The dissemination of divination in roman republican times

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Whereas information about the number of prodigies reported per year is relatively straightforward (see appendix 5), we need to operationalize the degree of crisis. Such a measure will never be precise, but we should still be able to see some rough correlation between degree of crisis and number of reported prodigies. A crisis index was devised according to which every year was assigned a value 101 (se Table 7.1.): 0 - No perception of risk to Rome and her army 1 - Minor problems; for example rebellion in a remote region, or minor casualties in the Roman army 2 – Larger problems; for example limited military confrontations outside Italy, and some casualties in the Roman army 3 – Major problems; major military confrontations outside Italy; substantial casualties 4 – Serious problems; the enemy is in Italy or at its borders; Consuls killed or entire armies (the size of a legion or more) lost in battle 5 – Acute problems; Rome is facing its demise, the city itself is threatened with capture (or perceived to be so), an unsustainable level of casualties in the Roman army. Table 7.1. Crisis index Other things could be seen as the reason for crisis, most notably disease. The problem is that our sources speak of disease in general, and rarely gives us concrete historical information (Sallares 1996). Livy does occasionally inform us of plagues, but it is not clear in all cases how widespread they were. In order to have a fix-point, the chronological table in the Cambridge Ancient History Vol. VIII (page 524-541) and IX (780-798) served as the basis from which values for each year was assigned. Further, in order not to let theoretical preconceptions influence the individual ratings, values were assigned to each year before the count of prodigies per year was done. Thus we end up with a list of paired values. For each reporting year we have a value designating the degree of crisis and another designating the number of prodigies. To visualize the relation, a bubble plot was made. The size of the bubbles indicates the degree of crisis for 101 The index was devised by me, but was discussed with PhD Ittai Gradel, University of Reading, whom I thank for many fruitful suggestions and improvements. Any infelicities are naturally my responsibility. 132
the observation. If the fear thesis was right we would expect big bubbles and no small ones at the top and small bubbles and no big ones at the bottom. The results can be seen in fig.7.1. Number of prodigies 20 15 10 5 0 Relation between Degree of Crisis and Number of Prodigies 200 Degree of Crisis 150 Years Figure 7.1. Relation between degree of crisis and number of prodigies Around the Punic war (from 218-202 BCE onwards) there are indeed some big bubbles at the top as expected, but around 80-100 the big bubbles are at the bottom and the small ones at the top. We can see that there does not seem to be any big temporal difference, such as big bubbles at one end only, or high number of prodigies at one point. The fear thesis stipulates that there is a correlation between these two values, whereas the null-hypothesis is that there is none. We can investigate this statistically. 100 50 133
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The Dissemination of Divination in
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Chapter 8 - Sources to Roman Divina
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List of Figures Figure 3.1. Types o
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Acknowledgements Certain parts of t
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people. It is almost unanimously ag
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that precludes the investigation fr
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asic cognitive functions could acco
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Lienard & Feeney 2006), prayer (Bar
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“the making clear of something”
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In chapter 5 it is argued that obla
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Chapter 1 - History of divination a
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with *-eu appears in two forms. One
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involving the Korinthian Polyidos.
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The 15 th edition of the Encyclopae
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Chapter 2 - A History of Modern Div
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and games of chance a secondary dev
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causes. This is also the case conce
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Evans-Pritchard also uses a lot of
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through casting the decision “upo
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transformed and new relations are g
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Somewhat between the great currents
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efutations. With this article Zeitl
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the function of divination. Special
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Chapter 3 - Definition and typology
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means signs obtained from the gods
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producer. In this case we see that
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Chapter 4 - Impetrative Divination
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ontogenetic histories. Some feeling
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direct people in their life. It can
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or potential misfortune or lack of
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Before making blood-brotherhood Bef
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It was argued that emotion was cent
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Figure 4.2. Intentional action It i
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Figure 4.4. Ritualized action in di
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was the counterintuitive agent who
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education. 43 These problems requir
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Credibility 4,5 4 3,5 3 2,5 2 1,5 1
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Clairvoyant, and Astrologist. There
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Materials A booklet similar to the
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Summary The thesis of this chapter
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Page 107 and 108: her life”. 85 In the example the
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Page 111 and 112: answer. In oblative divination the
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Page 121 and 122: Chapter 7 - Research history on Rom
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Page 135 and 136: Based on the evidence available to
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Page 141 and 142: Post-republican writers Verrius Fla
Page 143 and 144: M. Servius Honoratus Marius Servius
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Page 163 and 164: Private sortition Private sortition
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Page 167 and 168: Extispicy is a form of divination w
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History Let us see how these observ
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Summary To summarize the conclusion
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as specified in equation 3, but it
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Dissemination Private sortition Pub
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“may the gods avert (bad) omens
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excelled every race and every natio
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calf ran away and spattered many of
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the cultural model of omens, identi
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very widespread 196 and along with
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Although there is great imprecision
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1,2 1 0,4 0,2 0 Omen words in Greek
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e distinguished: nuntiatio, relatio
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ating whether a prodigy involved a
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Year BCE 218-190 189-162 160-132 13
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distinction between public and priv
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140,00 120,00 100,00 80,00 60,00 40
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two seem to have been used in the c
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8) Sacrificia vetusta occultaque mi
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The actual interpretations we hear
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this type among the prodigia, where
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consideration here the cultural mod
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encounter of people using it to a g
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action. It was argued that these re
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investigate the dissemination of di
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practices that did not survive were
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divination. At the same time the op
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Appendix 1 The Kurabi among the Mwa
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Appendix 2 The Guzul In Central Aus
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Appendix 4 Roman Words Omen Prodigi
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Theocritus 21261 1.88 1.88 0 0 0.32
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Moon fell down Capua Goats got wool
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Note: *this is possibly not a separ
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Temple of Ceres struck by lightning
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Sheep with two heads born Suessa Pi
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12 year old hermaphrodite discovere
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Cows were talking Campania Bronze c
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*This prodigy may be the same as th
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156 Storm destroys sacred places on
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* Since the Graecostasis was right
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An owl was seen on the Capitol Roma
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* Rasmussen counts as two (Rasmusse
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Sun formed a disc like a shield at
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Two calfs were found in the entrail
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Fire in the sky Note: While this pr
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Tornado ripped of roofs Bridge coll
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Doors to the temple of Fortuna open
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Appendix 6 Examples of counterintui
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Bibliography Primary Sources 220 La
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Secondary sources Abbink, J. 1993:
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Bering, J. M. and Johnson, D. P. 20
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Callaway, H. 1970: The Religious Sy
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Dumezil, G. 1970: Archaic Roman Rel
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Guillaumont, F. 1984: Philosophe et
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Koenig, M. A., Clement, F., and Har
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Luterbacher, F. 1967: Der Prodigien
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Patton, L. L. 2000: "The Magic in M
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Schilling, R. 1979: "A propos des "
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Taylor, L. R. 1949: Party Politics
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Woodward, J. 2000: "Explanation and
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Oprindeligt blev divination forklar
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menneskelig perception eller ræson
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I kapitel 6 sammenlignes observatio
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Den sidste ligning udtrykker, at sa
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The dissemination of divination in roman republican times

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