Download Roman Mythology - 43-491-spring08-rome

OVtline of Presentation
Section A. Fundamentals
I – Introduction
II –Di Indigentes
III – The Greek Influences
Section B. Further Detail
IV – Daily life And Religion
V – Art and Architecture*
VI – Discussion of texts
VII – Conclusion
*Online Component Only
Part I. IntrodVction
• What is Mythology?
• Roman vs. Greek? What has been lost? Why?
• Fundamental Concepts:
– Native Gods vs. Adopted Gods
– What is important to the Romans?
– What is the influence on the daily life of an
average Roman?
What is Mythology?
The study, analysis, and interpretation of the
collected myths of a society and how they
relate back to the core values of the culture.
What are Myths?
• Tells a traditional story
• involving supernatural beings or forces
(not always)
• embodies and provides an explanation for
something such as
– the early history of a society
– a religious belief or ritual
– a natural phenomenon
– (a cultural\moral allegory)
Why StVdy Myths?
• Provide a new perspective on the culture
• Highlights the values and demands of a
society
• Allows us to more accurately compare and
contrast different civilizations and their belief
systems
What are oVr SoVrces?
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Poetry and Epic Poetry
Art – Pottery\Frescos\Sculpture, etc.
Plays
Legal Documents
Historical Accounts from Roman Historians
Letters, Personal Documents
Basic Time Table
Four Significant Dates\Periods
8th Century BCE - Estruscan and Di Indigentes
1st Century BCE – Domination of Greek thought
325 CE – Constantine and the Council of Nicea
391 CE - Theodosius I declares Christianity as the
only acceptable religion.
Part II. di indigetes
di indigetes
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Translates from Latin to “speaker within”
Complex group of gods, goddesses, and spirits
Opposes the di novensides the “newcomer gods”
Primarily female – very few male indigenous gods
Indigenous male gods had positions of power
Abstractions of a particular quality or natural
form
• Georg Wissowa's terminology.
Who did they Serve?
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Early Romans: Agrarian Society
Also Bellicose; fond of fighting and war
Gods fit the daily needs of everyday life
Jupiter, ruler of the other deities and spirits,
was responsible for the rain
• Early Roman cult was not so much polytheistic
as polyspiritualistic
What were the
Roman gods like?
• little individuality
• personal histories lacked marriages and
genealogies
• Unlike the gods of the Greeks, they were not
considered to function in the manner of
mortals.
Who were the most
important Roman gods?
At the head of the earliest pantheon in Rome
was:
• Jupiter – Chief god, god of rain, lightning and
ruled over laws and social order
• Mars – god of vegetation and war
What does this tell us about early Roman
society?
What happened to the
early roman gods?
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Many survived!
Assimilated into developing Roman Mythos
Adopted various personalities
Connections made (where appropriate) to
comparable Greek gods
Imperial Roman Coins
• Honored the past might of Rome and her
religion
• Connected the current administration with
the past – emphasized its power
VirtVs
•helmeted
•right breast exposed
•standing left
•Victory symbol in right
hand
•left hand resting on shield
•spear against left arm
Represents:
Courage, Virtue
HONOS
• Holding Cornacopia
and olive branch
Represents:
chivalry, honor, military
justice
PVdicitia
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•
•
Veiled
Right hand on breast
Scepter in left hand
Represents:
Virtue, Chastity
JanVs
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Double head
Could see past and future
Doorways and gateways
Reversed Spear in one hand
Thunderbolt in other
“Janitor”
Represents:
Time/Ages
Part Iv. The Greek
INflVence
Why did it happen?
• More established and richer legacy of
stories of the gods
• More advanced architectural
treatment of temples and shrines
• More emphasis on the human form
and anatomy on their sculptures
What changed the most?
• The gods were personified and
organized into a geneology
• Temples and shrines, like the
pantheon were now more
architecturally complex
• The power of religion shifted away
from the individual family and into
the priest (flamen)
Part IV. Daily Life and
Religion
Primary Concerns
Pontifex Maximus
Pax Deorum
Daily Examples
The Cults
The Business World
Vestal Virgins
The Lararium at home
Pontifex MaxiMVs
•
The high priest of the
Ancient Roman College of
Pontiffs (bridgebuilders).
•
The pontifex maximus,
the Vestal Virgins, the Rex
Sacrorum, and the
flamines.
•
Augustus and later
emperors became the
religious leaders
Pax Deorvm
The Temple of Hercules Victor, in the Forum Boarium.
The Cvlts
•
Mystery cults offered their
adherents a very specific
vision of the nature of the
world
•
organization of cults was
highly specific.
•
The Cult of the Emperor
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The Cult of Isis
•
The Cult of Christianity
Divine Bvsiness
• immediately interrupted or postponed
• priest or a magistrate that he had seen
a flash of lighting or some other form
of divine disapproval
Sacerdos VEstalis
•
virgin holy female priests
of Vesta, the goddess of
the hearth.
•
The objects of the
Virgins were essentially
the hearth fire and pure
water drawn into a clay
vase.
•
Chosen between 6 and
10 years of age.
The Lararivm
•
sacred place of the
home where offerings
and prayers are made to
the Gods.
•
A private station to pray
to the “Lar”
•
Lar is Roman household
deity who protected the
land that the family lived
upon
The Lararivm
"Salve lar familiaris
(adoratio). Salvete Di
Penates (adoratio).
Salve Gen Patris
Familias.
Salve Vesta Mater.”
“It is so!”
Part V. Art, ArchitectVre
and Religion
Online Component
Check the Wiki page for some examples
of religion in art and architecture
Part VI. DiscVssion
Livy: The Rape of Lucretia
Sextus Tarquinius returned to the house of Conlatinus, with one of his
companions. He was well received and given the hospitality of the house,
and maddened with love, he waited until he was sure everyone else was
asleep.
"When I have killed you, I will put next to you the body of a nude servant,
and everyone will say that you were killed during a dishonorable act of
adultery.“
"how can anothing go well for a woman who has lost her honor? There are
the marks of another man in your bed, Conlatinus. My body is greatly
soiled, though my heart is still pure, as my death will prove.
"By this blood, which was so pure before the crime of the prince, I swear
before you, O gods, to chase the King Lucius Tarquinius Superbus, with
his criminal wife and all their offspring, by fire, iron, and all the methods I
have at my disposal, and never to tolerate Kings in Rome evermore,
whether of that family of any other."
Part VI. DiscVssion
Livy: The Rape of Lucretia, Page Two
"how can anything go well for a woman who has lost her
honor? There are the marks of another man in your bed,
Conlatinus. My body is greatly soiled, though my heart is still
pure, as my death will prove.
"By this blood, which was so pure before the crime of the
prince, I swear before you, O gods, to chase the King Lucius
Tarquinius Superbus, with his criminal wife and all their
offspring, by fire, iron, and all the methods I have at my
disposal, and never to tolerate Kings in Rome evermore,
whether of that family of any other."
Part VI. DiscVssion
Ovid: The Creation Myth
There was opposition in all things: hot conflicted with cold, wet with
dry, heavy with light, and hard with soft.
The earth he organized into five zones, the same number that exist in
heaven, which is divided into two regions on the right, two on the left,
and one in the center. On earth the middle zone is too hot for
habitation and the two outer zones are too cold, but between these
extremes the god created two temperate zones where heat and cold
are balanced.
Part VI. DiscVssion
Ovid: The Creation Myth
Jove was about to strike the earth with a barrage of thunderbolts
when he realized that the conflagration caused by such an attack
might threaten heaven itself, so he resolved to destroy the earth's
inhabitants by water instead of by fiery lightning. To this end he
fettered the North Wind, then charged the South Wind to bring
forth endless rains. Jove's brother Neptune, god of the seas,
caused the tides and the waves to rise upon the land and the rivers
to overflow their banks.
Creation comes about through the resolution of opposing forces.
Part VII. ConclVsion
Native Gods vs. Adopted Gods
What is important to the Romans?
What is the influence on the daily life of an average
Roman?