Carmentalia
| Carmentalia | |
|---|---|
| Official name | Carmentalia |
| Observed by | Pagans, practioners of the Cultus Deorum Romanorum |
| Significance | Sacred to Carmenta, celebrating the dedication of her sacred grove by Numa Pompilius |
| Celebrations | Feasts of cake and honey and wine |
| Observances | Sacrifices of spelt cakes, religious readings and a public sacrifice |
| Date | a.d. III Id. Januarias, a.d. XVIII Kal. Februarias |
| Frequency | Annual |
The Carmentalia is a festival celebrated annually within Imperivm Romanvm (and by other Roman pagans and their groups) and historically in ancient Roman civilisation. This festival is in honour of the goddess Carmenta.
This festival is celebrated annually twice a year on a.d. III Id. Januarias and a.d. XVIII Kal. Februarias. The reason for this celebration happening twice a year and then annually was a common topic and preoccupation of Roman thought, baffling even the smartest minds of the time. Little is known about the festival itself except that Carmenta was invoked by 2 specific epithets Postvorta and Antevorta. These epithets were in reference to the goddess's power to look back into the past and forwards into the future.
The Carmentalia was chiefly observed by woman as the goddess was one of the goddesses governing childbirth.
Two Dates in Januarias
Carmentalia is observed on 2 dates, both in January. These dates are both considered separate festivals, rather than one single festival extending over this period, this is why it is a unique festival.
The matter of the 2 dates and the reasoning behind such an odd feature is still unclear to us today and it also baffled and occupied the minds of the ancients. Though this didn't stop the people of the Late Republic from coming up with theories.
Two Groves Beneath the Palatine
According to legend, Carmenta's cultus predated Rome itself. In some accounts She was known as Nicostrate, the mother of Evander, who was fathered by Mercurius. Evander was the legendary founder of Paletum, a village that gave its name to the Palatine Hill. Her sacred grove, therefore, may have originally lay beneath the Palatine Hill as some ascribe it. Indeed, it may be that it was in Her sacred grove beneath the Palatine that Romulus and Remus were said to have been discovered being suckled by a she-wolf, since Carmenta was so closely associated with the care of infants.
It was said that later Numa Pompilius founded a sacred grove for Her beneath the Capitoline Hill. The dedication of two groves to Carmenta is one possible reason why there were two days celebrated as Carmentalia in the month of January.
To Match Other Early Cults
It was proposed by Huschke that the two festival days represented the Latins of Romulus and the Sabines of Titus Tatius, just as there were two companies of Luperci and two companies of Salii. Were that the case we might expect that She once had a sacred grove on the Esquiline Hill, and that Numa's dedication beneath the Capitoline represented a union of the two culti Carmentalis. There was a complex on the Esquiline where such a grove may have once stood.
Fasti Praeneste
The fasti Praeneste suggests that the second date was added by a victorious Roman general who had left the City by the Porta Carmentalis for his campaign against Fidenae. The gate received its name from its proximity to the sacred grove of Carmentis.
Ovid
Ovid states that the two dates may be linked by a protest of the matrons of Rome in DLIX AVC