Final Draft - Preview Matter - Florida State University
Final Draft - Preview Matter - Florida State University
Final Draft - Preview Matter - Florida State University
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worship animals are thought to be more pious and devoted to their religion than those who<br />
worship gods in human form.<br />
speaks.<br />
Cicero seems to express a different opinion at De Natura Deorum III.19,47 when Cotta<br />
If those are gods, whom we worship and accept, why do we not count Serapis<br />
and Isis amongst them? And, why deny the gods of the barbarians? Therefore,<br />
we should place oxen and horses, ibises, hawks, serpents, crocodiles, fish, dogs,<br />
wolves, cats, in addition to many other beasts amongst the proper number of the<br />
gods. 25<br />
At first glance, this quote seems quite opposed to Egyptian religion due to the implication that<br />
the Romans do not place beasts amongst the gods. But Cotta’s statement is taken in the larger<br />
context of his argument, we see that he is attacking not only Egyptian religion. Cotta goes on to<br />
question the godhood of Greek and Roman deities.<br />
And if we reject those, we must also reject those who bore them. What then? Is<br />
Ino to be considered a goddess called Leukothea by the Greeks and Matuta by us,<br />
since she was a daughter of Cadmus; moreover are Circe, Pasiphae, and Aeetes,<br />
daughters of Perseis (a daughter of Ocean) and of father Sun, to be held in the<br />
number of the gods? 26<br />
Cotta’s remarks are not designed to attack animal worship but the acceptance of the existence of<br />
deities in general. We can see from these examples that Cicero’s depiction of animal worship is<br />
by no means wholly negative and primarily functions as a way of denoting the antiquity of the<br />
Egyptians and their foreign qualities.<br />
One literary topos used as evidence of a negative appraisal of animal worship is the trope<br />
of Anubis latrans, or barking Anubis. 27 This phrase appears in Vergil’s Aeneid during his<br />
25 Cic. Nat. D. III.19,47. Latin Text taken from Cicero Nature of the Gods, Academics, Loeb Classical Library,<br />
Vol. 19, edited by J. Henderson, Cambridge, MA: Harvard <strong>University</strong> Press, 2000, pp. 330, 332. (Translation by<br />
Author.)<br />
… si di sunt illi, quos colimus et accepimus, cur non eodem in genere Serapim Isimque numeremus? quod si<br />
facimus, cur barbarorum deos repudiemus? Boves igitur et equos, ibis, accipitres, aspidas, crocodilos, pisces, canes,<br />
lupos, faelis, multas praeterea beluas in deorum numerum reponemus.<br />
26 Cic. Nat. D. III.19, 47-8. Latin Text taken from Cicero Nature of the Gods, Academics, Loeb Classical Library,<br />
Vol. 19, edited by J. Henderson, Cambridge, MA: Harvard <strong>University</strong> Press, 2000, p. 332.<br />
Quae si reicimus, illa quoque, unde haec nata sunt, reiciemus. Quid deinde? Ino dea ducetur et a<br />
Graecis, a nobis Matuta dicetur, cum sit Cadmi filia, Circe autem er Pasiphaë et Aeeta e Perseide Oceani filia natae<br />
patre Sole in deorum numero non habebuntur?<br />
27 In addition to the Vergilian example produced here, Propertius III.11,41 refers to Anubis as latrantem in reference<br />
to the conflict between Antony as Cleopatra’s pawn, and Augustus.<br />
7