1 Earliest Rome

7.6 Prophecy in the Roman empire
(8) Then the other prophecy was read out, harder to understand not just because the
future is less certain than the past, but also because it was written in a more complex
style: 'Romans, if you wish to drive out the enemy from your land, the plague that came
from faraway lands, I bid you vow to Apollo annual games which will be celebrated for
him joyfully; the people shall bear part of the cost from public funds, but private men
shall contribute for themselves and their families. In charge of the conduct of the games
shall be the praetor who is the chief judge for the people and commons ; the decemviri shall perform the sacrifices, by the Greek rite. 5
If you perform all
this rightly, you shall ever rejoice and your power shall be dominant. For the god who
shall extinguish your wars shall be the one who in peace cultivates your fields.' 6
(11) They took one day for rituals of expiation after this prophecy. Then, next day, the
senate decreed that the decemviri should inspect the Sibylline Books on the subject of
games for Apollo and the rituals that should be followed. When the Books bad been
inspected and a report made to the senate, they decreed that the games for Apollo should
be vowed and performed and that at the time of the performance the praetor should
receive 12, 000 asses for the rituals and two greater victims. 7
A second decree was passed
that the decemviri should sacrifice by the Greek rite 1
with the following victims: for
Apollo a gilded ox and two white gilded goats; for Latona a gilded heifer.
1. Also mentioned by other authors, though there are sometimes (e.g. Cicero, On
Divination I.S9) said to be two brothers.
2. A praetor of 213 B.C., M. Aemilius Lepidtis, had investigated the presence of foreign
cults, in Rome. See Vol. 1, 91-2.
3. A disastrous Roman defeat inflicted by Hannibal in 216 B.C.
4. The references arc not entirely clear. Canna appears ro refer to the river Aufidus in
Apulia (south Italv) where the battle was fought, though it obviously evokes the name of
Cannae; Diomedes was a Greek hero in the Trojan war, who was supposed ro have trav­
elled in later life to Apulia and set up a kingdom there.
5- See 5.7b n.l. The Greek rire was the usual recommendation of the Sibylline Books.
6. For the ludi Apoilinares, see Scullard (1981) 159-60.
7. See 7-3a n.3.
7.6 Prophecy in the Roman empire
In the Roman empire, there was an enormous variety of prophecies and
prophetic activity, both pagan and Christian. This section tries to capture some
of that variety.
See further: Lane Fox (1986) 168-261, 375^18.
7.6a How to invent an oracle
Lucian's satire on Alexander of Abonouteichos (a city in the region of
Paphlagonia on the south shore of the Black Sea) sets out to expose a false oracle,
fraudulently stage-managed by Alexander. In this passage he describes the
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