Dies Sanguinis

Quanquam in fastis philocalianis inscribitur haec dies “Sanguem,” Jacobus Latham diem sanguinis vocitat,¹ quod nomen nobis magis placet.

Explicat autem Salzman ad hunc modum: “Postero autem die (a.d. viiii kal. apr.), Sanguem inscripto, luctus vehementior fiebat; religiosiores enim se verberibus afficiebant, dum sanguinem effunderent, aras effigiemque Attidis cruore aspergentes. Eo ispo die nonnulli ex erga deam religiosioribus, confusi conductique furenti rabie, devellebant ilibus suis pondera. ‘Sacra nocte’, quae celebrabatur a.d. viiii kal. apr., Attis sepultus (sic) est novique galli (sic) inducti in sacerdotium sunt (verisimile ut deum renascentem significarent); mane itaque festa, qua gaudendum erat, Hilaria celebrari poterant.”²

Quod autem Latham ait in supra citato dialogo, verisimilius esse gallas coleis non levari die sanguinis,³ penitus improbandum et, honos sit auribus, surridiculum videtur. Non potest haec sententia efferri, nisi a viro, cujus magna est in gallarum sacris ignorantia inexplicabilis. Similem enim puta et contrariam me efferre sententiam, dicentem flaminem Jovis procul dubio eviratum esse, quia a me alienissima est ista virilitatis vana cupido atque assectatio. Ridiculum foret et ignorantiam meam rerum virilium pateficeret.

Quod autem furori cujpiam assignant historici ac veteres execationem virilitatis, non omnino repugnabo: est enim transexualitas sacra quaedam res, qua et corpus perficimus et animam acuimus et deos veneramur et divinitati acceptiores redintegramur. Sic enim Plato docet in Ione, quum corybanticum esse furorem divinum ait,⁴ quippe quod Magna deum Mater corybantas instituit, ut tutarentur Jovem infantem strepitu armorum pulsatorum ululationibusque rabidis.⁵

1. Jacob Latham. “‘Fabulous Clap-Trap’: Roman Masculinity, the Cult of Magna Mater, and Literary Constructions of the galli at Rome from the Late Republic to Late Antiquity”, in The Journal of Religion 92, no. 1 (2012), 84-122. https://doi.org/10.1086/662205 Arcessitum a.d. xii kal. apr. ↩︎
2. Michele R. Salzman. On Roman Time (University of California Press, 1990), 167. Anglice: “The mourning became more violent on the following day, 24 March, Sanguem, when the devotees flagellated themselves until they bled, sprinkling the altars and effigy with their blood. This was also the day when certain devotees of the goddess, carried away by their emotion, would perform self-castration. During the “sacred night” of the twenty-fourth, Attis was ritually laid to rest in his grave and the new galli were inducted into the priesthood (presumably symbolizing the god’s rebirth); at dawn, then, a day of rejoicing-Hilaria-could begin” ↩︎
3. Jacob Latham. “‘Fabulous Clap-Trap’: Roman Masculinity, the Cult of Magna Mater, and Literary Constructions of the galli at Rome from the Late Republic to Late Antiquity”, in The Journal of Religion 92, no. 1 (2012), 107-108. https://doi.org/10.1086/662205 Arcessitum a.d. xii kal. apr. ↩︎
4. Plato. Ion, rec. Jeffrey Henderson (Loeb Classical Library, 1925), 534a. ↩︎
5. Publius Ovidius Naso. Fasti, rec. James G. Frazer (Loeb Classical Library, 1931), 4.207-210. ↩︎