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TAUROBOLIUM

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Originally appearing in Volume V26, Page 456 of the 1911 Encyclopedia Britannica.
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TAUROBOLIUM , the See also:

sacrifice of a See also:bull, usually in connexion with the See also:worship of the See also:Great See also:Mother of the Gods, though not limited to it. Of See also:oriental origin, its first known performance in See also:Italy occurred in A.D. 134, at See also:Puteoli, in See also:honour of See also:Venus Caelestis. See also:Prudentius describes it in Peristephanon (x., 1o66 ff.) : the See also:priest of the Mother, clad in a toga worn cinctu Gabino, with See also:golden See also:crown and fillets on his See also:head, takes his See also:place in a See also:trench covered by a See also:platform of planks pierced with See also:fine holes, on which a bull, magnificent with See also:flowers and See also:gold, is slain. The See also:blood rains through the platform on to the priest below, who receives it on his See also:face, and even on his 'See also:tongue and See also:palate, and after the See also:baptism presents himself before his See also:fellow-worshippers purified and regenerated, and receives their See also:salutations and reverence. The taurobolium in the 2nd and 3rd centuries was usually performed as a measure for the welfare of the See also:Emperor, See also:Empire, or community, its date frequently being the 24th of See also:March, the See also:Dies Sanguinis of the See also:annual festival of the Great Mother and See also:Attis. In the See also:late 3rd and the 4th centuries its usual See also:motive was the See also:purification or regeneration of an individual, who was spoken of as renatus in aeternum, reborn for eternity, in consequence of the ceremony (Corp. Insc. See also:Lat. vi. 510-512). When its efficacy was not eternal, its effect was considered to endure for twenty years. It was also performed as the fulfilment of a See also:vow, or by command of the goddess herself, and the See also:privilege was limited to no See also:sex nor class.

The place of its performance at See also:

Rome was near the site of St See also:Peter's, in the excavations of which several altars and See also:inscriptions commemorative of taurobolia were discovered. The taurobolium was probably a sacred See also:drama symbolizing the relations of the Mother and Attis (q.v.). The descent of the priest into the sacrificial See also:foss symbolized the See also:death of Attis, the withering of the vegetation of Mother See also:Earth; his See also:bath of blood and emergence the restoration of Attis, the rebirth of vegetation. The ceremony may be the spiritualized descent of the See also:primitive oriental practice of drinking or being baptized in the blood of an See also:animal, based upon a belief that the strength of See also:brute creation could be acquired by See also:consumption of its sub-stance or contact with its blood. In spite of the phrase renatus in aeternum, there is no See also:reason to suppose that the ceremony was in any way borrowed from See also:Christianity. See Esperandieu, Inscriptions de See also:Lectoure (1892), pp. 94 ff.; Zippel, Festschrift zum Doctorjubilaeum, See also:Ludwig Friedlander, 1895, p. 489 f.; Showerman, The Great Mother of the Gods, Bulletin of the University of See also:Wisconsin, No. 43, pp. 280-84 (See also:Madison, 1901); Hepding, Attis, See also:Seine Mythen and Sean Kull (See also:Giessen, 1903), pp. 168 if., 201; Cumont, Le Taurobole et le Culte de Bellone, Revue d'histoire et de litterature religieuses, vi., No. 2, 1901.

(G.

End of Article: TAUROBOLIUM

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