is as well here to remember that the further we probe back into old
Italian rites, the less distinctly can we expect to be able to connect
them with particular deities. The formula ‘si deus, si dea es’ should
always be borne in mind in attempting to connect gods and ceremonies.
And this ceremony, like that of the Argei[1014] (which also wants a
clearly-conceived deity as its object), is obviously a survival from a
very primitive class of performances which Mr. Frazer has called acts of
‘sympathetic magic[1015].’ I am indebted to the _Golden Bough_ for a
striking parallel to the rite of the lapis manalis, among many others
which more or less resemble it. ‘In a Samoan village a certain stone was
carefully housed as the representative of the rain-making god: and in
time of drought his priests carried the stone in procession and dipped
it in a stream[1016].’ What was done with the lapis manalis we are not
told, but it is pretty plain from the word ‘manalis,’ and from the
fragments of explanation which have come down to us from Roman scholars,
that it was either the object of some splashing or pouring, or was
itself hollow and was filled with water which was to be poured out in
imitation of the desired rain[1017]. Such rites need not necessarily be
connected by us with the name of a god: and the Jupiter Elicius, with
whom it is sought to connect this one, was always associated by the
Romans not with this obsolete rite, but with the elaborated science of
augury which was in the main Etruscan[1018].
But this discussion has already been carried on as far as the scope of
this work permits. It may be completed by any one who has the patience
to work through Aust’s exhaustive article, examining his conclusions
with the aid of his abundant references; but I doubt if anything will be
found, beyond what I have mentioned, which bears closely on the question
with which we set out. That question was, whether the distinctly
anthropomorphic treatment of Jupiter in the ‘epulum Iovis’ could be
explained by any native Italian practice in his cult (as Marquardt tried
to explain it), or must be referred with Aust to foreign, i. e.
Graeco-Etruscan, influence. I am driven to the conclusion that Aust is
probably right. There is no real trace in Italy of an indigenous iconic
representation of Jupiter. Trees and hills are apparently sacred to him,
and possibly stones, though this last is doubtful: we find a sacrificial
meal at the Latin festival, but no sign that he takes part in it as an
image or statue. Elsewhere, as at Praeneste, peculiar representations of
him arouse strong suspicions of foreign iconic influence. I think, on
the whole, that the Italian peoples owed the sacred image to foreign
works of art: and that the ‘epulum Iovis’ was introduced from Etruria by
the Etruscan dynasty which built the Capitoline temple. It may, indeed,
have been engrafted upon an earlier sacrificial meal like that of the
feriae Latinae, or that of the curiae, or the rustic one of Jupiter
dapalis: but, if so, the meal was one at which the ancient Romans were
content to _believe_, as Ovid says, that the gods were present, and did
not need, like the Greeks, the evidence of their eyes to help out their
belief. Their gods were still aniconic when the wave of foreign ideas
broke over them. We may say of the earliest Roman cult of Jupiter what
Tacitus asserts of the Germans of his day[1019]: ‘nec cohibere
parietibus deos neque in ullam humani oris speciem adsimulare ex
magnitudine caelestium arbitrantur: lucos ac nemora consecrant,
deorumque nominibus appellant secretum illud quod sola reverentia
vident.’
* * * * *
September 13 was also the day on which, according to Livy[1020] and
Verrius Flaccus[1021], a nail (_clavus_) was driven _annually_ by the
‘Praetor maximus’ into the wall of the cella of Minerva in the
Capitoline temple, in obedience to an old lex which was fixed up on the
wall of the temple adjoining this same cella. But Mommsen’s trenchant
criticism[1022] of the _locus classicus_ for this subject in Livy has
made it almost certain that the Roman scholars were here in error: that
the ceremony was not an annual one, but took place once in a century, in
commemoration of a vow made in 463 B.C., to commemorate the great
pestilence of that year, which carried off both the consuls and several
other magistrates[1023]: that it had no special connexion with the cult
of Jupiter, and was not intended, as is generally supposed, to mark the
years as they passed. The nail is really the symbol of Fortuna or
Necessitas; the rite was Etruscan, and was also celebrated at Volsinii
in the temple of the Etruscan deity of Fate; when brought to Rome it was
very naturally located in the great temple of the Etruscan Trias, the
religious centre of the Roman state. Originally a dictator was chosen
(i. e. Praetor maximus) _clavi figendi causa_; and when the dictatorship
was dropped after the Second Punic War, the ceremony was allowed to fall
into oblivion. Later on the Roman antiquarians unearthed and
misinterpreted it, believing it to have been a yearly rite of which the
object was to mark the succession of years. This brief account of
Mommsen’s view may suffice for the purpose of this work: but the subject
is one that might with advantage be reinvestigated.
Footnote 930:
This represents the length which the ludi had attained in Cicero’s
time (_Verr._ i. 10. 31). September 4 was probably added after
Caesar’s death (Mommsen in _C. I. L._ 328).
Footnote 931:
_C. I. L._ 281.
Footnote 932:
_R. R._ I. 33.
Footnote 933:
See Mommsen’s masterly essay in his _Römische Forschungen_, vol. ii.
p. 42 foll. Aust, in _Myth. Lex._ s. v. Iuppiter, 732.
Footnote 934:
Mommsen, _Röm. Chronol._ 86 foll.
Footnote 935:
The ‘equorum probatio,’ preliminary to the races in the circus, took
place on the day after the Ides: see above, p. 27.
Footnote 936:
Mommsen (_C. I. L._ 328, and _Röm. Forsch._ ii. 43 foll.) points out
that the real centre-point and original day of the ludi proper was the
day of the great procession (pompa) from the Capitol to the Circus
maximus; and that this was probably the 15th, two days after the
epulum, because the 14th, being _postriduanus_, was unlucky, and that
day was also occupied by the ‘equorum probatio.’ (See Fasti Sab.,
Maff., Vall., Amit. and Antiat.)
Footnote 937:
See below, p. 234. For the _dies natalis_, see Aust, in _Lex._ s.v.
Iuppiter, p. 707; Plutarch, _Poplic._ 14.
Footnote 938:
Mommsen, _Röm. Forsch._ l. c.
Footnote 939:
Livy, 36. 2. 3. The passage refers to _ludi magni_, i. e. _special_
votive games, vowed after the fixed organization of the ludi Romani;
but it is none the less illustrative of the latter, as they originated
in votive games.
Footnote 940:
So Marq. 349 and note; Mommsen in _C. I. L._ 329, 335. I follow Aust,
_Lex._ s. v. Iuppiter, 732. The ‘epulum Minervae’ of the rustic
calendars is but slender evidence for an ancient and special connexion
of the goddess with this day; but Mommsen thinks that the epulum
‘magis Minervae quam Iovis fuisse.’
Footnote 941:
Aust, l. c.
Footnote 942:
Aust, _Lex._ s. v. Iuppiter, 670, 735.
Footnote 943:
In Capitolio (Gellius, 12. 8. 2; Liv. 38. 57. 5). For the collegium of
_epulones_, which from 196 B.C. had charge of this and other public
feasts, see Marq. 347 foll.
Footnote 944:
Val. Max. 2. 1. 2; Plin. _N. H._ 33. 111; Aust, l. c.; Preller, i.
120.
Footnote 945:
Marq. 348.
Footnote 946:
_R. R._ 132. Festus (68) explains daps as ‘res divina quae fiebat aut
hiberna semente aut verna,’ and Cato directs the farmer to begin to
sow after the ceremony he describes. I do not clearly understand
whether Marquardt intended also to connect the epulum Jovis of Nov. 13
with the autumn sowing.
Footnote 947:
I am unable to offer any explanation of these words, though half
inclined to suspect that Vesta was the original deity of this rite of
the farm, and that Jupiter and the wine-offering are later intrusions.
Footnote 948:
_Fasti_, 6. 307. For Vacuna see Preller, i. 408.
Footnote 949:
Bk. 2. 23 (cp. 2. 50); Marq. 195 foll. For a comparison of Greek and
Roman usage of this kind see de Coulanges, _La Cité antique_, p. 132
foll.
Footnote 950:
He compares this common meal with those of the πρυτανεῖα of Greek
cities, and also with the φιδίτια at Sparta. But it is most unlikely
that the practice of the curiae should have had any but a native
origin.
Footnote 951:
See cap. 7 of Ambrosch’s _Studien_; and cp. cap. 1 on the Regia as the
older centre.
Footnote 952:
I may relegate to a footnote the further conjecture that the original
deity of the epulum was Vesta. We know that this Sept. 13 was one of
the three days on which the Vestals prepared the _mola salsa_ (Serv.
_Ecl._ 8. 32). We cannot connect this _mola salsa_ with the cult of
Jupiter on this day, for the Vestals have no direct connexion with
that cult at any period of the year; but it is possible that it was a
survival from the time when the common meal took place in the Regia.
Footnote 953:
See Aust’s admirable and exhaustive article on Jupiter in Roscher’s
_Lexicon_.
Footnote 954:
Robertson Smith (_Religion of the Semites_, 42 foll.) seems to trace
the idea back to an actual physical fatherhood. Mr. Farnell, on the
other hand (_Cults of the Greek States_, i. 49), believes that in the
case of Zeus it expresses ‘rather a moral or spiritual idea than any
real theological belief concerning physical or human origins.’ In
Italy, I think, the suffix pater indicates a special connexion with a
particular stock, and one rather of guardianship than of actual
fatherhood. See above on Neptunalia.
Footnote 955:
See Jordan’s note on Preller, i. 56.
Footnote 956:
See my paper in _Classical Review_, vol. ix. 474 foll.
Footnote 957:
Wissowa, _de Feriis_, p. 6, in the true spirit of Italian worship,
concludes that it was ‘non per iustum matrimonium, sed ex officiorum
affinitate.’
Footnote 958:
Bücheler, _Umbrica_; Bréal, _Les Tables Eugubines_.
Footnote 959:
_Tab._ 1 B. (Bücheler, p. 2, takes it as a temple or sacellum of
_Juno_).
Footnote 960:
Grabovius is an epithet of Mars; Sancius of Fisius; Jovius or Juvius
of more than one deity.
Footnote 961:
Farnell, op. cit. i. 50 and notes.
Footnote 962:
Mommsen, _Unteritalische Dialekten_, 341; _Lex._ 637. The Jupiter
_Cacunus_ of _C. I. L._ 6. 371 and 9. 4876 also points to _high
places_, and there are other examples.
Footnote 963:
_Aen._ 9. 567.
Footnote 964:
Wordsworth, _Fragments and Specimens_, p. 564.
Footnote 965:
_Sat._ 1. 15. 14.
Footnote 966:
Deecke, _Etruskische Forschungen_, iv. 79 foll.
Footnote 967:
_Lex._ s. v. Iuppiter, p. 634.
Footnote 968:
Servius _Ecl._ 10. 27; _Dict. of Antiquities_ (ed. 2), s. v.
Triumphus.
Footnote 969:
Farnell, i. 184 foll. See also Dion. Hal. 1. 21. 2; Deecke, _Die
Falisker_, p. 88; _Lex._ s. v. Juno, 591; Roscher, _Juno und Hera_,
76.
Footnote 970:
_Lex._ 643.
Footnote 971:
H. Jordan, _Symbolae ad historiam religionum Italicarum alterae_.
Königsberg, 1885.
Footnote 972:
‘Orceria·Numeri·nationu·cratia·Fortuna·Diovo·filei·primocenia·donom
dedi’ (_C. I. L._ xiv. 2863). There are later inscriptions in which
she appears as ‘Iovis (or Iovi) puero,’ in the sense of female child
(_C. I. L._ xiv. 2862, 2868). The subject is discussed by Mommsen in
_Hermes_ for 1884, p. 455, and by Jordan op. cit. See also _Lex._ s.
v. Fortuna, 1542 foll., and s. v. Iuppiter, 648.
Footnote 973:
_Symbolae_, i. p. 8, and cp. 12. For the apparent parallel in the myth
of the birth of Mars see on March 1.
Footnote 974:
_Hermes_, 1884, p. 455 foll.
Footnote 975:
Gellius, _N. A._ 5. 12; Ovid, _Fasti_, 3. 429 foll.; and see above on
May 21. For Hercules, Jordan l. c. and his note on Preller, ii. 298.
For Caeculus, Wissowa, in _Lex._ s. v.
Footnote 976:
_C. I. L._ xiv. 2862 and 2868.
Footnote 977:
The _tria signa_ of Liv. 23. 19, placed ‘in aede Fortunae’ by M.
Anicius after his escape from Hannibal, with a dedication, may
possibly have been those of Fortuna and the two babes (Preller, ii.
192. note 1): but this is very doubtful.
Footnote 978:
Jordan, _Symbolae_, 10; _Lex._ s. v. Fortunae, 1543; Fernique, _Étude
sur Préneste_, 78.
Footnote 979:
Gerhard, _Antike Bildwerke_, Tab. iv. no. 1, gives an example: the
children here, however, are not babes, and the mother has her arms
round their necks. It seems more to resemble the types of Leto with
Apollo and Artemis as infants (_Lex._ s. v. Leto, 1973), as Prof.
Gardner suggests to me.
Footnote 980:
Ad _Aen._ 7. 799.
Footnote 981:
_Lex._ s. v. Iuppiter, 640.
Footnote 982:
See Fernique, _Étude sur Préneste_, pp. 79-81.
Footnote 983:
Fernique, op. cit. p. 79.
Footnote 984:
Fernique, 139 foll. Wissowa writes of Praeneste as ‘a special point of
connexion between Latin and Etruscan culture’ (_Lex._ s. v. Mercurius,
2813).
Footnote 985:
Plutarch, _Parallela_, 41.
Footnote 986:
See at end of April, p. 95.
Footnote 987:
Liv. 1. 31. 3 ‘visi etiam audire vocem ingentem ex summi cacuminis
luco, ut patrio ritu sacra Albani facerent.’
Footnote 988:
e. g. the vases of very primitive make (Henzen, _Acta Fratr. Arv._
30).
Footnote 989:
Liv. 27. 11 (B.C. 209).
Footnote 990:
Niebuhr, _Hist. of Rome_, ii. 37. Strong arguments are urged against
this view by Aust, _Lex._ 696.
Footnote 991:
Paul. Diac. 87. The lucus is mentioned in the corrupt fragments of the
Argean itinerary (see on May 15) in Varro, _L. L._ 5. 50 (see Jordan,
_Topogr._ ii, 242): where I am inclined to think the real reading is
‘Esquiliis cis Iovis lucum fagutalem’; ‘Iuppiter Fagutalis’ in Plin.
_N. H._ 16. 37; a ‘vicus Iovis Fagutalis,’ _C. I. L._ vi. 452 (110
A.D.).
Footnote 992:
For Iuppiter Viminius and his ara, Fest. 376.
Footnote 993:
Liv. 1. 10; Dionys. 2. 34; Propert. 5. (4.) 10.
Footnote 994:
For other examples of this practice see Bötticher, _Baumkultus_, pp.
73 and 134; Virgil, _Aen._ 10. 423, and Servius, ad loc.; Statius,
_Theb._ 2. 707.
Footnote 995:
Corn. Nep. _Atticus_, 20; cf. Mommsen, _Res Gestae Divi Augusti_, p.
53; Dion. Hal. 2. 34. 4. This is apparently what Livy alludes to in 1.
10, attributing it, after Roman fashion, to Romulus: ‘Templum his
regionibus, quas modo animo metatus sum, dedico sedem opimis spoliis.’
For a discussion of the shape of this temple see Aust, in _Lex._ s. v.
Iuppiter, 673. He is inclined to attribute it (679) to the A.
Cornelius Cossus who dedicated the second _spolia opima_ in B.C. 428
(Liv. 4. 20).
Footnote 996:
The meaning of the cult-title is obscure; _Lex._ s. v. Iuppiter, 673.
Footnote 997:
Paul. Diac. 92; Serv. _Aen._ 12. 206.
Footnote 998:
Aust, in _Lex._ 676. The idea is that of Helbig in his _Italiker in
der Poebene_, 91 foll. Cp. Schwegler, _Röm. Gesch._ i. 681, and
Preller, i. 248 foll. H. Nettleship, _Essays in Latin Literature_, p.
35, and Strachan-Davidson (Polybius, _Prolegomena_, viii) discuss the
oath _per Iovem lapidem_ usefully. Nettleship saw that the passage of
Servius is the only one which ‘gives any real support’ to the notion
that the god was represented by a stone; and Strachan-Davidson notes
the aetiological method of Servius.
Footnote 999:
Cp. his note on the ‘sceptrum’ (_Aen._ 12. 206), which he explains as
being the substitute for a ‘simulacrum’ of Jupiter. Was this
‘simulacrum’ a stone? If so he would have said so. Obviously he knew
little or nothing about these cult-objects.
Footnote 1000:
_de Civ. Dei_ 2. 29. S. Augustine couples it with the focus Vestae, as
something well known: and this could not be said at that time of any
object in the temple of Jupiter Feretrius. The epithet Capitolinus
would suit the stone of Terminus far better; and this is, in fact,
made almost certain by Servius’ language when speaking of Virgil’s
‘Capitoli immobile saxum’ (_Aen._ 9. 448), which he identifies with
the ‘lapidem ipsum Termini.’ Doubtless if we could be sure that such a
stone existed, we might guess that it was an aerolite
(Strachan-Davidson, p. 76, who quotes examples).
Footnote 1001:
So Nettleship, l. c.: and Strachan-Davidson, l. c.
Footnote 1002:
He quotes Plin. _N. H._ 37. 135 ‘cerauniae nigrae rubentesque et
similes securibus.’
Footnote 1003:
Communicated to Mr. Strachan-Davidson, and mentioned by him in a note
(op. cit. p. 77). An instance in Retzel, _History of Mankind_, vol. i.
p. 175. The other suggestion, that it was a meteoric stone, is also
quite possible: for Greek examples, see Schömann, _Griech.
Alterthümer_, ii. 171 foll.
Footnote 1004:
Liv. 30. 43.
Footnote 1005:
We may compare the ‘orbita’ of the cult of Jupiter Sancius at Iguvium:
Bücheler, _Umbrica_, 141. See above, p. 139.
Footnote 1006:
It may be as well to say, before leaving the subject, that I certainly
agree with Mr. Strachan-Davidson that the ordinary oath, ‘per Iovem
lapidem,’ where the swearer throws the stone away from him (described
by Polybius, 3. 25), has nothing to do with the ritual of the Fetials.
Footnote 1007:
Festus, p. 2. Cp. 128, where this stone is distinguished from the
other, which was the ‘ostium Orci.’ Serv. _Aen._ 3. 175.
Footnote 1008:
Serv. l. c. Marquardt, and Aust following him, add the matrons with
bare feet and the magistrates without their praetexta: but this rests
on the authority of Petronius (_Sat._ 44), who surely is not writing
of Rome, where the ceremony was only a tradition, to judge by Fest. p.
2.
Footnote 1009:
Varro, _L. L._ 6. 94.
Footnote 1010:
O. Gilbert, ii. 154: adopted by Aust, 658, who adds some slight
additional evidence: e. g. the ‘Iovem aquam exorabant’ of the passage
from Petronius.
Footnote 1011:
Tylor, _Prim. Cult._ ii. 235-7: for the Greek Zeus, Farnell, _Cults_,
i. 44 foll.
Footnote 1012:
Preller, i. 190. I cannot say that I find evidence earlier than the
passage of Tibullus, 1. 7. 26 (Jupiter Pluvius).
Footnote 1013:
Note that the Flamen Dialis is not mentioned along with the Pontifices
by Servius, l.c.
Footnote 1014:
See on May 15.
Footnote 1015:
_Golden Bough_, i. 11 foll.; Grimm, _Teutonic Mythology_, 595 foll.;
abundant examples in the works of Mannhardt, see indices.
Footnote 1016:
From _Samoa_, by G. Turner, p. 145.
Footnote 1017:
Compare together Nonius, 547. 10; 559. 19 (s. v. trulleum), from
Varro; Festus, 128, s. v. ‘manalis lapis,’ from Verrius Flaccus. The
suggestion that the stone was hollow is O. Gilbert’s.
Footnote 1018:
Aust, _Lex._ 657, who believes the Romans to have been mistaken. The
_locus classicus_ is Ovid, _Fasti_, 3. 285 foll.; a more rational
account in Liv. 1. 20; Plin. _N. H._ 2. 140. Note the position of the
altar of this Jupiter, i. e. the Aventine.
Footnote 1019:
_Germania_, 9.
Footnote 1020:
7. 3.
Footnote 1021:
Festus, 55.
Footnote 1022:
In _Röm. Chronologie_, p. 175 foll. Preller (i. 258) had already seen
that the ceremony was a religious one, but believed it to be annual,
and used for the reckoning of time.
Footnote 1023:
‘An sich hat der Nagel gewiss mit dem Jahre nichts zu thun, sondern
steht in seiner natürlichen und wohlbekannten Bedeutung der
Schicksalsfestung, in welcher er als Attribut der grausen
Nothwendigkeit (saeva Necessitas), der Fortuna, der Atropos bei
römischen Schriftstellern und auf italischen Bildwerken begegnet.’
Mommsen, op. cit. 179. He alludes, of course, to Horace, _Od._ 1. 35,
and 3. 24, and to the Etruscan mirror mentioned by Preller (p. 259):
see Gerhard, _Etr. Spiegel_, i. 176. But the interpretation of this
mirror, as given by Preller, seems to me very doubtful.
MENSIS OCTOBER.
In the Italy of historical times, the one agricultural feature of this
month was the vintage. The rustic calendars mark this with the single
word _vindemiae_[1024]. The vintage might begin during the last few days
of September, but October was its natural time, though it is now
somewhat earlier: this point is clear both from Varro and Pliny[1025].
But the old calendars have preserved hardly a trace of this; and in fact
the only feast which we can in any way connect with wine making (the
Meditrinalia on the 11th) is obscure in name and its ritual unknown to
us. We may infer that the practice of viticulture was a comparatively
late introduction; and this is borne out by such facts as the absence of
wine in the ritual of the Latin festival[1026], and the words of a _lex
regia_ (ascribed to Numa) which forbade wine to be sprinkled on a
funeral pile[1027]. Pliny also expressed a decided opinion that
viticulture was _multo serior_: and lately Hehn[1028] has traced it to
the Italian Greeks on etymological grounds. It can hardly have become a
common occupation in Latium before the seventh or possibly even the
eighth century B.C.
Probably if Ovid had continued his _Fasti_ to the end of the year we
might have learnt much of interest about this month: as it is, we have
only scraps of information about a very few primitive rites, only one of
which can be said to be known to us in any detail; and the
interpretation of that one is extremely doubtful.
KAL. OCT. (OCTOBER 1). N.
[FIDEI] IN CAPITOLIO. TIGILL[O] SOROR[IO] AD COMPITUM ACILI. (ARV.)
The sacrifice here indicated to Fides in the Capitol is clearly the one
which Livy ascribes to Numa[1029]: ‘Et soli Fidei sollemne instituit. Ad
id sacrarium flamines bigis, curru arcuato (i. e. ‘covered’) vehi
iussit, manuque ad digitos usque involuta rem divinam facere:
significantes fidem tutandam, sedemque eius etiam in dextris sacratam
esse.’ Dionysius also mentions the foundation, without alluding to the
peculiar ritual, but dwelling on the moral influence of the cult both in
public and private life[1030].
The personification of a moral idea would hardly seem likely to be as
old as Numa; yet there are points in the ritual which suggest a high
antiquity, apart from tradition. It was the three chief flamines who
thus drove to the Capitol—i. e. those of Jupiter, Mars, and Quirinus;
these at least were the three who had been just instituted by Numa (Liv.
1. 20), and to them Livy must be referring. As has been often pointed
out, the presence of flamines at a rite is always evidence of its
antiquity; and in this case they may have represented the union of the
two communities of Septimontium and Quirinal in a common worship on the
Capitol, this central point being represented by the Flamen Dialis. The
curious fact that the right hands of these flamens were wrapped up to
the fingers in white cloth is another obvious sign of antiquity, and is
explained as meaning that the right hand, which was given to another in
pledging one’s word, then as now[1031], was pure and clean, as was the
mind of the pledger[1032]. A sacred object, statue or victim, was often
thus wrapped or tied with fillets (_vittae_); and the μύσται in the
Eleusinian mysteries seem to have worn a crocus-coloured band on the
right hand and right foot[1033]. The statue of the goddess in her temple
had probably the right hand so covered, if at least we are at liberty so
to interpret the words of Horace, ‘albo Fides velata panno’[1034].
A word about the _tigillum sororium_[1035]. What this was, and where it
was, can be made out with some certainty; beyond that all is obscure. It
was a beam, renewed from time to time, let into the opposite walls of a
street which led down from the Carinae to the Vicus Cyprius, now the via
del Colosseo[1036]. It remained till at least the fourth century A.D. It
is now generally explained as a primitive Janus-arch, apparently on the
ground that one of the altars below it was to Janus Curiatius[1037]. As
it seems, however, to have been a single beam, without supports except
the street walls[1038], I am unable to understand this conclusion; and
as the Roman antiquaries never supposed it to be such, we can hardly do
so safely. They believed it to be a memorial of the expiation undergone
by the legendary Horatius for the murder of his sister. Acquitted by the
people on appeal, he had to make religious expiation, and this he did by
the erection of an altar to Janus Curiatius, and another to Juno
Sororia[1039], and by passing under a yoke, which was afterwards
represented by the _tigillum_.
We may leave the _tigillum_ as really inexplicable, unless we are to
accept the suggestion of Roscher[1040], that the germ of the legend is
to be found in the practice of creeping through a split tree to get rid
of spell or disease. The two altars demand a word.