bluuebunny/crossref_metadata_2025 huggingface dataset:
Jewelry, Pharaonic Egypt
Authors: Ikram Salima
Published: December 2012

Jewelry was always important in ancient Egypt, not only as adornment, but also as a display of wealth, a mark of rank or royal favor, as amuletic protection, and even a way of “signing” or making a mark using a seal.
Khepry
Authors: Zinn Katharina
Published: December 2012

The Heliopolitan cult of the sun features the beetle deity Khepry, who represents the morning aspect of the sun god, as the solar disc rises in the eastern horizon.
Khons (Khonsu)
Authors: Eavis Ros , Ikram Salima
Published: December 2012

The god Khons had several manifestations.
Kingship, Pharaonic Egypt
Authors: Nadig Peter
Published: December 2012

Egyptian kingship originated in the fourth millenniumBCEthrough the emergence of two separate kingdoms in Upper and Lower Egypt.
Kush
Authors: Darnell John Coleman
Published: December 2012

During the Egyptian Old Kingdom, the toponym Wawat encompassed most, if not all, of Lower Nubia; the toponym Irtjet referred either to the southern portion of Wawat, between Tumâs and Toshka, or more probably encompassed an area south of the Second Cataract, including Kerma to the south of the Third Cataract.
Land and landholding, Pharaonic Egypt
Authors: Katary Sally L. D.
Published: December 2012

Egypt's wealth derived from an agricultural economy that successfully exploited the human and physical resources of the countryside in the contrasting environments of the Nile Valley and the Delta. While the land and its workers were the most precious of state resources, the richness of the land, as a result of the annual inundation, required only minimal state interference to produce bounteous crops. Various land tenure regimes gradually evolved in which wealthy landowners – institutional and individual – and independent smallholders, as well as tenants and forced labor, worked lands under institutional management, crown control, or even private enterprise. However, landowning was largely dominated by temples and the crown, with private holding a poor third. The history of landholding raises such vital issues as the relationship between temple and state/crown in matters of cultivation and harvest shares; the meaning of private ownership/possession; and the integration of various types of landholding in the economic mosaic. Ultimately, the system of land tenure is better understood from the perspective of institutional landowners than from the vantage of the crown or state. Even less well understood is the economic and social reality of the ordinary peasant.
Libraries, Pharaonic Egypt
Authors: Zinn Katharina
Published: December 2012

Despite previous doubts, a library system of a kind existed in ancient Egypt and included a variety of institutions that stored writings, along with their inherent knowledge, for various purposes. These are attested in more than three hundred textual and archaeological sources. Some can be classified as libraries, others as archives. These institutions and their responsibilities changed over time.
Literature and poetry, Pharaonic Egypt
Authors: Manley Bill
Published: December 2012

For a millennium after the invention of writing, Egyptian creative writing consisted almost exclusively of inscriptions in the burials of kings and officials.
Maiherpri
Authors: Ikram Salima
Published: December 2012

Maiherpri owned tomb 36 in the Valley of the Kings (
see
Thebes, West), a tomb that was found virtually intact by Victor Loret in 1898–9.
Markets, Pharaonic Egypt
Authors: Warburton David A.
Published: December 2012

Markets are attested in Egyptian tomb scenes before the end of the third millenniumBCE; papyri preserve market prices for land, labor, and commodities from the beginning of the second millennium.
Menes
Authors: Dreyer Günter
Published: December 2012

The Greek form of the name
mnj
, credited by Greek historians (Hdt. 2.4 99) as the first human ruler of Egypt and founder of the capital city of Memphis at the apex of the Delta.
Mentuhotep
I
‐
VII
Authors: Dodson Aidan
Published: December 2012

Mentuhotep was the name borne by three kings of Egypt and one local ruler during the 11th Egyptian Dynasty, together with three more kings during the Second Intermediate Period.
Mines, mining, Pharaonic Egypt
Authors: Shaw Ian
Published: December 2012

Considerable archaeological and textual information has survived concerning ancient Egyptian mining expeditions in pursuit of a variety of metals and gemstones, notably copper, gold, turquoise, malachite, amethyst, and chalcedony (Aston
et al
. 2000; Ogden 2000). Copper‐mining and smelting sites include Wadi Dara, Buhen, and Qubban, while numerous Pharaonic gold‐mining sites in the Eastern Desert of both Egypt and Nubia have been identified and surveyed (Klemm and Klemm 1998). Turquoise was mined at Wadi Maghara and Serabit el‐Khadim, amethyst at Wadi el‐Hudi, chalcedony (particularly carnelian) at the Stele Ridge site in the northern part of the Gebel el‐Asr region, galena (lead sulphide, used primarily for cosmetics) at Gebel el‐Zeit, and natron at the Wadi Natrun. The importance of Pharaonic quarrying and mining sites is firmly rooted in the fact that they were of prime importance to the prosperity and stability of the economy.
Music, Pharaonic Egypt
Authors: Manniche Lise
Published: December 2012

The ancient Egyptians had no written music –their tunes are lost for ever (Hickmann 1956: 48–96; von Lieven 2002). Nevertheless, we are able to gain a fair idea of the overall nature of the music performed; the sound of the individual instruments; and the circumstances in which music was played, and by whom. Numerous instruments have survived, and paintings and reliefs in tombs and temples (Hickmann 1961; Pérez Arroyo 2003), in houses and on objects, not to mention lyrics and hymns performed with musical accompaniment, help build up a picture of musical life in different strata of society along the River Nile (Manniche 1991; von Lieven 2006). Comments by classical writers and scattered references in Egyptian texts may illuminate certain issues.
Napata
Authors: Kendall Timothy
Published: December 2012

Napata (18° 33' N, 31° 40' E) was the chief cult center of ancientKUSH.
Naqada (Nagada)
Authors: Hendrickx Stan
Published: December 2012

Naqada or Nagada, known as Ombos in Classical Antiquity (25°54' N, 32°43' E, Upper Egypt, west bank of the Nile), is the eponymous site of the Predynastic Naqada culture.
Nilometer
Authors: Katary Sally L. D.
Published: December 2012

For the production of plentiful crops, the ancient Egyptians depended upon the annual to enrich the fertile soil as it washed over the Nile floodplain.
Palaces, Pharaonic Egypt
Authors: Lacovara Peter
Published: December 2012

The Royal Palace in ancient Egypt was not only the residence of the king but also the center of government administration.
Pepinakht Heqaib
Authors: Kraemer Bryan
Published: December 2012

Pepinakht was an administrative official in the town of Elephantine in late 6th Dynasty Egypt (ca. 2250
BCE
).
Punt
Authors: Meyrat Pierre
Published: December 2012

The exotic land
par excellence
for Egyptians, Punt was probably situated in a zone including eastern Sudan, Eritrea, and northern and western Ethiopia.
Re and Re Horakhty
Authors: Ikram Salima
Published: December 2012

Re was the sun god whose cult center was located at Heliopolis, ancient Iunu.
Satet
Authors: Liszka Kate
Published: December 2012

Satet (Satis), an Egyptian goddess, protected Egypt's southern border and was connected with the Nile's inundation.
Scorpion (king)
Authors: Dodson Aidan
Published: December 2012

At least one ruler of the period directly before the unification of Egypt bore a name written with the image of a scorpion.
Semerkhet
Authors: Engel Eva‐Maria
Published: December 2012

Semerkhet is the Horus name of the seventh and penultimate king of the 1st Dynasty, who was also referred to by his
nsw‐bit
name
nbtj‐jrj
.
Sinai
Authors: Tallet Pierre
Published: December 2012

Sinai stands as the true eastern frontier of Egypt. The peninsula, which has a triangular shape, is bounded to the west by the Gulf of Suez and to the east by the Gulf of Aqaba, its northern Mediterranean coastal plain forming a link connecting Africa to western Asia. With 60,000 km2, the area of Sinai is very significant. Along its 380 km length from north to south, the landscape keeps changing, and those sometimes substantial changes divide the area into two specific parts.
Sobek
Authors: Nelson‐Hurst M. G.
Published: December 2012

Sobek (
sbk
, Greek:
Souchos
) was a deity with diverse attributes and cult centers, mainly portrayed as a Crocodile or a man with a crocodile head. He was associated with fertility and the abundance of the annual Nile floods, as well as with royal power.
Sobekhotep
Authors: Gillam Robyn
Published: December 2012

This name (“Sobek is content”) is recorded for eight kings (ca. 1795–1670
BCE
) of the Second Intermediate Period (1795–1550) in the 13th Dynasty. It commemorates, Sobek, the Crocodile god of Shedyt (Krokodilopolis/Arsinoe), who was elevated to a state divinity in the late 12th Dynasty (Spalinger 1984a).
Sphinx
Authors: Ikram Salima
Published: December 2012

The word “sphinx” is Greek in origin, although some scholars have suggested that it was derived from the Egyptian
shesepankh
, meaning living image; the word for sphinx in Egyptian was
šspw
. In Greek mythology the word referred to the creature with a woman's head and torso, a lion's body, and the wings of an eagle that guarded the gates of the Greek city of Thebes and asked a riddle of anyone who wished to enter the city; if they failed to answer correctly, she would devour them. Oedipus was the only one who correctly responded to the Greek Sphinx's riddle: “Which creature in the morning goes on four legs, at midday on two, and in the evening upon three, and the more legs it has, the weaker it be?” with the answer, “man”.
Stelae, Egypt
Authors: Shazly Yasmin El
Published: December 2012

The word
stela
(pl.
stelae
) is Latin, but was originally derived from the Greek
stele
, the meaning of which is pillar or vertical tablet.
Stela
is used by Egyptologists to designate slabs, usually of stone or wood, but also found in other materials such as faience, bearing reliefs, inscriptions, or paintings.
Thutmose I–IV
Authors: Dodson Aidan
Published: December 2012

Thutmose (“the one born of Thoth” – Greek: Tuthmosis) was a common Egyptian name during the New Kingdom and borne by four kings of the 18th Dynasty.
Tutu
Authors: Kaper Olaf E.
Published: December 2012

The god Tutu (Greek Totoes or Tithoes) was a popular protector god of Ptolemaic and Roman Egypt. He was the son of the goddess Neith of Sais (see Sais, Sa el‐Hagar), which is his place of origin.
Wadi Hammamat
Authors: Meyer Carol
Published: December 2012

The Wadi Hammamat 25° 58′–26° 35′ N, 33° 32′–33° 35′ E cleaves through the mountains of the Egyptian EASTERN DESERT at the central and narrowest part of the shortest route from the Nile at Quft (Coptos) to the Red Sea at Quseir (ancient Myos Hormos); it has channeled interregional traffic for some five thousand years.
Weaponry, Pharaonic Egypt
Authors: Heagren Brett H.
Published: December 2012

Throughout the Pharaonic Period, the Egyptian army employed an extensive array of offensive and defensive weaponry, which tended to fall into two general classes: hand‐to‐hand weapons, which were primarily employed by the “heavy” infantry; and projectile weapons, employed by the “light” infantry (Army, Pharaonic Egypt).
Wilbour Papyrus
Authors: Katary Sally L. D.
Published: December 2012

As the primary administrative document for New Kingdom land tenure, the Wilbour Papyrus, from Year 4 of Rameses V, documents the administration of cultivable land in Middle Egypt under temples and secular institutions located throughout Egypt.
Pharaonic glass
Authors: Nicholson Paul T.
Published: December 2012

The study of ancient Egyptian glass can be divided into two broad areas: glass‐making and glass‐working.
Alburnus Maior
Authors: Cauuet Beatrice
Published: December 2012

Alburnus Maior (Roşia Montană, Alba County, Romania) was an important settlement for Gold mining in Roman Dacia Superior, in the Apuseni mountains. The ancient name is known from wax tablets found in the mines (
IDR
1, 31.39.43).
Apulum/Alba Iulia (Romania)
Authors: Alexandrescu Cristina‐Georgeta
Published: December 2012

The most important urban settlement of Roman Dacia as well as the camp of the
Legio XIII Gemina
developed at
Apulum
(see Figure 1).
Aquincum (Budapest)
Authors: Fedak Janos P.
Published: December 2012

Aquincum, one of the major settlements of Roman Pannonia, is located south of the Danube Bend.
Augustodunum (Autun)
Authors: Moore Tom
Published: December 2012

Augustodunum
(Autun), situated beside the banks of the Arroux River in Burgundy, was one of the most important cities of Roman Gaul and a noted center of learning and culture. At the height of occupation in the early third century
CE
its walled area covered 200 ha, with an estimated population of twenty to thirty thousand (Woolf 1998: 137). It was established during the Augustan period, around 15
BCE
, succeeding Bibracte (Mont Beuvray), which lies 27 km away, as the capital of the
civitas
of the Aedui.
Boscoreale
Authors: Powers Jessica
Published: December 2012

The modern town of Boscoreale, located just north of Pompeii on the southern slopes of Mount Vesuvius, is best known today as the site of numerous Roman villas of the second centuryBCEto first centuryCEthat combined well‐appointed living spaces with facilities for wine and olive oil production.
Bu Njem
Authors: Rossiter Jeremy
Published: December 2012

The Roman fort at Bu Njem (ancient
Gholaia
) in western Libya was built during the reign of the emperor Septimius Severus as one of three new outpost forts guarding routes from the Sahara desert into the Roman territory of Tripolitania.
Calleva (Silchester)
Authors: Fulford Michael G.
Published: December 2012

An Iron Age
oppidum
, initially of some 70 acres (32 ha) and defended by earthen ramparts and ditches, Calleva was founded in the late first century
BCE
and was subsequently developed after the Roman conquest of Britain in the late first century
CE
into a planned town, the
civitas
capital of the Atrebates (
see
Oppida, Britannia, Roman Empire).
Camulodunum (Colchester)
Authors: Rogers Adam
Published: December 2012

Camulodunumlies beneath modern Colchester in Essex, 80 km northeast of London, in what was the territory of the Trinovantes. The name probably derived fromthe pre‐Roman
oppidum
perhaps meaning “the stronghold” or “fortified place” of Camulos, an Iron Age god of war (Crummy 1997).
Capua
Authors: Tuck Steven L.
Published: December 2012

With a reputation for luxury, Capua was one of the largest and the wealthiest cities in southern Italy during the period of the Roman Republic and Empire. Capua was an Etruscan foundation, probably colonized to maintain Etruscan control over the fertile plains of Campania and to check the power of the Greek colony at Cumae. Etruscan power waned after losses at the battles of Cumae in 524 and 474
BCE
and declined in the fifth century with Samnite occupations of many Campanian communities.
Etna, Mount
Authors: Perrotta Annamaria , Scarpati Claudio
Published: December 2012

Mount Etna dominates the landscape of northeast Sicily and is the largest continental volcano in the world: the summit crater reaches the height of about 3300 m above sea level, and its volcanic products cover an area of around 1750 km
2
.
Fazzan
Authors: MacDonald Eve
Published: December 2012

Fazzan (Fezzan) is a vast desert region of southwest Libya that consists of a series of oases rich in archaeological sites.
Fossa Regia
Authors: Cherry David
Published: December 2012

A long, broad trench, excavated on the orders of Scipio Aemilianus at the end of the Third Punic war in 146BCE, the Fossa Regia was intended to delimit the western boundary of the newly created Roman province of Africa.
Garama
Authors: MacDonald Eve
Published: December 2012

Garama was the capital city of the Garamantes, a powerful Saharan tribe whose civilization flourished in Fezzan from 500BCEto 500CE(Plin.HN5.36).
Histria, Romania
Authors: Owens E. J.
Published: December 2012

Histria (Istros) was the first Greek colony on the west coast of the Black Sea.
Kerkouane
Authors: Hughes Ryan C.
Published: December 2012

The site of Kerkouane is located at the extreme northern end of Cap Bon, 12 km north of Kelibia in Tunisia. Probably built in the sixth century, the site was abandoned some time in the middle of the third century
BCE
. Kerkouane is notable, first and foremost, for being the only Punic settlement to have escaped subsequent development. As such, the site offers important examples of the art and architecture of Punic North Africa as well as evidence about the daily lives of Libyophoenician peoples before the arrival of Rome.
Lutetia (Paris)
Authors: Blonce Caroline
Published: December 2012

The Roman city of Lutetia, in Gallia Lugdunensis, extended from the Ile de la Cité to the banks of the Seine, from 52
BCE
, when it was seized by Labienus, to the fifth century
CE
.
Medracen
Authors: Stone David L.
Published: December 2012

The Medracen is a monumental circular tomb constructed of thousands of dressed stone blocks held together with over 29 tonnes of lead clamps.
Po
Authors: McCallum Myles
Published: December 2012

The Po is Italy's longest river, running 652 km from its source at Pian di Re in the Cottian Alps to its delta which debouches into the Adriatic Sea, and its drainage basin measures approximately 74,000 km2. Many tributaries feed into the Po, including rivers such as the Tanaro, Trebbia, and Ticino, and several of the Alpine tributaries drain large lakes such as Lago di Como (Comacinus Lacus). The Po is a seasonal river, whose flow rate and depth is highest from the late spring through the early summer and again during the fall, and is lowest during August. During the Classical period the Po's delta was substantial, with seven branches flowing into the Adriatic, and this flow resulted in the formation of a series of coastal lagoons, known as theSeptem Maria(Seven Seas), running from Ravenna in the south toBrundulum(Brondolo) in the north.
Portus
Authors: Keay Simon
Published: December 2012

Portus was an artificial port complex, covering ca. 3.5 km
2
, located a short distance to the north of the Tiber mouth.
Praeneste
Authors: Naso Alessandro
Published: December 2012

The ancient town of Praeneste (modern Palestrina) in eastern Latium, ca. 36 km east of Rome, lay in a strategic location, controlling the natural route between Latium and Campania.
Sarmizegetusa Regia
Authors: Oltean Ioana A.
Published: December 2012

The most important Dacian religious center and royal residence,Sarmizegetusa Regiawas the location of the final resistance of the last Dacian king, Decebalus, to Roman conquest (Ptol. 3.8.9: Zαρμιζεγέθουσα βασίλειον; Cass. Dio 68.9.7: Zερμιζεγεθούση; 67.10; 68.8.3.1; Exc. UG 47.7: τὰ βασίλεια Δακῶών). Probably constructed towards the middle of the first centuryBCE, its religious (and perhaps industrial) importance is likely to have predated its political significance as a royal capital.
Settefinestre
Authors: De Sena Eric
Published: December 2012

The Roman villa of Settefinestre is located in the ager cosanus and remains the best studied villa in the Roman world.
Sufetula (Sbeitla)
Authors: Morton Thomas J.
Published: December 2012

Strategically positioned between the sahel to the east, the plains to the north, and the oases to the south, Sufetula (modern Sbeitla, Tunisia) flourished as a Roman city.
Timgad (Thamugadi)
Authors: Dondin‐Payre Monique
Published: December 2012

Timgad (an Arab name) is unique.
Tusculum
Authors: Notarian Matthew
Published: December 2012

Tusculum was a city in Latium, located approximately 30 km southeast of Rome in an elevated position along the outer ridge of the Alban hills.
Uthina (Oudna)
Authors: Morton Thomas J.
Published: December 2012

Located approximately 40 km southwest of Carthage, Uthina was placed on the lower slopes of Mount Mekrima and is on the main road from Carthage to Thuburbo Majus.
Venta Silurum (Caerwent)
Authors: Rogers Adam
Published: December 2012

The city Venta Silurum lies beneath fields and the village of Caerwent in Monmouthshire, South Wales.
Vetera (Birten, Germany)
Authors: Wilson R. J. A.
Published: December 2012

Vetera was the local name (probably meaning “Water”) of two successive Roman legionary fortresses on the Fürstenberg near the modern village of Birten; they lay at the ancient confluence of the Rhine and the Lippe, 2 km southeast of the later Roman colonia of Xanten, Germany.
Volubilis
Authors: MacDonald Eve
Published: December 2012

Volubilis is a well‐preserved Roman site situated on a fertile plateau between the rivers Khoumane and Fertassa, about 214 km south of Tingis, modern Tangier.
Phlegraean Fields
Authors: Perrotta Annamaria , Scarpati Claudio
Published: December 2012

The Phlegraean Fields, an active volcanic field located west of the city of Neapolis (Naples), has been the site of numerous eruptions from monogenic volcanoes for the past 70,000 years.
Iceni
Authors: Owens E. J.
Published: December 2012

The Iceni were a prosperous British tribe, occupying Norfolk and parts of Suffolk and Cambridgeshire in eastern Britain. The Iceni became allies of the Romans, but on two occasions they revolted. Boudica led the second rebellion. After it was suppressed, the tribe developed as a local, self‐governing community (civitas) within the Roman province of Britain.
Brennodurum (Berne)
Authors: Cramatte Cédric
Published: December 2012

Brennodurum was a small
vicus
that developed on the Enge Peninsula, surrounded by the River Aar.
Orbe‐Boscéaz, villa of (Switzerland)
Authors: Dubosson Benoît
Published: December 2012

The villa of Orbe‐Boscéaz is a Roman rural establishment located at the foot of the Jura, on a plateau above the communication road that linked the Rhône, transalpine, and Rhine axis together between Lousonna (Lausanne) and Yverdon.
Pantelleria
Authors: Schäfer Thomas
Published: December 2012

Pantelleria (Cossura) is a semiarid volcanic island in the “Street of Sicily” with the size of 82 km, 110 km west from Sicily and 70 km from Cape Bon, Tunisia. Due to its position in the narrowest space between Africa and Europe in the middle of the Mediterranean, Pantelleria became an ideal bridgehead and important military point of control. Intensive trade in obsidian from Pantelleria is attested since the third millennium
BCE
. The earliest settlement, located on a promontory in the west (Mursia), has an excellent preserved fortification wall and a large necropolis with massive, stone‐built tumuli for clan‐burials (sesi). It is documented for the seventeenth to the fourteenth centuries
BCE
.
Malta
Authors: Brown Amelia R.
Published: December 2012

Malta (Latin Melita, Greek Melitê, Punic 'NN) and Gozo (Latin Gaulus, Greek Gaulos, Punic GWL) are the main islands of the Maltese archipelago in the central Mediterranean Sea (modern Republic of Malta).
Acca Larentia
Authors: Woodard Roger D.
Published: December 2012

By the name Acca Larentia, the Romans denoted two separate figures of mythic tradition.
Anna Perenna
Authors: Mueller Hans‐Friedrich
Published: December 2012

Ovid (
Fast
. 3.523–696) offers the fullest account of Anna Perenna and her festival on March 15 when the lower classes (plebeians) would pair off, lie about on the grass along the river Tiber, drink heavily, dance, sing obscene songs, and stagger home.
Ares
Authors: Konaris Michael
Published: December 2012

Son of Zeus and Hera, Greek god of war, identified with the Roman Mars. Ares' name is attested in Linear B tablets from Knossos, indicating his early origin.
Atheism, Greece and Rome
Authors: Rives James B.
Published: December 2012

Although the word “atheism” derives from the Greek adjectiveatheos, “godless,” the two word groups have rather different connotations. In modern English, “atheist” denotes someone who asserts that there is no deity. The ancient Greeks, in contrast, described asatheosanyone whose actions or statements implied a lack of proper respect for the gods; they could thus apply the word to people like the Christians who were certainly not atheists in the modern sense.
Augustales
Authors: Husser Zehavi
Published: December 2012

Modern scholarship uses the term “Augustales” to refer to a number of offices with related titles that afforded their holders a modest honor, but one that permitted public distinction in municipalities throughout the Roman West from approximately the last decade of the first century
BCE
onwards.
Augustalia
Authors: Husser Zehavi
Published: December 2012

The Augustalia refers to a festival instituted by the Senate in 19BCEhonoring the return of the emperor Augustus to Rome from his travels in the East.
Camenae
Authors: Glinister Fay
Published: December 2012

The Camenae are four (or three) Roman goddesses of a spring from which the Vestals drew water daily for their rites. They had prophetic powers and by the time of Livius Andronicus (
Od
. fr. 1) were identified with the Greek Muses.
Carmen Arvale
Authors: Hahn Frances Hickson
Published: December 2012

One of the most ancient Roman prayers still in existence is that performed by the Arval Brothers and preserved in an early third centuryCEinscription.
Chaldaean Oracles
Authors: Cline Rangar
Published: December 2012

The Chaldean Oracles are a collection of hexameter verses attributed to Julian the Theurgist; some Neoplatonic sources also credit his father Julian the Chaldean with their composition.
Compitalia
Authors: Lott Bert
Published: December 2012

Compitalia was a midwinter holiday celebrated both in Rome and throughout the Roman countryside.
Concordia
Authors: Stone Shelley C.
Published: December 2012

A deified virtue (concordia ordinum) that personified the (often elusive) harmonious agreement between factions in Roman society (cf. Greek Homonoia).
Cult attendants, Roman
Authors: Horster Marietta
Published: December 2012

In the city of Rome, for most of the republican and imperial periods, Roman religious authority lay in the hands of senators, who held most of the life‐long priesthoods. The priesthoods were usually not linked to specific deities. Consequently, the idea of matching the gender of deities, priests, and cult personnel seems not to have existed, except in cults whose deities and general cult concepts had been imported to Rome.
Cult image, Greek
Authors: Platt Verity C
Published: December 2012

The term “Cult image,” is conventionally applied to a statue of a deity that functioned as the primary focus of ritual and veneration in his or her sanctuary. Usually located within the god's temple, such images served as authoritative symbols of the cult and were often replicated in the form of votive statuettes and reproduced in a wide variety of media, from reliefs to coins (e.g., Nick 2002).
Danubian Rider Gods
Authors: Hijmans Steven E.
Published: December 2012

Many small lead or marble reliefs from the Danubian provinces of Rome constitute our only evidence for an enigmatic regional cult that flourished from the late second century to the fourth centuryCE.
Dendrophoroi
Authors: Roller Lynn E.
Published: December 2012

Dendrophoroi, a Greek word meaning “those who bear trees,” were participants in cult rituals who carried tree branches in procession.
Devotio
Authors: Hickson Hahn Frances
Published: December 2012

The
devotio
was an ancient Roman ritual for consecrating oneself or another to death to ensure the safety of the community.
Dionysia
Authors: Bedigan Kirsten
Published: December 2012

The Dionysia was an Athenian festival established in the latter half of the sixth centuryBCE.
Dis Pater
Authors: King Charles W.
Published: December 2012

Although modern mythological handbooks in the popular press show an odd preference for the alternate name “Pluto,” Dis (or more formally Dis Pater, “Father Dis”) is the most common Latin name for the God who presides over the underworld land of the dead. He is also sometimes known as Orcus.
Egeria
Authors: Glinister Fay
Published: December 2012

A deity associated with Diana Nemorensis at her sanctuary near Aricia in Latium; also the name of a spring that fed Lake Nemi (Verg.
Aen
. 7.763–4, Ovid
Fasti
. 3.261, Strabo 5.3.12).
Equus October
Authors: McDonough Christopher M.
Published: December 2012

The
Equus October
was, according to a late source, “sacrificed annually each October to Mars on the Campus Martius.
Eros/Cupid
Authors: Smith Amy C.
Published: December 2012

Eros, sexual love, is personified as an adolescent boy, as are his Latin equivalents, Amor and Cupido.
Galli
Authors: Roller Lynn E.
Published: December 2012

The Galli were eunuch priests of the Phrygian Mother goddess, the Greek and Roman Cybele, notorious for self‐castration that was an essential part of their priestly office.
Haruspices
Authors: de Grummond Nancy T.
Published: December 2012

Haruspiceswere diviners specializing in extispicy, the reading of animal entrails to determine the will of the gods.
Healing deities, healing cults, Greece and Rome
Authors: Mylonopoulos Ioannis
Published: December 2012

In one of his early works, Pablo Picasso placed at the sides of a dying person's bed a physician and a nun as symbols of science and charity. Despite the myriad sophisticated interpretations of the paintings, the two figures illustrate on the most basic level the eternal twin powers to which people appeal in cases of serious illness: medicine and religion. This attitude has not changed much since ancient times. In the period of Greek or even Roman antiquity, when western medicine was in its infancy and superstition dominated the diagnosis of illnesses, the cult of healing deities and heroes played a vital role in society.
Hecatomb
Authors: Naiden F. S.
Published: December 2012

A hecatomb was a large offering of animals to one of the leading Olympian gods, such as that made to Athena at the Greater Panathenaia.
Hephaistos
Authors: Blakely Sandra
Published: December 2012

Metonymic for fire, uniquely imperfect among the flawless Olympians, Hephaistos is the Greek god of the forge, of telluric flame, and of craftsmanship that exceeds mortal limitations.
Herms
Authors: Taylor Martha C.
Published: December 2012

According to several ancient sources a particularly Attic monument (Hdt. 2.51.2; Thuc. 6.27.1; Paus 1.24.3, 4.33.3), herms were stone pillar‐shaped figures surmounted by a bearded head, with an erect phallus carved on the front.
Hestia
Authors: Mili Maria
Published: December 2012

The goddess Hestia was the personification of the hearth, with which she was synonymous.
Hymns, Greek
Authors: Kowalzig Barbara
Published: December 2012

The Greek wordhymnosdenotes a song in honor of a god; it can also refer to a song of any kind and occasionally to a discrete form of religious song, viz.
Kronos and Kronia
Authors: Hitch Sarah
Published: December 2012

Kronos (Roman Saturn) was the father of Zeus in myth, a symbol of the generational conflict that threatened cosmic stability before Zeus' supremacy; the tradition develops over time to associate him with Utopian conditions of a “Golden Age.” The oldest and most complete depiction of Kronos can be found in the seventh‐century
BCE
epic cosmogony, Hesiod's
Theogony
.
Mars
Authors: Scopacasa Rafael
Published: December 2012

A major Italian deity, Mars (OscanMamers/Mamars, EtruscanMaris) was associated with warfare, agriculture, and animal husbandry. Together with Jupiter and Quirinus, Mars formed a central triad in Roman and Italic religion, and was regarded as the protector of Roman territory. He became identified with the Greek Ares, also a war god. The main priests of Mars in Rome were theflamen Martialisand the Salii, and sacrifices offered to him usually consisted of thesuovetaurilia, the joint sacrifice of a bull, ram, and boar. The names “Mars” and “Mamers” can be traced back to the proto‐Indo‐European rootmar‐, which is also present in the Sanskrit wordmarikis(“beam of light, radiant”).
Mater Matuta
Authors: Mueller Hans‐Friedrich
Published: December 2012

We have archaeological evidence for the worship of Mater Matuta from Rome in the Forum Boarium, from Satricum to the south, and from Pyrgi, a port of Caere, to the north.
Meditrinalia
Authors: Holland Lora L.
Published: December 2012

The Meditrinalia was a Latin wine festival celebrated on October 11, attested in Latin literature and on some Roman calendars (fasti). It is associated with a goddess, Meditrina (FestusGloss. Lat. 110), but we have no evidence for her cult in the archaeological record. It is the last wine festival of the year, after the Vinalia Priora on April 23 and the Vinalia Rustica on August 19.
Mefitis
Authors: Glinister Fay
Published: December 2012

Mefitis (or Mephitis), an Italic goddess, worshipped at Rome in a sanctuary on the Esquiline (Varro
Ling
. 5.49), and widely in Italy, particularly in Samnium and Lucania.
Meilichios, theoi meilichioi
Authors: Mili Maria
Published: December 2012

Cult title of uncertain etymology usually translated as the “kindly one,” but which also entails the notion of propitiation.
Mysteries
Authors: Alvar Jaime
Published: December 2012

“Mysteries” (Greekmysteria) was originally the name given to a ritual, known since the HomericHymn to Demeter, performed annually in Eleusis.
Necromancy
Authors: Hanesworth Pauline
Published: December 2012

Necromancy is a form of divination based upon communication with the dead. Conducted at tombs (Aesch.Pers. 598–708), on battlefields (Heliod.Aeth. 6.12–15), in homes (PGMIV.1928–2005), or at oracles of the dead (Hdt. 5.92), necromancy seems to operate throughout the ancient world on both the private and state level.
Oracles, Greece and Rome
Authors: Kindt Julia
Published: December 2012

Oracles are a special group of sanctuaries in the Greco‐Roman world, at which one could inquire about past, present, and future events, with the responses delivered there reflecting divine knowledge.
Orpheus and Orphism
Authors: de Jáuregui Miguel Herrero
Published: December 2012

The bard Orpheus was the protagonist of several famous Greek myths: he charmed nature with his songs, sailed with the Argonauts, went down to Hades in search of his wife, was torn apart by Thracian women, and his head went on singing after his death.
Orthia
Authors: Petrovic Ivana
Published: December 2012

Orthia was a Greek goddess who was identified with Artemis.
Parentalia
Authors: Dolansky Fanny
Published: December 2012

Also referred to asdies Parentalesanddies ferales(“days for the commemoration of the dead” and “days of the dead,” Ov.Fast. 2.548, 2.34), the Parentalia spanned nine days (February 13 to 21) devoted to honoring deceased kin, and was the first of two festivals for the family dead.
Pelops
Authors: Pache Corinne Ondine
Published: December 2012

A hero worshipped at Olympia, Pelops was, according to myth, the son of Tantalus and the father of Atreus and Thyestes. Pelops came to Greece from Asia Minor, and gave his name to the Peloponnese.
Poseidon
Authors: Mylonopoulos Ioannis
Published: December 2012

The origins of Poseidon's cult can be traced back to the Mycenaean period.
Priapus
Authors: Mueller Hans‐Friedrich
Published: December 2012

Although our sources derive him from Orneai (subject to Argos) in Greece (Strabo 13.1.12: 587; Paus. 9.31.2) and Lampsakos on the Hellespont in Greek Asia Minor (Paus.ibid.), Priapus does not appear in early Greek literature or mythology. His fame rests instead on numerous surviving statuettes and figurines as well as on later obscene poems both in Greek (especially in thePalatine Anthology) and in Latin (especially thePriapea).
Religion, Etruscan
Authors: de Grummond Nancy T.
Published: December 2012

The Etruscans had a reputation for being devoted to the practices of religion. Livy's description of them is well known and demonstrably correct: “a people more than any others dedicated to religion, the more as they excelled in practicing it” (5.1.6).
Religion, Minoan and Mycenaean
Authors: Rutherford Ian
Published: December 2012

Before the decipherment of Linear B, the religions of Minoan Crete and Mycenaean Greece were seen as a continuum (Nilsson 1950). Today, the two are usually seen as distinct, although there seems to have been influence between them both before and after the presumed Mycenaean invasion of Crete at the start of Late Minoan III (1470?).
Sacrilegium
Authors: Mueller Hans‐Friedrich
Published: December 2012

The Latin word
sacrilegium
, whence English “sacrilege,” denoted the crime that we might call temple robbery. As its etymology implies, to commit sacrilege is to steal what belongs to a god (i.e., what is
sacer
) from the god's temple or dwelling place (Quint.
Inst
. 7.3.10).
Salaminia
Authors: Taylor Martha C.
Published: December 2012

The Salaminia was one of the sacred triremes of the Athenians. It must be named after the island of Salamis and commemorates its conquest by Athens in the sixth century. These ships carried official messages and performed official (often religious) functions.
Salus
Authors: Stone Shelley C.
Published: December 2012

A deified virtue (literally, “well‐being”) that personified the security and welfare of the Roman people. Her temple on the Quirinal Hill was dedicated by C. Iunius Bubulcus on March 5, 302BCE(Livy 10.1.9; Cic.Sest. 63.131).
Sarapis
Authors: Dowling Melissa Barden
Published: December 2012

Sarapis (Serapis in Latin), a god of creation, eternal life, secret knowledge, and healing, combined the cults of Osiris and Apis (Oserapis).
Sea Deities
Authors: Mylonopoulos Ioannis
Published: December 2012

Throughout Greek antiquity, it remained clear that the sea was the domain of Poseidon. Nonetheless, a number of lesser sea deities – the divine followers of the master of the sea – formed Poseidon's so‐called marine
thiasos
or entourage.
Springs, Sacred
Authors: Mylonopoulos Ioannis
Published: December 2012

Springs in ancient Greece were often personified and even worshipped as cult figures.
Supplication
Authors: Naiden F. S.
Published: December 2012

Supplication is a kind of earnest entreaty found in both Greek and Roman society from Homer down to the Christianization of the Roman Empire (and beyond, with changes mostly due to the establishment of Christianity as an official religion).
Tages
Authors: de Grummond Nancy T.
Published: December 2012

Tages was the Latin name of an Etruscan prophetic child who taught the Etrusca Disciplina, a basic body of religious doctrine, to the Etruscans.
Temples, Roman
Authors: Kaiser Alan
Published: December 2012

Roman temples were just one part of an entire sacred precinct in which worshippers performed rituals for the benefit of themselves, those around them, their cities, and the state. Temples housed cult statues and offerings to the god, as well as equipment used in rituals. The Romans learned much about temple building from the Etruscans and Greeks, but they adapted what they learned to make a uniquely Roman style of temple.
Tyche
Authors: Smith Amy C.
Published: December 2012

The wordtyche(pluraltychai) denotes an ancient Greek concept encompassing many aspects of fortune – chance, fate, luck, occurrence, even achievement, success, and wealth – both good and bad. As a personification of that concept, the goddess Tyche came to symbolize the fate and fortune of rulers and through them their cities; she thus emerged as the preeminent city goddess throughout the Hellenistic and Roman worlds. Her name is etymologically related to the verbtynchanein(“to hit, meet with, be favored with, happen accidentally”). The connection between the noun and verb is so close that it is difficult to distinguish in Greek literature between the deity and the abstraction.
Apamea, Syria
Authors: Butcher Kevin
Published: December 2012

A city of the Syrian Tetrapolis, founded by Seleukos I Nikator between 301 and 299BCEand named after his Persian wife Apame.
Arminius
Authors: Nikolic Milorad
Published: December 2012

Arminius was a nobleman from the Germanic tribe of the Cherusci. He was born shortly after 19
BCE
, the son of Segimer, a Cheruscan prince.
Asia, Roman province of
Authors: Mitchell Stephen
Published: December 2012

Attalos Iii of Pergamon bequeathed his kingdom to Rome in 133BCE, and the western part of Asia Minor thereby became Rome's first province east of the Aegean, called Asia.
Beneventum
Authors: Bispham Edward
Published: December 2012

At the junction of the Sabato and Calore rivers, originally in the territory of the Samnite Hirpini, the site of Beneventum lay at the intersection of routes between the Tyrrhenian, the Apennines, and between Rome and southern Italy (the latter becoming the Viae Appia and Traiana).
Berbers and Moors
Authors: Mccarty Matthew M.
Published: December 2012

Berbers and Moors are two names given to the inhabitants of North Africa, by those who colonized or conquered the region.
Booty, Greece and Rome
Authors: Levithan Josh
Published: December 2012

“Booty” describes a thing of value taken by violence. Although the study of Greek and Roman booty often focuses on its economic impact, its cultural significance was powerful and enduring: booty, the physical manifestation of both violent prowess and property ownership, represented the combined essence of wealth and glory.
Commius
Authors: Nice Alex
Published: December 2012

Commius (ca. 90‐ca. 30
BCE
) was a Gallic chieftain who played an important role in Caesar's invasions of Britain and the revolt of Vercingetorix. He was appointed king of the Atrebates by Julius Caesar. In 55
BCE
he was dispatched to encourage the British tribes to seek the protection of Rome (Caes.
B Gall
. 4.21).
Cyrene and Cyrenaica
Authors: Fejfer Jane
Published: December 2012

The Cyrenaica was the region in North Africa located between Roman Egypt and Tripolitania, today part of Libya. It is cut off towards the north and west by the Mediterranean Sea, and towards the east and south by the Sahara desert.
Dura‐Europos
Authors: Kaizer Ted
Published: December 2012

The Macedonian colony of Europos was founded in the early Hellenistic period on a plateau overlooking the Middle Euphrates, at a site known as Dura, meaning “fortress. ” Though both names were used simultaneously – as is clear from inscriptions and papyri, and especially from Isidorus of Charax, who refers to it as “a city of Nikanor, a foundation of the Macedonians, called Europos by the Hellenes” (Parthian Stations1) – the common appellation “Dura‐Europos” is a modern construction.
Eboracum (York)
Authors: Ottaway Patrick
Published: December 2012

Eboracum
(York) lies in northeastern England at a point where the River Ouse cuts a ridge of high ground, which was used in prehistoric times as a route across the low lying Vale of York. Strategic considerations led to the foundation of a legionary fortress ca. 71
CE
by
Legio IX Hispana
, engaged in the conquest of the region. York became the base of
Legio VI Victrix
ca. 122
CE
, after which early timber buildings and the fortress defenses were reconstructed in stone. The south‐western defences featured a remarkable series of polygonal corner and interval towers projecting from the line of the wall. The emperor Septimius Severus made York his campaign base in 208
CE
and died in the city in 211.
Forests, Roman Empire
Authors: Ulrich Roger B.
Published: December 2012

Forests in the Greco‐Roman world played significant roles at all periods: for the economy as a source of building timber and fuel, as habitat for wild game and edible plants, as places of worship where both major and minor sanctuaries were located, and as natural barriers between different populations or as dangerous traps where armies were vulnerable to ambush.
Galatia
Authors: Mitchell Stephen
Published: December 2012

Galatia was a region in central Asia Minor, occupied by Celtic‐speaking peoples, which came under direct Roman rule when it was annexed by Augustus in 25BCE.
Gallia Cisalpina/Italia Transpadana
Authors: Haeussler Ralph
Published: December 2012

Cisalpine Gaul is a region of North Italy surrounded by the Alps in the north and west, the Adria in the east, and Luca in the south; in the first centuryBCE, the river Rubicon separated Cisalpine Gaul from the rest of Italy (Plut.Caes. 20; 32; Plin.HN3.20).
Gallia Narbonensis
Authors: Thorne James
Published: December 2012

The Romans took control of the province in southern Gaul about a century after the territories on either side (Hispania Citerior to the west, and Gallia Cisalpina to the east).
Goths
Authors: Lawrence Thomas Christopher
Published: December 2012

The Goths were a loose confederation of barbarian peoples, including the Greuthungi, the Tervingi, and the Taifali, that arose as a response to the long years of Roman political and military turmoil in the third centuryCE.
Isauria
Authors: Elton Hugh
Published: December 2012

Isauria was a region in the Taurus Mountains of southern Asia Minor. In the fourth centuryBCE, the term applied to the inland area (also described as southern Lykaonia) around the city of Isaura (Isaura Vetus; modern Bozkir). By the third centuryCE, Isauria was a Roman province extending from the Mediterranean coast up to the borders of Lykaonia.
Languages, Roman Empire (east)
Authors: Salmeri Giovanni
Published: December 2012

In an entertaining scene at the beginning of the biography of Maximinus Thrax, in theHistoria Augusta(Max. Thrax2–3), we encounter an emperor and a future emperor, neither of whom is an accomplished speaker of Latin or Greek.
Lugdunum (Lyons)
Authors: Thorne James
Published: December 2012

Lugdunum (“Stronghold of the god Lug”), a Roman colony established near a Celtic settlement soon after Caesar's Gallic War, became the capital of the province of Lugdunensis, and then of the Three Gauls as a whole. Located at the confluence of the Rhône and Saône, it flourished early on, but lost status to other centers after the end of the second century
CE
.
Lusitania
Authors: Edmondson Jonathan
Published: December 2012

Lusitania was the name the Romans gave to the region in the west of the Iberian Peninsula, which now covers modern Portugal as far north as the River Douro and the neighboring parts of Spanish Extremadura.
Macedonia
Authors: Hatzopoulos M. B.
Published: December 2012

Macedonia (in GreekMakedonia) is the country inhabited by the Macedonians (Macedones), who not only gave their name to the country, but also formed it by bringing together regions, in which physical geography did not promote unity. At the end of a process, which lasted from the foundation of the kingdom at the beginning of the seventh centuryBCEuntil its abolition by the Romans in 167BCE, the term Macedonia, in a geographical sense, designated all the lands between the Pindus chain to the west and the plain of Philippi to the east, and between Mount Olympos to the south and a line close to the border of present‐day Greece to the north. The cradle of Macedonian power was the Old Kingdom, around the great alluvial plain of Emathia, formed by the rivers Haliakmon, Loudias, and Axios, and the smaller plain of Pieria, with its surrounding mountains: Olympos, the Pierian mountains, Bermion, and Barnous. To the west, Upper Macedonia was composed of high plateaux: from the south to the north, Elimeia, Orestis, Lynkos and, even further west, Tymphaia and Parauaia, which had originally constituted small independent kingdoms. For about two centuries, the Axios River formed the eastern border of the kingdom. The conquest and absorption into Macedonia of the New Territories to the east of this river, which were shared between colonies from the Greek city‐states along the coasts and the “indigenous” tribes of the interior, including the Crestonians, Mygdonians, Bottiaeans, Odomantes, Bisaltes, and Edonians, was a long process that started at the beginning of the fifth centuryBCEand had barely finished on the eve of the Roman conquest.
Mediterranean, Roman
Authors: Schulz Raimund
Published: December 2012

Being located on the banks of the Tiber River some 25 km off the coast of the Tyrrhenian Sea, early Rome was an integral part of the western Mediterranean trade world. Already by the seventh centuryBCEGreek, Phoenician, and Etruscan naval merchants were satisfying the Latin aristocrats' demand for luxury goods, in return acquiring raw materials (metals, wood, wool), livestock, and slaves from Latium. The Etruscan kings further encouraged this trade through their building policy at the Tiber ford, although they themselves engaged in piracy and trade on the Tyrrhenian Sea.