page_title: Switzerland in the Roman era
section_title: Polytheism
hierarchical_section_title: Switzerland in the Roman era / Roman Switzerland / Religion / Polytheism
caption_attribution_description: Deutsch: Augusta Raurica (Augst): Statue Français&#160;: Statue romaine d'Hercules à Augusta Raurica English: Roman statue of Hercules at Augst (Augusta Raurica), Basel-Land, Switzerland
context_page_description: The territory of modern Switzerland was a part of the Roman Republic and Empire for a period of about six centuries, beginning with the step-by-step conquest of the area by Roman armies from the 2nd century BC and ending with the decline of the Western Roman Empire in the 5th century AD.
  The mostly Celtic tribes of the area were subjugated by successive Roman campaigns aimed at control of the strategic routes from Italy across the Alps to the Rhine and into Gaul, most importantly by Julius Caesar's defeat of the largest tribal group, the Helvetii, in the Gallic Wars in 58 BC. Under the Pax Romana, the area was smoothly integrated into the prospering Empire, and its population assimilated into the wider Gallo-Roman culture by the 2nd century AD, as the Romans enlisted the native aristocracy to engage in local government, built a network of roads connecting their newly established colonial cities and divided up the area among the Roman provinces.
  Roman civilization began to retreat from Swiss territory when it became a border region again after the Crisis of the Third Century.
context_section_description: In the course of Romanization, the Celtic polytheism of the local tribes was merged – syncretized – with the Roman religion. The Celtic deities came to be worshiped under the names of their Roman counterparts. Thus Lugus was replaced by Mercury, Belenus by Apollo, Taranis by Jupiter and so forth, in a practice called interpretatio romana by Caesar, who pioneered it. Roman gods also acquired the names of local gods as epithets; thus Mars was venerated as Mars Caturix, Mercury as Mercurius Cissonius and Jupiter as Jupiter Poeninus after the god of the Pennine Alps.
  As oriental religions grew more popular in the later Empire – unlike the traditional Roman cults, they promised rewards in the afterlife – they also percolated into Gaul. Artifacts related to the cults of gods such as Isis, Osiris, Serapis, Kybele, Serapios, Dionysos or Mithras have been found at the site of every Roman settlement in Switzerland.
  The great significance of religion in the culture of Roman Switzerland is illustrated by the imposing size and central location of the Roman temples in the cities, as well as by the great number of religious artifacts found by archaeologists. As everywhere in the Empire, the Imperial cult was practiced in Switzerland; it had a particularly prominent temple in the center of the forum of Nyon.
caption: Statue of Hercules in Augusta Raurica
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