Terminus (god)

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Terminus is often pictured as a bust on a boundary stone, here the concedo nvlli or concedo nulli means "I yield to no one".
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    Jupiter
    under the name "Jupiter Terminalis".

    Ancient writers believed that the worship of Terminus had been introduced to

    proto-Indo-European belief in a god concerned with the division of property. [citation needed
    ]

    Worship

    The name of the god Terminus was the

    garland their respective sides of the marker and make offerings to Terminus at an altar—Ovid identifies these, again, as crops, honeycombs, and wine. The marker itself would be drenched in the blood of a sacrificed lamb or pig. There followed a communal feast and hymns in praise of Terminus.[2][5]

    These rites were practised by private landowners, but there were also related public ceremonies. Ovid refers to the sacrifice of a sheep on the day of the Terminalia at the sixth

    Jupiter extended to regarding Terminus as an aspect of that god; Dionysius of Halicarnassus refers to "Jupiter Terminalis",[7] and one inscription names a god "Juppiter Ter."[8]

    There is some evidence that Terminus' associations could extend from property boundaries to limits more generally. Under the

    his persecution of Christians on February 23 has been seen as an attempt at enlisting Terminus "to put a limit to the progress of Christianity".[11]

    History

    Ancient views

    Ancient authors agreed that the worship of Terminus was of

    Sabine origin, ascribing its introduction to Rome either to Titus Tatius, the Sabine colleague of Rome's founding king Romulus (traditional reign 753–717 BC),[12] or to Romulus' successor Numa Pompilius (717–673 BC).[7][13] Those authors who gave the credit to Numa explained his motivation as the prevention of violent disputes over property.[7][13] Plutarch further states that, in keeping with Terminus's character as a guarantor of peace, his earliest worship did not involve blood sacrifices.[13]

    The stone in the Capitoline Temple was believed to have been among the altars located on the Capitoline Hill before the Temple was built under

    auspices to discover whether the god or goddess of each altar was content for it to be moved, Terminus refused permission, either alone or along with Juventas the goddess of youth. The stone was therefore included within the Capitoline Temple, and its immovability was regarded as a good omen for the permanence of the city's boundaries.[2][14]

    Modern views

    According to the dominant scholarly view during the late 19th and much of the 20th century, Roman religion was originally animistic, directed towards spirits associated with specific objects or activities which were only later perceived as gods with independent personal existence. Terminus, with his lack of mythology and his close association with a physical object, seemed a clear example of a deity who had developed little from such a stage.[4]

    This view of Terminus retains some recent adherents,

    Mitra, Aryaman, and Bhaga. In this view the sovereign god (Jupiter/Mitra) was associated with two minor deities, one concerned with the entry of men into society (Juventas/Aryaman) and the other with the fair division of their goods (Terminus/Bhaga).[8]

    References

    1. ISBN 0-19-860641-9
      .
    2. ^ a b c d e Ovid, Fasti 2.639–684.
    3. ^ Siculus Flaccus, De Condicionibus Agrorum 11.
    4. ^ a b W. Warde Fowler (1899). The Roman Festivals of the Period of the Republic: An Introduction to the Study of the Religion of the Romans. London: Macmillan and Co. pp. 324–327. Retrieved 2007-03-24.
    5. ^
      ISBN 0-500-40041-5
      .
    6. ^ Samuel Ball Platner; Thomas Ashby (1929). "Terminus, Fanum". A Topographical Dictionary of Ancient Rome. London: Oxford University Press. p. 512. Retrieved 2007-03-19.
    7. ^ a b c Dionysius of Halicarnassus, Roman Antiquities 2.74.2–5.
    8. ^
      ISBN 0-8018-5482-2
      .
    9. ISBN 0-19-860641-9
      .
    10. ^ Varro, De Lingua Latina 6.3; Ovid, Fasti 2.47–54.
    11. ISBN 0-19-814822-4
      .
    12. ^ Varro, De Lingua Latina 5.10.
    13. ^
      Roman Questions 15; Numa 16
      .
    14. ^ Livy 1.55; Dionysius of Halicarnassus, Roman Antiquities 3.69.3–6.

    Further reading

    External links

    Wikimedia Commons has media related to Terminus.
    Wikisource has the text of the 1911 Encyclopædia Britannica article "Terminus".

    The dictionary definition of Terminus at Wiktionary

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