HERCULES AND THE TRIUMPHAL FEAST FOR THE ROMAN PEOPLE* Annalisa MARZANO

Transcription

1 HERCULES AND THE TRIUMPHAL FEAST FOR THE ROMAN PEOPLE* Annalisa MARZANO University of Reading, U.K. ABSTRACT This article looks at the practice of offering a banquet to the people of Rome as part of the celebrations staged during triumphs. Through the discussion of the nature of the cult of Hercules, it aims at explaining why there was a connection between the cult of the god at the Ara Maxima and the triumphal feast. It also investigates when the practice was first introduced as part of the triumphal celebrations, arguing for Hellenistic influences and suggesting that a possible candidate was Aemiliu Paullus on the occasion of his triumph over Macedonia in 167 B.C. Triumph Ara Maxima Hercules KEYWORDS Epulum Publicum Introduction The cult of Hercules was very popular in ancient Italy and various sanctuaries to the god are attested especially in the Sabine, Samnite and Lucanian territories. 1 The Italic Hercules was primarily the protector of commerce and traders (see infra), in particular in relation to cattle markets, and bronze statuettes of Hercules are documented among the Etruscans, the Umbrians, Oscans, and other Italic populations. 2 It is widely accepted that the popularity of this cult was due to the assimilation of the figure of Hercules with local deity (or deities) of the Appennine region, as evidenced by the various epithets that accompany the god s name in different areas. 3 In Rome herself the worship of Hercules dated back to very early times. We find this god (and interestingly not Jupiter) among the honoured divinities on occasion of the lectisternium prepared in 399 B.C. 4 In one version of the myth on the origins of Rome reported by Dionysios of Halikarnassos, Hercules, coming from the Iberian Peninsula at the head of a band of armed men, is even said to be the founder of Rome and the husband of Lavinia, Evander s daughter. 5 * Different stages of this research were presented at the APA Annual Meeting 2005 and at the CA Conference I attended the AREA workshop in Barcelona as representative of the Oxford Roman Economy Project and gave a presentation on the project s aims. I therefore would like to thank the editors for accepting this article for publication in this volume. I am grateful to Rebecca Benefiel and Ed Bispham for their useful comments on an earlier draft, and to Sarah Fields for her help with the editing; shortcomings remain my own responsibility. I could not acquire a copy of Bastien, J.-L. (2007), Le triomphe romain et son utilisation politique à Rome aux trois derniers siècles de la République, CEFR 392, Rome, in time for considering it while writing this article. 1 Di Niro 1977; Van Wonterghem 1973; Bonnett, Jourdain-Annequin 1992; Carrière 1995; Bradley Balty 1961; Colonna 1970; Papi Another aspect of the god, well represented in figurative arts and in literature, is expressed by the epithet Epitrapezios (Hercules at the table): De Visscher Bradley 2005, Liv Dion. Hal The arrival of Hercules/Herakles to Italy long before the foundation of Rome was related also in Q. Fabius Pictor s work, as Public Banquet Aemilius Paullus One of the areas of Rome which had the strongest connection to the cult of Hercules in the religious topography of the city was the Forum Boarium, the ancient cattle market in proximity to the ford on the Tiber, where later the Pons Sublicius was built. 6 The area featured the ancient and venerable cult of Hercules at the Ara Maxima, and several temples dedicated to this god built at a later stage, such as the Aedes Aemiliana Herculis, built by Scipio Aemilianus in 142 B.C., 7 and the socalled Aedes Pompeiana, a temple to Hercules Invictus restored by Pompey the Great. On the mythological level, the connection between the Forum Boarium and Hercules appears in the story of the arrival there of the god-to-be with Geryon s cattle, and the subsequent attempt by the thief Cacus to steal the oxen. 8 It is well known that the Hercules worshipped in the Forum Boarium was connected to the celebration of the triumph from very early times. 9 The Ara Maxima was on the route of the triumphal procession and a very ancient bronze statue of Hercules, which, as we read in Pliny the Elder s work, was arrayed in triumphal clothes on the occasion of a triumph, was indicated in a second century B.C. inscription from Taormina: SEG fr. 2 col. A. 6 LTUR, s.v. Forum Boarium. The original road coming from the saltpans at the mouth of the Tiber probably ended in the Forum Boarium; see the toponym Salinae for the area the foot of the Aventine, Coarelli 1988, As argued in Coarelli 1988 contra the old opinion by Wissowa that the Aedes Aemiliana was built by Aemilius Paullus; some scholars still accept the association between this building and Aemilius Paullus, for instance Holliday 2002, Gellius apud Sol. 1.7 refers an alternative rarer version of the myth, in which Cacus is the ambassador of the king Marsyas, wronged by the Etruscan Tarchon and killed by Hercules when, after seizing military control of Rome in revenge, he threatened the possession of the Arcadians. See also Dion. Hal (cf. Plut., QRom 18) and discussion in Coarelli 1988, The foundation of the Ara Maxima is attributed to Hercules himself in Liv , Ov., Fast , Prop , Sol. 1.10, Verg., Aen On the archaic triumph: Versnel 1970, Bonfante Warren 1970, and Coarelli 1988, ; on the triumph in general: Payne 1962, Künzl 1988, and Beard B.Antela-Bernárdez & T.Ñaco del Hoyo (eds.),transforming Historical Landscapes In The Ancient Empires, BAR Int.Ser (Oxford 2009).

2 TRANSFORMING HISTORICAL LANDSCAPES IN THE ANCIENT EMPIRES 84 located in the Forum Boarium itself. 10 It seems that by the first century B.C. it was customary for the generals celebrating a triumph to offer a tithe from their booty to the Hercules worshipped at the Ara Maxima, and to also offer a lavish banquet to the Roman people, a sort of pendant of the coena triumphalis for senators held in the temple of Iuppiter Optimus Maximus. 11 The aim of this article is twofold. The first aim is to investigate the reasons behind the association of the triumphal banquet with the cult of Hercules. I then focus on the banquet itself, trying to define when this practice was first established and where the banquet was held. On the basis of textual evidence I argue that in its first stages the banquet for the Roman people took place in the sacred precinct of the Ara Maxima, immediately following the sacrifices performed to Hercules. I also argue that the transformation from a simple distribution of sacrificial meat into an elaborate banquet took place under the influence of celebrations organized by Hellenistic kings. We should look at the period when Rome was engaged in military campaigns in Asia Minor and in Greece to place the first secure instance of a triumphal banquet for the people. As we are going to discuss, the victor of Pydna, Aemilus Paullus, appears as a possible candidate in consideration of his philhellenism, the type of festivities he organized while in Greece, and of the special thanks due to Hercules, who was the protector of the royal house of Macedon, for the favour granted to the Romans instead. The Banquet in Context The episodes narrated in literary sources about generals offering a tithe to Hercules and a feast to the Roman people all portray prominent political figures of the first century B.C. Sulla, Crassus, Licinius Lucullus, Pompey, and Caesar are all said either to have offered a tithe to Hercules and/or to have given a sumptuous feast for the people on occasion of the triumphal celebration. 12 According to Plutarch, for instance, 10 Plin., NH : Fuisse autem statuariam artem familiarem Italiae quoque et vetustam, indicant Hercules ab Evandro sacratus, ut produnt, in foro boario, qui triumphalis vocatur atque per triumphos vestitur habitu triumphali ( ). See also Plin., NH The mention of Evander is significant, because some mythical accounts referred the foundation of the Ara Maxima to him: Dion. Hal ; Strabo 5.33; Tac., Ann ; Macr., Sat Scipio Africanus offered a feast for his friends at the temple of I.O.M. as was customary at the end of his triumphal procession in 201 B.C. (App., Pun. 66). 12 Sulla offering a decuma to Hercules from his patrimony: Plut., Sulla 35; Crassus sacrifice to Hercules followed by a banquet for the people: Plut., Crass. 12.2; Lucullus decuma: Diod ; Lucullus s feast for the people in 63 B.C.: Plut., Luc. 37.4; on Pompey s feast for his third triumph in 61 B.C.: Plut., Pomp. 45; Plin., NH Caesar s exploited the epulum publicum to promote his political aims, starting with the feast he offered in occasion of his aedileship in 65 BC; he offered triumphal feasts in occasion of the celebrations of 46 and 45 B.C., on which see D Arms 1998; Plut., Caes. 55.4; Liv., Per. 115; Vell. Pat ; Suet., Div. Iul. 38; Plin., NH 9.171; Dio Cass At the feast in 46 B.C. on the occasion of his third consulship Caesar was the first to offer four kinds of wine at a public banquet (Plin., NH 14.97, quoted at p. 196 in D Arms 2000, an important study for understanding the repercussions of Caesar s behaviour on municipal elites). 10,000 tables were set in occasion of Crassus banquet, which followed a sacrifice to Hercules. In this case the event did not occur in occasion of triumphal celebrations, but during Crassus consulship with Pompey in 70 B.C. Crassus, who is also said to have presented the people participating in the banquet with an allowance of grain enough to last for three months, with this event was clearly counterbalancing Pompey s propaganda focused on Hercules. 13 However, we should consider Crassus celebrations also in the light of the event of 71 B.C., when he had intensely hoped to be granted a triumph for his victory over Spartacus and had instead received the ovatio or lesser triumph. 14 It is possible that he intentionally choose celebrations that were usually part of the triumph to boost the memory of his ovatio, which unfortunately had been overwhelmed by the three triumphs granted in The connection between triumph, banquet and Hercules seems indeed well established by Crassus time if we consider that we find mention on this kind of entertainment in a fragment of the Histories of Posidonius of Apamea that has been interpreted as referring to the period B.C. (further discussion infra). Lucullus feast in 63 B.C. was particularly grand, involving the whole city and surrounding vici, 16 while the banquet offered by Pompey lasted for three days, and was so abundant in food that the leftover meat was thrown into the Tiber. 17 In this period, when the prominent politicians of the Late Republic were engaging in such lavish display and were competing with each other for prestige and followers, it is clear that several areas of the city were necessary for the staging of banquets on such a large scale. Besides the mention of the 10,000 tables set in the Forum Boarium for Crassus feast, we are told that for Caesar s triumphal banquet in 46 B.C. 22,000 triclinia were prepared, probably using also the space in Caesar s Horti trans Tiberim. 18 This fact implies that banquet arrangements for 198,000 people were made, considering that a triclinium was a set of three couches for a total of nine people. In D Arms calculation, the setting up of all those triclinia would have required a space of minimum 275,000 square meters, 19 an area equal to ca. 40 professional soccer fields. However, in all likelihood, when the custom of offering a banquet to the people in occasion of a triumph at first started in Rome, the size of the celebration must have been smaller than the above-cited first century examples, and the banquet must have taken place in a precise location of the city, religiously relevant with respect to the triumphal celebration and the cult of Hercules. It is not easy trying to determine who should be included in the number of those feasted by the triumphing generals. In fact, 13 Plut., Crass Pompey had an interest in Hercules because of the Spanish associations in the cult of the god and his own military campaigns there; Rawson Crassus managed, however, to have a special decree of the senate that allowed him to wear the laurel wreath of the triumphator and not the myrtle crown usually used for ovationes: Gell To Q. Caecilius Metellus Pius, over Spain, to Pompey, over Spain as well, to M. Terentius Varro Lucullus over Macedonia. 16 Plut., Luc Plut., Pomp Plut., Caes. 55.4; D Arms 1998; Beard 2007, 261 thinks that the most likely location for Caesar s banquet was the Forum. 19 D Arms 1998, 40.

3 A. Marzano Hercules and the triumphal feast for the people if triumphal celebrations were an affair involving the whole city of Rome and its environs, 20 we have hints in the ancient texts that the banquet, as in other cases of public epulum, must have been intended only for citizens, in other words for male adults; for what concerns the cult of Hercules at the Ara Maxima we are told that women were excluded from its rites. 21 In the case of Caesars s grand triumphal banquets the large number of people participating in it has been connected with the plebs urbana eligible to receive the public distribution of grain, plus his legionaries and the notables.t 22 In fact, even after the lex Iulia frumentaria of 46 B.C., which reduced by half the number of people on the distribution list, the number of eligible men was still large: 150, The occasions for an epulum, a public banquet, were not limited to triumphal ceremonies. 24 Funerals became also a pretext for important families to offer different kinds of entertainments to the people and thus increase their prestige. Indeed, as it has been already noted by scholars, there is a clear resemblance and connection between the celebration of the triumph and that of funerals of important political figures, especially in the cases of the funus publicum. 25 The two ceremonies shared, among other things, a procession, the use of laurel wreaths, the presence of musicians and actors, the staging of ludi, gladiatorial games, and a public banquet. The first instance of a public banquet offered in occasion of a funeral recorded in the literary sources refers to the funeral of P. Licinius Crassus Dives in 183 B.C., when tables were set up in the Roman Forum. 26 Nicholas Purcell s study on the Roman plebs and John D Arms article on Caesar s banquets illustrated very clearly that the free meal had a great political and social importance in ancient Rome. 27 An anecdote referring to the Stoic Aelius Tubero is very revealing in this respect. Tubero, in occasion of the funeral of Scipio Africanus Aemilianus in 129 B.C. was in 20 According to Suet., Div. Iul. 39, in occasion of Caesar s triumph in 46 B.C. such a vast crowd gathered in Rome, that various people, including two senators, were killed in the press of people. Note that Caesar, by passing sumptuary laws that drastically curbed what others could offer at public feasts, de facto monopolized the potential of the epulum. He seems to have claimed to have been the first to sanction public banquets (Plin., NH 14.66: enim primus auctoritatem [for banquets] dedit, ut epistulis eius apparet; D Arms 1998, 42). See n. 31 on the sumptuary laws. 21 Prop : Plut., QRom 60. The exclusion regarded this specific cult, and not the cult of Hercules in general, as other sources seems to state; for a discussion of this topic Schultz 2006, 61-9; Flemming D Arms 1998, 39 n. 34; 41 n. 50; D Arms 2000, D Arms 1998, 41, with previous bibliography. 24 The practice of offering a banquet to the people in occasion of a triumph continued in the imperial period as well; for instance, see the feast offered by Tiberius on the occasion of his minor triumph (ovatio) over the Pannonians and Dalmatians in 9 B.C. (Dio Cass : Tiberius feasted the people on the Capitol and in many other places ), or the celebrations for Trajan s triumphs, when, according to Fronto, the Roman people often drank the sweet wine (de feriis Alsiensis 5.15, Teub. ed. 229). 25 Brelich On the posthumous triumph of Trajan during his funeral: Richard Val. Max., Mem ; Liv D Arms 1998; Purcell charge of the organization of a share of the public banquet, and ended up offending the Roman people by the frugality of the preparation using Samian tableware instead of silverware, for instance to the extent that for this reason he failed to be elected praetor. 28 Tubero s behaviour fits well his philosophical beliefs; elsewhere in the literary sources he is said to have been one of the three Romans to observe the Lex Fannia, one of the sumptuary laws aimed at regulating expenditure for private banquets. 29 By offering a moderate epulum, Tubero seems to have underestimated both the political importance of the public banquet and the expectations of the Roman citizens on this kind of occasion. Such a reaction is understandable only if we assume that by this time the people were accustomed to public banquets on a large and lavish scale, and the comment in the literary sources about the people s reaction to the use of Samian ware makes this clear. 30 Indeed, the insistence and the reiteration, during the whole second century, of sumptuary laws dealing with banquets prove the large scale and luxury of these events, both in the public and private sphere, and indicate the awareness on the part of the political class of their social and political importance. 31 The phenomenon was not limited to the city of Rome herself, but involved also the rest of Italy; in 103 B.C. the Lex Fannia was extended to the whole of Italy under the name of Lex Didia, thus showing that also the behaviour of local elites and/or the doings 28 Val. Max : Q. Aelius Tubero a Q. Fabio Maximo epulum populo nomine P. Africani patrui sui dante rogatus ut triclinium sterneret lectulos Punicanos pellibus haedinis strauit et pro argenteis vasis Samia exposuit. Cuius rei deformitas sic homines offendit, ut, cum alioqui uir egregius haberetur comitiisque praetoriis candidatus in campum L. Paulo auo et P. Africano auunculo nixus descendisset, repulsa inde abiret notatus: nam ut priuatim semper continentiam probabant, ita publice maxima cura splendoris habita est. quocirca urbs non unius conuiuii numerum, sed totam se in illis pelliculis iacuisse credens ruborem epuli suffragiis suis uindicauit; cf. Cic., Mur Ath., Deip c: Mucius Scevola, Aelius Tubero and Rutilius Rufus (who wrote the history of our country) are three Romans who observed in their own lives the Fannian Law (Loeb trans.); on the sumptuary laws see n As Cicero wrote, by his time the Roman plebs considered the public feast as part of its rightful due (Cic., Mur. 73, quoted in D Arms 1998, 36). 31 The sumptuary laws passed in the second century B.C. are: Lex Orchia, 182 B.C. (restrictions on expenditure for banquets and limiting the number of guests); Lex Fannia, 161 B.C. (strengthened the previsions of the Lex Orchia, adding that no more than 100 pounds weight silver ware could be used at one banquet); Lex Didia, 143 B.C. (extended the Lex Fannia to the whole of Italy); Lex Licinia (103 B.C.? proposed by P. Licinius Crassus according to Gellius, maybe during his praetorship, because the Lex Fannia was being neglected ). Sumptuary laws continued to be proposed during the first century by Sulla, Aemilus Lepidus, Caesar, and Augustus; interestingly, both Sulla and Caesar, who staged luxurious banquets for the people, were concerned with curbing the display of others in this field. Sulla s law, the Lex Cornelia of 81 B.C., might have been the same one determining how much might be spent upon monuments (Cic., Ad Att ); Caesar s Lex Iulia enforced the previous sumptuary laws (Cass. Dio 43.25); according to Suet., Divus Iul. 43, he sent lictores and soldiers to banquets to take away every thing which was not allowed by the law and stationed officers in the market to seize all forbidden foodstuffs; see also Cic., Fam

4 TRANSFORMING HISTORICAL LANDSCAPES IN THE ANCIENT EMPIRES 86 of Roman senators in other urban centres was a matter of increasing concern in Rome. The fact that no one really seemed to observe these laws did not stop the ruling class from proposing new regulations on the matter. The second century was a time of deep transformations in Roman society and economy. The ancients themselves sensed this and indicated in the period of the Syrian and Macedonian Wars a turning point for Rome. 32 The upper class faced the problem of keeping the political outcomes of these changes under control. 33 It is in this scenario that we ought to place the introduction in Rome of the triumphal banquet for the people, which had the same social and political importance as the other free meals. Hercules and War As anticipated earlier, in the case of the triumphs of first century generals cited above, the literary texts are clear in making a connection between the tithe from the booty, offered to Hercules, and the banquet to the people. But how did the god Hercules become so strictly associated with war and victory? The cult of Hercules in Rome in the Middle and Late Republican period, with its different places of worship, complex mythological baggage, and cultural practices, reflects the stratification of different cultural and religious elements; in order to understand the result of this process of trans-cultural exchange and appropriation, which involved the whole Hellenistic West, 34 we need to look at Hercules in different contexts and roles. As I have already stated, the connection between Hercules and the triumphal ceremony is quite ancient. Although the divine protagonist of the triumph was Iuppiter Optimus Maximus, Hercules played a role in the ceremony as well. This god is a very complex figure, presenting several cultural and religious aspects. 35 The Hercules worshipped in ancient Italy was not the simple transposition of the Greek Herakles, but with the passing of time, and the increase of cultural and commercial exchanges, myths and cults relating to this god in different geographical and cultural contexts tended to merge together. The religious stratification is particularly evident in the case of Rome and the commercial emporium in the Forum Boarium area, where the cult of Hercules presents indigenous, Greek, Cypriot and Phoenician elements. 36 To begin with, Hercules 32 See for instance Liv marking the display of booty during the triumph of Cn. Manlius Vulso in 187 B.C. as the beginning of Hellenistic convivial luxury in Rome (luxuriae enim peregrinae origo ab exercitu Asiatico inuecta in urbem est ( ) semina erant futurae luxuriae): the Romans were introduced to the use of couches inlaid with bronze (cf. Plin., NH ), elaborate vessels, precious tapestry, specialized cooks, etc. 33 Clemente The cultural exchanges and existence of a common ideological language dependant on Hellenistic models is also reflected in coinage: Hercules/Herakles coin-types were struck not only by the Barcid in Spain and by Syracuse, but also by the Oscan communities, the Bruttii, and, of course, Rome itself from the 230s B.C. (on quadrantes); Crawford 1974; Rawlings Bayet 1926; De Visscher 1962; Coarelli 1988; Levi Van Berchem ; Coarelli 1988; the Phoenician god Melqart was equated to Hercules/Herakles. A deposit of Greek pottery dated to was celebrated for his physical strength, which allowed him to overcome difficult tasks and to ultimately become a god. The Italic Hercules was not only the god of traders, who would dedicate to him the decuma, a tithe from their profits and in this view the location of the cult of Hercules in the Forum Boarium, the cattle market and the place of commercial exchanges via the Tiber makes perfect sense but he was also connected with war. 37 Sometimes he was equated with Mars. 38 The connection between Hercules and trade can be fully understood only when considering that it is the absence of war that allows trade, 39 and that merchants needed the aid of Hercules to overcome various perils, as in the case of the merchant M. Octavius Herennus, who built in the second century B.C. in the Forum Boarium a temple dedicated to Hercules Victor in thanksgiving for escaping the danger posed by pirates. 40 Octavius Herennus might be the same person mentioned by Macrobius as author of a literary work on the salii of the sanctuary of Hercules Victor at Tibur, and was perhaps the eight century B.C., discovered under the church of S. Omobono in the Forum Boarium, may indicate that Greek traders resided there: Bradley 2005, Epigraphic attestations of the decuma: CIL X.5708 (Sora); CIL IX.4672 (Reate; see also Verzár Bass 1985); IX.3569 (Pagus Ficulanus?); IX.4071a (Carsioli); IX.6153 (Tarentum); CIL X.3956 (Capua); CIL XIV.3541 (Tibur), and recently also from Tusculum: Nuñez & Dupré Especially in the case of the cult at the sanctuary at Tibur, which had Salii, an archaic collegium of priests typical of Mars; on the cult at Tibur see G. Hallan, Cenni sul culto di Ercole Vincitore in Tivoli e dintorni, Atti e memorie Società Tiburtina ( ), , which I could not access. Also Melqart seem to have presided over the martial sphere in addition to the world of commerce. 39 The connection between Hercules/Herakles and trade is ancient and traceable also in Greek and Etruscan contexts. A. Mastrocinque, Eracle Iperboreo in Italia, in Mastrocinque 1993, 49-62, at has drawn attention to the link between areas in the West part of the Greek and Etruscan commercial network and the localization of myths of the god. See also D. Placido, Le vie di Ercole nell estremo Occidente, ibidem, It is worth mentioning that in the Pseud. Arist. De mir. ausc. 85 the Heraklean road (in the myth the route followed by Hercules while leading the oxen of Geryon from Spain to Sicily) that connected the Iberian Peninsula with Magna Graecia is presented as a route used by Greek and local traders, who were under the god s protection: Benoît 1949 and Coarelli 1988, 128. For the connection between the cult of Hercules and Roman colonization, a framework in which the god s mythical deeds could become a paradigm of the colonists experience in bringing civilization and promoting cultural integration, see Bispham 2006, esp The story is told by Macr., Sat , who quotes Masurius Sabinus: Romae autem Victoris Herculis aedes duae sunt, una ad Portam Trigeminam, altera in foro Boario. Huius commenti causam Masurius Sabinus Memorabilium libro secundo aliter exponit: Marcus Octavius Herennus ( ) instituit mercaturam, et bene re gesta decimam Herculi profanavit. Postea cum navigans hoc idem ageret, a praedonibus circumventus fortissimo repugnavit et victor recessit. Hunc in somnis Hercules docuit sua opera servatum. Cui Octavius impetrato a magistratibus loco aedem sacravit et signum, Victoremque incisis litteris appelavit. Coarelli 1988, identified this temple (also referred to as temple of Hercules Olivarius on the basis of CIL VI.33936) with the so-called temple of Vesta, located by the Tiber and the Forum Boarium.

5 A. Marzano Hercules and the triumphal feast for the people engaged in the olive oil trade. 41 Epigraphic evidence informs us that Hercules was the patron of the Italic negotiatores in Delos, and in particular of the olearii. 42 The association between the cult of the god and cattle/sheep markets, which would take place in sanctuaries located at crucial points of the transhumance routes, is recurrent not only in Rome in the case of the Forum Boarium, but also at other important sanctuaries in early Italy. 43 To this we need to add also a particular connection with salt, a vital element for those engaged in animal husbandry, both for its role in the preservation of meat and in the production of cheese. As suggested by Torelli, herdsmen could probably purchase salt at the sanctuaries of Hercules where the cattle markets were held. 44 In Rome itself the place-name Salinae in the Forum Boarium refers to the deposits of salt produced at the mouth of the Tiber, which was then distributed inland along the Via Salaria. 45 In the Greek world, we find the association between Herakles and rulers in different contexts. The tyrant Peisistratos in sixth century B.C. Athens promoted an identification of himself with Herakles, evoking, with his return to Athens after the second exile on a chariot driven by a woman dressed as Athena, the introduction (and therefore the legitimation) of Herakles into Olympos by the goddess. 46 In this context we need to remember that the association between king/tyrant and the divine couple Herakles/Athena appears also in Rome at about the same time, and precisely in the Forum Boarium, where the acroterial decoration of the archaic temple of Mater Matuta, in the monarchical period, featured terracotta statues depicting these 41 Macr., Sat mentions a Herennus as author of a work de sacris saliaribus Tiburtium. Note that the recipient of the Roman temple is the same divinity worshipped in the sanctuary of Tibur. Coarelli thinks that Herennus was from Tibur or at least had a close connection with it. 42 Cassola ; Coarelli 1988, On why Hercules should be connected with olive oil, see the myth about his importation of the olive plant from the region of the Hyperborei: Pind., Ol. 3.24; Paus ; See for instance the sanctuary of Alba Fucens (Coarelli & La Regina 1984, 87); Torelli 1993, esp. 114; 1999, 35-9); of Tibur (Hallan 1932 quoted n. 38); of Praeneste Vigna Soleti (not to be confused with the sanctuary to Fortuna Primigenia, Coarelli 1982, 155; ILLRP 132); the sanctuary of Campochiaro on the tratturo between Bovianum and Saepinum (Capini & Di Niro 1991); of Sora (Tanzilli 1982, 142-3). On central Italy as specializing in husbandry and sheep-rearing: Torelli 1988, On Hercules and sheep-rearing: Van Wonterghem, F. (1999), Il culto di Ercole e la pastorizia nell Italia centrale, in E. Petrocelli (ed.), Civiltà della transumanza, Isernia, , which I could not access. Also in the case of periodic markets and fairs not associated with sanctuaries a connection with the cult of Hercules is attested: Gabba 1975, Gabba & Pasquinucci 1979, Torelli 1993, The god worshipped at the sanctuary of Alba Fucens had the epithet of Salarius as indicated by an inscription of a collegium of the cultores Herculis Salarii: CIL IX Fest. 272 L.; Sol. 1.8; Frontin ; Liv ; Torelli 1993, Herod See Boardman 1972, 1975, 1989; contra Cook Glinister 2003; Cristofani 1990; Coarelli 1988, Bradley 2005, 130 points out that representations of this subject are known also from other places in Tyrrhenian central Italy in the same period and that the wide diffusion of the type makes it difficult to link it specifically to the historical context of the later monarchy at Rome. In later times, it was especially Alexander the Great, later imitated by the diadochoi and subsequent Hellenistic dynasts, who exploited a connection with Herakles. Alexander, whose family claimed descent from this god, struck coins bearing the image of Herakles and is said to have often assumed his guise, wearing the lion skin, and in such a guise he is often depicted in figurative arts. 48 Herakles is said to have preceded Alexander in his journey eastwards, even to have prepared the way for Alexander s conquest, by the historians of the expedition. 49 The story about the statuette of Herakles by Lysippus, owned by Alexander, that accompanied (and granted favour to) the king during his military campaigns, reinforced the special connection between the god and Alexander. 50 In the Hellenistic period great emphasis was put on the god being an invincible hero; indeed, among the various epithets attached to the god we find kallinikos, nikator, nikeforos, titles notoriously used by the Seleucid dynasty. It also appears that in some instances the cult of Herakles Kallinikos was equated with that of Zeus Basileus. In this context, the connection between Herakles and the military sphere is easily understood. Even Hannibal represented himself as an Alexander-Herakles figure, 51 fully mastering imagery familiar to Graeco-Italic minds. The Carthaginian general is said to have visited the sanctuary of Hercules/Melqart at Gades, where he dedicated the spoils of Saguntum, before embarking on the crossing of the Alps, following in the steps of the god s feat. 52 Regardless of the historical authenticity of Hannibal s visit to the sanctuary, his march through the Alps and Italy was compared with divinities. 47 Hercules own crossing of the Alps from an early point. 53 In the Hellenistic and also in the Roman period, aspects of 87 the myth of Hercules/Herakles and of the myth of Dionysos merged, especially the stories connected to their mythical deeds in the East. Pliny the Elder, talking about the empire conquered by Alexander the Great, wrote that Macedonia roamed in the tracks of Father Liber and of Hercules. 54 In figurative arts very often the deeds of the two gods are presented together, and at times Hercules appears on the chariot of Dionysos triumphator or among his triumphal train. For instance, the iconographic program in the complex built by Pompey to Venus Victrix in the 48 Ephippos ap. Athen., Deip e; Steward 1993 on Alexander s silver coinage and its later imitations. Examples of Alexander depicted wearing the lion skin include a head from Sparta, now in the Boston Fine Arts Museum, and the famous Alexander sarcophagus from Sidon (Istanbul Archaeological Museum); see Campus 2005, esp for other examples and previous bibliography. For a synthetic analysis of Alexander s and other dynasts association with Herakles, including discussion of the shifting discourse of power involving Greek, Phoenician, and Roman elements, see Rawlings For instance Arr., Anab On Alexander and the statuette see Campus This is the statue described by Stat., Silv. 4.6 and Mart and 44, which was later owned by Hannibal and Sulla (!). 51 Rawlings 2005, Liv Roman literary tradition elaborated further on the theme, seeing in Hannibal s behaviour a deliberate challenge to Hercules achievements: Rawlings On the role of Melqart s sanctuaries in the Punic world: Van Berchem Plin., NH 4.10.

6 TRANSFORMING HISTORICAL LANDSCAPES IN THE ANCIENT EMPIRES 88 Campus Marius paired the deeds of Dionysos and Hercules. 55 The pairing of Hercules with Dionysus was particularly relevant at a later epoch, under Septimius Severus, who, according to Cassius Dio ( ), built a very large temple dedicated to both gods, the protectors of his two sons, Caracalla and Geta. 56 As far as concerns the nature of the cult of Hercules at the Ara Maxima, as we said, it was a very ancient cult, perhaps presenting traces ascribable to Eastern cults, if Coarelli s interpretation of the myth regarding the god and Acca Larentia in the context of sacred prostitution is correct. 57 The Romans themselves were aware of the antiquity of this cult, as shown by the legend that its foundation predated the arrival of Aeneas in Latium. The cult was, however, administered according to the Greek rite, i.e. with bare head, as the ancient sources stress. 58 From inscriptions and calendars dating to the imperial age we know that at a certain point the Hercules worshipped at the Ara Maxima received the epithet of Invictus. 59 The epithets of Invictus and Victor were introduced in Rome in the Mid- Republican period, when the figure of Hercules primarily connected to traders was substituted with a god more directly connected to the sphere of war and victory in a Hellenistic way, and in this context the use of the Greek rite for the cult 55 Sauron 1987, esp ; more in general Sauron Herakles/Hercules, through the myth of his involvement in the killing of Laomedon and the instating of Priam on the throne of Troy, a subject that appears often in Roman wall-painting, appears as legitimizing imperial rule in figurative arts: De Vos 1993; see for instance the first century B.C. reliefs from Arsameia and Nemrud Dağ in Anatolia, depicting Antiochos and Herakles in the act of dextrarum iunctio: W. Hoepfner, Arsameia am Nymphaios II, Istanbuler Forschungen 33 (Tübingen 1983). On the cult of Hercules in the imperial period: Schilling 1942; Jaczynowska Also Augustus exploited for ideological purposes a connection with Hercules. Horace compared him to the god upon his return from Spain: Hor., Carm ; (on this last poem, Morgan 2005). On the identification of Hercules and Theseus fighting the Amazons in the pediment of the temple of Apollo Sosianus with Augustus and Marcellus, respectively: La Rocca 1985; on the trophy of La Turbie, its association with the temple of Herakles Monoikos, and Augustan propaganda: Binminger For the association with Hercules in the case of the second century emperors, especially Domitian: Hekster Coarelli 188, ; Torelli 1993, The story is told in Macrob., Sat ; Lactant., Div. Inst : the aeditus of the temple of Hercules played dice with Hercules himself and lost; he had therefore to offer the god dinner and a prostitute, Acca Larentia. Hercules, as payment for her favours, granted her to marry the first man she encountered upon leaving the sanctuary. This turns out to be a rich and noble man, who will leave in his will everything to Acca L.; when she dies, she leaves all her properties to the Roman people and in thanksgiving Acca L. s tomb was the recipient of a public cult. 58 Macrob., Sat : Nam propria observatio est in Herculis sacris epulari sedentes; et Cornelius Bassus in libro octavo decimo ait apud aram Maximam observatum ne lectisternium fiat. Custoditur in eodem loco ut omnes aperto capite sacra faciant. Hoc fit, ne quis in aede dei habitum eius imitetur: nam ipse ibi operto est capite. Varro ait Graecum hunc esse morem, quia sive ipse sive qui ab eo relicti aram Maximam statuerunt Graeco ritu sacrificaverunt. Hoc amplius addit Gavius Bassus. Idcirco enim hoc fieri dicit, quia ara Maxima ante adventum Aeneae in Italia constituta est, qui hunc ritum velandi capitis invenit. 59 A detailed discussion on this issue can be found in Coarelli 1988, on which I depend for the following account. may be significant. 60 There is one instance, in the sources at our disposal that refer to the Republican period, of an episode clearly connecting the cult of Hercules with a military victory: the erection of a statue of the god on the Capitol after the recovery of Sora, Arpinum and Cesennia by the Romans in 305 B.C. 61 Perhaps we ought to explain this dedication with the fact that the cult of Hercules was deeply rooted among the Samnites, 62 an act of thanksgiving for the divine favour bestowed upon the Romans instead. During the second Punic war, when as we have seen Hannibal exploited an association with Herakles/Hercules, the Romans responded to Hannibal s military victories also appealing to Hercules, as attested by the actions of Minucius and Q. Fabius Maximus. 63 If these cases do not specifically regard the cult at the Ara Maxima, there is however one interesting detail that indicates how by this time Hercules and the military sphere was a well-established association in Rome. Livy reports that in two instances, in 217 and in 207 B.C., special invocations were made to Iuventas. 64 This goddess, who was equated to Hebe and considered as the bride of Hercules by the Romans, was associated with the military training and the velites, the youngest age group in the troops. 65 These appeals to Iuventas, i.e. to the safety of a special part of the army, that took place in the temple of Hercules seem to me to indicate that by this time the association of Hercules with war was fully developed at Rome and constructed in a complex, Hellenized way. It seems that the ancients considered Hercules Invictus to be similar to the god Mars, since Hercules also, as in the case of the god of war, had a collegium of Salii. As we learn from Macrobius, Varro equated the two divinities in his Satura Menippea. And so says Varro s Maenippea, entitled the other Herakles, in which, since he discusses about Hercules Invictus, he shows that the god is the same as Mars See Scheid 1995 for a discussion of the Greek rite as characteristic of third/second century B.C. Hellenistic influence. 61 Liv : eo anno Sora Arpinum Cesennia recepta ab Samnitibus; Herculis magnum simulacrum in capitolio positum dedicatumque. According to Strabo , Domitius Ahenobarbus built, at the meeting point of the Iser and Rhone, a military trophy with two temples, one to Mars, the other to Hercules. 62 Salmon 1967, 170-1; Bradley 2005, esp for discussion of the cult in this area and of how modern studies have linked the popularity of the cult of Hercules among the Samnites with the perception of this population which depends upon the stereotypes we find in the ancient sources about their bellicosity and roughness. 63 Minucius dedicated an altar to Hercules in 217/16 B.C. after a minor success over Hannibal: ILLRP 118; however, see Dorey 1955 for the view that the altar may refer to 220 B.C. Q. Fabius Maximus moved to the Capitoline hill the temple to Hercules at Porta Collina (from where Hannibal had surveyed Rome: Liv ): Plin., NH 34.40; on Fabius taking from Tarentum the cult statue of Heracles and placing it next to one of his own on the Capitol: Plut., Fab Liv : a lectisternium to Iuventas performed at the temple of Hercules after the offering of special prayers to the god; : temple vowed to Iuventas. 65 Rawlings 2005, 161-2; Polyb for the connection Iuventas-velites. 66 Macrob. Sat : Et sane ita Menippea Varronis affirmat quae inscribitur: Ἄλλος οὖτος Ἡρακλῆς, in qua, cum de Invicto Hercule loqueretur, eundem esse ac Martem probavit.

7 A. Marzano Hercules and the triumphal feast for the people Furthermore, we are told that during sacrifices performed at the Ara Maxima laurel wreaths, a symbol connected to victory, taken from the Loretum maius were used, instead of the poplar wreaths typical of the cult of the Italic Hercules. 67 However, we are unable determine with precision when the shift in the cult of the Ara Maxima from primarily a god of traders to a Hercules predominantly connected to the military sphere and victory took place. Some scholars have related this change to the reform of the cult attributed to Appius Claudius Caecus, who took the administration of the cult away from the families of the Pinarii and the Potitii, and turned it into a state cult during his censorship in 312 B.C. 68 It is also not possible to determine exactly when victorious generals started to offer a tithe from their booty to Hercules. As mentioned above, previously the tithe was offered mostly by merchants in thanksgiving for their profits. 69 Coarelli strongly argues for placing the dedication of tithes on the part of victorious generals after the cult at the Ara Maxima received the epithet of Invictus, so sometime in the early third century B.C. if the proposed connection with Appius Claudius reform and the appearance of the title Invictus is correct. However, it is to be said that a sequential relationship between the appearance of the epithet Invictus for the cult at the Ara Maxima and the offering of tithes from the spoils of war is logical, but not certain. It is equally possible that spontaneous and frequent dedications of booty on the part of generals helped to formalize this aspect of the cult and led to the attribution of the religious epithet Invictus. In any case, it is worth remembering that the transformation of the cult with the addition of the epithet did not mean that the old custom of giving offerings from the gains of commerce died out. On the contrary, this practice continued alongside the dedications made by the victorious generals. Hercules, the Tithe and the Banquet The tradition of offering to Hercules a tithe from one s gain was an ancient one. The aetiological explanation given by the antiquarian writers connected this practice with Hercules himself, who had told the inhabitants of the Aventine that those who would vow to give to him a tithe from their possession would lead a happier and more prosperous life. Diodoros adds that such a custom persisted in his own days and that many Romans, of moderate and great wealth, had offered to the god a tenth of their possessions. 70 It seems that any kind of edible or drinkable items were regarded as appropriate offerings to Hercules; 71 what was not burned on the altar was distributed among the participants and consumed within the sanctuary, in 67 The myth ascribes that change in custom to the beginnings of Rome, when Titus Tatius was buried in the Loretum maius: Varro, LL 5.152; Fest. 496 L. 68 Liv. 9.29; on Heracles instructing them about the rites of the Ara Maxima: Liv ; on Appius Claudius Caecus reform: Palmer On the offering of tithes at the Ara Maxima: Dion. Hal : the altar where the tithes are dedicated to Hercules is called by the Romans Maxima and it is next to what they call Forum Boarium. 70 Diod. Sic see also Plut., QRom 18 on the tithe as a custom of the wealthy people in general. 71 Fest. 253a M: omnia esculenta posculenta. fano, as we learn from an erudite disquisition in Varro s de Lingua Latina, which is here worth quoting: Hinc fana nominata, quod pontifices in sacrando fati sint finem; hinc profanum, quod est ante fanum coniuctum fano; hinc profanatum quid in sacrificio atque Herculi decuma appellata ab eo est quod sacrificio quodam fanatur, id est ut fani lege fit. Id dicitur polluctum, quod a porriciendo est fictum: cum enim ex mercibus libamenta porrecta sunt Herculi in aram, tum polluctum est, ut cum profanatur ducutur, id est proinde ut sit fani factum: itaque ibi olim in fano consumebatur omne quod profanatum erat, ut etiam nunc fit quod preator urbanus quotannis facit, cum Herculi immolat publice iuveneam. (LL ) 72 The ancient sources also stress that it was not religiously proper to recline at the table during the banquets to Hercules, but that participants had to be seated. 73 We are also informed of the exclusion of women from the rites at the Ara Maxima. 74 The tithe to Hercules, also called the Herculana pars, is referred to by numerous literary passages, especially in the comedies of Plautus, 75 but for what concerns the epulum for the Roman people and its location before the first century B.C. cases of triumphal feasting, we do not have clear indications. If the association between the tithe and the banquet is clear enough in the literary texts, we are not always told where these banquets were staged. Only two passages in Athenaeus Deipnosophistai explicitly make a connection between the Ara Maxima and the epulum for the people in occasion of triumphs. 76 Athenaeus, who is quoting 72 From this the fana [sanctuaries] are named, because the pontiffs in consecrating them have fati spoken their boundary; from this, profanatum [being before the sanctuary], which applies to something that is in front of the sanctuary and joined to it; from this anything in the sacrifice, and especially Hercules tithe, is called profanatum brought before the sanctuary, dedicated, from this fact that it fanatur is consecrated by some sacrifice, that is, that it becomes by law the property of the sanctuary. This is called polluctum offered up, a term which is shaped from porricere to lay before : for when from articles of commerce first fruits are laid before Hercules, on his altar, then there is a polluctum offering up, just as, when profanatum is said, it is as if the thing had become the sanctuary s property. So formerly all that was profanatum dedicated used to be consumed in the sanctuary, as even now is done with that which the City Praetor offers every year, when on behalf of the state he sacrifices a heifer to Hercules (Loeb trans.). 73 Macrob., Sat : Non vacat quod dixit sedili. Nam propria observatio est in Herculis sacris epulari sedentes: et Cornelius Balbus in libro octavo decimo ait apud aram Maximam observatum ne lectisternium fiat. Note that Plutarch on reporting on Crassus banquet mentions tables vs. the triclinia in Caesar s case: maybe indication that Crassus observed the religious restriction of seating at the banquet? 74 Plut., QRom. 60; Prop Origo gentis romanae 8.5, discussed in Schultz 2006 states that in 312 B.C. Appius Claudius not only bribed the Potitii and Pinarii into relinquishing the administration of the cult, but also into allowing women to take part. 75 Plaut., Bacch ; Mostell. 984; Stich Ath., Deipn c: In the second book he (i.e., Posidonius) says: In the Roman capital, whenever they hold a feast in the precinct of Hercules, it is given by the general who for the time being is celebrating a triumph, and the preparation for the banquet is worthy of Hercules himself. For honeyed wine flowed copiously throughout the entire meal, and the food consisted of large loaves and boiled and smoked meat, as well as roast meat from the freshly sacrificed victims, in extravagance 89

8 TRANSFORMING HISTORICAL LANDSCAPES IN THE ANCIENT EMPIRES 90 Posidonius of Apameia, 77 relates that after the conclusion of the triumphal procession the generals feasted the people ἐν τῷ τοῦ Ἡρακλέους ἱερῷ. Other ancient authors are more generic in their accounts, such as Columella, who does not give a location for the banquet, but simply states when those who celebrated a triumph gave a feast to the people (Rust ). John D Arms was the first to recognize the importance of Athenaeus passages for the location of the seat of the triumphal feast. In D Arms view, ἱερόν ought to be understood here as referring to the whole Forum Boarium area, where the cult of Hercules was so prominent. 78 However, in my opinion the use of the whole Forum Boarium for the staging of the banquets, as in the case of Crassus feast, is a later development, when the scale of entertainment grew to include a larger number of citizens. The ancient texts, I believe, allow us to be more specific about the location of the banquet in its earlier stages. Iulius Solinus, a compiler who wrote in the third or fourth centuries A.D. but who drew mostly on the earlier works of Pliny the Elder and Pomponius Mela, while discussing the foundation of the Ara Maxima and its rites by Hercules, mentions a conseptum sacellum in which the signs of Hercules banquet and divine nature were kept, that is to say the wooden skyphos, or cup, and the club. 79 Hercules was supposed to have brought with him to Italy a large wooden cup that, as Servius explains, was kept at the Ara Maxima, carefully preserved, and used for libations by the urban praetor in occasion of the yearly sacrifice. 80 The skyphos was so much the symbol of the Hercules worshipped at the Ara Maxima that a representation of it appeared on the Porta Trigemina, the city gate near the Forum Boarium, together with shields and helmets. 81 As Coarelli s plenty (Loeb trans.); f: he (i.e., Larensis, in the context of discussing skins of strange animals sent back to Rome by Marius) further said that these skins hang dedicated in the temple of Hercules, where commanders celebrating their triumphs feast the citizens, as many poets and historians of Rome have told (Loeb trans.). 77 The fragment is dated as referring to the years B.C. since it comes from the 2 nd book of the Histories: Edelstain & Kidd 1989, 78, fr. 53. Posidonius was in Rome in 87/86 B.C. 78 D Arms 1998, 36 n. 20. Beard 2007, 261 does not accept that Athenaeus s passages are necessarily referring to the Ara Maxima: Athenaeus does not specify which precinct of Hercules he means. 79 Sol : Suo quoque numini idem Hercules instituit aram, quae maxima apud pontifices habetur, cum se ex Nicostrate, Evandri matre, quae vaticinio Carmentis dicta est, immortalem conperisset. Conseptum etiam, intra quod ritus sacrorum, factis bovicidis, docuit Potitios, sacellum in Boario foro est, in quo argumenta et convivii et maiestatis ipsius remanent. Nam divinitus neque muscis illo neque canibus ingressus est. 80 Serv., ad Aen : Legitur in libris antiques, Herculem ad Italiam ligneum poculum attulisse, quo utebantur in sacris. Quod ne carie consumeretur pice oblitum servabatur (...) scypho praetor in anno semel vino libabat, neque sine sacra fiebat. 81 The Porta Trigemina was thus depicted on a lost piece of a relief, fortunately drawn in the codex Coburgensis. It showed a gateway opening in the city-walls with a temple in the background and a pompa passing through the gate. Above the arch was the sculpted decoration featuring the cup, the weapons (reference to spoil, perhaps to the tithe?) and a boar s head, interpreted as an allusion to the Caledonian boar hunt. Coarelli 1988, convincingly rejects an identification of the gate in the lost relief with the Porta Triumphalis. Ibidem for a photo of the drawing in the codex. research has illustrated, the Ara itself and this sacellum were strictly connected to each other. If we turn our attention to the word-choice in the texts that refer to the Ara Maxima, we see that Greek writers usually refer to it by either using βωμός, the literal translation of the Latin ara, or, with reference to the entire sacred complex, that is to say the ara + sacellum, ἱερόν, as in one passage by Diodorus. 82 However, a closer analysis of the linguistic usage in the literary sources that refer to the religious complex reveals that the sacred precinct connected to the Ara could either be called in Latin fanum 83 and in Greek ἱερόν, using a general term, as Athenaeus does, or, using more precise and technical terms, conseptum sacellum (Solinus) and περίβολον (Plutarch). 84 Therefore, Solinus sacellum at the Ara Maxima, where the divine signs of Hercules were kept, can coincide with the ἱερόν named by Athenaeus as the location for the banquets; it is in this sacellum, in my opinion, that the sacrifices from the offered tithes were performed and that the banquet to the people took place at first. The Ara Maxima, whose appearance is never described precisely in our sources, 85 was probably an altar of Hellenistic type on a large rectangular podium with access through a staircase. 86 Coarelli believes that the structure built in Aniene tufa blocks under the church of Santa Maria in Cosmedin belonged to the Ara Maxima. 87 This podium was connected to a complex with portico on the north-west side, usually identified with the Statio annonae, but to be interpreted as the sacellum belonging to the Ara Maxima in Coarelli s reconstruction. 88 In its first stages, the feast offered to the Roman people must have the direct outcome of the sacrifices performed at the Ara Maxima. As in the case of the annual sacrifice performed by the urban praetor, the meat must have been distributed to the participants and consumed within the sacellum. Varro reports the information that during rites at the Ara the meat from the sacrificial victims and the other offerings were consumed within the sanctuary by the male attendees, who ate crowned with 82 Diod : ἱερόν; Dion. Hal : βωμός. 83 As in Tac., Ann , in the context of the fire of A.D. 64: magna ara fanumque, quae praesenti Herculi Arcas Evander sacraverat exusta. 84 See discussion in Coarelli 1988, 71-3: the definition of sacellum given by the sources is as locus parvus deo sacrato cum ara (Trabatius apud Gell ), and sacella dicuntur loca diis sacrata sine tecto (Fest. 422 L.). Plut., QRom 90: Why is it that, when the sacrifice to Hercules takes place, they mention by name no other god, and why is a dog never seen within his enclosure as Varro has recorded? ; for parallels in the usage of fanum as equivalent to ἱερόν, see the sanctuary of the Euemenides in Athens, called by Pausanias ἱερὸν (1.8.6) and by Cicero fanum ( Cic., Nat. Deor. 3.46). 85 See for instance Serv. Ad Aen ; 3.407: ara quam maximam dicit ex magnitudine fabricae; Ovid., Fast : Constituique sibi, quae maxima dicitur, aram / hic ubi pars urbis de bove nomen habet. 86 LTUR, s.v. Hercules Invictus, Ara Maxima. 87 Coarelli 1988, 67-77; see also ibidem, Appendix 1 by F. Tolotti. 88 Torelli 1993, 112-3, on the basis of the typology of the sanctuary at Alba Fucens, proposes that the conseptum sacellum of the Ara Maxima was a relatively small enclosure for the cult statue. If this suggestion is correct, there would not be enough space to stage the banquet. The remains investigated in the early 20 th century that Coarelli proposes as candidate for the sacellum annexed to the Ara Maxima refer to a late phase dated to the 4 th century A.D. and measure c. 29x16 m (interior).