Lupercalia, also known as Lupercal, was a pastoral festival of Ancient Rome observed annually on February 15 to purify the city, promoting health and fertility. Lupercalia was also known as , after the purification instruments called , for which the month was named.
Name The festival was originally known as Februa ("Purifications" or "Purgings") after the used on the day.. It was also known as and gave its name variously as epithet to Juno , , or in her role as that month's patron deity; to a supposed purification deity called Februus; and to February (), the month during which the festival occurred. Ovid connects to an Etruscan word for purging.
The name was believed in antiquity to have some connection to the Ancient Greek festival of the Arcadian Lykaia, a wolf festival (, ; ), and the worship of Lycaean Pan, assumed to be a Greek equivalent to Faunus, as instituted by Evander.Dionysius of Halicarnassus, Roman Antiquities 1.32.3–5, 1.80; Justin, Epitome of the Philippic History of Pompeius Trogus 43.6ff; Livy, Ab urbe condita 1.5; Ovid, Fasti 2.423–42; Plutarch, Life of Romulus 21.3, Life of Julius Caesar, Roman Questions 68; Virgil, Aeneid 8.342–344; Lydus, De mensibus 4.25. See Smith, Dictionary of Greek and Roman Antiquities, s.v. "Lupercus" Justin describes a cult image of "the Lycaean god, whom the Greeks call Pan and the Romans Lupercus", as nude, save for a goatskin girdle.Justin, Epitome of the Philippic History of Pompeius Trogus 43.1.7. The worship of Lupercus originated in the Augustan period, leaving the question open as to which god the Luperci were considered to honour before this point.
The statue stood in the Lupercal, the cave where tradition held that Romulus and Remus were suckled by the she-wolf (Lupa). The cave lay at the foot of the Palatine Hill, on which Romulus was thought to have founded Rome. The name of the festival likely derives from , 'wolf', though both the etymology and its significance are obscure. The wolf appellation may have to do with the key role an animal predator plays in male rites of passage.
Rites
Locations The rites were confined to the Lupercal cave, the Palatine Hill, and the Forum, all central locations in Rome's foundation myth.Livy, Ab urbe condita 1.5 Near the cave stood a sanctuary of Rumina, goddess of breastfeeding; and the wild fig tree (Ficus Ruminalis) to which Romulus and Remus were brought by the divine intervention of the river god Tiberinus; some Roman sources name the wild fig tree , literally "goat fig". Like the cultivated fig, its fruit is pendulous, and the tree exudes a milky sap if cut, making it apt for a cult of breastfeeding.
Priesthoods
The Lupercalia had its own priesthood, the ("brothers of the wolf"), whose institution and rites were attributed either to the Arcadian culture-hero Evander or to Romulus and Remus, erstwhile shepherds who had each established a group of followers. The were young men (), usually between the ages of 20 and 40. They formed two religious (associations) based on ancestry—the (named after the Quinctia) and the (named after the Fabia). Each college was headed by a .
In 44 BC, a third college, the , was instituted in honor of Julius Caesar; its first magister was Mark Antony. The college of disbanded or lapsed after Caesar's assassination and was not reestablished in the reforms of his successor, Augustus. In the Imperial era, membership of the two traditional was opened to of equestrian status.
Sacrifice and fertility rites At the Lupercal altar, a male goat (or goats) and a dog were sacrificed by one or another of the under the supervision of the Flamen dialis, Jupiter's chief priest. An offering was also made of salted mealcakes, prepared by the Vestal Virgins. After the blood sacrifice, two approached the altar. Their foreheads were anointed with blood from the sacrificial knife, then wiped clean with wool soaked in milk, after which they were expected to laugh.
The sacrificial feast followed, after which the Luperci cut thongs (known as ) from the flayed skin of the animal, and ran with them, naked or near-naked, along the old Palatine boundary, counterclockwise around the hill. In Plutarch's description of the Lupercalia, written during the early Roman Empire,
After completing their circuit of the Palatine, the returned to the cave.
History
The Februa was of ancient and possibly Sabine origin. After February was added to the Roman calendar, Februa occurred on its 15th day (). Of its various rituals, the most important came to be those of the Lupercalia. The Romans attributed the instigation of the Lupercalia to Evander, a culture hero from Arcadia who was credited with bringing the Olympic pantheon and Greek laws and alphabet to Italy, where he founded the city of Pallantium on the future site of Rome, 60 years before the Trojan War.
Lupercalia was celebrated in parts of Italy; are attested by inscriptions at Velitrae, Praeneste, Nemausus (modern Nîmes) and elsewhere. The ancient cult of the Hirpi Sorani ("wolves of Soranus", from Sabine "wolf"), who practiced at Monte Soratte, north of Rome, had elements in common with Lupercalia.
Descriptions of the Lupercalia festival of 44 BC attest to its continuity. During the festival, Julius Caesar publicly refused a golden crown Mark Antony offered him. The Lupercal cave was restored or rebuilt by Augustus, and has been speculated to be identical with a grotto discovered in 2007, below the remains of Augustus's residence, but according to scholarly consensus, the grotto is a nymphaeum, not the Lupercal. Lupercalia is marked on a calendar of 354 alongside traditional and Christian festivals.
Despite the banning in 391 of all non-Christian cults and festivals, Lupercalia was still celebrated by the nominally Christian populace into the reign of emperor Anastasius I Dicorus. Pope Gelasius I said only "vile rabble" were involved in the festival (Gelasius) and sought its forceful abolition; the Roman Senate protested that Lupercalia was essential to Rome's safety and well-being. This prompted Gelasius's scornful suggestion: "If you assert that this rite has salutary force, celebrate it yourselves in the ancestral fashion; run nude yourselves that you may properly carry out the mockery."Gelasius, Epistle to Andromachus, quoted in Green (1931), p. 65.
No contemporary evidence supports the popular notions that Gelasius abolished Lupercalia, or that he or any other prelate replaced it with the Feast of the Purification of the Blessed Virgin Mary. A literary association between Lupercalia and the romantic elements of Saint Valentine's Day dates to Chaucer and poetic traditions of courtly love.
Legacy
Horace's Ode III, 18 alludes to the Lupercalia. The festival or its associated rituals gave its name to the Roman month of February () and thence to the modern month. The Roman god Februus personified both the month and purification, but seems to postdate both.
William Shakespeare's play Julius Caesar begins during Lupercalia. Caesar tells Mark Antony to strike Calpurnia, in the hope that she will be able to conceive.
Research published in 2019 suggests that the word Leprechaun derives from .
Patrick Wolf's fifth album was titled Lupercalia in honour of the festival.
Notes
References Citations
Bibliography
Further reading Baier, Thomas (2023). "Nudus unctus ebrius. Das Luperkalienfest in Rom" [Nudus unctus ebrius. The Lupercalia festival at Rome]. In: Bernhard Zimmermann (ed.). 30. Salemer Sommerakademie: Feste und Spiele in der Antike. Paradeigmata, vol. 74. Baden-Baden: Rombach, , pp. 27–57. Beard, Mary; North, John; Price, Simon. Religions of Rome: A History. Cambridge University Press, 1998, vol. 1, limited preview online; search "Lupercalia". Lincoln, Bruce. Authority: Construction and Corrosion. University of Chicago Press, 1994, pp. 43–44 online on Julius Caesar and the politicizing of the Lupercalia; valuable list of sources pp. 182–183. North, John. Roman Religion. The Classical Association, 2000, pp. 47 online and 50 on the problems of interpreting evidence for the Lupercalia. Markus, R.A. The End of Ancient Christianity. Cambridge University Press, 1990, pp. 131–134 online, on the continued celebration of the Lupercalia among "uninhibited Christians" into the 5th century, and the reasons for the "brutal intervention" by Pope Gelasius. Vuković, K. Wolves of Rome: The Lupercalia from Roman and Comparative Perspectives. Berlin, De Gruyter, 2023. Wiseman, T.P. "The Lupercalia". In Remus: A Roman Myth. Cambridge, Cambridge University Press, 1995, pp. 77–88, limited preview online, discussion of the Lupercalia in the context of myth and ritual.
External links William Smith, Dictionary of Greek and Roman Antiquities, 1875: Lupercalia