From Good Goddess to Vestal Virgins: Sex and Category in Roman Religion (32 page)

1. See Prop., 4.3.13; cf. Plut.,
   Quaest. Rom.,
   2.
   

2. Festus, p. 282 L.
   

108 Pliny,
H.N.,
16.30.75.

109 See Le Bonniec 1958:254. 110 Cic.,
Nat. D.,
2.24.62. 111 Cic., 2
Verr.,
5.14.36.

112 The most comprehensive account is Bruhl 1953.

113 Aug.,
de Civ. D.,
7.21. 114
Ibid.,
4.11.

1. See also
   ibid.,
   7.2. Augustine claims Varro as a source, and there is no reason to suspect his characterization of the cult. But see Piganiol
   ’
   s observations on Augustine and Varro. Piganiol 1923:16
   –
   17.
   

2. Ov.,
   Fast.,
   3.736
   et seq.
   

3. See also Varro,
   Ling.,
   6.3.14.
   

4. Ov.,
   Fast.,
   3.713
   et seq.
   

5. Ov.,
   Fast.,
   3.771
   et seq.;
   see also Cic.,
   Att.,
   9.6;
   ibid.,
   9.17;
   ibid.,
   

   9.19.
   

6. See e.g., Wiedemann 1989:113
   et seq.
   

7. In 529 AD Justinian abolished physical inspection of boys and fixed upon the end of the fourteenth year as the age at which a boy was legally considered to possess the capacity to father chil- dren, Corbett 1930:52. However, it is likely that the practice of physical inspection declined much earlier than this. See Gardner 1986:38. In cases where inspection did not take place, physical capacity for marriage was assumed at around fourteen years of age. See also Eyben (1972).
   

122 Pliny,
H.N.,
8.194.

123 Prop., 4.11.33.

124 The ceremony for Q.Cicero
’
s coming of age appears to have taken place in April. See Wiedemann 1989:86.

125 See App.,
B. Civ.,
4.5.30.

1. See p. 85.
   

2. See note 77, p. 175, with accompanying text.
   

3. Dion. Hal.,
   Ant. Rom.,
   1.33.1; Macrob.,
   Sat.,
   3.11.1
   –
   2. Signifi- cantly wine mixed with honey might be offered to Ceres,
   ibid.,
   

9. According to Cato, Ceres in her capacity as agricultural deity was offered wine, Cato,
Agr.
134. For the idea that Ceres was especially concerned with the chastity of wives in marriage see also Juv., 6.49
–
50.

129 Livy, 22.56.4
–
5; Plut.,
Fabius,
18.1
–
2; Val. Max., 1.1.15; Fes-

tus, p. 86 L.

130 See, conveniently, Le Bonniec 1958:400
et seq.

131 Ov.,
Met.,
10.431
–
435;
ibid., Ars Am.,
3.10.

1. In the story of Myrrha as told by Ovid, it was the absence of her mother at the rites of Ceres that gave Myrrha the opportunity of seducing her father, Cinyras. It is clear from this account that sexual intercourse was forbidden to his wife only, not to Cinyras. The fact that he slept with another woman during the rite was not in itself a transgression. It was the fact of incest that evoked horror, Ov.,
   Met.,
   10.431
   et seq.
   

2. Tac.,
   Ann.,
   2.49. My emphasis. See also Platner-Ashby,
   s.v. Ceres, Liber Liberaque Aedes; ibid.,
   Flora Aedes.
   

3. These were, in order, the Cerialia, the Fordicidia, the Parilia, the Vinalia, the Robigalia and the Floralia, and were celebrated from 12 April to 3 May. Ov.,
   Fast.,
   4.393
   –
   5.378. The
   sacrum anniversarium Cereris
   was in August. See Le Bonniec 1958:403.
   

4. Most of the detailed evidence for this aspect of the Floralia comes from later writers, although brief corroboration of their views can be found in Ovid. Elaine Fantham
   ’
   s explanation for
   

   this is plausible:
   ‘
   Both the goddess
   —
   sc.
   Flora
   —
   and her games are ignored by the Augustan writers before Ovid himself
   …
   . The goddess
   ’
   mime-festival was a scandal to the more severe and this might explain what seems to be a pattern of studied neglect under Augustus. The Princep
   ’
   s restoration of traditional cult was subordinate to his concern for restored morality.
   ’
   Fantham 1992.
   

5. Aug.,
   Ep.,
   91.5; Sen.,
   Ep.,
   97; Val. Max., 2.10.8; Minucius Felix refers to the goddess herself as a prostitute
   —
   meretrix
   —
   and compares her to Acca Larentia.
   Oct.,
   25.8.
   

6. See also Ov.,
   Fast.,
   5.331
   et seq.
   

138 Ov.,
Fast.,
5.355
–
356;
ibid.,
4.619
–
620.

1. For the
   sacrum anniversarium Cereris
   see Ov.,
   Met.,
   10.432; Val. Max., 1.1.5.
   

2. Dio Cass., 58.19; see also, Ov.,
   Fast.,
   5.361
   et seq.
   

1 Arn.,
Adv. Nat.,
5.18; Sex. Clodius
ap.
Lactant.,
Div. Inst.,

1.22.9
–
11; Macrob.,
Sat.,
1.12.24
–
25.

2 See e.g., Verg.,
Ecl.,
7.62; G., 1.28; Verg.,
Aen.,
5.72; Ov.,
Fast.,

4.15. See generally, Maxwell-Stuart 1972.

1. Maxwell-Stuart discusses the ways in which myrtle was used in classical antiquity in symbolic representations of sexuality,
   op. cit.
   

2. See pp. 48
   et seq.,
   with accompanying notes for the prohibition against married women drinking wine.
   

3. See pp. 48
   et seq.
   

6 Gell.,
N.A.,
5.6.

1. See also Pliny,
   H.N.,
   15.38.125; Plut.,
   Marc.,
   22.3
   –
   4. Versnel discusses the reasons why an
   ovatio
   might be granted in place of a triumph. Versnel 1970:166
   et seq.
   

2. Pliny,
   H.N.,
   15.36. See also pp. 107
   et seq.
   where I discuss this passage further.
   

9 Val. Max., 8.15.12.

10 Livy,
Epit.,
63; Dio Cass., 26.87; Plut.,
Quaest. Rom.,
83; Obse- quens 37. See generally, Platner-Ashby,
s.v. Venus Verticordia, Aedes.

11 Ov.,
Fast.,
4.160.

1. I discuss the implications of unchastity among Vestal Virgins in
   chapter 4
   .
   

2. Ov.,
   Fast.,
   4.291
   et seq.
   See also pp. 000
   et seq.
   

3. See pp. 80
   et seq.
   

4. Hence also the significance of the reason for the dedication of the statue:
   quo facilius virginum mulierumque mens a libidine ad pudicitiam converteretur.
   So that the hearts of virgins and women would turn more readily from licentiousness to chastity. Val. Max., 8.15.12. Although different categories of women were included in the cult, each had to be true to its own sexual ethics. Thus, although wives and prostitutes, for example, both participated in the rites, Venus Verticordia
   ‘
   ensured
   ’
   that wives did not behave like prostitutes.
   

16 Ov.,
Fast.,
4.133
–
160.

1. See e.g., Plut.,
   Num.,
   19.
   

2. For details of the controversy see Schilling 1982:389
   et seq.
   See also, Pomeroy 1975:208
   –
   209. Kraemer
   ’
   s is probably the most far-fetched account of Ovid
   ’
   s treatment of the festival:
   

   Can we avoid seeing something ironic in [Ovid
   ’
   s] account of women
   ’
   s worship of Venus Verticordia
   —
   Venus who turns the hearts of women towards marital fidelity that contrasted so strongly with Ovid
   ’
   s own life and experi- ences of Roman society? What do we make of these vastly contradictory accounts of the attitudes and practices of allegedly respectable Roman women? What too do we do with this ancient expression of the sexual double stan- dard? Ovid exemplifies male complicity in the sexual dalliances of elite Roman women, and yet there are no known cults of male chastity and fidelity!
   

   It may not surprise us to find that aristocratic Roman men saw the marital infidelity of Roman women as qualita- tively different from their own sexual dalliances. The point here is not only that Roman men considered it acceptable to sleep with a variety of women other than their legal wives, but rather that they were apparently content to place the blame for their liaisons with women legally mar- ried to other aristocratic men solely on the women
   —
   or perhaps women and the goddess Venus
   —
   at least when
   

   religion was concerned. Might there not be something sub- versive and intentional in Ovid
   ’
   s odd conflation of the worship of Fortuna Virilis and Venus Verticordia
   —
   a sug- gestion, perhaps, that the distinctions between chaste married matrons and sexually indiscriminate
   humiliores
   were not, in fact, nearly as clear as they seemed.
   

   Kraemer 1992:60
   –
   61
   

3. Mommsen
   ’
   s reconstruction of the entry in the
   Fasti Praenestini
   reads as follows:
   Frequenter mulieres supplicant [honestiores Veneri Verticordiae] fortunae virili, humiliores etiam in balneis, quod in iis ea parte corpor[is] utique viri nudantur, qua femi- narum gratia desideratur.
   See Scullard 1981:96. For the original calendar see A.Degrassi 1963: Table 40. Verrius Flaccus
   ’
   account is most usefully analysed in conjunction with Ovid
   ’
   s exegesis.
   

20 Macr.,
Sat.,
1.12.15.

21 Plut.,
Num.,
19.2

1. Lydus,
   de Mens.,
   4.65.
   

2. Schilling 1982:389
   et seq.
   

3. Lydus,
   op. cit.
   

4. See pp. 45
   et seq.
   

5. Garnsey 1970:219
   et seq.;
   see also Garnsey and Saller 1987:109
   –
   112.
   

6. The ritual washing of a cult statue was in itself unexceptional. What is striking about this cult is that the worshippers bathed themselves too, in apparent imitation of the washing of the cult statue.
   

7. See Schilling 1982:94. See also Platner-Ashby,
   s.v. Venus Obse- quens Aedes.
   

29 Serv.,
Aen.,
1.720.

30 Livy, 31.8
–
9.

31 For the antiquity of the cult see Diod. Sic., 4.78.4
–
5; cf. Strab., 6.2.6; Tac.,
Ann.,
4.43; Suet.,
Claud.,
25.

32 Livy, 22.9.7
–
11.

1. It was the city of Rome, enclosed within its boundaries, however amorphously defined, that was seen as the special responsibility of the Roman gods. See pp. 153
   et seq.
   

2. Livy, 29.10. See also Stehle 1989.
   

3. In terms of symbolic action in the case of the Magna Mater,
   

Ovid
’
s is the most vivid description. See
Fast.,
4.247
–
348. For Juno of Veii see Livy, 5.22.3. I shall rely chiefly on these texts for the following analyses.

36 Livy, 5.21.

1. See also Plut.,
   Cam.,
   6.
   

2. See for example, Livy, 29.14; Ov.,
   Fast.,
   4.291
   –
   344. Varro says simply that the goddess was brought from Pergamum, from King Attalus. Varro,
   Ling.,
   6.3.15.
   

39 Ov.,
Fast.,
4.265
–
272.

40 See Wiseman 1979:96; Ov.,
Fast.,
4.326:
mira, sed et scaena testificata loquar
—‘
My story is a strange one, but it is attested by the stage.
’

41 Ov.,
Fast.,
4.321
–
324.

1. Bremmer 1987b.
   

2. See Vermaseren 1977:96. Lucretius gives a description of the ritual procession of the
   Galli
   escorting the statue. Lucr.,
   De Rerum Natura,
   2.600
   et seq.
   For the exclusion of Roman citi- zens from the ranks of the
   Galli,
   see Dion. Hal.,
   Ant. Rom.,
   

   2.19. Nearly three centuries earlier when the cult of Ceres, Liber and Libera was introduced into Rome, the Greek priestesses in charge of the cult were made Roman citizens. Cic.,
   Balb.,
   24.55. Despite the different treatment accorded the religious atten- dants of Magna Mater and Ceres, Liber and Libera, Festus sees the two cults as parallel. Festus, p. 268 L.
   

3. But see also Dion. Hal.,
   Ant. Rom.,
   2.19.
   

4. Hopkins argues that the distinctions we might be disposed to make between political and religious rituals are not necessarily valid in the Roman context. Hopkins 1991.
   

5. Note that Minucius Felix, although in an entirely different con- text, makes no distinction between the
   Galli,
   the
   Salii,
   and the
   Luperci
   . See
   Oct.,
   22.8.
   

6. Ov.,
   Fast.,
   4.183; see also Catull., 63.
   

7. See pp. 68
   et seq.
   

8. The figure of Claudia Quinta, a symbol not merely of matronly chastity, but of the integrity of the system of sexual categoriza- tion, as I have suggested, continued to be important in terms of the cult of the Magna Mater. There was a statue of Claudia Quinta in the goddess
   ’
   temple. This statue was believed miracu- lously to have survived, unscathed, two conflagrations of the temple, Val. Max., 1.8.11. I suggest that the presence of the statue be interpreted as an iconic representation of the same sen-
   

timents that the story of Claudia Quinta expressed mythically: that the state was, from a ritual perspective, strong and healthy enough to receive unthreatened a cult as
‘
foreign
’
as that of Cybele.