Roman

## Myths

### Aeneas

The national epic of mythical Rome, the Aeneid of Virgil, tells the story of how Trojan prince Aeneas came to Italy. The Aeneid was written under Augustus, who claimed ancestry through Julius Caesar from the hero and his mother Venus. According to the Aeneid, the survivors from the fallen city of Troy banded together under Aeneas and underwent a series of adventures around the Mediterranean Sea, including a stop at newly founded Carthage under the rule of Queen Dido, eventually reaching the Italian coast. The Trojans were thought to have landed in an area between modern Anzio and Fiumicino, southwest of Rome, probably at Laurentum or, in other versions, at Lavinium, a place named for Lavinia, the daughter of King Latinus whom Aeneas married. This started a series of armed conflicts with Turnus over the marriage of Lavinia..Before the arrival of Aeneas, Turnus was betrothed to Lavinia, who then married Aeneas, starting the war.Aeneas won the war and killed Turnus.The Trojans won the right to stay and to assimilate with the local peoples. The young son of Aeneas Ascanius, also known as Iulus, went on to found Alba Longa and the line of Alban kings who filled the chronological gap between the Trojan saga and the traditional founding of Rome in the 8th century BC.Toward the end of this line, King Procas was the father of Numitor and Amulius. At Procas' death, Numitor became king of Alba Longa, but Amulius captured him and sent him to prison; he also forced Numitor's daughter Rhea Silvia to become a virgin priestess among the Vestals.

### Romulus and Remus

The myth of Aeneas was of Greek origin and had to be reconciled with the Italian myth of Romulus and Remus, who would have been born around 771 BC if taken as historical figures. They were purported to be sons of Rhea Silvia and either Mars, the god of war, or the demi-god hero Hercules. They were abandoned at birth, in the manner of many mythological heroes, because of a prophecy that they would overthrow their great-uncle Amulius, who had overthrown Silvia's father Numitor. The twins were abandoned on the river Tiber by servants who took pity on the infants, despite their orders. The twins were nurtured by a she-wolf until a shepherd named Faustulus found the boys and took them as his sons. Faustulus and his wife Acca Larentia raised the children. When Remus and Romulus became adults, they killed Amulius and restored Numitor. They decided to establish a city; however, they quarreled, and Romulus killed his brother. Thus, Rome began with a fratricide, a story that was later taken to represent the city's history of internecine political strife and bloodshed.

## Pontefix Maximus

### Roman Republic

In the Roman Republic, the Pontifex Maximus was the highest office in the state religion of ancient Rome and directed the College of Pontiffs. According to Livy, after the overthrow of the monarchy, the Romans created the priesthood of the rex sacrorum, or "king of sacred rites," to carry out certain religious duties and rituals previously performed by the king. The rex sacrorum was explicitly deprived of military and political power, but the pontifices were permitted to hold both magistracies and military commands.The official residence of the Pontifex Maximus was the *Domus Publica* ("State House") which stood between the House of the Vestal Virgins and the Via Sacra, close to the Regia, in the Roman Forum. His religious duties were carried out from the Regia. Unless the *pontifex maximus* was also a magistrate at the same time, he was not allowed to wear the toga praetexta, i.e. toga with the purple border. In artistic representations, he can be recognized by his holding an iron knife *(secespita)* or the *patera* and the distinctive robes or toga with part of the mantle covering the head *(capite velato)*, in keeping with Roman practice.The Pontifex was not simply a priest. He had both political and religious authority. It is not clear which of the two came first or had the most importance. In practice, particularly during the late Republic, the office of Pontifex Maximus was generally held by a member of a politically prominent family. It was a coveted position mainly for the great prestige it conferred on the holder; Julius Caesar became pontifex in 73 BC and pontifex maximus in 63 BCE.The major Republican source on the pontiffs would have been the theological writings of Varro, which survive only in fragments preserved by later authors such as Aulus Gellius and Nonius Marcellus. Other sources are Cicero, Livy, Dionysius of Halicarnassus, Valerius Maximus, Plutarch's *Life of Numa Pompilius*, Festus' summaries of Verrius Flaccus, and in later writers, including several of the Church Fathers. Some of these sources present an extensive list of everyday prohibitions for the Pontifex Maximus; it seems difficult to reconcile these lists with evidence that many Pontifices Maximi were prominent members of society who lived normal, non-restricted lives.

### Election

The number of Pontifices, elected by *co-optatio* (i.e. the remaining members nominate their new colleague) for life, was originally five, including the *pontifex maximus*.The *pontifices*, moreover, could only come from the old nobility, the patricians. However, in 300–299 BCE the *lex Ogulnia* opened the office of Pontifex Maximus to public election and permitted the *plebs* (plebeians) to be co-opted as priests, so that part of the exclusivity of the title was lost. But it was only in 254 BCE that Tiberius Coruncanius became the first plebeian Pontifex Maximus.The *lex Ogulnia* also increased the number of pontiffs to nine (the *pontifex maximus* included). In 104 BCE the *lex Domitia* prescribed that the election of all pontiffs would henceforward be voted by the *comitia tributa* (an assembly of the people divided into voting districts); by the same law only 17 tribes, chosen by lot from the 35 tribes of the city, could vote. The law's promulgator, L[ucius] Domitius Ahenobarbus, was shortly afterwards elected Pontifex Maximus after the death of the incumbent Metellus Dalmaticus: Something of a personal revenge because, the previous year, he had expected to be co-opted as a pontiff to replace his late father, but the pontifical college had appointed another candidate in his place. The office's next holder, Q[uintus] Mucius Scaevola, was also elected under the same law, though without controversy or opposition since he was a former consul and long-serving pontiff.This law was abolished in 81 BCE by Sulla in his dictatorship, in the *lex Cornelia de Sacerdotiis*, which restored to the great priestly colleges their full right of *co-optatio*.Also under Sulla, the number of pontifices was increased to fifteen, the *pontifex maximus* included, and Sulla nominated Quintus Caecilius Metellus Pius as the next holder of the office – the only truly unelected Pontifex Maximus in history, since even the other pontiffs did not get a vote in the matter.In 63 BC, the law of Sulla was abolished by the tribune Titus Labienus, and a modified form of the *lex Domitia* was reinstated providing for election by *comitia tributa* once again: Gaius Julius Caesarfollowed Ahenobarbus's precedent by being elected by public vote, although Caesar at least had previously been a pontiff. Marcus Antonius later restored the right of *co-optatio* to the college, in time for the election of Marcus Aemilius Lepidus. Also under Julius Caesar, the number of pontifices were increased to sixteen, the pontifex maximus included. (Possibly because Caesar's own long absences from Rome necessitated the appointment of a deputy pontiff for those occasions when fifteen needed to be present?) The number of pontifices varied during the Empire but is believed to have been regular at fifteen.

### Duties

The immense authority of the sacred college of pontiffs was centered on the Pontifex Maximus, the other pontifices forming his *consilium* or advising body. His functions were partly sacrificial or ritualistic, but these were the least important. His real power lay in the administration of *ius divinum* or divine law;

the information collected by the pontifices related to the Roman religious tradition was bound in a *corpus* which summarized dogma and other concepts. The chief departments of *jus divinum* may be described as follows:

1. The regulation of all expiatory ceremonials needed as a result of pestilence, lightning, etc.
2. The consecration of all temples and other sacred places and objects dedicated to the gods.
3. The regulation of the calendar; both astronomically and in detailed application to the public life of the state.
4. The administration of the law relating to burials and burying-places, and the worship of the *Manes* or dead ancestors.
5. The superintendence of all marriages by conferratio, i.e. originally of all legal patrician marriages.
6. The administration of the law of adoption and of testamentary succession.
7. The regulation of the public morals, and fining and punishing offending parties.

## Refrences

1. ↑ 1.0 1.1 1.2 "Turnus". Encyclopædia Britannica. Retrieved 2013-09-13.
2. ↑ https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Romulus\_and\_Remus. 11:56, 9 October 2018‎  ClueBot NG.
3. ↑ Roman Public Religion Archived March 18, 2011, at the Wayback Machine. Roman Civilization, bates.edu retrieved August 17, 2006
4. ↑ Panel Reliefs of Marcus Aurelius and Roman Imperial Iconography State University of New York, College at Oneonta retrieved Sep 14, 2006
5. ↑ Liv. Epit. 89
6. ↑ Pseudo-Ascon. in Divinat. p 102, ed. Orelli