazer, in his _Golden Bough_ has
collected some examples of this practice, though he has not brought them
together under one head or given them a single explanation. The most
striking, and at the same time the best attested, example is as
follows[619]:
‘Among the Creek Indians of North America, the _busk_, or festival of
firstfruits, was the chief ceremony of the year. It was held in July or
August, when the corn was ripe, and marked the end of the old year and
the beginning of the new one. Before it took place none of the Indians
would eat or even handle any of the new harvest.... Before celebrating
the Busk, the people provided themselves with new clothes and new
household utensils and furniture; they collected their old clothes and
rubbish, together with all the remaining grain and other old provisions,
cast them together in one common heap and consumed them with fire. As a
preparation for the ceremony all the fires in the village were
extinguished, and the ashes swept clean away. In particular the hearth
or altar of the temple was dug up, and the ashes carried out....
Meanwhile the women at home were cleaning out their houses, renewing the
old hearths, and scouring all the cooking vessels that they might be
ready to receive the new fire and the new fruits. The public or sacred
square was carefully swept of even the smallest crumbs of previous
feasts, for fear of polluting the first-fruit offerings. Also every
vessel that had contained any food during the expiring year was removed
from the temple before sunset.’ A general fast followed, we are told;
‘and when the sun was declining from the meridian, all the people were
commanded by the voice of a crier to stay within doors, to do no bad
act, and to be sure to extinguish and throw away every spark of the old
fire. Universal silence now reigned. Then the high priest made the new
fire by the friction of two pieces of wood, and placed it on the altar
under the green arbour. This new fire was believed to atone for all past
crimes except murder. Then a basket of new fruits was brought; the high
priest took out a little of each sort of fruit, rubbed it with bear’s
oil, and offered it together with some flesh to the bountiful spirit of
fire as a first-fruit offering and an annual oblation for sin....
Finally the chief priest made a speech, exhorting the people to observe
their old rites and customs, announcing that the new divine fire had
purged away the sins of the past year, and earnestly warning the women
that if any of them had not extinguished the old fire, or had contracted
any impurity, they must forthwith depart lest the divine fire should
spoil both them and the people.’
The four chief points in this very interesting account are, (1) the
extremely solemn and critical character of the whole ceremonial, as
indicated in the general fast; (2) the idea of the necessity of
purification preparatory to the reception of first-fruits, a
purification which seems to extend to human beings as well as to houses,
receptacles, and utensils; (3) the renewal of the sacred fire, which was
coincident with the beginning of a new year; (4) the solemn reception of
the first-fruits. Comparing these with Roman usage, we notice that the
first two are fully represented at the Vestalia, the one by the
religious character of the days, and the mourning of the Flaminica
Dialis, the other by the cleansing of the penus Vestae, and the careful
removal of all its refuse. The third is represented, not at the
Vestalia, but at the beginning of the year on March 1, when the sacred
fire was renewed, as we saw, in the primitive fashion by the friction of
two pieces of wood, and the temple of Vesta was adorned with fresh
laurels, as was the case also with the altar in the American example
just quoted. The fourth point is represented neither in March nor June,
but rather by the plucking of the first ears of corn by the Vestals
before the Ides of May, from which they made the sacred salt-cakes of
sacrifice.
Now we need not go the length of assuming that the Roman ceremonies of
March, May and June were three parts of one and the same rite which in
course of time had been separated and attached to different periods of
the year; though this indeed may not be wholly impossible. But we may at
least profitably notice that all the four striking features of the
Indian ceremony are found in the cult of Vesta, and descended no doubt
to the later Romans from an age in which both the crops, the fire and
the store-houses were regarded as having much the same sacred character
as they had for the Creek Indians.
To me indeed it had seemed probable, even before the publication of Mr.
Frazer’s _Golden Bough_, that the cleansing of the penus Vestae was
nothing but a survival of a general purification of store-houses, barns,
utensils, and probably of all the apparatus of farming, including
perhaps human beings, before the completion of the harvest which was now
close at hand. The date of the Vestalia is indeed too early to let us
suppose it to have been a real harvest festival, nor had it any of the
joyous character found in such rites; and, as we shall see, the true
harvest festivals are to be found in the month of August. The corn
harvest in middle Italy took place in the latter half of June and in
July[620]; and, as is everywhere still the practice, the festivals
proper did not occur until the whole work of harvesting was done. But at
the time of the Vestalia the crops were certainly ripening; in May we
have already had the plucking of the first ears by the Vestals, and the
_lustratio segetum_ which has been described under the head of
Ambarvalia on May 28.
I must leave to anthropologists the further investigation of the ideas
underlying the ritual we have been examining; it is something to have
been able to co-ordinate it with rites which are so well attested as
those of the Creek Indians, and which admit without difficulty of a
reasonable interpretation[621].
III ID. IUN. (JUNE 11). N.
MAT[RALIA]. (TUSC. VEN. MAFF.)
MATR[I] MATUT[AE]. (VEN.)
MATRALIA. (PHILOC.)