10. ROMAN MYTHOLOGY

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Roman religion

• deities start as natural forces
  • not individual personalities like Greek deities
  • no stories about men and gods
  • no statues, temples until c. 300 B.C.
• names or attributes acquired from Greeks
  • Jupiter--Latin translation of Zeus pater
  • Venus--originally a garden goddess, transformed by analogy with Aphrodite
  • Mars--god of War; more important than Ares
  • Vesta--goddess of the Hearth; more important than Greek Hestia
  • Minerva--much less important than Greek Athena
• exotic foreign religions--mystery religions
  • Cybele--mother goddess; consort Atthis
    • cf. Aphrodite and Adonis, Near Eastern parallels
  • Mithras--Orphic type cult
  • reason: Roman empire incorporates much foreign territory; leaves subjects to their own ways

Roman historical legend

• Vergil's Aeneid
  • epic poem by Vergil (70-19 B.C.), written under patronage of emperor Augustus
  • deliberate imitation of Homer
    • Books 1-6 an odyssey, 7-12 an iliad
  • story: Aeneas, son of Anchises and Venus, flees Troy after its fall
    • sails to Italy by way of Africa, interlude with Queen Dido
    • in Italy, conquers king Latinus of Latium, founds homeland there
    • interlude in Underworld, like Odysseus; guided by sibyl of Cumae (prophetic woman)
  • differences from Greek epic
    • written poetry; formal, organized, polished
    • self-conscious in use of Homer as model
    • emphasis on future history of Rome ("foreseen" in Underworld by ghost of Aeneas' father)
• Legend of Romulus and Remus
  • folktale motifs abound
    • twin sons exposed at birth--in boat on Tiber River
    • suckled by she-wolf, raised by shepherds
    • found new city, fight over whose name to give it
      • 6 birds appear to Remus (first)
      • 12 birds (more) appear to Romulus next
    • Remus killed in ensuing quarrel; city named Rome