ProQuest Dissertations - Historia Antigua

etween the generals, locals, and the landscape made ready for Roman colonization(Figure 2.1). Following this is a discussion of the motivations for the commissioners inrelation to their position in Rome and the benefits they accrued from the colonies (Figure2.2). Chapter 3 concerns the relationships between Rome and the commissioners, on theone hand, and the commissioners, colonists, and colonial landscape, on the other (Figure3.1). Finally, Chapter 4 explores the relationships between colonists, locals, and thelandscape as seen through the lens of religious practice (Figure 4.2).IV.Roman ReligionIn order to determine whether the Romans imposed their religion on the colonists and thelocal populations around the colonies, it is necessary to examine religion in Rome itself.Thus, this section will address whether there was an obvious and distinct state cult inRome as well as who was responsible for introducing new cults into the religious systemthere. Through addressing these queries, it becomes clearer that Rome could not havestamped each colony with a pre-formed set of religious ideals because, in the middleRepublic, such a thing did not exist.Was there a Roman state cult?One very important, often unspoken assumption in the discourse on deliberate'Romanization' of the colonies through religion is that the Romans had some sort ofdefinable state cult. It was part or the whole of this official religious structure, then,which Rome is imagined to have imposed on colonies planted throughout the Republicanperiod. De Cazanove supports the notion of a Roman state cult, distinct from that of its29