The ancient Roman concept of religion was very different from the modern view of religion. First of all, Roman religion was polytheistic: many different gods and goddesses were respected, honored, and worshipped. As the Roman Empire expanded, the local gods of the conquered territories were added to the Roman pantheon and worshipped alongside the Roman gods.
While some of the Roman gods and goddesses lived in temples, the temples were not the focal point of worship, nor were they places where people gathered for worship. Temples housed a statue of the god or goddess; it was where the god or goddess lived.
Roman priests were generally men of relatively senior status who held the position of priest as a part-time position. In his entry on Rome in The Grammar of the Ancient World, Peter Chrisp reports:
“Roman magistrates and generals acted as priests in the course of their duties, just as the head of the household was a priest in his own home.”
When acting as a priest, a man would cover his head with his toga. This action was considered a mark of respect for the god.
Religion was not a matter of creed or belief, but rather it was demonstrated through actions rather than words. Rituals and sacrifices to the gods were generally done outside of the temple. Sacrifices were a way of offering a gift to the god. Part of the animal sacrificed would be cooked and eaten by those attending the ceremony as a way of having a communal feast for both the people and the god.
In describing the differences between the religion of the ancient Romans and that of modern monotheistic societies, Professor Dame Mary Beard, DBE, in her book The Fires of Vesuvius: Pompeii Lost and Found, writes:
“The traditional religion of ancient Rome and Italy was unlike most religions of the modern world in many important aspects. The fact that there were many gods and that their number was not fixed (more deities might always be discovered at home, or imported from abroad) are only two of the things that make Roman religion so strikingly different from Judaism, Christianity or Islam. It is also the case that there were no tenets of belief that an individual would be expected to hold, no equivalent of the Christian creed and no authoritative sacred texts which laid down doctrine.”
In her book A History of God: The 4,000-year Quest of Judaism, Christianity and Islam, Karen Armstrong writes:
“In the Roman empire of late antiquity, people worshipped the gods to ask for help during a crisis, to secure a divine blessing for the state and to experience a healing sense of continuity with the past. Religion was a matter of cult and ritual rather than ideas; it was based on emotion, not on ideology or consciously adopted theory.”
One of the important rites of Roman religion was the sacrifice of animals. Dame Mary Beard writes:
“The repeated slaughter of animals by humans to god was an emblem of the hierarchy of the cosmos, with humans in the middle between the beasts on one hand and the divine on the other.”
The act of sacrifice is one of reciprocity: by giving the life of the animal to the god, people expect something in return from the god. In his book Secrets of Pompeii: Everyday Life in Ancient Rome, Emidio de Albentiis writes:
“In very general terms it is worth noting the often practical nature of religious beliefs, with cult practices informed by a series of reciprocal obligations between human beings and gods. The hope was eventually to obtain well-defined benefits from the latter in exchange for the scrupulous observance by the former of ceremonial rituals carefully overseen by priests and followers of the cult.”
In general, Roman religion was based on a mutual trust between the people and their gods. Three of the Roman deities—Jupiter, Juno, and Minerva—made up the Capitoline triad. Jupiter is concerned with oaths and treaties; Juno is the female counterpart of Jupiter and is connected with all aspects of women; Minerva is the goddess of handicrafts, the professions, the arts, and war. In addition, there many other important gods in the Roman pantheon: Ceres was the goddess of the harvest; Neptune ruled the oceans; Venus was the goddess of beauty and fertility; Mars controlled war; Diana was the goddess of hunting.
Roman religion, like most polytheistic religions, was tolerant and flexible. As the Roman empire expanded, the Romans encountered other polytheistic people whose gods were different from theirs. Gods which were not a part of the Roman pantheon were adopted and worshiped. In his book Roman Empire, Nigel Rodgers writes:
“The Romans had many gods and, like most other polytheists, normally accepted those of other peoples.”
Pompeii
Pompeii began as a settlement of small fishing and agricultural communities. In 80 BCE, it was incorporated into the Roman Empire when the Roman dictator Sulla settled about 5,000 Roman veterans and their families in the city. Local inhabitants were displaced, and the city was renamed Colonia Cornelia Veneria Pompeianorum, indicating its status as a colony.
While Pompeii was not a particularly important town within the Roman empire, it had a population of 10-12,000 and many wealthy Romans built houses there. With easy access to the Mediterranean and proximity to Rome, Pompeii was a hub for trade throughout the empire.
The Oregon Museum of Science and Technology (OMSI) in Portland had a special exhibit on Pompeii which included more than 200 items on loan from the Naples National Archaeological Museum. Among the items displayed are images of the Roman gods and goddesses. In his entry on Rome in The Grammar of the Ancient World, Peter Chrisp reports:
“The Romans believed that the more gods their Empire had to protect it, the stronger it would be.”
The oldest building in Pompeii is the Temple of Apollo which dates to the sixth century BCE. There is also a later Temple of Venus, which was probably built by the Roman colonists settled in the city by Sulla. One of the grandest temples in the city is the Temple of Jupiter, considered by some to be the king of the gods. According to the Museum display:
“Like all Romans, Pompeians worshipped many gods and goddesses. Public temples to the patron gods of the city, Apollo, Venus, and Jupiter, who was king of the Roman gods, stood in and around the Forum. Many street intersections had neighborhood shrines.
At home, people worshipped the spirits of their dead ancestors and their own household gods (Lares) at a shrine called the Lararium.”
While the Roman temples in Pompeii provide evidence of public religion at this time, the temples were not like modern religious structures in which groups of people come together to perform ceremonies. Rather, temples were the homes of the gods. Professor Dame Mary Beard writes:
“Temples were not places where a congregation of worshippers gathered or where religious rituals were carried out. The essential feature of any Greek or Roman temple was to house a statue of a god or goddess.”
Roman religion was based on reciprocity: the people would take care of the gods, and the gods, thus, would take of the people and protect them from catastrophes. Professor Dame Mary Beard writes:
“To put it at its simplest, the official line was that the gods protected and supported Rome or, on a smaller scale, Pompeii, so long as they received due worship. If they were neglected, disaster would surely be the result.”
With regard to the guardian spirits of the household, Lares and Penates, Nigel Rodgers, in his book Roman Empire, writes:
“Each Roman household traditionally had one lar (the word was originally Etruscan, meaning prince) and two penates, whose names derived from penus, larder.”
Nigel Rodgers also writes:
“The lar was invoked on all important occasions such as marriages and funerals.”
Nigel Rodgers writes:
“The penates oversaw the family supply of food and drink and their altar was the hearth, which they shared with Vesta.”
Vesta was the god of the hearth and sown fields.
A lararium is shown above.
Shown above are statuettes depicting Minerva, the goddess of a thousand words. Minerva was originally the Etruscan goddess Menrfa or Menarva. She later became the patron goddess of doctors, musicians, and craftsmen.
Shown above is an altar of white marble from the House of the Harpist. This dates to 62-79 CE.
According to the Museum display:
“Small altars were commonplace in larariums. Members of the household would have performed religious rituals at this altar and worshipped the Lares and other family deities.”
Shown above is Genius who was a kind of guardian angel.
Shown above is a bronze statuette of Mercury, the patron god of commerce, communication, and luck.
Apollo Citharist
The bronze statue of Apollo shown below was created in the second half of the first century BCE and is a replica of a Greek sculpture. Apollo was a Greek god imported to Rome in the fifth century BCE to ward of plague. This statue was in the House of the Citharist. According to the Museum display:
“The cult of Apollo was one of the oldest in Pompeii and probably influenced the choice of subject matter. At life-size, the inlayed bone eyes would have met the gaze of each passerby reinforcing the presence of the powerful god.”
More Ancient Rome
Ancient Rome: Bronze Artifacts from Pompeii (Photo Diary)
Ancient Rome: Tools from Pompeii (Photo Diary)
Ancient Rome: Paintings and Mosaics in Pompeii
Ancient Rome: Glass Vessels from Pompeii (Photo Diary)
Ancient Rome: Sculpture in Pompeii