Roman Divination

[docoflove1974]

Yes, the owl I believe did have the same symbolism for Minerva.

 

However, it seems it wasn't a good omen if it showed up at a Temple or Sacred Grove. I would say it was treated like Minerva herself had showed up and was saying: "I'm watching you bitches, and I ain't likin' what I'm seeing..."

 

Funny, but I don't quite get the same 'aggressive' feeling with Minerva that I do Athena. Maybe it's the name; 'Minerva' sounds old fashioned and frumpy.

 

(Oh crap...I hope I didn't piss her off too much...)

[Pantagathus]

Funny, but I don't quite get the same 'aggressive' feeling with Minerva that I do Athena. Maybe it's the name; 'Minerva' sounds old fashioned and frumpy.

 

Yeah:

 

Minerva = "That sewing looks like crap"

Athena = "You better kick the crap out of the Trojans & I'll help you"

[Pantagathus]

Interesting! From the Charlton T. Lewis, An Elementary Latin Dictionary:

 

Sinister of uncertain origin, left, on the left, on the left hand, at the left side: in sinistro cornu, on the left wing, Cs.: angulus castrorum, Cs.: ripa, H.: tibia, Ph.: manus, N.

[Stoic]

From what I've picked up so far:

 

Vultures were the most sacred birds because they never killed a living thing (hence the Romulus and Remus competition as to who would see the most vultures would be the founder of the city); Geece were sacred and saved Rome (As they warned the Romans that the Gauls were trying to take their citadel durring their sack of Rome); the chickens eating as mentioned before (the hungrier they were the better).

 

The livers of certain animals were considered to predict a positive outcome if they were clear during their inspection and if they contained a defined 'head' (but if the head was missing this was bad), lightening striking a temple usually indicated that the said God was unsatisified whereas lightening striking a wall indicated the same (as far as I can tell anyways, probably whichever God was considered the patron of said city was the one who was angry); derformed animals and people at birth (having both sexual organs particularly) were considered abombinations and cast into the sea; 'raining stones' (not hail as I orginally thought since this is mentioned seperately) was an omen of particular concern and the books were always pulled out when that happend.

 

Other then those, there are many, many mentions of isolated incidences such as strange lights and objects in the sky, statures bleeding or sweating, the sun turning red, rivers and fountains issuing blood, etc...

[Pantagathus]

Vultures were the most sacred birds because they never killed a living thing (hence the Romulus and Remus competition as to who would see the most vultures would be the founder of the city);

Stoic,

 

That's an interesting reasoning, and one I've not heard expressed that way; do you have a source for that?

[Stoic]

That's an interesting reasoning, and one I've not heard expressed that way; do you have a source for that?

 

It took me a bit to find where I picked it up but it's from Plutarch's Life of Romulus:

 

Agreeing to settle their quarrel by the flight of birds of omen, and taking their seats on the ground apart from one another, six vultures, they say, were seen by Remus, and twice that number by Romulus. Some, however, say that whereas Remus truly saw his six, Romulus lied about his twelve, but that when Remus came to him, then he did see the twelve. Hence it is that at the present time also the Romans chiefly regard vultures when they take auguries from the flight of birds.

 

Herodorus Ponticus relates that Hercules also was glad to see a vulture present itself when he was upon an exploit. For it is the least harmful of all creatures, injures no grain, fruit-tree, or cattle, and lives on carrion. But it does not kill or maltreat anything that has life, and as for birds, it will not touch them even when they are dead, since they are of its own species. But eagles, owls, and hawks smite their own kind when alive, and kill them. And yet, in the words of Aeschylus:

 

How shall a bird that preys on fellow bird be clean?"

 

Besides, other birds are, so to speak, always in our eyes, and let themselves be seen continually; but the vulture is a rare sight, and it is not easy to come upon a vulture's young, nay, some men have been led into a strange suspicion that the birds come from some other and foreign land to visit us here, so rare and intermittent is their appearance, which soothsayers think should be true of what does not present itself naturally, nor spontaneously, but by a divine sending.

[Pantagathus]

It took me a bit to find where I picked it up but it's from Plutarch's Life of Romulus:

 

Thank you so much Stoic, I knew that vultures were esteemed from one end of the Med to the other but the cult symbolism usually accompanied death scenes. Plutarch's comments make sense but were new to me.

[Stoic]

Thank you so much Stoic, I knew that vultures were esteemed from one end of the Med to the other but the cult symbolism usually accompanied death scenes. Plutarch's comments make sense but were new to me.

 

No problem! I guess their scarcity in that region makes for why they aren't mentioned more often but it's kind of neat to realize that they are pretty harmless creatures, feeding only off the dead n' such.