Castor and Pollux - Italy and The Roman Empire

Italy and The Roman Empire

From the fifth century BC onwards, the brothers were revered by the Romans, probably as the result of cultural transmission via the Greek colonies of Magna Graecia in southern Italy. An archaic Latin inscription of the sixth or fifth century BC found at Lavinium, which reads Castorei Podlouqueique qurois ("To Castor and Pollux, the Dioskouroi"), suggests a direct transmission from the Greeks; the word "qurois" is virtually a transliteration of the Greek word κούροις, while "Podlouquei" is effectively a transliteration of the Greek Πολυδεύκης. The construction of the Temple of Castor and Pollux, located in the Roman Forum at the heart of their city, was undertaken to fulfil a vow (votum) made by Aulus Postumius Albus Regillensis in gratitude at the Roman victory in the Battle of Lake Regillus in 495 BC. The establishing of the temple may also be a form of evocatio, the transferral of a tutelary deity from a defeated town to Rome, where cult would be offered in exchange for favor. According to legend, the twins fought at the head of the Roman army and subsequently brought news of the victory back to Rome. The Locrians of Magna Graecia had attributed their success at a legendary battle on the banks of the Sagras to the intervention of the Twins. The Roman legend may in fact have had its origins in the Locrian account and possibly supplies further evidence of cultural transmission between Rome and Magna Graecia.

The Romans believed that the twins aided them on the battlefield. Their role as horsemen made them particularly attractive to the Roman equites and cavalry. Each year on July 15, the feast day of the Dioskouroi, the 1,800 equestrians would parade through the streets of Rome in an elaborate spectacle in which each rider wore full military attire and whatever decorations he had earned.

In the comedies of Plautus, women swear by Castor, and men by Pollux.

Read more about this topic:  Castor And Pollux

Famous quotes containing the words roman empire, italy and, italy, roman and/or empire:

    The descendants of Holy Roman Empire monarchies became feeble-minded in the twentieth century, and after World War I had been done in by the democracies; some were kept on to entertain the tourists, like the one they have in England.
    Ishmael Reed (b. 1938)

    For us to go to Italy and to penetrate into Italy is like a most fascinating act of self-discovery—back, back down the old ways of time. Strange and wonderful chords awake in us, and vibrate again after many hundreds of years of complete forgetfulness.
    —D.H. (David Herbert)

    Lump the whole thing! Say that the Creator made Italy from designs by Michael Angelo!
    Mark Twain [Samuel Langhorne Clemens] (1835–1910)

    We do not preach great things but we live them.
    Marcus Minucius Felix (late 2nd or early 3rd ce, Roman Christian apologist. Octavius, 38. 6, trans. by G.H. Rendell.

    The trouble with Freud is that he never played the Glasgow Empire Saturday night.
    Ken Dodd (b. 1931)