Before Greek gods and myths were known to them, the Italians worshipped not
only Lares, Manes, Genii, and Junones, but also the spirits known as Di
Indigetes. These spirits were not conceived in human or in animal form.
They had not human parts or passions. They did not form a community. They
had no common abode. There is nothing in Italian religion corresponding to
the Olympus of Greek mythology. They did not marry or give in marriage.
Above all, what distinguishes them both from Greek gods and from the
tree-spirits, which also were worshipped by the Italians, is that they were
rather _numina_ or forces than beings. They were the forces which regulated
and controlled all human actions, psychological and physiological, and
through which all the work of man's hands could alone be brought to a
favourable issue. When, however, we come to examine these _numina_, we find
that the name of the _Indiges_ is simply the name of the action which he
controls: the _Indiges_ of sowing is Saturnus; of remembering, Minerva; of
suckling, Rumina, and so on. It is a canon of savage logic that he who
possesses the name of a person or thing has that person or thing in his
power; hence the Roman's belief that he could control any process,
psychical or physical, if only he could put a name to it. This primitive
form of magic was organised by the Roman State. The pontiffs were intrusted
with the duty of drawing up catalogues (_indigitamenta_) of all the stages
and processes of a man's life, from his begetting and birth to his death
and burial; and as the State was but a community of farmers, similar
catalogues were made of all the agricultural operations by which crops are
raised. To be effectual, it was necessary that these lists should be
complete. As the Roman could avert or remedy any evil by simply naming the
proper spirit, it was essential that his roll of spirits should have no
omissions. Then, if he were in doubt what spirit to name, he could make
assurance doubly sure by naming all.
Let it not be imagined that this State-organised magic, though it appear to
us inconsistent with civilisation, is mere matter of inference, or belongs
purely to pre-historic times. Not only did it survive the introduction of
polytheism, it was a firm article of Roman faith in the most glorious days
of the Republic, and until B.C. 211 or later, the belief was so living as
to give birth continually to fresh spirits, as fresh departments of human
activity were opened up.[55] Nor did it cease then. It changed, but it did
not die. In the worship of such abstractions as Fortuna, Spes, Juventas,
Concordia, Pietas, Libertas, Felicitas, Annona, &c., we have evidence that
abstract names exercised as great a hold over the minds of Romans of the
Empire as they had over the earliest Italians.
On some _indigetes_ Greek cults and myths were grafted, and these _numina_,
which were in truth but _nomina_, henceforth lived as gods. Mercurius was
declared to be Hermes. Minerva, the spirit of memory, was seen to be
Athênê, the goddess of wisdom. Saturnus was identified with Kronos, and was
henceforth worshipped in the Greek fashion with uncovered head (_R. Q._
13). Opis was identified with Dêmêtêr, Venus with Aphroditê, and Libitina,
the _numen_ of funerals, was interpreted, by a pedantic etymological
confusion with Libentina, as a bye-name of the new goddess (_R. Q._ 23).
The _indiges_ Liber[56] was recognised in Dionysius Eleutherios (_R. Q._
104).
In all these cases the identification proceeded on a fancied resemblance in
name or an actual similarity of function. There seems to be only one
instance of identification based on similarity of cult, that of the Roman
Matuta and the Greek Leucothea. According to Plutarch (_R. Q._ 16)
maid-servants were excluded from the temples of both, except when _the
Dames of Rome, bringing in thither one alone and no more with them, fall to
cuffing and boxing her about the eares and cheeks_. Here the servant is the
scapegoat, to whom are transferred the evils which may or might afflict the
free women of the community, and the beating is done for purification. It
is just conceivable that the Greek cult may have been borrowed by the
Romans; but the use of a scapegoat and of beating in this way is so
wide-spread over all the world, and so deeply seated in European folk-lore,
that it is difficult to imagine it was unknown to the Romans. As a matter
of fact, even in the _Roman Questions_, without going further, we have
indications that both practices were known in Italy. In _R. Q._ 20 a myth
is given, the earlier form of which is to be found in Macrobius (_S._ i.
12), who states that the Bona Dea was on a day scourged with myrtles. On
the principle that customs often give rise to myths but cannot be
originated by them, we may infer that the representative, or else the
worshippers of the Bona Dea, were purified by scourging. Still less can it
be doubted after Mannhardt's exhaustive investigation (_Myth. Forsch._, pp.
72 _ff._), that the Luperci, described in _R. Q._ 68, drove out the evil
spirits of disease, sterility, &c., by the blows from their scourges.
Again, the expulsion of evil tends in many places to become periodic; a day
or season is devoted annually to the driving out of all devils and evil
spirits, after which the community is expected to live sober and clean. The
community, not unnaturally, indulges in a kind of carnival immediately
before this season, and allows itself all sorts of license: slaves behave
as though they were masters, men dress up in women's clothes, &c. This,
presumably, is the explanation of the fact related by Plutarch (_R. Q._
55), that _upon the Ides of Januarie, the minstrels at Rome who plaied upon
the hautboies, were permitted to goe up and downe the city disguised in
women's apparell_.[57]
Though the influence of Hellenic religion failed to transform the many
other _indigetes_ into gods, still it affected their cult in other ways.
For one thing, it provided them now for the first time with temples or
chapels. This innovation was doubtless found strange by the folk to whom
the fashionable ideas from Hellas penetrated slow and late. In the case of
Carmenta it must have seemed particularly strange. Carmenta was one of the
several _indigetes_ whose power was manifested in the various processes of
gestation;[58] and she was invoked as Porrima (Prorsa or Antevorta) or
Postverta, according as the child came into the world head or foot
foremost. From the mention of a _saxum Carmentæ_,[59] near which was the
_porta Carmentalis_, and near which the temple in question was erected, we
may venture to infer that this rock was originally the local habitation of
the spirit. Why then needed she to have a temple built? This was a point
which, to the popular mind, required explanation; and a popular explanation
was accordingly forthcoming, which has fortunately been preserved to us by
Plutarch. It starts from a folk-etymology or confusion between the name
Carmenta and the word _carpenta_, meaning "coaches," and may be read at
length in _R. Q._ 56.
There remains one other _indiges_ who is mentioned in the _Romane
Questions_—Rumina (_R. Q._ 57) the _numen_ of suckling. As the temple of
Carmenta was erected near the _saxum Carmentæ_, so the _sacellum_ of Rumina
was built near the _ficus Ruminalis_; and as we may conjecture that the
rock was in the nature of a fetich, so we may infer that Rumina was a
tree-spirit. It is easy to understand why a fig-tree was chosen as the
abode of the spirit of suckling; the sap of this tree resembles milk and
was known to the Romans as _lac_. The fact reported by Plutarch,[60] that
milk, not wine, was offered in the cult of Rumina, is quite in accord with
the principles of sympathetic magic.
The worship of this spirit bears every mark of hoar antiquity, and it was
worked into the legend of the foundation of Rome by the device of making
the wolf suckle the twins under the _ficus Ruminalis_.