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Saturnalia

January 20, 2023

For other uses, see Saturnalia (disambiguation).

Saturnalia is an ancient Roman festival and holiday in honour of the god Saturn, held on 17 December of the Julian calendar and later expanded with festivities through to 23 December. The holiday was celebrated with a sacrifice at the Temple of Saturn, in the Roman Forum, and a public banquet, followed by private gift-giving, continual partying, and a carnival atmosphere that overturned Roman social norms: gambling was permitted, and masters provided table service for their slaves as it was seen as a time of liberty for both slaves and freedmen alike.[1] A common custom was the election of a "King of the Saturnalia", who gave orders to people, which were followed and presided over the merrymaking. The gifts exchanged were usually gag gifts or small figurines made of wax or pottery known as sigillaria. The poet Catullus called it "the best of days".[2]

Saturnalia
Saturnalia (1783) by Antoine-François Callet, showing his interpretation of what the Saturnalia might have looked like
Observed byRomans
TypeClassical Roman religion
SignificancePublic festival
CelebrationsFeasting, role reversals, gift-giving, gambling
ObservancesPublic sacrifice and banquet for the god Saturn; universal Phoenix wearing of the pileus
Date17–23 December

Saturnalia was the Roman equivalent to the earlier Greek holiday of Kronia, which was celebrated during the Attic month of Hekatombaion in late midsummer. It held theological importance for some Romans, who saw it as a restoration of the ancient Golden Age, when the world was ruled by Saturn. The Neoplatonist philosopher Porphyry interpreted the freedom associated with Saturnalia as symbolizing the "freeing of souls into immortality". Saturnalia may have influenced some of the customs associated with later celebrations in western Europe occurring in midwinter, particularly traditions associated with Christmas, the Feast of the Holy Innocents, and Epiphany. In particular, the historical western European Christmas custom of electing a "Lord of Misrule" may have its roots in Saturnalia celebrations.

Origins

 
Ancient Greek painting signed by "Alexander of Athens", discovered in Herculaneum, showing five women playing knucklebones, a game which was played during the Attic holiday of Kronia[3]

In Roman mythology, Saturn was an agricultural deity who was said to have reigned over the world in the Golden Age, when humans enjoyed the spontaneous bounty of the earth without labour in a state of innocence. The revelries of Saturnalia were supposed to reflect the conditions of the lost mythical age. The Greek equivalent was the Kronia,[3] which was celebrated on the twelfth day of the month of Hekatombaion,[4][3] which occurred from around mid-July to mid-August on the Attic calendar.[3][4] The Greek writer Athenaeus also cites numerous other examples of similar festivals celebrated throughout the Greco-Roman world,[5] including the Cretan festival of Hermaia in honor of Hermes, an unnamed festival from Troezen in honor of Poseidon, the Thessalian festival of Peloria in honor of Zeus Pelorios, and an unnamed festival from Babylon.[5] He also mentions that the custom of masters dining with their slaves was associated with the Athenian festival of Anthesteria and the Spartan festival of Hyacinthia.[5] The Argive festival of Hybristica, though not directly related to the Saturnalia, involved a similar reversal of roles in which women would dress as men and men would dress as women.[5]

The ancient Roman historian Justinus credits Saturn with being a historical king of the pre-Roman inhabitants of Italy:

The first inhabitants of Italy were the Aborigines, whose king, Saturnus, is said to have been a man of such extraordinary justice, that no one was a slave in his reign, or had any private property, but all things were common to all, and undivided, as one estate for the use of every one; in memory of which way of life, it has been ordered that at the Saturnalia slaves should everywhere sit down with their masters at the entertainments, the rank of all being made equal."

— Justinus, Epitome of Pompeius Trogus 43.3[6]
 
2nd-century AD Roman bas-relief depicting the god Saturn, in whose honor the Saturnalia was celebrated, holding a scythe

Although probably the best-known Roman holiday, Saturnalia as a whole is not described from beginning to end in any single ancient source. Modern understanding of the festival is pieced together from several accounts dealing with various aspects.[7] The Saturnalia was the dramatic setting of the multivolume work of that name by Macrobius, a Latin writer from late antiquity who is the major source for information about the holiday. Macrobius describes the reign of Justinus' "king Saturn" as "a time of great happiness, both on account of the universal plenty that prevailed and because as yet there was no division into bond and free – as one may gather from the complete license enjoyed by slaves at the Saturnalia."[8] In Lucian's Saturnalia it is Chronos himself who proclaims a "festive season, when 'tis lawful to be drunken, and slaves have license to revile their lords".[9]

In one of the interpretations in Macrobius's work, Saturnalia is a festival of light leading to the winter solstice, with the abundant presence of candles symbolizing the quest for knowledge and truth.[10] The renewal of light and the coming of the new year was celebrated in the later Roman Empire at the Dies Natalis Solis Invicti, the "Birthday of the Unconquerable Sun", on 25 December.[11]

The popularity of Saturnalia continued into the 3rd and 4th centuries AD, and as the Roman Empire came under Christian rule, many of its customs were recast into or at least influenced the seasonal celebrations surrounding Christmas and the New Year.[12][13][14][15]

Historical context

Saturnalia underwent a major reform in 217 BC, after the Battle of Lake Trasimene, when the Romans suffered one of their most crushing defeats by Carthage during the Second Punic War. Until that time, they had celebrated the holiday according to Roman custom (more Romano). It was after a consultation of the Sibylline Books that they adopted "Greek rite", introducing sacrifices carried out in the Greek manner, the public banquet, and the continual shouts of io Saturnalia that became characteristic of the celebration.[16] Cato the Elder (234–149 BC) remembered a time before the so-called "Greek" elements had been added to the Roman Saturnalia.[17]

It was not unusual for the Romans to offer cult (cultus) to the deities of other nations in the hope of redirecting their favour (see evocatio), and the Second Punic War in particular created pressures on Roman society that led to a number of religious innovations and reforms.[18] Robert E.A. Palmer has argued that the introduction of new rites at this time was in part an effort to appease Ba'al Hammon, the Carthaginian god who was regarded as the counterpart of the Roman Saturn and Greek Cronus.[19] The table service that masters offered their slaves thus would have extended to Carthaginian or African war captives.[20]

Public religious observance

See also: Religion in ancient Rome

Rite at the temple of Saturn

 
Ruins of the Temple of Saturn (eight columns on right) in Rome, traditionally said to have been constructed in 497 BC[21][22]

The statue of Saturn at his main temple normally had its feet bound in wool, which was removed for the holiday as an act of liberation.[23][24] The official rituals were carried out according to "Greek rite" (ritus graecus). The sacrifice was officiated by a priest,[25] whose head was uncovered; in Roman rite, priests sacrificed capite velato, with head covered by a special fold of the toga.[26] This procedure is usually explained by Saturn's assimilation with his Greek counterpart Cronus, since the Romans often adopted and reinterpreted Greek myths, iconography, and even religious practices for their own deities, but the uncovering of the priest's head may also be one of the Saturnalian reversals, the opposite of what was normal.[27]

Following the sacrifice the Roman Senate arranged a lectisternium, a ritual of Greek origin that typically involved placing a deity's image on a sumptuous couch, as if he were present and actively participating in the festivities. A public banquet followed (convivium publicum).[28][29]

The day was supposed to be a holiday from all forms of work. Schools were closed, and exercise regimens were suspended. Courts were not in session, so no justice was administered, and no declaration of war could be made.[30] After the public rituals, observances continued at home.[31] On 18 and 19 December, which were also holidays from public business, families conducted domestic rituals. They bathed early, and those with means sacrificed a suckling pig, a traditional offering to an earth deity.[32]

Human offerings

 
During Saturnalia, the Romans offered oscillum, effigies of human heads, in place of real human heads.[33][34]

Saturn also had a less benevolent aspect. One of his consorts was Lua, sometimes called Lua Saturni ("Saturn's Lua") and identified with Lua Mater, "Mother Destruction", a goddess in whose honor the weapons of enemies killed in war were burned, perhaps in expiation.[35] Saturn's chthonic nature connected him to the underworld and its ruler Dīs Pater, the Roman equivalent of Greek Plouton (Pluto in Latin) who was also a god of hidden wealth.[36] In sources of the third century AD and later, Saturn is recorded as receiving dead gladiators as offerings (munera) during or near the Saturnalia.[37] These gladiatorial events, ten days in all throughout December, were presented mainly by the quaestors and sponsored with funds from the treasury of Saturn.[38]

The practice of gladiator munera was criticized by Christian apologists as a form of human sacrifice.[39][40] Although there is no evidence of this practice during the Republic, the offering of gladiators led to later theories that the primeval Saturn had demanded human victims. Macrobius says that Dīs Pater was placated with human heads and Saturn with sacrificial victims consisting of men (virorum victimis).[41][40] In mythic lore, during the visit of Hercules to Italy, the civilizing demigod insisted that the practice be halted and the ritual reinterpreted. Instead of heads to Dīs Pater, the Romans were to offer effigies or masks (oscilla); a mask appears in the representation of Saturnalia in the Calendar of Filocalus. Since the Greek word phota meant both 'man' and 'lights', candles were a substitute offering to Saturn for the light of life.[33][34] The figurines that were exchanged as gifts (sigillaria) may also have represented token substitutes.[42]

Private festivities

"Meanwhile, the head of the slave household, whose responsibility it was to offer sacrifice to the Penates, to manage the provisions and to direct the activities of the domestic servants, came to tell his master that the household had feasted according to the annual ritual custom. For at this festival, in houses that keep to proper religious usage, they first of all honor the slaves with a dinner prepared as if for the master; and only afterwards is the table set again for the head of the household. So, then, the chief slave came in to announce the time of dinner and to summon the masters to the table."[43]

Macrobius, Saturnalia 1.24.22–23

Role reversal

Saturnalia was characterized by role reversals and behavioral license.[5] Slaves were treated to a banquet of the kind usually enjoyed by their masters.[5] Ancient sources differ on the circumstances: some suggest that master and slave dined together,[44] while others indicate that the slaves feasted first, or that the masters actually served the food. The practice might have varied over time.[7]

Saturnalian license also permitted slaves to disrespect their masters without the threat of a punishment. It was a time for free speech: the Augustan poet Horace calls it "December liberty".[45] In two satires set during the Saturnalia, Horace has a slave offer sharp criticism to his master.[46] Everyone knew, however, that the leveling of the social hierarchy was temporary and had limits; no social norms were ultimately threatened, because the holiday would end.[47]

The toga, the characteristic garment of the male Roman citizen, was set aside in favor of the Greek synthesis, colourful "dinner clothes" otherwise considered in poor taste for daytime wear.[48] Romans of citizen status normally went about bare-headed, but for the Saturnalia donned the pilleus, the conical felt cap that was the usual mark of a freedman. Slaves, who ordinarily were not entitled to wear the pilleus, wore it as well, so that everyone was "pilleated" without distinction.[49][50]

The participation of freeborn Roman women is implied by sources that name gifts for women, but their presence at banquets may have depended on the custom of their time; from the late Republic onward, women mingled socially with men more freely than they had in earlier times. Female entertainers were certainly present at some otherwise all-male gatherings.[51] Role-playing was implicit in the Saturnalia's status reversals, and there are hints of mask-wearing or "guising".[52][53] No theatrical events are mentioned in connection with the festivities, but the classicist Erich Segal saw Roman comedy, with its cast of impudent, free-wheeling slaves and libertine seniors, as imbued with the Saturnalian spirit.[54]

Gambling

 
Dice players in a wall painting from Pompeii

Gambling and dice-playing, normally prohibited or at least frowned upon, were permitted for all, even slaves. Coins and nuts were the stakes. On the Calendar of Philocalus, the Saturnalia is represented by a man wearing a fur-trimmed coat next to a table with dice, and a caption reading: "Now you have license, slave, to game with your master."[55][56] Rampant overeating and drunkenness became the rule, and a sober person the exception.[57]

Seneca looked forward to the holiday, if somewhat tentatively, in a letter to a friend:

"It is now the month of December, when the greatest part of the city is in a bustle. Loose reins are given to public dissipation; everywhere you may hear the sound of great preparations, as if there were some real difference between the days devoted to Saturn and those for transacting business. … Were you here, I would willingly confer with you as to the plan of our conduct; whether we should eve in our usual way, or, to avoid singularity, both take a better supper and throw off the toga."[58]

Some Romans found it all a bit much. Pliny describes a secluded suite of rooms in his Laurentine villa, which he used as a retreat: "...especially during the Saturnalia when the rest of the house is noisy with the licence of the holiday and festive cries. This way I don't hamper the games of my people and they don't hinder my work or studies."[59]

Gift-giving

Main article: Sigillaria (ancient Rome)

The Sigillaria on 19 December was a day of gift-giving.[60] Because gifts of value would mark social status contrary to the spirit of the season, these were often the pottery or wax figurines called sigillaria made specially for the day, candles, or "gag gifts", of which Augustus was particularly fond.[61] Children received toys as gifts.[62] In his many poems about the Saturnalia, Martial names both expensive and quite cheap gifts, including writing tablets, dice, knucklebones, moneyboxes, combs, toothpicks, a hat, a hunting knife, an axe, various lamps, balls, perfumes, pipes, a pig, a sausage, a parrot, tables, cups, spoons, items of clothing, statues, masks, books, and pets.[63] Gifts might be as costly as a slave or exotic animal,[64] but Martial suggests that token gifts of low intrinsic value inversely measure the high quality of a friendship.[65] Patrons or "bosses" might pass along a gratuity (sigillaricium) to their poorer clients or dependents to help them buy gifts. Some emperors were noted for their devoted observance of the Sigillaria.[66]

In a practice that might be compared to modern greeting cards, verses sometimes accompanied the gifts. Martial has a collection of poems written as if to be attached to gifts.[67][68] Catullus received a book of bad poems by "the worst poet of all time" as a joke from a friend.[69]

Gift-giving was not confined to the day of the Sigillaria. In some households, guests and family members received gifts after the feast in which slaves had shared.[50]

King of the Saturnalia

 
Ave, Caesar! Io, Saturnalia! (1880) by Lawrence Alma-Tadema. The painting's title draws a comparison between the spontaneous declaration of Claudius as the new emperor by the Praetorian Guard after the assassination of Caligula and the election of a Saturnalicius princeps.[70]

Imperial sources refer to a Saturnalicius princeps ("Ruler of the Saturnalia"), who ruled as master of ceremonies for the proceedings. He was appointed by lot, and has been compared to the medieval Lord of Misrule at the Feast of Fools. His capricious commands, such as "Sing naked!" or "Throw him into cold water!", had to be obeyed by the other guests at the convivium: he creates and (mis)rules a chaotic and absurd world. The future emperor Nero is recorded as playing the role in his youth.[71]

Since this figure does not appear in accounts from the Republican period, the princeps of the Saturnalia may have developed as a satiric response to the new era of rule by a princeps, the title assumed by the first emperor Augustus to avoid the hated connotations of the word "king" (rex). Art and literature under Augustus celebrated his reign as a new Golden Age, but the Saturnalia makes a mockery of a world in which law is determined by one man and the traditional social and political networks are reduced to the power of the emperor over his subjects.[72] In a poem about a lavish Saturnalia under Domitian, Statius makes it clear that the emperor, like Jupiter, still reigns during the temporary return of Saturn.[73]

Io Saturnalia

The phrase io Saturnalia was the characteristic shout or salutation of the festival, originally commencing after the public banquet on the single day of 17 December.[29][21] The interjection io (Greek ἰώ, ǐō) is pronounced either with two syllables (a short i and a long o) or as a single syllable (with the i becoming the Latin consonantal j and pronounced yō). It was a strongly emotive ritual exclamation or invocation, used for instance in announcing triumph or celebrating Bacchus, but also to punctuate a joke.[74]

On the calendar

 
Drawing from the Chronography of 354 (a calendar of the year 354 produced by Filocalus) depicting the month of December, with Saturnalian dice on the table and a mask (oscilla) hanging above

As an observance of state religion, Saturnalia was supposed to have been held "...quarto decimo Kalendarum Ianuariarum",[75] on the fourteenth day before the Kalends of the pre-Julian, twenty-nine day December, on the oldest Roman religious calendar,[76] which the Romans believed to have been established by the legendary founder Romulus and his successor Numa Pompilius. It was a dies festus, a legal holiday when no public business could be conducted.[21][77] The day marked the dedication anniversary (dies natalis) of the Temple to Saturn in the Roman Forum in 497 BC.[21][22] When Julius Caesar had the calendar reformed because it had fallen out of synchronization with the solar year, two days were added to the month, and the date of Saturnalia then changed, still falling on the 17 December, but with this now being the sixteenth day before the Kalends, as per the Roman reckoning of dates of this time. It was felt, thus, that the original day had thus been moved by two days, and so Saturnalia was celebrated under Augustus as a three-day official holiday encompassing both dates.[78]

By the late Republic, the private festivities of Saturnalia had expanded to seven days,[79][40] but during the Imperial period contracted variously to three to five days.[80] Caligula extended official observances to five.[81]

The date 17 December was the first day of the astrological sign Capricorn, the house of Saturn, the planet named for the god.[82] Its proximity to the winter solstice (21 to 23 December on the Julian calendar) was endowed with various meanings by both ancient and modern scholars: for instance, the widespread use of wax candles (cerei, singular cereus) could refer to "the returning power of the sun's light after the solstice".[83]

Ancient theological and philosophical views

Roman

 
Saturn driving a four-horse chariot (quadriga) on the reverse of a denarius issued in 104 BC by the plebeian tribune Saturninus, with the head of the goddess Roma on the obverse: Saturninus was a popularist politician whose Saturnian imagery played on his name and evoked both his program of grain distribution to aid the poor and his intent to subvert the social hierarchy, all ideas associated with the Saturnalia.[84]

The Saturnalia reflects the contradictory nature of the deity Saturn himself: "There are joyful and utopian aspects of careless well-being side by side with disquieting elements of threat and danger."[68]

As a deity of agricultural bounty, Saturn embodied prosperity and wealth in general. The name of his consort Ops meant "wealth, resources". Her festival, Opalia, was celebrated on 19 December. The Temple of Saturn housed the state treasury (aerarium Saturni) and was the administrative headquarters of the quaestors, the public officials whose duties included oversight of the mint. It was among the oldest cult sites in Rome, and had been the location of "a very ancient" altar (ara) even before the building of the first temple in 497 BC.[85][86]

The Romans regarded Saturn as the original and autochthonous ruler of the Capitolium,[87] and the first king of Latium or even the whole of Italy.[88] At the same time, there was a tradition that Saturn had been an immigrant deity, received by Janus after he was usurped by his son Jupiter (Zeus) and expelled from Greece.[89] His contradictions—a foreigner with one of Rome's oldest sanctuaries, and a god of liberation who is kept in fetters most of the year—indicate Saturn's capacity for obliterating social distinctions.[90]

Roman mythology of the Golden Age of Saturn's reign differed from the Greek tradition. He arrived in Italy "dethroned and fugitive",[91] but brought agriculture and civilization and became a king. As the Augustan poet Virgil described it:

"[H]e gathered together the unruly race [of fauns and nymphs] scattered over mountain heights, and gave them laws … . Under his reign were the golden ages men tell of: in such perfect peace he ruled the nations."[92]

 
Roman disc in silver depicting Sol Invictus (from Pessinus in Phrygia, 3rd century AD)

The third century Neoplatonic philosopher Porphyry took an allegorical view of the Saturnalia. He saw the festival's theme of liberation and dissolution as representing the "freeing of souls into immortality"—an interpretation that Mithraists may also have followed, since they included many slaves and freedmen.[93] According to Porphyry, the Saturnalia occurred near the winter solstice because the sun enters Capricorn, the astrological house of Saturn, at that time.[94] In the Saturnalia of Macrobius, the proximity of the Saturnalia to the winter solstice leads to an exposition of solar monotheism, the belief that the Sun (see Sol Invictus) ultimately encompasses all divinities as one.[95]

Jewish

M. Avodah Zarah lists Saturnalia as a "festival of the gentiles," along with the Kalents of January and Kratesis.[a][96] B. Avodah Zarah records that Ḥanan b. Rava said, "Kalends[b] begins eight days after the [winter] solstice and Saturnura[c] begins eight days before the [winter] solstice".[97] Ḥananel b. Ḥushiel,[98] followed by Rashi,[99] claims: "Eight days before the solstice -- their festival was for all eight days," which slightly overstates the Saturnalia's historical six-day length, possibly to associate the holiday with Hanukkah.[100]

In the Jerusalem Talmud, Avodah Zarah claims the etymology of Saturnalia is שנאה טמונה śinʾâ ṭǝmûnâ "hidden hatred," and refers to the hatred Esau, whom the Rabbis believed had fathered Rome, harbored for Jacob.[101]

The Babylonian Talmud's Avodah Zarah ascribes the origins of Saturnalia (and Kalends) to Adam, who saw that the days were getting shorter and thought it was punishment for his sin:

When the First Man saw that the day was continuously shortening, he said, "Woe is me! Because I have sinned, the world darkens around me, and returns to formlessless and void. This is the death to which Heaven has sentenced me!" He decided to spend eight days in fasting and prayer. When he saw the winter solstice, and he saw that the day was continuously lengthening, he said, "It is the order of the world!" He went and feasted for eight days. The following year, he feasted for both. He established them in Heaven's name, but they established them in the name of idolatry.[102]

In the Babylonian Avodah Zarah, this etiology is attributed to the tannaim, but the story is suspiciously similar to the etiology of Kalends attributed by the Jerusalem Avodah Zarah to Abba Arikha.[100]

Influence

 
Saturnalia (1909) by Ernesto Biondi, in the Buenos Aires Botanical Gardens

Unlike several Roman religious festivals which were particular to cult sites in the city, the prolonged seasonal celebration of Saturnalia at home could be held anywhere in the Empire.[103] Saturnalia continued as a secular celebration long after it was removed from the official calendar.[104] As William Warde Fowler notes: "[Saturnalia] has left its traces and found its parallels in great numbers of medieval and modern customs, occurring about the time of the winter solstice."[105]

The actual date of Jesus's birth is unknown.[106][107] A spurious correspondence between Cyril of Jerusalem and Pope Julius I (337–352), quoted by John of Nikiu in the 9th century, is sometimes given as a source for a claim that, in the fourth century AD, Pope Julius I formalized that the nativity of Christ should be celebrated on 25 December.[108][109] Some speculate that this is around the same time as the Saturnalia celebrations,[106][110] and that part of the reason why he chose this date may have been because he was trying to create a Christian alternative to Saturnalia.[106] Another reason for the decision may have been because, in 274 AD, the Roman emperor Aurelian had declared 25 December the birthdate of Sol Invictus[107] and Julius I may have thought that he could attract more converts to Christianity by allowing them to continue to celebrate on the same day.[107] He may have also been influenced by the idea that Jesus had died on the anniversary of his conception;[107] because Jesus died during Passover and, in the third century AD, Passover was celebrated on 25 March,[107] he may have assumed that Jesus's birthday must have come nine months later, on 25 December.[107] But in fact the correspondence is spurious.[108]

 
The King Drinks (between 1634 and 1640) by David Teniers the Younger, showing a Twelfth Night celebration with a "Lord of Misrule"

As a result of the close proximity of dates, many Christians in western Europe continued to celebrate traditional Saturnalia customs in association with Christmas and the surrounding holidays.[106][111][14] Like Saturnalia, Christmas during the Middle Ages was a time of ruckus, drinking, gambling, and overeating.[14] The tradition of the Saturnalicius princeps was particularly influential.[111][14] In medieval France and Switzerland, a boy would be elected "bishop for a day" on 28 December (the Feast of the Holy Innocents)[111][14] and would issue decrees much like the Saturnalicius princeps.[111][14] The boy bishop's tenure ended during the evening vespers.[112] This custom was common across western Europe, but varied considerably by region;[112] in some places, the boy bishop's orders could become quite rowdy and unrestrained,[112] but, in others, his power was only ceremonial.[112] In some parts of France, during the boy bishop's tenure, the actual clergy would wear masks or dress in women's clothing, a reversal of roles in line with the traditional character of Saturnalia.[14]

During the late medieval period and early Renaissance, many towns in England elected a "Lord of Misrule" at Christmas time to preside over the Feast of Fools.[111][14] This custom was sometimes associated with the Twelfth Night or Epiphany.[113] A common tradition in western Europe was to drop a bean, coin, or other small token into a cake or pudding;[111] whoever found the object would become the "King (or Queen) of the Bean".[111] During the Protestant Reformation, reformers sought to revise or even completely abolish such practices, which they regarded as "popish";[14] these efforts were largely successful.[14][114] The Puritans banned the "Lord of Misrule" in England[114] and the custom was largely forgotten shortly thereafter, though the bean in the pudding survived as a tradition of a small gift to the one finding a single almond hidden in the traditional Christmas porridge in Scandinavia.[114][115]

Nonetheless, in the middle of the nineteenth century, some of the old ceremonies, such as gift-giving, were revived in English-speaking countries as part of a widespread "Christmas revival".[14][114][116] During this revival, authors such as Charles Dickens sought to reform the "conscience of Christmas" and turn the formerly riotous holiday into a family-friendly occasion.[116] Vestiges of the Saturnalia festivities may still be preserved in some of the traditions now associated with Christmas.[14][117] The custom of gift-giving at Christmas time resembles the Roman tradition of giving sigillaria[117] and the lighting of Advent candles resembles the Roman tradition of lighting torches and wax tapers.[117][111] Likewise, Saturnalia and Christmas both share associations with eating, drinking, singing, and dancing.[117][111]

See also

References

  1. ^ Miller, John F. "Roman Festivals," in The Oxford Encyclopedia of Ancient Greece and Rome (Oxford University Press, 2010), p. 172.
  2. ^ Catullus 14.15 (optimo dierum), as cited by Mueller 2010, p. 221
  3. ^ a b c d Hansen, William F. (2002). Ariadne's Thread: A Guide to International Tales Found in Classical Literature. Ithaca, New York: Cornell University Press. p. 385. ISBN 978-0801475726.
  4. ^ a b Bremmer, Jan M. (2008). Greek Religion and Culture, the Bible and the Ancient Near East. Leiden, The Netherlands: Brill. p. 82. ISBN 978-9004164734.
  5. ^ a b c d e f Parker, Robert (2011). On Greek Religion. Ithaca, New York: Cornell University Press. p. 211. ISBN 978-0-8014-7735-5.
  6. ^ Smith, Andrew. "Justinus: Epitome of Pompeius Trogus (7)". www.attalus.org. Retrieved 2017-09-07.
  7. ^ a b Dolansky 2011, p. 484.
  8. ^ Standhartinger, Angela. Saturnalia in Greco-Roman Culture. p. 184.
  9. ^ Roth, Marty. Drunk the Night Before: An Anatomy of Intoxication. University of Minnesota Press.
  10. ^ Macrobius, Saturnalia 1.1.8–9; Jane Chance, Medieval Mythography: From Roman North Africa to the School of Chartres, A.D. 433–1177 (University Press of Florida, 1994), p. 71.
  11. ^ Robert A. Kaster, Macrobius: Saturnalia, Books 1–2 (Loeb Classical Library, 2011), note on p. 16.
  12. ^ Beard, North & Price 2004, p. 259.
  13. ^ Williams, Craig A., Martial: Epigrams Book Two (Oxford University Press, 2004), p. 259 (on the custom of gift-giving). Many observers schooled in the classical tradition have noted similarities between the Saturnalia and historical revelry during the Twelve Days of Christmas and the Feast of Fools
  14. ^ a b c d e f g h i j k l Grafton, Anthony; Most, Glenn W.; Settis, Salvatore (2010). "Bacchanalia and Saturnalia". The Classical Tradition. Cambridge, Massachusetts and London, England: The Belknap Press of Harvard University Press. p. 116. ISBN 978-0-674-03572-0.
  15. ^ "The reciprocal influences of the Saturnalia, Germanic solstitial festivals, Christmas, and Chanukkah are familiar," notes C. Bennet Pascal, "October Horse," Harvard Studies in Classical Philology 85 (1981), p. 289.
  16. ^ Livy 22.1.20; Macrobius, Saturnalia 1.10.18 (on the shout); Palmer 1997, pp. 63–64
  17. ^ Palmer 1997, p. 64, citing the implications of Cato, frg. 77 ORF4.
  18. ^ Palmer 1997, p. passim See also the importation of Cybele to Rome during this time.
  19. ^ Palmer 1997, p. 64 For other scholars who have held this view, including those who precede Palmer, see Versnel 1992, pp. 141–142, especially note 32.
  20. ^ Palmer 1997, pp. 63–64.
  21. ^ a b c d Palmer 1997, p. 63.
  22. ^ a b Mueller 2010, p. 221.
  23. ^ Macrobius 1.8.5, citing Verrius Flaccus as his authority; see also Statius, Silvae 1.6.4; Arnobius 4.24; Minucius Felix 23.5; Miller, "Roman Festivals," in The Oxford Encyclopedia of Ancient Greece and Rome, p. 172
  24. ^ Versnel 1992, p. 142.
  25. ^ The identity or title of this priest is unknown; perhaps the rex sacrorum or one of the magistrates: William Warde Fowler, The Roman Festivals of the Period of the Republic (London, 1908), p. 271.
  26. ^ Versnel 1992, pp. 139–140.
  27. ^ Versnel 1992, p. 140.
  28. ^ Livy 22.1; Palmer 1997, p. 63
  29. ^ a b Versnel 1992, p. 141.
  30. ^ Versnel 1992, p. 147, citing Pliny the Younger, Letters 8.7.1, Martial 5.84 and 12.81; Lucian, Cronosolon 13; Macrobius, Saturnalia 1.10.1, 4, 23.
  31. ^ Beard, North & Price 2004, p. 50.
  32. ^ Horace, Odes 3.17, Martial 14.70; Fowler, Roman Festivals, p. 272.
  33. ^ a b Taylor, Rabun (2005). "Roman Oscilla: An Assessment". RES: Anthropology and Aesthetics. Chicago, Illinois: The University of Chicago Press. 48 (48): 101. doi:10.1086/RESv48n1ms20167679. JSTOR 20167679. S2CID 193568609.
  34. ^ a b Chance, Jane (1994). Medieval Mythography: From Roman North Africa to the School of Chartres, A.D. 433–1177. Gainesville, Florida: University Press of Florida. pp. 71–72. ISBN 9780813012568.
  35. ^ Mueller 2010, p. 222; Versnel, however, proposes that Lua Saturni should not be identified with Lua Mater, but rather refers to "loosening": she represents the liberating function of Saturn Versnel 1992, p. 144
  36. ^ Versnel 1992, pp. 144–145 See also the Etruscan god Satre.
  37. ^ For instance, Ausonius, Eclogue 23 and De feriis Romanis 33–7. See Versnel 1992, pp. 146 and 211–212 and Thomas E.J. Wiedemann, Emperors and Gladiators (Routledge, 1992, 1995), p. 47.
  38. ^ More precisely, eight days were subsidized from the Imperial treasury (arca fisci) and two mostly by the sponsoring magistrate. Salzmann, Michele Renee, On Roman Time: The Codex-Calendar of 354 and the Rhythms of Urban Life in Late Antiquity (University of California Press, 1990), p. 186.
  39. ^ Mueller 2010, p. 222.
  40. ^ a b c Versnel 1992, p. 146.
  41. ^ Macrobius, Saturnalia 1.7.31
  42. ^ Macrobius, Saturnalia 1.10.24; Carlin A. Barton, The Sorrows of the Ancient Romans: The Gladiator and the Monster (Princeton University Press, 1993), p. 166. For another Roman ritual that may represent human sacrifice, see Argei. Oscilla were also part of the Latin Festival and the Compitalia: Fowler, Roman Festivals, p. 272.
  43. ^ Beard, North & Price 2004, p. 124.
  44. ^ Seneca, Epistulae 47.14; Carlin A. Barton, The Sorrows of the Ancient Romans: The Gladiator and the Monster (Princeton University Press, 1993), p. 498.
  45. ^ Horace, Satires 2.7.4, libertas Decembri; Mueller 2010, pp. 221–222
  46. ^ Horace, Satires, Book 2, poems 3 and 7; Catherine Keane, Figuring Genre in Roman Satire (Oxford University Press, 2006), p. 90; Maria Plaza, The Function of Humour in Roman Verse Satire: Laughing and Lying (Oxford University Press, 2006), pp. 298–300 et passim.
  47. ^ Barton, The Sorrows of the Ancient Romans, passim.
  48. ^ Versnel 1992, p. 147 (especially note 59).
  49. ^ Versnel 1992, p. 147.
  50. ^ a b Dolansky 2011, p. 492.
  51. ^ Dolansky 2011, pp. 492–494.
  52. ^ At the beginning of Horace's Satire 2.3, and the mask in the Saturnalia imagery of the Calendar of Philocalus, and Martial's inclusion of masks as Saturnalia gifts
  53. ^ Beard, North & Price 2004, p. 125.
  54. ^ Segal, Erich, Roman Laughter: The Comedy of Plautus (Oxford University Press, 1968, 2nd ed. 1987), pp. 8–9, 32–33, 103 et passim.
  55. ^ Versnel 1992, p. 148 citing Suetonius, Life of Augustus 71; Martial 1.14.7, 5.84, 7.91.2, 11.6, 13.1.7; 14.1; Lucian, Saturnalia 1.
  56. ^ See a copy of the actual calendar
  57. ^ Versnel 1992, p. 147, citing Cato the Elder, De agricultura 57; Aulus Gellius 2.24.3; Martial 14.70.1 and 14.1.9; Horace, Satire 2.3.5; Lucian, Saturnalia 13; Scriptores Historiae Augustae, Alexander Severus 37.6.
  58. ^ Seneca the Younger, Epistulae 18.1–2.
  59. ^ Pliny the Younger, Letters 2.17.24. Horace similarly sets Satire 2.3 during the Saturnalia but in the countryside, where he has fled the frenzied pace.
  60. ^ Dolansky 2011, pp. 492, 502 Macrobius, Saturnalia 1.10.24, seems to indicate that the Sigillaria was a market that occurred at the end of Saturnalia, but the Gallo-Roman scholar-poet Ausonius (Eclogues 16.32) refers to it as a religious occasion (sacra sigillorum, "rites of the sigillaria").
  61. ^ Suetonius, Life of Augustus 75; Versnel 1992, p. 148, pointing to the Cronosolon of Lucian on the problem of unequal gift-giving.
  62. ^ Beryl Rawson, "Adult-Child Relationships in Ancient Rome," in Marriage, Divorce, and Children in Ancient Rome (Oxford University Press, 1991), p. 19.
  63. ^ Martial, Epigrams 13 and 14, the Xenia and the Apophoreta, published 84–85 AD.
  64. ^ Dolansky 2011, p. 492 citing Martial 5.18, 7.53, 14; Suetonius, Life of Augustus 75 and Life of Vespasian 19 on the range of gifts.
  65. ^ Ruurd R. Nauta, Poetry for Patrons: Literary Communication in the Age of Domitian (Brill, 2002), pp. 78–79.
  66. ^ Versnel 1992, pp. 148–149, citing Macrobius, Saturnalia 1.10.24 and 1.11.49; Suetonius, Life of Claudius 5; Scriptores Historiae Augustae Hadrian 17.3, Caracalla 1.8 and Aurelian 50.3. See also Dolansky 2011, p. 492
  67. ^ Martial, Book 14 (Apophoreta); Williams, Martial: Epigrams, p. 259; Nauta, Poetry for Patrons, p. 79 et passim.
  68. ^ a b Versnel 1992, p. 148.
  69. ^ Catullus, Carmen 14; Robinson Ellis, A Commentary on Catullus (Oxford: Clarendon Press, 1876), pp. 38–39.
  70. ^ The painting represents a scene recorded by Josephus, Antiquitates Iudiacae 19; and Cassius Dio 60.1.3.
  71. ^ By Tacitus, Annales 13.15.
  72. ^ Versnel 1992, pp. 206–208.
  73. ^ Statius, Silvae 1.6; Nauta, Poetry for Patrons, p. 400.
  74. ^ Entry on io, Oxford Latin Dictionary (Oxford: Clarendon Press, 1982, 1985 reprinting), p. 963.
  75. ^ Macrobius, Saturnalia I.X.18.
  76. ^ Palmer 1997, p. 62.
  77. ^ Beard, North & Price 2004, p. 6.
  78. ^ Macrobius, Saturnalia 1.10.23; Mueller 2010, p. 221; Fowler, Roman Festivals, p. 268; Carole E. Newlands, "The Emperor's Saturnalia: Statius, Silvae 1.6," in Flavian Rome: Culture, Image, Text (Brill, 2003), p. 505.
  79. ^ Macrobius, Saturnalia 1.10.3, citing the Atellane composers Novius and Mummius
  80. ^ Miller, "Roman Festivals," in The Oxford Encyclopedia of Ancient Greece and Rome, p. 172.
  81. ^ Suetonius, Life of Caligula 17; Cassius Dio 59.6.4; Mueller 2010, p. 221; Fowler, Roman Festivals, p. 268, citing Mommsen and CIL I.337.
  82. ^ Fowler, Roman Festivals, p. 268, note 3; Roger Beck, "Ritual, Myth, Doctrine, and Initiation in the Mysteries of Mithras: New Evidence from a Cult Vessel," Journal of Roman Studies 90 (2000), p. 179.
  83. ^ Fowler, Roman Festivals, p. 272. Fowler thought the use of candles influenced the Christmas rituals of the Latin Church, and compared the symbolism of the candles to the Yule log.
  84. ^ Versnel 1992, p. 162.
  85. ^ Versnel 1992, pp. 136–137.
  86. ^ Fowler, Roman Festivals, p. 271.
  87. ^ The Capitolium had thus been called the Mons Saturnius in older times.
  88. ^ Versnel 1992, pp. 138–139.
  89. ^ Versnel 1992, p. 139 The Roman theologian Varro listed Saturn among the Sabine gods.
  90. ^ Versnel 1992, pp. 139, 142–143.
  91. ^ Versnel, "Saturnus and the Saturnalia," p. 143.
  92. ^ Virgil, Aeneid 8. 320–325, as cited by Versnel 1992, p. 143
  93. ^ Porphyry, De antro 23, following Numenius, as cited by Roger Beck, "Qui Mortalitatis Causa Convenerunt: The Meeting of the Virunum Mithraists on June 26, A.D. 184," Phoenix 52 (1998), p. 340. One of the speakers in Macrobius's Saturnalia is Vettius Agorius Praetextatus, a Mithraist.
  94. ^ Beck, Roger, "Ritual, Myth, Doctrine, and Initiation in the Mysteries of Mithras: New Evidence from a Cult Vessel," Journal of Roman Studies 90 (2000), p. 179.
  95. ^ van den Broek, Roel, "The Sarapis Oracle in Macrobius Sat., I, 20, 16–17," in Hommages à Maarten J. Vermaseren (Brill, 1978), vol. 1, p. 123ff.
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  104. ^ Michele Renee Salzman, "Religious Koine and Religious Dissent," in A Companion to Roman Religion (Blackwell, 2007), p. 121.
  105. ^ Fowler, Roman Festivals, p. 268.
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  1. ^ קלנטס וסטרנלייא Kalends and Saturnalia in MSS Kaufmann A50 and Parma A (de Rossi 138). The spelling is the same in both, though Kaufmann's waw-conjunctive is the work of a later scribe and the phrase has been struck through in Parma A. All Mishnaic printings have edited the spellings toward the Kalenda and Saturnura of b. Avodah Zarah MSS.
  2. ^ קלנדא Kalenda in extant MSS; however Ḥananel b. Ḥushiel quotes s.v. "קלנדס" Kalends.
  3. ^ MSS variants: Saturnaya, Saturnurya. This is likely a pun on סתר-נורא satar-nura "cloaking of the flame"; i.e. the shortening of the day which the solstice represents. In all printings of b. Avodah Zarah, the final mention of the holiday has been corrected to Saturnalia, though all MSS read Saturnura as before.

Bibliography

Ancient sources

Modern secondary sources

  • Beard, Mary; North, J. A.; Price, S. R. F. (2004) [1998], Religions of Rome: A Sourcebook, vol. 2, Cambridge, England: Cambridge University Press, ISBN 0-521-45646-0
  • Dolansky, Fanny (2011), "Celebrating the Saturnalia: Religious Ritual and Roman Domestic Life", in Rawson, Beryl (ed.), A Companion to Families in the Greek and Roman Worlds, Blackwell Companions to the Ancient World, Hoboken, New Jersey: Wiley-Blackwell, ISBN 978-1405187671
  • Mueller, Hans Friedrich (2010), "Saturn", in Gagarin, Michael; Fantham, Elaine (eds.), The Oxford Encyclopedia of Ancient Greece and Rome, Oxford, England: Oxford University Press, pp. 221–222, ISBN 978-0-19-538839-8
  • Palmer, Robert E. A. (1997), Rome and Carthage at Peace, Historia – Einzelschriften, Stuttgart, Germany: Franz Steiner, ISBN 978-3515070409
  • Versnel, Hank S. (1992), "Saturnus and the Saturnalia", Inconsistencies in Greek and Roman Religion, Volume 2: Transition and Reversal in Myth and Ritual, Brill, ISBN 978-90-04-29673-2

External links

 
Wikisource has the text of The New Student's Reference Work article about "Saturnalia".
  •   Media related to Saturnalia at Wikimedia Commons
  • Saturnalia – World History Encyclopedia
  • Saturnalia, A longer article by James Grout


January 20, 2023
saturnalia, other, uses, disambiguation, ancient, roman, festival, holiday, honour, saturn, held, december, julian, calendar, later, expanded, with, festivities, through, december, holiday, celebrated, with, sacrifice, temple, saturn, roman, forum, public, ban. For other uses see Saturnalia disambiguation Saturnalia is an ancient Roman festival and holiday in honour of the god Saturn held on 17 December of the Julian calendar and later expanded with festivities through to 23 December The holiday was celebrated with a sacrifice at the Temple of Saturn in the Roman Forum and a public banquet followed by private gift giving continual partying and a carnival atmosphere that overturned Roman social norms gambling was permitted and masters provided table service for their slaves as it was seen as a time of liberty for both slaves and freedmen alike 1 A common custom was the election of a King of the Saturnalia who gave orders to people which were followed and presided over the merrymaking The gifts exchanged were usually gag gifts or small figurines made of wax or pottery known as sigillaria The poet Catullus called it the best of days 2 SaturnaliaSaturnalia 1783 by Antoine Francois Callet showing his interpretation of what the Saturnalia might have looked likeObserved byRomansTypeClassical Roman religionSignificancePublic festivalCelebrationsFeasting role reversals gift giving gamblingObservancesPublic sacrifice and banquet for the god Saturn universal Phoenix wearing of the pileusDate17 23 DecemberSaturnalia was the Roman equivalent to the earlier Greek holiday of Kronia which was celebrated during the Attic month of Hekatombaion in late midsummer It held theological importance for some Romans who saw it as a restoration of the ancient Golden Age when the world was ruled by Saturn The Neoplatonist philosopher Porphyry interpreted the freedom associated with Saturnalia as symbolizing the freeing of souls into immortality Saturnalia may have influenced some of the customs associated with later celebrations in western Europe occurring in midwinter particularly traditions associated with Christmas the Feast of the Holy Innocents and Epiphany In particular the historical western European Christmas custom of electing a Lord of Misrule may have its roots in Saturnalia celebrations Contents 1 Origins 2 Historical context 3 Public religious observance 3 1 Rite at the temple of Saturn 3 2 Human offerings 4 Private festivities 4 1 Role reversal 4 2 Gambling 4 3 Gift giving 4 4 King of the Saturnalia 4 5 Io Saturnalia 5 On the calendar 6 Ancient theological and philosophical views 6 1 Roman 6 2 Jewish 7 Influence 8 See also 9 References 10 Bibliography 10 1 Ancient sources 10 2 Modern secondary sources 11 External linksOrigins Edit Ancient Greek painting signed by Alexander of Athens discovered in Herculaneum showing five women playing knucklebones a game which was played during the Attic holiday of Kronia 3 In Roman mythology Saturn was an agricultural deity who was said to have reigned over the world in the Golden Age when humans enjoyed the spontaneous bounty of the earth without labour in a state of innocence The revelries of Saturnalia were supposed to reflect the conditions of the lost mythical age The Greek equivalent was the Kronia 3 which was celebrated on the twelfth day of the month of Hekatombaion 4 3 which occurred from around mid July to mid August on the Attic calendar 3 4 The Greek writer Athenaeus also cites numerous other examples of similar festivals celebrated throughout the Greco Roman world 5 including the Cretan festival of Hermaia in honor of Hermes an unnamed festival from Troezen in honor of Poseidon the Thessalian festival of Peloria in honor of Zeus Pelorios and an unnamed festival from Babylon 5 He also mentions that the custom of masters dining with their slaves was associated with the Athenian festival of Anthesteria and the Spartan festival of Hyacinthia 5 The Argive festival of Hybristica though not directly related to the Saturnalia involved a similar reversal of roles in which women would dress as men and men would dress as women 5 The ancient Roman historian Justinus credits Saturn with being a historical king of the pre Roman inhabitants of Italy The first inhabitants of Italy were the Aborigines whose king Saturnus is said to have been a man of such extraordinary justice that no one was a slave in his reign or had any private property but all things were common to all and undivided as one estate for the use of every one in memory of which way of life it has been ordered that at the Saturnalia slaves should everywhere sit down with their masters at the entertainments the rank of all being made equal Justinus Epitome of Pompeius Trogus 43 3 6 2nd century AD Roman bas relief depicting the god Saturn in whose honor the Saturnalia was celebrated holding a scythe Although probably the best known Roman holiday Saturnalia as a whole is not described from beginning to end in any single ancient source Modern understanding of the festival is pieced together from several accounts dealing with various aspects 7 The Saturnalia was the dramatic setting of the multivolume work of that name by Macrobius a Latin writer from late antiquity who is the major source for information about the holiday Macrobius describes the reign of Justinus king Saturn as a time of great happiness both on account of the universal plenty that prevailed and because as yet there was no division into bond and free as one may gather from the complete license enjoyed by slaves at the Saturnalia 8 In Lucian s Saturnalia it is Chronos himself who proclaims a festive season when tis lawful to be drunken and slaves have license to revile their lords 9 In one of the interpretations in Macrobius s work Saturnalia is a festival of light leading to the winter solstice with the abundant presence of candles symbolizing the quest for knowledge and truth 10 The renewal of light and the coming of the new year was celebrated in the later Roman Empire at the Dies Natalis Solis Invicti the Birthday of the Unconquerable Sun on 25 December 11 The popularity of Saturnalia continued into the 3rd and 4th centuries AD and as the Roman Empire came under Christian rule many of its customs were recast into or at least influenced the seasonal celebrations surrounding Christmas and the New Year 12 13 14 15 Historical context EditSaturnalia underwent a major reform in 217 BC after the Battle of Lake Trasimene when the Romans suffered one of their most crushing defeats by Carthage during the Second Punic War Until that time they had celebrated the holiday according to Roman custom more Romano It was after a consultation of the Sibylline Books that they adopted Greek rite introducing sacrifices carried out in the Greek manner the public banquet and the continual shouts of io Saturnalia that became characteristic of the celebration 16 Cato the Elder 234 149 BC remembered a time before the so called Greek elements had been added to the Roman Saturnalia 17 It was not unusual for the Romans to offer cult cultus to the deities of other nations in the hope of redirecting their favour see evocatio and the Second Punic War in particular created pressures on Roman society that led to a number of religious innovations and reforms 18 Robert E A Palmer has argued that the introduction of new rites at this time was in part an effort to appease Ba al Hammon the Carthaginian god who was regarded as the counterpart of the Roman Saturn and Greek Cronus 19 The table service that masters offered their slaves thus would have extended to Carthaginian or African war captives 20 Public religious observance EditSee also Religion in ancient Rome Rite at the temple of Saturn Edit Ruins of the Temple of Saturn eight columns on right in Rome traditionally said to have been constructed in 497 BC 21 22 The statue of Saturn at his main temple normally had its feet bound in wool which was removed for the holiday as an act of liberation 23 24 The official rituals were carried out according to Greek rite ritus graecus The sacrifice was officiated by a priest 25 whose head was uncovered in Roman rite priests sacrificed capite velato with head covered by a special fold of the toga 26 This procedure is usually explained by Saturn s assimilation with his Greek counterpart Cronus since the Romans often adopted and reinterpreted Greek myths iconography and even religious practices for their own deities but the uncovering of the priest s head may also be one of the Saturnalian reversals the opposite of what was normal 27 Following the sacrifice the Roman Senate arranged a lectisternium a ritual of Greek origin that typically involved placing a deity s image on a sumptuous couch as if he were present and actively participating in the festivities A public banquet followed convivium publicum 28 29 The day was supposed to be a holiday from all forms of work Schools were closed and exercise regimens were suspended Courts were not in session so no justice was administered and no declaration of war could be made 30 After the public rituals observances continued at home 31 On 18 and 19 December which were also holidays from public business families conducted domestic rituals They bathed early and those with means sacrificed a suckling pig a traditional offering to an earth deity 32 Human offerings Edit During Saturnalia the Romans offered oscillum effigies of human heads in place of real human heads 33 34 Saturn also had a less benevolent aspect One of his consorts was Lua sometimes called Lua Saturni Saturn s Lua and identified with Lua Mater Mother Destruction a goddess in whose honor the weapons of enemies killed in war were burned perhaps in expiation 35 Saturn s chthonic nature connected him to the underworld and its ruler Dis Pater the Roman equivalent of Greek Plouton Pluto in Latin who was also a god of hidden wealth 36 In sources of the third century AD and later Saturn is recorded as receiving dead gladiators as offerings munera during or near the Saturnalia 37 These gladiatorial events ten days in all throughout December were presented mainly by the quaestors and sponsored with funds from the treasury of Saturn 38 The practice of gladiator munera was criticized by Christian apologists as a form of human sacrifice 39 40 Although there is no evidence of this practice during the Republic the offering of gladiators led to later theories that the primeval Saturn had demanded human victims Macrobius says that Dis Pater was placated with human heads and Saturn with sacrificial victims consisting of men virorum victimis 41 40 In mythic lore during the visit of Hercules to Italy the civilizing demigod insisted that the practice be halted and the ritual reinterpreted Instead of heads to Dis Pater the Romans were to offer effigies or masks oscilla a mask appears in the representation of Saturnalia in the Calendar of Filocalus Since the Greek word phota meant both man and lights candles were a substitute offering to Saturn for the light of life 33 34 The figurines that were exchanged as gifts sigillaria may also have represented token substitutes 42 Private festivities Edit Meanwhile the head of the slave household whose responsibility it was to offer sacrifice to the Penates to manage the provisions and to direct the activities of the domestic servants came to tell his master that the household had feasted according to the annual ritual custom For at this festival in houses that keep to proper religious usage they first of all honor the slaves with a dinner prepared as if for the master and only afterwards is the table set again for the head of the household So then the chief slave came in to announce the time of dinner and to summon the masters to the table 43 Macrobius Saturnalia 1 24 22 23 Role reversal Edit Saturnalia was characterized by role reversals and behavioral license 5 Slaves were treated to a banquet of the kind usually enjoyed by their masters 5 Ancient sources differ on the circumstances some suggest that master and slave dined together 44 while others indicate that the slaves feasted first or that the masters actually served the food The practice might have varied over time 7 Saturnalian license also permitted slaves to disrespect their masters without the threat of a punishment It was a time for free speech the Augustan poet Horace calls it December liberty 45 In two satires set during the Saturnalia Horace has a slave offer sharp criticism to his master 46 Everyone knew however that the leveling of the social hierarchy was temporary and had limits no social norms were ultimately threatened because the holiday would end 47 The toga the characteristic garment of the male Roman citizen was set aside in favor of the Greek synthesis colourful dinner clothes otherwise considered in poor taste for daytime wear 48 Romans of citizen status normally went about bare headed but for the Saturnalia donned the pilleus the conical felt cap that was the usual mark of a freedman Slaves who ordinarily were not entitled to wear the pilleus wore it as well so that everyone was pilleated without distinction 49 50 The participation of freeborn Roman women is implied by sources that name gifts for women but their presence at banquets may have depended on the custom of their time from the late Republic onward women mingled socially with men more freely than they had in earlier times Female entertainers were certainly present at some otherwise all male gatherings 51 Role playing was implicit in the Saturnalia s status reversals and there are hints of mask wearing or guising 52 53 No theatrical events are mentioned in connection with the festivities but the classicist Erich Segal saw Roman comedy with its cast of impudent free wheeling slaves and libertine seniors as imbued with the Saturnalian spirit 54 Gambling Edit Dice players in a wall painting from Pompeii Gambling and dice playing normally prohibited or at least frowned upon were permitted for all even slaves Coins and nuts were the stakes On the Calendar of Philocalus the Saturnalia is represented by a man wearing a fur trimmed coat next to a table with dice and a caption reading Now you have license slave to game with your master 55 56 Rampant overeating and drunkenness became the rule and a sober person the exception 57 Seneca looked forward to the holiday if somewhat tentatively in a letter to a friend It is now the month of December when the greatest part of the city is in a bustle Loose reins are given to public dissipation everywhere you may hear the sound of great preparations as if there were some real difference between the days devoted to Saturn and those for transacting business Were you here I would willingly confer with you as to the plan of our conduct whether we should eve in our usual way or to avoid singularity both take a better supper and throw off the toga 58 Some Romans found it all a bit much Pliny describes a secluded suite of rooms in his Laurentine villa which he used as a retreat especially during the Saturnalia when the rest of the house is noisy with the licence of the holiday and festive cries This way I don t hamper the games of my people and they don t hinder my work or studies 59 Gift giving Edit Main article Sigillaria ancient Rome The Sigillaria on 19 December was a day of gift giving 60 Because gifts of value would mark social status contrary to the spirit of the season these were often the pottery or wax figurines called sigillaria made specially for the day candles or gag gifts of which Augustus was particularly fond 61 Children received toys as gifts 62 In his many poems about the Saturnalia Martial names both expensive and quite cheap gifts including writing tablets dice knucklebones moneyboxes combs toothpicks a hat a hunting knife an axe various lamps balls perfumes pipes a pig a sausage a parrot tables cups spoons items of clothing statues masks books and pets 63 Gifts might be as costly as a slave or exotic animal 64 but Martial suggests that token gifts of low intrinsic value inversely measure the high quality of a friendship 65 Patrons or bosses might pass along a gratuity sigillaricium to their poorer clients or dependents to help them buy gifts Some emperors were noted for their devoted observance of the Sigillaria 66 In a practice that might be compared to modern greeting cards verses sometimes accompanied the gifts Martial has a collection of poems written as if to be attached to gifts 67 68 Catullus received a book of bad poems by the worst poet of all time as a joke from a friend 69 Gift giving was not confined to the day of the Sigillaria In some households guests and family members received gifts after the feast in which slaves had shared 50 King of the Saturnalia Edit Ave Caesar Io Saturnalia 1880 by Lawrence Alma Tadema The painting s title draws a comparison between the spontaneous declaration of Claudius as the new emperor by the Praetorian Guard after the assassination of Caligula and the election of a Saturnalicius princeps 70 Imperial sources refer to a Saturnalicius princeps Ruler of the Saturnalia who ruled as master of ceremonies for the proceedings He was appointed by lot and has been compared to the medieval Lord of Misrule at the Feast of Fools His capricious commands such as Sing naked or Throw him into cold water had to be obeyed by the other guests at the convivium he creates and mis rules a chaotic and absurd world The future emperor Nero is recorded as playing the role in his youth 71 Since this figure does not appear in accounts from the Republican period the princeps of the Saturnalia may have developed as a satiric response to the new era of rule by a princeps the title assumed by the first emperor Augustus to avoid the hated connotations of the word king rex Art and literature under Augustus celebrated his reign as a new Golden Age but the Saturnalia makes a mockery of a world in which law is determined by one man and the traditional social and political networks are reduced to the power of the emperor over his subjects 72 In a poem about a lavish Saturnalia under Domitian Statius makes it clear that the emperor like Jupiter still reigns during the temporary return of Saturn 73 Io Saturnalia Edit The phrase io Saturnalia was the characteristic shout or salutation of the festival originally commencing after the public banquet on the single day of 17 December 29 21 The interjection io Greek ἰw ǐō is pronounced either with two syllables a short i and a long o or as a single syllable with the i becoming the Latin consonantal j and pronounced yō It was a strongly emotive ritual exclamation or invocation used for instance in announcing triumph or celebrating Bacchus but also to punctuate a joke 74 On the calendar Edit Drawing from the Chronography of 354 a calendar of the year 354 produced by Filocalus depicting the month of December with Saturnalian dice on the table and a mask oscilla hanging above As an observance of state religion Saturnalia was supposed to have been held quarto decimo Kalendarum Ianuariarum 75 on the fourteenth day before the Kalends of the pre Julian twenty nine day December on the oldest Roman religious calendar 76 which the Romans believed to have been established by the legendary founder Romulus and his successor Numa Pompilius It was a dies festus a legal holiday when no public business could be conducted 21 77 The day marked the dedication anniversary dies natalis of the Temple to Saturn in the Roman Forum in 497 BC 21 22 When Julius Caesar had the calendar reformed because it had fallen out of synchronization with the solar year two days were added to the month and the date of Saturnalia then changed still falling on the 17 December but with this now being the sixteenth day before the Kalends as per the Roman reckoning of dates of this time It was felt thus that the original day had thus been moved by two days and so Saturnalia was celebrated under Augustus as a three day official holiday encompassing both dates 78 By the late Republic the private festivities of Saturnalia had expanded to seven days 79 40 but during the Imperial period contracted variously to three to five days 80 Caligula extended official observances to five 81 The date 17 December was the first day of the astrological sign Capricorn the house of Saturn the planet named for the god 82 Its proximity to the winter solstice 21 to 23 December on the Julian calendar was endowed with various meanings by both ancient and modern scholars for instance the widespread use of wax candles cerei singular cereus could refer to the returning power of the sun s light after the solstice 83 Ancient theological and philosophical views EditRoman Edit Saturn driving a four horse chariot quadriga on the reverse of a denarius issued in 104 BC by the plebeian tribune Saturninus with the head of the goddess Roma on the obverse Saturninus was a popularist politician whose Saturnian imagery played on his name and evoked both his program of grain distribution to aid the poor and his intent to subvert the social hierarchy all ideas associated with the Saturnalia 84 The Saturnalia reflects the contradictory nature of the deity Saturn himself There are joyful and utopian aspects of careless well being side by side with disquieting elements of threat and danger 68 As a deity of agricultural bounty Saturn embodied prosperity and wealth in general The name of his consort Ops meant wealth resources Her festival Opalia was celebrated on 19 December The Temple of Saturn housed the state treasury aerarium Saturni and was the administrative headquarters of the quaestors the public officials whose duties included oversight of the mint It was among the oldest cult sites in Rome and had been the location of a very ancient altar ara even before the building of the first temple in 497 BC 85 86 The Romans regarded Saturn as the original and autochthonous ruler of the Capitolium 87 and the first king of Latium or even the whole of Italy 88 At the same time there was a tradition that Saturn had been an immigrant deity received by Janus after he was usurped by his son Jupiter Zeus and expelled from Greece 89 His contradictions a foreigner with one of Rome s oldest sanctuaries and a god of liberation who is kept in fetters most of the year indicate Saturn s capacity for obliterating social distinctions 90 Roman mythology of the Golden Age of Saturn s reign differed from the Greek tradition He arrived in Italy dethroned and fugitive 91 but brought agriculture and civilization and became a king As the Augustan poet Virgil described it H e gathered together the unruly race of fauns and nymphs scattered over mountain heights and gave them laws Under his reign were the golden ages men tell of in such perfect peace he ruled the nations 92 Roman disc in silver depicting Sol Invictus from Pessinus in Phrygia 3rd century AD The third century Neoplatonic philosopher Porphyry took an allegorical view of the Saturnalia He saw the festival s theme of liberation and dissolution as representing the freeing of souls into immortality an interpretation that Mithraists may also have followed since they included many slaves and freedmen 93 According to Porphyry the Saturnalia occurred near the winter solstice because the sun enters Capricorn the astrological house of Saturn at that time 94 In the Saturnalia of Macrobius the proximity of the Saturnalia to the winter solstice leads to an exposition of solar monotheism the belief that the Sun see Sol Invictus ultimately encompasses all divinities as one 95 Jewish Edit M Avodah Zarah lists Saturnalia as a festival of the gentiles along with the Kalents of January and Kratesis a 96 B Avodah Zarah records that Ḥanan b Rava said Kalends b begins eight days after the winter solstice and Saturnura c begins eight days before the winter solstice 97 Ḥananel b Ḥushiel 98 followed by Rashi 99 claims Eight days before the solstice their festival was for all eight days which slightly overstates the Saturnalia s historical six day length possibly to associate the holiday with Hanukkah 100 In the Jerusalem Talmud Avodah Zarah claims the etymology of Saturnalia is שנאה טמונה sinʾa ṭǝmuna hidden hatred and refers to the hatred Esau whom the Rabbis believed had fathered Rome harbored for Jacob 101 The Babylonian Talmud s Avodah Zarah ascribes the origins of Saturnalia and Kalends to Adam who saw that the days were getting shorter and thought it was punishment for his sin When the First Man saw that the day was continuously shortening he said Woe is me Because I have sinned the world darkens around me and returns to formlessless and void This is the death to which Heaven has sentenced me He decided to spend eight days in fasting and prayer When he saw the winter solstice and he saw that the day was continuously lengthening he said It is the order of the world He went and feasted for eight days The following year he feasted for both He established them in Heaven s name but they established them in the name of idolatry 102 In the Babylonian Avodah Zarah this etiology is attributed to the tannaim but the story is suspiciously similar to the etiology of Kalends attributed by the Jerusalem Avodah Zarah to Abba Arikha 100 Influence Edit Saturnalia 1909 by Ernesto Biondi in the Buenos Aires Botanical Gardens Unlike several Roman religious festivals which were particular to cult sites in the city the prolonged seasonal celebration of Saturnalia at home could be held anywhere in the Empire 103 Saturnalia continued as a secular celebration long after it was removed from the official calendar 104 As William Warde Fowler notes Saturnalia has left its traces and found its parallels in great numbers of medieval and modern customs occurring about the time of the winter solstice 105 The actual date of Jesus s birth is unknown 106 107 A spurious correspondence between Cyril of Jerusalem and Pope Julius I 337 352 quoted by John of Nikiu in the 9th century is sometimes given as a source for a claim that in the fourth century AD Pope Julius I formalized that the nativity of Christ should be celebrated on 25 December 108 109 Some speculate that this is around the same time as the Saturnalia celebrations 106 110 and that part of the reason why he chose this date may have been because he was trying to create a Christian alternative to Saturnalia 106 Another reason for the decision may have been because in 274 AD the Roman emperor Aurelian had declared 25 December the birthdate of Sol Invictus 107 and Julius I may have thought that he could attract more converts to Christianity by allowing them to continue to celebrate on the same day 107 He may have also been influenced by the idea that Jesus had died on the anniversary of his conception 107 because Jesus died during Passover and in the third century AD Passover was celebrated on 25 March 107 he may have assumed that Jesus s birthday must have come nine months later on 25 December 107 But in fact the correspondence is spurious 108 The King Drinks between 1634 and 1640 by David Teniers the Younger showing a Twelfth Night celebration with a Lord of Misrule As a result of the close proximity of dates many Christians in western Europe continued to celebrate traditional Saturnalia customs in association with Christmas and the surrounding holidays 106 111 14 Like Saturnalia Christmas during the Middle Ages was a time of ruckus drinking gambling and overeating 14 The tradition of the Saturnalicius princeps was particularly influential 111 14 In medieval France and Switzerland a boy would be elected bishop for a day on 28 December the Feast of the Holy Innocents 111 14 and would issue decrees much like the Saturnalicius princeps 111 14 The boy bishop s tenure ended during the evening vespers 112 This custom was common across western Europe but varied considerably by region 112 in some places the boy bishop s orders could become quite rowdy and unrestrained 112 but in others his power was only ceremonial 112 In some parts of France during the boy bishop s tenure the actual clergy would wear masks or dress in women s clothing a reversal of roles in line with the traditional character of Saturnalia 14 During the late medieval period and early Renaissance many towns in England elected a Lord of Misrule at Christmas time to preside over the Feast of Fools 111 14 This custom was sometimes associated with the Twelfth Night or Epiphany 113 A common tradition in western Europe was to drop a bean coin or other small token into a cake or pudding 111 whoever found the object would become the King or Queen of the Bean 111 During the Protestant Reformation reformers sought to revise or even completely abolish such practices which they regarded as popish 14 these efforts were largely successful 14 114 The Puritans banned the Lord of Misrule in England 114 and the custom was largely forgotten shortly thereafter though the bean in the pudding survived as a tradition of a small gift to the one finding a single almond hidden in the traditional Christmas porridge in Scandinavia 114 115 Nonetheless in the middle of the nineteenth century some of the old ceremonies such as gift giving were revived in English speaking countries as part of a widespread Christmas revival 14 114 116 During this revival authors such as Charles Dickens sought to reform the conscience of Christmas and turn the formerly riotous holiday into a family friendly occasion 116 Vestiges of the Saturnalia festivities may still be preserved in some of the traditions now associated with Christmas 14 117 The custom of gift giving at Christmas time resembles the Roman tradition of giving sigillaria 117 and the lighting of Advent candles resembles the Roman tradition of lighting torches and wax tapers 117 111 Likewise Saturnalia and Christmas both share associations with eating drinking singing and dancing 117 111 See also EditBrumalia Yule BacchanaliaReferences Edit Miller John F Roman Festivals in The Oxford Encyclopedia of Ancient Greece and Rome Oxford University Press 2010 p 172 Catullus 14 15 optimo dierum as cited by Mueller 2010 p 221 a b c d Hansen William F 2002 Ariadne s Thread A Guide to International Tales Found in Classical Literature Ithaca New York Cornell University Press p 385 ISBN 978 0801475726 a b Bremmer Jan M 2008 Greek Religion and Culture the Bible and the Ancient Near East Leiden The Netherlands Brill p 82 ISBN 978 9004164734 a b c d e f Parker Robert 2011 On Greek Religion Ithaca New York Cornell University Press p 211 ISBN 978 0 8014 7735 5 Smith Andrew Justinus Epitome of Pompeius Trogus 7 www attalus org Retrieved 2017 09 07 a b Dolansky 2011 p 484 Standhartinger Angela Saturnalia in Greco Roman Culture p 184 Roth Marty Drunk the Night Before An Anatomy of Intoxication University of Minnesota Press Macrobius Saturnalia 1 1 8 9 Jane Chance Medieval Mythography From Roman North Africa to the School of Chartres A D 433 1177 University Press of Florida 1994 p 71 Robert A Kaster Macrobius Saturnalia Books 1 2 Loeb Classical Library 2011 note on p 16 Beard North amp Price 2004 p 259 Williams Craig A Martial Epigrams Book Two Oxford University Press 2004 p 259 on the custom of gift giving Many observers schooled in the classical tradition have noted similarities between the Saturnalia and historical revelry during the Twelve Days of Christmas and the Feast of Fools a b c d e f g h i j k l Grafton Anthony Most Glenn W Settis Salvatore 2010 Bacchanalia and Saturnalia The Classical Tradition Cambridge Massachusetts and London England The Belknap Press of Harvard University Press p 116 ISBN 978 0 674 03572 0 The reciprocal influences of the Saturnalia Germanic solstitial festivals Christmas and Chanukkah are familiar notes C Bennet Pascal October Horse Harvard Studies in Classical Philology 85 1981 p 289 Livy 22 1 20 Macrobius Saturnalia 1 10 18 on the shout Palmer 1997 pp 63 64 Palmer 1997 p 64 citing the implications of Cato frg 77 ORF4 Palmer 1997 p passim See also the importation of Cybele to Rome during this time Palmer 1997 p 64 For other scholars who have held this view including those who precede Palmer see Versnel 1992 pp 141 142 especially note 32 Palmer 1997 pp 63 64 a b c d Palmer 1997 p 63 a b Mueller 2010 p 221 Macrobius 1 8 5 citing Verrius Flaccus as his authority see also Statius Silvae 1 6 4 Arnobius 4 24 Minucius Felix 23 5 Miller Roman Festivals in The Oxford Encyclopedia of Ancient Greece and Rome p 172 Versnel 1992 p 142 The identity or title of this priest is unknown perhaps the rex sacrorum or one of the magistrates William Warde Fowler The Roman Festivals of the Period of the Republic London 1908 p 271 Versnel 1992 pp 139 140 Versnel 1992 p 140 Livy 22 1 Palmer 1997 p 63 a b Versnel 1992 p 141 Versnel 1992 p 147 citing Pliny the Younger Letters 8 7 1 Martial 5 84 and 12 81 Lucian Cronosolon 13 Macrobius Saturnalia 1 10 1 4 23 Beard North amp Price 2004 p 50 Horace Odes 3 17 Martial 14 70 Fowler Roman Festivals p 272 a b Taylor Rabun 2005 Roman Oscilla An Assessment RES Anthropology and Aesthetics Chicago Illinois The University of Chicago Press 48 48 101 doi 10 1086 RESv48n1ms20167679 JSTOR 20167679 S2CID 193568609 a b Chance Jane 1994 Medieval Mythography From Roman North Africa to the School of Chartres A D 433 1177 Gainesville Florida University Press of Florida pp 71 72 ISBN 9780813012568 Mueller 2010 p 222 Versnel however proposes that Lua Saturni should not be identified with Lua Mater but rather refers to loosening she represents the liberating function of Saturn Versnel 1992 p 144 Versnel 1992 pp 144 145 See also the Etruscan god Satre For instance Ausonius Eclogue 23 and De feriis Romanis 33 7 See Versnel 1992 pp 146 and 211 212 and Thomas E J Wiedemann Emperors and Gladiators Routledge 1992 1995 p 47 More precisely eight days were subsidized from the Imperial treasury arca fisci and two mostly by the sponsoring magistrate Salzmann Michele Renee On Roman Time The Codex Calendar of 354 and the Rhythms of Urban Life in Late Antiquity University of California Press 1990 p 186 Mueller 2010 p 222 a b c Versnel 1992 p 146 Macrobius Saturnalia 1 7 31 Macrobius Saturnalia 1 10 24 Carlin A Barton The Sorrows of the Ancient Romans The Gladiator and the Monster Princeton University Press 1993 p 166 For another Roman ritual that may represent human sacrifice see Argei Oscilla were also part of the Latin Festival and the Compitalia Fowler Roman Festivals p 272 Beard North amp Price 2004 p 124 Seneca Epistulae 47 14 Carlin A Barton The Sorrows of the Ancient Romans The Gladiator and the Monster Princeton University Press 1993 p 498 Horace Satires 2 7 4 libertas Decembri Mueller 2010 pp 221 222 Horace Satires Book 2 poems 3 and 7 Catherine Keane Figuring Genre in Roman Satire Oxford University Press 2006 p 90 Maria Plaza The Function of Humour in Roman Verse Satire Laughing and Lying Oxford University Press 2006 pp 298 300 et passim Barton The Sorrows of the Ancient Romans passim Versnel 1992 p 147 especially note 59 Versnel 1992 p 147 a b Dolansky 2011 p 492 Dolansky 2011 pp 492 494 At the beginning of Horace s Satire 2 3 and the mask in the Saturnalia imagery of the Calendar of Philocalus and Martial s inclusion of masks as Saturnalia gifts Beard North amp Price 2004 p 125 Segal Erich Roman Laughter The Comedy of Plautus Oxford University Press 1968 2nd ed 1987 pp 8 9 32 33 103 et passim Versnel 1992 p 148 citing Suetonius Life of Augustus 71 Martial 1 14 7 5 84 7 91 2 11 6 13 1 7 14 1 Lucian Saturnalia 1 See a copy of the actual calendar Versnel 1992 p 147 citing Cato the Elder De agricultura 57 Aulus Gellius 2 24 3 Martial 14 70 1 and 14 1 9 Horace Satire 2 3 5 Lucian Saturnalia 13 Scriptores Historiae Augustae Alexander Severus 37 6 Seneca the Younger Epistulae 18 1 2 Pliny the Younger Letters 2 17 24 Horace similarly sets Satire 2 3 during the Saturnalia but in the countryside where he has fled the frenzied pace Dolansky 2011 pp 492 502 Macrobius Saturnalia 1 10 24 seems to indicate that the Sigillaria was a market that occurred at the end of Saturnalia but the Gallo Roman scholar poet Ausonius Eclogues 16 32 refers to it as a religious occasion sacra sigillorum rites of the sigillaria Suetonius Life of Augustus 75 Versnel 1992 p 148 pointing to the Cronosolon of Lucian on the problem of unequal gift giving Beryl Rawson Adult Child Relationships in Ancient Rome in Marriage Divorce and Children in Ancient Rome Oxford University Press 1991 p 19 Martial Epigrams 13 and 14 the Xenia and the Apophoreta published 84 85 AD Dolansky 2011 p 492 citing Martial 5 18 7 53 14 Suetonius Life of Augustus 75 and Life of Vespasian 19 on the range of gifts Ruurd R Nauta Poetry for Patrons Literary Communication in the Age of Domitian Brill 2002 pp 78 79 Versnel 1992 pp 148 149 citing Macrobius Saturnalia 1 10 24 and 1 11 49 Suetonius Life of Claudius 5 Scriptores Historiae Augustae Hadrian 17 3 Caracalla 1 8 and Aurelian 50 3 See also Dolansky 2011 p 492 Martial Book 14 Apophoreta Williams Martial Epigrams p 259 Nauta Poetry for Patrons p 79 et passim a b Versnel 1992 p 148 Catullus Carmen 14 Robinson Ellis A Commentary on Catullus Oxford Clarendon Press 1876 pp 38 39 The painting represents a scene recorded by Josephus Antiquitates Iudiacae 19 and Cassius Dio 60 1 3 By Tacitus Annales 13 15 Versnel 1992 pp 206 208 Statius Silvae 1 6 Nauta Poetry for Patrons p 400 Entry on io Oxford Latin Dictionary Oxford Clarendon Press 1982 1985 reprinting p 963 Macrobius Saturnalia I X 18 Palmer 1997 p 62 Beard North amp Price 2004 p 6 Macrobius Saturnalia 1 10 23 Mueller 2010 p 221 Fowler Roman Festivals p 268 Carole E Newlands The Emperor s Saturnalia Statius Silvae 1 6 in Flavian Rome Culture Image Text Brill 2003 p 505 Macrobius Saturnalia 1 10 3 citing the Atellane composers Novius and Mummius Miller Roman Festivals in The Oxford Encyclopedia of Ancient Greece and Rome p 172 Suetonius Life of Caligula 17 Cassius Dio 59 6 4 Mueller 2010 p 221 Fowler Roman Festivals p 268 citing Mommsen and CIL I 337 Fowler Roman Festivals p 268 note 3 Roger Beck Ritual Myth Doctrine and Initiation in the Mysteries of Mithras New Evidence from a Cult Vessel Journal of Roman Studies 90 2000 p 179 Fowler Roman Festivals p 272 Fowler thought the use of candles influenced the Christmas rituals of the Latin Church and compared the symbolism of the candles to the Yule log Versnel 1992 p 162 Versnel 1992 pp 136 137 Fowler Roman Festivals p 271 The Capitolium had thus been called the Mons Saturnius in older times Versnel 1992 pp 138 139 Versnel 1992 p 139 The Roman theologian Varro listed Saturn among the Sabine gods Versnel 1992 pp 139 142 143 Versnel Saturnus and the Saturnalia p 143 Virgil Aeneid 8 320 325 as cited by Versnel 1992 p 143 Porphyry De antro 23 following Numenius as cited by Roger Beck Qui Mortalitatis Causa Convenerunt The Meeting of the Virunum Mithraists on June 26 A D 184 Phoenix 52 1998 p 340 One of the speakers in Macrobius s Saturnalia is Vettius Agorius Praetextatus a Mithraist Beck Roger Ritual Myth Doctrine and Initiation in the Mysteries of Mithras New Evidence from a Cult Vessel Journal of Roman Studies 90 2000 p 179 van den Broek Roel The Sarapis Oracle in Macrobius Sat I 20 16 17 in Hommages a Maarten J Vermaseren Brill 1978 vol 1 p 123ff Mishnah Avodah Zarah 1 3 www sefaria org Retrieved 2021 03 05 Avodah Zarah 6a 10 www sefaria org Retrieved 2021 03 05 Rabbeinu Chananel on Avodah Zarah 6a 3 www sefaria org Retrieved 2021 07 22 Rashi on Avodah Zarah 6a 10 1 www sefaria org Retrieved 2021 07 22 a b Sarit Kattan Gribetz 2020 11 17 Time and Difference in Rabbinic Judaism doi 10 23943 princeton 9780691192857 001 0001 ISBN 9780691192857 S2CID 241016818 Jerusalem Talmud Avodah Zarah 3a 1 www sefaria org Archived from the original on 2021 08 20 Retrieved 2021 07 23 Avodah Zarah 8a 7 www sefaria org Retrieved 2021 07 23 Woolf Greg Found in Translation The Religion of the Roman Diaspora in Ritual Dynamics and Religious Change in the Roman Empire Proceedings of the Eighth Workshop of the International Network Impact of Empire Heidelberg July 5 7 2007 Brill 2009 p 249 See Aulus Gellius 18 2 1 for Romans living in Athens and celebrating the Saturnalia Michele Renee Salzman Religious Koine and Religious Dissent in A Companion to Roman Religion Blackwell 2007 p 121 Fowler Roman Festivals p 268 a b c d John J 2005 A Christmas Compendium New York City New York and London England Continuum p 112 ISBN 0 8264 8749 1 a b c d e f Struthers Jane 2012 The Book of Christmas Everything We Once Knew and Loved about Christmastime London England Ebury Press pp 17 21 ISBN 9780091947293 a b Martindale Cyril 1908 Christmas The Catholic Encyclopedia New York Robert Appleton Company Retrieved 2018 11 18 Letter of Cyril of Jerusalem to Julius I cited as false Patrologiae cursus completus seu bibliotheca universalis integra uniformis commoda oeconomica omnium SS Patrum doctorum scriptorumque ecclesiasticorum sive latinorum qui ab aevo apostolico ad tempora Innocentii 3 anno 1216 pro Latinis et Concilii Florentini ann 1439 pro Graecis floruerunt Recusio chronologica Opera quae exstant universa Constantini Magni Victorini necnon et Nazarii anonymi S Silvestri papae S Marci papae S Julii papae Osii Cordubensis Candidi Ariani Liberii papae et Potamii in Latin Vrayet 1844 p 965 Why is Christmas celebrated on December 25 www italyheritage com Retrieved 2018 11 18 a b c d e f g h i Forbes Bruce David 2007 Christmas A Candid History Berkeley California University of California Press pp 9 10 ISBN 978 0 520 25104 5 a b c d Mackenzie Neil 2012 The Medieval Boy Bishops Leicestershire England Matadore pp 26 29 ISBN 978 1780880 082 Shaheen Naseeb 1999 Biblical References in Shakespeare s Plays Newark Maryland University of Delaware Press p 196 ISBN 978 1 61149 358 0 a b c d Jeffrey Yvonne 17 September 2008 The Everything Family Christmas Book Everything Books pp 46 47 ISBN 9781605507835 Sjue K 25 December 2016 Historien om mandelen i groten Dagbladet Retrieved 25 November 2019 a b Rowell Geoffrey December 1993 Dickens and the Construction of Christmas History Today 43 12 Retrieved December 28 2016 a b c d Stuttard David 17 December 2012 Did the Romans invent Christmas bbc co uk British Broadcasting Company קלנטס וסטרנלייא Kalends and Saturnalia in MSS Kaufmann A50 and Parma A de Rossi 138 The spelling is the same in both though Kaufmann s waw conjunctive is the work of a later scribe and the phrase has been struck through in Parma A All Mishnaic printings have edited the spellings toward the Kalenda and Saturnura of b Avodah Zarah MSS קלנדא Kalenda in extant MSS however Ḥananel b Ḥushiel quotes s v קלנדס Kalends MSS variants Saturnaya Saturnurya This is likely a pun on סתר נורא satar nura cloaking of the flame i e the shortening of the day which the solstice represents In all printings of b Avodah Zarah the final mention of the holiday has been corrected to Saturnalia though all MSS read Saturnura as before Bibliography EditAncient sources Edit Horace Satire 2 7 4 Justinus Epitome of Pompeius Trogus Macrobius Saturnalia Pliny the Younger Letters Modern secondary sources Edit Beard Mary North J A Price S R F 2004 1998 Religions of Rome A Sourcebook vol 2 Cambridge England Cambridge University Press ISBN 0 521 45646 0 Dolansky Fanny 2011 Celebrating the Saturnalia Religious Ritual and Roman Domestic Life in Rawson Beryl ed A Companion to Families in the Greek and Roman Worlds Blackwell Companions to the Ancient World Hoboken New Jersey Wiley Blackwell ISBN 978 1405187671 Mueller Hans Friedrich 2010 Saturn in Gagarin Michael Fantham Elaine eds The Oxford Encyclopedia of Ancient Greece and Rome Oxford England Oxford University Press pp 221 222 ISBN 978 0 19 538839 8 Palmer Robert E A 1997 Rome and Carthage at Peace Historia Einzelschriften Stuttgart Germany Franz Steiner ISBN 978 3515070409 Versnel Hank S 1992 Saturnus and the Saturnalia Inconsistencies in Greek and Roman Religion Volume 2 Transition and Reversal in Myth and Ritual Brill ISBN 978 90 04 29673 2External links Edit Wikisource has the text of The New Student s Reference Work article about Saturnalia Media related to Saturnalia at Wikimedia Commons Saturnalia World History Encyclopedia Saturnalia A longer article by James Grout Retrieved from https en wikipedia org w index php title Saturnalia amp oldid 1128911117, wikipedia, wiki, book, books, library,

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