[379] In religious usage, the harmony or accord between the divine and human was the pax deorum or pax divom ("the peace of the gods" or "divine peace"). Once married, she was officially an adult. [510] The Roman jurist Ulpian distinguishes sanctus as "neither sacred (sacer) nor profane (profanum) ... nor religiosus. Its details and workings are unknown; it may have derived from a radical intervention into traditional augural law of a civil Lex Aelia Fufia,[clarification needed] proposed by dominant traditionalists in an attempt to block the passing of popular laws and used from around the 130s BC. [508] Some think it is a derivation from the theonym Sancus, the god of the ratification of foedera and protection of good faith, from the root sancu- plus suffix -io as inquio>incio. [310] See also nemus. Within the tripartite structure that was often characteristic of formal ancient prayer, preces would be the final expression of what is sought from the deity, following the invocation and a narrative middle. [87] A nail was one of the attributes of the goddess Necessitas[88] and of the Etruscan goddess Athrpa (Greek Atropos). Both deus and divus derive from Indo-European *deywos, Old Latin deivos. The term could also be used for removing someone from a priestly office (sacerdotium). These trees either were located in and marked a fanum or were themselves considered a fanum. The origin of the English word "tabernacle. [408] Dirae precationes were "dire" prayers, that is, imprecations or curses. [40] Favorable auspices marked a time or location as auspicious, and were required for important ceremonies or events, including elections, military campaigns and pitched battles. They were the most ancient religious sodalitas: according to tradition they were created by Romulus, but probably predated the foundation of Rome. "[72] In Roman art, the covered head is a symbol of pietas and the individual's status as a pontifex, augur or other priest. [395] Both exta porricere and exta dare referred to the process by which the entrails were cooked, cut into pieces, and burnt on the altar. ", The Romans regarded ritus graecus as part of their own mos maiorum (ancestral tradition), and not as novus aut externus ritus, novel or foreign rite. On substantive grounds, a war required a "just cause," which might include rerum repetitio, retaliation against another people for pillaging, or a breach of or unilateral recession from a treaty; or necessity, as in the case of repelling an invasion. [clarification needed] The hostia praesentanaea was a pig offered to Ceres during a part of the funeral rites conducted within sight of the deceased, whose family was thereby ritually absolved. Priestly literature was one of the earliest written forms of Latin prose, and included rosters, acts (acta), and chronicles kept by the various collegia,[112] as well as religious procedure. As "the most powerful", the rex sacrorum was positioned next to the gods, followed by the Flamen Dialis, then the Flamen Martialis, then the Flamen Quirinalis and lastly, the Pontifex Maximus. Festus defined municipalia sacra as "those owned originally, before the granting of Roman citizenship; the pontiffs desired that the people continue to observe them and to practice them in the way (mos) they had been accustomed to from ancient times. At home, a Roman who was about to drink wine would pour the first few drops onto the household altar. This page was last modified on 9 January 2021, at 08:54. Decreta (plural) were the binding explications of doctrine issued by the official priests on questions of religious practice and interpretation. These were preserved in written form and archived. [386] "Dutiful" is often a better translation of the adjective than "pious. A delubrum was a shrine. Attrectare had a positive meaning only in reference to the actions of the sacerdotes populi Romani ("priests of the Roman people"). Livy, IV 31, 4; VIII 15, 6; XXIII 31, 13; XLI 18, 8. See also votum, a dedication or a vow of an offering to a deity as well as that which fulfilled the vow. [83][84] The cincture accompanied the veiling or covering of the head (capite velato) with a cowl-like fold of the toga. Practices characterized as "magic" could be a form of superstitio as an excessive and dangerous quest for personal knowledge. The libri pontificales (pontifical books) are core texts in Roman religion, which survive as fragmentary transcripts and commentaries. [61] The requirements for a just war were both formal and substantive. As the sign that manifests the divine will,[31] the augurium for a magistrate was valid for a year; a priest's, for his lifetime; for a temple, it was perpetual. [296] The drink offering might also be poured on the ground or at a public altar. belonging to the gods in the sense of having their guarantee and protection. [69] Festus derives the word from the Greek verb kalein, "to call. A Greek rite to Ceres (ritus graecus cereris) was imported from Magna Graecia and added to her existing Aventine cult in accordance with the Sibylline books, ancient oracles written in Greek. [111], The Commentaries of the Pontiffs contained a record of decrees and official proceedings of the College of Pontiffs. The word was used alone in a general sense or qualified by an adjective to mean a specific type of record. In the Christian Roman Rite a feria is a weekday on which the faithful are required to attend Mass. The Greek equivalent is theos, which the Romans translated with deus. After the swaddled child had been accepted into the family, a bulla was hung around the boy’s neck. The verb porricere had the specialized religious meaning "to offer as a sacrifice," especially to offer the sacrificial entrails (exta) to the gods. [41] In official state augury at Rome, only the auspicia ex caelo and ex avibus were employed. The addressing of a deity in a prayer or magic spell is the invocatio, from invoco, invocare, "to call upon" the gods or spirits of the dead. ("Caunean figs! [113] It was often occultum genus litterarum,[114] an arcane form of literature to which by definition only priests had access. Servius says[141] that deus or dea is a "generic term" (generale nomen) for all gods. The word has been considered as related to pons, bridge, either because of the religious meaning of the pons Sublicius and its ritual use[390] (which has a parallel in Thebae and in its gephiarioi) or in the original IE meaning of way. This mola salsa (salted flour) was prepared ritually from toasted wheat or emmer, spelt, or barley by the Vestals, who thus contributed to every official sacrifice in Rome. But the practice may have originated as a kind of "dodge," since a praetor was liable to religious penalties if he used certa verba for legal actions on days marked nefastus on the calendar. These were regarded as necessary and imperishable, and the desire to perpetuate the family's sacra was among the reasons for adoption in adulthood. This glossary provides explanations of concepts … [571] The victimarius severed the animal's carotid with a ritual knife (culter), and according to depictions was offered a hand towel afterwards by another attendant. 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