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Pompeius' Temple of Hercules

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  08 May 2015

B. A. Marshall
B. A. Marshall*
Affiliation:
University of New England
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Extract

In an article published in this journal several years ago, Dr B. Rawson put forward the suggestion that the temple of Hercules associated with Pompeius' building activity should be assigned to an early period in his career, either 79 or (more likely) about 70 B.C. If the latter, she connects it with a competition between Pompeius and Crassus to secure the mantle of military prowess as the heir of Sulla, manifest in the lavish sacrificial feast given by Crassus in 70 B.C. which she says he made at the festival of Hercules Invictus on 12 August, in thanks for the military success which the god had secured for him in the recent slave war, and which was designed to steal Pompeius' thunder as the games celebrating his Spanish victories were due to begin a few days later on 15 August (Cic. Verr. i 31).

Type
Research Article
Information
Antichthon , Volume 8 , 1974 , pp. 80 - 84
Copyright
Copyright © Australasian Society for Classical Studies 1974

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References

1 Antichthon 4 (1970), 30-7.CrossRefGoogle Scholar

2 Plut, . Crass, ii 3, xii 3Google Scholar, Comp. Nic. & Crass, i 4.Google Scholar

3 Cic, . Fam. vii 1Google Scholar, Off. ii 57Google Scholar; Plin, . NH viii 20 and 53Google Scholar; Plut, . Pomp. lii 5Google Scholar; Dio xxxix 38.1-6. Gell. x 1.1 ff. would seem to indicate that the temple was dedicated in Pompeius' third consulship (52 B.C.), but he is clearly mistaken.

4 Plin, . NH viii 20Google Scholar; Gell. x 1.1 ff.; Tert, . Sped. xGoogle Scholar. The temple was apparently built on top of the theatre in such a way that the rows of seats appeared to be the steps leading up to the temple. According to Tertullian, Pompeius claimed at the time to be dedicating this temple to avoid censure for building a permanent theatre (cf. Tac, . Ann. xiv 20)Google Scholar.

5 Mommsen, Th., commenting on the two fasti in CIL I 2 p. 324Google Scholar; Platner, S.B., A Topographical Dictionary of Ancient Rome, rev. Ashby, T. (London, 1929), p. 515.Google Scholar

6 So Drumann-Groebe, , GR iv 529Google Scholar; Platner-Ashby, op. cit., pp. 515-6 and 555; Koch, C., RE VIIIA 1.864Google Scholar; Hanson, J.A., Roman Theater-Temples (Princeton, 1959), pp. 43 and 52-3Google Scholar. The lavish games marking the opening of Pompeius' theatre must have taken place at the same time. That fact, incidentally, helps to establish the date of delivery of Cicero's in Pisonem which was delivered a few days before Pompeius' lavish games (Ascon. 1.1-3C; cf. Cic, . Pis. 65Google Scholar): see B.A. Marshall, CQ (forthcoming).

7 There are numerous examples of this sort of entry in the fasti: for some examples, see CIL I 2 p. 319Google Scholar (s.v. 3 June), p. 325 (s.v. 13 August), p. 331 (s.v. 9 October).

8 Platner-Ashby, op. cit., p. 256.

9 Plin, . NH xxxiv 57Google Scholar: [Myron] fecit … Herculem, qui est apud circum maximum in aede Pompei Magni. Vitr. iii 3.5Google Scholar: … fastigia tuscanico more, uti est ad circum maximum Cereris et Herculis Pompeiani, item Capitolii.

10 For this argument, see Platner-Ashby, op. cit., p. 256. Rawson (op. cit., 30) and Weinstock, S. (Hary. Theol. Rev. 50 [1957], 229Google Scholar) accept that it was a temple of Hercules Invictus. It is known that Pompeius had other links with Hercules Invictus: e.g. on the day of the battle of Pharsalus, the watchword issued by Pompeius was ‘Hercules Invictus’ (App, . BC ii 76Google Scholar).

11 There was a third temple of Hercules Invictus, near the Porta Trigemina (Macrob. iii 6.10); its festival day was 13 August (fasti Allifani, , CIL I 2 p. 217Google Scholar). There is some confusion between the temple in the Forum Boarium and Pompeius' temple, since Macrobius says there were only two temples of Hercules Invictus in Rome (Romae autem Victoris Herculis aedes duae sunt, una ad portam Trigeminam altera in foro boario). It would be tempting to say that the one in the Forum Boarium and Pompeius' temple were one and the same, but it is clear that they were different, for the temple in the Forum Boarium was described as round (Liv. x 23.3), while that of Pompeius was araeostyle and decorated in the Etruscan manner (Vitr. iii 3.5). On the confusion and attempts at reconciliation, see Platner-Ashby, op. cit., pp. 256 and 258.

12 E.g. Fowler, W. Warde, The Roman Festivals of the Period of the Republic (London, 1899), p. 193Google Scholar; Wissowa, G., Religion und Kultus der Römer (Munich, 1912), p. 275Google Scholar. Fowler says the annual festival described by Varro took place at the Ara Maxima and the temple of Hercules in the Forum Boarium, but there is no evidence to say where it took place (and it is difficult to hazard a guess in view of the confusion discussed in the preceding note), nor is there any clear evidence to say when it was instituted.

13 For this argument, see Rawson, op. cit., 32-3.

14 Rawson, op. cit., 33; cf. Horace's use of victor in v.4. This argument was suggested to me independently by Professor R.G.M. Nisbet, of Corpus Christi College, Oxford.

15 On the possibility, see Wissowa, op. cit. (n. 12), p. 275; Platner-Ashby, op. cit., pp. 256 and 591; Weinstock, , Divus Iulius (Oxford, 1971), p. 39.Google Scholar

16 Rawson, op. cit., 36.

17 Weinstock, op. cit. (n. 15), p. 39, assumes that the dedications took place at the same time; cf. op. cit. (n. 10), 229. It may be relevant that the games celebrated by Pompeius in 55 B.C. were held in the Circus Maximus (Ascon. 16.6C; Plin, . NH viii 20Google Scholar; Dio xxxix 38.1), near the centres of worship of Hercules Invictus, rather than, say, the Circus Flaminius which was near the new theatre.

18 E.g., the fasti Amiternini and the fasti collegii Arvalium (CIL I 2 pp. 214 and 245Google Scholar; cf. p. 331) both record for 9 October the festivals of Fausta Felicitas, whose temple on the Capitol was built by Caesar c. 44 B.C. (Dio xliv 5.2), and of Apollo, whose temple on the Palatine was dedicated by Octavianus in 28 B.C. (references in Platner-Ashby, op. cit., p. 16).

19 See n. 10.