In ancient Roman religion, Ceres ( , ) was a goddess of agriculture, grain crops, fertility, and motherly relationships.Room, Adrian, Who's Who in Classical Mythology, p. 89-90. NTC Publishing 1990. . She was originally the central deity in Rome's so-called plebeian or Aventine Triad, then was paired with her daughter Proserpina in what Romans described as "the Greek rites of Ceres". Her seven-day April festival of Cerealia included the popular Ludi Ceriales (Ceres's games). She was also honoured in the May lustration (lustratio) of the fields at the Ambarvalia festival, at harvesttime, and during Roman marriages and funeral rites. She is usually depicted as a mature woman.
Ceres is the only one of Rome's many agricultural deities to be listed among the Dii Consentes, Rome's equivalent to the Twelve Olympians of Greek mythology. The Romans saw her as the counterpart of the Greek goddess Demeter,Larousse Desk Reference Encyclopedia, The Book People, Haydock, 1995, p. 215. whose mythology was reinterpreted for Ceres in Roman art and literature.
Etymology and origins The name Cerēs stems from Proto-Italic ('with grain, Ceres'; cf. Faliscan , Oscan ('Cererī' < - < -), ultimately from Proto-Indo-European *ḱerh₃-os ('nourishment, grain'), a derivative of the root , meaning 'to feed'.
The Proto-Italic adjective ('belonging to Ceres') can also be reconstructed from terms such as Oscan (fem. ). A masculine form ('with grain, Cerrus') is possibly attested in Umbrian śerfe. The spelling of Latin , a masculine form of Ceres denoting the creator (cf. 'creator bonus', 'good Cerus'), might also reflect Cerrus, which would match the other Italic forms.
Archaic cults to Ceres are well-evidenced among Rome's neighbours in the Regal period, including the ancient Latins, Oscans and Sabellians, less certainly among the Etruscans and Umbrians. An archaic Faliscan inscription of c. 600 BC asks her to provide far (spelt wheat),Watkins, Calvert. How to Kill a Dragon. Oxford University Press, 1995. pp. 127-128. . which was a dietary staple of the Mediterranean world. Ancient Roman etymologists thought that ceres derived from the Latin verb gerere, "to bear, bring forth, produce", because the goddess was linked to pastoral, agricultural and human fertility. Throughout the Roman era, Ceres's name was synonymous with grain and, by extension, with bread.Spaeth, 1990, pp. 1, 33, 182. See also Spaeth, 1996, pp. 1–4, 33–34, 37. Spaeth disputes the identification of Ceres with warlike, protective Umbrian deities named on the Iguvine Tablets, and Gantz' identification of Ceres as one of six figures shown on a terracotta plaque at Etruscan Murlo (Poggio Civitate)
Cults and cult themes
Agricultural fertility Ceres was credited with the discovery of spelt wheat (Latin far), the yoking of oxen and ploughing, the sowing, protection and nourishing of the young seed, and the gift of agriculture to humankind; before this, it was said, man had subsisted on acorns, and wandered without settlement or laws. She had the power to fertilize, multiply and fructify plant and animal seed, and her laws and rites protected all activities of the agricultural cycle. In January, Ceres (alongside the earth-goddess Tellus) was offered spelt wheat and a pregnant sow, at the movable Feriae Sementivae. This was almost certainly held before the annual sowing of grain. The divine portion of sacrifice was the entrails (exta) presented in an earthenware pot (olla).John Scheid, in Rüpke, Jörg (Editor), A Companion to Roman Religion, Wiley-Blackwell, 2007, p 264; and Varro, Lingua Latina, 5.98. In a rural, agricultural context, Cato the Elder describes the offer to Ceres of a porca praecidanea (a pig, offered before harvesting).Spaeth, 1996, p. 35: "The pregnant victim is a common offering to female fertility divinities and was apparently intended, on the principle of sympathetic magic, to fertilise and multiply the seeds committed to the earth." See also Cato the Elder, On Agriculture, 134, for the porca praecidanea. Before the harvest, she was offered a propitiary grain sample (praemetium).Spaeth, 1996, pp. 35–39: the offer of praemetium to Ceres is thought to have been an ancient Italic practice. In Festus, "Praemetium [is] that which was measured out beforehand for the sake of [the goddess] tasting it beforehand". Ovid tells that Ceres "is content with little, provided that her offerings are casta" (pure).Linderski, J., in Wolfgang Haase, Hildegard Temporini (eds), Aufstieg und Niedergang der römischen Welt, Volume 16, Part 3, de Gruyter, 1986, p. 1947, citing Ovid, Fasti, 4.411 - 416.
Ceres's main festival, the Cerealia, was held from mid to late April. It was organised by her plebeian aediles and included circus games (ludi circenses). It opened with a horse-race in the Circus Maximus, whose starting point lay below and opposite to her temple atop the Aventine Hill;Wiseman, 1995, p. 137. the turning post at the far end of the Circus was sacred to Consus, a god of grain-storage. After the race, foxes were released into the Circus, their tails ablaze with lighted torches, perhaps to cleanse the growing crops and protect them from disease and vermin, or to add warmth and vitality to their growth.Spaeth, 1996, pp. 36–37. Ovid offers a myth by way of explanation: long ago, at ancient Carleoli, a farm-boy caught a fox stealing chickens and tried to burn it alive. The fox escaped and fired the fields and their crops, which were sacred to Ceres. Ever since (says Ovid) foxes are punished at her festival. From c. 175 BC, the Cerealia included ludi scaenici (theatrical religious events) through April 12 to 18.A plebeian aedile, C. Memmius, claims credit for Ceres's first ludi scaeneci. He celebrated the event with the dole of a new commemorative denarius; his claim to have given "the first Cerealia" represents this innovation. See Spaeth, 1996, p. 88.
Helper gods In the ancient sacrum cereale a priest, probably the Flamen Cerialis, invoked Ceres (and probably Tellus) along with twelve specialised, minor assistant-gods to secure divine help and protection at each stage of the grain cycle, beginning shortly before the Feriae Sementivae.Ceres's 12 assistant deities are listed in Servius, On Vergil's Georgics, 1.21. Cited in Spaeth, 1996, p. 36. Servius cites the historian Fabius Pictor (late 3rd century BC) as his source. W.H. Roscher lists these deities among the indigitamenta, names used to invoke specific divine functions.Wilhelm Heinrich Roscher, Ausführliches Lexikon der griechischen und römischen Mythologie (Leipzig: Teubner, 1890–94), vol. 2, pt. 1, pp. 187–233.
Vervactor, "He who ploughs" Reparātor, "He who prepares the earth" Imporcĭtor, "He who ploughs with a wide furrow" Insitor, "He who plants seeds" Obarātor, "He who traces the first ploughing" Occātor, "He who harrows" Serritor, "He who digs" Subruncinator, "He who weeds" Mĕssor, "He who reaps" Convector, "He who carries the grain" Conditor, "He who stores the grain" Promitor, "He who distributes the grain"
Marriage, human fertility and nourishment In Roman bridal processions, a young boy carried Ceres's torch to light the way; "the most auspicious wood for wedding torches came from the spina alba, the May-tree, which bore many fruits and hence symbolised fertility".Spaeth, 1996, citing Pliny the Elder, Historia Naturalis, 30.75. The adult males of the wedding party waited at the groom's house. A wedding sacrifice was offered to Tellus on the bride's behalf; a sow is the most likely victim. Varro describes the sacrifice of a pig as "a worthy mark of weddings" because "our women, and especially nurses" call the female genitalia porcus (pig). Barbette Spaeth (1996) believes Ceres may have been included in the sacrificial dedication, because she is closely identified with Tellus and, as Ceres legifera (law-bearer), she "bears the laws" of marriage. In the most solemn form of marriage, confarreatio, the bride and groom shared a cake made of far, the ancient wheat-type particularly associated with Ceres.Spaeth, 1996, pp. 5, 6, 44–47; the relevant passage from Varro is Rerum Rusticarum, 2.4.10. Servius, On Vergil's Aeneid, 4.58, "implies that Ceres established the laws for weddings as well as for other aspects of civilized life." For more on Roman attitudes to marriage and sexuality, Ceres's role at marriages and the ideal of a "chaste married life" for Roman matrons, see Staples, 1998, pp. 84–93.Benko, p. 177.
From at least the mid-Republican era, an official, joint cult to Ceres and Proserpina reinforced Ceres's connection with Roman ideals of female virtue. The promotion of this cult coincides with the rise of a plebeian nobility, an increased birthrate among plebeian commoners, and a fall in the birthrate among patrician families. The late Republican Ceres Mater (Mother Ceres) is described as genetrix (progenitress) and alma (nourishing); in the early Imperial era she becomes an Imperial deity, and receives joint cult with Ops Augusta, Ceres's own mother in Imperial guise and a bountiful genetrix in her own right.Spaeth, 1996, 103 - 106. Several of Ceres's ancient Italic precursors are connected to human fertility and motherhood; the Pelignan goddess Angitia Cerealis has been identified with the Roman goddess Angerona (associated with childbirth).Spaeth, 1996, pp. 42–43, citing Vetter, E., 1953, Handbuch der italienischen Dialekte 1. Heidelberg, for connections between Ceres, Pelignan Angitia Cerealis, Angerona and childbirth.
Laws Ceres was the patron and protector of plebeian laws, rights and Tribunes. Her Aventine Temple served the plebeians as cult centre, legal archive, treasury and possibly law-court; its foundation was contemporaneous with the passage of the Lex Sacrata, which established the office and person of plebeian aediles and tribunes as inviolate representatives of the Roman people. Tribunes were legally immune to arrest or threat, and the lives and property of those who violated this law were forfeit to Ceres.For discussion of the duties, legal status and immunities of plebeian tribunes and aediles, see Andrew Lintott, Violence in Republican Rome, Oxford University Press, 1999,pp. 92–101
The Lex Hortensia of 287 BC extended plebeian laws to the city and all its citizens. The official decrees of the Senate (senatus consulta) were placed in Ceres's temple, under the guardianship of the goddess and her aediles. Livy puts the reason bluntly: the consuls could no longer seek advantage for themselves by arbitrarily tampering with the laws of Rome.Livy's proposal that the senatus consulta were placed at the Aventine Temple more or less at its foundation (Livy, Ab Urbe Condita, 3.55.13) is implausible. See Spaeth, 1996, pp. 86–87, 90. The temple might also have offered asylum for those threatened with arbitrary arrest by patrician magistrates.The evidence for the temple as asylum is inconclusive; discussion is in Spaeth, 1996, p. 84. Ceres's temple, games and cult were at least partly funded by fines imposed on those who offended the laws placed under her protection; the poet Vergil later calls her legifera Ceres ("law-bearing Ceres"), a translation of Demeter's Greek epithet, Thesmophoros.Cornell, T., The beginnings of Rome: Italy and Rome from the Bronze Age to the Punic Wars (c.1000–264 BC), Routledge, 1995, p. 264, citing Vergil, Aeneid, 4.58.