ProQuest Dissertations - Historia Antigua

colonization, contact with Greek colonists, images on coins from Magna Graecia,veneration by transhumant shepherds, or even through the movements of mercenarybands. 71These methods need not be mutually exclusive; they all could have functionedin tandem, leading to the widespread and diverse worship of Hercules in almost all partsof the Italian peninsula. 72Dionysius of Halicarnassus presents an account of Hercules asa colonizer, 73 which might suggest that Hercules was particularly important in thisvalence to the Roman and Latin colonists of the middle Republic. The evidence forworship of Hercules, such as small bronze figures, pocula deorum, inscriptions, andtemples, are so diverse in the colonies and so widespread in other Italian communitiesthat I would argue instead that the colonists adopted Hercules according to their needs asa community, not simply because they were colonists.Hercules' function as a colonizer is certainly one aspect of his worship. Bisphamdraws attention to the connotations of the cult found in Sicily and Southern Italy, whereHercules' endeavors resonated with the promotion of cultural and economic interactiontypical of colonial experience. 74The connection between Hercules' exploits andcolonization was noted even in antiquity by Dionysius of Halicarnassus {Ant. Rom. 1.38-44). Dionysius offers a 'truer' version of Hercules' travels in Italy {Ant. Rom. 1.41.1 f.)which deals not with cattle, but with Hercules as commander of a large army whichdestroyed despotisms, avenged injured states, and established humane and sociableVon Wonterghem (1992), pp. 320-322 for a discussion of, and evidence for, these methods in terms ofthe Osco-Sabellic peoples.72 Ibid., p. 322.73 Ant. Rom. 1.38-44.74 Bispham (2006), pp. 113-4.214