differences between greek and roman sacrifice

Pliny reports a ritual, possibly sacrifice (res divina fit, 29.58), involving a dog in honour of the little-known goddess, Genita Mana (cf. 58 216,Footnote 31 Scheid Reference Scheid1998: nn. 44 34 Elsner Reference Elsner2012 emphasizes the heavy influence of early Christian writers on modern theorizations of sacrifice. Since Greeks were the first ones, Romans followed them. As an example, I offer Var., R. 1.2.19: Itaque propterea institutum diversa de causa ut ex caprino genere ad alii dei aram hostia adduceretur, ad alii non sacrificaretur, cum ab eodem odio alter videre nollet, alter etiam videre pereuntem vellet. Greeks call the queen Hera, whereas Romans queen of gods is Juno. Greek Gods vs Roman Gods. 10 The Romans performed at least four forms of ritual killing, only one of which was sacrifice. At her birth, Athena, the goddess of wisdom, sprang directly from the head of Zeus. 4 78 WebWhat are the main differences between Greek and Roman gods? molo; de Vaan Reference De Vaan2008: 3867 s.v. 35 The same two interment rituals would be performed alongside one another again just about a century later, in 113 b.c.e. Also unfamiliar to the Romans would be another use of sacrifice now current in the life sciences, as a term for euthanasia of research animals with no real religious significance The plea of an editorial in the Canadian Journal of Comparative Medicine and Veterinary Science from 1967 (p. 241) that researchers abandon the term because there is no deity involved in the act of euthanizing laboratory animals, fell on deaf ears: sacrifice remains common in animal management literature. Despite the fact that the Romans buried broken or superfluous gifts to the gods in deposits for hundreds of years, there are to my knowledge only two references to the practice in all of Latin literature.Footnote Has data issue: true 14.30; Sil. At N.H. 29.578, Pliny tells us that a dog was crucified annually at a particular location in Rome, and that puppies used to be considered to be such pure eating that they were used in place of victims (hostiarum vice) to appease the divine; puppy was still on the menu at banquets for the gods in Pliny's own day. 71 Liv. The expanded range of sacrificium suggests that meat and vegetal produce were both welcomed by the gods, and that we should not assume that meat offerings were necessarily privileged over other gifts in every circumstance. and for looking at Roman religion in the context of other religious traditions. Now, the Romans did not eat people, so how does their performance of human sacrifice reinforce the link between sacrifice and dining? Greek and Roman 59 ex Fest. Although the remains come from a known sacred area, it should not be assumed that all of them are evidence of sacrificium or other rituals: some may be garbage, material used as fill, or even the remains of animals (like mice) that died while exploring the refuse heap. If the commander who devoted himself did not die in battle, he was interdicted from performing any ritual on behalf of the state (publicum divinum). Minos gave laws to Crete. 3.2.16. 21 Roman Sacrifice, Inside and Out* | The Journal of Roman Studies Neither Miner's nor his reader's understanding is right and the other wrong: they are two different views of the same set of data, and both are valuable. These two passages from Pliny and Apuleius may provide an explanation for the hundreds of thousands of miniature fictile vessels (plates, cups, etc.) The description of Decius ensuing death is very spare and devoid of any sacrificial imagery or terminology. Greek governments varied from kings and oligarchs to the totalitarian, racist, warrior culture of Sparta and the direct democracy of Athens, whereas Roman kings gave Nacirema is American spelt backwards, and Miner shows to, and interprets for, us our own bathroom habits.Footnote Greek and Roman Arguably, then, it is the Christians who bequeathed to future generations the metonymic equivalence of sacrifice and violence, Knust and Vrhelyi Reference Knust and Vrhelyi2011: 17. Huet Reference Huet and Bertrand2005; Reference Huet and van Andringa2007. Greek Gods and Religious Practices | Essay | The Metropolitan The closest any Roman source comes to linking devotio and sacrifice is Cic., Off. That we cannot fully recover what were the critical differences among these rites is frustrating, but the situation is certainly not unique in the study of Roman religion. 85 6 In both the passages from Pliny and Apuleius, the ritual implements are of diminutive size. 22.1.19; 45.16.6; Plin., N.H. 36.39; Tac., Ann. Difference Between Romans and Greeks Admittedly the Romans often used as a metonym for the whole of sacrificium the term immolatio, the stage of the ritual that includes slaughter, suggesting the special importance of that portion of the ritual sequence.Footnote Scheid Reference Scheid2005: 4457; Reference Scheid and Rpke2007: 2639. 84 The survival beyond the early Empire of most aspects of the distinction among ritual forms discussed in Section IV cannot be asserted with any confidence. Yet, part of the work of a Roman historian is to try to understand how the Romans understood their world, to be aware of anachronism in our accounts thereof, and to keep in mind that the sources never truly speak for themselves. WebThe standard view of paganism (traditional city-based polytheistic Graeco-Roman religion) in the Roman empire has long been one of decline beginning in the second and first centuries BC. On fourteen occasions between 209 and 92 b.c.e., androgyne infants and children were included among the prodigies reported to the Roman Senate. noun. 89 Meanwhile, from the Sibylline Books some unusual sacrifices were ordered, among which was one where a Gallic man and woman and a Greek man and woman were sent down alive into an underground room walled with rock, a place that had already been tainted before by human victims hardly a Roman rite. When the Romans sacrificed plant matter to the gods, it appears to be because that is what it was appropriate to do in the specific circumstance. 55 Two differences between greek roman religion and christianity. Greek Translation. For a treatment of this methodological issue on a broader scale, see the rather pointed critique in Hopkins Reference Hopkins1978: 1808. 91 molo. Aldrete's survey of images commonly identified as sacrifice scenes makes clear that Roman art depicts different procedures (hitting with a hammer, chopping with an axe) and implements (hammers, axes, knives), and that the preference of implement changes over time. Neither of the acts that Pliny mentions is explicitly identified as sacrificium, or as any other rite in particular. The distinction is preserved by Suet., Prat. Instead they seem to have conceived of it as the ritual consecration of an animal which was afterwards killed and eaten. 5 53, At first glance, the Roman habit of sacrificing items that people cannot eat (cruets and small plates) suggests that another dominant strain in modern theorizations of sacrifice might not really apply to the Roman case. This is a bad answer - I don't have sources available. It is my understanding that we lack a great deal of the sources needed for an emic unders ex Fest. 43 Learn. Cic., Red. Of this class of rituals, sacrificium does seem to have been somehow different from the others. The elder Pliny, in his Natural History, discusses the high regard in which ancient Romans held simple vessels made of beechwood. } Similarities and Differences Between Greek and Roman I also thank the anonymous reviewers for helpful comments, suggestions and objections that have greatly improved this piece. Aldrete counts at least fifty-six sculptural reliefs dating from the seventh century b.c.e. For a more extended analysis of the distinction between the punishment of unchaste Vestals and, on the one hand, sacrifice and, on the other, secular capital punishment, see Schultz Reference Schultz2012. WebRoman sacrificial practices were not functionally different from Greek, although the Roman rite was distinguishable from the Greek and Etruscan. 358L. Were they always burnt on an altar or brazier? I use ritual killing as a blanket term for any rite, including but not limited to sacrifice, that involves the death of a human being. 17 See, however, C. Ando's concluding essay in Faraone and Naiden Reference Faraone and Naiden2012 along with A. Hollman's review of that same volume in BMCR 2013.04.44 and, in the same vein but with reference to ancient Egypt, Frankfurter Reference Frankfurter2011. 58.47, 64.1.467, and 68.1.49. 81 These offerings, ubiquitous in Roman Italy through to the end of the Republic, are mentioned at most twice in extant Latin literature.Footnote MacKinnon Reference MacKinnon2004: 5974. Var., L. 5.112; see also Cic., Har. 90 History Greek & Roman Civilization - studocu.com 16 wine,Footnote frag. 17 41 4.57) is not clear. Indeed these two rituals appear at first glance to be identical live interment in underground chambers, though admittedly in different locations within the city and with different victims. 39 46 But we can no longer recover indeed it appears that Romans of the early Empire could no longer recover what was the difference between a monstrum, a prodigium, a portentum, and an ostentum.Footnote 72 fabam and Fest. The ritual ended with a litatio, that is, the inspection of the animal's entrails, and it was then followed by a meal. 95 9.7.mil.Rom.2). It appears that if a worshipper could not afford to sacrifice something that was itself tasty, he might fulfill his obligation by giving something that evoked the idea of it.Footnote One can also pollucere grain, wine, oil, cheese, meat, fish with scales, a host of other food items, and even unidentified (and presumably inedible) goods.Footnote In this section, I make the case that the related and equally widespread notion that all Roman rituals that required the death of an animal were sacrifices obfuscates the variety of rituals that Romans had available to them, effacing some of the fine distinctions Romans made about the ways they approached their gods. 45 36 Although there is some evidence for Roman consumption of dog in the form of canine skeletons with butchery marks (e.g., De Grossi Mazzorin and Tagliacozzo Reference De Grossi Mazzorin and Tagliacozzo1997: 4378), there is no evidence that dogs were raised for meat production (MacKinnon Reference MacKinnon2004: 74). 47 59 Although much work in anthropology and other social sciences has debated the relative merits of emic versus etic approaches, I find most useful recent research that has highlighted the value of the dynamic interplay that can develop between them.Footnote Hemina fr. 3, 13456; Prescendi Reference Prescendi2007: 1225; Rpke Reference Rpke and Gordon2007: 1378. the ritual began with a procession that was followed by a praefatio, a preliminary offering of prayers, wine and incense. 37 8 74 mactus; Serv., A. Knives would have been used only in conjunction with one or other of these implements. This study argues, however, that the apparent continuity is illusory in some important ways and that we have lost sight of some fine distinctions that the Romans made among the rituals they performed. 26 hasContentIssue true, Copyright The Author(s) 2016. 6.34. and for front limbs.Footnote 31. By placing this variety of rites that the Romans had under the single rubric of sacrifice, we have lost sight of some of the complexity and nuance of Roman ritual life. favisae. This line of interpretation has enjoyed a wider influence in the study of Classical Antiquity than work along the lines of Burkert Reference Burkert and Bing1983 and Girard Reference Girard and Gregory1977, and the bibliography is enormous. Plaut., Amph. Greek influences on Italian craftsmen in the 6 th century BC saw the image of Aeacus holds the keys to Hades. 50 Plaut., Stich. A wider range of scholarly approaches is presented by McClymond Reference McClymond2008: 124. Some more support for the notion that these were not interchangeable can be drawn from material evidence, visual representations of the moment of ritual slaughter. Thus the most likely reading of the passage in Pliny is that Curius sacrificed the guttum faginum to the gods. 87 The prevalence of Roman images of sacrificial victims standing before the altar, that is, of the instant before mola salsa is sprinkled on them, is due to the importance of that moment. van Straten has offered a stronger explanation: the absence of slaughter scenes in Greek art is due to a lack of interest in this particular aspect of sacrifice on the part of those Greeks whose religious beliefs are reflected in this material, shall we say, the common people of the Classical period.Footnote 2 Plu., RQ 83=Mor. Devotio is primarily a form of vow that is, ideally, followed by a death (si is homo qui devotus est moritur, probe factum videri (Liv. WebWhile both civilizations left astonishing changes in the world, the developments made by Greek thinkers outdo those of the Aztecs when evaluating their creation of a prosperous 44 Aldrete Reference Aldrete2014: 32. For example, Ares is the Greek They were rewarded for their endeavors with the position of judge in the Underworld. e.g., Martens Reference Martens2004 and Lentacker, Ervynck and Van Neer Reference Lentacker, Ervynck, Van Neer, Martens and De Boe2004 on a mithraeum at Tienen in Belgium, King Reference King2005 on Roman Britain, and the various contributions to Lepetz and Van Andringa Reference Lepetz and van Andringa2008 on Roman Gaul. There are many other non-meat sacrifices the Romans could offer. 50, From all this, it is reasonable to conclude that the poor could substitute small vessels for more expensive, edible sacrificial offerings. This draws further support from the fact that the object referred to by the instrumental ablatives that accompany the verb sacrificare is almost never a knife, an axe, a hammer, or other weapon.Footnote Once we have recognized that there are two notions of sacrifice at play, we can set aside our etic, outsider ideas for the moment and look at the Roman sources anew. One does, however, sacrifice with a cow, with a pig, or with a little cruet. Ioppolo Reference Ioppolo1972; Tagliacozzo Reference Tagliacozzo1989. Curius Dentatus, famous for his victory over Pyrrhus in 275 b.c.e. ex Fest. The catinus is a piece of everyday ware used to serve food that contains a lot of liquid (L. 5.120). He stresses the traditional nature of the burial of the one Vestal with the phrase as is the custom (uti mos est) and describes her death in neutral terms (necare).Footnote The elder Cato instructs his reader to pollucere a cup of wine and a daps (ritual meal) to Jupiter Dapalis (Agr. Goats: Var., R. 1.2.19; Liv. Vuli, Hrvoje Significant exceptions to this rule in the study of Roman sacrifice are the treatment of the sacrifice of wheat and wine in Scheid Reference Scheid2012 and the argument for the increased popularity of vegetal sacrifice in Late Antiquity advanced by Elsner Reference Elsner2012. It is entirely possible that the search for a single, critical moment where a change from profane to sacred occurs is, in fact, a modern preoccupation. Feature Flags: { Yet to limit the consideration of immolatio to the moment of killing is to overlook the other actions (running a knife along the animal's back, cutting a few hairs from it) that Scheid has identified as being part of that stage of sacrificium Greek There is also a queen of gods in Greek and Roman mythologies. WebOn the whole, political development in Greece followed a pattern: first the rule of kings, found as early as the period of Mycenaean civilization; then a feudal period, the The small size of the guttus and simpulum is assured by Varro (L. 5.124), who identifies both as vessels that pour out liquid minutatim. 4.57. Greek and Roman Art and Architecture Scheid's reconstruction focuses on a living victim, and this is in keeping with the ancient sources own emphasis on blood sacrifice. WebOne major difference between Greek and Roman religion and Christianity is their understanding of the concept of deity. Comparative mythology - Wikipedia Among these criteria are a clear preference for specific parts of an animal or for animals of a specific age/sex/species, unusual butchery patterns, burning or other alterations to the remains, and the association of the remains with other material (e.g., votive offerings) linked to ritual activity. 08 June 2016. 1996: The Oxford Classical Dictionary (3rd edn), Oxford. 93L, s.v. Bottom line: The Greeks tended towards greater personification of their gods; the Romans tended towards their religion being a series of quid pro quo transactions with uncovered in votive deposits throughout Italy. Sic factum ut Libero patri, repertori vitis, hirci immolarentur, proinde ut capite darent poenas; contra ut Minervae caprini generis nihil immolarent propter oleam, quod eam quam laeserit fieri dicunt sterilem (And so therefore, it has been established by opposing justifications that victims of the caprine sort are brought to the altar of one deity, but they are not sacrificed at the altar of another, since on account of the same hatred, one does not want to see a goat and the other desires to see one perish. For the Greeks Main Differences Between Romans and Greeks Romans appeared in history from 753 BC to 1453 while the Greeks thrived from 7000 BC (Neolithic Greeks) to 146 BC. The present study argues that looking at the relationship between sacrificium as it is presented in Roman sources and comparing that with modern notions of sacrifice reveals that some important, specific aspects of what has been conceived of as Roman sacrifice are not there in the ancient sources and may not be part of how the Romans perceived their ritual. There is a small amount of evidence for a form of auspicium performed with beans: Fest. Of the various forms of ritual killing that were part of their religious experience, the Romans only reacted with disgust to that form they identified as human sacrifice, a distinction in value sometimes lost when all these ritual forms are grouped together under the rubric sacrifice.Footnote 56 Nor was it secular, capital punishment; the punishment of criminals usually took a more direct and swift form: strangulation, beating, crucifixion, or precipitation (i.e., throwing someone off a cliff).Footnote In addition, the acceptability of miniature serveware as objects of sacrificium shows the ability of the ritual to accommodate the varying social status of those performing it. differences between 19 14 Furthermore, although all of these rites were performed on foodstuffs at altars or at least in sanctuaries, there are some critical differences among them and the ways they are discussed by the Romans. WebThe ancient Greeks and Romans performed many rituals in the observance of their religion. How, if these animals did not make desirable entrees, could they be considered suitable for sacrifice? 41 Tagliacozzo Reference Tagliacozzo1989: 66. Of these, three-fourths come from the first and second centuries c.e. 344L, s.v. pecunia sacrificium makes clear that, despite its name, this ritual did not involve money. Scheid Reference Scheid2005: 1002; Reference Scheid2012: 84. Magmentum also appears in two imperial leges sacrae pertaining to the observance of the Imperial cult preserved in inscriptions found in the Roman colonies of Salona in Dalmatia (CIL 3.1933, dated to 137 c.e.) In contrast, as I have pointed out, Livy uses the language of sacrifice to describe the second interment and in the next breath expressly distances Roman tradition from it, calling it a rite scarcely Roman (minime Romano sacro). Greeks call the queen Hera, whereas Romans queen of gods is Juno. Although they are universally referred to as votive offerings in the scholarly literature, it is possible that they are, technically, sacrifices. Art historians have debated whether the choice to encapsulate the entirety of sacrificial experience in a scene of libation rather than a scene of animal slaughter (or vice versa) may tell us something about what was being emphasized as significant about sacrifice at that time or context.Footnote 23 Far less common in the S. Omobono collection, but still present in significant amounts, is a range of animals that do not seem to have formed a regular part of the Roman diet, such as deer, a beaver, lizards, a tortoise, and several puppies.Footnote most famously those of Burkert, who identifies sacrificial slaughter as the basic experience of the sacred, and Girard, who begins his investigation into the origin of sacrifice by asserting its close kinship to murder and criminal violence.Footnote WebRoman sacrificial practices were not functionally different from Greek, although the Roman rite was distinguishable from the Greek and Etruscan. Devotio is frequently called self-sacrifice by modern scholars,Footnote 132.12). [1] Comparative mythology has served a This repeated coincidence of ritual performances suggests that the two forms of ritual killingFootnote WebFor example, the Peloponnesian War was primarily a struggle between two Greek city-states, Athens and Sparta, and was fought mainly on land and sea within the Greek world. Although there is substantial evidence for other types of sacrificial offerings in the literary sources (see below, Section III), Roman authors do not discuss them at length, preferring instead to talk about grand public sacrifices of multiple animal victims. Most houses are of wattle and daub construction, but the shrine rooms of the more wealthy are walled with stone. a more expensive offering that dominates in literary accounts of sacrifice. 413=Macr., Sat. From this same root also derives the name for the mixture sprinkled on the animal before it was killed, mola salsa.Footnote nor does any Roman author ever express any sort of discomfort with this rite akin to Livy's shrinking back from the sacrifice of Gauls and Greeks. Those poor Nacirema, who despise their physical form and try to improve it through ritual and ceremony, at first seem so different from us: primitive, superstitious, unsophisticated. Thinking along the same lines, it is reasonable to conclude that there are relatively few images of slaughter among Roman sacrificial scenes in public artwork of the Classical period because the emphasis in state-sponsored sacrifice lay elsewhere. Roman Gods vs. Greek Gods: Know the Difference We also find that the gods were open to receiving sacrifices of vegetables, grains, liquids, and, when those were not available, miniature versions of the serveware that would normally have contained them. Interim ex fatalibus libris sacrificia aliquot extraordinaria facta, inter quae Gallus et Galla, Graecus et Graeca in foro boario sub terram vivi demissi sunt in locum saxo consaeptum, iam ante hostiis humanis, minime Romano sacro, imbutum. All of this indicates a certain flexibility and elasticity in the ritual of sacrificium that suggests, especially if a similar flexibility could be demonstrated in other ritual forms, a need to moderate the emphasis both ancient and modern on the orthopractic nature of Roman religion. As proof, he recounts a story about M. The database is a very useful, but not infallible tool. and indeed it certainly fits the modern notion of an act by which one suffers great loss for the benefit of others. It is also clear from literary sources that on a handful of occasions, including instances well within the historical period, the Roman state sacrificed human victims to the gods, a topic we shall address more fully later on. to the fourth century c.e. In the sacred realm, Romans could also pollucere a tithe to the god Hercules.Footnote 2019. Contra Prescendi Reference Prescendi2007: 223. Livy's abhorrence of the Romans action is in line with other Roman authors disgust at the performance of sacrificium on humans by other ethnic groups, especially Carthaginians and Gauls.Footnote 24 22.57.26, discussed also in Schultz Reference Schultz2012: 1267. Another possible interpretation of the disappearance of some rituals from Latin literature is that the Romans no longer thought of them as distinct from one another, preferring to treat them all as sacrificium. The Gods in Greek and Roman mythology, while initially having almost no differentiation (we could easily lose in the Spot the difference game), yet started slowly being more dependent on the civilization where they were worshiped. e.g., J. Scheid, s.v. Further support for the idea that the act of sprinkling mola salsa was either the single, critical moment or an especially important moment in a process that transferred the animal to the divine realm, is that mola salsa seems to be the only major element of sacrifice that is not documented explicitly by a Roman source as appearing in any other ritual or in any other area of daily life: processions, libations, prayers, slaughter, and dining all occurred in non-sacrificial contexts.Footnote It is understandable that, from the etic viewpoint, two rituals performed in roughly the same way should appear to be identical to each other, even if emic accounts distinguish between them. 75 Footnote Fontes, Lus You would do well to remember that there were very few similarities between Roman and Greek religion until the Romans began borrowing from the Gree It is the only one of these terms that does not come to be used outside the realm of the divine. At the centre of the whole complex was the immolatio, during which the animal was sprinkled with mola salsa (a mixture of spelt and salt), the flat of a knife was run along its back, and then it was slaughtered. Test. 69 ex. The only inedible items that we know from literary sources were objects of sacrificium are all miniature versions of regular, everyday serveware: a cruet, a plate, and a ladle. 63 Subjects. The prominence of animal victims in Roman accounts overshadows a substantial number of passages that make it absolutely clear that Roman gods received sacrifices of inanimate edibles.

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