Cultural Province Research Articles

New Light on the Cult Centre at Gorsium (Pannonia Inferior)

Dans une étude révisée de RIU 1533, G. Alföldy réaffirme que les premières lettres du texte correspondent aux Di Magni—une interprétation approuvée par d'autres épigraphistes éminents—mais propose que ces dieux puissent avoir été vénérés dans le curieux temple aux nefs multiples récemment mis au jour par J. Fisk. Il interprète alors les templenses comme étant les disciples du culte, et non le personnel du temple. En plus de son commentaire à cette inscription, Alföldy présente une analyse de la famille de Mercator dont il reconstitue les noms et le stemma familial. Dans sa réédition de CIL III 3342 (RIU 1537), il indique que plusieurs lignes du texte pourraient avoir été perdues au-dessous des mots préservés et il réitère que le site de Tác ne peut pas avoir été le foyer du culte provincial de la Pannonie inférieure, étant donné que D. Fishwick a montré que ce culte se déroulait sûrement, non pas dans un temple, mais sur un autel, peut-être celui à Aquincum. Finalement, Alföldy propose que le temple des Di Magni ait été le temple excentrique récemment découvert (voir ci-dessus) plutôt que l' area sancta en entier, comme l'avait supposé Fishwick.

Diana’s cave sanctuary in Csákvár (county Fejér)

Near Csákvár, in the so-called Báraczháza cave there are relics of an antique Diana cult. A number of inscriptions can be found before and within the cave system, part of them known from the 18 th c., part of them unpublished. The two main passages of the cave seem to have been the sanctuary. In the left passage the Diana idol carved into the stone remained, its iconography is nearly unique, and fits to a provincial cult based on pre-Roman, Celtic or Pannon background. At the end of the right passage there is a strange short inscription with a phallic symbol scratched into the wall, which may refer to the divine pair of the local Diana goddess, called most likely Silvanus. The statue and some inscriptions were made, and consequently the sanctuary was certainly used in the Severan Era, and probably remained in use until the later 4 th c., when the spreading Christianity must have finished the cult, although the possible Christograms in the walls of the cave cannot be taken doubtless as signs for that; the cave contains some early New Age inscriptions too.

Book Review: The Imperial Cult in the Latin West: Studies in the Ruler Cult of the Western Provinces. Volume Three: Provincial Cult; Part One: Institution and Evolution. By Duncan Fishwick. Leiden, The Netherlands: Brill, 2002. Pp. xvi + 259. Cloth, $137.00. The Imperial Cult in the Latin West: Studies in the Ruler Cult of the Western Provinces. Volume Three: Provincial

Book Review: The Imperial Cult in the Latin West: Studies in the Ruler Cult of the Western Provinces. Volume Three: Provincial Cult; Part One: Institution and Evolution. By Duncan Fishwick. Leiden, The Netherlands: Brill, 2002. Pp. xvi + 259. Cloth, $137.00. The Imperial Cult in the Latin West: Studies in the Ruler Cult of the Western Provinces. Volume Three: Provincial

The Sacred Area at Gorsium (Pannonia Inferior)

UNTIL ONLY TEN YEARS AGO prolonged discussion reaching back into the nineteenth century seemed finally to have agreed that the centre of the provincial cult of Pannonia Inferior was located at Gorsium, not Aquincum.' Lower Pannonia consequently resembled Pannonia Superior, where the seat of the provincial council looks to have been at Savaria rather than Carnuntum, the administrative centre and residence of the provincial governor.2 As developed by J. Fitz in particular, this conclusion was based primarily on archaeological evidence, an important cultic complex uncovered on a slight rise at Tic, where Fitz identified the Roman settlement with Gorsium.3 Construction in the enclave

Grands-prêtres et helladarques d'Achaïe

Some eminent Peloponnesians, through the IInd century, served as helladarchs in the Achaean koinon and provincial high priests in the imperial cult. The first man who held both offices was Cornelius Pulcher whose career was a model of harmonious balance between adhesion to Roman order and loyalty to Greek values. Just like the provincial priesthood, the Achaean Helladarchy was held for life. As a prosopographical study makes clear, two types of Helladarch existed simultaneously, for the koinon and for the Amphictiony. The Achaean Helladarchy and the provincial priesthood were distinct offices and ceased to be closely connected from the last quarter of the Und century : the first one then became a temporary office. Pulcher's career and an inscription from Ancyra suggest that the Helladarchy had been instituted between 128 and 132. The Corinthian archiereus Licinius Priscus must have performed his priesthood in the reign of Trajan, so that the Isthmian sanctuary was restored and the temple of Palaimon achieved, under his control, before about 110 A.D. From Julius Spartiaticus to Cornelius Pulcher, the provincial high priests were Corinthians, who had close dealings with the Isthmian sanctuary where the provincial cult had grown out of the celebration of «imperial contests». From the creation of the Helladarchy onwards, the archiereus were chosen in other Peloponnesian cities and the Isthmian sanctuary lost its outstanding position in the koinon and the imperial cult.

Templum Divo Claudio Constitutum

The standard view of the great temple at Camulodunum is that it served an early provincial cult which paid outright divine worship to the reigning emperor Claudius. ‘The British cult … was a personal cult of the Emperor Claudius, to whom it accorded divinity during his lifetime with an emphasis which went well beyond previous Roman practice.’ So entrenched has this belief become that discussion has centred almost entirely upon how such an anomalous situation is to be explained. Had Claudius' officials exceeded their orders in a fit of over-enthusiasm? Or should one rather suppose a more moderate cult, for example of the emperor's numen, that quickly merged into unadulterated divine veneration? Even in Rome the trend was more and more to regard the emperor as a praesens deus; so much so that a medical writer could boldly refer to Claudius as ‘our god Caesar’. Perhaps, then, one should think in terms of a provincial experiment, justifiable for local reasons but still too far ahead of its time to be risked in the political climate of the capital. Whatever explanation recommends itself, the temple of Claudius, as now interpreted, presents major difficulties that have never been satisfactorily resolved. I should like to reconsider the problem here by openly dissenting from the main tenets of present doctrine. Was Claudius ever the object of a purely personal cult at Camulodunum? Did a temple to the god Claudius even exist there within his own lifetime?