The Parilia

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The Parilia
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Parilia

• The Parilia, or Palilia,  was a festival held in
  Ancient Rome on what is today April 21st. 
• The purpose of the festival was twofold 
• Originally, it was a pastoral festival to purify
  both sheep and shepherd. 
• Later, the festival was recognized as the
  birthday of Rome, the day on which Romulus killed
  Remus and founded the city in 753 BCE. 
• The Parilia is outstanding among Roman festivals
  as it incorporates both the rural and urban
  celebrations of Roman religion.

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Rituals Involved in the Festival

• In the Fasti, Ovid provides great detail
  concerning the Parilia.  However, it must be
  noted that like many other Roman festivals, the
  Parilia had two representations.  These were the
  rural and the urban.  It is uncertain exactly
  which ceremonies existed pertained to which
  representation.

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First Part of the Ritual

• From what we know, to celebrate the Parilia, the
  sheep-fold was decorated with leafy branches and
  its entrance with a wreath.  When dawn came, the
  fold was swept and cleansed. and the sheep
  themselves were purified.  This was done by
  fumigating them with sulfur.  Following this, a
  fire was made using pine and olive woods, into
  which laurel branches were thrown.  Crackling of
  the branches was taken as a good omen.

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First Part of the Ritual (contd)

• Next offerings of cakes of millet were made, and
  food and pails of milk were brought.  Following
  this, the shepherds prayed to Pales, the god (or
  goddess or gods or goddesses) of sheep and
  shepherds, in which they sought protection for
  themselves and their flocks from disease and
  wolves.  They also prayed for forgiveness for any
  inadvertent transgression of holy ground by
  themselves or their sheep.

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First Part of the Ritual (contd)

• This prayer was made four times, always facing
  east.  After completing the prayer, the shepherd
  washed himself in dew.  After this, he heated
  wine in a bowl, mixed it with milk, and drank
  it.  He then leap through  crackling bonfires,
  placed three in a row.  It is also believed the
  sheep too may have been lead to leap through the
  fire as well.

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Second Part of the Ritual

• The previously described activities are believed
  to have been part of the rural celebration of the
  Parilia.  However, there may have been much more
  to the urban State celebration.  Little is known
  about the cult itself, other than the fact it
  remained popular well into the Empire, and was
  conducted by the Rex Sacrorum.  It is known that
  the ashes of the unborn calves were mixed with
  the blood preserved and kept by the Vestal from
  the previous year's October Horse, sacrificed on
  the Ides of October, the 15th, and sprinkled over
  the fire made by the burning bean-straws.  This
  was a symbol of purification.  However, since
  this mixture would have been in short supply, and
  this ceremony described by Ovid would have only
  been able to be practiced at only a few select
  locations, if more than one at all.

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Myths Behind the Festival

• Ovid himself is not certain which myth should be
  accepted as the foundation of the Parilia.  He
  puts forth seven suggestions and leaves the
  reader to make up his own mind, though not
  without lending a certain amount of weight to one
  particular suggestion.
• Worship of Pales (found by other sources)
• Fire as Purifier
• Opposing Elements
• Phaethon
• Deucalion
• Chance
• Aeneas
• Founding of the City

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Celebration in Honor of Pales

• The original festival itself is believed to
  predate the founding of the city.  It is believed
  to have evolved from very early pagan
  celebrations of spring and fertility.  It was
  originally a celebration of the deity Pales.  The
  identity of Pales is somewhat obscure as well. 
  It is unknown whether the deity was male or
  female, of even if it was intended to be a single
  deity or pair of deities.  In the Fasti, Ovid
  invokes Pales as a singular female deity.  Some
  identify certain statues of an elderly woman
  leaning on a shepherd staff as Pales, but others
  hesitate to make this claim, and believe no
  representations of Pales actually exist. 
  Offerings were often made "sive deo sive deae." 
  The association of the Parilia with Pales is, in
  fact, in doubt.  However, references to the
  Parilia as the Palilia reinforce the association.
  
• Some believe Pales lends his/her name to the
  Palatine hill.  While there is little or no
  evidence to substantiate this claim, it would
  help to explain the very old roots of this
  festival.  It would also help to explain how the
  festival became associated with the foundation of
  the city.  If true, this day to celebrate the
  namesake of one of the central hills of Rome is
  also the birthday of Roma, the personification
  the city itself, and the foundation of the city.

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Pales
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Fire as Purifier

• The first suggestion Ovid offers is that fire is
  a natural purifier.  This seems the most basic,
  relying simply on natural science.

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Opposing Elements

• The next suggestion is philosophic, that since
  everything is composed of opposing elements, so
  too is the Parilia made of fire and water.  The
  next suggestion too is philosophic, that fire and
  water contain the source of life.

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Phaethon and Deucalion

• The next explanation, which Ovid places the least
  credence on, and frankly admits so, relies on
  Greek mythology.  The Parilia may be an allusion
  to the myth of Phaethon and Deucalion's flood. 
  These two myths deal with the destructive powers
  of fire and water respectively.

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Phaethon
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Pyrrha and Deucalion
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Chance

• Next Ovid explores the possibility of chance.  He
  suggests that while banging stones together,
  shepherds once ignited straw, and this is the
  source of the flame of the Parilia.

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Aeneas

• After that, Ovid relies on Roman mythology and
  suggests that the flame is symbolic of the flame
  through which Aeneas leapt and passed unscathed
  because of his piety in the hour of the defeat of
  Troy.

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Aeneas
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Founding of the City

• The last explanation which Ovid offers, and lends
  his support to, is that when Rome was founded,
  those living there were ordered to burn their old
  houses after they transferred the household gods
  to the new houses.  Thus the people and their
  flocks leapt through the flames of their old
  houses, and were cleansed before they took up
  residence in their new houses in the newly
  founded Rome.

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Romulus Founding the City
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Romulus Founding the City
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Founding of the City (contd)

• Ovid's support of this last explanation is very
  significant because it links the current festival
  with the direct history of Rome.  This was a very
  common trend in the late Republic and early
  Empire.  This would have coincided well with
  Augustus' attempts to make remodel his image to
  that of a new Romulus.  This also focuses
  attention on the fact that much of Roman religion
  is very centered on Rome, the place itself.  Ovid
  exploits this association of myth and place after
  his last explanation of the flame at the Parilia,
  and then recounts the story of the founding of
  Rome, as the festival itself also celebrates that
  occasion.

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Bibliography

• Ovids Fasti
• http//www.angelfire.com/ar2/parilia/ceremonies.ht
  ml
• http//penelope.uchicago.edu/Thayer/E/Roman/Texts/
  secondary/SMIGRA/Palilia.html