Sibylline Books

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The Sibylline Books (

Latin: Libri Sibyllini) were a collection of oracular utterances, set out in Greek hexameter verses, that, according to tradition, were purchased from a sibyl by the last king of Rome, Lucius Tarquinius Superbus, and consulted at momentous crises through the history of the Roman Republic and the Empire
.

Only fragments have survived, the rest being lost or deliberately destroyed. The Sibylline Books are not the same as the Sibylline Oracles, twelve books of prophecies thought to be of Judaeo-Christian origin.

History

Michelangelo's rendering of the Erythraean Sibyl

According to the Roman tradition, the oldest collection of Sibylline books appears to have been made about the time of

Gergis on Mount Ida in the Troad; it was attributed to the Hellespontine Sibyl and was preserved in the temple of Apollo at Gergis. From Gergis the collection passed to Erythrae, where it became famous as the oracles of the Erythraean Sibyl. It would appear to have been this very collection that found its way to Cumae (see the Cumaean Sibyl
) and from Cumae to Rome.

The story of the acquisition of the Sibylline Books by the seventh and last king of Rome, Lucius Tarquinius Superbus ("Tarquinius", ruled 534 to 509 B.C., d. 495 B.C.), is one of the famous legendary elements of Roman history. An old woman, possibly a Cumaean Sibyl, offered to Tarquinius nine books of these prophecies at an exorbitant price; when the king declined to purchase them, she burned three and offered the remaining six to Tarquinius at the same price, which he again refused. Thereupon, she burned three more and repeated her offer, maintaining the same price. Tarquinius then consulted the Augurs whose importance in Roman history is averred by Livy. The Augurs deplored the loss of the six books and urged purchase of the remaining three. Tarquinius then purchased the last three at the full original price, and had them preserved in a sacred vault beneath the Capitoline temple of Jupiter. The story is alluded to in Varro's lost books quoted in Lactantius Institutiones Divinae (I: 6) and by Origen, and told by Aulus Gellius (Noctes Atticae 1, 19).[1]

The

praetors. They held office for life, and were exempt from all other public duties. They had the responsibility of keeping the books in safety and secrecy. The 15 individuals were custodians of the Sibylline Books that were kept on the Palatine. These officials, at the command of the Senate, consulted the Sibylline Books in order to discover not exact predictions of definite future events in the form of prophecy
, but the religious observances necessary to avert extraordinary calamities and to expiate ominous prodigies (comets and earthquakes, showers of stones, plague, and the like). It was only the rites of expiation prescribed by the Sibylline Books, according to the interpretation of the oracle that were communicated to the public, and not the oracles themselves, which left ample opportunity for abuses.

In particular, the keepers of the Sibylline Books had the superintendence of the worship of

Etruscan religion. As the Sibylline Books had been collected in Anatolia, in the neighborhood of Troy, they recognized the gods and goddesses and the rites observed there and helped introduce them into Roman state worship, a syncretic
amalgamation of national deities with the corresponding deities of Greece, and a general modification of the Roman religion.

Since they were written in

Tibur (the 'Tiburtine Sibyl') of the brothers Marcius, and others, which had been circulating in private hands but which were called in, to be delivered to the Urban Praetor, private ownership of such works being declared illicit, and to be evaluated by the Quindecimviri, who then sorted them, retaining only those that appeared true to them.[5]

From the Capitol they were transferred by Augustus as pontifex maximus in 12 BC, to the

Flavius Stilicho (died AD 408) burned them, as they were being used to attack his government. The last known consultation was in 363 CE.[6]

Some supposedly genuine Sibylline verses are preserved in the Book of Marvels or Memorabilia of Phlegon of Tralles (2nd century AD). These represent an oracle, or a combination of two oracles, of seventy hexameters in all. They report the birth of an androgyne, and prescribe a long list of rituals and offerings to the gods.[citation needed] Their authenticity has been questioned.[7]

Relationship with the "Sibylline Oracles"

The

Late Antiquity.[8]

Consultations of the Books cited in history

An incomplete list of consultations of the Sibylline Books recorded by historians:

  • 399 BC: The books were consulted following a pestilence, resulting in the institution of the lectisternium ceremony. (Livy 5, 13)
  • 348 BC: A plague struck Rome after a brief skirmish with the Gauls and Greeks. Another lectisternium was ordered. (Livy 7, 27)
  • 345 BC: The books were consulted when a "shower of stones rained down and darkness filled the sky during daylight". Publius Valerius Publicola was appointed dictator to arrange a public holiday for religious observances. (Livy 7, 28)
  • 295 BC: They were consulted again following a pestilence, and reports that large numbers of Appius Claudius' army had been struck by lightning. A Temple was built to Venus near the Circus Maximus. (Livy 10, 31)
  • 293 BC: After yet another plague, the books were consulted, with the prescription being 'that
    Samnite wars
    , took no steps beyond performing one day of public prayers to Aesculapius. (Livy 10, 47)
  • 240/238 BC: The Ludi Florales, or "Flower Games", were instituted after consulting the books.

References

  1. ^ Gell. I 19 [1]
  2. ^ Orlin 2002;97.
  3. ^ See Orlin 2002:97f.
  4. ^ "after the burning of the Capitol during the Social War... the verses of the Sibyl, or Sibyls, as the case may be, were collected from Samos, Ilium, and Erythrae, and even in Africa, Sicily, and the Graeco-Italian colonies; the priests being entrusted with the task of sifting out the genuine specimens, so far as should have been possible by human means. " (Tacitus, Annals, VI.12.
  5. ^ Tacitus, Annals, eo. loc.
  6. ^ Warrior, Valerie. Roman Religion. Cambridge University Press.
  7. ^ Keskiaho, Jesse (January 2013). "Re-visiting the libri Sibyllini: Some remarks on their nature in Roman legend and experience". Mika Kajava Ed., Studies in Ancient Oracles and Divination, Acta Instituti Romani Finlandiae 40.
  8. ^ Terry, 1899.
  9. ^ Beard, p. 158.
  10. ^ For attestations see: Cicero De Haruspicum Responsis 24–28; Varro Lingua Latina 6.15; Diodorus Siculus 34.33.1–6; Livy 29.10.4–11.8, 29.14.1–14; [Verrius Flaccus] Fasti Praenestini April 4; Strabo Geography 12.5.3; Ovid Fasti 4.180–372; Valerius Maximus 8.15.3; Pliny Natural History 7.120; Silius Italicus Punica 17.1–45; Appian The Hannibalic War 56; Festus De verborum significatu S. 51–52 M, P. 237 M; Dio Cassius 17.61; Herodian 1.11.1–5; Arnobius Adversus Nationes 7.49–50; Lactantius Divinae institutiones 2.7.12; Julian Hymn to the Mother of the Gods (Oration V) 159c–161b; Ammianus Marcellinus 22.9.5; Augustine De civitate Dei 2.5, 10.16. Other minor sources exist but these are the major attestations.
  11. ^ For attestations see: Livy 36.36.3; Tacitus Annales 4.65; Valerius Maximus 1.8.11.
  12. ^ Livy 36.36.3, trans. Sage, E. (Cambridge, Massachusetts: Harvard University Press, 1935)

Bibliography

External links

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