Month: November 2009

Mithras, “protector of the empire”

Posted on by Roger Pearse
Altar at Carnutum dedicated to Mithras by Diocletian
Altar at Carnutum dedicated to Mithras by Diocletian (CIL III 4413, CIMRM 1698)

The silly season is well underway, and daft stories about Christian origins being really pagan — all told with glee — are circulated uncritically and believed unquestioningly by those so inclined. We might reasonably wonder, however, just why every major Christian holiday is subjected to this ritual of debunking, with the evident approval of those in power.

Today’s fairy-story is that in 307 AD the emperor Diocletian proclaimed Mithras as the official protector of the empire. Those of us who know that Mithras was a mystery cult will rub their eyes at this a bit; was Diocletian really adding Mithras to the state cults?

A general google search reveals much hearsay, and suggests that the source of all this is an inscription at Carnutum on the Danube, where Mithras is apparently described as fautor imperii sui. I find a reference to this as C.I.L. III, nr. 4413.

Off to Google books, where some scholarly books might be found. And the magic name “Cumont” starts to appear. Oh blast! Off to Textes et monumentes, and there it is, in vol. 2, page 146, item 367, with a link to 227. Curiously Cumont lists the monument and its inscription separately. Here’s the details.

367. Carnuntum, CIL, III, 4413. Voyez le monument n° 227.

D(eo) S(oli) i(nvicto) M(ithrae) | fautori imperii sui | Iovii et Herculii | religiosissimi
| Augusti et Caesares | sacrarium | restituerunt.

Iovii imperatores sunt Diocletianus et liberi eius, sc. lege adoptionis Galerius, Maximinus, Licinii pater et filius, Herculii Maximianus et filius eius Constantius, nec minus Constantii liberi ius eius nominis fuisse patet, etsi Constantinus propter dissensionem cum Galerio et factione eius eo abstinuit. Pertinet autem titulus hic omnino ad a p. C.307 quo caeso a Maxentio Severo altera Augusto Galerius Aug. die Nov. 11 Carnunti praesentibus duobus Augustis senioribus Diocletiano et Maximiano Licinium patrem Augustum creavit [Euseb. ad h. a.; Idat ad h. a.; Auct. de mort. persec. c. 29; Zosim II 10 qui male confudit cum Carnunto Carnutum Galliae]. Fuerunt eo tempore Iovii Augusti tres Diocletianus senior Augustus, Galerius, Licinius,Caesar unus Maximinus ; Herculii Augustus unus Maximianus senior, Caesar item, unus Constantinus quem quamquam exercitus iam a 308 Augustum proclamaverat, tamen Galerius adhuc pro Caesare habuit, ut mittamus hostem communem Maxentium. [Tillemont IV 103 sqq.] E quibus quos affuisse constat Carnunti quattuor Augusti videntur Mithrae votum solvisse et pro se et pro absentibus Caesaribus duobus. [Mommsen.]

Always nice to get a chunk of Latin as explanation.

Monument 227 is on p. 331-2, where there is a picture of the monument (fig. 205). It’s an altar, with a picture of Cautes on one side.

227. — Grand autel [H. 1.45m, L. 0.92 m] au xviii” siècle à Petronell dans la cour du château du comte Traun. Aujourd’hui au musée des antiques de Vienne.

Décrit : Hormayr, l. c, n° 229 ; Labus, Ara Antica di Hainburgo, 1830, p. 9; Arneth, Beschreibung der zum K. K. Miïnz- und Antikencabinet gehorigen Meilensteine, etc., n” 15; cf. CIL, III, 4413. — Reproduit : fig. 205, d’après un croquis.

Sur la face antérieure on lit l’inscription n° 367. Sur le côté gauche, un dadophore dans le costume oriental ordinaire tient de la main droite une torche élevée et de la gauche trois épis. Sur le côté droit, un porte-flambeau semblable abaisse seulement sa torche.

So, we’re dealing with an altar inscription. Consulting Manfred Clauss, The Roman cult of Mithras, I find the following:

We may mention first of all the dedication by the Tetrarchs dating to the year AD 308 (V 1698). On the occasion of their meeting at Carnuntum in Pannonia Superior, Diocletian, now in retirement, together with the ruling emperors, the Iovii et Herculii religiosissimi Augusti et Caesares, dedicated an altar to Mithras as fautor imperii sui, as protector of their empire, and thereby gave expression to an understanding of the god already shared by Mithraists for centuries. Concomitantly, the Tetrarchs had part of Mithraeum III at Carnuntum repaired.

The reference to ‘V 1698’ is to the collection of monuments by Vermaseren, making this CIMRM 1698.

The inscription is thus:

Deo Soli invicto Mithrae, fautori imperii sui; Iovii et Herculii religiosissimi Augusti et Caesares, sacrarium restituerunt.
To the unconquered sun-god Mithras, patron/protector/supporter of their imperium; the Joves and Hercules’s, the most religious Augustuses and Caesars, have restored the shrine.

Not quite the same as an official edict creating Mithras the protector of the empire, is it?

As an afterthought, I look in the Clauss-Slaby database. This reveals only 6 inscriptions which use the term fautori, always as “protector”. But… great news, the database people have included a photograph! The link won’t embed in the blog software, so I’ve had to copy the image. The original is here, although that link doesn’t look very permanent. Enjoy it, and think kindly of those chaps in Eichstatt who put it online.

CIMRM 1698 Altar of Mithras erected at Carnutum by Diocletian
CIMRM 1698 Altar of Mithras erected at Carnutum by Diocletian
Share

Leo I and sun-worshippers at Christmas

Posted on by Roger Pearse

I see that the stale old anti-Christian legends are going around again this Christmas.  I’ve just seen one misrepresentation and had to look it up.

In fact, it is recorded that Pope Leo the Great, in the fifth century, had to tell Church members to stop worshiping the Sun.

Note the lack of verbatim citation and the lack of reference.  Such omissions should always make us suspicious.  So what does Leo say?  It’s in his Sermon 27, the 7th sermon on the feast of the nativity.  The NPNF translation is here:

IV. The Foolish Practice of Some Who Turn to the Sun and Bow to It is Reprehensible.

From such a system of teaching proceeds also the ungodly practice of certain foolish folk who worship the sun as it rises at the beginning of daylight from elevated positions: even some Christians think it is so proper to do this that, before entering the blessed Apostle Peter’s basilica, which is dedicated to the One Living and true God, when they have mounted the steps which lead to the raised platform, they turn round and bow themselves towards the rising sun and with bent neck do homage to its brilliant orb. We are full of grief and vexation that this should happen, which is partly due to the fault of ignorance and partly to the spirit of heathenism: because although some of them do perhaps worship the Creator of that fair light rather than the Light itself, which is His creature, yet we must abstain even flora the appearance of this observance: for if one who has abandoned the worship of gods, finds it in our own worship, will he not hark back again to this fragment of his old superstition, as if it were allowable, when he sees it to be common both to Christians and to infidels?

So … in this case the quotation is fair.  

Share

The anniversary of the death of C.S.Lewis

Posted on by Roger Pearse

… was yesterday, 22nd November 1963.  Few people so unrecognised by the establishment have had so wide an influence, on me as on many.  He provided a framework for Christians to think about what they believed.

Much as I like his theology, I do wish he’d written more fantasy.  I loved Out of the Silent Planet, and Voyage to Venus, and of course the Narnia stories.  That Hideous Strength has been described as “a Charles Williams novel written by C.S.Lewis” and correctly in my opinion. 

Share

Linking Egyptian and Babylonian chronology

Posted on by Roger Pearse

Jona Lendering points to a discovery of a Babylonian royal seal impression in a tomb in Sinai belonging to one of the Hyksos kings.  If true, this would provide a direct link between the two chronologies.  Read it – this is important.

For myself, I didn’t know that the tombs of the Hyksos monarchs were known!

Share

Origen update

Posted on by Roger Pearse

I commissioned a translation of Origen’s fourteen homilies on Ezekiel earlier this year.  Today I had what must be very nearly the final versions of homilies 11-14, including translations of relevant Greek fragments from the catenas.  This means that the job is nearly done.  It also means, less pleasantly, that I need to start thinking about how to market these, in order to recover at least some of the money, so that I can then put them online.

The sermons are lost in the original Greek; what we are translating into English for the first time is St. Jerome’s Latin translation of them.  We’re using the GCS critical text.  In the Patrologia Graeca is a pre-critical version.  But also present is an excerpt from Origen’s Commentary on Ezechiel — also mostly lost — which is about a page in length.  We’ll do that as well.

In Migne there is also a collection of Selecta in Ezechielem.  These are fragments of Origen’s original Greek text, found mixed with excerpts from other authors in the medieval Greek commentaries or catenae.  The labelling of which father contributed which excerpt can be pretty erratic in the catenas, so not all his material labelled “Origen” is probably authentic.  Migne prints what there is, tho.

Translation of the Selecta has begun, and the fragments on chapters 1-3 of Ezekiel have been completed.  Interestingly the catena fragments are much more readable than Origen at full length.  Probably the brevity of the chunks has something to do with this, but I think people will find them interesting.  Here’s one on chapter 1, verse 3.  Origen writes:

“in the land of the Chaldaeans.”  “Chaldaean” is translated as “all work.” And these [i.e., Chaldaeans] are astrologers, who talk about fate, and are completely tied to perceptible things, and work hard among them, making them into gods.  The “land of the Chaldaeans” is the worst position and attitude.  Indeed, the Chaldaeans represent a symbol of those who are arrogant in impiety.

I smiled when I read this, since later Syriac fathers would identify with the Chaldaeans.  I think we may be sure that they never saw this comment when doing so!

Share

New blog from Charles Sullivan

Posted on by Roger Pearse

Charles Sullivan, who is working on a history of Speaking in Tongues, writes to say that he has started a new blog:

http://charlesasullivan.wordpress.com/

The only thing I have in html right now is the “Translation Tips on the Greek Church Fathers” but more will come. 

Blogging every day takes time.  But if you don’t, then your readers drift away.

Share

An interesting online colour image of Mithras killing the bull

Posted on by Roger Pearse

I was experimenting with the new Microsoft Bing image search, which gave me quite different results to Google image search.  One of these caught my eye, on a Dutch forum, here.  A better version of the image, this time with real data attached, here.  It looks as if both have been scanned from a book, the first not very well.   According to the second link, this is a relief from Sterzing in Austria, CIMRM 1400.  It says that the colours are modern restoration, based on coloured frescos from Italy. 

Sterzing Mithras Tauroctony
CIMRM 1400 Sterzing Mithras Tauroctony, modern colouring

The image is useful because it is a splendidly clear representation of the cult relief of Mithras, found in every Mithraeum.  These depictions of Mithras killing the bull — the tauroctony — vary in the details.  If you do a Google search on Mithras, you will find many images of the tauroctony, varying in what is included. 

This one contains almost a full set of all the features.

Mithras kneels on the bull and pulls back its head while looking to his right toward the view.  On either side stand the demi-god torchbearers, Cautes with torch held up, Cautopates with it down. 

Below the bull the snake and the dog reach for the blood of the bull.  There is a scorpion seizing the bull’s genitals.

The events take place in a cave; hence the roof above Mithras.  At the top left appears Sol with his flaming crown.  At the top right is Luna, with her horned moon. 

Note the raven next to Sol, and the single extra-long ray of light reaching down from Sol into the cavern and onto Mithras.

At the top there are other animals, and a tabula ansata, or ‘box with a triangle at each end’ which probably had an inscription, now lost. A larger one, again with a lost inscription, is at the bottom.

On either side are panels, showing other elements from the cult myth.  These are of great interest, since we have no literary description of them.

The left-hand column shows (from the top) Jupiter battling the giants; Mithras born from the rock; Mithras doing something unrecognisable; Mithras (or possibly Atlas) kneeling, and probably the bull.

The right-hand column shows at the bottom Mithras dragging the bull.  Above it is Mithras plus two other figures.  Then Mithras, with Sol kneeling before him; then Mithras and Sol shake hands; Mithras gets into the quadriga of the sun.  At the top the feast of Sol and Mithras which in other reliefs involves consuming parts of the bull.

Details of the relief may be found here: M.J. Vermaseren, Corpus inscriptionum et monumentorum religionis Mithriacae II (1960) 148ff. No. 1400 Abb. 360; R. Merkelbach, Mithras (1984) 368f. Abb. 132.- R. Vollkommer, s.v. Mithras, LIMC VI (1992) Nr. 156 Abb.

It is interesting that initiation into the rites of Mithras did feature a hand shake, as shown here.  Firmicus Maternus comments that they were “initiates of the theft of the bull, united by the handshake of the illustrious father (Pater).” (FM 5.2)

Share

Last ancient reference to the temple of Sol

Posted on by Roger Pearse

An article at Lacus Curtius on the temple of Sol Invictus in Rome contains the following interesting statement:

The last reference to it in antiquity is in the sixth century (Anon. de Antiq. Cpl. IV.66, ed. Banduri) when eight of the porphyry columns were sent to Constantinople for the church of S. Sophia…

These abbreviated references in older literature can be a bit of a pain.  Who can guess precisely what “de Antiq. Cpl.” is?

Some Google searching reveals that it is Imperium Orientale sive Antiquitates Constantinopolitanae, edited by Anselmo Banduri and published in Paris in 1711.  A copy is being sold at auction somewhere for doubtless significant money. A google book search reveals evidence of the book’s existence, but sadly no copies.  I would have liked to see what the text actually said.

But a further search for a title of “imperium orientale” did bring up some interesting things:

So not entirely wasted effort; but I would like to see all the data on the Temple of Sol Invictus tabulated, pictures of whatever remained at the renaissance — so much was destroyed during this period! — all on one web page.

It is remarkable how little Google images gives us, if you search for pictures online of classical topics.  The same few scanty images of Mithras represent the vast body of sculpture; likewise with Sol.  Someone ought to go down to a museum with a camera and just mass upload images!  (Although I notice that if you add them to Picasa, Google images does not pick them up!)

Share

The rule of experts

Posted on by Roger Pearse

We are often advised to follow some policy or other on the grounds that all the experts agree in recommending it.  Such reliance on “wise men” rather than democracy reminded me of a saying, I think by C. S. Lewis, which from memory runs as follows:

Who are these “wise men”?  Either they are those whom the foolish think wise — a doubtful recommendation — or else those even more foolish souls who think themselves wise.

Share

Update on Abu’l Barakat

Posted on by Roger Pearse

There is a 13th century list of works that exist in Arabic Christian literature by a certain Abu’l Barakat.  It was published long ago by Riedel, with a German translation, but has never found an English translator.

Such a list is a “road-map” of the unexplored land, a guide to the wayfarer as to what might exist.  It includes works translated into Arabic, such a material by the Cappadocian fathers, plus original compositions.  The translations may be interesting — because material does exist in Arabic now lost in Greek and Syriac.  The original compositions should help us to get an idea of what there is in the language.

I commissioned a translation of this back in the summer, which I intend to give away online.  It’s been delayed because the same translator was working for me on the Syriac fragments of Eusebius.  But today I heard back.

Riedel is about 25 pages, so the idea is that we’ll do it in 5-page chunks.  That’s less intimidating for him, and easier on my pocket!

Share