Fauni of power for good or evil over the crops and herds, as we have
seen it already implied in Horace’s ode. Porphyrion[1141] in his
commentary on this ode tells us that Faunus, on the Nones of December,
wishes the cattle, which are under his protection, to be free from
danger. Just before this passage he had spoken of him as ‘deum inferum
et pestilentem,’ thus giving us the dark and hurtful side of his power
as well as the bright and gracious. The same combination of the powers
of doing and averting harm is seen in Mars, as we have already learnt
from the hymn of the Arval Brethren and the formula of prayers preserved
by Cato[1142].
Under this head may be mentioned the belief that both Faunus and
Silvanus were dangerous for women, an idea which finds expression in the
significant word _incubus_, so often applied to them[1143]. We may
perhaps find a reason for the identification of Faunus as god of the
Lupercalia in the most striking feature of the festival—the pursuit of
the women by the _creppi_, who struck them with thongs in order to
render them productive[1144].
(4) The last characteristic of the Fauni to be noticed is that they had
the power of foretelling the future. The verse of Ennius already quoted
is the earliest literary evidence we have of this; but the quaint story
of the capture of Picus and Faunus by Numa[1145], who caught them by
making them drunk with wine at the fountain where they came to drink,
and compelled them as the price of their liberty to reveal the art of
staying a disaster, has an unmistakeable old-Italian ring. The idea
seems to have been, not that Faunus was a ‘god of prophecy,’ as Preller
seems to fancy, but that there was an ancient race of Fauni, who might
be coaxed or compelled to reveal secrets. Sometimes indeed they ‘spoke’
of their own accord; when a Roman army needed to be warned or encouraged
on its march, their voice was heard by all as it issued from thicket or
forest. Cicero and Livy[1146] write of these voices with a distinctness
which (as it seems to me) admits of no suspicion that they are inserting
Greek ideas into Roman annals.
There are also traces to be found of a belief in the existence of local
woodland oracles of Faunus and his kind. It was in a grove sacred to
Faunus that Numa, in Ovid’s vivid description[1147], slew two sheep, the
one to Faunus, the other to Sleep, and after twice sprinkling water on
his head, and twice wreathing it with beech-leaves, stretched himself on
the fleeces to receive the prophetic inspiration as he slumbered. Almost
every touch in this story seems to me to be genuine; and especially the
conditions necessary to success—the continence of the devotee, and the
removal of the metal ring from the finger. Virgil, with something more
of foreign adornment, tells in exquisite verse what is really the same
story as Ovid’s[1148]. And a later poet writes of a sacred beech-grove,
where under like conditions of temperance, &c., the shepherds might find
the oracles of Faunus inscribed on the bark of a beech-tree[1149]. All
this reminds us of Dodona and the oldest Greek oracles: we have here the
quaint methods of primitive shepherds, appealing to prophetic powers
localized in particular woodland spots. Roman exigencies of state drew
by degrees the whole of the secrets of fore-knowledge into the hands of
a priestly aristocracy, with its fixed doctrine and methods of
divination; but the country folk long retained their faith in the
existence of an ancient race, possessed of prophetic power, which
haunted forest and mountain.
These four points, taken together, i. e. the multiplicity of the Fauni,
their woodland character, and their supposed powers of productivity and
prophecy, seem by no means to exclude the possibility of the human
origin suggested long ago by Scaliger, and recently by Prof. Nettleship,
though I would shape the explanation somewhat differently. Wild men from
the hills and woods, for example, might well be supposed to be possessed
of supernatural powers, like the gipsies of modern times[1150]. And the
striking absence of any epigraphical survivals of a definite cult may
possibly be explained by a persistence of the belief in the Italian mind
that Faunus was never really and truly a god, but one of a race with
some superhuman attributes—a link in the chain that always in antiquity
connected together the human and the divine. Horace’s ode shows the
divine element predominating; some local Faunus has, so to speak, been
caught and half deified; and yet, even then, the process is hardly
complete.
There is, however, another explanation of conceptions of this kind to
which I must briefly allude, which was based by Dr. Mannhardt on an
exhaustive examination of the attributes of creatures like the Fauni, as
they occur in various parts of Europe and elsewhere[1151]. The general
result of his investigation may be stated thus. Spirits which seem to
have their origin in woods and mountains find outward expression for
their being in the _wind_; so also do those which seem to have their
origin in corn and vegetation generally. We thus find three ingredients
in their composition: (1) trees, (2) corn, (3) wind. We have only to
think how the invisible wind moves the branches of the trees, or bows
the corn before it, to see how closely, in the eyes of men used to
attribute life to inanimate things, the idea of the wind might run
together with that of objects to which it seems to give motion and life.
The result of its mysterious agency is the growth of a variety of
creatures of the imagination, often half bestial, like Pan and the
Russian Ljeschi, sometimes entirely animal, like the Rye-wolf and many
another animal corn-spirit now familiar to readers of Frazer’s _Golden
Bough_; sometimes entirely human, like Silvanus, perhaps Faunus
himself[1152], or the Teutonic ‘wild man of the woods.’ Mannhardt
endeavours, not wholly without success, to bring the attributes of
Faunus into harmony with this theory. His prophetic _vox_ comes from the
forest in which the wind raises strange noises; his relation to crops
and flocks is parallel to that of many other spirits who can be traced
to a woodland origin; and the word Favonius, used for the western moist
and fertilizing breeze, is kindred, if not identical, with Faunus; and
so on.
This theory, resting as it does on a very wide induction from
unquestionable facts, beyond doubt explains many of the conceptions of
primitive agricultural man; whether it can be applied satisfactorily to
the Italian Faunus is perhaps less evident. At present I rather prefer
to think of the Fauni as arising from the contact of the first clearers
and cultivators of Italian soil with a wild aboriginal race of the hills
and woods. But on such questions certainty is impossible, and dogmatism
entirely out of place.
III ID. DEC. (DEC. 11). NP.
AG. IN.... (AMIT.). AG[ONIA] (MAFF. PRAEN. ANT.)
SEPTIMONTIA (PHILOC.). SEPTIMONTIUM, GUID. SILV.[1153]
For Agonia see on Jan. 9. This (Dec. 11) is the third day on which this
mysterious word appears in the calendars. The AG. IN. of the Amiternian
calendar was conjectured by Mommsen in the first edition of _C. I. L._,
vol. i, to indicate ‘Agonium Inui’[1154]; but in the new edition he
withdraws this; ‘ab incertis coniecturis abstinebimus.’ This is done in
deference to Wissowa, who has pointed out that there is no other case in
the calendars of a festival-name inscribed in large letters being
followed immediately by the name of a deity[1155]. We must fall back on
the supposition that AG. IN. ... is simply a cutter’s error for the
AGON. of three other calendars.
It is impossible to determine what was the relation between this
agonium, or solemn sacrifice, and the Septimontium or Septimontiale
sacrum, which appears only in very late calendars, or whether indeed
there was any relation at all. It is not absolutely certain that the
so-called Septimontium took place on this day. It was only a conjecture
of Scaliger’s (though a clever one) that completed the gloss in Festus
on the word ‘Septimontium’[1156] [_Septimontium dies ap_]_pellatur
mense_ [_Decembri qui dicitur in f_]_astis agonalia._ The word
Septimontium suggested itself, as the gloss occurred under letter S.
Other support for the conjecture is found in the two late calendars, and
in a fragment of Lydus[1157], who connects the two ceremonies.
But even if Scaliger’s conjecture be right, it does not follow that the
Agonium was identical with or was part of the Septimontiale sacrum. The
latter does not appear in the old calendars, as it was not ‘pro populo,’
but only ‘pro montibus’ (see below); and if it was there represented by
the word Agonium, it is not easy to see how the latter should have found
its way into the calendar. It seems better to conclude that the two were
distinct.
About the Septimontium itself we have just enough information to divine
its nature, but without details. The word is used by Varro both in a
topographical and a religious sense: ‘Ubi nunc est Roma, erat olim
Septimontium; nominatum ab tot montibus, quos postea urbs muris
comprehendit[1158].’ Here he implies that the old name for Rome was
Septimontium; but this is only a guess based on the name of the
festival: ‘Dies Septimontium nominatur ab his septem montibus, in quis
sita urbs est; feriae _non populi sed montanorum_ modo, ut Paganalia,
quae sunt aliquoius pagi[1159].’
The _montes_ here meant are the three divisions of the Palatine, viz.
Palatium, Cermalus, Velia; the three of the Esquiline, viz. Mons Oppius,
Mons Cispius, and the Fagutal, together with the lower ground of the
Subura[1160]. I believe that Mommsen is right in thinking that these
were never political divisions—in other words, that they were not
originally distinct communities[1161], but probably religious divisions
of a city which began on the Palatine, and gradually took in new ground
on the Esquiline. The same process can be traced at Falerii, and at
Narce a few miles above it; what we seem to see is not the accretion of
villages—not συνοικισμός—but the extension of a city from one strong
position to another[1162]. This is especially clear at Narce, where it
is distinctly proved by the pottery found in the excavations, that the
hill (Monte li Santi) subsequently added to the original city was not
co-eval with the latter as a settlement; i. e. that it was the
absorption by an older settlement of a probably uninhabited position
which here took place, and not the synoecizing of distinct political
communities[1163]. In the later Rome the _montani_ of the seven
districts, together with the _pagani_, or inhabitants of what had
originally been the farm-country around Rome, formed the united
city[1164]. It is most interesting to find that the earliest divisions,
i. e. of the _montes_, were imitated in the foundation of some
colonies—we should find them probably in many if we had the necessary
information[1165].
All we know of the cult of the _montani_ on this day is as follows: (1)
There was a sacrifice on the Palatium (which seems to have been the
first in dignity of the _montes_) by the Flamen Palatualis[1166]; but we
do not know to what deity, and can only guess that it was Pales, or
Palatua[1167]. (2) On this day no carts or other vehicles drawn by
beasts of burden were allowed in the city, as we learn from Plutarch,
who asks the reason of this, and gives some quaint answers[1168]. But
the explanations are useless to us, and we cannot even guess whence
Plutarch drew his knowledge of the fact, unless it was from personal
observation. Let us remember, however, that this was a feast of
_montani_: is it not likely that this was a survival from a time when
the farm-waggons of the _pagani_ really never ascended to the ‘hills’?
PRID. ID. DEC. (DEC. 12). EN.
CONSO IN AVENTIN[O]. (AMIT.)
XVIII (ANTE CAES. XVI[1169]) KAL. IAN. (DEC. 15). NP.
CONS[UALIA]. (MAFF. PRAEN. AMIT. ANT.) FERIAE CONSO
(PRAEN. AMIT.)
For these see on Aug. 21. If the conclusions there arrived at are sound
we might guess that these winter rites of Consus arose from the habit of
inspecting the condition of the corn-stores in mid-winter[1170]. It is
this day that has the note attached to it in the Fasti Praenestini,
‘Equi et [muli floribus coronantur] quod in eius tu[tela] ... itaque rex
equo [vectus?],’ which was commented on under Aug. 21. See also under
Aug. 25 (Opeconsivia); Wissowa, s. v. Consus, in _Lex. Myth._; and _de
Feriis_, vi foll.
XVI (ANTE CAES. XIV[1171]) KAL. IAN. (DEC. 17). NP.
SATURNALIA. (MAFF. AMIT. GUID. RUST. PHILOC.)
FERIAE SATURNO. (MAFF. AMIT.)
SATURN[O] AD FO[RUM]. (AMIT.)
FERIAE SERVORUM. (SILV.)
This was the original day of the Saturnalia[1172], and, in a strictly
religious sense, it was the only day. The festival, in the sense of a
popular holiday, was extended by common usage to as much as seven
days[1173]: Augustus limited it to three in respect of legal business,
and the three were later increased to five[1174].
Probably no Roman festival is so well known to the general reader as
this, which has left its traces and found its parallels in great numbers
of mediaeval and modern customs[1175], occurring about the time of the
winter solstice. Unfortunately, it is here once more a matter of
difficulty to determine what features in the festival were really of old
Latin origin, in spite of information as to detail, which is unusually
full; for both Saturnus himself and his cult came to be very heavily
overlaid with Greek ideas and practice.
That Saturnus was an old agricultural god admits, however, of no doubt;
the old form of the word was probably Săĕturnus, which is found on an
inscription on an ancient vase[1176], and this leads us to connect him
with _serere_ and _satio_; and popular tradition attributed to him the
discovery of agricultural processes[1177]. But the Roman of the
historical age knew very little about him, and cared only for his
Graecized festival; like Faunus, he is the object of no votive
inscriptions in Rome and its neighbourhood[1178]; and this conclusively
proves that he was never what may be called popular as a deity. As the
first king of Latium there were plenty of legends about him, or as the
first civilizer of his people, the representative of a Golden Age[1179];
but no one has as yet thoroughly investigated these[1180], with a view
to distinguish any Italian precipitate in the mixture of elements of
which they certainly consist. We are still without the invaluable aid of
the contributors to Roscher’s _Lexicon_.
More promising at first sight is the tradition which connects him in
Rome itself with the Capitoline hill. Varro tells us positively that
this hill was originally called Mons Saturnius; and that there was once
an _oppidum_ there called Saturnia, of which certain vestiges survived
to his own time, including a ‘fanum Saturni in faucibus,’ i. e.
apparently the ara Saturni of which Dionysius records that it was at the
‘root of the hill,’ by the road leading to the summit[1181], in fact on
the same spot where stood later the temple of which eight columns are
still standing. Close to this, it may be noted, was a sacellum of Dis
Pater[1182], the Latinized form of Plutus; in the temple was the
aerarium of later Rome[1183], and built into the rock behind, the
chambers of records (tabularia). But it would be idle to found upon
these facts or traditions any serious hypothesis as to the original
nature of the Roman cult of Saturn; all attempts must fail in the
bewildering fog of ancient fancy and ancient learning. Saturnus belongs,
like Janus, with whom he was closely connected in legend[1184], to an
age into whose religious ideas we cannot penetrate, and survived into
Roman worship only through Greek resuscitation[1185], and in the feast
of the Saturnalia. All we seem to see is that he is somehow connected
with things that are put in the earth[1186]—seed, treasure, perhaps
stores of produce; to which may just be added that the one spot in Rome
at all times associated with him is close to the _market_, and that
market-days (nundinae) were said to be sacred to him[1187]. The temple
of Janus is also close by, and it is not impossible that both these
ancient gods had some closer relation to the Forum and the business done
there than we can at present understand with our limited knowledge.
Neither of them, it may be noted, had a flamen attached to his cult;
from which we may infer that they did not descend from the primitive
household or the earliest form of community, but rather represented some
place or process common to several communities, such as a forum and the
business transacted there[1188]. It is precisely such gods who figure in
tradition as kings, not of a single city, but of Latium.
But to turn to the festival; if the god was obscure and uninteresting,
this was not the case with his feast. It seems steadily to have gained
in popularity down to the time of the empire, and still maintained it
when Macrobius wrote the dialogue supposed to have taken place on the
three days of the Saturnalia, and called by that name. Seneca tells us
that in his day all Rome seemed to go mad on this holiday[1189].
Probably its vogue was largely due merely to the accident of fashion,
partly perhaps to misty ideas about the Golden Age and the reign of
Saturn[1190]; but it seems to be almost a general human instinct to rest
and enjoy oneself about the time of the winter solstice, and to show
one’s good-will towards all one’s neighbours[1191]. In Latium, as
elsewhere, this was the time when the autumn sowing had come to an end,
and when all farm-labourers could enjoy a rest[1192]. Macrobius alludes
also to the completion of all in-gathering by this date: ‘Itaque omni
iam fetu agrorum coacto ab hominibus hos deos (Saturnus and Ops) coli
quasi vitae cultioris auctores[1193].’ The close concurrence of
Consualia, Opalia, and Saturnalia at this time seems to show that some
final inspection of the harvest work of the autumn may in reality have
been coincident with, or have immediately preceded, the rejoicings of
the winter solstice.
There are several well-attested features of the Saturnalia as it was in
historical times[1194]. On Dec. 17 there was a public sacrifice at the
temple (formerly the _ara_) of Saturn by the Forum[1195], followed by a
public feast, in breaking up from which the feasters shouted ‘Io
Saturnalia’[1196]. During the sacrifice Senators and Equites wore the
toga, but laid it aside for the convivium, which reminds us of the
ritual of the Fratres Arvales, except that the toga was in the latter
case the praetexta[1197]. These proceedings of the first and original
day of the festival might seem pretty clearly to descend from the
religion of the farm, yet the convivium is said by Livy to have been
introduced as late as 217 B.C.[1198].
On the 18th and 19th, which were general holidays, the day began with an
early bath[1199]; then followed the family sacrifice of a sucking pig,
to which Horace alludes in familiar lines:
Cras genium mero
Curabis et porco bimenstri
Cum famulis operum solutis[1200].
Then came calls on friends, congratulations, games, and the presentation
of gifts[1201]. All manner of presents were made, as they are still at
Christmas: among them the wax candles (_cerei_) deserve notice, as they
are thought to have some reference, like the yule log, to the returning
power of the sun’s light after the solstice. They descended from the
Saturnalia into the Christmas ritual of the Latin Church[1202]. The
sigillaria, or little paste or earthenware images which were sold all
over Rome in the days before the festival[1203], and used as presents,
also survived into Christian times; thus, in the ancient Romish
Calendar, we find that all kinds of little images were on sale at the
confectioners’ shops, and even in England the bakers made little images
of paste at this season[1204]. What was the original meaning of the
custom we do not know; but it reminds us of the oscilla of the Latin
festival and the Compitalia[1205].
But the best known feature of the Saturnalia is the part played in it by
the slaves, who, as we all know, were waited on by their masters, and
treated as being in a position of entire equality. The earliest
reference to this is in a fragment of Accius, quoted by Macrobius[1206]:
Iamque diem celebrant, per agros urbesque fere omnes
Exercent epulas laeti, famulosque procurant
Quisque suos: nostrique itidem, et mos traditus illine
Iste, ut cum dominis famuli epulentur ibidem.
But even this custom, as Marquardt points out, may not have been of
genuine Latin origin: ‘Though the Romans looked on it as a reminiscence
of the Golden Age when all men were equal, it may have begun with the
lectisternium of 217 B.C., for such entertainments were a characteristic
of lectisternia.’ When we turn, however, to the same author’s
account[1207] of the Greek forms of religion introduced through the
Sibylline oracles, of which the lectisternium was one, we do not find
slaves included in the ritual of any of them. There was no general
exclusion of outsiders or women, but nothing is said of slaves. And on
the whole we may still perhaps consider the other explanation possible,
that the slaves here represent the farm-servants of olden time, whatever
social position they may have held, who at the end of their year’s work
were allowed to enjoy themselves ‘exaequato omnium iure.’
XIV (ANTE CAES. XII) KAL. DEC. (DEC. 19). NP.
OPAL[IA]. (MAFF. AMIT.)
FERIAE OPI: OPI AD FORUM. (AMIT.)
For Ops see on Aug. 25, when the sacrifice was in the Regia, the
significance of which I endeavoured to explain. Here it is ‘ad forum,’
which has lately aroused a little unfruitful dispute. Is the temple of
Saturn meant, which was also described as ‘ad forum’ in the same
calendar? This is still the view of Mommsen[1208], who seems to hold the
old opinion that there was a sacellum Opis attached to the aedes
Saturni, or that this aedes was dedicated to both deities[1209]. H.
Jordan made up his mind that ‘ad forum’ meant the Regia[1210]; but this
is not supported by any similar entry in the _Fasti_. Aust and Wissowa
believe that Ops had a separate temple ‘ad forum,’ of which all traces
are lost, as has happened with many others[1211]; and the latter, as we
have already seen, disbelieves in any connexion between Saturnus and
Ops, attributing it entirely to Greek influence.
However this may be, the one interesting fact about the temple—or
whatever it was—is that it was ‘ad forum.’ The conjunction of Saturnus
and Ops at this place and time must surely indicate some connexion of
function between the two. But what it was is not discoverable; under
Saturnalia I have merely suggested the direction in which we may look
for it.
XII (ANTE CAES. X). KAL. IAN. (DEC. 21). NP.
DIVA[LIA]. (MAFF. PRAEN.)
Praen. adds a terribly mutilated note, which Mommsen thus fills up from
stray hints in Varro, Pliny (following Verrius), and Macrobius[1212]:
FERIAE DIVA[E ANGERONAE, QUAE AB ANGINAE MORBO] APPELL[ATUR, QUOD
REMEDIA EIUS QUONDAM] PRAE[CEPIT. STATUERUNT EAM ORE OBLIGATO] IN AR[A
VOLUPIAE, UT QUI NO]SSET N[OMEN] OCCUL[TUM URBIS, TACERET. S]UNT TAMEN,
[QUI FIERI ID SACRU]M AIUNT OB AN[NUM NOVUM; MANI]FESTUM ESSE [ENIM
PRINCIPIU]M [A]NNI NOV[I].