1. Cicero, On The Nature of The Gods, 3.46 (2nd cent. BCE - 1st cent. BCE)
| 3.46. Is not the explanation this, that divine honours are paid to men's virtues, not to their immortality? as you too, Balbus, appeared to indicate. Then, if you think Latona a goddess, how can you not think that Hecate is one, who is the daughter of Latona's sister Asteria? Is Hecate a goddess too? we have seen altars and shrines belonging to her in Greece. But if Hecate is a goddess, why are not the Eumenides? and if they are goddesses, — and they have a temple at Athens, and the Grove ofurina at Rome, if I interpret that name aright, also belongs to them, — then the Furies are goddesses, presumably in their capacity of detectors and avengerss of crime and wickedness. |
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2. Cicero, Pro Flacco, 69 (2nd cent. BCE - 1st cent. BCE)
| 69. ratio constat, aurum in aerario est; furtum non reprehenditur, invidia quaeritur; a iudicibus oratio avertitur, vox in coronam turbamque effunditur. Sua cuique civitati religio, Laeli, est, nostra nobis. stantibus Hierosolymis pacatisque Iudaeis tamen istorum religio sacrorum a splendore huius imperi, gravitate nominis nostri, maiorum institutis abhorrebat; nunc vero hoc magis, quod illa gens quid de nostro imperio sentiret ostendit armis; quam cara dis immortalibus esset docuit, quod est victa, quod elocata, quod serva facta. | |
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3. Catullus, Poems, 63 (1st cent. BCE - 1st cent. BCE)
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4. Dionysius of Halycarnassus, Roman Antiquities, 2.19, 2.19.4 (1st cent. BCE - 1st cent. BCE)
| 2.19. 1. Indeed, there is no tradition among the Romans either of Caelus being castrated by his own sons or of Saturn destroying his own offspring to secure himself from their attempts or of Jupiter dethroning Saturn and confining his own father in the dungeon of Tartarus, or, indeed, of wars, wounds, or bonds of the gods, or of their servitude among men.,2. And no festival is observed among them as a day of mourning or by the wearing of black garments and the beating of breasts and the lamentations of women because of the disappearance of deities, such as the Greeks perform in commemorating the rape of Persephonê and the adventures of Dionysus and all the other things of like nature. And one will see among them, even though their manners are now corrupted, no ecstatic transports, no Corybantic frenzies, no begging under the colour of religion, no bacchanals or secret mysteries, no all-night vigils of men and women together in the temples, nor any other mummery of this kind; but alike in all their words and actions with respect to the gods a reverence is shown such as is seen among neither Greeks nor barbarians.,3. And, â the thing which I myself have marvelled at most, â notwithstanding the influx into Rome of innumerable nations which are under every necessity of worshipping their ancestral gods according to the customs of their respective countries, yet the city has never officially adopted any of those foreign practices, as has been the experience of many cities in the past; but, even though she has, in pursuance of oracles, introduced certain rites from abroad, she celebrates them in accordance with her own traditions, after banishing all fabulous clap-trap. The rites of the Idaean goddess are a case in point;,4. for the praetors perform sacrifices and celebrated games in her honour every year according to the Roman customs, but the priest and priestess of the goddess are Phrygians, and it is they who carry her image in procession through the city, begging alms in her name according to their custom, and wearing figures upon their breasts and striking their timbrels while their followers play tunes upon their flutes in honour of the Mother of the Gods.,5. But by a law and decree of the senate no native Roman walks in procession through the city arrayed in a parti-coloured robe, begging alms or escorted by flute-players, or worships the god with the Phrygian ceremonies. So cautious are they about admitting any foreign religious customs and so great is their aversion to all pompous display that is wanting in decorum. 2.19.4. for the praetors perform sacrifices and celebrated games in her honour every year according to the Roman customs, but the priest and priestess of the goddess are Phrygians, and it is they who carry her image in procession through the city, begging alms in her name according to their custom, and wearing figures upon their breasts and striking their timbrels while their followers play tunes upon their flutes in honour of the Mother of the Gods. |
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5. Livy, History, 5.15.10-5.15.11, 10.47.7, 29.10.4-29.10.5, 29.10.7-29.10.8, 29.11.8, 29.14.5-29.14.14, 36.36.4, 38.18.9, 39.8-39.19, 42.28.12 (1st cent. BCE - 1st cent. BCE)
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6. Lucretius Carus, On The Nature of Things, 2.610-2.628 (1st cent. BCE - 1st cent. BCE)
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7. Ovid, Fasti, 4.193-4.244, 4.247-4.348 (1st cent. BCE - 1st cent. CE)
| 4.193. ‘Nurslings of Helicon, mindful of her orders, reveal 4.194. Why the Great Goddess delights in continual din.’ 4.195. So I spoke. And Erato replied (it fell to her to speak about 4.196. Venus’ month, because her name derives from tender love): 4.197. ‘Saturn was granted this prophecy: “Noblest of kings 4.198. You’ll be ousted by your own son’s sceptre.” 4.199. The god, fearful, devoured his children as soon a 4.200. Born, and then retained them deep in his guts. 4.201. often Rhea (Cybele) complained, at being so often pregt 4.202. Yet never a mother, and grieved at her own fruitfulness. 4.203. Then Jupiter was born (ancient testimony is credited 4.204. By most: so please don’t disturb the accepted belief): 4.205. A stone, concealed in clothing, went down Saturn’s throat 4.206. So the great progenitor was deceived by the fates. 4.207. Now steep Ida echoed to a jingling music 4.208. So the child might cry from its infant mouth, in safety. 4.209. Some beat shields with sticks, others empty helmets: 4.210. That was the Curetes’ and the Corybantes’ task. 4.211. The thing was hidden, and the ancient deed’s still acted out: 4.212. The goddess’s servants strike the bronze and sounding skins. 4.213. They beat cymbals for helmets, drums instead of shields: 4.214. The flute plays, as long ago, in the Phrygian mode.’ 4.215. The goddess ceased. I began: ‘Why do fierce lion 4.216. Yield untamed necks to the curving yoke for her?’ 4.217. I ceased. The goddess began: ‘It’s thought their ferocity 4.218. Was first tamed by her: the testament to it’s her chariot.’ 4.219. ‘But why is her head weighed down by a turreted crown? 4.220. Is it because she granted towers to the first cities?’ 4.221. She nodded. I said ‘Where did this urge to cut off 4.222. Their members come from?’ As I ended, the Muse spoke: 4.223. ‘In the woods, a Phrygian boy, Attis, of handsome face 4.224. Won the tower-bearing goddess with his chaste passion. 4.225. She desired him to serve her, and protect her temple 4.226. And said: “Wish, you might be a boy for ever.” 4.227. He promised to be true, and said: “If I’m lying 4.228. May the love I fail in be my last love.” 4.229. He did fail, and in meeting the nymph Sagaritis 4.230. Abandoned what he was: the goddess, angered, avenged it. 4.231. She destroyed the Naiad, by wounding a tree 4.232. Since the tree contained the Naiad’s fate. 4.233. Attis was maddened, and thinking his chamber’s roof 4.234. Was falling, fled for the summit of Mount Dindymus. 4.235. Now he cried: “Remove the torches”, now he cried: 4.236. “Take the whips away”: often swearing he saw the Furies. 4.237. He tore at his body too with a sharp stone 4.238. And dragged his long hair in the filthy dust 4.239. Shouting: “I deserved this! I pay the due penalty 4.240. In blood! Ah! Let the parts that harmed me, perish! 4.241. Let them perish!” cutting away the burden of his groin 4.242. And suddenly bereft of every mark of manhood. 4.243. His madness set a precedent, and his unmanly servant 4.244. Toss their hair, and cut off their members as if worthless.’ 4.247. ‘Guide of my work, I beg you, teach me also, where She 4.248. Was brought from. Was she always resident in our City? 4.249. ‘The Mother Goddess always loved Dindymus, Cybele 4.250. And Ida, with its pleasant streams, and the Trojan realm: 4.251. And when Aeneas brought Troy to Italian fields, the godde 4.252. Almost followed those ships that carried the sacred relics. 4.253. But she felt that fate didn’t require her powers in Latium 4.254. So she stayed behind in her long-accustomed place. 4.255. Later, when Rome was more than five centuries old 4.256. And had lifted its head above the conquered world 4.257. The priest consulted the fateful words of Euboean prophecy: 4.258. They say that what he found there was as follows: 4.259. ‘The Mother’s absent: Roman, I command you: seek the Mother. 4.260. When she arrives, she must be received in chaste hands.’ 4.261. The dark oracle’s ambiguity set the senators puzzling 4.262. As to who that parent might be, and where to seek her. 4.263. Apollo was consulted, and replied: ‘Fetch the Mother 4.264. of all the Gods, who you’ll find there on Mount Ida.’ 4.265. Noblemen were sent. Attalus at that time held 4.266. The Phrygian sceptre: he refused the Italian lords. 4.267. Marvellous to tell, the earth shook with long murmurs 4.268. And the goddess, from her shrine, spoke as follows: 4.269. ‘I myself wished them to seek me: don’t delay: send me 4.270. Willingly. Rome is a worthy place for all divinities.’ 4.271. Quaking with fear at her words, Attalus, said: ‘Go 4.272. You’ll still be ours: Rome claims Phrygian ancestry.’ 4.273. Immediately countless axes felled the pine-tree 4.274. Those trees pious Aeneas employed for his flight: 4.275. A thousand hands work, and the heavenly Mother 4.276. Soon has a hollow ship, painted in fiery colours. 4.277. She’s carried in perfect safety over her son’s waves 4.278. And reaches the long strait named for Phrixus’ sister 4.279. Passes fierce Rhoetum and the Sigean shore 4.280. And Tenedos and Eetion’s ancient kingdom. 4.281. Leaving Lesbos behind she then steered for the Cyclades 4.282. And the waves that break on Euboea’s Carystian shoals. 4.283. She passed the Icarian Sea, as well, where Icarus shed 4.284. His melting wings, giving his name to a vast tract of water. 4.285. Then leaving Crete to larboard, and the Pelopian wave 4.286. To starboard, she headed for Cythera, sacred to Venus. 4.287. From there to the Sicilian Sea, where Brontes, Sterope 4.288. And Aemonides forge their red-hot iron 4.289. Then, skirting African waters, she saw the Sardinian 4.290. Realm behind to larboard, and reached our Italy. 4.291. She’d arrived at the mouth (ostia) where the Tiber divide 4.292. To meet the deep, and flows with a wider sweep: 4.293. All the Knights, grave Senators, and commoners 4.294. Came to meet her at the mouth of the Tuscan river. 4.295. With them walked mothers, daughters, and brides 4.296. And all those virgins who tend the sacred fires. 4.297. The men wearied their arms hauling hard on the ropes: 4.298. The foreign vessel barely made way against the stream. 4.299. For a long time there’d been a drought: the grass was dry 4.300. And scorched: the boat stuck fast in the muddy shallows. 4.301. Every man, hauling, laboured beyond his strength 4.302. And encouraged their toiling hands with his cries. 4.303. Yet the ship lodged there, like an island fixed in mid-ocean: 4.304. And astonished at the portent, men stood and quaked. 4.305. Claudia Quinta traced her descent from noble Clausus 4.306. And her beauty was in no way unequal to her nobility: 4.307. She was chaste, but not believed so: hostile rumour 4.308. Had wounded her, false charges were levelled at her: 4.309. Her elegance, promenading around in various hairstyles 4.310. And her ready tongue, with stiff old men, counted against her. 4.311. Conscious of virtue, she laughed at the rumoured lies 4.312. But we’re always ready to credit others with faults. 4.313. Now, when she’d stepped from the line of chaste women 4.314. Taking pure river water in her hands, she wetted her head 4.315. Three times, three times lifted her palms to the sky 4.316. (Everyone watching her thought she’d lost her mind) 4.317. Then, kneeling, fixed her eyes on the goddess’s statue 4.318. And, with loosened hair, uttered these words: 4.319. “ Kind and fruitful Mother of the Gods, accept 4.320. A suppliant’s prayers, on this one condition: 4.321. They deny I’m chaste: let me be guilty if you condemn me: 4.322. Convicted by a goddess I’ll pay for it with my life. 4.323. But if I’m free of guilt, grant a pledge of my innocence 4.324. By your action: and, chaste, give way to my chaste hands.” 4.325. She spoke: then gave a slight pull at the rope 4.326. (A wonder, but the sacred drama attests what I say): 4.327. The goddess stirred, followed, and, following, approved her: 4.328. Witness the sound of jubilation carried to the stars. 4.329. They came to a bend in the river (called of old 4.330. The Halls of Tiber): there the stream turns left, ascending. 4.331. Night fell: they tied the rope to an oak stump 4.332. And, having eaten, settled to a tranquil sleep. 4.333. Dawn rose: they loosed the rope from the oak stump 4.334. After first laying a fire and offering incense 4.335. And crowned the stern, and sacrificed a heifer 4.336. Free of blemish, that had never known yoke or bull. 4.337. There’s a place where smooth-flowing Almo joins the Tiber 4.338. And the lesser flow loses its name in the greater: 4.339. There, a white-headed priest in purple robe 4.340. Washed the Lady, and sacred relics, in Almo’s water. 4.341. The attendants howled, and the mad flutes blew 4.342. And soft hands beat at the bull’s-hide drums. 4.343. Claudia walked in front with a joyful face 4.344. Her chastity proven by the goddess’s testimony: 4.345. The goddess herself, sitting in a cart, entered the Capene Gate: 4.346. Fresh flowers were scattered over the yoked oxen. 4.347. Nasica received her. The name of her temple’s founder is lost: 4.348. Augustus has re-dedicated it, and, before him, Metellus.’ |
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8. Strabo, Geography, 12.5.3 (1st cent. BCE - 1st cent. BCE)
| 12.5.3. Pessinus is the greatest of the emporiums in that part of the world, containing a sanctuary of the Mother of the Gods, which is an object of great veneration. They call her Agdistis. The priests were in ancient times potentates, I might call them, who reaped the fruits of a great priesthood, but at present the prerogatives of these have been much reduced, although the emporium still endures. The sacred precinct has been built up by the Attalic kings in a manner befitting a holy place, with a sanctuary and also with porticos of white marble. The Romans made the sanctuary famous when, in accordance with oracles of the Sibyl, they sent for the statue of the goddess there, just as they did in the case of that of Asclepius at Epidaurus. There is also a mountain situated above the city, Dindymum, after which the country Dindymene was named, just as Cybele was named after Cybela. Near by, also, flows the Sangarius River; and on this river are the ancient habitations of the Phrygians, of Midas, and of Gordius, who lived even before his time, and of certain others, — habitations which preserve not even traces of cities, but are only villages slightly larger than the others, for instance, Gordium and Gorbeus, the royal residence of Castor the son of Saocondarius, where Deiotarus, Castor's father-in-law, slew him and his own daughter. And he pulled down the fortress and ruined most of the settlement. |
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9. Vergil, Aeneis, 7.324-7.327 (1st cent. BCE - 1st cent. BCE)
| 7.324. his daughter dear. He argues in his mind 7.325. the oracle of Faunus:—might this be 7.326. that destined bridegroom from an alien land 7.327. to share his throne, to get a progeny |
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10. Juvenal, Satires, 6.512-6.516 (1st cent. CE - 2nd cent. CE)
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11. Plutarch, Lysander, 11.7, 18.3-18.4 (1st cent. CE - 2nd cent. CE)
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12. Arnobius, Against The Gentiles, 7.49 (3rd cent. CE - 4th cent. CE)
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13. Ammianus Marcellinus, History, 22.9.5-22.9.7 (4th cent. CE - 4th cent. CE)
| 22.9.7. for some have maintained that since the image of the goddess fell from heaven, the city was named from πεσεῖν, which is the Greek word meaning to fall. Others say that Ilus, son of Tros, king of Dardania, Herodian, i. 11, 1. gave the place that name. But Theopompus of Chios, a pupil of Isocrates, and a rhetorician and historian. His works are lost. asserts that it was not Ilus who did it, but Midas, According to Diod. Sic. (iii. 59, 8), he was the first to build a splendid temple to Cybele at Pessinus. the once mighty king of Phrygia. |
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14. Augustine, The City of God, 2.14 (4th cent. CE - 5th cent. CE)
| 2.14. We have still to inquire why the poets who write the plays, and who by the law of the twelve tables are prohibited from injuring the good name of the citizens, are reckoned more estimable than the actors, though they so shamefully asperse the character of the gods? Is it right that the actors of these poetical and God-dishonoring effusions be branded, while their authors are honored? Must we not here award the palm to a Greek, Plato, who, in framing his ideal republic, conceived that poets should be banished from the city as enemies of the state? He could not brook that the gods be brought into disrepute, nor that the minds of the citizens be depraved and besotted, by the fictions of the poets. Compare now human nature as you see it in Plato, expelling poets from the city that the citizens be uninjured, with the divine nature as you see it in these gods exacting plays in their own honor. Plato strove, though unsuccessfully, to persuade the light-minded and lascivious Greeks to abstain from so much as writing such plays; the gods used their authority to extort the acting of the same from the dignified and sober-minded Romans. And not content with having them acted, they had them dedicated to themselves, consecrated to themselves, solemnly celebrated in their own honor. To which, then, would it be more becoming in a state to decree divine honors - to Plato, who prohibited these wicked and licentious plays, or to the demons who delighted in blinding men to the truth of what Plato unsuccessfully sought to inculcate? This philosopher, Plato, has been elevated by Labeo to the rank of a demigod, and set thus upon a level with such as Hercules and Romulus. Labeo ranks demigods higher than heroes, but both he counts among the deities. But I have no doubt that he thinks this man whom he reckons a demigod worthy of greater respect not only than the heroes, but also than the gods themselves. The laws of the Romans and the speculations of Plato have this resemblance, that the latter pronounce a wholesale condemnation of poetical fictions, while the former restrain the license of satire, at least so far as men are the objects of it. Plato will not suffer poets even to dwell in his city: the laws of Rome prohibit actors from being enrolled as citizens; and if they had not feared to offend the gods who had asked the services of the players, they would in all likelihood have banished them altogether. It is obvious, therefore, that the Romans could not receive, nor reasonably expect to receive, laws for the regulation of their conduct from their gods, since the laws they themselves enacted far surpassed and put to shame the morality of the gods. The gods demand stageplays in their own honor; the Romans exclude the players from all civic honors; the former commanded that they should be celebrated by the scenic representation of their own disgrace; the latter commanded that no poet should dare to blemish the reputation of any citizen. But that demigod Plato resisted the lust of such gods as these, and showed the Romans what their genius had left incomplete; for he absolutely excluded poets from his ideal state, whether they composed fictions with no regard to truth, or set the worst possible examples before wretched men under the guise of divine actions. We for our part, indeed, reckon Plato neither a god nor a demigod; we would not even compare him to any of God's holy angels; nor to the truth-speaking prophets, nor to any of the apostles or martyrs of Christ, nay, not to any faithful Christian man. The reason of this opinion of ours we will, God prospering us, render in its own place. Nevertheless, since they wish him to be considered a demigod, we think he certainly is more entitled to that rank, and is every way superior, if not to Hercules and Romulus (though no historian could ever narrate nor any poet sing of him that he had killed his brother, or committed any crime), yet certainly to Priapus, or a Cynocephalus, or the Fever, - divinities whom the Romans have partly received from foreigners, and partly consecrated by home-grown rites. How, then, could gods such as these be expected to promulgate good and wholesome laws, either for the prevention of moral and social evils, or for their eradication where they had already sprung up?- gods who used their influence even to sow and cherish profligacy, by appointing that deeds truly or falsely ascribed to them should be published to the people by means of theatrical exhibitions, and by thus gratuitously fanning the flame of human lust with the breath of a seemingly divine approbation. In vain does Cicero, speaking of poets, exclaim against this state of things in these words: When the plaudits and acclamation of the people, who sit as infallible judges, are won by the poets, what darkness benights the mind, what fears invade, what passions inflame it! |
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15. Epigraphy, Ils, 18
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