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The Cult of Sul-Minerva at Bath

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  02 January 2015

J. H. Croon
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Extract

The process commonly called Interpretatio Romana, by which in ancient times a barbarian deity was identified with some Roman god or goddess, was admittedly of a locally very different nature. To quote an example: In Southern Gaul we find a whole series of Celtic deities connected with hot healing springs, Bormo, Grannus, Belenus, Nisincius, all in due course identified with Apollo. It seems obvious that the function of healing provided the link or association between the native deity and the Roman god. With this sole function their properties were not exhausted. But the fact that there are traces of fertility-aspects, that they were nearly always associated with a female consort or mother, etc., is a thing apart; there is no indication that these characteristics influenced the identification. Neither did the connection with hot springs, as far as I can see. We hear of an Apollo Thermios in Lesbos and at Thermon in Aetolia; in the Aegean island he was at any rate a patron of hot springs. Likewise, there were cults of Apollo near hot springs in Anatolia. But there are no indications whatever that these beliefs influenced the Roman Apollo.

Type
Research Article
Information
Antiquity , Volume 27 , Issue 106 , June 1953 , pp. 79 - 83
Copyright
Copyright © Antiquity Publications Ltd 1953

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References

1 Principal literature : The Victoria History of the County of Somerset I (1906) ; herein : W. Boyd Dawkins, Early Man (p. 167 sqq.) ; F. J. Haverfield, Romano-British Somerset (p. 207 sqq.). This work supersedes most older books, but cf. C. E. Davis, The Excav. of Roman Baths at Bath (Bath 1887) ; id., Guide to the Roman Baths of Bath (24th ed. 1887) ; J. Earle, Bath Ancient and Modern (1864). After 1906 were published : The Book of Bath, written for the 99th annual meeting of the Br. Med. Assoc. (Bath 1925) ; A. J. Taylor, The Roman Baths of Bath (12th ed. Bath 1940), A. B. Cook, Zeus III (Cambridge 1940), 858 sqq. The spring at Buxton has a much lower temperature than Bath.

2 Dawkins, op. cit., 204 (following Sir R. C. Hoare) ; Haverfield, op. cit., 221.

3 Ptolem. II, 3, 13 ; Itin. Ant., 468, 3 ; and especially Solinus, Collect, rer. memorab. 21 (p. 115, 1 Mommsen) ; cf. Haverfield, op. cit., 220 sq. ; Hübner, Pauly-Wissowa’s RE (henceforth quoted : RE) 11, 298.

4 There are coalfields on the surface near Bath, cf. Wallis in The Book of Bath (quoted supra note 1), 2 ; Haverfield, op. cit., 221.

5 For these dates cf. Haverfield, op. cit. 225 n. 2 against Irvine, and R. A. L. Smith, Bath (London 1944), 19.

6 Perhaps the correct nominative is Sulis (only the genitive and dative survive in the inscriptions, etc.), cf. Tolkien in Collingwood-Myres, Roman Britain 264, n. 1 ; Cook, op. cit. 858, n. 5. I have, however, adopted the more popular spelling, as it is better known.

7 Haverfield, op. cit. 267 sqq. ; Heichelheim, RE IV A, 723 sq. ; C.I.L. VII, 39 sqq. Other dedications, to ‘Dea Diana’ (reading uncertain) : Haverfield nr. 18 ; to the Genius Loci : nr. 19 ; to Mars Loucetius and Nemetona (Celtic deities) : nr. 20 ; to the Suleviae (cf. infra, note 20) : nr. 21.

8 See, apart from the literature quoted already, Ihm, Roscher’s Myth. Lex. IV, 1591 sq. ; Windisch, Das kelt. Brittanien, Abh. Kön. Sächs. Ges. Wissensch., Ph.-Hist. Kl. XXIX, 6 (Leipzig 1912), 96 sq.

9 For authorities see Cook, op. cit. 858, n. 6 and 7.

10 On the possible connection with the Suleviae see below.

11 Haverfield, op. cit. 224 ; Earle, op. cit. 5 sq.

12 Cf. J. A. McCulloch, Hastings’ Encycl. v, 838 sqq. ; The Religion of the ancient Celts (Edinburgh, 1911), 265.

13 Cf. McCulloch, op. cit. 266 sq.

14 Cf. McCulloch, ibid., 181 sqq.

15 Haverfield, op. cit., 249 sqq. This throwing of coins into a (hot) spring is, however, a universal custom ; cf. also the hot springs of Vicarello in Italy and elsewhere : Keune, RE Suppl. III, 136 ; Frazer, Pausanias 11, 474 sqq.

16 McCulloch, op. cit., 197 ; a curious example in modern times : H. V. Morton, In Search of Wales (London, 1932), 61 sq.

17 A so-called ‘tabula defixionis’ : Haverfield, op. cit., 249 sqq. ; cf. W. K. C. Guthrie, The Greeks and their gods (London, 1950), 273 sq.

18 G. Wissowa, Myth. Lex. 11, 2989 ; id., Religion und Kultus der Römer, 2nd ed., 254 sq. ; Altheim, RE xv, 1778.

19 Cook, op. cit., 858 sq. ; Windisch, op. cit., 96 sq.

20 Haverfield nr. 21 ; Ihm, Myth. Lex. IV, 1591 sqq. nr. 24 ; C.I.L., VII, 37 : ‘Sulevis Sulinus scultor Bruceti f. sacrum f.l.m.’

21 Ihm, op. cit., 1599 ; McCulloch, op. cit., 47.

22 Heichelheim, RE IV A, 725 nrs., 1-2 ; Ihm, op. cit., 1595 nrs., 29-30 ; C.I.L. XII, 2974 and XIII, 3664.