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A Mithraic Pope? The “Pater Patrum” or “Father of Fathers”

Posted on by Roger Pearse

Among the nonsense that circulates on the web is an interesting claim, which may be found in the old online Catholic Encyclopedia,[1] and spread into atheist literature via the medium of Joseph Wheless’ Forgery in Christianity.[2].  It is perhaps most accessible today by means of the Christ Conspiracy by a certain Acharya S., a poor woman who has seemingly managed to read uncritically incredible amounts of unreliable books, without acquiring any critical sense in the process.[3].  The various corrupt versions of the Catholic Encyclopedia material will doubtless be professionally interesting to the textual critic, who may see therein the process of transmission by careless scribes beautifully exampled.

The CE states:

The fathers conducted the worship. The chief of the fathers, a sort of pope, who always lived at Rome, was called “Pater Patrum” or “Pater Patratus.”

We may reasonably ask what the source for this claim is.  Inevitably we find that it is Franz Cumont’s Textes et Monuments, vol. 1.  On p.317-8 this states:

Finally, at the top of the hierarchy were the Fathers, who appear to have presided over the sacred ceremonies (pater sacrorum). The chief of them bore the title of Pater Patrum [1], sometimes transformed into Pater patratus [2] in order to introduce an official sacerdotal title into a sect which was Roman by naturalisation.  These Grand Masters of the adepts retained until their death the general control of the cult.[3]

1. Pater patrum, cf. t. II, 535, col. 2.  One became pater patrum after being an ordinary pater, cf. inscr. 14, 15 and note, and also 13 and note. — the Marcellinus leo of inscription 45 is perhaps the same person as the Domitius Marcellinus of inscr. 31. — the title of pater nomimus (inscr. 166 and note) seems to be an ordinary Father, as opposed to the Pater Patrum.

2. Pater patratus, inscr. 190; cf. however 514: Pater patratum leonem, which I cannot explain.  Patratus cannot be considered as a collective, despite the expression ob honorem sacri matratus  of inscription 574 b.

3. Inscr. 13 and note, 15 and note.

This material is what lies behind the statements in the C.E., which thus merely serve to popularise.  (The title pater patratus is an ancient one which appears in Livy[4] for a fetial priest with powers to make a religious oath on behalf of the Roman people to conclude treaties, so perhaps might be translated as executive father).[5] 

The material given is unsatisfactory as evidence for the large claims made.  Page 535 is merely the index to all mentions of the term, 14 of them.  Inscription 13 relates to CIL VI 754, set up between 357-362 A.D. by Nonius Victor Olympius, which does not seem to refer to him as a simple pater. Inscr. 14 and 15 are the monuments of Vettius Agorius Praetextatus from 387 A.D.  The latter monuments certainly do not support Cumont’s claim that a Pater Patrum was first a Pater (however probable this would otherwise seem to be).  Neither state, as Cumont does, that the role consisted of a general direction of the cult as a whole.  Inscr. 190 is CIMRM 706, in Milan, where P. Acilius Pisonianus is labelled pater patratus, dedicates a Mithraeum with funds from the municipality of Milan after a fire.  But there is no indication that this title is the same as pater patrum.  Inscr. 514 is a 3rd century inscription in Spain (CIMRM 803), where presidente patrem patratum leonem, is the perfect Father of the Lions presiding.

As so often with Cumont, the evidence simply does not support the claims made in the text.  Wild imagination extrapolates what might be true from the rather less exciting raw data.  None of this material takes us further forward. 

We can speculate ourselves.  The Pater Leonem is, quite possibly, simply a pater with supervisory responsibility for the initiates of the grade of leo or Lion.  By analogy, a Pater Patrum would simply be the senior pater in a Mithraeum.  Given the military links of the cult, that a single individual would lead each grade, and perhaps the Mithraeum as a whole, seems inevitable, just as the centurions were led by a primus pilus in the legion.  This all fits the data admirably, and gives rise to none of the exciting claims of a “Mithraic Pope”.  Do we need to suppose the existence of such a figure?  Even if we refer to a “High Priest of Mithras”, which might have existed … do we need to suppose that there was one?  What evidence requires it?  Or should we, perhaps, see in the pater patrum the equivalent of the Christian bishop, responsible for the temples in a city?  We could; but what evidence requires this?

When we know nothing, it is really, really important not to speculate.  The data we have indicates very little.

A useful 1982 article by Peter Herz in ZPE [6] lists all the monuments that refer to a Pater Patrum.  There are fifteen of these in all.  Eleven of these are from Rome.  The majority are late Roman noblemen. 

It is, in truth, a thin collection of data.  I hope to review it all at some subsequent point.

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  1. [1]Here.↩
  2. [2]The passage in Wheless may be found here, apparently on p.37, who states that the CE material is on p.403-4.  It reads: “The fathers conducted the worship. The chief of the fathers, a sort of pope,who always lived at Rome, was called ‘Pater Patratus’ … The members below the grade of pater called one another ‘brother,’ and social distinctions were forgotten in Mithraic unity…”↩
  3. [3]Achrya S, The Christ Conspiracy, p.120: ‘Of Mithraism the Catholic Encyclopedia states, as related by Wheless, “The fathers conducted the worship. The chief of the fathers, a sort of pope, who always lived at Rome, was called ‘Pater Patratus.’” The Mithraic pope was also known as Papa and Pontimus Maximus.’↩
  4. [4]Book 1, chapter 24. Here.↩
  5. [5]More details on the ancient “Pater patratus”, a member of the college of priests known as fetiales, may be found in William Smith’s Dictionary of Greek and Roman Antiquities (1890), online here: “It appears that when an injury had been sustained, four fetiales (Varr. ap. Non.) were deputed to seek redress, who again elected one of their number to act as their representative. This individual was styled the pater patratus populi Romani. (It is an error to suppose that the pater patratus was the permanent head of the college: Mommsen, Staatsr.2 2.670. “↩
  6. [6]Peter Herz, Agrestius v(ir) c(larissimus), Zeitschrift für Papyrologie und Epigraphik, Bd. 49 (1982), pp. 221-224. JSTOR.↩

The monument of Vettius Agorius Praetextatus

Posted on by Roger Pearse

CIL VI, 1779 is a statue base.  Blessedly, a photograph is online at BBAW here, which I borrow (right), together with a transcription and a German translation.  I believe the monument may now be in the Capitoline museum in Rome.[1]

The statue which stood atop it has, alas, long since vanished, but on the base is a long inscription set up by the widow of the man in question, one Vettius Agorius Praetextatus, the leader of the “pagan reaction” in the late 4th century, which went down before S. Ambrose and the emperor Theodosius I.  He died in 384 A.D.

The inscription is as follows:

D(is) M(anibus) / Vettius Agorius Praetextatus / augur p[o]ntifex Vestae / pontifex Sol[is] quindecemvir / curialis Herc[u]lis sacratus / Libero et Eleusiniis hierophanta / neocorus tauroboliatus / pater patrum in [r]e publica vero / quaestor candidatus / pr(a)etor urbanus / corrector Tusciae et Umbriae / consularis Lusitaniae / proconsule Achaiae / praefectus urbi / legatus a senatu missus V / praefectus praetorio II Italiae / et Illyrici / consul ordinarius / designatus / et Aconia Fabia Paulina c(larissima) f(emina) / sacrata Cereri et Eleusiniis / sacrata apud (A)eginam Hecatae / tauroboliata hierophantria / hi coniuncti simul vixerunt ann(os) XL // Vettius Agorius Praetextatus / Paulinae coniugi / Paulina veri et castitatis conscia / dicata templis atq(ue) amica numinum / sibi maritum praeferens Romam viro / pudens fidelis pura mente et corpore / benigna cunctis utilis penatibus / cae[le]s[tium iam sede semper mec]u[m e]ri[s // Vettius Agorius Praetextatus / Paulinae coniugi / Paulina nostri pectoris consortio / fomes pudoris castitatis vinculum / amorque purus et fides caelo sata / arcana mentis cui reclusa credidi / munus deorum qui maritalem torum / nectunt amicis et pudicis nexibus / pietate matris coniugali gratia / nexu sororis filiae modestia / et quanta amicis iungimur fiducia / aetatis usu consecrandi foedere / iugi fideli simplici concordia / iuvans maritum diligens ornans / colens // [Sple]ndor parentum nil mihi maius dedit / [quam] quod marito digna iam tum visa sum / [se]d lumen omne vel decus nomen viri / Agori superbo qui creatus germine / patriam senatum coniugemq(ue) inluminas / probitate mentis moribus studiis simul / virtutis apicem quis supremum nanctus es / tu namque quidquid lingua utraq(ue) est proditum / cura soforum porta quis caeli patet / vel quae periti condidere carmina / vel quae solutis vocibus sunt edita / meliora reddis quam legendo sumpseras / sed ista parva tu pius m<y=OVE>stes sacris / teletis reperta mentis arcano premis / divumque numen multiplex doctus colis / sociam benigne coniuge nectens sacris / hominum deumque consciam ac fidam tibi / quid nunc honores aut potestates loquar / hominumque votis adpetita gaudia / quae tu caduca ac parva semper autumans / divum sacerdos infulis celsus clues / tu me marite disciplinarum bono / puram ac pudicam sorte mortis eximens / in templa ducis ac famulam divis dicas / te teste cunctis imbuor mysteriis / tu Dindymenes Atteosqu<e=I> antistitem / teletis honoras taureis consors pius / Hecates ministram trina secreta edoces / Cererisque Graiae tu sacris dignam paras / te propter omnis me beatam me piam / celebrant quod ipse bonam disseminas / totum per orbem ignota noscor omnibus / nam te marito cur placere non queam / exemplum de me Romulae matres petunt / subolemque pulchram si tuae similis putant / optant probantque nunc viri nunc feminae / quae tu magister indidisti insignia / his nunc ademptis maesta coniunx maceror / felix maritum si superstitem mihi / divi dedissent sed tamen felix tua / quia sum fuique postque mortem mox ero

Much of this is an epitaph by the wife, Paulina, and an English translation of it may be found here.  But the list of offices held is also very interesting:

To the shades of Vettius Agorius Praetextatus, augur, priest of Vesta, priest of Sol, member of the Board of Fifteen, initiate of the senate of Hercules, hierophant of Liber and the Elusinian mysteries, neocorus (?), tauroboliate (i.e. had undergone the taurobolium in the cult of Cybele), pater patrum; and in the state: candidate for Quaestor, Urban Praetor, Corrector of Tuscany and Umbria,  a consular of Lusitania, proconsul of Achaia, Urban Prefect, senatorial legate 5 times, Praetorian Prefect of Italy and Illyria twice, consul-ordinary-designate; and Aconia Fabia Paulina, noble woman, initiate of Ceres and the Eleusinian mysteries, initiate of Hecate at Aegina, tauroboliate hierophant …

The mention of “pater patrum” reminds us of the cult of Mithras, where 15 inscriptions attest to a person of high rank, usually in Rome, with that title. 

But when I first read this, I wondered whether it should be connected instead to the list of secular offices.  Unlike any other priesthood, the name of the god is not mentioned.  Could we simply read as “truly the Father of the Fathers in the state”, with the old meaning of patres as the Fathers, the senators, in much the way that Lord Macaulay gives it:

For Romans in Rome’s quarrel spared neither land nor gold,
Nor son nor wife, nor limb nor life, in the brave days of old.
Then none was for a party; then all were for the state;
Then the great man helped the poor, and the poor man loved the great.
Then lands were fairly portioned; then spoils were fairly sold:
The Romans were like brothers in the brave days of old.
Now Roman is to Roman more hateful than a foe,
And the Tribunes beard the high, and the Fathers grind the low.
As we wax hot in faction, in battle we wax cold:
Wherefore men fight not as they fought in the brave days of old.

But it seems to be generally read as a reference to the Mithraic office.

Praetextatus was a great man in his day, a Roman aristocrat at the end of the 4th century, watching the world change in unthinkable ways and trying, in his own way, to resist.  Within a handful of years of his death, the barbarians would ride in triumph through Rome itself.  How curious that his monument should survive, 16 centuries later, as a window into a Rome that was vanishing as it was carved.

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  1. [1]See the website here.  This gives an inventory no, inv. MC0208, and tells us the item is 125 cm high.↩

John the Lydian, On the Roman Months — “February” now online

Posted on by Roger Pearse

I am delighted to say that another section of John the Lydian, De Mensibus, book 4, has now made it into English!  This is the portion that deals with Roman calendar events in February.  As always, I make this public domain.  Do whatever you like with it, personal, educational or commercial.

It’s really rather an interesting section this.  Who would have thought that it contained medical details?!

The translator has also agreed to have a go at the section on April, so we have more goodies to look forward to!

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From my diary

Posted on by Roger Pearse

Roger Beck’s collection of essays, Beck on Mithraism, has arrived at my local library and I have taken possession of it.  It will be interesting to look at, although I find that it is difficult to concentrate on any project while I am working at full pressure in my day-job.

I’m still working through Manfred Clauss’ book on Mithras, but the same problem applies.

A review of the Eusebius book, Gospel Problems and Solutions, has appeared in Adamantius, who have kindly sent me a PDF of it.  It’s in Italian (which means that I have not read it yet) and by the excellent Christophe Guignard.

A translation of the remarks of John the Lydian on February, in his book On the Roman Months, is complete, has been paid for, and will appear here very soon now.  It is quite excellent and very interesting.  The work suffers from lacunae, at points where the manuscript was unreadable.  The edition in question appeared a century ago and I can’t help wondering what a modern UV photograph might reveal.

Meanwhile it looks as if we will be getting a translation of a short sermon by Severian of Gabala!

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A Greek Christian Text on the Seven Sages: Ps.-Athanasius, “On the Temple at Athens” now online in English

Posted on by Roger Pearse

In 1923 A. Delatte published a strange, short Greek text which consists of sayings predicting Christ attributed to the Seven Sages.[1]  There are quite a number of collections of “sayings” in later Greek literature, which are studied under the intimidating title of “gnomologia” (i.e. “wisdom sayings”).  Most remain inaccessible and untranslated.  The sayings are usually attributed to some important sounding individuals.  There is a class of this literature which consists of sayings predicting Christian teaching and the events of the New Testament and attributed to pagan philosophers.  In this way the medieval Greeks had both Jewish and pagan predictions of Christ, a twofold testimony.

It is unfortunate that sayings literature is a low form of literature, in which the apophthegms are routinely transferred from one name to another.  The closest modern parallel is perhaps the joke book, in which many a joke ends up attributed to Winston Churchill or Oscar Wilde.

Delatte’s text is one of this class.  He found it in a Vatican manuscript, Ms. Vatican graecus 1198 (16th century), which was published by the Benedictine Fathers and reprinted by Migne.[2].  A manuscript in Athens, B.N. 431 (18th c.), fol. 79r ff, also contains the text.  Attributed to Athanasius, the date of the text must be later and is supposed by Delatte to be 5th century A.D., as he believed it to be a fragment of the lost work of Aristocritus, the Theosophy.

Adam McCollum has kindly transcribed the Greek and translated the text into English for us, with useful notes.  I have placed his PDF and the .RTF file at Archive.org, here.  But I thought the bare translation might usefully appear here.  Enjoy it!

* * * *

On the Temple, Schools, and Theatres in Athens
Commentary of Athanasius the Great on the Temple in Athens

1. Those who do not understand the divine scriptures we ought to persuade concerning the knowledge of God further from the nature of things itself, for we see certain essences in creation that cooperate  with each other not naturally but supernaturally. As an example I mention the essence of water, a nature that is flowing and having a downward tendency: how, then, do we see the so-called water-spouts carrying water up out of the sea to the clouds? But more surprising is the fact that [what had been] salty, as it returns to the earth, comes down through the rain as something sweet. And again, how does the nature of bodies, naturally sinkable, appear unsinkable and unsubmergeable in the waters of the Pentapolis of Marmarica?  Not only this, but at one time in Lycia on the mountain called Olympus nature was also the reverse of both water and fire  at the same time, as countless people have seen, and even to the present [people] witness this, and countless other paradoxes are seen and marveled at in creation, things that would not thus be destined to be supernatural, were it not for some essence of God mastering them and commanding them not to oppose each other. O children of the Greeks! How, when there is severe thunder, does all human nature tremble, shudder, and stop dumbfounded, declaring through that bearing that it is under [the power of] a master who effects the thunder?

2. While these things bring examples for the knowledge of God to the simpler ones among the Greeks, to the wise among them certain wise men of the Greeks from among the old and able philosophers declared many testimonies concerning reverence for God, and they even dimly declared beforehand the economy of Christ. For many years before the arrival of Christ, a certain wise man, Apollo by name — moved, I believe by God — founded the temple in Athens, having written on its altar, to the unknown god. In this [temple], then, were gathered the first philosophers of the Greeks, that they might ask him about the temple and about prophecy and reverence for God. Their names, we will say, are these: first Titon, second Bias, third Solon, fourth Cheilon, fifth Thucydides, sixth Menander, seventh Plato. These seven philosophers spoke to Apollo: “Prophesy to us, O prophet Apollo: what is this temple, and whose is this altar behind you?” Apollo said to them: “Whatever pertains to virtue and good order, arise to do, [and] do it! For I announce the triune ruler on high, whose ineffable Logos will be conceived in a free  girl. Like a fire-bearing bow, he will bring a gift to [his] father that, [instead of killing], has taken captive the whole world. Mary is her name.”

3. This is the explanation of the prophecy: The first saying has to do with the temple. He says to do what pertains to the good order of the temple along with practicable beauty: do things pleasing to God and to people. For I take [God] to be a great king on high in three persons in heaven: its  God without beginning, and Logos becomes flesh in an unmarried girl, and he will appear like a fire-bearing bow — or something more powerful — to the whole world, fishing for people as for fish from the depth of unbelief and ignorance, people whom he will offer as a gift to his own father. Mary is her  name. Apollo said these things in prophecy.

4. Titon said, “There will come a young girl who has progeny for us, the heavenly child of [our] God and Father. The girl conceives without a man.” Bias said, “He has come from the heavens, an exceeding, immortal fire of flame, at whom, heaven, earth, and sea tremble, [together with] the hells  and the demons of the deep, [the one who is] self-engendered  and thrice-happy.” Solon said, “Eventually at some time will God drive on  to this much-divided earth and without error become flesh; in the bounds of his inexhaustible divinity he will destroy the corruption of incurable sufferings, the ill-will of people will become bitter toward him, yet when he has been hung up like one condemned to death, he will humbly persuade each one.” Cheilon said, “He will be the inexhaustible nature of God, and [as] Logos he will derive from him [God] himself.” Thucydides said, “Honor God and learn! Do not seek who he is and how, for either he is or he is not: as he is, honor him!” Menander said, “The old is new and the new ancient, the father progeny and progeny a father. The one is three and the three one. Fleshless is of flesh. Earth has given birth to the heavenly king.” Plato said,  “Since God is good, he is not responsible for everything, as many people say; rather, for many things he is not responsible. We say that he and no other is responsible for good things: only of what is beautiful, hardly of what is bad.” In turn these seven spoke:  they were concerned with the economy of Christ and with the holy trinity.

5. Another Greek sage, called Asclepius, along with some others, asked Hermes, more philosophical than all the philosophers, to give them a saying about God’s nature. Hermes took a pen  and wrote as follows: “Except for some providence of the Lord of all, he would be wishing neither to reveal this saying, nor to occupy you with such deeds, that you ask about them, for it is not possible for such things to be handed over to the uninitiated, but [as for you], listening with the mind, listen! There was only one: intellectual light before intellectual light, and it had unity from the mind in light and spirit. All things are from him and to him.  One fertile, having come down from [another] fertile one onto fertile water,  made the water pregnant.”

6. You know how the children of the Greeks prophesied and declared beforehand the God who is before all eternity, his Son and Word likewise without origin, and his co-reigning and consubstantial Spirit, and declared beforehand the costly sufferings of the cross. To him be glory and power along with the Father without beginning and the all-holy Spirit forever and ever, amen!

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  1. [1]A. Delatte, “Le déclin de la Légende des VII Sages et les Prophéties théosophiques”, Musée Belge 27 (1923): 97-111.  An extremely poor copy of this was sold to me by the British Library for an exorbitant price some years ago.↩
  2. [2]PG 28, col. 1428 f.↩

Translation of the Triadon, part 1 – now online in English

Posted on by Roger Pearse

Anthony Alcock has been busy.  He has made a translation of the first half of the Triadon and is generously making it available to us all.

The Triadon is a 14th century poem which has the distinction of being the last literary text composed in Coptic.[1]

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  1. [1]For more details see here.↩

From my diary

Posted on by Roger Pearse

Good news.  I have today received the first draft of the translation of “February” from John the Lydian’s On the months (De mensibus) book 4.  It’s a cracker.  How this text has avoided being translated before I do not know.  The footnotes added by the translator are also very, very useful.  To read this stuff is a liberal education.  I will post the final version online when it is ready.

Also in the works is a translation of a curious text on the Seven Sages, attributed to Athanasius but in reality part of the gnomological tradition.  In this the sages predict the coming of Christ.  I have the PDF, but need a Word document so that I can post it here.  It’s a useful piece, showing how the Greeks in the Middle Ages created a rival “pagan prophets of Jesus” tradition to stand alongside the Jewish prophecies in the Old Testament.

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The Dieburg Mithraeum – some reflections on the 1928 publication

Posted on by Roger Pearse

Great news – Behn’s Das Mithrasheiligtum zu Dieberg, De Gruyter (1928) has arrived.  Here’s an image of the title page as proof!

The discovery of the Mithraeum at Dieberg was something of a watershed.  I don’t know if there were monographs dedicated to individual Mithraea before then, but it set a pattern for such monographs in future.  Most notably these included the publications of Vermaseren of the splendid Mithraea of Marino and Barberini, with the amazing colour frescos.

Behn’s book was doubtless cutting-edge in its time.  But what struck me, as I looked through it, was how poor the quality of the photographs was.  They are small, grainy, and I don’t know how useful they are to the scholar.  Yet, most likely, these are the only available images of the lesser finds.

The Mithraeum in Germany tends to contain very elaborate tauroctonies, with side panels depicting what must be elements of the mythology of the mysteries of Mithras.  Unfortunately we can only guess from these what the story being told was.

So the German tauroctonies are important for the study of Mithras.  The Dieburg Mithraeum is one of these.

The volume itself is A4, and less than 50 pages, so I have made a copy of it for my own use.  I wish that I could share it; but the fact is that it will probably be in copyright when I am in my grave.  I doubt that more than a handful of people ever consult Behn’s tome; and, so long as we have oppressive copyright laws, that is the way that it will stay.

So why scan it?  Well, because I want to read it.  And I don’t read German very well.  Once the OCR has completed, I can copy and paste portions of the German text into Google Translate.  And that will give me a very fair idea of what most of the book — much of it probably waffle – says.

It has been long since I sat at my scanner on a Friday evening, and it has been a pleasant reminder of how I used to spend my weekends.  The time at my disposal grows less every year, or so it seems.  The night comes, when none of us can work.  But “ah, not yet, not yet”.[1]

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  1. [1]Matthew Arnold, On the Rhine. From Empedocles on Etna, and Other Poems, 1855.  Online here.↩

Celebrating the Lupercalia

Posted on by Roger Pearse

Bill Thayer writes to say that he has located a 1921 thesis devoted to sifting the evidence for the ancient Roman festival of the Lupercalia.  He’s typed it in, and uploaded it to the web.  It can be found here.

If you are not familiar with Bill’s site, Lacus Curtius, it goes considerably further than the excellent transcriptions of translations of the Greek and Latin classics.  It also contains very useful secondary material, often with “Thayer’s notes” at the end, which are invariably erudite.

Apparently there are people who go around telling modern fairy-stories about the Lupercalia, often with an anti-Christian twist or imagined “orgies”.  This must be an American thing, for I have never encountered it.  If so, it is regrettable.

The lupercalia was abolished in the late 5th century, as we learn from a letter of Pope Gelasius, letter 100 in the Collectio Avellana.  I have had no luck in getting this translated; but I have just offered it to another reader, and perhaps this time it will be done!

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Chrysostom’s Christmas sermons – now online in English

Posted on by Roger Pearse

Maria Dahlin has done us all a favour, and made available her translation of five sermons by John Chrysostom!  Here’s what she says:

Now available at http://archive.org/details/ChrysostomsChristmasSermonsTranslatedAndExamined are the translations of 5 of Chrysostom’s sermons on Christmas:

  • In Christi Natalem Diem,
  • In Christi Natalem,
  • In Natalem Christi Diem,
  • In Natale Domini Nostri Jesu Christi, and
  • In Natale Domini et in Sanctam Mariam Genitricem

and a 20 page essay on the important status that Chrysostom gives to Christmas.

The files are also here:

I have always wanted to see English versions of these made available.  Thank you so much, Maria!

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