Lemuria

LEMU'RIA, a festival for the souls of the departed, which was celebrated at Rome every year in the month of May. It was said to have been instituted by Romulus to appease the spirit of Remus whom he had slain (Ovid, Fast. v. 473, &c.), and to have been called originally Remuria (clearly a fanciful derivation). It was celebrated at night and in silence, and during three alternate days, that is, on the 9th, 11th, and 13th of May. During this season the temples of the gods were closed, and it was thought unlucky for women to marry at this time and during the whole month of May, and those who ventured to marry were believed to die soon after, whence the proverb *mense Maio malae nubent*. Those who celebrated the Lemuria walked barefooted through the house, washed their hands three times, and threw black beans nine times behind their backs.

At the same time the words were used, "I redeem myself and my household with these beans," and the ghosts were bidden to quit the house. It was supposed that they followed behind the thrower and gathered up the beans. The Lemures, as the Larvae, represented the spirits of the wicked and haunted a house for evil : beans were sacred to the infernal powers, for which reason the Flamen Dialis was forbidden to touch or even to name them, just as he was forbidden to approach a grave or a dead body (Gell. X. 15) ; and black beans, like the wdμμελasσts of Homer, would be particularly appropriate to the Lemures. That the festival was a very ancient one may be conjectured from its fetish-like character, and from the fact that it was celebrated by the father of the family for his own household. (For the date of the Lemuria, see Marquardt, Staatsverwaltung, iii. 575 : and for details of the ceremony, Ovid, l. c. ; Preller, Rom. Myth. 499.) [L. S.] [G. E. M.]

### Dates:

May 9, 11, 13.

 Possibly May 7th to the 15th.

## Source 1

Lemuria and Ancestor Worship

The Lemuria took place on three different days in May. On the ninth, eleventh, and thirteenth of that month, Roman householders gave offerings to their deceased ancestors to make sure their ancestors didn’t haunt them. The great poet Ovid chronicled Roman festivals in his "Fasti." In his section on the month of May, he discussed the Lemuria.

Ovid alleged that the festival got its name from “Remuria,” a festival named for Remus, Romulus’s twin brother whom he killed after founding Rome. Remus appeared as a ghost after his death and asked his brother’s friends to make future generations honor him. Said Ovid, “Romulus complied, and gave the name Remuria to the day on which due worship is paid to buried ancestors.”

Eventually, “Remuria” became “Lemuria.” Scholars doubt that etymology, however, instead of supporting the likely theory that Lemura was named for the “lemures,” one of the several types of Roman spirits.

The Ceremony for Celebrating the Dead

The Romans believed that there could be no knots present during the ceremony. Some scholars theorize that knots were forbidden to allow natural forces to flow properly. The Romans are known to take off their sandals, and walk in their bare feet while making a sign to ward off evil. This gesture is called mano fica (literally "fig hand").

They would then clean themselves with fresh water and throw black beans (or spit black beans from their mouth). Looking away, they would say, “These I cast; with these beans, I redeem me and mine."

By throwing away beans and what they symbolize or contain, ancient Roman's believed they were removing potentially dangerous spirits from their home. According to Ovid, the spirits would follow the beans and leave the living be.

Next, they would wash and bang together pieces of bronze from Temesa in Calabria, Italy. They would ask the shades to leave their home nine times, saying, "Ghost of my fathers, go forth!" And you're done.

It's not "black magic" as we think of it today, which Charles W. King explains in his essay “The Roman Manes: the Dead as Gods." If the Romans even had such a concept, it would have applied to “invoking supernatural powers to harm others,” which doesn't happen here. As King observes, the Roman spirits in the Lemuria aren't the same as our modern ghosts. These are ancestral spirits to be propitiated. They might harm you if you don’t observe certain rites, but they’re not necessarily inherently evil.

## Source 2

Lemuralia

May 9, 11 and 13 are the days of the Lemuralia, a festival to appease the restless dead. It is a domestic observance, rather than a public rite. The temples are closed, and marriages are prohibited during this period. It’s dedicated to the malevolent and restless dead, for maintaining their memory is as paramount as those of the benevolent ancestors. Sacrifices are offered as propitiation in order to keep the peace and avoid ill luck from these infernal spirits.

The Lemures are the roaming spirits of those who have no family or friends to perform the customary rites for them. These are not one’s Lares, though, and one does not wish to encourage them to linger at one’s domus (home). Therefore, a bowl of water and some scraps of food, with flour, salt, olive oil, and perhaps a coin of small value to pay the ferryman may be left for them outdoors or, better yet, at a crossroads. A prayer is offered for them to peacefully continue their journey to the next world.

The home may be cleaned and purified during this festival, and one’s own Lares should be shown special honor, perhaps with offerings of candlelight, flowers, or morsels from your own evening meal.

Ritual

The head of the household (the paterfamilias) is to arise at midnight and make the mano ficosign (the thumb between the first and second fingers of the closed hand). Wearing unknotted clothing, the head of the household then walks through the abode barefoot, and tosses or spits nine black beans over their shoulder.

Then, this prayer is repeated nine times:

*Haec ego mitto; his redimo meque meosque fabis.* (“These I cast; with these beans I redeem me and mine.”) [x9]

The rest of the household then clash metal pots while shouting nine times:

*Manes exite paterni!* (“Ghosts of our ancestors, be gone!”) [x9]

## In Vampireology

### Lemures

Main Entry: Lemure

Lemures may represent the wandering and vengeful spirits of those not afforded proper burial, funeral rites or affectionate cult by the living: they are thus not attested by tomb or votive inscriptions. Ovid interprets them as vagrant, unsatiated and potentially vengeful di manes or di parentes, ancestral gods or spirits of the underworld. To him, the rites of their cult suggest an incomprehensibly archaic, quasi-magical and probably very ancient rural tradition.

Lemures were formless and liminal, associated with darkness and its dread. In Republican and Imperial Rome, May 9, 11, and 13 were dedicated to their placation in the household practices of Lemuralia or Lemuria. The head of household (paterfamilias) would rise at midnight and cast black beans behind him with averted gaze; the Lemures were presumed to feast on them. Black was the appropriate colour for offerings to chthonic deities. William Warde Fowler interprets the gift of beans as an offer of life, and points out that they were a ritual pollution for priests of Jupiter. The lemures themselves were both fearsome and fearful: any malevolent shades dissatisfied with the offering of the paterfamilias could be startled into flight by the loud banging of bronze pots.

### Lemure (also Larve)

Main Entry: Lemure

In Ancient Rome it was believed that the souls who descended to the Underworld were divided into two groups: Manes and Lemure. A Mane was the spirit of a person deserving of honor, and if his spirit received the proper respect from his living relatives, and if the proper holy rites were performed in his memory, then his spirit would be released from the underworld and would often serve as a spiritual guide and guardian to his surviving family and descendants.

A person who's soul was corrupt, and who was therefore unlikely to be revered by his surviving family, was known as Lemure. This creature often returned to Earth as an evil ghost who delighted in sowing discord and bringing torment to everyone he encountered.

The Lemures were essential vampires who fed on the pain and misery they caused, and they worked at their evil all year long. They are particularly powerful, however, during the Festival of Lemuria, held each may. Since they are ghosts, the Lemure cannot be killed, but they cannot abide loud noise, and the banging of drums will drive them away.

### Vampire: A bloodsucking Specter

Main Entry: General, Dictionaries & Encyclopedias

 The object of superstitious dread among various nations of Europe. The belief in vampires, i.e., in persons returning to the earth after death and burial, not as ghosts, but in actual corporeal substance, and sucking the blood of living men, appears to have prevailed in classical times. The Empuse, Lamiae, and Lemures were species of vampires. One of the most detailed stories of vampires is the tale of Machates and Philinuion which Goethe has made the foundation of his poem of the Bride of Corinth : in which the dead bride of a young man visits him at night, and withers him by her embrace.

## Ovid

**Book V: May 9: The Lemuria**

When Hesperus, the Evening Star, has shown his lovely face Three times, from that day, and the defeated stars fled Phoebus, It will be the ancient sacred rites of the Lemuria, When we make offerings to the voiceless spirits. The year was once shorter, the pious rites of purification, februa, Were unknown, nor were you, two-faced Janus, leader of the months: Yet they still brought gifts owed to the ashes of the dead, The grandson paid respects to his buried grandfather’s tomb.

It was May month, named for our ancestors (maiores), And a relic of the old custom still continues. When midnight comes, lending silence to sleep, And all the dogs and hedgerow birds are quiet, He who remembers ancient rites, and fears the gods, Rises (no fetters binding his two feet) And makes the sign with thumb and closed fingers, Lest an insubstantial shade meets him in the silence. After cleansing his hands in spring water, He turns and first taking some black beans, Throws them with averted face: saying, while throwing: ‘With these beans I throw I redeem me and mine.’ He says this nine times without looking back: the shade Is thought to gather the beans, and follow behind, unseen.

Again he touches water, and sounds the Temesan bronze, And asks the spirit to leave his house. When nine times he’s cried: ‘Ancestral spirit, depart,’ He looks back, and believes the sacred rite’s fulfilled. Why the day’s so called, and the origin of the name, Escapes me: that’s for some god to discover.

Mercury, son of the Pleiad, explain it to me, by your Potent wand: you’ve often seen Stygian Jove’s halls. The caduceus-bearer came, at my prayer. Learn then, The reason for the name: the god himself revealed it. When Romulus had sunk his brother’s spirit in the grave, And justice was done to the over-hasty Remus, The wretched Faustulus, and Acca with streaming hair, Sprinkled the calcined bones with their tears. Then at twilight they returned home grieving, And flung themselves on the hard couch, just as it lay. The bloodstained ghost of Remus seemed to stand By the bed, speaking these words in a faint murmur: ‘Behold, I who was half, the other part of your care, See what I am, and know what I was once!

If the birds had signalled the throne was mine, I might have been highest, ruling over the people, Now I’m an empty phantom, gliding from the fire: That is what remains of Remus’ form! Ah, where is Mars, my father? If you once spoke The truth, it was he who sent us the she-wolf’s teats. The rash hand of a citizen undid what the wolf saved. O how gentle she was in comparison! Savage Celer, wounded, may you yield your cruel spirit, And bloodstained as I am, sink beneath the earth.

My brother never wished it: his love equals mine: He offered, at my death, all he could, his tears. Beg him by your weeping, by your nurturing, To signal a day of celebration in my honour.’ They stretched out their arms at this, longing to embrace him, But the fleeting shade escaped their clutching hands. When the phantom fleeing dispelled their sleep, They both told the king of his brother’s words. Romulus, complying, called that day the Remuria, When reverence is paid our buried ancestors.

Over time the harsh consonant at the beginning Of the name, was altered into a soft one: And soon the silent spirits were called Lemures too: That’s the meaning of the word, that’s its force. And the ancients closed the temples on these days, As you see them shut still at the season of the dead. It’s a time when it’s not suitable for widows or virgins To wed: she who marries then won’t live long. And if you attend to proverbs, then, for that reason too, People say unlucky women wed in the month of May. Though these three festivals fall at the same time, They are not observed on three consecutive days.

## References

1. ↑ 1.0 1.1 1.2 A dictionary of Greek and Roman antiquities, Volume 2 Edited by William Smith 1890 pg 30 https://archive.org/details/adictionarygree01smitgoog/page/n41/mode/2up
2. ↑ 2.0 2.1 2.2 2.3 2.4 https://www.poetryintranslation.com/PITBR/Latin/OvidFastiBkFive.php#anchor\_Toc69367924
3. ↑ A dictionary of Greek and Roman antiquities, Volume 2 Edited by William Smith 1890 pg 30 https://archive.org/details/adictionarygree01smitgoog/page/n41/mode/2up
4. ↑ http://www.capitolium.org/eng/ludi/feste.htm
5. ↑ Silver, Carly. "Lemuria the Ancient Roman Day of the Dead." ThoughtCo, Feb. 11, 2020, thoughtco.com/lemuria-ancient-roman-day-of-dead-117915.
6. ↑ https://hellenicfaith.com/lemuria/
7. ↑ Thaniel, G. (1973). Lemures and Larvae, The American Journal of Philology, 94.2, 182–187.
8. ↑ W. Warde Fowler, The Roman Festivals of the period of the Republic, MacMillan (New York, 1899) – available at Questia: see Mensis Maius, 106–10:
9. ↑ Beard, M., North, J., Price, S. (1998). Religions of Rome, Vol 1, 31, 50, Cambridge.
10. ↑ Maberry, Jonathan. Essay. In Vampire Universe: the Dark World of Supernatural Beings That Haunt Us, Hunt Us, and Hunger for Us, 197. New York: Citadel, 2006. https://books.google.com/books?id=6h17h23zo1AC&pg=PA197&lpg=PA197&dq=Vampires.com+Lemures&source=bl&ots=zLE3Ak\_WRT&sig=ACfU3U1G\_6TwrJDpTcJHy6wGWdlcKw5VGQ&hl=en&sa=X&ved=2ahUKEwiJ3YyH2orqAhWUHzQIHRXOAqEQ6AEwBnoECAYQAQ#v=onepage&q=Vampires.com%20Lemures&f=false
11. ↑ A dictionary of science, literature, & art: comprising the definitions and derivations of the scientific terms in general use, together with the history and descriptions of the scientific principles of nearly every branch of human knowledge; by William Thomas Brande and George W. Cox 1851 page 1291 https://archive.org/details/brandedictionary00branrich/page/1290/mode/2up

## Additional Reading

* HonorTheGods. “Lemuria.” Honor the Gods. October 06, 2016. Accessed October 07, 2017. http://honorthegods.tumblr.com/post/160483079206/mosaic-depicting-a-skeleton-vesuvius-area-1st.
* Horatius Piscinus, M. “Lemuria.” Religio et Pietas. May 09, 2011. Accessed December 19, 2017. http://www.patheos.com/blogs/religioromana/2011/05/lemuria/.
* Silver, Carly. “How Did the Ancient Romans Worship Their Dead?” ThoughtCo. March 06, 2017. Accessed December 19, 2017. https://www.thoughtco.com/lemuria-ancient-roman-day-of-dead-117915.
* TheLettuceMan. “Hālige Dagas.” Of Axe and Plough. June 18, 2017. Accessed December 05, 2017. https://thelettuceman.wordpress.com/about-eofores-holt-heorth/halige-dagas/.