Editing Religion in ancient Rome (section)

=== Religion and politics ===
[[File:Wall painting - Dionysos with Helios and Aphrodite - Pompeii (VII 2 16) - Napoli MAN 9449 - 01.jpg|thumb|[[Dionysus]] (Bacchus) with long torch sitting on a throne, with [[Helios]] ([[Sol (Roman mythology)|Sol]]), [[Aphrodite]] ([[Venus (mythology)|Venus]]) and other gods. Wall-painting from [[Pompeii]], Italy]]
Rome's government, politics and religion were dominated by an educated, male, landowning military aristocracy. Approximately half of Rome's population were slave or free non-citizens. Most others were [[plebeians]], the lowest class of Roman citizens. Less than a quarter of adult males had voting rights; far fewer could actually exercise them. Women had no vote.<ref>During the Augustan era, the city of Rome probably housed around a million people, including an unknown number of provincials: by Mouritsen's estimate, around 200,000 Roman citizens were eligible to vote in Rome itself during the late Republican era but during major elections, the influx of rural voters and the bottleneck of the city's ancient electoral apparatus meant that perhaps 12% of eligible citizens actually voted. This nevertheless represents a substantial increase from the estimated 1% adult male enfranchisement rights of 145 BC. At any time, the overwhelming majority of citizens – meaning the plebs – had minimal direct involvement in central government. See Henrik Mouritsen, Plebs and Politics in the Late Roman Republic (Cambridge, U.K., Cambridge University Press, 2001), 32ff.</ref> However, all official business was conducted under the divine gaze and auspices, in the name of the Senate and people of Rome. "In a very real sense the senate was the caretaker of the Romans’ relationship with the divine, just as it was the caretaker of their relationship with other humans".<ref>Orlin, in Rüpke (ed.), 61.</ref>

The links between religious and political life were vital to Rome's internal governance, diplomacy and development from kingdom, to Republic and to Empire. Post-regal politics dispersed the civil and religious authority of the kings more or less equitably among the patrician elite: kingship was replaced by two annually elected consular offices. In the early Republic, as presumably in the regal era, plebeians were excluded from high religious and civil office, and could be punished for offenses against laws of which they had no knowledge.<ref>Orlin, in Rüpke (ed.), –– 60.</ref> They resorted to [[Conflict of the Orders|strikes and violence]] to break the oppressive patrician monopolies of high office, public priesthood, and knowledge of civil and religious law. The Senate appointed [[Marcus Furius Camillus|Camillus]] as [[Roman dictator|dictator]] to handle the emergency; he negotiated a settlement, and sanctified it by the dedication of a temple to [[Concordia (mythology)|Concordia]].<ref>Belayche, in Rüpke (ed.), 283: citing Plutarch, Camillus, 42. Belayche describes this as a votive offering (''uotum''), which "offered a supernatural legitimacy for decisions or actions... [and] entailed being assisted and reassured, through the forwarding of hopes or dis-
appointments, anger or contentment, to superior powers." See also Versnel, Henrik S., (ed.), "Religious mentality in ancient prayer," in Versnel, Henrik S., Faith, Hope and Worship: Aspects of Religious Mentality in the Ancient World, Leyden, 1981, pp 1–64.</ref> The religious calendars and [[Twelve Tables|laws]] were eventually made public. [[Tribune of the plebs|Plebeian tribunes]] were appointed, with sacrosanct status and the right of veto in legislative debate. In principle, the augural and pontifical colleges were now open to plebeians.<ref>The ''collegia'' were opened to plebs by the ''[[Lex Ogulnia]]'' of 300 BC.</ref> In reality, the patrician and to a lesser extent, plebeian nobility dominated religious and civil office throughout the Republican era and beyond.<ref>"The change that comes about at the end of the republic and solidifies under Augustus is not political, but cultural". Galinsky, in Rüpke (ed.), 72: citing Habinek, T., and Schiesaro, A., (eds.) ''The Roman Cultural Revolution''. Princeton, New Jersey, 1997 & Wallace-Hadrill, A., "Mutatas formas: the Augustan transformation of Roman knowledge", in: Galinsky, K., (ed.) ''The Cambridge Companion to the Age of Augustus'', Cambridge, 2005, pp 55–84: ''contra'' Syme, R., The Roman Revolution, 1939.</ref>
[[File:巴貝克神殿8591 (2).jpg|thumb|left|[[Temple of Bacchus]] ("Temple of the Sun"), c. 150 AD]]

While the new plebeian nobility made social, political and religious inroads on traditionally patrician preserves, their electorate maintained their distinctive political traditions and religious cults.<ref>Smith, in Rüpke (ed.), 42.</ref> During the Punic crisis, popular cult to [[Dionysus]] emerged from southern Italy; Dionysus was equated with [[Liber|Father Liber]], the inventor of plebeian augury and personification of plebeian freedoms, and with Roman [[Bacchus]]. Official consternation at these enthusiastic, unofficial [[Bacchanalia]] cults was expressed as moral outrage at their supposed subversion, and was followed by ferocious suppression. Much later, a statue of [[Marsyas#Prophecy and free speech at Rome|Marsyas]], the ''[[Silenus|silen]]'' of Dionysus flayed by [[Apollo]], became a focus of brief symbolic resistance to Augustus' censorship. Augustus himself claimed the patronage of Venus and Apollo; but his settlement appealed to all classes. Where loyalty was implicit, no divine hierarchy need be politically enforced; [[Liberalia|Liber's festival]] continued.<ref>Galinsky, in Rüpke (ed.), 72: "...the change that comes about at the end of the republic and solidifies under Augustus is not political, but cultural. Most of the members of the priestly colleges in Augustus’ time continued to be aristocrats, but the real power and control over religion and the calendar now flowed from professional experts, such as the polymath Varro, because they had the power of knowledge.</ref><ref>Two centuries later, when Decius and Diocletian required universal sacrifice to Roman gods as a test of loyalty, any traditional gods served the purpose: loyal compliance with Imperial dictat made them Roman.</ref>

The Augustan settlement built upon a cultural shift in Roman society. In the middle Republican era, even [[Scipio Africanus|Scipio]]'s tentative hints that he might be Jupiter's special protege sat ill with his colleagues.<ref>Scipio did not claim personal connections with Jupiter; but he did not deny rumours to that effect. Contrary to usual practice, his ''[[Roman funerals and burial#Imagines ("images")|imago]]'' (funeral mask) was stored in the Temple of Jupiter.</ref> Politicians of the later Republic were less equivocal; both [[Sulla]] and [[Pompey]] claimed special relationships with [[Venus (mythology)|Venus]]. Julius Caesar went further; he claimed her as [[Venus (mythology)#Epithets|his ancestress]], and thus an intimate source of divine inspiration for his personal character and policies. In 63 BC, his appointment as ''pontifex maximus'' "signaled his emergence as a major player in Roman politics".<ref>Orlin, in Rüpke (ed.), 66.</ref> Likewise, political candidates could sponsor temples, priesthoods and the immensely popular, spectacular public ''ludi'' and ''munera'' whose provision became increasingly indispensable to the factional politics of the Late Republic.<ref>Otherwise, electoral bribery ([[ambitus]]): see Cicero, ''Letters to friends'', 2.3: see also Beard et al., Vol. 1, 65–67.</ref> Under the [[principate]], such opportunities were limited by law; priestly and political power were consolidated in the person of the princeps ("first citizen").

<blockquote>Because of you we are living, because of you we can travel the seas, because of you we enjoy liberty and wealth. —A thanksgiving prayer offered in Naples' harbour to the princeps Augustus, on his return from Alexandria in 14 AD, shortly before his death.<ref>Hertz, in Rüpke (ed.), 310.</ref></blockquote>