Scattered evidence suggests that the priesthood of the Salii did cover distant parts of the city with their dancing processions and the changing public location for their dinners, which were possibly a daily occurrence.17 Yet these ritual movements, which underline the unity of the city, covered the whole of the month of March. Apart from a few topographical foci (such as the Quinquatrus, a special ritual on March 17 that included other religious agents), spectators would be involved only occasionally, perhaps by chance.
Another possible candidate for an old processional rite is offered by the dedication of the spolia opima, a procession attributed already to Romulus, which featured the armor and arms of a hostile general. It is impossible to isolate a clear image of an early ritual underneath the assimilation of the spolia opima to the later triumph in the Augustan sources. However, the probably fictitious sacral regulation assigned to the ritual in these late sources implies different temples as destinations, including the Temple of Mars on the Campus Martius. The latter destination would not have made for a grand procession; the same was true in its way of Iuppiter Feretrius on the Capitol.18
In order to find a ritual that not only conveys the idea of a unified and unitary city but actually tries to universalize that ideal through, in part, the attraction of the whole city’s interest, one has to wait for the pompa circensis, the opening procession to the circus, and the actual games, the ludi circenses. Here, obviously, the older type of competitive races and other types of competition—which would find their culminating form in the ludi circenses— were combined with a long procession that involved more than a large number of marching participants. Many deities were also displayed, in the form of statues, busts, or symbols, and their presence at least implied that many temples were involved (as the natural places to store such items), even if the procession proper started from the Capitol. It is significant that the starting days of games in the late Republic do not compete with other spectacular events, but rather create such an event by monopolizing the public stage.
When did these processions originate? The author of the most detailed description, the Augustan Greek antiquarian and literary critic Dionysios of Halikarnassos (7.72.1–14), claims to base his description on Fabius Pictor, a late third-century author. Although Dionysios’s avowed interest in providing a Greek origin for Roman culture might incline us to suspicion on this point, the many elements of the pompa that clearly parallel or even imitate Greek practices are plausible for the time of Fabius.19 I follow the skeptical position of Mommsen in postulating annual games only from 367/66 (the date being indicative rather than precise) onward; Frank Bernstein’s arguments for an earlier date (following Livy’s dating to the regal period)20 rely heavily on the Varronian theory that anthropomorphic cult statues were an invention of the late regal period only and hence related to the cult of Iuppiter Optimus Maximus and his Capitoline Temple. The lack of an annual ritual that included cult statues from many temples does not exclude the possibility that ritual agents or high-ranking spectators were transferred by chariots (as perhaps depicted on an architectural frieze of the Capitoline Temple), but makes a full-fledged procession for the earlier phase less probable. The conversion of the pompa circensis into a spectacular procession would have been a development of the fourth and third centuries. Such a date would explain the rise of processions as an attempt to compete with contemporary Hellenistic rituals. Similarly, as I will argue in Chapter 5, the triumphal procession and— following Harriet Flower—the pompa imaginum of noble funerals hardly antedate the second half of the fourth century.21
Dionysios’s description of the pompa circensis reveals how spectators were attracted:
Before beginning the games the principal magistrates conducted a procession in honour of the gods from the Capitol through the Forum to the Circus Maximus. Those who led the procession were, first, the Romans’ sons who were nearing manhood and were of an age to bear a part in this ceremony, who rode on horseback if their fathers were entitled by their fortunes to be knights, while the others, who were destined to serve in the infantry, went on foot, the former in squadrons and troops, and the latter in divisions and companies, as if they were going to school; this was done in order that strangers might see the number and beauty of the youths of the commonwealth who were approaching manhood. These were followed by charioteers, some of whom drove four horses abreast, some two, and others rode unyoked horses. After them came the contestants in both the light and heavy games, their whole bodies naked except their loins. . . . (5) The contestants were followed by numerous bands of dancers arranged in three divisions, the first consisting of men, the second of youths, and the third of boys. These were accompanied by flute-players, who used ancient flutes that were small and short, as is done even to this day, and by lyre-players, who plucked ivory lyres of seven strings and the instruments called barbita. . . . (6) . . . The dancers were dressed in scarlet tunics girded with bronze cinctures, wore swords suspended at their sides, and carried spears of shorter than average length; the men also had bronze helmets adorned with conspicuous crests and plumes. Each group was led by one man who gave the figures of the dance to the rest, taking the lead in representing their warlike and rapid movements, usually in the proceleusmatic rhythms. . . . (10) But it is not alone from the warlike and serious dance of these bands which the Romans employed in their sacrificial ceremonies and processions that one may observe their kinship to the Greeks, but also from that which is of a mocking and ribald nature. For after the armed dancers others marched in procession impersonating satyrs and portraying the Greek dance called sikinnis. Those who represented Sileni were dressed in shaggy tunics, called by some chortaioi, and in mantles of flowers of every sort; and those who represented satyrs wore girdles and goatskins, and on their heads manes that stood upright, with other things of like nature. These mocked and mimicked the serious movements of the others, turning them into laughter-provoking performances. . . . (13) After these bands of dancers came a throng of lyre-players and many flute-players, and after them the persons who carried the censers in which perfumes and frankincense were burned along the whole route of the procession, and also the men who bore the show-vessels made of silver and gold, both those that were sacred to the gods and those that belonged to the state. Last of all in the procession came the images of the gods, borne on men’s shoulders, showing the same likenesses as those made by the Greeks and having the same dress, the same symbols, and the same gifts which tradition says each of them invented and bestowed on mankind. These were the statues not only of Iuppiter, Iuno, Minerva, Neptune, and the rest whom the Greeks reckon among the twelve gods, but also of those still more ancient from whom legend says the twelve were sprung, namely, Saturn, Ops, Themis, Latona, the Parcae, Mnemosynē, and all the rest to whom temples and holy places are dedicated among the Greeks; and also of those whom legend represents as living later, after Iuppiter took over the sovereignty, such as Proserpina, Lucina, the Nymphs, the Muses, the Seasons, the Graces, Liber, and the demigods whose souls after they had left their mortal bodies are said to have ascended to Heaven and to have obtained the same honours as the gods, such as Hercules, Aesculapius, Castor and Pollux, Helen, Pan, and countless others. . . . (15) After the procession was ended the consuls and the priests whose function it was presently sacrificed oxen; and the manner of performing the sacrifices was the same as with us.22
I have already pointed out the advantages of any procession ritual. The lengthy description shows in detail how mass appeal is created for such an event, clearly ritualized by its mixture of excessive order and rather anarchic elements. Many people are involved as actors or attracted as spectators. Young participants guarantee the participation of their families; the potential for an up-close look at the drivers and athletes attracts the athletic-minded crowd (1), the dances the aesthetic-minded. The level of noise marking this event must have been quite boisterous. Every sense is engaged: unusual dresses in bright colors (6), odors (13), music, even played on archaic instruments (5), thus giving additional ceremonial qualities to the procession. There is a close interaction between actors and spectators, whose laughter is provoked by improvised performance (10). And last, but not least, the ritual assembles a large number of deities, including the most important ones according to Greek and Roman standards. The use of standardized representations of these deities, clearly stressed (13), ensures intellectual