Lustratio

[Gaius Paulinus Maximus]

I know that lustratio was a ceremony of ritual purification that the army performed each year but what I don't know is what exactly was involved in this ceremony.

 

Why and how did the legionaries go about this ritual?

[Nephele]

An article by Dr. Leonhard Schmitz (19th century Rector of the High School of Edinburgh) on the lustratio (a purification and blessings petition ritual for many things, from sheep to soldiers) appears in Smith's Dictionary of Greek and Roman Antiquities.

 

Dr. Schmitz stated that, as regards the Roman armies, the lustratio was "probably always connected with a review of the troops." He also stated that the customary rites employed by the Roman armies aren't mentioned in the available sources, but that they "probably resembled those with which a fleet was lustrated before it set sail." He cites Book V, Chapter 96 of Appian's Civil Wars for a description of these rites.

 

Going directly to Appian via the Lacus Curtius website, here is how Appian described the lustratio for the Roman fleet:

 

"When the fleet was ready, Octavian perform a lustration for it in the following manner. The altars are erected on the margin of the sea, and the multitude ranged around them in a circle of ships, observing the most profound silence. The priests who perform the ceremony offer the sacrifice while standing at the water's edge, and carry the expiatory offerings in skiffs three times round the fleet, the generals sailing with them, beseeching the gods to turn the bad omens against the victims instead of the fleet. Then, dividing the entrails, they cast a part of them into the sea, and put the remainder on the altars and burn them, while the multitude chant in unison. In this way the Romans perform lustrations of the fleet."

 

-- Nephele

[Gaius Paulinus Maximus]

Thanks Neph.

 

From reading Smith's Dictionary it appears that Lustrations were performed as a way of receiving blessings from the god's for the crimes and wrong doings that the army had been guilty of during battles fought throughout that year. I suppose they just wanted to know that although it was a bad thing they'd been doing, they were still in the favour of the gods.

 

From Smith's.........

 

Lustrations were made in ancient Greece and at Rome also, by private individuals who had polluted themselves with any criminal action. Whole cities and states sometimes underwent purification to expiate the crime or crimes committed by a member of the community.

 

The Romans performed lustrations on many occasions; that the Greeks did not think of them, and the object of most Roman lustrations was not to atone for the commission of the crime but to obtain the blessing of the gods upon the persons or things which were lustrated.