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the roman sun: symbolic variation in ancient solar - UvA-DARE
the roman sun: symbolic variation in ancient solar - UvA-DARE

chasing the sun - University of Canterbury
chasing the sun - University of Canterbury

... intermingle. As a powerful and visible divine being, the sun was sometimes associated with other deities, and thus Sol was often present in their myths and visual representations. Finally, the aim of this chapter is to set the scene for a discussion of solar iconography in the 3 rd century, and to e ...
Introduction
Introduction

... He had to adapt his hero such that he would be an exemplum of contemporary Roman ideals and morals; a man who had grown from the more primitive heroic code of the Homeric epics into a more modern Augustan hero. In addition to Homer, Virgil also made use of many of his other literary predecessors, Gr ...
Introduction
Introduction

... He had to adapt his hero such that he would be an exemplum of contemporary Roman ideals and morals; a man who had grown from the more primitive heroic code of the Homeric epics into a more modern Augustan hero. In addition to Homer, Virgil also made use of many of his other literary predecessors, Gr ...

Di indigetes

In Georg Wissowa's terminology, the di indigetes or indigites were Roman deities not adopted from other religions, as distinguished from the di novensides. Wissowa thus regarded the indigetes as ""indigenous"" gods, and the novensides as ""newcomer gods"". Ancient usage, however, does not treat the two terms as a dichotomy, nor maintain this clear-cut distinction. Wissowa's interpretation is no longer widely accepted and the meaning remains uncertain.In classical Latin, the epithet Indiges, singular in form, is applied to Sol (Sol Indiges) and to Jupiter of Lavinium, later identified with Aeneas. One theory holds that it means the ""speaker within"", and goes back to before the recognition of divine persons. Another, which the Oxford Classical Dictionary holds more likely, is that it means ""invoked"" in the sense of ""pointing to"", as in the related word indigitamenta.In Augustan literature, the di indigites are often associated with di patrii and appear in lists of local divinities (that is, divinities particular to a place). Servius notes that Praeneste had its own indigetes.Evidence pertaining to di indigites is rarely found outside Rome and Lavinium, but a fragmentary inscription from Aletrium (modern Alatri, north of Frosinone) records offerings to di Indicites including Fucinus, a local lake-god; Summanus, a god of nocturnal lightning; Fiscellus, otherwise unknown, but perhaps a local mountain god; and the Tempestates, weather deities. The inscription has been interpreted as a list of local or nature deities to whom transhumant shepherds should make propitiary offers.Wissowa listed 33 di indigetes, including two collectives in the plural, the Lares of the estate and the Lemures of the dead. Any list of indigetes, however, is conjectural; Raimo Anttila points out that ""we do not know the list of the di indigetes.""