Id. Feb. (Feb. 13). NP.
VIRGO VESTALIS PARENTAT. (PHIL.)
PARENTATIO TUMULORUM INCIPIT. (SILV.)
The dies parentales, or days of worshipping the dead (placandis Manibus), began at the sixth hour on this day, and continued either to the 21st (Feralia), or the 22nd (cara cognatio)[[1368]]. The parentatio of the Vestal was at the tomb of Tarpeia, herself a Vestal[[1369]]. Undoubtedly, the Feralia (21st) was the oldest and the best known of these days, and the only one which was a public festival: it appears in three calendars (Caer. Maff. Farn.) in large letters. Yet there is reason for believing that even the Feralia was not the oldest day for worshipping the manes: it was in part at least a dies fastus, and none of the dies parentales are marked N in the calendars; and this, according to Mommsen[[1370]], shows that the rites of those days were of later origin than those of the Lemuria (May 9-13), which are all marked N. This seems also to have been the opinion of Latin scholars[[1371]].
Whatever the Lemuria may have been, it is certain that the Parentalia were not days of terror or ill-omen; but rather days on which the performance of duty was the leading idea in men’s minds. Nor was the duty an unpleasant one. There was a general holiday: the dead to be propitiated had been duly buried in the family tomb in the great necropolis, had been well cared for since their departure, and were still members of the family. There was nothing to fear from them, so long as the living members performed their duties towards them under the supervision of the State and its Pontifices[[1372]]. They had their iura, and the relations between them and their living relations were all regulated by a ius sacrum: they lived on in their city outside the walls of the city of the living[[1373]], each family in their own dwelling: they did not interfere with the comfort of the living, or in any way show themselves hostile or spiteful. Such ideas as these are of course the result of a well developed city life; experience has taught the citizen how his conduct towards the Di Manes can best be regulated and organized for the benefit of both parties. The Parentalia belong to a later stage of development than the Lemuria, though both have the same original basis of thought. The Parentalia was practically a yearly renewal of the rite of burial. As sacra privata they took place on the anniversary of the death of a deceased member of the family, and it was a special charge on the heir that he should keep up their observance[[1374]]. On that day the family would go in procession to the grave, not only to see that all was well with him who abode there, but to present him with offerings of water, wine, milk, honey, oil, and the blood of black victims[[1375]]: to deck the tomb with flowers[[1376]], to utter once more the solemn greeting and farewell (Salve, sancte parens), to partake of a meal with the dead, and to petition them for good fortune and all things needful. This last point comes out clearly in Virgil’s picture:
Poscamus ventos, atque haec me sacra quotannis
Urbe velit posita templis sibi ferre dicatis.
The true meaning of these lines is, as Henry quaintly puts it[[1377]], ‘Let us try if we cannot kill two birds with one stone, and not only pay my sire the honours due to him, but at the same time help ourselves forward on our journey by getting him to give us fair winds for our voyage.’
As we have seen, the dies parentales began on the 13th; from that day till the 21st all temples were closed, marriages were forbidden, and magistrates appeared without their insignia[[1378]]. On the 22nd was the family festival of the Caristia, or cara cognatio: the date of its origin is unknown, but Ovid[[1379]] writes of it as well established in his time, and it may be very much older. He describes it as a reunion of the living members of the family after they have paid their duties to the dead:
Scilicet a tumulis et qui periere, propinquis
Protinus ad vivos ora referre iuvat;
Postque tot amissos quicquid de sanguine restat,
Aspicere, et generis dinumerare gradus.
It was a kind of love-feast of the family, and gives a momentary glimpse of the gentler side of Roman family life. All quarrels were to be forgotten[[1380]] in a general harmony: no guilty or cruel member may be present[[1381]]. The centre of the worship was the Lares of the family, who were ‘incincti,’ and shared in the sacred meal[[1382]].
We might naturally expect that, especially in Italy—so tenacious of old ideas and superstitions—we should find some survival of primitive folk-lore, even in the midst of this highly organized civic cult of the dead. Ovid supplies us with a curious contrast to the ethical beauty of the Caristia, in describing the spells which an old woman works, apparently on the day of the Feralia[[1383]]. ‘An old hag sitting among the girls performs rites to Tacita: with three fingers she places three bits of incense at the entrance of a mouse-hole. Muttering a spell, she weaves woollen threads on a web of dark colour, and mumbles seven black beans in her mouth. Then she takes a fish, the maena, smears its head with pitch, sews its mouth up, drops wine upon it, and roasts it before the fire: the rest of the wine she drinks with the girls. Now, quoth she, we have bound the mouth of the enemy:
Hostiles linguas inimicaque vinximus ora,
Dicit discedens, ebriaque exit anus.’
In spite of the names of deities we find here, Tacita and Dea Muta[[1384]], and of the pretty story of the mother of the Lares which the poet’s fancy has added to it, it is plain that this is no more than one of a thousand savage spells for counteracting hostile spirits[[1385]]. The picture is interesting, as showing the survival of witchcraft in the civilized Rome of Ovid’s time, and reminds us of the horrible hags in Horace’s fifth epode; but it may be doubted whether it has any real connexion with the Feralia. Doubtless its parallel could be found even in the Italy of today[[1386]].