Contents
Polytheism & numen
Mythology
Imperial cult · Festivals
Temples · Funerals
Votive offerings · Animal sacrifice
Apollo · Ceres · Diana · Juno
Jupiter · Mars · Mercury · Minerva
Neptune · Venus · Vesta · Vulcan
Divus Augustus · Divus Julius · Fortuna
The Lares · Quirinus · Pluto · Sol Invictus
Adranus · Averrunci · Averruncus
Bellona · Bona Dea · Bromius
Caelus · Castor and Pollux · Clitunno
Cupid · Dis Pater · Faunus · Glycon
Inuus · Lupercus
Sibylline Books · Sibylline oracles
Aeneid · Metamorphoses
The Golden Ass
Decline and persecution
Nova Roma
Greek polytheism
Sol Invictus ("Unconquered Sun") was a Roman god identified in the later Roman empire[ambiguous] with Sol, accompanied with the epithet invictus meaning unconquered that was commonly given to Sol from the second century CE onwards. There is much confusion about Sol Invictus because modern scholarship long maintained that he was actually a distinct sun god introduced from Syria by the emperor Aurelian in 274 CE.[1] In recent publications this older view has been definitively refuted, and it now seems certain that the Romans revered the sun, Sol (with various epithets, including invictus) as a god, without interruption, from as far back as we can trace Roman religion until the end of antiquity[ambiguous].[2]
As a result of these new studies, many of the older notions concerning the role of the sun god in Late Antiquity are falling by the wayside.
Use of the phrase
Invictus (unconquered) was an epithet used for various Roman divinities in the Roman Empire. In the Roman Calendar of the early empire these include Jupiter Invictus and Mars Invictus. It was in use from the late Republic and throughout the Imperial period for a range of deities, such as Hercules, Apollo and Silvanus, and was therefore a well-established form when applied to Mithras by Roman devotees from the second century onwards. It has a clear association with solar deities and solar monism; as such, it became the preferred epithet of Rome's traditional Sol and the novel, short-lived Roman state cult to Elagabalus, an Emesan solar deity who headed Rome's official pantheon under his namesake emperor.[3]
The earliest dated use of Sol invictus is in a dedication from Rome, AD 158.[4] Another, stylistically dated to the 2nd century AD, is inscribed on a Roman phalera: "inventori lucis soli invicto augusto" (to the contriver of light, sol invictus augustus ).[5] Here "augustus" is most likely a further epithet of Sol as "august" (an elevated being, divine or close to divinity), though the association of Sol with the Imperial house would have been unmistakable and was already established in iconography and stoic monism.[6] These are the earliest attested examples of Sol as invictus, but in 102 AD a certain Anicetus restored a shrine of Sol; Hijmans (2009, 486, n. 22) is tempted "to link Anicetus' predilection for Sol with his name, the Latinized form of the Greek word ἀνίκητος, which means invictus".[7]
Elagabalus
The first sun god consistently termed invictus was the provincial Syrian god Elagabalus. According to the Historia Augusta, the teenaged Severan heir adopted the name of his deity and brought his cult image from Emesa to Rome. Once installed as emperor, he neglected Rome's traditional State deities and promoted his own as Rome's most powerful deity. This ended with his murder in 222.
The Historia Augusta refers to the deity Elagabalus as "also called Jupiter and Sol" (fuit autem Heliogabali vel Iovis vel Solis).[8]
This has been seen as an abortive attempt to impose the Syrian sun god on Rome;[9] but because it is now clear that the Roman cult of Sol remained firmly established in Rome throughout the Roman period,[10] this Syrian Sol Elagabalus has become no more relevant to our understanding of the Roman Sol than, for example, the Syrian Jupiter Dolichenus is for our understanding of the Roman Jupiter.
Aurelian
The Roman gens Aurelian was associated with the cult of Sol.[11] After his victories in the East, the emperor Aurelian thoroughly reformed the Roman cult of Sol, elevating the sun-god to one of the premier divinities of the empire. Where previously a priests of Sol had been simply sacerdotes and tended to belong to lower ranks of Roman society,[12] they were now pontifices and members of the new college of pontifices instituted by Aurelian. Every pontifex of Sol was a member of the senatorial elite, indicating that the priesthood of Sol was now highly prestigious. Almost all these senators held other priesthoods as well, however, and some of these other priesthoods take precedence in the inscriptions in which they are listed, suggesting that they were considered more prestigious than the priesthood of Sol.[13] Aurelian also built a new temple for Sol, bringing the total number of temples for the god in Rome to (at least) four[14] He also instituted games in honor of the sun god, held every four years from AD 274 onwards.
The confusion surrounding Aurelian's reforms has been significant, much of it rooted in the mistaken opinion that he was introducing a new cult, which, as is now clear, he was not. The following constitute the most common errors of fact attributed to Aurelian and his reforms.
1. Aurelian called his sun god Sol Invictus to differentiate him from the earlier Roman god Sol.
Actually, Aurelian is twice as likely to call Sol Oriens on his coins as he is Sol Invictus.[15] Only one of the fifteen or so pontifices of Sol adds the epithet invictus; all others simply call themselves "pontifex Solis".[16]
2. Aurelian built his new temple for a Syrian sun god, not the Roman one.
There is no credible evidence to support this, and ample evidence to refute it. The "Syrian Sol-hypothesis" is therefore now rejected by all specialists in the field.[17]
3. Aurelian inaugurated his new temple dedicated to Sol Invictus and held the first games for Sol on December 25, 274, on the supposed day of the winter solstice and day of rebirth of the Sun.
This is not only pure conjecture, but goes against the best evidence available.[18] There is no record of celebrating Sol on December 25 prior to CE 354/362. Hijmans lists the known festivals of Sol as August 8 and/or 9, August 28, and December 11. There are no sources that indicate on which day Aurelian inaugurated his temple and held the first games for Sol, but we do know that these games were held every four years from CE 274 onwards. This means that they were presumably held in CE 354, a year for which perchance a Roman calendar, the Chronography of 354 (or calendar of Filocalus), has survived. This calendar lists a festival for Sol and Luna on August 28, Ludi Solis (games for Sol) for October 19-22, and a Natalis Invicti (birthday of the invincible one) on December 25. While it is widely assumed that the invictus of December 25 is Sol, the calendar does not state this explicitly.[19] The only explicit reference to a celebration of Sol in late December is made by Julian the Apostate in his hymn to King Helios written immediately afterwards in early CE 363. Julian explicitly differentiates between the one-day, annual celebration of late December 362 and the multi-day quadrennial games of Sol which, of course, had also been held in 362, but clearly at a different time.[20] Taken together, the evidence of the Calendar of Filocalus and Julian's hymn to Helios clearly shows, according to Hijmans and others, that the ludi of October 19 - 22 were the Solar Games instituted by Aurelian. They presumably coincided with the dedication of his new temple for Sol.[21]
4. After Aurelian, Sol became supreme deity of the Roman Empire.
(Hijmans 2009, chapter 9) raises serious doubts about this contention.
Constantine
Emperors portrayed Sol Invictus on their official coinage, with a wide range of legends, only a few of which incorporated the epithet invictus, such as the legend SOLI INVICTO COMITI, claiming the Unconquered Sun as a companion to the Emperor, used with particular frequency by Constantine.[22] Statuettes of Sol Invictus, carried by the standard-bearers, appear in three places in reliefs on the Arch of Constantine. Constantine's official coinage continues to bear images of Sol until 325/6. A solidus of Constantine as well as a gold medallion from his reign depict the Emperor's bust in profile twinned ("jugate") with Sol Invictus, with the legend INVICTUS CONSTANTINUS[23]
Constantine decreed (March 7, 321) dies Solis—day of the sun, "Sunday"—as the Roman day of rest [CJ3.12.2]:
On the venerable day of the Sun let the magistrates and people residing in cities rest, and let all workshops be closed. In the country however persons engaged in agriculture may freely and lawfully continue their pursuits because it often happens that another day is not suitable for grain-sowing or vine planting; lest by neglecting the proper moment for such operations the bounty of heaven should be lost.[24]Constantine's triumphal arch was carefully positioned to align with the colossal statue of Sol by the Colosseum, so that Sol formed the dominant backdrop when seen from the direction of the main approach towards the arch.[25]
Sol and the other Roman Emperors
Berrens[26] deals with coin-evidence of Imperial connection to the Solar cult. Sol is depicted sporadically on imperial coins in the first and second centuries CE, then more frequently from Septimius Severus onwards until CE 325/6. Sol invictus appears on coin legends from CE 261, well before the reign of Aurelian.[27]